Squid Ink Incorporated

This is my entry into @chuckwendig’s Flash Fiction challenge: ‘Thats right, I said Unicorn‘

‘Yeah, I was big in the 1980s, Legend man that was the big one *cough cough* that will be the movie I’m remembered for. Then there was Blade Runner, that’s right, man fucking Blad… huh? Yeah, that footage was on the cutting room floor for years before the director’s cut, and what’s worse, my shitty agent only negotiated a one-off fee, so no royalty cheque for me *cough cough* I got stiffed, but hell, I ain’t bitter’.

The Unicorn spits on the stable floor and takes a large gulp of whiskey from it’s trough before sparking up another cigarette.

‘Then there was all those fantasy art portraits of me, plenty of royalties for that gig, plus fees for life modelling, yeah, shit man *cough… spit* the 80s were good to me. I was on top of my game then. But the 90s, the 90s rode a cock horse, the early 00s weren’t much better, shit, if it hadn’t been for the money I made selling my likeness to Hasbro I’d have been royally fucked!’

The Unicorn tosses down more whiskey and then lifts his tail, allowing a hefty avalanche of faeces to fall to the stable floor.

‘Of course that wasn’t easy to live with; I mean my likeness on those prissy, plastic dolls, man, what do you think that does to a dude’s ego huh? Shit!’

‘I mean, I hate all that, when I was young, man, we were feared, like dragons or shit, I mean, have you seen those pictures of me fighting a lion? A lion man! Now people think of me like I’m a fucking Care Bear or some shit’.

‘Wassat? Sure, sure I fought a lion, but, hey even, even if I didn’t a-c-t-u-ally fight a lion, does anyone draw pictures of YOU like that, you fuck! Man, course I fought a Lion’.

Getting more irate, the unicorn succumbs to a fit of coughing; after more whiskey and another cigarette, he slowly recovers his composure.

‘Sorry man, immortality is a bitch! You get to do what you want, for as long as you want and you never die, but it don’t mean you wear well though, know what I mean?’

‘The others, nah, I’m the last… hunted down, you know, in the middle ages, all knights and fair maidens and shit. Nah, I don’t miss the others, fuck them, lording it over me with their granting wishes and looking enigmatic in the woods. I used my magical powers to get me some fine fillies, give them the horn, *cough* know what I mean?’

‘Nah, nah, *spit* I don’t want to talk about that, let’s just say The Last Uni-porn was a mistake, that movie was a low, low, point in my career, ’nuff said’.

‘Now? *cough cough… spit* Yeah, well I’ve hit upon hard times, people’s tastes change and shit. I got a bit part in that last Lord of the Rings movie you see that one? Yeah, Lord of the Rings man. But mostly it’s all CGI and shit now, they don’t use real performers like me anymore, times are hard Bro, times are hard’.

After that the unicorn goes sullen and silent, he bristles and wanders off to the back of the stable. I broke the recording crew for coffee; it was then, after the crew had left, that he started talking to me again.

‘Hey, hey, can a Unicorn get a cup of Joe round here? Yeah, that’s right, leave me out, I’m the star here, shit *spit* I want a double espresso bitch, nah, make that a quadruple’.

I held a cup of espresso up to the Unicorn’s mouth and lit him another cigarette; in this moment of intimacy, I seized my chance to ask the question that I had been dying to ask throughout the whole interview.

He went quiet again for a moment, I could see a faraway look in his eyes, and for that moment the crusty, alcoholic, emphysemic, prima donna fell away and I could see him for what he really was. He was an immortal, a noble and mystical creature, one that had lived through countless centuries, who was the very last of his kind.

‘Yeah, I don’t like to talk about that *spit* as I said man, times are hard… I cut it off and hawked it’.