Downtime

My short story 'Downtime' has just placed third in the Multi-Story short fiction competition. Below you will find a link for the story itself.

http://www.multi-story.co.uk/winners-1500word3.html


And here are the judges comments:


3rd Prize - Downtime by M. Trevelean
Comments - The style is very spare and uses the present tense to convey a sense of tension and immediacy. The use of a countdown towards an event that is not obvious to the reader until the very end creates a sense of danger. The style is in harmony with the only character, about whom we are told very little except that he is a rich, risk-taking shit - which is all we need to know. This is very effectively done.
This is a dark story and its conclusion is open to interpretation. It isn’t clear if the underground room is a tomb or an engine by which the “hero” asserts the triumph of his will over Nature and his enemies. One suspects that both interpretations are true.
I chose this story for third prize for its general competence and I thought it original and provocatively ambiguous.