It’s time for this week’s Song Title Challenge.

Write a short piece of fiction, around 300 words, using the song title as your story title but don’t listen to the song.  You can pick your own genre or use the one suggested to me.  Remember to link back to this post so I can find yours.

If you would like to suggest a song title for a future post, you can do so from the challenge page.  You can also leave a suggestion on the Facebook page.

This week’s song is Scentless Apprentice by Nirvana and the genre is Horror/Thriller.  It was suggested by bumblepuppies who claimed this suggestion is a dirty trick of sorts.  It must be because the song was apparently inspired by the novel Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind, itself a horror about a man with an excellent sense of smell but no body scent of his own who becomes an apprentice to a perfumer but then starts killing virgins in search of the perfect scent.  Creepy.

Scentless Apprentice

Ah, you’re awake.  Welcome to my…well, I guess you’d call it a dungeon, wouldn’t you?  It’s no use struggling, you know.  You’re not nearly strong enough to break these restraints.  Ooh, you do have pretty eyes.  I can simply stare into them for ages.

Sorry about the smell, by the way.  I have a bit of a, erm, condition.  Can’t be fixed, I’m afraid.  It’s a good thing Steven here suffers from anosmia.  He can’t smell.  Not a thing.  Oh, I should probably introduce you.  Steven is my apprentice.  He’s learning the craft from me.  Hey, I just thought of something.  Steven, you’re my scentless apprentice!  Ha-ha.  Oh, lighten up, why don’t you?  Good thing Steven’s as crazy as I am, otherwise I’d have killed him ages ago.  Never laughs at my little jokes.

What’s that?  You have to speak up, my dear. I can’t hear you through all that tape over your mouth.  I’ll tell you what.  I’ll guess what you’re saying.  You’re asking what we’re going to do.  That’s a dumb question.  We’re going to kill you, of course.  Don’t worry.  We like to take our time, and it’s a while still before you’ll have to die.

Now you’re asking, but why?  Because it’s fun, silly.  Life’s too short to do stuff that isn’t fun.

No, don’t cry.  Steven, look.  She’s crying.  Why do they always do that?  It quite ruins the fun for me when they cry.  Make her stop.

Sorry that I had to have Steven slap you, my dear, but if you’re going to spoil things by turning on the waterworks you force my hand.  Or his, rather.  Ha-ha.

Let’s start, shall we?  Scalpel please, Steven.  You might want to close your eyes, my dear.  I’m afraid this is going to hurt.  A lot.

Copyright © 2014 Herman Kok

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• Song Title Challenge