Ben Paddon
Joined May 2009 and calls BenPaddon.com home.
59 stories, 85 challenges, 66 comments, and 24 friends
I’m a career writer (or, rather, a writer who’d like to one day be able to make a career out of it). I was born in Milton Keynes, England back in 1986, moved to Luton when I was 3, and then moved to Los Angeles shortly after my 21st birthday purely because I could.
I’m the creator and Head Writer for Jump Leads, a Scifi-comedy webcomic which can be found at www.jump-leads.com. I’m also the Editor-in-Chief of SoulGeek Webcomics (www.soulgeek.com/comics/). A while back, I helped Kill9 Studios as a Script Consultant for ./shutdown, and we later worked together on a “Left 4 Dead” inspired miniseries called Boomer’s Day Off, which can be found at kill9studios.com.
I’m also a former columnist and Editor-in-Chief at GamePartisan.com, and columnist and co-founder of RealVG.org.
You can find my old ficlets here – http://ficlets.ficly.com/authors/benpaddon
Stories
-
The Clone Ranger
Yes, alright, this situation was my fault. I’d cloned myself. My clone turned out to be evil. He’d killed everybody I’d ever loved, and then he’d hijacked a local television broadcast to inform everyone that he – ostensibl...
-
Two Days
Gareth awoke feeling fantastic. The sunlight shone through his window. His radio alarm clock rang with the voices of the morning DJs having an inane conversation. He heard birds outside singing their morning mating calls (which, in recent years, had be...
-
Micra-Explosives
It didn’t take him long to work out that there was a bomb strapped to the underside of his seat. He’d noticed a mess of wires jutting from underneath – a clear sign of a hidden explosive. That is to say nothing of the note that was st...
-
The Light
He lay on his air-bed in the bedroom of his otherwise unfurnished apartment, watching his fan oscillate from left to right. The light on the top of the fan was dim, shining just brightly enough to provide some distraction in the form of an orange splod...
-
Of Course, He Always Had Pale Skin
“Bloody Twilight. Y’know, I really don’t like the way Stephanie Meyer dicked about with the vampire mythos. Vampires don’t sparkle.” “Yeah. And they’re not vegetarian.” “And they don’t play ba...
-
The Fall
Dennis had spent rather a lot of time and, counter-intuitively, effort trying to avoid doing his job. He didn’t like his job, a fact made all the more frustrating to him by the smiles of his colleagues who seemed to enjoy that same profession. Th...
-
Scientific Frontiers
Tim may be the finest mind humanity had ever known, and yet when he tells other researchers what his field is, they scoff. This was because he is the world’s foremost expert on Headphone Physics. Headphone Physics is a catch-all term for a common...
-
The Boyfriend Scenario
Mark had often described women as “stunners” but this was the first time he had actually been stunned into silence by an attractive woman. She sat across the pub, drinking very little and looking beautiful. In fact he’d been so transf...
-
Toodeloo, Hulu [Jacquelyn Hyde Challenge]
Hey Hulu, could you come in here a minute? These days you’re always buffering. Is your heart really in it? I tried to stay commited when you lost Jon and Colbert, But when I want to watch 30 Rock you’re never there for me. I’m telling...
-
A Load of Crap
-
Who's There
-
The Magician
They say that sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. So when Lland was confronted by a man who claimed to be a magician… well, he made the only conclusion he could. “I’m definitely a magician,” insiste...
-
Accidents in the Workplace
-
A Conversation About Writer's Block
Darren looked at his typewriter. The blank sheet of paper set in the machine stared back at him tauntingly. No, accusingly. This was angry paper, but its anger couldn’t match Darren’s frustration. His eyes flitted across the desk to his wri...
-
Car Trouble
It was a long dirt road. It was the middle of the night. The moon hung ominously against the blue tapestry of the night sky. The air tasted stale, and not without a hint of dust and sand. I was standing at the front of the car, hood popped, staring int...
-
Upon Reflection
-
This Blouse Had Better Not Be Dry Clean Only
So when I tell you what it was that made me jump… well, promise you won’t laugh, okay? My ego is fragile. I’ve already made it clear that I’m mistrusting and a little paranoid. It shouldn’t shock you to learn that I’...
-
Body of Evidence
Some people like to start the day with a jog, but Leonard Dickens had decided to mix things up that morning by exploding instead. A Response Unit was there when I arrived, collecting what they could find of his body and putting them into little plastic...
-
Summer Wedding
“When will you pop the question?” he asks me. We’re sitting around a table in the bar nearest the office, celebrating what must be the fifth engagement of the year. Nearly every other man at the table is married, engaged, or divorced ...
-
Unfortunately He'd Left His Benadryl At Home
Lawrence would often tell people he was allergic to being harpooned through the chest with a spear, but noone believed him until that night.
-
DOOM!
I knocked on the door. Nothing. I knocked again, and the nothing continued, uninterrupted. “Hello?” called. Only silence answered. I turned the handle and walked in. The room was dark – the lights were off, the curtains were pulled, i...
-
Wise Man Seeks Similar
Bill was distracted from the rolling of his joint by a strange sight off in the sky. “Hey fellas,” he said, a look of shock and fret upon his face. “D’you see that?” “See what?” asked Eddies. “That! There...
-
On Self-Doubt
Sitting in the dark. Occasionally they ask, “Have we shown our worth?” But no answer ever comes. And no answer ever will.
-
The Doom That Came To Dinner
“I’ve been reading the Necronomicon,” said Mark, examining with great curiosity the sushi dish that had been placed on the table in front of him. He’d never seen sushi before, and he wasn’t sure whether to eat it or dissec...
-
Might As Well Face It
It happened when I was 15. It happened because she happened. Her name was Heather, and she was everything. She was smart, pretty, playful, fun… she was incredible. In a school filled with kids all trying to fit in and Be Popular she somehow manag...
-
We All Fall Down
Most of the staff, content with the Godly coffee available in the kitchen, had long since abandoned Starbucks and had forgotten what their coffee tasted like (for the record, it tastes like the charred remains of the concept of what coffee might have b...
-
The Masks We Wear
I have never hidden myself from her. Not once. That is, above all things, pretty damned impressive. I usually do all I can to hide the Real Me from view around anyone. I always worry that if people see the Real Me for just one moment, they will be repu...
-
In A Hurry To Stay Young
In his dreams he pushes back. He is eleven years old. His world has changed so much, his understanding of his place within it crumbling away. A few weeks ago he would have been playing games on the playground. Now, because of some understanding between...
-
Spheres
He climbed atop his Quantum Glider, pushed the key into the ignition, and turned it. The sound could be heard for miles, echoing, distorting the landscape around it. And then, with a twist of the throttle, he was away, bound for new worlds full of new ...
-
Where Would You Like To Go Today?
I’ve used any number of internal computer systems before, all with silly acronym names. Names like SABS, or SMS, or SAP, and so on. This system had a similar name: LCARS, although Kat says that the person who designed it had long ago left the com...
