Things in life have a way of going wrong or taking an unexpected turn at the last minute. You're on your way up to your office, barely on time, and the elevator jams. You're on the evacuation route from a hurricane-struck city when the bridge to the mainland collapses in front of you. Or maybe you're about to post your Thunderdome entry at midnight like the smooth mofo you are, and your power goes out. Such crises big and small can lead to drama, to comedy, to romance or to failure, and your prompt this week is to write a prose story in which something important happens at the eleventh hour. This event can happen at the start of your entry, requiring your main characters to deal with the fallout, or it can occur at the climax, or it can take place somewhere in between. I don't care which! Just make sure you turn in a full story; a description of the event is not enough.

To prevent a dozen entries in which the protagonist kicks the bucket in the last line, there's an additional restriction: your main character(s) may neither die nor kill another person at any point in the story.

Some common rules also apply. No fanfic. No erotica. No poetry. Write fiction. Other than that, the world is your oyster. But there will be no flash rules unless they're punitive.