Fantasy
Vas Forterai
Vas Forterai sat in a restaurant in the center of town, in the corner seat farthest from the entrance. Marjory’s. She’d been here a number of times before, but this time she wasn’t here to eat. Instead, her eyes were laser-focused on a greasy-looking mountain of a man that was about to begin enjoying his first meal outside of prison. He picked up his chopsticks and held them gingerly in his large hands, as if he was afraid that someone would take them away.
By Rietz Kanning5 years ago in Fiction
Darker Drabbles
Undoing Life’s Choices “Ready?” Walter nodded. “Am I ever.” They approached the children playing in the yard. “Daddy’s home!” The excited squeals were well worth the gut-churning journey in the time-machine, the struggle to convince his younger self not to make those terrible choices.
By Heather Ewings5 years ago in Fiction
Ever Since the Seas Had Risen
Whenever I want to remind myself of what life was like before the world ended, I burn some toast. As the smoke rises, I close my eyes, breathe in deep, and the smell of the over-crisp bread transports me back to those precious moments right before everything changed those many years ago:
By Amanda Hovseth5 years ago in Fiction
(Dys)Utopian Eulogy
If you are reading this, then I guess, I am at long last dead. If you are a part of the dominion’s acolytes, guck yourself. But if you are among the living with a selfish thought in your noggin, consider me lucky, because you are still breathing air in what I can only assume is a state of direction versus independent thought. It was not always so.
By j.d. davis5 years ago in Fiction
Which way is North?
Which way is North? To start again. The tiny group of people stood in a huddle waiting for the sun to rise, they wait silently and with a stillness that only experienced hunters can achieve. They are on the top of Glastonbury Tor, the rising sun will show them directions, since the ancient words they followed said the sun was from the east. From this they could select their path for the day. All around the ancient Tor is black water, thick with reeds and mud. Emerging from the waters are the ruins of a world that had once been so sure of its future, so certain of its ability to master nature and so careless about its past.
By Peter Rose5 years ago in Fiction
Paradiso
The plan had been to die there, in paradise. It had been two years and six months to the day according to the etchings Polly had made on the walls inside her concrete box. One small line with every new sun. Inside of her tomb she had a small mattress that was nailed to the floor, a toilet, a tiny slit at the bottom of the wall where once a day one orb of something edible slid through and an aluminium vase that contained one stem of what she supposed was once a bouquet of orchids. The stem hadn't been watered in the time that she'd been there yet was as alive and living as it was the first day she woke up in the box. There was no door but one wall had a large convex window made of some reinforced material that had been heavily tinted so as nothing apart from the light of the sun and the moon could be seen from inside. In times of desperation she had tried to smash it with her hands and her head to no avail other than leaving a few tiny scrapes that could be wiped away with saliva. Above the window there was an ornate inscription in the concrete that read, 'Paradiso'. This, she assumed, was some sort of feeble attempt at humour by her captors. She'd imagined so many times whoever it was laughing as they hammered a chisel into the wall with extreme and delicate precision. Two years and six months, a long enough period of time that Polly had lost all hope of ever escaping her grey prison. On that 913th day as she sat against the back wall nibbling on the tasteless round thing that had slid through into her box she was surrounded by a great light so magnificent that it blinded her. Her brain fizzed and her ears rang with a screech of a thousand pigs at the slaughterhouse. She curled up in a ball and fumbled her way to the corner, scratching at the mattress praying for it to absorb her like some dried up bed bug. There she lay waiting for the sickness to pass. The screeching in her ears dissipated to a low hum and the fire balls that were her eyes began to cool as her brain began to recognise true sunshine again. She pulled herself upright with the help of the wall and rubbed at her eyes seeing the concrete room for what felt like the first time. The convex window was glowing a bright white as if the dark tint that had been there for two and a half years was suddenly ripped of like a band aid. She took slow steps toward the glow and saw tiny shapes starting to form as she got closer, tiny shapes turning into big shapes turning into buildings and trees. Her stomach flipped with vertigo as she realised that her concrete box was so high off the ground that the street below looked like a penciled line on a piece of paper. She fell back onto the cold ground and hugged her legs, shaking with fear and confusion. She didn't recognise the city in front of her. Was it her city? Was it where she once worked? Where she loved and played? She tried so hard to locate the memories of the alien place but found nothing. She cried and in a fury threw herself at the window, yelling and screaming and scratching hoping for someone out there to see her, to look up and see a woman trapped in a concrete box and call the police or rouse the cavalry. Anything would do, she just wanted saved. With energy depleted she slipped back down to the floor. Her filthy clothes soaked with a salty lament she saw movement from each side of the plastic bubble. She pressed her wet face against the curvature of the reinforced material and saw that there were hundreds of windows on a concrete wall. Bubbles in rows like hives and behind each an insect like her, all simultaneously coming to the same realisation.
By Kris Platt5 years ago in Fiction
THE BARBARIAN & THE KING
T he ring in the curved steel as it cleared the scabbard spoke to the quality of the blade, the glare from the morning sunlight striking its edge spoke to its sharpness. The steam of his breath spoke of the coldness of the air. The speed of his movement spoke of the hone of his reflexes. The stare in his cold grey eyes spoke of his determination. The stance in his lean but powerful form spoke of his skill as a warrior.
By Grant Kininmont5 years ago in Fiction
The New Eden
“You can keep staring at it, Evangeline. It’s never going back to the way it was before.” “Nathaniel, my dear friend, that kind of eternal optimism is why I’ve kept you around all these years….” I turned to face my friend with a smirk, one eyebrow cocked so he could sense I was only half-teasing with my sarcasm.
By Jessie Waddell5 years ago in Fiction
The Apprentice
“AVARANTHA!” the old wizard yelled, tracing a circle in front of him with both hands. The monster stopped in its path suddenly, claws held out in mid-air, frozen in time, the air around it shimmering with powerful magic. Its great bloodshot eyes darted around the room, searching for whatever was holding it back.
By Keenan Cronyn5 years ago in Fiction
