STILL DREAM

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Here’s another short story. RED FIST is still set for late September. Currently, I’m just playing the waiting game, and writing the rough draft to the sequel.

Pricks…that’s what I feel. Coldness…deep in my bones. My eyes snap open, flickering around. All around me is a city, a city frozen in eternal silence. Cars slumber near curbs, traffic lights change colors like their supposed to, aiding no one, because it seems I am the only person around. No traffic jams and honking horns, no pedestrians crossing the streets. It’s just me. The skyscrapers are dark, no lights blare out their windows, and the sky itself is gray, threatening a notorious rain. I am in the middle of a clear street, stuck. I try to move, but my body won’t listen to me. My limbs are numb and frigid, but yet it feels as if something sharp and needlelike is sliding into my skin, paralyzing me. A dry wind blows, and an ambiguous, bone-shattering pressure presses down upon me. I hear the bones within me break and snap, but I don’t feel any pain, and I don’t fall. The world around me starts to deteriorate as my mouth grows dry. I can’t speak. Poles and traffic signals begin to bend and twist, ending up at odd angles, the lights start to jerk around on the wire, blinking random numbers instead of colors, chunks of concrete from the skyscrapers plummet down all around onto the streets, flattening mailboxes and cars and lower buildings. The sky flashes a sinister purple and lighting reaches down, grasping…

… a giant, sweltering fireball leaps into the air, forming a mushroom cloud in the distance, shaking the earth. The vibration runs throughout my broken body that is too many tons to move. I search for something that can help me out of this disaster as the street caves in around me, and I’m left on an island of pavement floating in a sea of blackness. A robust and mighty wind pushes against my body that refuses to budge. Cars flip into the air and get thrown every which way, making ear-splitting impacts with buildings. The wail of chaos is so loud I think my ears begin to bleed.

Suddenly, my eyes focus on a figure dressed in dark rags that resemble a cloak.  The person wears a hood, hiding their face as they walk around the destruction as if on a lovely stroll through a peaceful park. The figure raises its hands and the half-standing buildings around it, crumple, plundering towards the ground. The person stands and watches as the skyscrapers tumble towards it. The person doesn’t move. I want to scream at whoever it is to jump out of the way, but it’s too late, the person is buried beneath a pile of rubble…

Tingling… warmth spreads throughout my body, a hand is on my shoulder, and I look up. Did I fall asleep? This has to be a dream! The person is before me, face hidden in the recesses of its hood. The person smiles, and from that smile, I can tell this is no person.

Sweat pours out of me.

Jagged, gleaming white teeth shine at me, and I scream; whatever is before me matches my agony, terror filled pitched, mocking me.