short story
Shiver
Tingles and sparks run across my skin. Tickles and coarseness between my clothes and skin. I vibrate and shake, I can feel every cell alight with movement, but no one else can see it. My hair stands on end, my skin bumped and raised, as though the millimeters of air will provide substantial insulation.
By Steph Ruff4 years ago in Earth
Drinking Air
My local Priceline pharmacy has started selling bottles of Chinese air. I’m late to this trend. I pull up at Castle Towers one July morning, and a hundred or more people have congregated outside the doors to Priceline and onto Terminus Street. They are huddled together like a colony of penguins, albeit with coats and masks. A large pullup banner at the entrance marks the event.
By Joshua Han4 years ago in Earth
Somebody Threw It
Somebody Threw It by: Dennis R. Humphreys There was biological warfare during the middle ages. It just wasn't called that back then. Get the diseased body, the one with the plague, put it on the catapult and heave it over the castle walls. If the fear of getting the plague out paced the fear of being slaughtered by the attacking forces than the drawbridge was dropped and the attacking army entered the castle. This more than anything probably contributed to the spread of the disease, for there were so many factions and various feudal entities at war with each other, and each lord wanting what the other had in an effort to become bigger, stronger and more powerful than the next, they constantly were waging war of some kind and size. It was easier to do this and starve them out than to lose your men in a direct attack or spend a lot of time waiting. Greedy people are impatient people.
By Dennis Humphreys4 years ago in Earth
Primitive man in a technological age
Primitive man in a technological age In the past, I loved my “dumb” phone and as I watched my friends and people in general drown out their phones, get addicted to their small screens, and increasingly neglect the world around them, I began to develop a kind of resentment toward smartphones . Yes, I know that smartphones are not responsible for our collective mental escape from reality ( escaping from reality is a natural reaction sometimes to an unbearable reality ), but when you as a human begin to compete with smartphones to get the attention and interaction of people around you it is hard not to curse that machine small.
By Salah eddine Sedraoui4 years ago in Earth
September's Palette
Black was the sky when the day began its slow crawl towards night. Black was the blanket that twisted and knotted itself around my shivering husk as I slept. Black was the car that I sought refuge in, sleeping inside of to shelter myself from the biting winds of the highlands of Wyoming’s unforgiving wilderness. There was a beautiful calmness in the air; I remember that. Though I slept very little, and my back was as twisted and bent as the blanket was that covered me, I felt little other than calmness and the quietness of the morning. Stepping out of my car only briefly to unfurl my twisted legs, I was met with a harsh gust of wind that woke me up better than any cup of coffee could. The soft blue glow of my watch read 4:26. Good morning. I returned to my car and began driving, leaving behind my little patch of dirt that served as a good and stable home for the night. Black was the abyss of the night that pushed back against my headlights as I drove on. Black was the hauntingly vast sky above, and black was the road that stretched on and on below me. I drove for hours through this empty, starless galaxy. No moon guided me, and no stars flickered above me. Through blackness, I cut and fought forward, and through emptiness, I voyaged on. What was once open flatland soon became a mountainous terrain. The road rose and fell through the mountain ranges, as though I was a lonely black ship on a dark and haunted ocean. I felt as though I was being swallowed up; my car a lump of coal, the world before me a large and lightless fire. I drove on through the night as the glow of my watch showed time marching on and on and on. Good morning, my dear sweet Wyoming. I praise what I have been granted to see: September’s beautiful palette.
By Joshua Grady4 years ago in Earth
Beginning of Week 3
Well a lot has been going on. From time to time, I like to take a run to the outside of town and enjoy the peace and quiet. Lately, that has not been very helpful. My mind is racing and my heart is far from the place of peace I use to find out there. The breeze and the horses and the grass; none of it feels the same. I know that in reality, things will never be the same, but that is all I long for. I want her back and I want these last two weeks to not have happened at all.
By Piper Curran4 years ago in Earth
