My dad believed the island to be the end of a search for a cure for mom.
The promise of a healer that would finally reverse the soul destroying illness that was taking mom away from us.
Dad didn't care anymore what it would take, money, hope, nervous exhaustion from the endless searching, trying, failing, crying. He had to give it one more go.
Mom wanted to go home as soon as we got into the hotel room. She always wanted to go home even when she was in our house. She could only remember her childhood house and her...
The wizened beast crawled across the savannah, dragging the old cart with dilapidated wheels. The grassland swayed, tickling his nostrils. He made his way to the coffee table after pulling his head out of the carpet.
"Daddy, you can't stand yet! You are supposed to be pulling my wagon!"
"Daddy needs his coffee, son." The man scratched his stubble and his backside, retaining the mannerisms of his cattle form. The child scampered around the couch, catching the beast at its watering hole.
"Alright, back on the trail. Where was I heading?"
"Oregon trail. You have dysentery."
"So to the toilet...
No shoes or socks in the snow, JaKK was only focused on finding the settlement. Escaping was the easy part, finding his family might be hard. Physical discomfort was not part of his programming, his body able to withstand any extremes of temperature.
The scientists had made them. Fed them. Studied them. Experimented on them. Killed them. Few were left.
After two days he was still beside the forest, the neverending trees.
He might be alone. Lost.
But for the first time in his existence.
He was free.
The gate closed behind them. Back to the land of the living, no walking into the light without a backward glance.
Angels watched the reluctant men, women and children hesitate, clutching hands with their loved ones, those that had passed on beforehand and had greeted them. Now comforting and advising it is the wrong time to stay. They were special, given a glimpse into heaven, a chance to alter their lives for good, inspire others that there is more to this life than most believe nowadays. They would return without the paralysing fear of death, they would welcome the last...
They crouched to peer beneath the stairs.
"Did that blade seriously just nick my ankle?"
Brody grabbed a stalk of grass and shook it in front of the step. A pair of scissors lashed out and bisected the leaf and receded into obscurity.
"It looks like Jiro's back." Myka pulled a long, desperate drag out of her cigarette. "Looks like the girlfriend thing didn't work out."
"Maybe the booby trap is to keep people out as they get it on." Brody coughed as Myka exhaled a noxious cloud in his face.
They skipped the step and carefully ascended the stairs...
PUNCH
Graham Pererson was a murderer. He killed people. Often.
Under the guise of a little old man he scoured the late evening streets for his victims. He carried a small bag and a walking stick.
He had a nicely worked out system which had, to date, never failed him.
And so tonight, April 1, he locked his door behind him and headed towards the suberbs.
They were starting to head home in groups of two and three from their nights of debauchery. He hated them. All of them.
A young woman seperated from her group and turned a corner....
£18000. The figure flashed through his mind as he drove to work. Quite a sum but not above what many were willing to pay. He wondered if he should up his price, expand the business. He smirked as he parked and pulled on his gloves, He checked his watch and took his time getting his tools from the back of the car. Calm, assured, he had every detail planned so on the job he didn't have to think. He wondered who it was today. He checked his notes; female. He briefly considered what she'd done to piss her husband off...
The lamp wouldn't turn on. "Shit," Mel muttered. "Jerry!"
Of course, he wouldn't come. He was in the tiny bathroom, savoring the one amenity included in the rent, his head bowed under the shower's heavy, erratic spray.
Mel moved over to the dusty window. Rocking back and forth with Ollie on her hip, she pulled the curtain aside and grabbed at a cloth sitting on the sill. Not caring what it was, she wiped at the windows and tried to see out. Somehow they never seemed to stay clean. Mel was amazed at the amount of dust that always seemed...
Absent. That's what I was called by my fifteen year old daughter. The absent father. She did not know the truth, I worked undercover. Danger. Security. Empathy. Love. I had it all but I had nothing for my own family. That isn't true, I thought about them in the spare moments, pulled up images in my mind. Reflected on those special times tucking Beth into bed while she slept, unaware I'd be staring at her, a light in the hall illuminating her face.
I knew Beth thought I didn't care. I know because that's how I felt about my own...
"Death to the tyrant!" Lorenzo shouted.
Within the crowd, there were many responses. Each one said the same words, "Death to the tyrant", but each man enunciated the words differently. In each utterance you could hear the word being ejected with their personal reasons.
Tremain, in his worldview, saw the king as symbol of the working class oppression that had haunted him his whole life. Why should his money support some overfeed pompous ass who hadn't worked a day in his life? The king does not decide the laws anymore, that is the parliament's job.
Lorenzo, in his wisdom, saw...