Swing with me friend. Come on to the cosmic dance floor of life and death, and dance. There are things there that can only be seen on the dance floor. The things you'll see there are both magical and yet still very plain once you get used to it you may say how can anyone get use to it well my friend I am Death and I've been here a long time now. Let's dance now and you can Live for a while longer. Swing friend Swing.
Shape, function, ability, beauty, perfection. I wanted it all.
It started when I had a freak SCUBA diving accident that left me partially deaf in both ears. I'd gone and gotten the implants that made me hear again. But the surgery was such a success, the technology so advanced, that now I could hear better than ever. I heard couples squabbling politely over their meals from across crowded restaurants. I heard babies crying from four blocks away.
Next, I lost my vision in a freak astronomy accident and had full eye replacement surgery. Now I could see the seat number...
In hindsight, the solution was obvious. I'm not sure why I didn't see it at the time, but then again who does? I suppose that's why they say 'hindsight's always 20/20'. Perfect vision. I can't say that I've ever really had a knack for figuring things out on the spot, on the fly, with no real time to think about it. I'm a 'processer'. I like to process things, take my time, really think things through. Unfortunately, that doesn't always work to my advantage.
There are situations in life when you just have to come up with an answer, lightning...
In the harsh twilight, he knelt and dug.
In the bottom of the phoenix-grave, he spread the spores that would feed on and support the beginnings 0f all life.
In the sharp, glassy soil, he placed the seeds of a new planet.
In the unmeasured, empty space of an hour, he changed the course of the universe.
In the flat gray expanse of weathered silicates, three thousand potatoes rested.
In the dead methane-carbon dioxide atmosphere, the harsh actinic sun slanted down, undimmed by ozone.
In the cool, moist air of his time machine, he left the dawn of the world,...
The lamp wouldn't turn on. That was really the least of his problems. It meant the electricity had finally been turned off. So had the water, the cable, and the gas. At least they had waited until the spring. It was warm enough to not risk freezing that night.
Jacob wondered through his house, filled with useless possessions. He touched the television and the fridge as he walked by them, exiting the house and into the beautiful April morning.
The birds were chirping and a steady drone of cars racing down the highway filled his ears. He took a deep...
She opened the envelope and screamed. This luxury was purely due to the rough edge of the foil having cut into her thumb before she'd completely broken the electrical contacts just inside the ripped flap. The Army man who'd come within minutes of that first scream, had peered over her shoulder down inside the folded card and taken in the plastic, the wires and the detonator. To his credit, though he was clearly Protestant, he had paid her more attention than any man in her rather drab existence. Everyone else had vacated, but finally she was the centre of attention....
It was the fall that surprised me the most. We worked together for years on the 82nd floor of Tower two, and when I knew we couldn't get to the bottom I knew he'd want to go to the top. I agreed immediately even though I knew he had a plan, he always had a plan. I was too busy not thinking clearly to think clearly, about what this plan would would to do us, how it would end, how we could survive.
For the last minute of his life, the terror was gone. His smile didn't surprise me, I...
They were listening.
That's what my mother always told me when I enquired about the two men sitting on the bench in the park.
Every Tuesday we would find them there, sitting as still as statues, seemingly staring straight ahead. My mother told me that they were blind and that that was why they never seemed to be looking at anything in particular.
She said that they listened so much because they couldn't see; that they took in double as much information through their ears. They were drinking in the sounds of children playing and dogs barking and couples walking...
It approached. Well, as much as the end can be said to approach, as opposed to us approaching it. The great beast, that stalking horse of the apocalypse, with massive paws that looked like human hands, a lion's head with a mane of fire, and the body of a wolf.
The great hunter Talianto was selected from all people to confront this end. Of all people her spear flew the straightest, her blade cut sharpest and cleanest. If there was any hope of defeating such a monstrosity, of doomsday that moved in shadow and swished a spiked tail clearing all...
100 feet away. That's where I was when the car crashed through our fence. I was watering the yard, and I thought I was watching the kids, but I had my back to them. We live on the highway. Four acres stretch out behind us. Plenty of space, I figured. But the last owner built right up against the road, the better to show off the building. I wasn't looking. I wasn't thinking. There was Bill, eight years old, all skin and bone and muscle, and he's teaching six year-old Jenny how to toss a football, only she can't quite...