Blitzkrieg

Silvia jerked her head up and stared westward. I turned to look as well but saw nothing at first. Then suddenly, one dropped out of the cloud bank. It flew in front of the crescent moon, low on the horizon, as his companions dropped into view after him. Within seconds they dotted the sky. Millions of them, it seemed, slowly flying toward us.

Then the first bomb hit, the earth resonated with vibrations. Another hit, the ground shifted out from under us and we tumbled forward. As quickly as I could, I pulled Silvia to her feet and we darted out the barn door. The explosions rumbled like the beat of a drum, an approaching drum.

The blasts picked up tempo.

“Ahh!” Silvia screamed as a house near the end of our street was engulfed in a fiery inferno.

With a sickening BOOM the barn, our barn, burst into a wave of splinters and smoke. It singed my fingers and hair and burned my eyes. Silvia and I flew forward and landed on the lawn. I blinked to regain my vision. Silvia lay at my feet, a wood plank atop of her; she was alive but unconscious. I shouted her name, but I couldn’t even hear my own voice over the drone above me.

There was a whoosh and I looked up. Time bogged down and I watched, frame-by-frame, as a black dot fell, the strobe effect of other distant explosions behind it. The faces of my mother, and my father, my younger brother, and grandmother, all inside our house, flashed before me. I was too stunned to scream, or cry, or react in any other way. I just watched, following the black streak across the smoky red sky.

I tried to look away, or at least close my eyes. It was too horrific, but I was stuck in position. The window shattered and then the red fire billowed out. The planks around the pane disassembled and spun off, chaotically, in every direction. The whole house bent in the opposite direction as the roof broke off and disintegrated. Then the whole building collapsed outward, falling down around its own foundation. And still, even as the old oak tree that shielded us fell, I did not move.

Then as suddenly as the air raid began, it ended. The last plane banked a turn west to head back across the border.

I scooped up Silvia’s limp body in my arms, checking that she still had a pulse, and ran for the street, to escape the tomb of my home.

Several others were standing out on the street too, all looking west down the road. I looked too, in the distance a long procession of tanks were rolling in. And then it all clicked. We were orphans now; we had no home or money. It felt like a daydream, the war had finally reached us. Reading about it in the news was one thing, seeing it was another.

Author's Note

This short story has no background story, no follow up or future events.
It is to be taken as an independent snapshot into someone's life, like if you read a single page in the middle of a diary, the issue this produces is little if any character development. (I do want some and will work on this.)
There is also no particular setting, it should have the feeling of a city in WWII, but no specific one.

As clarification, this was written as part of a challenge with the requirement of less than 500 words.

Reviews

[hippityhoppitybippitybo..]

As far as I can tell, you're looking for a serious review and this doesn't have any reviews yet so I suppose I'll start; Most these are suggestions and I myself do not write a lot so some of them may be incorrect or you may find some of them strange:

"Then the first bomb hit [and] the earth resonated with vibrations." We have a grammatical error here ~ Please keep in mind there are more of these errors but I don't think it would be ideal for me to take my time and point them all out.

"With a sickening BOOM [the barn - our barn - burst into] a wave of splinters"

"'Ahh!' Silvia screamed as a house near the end of our street was engulfed in a fiery inferno." Maybe it's just me but I find this sentence a bit comical; I would suggest removing the dialogue from this sentence.

"Reading about it in the news was one thing, [experiencing] it was another."

"I scooped up Silvia’s limp body in my arms, checking that she still had a pulse, and ran for the street, to escape the tomb of my home." This sentence seems a bit abrupt; perhaps making it longer by adding a little more detail along with the thoughts of the character would help.

"There was a [preferably italicized -> whoosh] and I looked up."

Good things (in my opinion):

- Conflict in the beginning will most likely draw readers in.

- Details/descriptions were well used and don't really get in the way of reading.

- No confusion about what's going on; pretty solid so far.


Bad things (in my opinion):

- Deaths this early on will seem pointless and will not draw any emotion; it may or may not be better to simply give a background story to the characters a little later on/The pacing of the story is too quick and the characters haven't developed at all so it is nearly impossible to actually feel sorry for the (supposed) main characters, if that was indeed your intent.

- Improper use of grammar somewhat detracts from the story.

- The setting was not described and I only have a vague idea of where exactly this takes place.

Overall ~ Not bad but nothing special either ~ I recommend trying to put your own twist on stories so they aren't straight forward all the time/extremely generic and making each section/story/chapter longer so it is easier to review.

[Alysa Taladay]

The paragraph in which the house blows apart feels longer than it actually is. I like that: it has concrete details that really give you a sense of the shock impressed by that short, painful moment the narrator goes through. Words like billowed and bent, disassembled and chaotically; they give a sense of the surrealism of the moment.