Home *Language and Violence*

As I turn around to lock the door of my cabin, I sigh. I can't wait until next year. How will they react when I suddenly just come back after being gone for four months? I just needed some time to breathe and be alone. I start my car and head back home.

Driving through the streets, I see pictures of me hanging on wooden posts and taped in store windows. Wow, they were really concerned. They'll never forgive me.

I pull into my driveway and walk to the front of my house. "Holy s**t! What? What the-" I walk to the place my front door used to be and enter my house. My hands brush the burned walls and my fingers come back black. I wipe the tears from my eyes and sit down on the concrete floor that used to be wood. 

BANG. BANG. BANG BANG BANG.

I duck and crawl over to the destroyed bathroom. I check all my body parts to make sure none have been hit. Why the hell are they shooting at me? The sound of footsteps coming into the house sends me running for the window. Luckily, it's already been broken and I crawl out, dropping onto the soft dirt. I run into the woods behind my house and keep running. Maybe I can make it to the cabin? Ugh, when was the last time I ran anything over half a mile? I stop behind a huge rock and retch, grasping its sides for support.

As I sit down, I hear a leaves crunching. It must be a hunter. I shrink down and wait for them to pass but they don't. 

"I know you're there, Murray," I hear a feminine voice say from the other side of the rock. It sounds rough but not threatening. I rise and come face to face with a red-haired teenage girl. She looks me up and down before motioning for me to follow her. We stop next to a stream about fifteen minutes later.

"What's happened? Why did they destroy my house? Why were they shooting at me?" I ask. She sits down and unlaces her boots, dipping her feet into the freezing water. 

She sighs and says, "I wasn't there but I saw what happened from my camp in the woods. A huge white light descended from the sky and expanded to cover the whole town. Suddenly, everyone just dropped to the ground. They stayed like that for about ten minutes and then the light rose back up to the sky and disappeared. Everyone got back up and went on with their normal lives until that night, when a town meeting was arranged. This was about two or three weeks after you left and everyone had been a little worried but not much. We all thought you had just gone on vacation without telling anyone.

"Anyways, at the meeting, they talked about you. They said that what you were really doing was planning to destroy our town and everyone in it. You were going to take over the town and recreate it as a place of worship for you. They said you'd be a brutal governor and that you'd kill anyone you wanted and make everyone do everything for you. You'd make everyone else's lives hell. So they decided to burn your house, belongings, and when you came back, they were going to kill you."

"Wow. What do you think?"

"I don't believe any of it. But, I'm the only one here with common sense at the moment. Every time I tried to tell someone the truth, that they were deceived, they told me that when you came back, they'd kill me too. So, I've just been living in the woods from then on."

"What about other people? In other towns?"

"I don't know. I only saw the light span ours."

"Maybe we should try Martinsville. It's not too far but far enough that I don't think the light or whatever reached it. How about that?"

"We could try it."

We walk for hours and hours until it gets too dark to see anything. The girl, Grace, I've found out, is gathering some sticks for a fire. We're planning on just staying the night here and starting again in the morning. 

I hear Grace return and say over my shoulder to her "Do you think any of these berries are good to eat?" She doesn't reply but moves closer to me. I feel her presence behind me.

"I just want everything back to normal, Murray. I'm sorry."

I feel a sharp pain in my neck and clutch it with my hands. I just register the warmth and wetness of my neck when I have the uncontrollable urge to close my eyes. Someone pushes me to the ground and I finally give in. 

Reviews

[Norbanus]

That knack of yours for leaving questions hanging, is at it again.

Surely, this is a prologue for one hell of a sci-fi drama. I NEED the next segment to help me get over the suspense of whether it really is Grace who stabbed her, and pushed her to the ground.
With you penchant for suspense, you'd probably leave me grasping for straws for the next several chapters, before you let the cat out of the bag.

[barleygirl]

One of the best ending twists I've read in a very long time -- totally unexpected, yet also well-crafted to be easily visualized. I had to read this twice just to absorb each carefully crafted aspect, to see how you achieved this surprise ending without a hint of foreshadow. Usually I like to have a little foreshadow, but in your story it works well not to have it. Your storytelling is superb in that the details are easily followed & pictured in the reader's mind, yet everything is unlike any other similar type storyline. Originality could be your middle name (((HUGS))) Fondly, Margie

[DIANE J.T.]

wow!! brought me to tears i was really able to put myself in the story