I have been chided
not to pray or wish
for the death of any
human, no matter
what. Yet those
same voices sit in
silence when those
humans sever the lives
of countless—thousands
upon thousands upon
thousands. Luigi was
right. One wicked life
in exchange for the lives
of many. Trump, Vance,
Musk, the Heritage
Foundation, CPAC, Zuckerberg,
and all their billionaire
buddies. Take them all—
every last one. It is not that
we’ve come to play God,
rather, we’ve merely come
to do the gods’ work.
Tag: Fiction
Is It?
The gun rang out.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Four shots tore through her chest. All five feet, seven inches of her crumpled to the ground. Blood soaked the moonlit shore as the lake lapped at her flesh. The boy stood, tears streaming down his cheeks, gun still trained on the fallen woman, breath caught in his throat.
“It’s over.” He exhaled.
“Is . . . it?”
Her body convulsed, bones snapping out of place, limbs twisting and elongating. She rose like water and held him in two fathomless pools. Her jaw popped and jerked, unhinging itself, mouth stretching unnaturally wide revealing row upon row of jagged teeth. The dead woman bellowed a scream so primal the boy collapsed to his knees, sobbing.
“No need to cry, boy.” Her voice was like a skittering swarm of roaches. Her laugh like an electric guitar. She towered over the child and whispered, “Now, come to mommy.”
The Real Santa
He is neither kind nor jolly. Every year he enters the homes of especially unruly children and snatches them up, leaving behind no trace or memory that they had ever existed. By night’s end, with his sack full of naughty children, he slinks back to his lair to gorge himself. When the last child is devoured, bones and all, he falls into a deep sleep for another year, with none of us the wiser.
Until now.
Before the Unknowable
Morgan stared into the deep darkness, watching massive tentacle-like arms breach and retreat back into the infernal vortex. He never felt so aware of his own insignificance as he did in that moment.
“Okay,” he answered, “who are you?”
“How can you know the unknowable? Or apprehend a god? Can a mote of dust lay hold the heavens? Can you devour entire worlds? Two more left.” Its voice echoed across the galaxy, shaking heaven and earth.
“That’s bullshit! That’s not an answer!” Morgan shouted.
“Rebuke me again, and you will have never existed.”
“What does that mean?”
“You will have never been born, never lived, and never been known. Whatever pitiful sentiments anchor you to this life will have never been. Your thread will be plucked from the Great Tapestry. One.”
“No! Please! That wasn’t a question!”
“You have asked, and We have answered. The bargain is kept. You have one more question.”
“I need a moment to think.”
“I have eternity.”
Morgan wracked his brain. His first question resulted in more questions. His second was an accident. The last question had to be carefully woven if he were to find some way to stop the entity from tearing apart the universe.
“Okay . . .”
The Inevitable Introduction
These are the ghosts that wander through the infinite corridors of a divergent, and admittedly, unsound mind. Some belong to a troubled past, others arise from social decay, while others are utterly fabricated. I speak them into being, bring them out for examination, and in doing so, unintentionally examine and critique myself.
Continue reading “The Inevitable Introduction”
Void Engineer 