The Long Battle

The heat has taken its toll on my men and the tents smell of sweat and rotting flesh. The battle raged taking many of my soldiers, still left in the trenches, their corpses exposed.

I take refuge in my own tent and remove my wife’s letter from my uniform pocket where I’ve kept it for the last month, her encouraging words the only solace to get me through this hell of a war. The scent of her fragrance has worn, but I envision her beautiful smile.

A loud explosion startles me. I inadvertently drop the letter and run for cover.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

East Of Deadwood

Off in the distance, hundreds of lifeless began to shuffle toward town. Vernon turned and saw the cowboy he'd killed staring at him with bloodshot eyes.

"We have to get out of here," Vernon said.

Emmett answered, "I agree. It'll only get worse."

Vernon patted him on the back. He was a good man to have on his side.

They watched them scurry about like insects surrounding the few remaining living. The corpses hadn't crossed a burned-out piece of road.

Vernon added, "West is our ticket out."

Hell-bent for leather on horseback, they left the living and the un-dead behind.

From Guest Contributor J. Iner Souster

Human Beings Are The Only Wild Animals

Whenever I fly into a foreign country, I’m afraid I’ll be dragged into a room and forced to answer questions I’ll fail to understand. “You can do better,” the examiner will say, just before firing an electric current through the alligator clips attached to my ears. By the time I’m released from custody, I’ll be bent, shriveled, gnome-like, and afflicted with tremors. These events repeat themselves in my mind on a loop, every recurrence worse than the last, now involving sleep deprivation, now an inmate orchestra playing a German requiem, now corpses sprawled half in, half out of broken caskets.

From Guest Contributor Howie Good

Howie's latest poetry collections are I'm Not a Robot from Tolsun Books and A Room at the Heartbreak Hotel from Analog Submissions Press. 

Americana

The diner, Elmer's Pitstop, recalled a simpler time, when coffee refills were always free and quarters were collected for eventual use in the jukebox. The server, Gina was her name, enjoyed the work and could actually raise a family on the income.

Bennett still enjoyed a good diner, even now that they were considered, at best, a novelty. Elmer's had the best milkshakes in town. Did people not like milkshakes anymore?

He sighed as he surveyed the chaos. The outlines on the floor, dark red shadows marking where six people had died, were more gruesome than bodies would have been.

The Chariot

Pale reaching hands slipped below powdered ash and blood-soaked mud, pressing tighter to the earth, seeking salvation in the grave-like ditch. War thundered overhead as gunpowder sparked and chorused above. The soldier turned his silver eyes over the mud—to the cemetery of barbed wire and bruised corpses.

A high-pitched scream wailed distantly from two warring steeds tethered together. He watched the blood-stained Roan shriek and kick as it fell into the sea of barbed wire; the moon-kissed Arabian jolted from the tearing spikes, her gas mask hanging from bloodied leather, not knowing whether to die quietly or while struggling.

From Guest Contributor Mikayla E. Gruber

Mikayla is currently writing a fantasy/sci-fi novel and studying English and German at Pikes Peak Comunity College. She is also working towards a CPDT-KA Certification.

A Survivor’s Calling

Mouth agape, eyes widened with fear, I looked on to what my world had been. Everything I lived for was swept up in a distant array of mud, debris and...corpses. Even through my grief, I knew the landslide had chosen me, to avenge everyone's lives that came to an end in this short, devastating moment. This was my calling, which I would live through for the rest of my life, bearing their dreams.

Standing strong, even until this day, I recall this distant memory. With tears beginning to well in my eyes I see hope glimmering from the future.

From Guest Contributor Danielle Simpfendorfer

Double Down

Dave peered from his bunker across the smoldering horizon. He refused to cry.

That charred skeleton of masonry and rebar had once been home. People he knew had died in those streets, now nothing more than corpses and ruin.

After the initial wave of destruction came the pestilence and blight. The rotting skin and miracle pleas suggested a biblical retribution was at hand. The metaphor was on everyone's lips, but Dave clamored against it. He blamed the whining snowflakes who refused to accept they had lost.

Dave remained certain. This outcome was still better than if she had been elected.

Whispers

Caspar would hear the whispers as soon as he closed his eyes. At first they seemed related to his dreams, but gradually they became detached, having nothing to do with his REM cycles.

The whispers were not kind. They commanded him to murder his family. Caspar wanted to ignore them, but as their stridency increased, he eventually relented.

When the police found him covered in blood and surrounded by corpses, Caspar claimed that it was God who was whispering to him. The jury agreed, and he was eventually set free.

You see, God was whispering to the jurors as well.