Today's offering is small but spooky, with three drabbles...
Knock, Knock
The grandfather clock in the hall ticked in unison with Sally’s fingers as she drummed her digits against the stone fireplace. She barely breathed, her only movement beating against the hearth.
Tick, tap. Tick tap. Tick, tap.
She crouched by the iron grate, staring into the cold ashes. She murmured, repeating the same soft words.
“Can you hear them? Knocking, knocking at the mirror? When it breaks they’ll get out.”
Suddenly her hand stopped and Sally looked up. Somewhere in the hall, a tapping sound reverberated in unison with the ticking of a clock.
And somewhere glass began to crack.
Underneath the World
Can you feel it? That sensation of peculiarity? A strange reverberation of the uncanny running beneath your feet. A thought or two, perhaps the earth is alive with… something?
Your step quickens as the twilight deepens. You avoid shadows, and the thickening mist. Who knows what eerie perils lurk in the hidden places? Best not indulge any curiosity. You want to make it home alive.
And there you are, hand on the door, home. Safe at last. All imagings left in the dark.
Yet… are they truly imaginary?
What if it is all real?
What if there is no escape?
Aftermath
In the boneyard, the ashes rained down, velvet grey petals coating the bare ground in a soft layer of soot. Above, the sky still flared with hues of red and purple and the few remaining trees were shrivelled and cracked.
The automatons sorted piles of remains, as they always had, more broken skeletons stacked weekly as the mechanical retrievers brought in the flesh-stripped corpses. It was the way of things now, the clean-up. Years since the end, but the routine went on, a cycle of programming and efficient energy cells.
One apocalyptic war, billions dead, and only the machines remained.
So that ends today's post. Be sure to hop on over and check out the offerings of the other participants as well. Here's the list.
