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10:11 AM Nov. 15, 2273

            Journal Entry #1013

The government is exploding with secrets… and its shrapnel is ripping through our society… infecting us with our own web of secrets… soon this epidemic will spread internationally and this world will explode with lies…

9:41 AM Nov. 15, 2273

            “I just find it frustrating that I can’t get a job due to my ‘inability’ to keep up with the times,” rants a man who lies on a large couch, its plush red cushions supporting his weary, run-down and classic middle-aged body. Though, of the time, he is considered an old man who is terribly out of date and whose existence will never be noted in regular society.

His imagination for the government has drilled a hard line in his forehead, which appears now as the therapist continues to question him.

        “Why don’t you want to be like the people of today?” asks the therapist, who shares a surprisingly similar style with his client.

        “I’ve told you before, Doctor. I don’t wish to become something I’m not. The government is making us clones of one another. They’re poisoning us with the technology of the time. We’re simply slaves to them for no good reason!” the man explains.

        “Are you afraid of the government?” the doctor interrupts.

        The client’s eyebrows furrow in reaction to the irrelevant question. Nevertheless, he allows the strand of thoughts that erupt from a crevice of his mind he has not once touched before leak into his imagination.

        “I suppose so… but it is not I that should be afraid of the government. It is the government that should be afraid of me. My life is unrecorded in history. No family, no job, no life… But let me tell you this: the government wants me. I know this to be true.”

        The doctor’s face is expressionless. “Why do you think that?”

        “Because. Much of the time that I spend out in public, I’m being stared at. It’s very obvious when people stare at other people. It’s rare to find a case where people are not too busy with their government issued world to watch you go about your own world. And it seems like everyone’s government issued job is to spy on me and my world.” A few fingers scrape along the hills of the man’s ruffled skin as he explains to the therapist his experiences in this modern world; the strings suddenly pulling together as his thoughts rage onward.

        “Aren’t people allowed to be curious?” the man with the clipboard has a reassuring curiosity in his voice that the client has never heard before, which makes the client deliver a quick and curious glance towards him. He is sitting quietly and waiting patiently for an answer. And suddenly, the client sits up, facing his therapist with a tentativeness that could devour a criminal.

        “You seem like a man of observant sorts, being a therapist and all. You mean to tell me that you’ve never noticed that everyone keeps to themselves and never expresses any type of social interest? That no one even looks at each other? Or are you exactly the same as the rest?!”

        “Sir, please calm yourself,” spits the therapist calmly.

        Suddenly his tentativeness whips into frustration and rage, “how can you not be driven mad by this government, or at least made a little bit curious of what is going on behind its closed doors?!” His hands are cradling the air before him ferociously as he questions the doctor.

        The therapist simply observes the crazed man, unmoving except for the subtle rise and fall of his chest. His placidity is unnerving.

        “Shouldn’t I be the one asking the questions?” asks the therapist in response to the rain of questions poured down by the client.

        The client’s eyes narrow at the therapist, looking for any trace of emotion in the man’s eyes. Finding none, he tries for a more direct reaction.

        Suddenly calm, the client asks a question. “Well, answer me this, Doctor. Have you a family? Any loved ones? A pet? A passion?” The man shoots reality at the therapist, pausing slightly in between to let the man think.

        His interrogation grows a certain ferocious tone with every question that doesn’t get a reaction from the man. And then, the therapist repeats his question in the same tone as before, “Shouldn’t I be the one asking the questions?” With this, the client leaps from his chair and screams in rage. He charges the man in the therapist’s chair, the man watching him with the same, unchanging eyes; unaffected by the intensity of his client, whose fist is raised behind his head, ready to let loose with all his hatred right now.

        “WOULD YOU SIMPLY REACT?!” screams the man as his fist plows deeply into the therapists cheekbone. The doctor’s head snaps sharply to the left and doesn’t rebound. His eyes twitch a few times before the client bashes him again. Not a single reaction comes from the therapist, his hands folded on top of his clip board which lay upon crossed legs, as if this beating wasn’t even taking place.

The client finishes once he realizes his hands are bleeding, and the doctor’s rubber face has fallen off, revealing a hard metallic surface with cracked, but human-like eyes twitching and sparking.

“Oh my God…”

The man stares at the destroyed machine sitting in the chair before him. His bleeding fists fidget with the adrenaline, and a sudden surge of rage compels a finalizing kick to the robot’s head, sending it flying to the back of the room. On impact, the room flashes from a dimly lit, old-style book room to a bright, futuristic room.

The client gasps at the transformation and stumbles back into the chair that he has sat in every time he has come to see this thing, but only as his bottom hits the chair does he realize that it transformed into a hard block of metal just as the rest of the room. He quickly jumps up and flees the room, yelling and pushing people over as he sprints back to his home.

10:03 AM Nov. 15, 2273

The door rips open as he flies inside, but the comfort of home doesn’t slow his velocity towards his bedroom in the back of his suite. His hands fumble around his bedspread and through his desk and around in his closet as he looks for his journal. It is the only thing in which he has confidence that he has any privacy.

He finds it somewhere within the darkness of his closet, and lifts it with care while muttering words that are barely audible.

“I told that machine everything that I’ve ever wrote or thought… everything. I trusted him… it… I befriended the spawn of the government… it was without a doubt a government robot… used to spy on me… and get me to spill every one of my secrets… I should have known… I should have been more careful…”

The man takes the journal to his desk, carrying it with trembling fingers. His movements are slow as he sits down and picks up a pen and begins to write, still spitting words and phrases out, getting louder and louder with every word.

            And suddenly he stops.

            He straightens up and stares blankly at the pale blue wall that his desk faces.

            And in a hushed and horrified voice he whispers, “… the shrapnel has arrived…”

lol, meh ._.

                She enters the bedroom while I lay on the bed, lost in immense thought on what should be done. With her sudden presence I sit up and quickly meet her gaze; her eyes showing an intense lust that greatly overcomes whatever pain is hidden beneath the surface. I’m forced to shy away from her beautiful eyes, slightly shaking my head in hopes that my body language will inform her of my current mood, which is nowhere near equal to hers. She’s bound to try and change that, but I have to make an attempt to try and stop it.

                As I swing my legs off the edge of the bed, I crack my neck, but it cracks wrong; a groan of pain slithers through my clenched teeth and my hand flies up to massage my tensed neck muscles. She must have thought it as an invitation to further enter the room, for I look up through squinting eyes to find her standing in front of me; her hand gently gliding towards mine, removing my hand from my neck. I keep my head low and cocked as she dips in to deliver a sweet kiss on my reddening skin. I smile at the useless remedy of kissing an injury to make it feel better, but it quickly diminishes when she doesn’t remove her lips. In fact, she starts to suck on my relaxing neck, harder and harder every time she readjusts her lips. My smile turns into a slight frown in an attempt to try and mask the pleasure my body is feeling. Pleasure so refreshing that my muscles start relaxing, my breathing becomes heavy, and the almost inaudible noises coming out of me with every breath I take start to erupt from within me. Her teeth respond with a light pinch on my wet skin, and a slight moan escapes from inside, but I quickly silence it and cup my hand on her shoulder, pushing her away.

                She removes her lips, leans back and brushes off my hand, and then returns to meet my lips with a kiss. Her kisses are so sweet; I never have any control over myself when she kisses me, and so I’m driven to kiss back immediately. I put a hand on her cheek, savoring the moment, but my eyebrows furrow as the kiss becomes sour and I snap back to reality. I slide my hand down her neck and stop at her collar bone, pushing her back once more. I try to look into her eyes, but she shakes her head and throws herself at me, kissing me with all the intensity she has within her. She’s fighting it too… and in knowing this I kiss her back passionately, my hand hovering beside her as she steadies herself on top of me. It resorts to resting on her waist as the kiss intensifies, but she moves it in between her legs, outside of her pajamas.

My body wishes to just give up this struggle between my feelings and instinct. I want to give her what she wants; I want her to feel better… and I just wish that what she needs and what she wants were the same thing… but they aren’t the same. At all. And now, with every thought that rolls through my mind the moment goes sour once again and I tilt my head towards hers, using my forehead to detach my lips so I can catch my breath.

                After I had silently refused to give her what she wanted, she volunteers a hand on the outside of my pajamas, continuing the battle between my solemnity and her eager arousal; making me feel overwhelmed with the amount of confusion and torment that is happening inside of me. The persistent animal that is trying to rip through me is making it hard to concentrate, causing me to fall back onto the sheets, covering my face as if my hands were a shield against reality. I realize I don’t have the energy to keep fighting like this for much longer.

I just wish she would stop as she starts to tease me through my clothing. I slide my hands up my face and run my fingers into my hair, but stop with my palms over my eyes, applying pressure and forcing them further into my head, hoping that the knowledge of what to do will come gushing out. She doesn’t notice my agony, or chooses to ignore it, because she slips a hand into my panties and continues to rub.

My pelvis reacts slightly to the excitement, gently lifting off the bed; although in a controlled manner. She notices and takes off her shirt, returning to slip a finger inside. My nails dig into my scalp and I purse my lips in an attempt to tame what she wants me to feel; which is becoming stronger and stronger with everything she does. She still doesn’t recognize my torture, and pulls off my panties, placing her lips where her fingers once were.

                I’ve had enough. I can’t let her do this. Not now, not after so much hard work to get over her, I can’t just let a year and a half of pain to try and get over her go to waste in one night because she has only months to live. I quickly pull myself from her reach, sit upright and hug my legs. I can’t look at her, so I resort to resting my head on my knees and just stare off across the room, thinking about what could be done and what should be done. And although I hear the rustling of clothes, I don’t dare look at her.

                After the noise stops, she asks with garbled speech, “am I not beautiful enough for you…?”

                My eyes shift left and right before I finally lift my head and set my chin upon my knees, looking at her. I look her up and down; at her belly, her hips, her thighs, her knees, her curves, her breasts, her collar bone, her neck, her lips, her nose, her hair, her eyes.

                Her eyes.

                They are no longer blanketed in lust; they show every emotion hidden inside her at this very moment.

Pain.

So much pain in her eyes; it seems to draw forth the pain from within me, for I feel it across my body like a bath in a million needles.

I have to make it stop; it all just needs to stop. I roll onto my knees, meet her at eye level and set my hand on her cheek; delivering a single kiss for what seems like the rest of the night, which contains all the words needed, all the feelings and broken hearts, sharing with her everything that pains me inside, and also everything that means it will be all right…

As I finish, I ease away from her and sit cross-legged on the bed, my arms limply crossed in front of me. I gaze into her eyes with the look that needs no words to voice my emotions—just a mixture of slight relief and slight pain, making to be a quite troubled expression. And to add to it, vulnerability sets heavy upon my shoulders.

We just watch each other, unmoving, like our bodies still need time to process what has just happened—or, what is going to happen. All until a tear emerges from her eye and rolls down her cheek. My head falls and I close my eyes, my hands wrap around my legs, and my nails dig into my calves to try and contain the pain that is about to come pouring out. A drop leaks through and falls to the bed sheets. I lean forward into the mattress, meeting the sheets with the top of my forehead. She comes forward and gets on her knees before the bed, covering her arms, trying to hold herself together before she lets herself go and cries harder. I twist my neck, trying to get rid of the knot that won’t leave the back of my throat, but nothing is working…

I have to move, I can’t show her weakness right now, she doesn’t need weakness; she needs strength. And with a quick breath, I clench my teeth, choking back the tears and the knot—composing myself—for I am still in the presence of her. I lift my head slowly to see her, and quickly pull my hands out from under my legs and wipe away the weakness from my cheeks with the back of them. She watches me through sobbing eyes, her arms wrapped around herself; her innocence only helps compose myself and make me stronger, helping me edge my way to the side of the bed where she sets.

Instead of meeting her on the edge of the bed, I slide off it to her side, using an arm to pull her close to me. At first she resists. She’s stiff and shaking, so I ease off and look at her. The moment our eyes meet she falls into my side and her arms wrap around me as her sobs are muffled by my clothing. I hold her close to me, kiss her on the head and whisper to her.

“It’s going to be okay… It’ll be okay… I promise…”

A short story by me… Sorry it looks pretty long D:

                “I think it’s all clear.”

                “Hmm…”

                Two soldiers are invading the remains of torched homes after a nuclear bombing; searching for survivors that will need to be collected for interrogation.

                Suddenly a scout swings their rifle around and shines the attached light into the arcane darkness, “d-did you see that?”

                “See what? There’s nothing here, Jok,” states an audacious, confident young man, “this place was wrecked last night. Not a single man should be alive after such a wrecking.”

                “I don’t know, Challe… I’ve seen things… in the shadows… Challe, they’re moving in the shadows, and I can feel their presence. I know there’s something there,” replies a nervous Jok.

                Both are about the same age (early twenties), and countless times have they gone on missions such as these as comrades. But they have two drastically different personalities: Jok is a very disturbed young man that wishes to have no part in this fruitless war—well, if you can even call it a war, that is. He wishes to live life as any other middle-class man; a wife, children, a steady job plus income.

                Challe on the other hand, wants to do everything and be everything. He could care less about the sentimental side of life. People call him a heartless brute (mostly the girls from the nights proceeding a party, after his charm has acted as a net in catching taken women by the amorous words he speaks, simply to have them for a night of romantics.) He loves this war, this relentless “rage” upon surrounding civilizations; he can’t get enough of it. That’s just the way he is.

                But they both have a way with each other; a way of keeping each other in check. While one stumbles about, looking too long at nothing at all; the other pushes him forth and moves on—or vice-versa.

                “Brother, we all see things in times like these. The fear gets to our heads and makes us see things that are really just our silly imagination,” Challe explains as he walks out of what used to be the front door of a suburban home, “that lump, of whatever it used to be, could be a mutated Russian to a mind that has gone through too much.”

                Jok shuffles out, and Challe puts a reassuring hand on his shoulder, “Jok my friend, you have gone through too much; way too much to handle for an innocent young man like yourself. I suggest you try to escape this madness before it’s too late, ya? I know your ever-so-charming love waiting for you back home is sure to be happy when you return.” Challe mocks Jok’s life choices in an empty chuckle.

                Jok stares at the mound of rubble where he saw things move in the shadows and where he felt more presence there than any of the other homes. Challe radios in to headquarters that they’re still alive and house number 213 is void of any life, adding a bit of sarcasm at the end: “as is every lost home in this stretch of foreign land.”

                Jok sees a flash of something within the ashes that he just came from; almost like a set of eyes peering over the demolished wall. Cocking his weapon, he stares for a moment and slowly starts back up into the obscurity. His dark sunken eyes steady, his jaw set, and the slight part between his lips translate the intense determination to find what is lurking in the shadows. Challe is too busy joking with the head reporter to notice Jok’s disappearance.

                As he walks further into the radioactive dust than he and Challe ever went in the first 212 houses, things scramble beyond the reach of Jok’s dimming light. Challe’s voice distant, as Jok’s heart races, pounding through his veins, disabling his sense of sound. He pauses examining the dark abyss. A bead of sweat slips into Jok’s eye causing him to blink repeatedly, and he shakes his head out of habit, causing the wiring in the light to become loose. The light starts to blink and fade out; Jok’s breath begins to quicken in fear. More perspiration emerges from his trembling skin, and he swallows to try and get a hold on himself. Something in the shadows startles him out of his perturbation. Adrenaline surges through his body; he becomes still—waiting. The light shines in the direction of the fuss, and suddenly flickers out.

                Silence for a moment… not even Challe’s voice…

                But a scratching noise…

                Something appears… silver in the moonlight…

                It cocks its mutated head…

                “Holy—“

                A piercing scream comes from the mess, followed by rapid shots echoing through the neighborhood. Challe’s head snaps towards the screeching—now not just a man’s screams but an added high pitched shriek—sending shivers down Challe’s spine. Flashing from the high-powered rifle that was issued by the German government leads Challe to where Jok is; all the time screaming for him.

                Challe’s radio is left feeding noises and sounds to the reporter. The reporter desperately scrambles to try and understand what is happening, asking questions about it, but not receiving anything useful—just screams and gun shots.

                Challe finally reaches Jok as the click of the smoking gun is ticking—Jok spent all his ammunition on the darkness. Challe kneels beside the startled Jok. Using the light on his gun, Challe inspects the man. Jok is sputtering blood—trying to speak but simply cannot form words. Challe’s eyes intensify as he tries to figure how the large gash in Jok’s gut came about. He ignores the desperate calls coming from Jok’s radio.

                “—Jok… calm down, brother…” Challe becomes a person he has never been before, a reassuring, calm man. “Slow down, and tell me what happened here.”

                Jok stares at Challe with frantic eyes and rolls his head towards the darkness that he was shooting into and points. Challe’s light reveals a human-like figure stumbling around in a corner, trying to get away, but its injuries are too severe for it to even stand. Challe’s serenity melts into complete horror.

                “What the hell is it, Jok?!” Challe falls backwards on his bottom and starts emptying all that he’s got on the limp creature. “It’s true… things are… are in the shadows… Oh, God!”

                The reporter on the radio is yelling for the general.

                The general comes and speaks three words to the men: “Thank you, soldiers.”

                A flash of immense light comes from the distance. Challe and Jok turn their heads to the mushroom cloud that is growing… reaching for the full moon that hangs in the sky above the chaotic world.

                “Dammit…” is all Challe can say before he and his partner is engulfed in the hot flames of a nuclear bomb.