Short Story: Dying Breed

Vampire turned into a short story. I’m sure I could also do a poem but this was what came out. I feel like it’s the start of bigger story rather than a story unto itself.

Dying Breed

I was a beggar dying in the streets. Disease was taking my body as it was taking so many others. I saw a woman walking down the street. Her clothes gave her away as wealthy and her near perfect face told me she was an angel and I was near the end. I asked her if she was here to take me away. There was a hunger in her eyes when she said “It would be my pleasure.” As I struggled to my feet she leaned toward my face and that’s when I saw her fangs. Before I could react, she was drinking from my neck.

I had never felt so relaxed and happy. Euphoria washed over me. Everything was starting to blur around the edges when I felt the beautiful woman offer me something to drink. I gulped it down hungrily.

The more I drank, the stronger I felt. I could feel the strength returning to my limbs, the warmth returning to my body. I felt alive and well for the first time in ages. With a wicked smile the woman asked me “Do you want to live forever?”

I was promised the world. For centuries, we had it. When you live for such a long time, it’s easy to accumulate wealth. Humans become very predictable creatures. We never stayed in one place for too long. After 10 or 20 years it would become apparent we weren’t aging.

We claimed several countries as our homes living a life of sin and luxury. It was refreshing to enjoy carnal lust with no consequences. Disease was such a peril for so many years. We wanted for nothing and held no envy. Gluttony became overrated since food no longer sustained me and held little taste.

Quenching my thirst became easy when we target the destitute, the dying, the criminals, people no one would miss. The only people of importance we targeted were ones who knew our secret and had no intention of keeping it. We were always able to orchestrate the death so that nothing even hinted at our secret.

Life was far from perfect. Whatever magic that gave us our strength and power provided its own set of limitations. We could never walk on consecrated ground. Given the centuries requirement of regular church attendance, this was occasionally an obstacle we had to work around. Religious symbols burned like fire. Certain herbs could be used to make us ill. For the first time in my life or death, I had allergies.

The worst part was never being able to go out in the sun. I could hide in shadows but direct sunlight would overwhelm my system. For a long time I thought it was heaven’s punishment for our nature. Abominations who aren’t permitted to grace the light of day.

Science has turned a light on my condition which was once magic. UV light causes a fatal reaction in our cells. Our bodies lost the ability to break down the herbs we once thought were poison. Religion is still a problem but no one cares if I attend church. My mate and I were doing quite well for so many years but our numbers are dwindling.

Our absences during daylight hours can be easily explained but still pose problems. Why can’t we join our mortal friends for happy hour in April but always come out in the fall? They have the pictures on social media to prove it. With the internet becoming a permanent part of our world, we’re at great risk of exposure. Even if I completely change my identity and leave the country, all I need is the wrong picture in the wrong place at the wrong time. One of ours was put on a terrorist watch list. He can’t risk open travel for years.

So many stories of our kind show us as powerful. Lords of the underworld, bending the ears of leaders, manipulating the future of mortals everywhere. While we have money and power and often have the ears of leaders, we stay as uninvolved as possible. The bigger our place in history, the shorter our lives would be.

In my latest incarnation I am a scientist. I study blood diseases which has given me an opportunity to analyze our condition. I’ve come very close to isolating what in our genetic code caused us to change, to live without life. This knowledge has generated several questions.

I haven’t told anyone how close I am. Rather than answers, this only generates more questions. Can we be made mortal? Should we allow ourselves to die? Should we sire enough humans that we have a voice in the greater world? How far are we willing to go to save our kind? We are a dying breed but should we allow ourselves to die?

Poem: Rise Up

The month of Halloween is upon us. Since I’ve been trying to work on my creative writing I thought this month I’d do some Halloween poems. I’m opening with an ode to zombies. I like this one but I think it could be better. If I make changes, I’ll add an update.

Rise Up

Cold, comfy, sealed

Trapped, box

Life so far away

Life crying

Rise up

Rip and tear

Splinters, wood, dirt, cold

Stench of decay

Pure black, no sound

Rise up

Rip and tear

Claw at cold and wet

Fight and drag and scrap

Grasp, breath

Smell earth, flowers, death

So much death

World so still

Ground moving but cold

Smooth cold stones

Names and dates

Flowers and sadness

Rise up

Rip and tear

Light, air

Movement, sound

Smell exhaust, clouds, dark

Heat, anger, life

So much life

Rip and tear

Pump pump pump

Worldess chatter

Hunger, empty

So empty, so hollow

Heat, life,

Movement, life

Smell sweat, blood, saliva, fear

Throbbing, running pulsing life

Rip and tear

Screaming, crying

Running, beating

Pulsing, roasting

Blood boiling

Color changing

Hungry, cold,

Dead, stale

Rip and tear

Life, heat, warmth, glory, consume

Soft fragile nourishing life

Howling, crying, anguish, dying

Soft, breakable, hungry, dying

All, must take it all

Rip and tear

Life so much life

Need more life,

Pulse, breath, fire, death

So little life

Fight, consume,

Feel alive

Keep dying

Need more life

Must have life

Rise up

Rip and tear

Short: The Perfect Sandwich

I was messing around looking at writing exercises on the internet when I saw one about the perfect sandwich. This is what I came up with for an extra short story.

The Perfect Sandwich

“I tried this burger, marinated in beer, on a pretzel roll with a fried egg. A fried egg!”

“I went to a place that lets you build your own burger. I got bacon, ham, 3 kinds of cheese, fried onions, lettuce and tomato.”

“And hopefully a week of salad for your colon. The best sandwich I ever had was grilled chicken on lightly toasted cibatta bread with bruschetta style tomatoes and a light basil pesto mayonnaise.”

“It was made with generic square shaped white bread so that when you cut it in half it was perfect triangles. The peanut butter was smooth. I’ve always hated nuts in my peanut butter. The texture is all wrong. The jelly was raspberry or strawberry, one of the red flavors. It didn’t have any fruit or seeds it in, very simple stuff. The proportions were perfectly even. Few things I’ve ever eaten tasted as good and simple and perfect as that sandwich.”

“What’s so special about a PB&J when you were a kid?”

“It was the last one my mother ever made. I wasn’t quite a teenager so my mom and I were still close, no adolescent angst to cock it all up. She made me the sandwich before the left to get some groceries. She never made it back from that trip. My last memory of her was making me the most perfect sandwich I’ll ever have. I’ve had burgers, melts, subs, and calzones but nothing will ever top that PB&J.”

“So what’s the weirdest ice cream flavor you’ve ever eaten?”

The Good Book

She fingered its delicate pages. It had a great deal of weight for such a delicate thing.

The pages were lighter than most. So easily torn. It survived many years but could it survive fire? Could it withstand water?

So many interpretations. So many translations. So many voices cast out. How much was lost in the translations? How much had been lost over time? Can any text maintain its integrity over thousands of years at the hands of so many?

What of the voices cast aside? Not every tale that was written for it has been told. The great men who created it also omitted pieces of it. If you don’t tell the whole tale, is it still worth fighting over? Would you risk your life on half of the truth? Would you risk someone else’s?

So much righteous blood has been shed. So much land stolen, so much currency controlled, by the men who wield the word. The pen is mightier than the sword. The book is mightier than its truth. Its authority has been enough to destroy as many lives as it’s saved.

Man is not perfect. Neither is his book. All it takes is a spark. She saw the light.

Keep Driving

Have you ever been going somewhere and just want to keep going right past it? Drive through the city. Past the noise and politics and pettiness until you hit nature where you can absorb the quiet. Drown out the din of real life as the breeze whispers to the trees.

Drive away from the beeps, whirs, tweets, and vibrations until you hit a simpler place welcoming you to a simpler time.

Driving to work and then just kept going. Driving until you hit ocean so you can watch your problems wash away on the salt waves. 

Maybe go north until you hit the border. Hoping a completely new place will have new, better problems.

Have you ever just wanted to go and not stop. Keep moving as the road rises to meet you chasing the sun to the place where it sets.

We all think this. We all dream this. What would happen if we actually did it?