April 2016 75-word Writing Challenge -- VICTORY TO MOSAIX!

[Calliopenjo]

The Outcast

A child without wings or antennae, without ability to communicate with creatures great and small. She came to these forest people, learned about them, and celebrated life with them. A child cast out of her world because of vanity and greed had found a home among these forest dwellers. Flowers bloomed,animals grazed, birds sat in nests above all of this without worry that this new inhabitant would harm them. They knew she belonged.

 

[Duttster]

It began as a distortion in the air. They were weak to begin with.

But eventually they worked up the strength to manifest into a form, yet a form without true substance. A gaping maw of pure light on its 'head' beckoned, a strange attempt at a mouth.

By now they looked more humanoid, and they began to experiment with their capabilities, stretching themselves in through the first floor windows.

The night the Outsiders came.

 

[Vaz]

The Cutting Room

They watch warily behind shadows as I slink to my study, a body saddled over my shoulder. 'Demon.' One sneers before scurrying away.

They fear what I don't. The blooming of his blood that's stains my fingers with sour petals, the crunch of bone as his breast cracks like granite.

Smiling, I cut out his heart. Because it is rotten. Replace it and stitch him shut.

He'll live.

One man's scorn is another's saviour.

 

[willwallace]

Convert



Every day, they hunt us. Bullets, arrows, axes, bats, all wielded with deadly effect.



We have the numbers, they have the technology.



Nighttime is our only ally in this fight. We can easily overwhelm any who venture into the darkness from behind their walls.



It doesn’t have to be this way. A moment of surrender, and they are one of us.



Why do they resist? It is inevitable.



Being human wasn’t so great, anyway.

 

[HazelRah]

The Fruit of Her Hands


A fragile silence echoed. And the hatch sealed shut.

I traced the window behind which my daughter wept. My fingertips white against the glass as I pushed away the aching in my chest.

Outsiders had found her, spoken with her. She could no longer be trusted within the colony. Not now she was one of them.

Turning back to my people, I confirmed her exile. She could have threatened my presidency.

I had no choice.

 

[johnnyjet]

Vestigial Vespers

Sunset melted over jagged cityscape like flowing lava. Wilted shadows were draped against the fiery backdrop. They were sad remnants of their former glory, hollow shells, puppets for their new wolf masters.

We set down our heavy loads and approached them.

"Exile has brought much change," said one, propped against a post.

"Yes," I said, tears welling.

"What will you do?"

"We are reprieved." I glared at the lurking wolves. "And we are back."

 

[Cascade]

What we don’t understand

They’re not like us these other ones,
They fear the moon and worship sun


They call atrocious at their feasts
They drink the blood of unclean beasts
They scrape the hair from off their faces
They desecrate the holy places
They cast their rites beyond the wall
And do not fear our gods at all

Their hair is white, their eyes are blue
It cannot be they’re human too

 

[Bowler1]

Duck and Cover

My bunker door finally opened after forty years on a time lock and I took in the outside world for the first time.

So many people… Here all this time… In a world that hadn’t ended….

No war…. No Armageddon….

I felt betrayed.

Nothing could give me back my lost years.

Anger… burning anger consumed my soul.

In a blinding rage I wanted revenge… retribution… retaliation….

Now I live with regret, back in my bunker.

 

[mosaix]

Outsiders? For Now...

Carlson enjoyed his daily commute to work. He just sat, counted and took quiet satisfaction from the numbers.

Today, he noted, the split was eighteen / forty six. Down slightly on recent weeks but certainly up on last year.

He caught the eye of another shapeshifter across the aisle and they exchanged barely perceptible nods and conspiratorial smiles.

The trend indicated approximately thirty years to parity, he calculated. But domination? Maybe fifty. They could wait...

 

[LittleStar]

Just The Stars

"I know that, but what are they really?"

Cali rubbed Ham's sandstone-brittle hand. "Each one is someone's wish."

"And the moon?"

"The same wish every Outsider has, all balled up." She ruffled hair and imagined life inside the Dome." Not mine though." Her wish twinkled over crags.

"What's yours then?"

Cali pulled Ham under her shawl when the razor wind blew. When it passed she just kissed him on the head and shrugged.

 

[Starbeast]

Outsiders KEEP OUT
Or I'll be mean to you.​

"Very funny, Parker."

"I didn't put that sign there."

"We're the only two on Mars."

"I didn't do it. Look....."

"A girl? Here?! No space suit either...."

A young girl, with blue hair in ponytails, and books under her arm, approached."Can't you read? Get lost."

"How..?"

She stomped her foot once. "GO!!!"

"But..?"

Dropping her books, she reached into her black dress pocket.

"Scissors?"

She snipped a hole in Parker's suit.

"AAAGH!! Run!"

 

[Christopher Lee]

The Lone Patron

I watched through the glass windows as patrons ordered food from thick menus. Waiters scurried here and there, balancing assortments of fine cuisines on their arms. I could smell the grill, the fried onions; hear the sizzling steaks and the boiling of cooking oil in which thick strips of potato were dropped in with a splash.


My mouth watered. Finally, I saw my dinner. I watched as she happily strolled out of the restaurant.

 

[Heijan Xavier]

The Majl asked no questions about personal business; the embarrassing answers were written all over Trepp’s face.

“Avuure has been rediscovered.” He said, “and Nohon is breaking apart.”

“This Doctor…” The Majl paused to think, “…he hadn’t had Ithsmii to experiment on, especially descendants of the Avuuri…” He stared, but didn’t feel the need to call Trepp out for being patient zero.

“Nohon is a beautiful nation, but we are just visitors here. Remember that.”

 

[Culhwch]

Outsiders

It was just a story spacers told their children, to make them fearful of airlocks. So they wouldn’t mess around in there.

The Outsiders. Cold and pale, they'd suck the air from your lungs, freeze you from the inside out.

Just a story, I tell myself, as the small research station loses power.

As the lights blink off, one by one.

Just a story.

As the scratching starts at the airlock door.

Just a story.

 

[Glen]

Long Shot

Humanity’s freedom hangs on Lazarus, a rank outsider coming round the final corner of the 2:30 at Aqueduct. The crowd erupts. Faced with an apocalyptic war we could not win, Earth accepted the Venusians’ alternative of deciding our fate through chance, with me calling the shots. No-one knows the races like I do - Lazarus cannot lose.

At the rail, Elgar, paramutuel tickets clutched in his tentacles, looks victorious already.

Come on Lazarus!

 

[Zoe Mackay]

Espionage and the Art of the Blown Cover.

In the street today, a small child pointed at me. Her father obscenely waved me off.

I am a bad spy.

My camouflage system works, but these creatures can tell. There is something unmistakably alien about me.

I was supposed to assimilate, to be one of them. I try. I study and imitate their behaviours. Still, they detect and reject me.

I fall in despair, find escape in hope, and scan the skies for salvation.

 

[Venusian Broon]

tattarrattat ​

“Walking eternally you will find no end to the infinite wall,” the old priest chuckled.

“High tower or deep mine never breached it. Except this locked door.”

We pilgrims tapped the oblong hatch. What marvels were inside?

<-------------|--|------------>​

¿ǝpısuı ǝɹǝʍ sןǝʌɹɐɯ ʇɐɥʍ˙ɥɔʇɐɥ ƃuoןqo ǝɥʇ pǝddɐʇ sɯıɹƃןıd ǝʍ

”˙pǝʇdǝɔxǝ ɹoop pǝʞɔoן sıɥʇ ˙ɹǝʍoʇ ɥƃıɥ ɹo ǝuıɯ dǝǝp ʎq pǝɥɔɐǝɹq ɹǝʌǝu„

˙pǝןʞɔnɥɔ ssǝʇsǝıɹd pןo ǝɥʇ „'ʎןןɐuɹǝʇǝ ƃuıʞןɐʍ ןןɐʍ ǝʇıuıɟuı ǝɥʇ oʇ puǝ ou puıɟ ןןıʍ noʎ“​

 

[Parson]

Population Explosion on the Armstrong​

Maria sits staring at her destination star. It’s so far away. She’s on the generation ship Armstrong, literally on the ship. A fourth of the passengers now have outside quarters.

Her stylist scratches her epithet:

Maria — one of the Outsiders:​

On the Armstrong
Under my dome
Tonight and forever
Sits Maria on my home
Inside would be best
Despite my protest
Each day I see my star
Ridiculously far
Short is the life I’ll live.

​

 

[reiver33]

No Angel Tonight

The Starling Lounge was jumping; all hot dames and cool jazz. I stood in the corner behind a potted palm, snub-nose .38 hanging heavy in my jacket pocket.

The devil on my shoulder pointed. “The sax player taking a break, he’s a reefer addict. Follow him out back to the alley. The cops won’t lift a finger.”

I was the only real person in a room of jerking caricatures. Outnumbered.

Time to shorten the odds.

 

[Phyrebrat]

Homesick
‘Let me in,’ a pleading voice says; a compelling suggestion.
‘Selene?’ Mother croaks, ‘I hear Selene.’
‘Hush, Mother, save your energy, it’s no one.’
Get better, Mother, you can’t go, too.
‘Let me in,’ another familiar voice coos. Splintered nails scratch the door; prying, testing. My brother’s entreaty sounds so reasonable.
‘Is that Jarius?’ Mother’s face, a bruised Jupiter, sweats, blooming chancres.
‘Rest, Ma.’
But she’s passed.

Later: Scritch-scratch
‘Let me in,’
Hush, mother…