BennyFaye

Bodies congealed. Then bodies revealed, and rainbows fantastic in abundance-- Bliss walked, bobbed eternal, but reality tripped, glowering infernal, robust with flattened, finite attitudes. On top, a music blared ins and outs-- its ways and wants from the speakers adjusted by the hands of the uncaring and the frivolous and quaint. Elsewhere, people slept far further down, downed until they waked, and harder workers worked harder down still with no future rewards in sight, just tedious delirium and sadness. Meanwhile, the hot sun had long since set itself once again, its glowing creeping deep below the dusty horizoned windowsill of the lone B

"You are inside Borealis, Howl," a man said through an invisible loud speaker. "Killer." He chuckled. It was just another white room that lacked all depth and definition after the sudden flurry of images had dissipated. Silent tears trickled down Howl's cheeks. His brain was in pieces, and his heart had beat itself into submission. The boy tried to speak again but could only produce squeaks. Another chuckle through the loud speaker. "I'm surprised you don't recognize my voice," the man said. His voice was smug. "No matter, though. You're a smart boy. You'll figure it out before too long." Howl blinked, severing a stream of tear drops from

Red light. Blood walls. The color. Howl was scared. The screeching, the flashing. Pulsating, highly audible and visible pain. It wouldn't stop. Everything had been white. Then. The hatch closed behind him. Above him. He had come from the ceiling. The desert. Pain. No sky. Pain. No wind. Stale air. Ears hurting. Howl clutched his ears. He never wanted to let them go. His head began to pound. He closed his eyes tighter and tighter and began to grimace. What was happening? Though full of flashing red light, the room lacked definition, save the ladder leading back up to the closed hatch. To the desert. To serenity. Nature. And concrete. Howl wan

Ember smiled, "Yup, I was right behind you." She walked over to Aurora's side and looked out at the city along with her friend. "If it hadn't been for that champagne bottle of yours, I probably would have never noticed you." "You think so?" Aurora asked, somewhat rhetorically. "Yeah. I mean, you're lucky it wasn't more than just me and those guys--" "The Riser Dogs?" "Yeah, who noticed you. You know," Ember turned to face Aurora, but the city girl kept her face planted against the window. "You never did tell me where you got that bottle from." Sounding somewhat bored with Ember's question, the city girl responded, "Garnet." "What?" "Ga

The long, metal hallway was purple and cold. Aurora didn't like it. It was too small and cramped. Where was the sky? Why was it so dark? Ember walked along in front, quiet and cautious. "You okay?" she said, looking back, a faint echo following her words. "I'm fine," Aurora lied. Her new clothes were too tight. "Loosen up, will ya?" Ember said with a slight smirk. "The goal is not to stick out." She thought for a moment. "Not that that's really achievable given that there are no records of you ever living here. Your name isn't on file. Your face--" "I thought you said you watched us somehow, even though you're in here. Doesn't that mean o

A small burst of sand popped into view behind a nearby sand dune, raining and mixing granules of yellow and beige over and beyond the summit of the guilty desert bulge that covered the explosion's origin. Howl darted behind an empty platform of concrete that sheltered itself beneath a semi-transparent red tarp. He peeked over. Saw nothing. But heard the sound of shifting sand and scooping hands. Five minutes passed, and the sound stopped. Footsteps, boots digging into sand, climbing, replaced the previous sound. Howl waited. The footsteps stopped. Still no sight of the noise maker, the sand blower. Howl crept backward into an alleyway that st

Howl frowned at the dunes sprawling out in front of him. There seemed no end to them, but he knew that there probably was an end, an end that he would never get to see. He had tried his best to see the end of the desert once, but even the tip of the tallest skyscraper in Borealis had not been high enough to look beyond the horizon. It frustrated him. He knew that if his eyes were unable to make the journey, then surely the rest of his body would fair far worse, and his body was already capable of so much at such a young age. Howl could leap, duck, zig and zag with the best of the Unfortunate Ones of the city, rough up anyone he came across, a

Ember poked the yolk of one of her eggs, cooked sunny side up, until one of the eggs popped. The warm, orangey yellow stuff inside oozed up and bled out as soon as she removed the prong of her fork from the puncture. Plump liquid slowly covered half of the plate. It was weird, so Ember popped the second egg to fill the rest of the plate. Aurora, who had asked for her eggs scrambled, leaned over and lightly scolded Ember, "Don't be wasteful. Your eggs will be cold soon. Eat." She shoveled the last of her scramble into her mouth, barely chewing and mostly inhaling. "Okay," Ember said. She hadn't ever seen eggs before, and although she should