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Fire of the Gods
This Chuck Wendig challenge is harder than most. 1000 words and the title has to be “Fire of the Gods.”
Mary Goodheart’s grandmother raiser her arm.
“No Grandma,” said Mary. ”That’s the arm with the medicine.”
“Come closer,” said her grandmother. ”My time is close.”
The smell of over ripe oranges filled the room.
“Don’t be silly,” said Mary.
A scream came from the outside.
“Leave me alone,” screamed a woman. ”I’m on the way into the hospital. It’s safe ground!”
The cackling laughs of teens echoed from the street. ”You aren’t in the hospital yet!”
There was a roar of fire.
The woman screamed again. Sobs cut it off.
Mary thought she could hear a whisper; “My baby. Please I am pregnant.”
Yellows and orange light filled the room.
“Wait!” The voice of on older man shouted.
“Close the window Mary,” said he grandmother.
Mary walked over to the window. Three boys held the balls of fire over their head and a man held them back. The boys had chosen fire as their personal power. Boys lacked originality but were just as deadly as the girls and the female preference for black and blood themes.
Fire of the Gods, she thought. What Gods would give this power to adolescents without restrictions?
Mary removed the bar from under the window and started to slide it down.
“I sense a new power,” said the man. ”The man spun his hand around the boys and the fires disappeared.
If only those boys would help that woman, just one of them, she thought. I just don’t know how I can help.
The window slid shut. Mary latched it and walked back to her grandmother.
“I’m sorry Grandma,” said Mary. ”Boys had balls of fire, but a man stopped them.”
“Mary,” said her Grandmother. ”I must talk to you.”
Her grandmother’s body shook with a chill. Mary removed her own sweater and laid it on top of the blanket. ”Rest Grandma.”
The grandmother’s eyes opened fully. Then sweat poured from her grandmother.
Mary took her hand. ”What is it Grandma?”
Was this the time? Was Mary about to be on her own?
“Mary, my control is almost gone. I can no longer stop you from realizing you have the Gift of the Gods.” Her grandmother started a hacking cough.
“Grandma, no one calls it that anymore. It’s called Fire of the Gods for a good reason.”
“Listen.” Her grandmother had the same rebuke from when Mary was little.
“Okay Grandma,” said Mary. She patted her hand. This woman had raised her since she was an infant. After teenage girls with the Fire of the Gods had killed her parents with dark smoke and blackness. Mary would do whatever her grandmother asked.
“Mary, I wanted you to know before I left.” Her grandmother pointed to a cup of water. Mary handed it to her so she could drink before continuing. ”Mary, I wanted to raise you to know that being pure of heart and full of love and kindness is all you ever needed.”
“You did Grandma. Love and kindness is all we’ve ever needed.”
Grandmother’s face blossomed into a smile. ”The Internal Light is bright inside of you. It has kept you safe. But you need the truth.”
“The truth Grandma?”
“Your father survived the attack that killed your mother.” The old woman paused and put down the cup. He smile faded. ”He lost his way.”
Mary listened out of respect for her grandmother.
“You need to be stronger than he was,” her grandmother coughed again. Mary reached for the cup of water, but her grandmother waived her away. ”I will be able to help myself shortly dear. Now brace yourself.”
Her grandmother took her hand back and then Mary felt a burning inside her.
“Anything you want,” screamed her grandmother. ”Remember your Internal Light.”
The window crashed in, framing and bricks crashed down to it.”
Everything around Mary slowed. But she was burning from the inside out. A voice inside her screamed, “choose!”
This is crazy, All I want is to spread love and kindness. All I want is to go places and stop meanness and bad people.
Mary felt herself rise. Their was something holding her up from inside of her.
“Mother?” the man screamed from outside the window. ”You have been alive?”
Mary watched her Grandmother throw a ball of something at the man just as she was hit with lightning. He was knocked backwards and trapped.
He through a bolt of lightning at grandma!
Mary flew over to her grandmother.
Yes I can fly. It is normal for me to fly.
She took her dead grandmother’s hand in hers and cried.
Mary felt no rage.
My name is not Mary. It is Internal Light. Mary is my secret name.
She felt love. She flew out of the window and filled the man with love, with kindness, and with forgiveness.
The man waived his hand and undid the ball trapping him and plummeted to the ground. Mary tried to catch him. She did not want him to be hurt, just to feel love and kindness.
She missed.
The man splayed on the ground at the feet of the boys.
“Ha ha, we can kill this woman now,” said one boy.
“And then kill us a new power,” said another. He pointed at Internal Light
All three boys raised balls of fire and threw it at the pregnant woman.
Internal Light threw a heart shaped shield in front of the woman and then stepped into the fire. She dispersed it with a wave of love from her hand.
“You boys need to tell the others who have abused the Fire of the Gods that their is a new leader in town. Her name is Internal Light.”
She smiled at the woman.
The boys ran away.
The woman stood cautiously then ran to the hospital.
Internal Light flew up over the buildings at looked down on her city. She would fill it with love.
Seed of Hope
Yes! Check it out guys and gals. It’s another Chuck Wendig Challenge!
This time the challenge is to use ten ‘given’ words and write a flash fiction under 1000 words with those words..
The ten words I have are; Cape, Research, Finger, Dinosaur, Paradise, Gate, Seed, Scream, Justice, and Insult.
And, here we go…
Against the calm waters of the Cape of Good Hope, the name Tony and Gina had given to this area to identify it among the thousands of miles of western interior seaway beaches, Tony hurried along the sands and ferns. Though this area was a paradise compared to the lands that would be known as Appalachia, they were still dangerous. He shuffled his feet over the sand and dodged the giant ferns. His hand was cupped to catch blood dripping from a cut in his finger.
“Take nothing with you and leave nothing behind,” he said aloud. The mantra had worked for him for years and it had kept him alive. But now, Tony was frightened. If his DNA splashed on ancient soil…
His foot slipped down toward the edge. Tony stopped and and placed his feet back on the dune. “Relax,” he thought. There was more than 99% probability that even if his whole body was left behind, it would not change evolution or history. One drop of blood may not matter. What was important was getting back to the gate, to Gina.
“Focus,” he thought. The mantra was more than just a saying. It was The Code. Everyone who travelled in time had to follow the code or face the consequences. He was in danger of breaking both facets of the code, when he only intended to break one.
The seed, perched between his thumb and finger was darker red than the blood that collected in the palm of his hand. Five years of research had led he and Gina to know this seed was what was needed.
A shadow went overhead. A pterosaur soaring over the ocean looking for something swimming too close to the surface.
Tony ducked.
He was too big to be considered prey by one of these flying creatures, but better safe than sorry when it flew so close.
Tony counted to ten, stood up, and started walking again. The only thing that could stop him was the Justice of Time. ”Or one if his Justiciars,” he thought.
If this seed got to his lab, he and Gina could grow this plant, and develop the antidote without the Justice noticing. If he were caught, tiny Gina would suffer as much as he — as well as the people with the affliction. All of Tony and Gina’s research would be confiscated and time portals destroyed.
He looked down to his hip. His dazer hung loosely. It was set to blind. He could not kill here. It did not matter if it were a fish, a plant, nor a dinosaur. But, he could blind one to give him time to get away.
“Two more dunes and then the gate,” thought Tony.
A flash of light came over the dune where his gate was. Did some dinosaur try to walk into it?
Tony crouched under the ferns and skittered through the ferns out of site until he could see the gate.
A Justiciar guarded the gate.
Tony stayed down. The ferns swayed around him in the wind. He knew he had ample cover. The Justiciars were just men.
Tony dropped his hand and wiped it on his shirt. The risk of spilling a drop of blood was minimal now, they had found him without it. He placed the seed in his left had and grabbed his dazer from his holster. When the Justiciar turned his head to look towards the sea, Tony charged. The sand did not let him move fast, but he moved silently.
When the Justiciar turned back in his direction, Tony fired.
The Justiciar dropped his dazer and clasped at his eyes.
Tony dashed passed him and through the gate. The anguished scream of the Justiciar cut off with the gate’s closing.
Tony panted on the ground. He chuckled to himself. The worst possible insult to a Justiciar was to die breaking The Code. Unless the Justiciar risked altering history or evolution, he would never be noticed by the Justice of Time.
Tony looked at the seed in his hand and started to stand.
“We travel in pairs,” said a second Justiciar.
Tony started to turn when a dazer blast went off. He hit the ground at the same time he heard a thud.
“So do we,” said Gina. She untucked herself from a supply cabinet and jumped down. ”And I don’t set to blind.”
Tony stood up and showed her the seed. ”We got it baby.”
She smiled and ran into his arms.
The two of them could now grow the plant that they could develop the antidote for. But that could wait for a little while.
