Time of Death

Copyright: Hrimwriter 2012

Time of Death

Shadows slink along silent corridors. Solitary crowds of

strangers sit side-by-side, stoic and unstirring: hushed

suspense. Silver-haired, she awaits a son and sister,

steels herself for the shush of the off-switch:

soporific swansong, bypass shutting down;

her heart in her husband’s chest, stops.

Beside her, chiaroscuro disguises

the shroud and scythe

sequestered amongst

scrub-clad saviours.

Gray’s insufficient,

souls shepherded

beyond the skill of

shocks and stethoscopes.

An unseasoned resident is

inspired to shame; he sourly

shakes his head. Romanticises

the day that steel drawers lie empty:

science steals white stiffs, black statues,

wins the fatal game. Scored on strange faces is

familiar helplessness. Sorrow submerses shared

joys. A last nostalgic sigh. Straining at the summit of

survival, the escaping spirit slips flesh shackles. Suddenly.

Recovery

Copyright: Hrimwriter 2012

Recovery

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK!”

Lucy Kennedy, spook, spy and undercover expert extraordinaire, kicked out savagely at the upright on her treadmill. She bared her teeth at the deep dent her sneaker toe drove into the heavily scarred surface. Four minutes slower than her average time for a ten-mile run. Four whole minutes! Twelve minutes off her best time and her lungs burned as though the air were molten. She grit her teeth as the adrenaline waned, invoking phantom aches that methodically commemorated a whole history of wounds: broken ribs and clavicle, a dislocated shoulder, splintered ulna, torn hamstring, dislocated patella, torn ankle ligaments and crushed toes. Her head throbbed with years of fractures and repeated concussions.

“Fuck,” she spat again for emphasis.

Curled up on a red beanbag with an open e-reader, Charlotte Schuster eyed her with the sympathetic perplexity of a military wife.

“You were beaten into a coma ten months ago,” she pointed out sensibly. “You’re doing amazingly well, Luce.”

Kennedy glared at her, breathing hard.

“The hell I am! Those bastards really screwed me over.”

Charlotte lowered the e-reader to her knee and waited, patient and inviting.

As always, Kennedy swung on her heel and strode over to the rain-spattered apartment window that overlooked the city. There were things a civilian would never understand. Should never have to understand. Too many things. She scowled at the rain drip-dripping down the glass and gave the wooden frame a thump, as though that would close this chapter of her life for good. The rain kept coming, just like the blows had done.

Aftershock

Copyright: HrimWriter 2012

 

Aftershock

“You know the trouble with putting people on pedestals, Aimee?”

 

Special Agent Edward Wilson tore his attention from the wall-mounted plasma screen to glance wryly at the forensic analyst beside him.

 

She answered distractedly, without thinking.

 

“They fall off?”

 

A thin track of black mascara streaked her white foundation. For a second, Wilson saw her as a part of the grainy black and white footage that flickered on the screen, as if she – as if they all – had become star noirs in this latest macabre crime scene.

 

Then Aimee’s narrow brows drew together sharply under her heavy black fringe. Incredulity flashed into her grey eyes and her blood red lips parted in an unvoiced denial of her statement, her assumption of what he meant. Inwardly flinching that she could think that of him, Wilson shied his gaze from her face and found himself confronting once more the image that had stilled on the screen.

 

His boss hung in chains. Sweat slicked his silvering hair to his scalp. Muscles and tendons in his strong-jawed face and powerful body bulged and strained in resistance to the inflicted agony. His lips were sealed stoically in a tight white line.

 

“Nope.”

 

Edward reached for Aimee’s keyboard and punched the screen into darkness. He faced her again, haunted and grim.

 

“It’s realising that you didn’t put ’em on one that was high enough.”

O for a muse of…any element really!

Right. Or perhaps write. That is the intention. To amuse, interest, inspire, and to stop scribbling ficbits down in notebooks never to see the light of day. This blog constitutes the new home of the full-grown plotbunnies: flash fiction, short fiction, and – hopefully – published fiction links. Here’s to drinking cups of caffeine and vacations from reality!