18 years after the Event
A scream pierces the night. The girl it belongs to sits bolt upright in bed, sweating and breathing hard. Darkness shivers and swirls around her, almost tangible, but stills when her eyes focus, flicking about nervously. She does not call out as she would have years ago. She is too old for that now. Instead, she reaches out and turns on her bedside lamp.
Yellow light spills onto the bedside table, illuminating a sketchpad and stick of charcoal. The girl's hand, already smudged with black, grasps the charcoal and wearily presses it to the paper. As she moves her hand, it marks out a jagged glyph into the paper, dark an
The mess hall was full of mirthful laughter and cigarette smoke as alcohol and conversation flowed. A firm hand gripped Alavon’s shoulder as it’s owner guffawed, his eyes bright with intoxication.
“Drake!” the man exclaimed. “You will not believe the jokes this guy tells!”
Alavon glanced to the French pilot standing with his gunman, George Starling.
“Oh?” he said. “Do tell.”
The French man’s face turned bright red. “Eet was nothing, sir. Just a jab at ‘ow easy eet eez to down their Zeppelins.”
“I see.” Alavon said and extended h
The Waking // Chapter 1: Free Fall by AKFeniks, literature
Literature
The Waking // Chapter 1: Free Fall
186 days after the Event
186. Alavon thought as the sun dawned. She knew exactly how many days had passed since the Event.
186. She got up, being careful not to disturb her five roommates, and pulled on a pair of jeans as the number repeated over and over in her head like a mantra.
It had been 186 days since she had lost the last remaining member of her family, Grandma Anna. She had already been an orphan; her mother having died giving birth to her sixteen years prior and her father having drunk himself to death a few years afterwards. Uncle Alavon, her namesake, mother's brother, and Grandma Anna's son, had disappeared without a trace a few