Caterpillar Crossing
by wittaero

Comment:
They had dared him. Oh, it was dangerous and forbidden, and no caterpillar with any brains in his head would attempt such a thing. No caterpillar with any common sense would even think it.

But they had DARED him. Double caterpillar dared him. TRIPLE caterpillar dared him.

So he did it. When a triple caterpillar dare is on the line, you simply don't think. You do. He did.

When it was over, and his parents found out, he didn't care about the punishments and the admonishments. The new-found respect and admiration of his peers put him on top of the world.

He was such a Brave Little Caterpillar.

Battle Horns
by dainmcgowan

Comment:
Ralph and Frank were long time rivals, but it was the fall of 'aught eight when Frank was suddenly initiated into the realization that Ralph was not only a bit of an ass, but a practical joking ass at that.

Yes, in that autumn of 'aught eight, as they stood there on that field, fighting for hours to get free of each other, was the Great SuperGlue Incident born.

It was a tale passed down to the sound of laughter for many, many a year.

Into the light
by quiet_observation

Comment:
He awoke suddenly, laying there on the ground, pains all over his body. At first he did not know where he was, what he was doing there. All about him was a dense white fog, and a silence that seemed almost unnatural. He struggled for a time to remember. What happened? What was he doing here. He tried to sit up and his head exploded in pain, causing him to wince and grab it in his hands, feeling like he was going to throw up. Somehow he forced himself not too, and soon the sudden pain began to fade, and his eyesight became clearer, and that's when he saw it.

The shadow looming in that mist. Large, and long, and a glint of light hit something on it and suddenly he saw it for what it was, the shattered remains of the fuselage of the plane he'd been on. Yes. He'd been flying. Flying back home after... and then it hit him. The engines going out, the screams, the chaos, the crash. It all came flooding back to him and he stared at that shadowy hulk for what seemed like an eternity.

Eventually, he began to take stock of himself and his surroundings. He was in some pain, but could move. Was he the only survivor? Were there others? He began to call out, but his cries echoed away in that mist. He slowly began to search around, and began to find them. The bodies. The dead. As he found them, he began to despair, and it was then that he saw the movement.

Saw her.

She came out of the mist like an angel through the air, silently, seeming to float there. He stared for a moment, wondering if he was possibly dreaming, and closed his eyes tight and pinched himself, but when his eyes opened once more, she was still there. A little girl, clothed in white, beckoning to him. Suddenly, another memory struck him. On the plane, before the panic, before the crash, he remembered a face peeking at him from over the seat in front of him. A face that had, for a time, played a game of peek-a-boo with him, that had resulted in a fit of giggles from them both, before her mother had sat her down and she had settled in for the long flight, and had eventually fallen asleep.

Now, as he stared, that face, those eyes, that had peeked at him so gaily a lifetime ago, now looked at him from out of the mists. She said not a word, but smiled that familiar smile and beckoned him once more. Then, turning, she began to disappear back into the fog. With a cry, he leapt to his feet, ignoring the pain and began to follow, calling to her. There was no answer. Further and further she led, and it was all he could do to keep her in sight. She would answer none of his calls, none of his questions, but kept a silent and determined trek through the mist.

He did not know how long he went on, following the girl. All he knew is that he lost all sense of time and direction, and was about to collapse from exhaustion when suddenly, he found his feet hitting pavement. He stopped, shocked, and stared. A road. He was on a road. Then, as if from nowhere, a set of lights shone through the now thinning mists and highlighted his form, and brakes squealed and the car came to a stop before him.

As the fog lifted fully, and from somewhere that seemed so far away a voice called out to him asking him if he was mad, what was he doing in the middle of the road, where the hell did he come from, was he ok? From the other side of that voice came another. From a patch of mist on the far side of the road, a pair of eyes gleamed out, and the tinkling sound of a child's laughter dispersed upon the breeze and was gone.

He blinked, and tears formed in his eyes, and he knew in his heart then that the girl hadn't been alive, but had led him to safety, somehow. She'd had one final task, and had delivered him, and for as long as he lived he would remember the peek-a-boo girl.

Mocksi Brown
by Jason_Cross

Comment:
He stood for the photograph, but wasn't happy about it. In fact, deep down, he was terrified. They'd never tried anything before, but this evening he was getting a very malevolent feel from them. Those three. A sort of icy chill that froze his bones and threatened to stop his heart.

They'd been his best of friends. From early teenage jams in the garage, to the formation of the band that would rocket them to stardom, they'd been as tight as a group could be. They believed they would live forever. They believed that they were untouchable.

So when he had fallen asleep at the wheel of their tour van, in an attempt to get back to their roots and see the country from a more personal point of view, and had been the only survivor of that horrible crash, he thought it was his own guilt that would be his undoing. He couldn't have been more wrong.

Now, everywhere he went, trying desperately to save a solo career and get his life back on track, they followed him. The friends that weren't his friends any more. The ghostly apparitions that haunted his every move. That followed his every step. That kept him awake at night, or caused him to wake from the little sleep he did finally fall exhaustingly into screaming from the nightmares that consumed him.

For all of that, however, they had so far just been ghosts. Ghosts of his past, of his failure. Harmless memories of that fateful accident.

He stood for the photograph, but knew something had now changed, and their presence grew stronger and that chill and hatred began to penetrate him, and suddenly he knew that they would be harmless no more.

He stood for the photograph, and the next day, when he was found in bed, passed on, his face frozen in a rictus of pain, they blamed it on the inability to forget his past and the addictions he had gained because of it.

But for the three fading beings standing around his bed, unnoticed by the ones still living, they knew better...

... and they finally claimed the last of their own.

30th Floor Fallsview Room: $325/night; Awe at Seeing the Windows Washed: PRICELESS!!
by annig

Comment:
It wasn't until her formative years later that she finally admitted to her real thoughts that day, and was shocked by the response from her friends.

She didn't realize that it wasn't natural for every child to wonder what the screams would sound like if she opened the window and cut the washer's safety line.

But, she always had been just a little different.

Schoolgirl Reflections
by pawdrix

Comment:
It was a day like any other for the three friends. The three girls that walked to and from school together every day. That laughed and giggled and talked about their favorite toys and hated boys and all the other trappings of the lives of little girls.

So when they stopped near that puddle, to show off in the reflection, a sense of vanity and self already growing, they weren't to know what was in store for them. Soon the fun of posing and the making of faces wore off, and it was decided that it was time for a little mischief. So together, as always, they nodded as one and giggling as they went, they leapt off the edge of the curb to splash into that puddle, knowing that wet shoes would earn them the ire of their parents, but not really caring in the way that children full of curiosity and fun don't care.

They leapt off that curb, and disappeared into a depth that wasn't there. Like dropping into a hole covered by a thin mirror of film, and as they disappeared from our world, they entered another, where they eventually found themselves a pivotal part of a struggle for freedom that earned them the status of Heroines of the Realm...

... but that is a tale for another day.

Beautiful Brown Haired Girl.
by JEFFJSB

Comment:
She stood there every day, and watched the world move. People would come and go. They would talk and laugh and cry. They would ignore her completely, or stand and look for a moment, or some would tease and pose for photographs or abuse her in ways she would try to forget.

Now and then, some kind person would come along and change her clothing for her, or style her hair, or give her a bit of a makeover, and that was nice. It was a horrible, horrible thing, this affliction that she suffered, and she often wondered if anyone even knew that she was there. She often thought that they saw her as some kind of non-living thing, an amusement, or a toy. If she could cry, even a single tear she thought, that would show them, but even that small symbol of humanity seemed to be beyond her. Her frustration and sorrow and heart-break would go on, it seemed, without notice.

She stood there every day, and watched the world go on, and longed to be a part of it and move as they did, and laugh as they did, and know the joys of food and touch and kisses and dancing and laughter and tears.

She stood there every day, and every day, she died a little more inside.

Anatolian Mood
by Pascal

Comment:
Every morning, without fail, she would be there. Standing on the rise, she would lift her hand and face and voice to the heavens, and she would sing.

For as long as they could remember, she was there, her song for the listening, marking each day. For some, that song carried them through their childhood, through the pain of adolescence, through the discovery of young adulthood, until one day they found themselves stopping to listen and then gazing down at their own children's faces to see the wonder there as a new generation heard her song.

For as long as they could remember, she was there, but even memory must end some day, and so too her song. So it was that one morning, when the rise stood empty, the air was still, the morning quieter than they could ever remember it being. So they gathered, and they placed remembrances at that spot, and they circled around...

... and they sang her song.

S. T.
by Lorenza F

Comment:
In the dark of night, in whitewashed dreams, came the tortured version of what she only knew as her inner self. That tortured creature battling demons and personal blockades that melted during the daylight, but came to horrific and detailed life in her sleep.

Wrapped in the bandages of her failures, she fought. Reaching for the paper butterflies of her future, struggling hard to wrap her fingers around the prize. She stretched out and fought, but never seemed to get much closer, those bright and fragile winged creatures always flitting just beyond fingertip reach.

What would become of her, if she ever grabbed her fractured vision of a colorful and beautiful future in those dreams? What would she do if the anxieties that clung to her in wrap and gauze were to ever fall away? What might happen if she were to awake, to find her fingers cupped, and one of those butterflies flitting inside, and to finally know hope and freedom?

In the dark of night, in whitewashed dreams, she found a power that hadn't been there before, a gleam in her one good eye, her body taut and ready and reached out with lightning quickness...

The Hunter
by AP

Comment:
Sadly, though he was a little happy with the goose that he got, his real target got away. He swore though, to keep on hunting, to keep on pursuing that elusive prey.

He swore that he would get Cheney back for that little incident so many years ago.