[F & R] The Next Wave

The day the world ends is not a day for regret, he thought.

He stood at the edge of the Western Front; cliff walls that less than a month ago had been called the Continental Divide. Well, the continent went and got itself divided all right, he thought. He may have even said it out loud. It didn’t matter; no one was around to hear him. A new wall of water, the seventh of the big ones and by far the biggest yet, ambled towards him with its promise of finality. This one would do it.

The world started ending the moment it was born, he imagined, but it started ending in a hurry just a few months ago. After decades of obsessing over apocalypse of all kinds - nuclear annihilation, anthropomorphic climate change (whatever the hell that ever meant), deliberately planned depopulation, collisions with comets or asteroids or planets, zombification virus, alien invasion, ruptures in the space/time continuum - the chaos of our minds finally manifested as chaos in our world.

As below, so above.

Thousands of years of mistranslating that little pearl.

All this time we thought we were following divine footsteps. Turns out we were dancing the lead all along, and the world followed our macabre thoughts to oblivion.

The wave was close now. In the moment before impact, a white light. A glimpse of something.

Another chance.

All is forgiven.

Well said.

You worked a thought briefly, and it tied into itself nicely.

reply to post by Druid42
Thanks! It's kind of a short short story, I guess. I'm pretty happy with it. I've just started reading some of the others, and I was really knocked out by your "I keep my mom in a box." Powerful stuff. Looks like you've been on a good run - I'm looking forward to reading the other stories you've posted!

reply to post by magicrat


We are allowed multiple entries, HINT-HINT.

reply to post by Druid42
I love that you're encouraging your competition to write more - that's my kind of contest!

Best of luck to you and to all the great writers here - I may try to submit more, and I'll definitely be posting more in the short stories forum, whether for this contest, or another one, or just to share some work.