The Nihilist Ranger

The Friday Challenge for 2/27/09 was Nihilists in Space.


Jack486 emerged abruptly from his dream and rolled out of his sleeping net. The ship’s alarm was screeching stridently and unceasingly. He strode forcefully into the control center and looked for indicators to tell him what the problem was this time. It wasn’t going to take too many more of these early morning episodes for him to get to the point of dismantling the alarm, no matter what headquarters said.

There it was on the proximity warning screen. A system with planets was about two days away. He punched the buttons that told the alarm he had seen the warning and was complying with the directive. It shut off immediately. He rubbed his eyes and waited for the com unit to connect.

A scene from his interrupted dream floated into his thoughts. What was that thing, anyway? It was a vine with thorns, and it had a very thick, strong stalk. He always dreamed about plants, either plants fighting each other, or else himself fighting off a gang of plants. And always the dream ended with the Cleaner destroying all the other plants.

The Cleaner was the ultimate weapon that he carried from planet to planet. It was a superplant, stronger and more virulent than any other plant that had ever existed. Its job was to clean up planets whose sentient inhabitants had socially imploded. He would seed it over the planet, and in a few days, it would cover the surface. After a decade or so, there would be no sign of civilization, no evidence that any other entities had ever been there, whether animal or vegetable.

But the best thing about the Cleaner was that after about a hundred years of being the only thing alive on the planet, it would get sick of itself and mutate. No one could predict what creatures would spring up on any planet. It was different every time. There would be a wide variety of plants and animals and eventually, sentient beings. And then the process would start all over again. Each new planet would begin with eager virility, but after thousands of years they all ended the same way. They would give up on their goals and dreams and turn on each other, becoming more and more self-destructive until they finally reached the implosion point, and society died.

“Jack?” The com unit had connected with headquarters.

“Yes, I’m here. I’ve received a proximity warning of a system with planets.”

“Have you attached your monitoring device, yet?” The voice was female, and he could swear he caught some motherly overtones. That was probably on purpose, to get him to obey orders. A slight smirk touched his lips. She hadn’t read his file yet, if she thought he would respond favorably to a reminder of his mother.

“No, I haven’t done anything but wait for your voice, HQ.”

“That’s good, Jack. You may get out the device and attach it now. Let me know when you are ready to test it.”

He pushed another button, this time on the door of the monitor dispenser. The door opened, and one monitor popped out. He scooped it up and pulled the strap over his head, positioning the little gadget so a sensor plate was over his temple, and a tiny tube was next to his ear. He didn’t really want to know how it worked, but he knew it measured him in hundreds of ways, from temperature and heart rate to what he was thinking and feeling.

“Ready for testing,” he said.

“Beginning calibration,” the HQ voice replied. There was a short pause. “Your temperature is a bit low, your pulse rate is a little high, your bladder is full, and you are feeling irritated. Did the alarm wake you?”

“Yup. Again,” he said emphatically.

“Is there anything unusual? Are you feeling well?”

“Nothing unusual, and I’m feeling fine.”

“What are you thinking about the planets up ahead?”

“I wasn’t thinking about them. I was thinking I want some coffee.”

“Your attitude is not very cooperative this morning. You know this is to help you as much as it will help us. We are trying to find out why planet checkers are disappearing.”

“Yes, ma’am, sorry.” He tried to say it as cooperatively as possible. No use getting HQ on his case.

“So, what are you thinking about the planets up ahead?”

“Nothing unusual. I feel ready to check them and carry out all functions necessary to the situation I find. I’m not having any strong emotions about them, and I hope I don’t have any. I’d really rather this was another routine case where nothing goes wrong.”

There was a slight pause, then HQ asked, “Are you feeling any fear or reluctance to approach the planets? This is the first time you have expressed a preference not to experience whatever may be happening to others in your group.”

Jack thought about it for a few seconds. “It’s possible that the lack of any concrete information about these disappearances over such a long period of time is making me a bit apprehensive. We’ve been monitoring for almost two years now, haven’t we? And there are no answers yet.”

“That’s true, but we do have a great deal of data, and statistical analysis of that data is beginning to provide some common threads. I have no doubt we will eventually find answers.”

“Okay, well, I just hope I won’t be one of the contributors of that data. I want things to go on the same as always.”

“Test complete,” was HQ’s response. “Your monitor is calibrated and recording. I have turned on your ship’s hourly reminders. You are ready. Any questions or comments before I go?”

“No, ma’am. I’m good.” Really ready for coffee, too, he thought to himself.

“Then good luck, and enjoy your coffee.” The com unit clicked off.

Guess the mind reading part is working, thought Jack.

An hour later, when the first reminder started, he was on his third cup and reading the report he had retrieved about the nearby planets. So far he had discovered only one of the planets had any life on it, and that planet had been Cleaned about two hundred years ago. He would get to see the beginnings of a new world. Or rather, a renewed world.

“This is your hourly reminder.” The ship’s voice was smooth, calm, and confident. And male. Nothing disturbing. “Have you noticed anything unusual? Are you feeling different in any way? Please report to the monitor.”

Jack automatically spoke aloud to give the monitor something to record. “I feel normal. I have not noticed anything unusual,” then returned to his reading. The monitor perched above his ear buzzed for a second, then the com unit clicked on and off again. Report sent.

A few minutes later, the com unit clicked on. “Jack486?” This voice was male, but not smooth, calm, or confident. It was more interested, maybe a trifle irritated.

Jack was startled. Now this was something unusual. “Yes? Who is this?”

“This is HQ. I was reviewing your report, and I see you were noticing something unusual, but you didn’t report it, something about two hundred years and a new world. Please explain.”

Getting over his momentary surprise, Jack explained that he had been reading information about the planetary system he was approaching. He read that part of the report to HQ. “Is that unusual? I know I’ve never been near a planet that soon after Cleaning, but I assumed other people had.”

“You are right, other people have observed planets after Cleaning, but what is unusual is that your ship has plotted a course to this system much earlier than necessary. It takes at least a couple thousand years to get to the implosion point.”

“Oh, oh yeah.” Jack was thoroughly embarrassed. “Sorry, that didn’t even occur to me.”

HQ didn’t seem to notice his discomfort. “I want you to run a diagnostic on the ship’s directional program. In fact, run diagnostics on all programs. When you get the results, send them through.”

“Sure, right away.”

The com unit clicked off.

“Hey, wait! I noticed something unusual. HQ called me. That’s unusual. And I felt embarrassed. That’s very unusual.”

HQ was already gone, but his monitor buzzed for several seconds, and the com unit clicked on and off. Report sent.

He stood there nonplussed for a moment, and then he grinned from ear to ear. “I noticed something unusual. And that is that I noticed something unusual. And the monitor reported it.” The monitor buzzed and the com unit clicked on and off. Satisfied, Jack486 prepared to run diagnostics.

* * * * * * * *

Two days later, Jack stared at the screen showing the planet’s surface as the ship passed over it. This was supposed to be the planet that had been Cleaned two hundred years ago, but it was not what he had expected to see. It was uniformly covered with the Cleaner, but instead of strong, healthy plants, they were wilted and had brown tips. Here and there, he saw open patches, where nothing grew.

“Uh … I am seeing something un…,” he began. Just then the hourly reminder broke in, asking for the umpteenth time if he had noticed or felt anything unusual. “Yeah, yeah, yeah…..give me a chance, will ya?”

Then he gasped. A crashed ship had flashed by on the screen, in the middle of one of the bare patches. It was a ship just like his, manned by a planet checker. He rapidly pushed buttons and started programs to look for life forms and remnants of civilization. He didn’t have any programs specifically designed to look for crashed ships, but they would be included in remnants of civilization.

The readout streamed data so fast he could barely keep up with it. It reported ship after ship, all crashed in the bare patches. The Cleaner plants were reported as life forms, but that was it. Nothing else was alive on the planet. He kept looking until the report started repeating. Hundreds of ships had crashed here, but not a single planet checker had survived.

He knew it was a lost cause, but he turned on the com unit anyway, to listen for SOS signals. His jaw dropped in amazement. There were hundreds of SOS recordings, so many that he couldn’t make out the individual messages.

“Ship, separate out one signal,” he demanded.

“Which signal?” asked the ship. “The signal from the life forms, or the signal from the remnants of civilization?”

“Wha…? The signal from the life forms.” It was wishful thinking. There were no living inhabitants of those ships.

Nevertheless, the ship was broadcasting the signal. “There is nothing. All life ends in nothing.” The message repeated over and over, while Jack sat horrified, eyes on the screen showing the planet’s surface. The plants streamed by, endlessly wilting, lamenting the death of all life, refusing to begin again one more time.

The ship shuddered. Jack looked around wildly. There were red lights flashing and alarms buzzing all around the control center. It was about to crash!

His last thought was that the monitor was overdue to report to HQ. It had failed to report that he had noticed and felt unusual things. It had reported nothing.

The ship crashed into a thick bunch of the Cleaner plants. There was a small flurry of activity, which soon subsided. By the time the next planet checker came along, Jack’s ship was in a bare patch, and it was broadcasting an SOS message. “Task finished, Jack486 logging out. There is nothing to be done here. There is nothing here. There is nothing.”

Another Kind of Pain

This story was written a long time ago, and although it would qualify for this week's Friday challenge by its topic, it probably took more than a week to write, so I am not entering it. My entry for this week is the post below.

Lynis gazed steadily up through the ceiling of the water above her head, waiting for the man to pass by in his bright green boat. Her long, golden hair drifted slowly with the small currents as she hung motionless in the water. She came as often as she could to watch the man row past on top of the waves, but always she was afraid someone would see her.

She peered at a spot far away on the surface. Yes, now she was sure it was the boat. The ends of the paddles dipped swiftly and rhythmically into the top of the bay. When he finally passed overhead he was still far above her, but she dared not go any higher for fear he might see her. He was young and strong looking, and he had light brown hair. She watched until he had disappeared in the distance, then slowly turned to swim back home in the deepest part of the bay.

Every time she saw the man, her desire to be human grew stronger. She wondered what it would really be like. It couldn’t be as bad as her parents and everyone had told her. And she knew there had been some sea people who had become human and had never come back. In fact, she had heard that Old Murella’s sister had been one of those. An idea shaped itself in Lynis’ mind, and she swam faster.

Old Murella lived on the edge of the underwater town, in a small cave-house. She lived alone. When Lynis arrived at her door, she graciously welcomed her.

“What is it, Child? You are troubled.”

Lynis gathered her courage to her. “I have a confession. I have gone many times to watch a human man ride his boat across the surface of the water. I knew this was forbidden, but I went anyway, first because I was curious, and then because … because I wanted to become human myself.” Her voice died away into silence. Old Murella’s face was grave, but still kind, and that encouraged Lynis to go on.

“I have heard our people say that your sister became human, and I thought perhaps you knew the secret.”

Old Murella answered slowly. “Yes I know the secret.”

“Will you tell it to me?”

Old Murella as silent for a long time before she answered. “It is a potion. If you were to drink it, your tail would divide into two parts which would become legs. Then you would no longer look like a mermaid, but like a human.”

Lynis interrupted eagerly. “Do you have any of this potion?”

“Yes, Child. But that is not all that happens. When you reach the lands outside the sea, every step you take on your human legs will bring you pain.”

“But surely I could bear that pain. Do we not have pain here also?”

“That is true. And my sister has told me that the pain is quite easily born after a while. But there is more in the secret. At first, even though you will look like a human, you will still be a mermaid inside. You will long for the sea and for your own people. This is the hardest part, and when my sister told me about it, I decided not to become human myself.

“But afterwards there is a change. I will never forget the last time my sister came out to the middle of the sea in a boat to speak with me. That was many years ago. She spoke of another kind of pain. She could not explain it to me and I could not understand. She said it came from inside oneself, but yet unwillingly.”

“Is that pain great?” Lynis asked hesitatingly.

“I think it is, but my sister spoke as though she were glad to have received it. She said she had at last truly become human.”

Both were silent with their own thoughts. Then Lynis asked, “If I were not happy as a human, could I ever become a mermaid again?”

“There is a way, but I do not know it. However, the voice of the sea that comes out of the sea foam, can tell you.”

Lynis’ thoughts focused to a decision. “I want to drink the potion.”

Old Murella talked with her a while longer to make her think of all the consequences, but Lynis did not change her decision, so she gave her a tiny amber-tinted, glass bottle, and told her to drink it near the edge of the bay.

Soon afterward Lynis found an opportunity to go to the top of the water, and this time she swam farther than she ever had before. When she neared the edge of the bay, she opened the bottle and drank quickly. Feeling rushed over her like a huge wave, leaving a residue of pain, which rapidly grew stronger. She looked down at her new legs, and then stood up in the shallow water. As she walked slowly toward the beach, sharp, biting pains shot up from her feet.

Once on the beach, she looked back at the shimmering water. The foam on the tops of the waves reminded here through the pain of her feet that she should ask the secret of becoming a mermaid again. She shouted the question out across the bay. The answer came back in a liquid whisper.

“On the high rocks behind you, there grows a weed watered by the sea. If you eat it, the pain in your legs will go away, for you will again have a mermaid’s tail. But if you have another kind of pain, it will always remain with you.”

Lynis stood for a moment, looking at the waves rushing softly onto the beach and listening to the sounds of the sea. Then she turned her back to it and slowly began making her way inland.

The first house she saw was on a small farm, and there was a woman working in the garden outside. She took pity on Lynis and gave her food and clothing, and later, when she and her husband discovered that Lynis had no home, they took her as their own daughter, for they had only a son. He was the young man Lynis had watched many times from under the water, and his name was Paul.

As the days passed, Lynis came to love Paul and his family with a stronger love than any she had ever known, and soon she realized she wished to marry him. But he loved a girl who lived on a nearby farm. Lynis tried in every way she could to turn his love to herself, but to no avail.

One day she saw Paul and the girl Joan preparing to go out on the bay in Paul’s boat. Lynis became very unhappy. She had often wanted to go with Paul in his boat, and now he was taking Joan. She watched them move slowly out on the lake, and the longing she felt grew rapidly into an ugly hate. She ran down to the water’s edge. As she looked out at the boat in the middle of the bay, tears came into her eyes and spilled into the sea. The rippling voice of the Sea spoke softly.

“Why do you weep, Daughter?”

Lynis told her unhappiness to the waves and asked what she should do.

“I will help you,” was the whispered answer. “What do you wish to happen?”

Instantly Lynis replied, “I want her to die. Then Paul will love me.” As soon as she had spoken, she wished she had not, but it was too late. The sea was rising swiftly and violently. Thundering waves crashed over the tiny boat in the bay. A huge mountain of water came up underneath it and overturned it.

Lynis could not see what had happened to the two small figures in the water. Without realizing it, she was calling, “Paul! Paul!” She was on her knees begging the sea to give Paul to her. Wave after wave rushed onto the beach with a roar. After an endless time, she caught sight of a dark object riding on the top of an approaching wave. Then she was in the water, swimming with all her strength, grabbing hold of the body, dragging it out onto the sand. His eyes were closed, but just as she was giving up hope, he coughed weakly. Sobbing softly against his wet shirt, she could say nothing.

Paul sat up suddenly as he remembered what had happened.

“Joan! Where’s Joan!” He turned abruptly to Lynis. “What happened to her? Where is she?”

“She is dead. The sea took her.”

For a long, sickening moment, Paul looked into her eyes with utter agony and despair. Then he stood up slowly and walked away along the water’s edge, his head bowed and his shoulders shaking. Lynis sat unmoving on the sand. The full knowledge of what she had done to Paul was upon her. Never would she forget the pain in his eyes—the pain she had given him.

As the long months passed, Lynis’ one purpose was to take the pain out of Paul’s eyes. When Paul laughed, Lynis was happy; when he sat in the darkness, looking out the window toward the bay, then she tried desperately to distract him from his thoughts. Slowly, ever so slowly, he laughed more and looked at the sea less. Finally came the time when Lynis realized with a leap of her heart that Paul was beginning to love her. There was a new look in his eyes.

One day he smiled and said, “You’ve been good to me, Lynis. Always kind, and never hurting me.”

As Lynis smiled in return and turned back to her sewing, the vivid memory of the two small figures in the tossing waves rose viciously in her mind. Once more she saw Paul’s look of despair, and once more she felt the terror of knowing she had caused it.

It was not long afterwawrd that she knew Paul had realized he loved her. Soon he would ask her to marry him. Lynis thought about that often, but the happiness of it was always taken away by the memory of the pain she had given Paul. Again and again she saw the violent sea, and Paul walking away with bowed head. She tried to push the pictures out of her mind, but others replaced them. Joan’s face. The waves crashing on the beach. And Paul’s eyes. Always Paul’s eyes.

“Will I never be rid of this unhappiness?” she asked herself. She knew she could not marry Paul if she saw pain in his eyes instead of love, every time he looked at her.

Then a terrifying thought came to her. “If I could give him pain once, I might do so again!” A flood of fear swept through her. She found herself running down to the beach, then scrambling on the jagged rocks, grasping at the tall weeds. Her trembling hands pushed the pointed leaves into her mouth. Her teeth chewed rapidly. She swallowed. Immediately she felt a great longing to be in the water. She ran and splashed into the cool, gentle waves. The sea foam swished softly around her face and hair, welcoming her. She realized with delight that the sensation of coolness was really the absence of the constant pain in her legs. Once more she had a tail. She had almost forgotten what it was like to be without pain.

Lynis paused in her frolicking. Had she said “without pain?” The familiar memory of Paul’s face rose before her. But this time there was a new agony in his eyes. She knew he would look that way when he discovered she was gone. She felt the old terror of knowing she had given him pain, and almost like a visible thing, she felt another kind of pain reflected in her own heart. She had never felt this kind of pain before. Instinctively, she knew that only a human heart could contain it. At last she had learned what it meant to become human.

Sorrowfully she turned downward into the deeper water, to swim forever with the heart of a human and the tail of a fish.

Johnny and Megan

For the Friday Challenge 2/20/09:


Megan's stomach hurt. It hurt almost every night, and she couldn't get to sleep. Even though she was only eight years old, she knew there wasn't enough to eat. Father wasn't able to earn very much money cutting wood, because most everyone in the village was too poor to buy it.

However, she also knew that her friends in the village had garden vegetables to eat, because their mothers worked all day tending their gardens. Megan's mother had a small garden, but she preferred to spend her time making potato wine instead of weeding the greens and picking beans.

Johnny's stomach didn't hurt at night because Mother gave him more to eat. She said he was bigger -- he was nine years old -- and he was a boy, so he needed more.

Every night Megan waited until she could hear her father's snores, and then she would creep silently out of the cottage and go into the garden to look for any vegetables that were ready to eat. Tonight she thought the peas were probably ripe. Peas were good raw.

It seemed like it was taking a long time for Father to fall asleep. She listened extra hard, and she thought she could hear her mother talking. She got up and tiptoed into the large front room and stopped outside her parents' bedroom.

"We will all starve if we don't do this!" her mother was saying. "The only way we will survive is to take the children into the forest and leave them. We MUST do it tomorrow. We only have one loaf of bread left."

"How can I abandon my own children?" her father moaned.

"If you don't, I will leave you! I will tell everyone in the village you are an evil man who beats his wife and children, and nobody will buy any wood from you."

Megan was shocked by what she heard, but she immediately clenched her little fists and vowed to thwart her mother's plan. It would not be the first time she had needed to take care of herself.

She moved on to the outer door and quietly opened it. While she was eating the raw peas, she thought about what she could do. As she looked around for ideas, she saw the pile of round pebbles she had brought up from the creek yesterday. They were bright in the moonlight. She loaded up her nightgown with as many as she could carry.

Back in her room, she put the pebbles in the pockets of her dress, which were many and large. Climbing back into bed, she fell asleep now that her hunger pains were silenced for the moment.

The next day her mother was cheerfully rattling on about a trip into the forest. They would all go with Father while he found some good wood to cut up. She would pack them a lunch of jelly sandwiches. It would be an adventure! Father was silent.

Mother made four jelly sandwiches and distributed them. One and a half for Father, one for Mother, one for Johnny, and one half for Megan. They started off into the forest, Mother still talking cheerfully about the adventure they would have. As they got farther and farther away from the part of the forest that was familiar to Megan, she began to drop the pebbles one at a time along the path.

It was almost lunch time when Megan dropped the last pebble. She asked her mother if she could stop and eat her sandwich. Johnny wanted to eat, too. Mother smiled and said that would be fine, and she and Father would go look for wood to cut. They would be back when it was time to go home.

Megan and Johnny sat under a tree and ate their sandwiches. For a while, they played at drawing pictures in the dust, but they were so tired from walking all morning, they fell asleep. When they woke up, it was dark.

Johnny was frightened. "How will we find our way home?" he cried. "It's dark and we've never been so far into the forest before!"

"Don't worry, Johnny," said Megan. "The moon is shining, and I can see the pebbles I dropped for a trail." She ran to the first pebble and picked it up. "See? They shine in the moonlight."

It didn't take them very long to get back home, running from pebble to pebble until they began to recognize where they were. They burst into the cottage, shouting, "Father! Mother! We are back!"

Mother and Father were very surprised to see them. "Why did you sleep so long?" Mother asked. "We thought you didn't want to come home."

Johnny proudly told them about Megan and the pebbles. He thought she was very clever. Mother frowned and said, "You must be very tired. To bed with you!"

Megan waited as usual for her father to begin snoring. Her stomach was hurting again, and she couldn't sleep. After waiting quite a while, she got up and listened at her parents' door.

"We must try again tomorrow! You will lead us in a different direction. I have made sure she won't get any more pebbles!" her mother hissed angrily.

Sure enough, when Megan went to the outer door, she saw the big wooden bar had been dropped in its place high up where she couldn't reach it. She was locked in! Her fists clenched and she stood still, thinking hard. A new determination came into her face. Yes, she knew what she would do.

The next morning, Mother was all cheerful again, rattling on about the new adventure they would have today, going with Father to look for wood. She packed four jelly sandwiches and distributed them as before. Megan put her half sandwich into her empty pocket. They set off into the forest.

As they went beyond the part of the forest with which she was familiar, Megan reached in her pocket and pulled a crumb of bread from her sandwich and dropped it beside the path. She was sure the bread would shine in the moonlight, too. Maybe not as brightly as the pebbles, but enough to guide them home.

When she ran out of bread crumbs, it was lunch time, and she asked if she could stop and eat lunch. She and Johnny sat beneath a tree and Mother and Father went off to look for wood. Johnny pulled out his sandwich, but then he noticed Megan didn't have hers.

"Aren't you going to eat?" asked Johnny.

"I dropped my sandwich," replied Megan. Johnny immediately offered her half of his, and they ate together happily and drew pictures in the dust. After a while, they fell asleep, and when they woke, it was dark.

"Where are your pebbles?" asked Johnny expectantly.

"I didn't have any pebbles this time," replied Megan. "I dropped bread crumbs from my sandwich instead." She ran back along the path, looking for the first bread crumb, but there were no crumbs to be seen.

"The birds must have gotten them," said Johnny.

Megan looked horrified. "I didn't think of that!"

Now both children were frightened, but they decided to follow the path and try to find their way back home. They walked all night and all the next day, but still they didn't see anything that looked familiar. Exhausted, they fell asleep.

The next day they began walking again, and a short time later, they came upon a funny-looking little cottage in a small clearing. They ran eagerly up to it and knocked on the door, but the door felt strange. It was soft and flaky. It was a big cinnamon roll! They couldn't help it, they were so hungry, they pulled off great chunks and stuffed them into their mouths.

Then they noticed the shutters were made of chocolate! They explored the rest of the cottage. It was all made of various kinds of desserts and breads, cookies and candies, each one more delicious than the last. They ate and ate and ate! Just as they were beginning to feel they couldn't eat another bite, the door opened, and out came an old woman, leaning on a cane.

"Are you lost, children?" she asked.

They explained what had happened, and she made them come inside and gave them water, for they were very thirsty after eating so much sweets. She said they should stay with her and before they knew what she was doing, she had pushed Johnny into a soft bed inside a cage and locked the cage door.

She turned to Megan. "You will be my housekeeper. You will clean and wash up for me, and you will feed your brother until he gets nice and plump. Then I will cook him and eat him!" She cackled wildly. "And if you don't do what I say, I'll eat YOU!"

For a month, the old witch, for that's what she was, kept them locked in the cottage. Every day she brought them plenty of desserts and rich food, made with the same magic she used to make her house. She had trapped many children with her magic candy house, and then she fattened them up and ate them.

The witch was half blind, so every day she felt Johnny's finger to see if he was getting fat enough, but Megan was hiding most of the food so they wouldn't get fat, because she didn't want them to be eaten. Since the witch was so blind, it was easy to hide the food.

After a month of this, the witch became impatient and decided to cook Johnny anyway. So she told Megan to climb into the oven to see if it was hot enough for baking. The witch's oven was a very large outdoor oven with steps leading up to it and a big heavy door.

Megan suspected immediately that the witch was planning to shut the door on her and cook her, so she said she didn't know how to see if the oven was hot enough. "Here, I'll show you," the witch said angrily. She climbed up the steps and stuck her head and shoulders into the oven.

Megan had followed right behind her and shoved her into the oven and shut and latched the door so the witch couldn't get out. Ignoring the witch's screams, she ran into the cottage and unlocked Johnny's cage. The children danced and hugged each other in celebration. Then they ate their fill of the witch's cottage. While Johnny was eating, Megan packed all her pockets would hold of the jewels and gold she had found in the cottage while cleaning. At last they were free to set out for home.

After only a few hours, they realized they were near their cottage. When they ran into the clearing, they saw Father working in the garden. He was very surprised to see them, and kept hugging them and saying, "I searched all over the forest for you. Every day I went looking. But I couldn't find you."

"Where's Mother?" asked Johnny.

"She got sick," Father said with a sob. "I came home and found her. She had been drinking the potato wine, and she got very sick. I took her to the doctor in the village, but it was too late. He couldn't help her."

Johnny burst into tears, but Megan turned away to hide the look of triumph on her face as she pictured her mother drinking the poisoned wine.

"It will be alright, Father," she said. "I found a gold coin in the witch's cottage. You can buy food for us, and we won't be hungry any more." She dug her hand into her pocket and pulled out a large gold coin.

The other gold coins and jewels she didn't mention, but kept them to herself. She never had to be hungry again for the rest of her life, and when she grew up, she lived in a beautiful house and had lots of servants to wait on her, but she never trusted anyone, so she lived alone.

Yellow

Written for my son's challenge, topic: yellow.


He caught the first glimpse of it as he came out of the last hairpin curve and began the short straight stretch leading to the next cluster of curves and dips. Because of the relatively straight road at this point, he could spare a few glances toward the brilliant yellow patches leaping out of the breaks in the trees ahead.

He couldn't figure out what it was. It was much bigger than, say, a school bus, and it wasn't moving. It seemed to be on or near the road ahead, well into the middle of the next few curves. He thought fleetingly of slowing down, but before could really think about it, he was distracted by a flock of black birds taking flight from the fence running along the road. They were probably startled by his approach, but they flew right in front of him, which kept him busy trying to avoid them without going off the road.

Then he was into the next curve, skillfully applying the brake and the accelerator at the right moments to maximize his speed (and therefore his exhilaration) without losing control of the sleek little sports car. He was definitely unprepared for the sight that greeted him as he came out of the third curve.

Even while he was stopping the car as urgently as he could, mental flashes of skidding off the road and flipping end over end down the hill competed with huge yellow shapes scattered over the road, thoroughly blocking it. When his car finally stopped moving, he sat and stared. They were Hummers! Big yellow Hummers! There were at least a dozen. They were skewed all over the road, facing in different directions. Some looked like they had collided, others like they had almost gone off the road to avoid the ones colliding. One had demolished the roadside fence.

The longer he sat there looking them over, the stranger it seemed. There was something very wrong with a dozen yellow Hummers sitting on a road in the middle of a forest, facing every which direction. Then he realized there were no people. Not a single one. No dead people, no injured ones, nobody calling 911 on a cell phone. That was when he should have left. He should have just turned right around and high-tailed it out of there and never looked back. Of course, it was probably already too late for that.

He heard the sound of his engine change from the smooth purring it normally made at idle to a high-pitched humming that hurt his ears. He felt his car moving slowly, closer to the nearest Hummer, until it was touching it. He tried to reach for the gear shift, to shift into reverse, but his hand wasn't cooperating. He looked down at it. It looked strange. It seemed to shimmer like metal, not flesh. Then he realized his whole body was melting and stretching out to blend in with the body of his car, which was turning from red to yellow. He and his car were becoming another yellow Hummer in the middle of the road!

Some time later he sensed it was getting dark. He must have blacked out for a while, because the sun had set. He and his car were now completely transformed into a yellow Hummer, but his mind was still working. He couldn't exactly see, but he sensed the other Hummers. He could even tell that many of them used to be cars, with people in them. He knew they had all been caught that day just like he had, and they were all waking up. But the other ones ... they had never been human.

He tried to struggle. If he had still had legs, he would have been running as fast as he could, but he couldn't move at all. Mentally he felt as though he was clawing at a cage, shrieking and kicking. Then he sensed that one of the not human Hummers was watching him. Even though he felt no trace of compassion from it, he cried out to it from inside his mind. What are you doing to me? Let me go home! What are you going to do with us tonight?

The same thing we do every night, Yellow - try to take over the world!