Wednesday, 13 March 2013

Chronic

by John Xero


Jerome flinched as he scratched his head and more hair fell away. His skin was dry, flaking, covered with livid sores. The blood beneath his fingernails disturbed him.

He squinted as he adjusted the chronal fibrillator, cursing his failing eyes.

Time fluttered around him.

His garage walls vanished, replaced by a broken wasteland stretching into the distance. The harsh air clawed at his lungs and rasped his eyes.

Then he was back in his garage, back in twenty thirteen.

How did it all end? When did it begin? He'd only jumped three years forward that time, and still too late.




Author bio: Time gets us all, in the end. The future is like quicksilver – a distorted mirror, hard to grasp, fatal.
I'm on twitter! And I blog (occasionally).


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10 comments:

  1. kymm13 March 2013 at 08:38

    This is wonderful, John.
    Time fluttered around him - left me breathless.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Cat Russell15 March 2013 at 13:24

    Wow. Awesome piece of flash!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Larry Kollar15 March 2013 at 14:21

    Nice! Is this part of the longer thing you're working on?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. John Xero16 March 2013 at 08:47

      Thanks, Larry. No, just written for itself. =)

      Delete
  4. Eric J. Krause15 March 2013 at 15:18

    Excellent story. Quite a warning cry for our earth. I also really enjoyed the line, "Time fluttered around him."

    ReplyDelete
  5. Peter Newman20 March 2013 at 09:58

    I like this idea. Works brilliantly here but would also make a cool short story.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. John Xero20 March 2013 at 11:33

      Thank you, Pete. =)

      Would have to try and avoid the obvious 'he caused the whole thing to happen' plot, though.

      Delete

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