They pulled the sun from the sky.
They harvested its energies, overcoming their world of sand and wind and forging a green and fertile new home, where pleasure reigned.
Their utopia fluorished as their sun died.
I destroyed its prison. I saved the sun and abandoned their paradise to entropy.
He poured concrete. He laid bricks. He hammered nails into wood.
He stapled tar paper. He put up siding. He packed insulation into the walls.
He spread out shingles. He rented a truck. He carried boxes. He painted. He assembled furniture.
Then his wife walked out.
He sold the house.
Noon: the sun stood still overhead.
A man in a black hat faced a man in a brown hat.
“Take ten paces!” cried the sheriff.
One, two, three, four—BANG!
Brown hat fell. Blood pooled in the dust; black hat smirked.
BANG!
Black hat fell. “Filthy cheater,” said the sheriff.
Flashing lights seared his eyes; sirens blared in his ears; acrid odours assailed his nostrils.
There was a pressure on his chest, a rhythmic, thumping, crushing pressure. Something popped. A flood of warmth rushed through his body. His chest expanded and contracted spasmodically. He was dizzy.
He retched.
He lived.
“Thanks for the ride,” Missy said, climbing into the idling truck. It was approaching midnight, and she had been stranded on a silent interstate with an empty fuel tank. “Things couldn’t possibly get worse,” she complained.
The stranger grinned wordlessly. At least this one had provided some decent last words.
It was the dead of night. Silence reigned over the misty hills. A cricket chirped, then fell still as a malicious whisper overtook him. The moon highlighted the twisting shadows of the fog, as gradually the shadows took form. Ethereal shapes churned into being.
They were the dead of night.