Peaceful (Micro-Fiction Monday)

Blue skies are my favourite thing. Those clear, sunny days, when there’s not a cloud in sight, and all I can see for miles and miles is the deepest, richest blue that I’ve ever seen. I live for those days.

                

I think he does, too, because those are always our most peaceful days—the days that I insist on doing nothing, and drag him down to the nearest valley or field with me. We lie in the grass, and we start up at the sky, and everything is perfect.

                

He loves it. I know he does. He just would never admit it.

                

“Can we go back, now?” he whispers in my ear. Which isn’t a hard thing to do, really, as the side of my head is brushing up against his shoulder. I could hear him breathing a few seconds ago, before he broke the silence with his annoying question.

                

“Not yet,” I whisper in reply. “Just a little longer.”

                

“But...it’s boring.”

               

  “It’s peaceful.”

                

“Yeah, and ‘peaceful’ is boring.”

                

I sigh and sit up. I open my mouth, about to protest, when a battle cry echoes through the sky, interrupting me.

                 

He sits up beside me, alert, hand reaching for the blade lying on the ground beside him. At least a dozen or so armed warriors come bursting out of the forest, the silver metal of the blades glinting in the sunlight.

                

Of course they would do this today. Of course.

                

“Come on,” he says quickly. His hand is on my arm, now, hoisting me up and ushering me backward. “Let’s go.”

                

Just before we break into a run, though, I can’t help but smirk as I eye him. “What did you just say about boring?”

                

He doesn’t reply.

~~

Until later,

- Justyne

Click (Micro-Fiction Monday)

He waited up high, in a tree, an old pistol loosely clutched in his hand. The branches were dead, rotten, and crumbling. They wouldn’t hold his weight for much longer. Luckily, his target was almost right beneath him. There were no leaves to cover him, but that was okay; the thick cloud of polluted air did the job nicely.

Just about there, now. Three more steps. Two. One...

He dropped, silently, from his perch, his feet colliding with his target’s back. The target cried in pain and dropped to the ground. The attacker was satisfied at the cracking and crunching of the target’s bones beneath his boots.

He hopped off of the fallen traveller, and stuck the pistol in between his teeth as he yanked the worn backpack right off his shoulders. The target groaned, rolling in pain, as the attacker rifled roughly through his belongings. Some old photographs, a dirty teddy bear, an empty water bottle. He threw the bag down in disgust and yanked the pistol out of his mouth. There was nothing he could use.

Frustrated, the attacker kicked his fallen target, hard in the gut. The man gasped, clutching his side. “What kind of survivor are you?” the attacker spat. “Not a crumb of food, or a drop of water...pathetic.”

“Please,” the man croaked. “Let me...have my things. They’re all I have left of my family!”

The attacker dropped to his knees, waving the pistol carelessly in the air. “You miss your family?”

“Yes...” Relief washed through the man’s eyes.

His gun clicked. “Then allow me to reunite you.”

~~

Until later,

- Justyne