Endfall

Read Endfall for Free Online

Book: Read Endfall for Free Online
Authors: Colin Ososki
Milo had no words to form from his thoughts. His questions simply couldn't be asked.
    -----
                  The air felt like a blanket, still as the dust on the floor and infinitesimally soft. Milo stood, breathing slowly. The mass of the long hallway was before him. He did not look behind. At the end of the hallway, which he saw now was surrounded in a wood texture, although he knew is wasn’t real wood, was a door. The door was a dark brown, with reddish tint. The handle was golden, and aside from the overwhelming presence and a star shaped symbol near the bottom, there was nothing particularly unique about this door. It stood, calling for him. Milo stared.
    -----
    Milo was awakened within just moments of falling asleep, it felt like. Monday was slow. He hadn’t seen Lyrah since she left. He rolled his head around in his uncomfortable bed to read the clock on his desk. It was 10:12 PM. The clock was dirty with a layer of dust assembling on the glass. He had never paid close attention to time or dates, but this was different. Soon he would have to tell his father about his eyes. He didn’t want to tell him, it would terrify him. His father took things well, but the death of his son would destroy him. He wondered how his uncle felt, six years ago when his cousin had been executed for the same reason; sprouting blue eyes. How awful.
                  Late, towards the shadiest time of night, Milo crept up onto the roof again with the snow globe in his hands. It was not dark outside, as he had expected. The moon lit up the sky, and the clouds hovered low in the air to create a gloomy blue atmosphere. The snowfall had stopped, and just a cool frost covered the ground. Milo stood there in the severe cold, looking into the snow globe.
    -----
                  Tuesday was again slow and dull. He had confessed to his father the dreadful news. His father did not take it well; they had a long conversation that afternoon, followed by Milo’s favorite foods for dinner. His father contacted the rest of the distant family, whom Milo rarely communicated with. He spoke to each of his aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents, for a last conversation.
                  The evening was drifting along quicker than Milo had anticipated, and he wished for it to slow down, slow down so far that it would reach a stop. He hadn’t seen Lyrah all day. Earlier in the morning, he had taken a long walk through the city, seeking her. It was now that he felt he needed her help most, even simply some calming words. Milo was not calm, despite what she had said before. He looked at the frost-covered window, half-expecting Lyrah to be there. When he discovered that the judgment in the back of his mind was right, that she wasn’t there, he was not disappointed, for there was a little sparrow perched on a tree branch just near the roof of the house. This sparrow, puny and allay, somehow calmed him down. Milo sat down on the chair beside his desk and stayed calm. Tomorrow he would die.
     
     
     
     
     
     
    BLOOD
                 
     
    Wednesday. Milo actually slept for the first time in days. But with great infortune, he awoke early that morning. He peered out from the itchy blanket that covered him, and saw the time on the clock. 4:44 AM. Artlessly, he was still, unable to fall back into sleep, waiting for the knock on the door by the Parliament. This morning, he was uncertain of what to think. He turned his head towards the snow globe. It was, as always, miraculous and bright. The snow was settled at the base, the polar bears safe from the spurious blizzard. Some character in the back of Milo’s mind had raised the notion of the door again, the door from his dream. He thought about that door, staring at it in his mind.
                  Sunday, I was a person just like everybody else. Days later, I have become a person with death lying just ahead, calamitous enough to know it and not have

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