A few random shorts

I haven't written anything really worth posting recently, but I have quite a few small things that I like enough to share. Don't expect them to be complete or make sense; they're not, and they won't.



A slice of the sky, of heaven and angels, cut down and bound here, bound to the earth to walk, to walk forever and ever amen, always staring up, never quite remembering who, or what, she is. Never, ever knowing, always longing, never looking down, never looking back, always trying, striving, reaching higher and higher, seeking to pull herself up from here, from this empty dust of too many distractions and nothing is real, nothing is reliable, and yet far too steady and unchanging, she walks the earth. Her prison. She doesn't remember, doesn't, couldn't imagine what she is, who she was. Who she will be. The wind calls her name. She doesn't know it's hers.



Black. White. Black. White. 64 squares. He stared at them darkly. Chess, chess, how he hated chess. The boy that sat across from him apparently liked it. Oh, and how he hated this boy. Smug little... The boy stared at the board a moment longer. “You're sure.”
“Yes, good grief! I'm sure!”
“You're sure you're sure. You want to move your queen to take my pawn. You're sure.”
“I'm sure! Just take your turn already!”
The boy shrugged. “Fine then.” He gently picked up a the black rook with the delicacy of an artist. “My turn.”
The man sputtered in shock. “How the...”
“Checkmate.” The young face broke into a gentle smile as he tipped over the white queen with the rook. The small noise of it tapping to rest on the board sounded like the crash of an empire.
The sirens of the police sounded like a dirge.



Jack stumbled out of the smoking robot, coughing. He looked up with tired eyes through the shattered mask, and saw her.
“Amy...” he whispered.
She was running to him before she even knew she was standing up. He opened his arms just in time to catch her as she embraced him. “Jack...” she mumbled.
His heart skipped several beats as they stood there. He was holding her. He was holding her. He was holding her! He closed his eyes, savoring the moment, and was hardly embarrassed at all when he started crying. She was crying too, and he shushed her gently, reveling in this new role as the comforter, the pillar of strength.
Thirty feet away, Crash hauled himself up, and proceeded to pull the little robot up from the hole behind him. They stared at the pair for a while, and then Crash shook his head and sat down, smiling broadly.
“So. Who's his best man, you or me?”
Fixit sat down next to him, looked at him for a moment, and then pointed to himself.



“Cursed be the charcoal, cursed be the wood, cursed be the gasoline, cursed be the one that would. The world will burn, the world will burn, the world will burn and I will laugh and the world will turn and turn and turn and we'll be left behind.” Spindle offered his hand. “Shall we dance?”