This is related to the shorts I've been writing lately. It is how I would really make it out if it were written in novel style and the shorts just helped me understand the story better. I wouldn't completely say this is science fiction, but it does take place in the near future and it does involve creatures. But they aren't from other planets, just genetically mutated animals or people. Enjoy and crits are very welcomed! Thanks! :3
Prologue
“Daddy!” The little girl screams. She watches as her dreams turn into a nightmare. It goes from walking in into a beautiful palace with walls and a floor made of gold and switching to a street full of blood and massacre. Bodies lay mangled in the streets, missing limps or chucks of flesh. Some of them twitch, still alive in their own nightmares of death, and other choke on their own life-supplying blood, praying for it to be over. The city is engulfed in a cloud of red, skyscrapers crumbling on their own weight; fires are burning in the distance. It’s an apocalypse and the little girl can’t close her eyes to the violence, her mind can’t react. It’s frozen, in disbelief of what it is witnessing.
But she is screaming and soon her calls are answered. She feels herself being pulled from the bloody scene, a force taking her away in the air and tugging hard on her tiny, doll body. She wakes, seeing a canopy of fat red, brown, and golden leaves and tree branches. The sky isn’t visible from the bowels of the forest and it feels like dusk instead of noon. She sucks in a deep breath of crispy, fall air and sits up, tears streaming down her soft cheeks. She wails, crying into her hands that shake with fear. The little girl feels her body being brought into the arms of her Daddy, her head resting on its chest. She cries into its black cloak, gripping like it is a rope holding her away from the dreams of the carnage. Her Daddy soothes her, speaking softly in her ear, telling her its OK now. Telling her that there won’t be any more nightmares.
“B-but Da-daddy!” She wails. “Y-you said th-that yesterda-day.” Her Daddy rubs her back slowly with its long fingered hands. It sighs.
“I know, my child,” It says, its voice a perfect harmony of male and female tones. The voice sooths her and she finds her cries soon become silent, then turn to sniffles and hiccups. “I know.” The little girl stays in her position a moment longer before pushing away from her Daddy and sitting straight on the flat-topped rock she was lying on. A rock in the middle of a small clearing where she sneaks off to each day and dreams with the guidance of her Daddy. The creature stands straight once again to its impressive six-foot height. She looks up into the creature’s face. The creature she calls “Daddy”, but is in fact not even blood related to her.
Its face has sharp features, both of female and male qualities. High cheeks bones that sit beneath its dark, almond shaped eyes and beside its perfectly straight nose. Its lips are full and a pale pink and sit at the end of its heart shaped face. Its eyebrows are perfectly done in a female fashion and frame its eyes. Underneath the hood of the cloak the little girl knows that her Daddy holds a crowd of shiny, dark hair that reaches the curve of its back. Her Daddy’s body has broad shoulders and a wide chest. Its hips are perfectly curved to still tip the scale of its feminine side. The cloak hides the ivory color of its flawless skin, but also conceals the swelling of its once flat belly. The girl sniffles and wipes her nose on her arm.
“Are the nightmares ever going to stop, Daddy?” She asks, her voice nearly a whisper and her eyes turning from her Daddy and to a ladybug that toddles in her direction. The red of its shell reminds her of the blood in the nightmare and she has to look away.
“I’m not sure, child,” It answers. “I’ve never seen Innocents that get nightmares. I do not even think I heard of any.” This makes tears welt up in the girl’s eyes again. She looks up into her Daddy’s dark eyes. Pools that people say they find themselves drowning in. But the little girl doesn’t drown. She floats.
“Does that make me a outcast, Daddy?” She sniffs, a tear running down her already wet cheeks. The creature places a hand on that cheek, stopping the tear short. It shakes its head slowly.
“No, Astrid. Of course not,” It says, resting her head on its belly. “It just makes you…different. And different is good. Different means change.” The creature strokes her ponytail that is done up with a fat, white ribbon. Astrid nods and listens to the bubbling of her Daddy’s insides. She also hears the small, rapid heartbeat of its offspring. A child that threatens to tear the creature and her apart for good. She puts a doll-like hand on her Daddy’s belly as if she could feel the heartbeat instead of hear it.
“Daddy.” The girl says.
“Yes, child.” It replies. The girl pauses for a moment, almost afraid to bring up the subject that she has wondered about since the news of the baby. News she was once happy about. Now she despises it.
“Are we still going to be together,” She asks, looking up into its face. “After Keeran is born?” Her Daddy frowns. It puts its hand over hers, completely hiding it from view. Astrid’s gaze falls to the hand, smooth and flawless of veins or freckles. The moment is silent and Astrid fears she had said something wrong. Maybe it wasn’t the best time to bring it up? But Daddy does answer, sighing heavily.
“I’m not sure, Astrid. But I fear the worst of it all.” The girl looks back at its face again, her dark eyebrows coming close together and her lips forming a grimace of confusion.
“And what would that be, Daddy?” She asks, tilting her head to the side like a confused, but curious dog. It lets a deep breath out from its nose and looks down at her, eyes either sorry or scared.
“That I will be executed and you’re taken away into slavery.”
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