The world wakes up and goes to sleep depending on where you live. People rise to start their day while others retire after a long grueling day. It is a cycle humanity has lived in for centuries. Some see the day as an opportunity, others a grind to “just get by’.

Unemployment reigned, wars escalated, hunger remained rampant, and disease was never-ending. The world and its inhabitants live in a vicious cycle with no clearcut way out.

*****

There was a time when Chuck Reynolds was just your average guy, living an average life. He was like many people. He would play the lottery every week, never winning, but he kept thinking one day he would be on easy street. He worked at a restaurant as a cook. He had an on and off again girl he would date. He paid his bills on time. There was a time for concern for his health when he contracted Covid, but with time and patience and a few shots, he was back in business again.

Every day, his life plodded along, and Chuck always had a belief his life wouldn’t be near as bad as it had been for others. He had plans. Not big plans, but plans for his future, his retirement one day and living what he would consider to be a good life. An okay life.

But one day, his life and the world he knew—changed.

He had a vacation coming up and decided to take a trip to witness the Aurora Borealis on the southern border as that was the best place to view this marvel. It was one of those places that was on his bucket list.

It was on his third day, or in this case, night, when his life took a turn. Gazing upward at the streaming colors that floated across the night sky, green cascading lights, the deep blues, sparkling baby blues, deep purples, pink and red hues. It was approximately 1:35 in the morning when a shift in colors happened. Very few people were out that early dark morning, but they witnessed a phenomenon unlike anything ever experienced, but most of all, Chuck became the inadvertent cause.

A rift occurred in between the colors and lowered itself over Chuck. This is something that never happened before, and Chuck remained immobilized at the sight and found himself immersed in the rich vibrant colors. Then he felt his body changing, he started to tremble. What had once been a green light—changed. The green became a bright, resonating red.

Normally, according to scientists, solar particles react with oxygen at higher altitudes, generally above 150 miles, meaning they should never reach out where Chuck stood.

But it did and Chuck was turning red. He didn’t feel pain, but he did feel a newfound strength he never had before, but the strength was different than what might be expected. It was a strength of resolve, calming.

What few people that were there, broke out their cell phones to record what was happening. It was a moment that otherwise without proof, would never be believed. As they videoed him into the four-minute mark, that was when they witnessed his disappearance.

Chuck again felt no pain, but what happened to him went beyond incredible. His body began to separate into minute red molecules and was pulled upward in a spiraling, almost circular motion, and beyond into the green hue that stretched across a vast night sky.

Chuck was gone.

And yet, Chuck had knowledge of what was happening to him. He knew he wasn’t dead, and he knew where he was going and why, for a voice no one could hear entered his mind.

“Have no fear. You are safe. Soon, you will be coming home.”

*****

Six months later, Chuck returned from the place he was drawn to—Zylar; a not known planet that lay behind Saturn. A planet filled with the greatest minds people on earth could never fathom.

When he returned, people would stand in awe of his appearance. He was different in his looks. His hair, eyes and skin were a deep red. And when he spoke, he gave the world a message of what to expect in the coming years. He spoke of how to rid the world of disease and hunger, where everyone could live in peace.

He gave instruction to scientists, educators, the medical world, and humanity.

“Follow these instructions and your life will be blessed. Ignore them, and your life becomes forever held in the dark mysteries of the what if. Take advantage of what is offered. You will not get a second chance.”

When Chuck was finished, he disappeared again, never to be seen again.

*****

That was thirty-five years ago. Today, more people visit the Aurora Borealis in hopes of either seeing Chuck again, or, being taken away as Chuck had been. But the green night hues never again produced any red solar particles that reached out for another human being.

What really became of Chuck when he returned to Zylar, no one can say. We would like to think he lives in peace and is happy.

If people knew, they would be envious. Chuck would live forever and never age. He would remain happy with each day that passed and not want for anything. One couldn’t ask for more than that.

Here, on earth, the world took his advice, his knowledge, and put it to good use. Hunger and disease were eradicated, hatred turned to love, and everyone had a place to live and work, but—five years ago, things started changing back to the way they were before Chuck reappeared.

It just shows that people cannot handle a good thing.

I went to a concert

that I wanted to go to

for ten years this week

and

I cut my hair

and

I bought another ticket

to see Allan Rayman

and

I’m going alone

and

I have a tattoo scheduled

for tuesday

and

I tell myself

you wouldn’t even

recognize me anymore

There’s space for rent inside my heart. The plus side is there’s not much in there. Not many tenants, but they’re here to stay—don’t have the heart to evict them. Yes, I know some of them have moved out. Doesn’t matter. I’ll hang on to their stuff for them for as long as they want.

Most of this empty space I’ll admit I’ve been afraid to lease, worried I’ll find the wrong person to fill some rooms. But all this empty space makes me feel a little lonely. That’s gotten worse with time. Don’t get me wrong, I love my current tenants. They live rent free—the space they occupy I make sure stays theirs.

I’ve gotten better at putting out my “For Rent” signs. Most of my applicants are boring though. Nice enough, I’m sure, just…not for me. I’m picky, I guess. Then again, one has to be selective when renting out space in the heart.

“For Rent.” What an odd concept, considering I give the space away for free. Maybe I should change my signs. But I don’t want anyone getting any ideas and taking advantage of me. I’ve got plenty of room. No hurry to change that.

My blood’s not red anymore;

It leaks from my shredded soul,

Seeping tar-like from blackened wounds—

The gashes came from many things, but

Oh, the largest ones, those came from me

Tearing out chunks to ease the pain

Of a thousand missing parts.

Funny how the brain—deranged by overload—

Decides it’s time to die

And tears away the parts of you

That should’ve stayed inside.

Oh, no my blood’s not red anymore

But my filthy heart still beats;

It pounds away inside my chest, but

It's not blood that swims within.

My blood’s not red anymore,

But it oozes from your lips—serotonin vampire,

Midday like it's midnight, but you’re still alive.

Hard to kill something that lives forever,

Embodiment of greed and vulturous lust,

Circling above my head as I fall to my knees

Crushed ’neath my terror and your bloodlust.

Oh, but I know all your dirty secrets—

I wrote them in my Book of Lies

Where the black drips down from pages smeared,

Scarred with everything that makes you hide.

Oh, no my blood’s not red anymore

But my filthy heart still beats;

It pounds away inside my chest, but

It's not blood that swims within.

I know I am miles away , but trust me when I say

I'm here

waiting patiently . until my fingertips can get lost against the tapestry

of your stars,

sinking into the skin and the warmth

I have been missing for millenniums, it seems

a blended kaleidoscope of countless lives

each one speaking of misplaced fragments of you,

painted in colors reflecting so well the light of your eyes

golden brown galaxies,

that have now settled in the form of soft whispers

in the complicated structure of my lungs,

so masterfully moving the red ribbon of fate

between the ribs

that only used to know ice

and now with gentle embers in the form of the winter sun,

resting so vulnerably

in the palm of my hands

a heart put together with careful threads,

stitched and seamed with silver linings, steady iron, and cotton dreams

I know I am miles away , but trust me when I say

I'm here

As my world burned, I held you in my arms, watching in silent awe and terror from the cold, lonely moon. Half of it blazed in a wave of red, orange, and stark black, the other drenched in the purest of greens and brilliant blues. Amazing how much you realize the beauty of something only when you're losing it.

All my songs are the same,

All my lyrics are alike—

The same words describing the same pain

But arranged in different ways

As if it could distract from the fact that

Everything I write is the same.

Interesting how the hole inside my chest

Bleeds over into every area of my life,

Eroding sections of my soul I

Didn’t know I needed until they were gone—

Snuffed out, sucked away into the riptide

Of this awful abyss inside my chest.

But all my songs are the same

And all my lyrics are alike—

The same words forming the same poems

But arranged in different ways,

As if it could distract from the truth that

Everything I write is the same.

The dumpster burst behind me, the heat wave close on my back, fiery wings wrapping around me. Chunks of flaming garbage streamed past, falling stars in the black alley.

I gripped the pistol tighter until my fingers stung with pins and needles as I ran. Out of the alleyway, back into the madness. The burning cars and store fronts, blazing cocktails rupturing and spewing glass and flame like urban phoenixes. Riot police and mob yelling, gunfire cracking from all around. Yellow, orange, and red, dancing against swaths of black and gray, angry color scorching the innocent night.

“Hey!” a masked man yelled ahead of me, gesturing with a handgun in my direction.

I didn’t hesitate, raising my own weapon and pressing the trigger twice. He dropped, screaming, pistol slipping from his grasp and clattering on the asphalt.

Handy. I snatched up the gun and sprinted on, past the box truck laying on its side in the middle of the road, cargo strewn out behind it like entrails. Fire leaped from its charred sides, reaching toward anything near it. I tucked the new weapon into my waistband as I dodged a woman grasping for me from a small group of rioters exiting through the broken window of a storefront. Black masks obscured the lower half of their faces, eyes burning with fury, drunk on the chaos and anarchy of the moment.

The mask obscuring my own face was beginning to strangle my breath. I wanted so badly to tear it off, to let myself breathe. But that would have been a terrible idea. I can’t be recognizable. You’re eye color is recognizable enough—don’t put your face out their too.

I kept on, making sure to concentrate on staying light on my feet. Just a little farther, and I’ll be out of this mess. Though suppressed at the moment, fear hid in the back of my mind, whispering that I wouldn’t make it.

I ducked into a side street, darkness hungrily swallowing up the dancing light of a thousand fires burning on the main road. A man lay propped against a brick wall on one side of the narrow road. Blood streamed down the side of his head. His eyes, yellowed and bloodshot, followed me as I dashed past. I didn’t have time to avoid puddles. Water splashed over my shoes, soaking my feet and shins.

Yellow-orange erupted in front of me as I ran from the side street, glass and heat bursting away from where the gasoline-filled jar had shattered. Bullets whizzed past my head, striking the brick wall beside me.

“Get him!” the men called, popping off more rounds in my direction.

I dove and rolled. Hard, warm, gritty ground scraped against my bare arms. Bringing my gun around as rounds cracked by, I fired. Once, twice, three times, five times. Three men dropped, yelling and clutching their wounds. The fourth, armed with a crowbar, ran the opposite direction in terror.

They’re gonna leave without you. Squeezing the thought back into my stomach, I shoved myself to my feet and hurried on. Left, right, left, right, straight for three blocks. Past shattered glass, bodies writhing on the streets and sidewalks. Past flaming vehicles with their waves of heat, roving gangs of degenerate scum, and police lines firing tear gas into mobs a hundred times their number.

There it was, a few hundred yards away. Rising above the smoking city, the burned-out cathedral’s blackened steeple stabbed into the smoky, red-orange sky. Above it hovered Aegis’ APC, blue jets aimed downward, guns firing into the streets beneath. Three drones whizzed from her angular sides as I got closer.

Bang!

Blood and asphalt sprayed from the bullet’s impact, dropping the man jumping from an alley at me. The drone turned, weapon firing another round at a man, clutching a rifle, rushing down the street at me. Empty shells clattered on the pavement, dropping from the drones as they fired again and again on nearby rioters.

The personnel carrier descended slowly, bullets ricocheting off its armored hide. Her guns barked back, cannons blasting away at buildings, autocannons sweeping the streets.

I was close now, perhaps a hundred yards or so away. But the carrier was drawing an increasing amount of attention from the rioters. Staying close to the ground for much longer was too dangerous.

She dove out of nowhere, tackling me to the pavement. I saw stars when my chin hit the ground, pain shooting up into the top of my skull. My palms scraped against the road as I tried to roll over under her.

The girl couldn’t have been much older than me—maybe eighteen, at the oldest. Fury blazed in her eyes, fists raining down blow after blow at my head and neck.

Barely, I blocked her strikes, searching for a weapon—she was too close to me for the drones to risk a shot. The gun in my hand had been thrown out of reach when I fell, but my second firearm dug into the small of my back.

I punched her square in the face. She screamed and cursed, blood streaming from her nose as she fell backward. The girl returned with an even faster rain of blows, catching me a few times in my face, before I could hit her again. “Die, you golden-eyed freak!” She screamed.

A solid connection with the side of her face sent her sprawling off me, dazed for a second. Rage took over, boiling up inside my chest. These people—no, these animals—had terrorized the country for long enough. They’d burned and looted across the nation, completely disregarding the lives of those around them. These animals didn’t care for anyone but themselves and their selfish, slanted agendas.

In their eyes, we were inferior. We were the animals, carrying a stained bloodline from a race of beings they despised. They were terrified of us, terrified we’d rise up and become their oppressors. Terrified of the power people like me held. Terrified of my golden eyes.

It was them who should have been purged from the face of the earth with extreme prejudice, them who should have been hunted down and killed, them who should have had to live in constant fear. Not me. Not my family. At least most of the nation saw us as just other humans, albeit unique, who still had a life. A life with value—a priceless human life. Not some dark group of sleeper agents for foreign governments or sadistic terrorists. Or telepaths destined to become Nazis bent on extermination and world domination.

I was atop her in an instant, knees pinning her arms to the ground, fists raining down blow after blow. She cried out, dark red liquid streaming from her mouth and nose.

The legislation she and other anarchists protested would bring equality—true equality—and protection under law for telepaths and Peace Keeper descendants alike. It must have been nice for someone like her, who never had to fear being slaughtered with her family in the middle of the night by a gang hunting down telepaths with golden eyes. Must’ve been nice sleeping in peace at night, worried only about your crush not texting you back, or a test at school the next day.

I grit my teeth so hard my jaw hurt. Strike after strike blasted through her week attempts to block them with her arms. Patches of black and purple were already spreading around her eyes and cheeks. Much of her face was no longer visible beneath broken skin and streaming blood.

“Alix, let’s go—leave her!” Taz directed through a loudspeaker attached to one of the drones circling overhead. “We’re getting called back to base, the drones are almost out of ammo, and we’ve gotta pull out—there’s a lot of idiots with heavy weapons headed our way. The carrier’s a sitting duck.”

“Fine.” I stood up, the girl groaning beneath me. My vision blackened for a moment. I swayed on my feet as I tried to move, still dizzy from the hits to my head.

Shouts of “Kill him!” echoed down the narrow street, sending more rioters dashing my direction. Bullets streamed from the drones, empty shell casings dropping onto the ground.

I staggered toward the rescuing carrier, brain finally clearing. Spots still danced in my vision. Definitely have a concussion.

Chink, chink, chink. The last spent cartridge dropped from one drone, then another, and another.

"Alix, run!” Taz commanded. “Go! Come on, man, get to the carrier!”

Retrieving the gun from the small of my back, I pulled back the slide. Golden brass glinted in the flickering light. Perfect.

I turned, weapon raised. Bullets whistled past my face and torso as I returned fire, dropping the leader of the charge. The metal bat he wielded clanged against the asphalt. I fired again and again, dropping four more, all the while stepping quickly backward toward the carrier and the deafening roar of its engines and autocannons.

The last man dropped to his knees, a knife slipping from his hands, blood streaming from two bullet wounds in his chest.

The girl forced herself up onto all fours, spitting blood. A hateful gaze seared into my soul as she struggled to her feet. Crimson streams covered her face and neck, more spattered across her arms and ripped T-shirt.

I let my weapon fall, halting my retreat to the APC. Which of us is more wrong? No, no—they started this.

With a cry of rage, she sprang at me. The battered girl halved the distance between us in a second.

You people will never learn. I raised my gun and pulled the trigger.

Her face paled with shock and pain, screaming mouth agape but silent. Her steps halted. She wobbled, tears streaming down her bloodied face. Panting and coughing up blood, she struggled to reach me.

I fired another round, this time into her leg.

With a scream, she dropped to the red-spattered road. Arms flailing, she scrabbled at the pavement, still trying desperately to reach me.

She’ll live. But did you make her hatred worse? Confrontation like this always makes things worse. Chaos breeds chaos, bloodshed creates bloodshed.

I left her and ran the remaining few yards to the carrier. The APC’s iron side slid open, jets firing to lift her, as I dove inside. Glancing over my shoulder, I watched the girl reach out for me, fury replacing the pain in her cries and curses. Hatred, all the way to the last. Stupid. But are we really that different?

After all this time I spent,

Chasing shadows and smoke

Dodging the spears you threw

While I drowned in my own blood,

I came to realize

Your rotting soul, thinly coated in

Sweet and soured love,

Was only meant to fool me—

Your arms dragged me

Into a dangerous embrace

Closer to your stillborn heart

Wrapping my soul in your lies.

Deeper into the abyss

You coaxed and prodded me

Shoving when I was hesitant

Sliding daggers under my ribs

You never loved me.

I gave you everything—

You took all I could give,

Every pound of flesh and drop of blood.

So after all this time I spent,

I opened my eyes to see

The only one I hate more than me

Is YOU.