100 Words a Day 723

I peeked over the edge of the cliff, spying the hermit below. He was making strange adulations in front of a fire he had built. I could see by the flickering light that he wore only a loincloth and his body was covered in bizarre symbols, drawn with what ink or ash I know not. His beard was long and spindly, like his limbs. He contorted himself in a strange fashion, and began to take deep breaths that made him sound like ragged bellows. The hermit moved through a number of strange positions before ending prostrate before the dying fire.

100 Words a Day 722

Grish went hard on the throttle and shook his chain loose. When he was close enough he whipped the links forward and they wrapped the chest of the man he was chasing Grish hit the brakes. The entangled man was pulled from his own bike, hit the asphalt, and began to drag behind Grish, had who picked up speed once the man had gone airborne. Grish tore down the road, shaking his chain in an effort to free it from the battered man dragging behind him. His efforts were frustrated by the man attempting to drag himself up the chain.

100 Words a Day 721

When the count reached one, the door was wrenched open and the grenade was rolled into the room. After the explosion, we charged in, a snaking line of order in the chaos of debris and body parts. When I saw a torso that looked like it might be alive I pulled the trigger. My teammates did the same. The poorly-trained occupants of the bungalow were quickly neutralized. We marched out in as orderly a fashion as we had entered and stowed our gear in our truck. The bodies were then removed from the kitchen and we broke out the beer.

100 Words a Day 720

The bog was slowly swallowing the swollen corpses. The sucking water had made it difficult to maneuver, forcing the two armies to simply hack each other to death. The piles of corpses sat in the stagnant water, feeding such a cloud of flies that it was impossible for the bog villagers to scavenge the bodies for some time. When the villagers were able to reach the battlefield, they found their nasty, brutish sensibilities awestruck by the carnage. Maggots gorged on the bloated bodies that lay in unnatural positions, some staring up at the sky, some face down in the muck. 

100 Words a Day 719

I’ll never forget the night the Stormriders attacked our camp. They were lightening in the dark: sudden and shocking. Their battle cries mixing with the roar of their machines were echoing thunder. A whirlwind of leather and steel was all I could see as they road through our encampment, slaying all and setting fire to anything within reach. I fled without looking back, chased at first by the screams of the dying, but eventually the rumbling roar of a single bike punctuated by the mad storm-howls of the rider. My legs were no match for the tempest she rode upon.

100 Words a Day 718

The tires of the mighty speed demon tore at the ancient tarmac, the claw-like grooves sent gravel and bits of debris flying. The deep roar issuing from its twin tailpipes echoed through the shattered canyon. The pipes shook as though in anger at the pace, necessarily slowed by the many twists and turns of the ancient fissure. Rider and machine were one, the man’s riding leathers matched the ebon saddle of the chrome beast. His face was concealed behind a grinning skull helmet. Often, the superstitious inhabitants of the plains mistook him for some vengeful spirit riding a howling demon.  

100 Words a Day 717

He almost missed the town, the green sign was so faded, and pulled into the adjacent gas station to double check he was in the right place. He sighed when the rundown letters confirmed that he had arrived. He looked to where he had come from, arrow straight road and scrubs. He looked past the gas station and the few other buildings that lined the hot asphalt, arrow straight road and scrubs.

Examining the other buildings, he learned there was a post office, general store, and a diner in his new home, a far cry from where he had been.