Writing Exercise 33: The Alternate Ending

In our last writing exercise, we were given the time to produce our very own alternate ending to Neil Gaiman's Babycakes in 150 words minimum.

Here's my very own continuation to the story.

View also Neil Gaiman reading Babycakes on Youtube

Babycakes
Neil Gaiman

A few years back all the animals went away.

We woke up one morning, and they just weren't there anymore. They didn't even leave us a note, or say good-bye. We never figured out quite where they'd gone.

We missed them.

Some of us thought that the world had ended, but it hadn't. There just weren't any more animals. No cats or rabbits, no dogs or whales, no fish in the seas, no birds in the skies.

We were all alone.

We didn't know what to do.

We wandered around lost, for a time, and then someone pointed out that just because we didn't have any animals anymore, that was no reason to change our lives. No reason to change our diets or to cease testing products that might cause us harm.

After all, there were still babies.

Babies can't talk. They can hardly move. A baby is not a rational thinking creature.

We made babies.

And we used them.

Some of them we ate. Baby flesh is tender and succulent.

We flayed their skin and decorated ourselves in it. Baby leather is soft and comfortable.

Some of them we tested.

We taped open their eyes, dripped detergents and shampoos in, a drop at a time.

We scarred them and scalded them. We burnt them. We clamped them and planted electrodes in their brains. We grafted, and we froze, and we irradiated.

The babies breathed our smoke, and the babies' veins flowed with our medicines and drugs, until they stopped breathing or until their blood ceased to flow.

It was hard, of course, but it was necessary.

No one could deny that.

With the animals gone, what else could we do?

Some people complained, of course. But then, they always do.

And everything went back to normal.

***

In time, this cannibalistic tradition, a by- product of a chaotic mind engulfed and trapped in the obsession for the rival of homo-sapiens' domination; flourished without inquiry.

As if given the power to rule over the Supreme Being’s enigmatic creations, the consumption was with cult following.

It has never come to pass, as in a conspiracy; everyone was destined to follow.

Then that fateful day did came. For in a turmoil of emotion, a youth that was tucked safely away and was forced to slumber under the bowels of our forsaken civilization, stood up.

No more did he say.

At the gathering for the fools feast, to the elders, he did point and raised the QUESTION.

In the shadows of murmurs, praises and protest, he pointed the inevitable.

And in the eyes of the gathering, at the swift hack of the executioner’s blade he was slain.

Sparkling and dripping in filth, his blood reflects an uprising against a rubbish tradition.

I was a part of that unruly crowd that night and I too felt ashamed of what i have become,

I QUESTIONED myself for every drop of innocent blood spilled...

Many years has passed since the last gathering, and everyone lived in peace; everyone figured it would end.

Then as in a swift awakening, the grey clouds of yesterday slowly melted away;

For now, our most shrewd learned to make animals out of babies...

Jasmin Uy

Message in a Bottle

A Horror Story in 500 Words: T'was the Night of Halloween

It was a dark and gloomy Tuesday night the hospital hallway was empty, with nurses and doctors busily at their stations attending to their obligations; not a single soul was in sight.

Then the dark green curtain of the emergency room rises to gust of the wind and reveal two bodies- one a police sergeant who met his fate at the hands of armed robbers who shot him three times to the head and that of a gymnast who broke his neck while doing cartwheels in a competition.

Both these men were alive just a few minutes ago when they were brought in, but now they are lifeless with eyes open as if they were trying to fend off an invisible force to prevent it from taking their souls.

Then along came the sound of familiar footsteps, for it is time for the nurses to make their rounds, and two proceeded immediately to the emergency room but were stunned after finding out of their sudden death.

Personnel and equipment were scrambled immediately in the hope to revive the two, with the defibrilator they exhausted all means, but their efforts were in vain for the patients are dead.

Just as everyone was about to cover the dead bodies with blankets, a nurse saw that the window of the room was open and that a bloodied scythe was lying on the floor.

She picks it up thinking that perhaps a visitor doing a trick or treat might have left it there, but as soon as she picked it, she saw visions, though blurry at first but the picture slowly cleared and she saw the two bodies just as if they were lying there but the scythe that she’s holding was carried by another being, with a shadow that’s as black as night and who’s face was hidden by a hood.

The being stabbed the two bodies, and in the nurse’s eyes she saw that which seemed to be their souls were wailing out from their once alive bodies into the being’s hand. Moans and laughter can be heard.

Suddenly, fear gripped the nurse as she now knows that what she is holding is the scythe of death himself, and as she was about to throw it out the window, everything flickered and went black.

Her companions, who saw what is happening, screamed and tug the scythe off her hands but it will not budge. Then the door slammed shut, and after a gust of wind, everything went silent. The door slowly opened to reveal several bodies of nurses and doctors who are now lying on the floor lifeless with eyes open, a death similar to the two patients.

The scythe was picked up from the floor by a black figure in a hood, who gazes out the window to see souls slowly marching towards a black whirlpool, the policeman and the gymnast are now beside him, and with an evil laugh they slowly vanish into thin air.

View: http://www.yuwie.com/jovir