Bogleech.com"s 2015 Horror Write-off:
" The Kinderflasche "
Submitted by Aoakesme (authoraoakesme@outlook.com)
Die Kinderflasche
(Setting: A series of mines and tunnels in the valley making up these people's homes have a very large portion of it in constant light; the tower in the distant holds it's own star, shining through day and night with it’s kind, warm, Fiery light, devoid of White... The people's village, on the surface, is not necessarily the prettiest place in the world: They live in dry lands, with limestone omnipresent in their landscape. They all seek metal, their one purpose ordered by the ancient machine they follow. Their metal is who they are, the Metallschmied.
The artificial sun lights their life, the parents teach to the children that the light is never to be shunned and to always be taken in with the greatest pleasures you may imagine. Where there is no light, where there is Night, however, the Kinderflasche looks for the youngs who rebuke the light.)
(Setting: A series of mines and tunnels in the valley making up these people's homes have a very large portion of it in constant light; the tower in the distant holds it's own star, shining through day and night with it’s kind, warm, Fiery light, devoid of White... The people's village, on the surface, is not necessarily the prettiest place in the world: They live in dry lands, with limestone omnipresent in their landscape. They all seek metal, their one purpose ordered by the ancient machine they follow. Their metal is who they are, the Metallschmied.
The artificial sun lights their life, the parents teach to the children that the light is never to be shunned and to always be taken in with the greatest pleasures you may imagine. Where there is no light, where there is Night, however, the Kinderflasche looks for the youngs who rebuke the light.)
The sun in the skies rise to awaken day upon the world, but the children are always out before it. Playing in the warm glow of the Second Star, time is of no matter to any of them. Some enjoy this timeless sequence until they grow up and take up work with their parents, as most do, but there are so little who doesn't like the idea. They decide to prolong their childhood for as long as they can, carelessly living the life they’re given.
Day and dusk they lived on and on, into their teens and nearly to adult. It’s unfortunate to find that one or two still think that growing up is unfathomable. So when their parents called them in for the end of day, it’s so often that they retort a negative response and hide out there in the limestone valleys. Spending weeks at a time out there, we’ll assume you gone.
The group will laugh, play, amuse themselves, tell folk stories, all to spend time. Fortunately, most rationalize themselves when daylight strikes them, thinking that they need to serve the Metallschmeid as their people. Heading home, discussing their nights with their parents, finally establishing their duty. Safe for the remaining one, or perhaps two.
Hatred gradually grows in them, as for anyone who denies their future, their talents in the world they’re supposed to be set in. It grows without cease, past the lukewarm nights in the second sun’s light, past the day’s dual star skies. One day, denying their roots, denying their future, their destiny and indirectly their hopes and dreams too. Hating the artificial light from so far away, that their parents worshiped through time, the ultimate insult to their guardians was to mock the construct, and finally leave it’s safe glow.
Timing impeccable, when darkness invaded the world, they departed; never would anyone seek them in this time. They were all sleeping after all. With no warning, a new light is seen: White. The shadows of the few who left, surrounded by a cold, heartless white light. Gradually intensifying, so did the noise. The churning of gears, the sound of pipes and steam and diesel working it’s way into the wanderers’ ears… A white circle in the sky, slowly approaching, lightly bobbing in the skies as the wanderers looked appalled at the cursed colour. Bobbing, churning, spending and steaming, one long mechanical appendage pried them one by one, like a damnable child’s game, seeking a prize. One by one, screaming, flailing, crying and writhing all’ve been dropped into the toad-like maw of the Kinderflasche, nearly drowning them in a wall of steam and chemicals, but ending their screams abruptly with the hiss of dissolving properties. Popped into the Kinderflasche, one by one, the wanderers were soon no more. The churning diesel, steaming pipes, grinding gears, the mechanical harmony bobbed it’s way farther from where they were. Farther from the Metallschmeid, who have not heard the screams of their very own children as they were whisked away by their own bogeyman.
Timing impeccable, when darkness invaded the world, they departed; never would anyone seek them in this time. They were all sleeping after all. With no warning, a new light is seen: White. The shadows of the few who left, surrounded by a cold, heartless white light. Gradually intensifying, so did the noise. The churning of gears, the sound of pipes and steam and diesel working it’s way into the wanderers’ ears… A white circle in the sky, slowly approaching, lightly bobbing in the skies as the wanderers looked appalled at the cursed colour. Bobbing, churning, spending and steaming, one long mechanical appendage pried them one by one, like a damnable child’s game, seeking a prize. One by one, screaming, flailing, crying and writhing all’ve been dropped into the toad-like maw of the Kinderflasche, nearly drowning them in a wall of steam and chemicals, but ending their screams abruptly with the hiss of dissolving properties. Popped into the Kinderflasche, one by one, the wanderers were soon no more. The churning diesel, steaming pipes, grinding gears, the mechanical harmony bobbed it’s way farther from where they were. Farther from the Metallschmeid, who have not heard the screams of their very own children as they were whisked away by their own bogeyman.