Prologue/Chapter 1. [Modern Fantasy, 709 words]
Ah, yeah. So there's a couple of sentences that may be like classified as political? maybe?
Not sure, anyway, that's more of setting the stage for being in modern day, I'm not going into future politics, well mostly not? Basically, treat is as made up and irrelevant to what's happening now modern day.
Oh, also, it's grimdark and a bit short. It's my first time writing really, or well, I count it as my first time.
Chapter 1: Repose
Wren’s eyes fluttered open as the light streaming through the window alighted on his face. He slipped out of bed and stumbled to the shower.
Today was a day like any other. Normal, serene, chaotic, the throes of life washing over the world.
Wren got out of the shower, dressed, brushed, and packed his bag. Walking to the kitchen, he knocked on Lia’s door before making waffles for breakfast and two turkey sandwiches for lunch. Lia skipped into the kitchen.
“Waffles for breakfast?” she asked.
“Yes. now hurry—we need to leave in 20 minutes,” Wren replied, shoveling waffles into his mouth.
Lia rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah.”
It was 2038, and the World was in the middle of the second cold war, between Russia, China, and America.
Wren took the freeway south, then turned off onto a beachside road leading to Lia’s school. Turning into the drop-off zone, Lia scrambled for her backpack. He pulled away and parked in the mall next to the school. Getting out of the car, he entered Lil garden cafe, sitting down at the table next to the window.
“Milk coffee and a croissant, yes?” Mia, the waitress, asked as she swept past the table.
Wren glanced up from his book and nodded with a smile.
“Right away, then,” she said with a laugh.
Where the last Cold War saw the advent of nuclear technology, the first space race, and the fight between communism and capitalism, the second Cold War was in A.I., biotech, global influence, and the start of a new space race.
Wren finished the coffee as he read the last paragraph. He swiped his card through the card reader, paid, and headed out to his car. By the time he reached campus, the lecture hall was already filling up. He slid into his seat and opened his notes. As the professor went over the logistics of war throughout history, Wren propped his head on his hand as his eyes gleamed with rapt attention—scribbling down notes.
Wren drifted between people in the quad as he headed to the learning commons, reviewing for the test next period. Opening his notes, he studied for an hour before heading to psych. Taking out the school-issued Chromebook, he opened the testing site and waited for his teacher to start the test. The test was sectioned into 3 parts. The first being a questionnaire about the unit's topics, behavior of individuals in a group, and group dynamics, as well as how internal and external pressures affect the judgment and behavior of individuals in a group. Then, an analysis of a research paper primarily focusing on motivation crowding and social exchange theories. Finally, an essay of choice. Wren choosing to write about cognitive dissonance harming an individual's ability to act as established in the social exchange theory.
Great progress in terraforming and astrophysics was made in recent years, starting another space race in the quest to set up better facilities on the moon.
Wren had two more lectures that day. After the first, he left to take Lia back to school before driving back for fourth period. On days when he had tests in Stats, he’d have Lia’s friends take her home instead.
He drove along the coast, the sun slipping beneath the horizon as dusk slowly swallowed the sky. The world fell quiet around him. Wren let himself drift in it, losing himself in the quiet bliss.
Getting home, he made a dinner of curry on rice before settling into the couch, finishing his homework, and reading his book.
“Good night,” Lia called as she headed to bed. Wren read for another hour before turning in as well. Lying in his sheets, his thoughts drifted—what he had seen, what he had done, what he had yet to do, and what he could only imagine. Gradually, they loosened their hold on him. Sleep took him into a shifting, prismatic repose of moments and places, where he drifted as a bird through the open winds.
It happened suddenly, unnoticed by the world. Something shifted—something that would shake the foundations of humanity. But even “change” was too small a word for it, for the things it did. A swift, serene quietus befell the world.
Wren would never wake again.