Complex Numbers

It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

PROMPT: January 23rd

Finish this story:
A girl, sitting alone on a rock at the edge of the woods, jumps when she hears…

A girl, sitting alone on a rock at the edge of the woods, jumps when she hears, not from the cracked, faded, tufted pavement in front of her, nor from the slope to her right that curves sharply up the mountain, nor from the long, straight expanse to her left that leads, were someone foolish enough to brave the journey, to overgrown fields, then to howling empty subdivisions, then to the infected city, then to it doesn't matter where because you're not getting past the ruins; the sound not beginning in the shadowed, leaf-strewn forest floor behind her and then continuing, crescendoing, impinging on her consciousness only slowly so that she would have time to become aware, time to run or at least to hide in a culvert or behind the weeds waving in the wind on the other side of the deserted road -- no, directly behind her, less than a meter maybe, certainly no more than that, the sudden unmistakable ca-crunch of a once-human footstep.


I've been learning about suspensive sentences lately, and thought I'd give one a try. This prompt seemed suited to it.

Team by team, reporters baffled, trumped, tethered, cropped
Look at that low plane, fine, then
Uh oh, overflow, population, common group
But it'll do, save yourself, serve yourself
World serves its own needs, listen to your heart bleed
Tell me with the Rapture and the reverent in the right, right
You vitriolic, patriotic, slam fight, bright light
Feeling pretty psyched

It's the end of the world as we know it
It's the end of the world as we know it
It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine