The Child

The parade stopped. The band's marching music fizzled away. The performers and their audience stood rooted, looking around them, seeking the source of the strange vibrations they felt under their feet. The trembling worsened until rivers of cracks meandered across the surface of the road. And then they saw him. A tiny child sat at the end of the road, his white blonde hair reflecting the summer sun. He got to his feet his head drooped and his arms hung limply by his sides. Suddenly, his head jerked up, his yellow eyes staring right through them. He began to laugh.