Phantasmagoria #AtoZChallenge (Part 2)

Phantasmagoria – a sequence of real or imaginary images like that seen in a dream.

The mushrooms were strange. They looked like white toadstools. I picked one up and it carried on glowing in my hand. I sniffed it but it didn’t smell of anything other than damp soil. I put the mushroom back and watched it grow as if I had never touched it.

I looked up at the ceiling and it was empty. The blue butterflies had all gone. Frowning,  I turned back to the window and saw it was open and rain was dripping until the mushrooms.

I shut the window and decided it was time to have something to eat. There was no sign of the butterflies and I had a quiet evening. I sprawled out on the sofa and read my book before watching a late night movie. I wrapped the duvet around myself again and kept glancing at the windowsill.

The mushrooms were still there, letting off a candle flame like light. They had stopped growing now but the soil around them had sprouted grass as if it was a window box.

The thunder and lightening finally arrived. I watched the sky as a few white flashes went off and I counted like a child the gaps before the thunder rumbled. The rain was still coming down and the wind was whipping. The weather seemed more interesting to watch then the movie.

I dozed, warm and sleepy and not caring about the strange mushrooms or the blue butterflies, they weren’t doing any harm.

The lightening cracked, flashing like a bomb going off. I half jumped up by the sudden noise then the electricity cut. Darkness filled the house as the lights, TV and everything else went off.

I clutched the duvet, feeling like a character in one of my horror novels. Was the serial killer going to smash down my door, blood dripping axe held high and ready for it’s next victim?

I laughed and relaxed. Nothing was going to happen. A faint glow drew my eyes and I saw the mushrooms, they were casting a soft glow and there was enough light for me to see clearly by.

I rested my head back and watched them. A blue butterfly appeared and touched down on top of one of the mushrooms. Soon, it was joined by more. They appeared gently out of the darkness, landing and circling the glowing mushrooms, attracted to them like moths.

I listened and heard the whisper of their wings. I felt one brush my cheek. How many more were they? How had they been in my house all this time and I hadn’t known. Looking at the window, I saw it open once again and the rain was dripping in. Had I opened the window? I didn’t remember.

I was too warm to get up, so I shut my eyes and rested. If sleep came then it came. I felt soft feather likeness touch my face, I stirred and struggled to open my eyes. I felt something crawling on me. Dark blue met my eyes and put a hand to my face and felt a wiggling mass of butterflies upon me.

Crying out, I leaped up and tried to wipe them off me. I was half blinded by them, panicking because I didn’t know what was going on and it was dark. I fell and expected to hit the carpet or the coffee table or the windowsill. But I didn’t. I was falling and falling into blackness, the butterflies all around me and sounding so loud and brushing against me harshly.

I arrived at the bottom of wherever it was. Landing lightly on the ground. I smelt damp soil, rotting leaves and flowers. It was still dark, so I sit for a moment and got use to it. The butterflies were still around me, their wings fluttering and sometimes touching me.

Light bloomed and I saw all over the ground the glowing mushrooms. They lit up the forest scene before me. There were thick, tall dark tree trunks and a canopy of black leaves. Long grass and flowers made a soft bed for me to walk on.

The blue butterflies stayed with me, surrounding me as I walked. There was no path and the mushrooms didn’t lead anywhere but I wasn’t going to sit on the ground and do nothing.

The scene didn’t change, I walked and walked and it was like going around in a circle. I sat on a large tree root to rest. Though I didn’t feel tried. There was a wide hollow at the base of the tree. I crawled inside and found a nest of dried leaves and mosses. I lay down and watched the mushrooms glowing outside and the butterflies playing above them.

I slept and dreamt. I had weird dreams of over coloured worlds where fairies and other creatures lived. I rode unicorns and whales. I flew with dragons and spoke riddles with a Sphinx. I climbed trees and watched giants moving rocks. Colours ran and mingled together, like a water colour that someone had dropped.

I laughed in the sun, I splashed in the sea, I collected oranges the size of beach balls and drink from them with a bamboo straw. The sky was a wash of a sunset forever and I was finally free of worry. Free of pain.

 

(Inspired by; http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com)

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Phantasmagoria #AtoZChallenge (Part 1)

Phantasmagoria – a sequence of real or imaginary images like that seen in a dream.

They said the drugs might effect my mind. I may see things that are not real; hallucinations. I wasn’t to worry and if needed I should go somewhere where I felt safe to let whatever I was experiencing pass.

I was fine for the first few weeks then one afternoon whilst it was raining outside I saw a blue butterfly on the window. It was on the inside, so I opened the window and hoped it would go free.

It was the middle of Spring and I’d seen lots of butterflies about. They had been white, black with red patches and the other day I swore I saw a peacock one. So, I didn’t think about the blue butterfly too much, other then I hadn’t seen one like it before.

The phone rang as I studying the butterfly and I went to pick it up. It was a friend calling to see if I was okay and up for coffee tomorrow. We chatted for a bit then I went back to watching TV and resting.

A flash of blue caught my eye and I turned my head. There were two blue butterflies fluttering against the window now.

‘You’ve got a friend,’ I spoke as I got up, ‘you should be outside though…looks like it’s really coming down.’

The rain really was. The sky was a rolling wave of black clouds and the rain was like a large waterfall, everything was being covered in water. The wind was getting up too. Looked like a storm was coming in.

‘You can stay there,’ I told the butterflies, ‘it’s rough out there. I’ll leave the window open for you.’

I turned on the lamp, turned the TV off and picked up the current horror novel I was reading. I should have picked something lighter, maybe a supernatural romance to read but I got the same experience that riding roller coasters had when I read horror; the high of being alive.

A read for an hour or so, the rain a fitting background sound. Slipping the bookmark into a chapter page, I stretched and decided it was time for a hot drink. I looked over at the window and saw there were three blue butterflies resting on the sill, their wings moving up and down gentle.

‘Where do you all keep coming from?’ I muttered, ‘do I have an infestation? Surely, I’d have noticed before. Maybe, I should shut the window?’

I got up and carefully did that then I went into the kitchen and made a hot drink and something to eat. Afterwards, I went to bed for a nap. I couldn’t sleep all the way through the night due to the illness and the other pills which caused insomnia. I felt tried a lot and getting little sleep often helped this.

Two hours later, I got up and it was as dark as the middle of the night. Grateful I had left the lamp on, I looked to see the time, it was almost four. I had pulled my curtains to, I got up and parted them. A storm was making itself known outside. I watched and listened for thunder and lightening but it was too distant yet. The rain splattered against the window, driven by the rain and I felt cold.

Wrapping up in a jumper, I went downstairs, leaving lights on behind me. I made a cup of tea and got out a tin of of soup to eat later. The house was too quiet, despite the sound of the storm so I went into the living room and turned on the TV. There were afternoon game shows on to watch.

A chill caused me to turn my head to the window and I saw the window open. Frowning, I got up and closed it, though I was sure I had shut it before I went upstairs. Sitting down, again I looked for the blue butterflies but they weren’t there. Maybe, they had left? But why go out into a storm?

Shrugging, I pulled a duvet around me which I left on the sofa in case I needed it down here. Snuggling, down I watched TV. After the two game shows was the news and then it was time to eat. I was too warm and comfy though to move. I thought about how hungry I was and decided not much, so I didn’t have to move. I found something else on TV to watch and carried on laying there.

There was a tapping on the window that I thought was the rain. I glanced to look and saw a blue butterfly trying to get through the glass. At least one of them hadn’t left. I felt sorry for the poor thing and I knew I should try and help but I couldn’t move. I watched the butterfly flapping about and then there were two.

‘None of you left then,’ I said then yawed.

Being cocooned was making me sleepy again. I shut my eyes but then opening then soon after, thinking I should open the window and give the butterflies a chance of escaping. I looked over the window and saw there was a cluster of blue butterflies there, about ten or so. Also, growing up from the sill were cream coloured mushrooms.

‘This doesn’t make sense,’ I mumbled and got up.

Stumbling over, I disturbed the butterflies and they took the air and circled the room like startled birds. They curled around the ceiling light and landed up there. I turned back to the windowsill and saw the mushrooms were sporting up from soil and the they were glowing white.

To Be Continued…

(Inspired by; http://www.a-to-zchallenge.com)

Dawn

The streets weren’t safe after dawn. Hannah Long knew that, just like she knew the cause. Sitting in the window box of the attic, she watched the sky changing colour. The streetlamps went out marking a growing pathway of light. Sighing, Hannah watched the first of the spores rising towards the sky. They always started appearing seconds after dawn arrived. At first glance the spores looked like large snowflakes, only green coloured. They were soft and damp to the touch, but they didn’t melt away. Instead they absorbed into skin and spread poison into the body.

Opening her scrapbook, Hannah flipped through the pages. Ever since the spores had first appeared, she had gathered clippings of all kinds. There were newspaper, magazine and internet articles, her own notes from the TV and radio, pictures she had found and others she had taken. Mixed in were her own diary passages, which contained thoughts and reflections on things she had read.

Tucking a lock of brown hair behind her ear and fixing her glasses, she began to read the first reports in the budging book. At first the spores had been something of a spectacle, a mystery of nature across the world, but then they had started killing. It had taken scientists and biologists awhile to figure out the cause, but things were too late and the mushrooms had become well established.

Hannah glanced out of the window as the spores tapped against it. They were growing in numbers as it got lighter and hotter. Looking back again, she scanned an article about how the spores were not being reported in freezing places like Alaska and the North and South Poles. Luckily, they still weren’t, but the idea of fleeing to one of those places now was long past. Their boarders had closed a few months ago, when her parents, who were leading mycologists, had discovered that the spores could transfer via skin contact and it didn’t matter what the outside temperature was because they could almost instantly move.

That was the other reason why Hannah was currently alone. Her parents were living in secret headquarters, working around the clock to try and kill off the mushrooms and their spores. Being fifteen and almost completely aware of the dangerous and progress, Hannah’s parents trusted her. They sent her money once a week and paid for a cleaner and cook to come on set days to help her. She was also still allowed friends over, though most of the people she’d known were either dead or had moved away.

Flipping through more pages, Hannah went to the last few. Most of these articles were about her parents and their team’s progress. She felt tears sting the corner of her eyes and turned the pages on the photographs. She never thought that she’d miss her parents so much. Turning to the next empty page, she picked up a fountain pen and lent back. The brick wall was cool on her back and hard on her head. Turning slightly, she watched the spores gathering into a thick fog now that the sun had fully risen.

Pressing pen to paper, she wrote:

It’s my 16^th birthday today and also Halloween. My parents can’t come home, so they are going to video call me later. I miss them. The spores seem thicker today and I was able to watch then rise as dawn broke. The remaining humans must feel like vampires because we are now officially nocturnal. We live in the night and sleep during the day. I fear that the spores might find out how to overcome the darkness that protects us.

I watched a TV interview about that and a biologist said it could never happen. The spores need the light and they know that to be a fact. However, they have yet to truly understand the mushrooms, so what if they can adapt?  

I’m trying not to think about it. Cook said she’d bring me a pumpkin to carve this afternoon. That’ll take my mind off things. Still though, I can’t help but wonder what things will be like when we are all gone.