“Ash”: A SciFanSat Microfiction Compilation

I find the big old #ash tree looks spooky in moonlight.

But daytime I enjoy moments of #solitude in its shade.

That was until little green men came out of the ground pulling me into a catacomb of the unknown. None believe me—no signs of ufos. #vss365 #scifansat #satsplat

— Fizzy-AllsortsOfAllsorts (@Fizzytwizler) August 6, 2022

The last tree stands amongst the skeletal ruins of its brethren, an ash that clings to its leaves, defiantly thrusting against a heartless sky. In #solitude I rest against its scarred grey skin, close my eyes, and for a moment allow myself to rest, to remember.#vss365 #scifansat

— John Everex (@EverexJohn) August 6, 2022

#SciFanSat #Ash against the sky raining uncertainties of a maybe tomorrow. Alien in the details, playing at being Frankenstein with our intelligence to memory away us to silhouette only the parody of their benevolence…What monsters!!

— Kimberly (@bionicanadian) August 5, 2022

Fire of the fight
Made fortune turn into the
Ash of solitude#SciFanSat #vss365#SciFiFri#6August1945Hiroshima#haiku pic.twitter.com/n74p3YNa30

— Indigenous Soul (@GeneVatow) August 6, 2022

First contact came as a fleet of six-hundred warships. The Earth held its breath as the President asked why they had come.

Their saurian alien leader is stoic. “The Tesh Armada reduced our world to ash. They are coming, but we will fight beside you.”#SciFanSat #2WordPrompt

— Jason H. Abbott (@Jason_H_Abbott) August 6, 2022

#SciFanSat
Stranded in a world of #solitude, the space designed to satisfy his vices, he stared at the empty bottles & the huge #ash tray overflowing w/ butts. Stoic when he first arrived he regretted his fight w/ the authorities, those who tried to save him.#vss365#2WordPrompt

— aran (@AranPotente) August 6, 2022

City life, a divorce & people had him craving solitude. So he traveled to Alaska near the Bering Sea & camped. One morning he hiked up a small volcano. An odd hued ash floated & swirled about him.He opted to climb into the crater. It was a new life. #satsplat #vss365 #SciFanSat

— Rick Milone (@rwmilone) August 6, 2022

Ash from the eruption rained on the mountain.
You have to leave! the rangers said. It's not safe here.
I'm not going anywhere, the old man said. This is my home. I am the mountain and the spotted owls, the black bears and the salmon. This is my home.#SciFanSat #ash

— Voima Oy (@voimaoy) August 6, 2022

My daughter thinks the fat flakes falling from the dark sky are snow, and begs to be allowed out. While she exclaims over the growing carpet of white, I watch the last ships take off. I want to let her believe for a while longer.#SciFanSat (ASH) #SciFiSat

— Louise Carey (@Louisecarey25) August 6, 2022

We turned away as our father cried.
He picked up a clump of #ash.
"It's time you leave this place, but I'm not strong enough to venture into the unknown."
From the smoke, a creature appeared.
"Stop crying old man. I will guide your family to a new home."#satsplat #SciFanSat

— Maria A. Perez (@MariaAPerez1) August 6, 2022

The treaty was signed and celebratory feasting over. The aliens were mesmerized when my youngest, Ashley, played Moonlight Sonata on the piano. Their elder gently keened through the first movement, then collapsed into a puddle of jelly by the end of the song. #SciFanSat

— Irene (@_Irene_Dreams_) August 6, 2022

When the ash from the volcano spumed into the sky, the people ran, their screams searing the air.

But I stood still; let it rain down.

Centuries later, my #solitude ends, as a team of Archaeologists unearth me.

Perfect.
Whole.
More than I ever was.#vss365 #SciFanSat

— Ellen✍K – in the gutter, looking at the stars (@poeticnihilist) August 6, 2022

#SciFanSat#Satsplat#vss365
No atmosphere
Temps swing
250 F
to -208 F freezing
Moon scout
Clinging

to life
in a cave
keeping 63 F
Saved

but I see and feel things
in my #solitude
that slither by me
in my lava tube
Smoke belches
from #ashy depths
Red eyes and heat
Dragon breath pic.twitter.com/0ySQYiEZhH

— Edward V. Fuller (@fuller_edward) August 6, 2022

Medieval knight. Old West rancher. Golden Age pirate. Every day I wake with a head full of memories, but not my own. Every face in the mirror is a mask I can't see behind. Every fleeting impression of "me" scatters when I reach for it, like ash in the wind.#Satsplat#scifansat

— Christopher Slagle (@christopheresl2) August 6, 2022

.

adapting
to a world of ash—
nuclear winter#SciFaiKuSaturday#SciFanSat

— Jonathan Roman (@deft_notes) August 6, 2022

"My penance?" he said. "Years of #stoic #solitude. I don't crave the #retribution of the Gods, I will not #fight."

"The %&!^ you won't," said #GrumpySwearyFairy. "You're a dragon, #Ash, we're gonna kick their deified %$$es."

"Oh, ok!"#vss365 #2WordPrompt #vssmagic #scifansat pic.twitter.com/NfeqNx6dt8

— That Burnt Writer 🇺🇦 (@ThatBurntWriter) August 6, 2022

I'd fled the city & survived alone on rainwater & scraps for months, but the #solitude was welcome. The visitors had looked unremarkable but their behaviour was disturbing & the accompanying smell of #ash was overwhelming – they were dead on the inside#vss365 #SciFanSat #scifi

— Karen (@SquiggleGallery) August 6, 2022

I kept them all. All your barbs, the snide jabs, the controlling aggressions, the veiled threats. All heaped into a pile. I waited, aimed – then struck the match.

Turned it all to ash.

I never thought someone else would crack my diamond solitude.#scifansat #vss365 #vsspic pic.twitter.com/a7Dvwza3S6

— A.L. MacDonald (@A_L_MacDonald) August 6, 2022

Earth was ash.

Millennia after THE WAR and Earth was still-not dead-not fruitful as before the bombs fell.

Humans proved each was the Alpha. Each succumbed to nuclear winter madness.

Cockroaches burrowed their way to the surface, knowing they ruled Ash.

Again.#SciFanSat pic.twitter.com/w0G1PFxKrk

— Alan Vincent Michaels (@AlanVMichaels) August 5, 2022

Even through filters, the air tastes of ash. Blackened footprints in pairs on the sidewalk.
Another town with no survivors. And until we find out what's causing an epidemic of spontaneous human combustion, they're only sending us in one at a time.#satsplat #scifansat #vss365

— Paul Briggs (@paulproofreader) August 6, 2022