Short Story: Foreshadow of Death

Held softly by the gentle currents of air, the blimp descended upon the city, flying over Mainstreet toward the needle-like spire. Its shadow swept over the slow traffic, and heads popped through car windows to gaze up at the spectacle.

On board, the passengers looked out their portholes at the city of ants below. A tired traveler, sitting cross legged with his fat suitcase under his seat, read and reread the grey newspaper he’d taken with him from home, disdaining the sights below. The news itself hadn’t changed, but he still read it. Fires, wars, business, weddings, he scanned the weathered rag for something to occupy his mind. The black marks of his pen already covered the crossword, the political opinions were too absurd to be credited, and the headline over all this regarded some dog. There was nothing in the paper but words, poor words without a home all huddled together, forced on the page by an editor.

Still he read the empty words; he would read anything to keep his mind from what he knew. Hidden away from light, locked snugly in the suitcase, the dreaded thing, hungering, undying, waited, and he, a currier to this nightmare, filled his mind with the mindless jumble of letters printed on the old newspaper.