Winner!
Third Place Sci-Fi Winner on The Dream Awards July 2020.
What would happen if one day you were infected with a virus that ate at your brain, your skin, and all your internal organ all while you were self-aware?
Would you still feel? Want to...
Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night. ~ Edgar Allan Poe ~
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Mindless, Teal sunk her teeth through the squishy, soft tissue and questioned for the third time in twenty-five years of death, if this was what living was all about. Tearing at the flesh in her hands, she yanked and pulled taking her time to chew, similar to the goats she'd seen at the farm her mother worked at.
The first time her mind wandered, she'd been four, and questioned her parents the reason why they did not go out during the day.
"You see our very pale almost paper-like skin?" her mother asked. "It cannot withstand the sunlight."
"Is mine like that?"
With a puff, Morgan exhaled and patted her offspring's hand which rested on her forearm.
"Not really, honey."
"Can I go out? With the sun?"
Morgan grimaced at her child's words. "No. Only humans can. We can't risk something happening to you since your dad, nor I can go out and help if it did."
Wrinkling her face, Teal persisted. "What are humans?"
"They're the inhabitants of the other half of this planet. Beyond the gates."
"Can I meet one?"
Her mother's crystal blue eyes bounced from her daughter's excited face to her husband's muted one, hesitating.
"Can we?" she insisted.
"Shut up dummy!" her brother Jax's mocking tone reached across the table. "Pff, who cares?! Humans die."
"I do!" she retorted wide-eyed. "They ... die?!" Teal turned her attention back to her mother.
Before the conversation heated, their father, Javier, interrupted with a commanding, "Eat-your-brains!" The discussion ended, and the siblings fell silent for the rest of the night.
The second time Teal questioned her existence, she'd been fifteen and rebellious, or as unruly as one can be in the Felix family. Tired of unanswered questions, she tried her luck again.
"But I don't understand why we have to be in seclusion?" she complained. "Why can't we live among the living? It's not like I'm gonna jump on one of them, smack 'em over the head, and eat their brain while they're still alive! Gross!" She shivered with abhorrence.
"The disease is easy and quick to spread. Humans are not interested in turning into us. They're afraid of how we look, what we eat ..." her mother trailed off.
