Original Short-short: Twelve Notes
The clock struck twelve, violently loud, harsh and grinding against his ears. Benny cringed, squeezing his eyes shut, as the note faded into memory, echoing in the distance. "No. Not yet, please, not yet."
He wanted to be strong, he wanted to be brave. But the booming note buffeted against him, the sound slamming into his body, reverberating down his spine. He shivered violently in the humid night air.
A second booming note filled the night.
"Come back, Dad," he pleaded, the images burned into his memory: broken glass shining on the pavement, reflecting the glow of the flames beyond.
"You promised you'd be back, said you'd never leave us."
Us. The word hit him like a rock and the tears came once more, unbidden and unstopping. There was no one else now. No one but Benny, scared, pathetic Benny, cowering in a corner while the world burned around him. The third note struck.
She raised the microphone to her mouth as she'd done so many times before, and the fourth note rung in the dark. But there was no camera filming, no news van standing just out of the shot, no families sitting around their televisions watching with mouths agape.
She opened her mouth, but no words came.
A fifth note, and silence. Silence that seemed to last for an eternity. Through her job she'd seen war, she'd seen famine, she'd seen plague. She'd never seen all three together. A complete breakdown of society. Panic and fear, spreading like disease, washing over the world, giving birth to naught but fire. And death.
A sixth note broke the silence, slamming into shattered-glass skyscrapers, echoing down abandoned streets. Words failing her, she lowered the microphone.
Another note, unforgiving, uncompromising. The hiss of static in the night. In the control room, the soldier stared forward, unblinking, unmoving.
"Break-break, this is callsign actual, priority transmission. Fort Benning, come in," a voice calls, distorted and desperate through the radio. The soldier looked down, eyes unfocused, expression uncomprehending.
"Fort Benning, come in. Do you copy?"
The bell tower boomed once more. Silence followed.
"This is callsign actual, we have massive casualties, extent of damage unknown, do you copy?"
The solider blinked slowly, arm reaching for the radio.
"Fort Benning do you co--" It died with a hiss, voice fading into oblivion as the soldier reached the receiver.
The bell tower chimed again.
The next note struck, exploding from the tower.
"Ten," John counted as he raised the revolver, reveling in the feel of its cool metal on his temple. It spoke to him, whispered promises, solid, final. No room for uncertainty. No more unfaithful spouse. No more unemployment. No more fear of tomorrow.
"Eleven." The clock tower boomed once more. He clicked the hammer back, the chamber rotating, a bullet slipping into position. The note faded to silence. The world seemed to hold its breath, the very air becoming stagnant.
"The rest," John began, tightening his finger on the trigger, "is silence." The twelfth note pierced the night. The report of the revolver followed.
The night drew to an end, rays of light brightening the eastern horizon. The dead and dying lay scattered. Haphazard. Broken. Plumes of smoke rose from the cities, billowing towers obscuring the brightening sky. Wildfires burned in the forests. Missile silos stood empty, their payloads delivered. And as the sun climbed steadily higher into the sky, all around the world survivors pulled themselves from the ashes, wiped soot-covered hands on bloodstained shirts, and opened their eyes to the remains of humanity. Before them, the world burned, and they realized they were wrong, as a new day dawned on the twenty-first day of the twelfth month of the year two-thousand and twelve.