@TERMINALLYILL PRESENTS...
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
Well my friends, I am still alive and well, despite the fact that I have not posted on the @terminallyill account for quite some time. Selflessness is the best excuse that I have for not getting material pushed through on here, as I have been incredibly busy building the @greetersguild, @breakthecycle and @fundthefuture projects, as well as my real life job which takes a great deal of my time renovating homes. With so much growth and prosperity coming into the guild, I have had my hands full, needless to say. Thankfully, I have finally found some time to breathe and put some much needed focus into a possible career that I am considering going after, writing. Since using the Steemit platform, I have become rather fond of writing and the work that it entails, to be completely honest. After some months of honing my skills and getting properly accustomed to Steemit, things have taken a positive change once again in my life. After years of soul searching I have finally found something driving me from within that I could even make a living doing. I finally have that fire lighting in my soul and a deep passion burning inside of me again!
With that said, I think its time to go ahead and unveil the fruit of my passions and labors. This publication is a portion of a fictional piece that I have been writing for the past few weeks that is the first book in a multi novel series. This is the first portion of the prologue for my novel "From The Dust", an intense post apocalyptic thriller based in a world gone to waste, beginning only two decades from our current timeline. This prologue is intended to set a detailed scene and paint a vivid picture for my readers, preparing them for the incredible story to follow. Please, for those curating, take it easy on me, as this is the first time I have written a fictional piece aside from storytelling for Dungeons and Dragons. Though I have never written a book (or many stories), I am confident in my progress with this piece and hope that all of you find the material enjoyable and well done. I can only hope the response to this is good, so I can pursue writing and finally have the opportunity to do something I truly love to do for a living.
FROM THE DUST - PROLOGUE - PART ONE
A chill whips through the stagnant morning air, almost as if to welcome the Winter seasons of old, pushing through a battered thicket of struggling Oak trees. Curled, burnt leaves push through the roughly shaped branches, dancing effortlessly in the cool breeze. Still flying high upon a heavily abused flagpole is a torn and tattered nylon American flag, partially shrouded by the small grove of trees. Just beyond this slight treeline lies the remains of the very last medical building left standing in the once magnificent city of Easton. At one point the city was the crowned jewel of the state of Delmarva. Now, as with most everything else, the effects of famine, panic and war have destroyed anything of substance from the ruined municipality.
Just hours beforehand, Dempsey Memorial Hospital was the final standing ground and last ray of hope for what was left of the local Army National Guard. This seven story building went from being their saving grace to becoming a bullet riddled slab of formed concrete accompanied by varying piles of crumbled block and rubble. Across the dilapidated landscape, the lifeless bodies of the fallen lay almost as if they were thrown about by angry gods. Mixed with the light breeze, the scent of gunpowder and decay sweep through the area, telling the story of the standoff that transpired here.
As the sun slowly rises in the East, a brilliant light stabs through the battered trees, glaring effortlessly from the thousands of scattered shell casings. This spectacle of light creates an almost unsettling sense of beauty as it casts upon the grim display of the apparent slaughter. The only signs of life within the entire city block are a murder of crows pecking upon the flesh of the deceased and the circling of grotesque, deformed vultures preparing for the feast to come. Welcome to the once wonderful trading capital of Delmarva, now crippled mercilessly by animalistic instinct. Today, this same animalistic instinct is what has been the driving force behind humanity, or what is left of humanity, as we know it.
The world once was something of absolute allure and splendor, a sight to truly behold, depending on the perception of the eyes surveying it. Roughly a decade prior to the present day, humanity turned a new leaf and began dedicating to the advancement of our people as a whole. The pursuit of knowledge and solidarity brought forth an era of time that mankind had finally realized was long overdue. Modern marvels were plentiful, technological advancements blessed the four corners God's ultimate creation and humanity was making steady progress towards creating something only envisioned in fairy tales. The arrival of true peace and prosperity in the years following had finally created a sense of ease within the world. Things had finally fallen into place.
In the year 2038 the world stood still and powerless at the hands of an incredible natural phenomena never seen before. In the month of June the planet was pummeled by a series of intense solar flares, which were always thought to be an idea conjured up by doomsday theorists on television. In the beginning, the flares were small, spread over the course of a few days, hitting periodically and providing an extravagant light show comparable to Aurora Borealis. The world embraced the natural event, as there were no significant signs of hindrance resulting from it's occurrence. Crowds gathered across the globe to photograph and record the natural events. Local and global news crews covered this rare spectacle day in and day out, turning it into a media fueled publishing dream. From the very beginning, all had seemed to be well with the initial series of solar flares. As we have been shown numerous times throughout history however, what seems to be good and wholesome, can turn out to be quite the opposite.
The universe once again proved to us all just how quickly things can unravel, more or less in the blink of an eye. We were quickly reminded, as a people, that we are not in control of our future, despite our finest of attempts and hardest of labor. Six days into the picturesque light show, things took a severe turn for the worse. What was considered a graceful and elegant dance of the angelic, in the splitting of a second, turned into the roaring spite of the wretched. On June 22nd, at 3:44 PM Eastern Standard Time, the planet was rocked by a series of "super" solar flares that easily penetrated the natural defenses of planet Earth, bringing every location on the planet to its knees in absolute terror and awe. Man, woman and child alike observed this grand event, as it was possibly one of the most beautiful and incredible things to have beheld with their eyes, even during peak daylight hours. When this series of super flares breached our planet's atmosphere, an astounding array of colors fell to the land, as if spilled from God's palette. Many froze and gazed at the phenomena in complete admiration as it rained down on the planet. However, nothing could prepare them for the panic and havoc that would quickly ensue afterwards.
PART TWO OF THE PROLOGUE IS COMING SOON! FOLLOW ME @TERMINALLYILL TO SEE IT WHEN IT RELEASES!
