Hellfire

Love your ego, you won't feel a thing. Always number one.

Darkness flooded the ground, eating away at every inch of light, stealing away the soft sunshine that played upon the sun-kissed skin of those below. Those still forced to inhabit the soft green planet of Origin.

The pen with a bent wrist crooked king, sign away our peace, for your war.

A round faced child tottered quickly through the long fields of grain, her own corn yellow hair matching the light golden hue of the amber waves that fluttered recklessly in the wind. Her cheeks were now spotted pink with exhaustion and excitement as she reached the haven of her home, the same pink of the thick ribbon in her hair. Giving a call to her mother and father, just as every child was doing in the small providence of Invidia, informing them of the soldier convoys who had come to give them sweets again.

One word and it’s over.

Silence began to echo eerily across the small valley, infectious quiet spreading from the still crafts that hung in the air with no signs of disembarking. The control center of the lead craft had been the start of the deathly silence, as if the world was about to tumble off the edge of a knife and teeter into oblivion. There was movement as a figure, clad in the general's uniform of the United Confederate, strode across the front of the large glass windshield. Lifting his fist up in a slow, precise motion up to the level of his ear, the others reacted instantly. Shifting around in uncomfortable hard-backed seats, clicking across the clear floor in sharp black shoes or skating their fingertips across the black screens that adorned the gray pedestals in front of them. "Fire."

Dropping your bombs now, on all we've built.

As the word began to form in the control room, slipping and sliding past the few crew members' eyes, bringing up sharp images of their home; there was a smooth sound of metal doors sliding open under the craft. The rest of the horde of space crafts followed suit, led on by the command ship. Large silver objects, the size of a seven pound newborn, dropped from the ships, falling down towards the surface. There was a pause as the earth held its breath, creating a brief, ringing silence.

How does it feel now to watch it burn?

Fire and ash rained down upon the houses and fields as the explosions shook the earth. Houses or life forms of any kind in a seven mile radius of the drop zone were incinerated into inky black dust which snowed down upon the scorched ground, now void of life. Hellfire rained down upon those fleeing, consuming the slower ones in slow flames that licked the flesh off their bones as their screams ripped through their throats. Several more eruptions of explosions rocked the province, overturning vehicles, ripping up roads and roots of a home.

Burn.

Once the dust and ash settled, the seething flames melted away by the lack of oxygen in the ash coated air; the crafts landed twenty miles from the initial blast radius to gaze down upon their shameful work. With small black and silver masks covering their faces, the destroyers descended off the ramp of their havens onto the hell they created. Reaching the edge of the blast radius, the commander paused, his thick gloved hands clasped behind him as he surveyed the wreckage. A flicker of motion drew him closer to a scorched tree that had managed to survive. Catching a string-like cloth in his hand, he rubbed his forefinger and his thumb together, feeling the ribbon as one of his men came up behind him. "We have victory." the commander announced darkly, allowing the pink ribbon to flutter through his fingers to the ground.

Burn.

[A very short story inspired by the song "Raise Your Weapon" by Deadmau5]