One More Sunrise

Sunrise comes every twenty-eight minutes. The tin can I'm in spins around and the sun rises in the viewing window, pretty as a postcard. About the same size, really. Two dawns an hour.

At that rate, I've got about two ersatz weeks before the air gets too thick to breathe. I couldn't figure out how to shut off all the alarms, so I just cut the wires. Except I cut too many, and now my only light is my distant sun, drifting now up beyond my line of sight. I watch it go and count, waiting for one more sunrise.

Sun and Moon, Midnight and Noon

The children of dawn run with wild abandon. They whoop and holler, shriek and giggle. They have races, rushing to beat one another over the tops of hills or dodging through the maze of foliage in some forgotten forest, striving to touch ground first. They push and taunt, shout encouragement, dare one another to run sideways or to slow down for even a moment.

They never do.

Dawn rushes on, vibrant and vital, and the children laugh. Beneath the laughter, though, is the knowledge of what awaits them should they stumble. For behind them, always, come the children of night...