SFF Short Stories

Photo by Christopher Campbell

Ying Yo
by Larry Heyl
CC BY-SA

Once there was a time before Adam and Eve, six million billion years ago. The breeding had begun, the heavy elements combined and recombined through intelligence, past sentience, towards enlightenment. Ying Yo, a young girl, attended monastery. She did not really have human form but this is not a story about form.

As she read she wondered much as young girls do today. Mostly she wondered about life. Her daydreams included adventure, romance, even fulfillment. When she prayed her mind would turn to bigger issues. Why was she here? What was her relationship to the Universe? And just who was God to put her through all of this?

So she read and adventured, carried away by imagination and then she prayed and feared what she did not know and she did not know much because she was just a young girl.

But she did not actually do much at monastery and her schedule went mostly like this.

Wake up hungry, bright and lithe.

Kill and eat then an hour of prayer.

A walk in the park where she would read under trees.

On a good day a big kill and a feast. But most days crackers and old bones.

An hour of prayer where she would debase herself for her lack of understanding and correctly so.

Then before rest a rubbing of the parts. She loved it when they writhed and tumbled star light bright and drizzling dank.

A rest. A long time with the fear. And a prayer like this.

O God I know nothing. I fear you I fear you. Within me I’m melting come dark or bright shining. The dank and the drizzle call out in the darkness. I fear you I fear you. My worship sustains me.

Finally that’s over and the killing begins again.