“The sky is on fire! It’s falling down to the waves. My God, the sand has flames on it!” Her voice calls out from a balcony.
I arrive to see the sunset in purest form. The Sun’s fiery tears weep into the water. An ocean lamps them to the shore. Breeze of salt mixes with a little smoke. Paradise is only lost when you stop thinking about it. I draw a deep breath.
She pauses realizing I have joined her. “You know it’s the reason I wanted to come here. They said there’s nothing like when they release the plasma waves to cleanse the water. Tears of the Sun, what a quaint term those earth beings had. They were so simple minded. They rashly thought we were here to help them. They left us a nice place to watch at least.”
I smile and think of his many more places we will go to and start again. It’s fun every time. Pity we will only have a century or two here.
“Shut up already. My mind doesn’t need your thoughts right now! Just take it in. Tomorrow, it’ll just seem like any other night.”
She loves the old ways to communicate. “Yes, tonite you dance to flames. Tomorrow, and the next week we will watch it burn.”
Written as part of a challenge called Flash Fiction for Aspiring Writers, details are available at https://flashfictionforaspiringwriters.wordpress.com/2016/11/21/fffaw-challenge-week-of-november-22-2016/
Coloring Outside the Lines 
Hehehe
I like your very different take.
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There would have to romantic aliens. If they are traipsing across the universe, aren’t there things you are going to want to see. 😉 Thank you very much
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Paradise is only lost when you stop thinking about it. Very philosophical and romantic aliens you have created. I agree that the alien love story community is underserved, and your fine story is a start towards filling that niche.
Nicely done. You might enjoy Thursday’s Tale Weaver’s.
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Oh no! I just can’t do Alien Pilgrims bring debauchery in the name if religious freedom and heresy. I mean mean 1620, letting indians feed you then kill and steal their land, Salem Witch trials, there are too many places from which aleins would have been better people. Just a thought 🙂
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That’s not what the prompt will ask you to put your alien mind to thinking about. Unless you want to.
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Just checking. I’m a bit of a history person and the Pilgrims were more grim than Puritan
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I used to teach history — North American colonial as well as other eras.
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So did you use the book as the gospel truth or did you bring up some of the seedy side of the past. The winners write history, or more correctly when America was the most literate country in the world New England had more publishing than anywhere else in the New World
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There is no gospel truth in history. Each generation rewrites the past. We add the missing voices, the forgotten fragments, the losers, the misbegotten.
If you’re gonna read the bible, then you’re gonna teach your children to read.
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I love reading both sides of history. we filter biases into rewriting history. I think if we could read books from a hundred years ago how different would we think
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I always gave my students lots of primary source material to read so they would get a better sense of the time as the people saw it, too.
There’s room for more than just DWM (dead white men) but ya still gotta mention them.
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Without DWW there would be no DWM. Of course, those same DWM gave you Betty Ross in 1876. I actually think my favorite book on history is Short History of the Confederate States by Jefferson Davis. It really has so many things that were left out in it. I knew the Civil War had multiple causes and that slavery was the Northern Cause (the Emancipation Proclamation not freeing slaves in the “Northern States” was weird ..Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky and Washington DC) But I never found anything before that mentioned New England threatening to succeed after the Louisiana Purchase. It was fascinating to see where they almost did in 1805.
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Good thing he didn’t set out to write a long history!
People weren’t happy about Alaska either, Seward’s Folly and all that. Now, it’s the darlin’ of reality TV. And makes a lotta money for the country.
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Seward’s folly lead to the US purchasing only Alaska. He wanted Siberia and would have gotten it. The negative publicity made the territory less desirable. A crazy crossroad that would have changed WWII
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More than WWII — might not have been a WWII. Alternate realities — South won the Civil War; still fighting the Civil War, etc. Makes for interesting guessing games. The folly was Britain not buying Alaska and Maine! Canada should include those two pieces of real estate.
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But if the colonies attack Canada during the revolution with the French. the New World us very different. Take away the 1820 compromise and the Caribbean becomes Southern states with rum, sugar, and skaves
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Auto-correct or late night version of North American history “skaves.”?
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skave… I’m hoping Auto correct
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Some scary and hostile aliens. Well written.
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Making it seem a romantic evening sensed the best way to reveal who they are. True horror requires you to be a participant to creating the image of what they must be like. Maybe that’s just me. 😉 Thank you darling
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I trust that Doctor Who will visit and send them packing. I also read this story as being about global warming.
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The element of the burning sky could pay here, in the Bradbury way of the aliens are us. Hmm I need u go back to the picture and see if there is any signs of his arrival
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You pose so many questions in this one Mark, the need to know more is there. Alien tales are always a fun area to explore.
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Wrapped in the blanket of human emotions, aliens are more terrifying. I could see building this one a little bit.
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Sounds to me that aliens are on the earth to destory it. Chilling! I really love the line, “the sun’s fiery tears weep into the water.” Even the sun is mourning.
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It had an interesting feel to the colors in the sky and water. I saw the sun crying in the picture.
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Someone else saw the picture as “aching.” It must have a foreboding feel to it.
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It’s weird because the ship and the gas station sign lighted, give so many other things other than the striking color
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This is a very clever piece that leaves you wanting to know more 🙂
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Alien romance stories are an underserved story form. I mean between conquering other worlds they do need to make more little aliens. What a better place than this? OK maybe not while we call it our own . 😀
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Nice take, Mark. My take on the prompt when in a similar direction from that sky. Nice descriptions in there.
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The colors were so rich they begged fir some kind of fire.
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I was flirting around with the idea of plasma for so long, but I didn’t think I could pull it off. You, on the other hand, did it wonderfully!
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There’s a thin line of romance and annihilation of the human race. Once plasma answered the question of how, I was good to go with both. I mean who says aliens wouldn’t find this a romantic place. Many thanks 😀
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I’m sure they would. We live on an exceptionally beautiful planet
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From my new location surrounded by mountains, it is awesome place to be
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