Achromic by Colbey Pratt

Image courtesy of Simon Howden / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Colbey Pratt won October's short fiction with his story called 'Achromic', not only is the story wonderfully written it has one of my favourite concluding lines in any of the entries so far. You can read the story below, but before you do why not come and join my Facebook group dedicated for short and flash fiction. Whether you're a reader looking for something new, or a writer with something to show off, there's something for everybody:

https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/shortfictionreadersandwriters/

Achromic by Colbey Pratt
I live in a world divested of color.

My senses escape me, lost and separated from the void in which I am trapped. I cannot feel the warmth of the light, nor the icy chill of the shadows. I cannot taste any fragrance in the air, of the dandelions that dance with even the subtlest hint of a breeze. I cannot hear the rustling of the Great Tree's leaves, or even that soft static that always accompanies silence. And, even though I can decipher shapes, I cannot perceive the color they may or may not possess.

Of my senses I can only smell, but even that is a curse in and of itself. For the only odor I can detect is of ash and smoke, of soot and the lingering essence of death. I am not quite positive of where it comes from, and every theory I've created has been squashed by simple logic...although logic is untouchable from my prison.

I am completely alone, isolated from any other soul that may occupy this realm as I do. Once, a while ago or so I believe, I thought I glimpsed another being passing by, tiptoeing just along my peripheral. But the instant I tried to look, anyone that might have been there had already vanished, and I was forsaken once more. I remember endeavoring to call out, but no sound came - and where no sound can be heard, no sound can be made.

I have no memory of a past or place before this province before this never-ending moment suspended in the fabric of time - only a knowledge of what should or should not be in the presence of reality. And that alone gives me the notion that I'm ensnared in the clutches of a world, of a universe, completely detached, severed from all facets of reality. It simply does not exist where I reside.
And that, I suppose, is the most frightening aspect of all. The idea, the possibility, that I am caught between the thriving before and the sacrosanct after.