Three Line Thursday: Droplet

It is an entire universe, with settled laws and shape
Scrambling desperately to life, spreading and multiplying beyond death’s counting,
All of it, of us, held together by surface tension.

Trojan Horse

You see the fort down there? See it?

Now, Chester, he says the only way to take the place is to rush the gate, pull it down before they can get organized. He says if we try to burn them out we'll incinerate anything we might have wanted from in there: guns, food, women, the works.

But I have a better idea. I think we just send you, just you, helpless and half-naked and beautiful. I think we let them take you in like a little lost kitten, just like I did. And then, when they're not paying attention, then you open the gate for us from the inside, and we walk in.

It'll take time before they'll trust you enough to stop watching. We will be patient. But don't think we've forgotten, that we've gone away, that you have a safe new home; we can still burn it down.

Verdant

You plant this seed, you see? You find a patch of rich earth favored by sun and rain and you push the seed in with your thumb, and you wait.

It'll take time, of course, long time. That's why we do this now, when you're little, when you don't understand how it all works. But one day you'll come back here and there she'll be, as grown as you and almost awake.

She won't belong to you; that's important. She'll choose you, right then, or she won't ever. If she doesn't, I suppose, try again while you still have time.