Amok

Lisa didn’t know why the man let her live. One second she was eating a burger, the next she hid under the table as he fired round after round into the other people in the restaurant. The young basketball players. The old woman and her grandson. The girl behind the counter. Her middle-aged manager. Everyone screamed and ran for the door and he shot them until his bullets ran out, then produced another gun from his pocket and kept going.

He stopped when everyone was dead. Lisa trembled and watched him, waiting for her turn. The man walked over to where she crouched, hunkering down to meet her gaze. Something moved behind his irises.

“Do you want to die?” he asked.

Lisa couldn’t find her voice. She shook her head.

He laughed. “I do.” Then he put the gun to his chin and pulled the trigger.

The police questioned her but she had no answers. No connection to the man at all. Only, when she went home and looked in the mirror, she saw something that hadn’t been there before. A flicker of movement in her eyes…

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3 Responses to “Amok”

  1. Donald says:

    Ooooh, now that’s disturbing. Nice delivery. I’ll be thinking of that long after I leave.

  2. Laura Eno says:

    Well now, that was a chilling ending! I love it!

  3. Good set up, bad resolution. The ending is way too expository. If you need to drop a clue, do it earlier in the story when the reader isn’t looking for it. Or just keep it random. That’s scarier. There’s too much Marysue in this story for me as is.

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