Filling the Void
Leaving an immense trail of condensed charcoal smoke and maroon dust behind it, a blood red cruiser soared a hundred feet above the Martian sand dunes. Zooming over the red sands dunes, the cruiser approached a cube shaped metallic house, shrouded in shadows from the think sand clouds billowing above and around it. The cruiser reduced in speed, and slowly descended next to the house, displacing pounds upon pounds of sand on its way down. Once on the floor, the car continued to pulse with the engine until the engine’s hum came to a distinct halt. The man sitting inside the car lazily pulled the keys from the ignition, as he slumped out of the leather seats and opened the car door with a loud “click”. The man put on his top hat and closed the car door, and set off with audible footsteps ,crunching the sand under the black soles of his shoes. Making his way up the doorsteps, a shiver ran down his spine like millions of ants sprinting down his back. Almost at the last step, the man was hit by a putrid odor emanating from the house. Reaching the front door, he realized the door was slightly ajar. With his heart pounding in his chest, he put his weight on the elephantine metal door. The natural orange Martian light spilled into the room, illuminating it. Overcome with fear and confusion, the man hobbled into the vacant living room, the stench of blood and rotting flesh pervading his nose. With his eyes searching the room, he found the source. Sprawled on the floor, motionless, was a woman lying in a pool of blood. Horrified, the man knelt next to his spouses’ corpse, holding her hand with a trembling hand. He reached down and undid the cold golden necklace attached to his wife's’ neck, reading Penny. Feeling a cold drop running down his cheek, he began to confront the reality that his wife was gone from his life. He moved his hand to hold his wife’s hand, however when he picked it up, he was only greeted with the clammy feeling of death. With distraught eyes, he glanced next to his wife where his gaze fell onto a crumpled white note. He reached over and attempted to read the numbers scrawled onto the paper, and a name. He immediately recognized it as a ransom letter, and the name written next to the number it was his daughter’s. He flipped over the paper, and on the back, was: “exact change...123,000.98 shmars. call 345-352-235-567 to arrange meeting. You have 24 hours to get the money, or else... ”. The man’s spirit was broken after reading the note. Knowing that he made only 12,000 shmars a year, he was devastated in that he did not own anything even worth that amount of shmars. In desperation, his mind went to the worst possible alternative of obtaining money: burglary. The man crumpled the note in his hand, shoved it in his pocket, and exited the house, closing the door behind him and leaving his wife in the darkness that consumed his house.
Confused and driven into depression, the man jumped into his cruiser and immediately hit the throttle after starting the ignition, sending the vehicle perusing madly into the air. Like a shaking time bomb, the vehicle shot off, obviously exceeding the vehicles’ limit. Rocketing off into the distance, his mind raced, attempting to find ways of getting enough Martian shmars for the ransom. With the gleaming metal Martian city of Glar in sight, he released the throttle.The cruiser, unable to handle the speeds, began to break down on it descent. When the cruiser finally touched down, it violently skidded across the Martian dunes, spewing scalding metal and sand in every direction. The man lay motionless in his seat, shocked and bloodied by the impact, for several minutes, then he placed his foot on the car door, and kicked. Exiting the jumbled mess of a cruiser, he was immediately hit by a gust of sand, filling his mouth with the taste of salt from the desert, and blood from his own mouth and body. He gritted his teeth in agony, by pressed onwards towards the towering metal skyscrapers. Still a good half mile from the city, he ran like a beaten horse, close to death and clasping to life with a vice grip.
After a few minutes of this hobbled running, he made it onto the metal and concrete streets of Glar. He made his way to the one place that had enough shmars to pay for the ransom, the Martian mint. He took off towards the core of the city, navigating his way through the streets of Glar, flooded with street merchants trying to sell black market items, commuting businessmen, and food stands from which the most peculiar of smells wafted from. Navigating through the throngs of people, he made it to the mint, one of the tallest buildings in Glar, distinguished by its glaring reflective red paint. The man made it to its two large double doors, and proceeded to push them forward with all his might. Having worked at the mint for several years, the man wasn’t surprised to see the massive lobby with its own waterfall. It sprayed a light mist throughout the room, filling his mouth with a slight saltiness. Knowing his way around, he walked straight for the secret passage he’d discovered years ago at the base of the waterfall. Without warning, he dove into the green shimmering pool. Above, he heard excited chatter, caused by the sight of himself diving into the decorative pool. Ignoring the people above, he quickly swam deeper and deeper into the pool’s murky depths, till he saw a hole in the pool’s side which led to a different chamber. Swimming through, he began his incline to a round opening at the top of the pool. With his neck bulging with veins, he swam his fastest towards the opening. Once surfacing, he allowed himself a few breaths before climbing out of the opening into a room. The room was completely barren apart from the small circular opening in the ground for the miniature pond from whence he came, and a 10 foot tall metal door with a number pad on it on the opposite side. He walked up to it and punched in the number sequence, 5439-405, after which he heard a noise which sounded like hundreds of metallic rocks being thrown at a pan, which he knew to be the tumblers to the door being unlocked. With a forceful shove, he pushed the door open. Expecting to find the solution to his problem, he was met by a vacant metal room, with a single metal shmar resting on the floor. The bank must have moved their funds to a different location...
Now utterly helpless to help his daughter, the man let forth an enraged bellow which rocked his very soul. After losing everything else in his life, he was pushed to insanity, and was determined to gather the money one way or another. He dove back into the pool and swam hastily until he emerged from the pool in the lobby. Causing more commotion upon his exit from the pool, he dashed through groups of people, knocking over old ladies and children. In desperation, he had to resort to stealing from the people of Mars.
Sprinting out into the streets, he searched for suitable subjects to swindle or steal from. He quickly spotted two old women whose purses were visibly weighed down with the distinctive large metallic shmars. He sprinted towards the women, and when within three feet of the women, he lurched, pushing off with his feet with all his might. Airborne, he reached out with his arms and clasped the two women by the top of their heads with his palms, and forced their heads onto the concrete, grinding the skin on their faces into a pulp, trailing blood and fragmented bones onto the pavement. Feeling salty blood and Martian sand spattering his lips and face, he licked the salty concoction off his face. The man quickly dug through the women’s purses on the floor brimming with insanity, pulling out fist fulls of shmars, and two, one thousand shmar coins. Stuffing the shmars into his jacket, he ran off before people on the streets were able to identify him.
He was nearing the end of the street, when he ran into two hobos, merely begging for a little bit of change. In a fit of insanity, he yelled, “ Here’s your change hobos!” while pulling out the two one thousand dollar shmars, which could be distinguished by their jagged star shape. With a nimble fling of his arms, he hurled the coins at their faces, making a loud crunch and squishing noise as the cold metal found its way in between one of the hobo’s eyes, splattering hot blood onto the pavement, and into the other hobo’s chest, gushing crimson blood everywhere. With his free hand, he dug through the hobos’ jackets and produced a few shmars from the filthy jackets that the hobos’ donned. With a crazed look in his eye he looked into the street and saw a bronze manhole cover. Under the impression that the manhole cover was merely a large shmar, he dashed into the middle of the road, and attempted to pull it up, straining his entire body. So concentrated on the task of pulling up the manhole cover, he was unaware of the five ton metallic monster barrelling down the road. And thus, his life was ended with his hand still clasping a gold pendant inscribed with the name, Penny.
His head was dismembered from his body, and was imprinted forever onto the pothole. And forever on he is remembered as the Crazy Headed Penny.