Twilight's Flash Fiction / Relatos cortos crepusculares

  Break the Wall Breaking the invisible wall that rises impassively behind time, that wall that prevents us from returning. Go back, following the trail of life and learn to feel that life is eternal.   Romper la pared Romper la invisible pared que se levanta impasible detrás del tiempo, esa pared que nos impide volver. Volver, siguiendo el rastro de la vida y aprender a sentir que la vida es eterna.

  The Unexpected It was dawning with the star Sidha, while the star Rhon, more distant, was located on the other part of the planet. I had gone out with the ship to bring the algae to the groups of beings alnodes, with which they fed and at the same time fed the microscopic bisphos, which helped them to metabolize the living algae. Alnode beings provide us with the resources to neutralize poisonous gases that pollute the planet's atmosphere. Surprisingly, when I was crossing the belt of soileus, vegetables that produce sweet and fleshy fruits essential for our food and which is located at a distance of several minutes from the surface of the planet, an object crossed the belt from east to west and fell on the amaranth plain. I diverted the course of the ship and approached the artifact that, motionless, had perched on the surface. I inspected its interior using the transparent gaze and verified that there was no movement of anything living inside. But when proceeding to a det...

  Amafis He met her on a Monday. The previous Sunday he had returned from Samarkand, where he was collaborating with Nikolay Veselovsky on the excavations. By a blessed chance, the train had stopped overnight due to heavy snowfall, and that circumstance had forced travelers to spend the night in a decaying and cold station. A few months earlier, in the midst of discovery fever, Nikolay asked him to accompany him. He wanted his opinion on the murals and paintings found in the strata dated to the 7th century AD. Following Nikolay's explanations, he carefully observed the murals and for a moment, it seemed to him that one of the figures represented on the mural, in which she appeared accompanying the King of Samarkand, was following him with her eyes. She was a very beautiful woman. Black eyes, like her hair, jet-black, sensual lips and a luminous, unforgettable face. He asked Nikolay about that lady but her presence in the mural was a mystery. In ancient texts she was not referre...

Chains I am on the black top of a promontory. Darkness. It is a dark night and the Moon is hidden by white, fragile, thick clouds. I begin to hear a slight murmur that slowly becomes more perceptible. Distant flashes accompany the macabre sound. The cold is felt in the face, in the hands, and as the murmur becomes more present, the flashes of the torches clearly reveal a procession of black robes, one after another, their faces hidden. The murmur is becoming understandable in some way, they are broken phrases, they are the dark prayers of the penitents. As they approach, the slow dragging of the chains is distinguished, one for each sin. I try to go unnoticed, but one of the penitents leaves the procession and comes to me. I can only see a black surface under his thick hood and a guttural sound warns me of my future. Without knowing how, I find myself forming part of the procession, wearing a black habit and occupying the last place, and my hands are not able to distinguish the featu...

  Lungs and brain And his brain proposed to his lungs to stop breathing. After all, it was lost in the immense reality of that pandemic. His lungs then proposed to his brain to stop thinking. And when his brain stopped thinking, his lungs were able to breathe and keep up with the rhythm of his heart.   Pulmones y cerebro Y su cerebro le propuso a sus pulmones que dejaran de respirar. Al fin y al cabo estaba perdido en la inmensa realidad de aquella pandemia. Sus pulmones entonces le propusieron a su cerebro que dejara de pensar. Y cuando su cerebro dejó de pensar, sus pulmones pudieron respirar y seguir el ritmo del corazón.

  Colors When the roses are born in your garden, water them with my tears and tell them our story. Tell them about the pain of our absence. Thus they will grow with the colors of life, the blue of the Arctic, the red of the savannah sunsets, the white of the cherry blossoms. And when someone cuts them to adorn the empty rooms, they will know what our love means.   Colores Cuando nazcan las rosas en tu jardín, riégalas con mis lágrimas y cuéntales nuestra historia. Háblales del dolor de nuestra ausencia. Así crecerán con los colores de la vida, el azul del ártico, el rojo de los atardeceres de la sabana, el blanco de los cerezos en flor. Y cuando alguien las corte para que adornen las vacías estancias, sabrán lo que significa nuestro amor.

  My home He had sat on a rung of the stairway to his house because he was unable to enter it. He had gone out to work in the morning and when he returned, a strange feeling predisposed him to flee from what seemed to have become a strange thing. After a time, which seemed endless, he plucked up his courage, got up, and climbed the steps that led to the door. He took out the key and, armed with a worrying calm, inserted it into the lock. He hardly had to turn the key. The lock seemed to be waiting for that key urgently. He entered what had been his beloved living room for many years, and now it seemed threatening, as if it had life. He began to hear a distant rumble that gradually changed in intensity until it became a deafening burst of   laugher. It was that house that had finally kidnapped him and from which he could never leave again.   Mi hogar Se había sentado en un peldaño de la escalera de acceso a su casa porque era incapaz de entrar en ella. Había salido...

Autora: Natalie English version : An extraordinary Carracosta story El más oscuro de los recuerdos   Era una noche más en Serene Village. Esa noche no fue tan tranquila como la mayoría de las noches, ya que la lluvia caía a cántaros. Un rayo atravesó el cielo mientras el trueno retumbaba poco después. El viento sacudía violentamente las ramas de los árboles.   Las casas estaban herméticamente cerradas. Los vecinos habían comprobado que las puertas estuvieran bien cerradas. Todo el mundo estaba intentando dormir a pesar del ruido de la tormenta.   Carracosta descansaba en su cama, tratando de dormir. La lluvia le recordó aquella noche de hacía dos años. La noche del día en que sucedió aquello. Las aletas de Carracosta descansaban sobre su cabeza.   Estos recuerdos no deberían acuciarme en estos momentos. ¡Ella está aquí ahora y eso es lo que importa! Pensó Carracosta. Miró por la ventana al cielo cubierto por la tormenta. —Ha pasado hora y media. ¿Tod...

  The Crimson Place In my dreams, I discovered a crimson place. At first, when it chose me, its image filled me with unease, yet I could not deny that I felt drawn to it. Slowly, I made my way toward it. The trees formed a dense canopy of green and blue and folded behind my steps, sealing off my return. As I moved toward the center, time flowed backward faster and faster. By the time I reached it, I had become a helpless little boy. Then I saw him.  And I knew he was me. The crimson grass grew and swayed beneath a gentle orange wind, while thoughts, transformed into great multicolored birds, soared above the transparent pearls that fell from the trees. Then, borne by those radiant birds, the pearls ascended toward infinity.   El lugar carmesí En mis sueños descubrí un lugar carmesí. Al principio, cuando me eligió, su imagen me produjo desasosiego, aunque no podía negar que me atraía. Poco a poco me abrí camino hacia él. Los árboles formaban una densa bóveda verde ...

  Passion Passion woke up one day naked. She did not know where to take shelter and thought that a good place could be the heart of a teenager from Tuscany. And from there, from that extraordinary heart, she began to draw art, to compose the melodies that accompany to her frind the time, and to fill the interstices of the soul, those that speak with infinity. And she thought that Leonardo's name was a good name for a heart as strong as that was. And she accompanied him until his heart stopped beating. And then she settled down on each of his works so that his heart, in some way, would continue to live among us forever.   Pasión La pasión se despertó un día desnuda. No sabía dónde cobijarse y pensó que un buen lugar podía ser el corazón de un adolescente de la Toscana. Y desde allí, desde aquel extraordinario corazón, empezó a dibujar el arte, a componer las melodías que acompañan a su amigo el tiempo y a rellenar los intersticios de alma, aquellos que hablan con el inf...

  Eternal Beings They are on the lookout for our movements. They are eternal, they do not need air to live. They watch the eons go by and how the planets transform. In their presence, time becomes small, it becomes a mere toy of their plans. And their plans are to stay. They can be tiny or they can be gigantic ones, but they all live in silence, waiting. Nobody knows that they are alive and in their own way they love us because they see us suffer and live. And when the end of time comes they will be there to explain everything they have seen. They are feminine beings, they are stones.   Seres eternos Están al acecho de nuestros movimientos. Ellos son eternos, no necesitan el aire para vivir. Ven pasar los eones y cómo se transforman los planetas. Ante su presencia, el tiempo se hace pequeño, se convierte en un mero juguete de sus planes. Y sus planes son los de permanecer. Pueden ser minúsculos o pueden ser gigantes, pero todos ellos viven en silencio, esperando. Nadie...

The Diary On my sixteenth birthday someone gifted me a diary. Bright blue pastes and in the center the image of the constellation Orion. When I opened it, a strange dedication surprised me: "So you can control the time." At that moment I interpreted the word "control" in the sense of organizing my time. I took writing the diary seriously and for a little over two years I was recording on its pages everything that happened to me and what I thought and felt for the people around me. A sad event made me stop writing and the diary was left in the bargueño desk of an old cabinet for many years. Back from a strange trip to the East, without knowing it, I began to remove all the things from that bargueño desk, and among them the diary, with its bright blue covers. I opened it to the page where I had left a mark and read what I had written many years before: “Today is the most dire day of my life. Due to my recklessness, my friend Sharon has suffered a serious ac...

Abandonment He is a young man. Dirty, with a beard and dressed in rags. The few times I have tried to approach him, he pace fast, as if expecting an insult from me or that I might inflict some physical harm on him. I am moved by his sadness. Whenever I have crossed that park I have seen it. Never sitting, always roaming around with a plastic bag in which, I suppose, he carries the only thing he has. I have wondered many times where he will sleep. Surely the street is his refuge. Now, every night when I say goodbye to the day, I remember him and send him my wishes that he is well. Desamparo Es joven. Sucio, con barba y vestido con harapos. Las pocas veces que he intentado acercarme a él, aligera sus pasos, como esperando de mí un insulto o que le pueda infligir algún daño físico. Me conmueve su tristeza. Siempre que he cruzado ese parque lo he visto. Nunca sentado, siempre deambulando con una bolsa de plástico en la que, supongo, lleva lo único que tiene. Me he pregun...

W hen Time Thickens I have learned that I must not ask questions, any kind of questions. I have to allow time flows and not to thicken. My lives and my deaths depend on my having the ability to move time. I mean the warm time, the time of emotions. It must flow to be alive. If it thickens, it dies. Cuando el tiempo se espesa He aprendido que no debo hacer preguntas, ningún tipo de preguntas. Tengo que dejar que el tiempo fluya y que no se espese. Mi vida y mi muerte dependen de que tenga la capacidad de mover el tiempo. Me refiero al tiempo cálido, el tiempo de las emociones. Debe fluir para estar vivo. Si se espesa, muere.

Hours There are great hours like planets. There are small hours like dragonflies. And there are hours without dimensions. They are the hours that I am with you. Horas Hay horas grandes como planetas. Hay horas pequeñas como libélulas. Y hay horas sin dimensiones. Son las horas en las que estoy contigo.

Signs of the hidden Her mother died, and that eternal song that sounded inside her faded, little by little, until her spirit stopped listening. Her son was born and, remembering her mother, a new song began to fill her space, and that eternal song sounded again along with the new one and made her mother come to be with her again. Signos de lo oculto Murió su madre, y aquella canción eterna que sonaba en su interior se fue apagando, poco a poco, hasta que su espíritu la dejó de escuchar. Nació su hijo y, recordando a su madre, una nueva canción empezó a llenar su espacio, y aquella canción eterna volvió a sonar junto a la nueva e hizo que su madre viniera de nuevo a estar junto a ella.

The Basement It had been only a short time since they had settled into the house on the outskirts of town—a large, spacious, and very old building. Alex and Shannon lived there with their little daughter, Sharon. One sunny day, Alex returned from work and found Shannon planting beautiful orchids in the garden. When he entered the house, he noticed that the basement hatch was open. “Sharon? Are you there?” “Sharon?” He started down the stairs, and a foul smell almost made him vomit. The darkness prevented him from seeing that little Sharon was opening small white boxes arranged in chronological order. Covering his nose and mouth with his arm, he continued down until he reached the light switch. When he turned it on, the white boxes began to decompose and vanished. But for a brief moment, he could see them—millions of them—immaculate and fragile, containing the bad thoughts that had taken place in that house, thoughts that Shannon had unknowingly released. The nauseating ...

Ethereal Song Words from other worlds, disembodied ties between spirits and between desires. White companions in black moments, heavenly knots with thoughts. Canción etérea Palabras de otros mundos, lazos incorpóreos entre espíritus y entre deseos. Compañeras blancas en negros momentos, celestiales nudos con los pensamientos.

The Fountain Every morning, when he passed in front of the fountain, he stopped for a few moments and became oblivious to everything around him. From a window, a little Japanese girl watched him attentively, and he was realizing that she was watching him. So day after day, year after year. He grew old, and the little Japanese girl became a beautiful young woman. One day they crossed paths in the street. Their glances met and she suddenly asked him: "Why do you stop every day in front of the beautiful fountain on the corner?" "At the foot of that fountain one day, my wife died, and through one of the nymphs of that fountain tells me every day how she is. Thus, every day, she gives me the reason to live, and every morning I find in her words the love she has always given me." Moved by that love story, two tears welled up in the young Japanese woman's eyes, which he hastened to wipe with a handkerchief. From that day on, he confided in her about his ...

The minaret The Sun was setting. Weary rays of sunlight illuminated the slim octagonal figure of the solitary minaret. Soon, the muezzin would call the faithful to prayer. Shortly before, a scarcely visible crevice ran in an instant across the west face wall from its top to the ground, accompanied by a dull wail. The muezzin had attended, as far as his memory remembers, the prayers in that square presided over by the minaret. He was preparing to go to the square when he felt a strange sensation. Someone had told him about the death of the minarets. All those sacred places, after dedicating their lives to the offering to the faithful, sooner or later died. And his minaret had wanted to say something to him. He went to the splendid square to which the faithful began to go, presided over by the majestic tower. The muezzin wanted to be with his minaret, so, with a determined step, he started up the steep staircase and when the climb was almost over, the minaret moaned again, this ti...

Smile From loving lips, a smile escaped and ended up in a field of flowers and tents. She did not know where to land and she was wandering for several days. Finally, tired, she inadvertently found the folds of the soul of a refugee, who clothed her and stayed with her forever. Sonrisa De unos labios amorosos, una sonrisa se escapó y vino a parar a un campo de flores y tiendas de campaña. No sabía dónde posarse y estuvo deambulando durante varios días. Por fin, cansada, encontró sin darse cuenta los pliegues del alma de un refugiado, que la arroparon y se quedaron con ella para siempre.

The Universal Mind At some point in the XXX century of the Gregorian calendar, 0-2-4-328 of universal / local Andromeda time, humanity as a whole, spread throughout the Milky Way and on some Andromeda planets, faces a threat without precedents. The genetic makeup of humans is in jeopardy and requires the adoption of an immediate emergency plan. The DNA chains break and form new compositions, degenerating into entropic structures whose information leads to the creation of deformed beings with an underdeveloped brain. The solution rested in the DNA of subjects who had lived in the 9th century whose DNA had characteristics that had not been repeated throughout history. These structures allow the repair of DNA chains and the restoration of the information contained in them. The evolution of physical theories, from the formulation of Einstein's relativity and Stephen Wolfram's Theory of Everything, through Robert Saphiro's Theory of Pairs and Antonio Acevedo's interspace...

Bjorn Among them, a young scientist had an irresistible fascination for the young woman. He had had a chance to admire her when she was in a unconscious state when the blue men rescued her from the time capsule. At that moment he tried to guess the color of her eyes. Days later, when he could see her behind a hidden window, he recognized that they were the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen. Of Nordic origin, Bjorn was interested in her from the first moment, and his interest went beyond scientific curiosity. Although it was precisely his interest in science that at first had prompted him to move to Peenemünde to participate in the so-called ‘Arne project’ in honor of the name of Lunia's father. Later he would remember his boat trips with Lunia on the Peene River. It was October 2, 1942. The first A2 rocket was to be launched the next day, equipped with an automatic guidance system designed by technicians at the German Army Research Center under the direction of Wernher von...

Madness Deformed monsters accompany me, spiders on the back of huge toads try to reach my cheeks, pale, bony. I rebel against that. Desperately I kneel down and cover my face with my hands. The toads go through the meat, the tendons, the bones and take over my face. I want to scream, but only laughter and praise to the dark come from my throat. From my arms hang stony excrescences that do not decide to abandon them, and my eyes linger on being distracted witnesses of how spiders devour the interior of my bones.   Locura Monstruos deformes me acompañan, arañas a lomos de sapos enormes tratan de llegar a mis mejillas, pálidas, huesudas. Me rebelo. Con desesperación me arrodillo y me tapo la cara con las manos. Los sapos atraviesan la carne, los tendones, los huesos y se adueñan de mi cara. Quiero gritar, pero de mi garganta solo salen risas y alabanzas a lo oscuro. De mis brazos cuelgan pétreas excrecencias que no se deciden a abandonarlos, y mis ojos se entretienen en ser te...

Lunia Lunia had been born in a small village in the fjords. Her father was a military leader, and because of the bravery and courage he showed at the Battle of Hafsrfjord, King Harald (the one with the fair hair), in recognition of his heroic courage, appointed him Jarl of the Shetlands. Lunia had to do a turbulent journey from Lindisfarne to Fair Island. During the voyage, the intense rain, the enormous waves that hit the ship and the violent treatment to which her father subjected her, weakened her health and her spirits.  So much so that, the first night on the ship, after her father raped her, Lunia surprised him from behind and killed him. Her first impulse was to explain to the crew what had happened, but frightened by what she had done and thinking about the reaction of those fierce warriors, she threw herself into the sea. Without knowing how, the waves threw her to a beach and the closed night did not allow her to distinguish the details surrounded her. Exhaus...