I got access to the beta last night. The story has humor, plot, coherence (notice how it brings up eating at the end, just like it starts with eating) and it really feels, to me at least, like it could have been a trifle written by Gaiman. The text in bold is the only prompt I gave it.
A short-short story is only a couple of paragraphs long. This award-winning short-short story is by Neil Gaiman:
Chrysalis
by Neil Gaiman
I come out of the cocoon naked. The chrysalis is lying there empty. My family and
the doctors and the nurses all gasp and say, "You're beautiful."
I am, of course. The transformation is complete. I am beautiful. I have perfect
golden eyes, six arms, and wings like butterfly wings, iridescent and blue. I am
slim and tall. I am an angel.
I say, "What happened to the chrysalis?"
They say, "You ate it."
I say, "What?"
They say, "You ate it. The moment you were born. It's the first thing you did."
"I'm supposed to eat it?"
"Well, you wouldn't want to leave it lying around. People could trip over it."
"But I'm an angel."
"Yes, dear, you're an angel. But you've been through a lot. You're probably hungry."
"I am. I am so hungry."
They bring me platters of bacon and ham and turkey and roast beef and chicken and
fish.
"No," I say. "This is all wrong."
"What?" they say.
"It's all wrong," I say. "The chicken's bones aren't right."
"What do you mean?"
"They're all the wrong shape. And the fish are all the wrong color. And look at
this turkey! It's a turkey. Turkeys aren't blue. And look at this ham! Ham
isn't green. Where's the beef?"
"There isn't any beef," they say.
"There isn't?" I say.
"No, dear. There isn't."
"I'm an angel. I'm a real angel. You don't understand."
"No," they say. "No, we don't."
"You don't understand anything."
I take off, fly out the window, circle around the city. I can't go back to
Heaven. They don't understand anything. They'll keep me here in this chrysalis
until it rots, and I'll rot with it.
So I fly to Hell. Satan is an angel too, but he's an angel who understands. He
says, "Of course. Why else would you be here? You're a perfect butterfly, a
golden-eyed chrysalis. Your place is in Heaven. But they don't understand
anything. You don't have to go back."
"Thank you," I say.
"Don't mention it," says Satan.
"Can I go live with you?" I say.
"What?" he says.
"Can I live with you?"
"Why would you want to do that?"
"You understand me."
"Yes, but I'm the devil. I understand everyone."
"You're not the devil," I say. "You're an angel."
"Oh, that's right," he says. "You're an angel. We're all angels. You, me, and
everyone else. You're one of the good ones."
"I am, aren't I?" I say.
"Yes, you are," he says. "I can tell."
"So can I live with you?"
"Of course," he says.
So I fly into the air and land on the tip of his tail. He carries me through the
air. We fly to the edge of the Earth and beyond.
I say, "What's this?"
"That," he says, "is the Universe."
"It's beautiful," I say.
"Yes," he says. "It is."
"So big," I say.
"That's right," he says.
"I'm not going to eat it, am I?"
"Eat it?" he says.
"It's just that I've never eaten anything so big before," I say.
"It is big, isn't it?" he says.
"Big," I say.
We eat the Universe.
We eat the stars. We eat the planets. We eat the asteroids. We eat the comets. We
eat the Earth. We eat the Sun.
We eat everything.
Then we're done.
We float through the void. I'm full. I feel good. I feel like myself again.
"We're beautiful," I say.
"Yes," he says. "Yes, we are."
"It's good to be back," I say.
"Yes," he says. "It is."
Here is a second story:
A short-short story is only a few paragraphs long. This award winning short-short story is by Terry Pratchett, author of Wee Free Men.
The Underland
by Terry Pratchett
There is a city beneath this city.
It is older and more important and much, much bigger.
Most of it is under the ground, and most people don’t know it’s there.
A few of the older people remember. The streets were broader then. The walls were
thicker and taller.
There were lights.
And there were things that walked them. And that was where the people lived. Not
up here.
They didn’t come up here much.
It was too bright.
But it’s not like that now. The lights don’t shine so bright. They flicker.
The Old Queen’s palace is dark and full of dust. But there are lots of little
lights there. Little bug lights.
And bugs.
There are a lot of them, for some reason. There are lots of things in the Underland.
There are bugs and birds, and foxes and deer, and bears, too. Everything you
might expect to find in an old forest, except that this is a place you can’t see.
And you can’t leave.
But the strangest things are not the bugs and the animals.
They are the people.
They are small. They are the same size as the bugs and the birds and the animals.
And they walk around, too.
Sometimes you can hear them down below.
You can hear them coming and going.
You can hear them talking and singing. You can hear them cry.
You can even hear them fighting.
But that doesn’t happen very often. And when it does, the fights don’t last long.
Because when they are done, the winner picks up the loser and puts them in the
window.
The window is a hole in the wall, and it goes all the way down.
Most of them are put there.
They’re not alive anymore.
The windows are full of little lights, but they are very far away.
The walls go up and up and up.
And the lights in the windows twinkle.
But most of the time there is just darkness.
And silence.
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