Word: Fog
Beyond The Fog
Rea had heard the stories from since she was old enough to understand what she was being told. "The fog," they used to say, "is home to all the monsters that inhabit your nightmares." But that was only one story.
The fog was famous in the small town of Blacktown, for obvious reasons. The reason was: No one, I mean no one, knew what was beyond the fog.
The fog had shrouded half the town since anyone could remember. There was no history books or archives that claimed that people moved freely in Blacktown, the whole of Blacktown. The town itself was named because of this attraction.
The fog was black during the day and a white mist during the night. The blanket of fog was so thick that nothing could be seen from beyond what faced them.
There were numerous stories as to what awaited beyond. Most were made up but some gave accounts of what they had experienced. Of course they were all different to each other but Rea loved to hear these stories around the fireplace and dreamed of exploring it for herself when she was older, then she could tell her children and family about what she saw. "The truth," she would say.
The crazy one armed man who hung out by the supermarket would tell Rea of what he faced when he went beyond the fog. "Took me arm it did, see here," he would point to the empty socket where his arm should've been. "Pulled it right off, like a game of tug o' war it was."
"What pulled it off?" She would ask.
"I wouldn't know, the fog was so thick that I couldn't even see me hands right in front of me face." He waved hands. "But I knew it was big....and strong."
Rea always wanted to question the crazy one armed man more about his adventures but her mother pulled her away and told her to not go talking to strangers.
Her uncle also used to love tell tales. Sometimes they seemed too good to be true but they were good nonetheless.
The tales were best told at family gatherings and around the fire. Her uncle had a collection of tales greater than any other in the town who had claimed to have gone beyond the fog, but there was one she loved the most.
It was when he was about 10 years old and his dad allowed him to go with him (after much begging and pleading) on his expedition. His dad was a town reporter and felt he should take it on himself to explore beyond the fog and to document what was actually there. Clearly he wanted exactly what Rea wanted, the truth.
On the day the town had gathered to send off his uncle and grandfather beyond the fog. There were people cheering and banners that said, "Good Luck!" Maybe the town too wanted the truth of what was truly beyond the fog, even his wife didn't stop him, not that he'd listen anyway.
"We were both wearing our protective gear, which was pretty much our awesome leather jackets, jeans and our lucky caps," he would say. "We were also clad in an armour of cameras. We were carrying one, there was one on the front of our jackets and on our caps too. It was insane but we had to make sure to capture everything." Rea would intently listen to every word that rolled off her uncle's tongue.
"Saying bye was a bit hard, people were beginning to cry, maybe it's because they thought we would never make it out, clearly they were wrong. But it made us think if we were going to survive as well, but the anticipation of what was waiting for us made me more excited than sad."
He would always do this, always make a huge intro and was slow to getting to the good juicy bits. "Hurry up," Rea would irritatingly say.
"Hang on, Sweety," he would politely say. "I want everyone to know all the details, wouldn't you want to know too."
