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The Fading Light
An unreleased short story from the book:
The Planetary Alignment When the Heavens Fall Apart
When the alignment began, it was just another extraordinary event that humanity had long awaited, an occasion to marvel at the cosmic precision, the planets lining up in perfect harmony. The sun was at its zenith, the brightest it had ever been. The world was bathed in light, its warmth wrapping the Earth in a golden embrace, but no one could have foreseen the deadly consequence that would come with the celestial shift.
At first, it was barely noticeable. A slight dimming of the sun, imperceptible to most, just a touch less bright than the day before. People speculated about the weather, about climate shifts, but no one thought it was something worth worrying about. The world continued, business as usual, until the next morning.
The sun rose, but it didn’t rise the same. The warmth was gone, replaced by a cold chill that felt unnatural, like the sun had forgotten how to burn. It wasn’t just the lack of heat, though—it was the light. The world was drowning in shadows, the sky a pale, sickly hue that clung to the land like a fog. The Earth was no longer bathed in sunlight. It was locked in an eternal dusk.
Emma stared out of the window of her small apartment in the city, her eyes scanning the skyline. The sun, now a pale shadow of its former self, hung in the sky, a weak orange disc hanging motionless. It wasn’t the heat she missed—it was the comfort, the certainty of knowing that day followed night. Now, the line between the two had blurred, leaving a sickening limbo of never-ending twilight.
Each passing day, the sun weakened. Its light dimmed further, until it barely cast enough light to see by. Shadows grew long and oppressive, swallowing up the city. The days grew colder, the chill creeping into homes, gnawing at the bones of those who remained. Plants withered, animals fled, and the human population began to feel the effect of the sun’s diminishing power.
At first, there were the whispers of panic. Emma could hear them wherever she went—the murmurs in the grocery stores, the frantic discussions at the workplace. Some said it was temporary, that the sun would return to its former glory, that things would return to normal. But deep down, Emma knew. This wasn’t a passing moment. The light was fading, and it was never coming back.
The temperature continued to plummet as the days stretched on. The city, once alive with vibrant sounds and bustling people, was becoming hollow. It wasn’t just the darkness that unsettled Emma—it was the silence. The streets were eerily quiet. People didn’t go out unless they had to. The lights that once illuminated the darkened streets flickered and died, leaving entire neighborhoods to fall into the same void that had taken the sun.
The fear began to settle in, not just in the hearts of individuals, but in the very air around them. Emma and the other survivors were slowly sinking into a quiet madness. It wasn’t just the cold—it was the pervasive sense that the world around them was dying. The sun, that ancient provider of life, was faltering, and with it, everything else seemed to fall apart.
The sky, once a vibrant blue or soft hues of pink and orange at sunset, was now a washed-out shade of gray. The sun, though still visible, had become nothing more than a muted, dying ember, unable to provide warmth or hope. Without the sun’s energy, the Earth grew colder, faster. Crops withered, animals perished in their sleep, and entire cities turned to ruins, abandoned by those who had been too weak to survive.
It wasn’t long before the survivors—those who remained—were hunted by something more insidious than the cold. Hunger. The land could no longer provide. The stores of food dwindled, and the people grew desperate. Desperation gave rise to cruelty, and it wasn’t long before survival meant more than just staying alive—it meant taking what little there was from others.
Emma watched, horrified, as the city turned into a battleground. The survivors, broken and driven to madness by the endless night, turned on each other. The streets that once hummed with life became a labyrinth of abandoned homes, empty stores, and dead bodies. No one could escape the pull of the darkness. The last remnants of society cracked under the strain, and people began to vanish, their fates uncertain, lost to the endless dusk.
The wind howled outside, cold and biting. Emma huddled under layers of blankets, her body stiff and trembling. Her breath formed visible clouds in the air. She had tried to find shelter—she had tried to find answers—but there were none. The sun’s light was gone, and the warmth had followed it into oblivion. The world, once so full of color, was now drained of life, frozen in a state of endless twilight.
There were others still alive, others who wandered the city like lost souls, searching for something that would give them meaning, some final act of survival. But it was all futile. No one could survive without the sun. The sun had given life to everything—the plants, the animals, the people. And now, as it faded into nothingness, so too did the Earth.
Emma had heard the rumors of the creatures—mutations that had arisen in the dark, animals twisted by the cold, starving and aggressive. There were whispers of people going missing in the night, dragged away by things that had once been human but were now something else entirely, something far worse. Emma had seen them once—flickers in the shadows, eyes glowing with hunger.
There was no escape. She couldn’t run from the cold, and she couldn’t hide from the creatures that now roamed the streets. Her mind was unraveling, her thoughts too cold to hold on to for long. The terror that had taken hold of her had become an unrelenting companion. It gnawed at her day after day, minute after minute. The sun was gone. And with it, everything that had ever been meaningful had disappeared.
As the days stretched into weeks, and then months, the last flickers of humanity flickered out. Emma was the last to succumb, her body succumbing to the cold, her breath slowing as her limbs grew numb. She stared out at the never-ending twilight, the endless, empty sky above her, as the final breath of the Earth was drawn.
The sun was gone. The light was gone. And with it, so too was everything else. The Earth had faded into nothing, and the survivors had become as much a part of the darkness as the dying planet itself. There was no redemption. There was no escape.
Only the chilling, suffocating emptiness that remained.
And the silence.
Forever.
If you enjoyed this short story you will probably like our latest release available now:
The Planetary Alignment When the Heavens Fall Apart
$3.99
The Planetary Alignment: When the Heavens Fall Apart is a chilling collection of 35 dark and disturbing short stories that explores the terrifying consequences of a cosmic event that alters the fabric of reality.
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