The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

280 Stones Pave the Way to Atlantis
by Elaine Pascale

“Alpha female, is there a problem?”

Una disentangled herself from the heap of bodies. The smell of the lab made her nauseous. Yet, for the past few months, the lab was all that she had known.

Every day, all day, their sexual activities were studied. They were paired, and sometimes grouped, randomly. The hope was for a reproductive miracle. 

They had selected the best specimens. Mars would support life just as earth had.

“Alpha female, is there a problem?” the intercom repeated. Una did not answer. There was no problem that their genetic tests would reveal. She and the other women had been selected for their fertility markers, intelligence, mental stability, and physical attractiveness. She and the other women had been selected while their family and friends and everyone they had loved had been left behind to burn on their dying planet. 

The placard above the door read: “280 Stones Pave the Way to Atlantis.” This was to remind them that the average pregnancy was 280 days in total. This was to distract them from the other activities in the lab.

“Alpha female, is there a problem?” 

“The old ways” of procreating were not working swiftly enough, so they resorted to “the old ways” of enhancing fertility.

Una knew she was not the one with a problem. Despite her recurring cycle, which heralded a lack of implantation, she was in no threat of becoming a “least liked.” 

The problem was she had seen the “least liked,” designated by a simulated social media vote, carried to the sacrificial bough. She had seen them hoisted by their ankles, throats slit, birthing so much blood that even the monstrous birds refused to fly over that part of the lab, and the monstrous birds loved human flesh.

So much blood, but some of the blood in the lab came from other practices.

“Alpha female, is there a problem?”

For Una, and the other women, guilt over the “least liked” was the main problem. The lab had resorted to “the old ways” of fertility rituals, but they had not considered that their specimens were enlisting “the old ways” of aborting them.

Fiction © Copyright Elaine Pascale
Image courtesy of  Pixabay.com

More from Elaine Pascale:

The Blood Lights

They victimize all…

Jezzie Mitchell is in anguish; with her brother’s murder still on her mind, she’s noticed strange behavior among the girls in the residential treatment center where she works. Is there a connection between the contagion on Cape Cod and the deadly Bahamas vacation that changed her life?

Jezzie reaches out to former lover Lou Collins, a scholar who has chased proof of the lights for decades. Will he be able to solve the mystery of the lights in time?

Intensely competitive, reporter Bridgette Collins knows the lights are a way to secure fame in her career. And while it’ll put the final nail into the coffin of her ex-husband’s career, she vows to know the secrets of the lights. Even if it means unleashing a world-wide epidemic…

Please don’t forget to visit the other WiHM 11 projects taking place!