Halloween One Shots

SAMHAIN (Winner)

Contest Profile: WattpadTimeTravel

I hate Halloween. I hate most celebrations, but Halloween is the worst. The enforced telepathic connection and day-long hive meditation was unbearable. I wanted to be alone in my head today. I wanted some peace. Needed some. Desperately. I just wanted to feel like an individual. A person. Not a part of the hive mind Collective. Just for a bit.

I was too young for a Time Travel Licence, but I didn't care. I was going anyway. Not that anyone would give a damn. Time travel had long since lost its lustre. No one cared to be reminded of our primitive, ignorant beginnings. And it was distasteful to go back in a bid to save them, seeing as they were all hell bent on destroying the planet anyway. It's just how they were wired. Until the Final Pandemic hit and changed our genetic makeup; helped us evolve into the transcendent beings we now were. Beyond the pointlessness of it all.

I wasn't keen to interact with humans of the past. I'm not an idiot. Nor am I a masochist. I just wanted to be alone, away from the collective for a few hours. Anymore would be detrimental to my mental well-being, but a few hours wouldn't hurt. I had an old painting that belonged to my great, great, grandfather. It was of Stonehenge. A circle of stones in the middle of nowhere in a place that was called England. I once asked my father to take me there. He refused. I was told never to go there. Yet, it seemed so peaceful in the painting. I wanted to feel that peace.

Being at Stonehenge, devoid of the background hum of the Collective, was glorious. The beautiful sunset was a wonderful compliment to the feeling.

I was just about to leave when a large crowd suddenly joined me at the stone circle. They were singing and dancing, loud and evidently inebriated. It was strange being in the presence of so many people and not knowing what they were thinking. They surrounded me, starting fires, setting up a spread of foods, singing and dancing some more. I kept getting passed on from one group to another, dancing, smoking, revelling. It was bananas.

"I didn't think anyone would ever take up the offer!" a man said, walking up to me.

He handed me a large knife and pointed to a young woman standing by a stone. Her eyes were glazed. Her arms open in surrender.

"You know the rules. The first one to the stones kills the virgin," he said, growling the next words. "Or they die."

The crowd erupted in cheers.

I really hate past humans. How did evolution even choose this path? I took the knife.

"You're always first to the stones," I said. He nodded.

The man had turned his serial killing into a celebration. It was eerily impressive. I plunged the knife deep into his chest, wishing I could feel his mind.

"I choose the third option."