Demons of the Dark Nebula
With engines burned out by an ion storm,
An Earthling vessel hangs dead in deep space.
Explorers come to probe the black unknown
Stoically face a bleak, lonely fate.
Adrift amidst a mass of sooty dust,
Men wait for aid they know will never come.
Something stirs within the nebula’s heart.
Shards of shadow detach from the dim cloud.
Dark creatures from the dawn of creation
Are drawn toward the vibrant pulse of life.
An ageless evil enters the doomed ship
As cosmic devils seek fell nourishment.
A chill slithers through the disabled craft,
Carried along conduits and corridors
By an impossibly palpable draught.
The crew shivers in their Spartan quarters
As cold fingers rob their bodies of warmth
And brave resolve gives way to abject fear.
One by one the hapless humans fall prey
To wraiths hungry for the essence of life.
Each blames the others for their dreadful state,
Unaware of the danger in their midst.
Frayed tensions lead to mad accusations
As more drained corpses are cast into space.
Strange silhouettes slip along silver walls
As fiery-eyed specters descend upon
The ragged remnants of humanity.
Terrible dreams lead to nightmarish deaths
As fey demons absorb vitality
From the lifeblood of the dying mortals.
Sated, the shades depart the lifeless ship
And return to their nebulous abode.
They glide back into the welcome darkness
To rest for another eternity
While a titanium mausoleum
Spins slowly in the blackness of deep space.
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Authors: Richard H. Fay. Form: Poem. Length: 36 lines. Editor who accepted this story: Previous Editors. Reprint History: Originally published in Hungur, Issue 6, Walpurgisnacht 2008
Author Bio
Richard H. Fay is a published artist, illustrator, poet, and writer of non-fiction, as well as an amateur medievalist, folklore nut, fan of classic speculative literature, and avid reader of true tales of the supernatural and the unexplained.
Abandoned Towers Content: Cosmic Journey Demons of the Dark Nebula Galactic Road Trip Gothic Window Holiday on Phreetum Prime Infiltration Mother Earth’s Children Nanomite 323 Purple Rain Selected Scifaiku Sorcerous Evolution Speculative Poetry: Past, Present, and Future Temporal Crack The Banshee’s Cry The Birth of Sentience on Aggraboth V The Era of Faeries and Dragons The Faces The Haunted Isle The Maginot Line They’ve Come for me Again Things in the Swamp West Dingleton’s Loss of Humanity When Wizards Dream at Night Worrying
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