Two Futurists gave scenario briefings to leaders in different cities on 3rd June 2041.
G9, London
1. Nightmare
Anyone game? Eight men looked at him
through AR monocles with one eye. The
woman wanted to say, my daughter. He
pointed to the right-hand side of the
triptych.
37% chance of Nightmare. When they’re
too many, too fast. When the edge of your
vision is spattered with blood.
See here – He flicked his wrist like a table
tennis pro – Unprecedented cross-species
unrest: hounds tearing the smiles off
children, hammering fish until their fists run
orange and here:
pigeons sticking their beaks into the gills of
hasselbacked commuters, chimps itching
in the boardroom and pissing in your
parliaments. Plus, mice. He paused, waiting
for them to pour out of the picture.
And they did, sporting acid burns and shivs
the size of stamps between their teeth.
Go a week without talking to anyone
anyone the cows Hope Farm ones and the other refugees
alive still they masticate donated pineapple skins. Face masks
stop the spread. You can’t catch cherry blossom unbuckled
falls like fireworks while the Geiger counter ticks up the wrong way.
In the forest over the road the trees are like the tsunami embalming
the exclusion zone except in deep time the children escaped but
animals some loved more didn’t they didn’t drown or boil
they curled on top of your coat belliesthe bottom of a handbag
tipped upside down. The cows’ rib eyes are marbled white
fat surf on a sea there are no flies
G. Toro is a speculative fiction writer who spends too much time wondering what’s lurking beneath the sea just beyond her window. She has been published by perverse magazine, The Babel Tower Notice Board, The Wondrous Real and Rune Bear magazine.