ORIGINAL FICTION

                      ABSENCE OF . . .

                      a short story by

                       Ace Armstrong



  
   "So what are ya? 'Fraid?"

   Kim squinted at her cousin. "Course not," she said.

   "Then why won't you go?"

   "I just don't want to."

   "Kimmy's a FRAAAIDY CAAAAAT!" Sheila shrieked. She started to giggle, 
her dark hair bouncing against her cheeks.

   "I am not!"

   "Are, too! Kim's a fraidy cat! Fraidy cat! Fraidy cat! Kimmy's a 
little fraidy cat!"

   "I am not!" Kim repeated, and wet tears began to form behind her 
eyelids. She blinked them back. She was, after all, nearly eight years 
old, and everyone knew big girls didn't cry.

   Sheila stopped her sing-song jeering. "So are ya gonna go or not?"

   The building behind the girls was a large concrete one, built in the 
early years of the twenty-first century. Ivy climbed the northernmost 
wall and cracks crisscrossed the remainder of the building's exterior, 
but other than that, Kim decided that it wasn't too foreboding. 
"Yeah. I guess so," she said. "But we have to be back by five. Mummy 
said..."

   "'Mummy said. Mummy said.' Mummy didn't say shit," answered Sheila. She 
had passed her eleventh birthday six months ago, and enjoyed using 
vulgarity to impress the younger children. "Anyway, it won't take that 
long. It's just inside this metal door by an old glass closet..." She was
already scrambling up the hill toward the building, talking as she 
went. "There's an old costume in there, like the ones they wear when they 
go to Nework..."

   Kim rolled her eyes once and followed. Ahead, the building's front 
entrance was dark, but not overly ominous. Sheila was really making too 
big of a deal of this whole thing.

   "Hey, come on!" Sheila was already at the front door. waiting for her 
younger cousin to catch up. Beside her, a rusted metal sign read "Warning: 
Restricted Area. Authorized Personnel Only." Sheila began to tap her 
fingers on it as she waited.

   "Hold on, I'm coming."

   The two girls stood outside the building for a moment, looking inside. 
Blond hair blew into the younger child's face and she brushed it away, 
then they both entered.

   "I found this place a few months ago," explained Sheila as they walked 
down the long corridor. "Mummy said not to go up here, but she's stupid. 
Anyway, it used to be some kind of Army thing, I guess. From before the 
War. All of the people just left ... I don't know why. Daddy bought the 
land when he and mum moved here from M-Colony, but he never came up here. 
I think he was afraid." She laughed, startling a nearby bird which had 
roosted in a deserted doorway.

   "It's dark," whispered Kim. She shuddered, imagining spiders and creepy 
crawly things.

   Sheila stopped. "Know what's weird? There's still 'tricity." Her hand 
probed the wall and found a light switch.

   Darkness leaped back as the overheads kicked in with a low hum. Kim 
found herself in the entrance to a large room, apparently some sort of 
laboratory. Stainless steel walls extended several meters to a concrete 
bunker, which in turn held a thick glass window. The center of the room 
housed an immense electronic construction, upon which the light focused. 
For a moment, Kim could almost imagine it as an altar.

   "See? Told you!" Sheila seemed almost triumphant. "This is it!" She 
skipped to the center of the room. "What do you think?"

   Kim looked around, dumbfounded. "What is it?"

   This evoked another laugh from Sheila. "I'll show you!" Her hand shot 
out, snagging Kim's blouse, and she dragged the younger child to a small 
computer terminal across the room. "Watch this!" she said, her finger 
mashing down a small green button.

   From the center of the room, a loud buzzing arose, bouncing from one 
wall to another. An ozone smell began to permeate the air, causing the 
girls to wrinkle their noses. The buzz suddenly rose in pitch, and from 
the device in the center of the room sprang a burst of intense light.

   Sheila disappeared. Kim tried to scream in surprise, but
found she had no voice, and no body to make sound with. The room had 
disappeared, along with, she supposed, the rest of the building. 
Everything she knew vanished, leaving Kim only with her consciousness.

   Then, she was back. Everything was as it had been. Sheila stood in 
front of her, smiling broadly. Kim staggered back, gasping for air. "What 
happened?" She asked.

   Sheila's smile broadened. "Nothing," she said. "Absolutely nothing."



                           THE END