The Omniscrolls

  A man stood in front of his wife and daughter, trembling as he begged the gun-wielding assailant before him to spare their lives. “No, please don't kill my family! It's me you want; I’ll come with you.” “Sorry, Silva, but when you play with fire, you’re bound to get burnt.” “I’ll hand over the video, just leave my family be.” “You mean this video?” The assailant pulled out his phone and held it before the man. “The officer you gave this to is my friend. Journalists like you will never make a difference, no matter how hard you try.” “Okay, fine, but let my daughter go. She’s only five.” “Fine,” the man replied. He ordered them to send the girl to the corner of the room and make her shut her eyes. The girl, Mala, did as she was told, but as the gun went off, she couldn’t help but open her eyes and watch as her parents fell to the floor, lifeless. Her father’s younger brother took her in afterwards and raised her as his own. Being a renowned anaesthesiologist, he made sure she r...

  I was just stepping into the station when my partner, Sylvester, walked up to me. “We’ve got a body, Olivia,” he said. A jogger had discovered a woman’s body in the woods during her morning run. She had reportedly seen a man fleeing the scene. The crime scene was grizzly: the victim had multiple stab wounds on her body. As officers combed through the area, Sylvester and I questioned the jogger. Her body was trembling, and she could barely speak a word, so we sent her home. The next day, we drove over to her house to resume the questioning. “Mrs. Senn, are you okay to talk?” I asked. “Please, call me Sadie. And sure, I’m good.” “Could you give us a description of the guy who fled the crime scene?” Before she could answer, a man walked into the room and sat next to her. “I’m sorry, detectives, but my wife’s in no condition to be answering your questions,” he said. Sadie’s demeanour changed, almost as if she feared him. Sylvester and I agreed to visit her later and gave her our card...

  My life was simple until the day my parents were taken away from me. It was a sunny yet cool afternoon. I was just an eight-year-old girl enjoying the gentle breeze outside when people from our parish visited us. I didn’t pay attention to them because they were people we knew and trusted, but that day, they betrayed us. I heard yelling that soon turned into screaming. I rushed to the house to find them dragging my mom away as my dad fought with the others. A couple of them held me back when I tried to get to her as well. She pleaded with them again and again to let her go, but they cursed her, calling her a ‘witch’ and a ‘demon’. They tied her up and dragged her away as she struggled to break free. My father couldn’t overpower the violent horde no matter how hard he tried; there were just too many of them. He was beaten down to the ground and spat on before they left our home. One of them even hit me and broke my nose when I resisted them. I crawled away from them and towards my ...

I was ready to leave for work when the phone rang. It was from the hospital. Karen, our nanny, had died after falling down the stairs. She had listed us as her immediate contacts because she had no one else. After the funeral, I was left with the task of finding a new nanny. A few days later, I was visited by an 18-year-old girl called Janice, who said she was Karen’s daughter. She said that Karen had given her up for adoption when she was an infant. I was suspicious of her story; Karen said she had a stillborn child in the past, but she never mentioned giving one up for adoption. However, Janice showed me a photo of a young Karen holding an infant that couldn’t have been more than two weeks old. After a long conversation, it seemed to me that she was genuine. Janice asked if the vacancy for a babysitter was still open, and that she would be willing to fill Karen’s spot. I was reluctant, but she said she had experience taking care of her adoptive siblings. I kept an eye on her for a fe...

It had been a year since the aliens that called themselves the “Xuvarians” took over our world. Many humans were either killed or enslaved, leaving just a few of us wandering in abandoned underground tunnels with nowhere to go. We didn’t have the means to attack the Xuvarians; neither bullets nor bombs harmed them. Their skin and armour were near impenetrable. However, our luck seemed to turn for the better the day I met a man called Dr. David Avery. He suggested that getting a sample of Xuvarian DNA was our best chance at creating a weapon against them. However, that meant one of us had to let ourselves be captured by a Xuvarian—something which no one agreed to... until I did. I wouldn’t say I wasn’t scared; seeing those aliens catch bullets with their bare hands made my entire body tremble. However, I didn’t want to be forced to live underground for the rest of my life. Dr. Avery was hesitant about sending a seventeen-year-old girl alone on such a dangerous mission, and even offered ...

  “No, don't take my mommy away!” “Isha, wake up; you're having a nightmare.” “I want my mommy and daddy, Gil.” “I know, I’ll get them back. Now, go back to sleep.”   I tucked my sister back into bed and stepped out of her room to find Darrell standing outside. “Nightmares again?” “Yes, and they’re only getting worse. We need to take down the witch and free everyone.” “Easier said than done, Gillian. We can’t fight an army with farmers alone.” “I know we can’t besiege the castle, but we still need to rescue the people trapped inside.” “We need to plan this more carefully.” After a brief discussion, Darrell left, and I went to bed; but sleep didn’t come easily. I tossed and turned for over an hour before finally feeling my eyes close. Some time passed, and I began to hear a voice slowly creep into my head—it was Mom. “Gillian, wake up! Go to the basement and look for a box marked ‘Isiadora’. I woke up confused. I snuck into the basement without waking anyone up and looked for t...

I was sitting in an interrogation room when two detectives walked in. “Hello, Mrs. Jeffries. I’m Detective Roland Matthews, and this is my partner, Janet Frazer. I’m sorry for your loss, but can we go through what happened?” “Yes, sure. I woke up to find Greg missing. When I checked the bathroom, he was lying on the ground. I noticed a needle next to him and knew he had been using again. All this time... How did I not notice?” “It’s not your fault, Mrs. Jeffries. I lost my brother to drugs, too. We didn’t know until it was too late; he hid it so well,” Detective Frazer said. “Mrs. Jeffries, have you got any insurance claims?” “No, I don’t. Greg wanted to get a life insurance policy, but I said no; I didn’t want to think of a life without him.” After the interrogation, I left the police station, still contemplating how to break the news to Greg’s parents. Once I arrived home, the house felt hollow. I wanted to walk out the door and spend the night at a hotel, but my body felt too heavy....