The Next Best Thing(Short Story)

Mackenzie Black rolled over to the side of her bed. A fierce throb of pain pulsed in her skull, clouding thoughts inside the compressing walls of Mackenzie’s brain. Her brown eyes grew wide and the throbbing refused to cease; her body suddenly trembled as she struggled to control the growing fever.

A bright bolt of sunlight shafted through the clouds and spilled through her window. Mackenzie was mesmerized by the sight of it. She sat bolt upright as she realized she couldn’t attend the Science exhibition that took place today. Science had always fascinated Mackenzie and she aspired to become a scientist; the experiments she performed in her bedroom resulted with impressive conclusions.

Without warning, a glass bottle that balanced perilously on the edge of her bedroom table shook and fell. Shards of glass sprawled all over. Purple liquid seeped into the wooden floorboards and flowed across the floor, eventually halting as it ran thin. Mackenzie cried weakly for help.

Suddenly, the floorboards sizzled like bacon before a jet of flame erupted from the middle of the bedroom, boring a frightening dark hole. Mackenzie screeched as she was sucked into the ‘black hole’ by a strong turbulence and flew down the dark tunnel at an incredulous speed. The air that whizzed past her prevented her from screaming. She suddenly jerked and halted and was exposed to an array of lights that stung her weary eyes and blurred her vision.

Before long Mackenzie realized that she was in a brightly lit science lab. She closely inspected the hole from where she had appeared but it simply seemed to disappear as not a trace showed on the pale walls. “I wonder from where you’ve materialized?” echoed a deep voice. She swung her head around to face a scientist in a white long coat, who seemed suspiciously young and towered meters above her, his orange hair a messy curtain around his head. He peered curiously at her, as if she was an insect before burying his left hand into the depths of his pockets. He extended his right hand towards Mackenzie. “Scientist Fitzlburg,” he whispered.

She then explained how she had ‘materialised’ while Scientist Fitzlburg stroked his beard thoughtfully before relating his own story to her - how he had stepped into a bizarre pothole that had formed itself in his bathroom around the 1960’s and had discovered this strange science lab. He successfully spent years, figuring out a chemical strong enough to bust his way home whilst discovering vital information – he had grown so attached to the lab that it was home to him.

Mackenzie sighed in relief as Scientist Fitzlburg produced a test tube containing the same, purple liquid from her bedroom. He applied a drop on the wall, and it parted to reveal a hole identical to the one that brought Mackenzie to the lab. She waved a silent goodbye to Scientist Fitzlburg and let the dark tunnel suck her back home, to her bedroom.

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Won first place in the Year 7 story writing competition(500 words) for the Emirates Festival of Literature.