Eldorado?

38 Replies
PHOTO PROMPT © Carole Erdman-Grant

There was a rumor that one town survived the collapse and continued on as if nothing happened.  After Mark was murdered for a 15-year-old can of green beans, I went in search of the modern-day Eldorado.

I kept my treasure close, a real-life paper map, printed a decade before the collapse.

There was a red “X” on one town.

I’d find it.

Three months, at the map’s “X”, I saw a glow on the horizon.  That was it!  I hadn’t seen such a glow since the collapse.

The next day I found the recently burned-out husk of my dream Eldorado.

***

word count = 100

Friday Fictioneers is hosted by  Rochelle Wisoff-Fields.  This week’s prompt is here and uses a photo by @ Carole Erdman-Grant. If you want to join or see other stories, go to the inlinkz linkup.

38 thoughts on “Eldorado?”

  1. granonine

    Seems nothing is safe from that glow. Terrifying, to think of one people-group destroying the whole world with the push of a button.

    My husband prefers paper maps over all the digital stuff. We have dozens of them :)

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      It is scary that a lot of “advances” make nuclear war more likely now than during the Cold War instead of less likely…
      I do love paper maps, but don’t use them often. I don’t use GPS either – I memorize my route and hope I don’t get lost ;) (I do have a lot of paper maps around still, but rely on looking things up on line these days)

      Liked by 1 person

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  5. GHLearner

    I love this for so many reasons. The dystopy, the little bits of information what to find in a post-nuclear eldorado, the treasure hunt for what then is considered treasure (who cares about money?)… Great writing!

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Thanks, Tessa. I hope you enjoyed “Seasons of Imagination” :)
      I think you sent me a Linkedin request – I don’t go in often, so I will take a look next time I am there (I saw an email).

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          1. Tessa

            I signed in quite a few years ago and I would have used my real name. And I haven’t been in since so can’t imagine why it would have sent you anything even if it picked up on my pen name. I’d be interested to see what it was. I definitely didn’t purposefully send you anything through there.

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            1. trentpmcd Post author

              I’ll check soon. most likely was someone who I know by another name and nothing to do with you, but will see – it has been several months since I signed in, but I get about 5 email notifications a day about people looking at my profile, or people doing x or y or whatever…

              Liked by 1 person

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            2. trentpmcd Post author

              OK, mystery partially solved -you did a friend request for Goodreads. I haven’t been in Goodreads in over a year. I just went in and responded. It was another person I blog with (and know exactly who it is) sending a request for LinkedIn. For some reason I mixed them up since I go into those two places about as often…

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  8. Bill

    An interesting and well told story. I agree with Iain, the dystopian backdrop is chilling. I found the comments regarding map reading intriguing, as well.

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  9. Shannon

    At first, I thought this might have been a post covid-apocalyptic landscape – then I read that the treasure was a paper map and not toilet paper. If they’re anything like me, it probably would have only taken them a month and a half to find it using a gps app 😂 (sad but true).

    Liked by 2 people

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Yeah, I guess I should have had Mark killed for a roll of toilet paper instead of green beans (green beans was from Bob Dylan’s first few albums where he mentioned post-nuclear war people protecting their green beans with their shotguns – I think he says “green beans ” in three different songs!) When GPS stops working, I will be one of the few that can still read a paper map ;) I think 95% of the population will be lost. Literally, as they can’t navigate.

      Liked by 2 people

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        1. trentpmcd Post author

          I think the idea back then was that all fall out shelters needed canned foods, like green beans… yeah, gps is easier when you are actually driving! I still look at a map (usually Google Map) before I leave and memorize my route. If I’m lost I might turn on GPS, but I think that happened once, and the GPS was wrong! lol (It wanted to take me about three times as far as the short cut I could see with my eyes would take me….)

          Liked by 1 person

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      It has been a few years since I’ve used one, but I still use maps – I look up the route I want to take on a map and memorize it. I never use GPS and think it might be the reason the civilization in this story collapsed ;)

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