You can read “Butterflies” for free on my blog here. 

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Dear World

Please Kill Me,

You ever had a dream that stuck with you?

Not necessarily a nightmare. Not a premonition or some deep, unresolved expression of fear, trauma, guilt, or desire. Not even an entire narrative—but images so striking that they never really leave you? That’s how “Butterflies” first seeded my mind with its forbidden nectar. 

Again, not the whole story, but an image. A tragic scene of a man digging in the rain while his daughter watched from a cabin window. Pretty benign, right? Like something out of your standard horror, thriller, anime, or dystopian elven porn (…DON’T GOOGLE IT!!! NSFTS!!! Not Safe for the Shire!!! (…don’t give Sauron IDEAS).

Was it an apocalypse? Heist gone wrong?? Prepper wet-dream??? Zombies????

(…please don’t be zombies…) 

FUCK… It was zombies. 

NOPE!!! Too crowded. Overdone. Atlas shrugged. Ta-ta deadite!!!

I don’t need a self-indulgent version of “YOU CAN’T PROTECT HER, RICK!!!”

…so I moved on—haunted by a dream I’d sidelined as pseudo-plagiarism.

But again, the image wouldn’t leave (…a Chipotle stain on tighty-whities).

I was around my mid-twenties when my mind dredged up the dream from the ether. Like any isolated and caffeine-addled writer, I poked and prodded for a little while before ultimately deciding it was either useless or ‘still stewing’. When that happens, I tend to let the ideas stew: “Shit or sustenance…? I don’t know. Let’s see how it smells.”

Writers are fussy. But stubborn ideas are PROBLEMATIC.

The image haunted me like some childhood embarrassment or echoes of an STD (…STI, if you’re nasty). The dream recurred every few months for YEARS before I sat down to investigate. I spend A LOT of time in my mind, so it was bound to happen, thus the casual acknowledgment of my unrequited wilderness lust and TOTALLY NOT ZOMBIE-ELF porn story (…although…??? PATENT PENDING!!!)

Following the completion of my debut novel, ‘Apostate’ (#ShamelessPlug), I decided to interrogate myself and the image that had plagued me. What’s the guy digging? Who the hell is the girl watching from a window? Why can’t I tell what year it is? What the hell leads to this predicament? WHY, BRAIN?!?! WHY?!?!?!—all followed by copious amounts of thoughtful meditation (…drunken stupors aimed at clarity)…then it hit me.

What if it’s NOT zombies—but something ELSE??? Something WEIRDER???

What if the monsters aren’t THE THREAT, but a circumstance—a backdrop???

We’ve seen “survival”, but how would it REALLY go? Preppers exist. So does wealth.

What if everyone involved was smart enough to SURVIVE? 

What if this is a story about *People* who aren’t COMPLETE IDIOTS???

(…characters come to mind, individual characters, but not a WHOLE CAST).

What becomes the monster in THAT moment? Love? Fear? Survival? Sacrifice?

What gets us to the grave in the rain?

Finally…I was cooking! 

The simmering thoughts were starting to smell like stew—dystopian-style.

Additionally, my aversion to straight-up zombie fare led me down some interesting narrative paths: Keep the infection, lose the ‘undead’. Keep the world-ending stakes, tighten the lens. Keep the community, lose the melodrama (…not wholly, but no “CARRRRLLLL!!! HAVE YOU SEEN CAAaaRRrrLLLL?!?!?!” (#ShaneWasRight #ForceGhostShane)). 

Add a little of the ole’, “He’s a little cuckoo,” (pronounced KOO-KOO, incels), and you get one of my finest tales to date. Survivalism. Body-horror. Suspense thriller. Family drama. Dark humor. Unexpected tenderness, and a quietly emotional spiral into the dark plausibilities of humanity under duress—an ‘anti-zombie’-story that grabs you by the heart and SQUEEZES.

The stew was smelling pretty good.

As for the bugs, that part was easy. 

I watched “The Fly” and aimed for more—an emotionally resonant story where monstrous metamorphosis is visceral, tragic, inevitable, beautiful, and…

—Human.*

Until Next Time,

—Antwan Crump

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If you’d like to support my work (and skip the Ads), you can buy “Butterflies” on: 
Amazon – B&N – KOBO – Google Play Books

Death came fluttering on an evening breeze…

When bioluminescent insects infect humanity with a novel virus known as the BUG, society quickly crumbles—leading to a world of panic and decay that spreads with unmitigated zeal. As bodies pile up and sickness spreads, the unprepared are left to fend for themselves—awaiting death as chaos reigns and governing bodies fail them.

However, Sam Cooke, a husband, father, and paranoid-prepper, has long prepared for this moment. The Cookes flee their cozy California home for a secluded, survivalist compound known as Eden. In exchange for a small fortune and contracted compliance, the Cookes are offered a secure safe-haven…but Eden is not quite what it seems.

Now, with nowhere to run and trapped in a brutal and authoritarian community, Sam must navigate once unimaginable horrors if he hopes to keep himself and his family alive.

From the author of Apostate and The Suicide Pod, Butterflies is a relentless, visceral tale of survival and psychological horror set in a world consumed by the bitter realities of creeping death. For fans of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and immersive apocalyptic thrillers, this latest short story from Antwan Crump is a profound exploration of grief, tragedy, and the cost of survival in a dying world.