The Orange Man

The man they called The Orange Man rose to power. He wasn’t a conqueror in the traditional sense—there were no armies at his back, no blood-soaked banners heralding his arrival. He won the hearts of the disillusioned, not by building them up, but by tearing down everything they hated. His words were like wildfire, burning through the landscape of truth and reason. He promised greatness but delivered chaos, dividing the people and poisoning the land.

His image was everywhere. The bloated, unnatural orange of his skin and his twisted, toothy grin adorned every screen, every building, every wall. His face became the sun in a sky that would soon darken. Even when his body failed and time claimed him, his presence lingered. His voice lived on in the endless broadcasts that echoed across the barren world. It wasn’t a voice anymore—it was a plague, infecting minds, sustaining his reign long after death.

The Orange Man’s rule became known as The Long Dark. The world he left behind was barely alive. Cities had turned to crumbling mausoleums of steel and stone, their inhabitants scattered. Crops refused to grow in poisoned soil, rivers carried the stench of rot, and the air was thick with the ash of burned-out forests. His loyalists, fractured but fanatical, clung to his memory like a lifeline. They carried his words as gospel, ensuring his legacy remained a shadow over humanity.

In this broken world, a group of survivors called themselves The Last Light. They were few, scattered across the desolation, but their goal was clear: to snuff out the remnants of his influence and rekindle the faint ember of hope. Among them was Mara, a woman hardened by loss but not yet defeated.

Mara had grown up in the ruins of the old world, her childhood spent scavenging through the carcasses of cities for scraps of food and fragments of memory. Her parents, who had dared to speak out against the Orange Man during his reign, had been taken from her when she was just a child. Their disappearance had taught her one thing: survival was the only way to resist. But as she stood among the rebels of the Last Light, she began to believe in something more.

The Last Light’s mission was dangerous, almost suicidal. Deep in the Wastelands lay the Tower of Dominion, the final stronghold of the Orange Man’s most zealous followers. At its heart was the Beacon Shard, a relic said to hold the power to silence his voice forever. The shard was a symbol of hope—and of the Orange Man’s enduring grip. To destroy it would mean cutting out the last piece of him that kept the world in his shadow.

The journey to the tower was grueling. The Wastelands stretched endlessly before them, a jagged landscape of cracked earth and skeletal remains of once-thriving forests. Ash fell from the sky like snow, coating their clothes and filling their lungs. They moved under the cover of darkness, the only time when the Orange Man’s loyalists were less vigilant.

When they reached the tower, it loomed above them like a monolith from another world. Its jagged structure was built of rusted steel and broken glass, its peak crowned with a massive effigy of the Orange Man. His grinning visage seemed to watch them, even in its decay.

Inside, the air was thick with the stench of mildew and death. The corridors were lined with faded murals depicting the Orange Man in grotesque glory—his face larger than life, his followers kneeling in worship. As they moved deeper into the tower, the sound of static grew louder, the remnants of his endless broadcasts still echoing through the halls.

At the tower’s core, they found the Beacon Shard. It rested atop a crumbling pedestal, its jagged edges glowing faintly with an unnatural light. The shard pulsed as if alive, and Mara felt a cold dread seep into her bones as she approached it.

But their intrusion had not gone unnoticed. From the shadows emerged the Harbinger’s most devoted loyalists. They were gaunt and hollow-eyed, their bodies twisted by years of living in the poisoned ruins. “He lives forever,” one of them rasped, their voice reverent. “You cannot kill what is eternal.”

The rebels fought with everything they had. The loyalists were fanatical, their fury overwhelming, but the rebels were driven by desperation. Mara pushed forward, her focus locked on the shard as chaos erupted around her.

Reaching the pedestal, she gripped the shard with trembling hands. It was cold to the touch, and the light within it flared brighter as she raised it above her head. “Your time is over,” she whispered, and with all her strength, she brought the shard down onto the pedestal, shattering it.

A wave of light erupted from the shard, filling the room with blinding brilliance. The effigy above the tower cracked and splintered, its orange visage disintegrating into dust. The tower groaned as its foundations gave way, collapsing in on itself as Mara and the survivors fled into the Wastelands.

When the dust settled, the wasteland was still. The air remained heavy, the sky dark. For a moment, it seemed as though nothing had changed. But then, on the horizon, Mara saw it—a single ray of sunlight breaking through the ash clouds. It was faint, fragile, but undeniable.

She fell to her knees, staring at the light. Behind her, the other rebels stopped, their faces illuminated by the sunbeam. No one spoke. The silence was filled with awe, and a fragile hope began to stir.

“Do you think it’s over?” one of them asked, their voice barely more than a whisper.

Mara didn’t answer. She stared at the horizon, where the faint sunlight fought to pierce the gloom. The shadow of the Orange Man was vast, his damage deep and enduring. But for the first time in generations, the darkness was not absolute.

And where there was light, there was the possibility of more.