Sally always dreamed of finding the end of the rainbow so she could make a wish to the Leprechaun there, and then one day, her dream came true! All right, so it wasn't a leprechaun at the end of the rainbow, it was a fat, drunken rainbow pirate, but he did grant wishes. Being a Nice Girl, Sally wished for it to rain candy, so that all the children poorer than her could finally have their fill!
Except it turns out that a lollipop can do considerable damage when it hits a person after falling for several miles. The death toll is climbing. And then there's the fact that since it never rains water anymore, the whole world is literally drying out. A ruthless militia is taking over the town. People are now resorting to mass-cannibalism. And it turns out that you can get really tired of candy when it's the only thing there left to eat...
Never has there been a Sugar Apocalypse quite this literal!
Sweet Story is a work of Bizarro Fiction by Carlton Mellick III.
This novella contains examples of the following tropes:
- Alliterative Name: Timmy Taco. Sally Sandwich.
- Apocalypse How: When the first days of the candy rain begin in late October, it causes a strong Class 1. Around seven weeks later, around January, it has become a complete Class 6, with the only things left alive on the planet being Sally and Timmy.
- The Apunkalypse: Within a few weeks, the Earth has become an inhospitable wasteland and what remained of human civilization have become roaming gangs of bikers that pillage other survivors for their natural resources, often cannibalizing the other human survivors and wearing their skin as pelts.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Sally's wish... does not turn out the way that she intended. For that matter, Timmy Taco wishes for him and Sally to be married forever, but doesn't mention anything about Sally liking him, so now they're unhappily married forever. And since marriage lasts "until death do us part," neither of them can ever die!
- Bratty Teenage Daughter: Sally's sister Jane thinks her entire family is painfully lame.She was at that age where everything was very serious. Her music, her relationships, her art, her views on the world. These things were all very important. They meant something. She didn't know what they meant, but they meant something deep, that was for sure.
- Break the Cutie: Sally gradually collapses under all the horror she sees, as well as her guilt at being the cause of it all.
- Complete Immortality: Timmy's wish that he and Sally be married "forever" causes them to become this, as marriage is supposed to last "until death do us part". They do not die of old age or lack of sustenance, and nothing can kill them. They even survive the end of humanity, with the book informing us they will stay alive until the end of time itself.
- Creepy Doll: Sally's dolls talk to her and are her friends. As the apocalypse goes on, they start getting more and more like this trope, getting very excited about ideas like killing her parents in their sleep. Unlike every other weird thing in the story, the dolls talking is actually just Sally's imagination - the reason why they get progressively creepier is her own Sanity Slippage. Near the end of the novel, they save her from a group of cannibals, until they fade away when she realizes they really were part of her imagination.
- Daddy's Girl: Sally is very close to and proud of her father, in contrast to her permanently grouchy and resentful mother. Things get more strained between them as Mr. Sandwich (and the world around them) gets increasingly monstrous, though.
- Dissonant Serenity: Sally's father is always of good cheer, no matter how bad things get. That starts out charming but quickly gets very creepy given just how bad things get.
- Downer Ending: The mother-of-all downer endings. Sally’s family has eaten their neighbors, and have been killed by cannibals. Due to the fact that water vapor just turns into candy when it condenses, all of the water will soon be gone from the entire planet. Not only has mankind gone extinct, but all other life, animal, plant, and microbial, has followed too. With no water, there are no more rainbows and thus no Rainbow Pirates can be contacted to wish everything back to normal. Because of Timmy's wish, neither he nor Sally will be able to die, meaning they will starve and become dehydrated while the rest of Earth dies.
- Driven to Suicide: A great many people, including Jane, and when Mrs. Sandwich discovers her body, she cooks her for the rest of the family.
- Eldritch Location: The blurry side of town is a side of town where everything is blurry. No matter what you do, nothing ever comes into focus there and it's impossible to see any details of anything. People living there are poor and usually illiterate (it's hard to learn how to read when reading is impossible in your home) and it doubles as The City Narrows.
- Foreshadowing: Sally's dad tells her that she's a survivor and will live longer than anyone else in the world. Thanks to Timmy's wish, she's immortal.
- Another example shows at the beginning of the novel, where it’s mentioned that if growing up meant she could not chase after rainbows, then Sally would want to be a child forever.
- From Bad to Worse: The candy rain already gets off to a rocky start with causing mass damage, blocking the roads, and whizzing through people’s skulls. Then the water and food start to run out.
- Fun with Acronyms: MOMSEF, the acronym Mrs. Truck uses while teaching class, stands for “Mind Open. Mouth Shut. Eyes Forward.” Near the end of the novel, when she becomes a militia leader, it stands for “Military Officers Monitoring Safety for Every Family.”
- Groin Attack: When a group of cannibals break into her home, her dolls attack and kill them, including one slicing off a cannibal’s “ugly piece of meat dangling between his legs.” Unfortunately, this is all just an Imagine Spot.
- Hope Spot: Sally manages to convince the militia guard that there might be something to her story, and he agrees to help her create a new rainbow and wish the candy rain away. Then Sally's dad kills him.
- Humanity's Wake: Not just humanity’s, but everything else’s, too! By the end of the novel, Sally and Timmy are the only living beings on the planet.
- I'm a Humanitarian: With no other way to get vitamins, people resort to eating each other. Even Sally and her family resort to cooking and eating their neighbors when they get sick of eating candy.
- Just Before the End: Set just before Sally makes her wish for it to rain candy, and dooming all life on Earth to a slow, painful end.
- Oh, Crap!!: When the candy rain finally starts in Sally’s town, the people initially celebrate, until Jane notices a boy holding his leg crying in pain. Then a piece of candy whizzes through the mailman’s head like a bullet.
- Rain of Something Unusual: Deconstructed. Sally’s wish for it to rain candy causes the complete halt of the water cycle and the gradual extinction of all life on the planet. This is due to the fact that since water vapor now becomes candy when it condenses, the thing that makes life on Earth possible is being replaced by sugar.
- Ride the Rainbow: Rainbows are used by rainbow pirates as transportation, allowing them to plunder wherever the rainbows lead and leave along with it. Considering that Sally's wish made it impossible for it to ever rain water again, this link between the two worlds is severed forever.
- Sadist Teacher: Sally's teacher, Mrs. Truck. She eventually becomes the brutal leader of the militia.
- Sole Survivor: By the end of the novel, Sally and Timmy are the only living things left on the planet.
- Sugar Apocalypse: Figuratively and literally. The story starts out as a cutesy children's story, and then everything gets progressively darker and more disturbing... and of course, it's also an apocalypse that takes the form of lots and lots of sugar.
- The End of the World as We Know It: By endless candy rain.
- Time Skip: A day after the first candy rain, Sally’s dad returns home after looting supplies and says that the candy rain is still continuing. Six weeks later, the water crisis has become more of a concern than the candy crisis, the world is going through a permanent drought, animals and plants are dying, and the Sandwiches have went through their supplies and are now eating their last actual meal: cold beans.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: Especially when the world becomes a dried-up husk covered in endless sugar. Sallly and Timmy are still stuck with that fate - and will be so, the ending informs us, until the end of time itself.
