Transubstantiation is a short story

Short story

A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...

 written by American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 speculative fiction

Speculative fiction

Speculative fiction is an umbrella term encompassing the more fantastical fiction genres, specifically science fiction, fantasy, horror, supernatural fiction, superhero fiction, utopian and dystopian fiction, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, and alternate history in literature as well as...

 author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

 Stephen Woodworth

Stephen Woodworth

Stephen Woodworth is an American speculative fiction author, and a native of Fullerton, California.- Publications :* "Scary Monsters" , in Writers of the Future VIII * "Relaxation" , in Plot #1...

. It was originally published on November 27, 2000 at Strange Horizons

Strange Horizons

Strange Horizons is an online speculative fiction magazine. It also features speculative poetry in every issue....

.

Plot summary

The story follows Marcus, a man plagued with Apocalyptic dreams about the extinction of the human race, as he stops in Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

 on a bizarre quest to donate as much of his own blood as possible to collection centers. Marcus, it appears, is immortal and currently about 2,000 years old, having been one of the Roman Senators of the Praetorium

Praetorium

- Etemology :The praetorium, also spelled prœtorium or pretorium, was originally used to identify the general’s tent within a Roman Castra, Castellum, or encampment. The word originates from the name of the chief Roman magistrate, known as Praetor...

 who sentenced Jesus the Nazarene

Jesus

Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...

 to death. Marcus had been the man to place the crown of thorns

Crown of Thorns

In Christianity, the Crown of Thorns, one of the instruments of the Passion, was woven of thorn branches and placed on Jesus Christ before his crucifixion...

on the defendant's head. When Marcus cut himself on the barbs, the Nazarene grabbed his hand, mixing their blood to heal the wound and cursing Marcus to eternal Earthly life. In the present-day, then, Marcus's blood-donation obsession is meant to create an immortal "family"; he keeps a scrapbook of newspaper articles detailing apparently miraculous recoveries that seem to be connected to transfusions of his own blood into the injured.

External links

• full text of "Transubstantiation"