This prompt was a bizarre one, but the story was easy to write. In fact, I wrote the draft in less time than it took me to decide on a title, which is: "Sole Saver"
Here's the prompt:
Sole Saver
At first, they thought it was a message from God. A warning of impending disaster, or a threat of impending doom. A giant foot hanging just above the heads of those brave enough to walk under it. What did it mean? The media descended on the site, bringing their fresh-faced reporters and self-important pundits. They each had their theories, delivered in breathless purple prose. As everyone expected, none would agree with another. Next came the religious, some devout and some fanatical, but all claiming they knew the meaning of the apparition. So many meanings, though. They all brought with them the conviction that the foot was divine confirmation of their own personal doomsday messages. Satan had arrived, ready to enslave the faithless under his foot. Or maybe, it was God come to crush the unrepentant sinners. Finally the scientists came with their sensors and probes. They measured it and photographed it, then measured the photographs. Finally, they proclaimed it to be an illusion, a mirage from some far-off place refracted by some weird, but perfectly natural, temperature inversion. But the weather changed, the news crews moved on to their next crisis, and the faithful lost interest when no great truth was revealed. Still the image of a giant, gnarly foot remained. The local residents soon simply took for granted that it would always be there, silent and somehow oddly comforting. Families gathered beneath it for picnics, tourists came to have their picture taken. It just became part of the landscape.
Imagine everyone’s surprise then, when glowing letters appeared one morning. Finally, the message everyone had been waiting for arrived in towering letters spelling out for all to read, "Dr. Bunion's Foot Cream."