Parva Gradus

Don’t Wake Her Up

January 10th, 2022
Quadragesimus Gradus

“Generally, she won’t remember them. Those she does remember we will be sure to process thoroughly. Don’t wake her up. You will only disrupt her sleep. In the short and long term, that has far more severe consequences. You both—you all—need rest.”

“I’m gonna get you!” Darian yelled with false animosity toward his screaming children. “Ahh!” He waved his arms high in the air as they scampered out of his path, ducking behind table legs and chairs, leaping onto couches. Darian cornered Merla, his middle daughter, and stomped over to her. Scooping her up, he dashed across the room while she wailed and thrashed. In a swift motion he dropped her onto a couch. “I got you!” Darian trumpeted as he began tickling her belly and under her ear. Her screaming turned to laughter.

After only a moment, Darian heard the others yelp little battlecries as they emerged from hiding, then the pitter-patter as they rushed to Merla’s rescue. Reaching Darian, Kayden began beating his father’s legs, hollering indecipherable curses. Everly, the eldest who was much taller, leapt onto Darian and grabbed hold of his shoulder, knocking him down and away from Merla. Merla joined her sister by pressing on his nape, their combined weight smooshing his face into a cushion.

Darian shook his whole body in an attempt to wriggle free, growling like a trapped beast. “Gah! I’ll get you, I’ll get you—ALL!” He caught Merla’s leg as she was beginning to crawl down his back, pushing her over his side and twisting out of Everly’s grip in one move. He put a hand on Kayden’s forehead and held him away; he was now free, but still on his knees. His back was to the couch, which gave the kids an excellent height advantage. Recovering faster than he expected her to, Merla scrambled from the couch onto the back of his neck—again. Everly hung from the arm which held Kayden, who was flailing his arms in the air before him, pressing into Darian’s hand. Then Everly began to tug on Darian’s elbow, forcing it to bend. Darian noticed Merla’s weight, the fatigue in his back. Truly, his kids were about to beat him in a wrestling match. They’d never done—if only she could see them now.

“Wrah!” He bellowed, rearing his back and flinging his arms. “You’ll never beat me!” Merla, again, fell onto the cushions. Kayden fell on his rear, giggling. Everly, however, had maintained her grip. “Never!” She retorted, adjusting and leaping at his face. The heel of her palm landed just below Darian’s eye. She tackled him to the floor, and from there he knew it was over. Merla and Kayden crawled on top of him, struggling to pin a limb each.

Darian let his bellows fade to begging whimpers, allowing his children to bask in their victory. When they finally let him up, they jumped and danced together, complimenting each others’ valor against the Dad-Beast.

“Alright!” He finally exclaimed, handing them each a water bottle. “Even though you bested me, that doesn’t mean bedtime is any later! Get going upstairs!” He widened his arms to playfully intimidate them, and they squealed and rushed up the steps. The springs of their beds rang as they leapt into them. Darian settled into his chair for a moment, plucking a cup of water in a light hold, and took a long draw.

He woke with a snort. He took a deep breath, inadvertently sucking in a strand of drool. He blinked. The pain in the corners of his eyes told him that sleep boogers had accumulated there. Slowly, he rotated his head, scanning the lamplit living room. Finding the clock, he sighed—four in the morning. He stood and wiped his eyes. Darian grabbed his cup of water and shuffled into the kitchen, flicking light switches as he went. After finishing off the glass at the sink, he filled it again, then performed the evening ritual of ensuring each door was locked and each light was off. Then he proceeded upstairs.

It was quiet, but the lights to Kayden’s room and the girls’ room were on. Darian exhaled, the air cutting through tight lips, seething at a pain in his knee. Continuing quietly up the steps, all was still silent—he hadn’t woken them.

At the top of the stairs lay the entrance to Kayden’s room, which Darian entered. Kayden was asleep, face sideways and mouth open wide on the pillow. Darian shook his head with a smile as he walked over. He has his mother’s cheeks. He gently guided Kayden’s body to its side. He kissed him above the ear. “Goodnight, my son.”

Darian flicked the light and went back into the hallway.

Murmuring.

He took careful, tense strides toward the girls’ room, listening to the voice, eager to determine its mood. As he drew closer, he realized that the voice waxed and waned in volume, almost in line with the inhale-exhale cycle. Certainly, the speaker was sound asleep.

Standing at the open door Darian could see that Merla and Everly were caught in slumber. It was Merla alone who spoke. She had a smile on her restful face. Between sentences she offered lax giggles. She said:

“Mommy! I know where you’re hiding! Come out, come out, wherever you are!” Her calls were sing-song lures intended to draw out her mother. Darian smiled—she was having a sweet dream, for once. He stepped into the room to tuck them in and kiss them goodnight.

Merla’s face contorted. Darian’s chest seized.

“Mommy! Mommy?” The call sounded surprised, the question sounded concerned.

“Mommy? Where are you?” The tone grew more worrisome. She shivered. “Momma?”

Darian rushed to Merla’s side, kneeling by the bed, taking her head in his arms.

“Momma? Mommy where are you?” Now she was anguished. Her head snapped back and forth, closed eyes searching. “Mom?” Her projected voice turned into whines, and her questions to begging. “Mommy please come out! Mom! Please….”

Her cheeks grew wet with tears, her pillow soaked in them. Darian groaned as he coddled Merla’s head in his arms, trying to wipe the tears from under her eyes and the hair from her face. But they were too many, and his hands grew wet, and her hair sprawled in chaos.

“Mom! Mom! Where are you?” Her voice reverberated through his ears as if through a dark, empty cavern. She was alone. She had to be. “Momma, please!”

Darian bit his lip until it popped in his mouth, washing his tongue with the taste of iron. He wanted to shake her, to shout her name, to pet her head until she woke up and realized she was safe, she was going to be okay, she wasn’t alone. But he couldn’t wake her, no matter how long she suffered, no matter how she begged him to be roused from the terror.

“Momma? Please! Don’t leave me!” No…not even now… “Mom! Where are you?”

So he gently attended to her tears, his hands trembling. When the blood dried on his tongue he whispered her a lullaby, the one her mother used to sing. “Mom,” Merla whimpered, “mommy….”

She fell silent. Her breathing steadied. Darian used his quaking forearms to wipe the moisture from his eyes so he could see. Her face relaxed. She was beautiful, she had her mother’s nose. How he hated to see it crumpled in pain! How he hated himself for letting her suffer!

But now she was alright, and he kissed her forehead. “Sleep well, my dear,” he managed through his constricted throat. Fatigued, he rose to stand. His leg had fallen asleep and he nearly fell to the floor, but he caught himself without too much noise. He shuffled over to Everly, kissed her above her mother’s eye; “goodnight, my daughter.”

He straightened his back and turned for the door, walking out as he had so many times before; with that fatherly gait which proclaimed its strength, its towering might, built upon a foundation of solid ancient stone hailing from deep within the Earth. Darian walked like this in case they were awake, or partially awake, and caught a glimpse of him. This way, they would feel secure in his confidence, not discouraged by his weakness.

He flicked the light and shut the door part-way.
```
       There the mountain stands,
	That great wonder of stone,
	A king towering o’er the Earth.
	See how broad his shoulders?
	See how high his peaks?
	A king so stern and wise,
	Resisting storm and ruin,
	Remaining e’r the same.
	

	Behold! The mountain rests
	But in God’s hands,
	All Creation’s Potter.
	Let God take that mountain stone,
	Let Him condense it twixt His palms.
	A meager petrosphere
	Has the King Mountain become,
	Who once towered sturdy o’er Earth.
```
Then he began the journey to his room through the hall, where they could not see him. His nerves washed with nothingness, but he sensed himself tumbling over a ledge. He stumbled into the guardrail of the steps, resting his entire forearm on it to steady himself. His shoulders hunched, his neck collapsed into his collar. He couldn’t feel his legs, he couldn’t feel his heart beat. Darian’s head lolled over his shoulders as he shrunk within himself.

He was focused on his throat, stopping those quaking vocal cords from tearing the air to shreds. He wanted to scream until his throat dried and decayed. To scream with outrage against the torture he had permitted, to scream as a prosecutor arguing against himself, to scream proclamation of a guilty verdict, and to scream until his throat bled as recompense for the horror which he had let Merla endure. But if he screamed they would wake up, and her suffering would be in vain, for he would ruin her night’s rest. She so deserved a good night’s rest. They deserved everything.

Darian pressed his door closed behind him. He fumbled sluggard and aimless through the dark. A dense weight thrashed within his heart, wrenching him toward the ground with each lurching step. His legs became rubber under the weight. His ribs clutched his chest the way spider legs cling to prey, squeezing tension into his abdomen. His neck and head throbbed, burning the air around them. Dizzy, what he could see of the dark room swayed like ocean waves. He groaned against his will and whined in protest against the groans, hating himself for being so ill-composed. He languished, preparing to collapse where he stood.

His knee struck the side of his bed. He fell in an instant onto the mattress. As he did, the air pressed forth from his lungs, the pressure in his gut subsided. He realized that this had created a sob. He drew a breath in through quivering lips. He held it in, eyes watering and creating two pools of tears on his sheets. He held it in, shrill groans breaking through the flesh of his neck for he refused to part his lips.

When his fingers began to tingle Darian could hold the breath no longer. He exhaled, and with the heaving breath the heat absolved from around his head, his ribs released their grasp, and the compressed mountain within his heart exploded through his skin. Tears leaked from his eyes, gasps and sobs polluted the silence in confidence. For a time his body writhed slowly, a sluggish squirming. He was acutely aware of every moment, of all the sorrow that seeped through his pores, of the remorse that racked his body.

Then he churned through his mind, unaware of the passing time, his body violently shaking and lurching, clutching the pillows and the blankets, shouting into them, crushing them and pulling them, crying out into them, suffering silently, his muscles growing tighter to restrain his rage, his screams, his destruction so as not to wake the children, who need their rest, they need their rest, she needs her rest, she needs her rest, do not wake her, she needs her rest, do not wake her, do not wake her, do not WAKE

“…her,” he stammered through a shuddering, blood-flooded mouth.

A sunbeam caressed his cheek through the window, coaxing him into consciousness. Fatigued, he dragged himself from the bed, splashed his face with water, rinsed his mouth with water.

He could hear Everly and Merla and Kayden singing to themselves as they woke.

And he crept downstairs to start making breakfast.
tea?

November 29th, 2021

Trigesimus Octavus Gradus

Inspired by and dedicated to my sister, whose imagination and creative talent far surpass my own. The event and characters are derived from a post she shared on 10 November 2021.

Black branches cut through the gray sky. They divided up the clouds like tight paint strokes, hiding the sky behind masses of tiny twigs. The naked trees swayed to and fro in waves that rippled through the forest, bending under the graceful wind above her head. She was a blot of color in the drab, dry forest. Her head was lush and bright, grown symmetrical. It was, of course, a pumpkin. Her eyes and mouth were jagged like puzzle pieces removed from the flesh of her head, leaving holes the color of a stormy night sky in their place. Yet, now and again, if one looked closely, one would see a faint yellow-orange flicker paint that black canvas. She frolicked among the sturdy trunks, crushing piles of dead leaves below her bare, pale feet. Her path was sure and confident, erratic and relaxed. She paid no mind to the biting wind. Her body was shrouded in a simple white gown with orange frills.

The young woman slowed before a wall of tightly-wound trees whose branches thrashed violently against each other. Instead of trailing behind her, her gown now flared in all directions. The cyclical gale was deafening in this place, where before the breeze was a soothing melody.

With one step forward, the wall of trees creaked, the gale whistled to a slower pace, and a gap in the branches emerged. She slipped through, entering a glade, and the gale resumed behind her, closing the trees.

Inside the perfect circle of trees there was no noise. The air was still. The overcast sky was clear of branches, but the clouds were giant foaming bubbles, no longer a flat blanket. No dead leaves hid the ground. Instead, healthy green vines snaked through the glade. She walked over yellowed grass toward the center of the circle.

There rested a white table, upon which waited a porcelain tea set of various pastel colors. Its metal frame was crafted with elegant shapes woven together. Two chairs on either side matched its style. One of them was occupied by another woman who sat with legs crossed, saucer in hand. A porcelain teacup rested against her lower pumpkin lip, pouring a thin stream of bright red tea into her mouth. Curled beneath her chair, with his eyes shut gently, his body rising and falling with deep breaths, slept a fox. The fox’s fur was groomed as if by an angel, his hue a perfect match for his owner’s pumpkin head. The black gloves over his paws and up his forelegs gave him a regal appearance even while he slept like a newborn pup.

The woman turned toward the newcomer. She smiled sweetly and gestured to the empty chair, which slid away from the table and rotated toward the younger woman.

“Welcome to my pasture, Nuala,” the woman’s dark mouth flickered that yellow-orange more rapidly as she spoke, its glow pawing at the lower edges of her eyes.

“Thank you for inviting me, Lady Lavendera,” Nuala responded with a curtsy before taking her seat. As the chair pulled itself back in to the table she folded her legs in the same way as Lavendera.

“I know you haven’t much time before Lord Fraxinus” (Nuala’s fiancé, as it were) “arrives. So, allow me to—oh, dear! I’ve not offered you a cup,” Lavendera chided herself. “Tea?” Nuala smiled, nodding.

The Lady’s movements as she curled her pale fingers around the teapot, raised the teapot, tilted the teapot, then set it down and handed the saucer and teacup to Nuala, were serene. Every elegance of nature permeated her actions. There was no flicker of hesitation in them. Nothing to betray the ongoing self rebuke that Nuala knew Lavendera was issuing, berating herself for forgetting to pour the tea before speaking.

Why was she so distracted and uptight, so rigid in spirit? What was she going to say? Nuala blinked and stared at the spout, certain she would not find the answers in Lavendera’s eyes.

As she poured, Lavendera held the teapot so still that the bright red tea poured so smooth as to be mistaken for a glass sculpture. Even the pale light of the glade refracted through the liquid and painted the tablecloth with rosy, motionless patterns.

The tea steamed as Nuala held the cup in her hands before her mouth. It smelled not unlike a rosebush, not unlike a rain-drenched strawberry in the first sunshine after a storm. It tasted not unlike those things, either, but many more flavors worked in tandem with them.

“Is the tea hot enough?” Lavendera sat forward.

Removing her lips from the edge of the cup, Nuala answered, “yes, and it is delicious. Did you add a cherry blossom this time?”

Lavendera folded her hands into her lap. Nuala shivered; the Lady was ready for conversation. What transgression have I committed to be ridiculed in person? In her pasture, no less! What Nuala once thought an honor was becoming a horror wrought by her own deficiency.

“Why,” Lavendera started with cheer, “indeed I did. You have a fine palate, dear.”

Nuala was going to offer her thanks, then bring attention to the dewdrop accent as well, to spend more time discussing the tea and less time discussing whatever Lavendera had on her mind. But Lavendera spoke too soon.

“Nuala, I summoned you here to express my gratitude.”

Your gratitude? Nuala’s eyes expanded, the pumpkin flesh wrinkling at the edges.

“In all the years I’ve been their stewardess my acres have never been better kept. Your enchantments and mundane efforts far surpass those of my peers of nobility—” this word she said with poison on the tongue— “whose lands are shabby wilderness compared to mine. Never have I met a more brilliant and honest Keeper. The Lords and Ladies are jealous that I have you in my employ. Rightly so.” She paused, her smile gleaming at Nuala. Her face grew stern as she continued. “I only hope that I have proved myself to be a master deserving of your talents and heart.”

The fox beneath the Lady’s chair cooed.

“I pray this winter has been a fulfilling rest that your good work would continue into the next growing season.” Lavendera paused to take a draw of tea. “I want you to know, Nuala, that anything you need of mine, whether for my purposes or your own, is yours. You need only alert me.”

The Lady turned her attention to her fox, who leapt onto her lap and nestled in. She looked over the table at Nuala and fell silent, now and again drinking tea. Her eyes remained set on Nuala, but they did not press for an answer. They were kind, patient.

Nuala raced for an answer, her head spinning. She planted a hand on the table to steady herself. The motion seemed unnecessary, for she was sat upright and polite, perfectly stoic. Her throat clenched, her eyes stung. What is the matter with me? What do I say to her?

She breathed, the glade’s pure air flooding her lungs.

“Lady Lavendera, the honor is all mine. In fact it is not by my—”

“Please. Do not take me as a fool. I can see the fruits of your labor,” the Lady smiled a punctual sort of smile, as if she would hear no more on the topic.

With all her heart, Nuala wanted to protest. She took a breath, and understood; she relaxed. “Cheers?” Nuala held out her cup, the tea inside brushing against the rim.

“Cheers!” Lavendera laughed, clapping her cup against Nuala’s. The tea sloshed over the edge, falling in peculiar spheres to the table and grass.

“Has Mister Verner caught up on his wife’s den projects, yet?” Nuala asked of the fox. Lavendera laughed heartily while the fox snickered. She refilled her cup as she said, “Mister Verner couldn’t finish her projects if he had a kingdom to command.”

The trio were merry for some moments, held aloft in that glade by their glad spirits. Mister Verner left Lavendera’s lap to stretch. As the conversation grew he pranced about or stood on his hind legs with paws on the table. Tea spilled over the cups as the women swung their arms in laughter without reserve; a formal mood at tea time is scarcely appropriate. The green and pink and pale blue teapots and saucers and sugar cups added to the jest.

The whirling wall of trees slowed. A sliver in their ranks, far taller than the one which had opened for Nuala, appeared. Through it emerged a black stallion. As he trotted into the glade Nuala’s chair spun away from the table. The rider bent over, placing a hand at Nuala’s waist and hoisting her up with the momentum of the horse. A dark aura surrounded the rider’s body like an inverted vignette. He wore a Victorian suit fitting for a nobleman, each piece black like his horse except the ivory shirt. The shirt was clearly intended as the focal point of the man, as Nuala, in her white gown, became the focal point of the stallion and its burden. The flesh above the rider’s collarbone—neck and all—was naught.

“Lord Fraxinus! Welcome to my pasture,” Lavendera gestured over the glade.

Fraxinus, in a motion invisible to any eye, tucked his harness straps onto hooks affixed to his jacket sleeves, then signed a message to the Lady. She smiled and nodded. He unhooked the straps effortlessly and snapped them, ushering his stallion out of the glade. As they departed, Nuala shouted, “thank you for everything, my Lady!”

The stallion was swift. Nuala could barely hear Lavendera’s message as they approached the edge of the glade.

“Fare well, Nuala! I pray the gifts in wait for you at your abode find you well.” Lavendera waved until the trees closed and the cyclical wind wound up behind them.
A Spring Hike

November 1st, 2021

Septimus Decimus Gradus

Emilia took in the scent of the mountain dew as her feet gently nuzzled into the dirt path. Jonathan, a young boy with angelic blonde hair, bobbed happily alongside her. His blue toy plane serpentined through the air as he simulated the sound of a jet engine.

“Nothing better than a morning hike in the hills, don’t you think, Jonathan?” Emilia asked. The twenty-something glanced over her shoulder and extended a hand.

“I think you’re right,” Jonathan’s little voice chirped as he placed his hand into hers. My jet has never been so high before! So close to where it belongs!

The tweeting of birds and whispers of the sweet breezes accompanied the false engine rumblings. Emilia focused on the former, filled with the peace offered by the serene sounds. They told her she was home here in the gentle regions of Oregon. The natural beauty of the lush mountains always won out over more exotic spring break locales. And instead of spending on an expensive vacation, she was saving. How could she pass up the opportunity to be paid to hike on these beautiful trails and practice working with children? The scenery is gorgeous. It’s building her career. It’s good for the soul. And she was being paid to experience it all. Can spring break be better spent than this?

Lost in thought, she bumped into a log. Startled, she turned quickly to locate Jonathan. After she found him next to her but closer to the walled side of the trail she turned her attention back to the log. It extended from the wall of dirt on their left to the open air on their right, branches dangling over the cliffside.

“Alright, I’ll have to help you over this tree, but stay away from the edge once you’re across, okay? Wait for me. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

He smiled at her as she hoisted him up and over the log. She let him slip his hand out of her grip as he landed securely on the other side. Her heart fluttered with anxiety as she relinquished control over him, over his safety. He was alone then, the steep edge mere steps away.

“Wait for me, buddy, okay?” She was surprised at the quiver in her voice, which overruled the faint, self-assuring smile on her lips. I should’ve turned us around… giving up on the log. Too late. She hurdled the dewey log as quickly as possible, scooping his little hand into hers even as she landed back onto the dirt. She sighed in relief. Ah, we’re fine anyway. And it’s such a great view from the observation deck. It’d be a shame to be thwarted by a log.

They continued to walk along the path. When it began to widen Emilia let Jonathan walk independently, though she remained between him and the edge.

Jonathan felt the air grow cooler. They were higher, closer to home! He made excited zooming noises as the jet gained speed. He picked up the pace of his little legs, coming a little close to—

“—Jonathan!” Emilia was frantic. “Get away from the edge!” She lunged behind him and snatched his shoulder, hard. His loose grip on the airplane was broken by the jarring catch. It tumbled through the air, bounced on a rock near the edge, then plummeted over the cliffside. No!

“Oh, my God! Don’t ever do something like that again, you scared me to death!” Emilia’s eyes were wide. She guided Jonathan away from the edge, keeping an arm wrapped across his chest.

“My plane!” Jonathan squawked.

“Jonathan,” Emilia turned him around to face her as she knelt. Her heart was pounding. “Y-you can’t go running so close to the edge.”

“My plane, I dropped it,” his big eyes began to water.

“You could’ve tripped or something… you can’t get that close ever again.” She stuttered as she added, “I told you it’s very steep, okay? From now on, stay on this side of me.” He sniffled, not offering an answer. But what about the plane? His cheeks flushed, growing hot.

She stood and began walking with him, her hand tight on his shoulder. When her thumping heart receded from her ears, Emilia began to think more clearly. She began to wonder.

“We’ve been up this trail before and I’ve never had a problem with you. Why would you do that today?”

He wiped his tears away and his soft face angled into a scowl. “I want my plane back,” he huffed defiantly. Oh, she thought, pausing the walk and putting a hand on either shoulder, he must’ve dropped it. That’s why he was running by the edge!

“Jonathan, I know you’re upset that you lost your plane. But you can’t rush over to the edge to save it. Your safety is more important than that toy. You wouldn’t run out into the street to get a ball, right?”

“No,” he sputtered.

“Right, same thing here.”

No… no, he thought, looking over his shoulder. You threw it over the edge, not me. “Can I have my plane back now?”

“I can’t get your plane right now, but we will look for it on our way home. Can you be patient and wait ’til then for me? Come on, we’re almost to the deck.”

Who cares, if the jet isn’t with us? It wanted to be home! Don’t you know that? He had waited a year to bring it to the observation deck. So, why would you throw it over the edge, into the dirt? Airplanes do not belong in the dirt on the bottom of the mountain, because airplanes go in the air. That’s why it’s called an airplane. Don’t you know anything?

“You’re mean!” He snapped his head back to face her. “Let me go!” Jonathan began to squirm, pushing at Emilia’s arms.

“No, Jonathan! Not until you show me you can behave! Come on now, we were having a good time, weren’t we?”

“No! You killed my plane! You killed it!”

“Jonathan, it’s not dead. We’ll get it later, okay?” He was secure in her grasp. He’ll calm down in a minute, I just have to hold on for now.

“No, go get it!”

“Ouch!” Emilia exclaimed, yanking her right hand off his shoulder. She shook her hand in the crisp air; it stung with heat. His dark shirt is soaking up the sun. Capitalizing on her distraction, Jonathan ran toward the edge of the path, toward the blue jet. “Jonathan!”

Emilia reached out to snatch him up again, but he stopped before she could reach him. She hesitated, opting for a more diplomatic approach.

“Hey, Jonathan, remember what I said about the edge? It’s dangerous, right?”

She walked closer to him. He was breathing heavily. He was shaking. She, too, was doing both of these things. Her heart raced as before, thudding in her ears.

“Hey,” she said when she reached him, “come on. We’ll walk down to go get it.”

“No!” He yelled. His voice was not little, it was thunderous. “Get it now!”

He turned violently, grasping her forearms and squeezing hard. He bent his body as if to force her toward the edge, but he was too weak to make her budge. Emilia twisted her arms out, breaking his grip, and grabbed around his elbows. She guided him a step away from the edge. I’ve never seen him so pissed off! “Hey, Jonathan, relax, okay?”

Emilia, easily overpowering the boy, pressed him away from the edge. Resisting, he crept backwards, battering at her to break her grip. Tears streamed down Jonathan’s face as it grew redder.

Suddenly the tears on his cheeks dried, leaving salt stains that Emilia didn’t notice. He squealed in frustration, flexing his whole body, then stopped resisting her grip. Emilia relaxed. Sensing this, Jonathan shoved his arms up from under hers, knocking her grip away. As his arms returned to his sides the skin fell away like soot shaken from a scorched log. Stunned, Emilia gaped as the flesh likewise withered. She yelped and stumbled back, then caught herself. The edge!

Emilia turned and bolted toward the downed trunk. But Jonathan snatched her arm with his fleshless hand, spinning her to face him as if she weighed nothing. Whatever remained of his flesh was ashen and floating away in the wind. His coal black bones groaned as they grew in length, shrouded by a shadowy aura.

Emilia stared into the yellow eyes of the towering figure. She tried to grab him as her mouth fell open, but her hands burned wherever they landed. Her vocal cords shook with pleading, but his ears were closed tight. He swatted her arms away and spun her around so they were both staring into the open sky. With his claw cupping her nape he marched her forward.

“Go get it, now!” He hoisted her off her feet and projected her over the edge with such force as to empty her lungs of breath. The bellow quaked, “bring it home!”

She fell screaming with no voice.
Deer God

October 8th, 2021

Trigesimus Primus Gradus

A dozen deer galloped along the trail through the moist, shady woods. The trail curved along the shorter side of a greenish lake from which trees with weeping branches grew, hiding the water from the sun. The deer’s chests blew out and squeezed in with perfect rhythm and near synchronicity, for their collective pilgrimage was well-practiced. Despite an age range from fawn to elder, their pace was perfectly balanced. Stick-like legs carried them over the hills and into the valleys, careful not to plant their hooves into a divot or to strike rocks on the trail. To do so meant snapping the bone. The ears of the adults flicked to and fro, scanning the surrounding wood for any predatory noises.

They arrived at a breach in the trees. Struck by the afternoon sun, the deer basked in its warmth, which despite their exercise was welcome. The heat from the sun was always better enjoyed than that which was self-generated. Together, they grazed in the glade, their tan coats glistening. The courageous fawns poked their snouts toward shrubs and bright, novel flowers. The timid fawns hid behind the thin legs of their mothers. The elders drank from the sparkling, bubbling stream first, rejuvenated by its crispness. Then the deer introduced their young to the clear forest vein, sharing the bank.

Soon enough it was time to leave, for each deer had drank its fill.

The deer galloped back into the dark forest, this time at a softer pace. Instead of the stream which awaited them, it was only their beds of pine needles and browning leaves. Some minutes into the journey, the sunlight from between the leaves suddenly dried up. The adults smelled rain in the air, and the elders smelled death. The bucks picked up their own paces and, by extension, the pace of the group. The fawns bleated in response to the change. One of them stepped on a smooth stone, her hoof sliding into the dirt in a fraction of a second. Her knee buckled as the leg was pulled away from the momentum of her body, sending her rolling down the hill. The nearest of the deer paused and turned as her mother rushed into the valley. The fawn was in hysterics; her leg broken. A buck and two doe followed into the valley, nudging the mother deer along. But the fawn with the broken leg was her only progeny and she could not be budged. With the rain beginning to seep through the leaves, the buck and the doe left mother and daughter in the valley. Otherwise, they would soon be trapped by the muddy slope. The deer had to carry on, leaving the wails of the fawn to be absorbed within the chorus of rainfall, and the flesh of the pair to the mercy of the forest.

Several minutes behind the other deer, the buck and the two doe arrived at home in time to see the eldest deer fall to his side, legs outstretched straight as rods. His tongue fell from between his lips as the life drained from his black eyes, wetting with raindrops.

The deer nestled into their dens. Each shivered, muscles tightened by the chilly air. Beads of water clung to their muddy fur. Thunder cracked all night and lighting blazed the sky. None of the deer slept, least of all the fawns, who quaked worst of all in fear and cold. The elders snorted at every burst of lightning, taking long draws of the forest air. Their fear was wiser than that of the fawns, for they feared flames, while the fawns feared only noise.

At last, dawn appeared. The sheets of rain gave way to inconsistent drizzling, and the last crack of thunder rolled far away. A deer trumpeted as if pierced by a branch. The scream carried itself through the forest. Every deer, shocked into alertness, turned toward the sound. They stood in silence for a long time. Then a doe stumbled out of her den and fell to her knees. Her fawn had drowned in the mud during the night.

With nothing to be done, the deer rested for the morning in their homes, risking a late arrival to the stream.

Weary, they trampled along their path to the stream. When it came time to pass the lake, the mourning doe halted, unwilling to travel any further in her despair. She meandered toward the loose shore. To her surprise, an elder buck nudged her flank. His mouth was agape, panting. Every intake was a wheeze, every exhale such an effort that he shuddered. Together they bowed their heads to the greenish, still water.

The other six deer were well on their way to the stream. The buck in the lead, soon to be an elder deer, smelled something far to the right. He trotted to a slower pace, venturing forward with caution. Long neck outstretched so he could peer over the crest of a hill, he saw them. The dark gray and white coats of wolves. The buck slid silently back down the hillside, ushering the group around the long part of the hill. He and two other bucks walked along the side of the path nearer the wolves.

In a few more paces, the deer would be safely around the hill with a far enough lead to gallop away. But a fawn stumbled, weak from the cold of last night, and veered into an elder deer. The elder bleated in surprise. Immediately, barks could be heard from over the hilltop. The doe, fawn, and elder took flight, rushing through the trees. The three bucks followed close behind, but could not escape before the wolves had spotted them. As the pack of predators emerged over the hilltop, the sky grayed. A distant rumbling shook the animals.

Facing the wolves, the bucks lowered their heads. Antlers toward the enemy, they backpedaled carefully. The wolves encircled them.

Three deer emerged from the woods into the glade. They were the elder who had bleated, the fawn who had stumbled, and a doe. They turned and stared at the tree line, begging for more to emerge. But they alone remained. Their bodies became heavy, and they mourned. The sky above them swelled, then gushed down with a torrent of rain twice as intense as any spat from the prior night. With no hope of shelter, the deer made for the stream, bearing the rain in its full effect. Before they reached the bank the elder’s chest heaved and his body crumbled to the mud. The doe averted the fawn’s gaze, and together they reached the stream, and bowed their heads to it.

The mother’s ear flicked in response to a snap behind her. It was barely audible over the oppressive shower. She raised her head and turned. There stood a large buck, antlers caked with maroon blood and gray fur. His thick neck was torn and bloody. He took two steps forward, then turned back toward the forest. The buck lowered his body as he pointed his antlers forward. The doe heard a sinister growl. A moment later, a whining wolf was hoisted in the air with his hind leg kicking in desperation. A second wolf was clawing and biting the flank of the buck, who lay on the ground. The buck called out, but his cry was cut short by a third wolf with a snap of her jaws to the throat. The whining wolf stopped kicking, caught up in the buck’s antlers, hanging from them.

The doe looked to the stream. It was white with anger, overflowed and rushing fast. Turning once more, she saw that the wolves had spotted her. Besides the one which was dead in the air—his blood was washing over the antlers of the buck—there were four more, closing in on her. They were nearly invisible behind the veil of rain.

She faced her fawn, who trembled. Realizing what fate awaited him, she prepared to push him into the current of the stream. The mercies of the stream would exceed the mercies of the wolves. But she froze.

The gurgling stream swelled before her as if the current was striking a wall. The white foam rose above the water, twisting and curling. Clear water, tinted black by the storm, followed the foam. A silhouette took shape, and in a blink of her eyes the doe saw the aquatic sculpture of a great buck, twice the size and with twice the rack of any she had ever seen, before her. It took a step past her onto the shore. As its hoof kissed the ground the water of its leg splashed outward, replacing the sculpturesque appendage with the flesh of a real deer—a frightfully stronger flesh which was wrapped in radiant tan fur.

The wolves snarled as they sank lower on their haunches. A few of them barked.

The living sculpture planted another hoof on the ground. Its chest and head emerged from the water. They were powerful and great. Its watery antlers dried, revealing the purest velvet the doe had seen. Before the buck was halfway out of the stream it already stood between the wolves and the mother deer.

Barking, two wolves leapt at the buck. As their claws fell upon his fur and their teeth sunk into his flesh, their bodies burst into clear water. The water which was once them splashed over the great buck and fell into the ground. The remaining two wolves recoiled and spun on their hind legs. The buck, however, now freed from the stream, leapt over them. He landed with a hoof on the nape of the first wolf, killing it under his weight. Then he flicked his great head, hurling the second wolf aside. As it flailed through the air its body dissipated, returning to the earth no different than the raindrops.

The deer god reared and the storm ceased. The fawn and the doe became warm and dry the moment the sky cleared. They knelt to the creature of the stream before them, trembling at his might.
Sun Sky

September 6th, 2021

Trigesimus Quintus Gradus

“Did you notice that?” Susanna asked while casting a concerned glance at the window.

“That flicker? They concern you far too much, hon,” her husband sighed. “You’re too spoiled by city life. You’re lucky I finally dragged you back out to the country.” He smiled, anticipating her customary response to that line. But it never came. Hm, she must be moody. He sniffed, wrinkling his nose in a waving motion.

Susanna hadn’t heard him say anything after “hon.” She was creeping toward the window, trance-like. The green trees were flat as if they were drawn on paper…the gray street was colored just wrong…the flowers were not themselves. No, everything was…

Susanna gasped, covering her mouth with tense fingers. The sky was cloudless yet hazy, borderless yet oppressive. And pale orange all across. No gradient, no discoloration. The sky was pure pale orange, sunless, yet everything on earth was bathed in its hue, devoid of shadow.

“Nicholas, come look outside!” She was exasperated. Worried by her tone, Nicholas finally stood up. He took his time approaching the window, stroking his chin. He stood with her, observing the atmosphere for a moment. Then,

“Someone picked up our dead tree, eh?” For the thirty-foot tall tree which had succumbed to last winter’s chill was finally gone from the divot which lay in front of their yard along the road.

“Are you blind? Look! Where are all the shadows? Why is the sky so orange?”

“I don’t know, dear, maybe it’s sunset already.” Nicholas looked at his wrist, but it was bare. He turned about scanning the room for his phone, but gave up. “How many shadows do you usually see in a corn field, anyway?”

“This is not okay…” Susanna began, but she was interrupted by the howling.

The trees outside immediately bent far to the right. Many shattered at the trunk and sent their tops hurtling across the countryside. The mailbox was likewise blown into the fields. The house shuddered under the power of the sudden gale; the roof shifted and siding was peeled from the house. Any crack in the house fought to withstand the eviscerating wind which squeezed through; windows, doors, and vents blew frozen air into the house at incredible speeds. Doors and cabinets slammed shut and ripped themselves open, books and papers and trinkets flew everywhere. Susanna was lifted from her feet and tossed by the violent wind onto a couch while Nicholas was forced to his knees to avoid the same. The gale ripped at their hair and clothing.

It stopped. They stood, shivering, looking each other up and down.

“You okay, boss?”

“Yeah, you?”

They examined the mess around them.

“Man, it looks like a torn—”

“—Nicholas, I swear on my life, if you finish that sentence I will kill you.”

He fell silent, smirking.

As Susanna’s teeth began to chatter, Nicholas darted into the laundry room to dig up a blanket for his wife. Flicking the light switch, he blinked, but was still unable to see. He jiggled the light switch; still nothing. Instead, he groped around the room until his hands met something soft. He clenched and pulled it, then returned to the living room and gave the blanket to his wife. Her skin was paler, her lips less red. His body had a violent thrill as he turned toward the garage where the breaker box was. “Power’s out.” Susanna tightened the blanket around her as she darted to a couch further from the cool window. Pulling out her phone, she began to call her mother… then her father… then her best friend… before she realized that there was no signal. The lights never came back on, nor did the refrigerator, nor did their new electric stove. (“I told you we should’ve kept the gas stove.”)

The next day, they planned, they would take a trip into the city if the power and cellular remained out. By then, the storm, if that’s what it was, would’ve passed, and it would be safe to travel. But the phrase “the next day” assumes that night will come. It never did. The sky remained pale orange, never fading to a new hue, never ripening, never clouding. It stayed orange, pale but with eerie luminescence, for hours. Susanna was so worried that she convinced Nicholas to sleep with her in alternate watches to see if night would ever fall. Eight hours later they stood together in front of a large window chewing on dry breakfast bars, pondering the sky.

“Maybe it’s a wildfire.” Nicholas finally deduced. “They really mess with the sky, you know.”

“No, I escaped one as a kid, remember. That was much more hellish. This is too… I don’t know, peaceful’s not the word. Stagnant.”

“Mm. I think it’s a wildfire. What else could it be?” She punched him. He grinned. He was taken aback by the frigidity as he stepped outside to start the car. He was even more shocked that the car was gone. “Susanna,” he called into the house. He quieted when he realized that she was just around the corner, where he’d left her. “We left the Volt in the driveway, right?”

“Yes, I’m certain.”
“Well…” he gestured for her to follow him, and she did. They walked around the house, scanning up and down the street for the car. There was no sign of it, meaning it couldn’t have been blown too far by the windstorm. The fields were intact, anyway. “Open the garage door, Nick,” Susanna said. He tried, but the door didn’t budge. No power. Walking back toward the house to open it manually, Susanna noticed something in the sky behind their roof. Something big, like the moon. Now bigger, and bigger, and bigger. Something coming closer. She screamed and threw her arms around her husband. “Look!”

Nicholas looked up in time to see the object, which by now commanded a whole third of the sky. He yelped and grasped Susanna tightly, but couldn’t pry his eyes from the… is that cement? The cement, bowl-shaped—it’s a bird bath! He laughed as the bird bath loomed over three fourths of the sky, blackening the pale orange but casting not a shadow over the world. Certain he was about to die, Nicholas laughed as Susanna wailed.

There was a show of lights that sprouted around the bird bath, bright and dancing and of many colors. The lights were more clear and more lively than aurora polaris. Suddenly the trajectory of the bird bath reversed, and it shrank in the sky. Nicholas patted the back of Susanna’s head and pointed to it; she caught a glimpse of the giant object as it receded into the pale orange haze and disappeared from view.

Nicholas raced into the house, dragging his wife behind him. He scanned the countertops, and finding them empty, threw open the refrigerator. There! The tray of brownies.

“What is in these?” He asked Susanna.

“Huh?” She was confused and wiping tears from her eyes.

“You saw what I saw, right? That was a…” he paused, leading her to finish his sentence.

“I—I—I guess it looked like a bird bath, if I had to guess,” she stammered.

“Then we are hallucinating, that’s the only logical explanation for all this! What did you—”

“—Don’t you dare!” She yelled, taking a step away. “I did not spike our brownies! Ugh, you are completely insufferable, are you serious right now?”

“Okay then what can you possibly say that makes more sense?”

She burned him with her eyes and stormed into the garage. Nicholas followed.

“I’m not helping you. We certainly can’t drive hallucinating like this.”
“My parents are in danger, Nicholas. I’m going to find them, and if you don’t help me open this damn door, it’ll be the last time you see me leave through it. I can promise you that.”

Reluctant, Nicholas helped her force the garage door open.

She peeled away with him in the passenger seat of their bumper-less, rusted-out old S-10, leaving an array of tools and parts behind. For Susanna, there was no time to waste. The truck would survive long enough.
Soot

August 31st, 2021

Trigesimus Tertius Gradus

A black winter ensnares the landscape with its deceptively calm and deadly ubiquity. The clouds never scream, never flash, only stir. They are gray, infested with soot spewed into the atmosphere from fires that consume flesh dozens, or scores, or hundreds of miles away. Fires somewhere, everywhere, never before the eyes or the ears. Thick flakes of soot drift without urgency toward the desolate ground. What can be seen of the beaten earth is black with the soot. Even the ground that catches the eye is mixed with soot and presented to it as a festering stew. If one were to dig a hole they might dig forever and never escape walls of sooty dirt. Black sludge which was once called water fills depresses of earth to the brim. Now the waters are unrecognizable, full of debris, and covered with a blanket of soot that swells with the sludge.

Gray legs wade through the ponds. Bare feet batter the barren soil. Every leg is scratched. Every foot punctured. Every wound infected, spilling yellow puss down to the surface of the sludge, down to the soles of the feet. The skins of many legs hang in tatters. Those legs which have walked for more years than most are in utter disrepair. Flaps of skin have been caught on the soulless points of stones, bark, and bones to be peeled from the flesh in sheets. The bodies care not to prevent the teeth of the earth from unraveling their gray skin. Strings and mats of skin hang, decaying, across the landscape. Worse are the legs which have given up the flesh beneath the skin. Rotting muscles give way to bones blackened by the sludge and the soot. The bodies that bear the burden of attachment to these legs stumble over the earth and through the sludge as a marionette beheld by trembling hands. Yet still did they fare better than those bodies which had lost their legs long ago. These monstrosities crawled through the decaying earth, their gray chests and stomachs and faces smeared with soot and the stew of waste. They crawled until the landscape had scraped away the gray skin of their fronts. Then the land could eat their organs as they yet crawled, entrails betraying their aimless paths through the black winter.

The bodies have black eyes, eyes blacker than the soot. Long ago had the pupils of those skulls overwhelmed the irises and the sclera such that they may devour as much light in the eternal dark as possible. Often, those black eyes hide behind veils of greasy hair the color of soot.

The bodies wander. One may find itself alone among the desolation surrounded by miles of empty, dying earth and choking air, its own soot-smeared gray skin the brightest shade in the endless black winter. Or one may find itself one among thousands, no more room between it and the next than is afforded between one’s own knuckles, ebbing with the others in an ocean of rotting upright bodies. Ever are they wandering. Rarely has a body not met foot to every plot of the stinking soil of the landscape, waded against every wave of sludge in the pernicious ponds. Never do they fall, save when the stumps of their shins or of their femurs can no longer support the bodies without sinking into the mud. Never do they reach a destination, because there is no destination to reach. There is only soot, anywhere, everywhere, suffocating the sensory organs until it finally devours them. Then the bodies soak and dissolve into the black earth, ground down by the feet of others. Never do the bodies change pace. They scour the land at the same, slow pace, always.

And the bodies eat. Acute nails bite into the forearms and faces of every body. Needle-thin hands pull away chunks or strips of skin and flesh from every body. A wanderer left alone will soon tear at its belly and devour the organs found within. Yet none wants to be consumed by another. The bodies scuffle for survival. The bodies move quickly, decisively, to defend their lives in the squalor of the landscape. The bodies prefer to wallow in the sludge than to be killed and eaten by another. So they fight. Clawing and biting at each other, shredding skin, shattering skulls, eating all along. They fight in silence until their stomachs are full. Then their ravenous engorgement ends and they continue to wander.

Then from the ground emerged a man. His eyes were white around the edges, and brown, and his pupils were small, but he moved with caution through the landscape, unscathed by its barbed extremities. He had brown, not black, hair. His body was whole, not scattered across the landscape. His skin was brown, not gray. It was not blackened by the falling soot or the soot which caked the earth. His feet were clean, not festering with disease. He moved with intention, choosing where and when to be. He could see the fire beyond the wandering bodies, the fire from which the soot spread out over the land.

Then the man met the bodies. Rather, the bodies met the man. Immediately a great horde of them rushed to him, spraying dirt and sludge out from everywhere they stepped. For the first time, the bodies began to speak. The first body fell upon the man, and the man’s red blood gushed from his throat as it was split by black fingernails. The bodies screamed with witless rage, cursing the man whose body was whole. They all fell upon him to rip at his skin, tear at his flesh, to cake his hair with grime and to beat him to his knees, to his side, to drag him to the sludge and drown him, to drag as well the bodies which had latched their teeth into him. All these things, they did. The red blood of the man spilled over, leaving a red streak in the black earth as he was dragged to a pit to be drowned. His human flesh was gnawed away as he was dragged. The mass of bodies around him grew larger and larger, each gray hand desperate to desecrate the man’s flesh. His joints bent awry, his bones beaten to the point of breaking. Every hand which was laid upon him, every jaw closed against him, every foot bashed against him, was a blessing to the remainder of the body, for the gray skin began to stitch itself together, the lost flesh began to regrow stronger than it had been before. Some bodies became less gray, and some which had crawled legless for millennia stood upright again.

After the gray mass had circulated completely, and what remained of the man was no longer distinguishable from the rest of the landscape, they turned to see him standing where he was first seen. And he turned, and left.

There was a great wail. Then the gray bodies said no more, for they could not. They hung their heads, hiding their taut faces behind those broken veils of hair, and wandered and decayed and burned, never and always.

Save for one, then another, and another. For these gazed upon that place where he had been, a slight hill in the dented, twisted landscape. And while the flesh of the others again degenerated, the bodies of the onlookers continued to heal. The flesh strengthened. The skin browned. The infections dispersed. The black eyes shrunk into whites, into irises, and the hair was cleansed.

These few fled lest they be treated the same as the first man; eaten in parts by bodies and land. But one of these few remained among the damned, and those who beat her were healed until she died. Her corpse was devoured and strewn about the black earth, returning to it. The damned returned to their wandering, rapidly returning to their deteriorated state. Lo, for two among the soot stood still to stare at her red blood as it sunk into the black earth, and lamented what they had done to the man. And their wounds mended, and the soot fell away from their browning skin.
Rescue

August 24th, 2021

Sextus Gradus

“Sector One Delta, go to ad board.”

“Contact.”

“Go to 5 o’clock, approximately 3 MOA.”

“Contact.”

“Go to glass.”

“Target has a black suit, tan tie, red cap. Three targets surrounding. Armed.”

A red van tears through the street. The driver’s teeth are clenched tight enough to cause pain, but he doesn’t feel it. He is too focused on the road, on the obstacles. He cranks the wheel left, then right, then left, scraping other cars and nearly missing pedestrians. His greatest fear is striking a pole or a vehicle that would bring him to a dead stop or destroy his van. His neck aches with tension as he leans into the wheel. The traffic fades out, leading him into a mostly-empty street that’s been gated off with official cones and signs. He smashes through a wooden barricade, sending splinters flying among the shabby men who guard the street. The tires squeal in protest as he accelerates to great speed, making up for the loss after striking the gate.

Four men stand in the distance, motionless against the speeding van. One has a red cap.

He closes in on them in moments, crushing the brake and skidding the van so that its broad side, its sliding door, faces the man in the middle. The murderer, the thief, the plotter, the extortioner; the man he is about to rescue.

The bullet strikes the hood of a red van.

“No good, no good! Who the hell is that?”

A large shell casing is expelled from the rifle. A fresh one is forced into the chamber.

The rubber is ripped off the tires in thick mats on the pavement. The van groans as it peels away behind a group of buildings, then back onto the busy city streets. This time, the driver is concerned with his new cargo.

“Where are they?” The driver screams. “Where are they?”

The man with the red cap rubs his head, aloof. Turning, the driver flails a free arm behind his chair, striking the man with the red cap. Made sensible, the red cap asks, in return, “who?”

“The CFO and her children! Where are you keeping them?”

The man with the red cap is silent at first, then he begins to chuckle.

“Rounding 47th, southbound—” the sniper’s shoulder pushes back slightly with a thunderous bang— “Target is in a red van. Driver unidentified,” the spotter rattles into his handset. And the van is gone. “Authorizing lethal force. Take the target down at all costs.”

“You’re a brave one. I hope you die that way.”

The driver jerks the wheel, sending the van into a desperate drift around a tight corner. The man with the red cap is thrusted into the wall of the van, striking with a sickening crunch. When the van straightens out, he coughs. The driver feels flakes of spittle, or blood, or both, spattering onto his neck.

Two white sedans emerge in the van’s mirrors. The windows are tinted black. They pick up speed as they careen as recklessly as the van they’re chasing through traffic.

“Get down!” The driver shouts, “and stay down! We’re about to take fire!”

The passenger window of the first sedan glides down smoothly, almost coy. The thick, black barrel of a sub machine gun reveals itself to the public and sprays a controlled burst at the rear tire of the van. The shots ping against the red paint, narrowly missing the rubber. The van’s erratic pattern is enough to save the tires. Another burst, then another, then another.

A shooter from the opposite sedan joins in. Each of the chasing drivers attempt to close the gap between them and the van, but the flow of traffic chokes their options down. People scream and dive for cover on the sidewalks, tires screech and horns blare up and down the street as drivers desperately swerve away.

An ornate glass entryway slips into the driver’s view. His fingers whiten as he clenches the steering wheel, veering toward the building. There’s a shallow incline of stone stairs, but as the van reaches them, the front bumper is crushed upward and threatens to fall off entirely. The driver sees nothing but a blur as the van shatters the entrance and begins to roll into the atrium. Metal and glass are flung everywhere, becoming deadly shrapnel. The windshield is blown out, placing cuts along the driver’s face.

The sedans skid to a stop at the base of the atrial staircase. The occupants, including the drivers, pour out of each, totaling eight armed shooters. They storm up the stone stairs toward the eviscerated glass entrance, stunned at the destruction they had just witnessed.

The driver scuffles out of the window, dragging the man with the bloody suit down a flight of marble stairs. The stairwell is enclosed, and apparently leads down three stories. The driver plucks a card out of a suit pocket before leaving the mangled man at the first landing. He proceeds to stumble down the remaining stairs alone.

The fire team steps into the atrium, carefully navigating through broken glass, watching every angle. The building is incredibly empty. Save for crackling glass, the only noises are from outside; police sirens slowly but surely approach.

The team reaches the van. A smeared trail of blood leads down a staircase. Carefully, they make their way to the stairwell. As the agent at point notices dressy shoes, he points his weapon at them and draws it up along the body. It’s the target.

Gunshots ring down the stairs. The driver shivers.

“Target eliminated. Should we proceed to find the driver of the escape vehicle? Signs indicate he is in the building.”

A crackling voice comes over the radio, “affirmative.”

He waves the key card in front of a terminal. A lock snaps, the door floats open.

The fire team descends, following a trail of bloody handprints and muddy footprints. Down a flight, then another, into a corridor. The blood stops at a door which is ajar. They flick on their flashlights. The point man enters, pointing the light—his gun—at a group. A man with torn clothes and ripped skin has his arms wrapped around a woman and children, who sob with him in the dark room. The point man motions to the others. Fall back. They turn, rushing back to the atrium.
Concerning Colors and Stars

August 19th, 2021

Trigesimus Secundus Gradus

Ethan squirmed over the mattress of plump switchgrass, trying to settle. Several times he had felt comfortable only to be prodded under the shoulder by a rock or tickled on the cheek by a limp blade. The rock would need to be excavated from the natural bed and the loose blade plucked from its root and tossed aside. While Ethan wrestled with his section of the field, the sky above ripened into dusk.

At last, Ethan was satisfied with his creation. He inhaled deeply, first with his chest, then with his belly. He exhaled through his nose, allowing his eyes to fall open as they focused on the bath of colors spread before him. His vision of the sky was undisturbed by dark silhouettes of switchgrass blades; his labor plucking them up had guaranteed him a clear view. All there was for him to do was breathe and enjoy the purples and oranges and yellows far above.

He considered each of the colors. His eyes greeted them individually before his mind examined their contribution to the painting which they composed. As lone colors, he decided, most of them were rather dull. It was where they wove together amidst the clouds (blending here, sharply contrasted there, bitten by a shadow here, look how that cloud is tearing the orange in two!) where they became beautiful. Beautiful, not like a painting, but rather like a dance.

Then, there was nothing to do but wish the hues farewell. On Ethan’s left, night had emerged over the horizon. Its darkness sapped the other side of the sky of her color, ushering the redder tones away and replacing them with blues and grays.

Oh, Ethan observed, that is a new color. It’s wonderful. Even alone, it was surely not dull. Whatever should it be called?

He was distracted at that moment by a bright light which he had not noticed before. Now, it commanded his attention wholesale. It was the first star of the night, which was still maturing on the left horizon. Alone in the black bubble of night it shimmered as if shivering in a bitter, snowless winter. Ethan himself would’ve shivered if not for the warm zephyr that passed over him. His lips curled into a smile as he imagined that he had opened an oven door; that was how warm the gust had been. He listened to the wind as it played upon the switchgrass like fingers playing upon a harp.

Inside the oven was a freshly-baked apple pie. It looked as perfect now as it was every year. The fork broke through the flaky crust. The tender apple slices gave way to the prongs, now warmed by the pie filling. It steamed as Ethan brought the fork up to his mouth. It tasted as perfect now as

“—ever. Thank you so much, Dad,” Ethan said with a smile, setting the plate and fork in the sink.

Ethan sighed with contentment, the warmth of his body now sustained by his gratitude, undisturbed by any further breezes. His head rolled gently, creating a defined bowl in the switchgrass mattress. He delighted in a number of memories, savoring them like he had with the colors before. Unlike the colors, though, each memory could be cherished alone. His thankfulness grew even as the sky grew crowded with stars.

Ethan’s chest fluttered, as it sometimes does when one is falling asleep but does not want to. His eyes snapped open and he shook his head a little, quite surprised at the totality of the blackness before him; there remained no hint of the day to his right.

He explored the stars. The first one of the night was too well hidden among its peers, though he had tried to find it again. Ethan was not an astronomer, and he could not identify a single constellation. Save, of course, for the Dippers. Anyone could find the Dippers. To his eye, the stars have no particular order. They’re like clouds. Look at this bunch, here. Together, they look like a knight upon a horse. Though, I could easily tell them to be a butterfly instead. “They” is arbitrary, itself. Why not include these two, as well, and make an ice cream cone? He amused himself like this for quite some time before he decided that all the shapes were equally meaningless, including the Dippers. Together, the stars meant nothing. But the sun is a star. And without it, I wouldn’t be looking at these.

“Why is that star there,” he wondered aloud.

He was overcome by a chill. He crossed his arms and rubbed them with his palms. Warmed, he sat up to stretch, and for the first time since laying down, took in his surroundings. The field was blessed with the starlight (the moon was not out tonight). The subtle white of the stars grazed the grasses and trees and stones enough to make them visible. Color, of course, had dissolved into the atmosphere with the sunset. But the silhouettes remained. Ethan felt as if he was in a dream. Then, he looked further away, at the tree line on the edge of the field, and saw that it was black. A purer black than even the night sky, because the trees had no stars within them. Ethan tensed up, shifting his leg as if to spring himself up. He scanned the blackness there, imagining a great wolf bounding out of the black. The details of the wolf’s body were hidden from view; Ethan could only see it by the horrid blotch it made against the starlit grass. Ethan turned to run but was frozen. Closer and closer the wolf was until it leapt, finally, and Ethan—

Realized that he was holding his breath. He released it, and it shook. Feeling silly, he laid himself back down on the natural mattress he had formed, and turned his attention back to the sky.

That could happen, though. Ethan’s thoughts began to spiral. He worried for the future and feared what it held. There were worse creatures than the wolf conjured in his mind. What of it? He finally shouted to himself. He breathed several breaths and focused on the stars, putting his mind at ease again.

His eyes returned to the star. He stared at it for a moment, then two, then more. His mind was silent. Then, the star is there because it exists, and by existing it has obeyed. What does it care if it shines tomorrow or not over my world?

“We share the same duty.”
A Fish In the Water Out of the Bucket

August 5th, 2021

Trigesimus Gradus

A paid 18-month internship with guaranteed employment which would place Derek Giles in the top 30-or-so percent of income earners in the United States within the first five years of his career was an irresistible offer. At the time, it was unbelievable. But some engineers had made incredible breakthroughs in submarine technology, so the previously unscathed resources of the deep sea had opened up to the curious hands of humanity. Hundreds of lucky investors became instant millionaires, or even billionaires, a few years ago. And for their hard work chancing upon the right stocks, Derek won the job of his life at negative personal cost. That is to say, Derek was blessed.

He felt a bump on his shoulder and his body jerked to the side.

“Oop! Sorry Giles, excuse me, sir.” It was Clive Scrivens, the freshest member of the crew with a cool six years of graduate schooling—fast-tracked—and at least eight years experience working in thermonuclear engineering. But soon, even Scrivens wouldn’t out-earn Derek.

“If it happens again, I’ll have you demoted to janitorial staff. It’s too tight of a fit in here for mistakes, Scrivens.”
“Yes sir!” Scrivens responded with reverence, but he’d noticed Derek’s slight grin.

They require over a decade of special skills training but no one cares that he’s never been on so much as a fishing boat, Derek joked to himself as he entered the control room.

The control room was a little more spacious than the congested, pipe-filled submarine walkways. More went on in it. Rising, falling, seeing, detecting, controlling the half-dozen arms and specialized tools of the submarine, light control, monitoring of life support systems, and communication. As many activities went on in this room, there were hundreds more switches, controls, buttons, and lights, all on neat, clean panels that look good in fancy corporate advertisements. Four other men were engrossed by them as the vessel approached its final target, a massive electronic control station tethered to the ocean floor like a depth charge. Fine repairs were required for the land lovers to continue commanding the massive mining fleet further below without “unacceptable levels of visual and motor control interference.” Derek was here to fix a lag issue.

“Giles! Take the lead on this one.” It was Captain Nejem. “We’re on final approach. You’ll need the fine control specialists to open up panel 16-B and 23-C. You know which one the communication relay goes to, right?” Affirmative. “And the new diagnostic computer goes to the other one. Right.”

Derek took a deep breath. His performance with this relatively routine task wouldn’t ruin his career, by any means, but Nejem was a tough judge and one bad review could delay promotion proceedings for up to a year. Just put the computer and the relay to bed.

“Remember to properly import the broken components for evaluation. And don’t leave before you run final diagnostics,” Nejem finished with his arms tucked behind his back.
“Of course. Rutgers, go ahead and open up 23-C. Kayode, be prepared to extract the old relay. Carefully….” Derek walked the operators through the process. To lead them, he had to be firm and thorough, but careful not to underestimate their independent ability. After a few minutes, the old relay was onboard with no issues. Almost twenty minutes later, the new one was installed with a slight hiccup caused by the operator, Rutgers.

“Hang in there, Rutgers, nice and easy. We’ve got time.” It was still done at a faster-than-average pace. “Alright. Kayode, move Arm 3 over to panel 16-B. Hart, get Arm 5 ready for extraction.”

“Sir,” Kayode started, “the control station moved.”

“It moved? Rutgers, what happened to Arms 2 and 4? I thought they were locked in. Find the control station, Kovac.” Rutgers grumbled under his breath. They truly had been locked in.

A soft whining filled Derek’s ears and the panels of the submarine flashed red, red, red.

“Not good,” Nejem grimaced. Derek looked at the depth gauge—it was blanking out.

“Kovac, where the hell are we?” Derek demanded.

“Sir, we haven’t moved!”

“Retract the arms!” Nejem commanded. He pressed a button. “Full power, Scrivens! Point our nose up, Kovac.”

“I can’t get a read, sir! The instruments can’t see an up!”

“Up is up, dammit! Don’t you have any sense?”

“Relative to what, sir? I don’t know which way we’re oriented around the—” he stopped, breath taken.

Through the thick glass windows of the submarine, the brightest, whitest light Derek had ever seen shown through. Everyone froze, squinting, trying to determine what the light was. The command room blipped red, red, red.

“Turn us away from that, Kovac! I’m going blind,” Derek ordered. Kovac obeyed, but what Derek saw horrified him more—it was clear, bright blue water. He could see hundreds of shapes. Are they… whales? A squid? Submarines? It was like opening your eyes in the pool back home and seeing toys, not being a mile deep in the ocean.

Then the submarine ratcheted to the left, then the right. Nejem was sent flying into a bar, crashing into it with a deafening clang and a host of snapping sounds. Kovac’s face was buried in a computer screen before being shot back out, slamming his head against his chair. His face was ruined. Derek was hurled out of the control room, back down the hallway, and landed on something soft. The submarine groaned, the lights flickered.

Derek slowly got back to his feet, rubbing his head. The bright white light flooded the submarine again. The ghastly bright blue water sloshed against the submarine. Derek stumbled toward the control room. Hearing yelling, he began to run.

Hart was screaming in pain. But Rutgers was stabbing Kayode, who was silent. Rutgers had a hand on Kayode’s shoulder, holding him upright, and driving the knife in and out of his chest, throwing blood over the entire room. The silhouette of the slaughter caused Derek to writhe with chill. He could see the bones of Rutger’s and Kayode’s bodies nestled within the red glow of their illuminated flesh.

Derek sprinted the short distance to tackle Rutgers and knock the knife away in the process. Without missing a beat, Rutgers put a hand on Derek’s face and crawled his fingers to Derek’s eye. Derek squirmed his neck, trying to wrestle his face out of Rutger’s grip, but it didn’t work. Rutger drove his fingers into Derek’s eye.

Then Derek heard a disgusting sound. Scrivens, on whom Derek had landed, struck Rutgers’ forehead with a huge wrench, in which it became lodged, killing him instantly and spraying Derek’s blood-soaked face.

Derek fell away from Rutgers, hands cupped over his gushing eye, whimpering.

Scrivens scurried to Kayode, shouting for Taft, the medic.

Whatever Kayode whispered to Scrivens, Derek never found out.

Kayode’s head went limp as Taft scrambled in, so Scrivens directed the medic to Hart.

The submarine rocked again, sending them sprawling. Hart was tossed against some controls, Taft was hurled back into the walkway, and Scrivens collided with the window, cracking the innermost layer of glass. Kayode, Rutgers, and Nejem’s bodies were scattered about, planting spots of blood wherever they struck. Kovac, who was surely dead but strapped into his seat, was whipped about like a wet noodle in a windstorm.

The submarine continued to convulse, throttling its contents. The sailors’ limbs, caught in gruesome nooks, were snapped and torn relentlessly. Their bodies crushed pipes, they mangled controls. Hot and freezing gasses sprayed everywhere.

Derek, with a gouged eye, broken leg, and twisted fingers, managed to strap himself into a control seat. Even then, the turbulence subjected him to the debris of his former shipmates, various tools, and anything else that had become dislodged in the commotion.

The lights flashed red, red, red. The control room became redder.

Soon he was the only survivor, and he was there when part of Scrivens’ body made its way to the reactor and bashed against the cooling pipes along with a wrench and a cot. Derek was still awake when the neon green and red lights frantically flashed, desperate to make themselves seen against the bright white, bleaching light. A few seconds after they started, he heard a dreadful creak, and he felt the air grow thin. Jess… Ev… Vaughn….

Outside, miles and miles away, one could see the perfectly-spherical, pale white blast of the submarine’s reactor near the middle of the bright, undulating mass of ocean water which congregated amidst the void, steaming away into oblivion. Large as it was, the blast of Derek’s ship could not compare to the oppressive white light of the sun.
This is Not an Abandoned Car

July 2nd, 2021

Vicesimus Nonus Gradus

Woe am I, the wanderer of that steaming country. Steaming with the phantoms of the masses, steaming with the victory of war. Woe am I, who art alone, and who travel that desolate land in search of they who would offer a scrap of their dog meat in trade of tales from the steaming land where tales are made and shared no more.

Then on a red day, when the bleeding sunlight purged forth from the black clouds like blood from the cracks in a scab, I chanced upon they the People of Ancient Huetter where Theft is a Crime Never Wrought. What devilish drive led me out to that portion of our forefathers’ now-accursed land I shall not ever know nor understand. Their rarity, the curiosity of their home, it is the envy of all the Survived. An envy the Survived hold dormant, for it is uninspired, for they yet know not that the People exist. And they are still not known, except to the woeful bloodied and muddied pages of this journal, for they have stapled my lips to secrecy with regards to their station in life.

Drab are the walls, and parched are the pigments of their former colorful luster, of course. But sound is the structure of their homes, and clasped together yet are the boards of their walls! On the Day of Quaking, we woe Survivors believed that not a single support of the bygone Earth should be left upright, but that all should be eviscerated or knocked away by the blasts. Truthfully, it is not so. Rightly too, the reader supposes, that the People have rebuilt their homes. Yea, yea, this they have. But their new homes are of a different architecture, a new architecture informed by their new, undead culture and the demands of a barren, unending prairie. But here, among these fortresses are homes of the times before, untouched indeed by the Quaking!

Let me dawdle no more on architecture and report, privately of course per our sacred agreement with the People, on the true curiosity of these People. In the center of their town—which is yet paved! Oh, the wretched pave of the ancient roads I thought mine eyes would never meet again—lays a car with paint long stripped by the Quaking and the Elements which followed, with rubber long decayed and blown by wind away from its wheels, with glass long busted apart and scattered for miles in that steaming land, in such wretched disrepair as to be quite possibly mistaken for an ancient and strange bear trap of the most inhumane kind.

Yet e’ry day a man as old as the land itself, it would seem, and as wrinkled as a water’s surface which has but just received a boulder unto itself, sets himself upon a folding chair with rusted legs and rusted joints, rusted like those of his body, and observes the careful keeping of the car that its condition may not be rendered worse. If such a frame were to exist in the steaming land, out of the bounds of merry Huetter, confidently I report that many an animal would kindly nest within its ancient make. Yet no such animal has ever bedded, not so much as an insect, would dare enter the car under the clouded and blind eye of the man whose age is unknown to all.

When the woeful I confronted the old man, I begged of him an answer; “for what reason do you set yourself upon that rusted chair in defense of this ancient frame?”

He has told me never more than this, that at one time far before the Elements washed it surely away, there was a sticker on the paint of the frame of the car which read “This is Not an Abandoned Car.”

Color me stunned as you will, and I assure you your image is not saturated enough.

Recognize as well that on e’ry fifth day, the People would gather themselves like clockwork around the car, and sing into the sky. The keeper of the car, on these fifth days, would stand rather than sit on his chair. When their singing was o’er, a new person on each fifth day would speak for some time, from the sun’s forty-fifth to its sixtieth degree, then all would recite an incantation and depart, ne’er to return save for the next fifth day. Scared I was to e’r inquire as to these fifth days, and observe them from quite far away only e’er would I, so that woeful I could not hear the strange mutterings which they set forth around the car.

Yea, that car, set in the highest and flattest part of their Sanctuary in the steaming land, was well-afforded the attention of that man on the four days twixt the fifths and by the whole of the People on the fifth.

Save for these oddities, the functioning of those People were quite as one would expect in the wake of the Quaking, for any man and woman who need survive in the steaming land. A number of them collect water from the river, from the burning rain, and they are the ones who set their stores to the filter. Others often meet outside in the brown grass and compete with the sticks which stand in for swords, or swing their empty firearms to and fro like one would in the ancient wars. Ne’er did I hear a round disperse from those clay-stained barrels, for I believe they are too valuable in the steaming land to be put to waste, otherwise they live in fear that upon the first shot their rusted barrels would expire violently and kill him or her who pulled the fire-stick by its own self-destruction.

On the fortieth-and-third day after my introduction to the People, lo! The car was gone, disappeared from the eyes of all forever and ever. Ne’er did we find tracks, or ancient tools which would enable locomotion of that frame, nor any other indication of the frame’s resurrection to car-hood of the ancient age. Yet gone it was! Curious was my woeful self to see what might happen on that fortieth-and-sixth day (for this would be the next fifth). Woeful I was surprised at the dispassion the People felt at the disappearance of their idol, their blesser of the crops and their filterer of the waters. Yet on that fortieth-and-sixth day they did gather, the man with unknown age among them, and recited their rituals as I have previously detailed within these stained pages. And ne’er was a tear shed for the car, and it seemed to be removed from memory as easily as a paperclip from a stack of papers. This I, my woeful I, should know, for these pages on which I write are held together by none other than a paperclip foraged from the steaming land, the land of mourning and undead souls, which roam eternally searching for the eviscerated remains of their blasted bodies, unable even to settle for their shadows of deaths which have themselves long been scratched away by the elements of unmerciful nature itself.

Quadragesimus Gradus

Trigesimus Octavus Gradus

Septimus Decimus Gradus

Trigesimus Primus Gradus

Trigesimus Quintus Gradus

Trigesimus Tertius Gradus

Sextus Gradus

Trigesimus Secundus Gradus

Trigesimus Gradus

Vicesimus Nonus Gradus