Crashing Tides

by Gwendolyn Marie

  Concern did not come over where she would stay the night nor if she would ever talk to another again. Conversation in itself held binds, for expression was confined to words. Limited. The extent that one could express oneself in such finite structure was oppressive. No desire summoned within her to be with the soldiers, that is until she turned the corner. Then, and only then, did her feelings rapidly change.

  This time, not one Chaot blocked her course, but many. She now faced the fire that sprung from the dragon’s mouth, for hell stood in front of her.

  Twelve Chaots convened together on the street. Tranquility did not exist in the small gathering, for even amongst each other they sought war and feast. Several of them bent over a meal like hyenas. The meal, another Chaot, was still alive under the scavenging. Moans and shrieks mounted from its lips as the prey tried to escape the frenzy. A larger, more muscular one was trying to tear the weaker’s leg off—a monstrous portrayal of survival of the fittest. The motivation of this carnal act seemed twofold: to gain nourishment, but the prevalent reason was for enjoyment. To watch its own kind shrivel in torment.

  The other two chewed directly from their banquet. One was over the abdomen, intestines strewn between its teeth as its meal convulsed. The second crouched over the head. Its tongue flicked as a snake’s over the eyeball, savoring the soft organ, oblivious of all else.

  Six of the other Chaots fought, not with weapons but with tooth and nail. Perhaps they quarreled to take down a second for additional cuisine or they simply enjoyed the brutal mayhem. Fighting for the sake of the fight. Either way, she could not discern the target individual or if any fought in cooperation.

  One Chaot stood to the side. It busied itself in scratching and nibbling its left arm; its gaze stared off into nothingness. It must have been abrading its flesh for a long time, for the Chaot’s fingernails were worn down from the mindless act. On the ring finger the nail hung loose, connected only by a cord of flesh that kept it from falling completely off. The skin where it scratched was ragged and raw. Blood dried in the crevices, gangrenous spores dotted the dermis. In some areas the bone was visible due to the obsessive-compulsive chafing. The disease was not directly responsible for this rot; rather the Chaots’ wasted minds could not comprehend the need to properly care for their bodies. Nor did they understand the basics of hygiene, for that required action with no immediate satisfaction. They lived for the moment, more so than herself, to indulge the needs of the id.

  The last wore only a loose-fitting hospital gown, no longer sterile white but now brown in filth and age. Tattered cloths flitted around the beasts; it looked as if none had changed nor washed their garments since infected by the disease. The gowned Chaot was fixated on a more lecherous pleasure than the others. It masturbated in the street’s corner with a neurosis matched only by the obsessive skin scratcher. The diseased organ was limp in its hands, desensitized by the chronic act.

  So secluded were these lepers, so depraved and uninhibited in their actions. So horrid in their form and mind.

  The Chaots burlesqued an obscene gathering akin of the maenads of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine. The maenads were his female followers who were indulgent in all of the mind’s deep-rooted pleasures and impulses. Mankind now festered with animalistic desires and hungers as the maenads had, with no conscience nor reason to restrain them. The gatekeeper of the mind destroyed, what makes us human no longer intact. Though at first glance, only chaos seemed to reign in their actions, there was order. Order from Chaos. Nyx could not piece it together, for she could not fully comprehend the scene. It was as elusive as trying to capture the winds in a butterfly net. Nonetheless, they could be caught, just like the tornado that gathers the winds for their demolition. And the order was there to be seen by some and used by others. By her, perhaps. But not yet.

  The number twelve symbolizes the ideal paragon. Twelve in their idyllic world of debauchery. Add one more to numerological perfection and it can only become marred in corruption and rebellion. Nyx was the thirteenth, coming before the group of twelve Chaots. Even the ones with rotted eyes, perhaps from smell or some undeciphered sense, looked toward her. Hunger swelled in them from her presence—not in the malnourished sense, but in all the ravenousness denotations of the word. And that surge led them to her, leaving prior acts forgotten in order to satisfy this new indulgence.

  Exhausted because of running from the intangible, she now had to run from the corporeal as they took chase upon her. Instinct broke within the Chaots when she ran, and they began to take chase, mouths salivating as hunting yelps echoed through the air. They ran like a pack of hyenas towards her—scattered and in it for their own satisfaction. Even the one who was the meal attempted to stand in its slaughtered ruin to go after her. Though as it propped itself up, its intestines tore completely from their cage and the creature fell in death.

  Running several blocks, she then cut a corner into an alleyway in hopes to lose them. She ran in silent caution in attempt to hide her location from the Chaots as she navigated the alley’s maze. Each step held a possibility to return her to her tormentors, but each step also promised that she would be clear of them. However, there is never any true escape from your nightmares. They are a part of you, as you are a part of them, and despite the silence she knew it would not last.

  The alley ended in an overflow of brilliance as the daylight came to view. The buildings curbed along the sidewalks before her; the Chaots no longer in her sight. She did not know whether they still roamed the alleyways anticipating an encounter with her, or whether they gave up their search. But she thought it would be best to hide, and so ran across the street, looking for somewhere safe.

  She came to a row of Victorian townhouses, once probably the venerated pleasure of the beach front community now in disrepair. The colors faded with dirt and ash, the structures collapsed on top of each other by what must have been a past fire. Not even a clear entrance was viable in one of the houses; only a misshaped crevice marked the entry into the decrepit innards. Hopefully it would be sufficient, she thought. She shifted between the rubble and squeezed in. Once inside she took some excess debris and placed it into the hole she had entered through. The windows had already been boarded up. Nothing would come in.

  At least she could hope.

  Her gaze swept the room. Scattering rays of sun lit the lair through the wall’s cracks; otherwise, her sight would have been met with darkness.

  Long ago the room was a child’s space. A crib sat to one side, the wood had pale yellow paint reminiscent of a blooming daffodil. It had begun to chip, yet she could almost imagine the stifled cries that had come from behind its bars. On the floorboards, a petite slipper rested, shimmering in bronze. So tiny were the feet of the creature that once lived here; miniatures of a human in body, but in mind they seemed to amplify the emotions as if giants. The love babies had, the passions of joy, anger and sorrow. Unconfined, restricted only by their infantile inabilities.

  The tiny boots fascinated her, preserved forever unlike the host they once contained. The turmoil of the outside was distanced in the rapture of childhood fantasy, and after a while she moved to touch the booties. Though before her fingers wrapped around them, her gaze caught a white object she did not notice before. The world no longer had white outside of the cascading waves, but rather dingy undertones of grey. The purity of white, both metaphorical and material, evaded society’s reach. Yet a streak of it remained, a treasure for her alone. It was beneath the crib and she reached out. It was part of a book, the cover was mostly deteriorated by the fire but had preserved the white pages inside.

  She opened the book as if unlocking a treasure containing untold secrets—as if it was about to erupt with demons as a volcano spews lava when the cover folds over. Each picture she looked over with unabated curiosity, amazed by the tale the child’s book wove. One by one she turned the pages, hungry for knowledge. She read of a young boy’s punishment. His journey over the sea. Meeting the wild things. They had wanted
to tear into him, but instead they found him to be the most wild thing of all, and dubbed him the king of the wild things.

  Tame them. Look into their wild eyes, without blinking once.

  Thud.

  The noise halted her rapture with the book. Her moment’s peace broken as the fanciful stories of nevermore shrank back into the pages. No longer white but tattered, burnt pages were in her hands. The pictures were faded and the words illegible, even though to her they had existed only moments before. She threw the book away from her. Hallucinations. No, memories, a voice whispered. From a time forgotten. She closed her eyes to forgo this memory of childhood’s end, though even more desperately she wished to transcend the outside’s reality.

  Thud. Thud.

  The pounding whispered out to her. Each thud was bone chilling, not because of the sound itself, but rather what lay beyond those walls. Chaots. They had found her. And now their incessant thuds continued, the only end in sight being when the wall would collapse.

  Maybe it was her smell that led them to her hiding place. Or the smell of fear that made them grovel at the walls, tormenting her to let them in.

  But she refused to give in, to allow terror to overcome.

  She scanned the room of the Victorian home, hoping to find a weapon. Wishing the Fisherman’s knife was with her still.

  Thud. Thud.

  Still it continued. The repetition. Again and again as if to constantly remind her of what resided outside.

  How long would these dilapidated walls hold?

  Soon she would know, for the thuds found err to their resonance.

  Thud. Crash.

  The barricade of the window crumbled and broke. An arm jetted inward in hopes to grab its prey and pull it from the crevice. The hand, torn by the shattered glass, splattered red on the yellow crib as it crashed through. Another thud turned into a crash bringing one more hole to her shelter.

  Her pulse escalated; breath quickened, she knew she could wait no longer. Running up the stairs, she headed to the attic and outside to the widow’s walk. The rooftop balcony received its namesake from the mariners’ wives who would look out over the sea in search of their husbands, hoping they had not succumb to the sea. But now, not even the wives escaped misfortune, as Nyx looked out and saw the swarm of Chaots—both male and female, husbands and wives—below.

  She climbed over the balcony, to the roof of the adjacent townhouse and to the edge. The next row of townhouses would offer an escape, it she could jump across the divide and on to the other roof. If, she whispered to herself, holding her breath and jumping before she could form any doubts. Air rushed past her, as did her life, though that is not much to say considering her amnesia. The jump ended, not with her feet securely planted on the roof as she hoped, but with a bang as she collided into the roof’s edge. Nyx struggled to grab onto the gutter to stop her fall, her nails digging into the composted leaves that filled it. Her plan of a quiet escape was also slipping from her grip, for one Chaot heard the commotion and began heading for the second row of townhouses where she now hung.

  The gutter groaned as she tried pulling herself up. It shuttered, she grabbed tighter. One last pull up, and she would be on the roof, away from ...

  “No!” she gasped but tried not to scream. The gutter bent, her with it, half way down the side of the house. It stopped with a violent jerk, though she did not as she fell the rest of the way. At least she fell directly on an overeager Chaot; he broke her fall, and she most likely broke his spine in the process.

  His tongue flickered to the sound of an exaggerated wheeze as if all the air were squished out from him; his eyes rolled back, his legs and arms seemed unresponsive as she pushed herself from the beastly cushion. She could not help the look of apologetic exhilaration as she moved off the Chaot, aching from the fall, but adrenaline making her pause only for a second. The others may have heard, and would soon be here.

  She took to the streets in flight. She sprinted over the pavement and into the forests that flanked the town’s edge. The creatures turned their efforts away from tearing down the walls of the Victorian townhouse to the wheezing, partially squished Chaot and fleeing woman. Though the sudden escape gave Nyx a sufficient head start, they still pursued. But soon she was a waning silhouette darting into the cover of the forest. Then she was lost to them.

  For now.

  Leaves replaced the harsh cement under her feet, cushioning her footfalls ever quick. The buildings metamorphosed to trees. Running until no longer the angles of civilization past haunted her, she became surrounded by nature.

  She hid in a patch of ferns and laid back exhausted and sore. Her stare pivoted upward to the blue skies. Clouds made their cycle, visible as they slid to and fro over the canopy. She found the rapture of serenity if only for a few fading moments, for though the scene implored tranquility, it still could not drown out the ever sounding thuds echoing in the distance. Were they imagined remnants from the thuds inside the townhouse, or did the Chaots persist in their search? The steps rang out, not of normalcy but rather of strange, erratic strides. The sounds came vibrantly from what should have been dead, what should have perished along with civilization, but did not.

  The Chaots now rambled closer, unseen but not unheard. She edged herself from her hideout in the ferns and crawled near a tree that was covered by vines and leaves. She pushed against the bark, letting the foliage wrap around her in an effort to camouflage herself.

  Grasping the low-lying branches and using them as leverage, she climbed up and away from the ground, praying the Chaots could not climb. From the elevated position, she looked along the forest’s floor to catch view of two Chaots walking, animated in their deadly stroll. They were the same ones from town, having followed her with unrivaled determination. Veins throbbing in the chase, bursting in a paradise lost, these destroyed shells of humanity searched.

  She looked up, not wanting to witness the terrors below. However, it was not the skies that graced her sight; it was a dead human in the branches above. It was not alone. Feasting upon the carcass was a Chaot, a different one than before. The soulless being once upon a time had called himself the civilized.

  Now he was savage, resembling a jaguar hiding its prey from scavengers. The Chaot moved with an animalistic grace in the tree. He could have trained in jujitsu in another life; nimble movements from branch to branch gave him an elegance, a gentle grace, that enchanted her. For the first time she did not abhor the infected beings, but saw another side. For the first time she saw the Chaot as ‘he’ rather than ‘it’. She saw her own desire reflected in him. The sun streamed between the leaves, igniting his copper skin in luminescence; each movement intentional and wildly beautiful as he stalked his new prey.

  Her.

  His eyes lacked the spark of social intelligence, yet they whispered knowledge of a secret known by the Chaots alone. To be truly free. His tanned features were stained in blood—old and new, prey and self. Gaped teeth smiled at her, as if in laughter over the fallacies of what humans were. In Nyx he found a new hunt and new desires. Waiting no longer, the human beast quickened his descent down the tree and pounced toward her direction.

  Part of her wanted him to take her as his own, to bring the secrets of the Chaots to her in sadistic whispers. Every moment the Chaots lived in the id. A freedom from societal construct that could only be released in the Chaots’ embrace. But she prepared to fight him, knowing this freedom was false.

  However, before they could collide, a gun sounded. Shots whizzed by her, two bursting in the sound of war. The bullets directly hit the oncoming predator, ending his hunt. The explosion of flesh tore on impact, causing the Chaot to lose his grip on the bark. Tumbling downward, the once graceful body rammed into Nyx on the branches. Both forms fell, colliding in midair. She hit the ground again, though this time it was she who broke the fall, the Chaot on top; the earth as their bed. Close to death, the Chaot moved with futile instinct, through sheer tenacity. He tried to grant his dying wish: f
or his teeth to sink into her, for his hands to tear her body apart.

  She had wanted to finally understand the Chaot. Curiosity had replaced revulsion when she saw the tree dweller, yet faced with death she had no choice but to fight.

  She reached up around his throat as she used all her strength to keep the snapping jaws away. Her hands sank into the wound near his clavicle where one bullet had hit; the second bullet had embedded itself in his abdomen. She did not have time to think of who had shot as she attempted to pry him off of her.

  She channeled everything to evade the infectious bites. Her will, her desire to remain uninfected, fueled her counterattack. For though he had obtained a type of deliverance from society, the Chaot was a mere marionette to the disease. He epitomized freedom, but look deeper and find only an illusion she realized. Underneath, only darkness and death resides. And she did not want that.

  Unearthly groans spilled from his mouth as he sought one last testament of satisfaction. He brought his head down again and again in reflex, teeth gleaming in the light that escaped the folds of the canopy. She grabbed a branch that had fallen in the fiasco. Clenching it, she brought it to the head of the creature. It hit the Chaot’s forehead with finality, ceasing his movements. With one last push, she removed the now dead form from on top of her.

  Falling backwards, the Chaot faced a long eluded end. She stood. Her rage became palpable as she hit him again; the stick tore away flesh and bone of the departed in the repeated striking. For moments, she had wanted the Chaot to descend upon her in order to understand his secrets. But he did not; he could not. She was thankful in his death and her salvation. It was lies that the wild eyes had offered, the beautiful copper Chaot was only a pawn.