Too Many Humans

by Jacob Rayne

  Davey tried to catch her eye, but a deafening roar rang out from below.

  Max had grabbed the first prisoner – the one who’d attacked Davey with the tree branch – and was leading him over to the gallows.

  Davey couldn’t hear what he said, but he could tell the man was terrified.

  His legs were quaking and, as Max fastened the rope around his neck – tight enough to make the flesh around it turn white, he noticed – a puddle appeared below his bare feet.

  He smiled, despite his apprehension of what was to come.

  Max looked up to the King, who gave a firm nod.

  In a movement so fast that Davey didn’t even see it, Max produced a blade and drew it across the lower curve of the man’s belly.

  A roar went up as blood began to soak through the white gown the man wore – with their transgression, they wore the white garments of prisoners, not the traditional black cloaks of the Grims, as they were no longer classed as part of their society.

  Then Max kicked away the stool.

  The man fell fast, jolting to a sudden stop as the rope reached its full extent.

  The crack of his neck rang out, as did the sickly tearing sound as his entrails appeared through the slit in his belly and dropped into the crowd below like steaming snakes.

  The Grims fought for possession of the guts, which slipped through everyone’s fingers due to the gore that coated them.

  Other Grims fought to get under the platform where the blood was dripping.

  The most bizarre spectacle Davey saw was a heavily bearded Grim forcing his way through the crowd. One arm held a writhing infant, the other shoved his fellow Grims out of the way.

  As the kid cried, he shoved it under the platform.

  The first drop of blood missed its intended target, plopping onto the miniature version of the Grims’ black robe that the infant wore.

  The Grim scowled and looked up, clearly trying to gauge the path of the blood’s fall.

  He repositioned the baby and smiled when a double splat of blood landed on its forehead.

  He made a symbol in the air which looked like an S, repeated the gesture on his own forehead, then forced his way back through the crowd.

  When the blood stopped dripping, Max got up and cut the offender down, throwing his body to the baying crowd below.

  Blood-smeared, they let out a primal roar.

  The King stood, a smile on his features. ‘Are we having fun yet?’ he bellowed.

  The crowd roared in return.

  Max raised his arms in the air like a boxer who’d just won a fight and went to the next quaking prisoner; Billy.

  He tried to get away, but Max clubbed him hard on the temple with the side of his fist.

  He landed on the floor in a stunned heap.

  ‘What do you think, free Grims? Do you want to take this one?’

  The crowd roared.

  Max grinned.

  ‘A week of free food for the Grim who brings me this bastard’s head,’ the King grinned.

  The crowd roared and jostled for position as Max dragged the terrified prisoner to the platform.

  Billy sunk to his knees, hands clasped together in the old way of praying.

  ‘Your God can’t help you now,’ the King grinned.

  Max grabbed the criminal bodily and pitched him headfirst into the writhing crowd.

  He disappeared into the sea of outstretched arms.

  Davey didn’t see too much of what was going on, but he did see clouds of gore rising from the rabid crowd.

  The screams lasted a matter of seconds before he was literally torn limb from limb.

  A fight ensued for the head.

  Despite the brutality of the scene, Davey found it touching when the Grim who’d lost a few teeth and almost one of his eyes fighting for the head handed it to a small, unaccompanied child near him.

  The rest of the Grims ceased struggling and cheered, taking turns to lift the child above their heads in a victory parade.

  The decapitated head swung from the kid’s blood-smeared mitt like some obscene pendulum.

  ‘Well done,’ the King bellowed. ‘Free meals for you this week. And also for the Grim who gave it to you.’

  The Grim punched the air, whereas the kid seemed to have no idea what was going on.

  ‘I’m sure this doesn’t need repeating,’ the King said. ‘But I’d like to make this crystal clear. Death to robbers, rapists and murderers.’

  The crowd roared their assent.

  In the background a huge bonfire was being prepared.

  Several Grims worked hard to pile up the wood.

  ‘Please, fill your bellies, on me,’ the King said, indicating huge wooden carts that had come in bearing food.

  The Grims were very orderly in making a queue, in total contrast to the way they’d fought to be the first to get the dead man’s blood on them.

  ‘We’ll resume in ten minutes.’

  Old Jimmy watched, aghast, from his place in the baying crowd.

  He’d watched as his comrades in depravity had been torn to shreds by the furious Grims.

  He’d remained pretty impassive; this was the way the world was now – even the end of civilisation as it had been in the early twenty-first century had done little to change the hatred that men like him inspired.

  The last straw had been his brother, the final execution.

  Young Jimmy had been in tears the whole time, as had Old Jimmy, though he hid it well from the crowd that surrounded him.

  Young Jimmy was borderline retarded, didn’t really understand what it was that he was doing.

  He was simply there because he liked to spend time with his brother.

  ‘I got him killed,’ Old Jimmy muttered to himself, quiet enough to go unheard by the crowd around him.

  His vision of his brother had been blurred by the tears that streamed down his face.

  This was probably just as well judging by the screams as he was led up to the gallows pole.

  Young Jimmy was looking round, his face hopeful, right up until the end.

  Old Jimmy knew his brother was waiting for him to bail him out like he had many times in the past.

  But this time he wouldn’t be coming.

  This time, he had chosen to save his own skin.

  Young Jimmy kept looking out into the crowd for his brother right up until the King’s guards tied a rope around his ankles and hung him upside down from the gallows.

  ‘You know what time it is,’ the King boomed, relishing his role as showman. ‘My friends, we all know you can’t have a party without a…’

  ‘Piñata,’ the crowd shouted as one.

  Before Old Jimmy could figure out what was going to happen, Max had beckoned a Grim up from the base of the platform.

  A blood-stained golf club was in his hand.

  He kissed the end of it, raised it high into the sky, then pointed up to King Solomon, who pointed right back at him, bouncing slightly on his feet with excitement.

  At that moment Old Jimmy vowed he’d slit the King’s throat some day.

  The sound of the golf club hitting his brother’s skull made him jolt.

  The crowd roared their approval.

  Old Jimmy almost relented, so pitiful was his brother’s cry, but he hardened.

  There was no way he could possibly have saved him.

  They would both have died for nothing.

  A female Grim with a stout tree branch climbed onto the platform and also pointed to King Solomon.

  Again the King pointed back.

  She grinned and slammed the makeshift weapon into the side of Young Jimmy’s skull so hard that it snapped.

  The crowd again voiced their support.

  Old Jimmy looked at the queue of Grims lining up to batter his brother, each hoping to be the one who administered the killing blow and earned themselves the admiration of their colleagues and a few free meals.

  The thought made him sick to his stomach.

  Eve
n kids were there to join in.

  ‘You hurt our kids, you die, you sick fuck,’ one female Grim shouted, grabbing Young Jimmy’s hair and yanking his head up so she could see the terror-stricken tears in his eyes.

  She spat in his face and began punching him in the face until two of the guard Grims dragged her away.

  The crowd cheered, the odd cry of, ‘Give someone else a go, lady,’ coming through the din.

  As Young Jimmy swung on his rope, blood pissing from his head in a dozen places, Old Jimmy bowed his head and sobbed.

  The crowd around him shouted and he screamed with them, though his were cries of pure anguish and despair.

  He had betrayed his own flesh and blood, the last surviving member of his family, the final link to life as it had once been.

  He was a snake in the grass, the lowest of the low.

  They could have done anything to him up there and he would have taken it, but to do this to Young Jimmy, the poor retard, was unthinkable.

  He turned away as a huge Grim moved up the stairs.

  His footsteps were like gunshots.

  In his hands was a full concrete bollard.

  He raised it skyward, his arms and chest bulging with the strain.

  Then he held up a fist towards King Solomon.

  ‘For King Solomon. For the Freelands,’ the Grim bellowed, making the crowd’s response double in volume.

  Solomon’s face lit up in a shit-eating grin then he raised his hand.

  Drew his thumb across his throat from ear to ear.

  A noise that was akin to a thunderclap rang out as the bollard met Young Jimmy’s skull.

  Gobbets of blood and brain flew through the air, spattering Old Jimmy and the Grims around him.

  As they roared their approval, Old Jimmy turned away, but not before he saw his brother’s body begin twitching violently on the end of the rope.

  The terror still hewn into the crumpled remains of his brother’s face was enough to cleave his heart right in two.

  The Grim who’d administered the killing blow dropped the bollard, put his clenched fists out to his sides, tipped his head to the sky and bellowed his triumph.

  He dipped his hands into the bloody crater on the side of Young Jimmy’s head and rubbed the blood all over his face.

  Tears blurring his vision, Old Jimmy moved slowly through the crowd towards the exit.

  ‘Cut that sack of shit down,’ the King bellowed.

  There was a thump as the body hit the gallows platform.

  Old Jimmy glanced up at the royal box for a final time, hatred blazing in his eyes for the King and his young companion.

  He promised himself that both of them would suffer a painful end before he met his maker.

  And with that, he left King Solomon’s stronghold without a backwards glance.

  1.13

  After the final execution, the bonfire was lit.

  Thick columns of smoke wound their way up to the heavens, the flickering flames casting moving shadows over the converted arena.

  It looked as though the figures carved into the walls were dancing.

  The effect was strange and disturbing.

  One of the Grims Davey had seen around one of the bonfires a few nights ago approached the flames with what looked like a jam jar in his grubby hands.

  He paused, said a few words that were hidden due to distance and the general hubbub in the arena.

  Then he took the lid off the jar and hurled it onto the flames.

  Instantly, a flamebow rose up, the colours mostly on the red side of the spectrum.

  The arena was bathed in blood red light for a few minutes.

  Dark red smoke began to pour from the flames.

  The Grims gathered round, eagerly shovelling handfuls of it into their faces.

  Within minutes, they were rolling round on the floor, tears of mirth pouring down their faces.

  Davey could hear their laughter from the royal box.

  ‘Having quite the night, aren’t we?’ the King smiled.

  Davey nodded. ‘It’s been great.’

  ‘Shall we go down and join our brethren?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You are aware that, in spite of our exhibition of what will happen to law-breakers, there could still be enemies of yours among the crowd?’

  ‘I’m aware. And I refuse to live my life in fear.’

  The King clapped a massive hand onto his shoulder with force enough to almost buckle his legs. ‘And still my respect for you grows, Davey lad.’

  He looked at him like a proud father.

  ‘Come on then, let’s go. The food is just being served.’

  The journey through the crowd to the fireside was something else entirely; the swathes of red smoke, the awestruck crowd, some of whom were spattered with the blood of those executed, the vast flames, the flickering shadows over the intricate and ominous architecture.

  What was even more bizarre was the crowd parting for Davey and the King.

  Most knelt, though the King seemed to frown upon it.

  They moved out of his way, clearing a path right to the fireside.

  This particular fire was strange in that it seemed to radiate cold, instead of heat.

  Still the red smoke spilled from the flames, still the Grims did their utmost to inhale it all.

  The laughter down here was deafening and contagious.

  Davey found it hard to keep a smile from his face, in spite of the events of the past twenty-four hours.

  But he did his best not to inhale it.

  ‘Have a go,’ the King said, noticing his reticence.

  ‘I was always brought up to believe drugs were a bad thing.’

  The King nodded. ‘As was I, but this is something I myself had a part in manufacturing. There are no ill effects on the body, it simply makes you laugh. The next day there is no hangover, no comedown, just the way you would normally feel when you wake up. Steam is the perfect drug.’

  Davey studied his face closely. ‘Have you tried it?’

  ‘Of course. And I have never felt any ill effects from it, unless you count aching sides from laughing so much.’

  Davey thought about it, decided he had nothing to lose.

  He moved in close.

  ‘Just breathe in normally,’ the King said. ‘Don’t do what those daft buggers are doing,’ he indicated the Grims who were laughing and capering and grabbing great handfuls of steam in their hands.

  Davey moved to the fireside, again his ears hurting a little from the sheer volume of the laughter around him.

  One of the Grims whacked him on the back. ‘Go on, lad,’ he bellowed, hard enough to make Davey’s ears ring.

  Davey found that he felt inexplicably nervous about doing this; it felt like he was breaking some sort of promise to his murdered parents.

  But then he thought that they would want him to be happy, and this seemed like a good way of achieving that.

  He saw a big trail of smoke rise from the fire and moved into it, inhaling gently as he did so.

  It felt like the steam from the shower, only warmer and more welcoming.

  If he’d been in a shower like this he’d have never wanted to come out.

  It was comforting in the extreme, like a hug from your most treasured someone, like a hot drink on a cold night, a favourite meal after a bad day.

  It was like sharing a belly laugh with close friends.

  It was a multitude of little comforts that he had taken for granted at the time but desperately needed now.

  But most of all, he could have sworn he felt his mother’s arms wrapped tight around him, settling him down to sleep after a nightmare.

  It was a feeling he never wanted to end.

  Life had been one long nightmare of late.

  His anxieties melted away from him like bark falling from an aging tree.

  The memories of what had happened with Old Jimmy in the woods fell away, as did the murder of his family.

  It felt as though
his lungs were filled with healing light and it was spreading through him.

  ‘He’s steamed,’ the Grim who’d patted him on the back said, his face cracking in a gargantuan grin.

  A cheer went up for him.

  His world shuddered as a seemingly endless stream of hands patted him on the back and shoulders and head.

  Instead of being afraid in the company of so many rough-looking strangers, he felt like he had come home.

  Like he was among family.

  He smiled, mirroring the grin on the Grim’s face.

  ‘Have some more, lad,’ the Grim bellowed, arming vast swathes of smoke into Davey’s beaming face.

  Davey threw caution to the wind and drew in the lot.

  As soon as it hit his lungs it felt like he’d simultaneously been told every joke he’d ever laughed at.

  The laughter burst out of him, so hard it hurt his stomach and ribs.

  He spun to look at the King, who was smiling at him.

  The Grim threw his arm around Davey and started dancing around with him.

  Davey followed, laughing at the top of his lungs.

  It had been a long time since he’d laughed at anything, so this was welcome release indeed.

  If this was what being a steamer felt like, he didn’t ever want to turn back.

  The flames seemed to twist and writhe, but he wasn’t sure if this was due to the steam he’d imbibed.

  He and his fellow Grims bellowed with laughter, and he felt closer to them than he even had to his own family.

  When the buzz died down a little, he went back to see the King to thank him for his part in this.

  He was still chuckling a little.

  ‘You deserve a little mirth, Davey,’ he said, a smile playing across his lips. ‘Hey, there’s some food here.’

  A man was pushing along what looked like a cross between a motorbike and a garden shed.

  Davey was impressed by how the King insisted that the Grims eat before him, refusing to be the first one served.

  The Grims engaged in a round of back-slapping with the King and feasted on the wagon’s wares.

  ‘Eat up, Davey lad,’ the King laughed, handing him what looked like a dubious concoction of tacos and curry.

  Davey sunk his teeth into it.

  The flavours and textures released were incredible.