Jornada del Muerto: Prisoner Days

by Claudia Hall Christian

  Not knowing what to do, and unable to leave these creatures as they were, we put the women in the back of the vehicle and tied the animal leads to the bumper. Certain the wasps would return at any time, we worked fast. We had no idea where the wasps were or how we had missed them. In the back of my mind, I worried that this was a trap of some kind. Like maybe they had trapped the women here because they came to help these animals.

  The ride back to the Pen was horrible. The women wept and cried with pain. The animals could only go at a moderate pace. Slowly, very slowly, we traveled across the ranches back to our safe Pen. We heard the wasps following us, surrounding us, but never saw one.

  For the last three days, we’ve attended to these creatures. We’ve also run the gasoline generators to keep the electricity flowing through the fences.

  We dispatched the cattle. They seemed to beg for death. I sedated them with high levels of barbiturates. George chopped off their heads. We burned them in a pyre and buried their ash and bones deep.

  We’d hoped that the horses would make it. One of the mares barely survived the journey to the Pen. She died the moment we stopped moving. A sickly stallion succumbed shortly afterwards. Not wanting to take a chance, we also cut off their heads and burned their bodies in our fire pit. They are buried with the cows. After we bathed, brushed, and fed the other horses, they seemed to recover. They have feasted in our fall garden, on a mixture of oats, and are resting comfortably.

  The women are a greater problem. They are ill, exhausted, and mentally broken. We set them up in a cell on our hallway. George brought cots, medicine, and supplies from the infirmary. We bathed and clothed them in warm, clean clothing. Their hair was matted, filthy, and full of lice. We had to shave off all of their body hair and douse the lice. When they were settled, we fed them broth and noodles, before leaving them to sleep. I wasn’t sure they would survive the first night. But they have survived, even rallied.

  In bits and pieces, the woman who could talk (I call her The Talker) told their story.

  They were teachers who had received the last 146-vaccine around the time that George had. Because they worked with such poor and sickly students, they ate mostly 146-modified foods. They had jumped at the chance to be vaccinated. They were at school when they turned. She was able to take care of the other teachers, younger teachers, until a nest of wasps came through the school. They were captured.

  One of the women was pregnant when she received the vaccine. When the child was born, the wasps ate her child. It was after that that the wasps came up with the idea of breeding their food.

  The Talker was vague about who impregnated them. I wasn’t sure if she couldn’t remember or didn’t want to remember. Or maybe it didn’t matter.

  The wasp hive was run by a man who had received the last 146-vaccine. She indicated that he was not the father of their children. George suggested that they were inseminated, like cows. She had a strong visceral reaction to the idea, and to George in general, but didn’t deny it. They had each given birth to numerous children only to watch them be eaten alive.

  When the wasps got the larger animals, the cows and horses, they weren’t as anxious to breed the humans. The larger animals provided larger babies for the wasps to feast upon. This relieved some of the pressure on the human women. The Talker was vague about how long they’d been held captive. Certainly, there is more to their story, but for now, they either won’t tell it or are in some way unable to.

  George is coping fairly well with all of the chaos. He’s worried that the wasps let us take their animals and women. He fears that the wasps have now invaded our home. At the same time, he’s enraptured with the horses, and they are with him. He’d only ever seen a horse in a movie or a book. The horses love his quiet presence.

  George is terrified of The Talker. He believes that she is telling lies and will betray us. He’s sure she is using us to help her friends. The question is which friends -- these human women? Or wasps?

  We’ve set up every precaution against the possibility of betrayal. The women are locked in when we aren’t with them. They are never alone. They haven’t seen our stores or supplies or even how to get in or out of the Pen.

  George and I haven’t been around women in so long, or really anyone but ourselves, that these women are like alien creatures. They blush or laugh. They swing their hair or breasts in our direction. Their vulnerability is very seductive. Their charm is infectious. In a way, being around them feels dangerous, which makes them all the more arousing.

  I think George distrusts his own reaction to them. So counter to the predator he once was, George doesn’t want anything to do with them. Ten years ago, he would have had them all and never thought another thing about it. Today, he doesn’t like the way he feels around them.

  We hear the wasps at night. They have tried multiple times to get to the horses. The fence remains electrified. We come out every morning to at least one dead wasp clinging to the fence. (I tell myself that a dead wasp doesn’t count as a wasp.)

  It’s been three days, and they haven’t given up. We’re moving the horses inside tonight. I needed a night to consult with the spirits for answers. I cannot worry about the horses and consult with the spirits.

  I don’t know how we will manage it, but I know in my heart we will have to kill the women. The talking woman and one of her friends are too ill to travel easily. We still have a few weeks before we have to go. Maybe they will heal. That’s what I tell myself -- even though my heart tells me we will cut off their heads and burn their bodies in the end.

  One of the women, a Native American-looking woman, maybe a Southern Ute, seems to be healing quickly. Her eyes are dark and intelligent. She doesn’t seem to be close with the talking woman or the other woman. She has that “native distance” that most Ind’ns hold around white people. She knows that I’m a shaman.

  I don’t dare separate them, at least until they are healthier. Any one of them could die tonight. They are not well, not healthy.

  In writing out our fears, I realize I haven’t looked for the souls of these women. Are their souls intact? Are they separated from their bodies? Why can’t I tell? Have I been away from people for so long that my lifelong gift is gone?

  In my connection with the horrendous evil perpetrated on these women and animals, I have lost connection to the spirit world. I’m exhausted with worry and grief over what has happened to these beings.

  Tonight, I will visit the spirit world. I will see if I can find the souls of these women. I will see if I can determine what is going on and whether we are in danger.

  I can only assume that we are in danger. My brother Earnesto’s soul has been around watching and waiting. He says nothing. And I have been so busy attending to everything that must be done, that I haven’t had time to listen. I assume my brother is here to protect me.

  Today, for the first time in decades, I feel in need of protection. Since the women and animals arrived, I’ve returned to locking George in at night. He and I stay within each other’s sight at all times during the day. We work together, eat together, and tend to our charges together. It limits the amount we can get done in a day.

  We both feel the pulse of some imminent threat. We are in danger. I don’t know what danger we are facing.

  I think men always see women as dangerous. Women bring out our desire to protect. We do stupid things for them and around them. You’d be amazed at how many men get to prison because of a woman.

  This is a different kind of danger, a more sinister danger.

  Our souls are at risk.

  11/14/2056

  I’ve just returned from trance and had to write this down. George is awake and sitting by my side. He’s watched me drum and go into trance a thousand times. But tonight, he’s stayed rooted to my side, watching to make sure I come back.

  Whenever I go into trance, I follow the same journey. It’s same journey I’ve been on thousands of times. A journey that I’m so familiar with, I could travel it wi
thout drums.

  I begin at the trailhead of a plush forest. All manner of animal spirit guides come to greet me like old friends. They are so delighted to see me that they dance around me with joy. I laugh at their antics and begin walking down the path. I always see Grey Squirrel first. Grey Squirrel waits for me at the trailhead. That’s what has happened every spirit journey since I was thirteen years old.

  Today, Grey Squirrel was nowhere to be found. No Grey Squirrel, no Playful Chipmunk, no Soaring Red Tailed Hawk, no Squawking Black Crow. Panicked by my lack of greeting, I ran down the trail looking for Grey Squirrel, calling for Grey Squirrel.

  “Where are you, Grey Squirrel? Where are you, Grey Squirrel?” my spirit called at the top of my lungs.

  As I ran, the forest darkened. Bushes, trees, and grass grow across the path until I can no longer pass. The trail and spirit land I have joyously wandered most of my life is closed to me.

  I put my staff in front of me and call my Great Horned Owl spirit guide to me. I demand his noble presence.

  Nothing. Only silence. Great Horned Owl has always come to me. Before I was a shaman, when I was a toddler, Great Horned Owl was always around as my friend, my guide.

  Not today.

  I am alone, locked out of my spiritual home. I have to work to quell the panic in my chest.

  I hear a rustle in the underbrush. Looking down, I see Angry Rattlesnake. The serpent rises, lifting its triangular-shaped grey head in front of me. His elliptical eyes lock with mine. I stare into his eyes for what feels like a decade. The serpent cools my fear, calms my terror. His ancient wisdom enters my soul. I can’t make out what he’s trying to tell me.

  Like a frustrated elder, the serpent seems to sigh at my ignorance. His transparent eyelids close over his eyes, and he strikes. Out of reflex, I jerk out of his way. He lurches a foot forward. His fangs land deeply into the neck of a being behind me.

  A spirit had followed me here.

  I had no idea that I’d been followed. I’d never been followed before.

  The spirit shrieks, writhes, and then bursts into flame. I’m knocked off my feet by the explosion of energy and fire. I must have passed out, because when I wake, I’m lying by a familiar waterfall with Great Horned Owl by my side. Grey Squirrel is sorting through a stack of pinon nuts just off to my side. Squawking Black Crow, Timid Horned Lizard, Chaotic Coyote, and all of the others are there with me.

  As I open my eyes, they begin speaking at once. I cannot make out what they are saying over the noise of all of their voices. Grey Squirrel climbs onto my shoulder to push a handful of pinon nuts into my mouth. Before I can chew the nuts, Great Horned Owl screeches for order. The spirit-guide animals quiet down.

  “You were followed.” I make out the Great Owl’s voice.

  The spirit guides began to speak at once again. Squirrel continues stuffing shelled pinon nuts into my mouth. I can’t make out what they are saying. My ears are clouded with the noise of their voices. I’m unable to speak with my mouth full of pinon nuts.

  “They have learned to breed,” Great Horned Owl says. Again, I work to make out the muffled words.

  The spirit guides scream and howl at the unnatural state of things. I feel the earth vibrate. Stomp! Stomp! Stomp! A very large being is moving toward us. The spirit guides continue screaming and howling. I can hear the noise of their voices and feel the earth vibrate.

  An enormous Black Bear breaks into the clearing. On all fours, she screams at the top of her lungs. Furious, she stomps toward us. Her enormity and rage remind me of George. She gets within two feet of me and screams again. Before I can react, she swipes a sharp black nail at my ear. She pulls what looks like sheep’s wool from one ear, then the next.

  “You will get him killed if you don’t listen carefully,” Towering Black Bear says.

  And I knew that this creature, this Towering Black Bear, belonged to George. Whether George knew it or not, he had this spirit guide watching over him. No wonder George and I became friends. No wonder I cared for him. He belongs to the earth and sky like I do.

  “WAKE UP FROM YOUR LUST-FILLED DREAM!” the Towering Black Bear screams. “LISTEN!”

  In a flash, I see myself standing with the women in their cell. I see my lust for them. My human-mind is delirious with the sight and smell of these women. I want them. I am drunk on my wanting of them. Desperately, I work to push aside my lust.

  My eyes turn to the Ute woman. I see what I missed before. She is trying to tell me something with her eyes. Her eyes flick to the pregnant woman’s belly and then to me. Flick to belly -- back to me.

  I’m back to the stream, surrounded by spirit guides. Playful River Otter flips from the stream to whisper in my now-clear ears:

  “They laid their eggs in her carcass.”

  In that moment, I know that Playful River Otter is telling me what the Ute woman cannot speak. Playful River Otter is telling me that he is Ute’s spirit guide.

  I’m back in the women’s cell watching myself. Great Horned Owl is there with me.

  “You must kill them all,” he says.

  I’m back at the stream. Playful River Otter slaps his tail on the water to splash at Great Horned Owl.

  “She deserves to be at peace,” Playful River Otter says.

  “The wasp can’t take hold in native peoples,” I argue.

  “That makes her more dangerous! They’re all incubating eggs,” Towering Black Bear says in a more moderate voice. “They need your seed to complete the monster.”

  “She must die with the others,” Great Horned Owl says. “For their souls, first. To stop the wasps, second. They will not survive the hatch.”

  “Salt kills the wasp. Salt kills the wasp,” Squawking Black crow chants. “Salt for horses. Salt for horses.”

  “Never let him follow you again!” Black Bear roars with rage.

  And I’m back in my cell, drumming, with George keeping guard next to me. I don’t have any idea who the “him” is that followed me into the spirit land. I don’t know what filled my ears with wool. I don’t know why I was followed.

  Only know this:

  George is in danger because Black Bear appeared.

  The spirit that followed me must be attached to the women and animals.

  We will try to save the horses with salt, but we will probably have to kill them as well.

  We are not the first men to “rescue” these women.

  There is powerful, unnatural magic involved with these women.

  We will have to kill the women before dawn.

  I have a terrible craving for pinon nuts. George follows me to where our nuts are stored. I grab two handfuls of roasted pinon nuts and carry them back to our cell.

  Sitting down again at this typewriter, I give George a handful of pinon nuts. He takes one, cracks the black shell with his teeth, spits out the shell, and eats the seeds. I listen to him eat the pinon nuts for a while before realizing what Grey Squirrel was trying to tell me.

  Like the wasp insects, they have stuffed the women full of wasp eggs. The wasp eggs will mix with my or George’s sperm to create a wasp. The wasp will hatch in their digestive system, not their reproductive system.

  Salt kills the wasp.

  We cannot wait. We must do this now.

  11/15/2056

  When I told George what we must do, he sobbed. We both long for some normalcy. We want to believe that we will find partners and live out a whole, real life. No matter how many wasps we kill. No matter how much horror we’ve seen. We still want to believe that we’ll find love and live happily ever after.

  Today, reality set in for us. There’s no going back.

  We changed into our outer clothing and retrieved our supplies. Delaying the inevitable, we started with the horses. We started with salt. We fed the horses a mixture of salted oats. The horses seemed to crave the salt. They wanted more than we had prepared. We left the horses, let the salt do its work, and went to the kitchen.

  When we finally made it
to the women, they were expecting us. We smiled and played as if our lust had brought us to their cell in the middle of the night. We fed them the salted fried potatoes called “French Fries” that were outlawed in 2021 in the sweeping obesity legislation. George had a cellmate who’d worked at a place with the odd Irish name of McDonald’s. The cellmate taught George how to make these French Fries. He made them for us once a week. Tonight, we over-salted these potatoes.

  Each of us played our roles. The Talker giggled and chatted about nothing. The other women batted their eyes, smiled, and ate their salted potatoes. Even the Ute woman, the woman I had refused to believe was a part of this, played along with the women. These women acted like lustful teenagers -- virginal and earthy, pure virtue and pure evil.

  George refused to touch them. From the moment he saw them, he’d known, on some deep level, that these women were dangerous. He was right.

  I laughed and flirted with them while continuing to encourage them to eat the salt.

  The women and horses were eating sea salt I had purified and blessed. It was ten times as powerful as table salt.

  The women had eaten about half of their potatoes when we left them to check on the horses. George and I went to our munitions area to select our weapons. I took a long-range rifle and a handgun. George took out his favorite sawed-off shotgun loaded with purified salt.

  We went to work preparing the sickles and axes. When we finished, we dug a pit in one of the yards and started a fire. We waited until the coals were hot and ready to consume what we ever killed.

  Standing near the door, we shared a look of determination. We did not want to do this thing. We would do it anyway.

  The herd of horses had shifted away from the most ill -- the pregnant mare and a stallion. I wouldn’t have selected these creatures as the most infected. We had to trust the horses’ instinct around illness. George and I led the pregnant mare and stallion away from the others to the other side of the Pen.