by Alex Kimmell
Ignoring the screams, he planted his feet into the thick mud and pulled hard to lift the old man above the waterline. He dragged him to shore, and they collapsed in a tumble of limbs, both men gasping for breath. Each sputtered up muddy water while Sgt. Harmon reached a hand beneath his back to pull out a sharp stick before it pierced its way completely between his ribs.
Helicopter blades make a sound unlike anything else in the world. Above the combined roaring of the pounding in his head and the crashing river, an immediately recognizable thumping came echoing through the canyon walls, like a welcome friend coming to take them home. Sgt. Harmon patted the wet skin of the old man’s shoulder in a gesture intended to be comforting. He was not soothed, but instead flinched and curled into a fetal position.
The sergeant felt bad for the old man, but he knew that the medical facilities back at the base would provide far better care than they could give him out here in the field. Besides, he needed to get back to finding Jabez.
The chopper landed in a clearing fifty yards from where the bearded man was curled up on the rocks. Sgt. Harmon waved to his crew and they jogged to his location, all of them now soaking wet and somewhat pissed off. Once the man was loaded inside, Sgt. Harmon helped to strap him down before twirling his index finger in the air, indicating the pilot was clear to take off.
Sliding the door shut, he noticed the old man’s eyes were open. They looked at each other for the first time, and Sgt. Harmon felt a searing shock of recognition. He couldn’t breathe. He knew that face, buried under the beard and draped in scraggly white hair. As the craft lifted off the ground, he watched Jabez pound his fists on the inside of the glass, his mouth forming screams that went unheard above the roar of the engines.
-17-
Sgt. Harmon: Night
Sgt. Harmon squinted through the thick bulletproof window in the hospital door. He overheard a group of doctors and nurses discussing the surprisingly healthy old man that had just been brought in from the field this morning. He was malnourished and dehydrated, but otherwise he seemed to be okay. Jabez was been missing for seven days. How could he be so old? Was it really Jabez, or did he just imagine it?
As visiting hours came to an end, he realized most of the doctors outranked him. Even if he wanted to throw his weight around to get into Jabez’s room, it wouldn’t work. Outside, the night was calm and warm. Sgt. Harmon sat down on the ground, trembling. He left his shirt unbuttoned and picked at the mud caked on the soles of his boots.
It was ten o’clock. Close to seven hours until sunrise. The second hand on his watch slowed itself down. Time moved through a puddle of thick sap pooling at the bottom of a maple tree. Leaves lilted by in front of him. He watched every drying vein’s detail cross his view. A small beetle unfurled iridescent wings, releasing itself from gravity’s pull and floating from tree branch to hiding spot behind a pile of rocks on the ground.
Across the way, soldiers sped past in open-topped jeeps. Others went running around corners and into doorways to deliver important messages. An alarm sounded. Troops sprinted outside the borders of the camp, rifles raised into firing position. Stone and metal debris exploded in all directions, clouding the air with the thick smell of war.
Sitting. Lost in thought. Immobile. Lost in time.
Eventually the sun did rise. Eventually the doors were opened. Eventually the sergeant stood and went back inside. Still lost.
-18-
Sgt. Harmon: The Hospital
Inside the hospital was a whirlwind. Not from new wounded patients brought in from a fresh battlefield. It was chaos. Fluorescent light tubes popped and burned out in tufts of smoke, papers flew everywhere in the darkness. Nurses and doctors ran into each other in doorways, monitors howled flat-line warnings as patients pulled off leads and tore IVs from their veins. Half-unrobed, wounded soldiers shuffled their feet through hallways, leaking reddish-brown bodily fluids from every orifice, like zombies aimlessly roaming in search of some relief from their pain.
This was worse than anything witnessed on the battlefield. The young sergeant hugged the wall, slowly creeping his way through the nightmare to reach his friend. Passing a pair of open double doors, he looked inside an operating room to a group of doctors and nurses scrambling to hold down the thrashing arms and kicking legs of a screaming woman. Succeeding in strapping her down to the table, the surgeon raised his scalpel in a melodramatic gesture, displaying twisted showmanship to the raised hands and cheer-like growling of his surgical staff. White scrubs were instantly splattered in a spray of dark red as his blade opened to the outside world organs and tissue never meant to see the light of day. The pitiful screaming continued for another few moments until her head turned to the side, fixing its hollowed eyes directly on Sgt. Harmon standing petrified in the doorway.
He sprinted off down the hallway to the room where they were keeping Jabez. Weaving between crumpled bodies on the floor and desperate hands reaching out for him, he tried not to look at anything too closely. If he kept everything a blur, he might be able to convince himself later that this was all a dream.
A slightly-built male nurse came at him with a syringe full of an unholy-looking liquid. Before the nurse could stick it through the skin of Sgt. Harmon’s neck, he punched the thrashing man in the stomach. He fell, blood spraying from his mouth, a dark stain spreading on the back of his scrub pants.
Curled up into a ball, Sgt. Harmon could see why he looked so short. Both feet were flipped ninety degrees onto their insteps. The brown calluses on the bottom of his toes were now facing outward instead of bearing his weight on the ground. The nurse attempted to stand but couldn’t reach high enough to wrap his fingers around the handrail. Covered with blood and other fluids, his grip slipped away, and with each attempt to stand, he smeared the wall with more of the viscous liquid.
Backing away, Sgt. Harmon watched the nurse pick up the syringe. He set it in his hand to throw it like a dart. Instead, he turned the needle on himself, slowly thrusting the long thin shaft into his temple. The syringe hit home somewhere behind the man’s eye, and he started to moan. He pushed the plunger all the way, injecting the darkness deep into his skull.
Thick black syrup crawled out from behind his eye. At first the small drop dribbled down to his top lip. Then it flowed freely from his nostrils, eyes and ears. The malignance oozed out of every place it could use as an escape. The man opened his mouth wide, screams growing louder. He took hold of his lower jaw and pulled down hard, muscles bulging out of his neck and arms. The unmistakable loud cracking sound of bones breaking reverberated down the dark hallway. His skin split in long, tattered slices, from the corners of his lips back to dark ear holes fountaining putrid gore.
Blackness drooled out everywhere.
Sounds of gunfire bounced off the walls as soldiers entered into the madhouse. He ran faster to find Jabez’s room, turning left at this corner, pushing through a door at the end of that hallway, shoving the body of an armless dead soldier away so he could get past. He wouldn’t leave Jabez in this hell.
-19-
Sgt. Harmon A Lovely Day Outside
The guard sat outside of room seven. Straight-backed, eyes front, unmoved by the chaos reigning around him. Sgt. Harmon approached the soldier from the right side. He hugged close to the wall to avoid drawing attention to himself. Sliding his feet, he stopped a few paces from the soldier.
This morning brought with it many horrors and delusions that would most likely keep him awake for decades, but the image of the dozen syringes forming a diagonal line down the young man’s cheek and neck was almost beautiful. Elegant in execution, none of the syringes were further apart than their own width. The top one appeared to be completely full of the same dark fluid the nurse used on himself earlier. The next one injected a few micrograms into his face. A little more was pushed out of each one until the last remained, hanging empty in the bottom of the soldier’s neck.
Whoever did this was on no mindless rampage. They were patient and to
ok their time. The empty medicine vial coated with remnants of black liquid in the guard’s hand was clue enough. This was self-inflicted. What the hell was going on here?
Sgt. Harmon slid himself around, giving the guard a wide berth, and moved to the door. No light shone through the window. He tried the door handle. It was unlocked. He took a deep breath and pushed it open. The chaos of the hospital completely passed this room by. Open curtains revealed a lovely day outside, and the potted plant in the corner was freshly watered and tidied up. Towels hung neatly folded over the shower door in the bathroom to his right. The bed sheets were crisply folded and tucked in tight.
Jabez was not here. There was no trace of any patient in this room at all. Why have a guard posted outside the door of an empty room? Unleashing a tidal wave of frustration, Sgt. Harmon launched into a wild rampage. He kicked the plant over, threw the small folding tray into the wall, punched the mirror, and ripped the covers from the bed. The shredded pillow fell in pieces to the floor. Now quiet. No screaming from the hallways. Bullets exploding from their cartridges were silenced. The horrible laughing of the insane dancing and cutting ceased.
All that remained were an old, leather-covered book tied with red twine, and a key, resting together on top of the neatly made bed, beckoning him to the center of the immaculately cleaned room.
-20-
Sgt. Harmon: A Beginning
Sgt. Harmon choked. The river woke him. Hands scratched and pulled at his clothes. He fought them at first. His head broke the surface. Burning lungs swallowed air until they almost burst. The men finally caught hold of him and dragged him to shore. The standing stones toppled over when one of the men smashed the butt end of his MK-17 into the structure. A low, resounding thump followed along with each flat disc crashing into the water.
Sgt. Harmon swiveled his head back and forth, scanning for the old Jabez. No one else remained in the canyon but his team. The medic reached for his left hand. He clutched it fiercely to his chest. Looking down, he saw blood slither out between his wet fingers. Try as he might, he could not release his grip. It took three men pulling on his forearm to pry it away from his body, revealing the brown leather book clutched in his clawed fingers. The medic was finally able to loosen his fingers as they slowly warmed in the sun. Dug in so deep, it took a pair of pliers to remove the teeth of the key from deep within his flesh.
They bandaged his hand, gave him some antibiotics, and bagged the key and brown leather book for the journey back to base. Sgt. Harmon told his men that the search was over and it was time to head back home. He knew Jabez was gone.
-21-
Dedra: The Queen of Order
Dedra sat up. Careful not to wake her husband, she slipped out from beneath the warm sheets, sliding her feet into her waiting slippers before they got cold. She never needed to look for them. Like everything else in her life, they were put exactly where they needed to be. Order was Queen in this life. She needn’t bother checking her reflection in the vanity mirror, but she did anyway, as she had every morning for the last twenty years.
Not a trace of sleep remained on her face. She adjusted the shoulders of her black robe and tied the belt in a knot, curling the soft fabric into a neat bow fit for a gift to royalty. Abram smacked his mouth and turned over. A kind and gentle man, always fun for the children. He had never measured up to the Prince she dreamed she would end up with. But it could have been much worse.
It was a comfortable life, if not altogether happy. They paid the bills regularly, and the grass was always neatly cut. Good grades were expected of the children, and were delivered. A few behavior problems here and there, but no more than expected. Some sibling rivalry and schoolyard scrapes. When the girls hit their teen years, she didn’t expect either of them to become pregnant or anything as disreputable as that.
Abram’s rejection from entering the service bothered her more than she thought it would. Most of her friend’s husbands had been off fighting for some time now. The “War Widows,” as they called themselves, got together for tea every Friday night. Dedra guessed it was for moral support and exchanging advice on how to raise their children alone. She didn’t really know firsthand.
One good thing about Abram being home was the steady work. With so many other men from town gone, he was getting calls 24 hours a day for his expertise. Before the war most folks thought that a handyman ranked somewhere down close to the bottom of the totem pole. Jack-of-all-trades, master of none type of thing. But Abram was good at everything. He could fix a leaky faucet and have your air conditioning working before you got the kids out of the pool and dried off for lunch.
Even his hobby was helpful these days. Down in the basement, his odd assortment of tools and knick-knacks were completely baffling to her. After an exhausting day of repairing broken garage door openers or replacing cracked drywall, he would tuck the girls into bed and head down into his own little world.
Dedra never went with him. He would have welcomed her, she was certain of it. It wasn’t that she was choosing to stay away from her husband, either. The heat in that closed-off space was simply too unbearable. Even during the cold winter Abram would climb upstairs after a few hours shirtless and drenched with sweat. He always had a smile on his face, though. Maybe someday she would let him kiss her before he took his shower. It was something to work on.
She quietly closed the door to the bedroom and checked on the girls in their pink princess room, breathing in perfect synchronicity. Watching for a few more moments, the tall woman shook her head in disbelief. Where did they come from? How did she get so lucky? Dismissing the twinge of regret scratching at the back of her mind, she walked to the top of the stairs.
Their black-and-orange tabby cat, Taffy, brushed against her leg and turned down the step, ready to follow to her food bowl the way she did every morning. There was movement in the shadows below. What was down there? The doors and windows all looked closed from up here. She must have imagined it. She lowered her foot to the first step, and the cat abruptly froze in place. Her fur was not raised in warning, however, and she did not hiss. Her front paw simply held still in its position a few inches above the burgundy carpet.
The air in the great room was still. No sound of the wind outside came through the walls. Branches ceased their constant scratching on the roof. It was as if someone or something had pressed a pause button.
A light at the bottom of the stairs radiated from an unknown source. White outlines in the shape of people formed in the air, glowing brighter. Indistinct faces remained still at first. A man, yes, definitely a man’s shape mounted the first two steps. Behind him, a slender woman with long, flowing hair. Below them on the ground floor, more shapes came into focus. Two small children stood next to each other, holding hands. By their postures, they both looked like little boys.
The four moved like shadows in reverse. White, cloudy-outlined images, hazily sliding over the edges of framed photographs hanging on the wall. Melting over the angles of the stairs up toward her. The bright un-shadows burned her eyes. Dedra’s eyelids seemed glued open. Her muscles strained unsuccessfully to raise her arms and protect her from the searing pain.
Dedra stifled the scream in her throat, keeping herself from falling by leaning on the wall. The inverted shadow mouths were stretched inhumanly wide. Gaping holes with no teeth or tongues were instead filled with white and grey hissing static screeching up at her. Each of the four heads slammed to the right in perfect sync, snapping their necks at an absurd angle.
Then Dedra did scream. Eyes slammed closed, entire body tensed and bracing for the inevitable pain she anticipated. She almost tumbled down the stairs when Abram touched her shoulder. Of course there was nothing there when she opened her eyes. Of course there wasn’t. This was the real world. Order was Queen. She was only dreaming.
She allowed Abram to lead her down the stairs after he checked the house. Discovering nothing out of the Queen’s order, he made her a cup of hot chamomile tea with two spoonfuls of hone
y. He sat with her in silence for a time. He was a good man, really. She told him everything was okay, that he should go back to bed, and kissed him on the lips gently.
Two hours later Dedra was still sitting at the table, absentmindedly stirring her cold cup of tea as the sky turned from black into purple, then into a momentary flash of dark blood red. In that short span of seconds, a squirrel hopped onto the fence top. The animal stood on its hind legs and appeared to stare directly into her wide-open eyes. The sun coming up behind it made it difficult to see its face.
Dedra walked to the edge of the sink and leaned closer to the window. The squirrel pointed straight at her with an outstretched hand, snapped its head violently to the right and leaped into the air. Instinctively, she ducked and heard a loud crack from the glass. She opened the silverware drawer with shaking hands and drew out a spatula. Fumbling with the oversized wooden utensil in her clumsy fingers, she dropped it and reached back into the drawer, struggling to grab hold of a knife.
The lights came on, and her chest lurched in shock. Maria, her youngest girl, stood with one hand on the light switch. With the other she rubbed her eyes and pointed curiously to the book and key sitting in the center of the kitchen table.
-21-
Dedra: Opening and Closing