by Zack Murphy
Conquest, who was having more fun than War but much less than Famine was as skeptical of the oasis of horses as The Death was. “He’s right,” she said, turning and putting a compassionate hand on the shoulder of War, “We’re going in the wrong direction.”
There was then a scream that filled the desert night. Halfway around the world in the sleepy little town of Canudos, Brazil a shiver went down the spines of cats looking for a place to take a nap. Off the coast of Akureyri, Iceland fish became distraught and committed suicide, much to the delight of a young fisherman who had spent the last three days praying to whatever God that would listen for a miracle to catch something.
“Are you finished?” The Death said.
“For now,” replied War.
“Go toward the light everyone! More road trip!” an excited Famine cried out. “Giddy up, Princess Lollipop,” she took the reins of her beast and galloped off in the direction of a flickering population, her pink cowboy hat bouncing rhythmically as she darted down a dune.
*****
The door to the hotel room opened and Ketty entered, followed by Barnaby close behind and Jeremiah bringing up the rear, limping with his arm in a sling.
Ketty flopped on the sofa and kicked off her shoes. She stretched herself out, lying across the soft cool linen, dangling her toes off to the side. Barnaby relaxed in the chair next to the sofa and slunk down in his seat.
Jeremiah looked around the room for a place to relax or at least to sit uncomfortably. As he watched his compadres drifting into a blissful peace he shrugged his shoulders and fell to the floor. On the carpeting he could finally rest his ravaged body on something that was at least softer than the concrete on which he had spent most of the day.
“What a day,” sighed Ketty as she wiggled her toes in the cool breeze of the air conditioning.
Barnaby nodded in agreement as his eyes fluttered to try to stay open. “No one would ever believe it if we told them.”
“I hurt so much.” Jeremiah’s struggled to speak as his face was being smothered by the strands of carpet from which he was too tired to remove his body.
“I mean, the runaway Ferris wheel, oh brother.”
“The chemical plant almost blowing up with us inside of it, that was crazy,” Barnaby said, taking his cue from Ketty.
“So much hurts.” Sobbed Jeremiah.
“How about that whole thing with the Chinese mafia mistaking Jeremiah for a fed?” wondered Ketty, “I’ve never seen so many weapons in my life. I don’t know how you survived that.”
“I don’t think I did.” Jeremiah wanted to die, but that took too much effort.
“How about when we had to confiscate that plane,” said Barnaby, rising a bit from his seat.
“I never knew you could fly a plane.” Exclaimed Ketty
“I can’t.” proclaimed a very proud Barnaby “That’s the crazy part. Of course, then there was us having to jump out of the plane with only two parachutes between us.”
“I landed on a car,” whimpered Jeremiah.
“And we landed on you,” laughed Ketty.
“Lucky thing too, we may have really been hurt.” Grinned Barnaby.
“I hurt.” Moaned Jeremiah.
Barnaby and Ketty laughed as they looked back on their day, reminiscing about all the close scrapes they barely got through. Jeremiah lay on the floor and tried hard to forget. It had been a wild day, one that would go down in the annals of history for its sheer zaniness. The three would sleep well tonight, as they drifted off in their respected places.
“I think I broke my liver,” said Jeremiah, right before fading off from exhaustion with no one listening.
*****
A young boy sat next to a fire, whittling away at a piece of driftwood his grandfather had brought him after returning from the sea. As the knife flicked and flung the chips of wood into the glowing embers the young boy looked up to see four large figures coming towards him through the desert’s setting sun.
He carefully set down the leisurely activity that had been amusing him and raced down the street toward his home to tell his mother of the army that were on the march toward them.
As the figures got closer more and more people lined the wall between town and desert. They watched in anticipation as the impending visitors made their way through the deadly sea of sand. Very few had ever come out of desert, and still fewer had come out singing.
It was not a song of those who had struggled through as an intolerably hot, blistering sun beat down on their backs with the fury of a thousand erupting volcanoes. It was the song of people who were quite content with the unrelenting persecution the desert had to offer.
The town patriarch began to step closer towards the on-comers, while still mindful to keep close to the pack. As the figures came into full view he stepped back, crashing into another villager and sending them both tumbling down into the dust-covered street. The clouds of sand that were kicked up from the galloping beasts subsided and the villagers were met face to face with their visitors.
The collective eyes of the village were now well aware of what had landed in their laps. Actually, they weren’t at all sure what had just arrived; it’s not every day a dinosaur, long believed extinct, comes to stand still in your general area.
The village elder moved closer to the four strangers. He tried to take in just what had interrupted their solace. They were costumed in such a way that was not built for desert travel.
Two men near the front who had a good view of the four beasts were busy in conversation, “I think they’re horses,” said the first.
“Those aren’t horses,” said the second, in doubt of whether what he was saying was actually true.
“I’m pretty sure they are.”
“They can’t be horses; they’re purple,” said the second, shrugging his shoulders in an attempt to make his statement sound plausible.
“There can be purple horses,” said the first with all the honesty that his limited knowledge of the outside world could muster.
“No, there can’t be purple horses.” Said another, “Besides, they’re reptiles.”
“Huh?” said the first, satisfied with the second’s explanation of the existence of the beasts.
“Listen,” said The Death, “I hate to break up the zoology lesson, but where are we?”
“Tandtar,” said the elder, as if anyone with a brain should know.
“Okay,” said The Death before he paused for a moment of inner reflection, “I have no idea where that is.”
“It’s not on the map.” Said the elder, he had never thought he’d be presented with having to give a tourist peroration. “We’re kind of in our own little world here; it’s kind of nice really. We find it pleasant. But you’re all free to stay here as long as you like.”
“I don’t want to stay!” screamed War, whose nerves were beginning to wear thin with every passing second.
“Well, you don’t have to get snippy,” said the elder, shaking his head in admonishment.
“Sorry, sorry,” said War trying to pull himself together. “It’s just we’ve had a hard few days. We’re not bad people; well, actually that’s not true at all, but we’re trying to get somewhere.”
A young man crept over to Conquest, who was sitting regally upon her stead. He smiled at her and reluctantly Conquest smiled back, though she was being overcome with a growing consciousness of discomfort at the man’s smile. She had smiled in an ill fated attempt to get the man to stop smiling at her and move on to someone else. Her smile just seemed to make the man smile at her more. His piercing brown eyes ripped at her mounting anxiety, tearing its way through her bowels.
“Kill the wabbit! Kill the wabbit!” sang the man, still with an easy smile on his face.
Conquest’s smile swelled as she showed all her perfectly symmetrical teeth as he sang to her. She began to chuckle and the man, seeing she was in on the joke, started to share in her bemusement. As he laughed along with the large woman, his head was
suddenly met with a large antlered steel helmet.
“Ow,” he whimpered, right before his body spun around, his eyes flapping in their sockets, and his body fell back, kicking up a cloud of dust into the night air.
“I don’t have a sense of humor,” she said to another woman who had been sharing in with the laughter and whose smile was now frozen to her face in sheer terror.
“That’s enough,” said The Death, raising a hand in Conquest’s direction. “We’re trying to reach the Vier Bylae Ranch. Does anyone know where that is? It would be greatly appreciated.”
“I know where it is,” said a man near the back of the group. He raised his hand hesitantly as he stared at The Death’s large skull. He deduced that his own skull was probably not a formidable opponent for the large one sitting on top of the skeleton’s shoulders.
After seeing what Conquest had done with the other villager he wasn’t too sure how much he wanted to help, in fear that he would give the impression of not being a help at all. “I was living there until yesterday; but there is nothing there, only my brother.”
“Onaiwu Iyare?” War rose from his slump into an excited pose.
“Yes, he is my brother.”
War leaped from his beast and grabbed the man in a bear hug, squeezing him between his massive arms and chest. “Bless you! Bless you! Bless you! What is your name?”
“Ducat,” said the man, gasping for air as he had become constricted by the grip of War.
“Bless you Ducat.” War dropped Ducat, who bent over clutching his knees, trying to catch his breath. “Get on!” his large hand outstretched toward Ducat’s slumped body.
Ducat’s eyes drifted from War to the large purple dinosaurs back to War who was wearing a wide-eyed grin that made the hair on the back of Ducat’s neck stand at attention. “I’m going--” he stuttered, “I’m going to get a horse?” As he backed away toward the stables he heard Famine screech in delight; “I love this so much! This is so cool!”
*****
In a large snow-covered house that sat back in the hills of Norway a letter arrived via courier. It was received by an outstretched hand at the door a. A pair of white gloves opened the letter and a tiny smile formed across the lips, surrounded by a white beard of its reader. “Pack it up boys!” boomed the man, the gold buttons of his red suit jostling with the excitement, “We’re going to America!”
*****
1 DAY BEFORE THE BIRTH
Ketty arose early to get a head start on her bunk mates. She pulled on a pair of blue sweat pants and a green t-shirt, tied her hair back in a ponytail and ventured out on the streets of L.A. She had taken up jogging four years ago, mainly as a way to keep up with other women in southern California.
She wasn’t vain, but she knew that she had to keep somewhat up on the rest of the plastic, tanned Barbie dolls living in the narcissism capitol of the world. She didn’t particularly cherish the morning workout but it had become a habit, and habits are hard to break.
As the morning sun cast its yellow glare through the high rises and palm trees her feet hit their shadows on the sidewalk with a steady pace. L.A. wasn’t a walking city, so she had the place to herself and her thoughts.
There was something in the air, she thought, as she raced by the cars whose drivers gave her a double look and a laugh. There was something different but she couldn’t put her finger on it. As the sweat glistened on her forehead, dripping from the earphones that kept the outside world at a safe distance she stopped and stood still. Her eyes darting to the trees that lined the street.
She finally realized what was causing her to have a sense of discrepancy about her city. There were no sounds, at least not any natural sound. There was the constant treble of cars and the echoes of wannna-be models and actors crying as they waited tables bouncing off the smog-covered atmosphere, but it was the lack of nature that got to her.
The city was never going to be confused with an Amazon rainforest, but you could always count on the sweet songs of birds to make it a little more comforting. There were no birds chirping; there were no birds at all. It was as if an all-avian points bulletin had been placed to get out town. It filled the air with such an abundant eeriness that Ketty broke her jog early and headed back to the hotel.
As she turned around to start back, she noticed a car parked on the side of the road. As it idled in front of her she peered inside and noticed a familiar face gazing off in the distance. The face was noticing the lack of birds also, something that no one in L.A. would ever notice unless they were also in tune with what was happening.
Dana Plough broke her stare and turned to Ketty. As their eyes locked, Kerry quickly turned and tried to run as nonchalantly as possible. “Damn,” she thought to herself as she made a conscious effort not to look back. “It’s starting.”
*****
Dana Plough knew that she had never met the raven-haired woman who caught her eye, but there was something cacophonously familiar about her face. She had looked at her as if they were in on something together, that they were on the same path, and that they were to diverge at some point very soon.
Her attention was drawn back to the sky and to the thing that Ketty hadn’t noticed. She watched the dark clouds converging on her city, like a runaway eighteen-wheeled semi barreling down on an unsuspecting family sedan on a curvy mountain road in the middle of a snow storm.
She tapped on the glass that separated her from Manuel and motioned to him to start driving again. Dana Plough watched the morning become bright day as they drove. She watched the city become an electric motherboard of rushing hordes bouncing from terminal to terminal.
She watched people whom she had never met or cared about go about their day as the child inside her kicked and punched in his last days of darkness. Dana Plough placed a hand on her belly and rubbed the protruding mass of destruction that would bring to end all of this. She felt a twinge of sadness for the first time. Then she smiled.
*****
Manuel got the cue to drive and sped off down the avenue, leaving behind a young woman doing her best not to stare at his employer. It was par for the course to get out fast. People usually had one of two feelings toward Dana Plough: unadulterated love or life-consuming hatred; either one brought out the weird in people.
He had spent the past night and subsequent morning chauffeuring her around and hadn’t got much out of her vocally. All her communicating was done with simple gestures, a way of exchange that he had grown to welcome.
The car idled at a light and Manuel turned his attention to a small man sitting on a park bench. The man was man wearing a bowler and dressed in a dapper tweed suit with bulky coke bottle glasses as he clutched a brown paper bag feverishly to his chest.
The only pigeons left in the city had flocked to the man like they were auditions for a Hitchcock film, but he wasn’t relinquishing whatever he had in the bag. He didn’t seem to mind the attention, but he wasn’t going to share his treasure with the winged rats.
The light turned green and Manuel drove through the intersection after a flurry of honks and shouting drew him out of his hypnotic state. As he turned the corner he caught the small man’s eyes and drew a coy grin from Manuel as he drifted out of sight.
His hand reached for a dial to turn on the radio. A soft Mozart symphony began to fill the car as Manuel drove; he kept one eye on his passenger and one eye on those portentous clouds that seemed to be speeding in a pinpoint direction toward his car.
*****
A small man wearing a bowler and dressed in a dapper tweed suit with bulky coke bottle glasses clutched the bag tightly. The vials of Jamaican Whooping Fever Pox rattled from deep within their cotton tombs.
The sun was just reaching his bench and the warmth soon stroked his pale face, burning it red with its rays slightest touch. His brow was furrowed, giving the impression of a shar pei dressed for a guest lecturer at a self-proclaimed accredited University.
*****
Drool covered the pillow, form
ing a small pool of warmed spittle below Jeremiah’s mouth. He slowly opened his eyes, trying to grasp the picture of his surroundings. He hadn’t remembered leaving the floor and making his way to bedroom, but there he was, tucked in tight between the bed spreads.
His head throbbed from the day before and the sun peeking from behind the drawn curtains left his brain aching for the dark.
He struggled to untangle his feet from the sheets that had shackled him during his sleep. He sat up, watched the room spin around like a merry-go-round after a hit of acid and collapsed back to the mattress. He lay staring up at the ceiling, trying to get a handle on his aching body.
He had concluded that if he could just will himself enough to get his feet on the floor, the rest of his body would fall into line after.
He spun his body up and around, shifting every muscle to contort with the ideas his mind had offered. His feet hit the floor and this jerked the rest of him into an upright position. He was standing under his own influence; this was a good start. As he started to step toward the bathroom his eyes rolled back in his head, then his body followed suit and fell back, landing on the soft mattress.
He could probably do with a little more sleep, he told himself. With his feet in the air and head nestled in the tousled bedding, his mind drifted back to a place where his body was more relaxed with the painlessness of slumber.
*****
Barnaby was awoken by a thump coming from the bedroom. Instead of investigation, he found his way downstairs and across the street to a little coffee shop he enjoyed frequenting while in town. He had discovered the place years before when an outbreak of deadly salmonella poisoning caused the death of fourteen customers.
The shop was, as he put it, ‘quaint, with a sense of danger’. He didn’t enjoy the hotel’s café, he felt it was too snooty for his taste, and besides, no one had ever died from runny eggs there.
He had settled into a booth and was nursing a cup of coffee when the door flung open and a rather frumpy man came staggering in. The man seemed to be in hurry to get away from someone or something. His eyes darted over the stained walls of the diner and relaxed on the torn red stools that lined the linoleum counter. He plopped down in the seat and called for a cup of coffee.