Twisted City

“It is time,”
a voice croaks from bed. There is no fear in the voice
nor
sadness, only something close to blessed resignation.

Maybe the
weather has something to do with it.

Late
yesterday morning the sky grew dark and gave way to drizzle that slowly progressed
into a storm of hard rain throughout the day. A steady cold chill stings the
air.

Yes,
maybe the weather has something to do with it.

After a long moment of silence the voice calls to Lathan again, a
bit louder this time, almost as much as he can manage without going into a fit
of coughs, and Lathan, solemnly staring off through the rain beaded second
story window, twitches his head to the side.

He’d heard the old man the first time. He always heard him, even
at deathly whispers. He’d even heard those same words in his own dreams.
They’ve haunted him, and he hoped that he would never have to hear them in the
woken world. But now, for the second time in a row, he just did.

Lathan continues to watch the rain flood the once pristine yard
down below, hoping the old man will grow tired enough to fall back to sleep and
perhaps by some chance of mercy die in peaceful slumber. But his own good
instincts tell him that he will not be afforded such mercy.

“We both knew that this day would come, sooner or later,” the old
man says. “We’ve prepared for it.”

Lathan turns to face him. “Sleep tonight. The rain will pass and
tomorrow will bring a day filled with the sun and blue skies.
A beautiful day.”

The old man gives his best grin, once a grand expression but now grim
with features eerily intensified by the play of light and shadow from the
candles stationed around the room, knowing that the younger man’s optimism is
fruitless but appreciative for it nonetheless.

“I’ve seen plenty of beautiful days,” the old man refines. “I need
no more.”

Lathan leaves the window and goes to stand at the side of the bed.
Placing his hand on the old man’s forehead, bone dry and cold to the touch, he
smooth’s his long white hair back. The old man turns his gaze upward, cobalt
blue eyes once so vital but now sunken deep into their sockets and full of
pain, and gives his young friend a small reassuring smile that says,
It’s
okay.

“Close your eyes,” Lathan finally says. “Let the rain vanish from
your mind and go to that place you love so much, wherever it is, filled with
bright sunny days.”

The old man closes his eyes and his mouth begins to move in silent
prayer, taking him to that very place, a long way from here and long ago, where
there is no disease and no sorrow.

Gathering as much courage as he can, Lathan quietly pulls the
sword from its scabbard and holds it firmly above his head.

“And no more pain. You are free my old friend.”

The sword slices through the air, making good on the promise he
gave early on, swiftly separating the head from the body.

And for the first time since it began to rain a streak of
lightning flashes across the night sky.

The
manor is old, and even though it is the worst of times, it still gleans a
certain degree of beauty reminiscent of better times.

But
beauty no longer has a natural place in the world. All that is left are empty
shells of what had once been, turning the masses into an ugly violent world.

There
were never any plans for him to stay at the manor. It was understood long ago
what he is to do after the old man’s death. If the old man had had his druthers
Lathan would have been gone long ago. But the younger man wouldn’t hear any of
it, he was going to stay and care for him for as long as it took.

He
douses what little gasoline he can spare around the downstairs rooms and then
sets it afire. It stopped raining before dawn and although the sky remains
mostly gray nowadays he believes it won’t rain again for a while. The entire
thing will burn down without a hitch, extinguishing its lore and legacy
forever.

In
a SUV loaded full of necessities he leaves the burning manor for the city.

If
a city exists in biblical hell, Claxton mirrors that city.

Streets
are filled with abandoned vehicles, wrecked and vandalized beyond present
repair. Any unit within all residential buildings is available to anyone for
the taking. What were once department and grocery stores are now mostly empty,
ravaged by looters, with broken store front windows and doorways.
Dead bodies in all stages of decomposition due to The New Disease
or by the hand of another lay in waste everywhere.
People fight and kill
for anything at will and without consequence.

Lathan
maneuvers the SUV slowly down the street, cautiously weaving it through the
chaos of past and present. Most people who are out on the street, living
breathing husks, watch him with great avidity as he passes by. It chills him to
the bone. The city itself, what it has become with its dilapidated streets and
skeletal buildings pocked with black honeycomb windows, doesn’t have a great
effect on him, but those intense stares from these walking husks of people, and
not just at him but at the vehicle he is driving, is what unease’s him the
most. They speak volumes, as if to say, “You knew this was going to happen and
now that the world is no longer as it once was you’ve come out of hiding with
your lavish vehicle to mock us. Well, maybe we’ll just have to do something
about that.”

He
taps the gas pedal a bit harder, speeding up a little in case someone suddenly
decides that they want a new SUV, fully loaded, with a surprise stock of food
and water and enough weaponry to supply a small army. Durable the SUV is but
far from susceptible to small firearms and Molotov cocktails.

A
few city blocks ahead someone finally lets him know how they feel. He slows
down some and watches a horribly emaciated woman draped in tattered clothing
carrying what looks like a small child while walking into the street toward
him. She moans in agony as she says, “Please help me and my child. He’s just a
little boy.” She holds up what is in her arms to show him. “He needs help.
Please help us. Please!
Please!”
She shakes as she wails. The
childs
head hangs limp from its
body, its shriveled leathery skin clings to its skeletal frame, the eyes have
shrunken into its sockets, and the lips of its mouth are stretched away from
what were once pink gums but now are brown with rot.

The
woman is clearly out of her mind and just looking at her annoys him to no end.
He can easily put her out of her misery but the quick thought of how others may
react holds him, especially if there are those around who may care about this
crazy woman. Doubtfully, but you never know.
Best not to rock
the boat.

And
then out of nowhere,
Whack!

He
about jumps out of his skin when the brick comes thundering down on the hood of
the SUV.

The
woman continues to wail, baring brown and blackened teeth and wide yellow eyes
as she approaches closer, making her way toward the center of the street before
him.

Lathan
looks in all directions, trying to locate the source of the brick, when another
comes smashing down onto the bottom right-hand corner of the windshield,
creating a splintered web that shoots a crack across the windshield. Lathan
then sees where it came from; someone is throwing them down at him from a
second story window in a building to his left. He can only see a dark figure,
unable to tell its gender. Not that it matters. The first one startled him but
the second one flat out pissed him off.