Wednesday, January 7, 2009
God had no intention of helping him
For a time, the panic returned. Oh God Oh God Oh God…
But it seemed that God had no intention of helping him. He could go nowhere. Gradually he calmed. He pushed has hand forward into a skull before him. He felt it shatter. Yes! It gave him a little more space in which to move.
Days passed. He worked without rest, scraping away at the bodies and rotting flesh, compressing it into the walls of the space around his hand. Slowly, the hole grew.
Then, after a year …
He could move his arm!
But it seemed that God had no intention of helping him. He could go nowhere. Gradually he calmed. He pushed has hand forward into a skull before him. He felt it shatter. Yes! It gave him a little more space in which to move.
Days passed. He worked without rest, scraping away at the bodies and rotting flesh, compressing it into the walls of the space around his hand. Slowly, the hole grew.
Then, after a year …
He could move his arm!
Sunday, January 4, 2009
He was, he realized, encased in dead bodies
He could not breathe!
For a long time he was unable to move. He could not see. He could not hear. He could not breathe. His lungs shrieked for air, but there was none. He was buried in something. Something hot. And heavy. And sometimes it moved about him.
He could not see. He could not hear. His only sense was touch, and all he could feel was the crushing weight of whatever it was that kept him trapped.
He tried to scream. But his lungs were sealed.
Oh, God! Oh God!
What had happened to him? Where was he? He remembered being in the apartment. He remembered that he’d been translating a document. Automatic writing! That was it. And a quote from Faustus. And waking up. And then taking a shower.
Then . . . he was here.
Sometimes he prayed. Let me die. But he didn’t. It just went on and on.
Finally, the horror gave way to … not exactly indifference, but a kind of numbness. There is only so much pain the body can endure before it becomes merely background noise. The most horrific nightmare becomes a bore. So it was that after the first few months he found himself testing the limits of his helplessness. What could he move? What could he feel?
He discovered that by dint of enormous effort he could begin to move the muscles of his arms. Once the mass around him quivered . . . an earthquake? . . . and a space formed around the fingers of one hand. He pressed his advantage, pressing back whatever it was that buried him. He could move his fingers! Yes. He stretched them . . . there! What was it he felt?
A skull. Tissue.
He was, he realized, encased in dead bodies.
For a long time he was unable to move. He could not see. He could not hear. He could not breathe. His lungs shrieked for air, but there was none. He was buried in something. Something hot. And heavy. And sometimes it moved about him.
He could not see. He could not hear. His only sense was touch, and all he could feel was the crushing weight of whatever it was that kept him trapped.
He tried to scream. But his lungs were sealed.
Oh, God! Oh God!
What had happened to him? Where was he? He remembered being in the apartment. He remembered that he’d been translating a document. Automatic writing! That was it. And a quote from Faustus. And waking up. And then taking a shower.
Then . . . he was here.
Sometimes he prayed. Let me die. But he didn’t. It just went on and on.
Finally, the horror gave way to … not exactly indifference, but a kind of numbness. There is only so much pain the body can endure before it becomes merely background noise. The most horrific nightmare becomes a bore. So it was that after the first few months he found himself testing the limits of his helplessness. What could he move? What could he feel?
He discovered that by dint of enormous effort he could begin to move the muscles of his arms. Once the mass around him quivered . . . an earthquake? . . . and a space formed around the fingers of one hand. He pressed his advantage, pressing back whatever it was that buried him. He could move his fingers! Yes. He stretched them . . . there! What was it he felt?
A skull. Tissue.
He was, he realized, encased in dead bodies.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Then he began to scream
Forrester risked another glance at Putridrine and Morris. He was staring at Lester, his lips tight below his mustache. Putridrine had remembered to close her mouth, but she, too, stared.
“I wish to give you an offer of aid,” Lester continued. “Each of you . . . one and all . . . needs me so very much. I would like to help you.”
Again, no one had the slightest idea what to say. But, finally, Professor Putridrine managed to speak. “What could you possibly . . . offer us?”
He favored them with another musical laugh. “Much, so very much. All of you have needs and desires, appetites unsatisfied...” He turned to face Morris. “Monographs unwritten.” Then to Putridrine. “Enemies to be confronted.” Then to her, “Fidelities to be maintained.” Then, seemingly, to everyone in the room. “So many things.”
He smiled again. “Well, I’ll be off. If you need me, just ask, and I’ll do whatever I can. Happy Halloween, everyone.”
And then, he was out the door, and gone.
For a long, strained moment, no one said a word. Then, everyone spoke at once, and wondered what the hell . . . what the bleeding, sulfuric hell . . . had happened.
*
It was a question that would occur, as well, to a young car thief a short time later.
Actually, he was a would-be thief. He’d never stolen a car before. In fact, he was only sixteen. He was one of the numberless young men and women who were, in theory, attending high schools in the grim little post-industrial city where the University remained as a relic from another, richer age when the mills still churned out shoes and optical instruments, rather than rotting empty on backstreets.
The boy saw the old car, beat up and ill maintained, on the road leading up to the University. It says much about him, and how green he was, that he paid any attention at all to it. A more experienced thief would have eyed the Morris’ little BMW, or Putridrine’s Audi, where they sat unattended in the lot known informally as Pedantic Place.
He crept up beside the driver’s side door. He tried the handle. It was unlocked! He looked through the window. The key was in the ignition! This was too good to be true. This was like someone was forcing the car on him.
He glanced up and down the street. No cops in sight. Now, he thought, for a little quick action. The guys would never believe it.
He opened the door and slid behind the wheel. Fantastic.
He realized the seat was wet. He put his hand on it. It came up red and dripping. What? He looked at the floor, in the passenger’s seat, in the back.
Then he began to scream.
Someone heard him and called the police. They arrived a little later. They saw the hysterical boy weeping in the street next to a parked car. Indifferently, they assumed he was on drugs. Indifferently, too, they shot him with a stun-gun and took him away in cuffs.
Only then did one of them look in the back of the car.
“I wish to give you an offer of aid,” Lester continued. “Each of you . . . one and all . . . needs me so very much. I would like to help you.”
Again, no one had the slightest idea what to say. But, finally, Professor Putridrine managed to speak. “What could you possibly . . . offer us?”
He favored them with another musical laugh. “Much, so very much. All of you have needs and desires, appetites unsatisfied...” He turned to face Morris. “Monographs unwritten.” Then to Putridrine. “Enemies to be confronted.” Then to her, “Fidelities to be maintained.” Then, seemingly, to everyone in the room. “So many things.”
He smiled again. “Well, I’ll be off. If you need me, just ask, and I’ll do whatever I can. Happy Halloween, everyone.”
And then, he was out the door, and gone.
For a long, strained moment, no one said a word. Then, everyone spoke at once, and wondered what the hell . . . what the bleeding, sulfuric hell . . . had happened.
*
It was a question that would occur, as well, to a young car thief a short time later.
Actually, he was a would-be thief. He’d never stolen a car before. In fact, he was only sixteen. He was one of the numberless young men and women who were, in theory, attending high schools in the grim little post-industrial city where the University remained as a relic from another, richer age when the mills still churned out shoes and optical instruments, rather than rotting empty on backstreets.
The boy saw the old car, beat up and ill maintained, on the road leading up to the University. It says much about him, and how green he was, that he paid any attention at all to it. A more experienced thief would have eyed the Morris’ little BMW, or Putridrine’s Audi, where they sat unattended in the lot known informally as Pedantic Place.
He crept up beside the driver’s side door. He tried the handle. It was unlocked! He looked through the window. The key was in the ignition! This was too good to be true. This was like someone was forcing the car on him.
He glanced up and down the street. No cops in sight. Now, he thought, for a little quick action. The guys would never believe it.
He opened the door and slid behind the wheel. Fantastic.
He realized the seat was wet. He put his hand on it. It came up red and dripping. What? He looked at the floor, in the passenger’s seat, in the back.
Then he began to scream.
Someone heard him and called the police. They arrived a little later. They saw the hysterical boy weeping in the street next to a parked car. Indifferently, they assumed he was on drugs. Indifferently, too, they shot him with a stun-gun and took him away in cuffs.
Only then did one of them look in the back of the car.
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