© Copyright 2017 Douglas Christian Larsen. Rood Der.
Rood Der — Episode Twelve: Ecstasies Horrific
In
the morning the first thing Frances wanted to do was give Frederic some of the
honey that Mister Bumbles had flown in during the night. Rooster cautioned
against giving him very much and suggested that Frances should first sample the
nectar in order to more fully understand how it just might affect Frederic. But
she didn’t want to waste any and Rooster could tell she was wanting to pour all
four large vials down the comatose man’s throat, and he cautiously attempted to
clue her that this was not the honey of her world, that it could cause...effects. He dipped his head to her and
ruffled his massive red Mohawk with his hand.
“This’s what gave you that?” she demanded, stepping back from him and holding the vial of
honey at arm’s length, wincing and ready to cast it away as foul Doctor Jekyll
Juice.
“Well, Frances, I don’t know what all caused
my...changes,” he said, slowly, “it was probably a whole lot of things.
Drinking the water here, eating the grasses, and the honey, and breathing the
air, absorbing the sunlight֫—this is a whole new world.”
“Oh don’t go all Disney on me!” she snapped,
throttling the honey vial in her hand. “I don’t want to turn Frederic into
a...a stupid...some insane, I don’t know—insect
man!”
“I don’t think you need to worry about that,
just go with it, that’s what Frederic wants to do, it’s the decision he made.”
“What do you know about Frederic!” she
snapped, actually showing her teeth in a snarl.
“Come on Frances, you know I love Frederic,
I’ve known him for years, and years. He’s been doing my taxes for me, for free
mind you, for about twelve years. I was his AA sponsor, and at least he’s never
relapsed, not once that I know of.”
“Right, you’re not even a heavy drinker,
you’re not an alcoholic, and never have been one!” she whispered. The thing of
it was, Frederic had never told her that, that Hank had played such an
important role in his life.
“Well, no, that’s true. I didn’t memorize and
practice the Twelve Steps for booze.
I have other...issues, and we, people like us, need a framework to operate on,
and while all the...religion, I guess you would call it—while that aspect of it
always bothered me, kind of generic religion—hey, it works, it teaches you to
think in a way that aids you in wrestling your...problems. I almost said
demons, but people get weird when you say that, even when you are obviously
using it as a metaphor,” Rooster said, chuckling softly. “But the point is, I
know Frederic. If not like a son, then like a younger brother. He and I have
been through a whole lot of...stuff.”
Mister Bumbles lifted off the ground,
generating that deep buzzing noise, which sounded more like the rumble of a
helicopter, or some deep electric generator. He flew up and circled Rooster’s head,
who remained very still. After a few slow revolutions about the man, the
bumblebee carefully alighted, and did many soft prancing, probing steps,
massaging Rooster’s head.
He is a
true man, Soul Mistress, he must be to be accepted as our Protector. He is thy
Protector as well, Soul Mistress. He is a man with great lusts for life, but
especially women, and especially thee, Soul Mistress.
Rooster lifted his hands, as if Frances held
a gun on him.
“They always speak the truth, but Frances,
they don’t have any kind of filter on board, they just speak things the way
they interpret your thoughts, our thoughts, and so you know, we are
complicated, all of us, and so yeah, what he says is true, I have had...well, I
guess...thoughts...about you,”
Rooster said, and his face was mottled red, and he couldn’t meet her eyes, and
he practically glowed with awkward embarrassment; no, he was mortified.
“Oh that’s okay, I knew all that, Mister
Bumbles didn’t tell me anything I didn’t know, Hank, I’m okay with that. If it makes you feel any better, I have
had some...thoughts about you, as well, but honestly, it has always been
Frederic for me.”
Mister Bumbles lifted off Rooster’s head and
buzzed over to circumnavigate Frances, and finally setting down gently upon her
head. For such a majestic creature, he seemed practically as light as the air
itself.
“Oh boy,” she said, closing her eyes. “Just
don’t go...spouting off, Mister
Bumbles. There are things you don’t have to say out loud. I mean, you know, think out loud.”
“You don’t have to say it out loud,” Rooster
said. “The bees don’t really understand our speech.”
“I know that, okay? It’s freaky enough as it
is, just let me get used to it in my own way,” she said, more calmly now.
Rooster hated to admit it to himself—with the
way he felt about Ivygarten, even though she was dead, she was all that consumed him—but he positively glowed with the
knowledge that Frances had felt, well, thoughts
about him. That was wonderful, it was beyond imagining, because he had no
illusions about himself. Women didn’t react to him in that way, they never had.
Oh, when they got to know him, they all liked him just fine, but no woman had
ever noticed him from across the room, and hell, just wanted him.
Of course, he did look a lot different than
he had in his earlier life, and even though he had not seen himself in a
mirror, he knew he certainly looked a whole lot more...vibrant, like this, in this world. He was more vibrant. He was alive
for the first time in his life. And, in this current guise—he was a living,
breathing Halloween costume, for goodness’ sake—everyone would notice him,
wherever he went.
“Ooh, this is better than a massage,” she
said, as the bumblebee strolled about over her head and shoulders, his long
proboscis sweeping and sampling her forehead and eyes and all through her hair
and ears.
“You are now officially part of us,” Rooster
said, packing up their stuff, readying for their last short trek to the Hot
Springs. “You now have access to all the aerial maps created by the bees. You
now know High Vale as well as I do, it’ll just take a while for all the
knowledge to seep into your consciousness.”
“Okay, okay, a little less mansplaining,
Hank. Rooster. Sorry, but I’m riding waves of ecstasy right now. Mister Bumbles
is massaging my soul,” she said, harsh at first, but gentling into a delighted
humor by the end of her words.
“I know, I know, but soon you will have to
shoo the bees away, because I’ve found that you can only take so much ecstasy
in a day,” Rooster said, squashing down the various grasses into the backpack.
“I can give Frederic the honey, I know that
now,” Frances said.
“You know a lot of things now,” Rooster said.
He stomped out what remained of their campfire, and kicked dirt over it.
Do as
the Protector says. Sample the gold, but only a mouthful. Take a second
mouthful, allow it to melt in thy mouth, and then gift this to Master Frederic.
“Yes Mister Bumbles, I guess the ecstasy
shouldn’t go on forever,” she simpered, pretending to be disheartened by the
last vestiges of the soul massage, but in truth she was equally excited about
the honey. She knew the honey, now, even though she had never tasted it.
Frances unstoppered the vial and lifted it to
her nose, and breathed. Oh! She had never smelled anything like it. What a scent,
what a truly glorious scent! Yes, it was the sweet smell of honey—but there was
more to it than that, it was huge, like breathing in the winds of the world,
all the pollen dancing upon all the winds...
...she sneezed. Now that was potent, although
her allergies didn’t seem to be kicking up a fuss, at least not yet.
She sniffed the vial again and practically
entered a dream state. This stuff was like a drug! Junkies could sit around all
the day long sniffing this, snorting it. It felt as if her body were lifting
up, soaring, flying into her head, and her head was coming apart, separating
into pieces, unfolding, unfurling—she felt like a flower! Oh it was terrible,
and beautiful, and tears welled in her eyes. Her entire being bobbed in the
breezes, swept and combed by the winds.
Soul
Mistress, thou might taste the gold. Do not use thy tiny two-hole thingy, but
thy mouth.
She opened her eyes, fully returned to
herself.
“Did you just say...thingy?” she queried, grinning at the bee. The bee buzzed at her.
“They do have a turn of phrase, so to speak,”
said Rooster, impatiently strolling about, swinging his ax, making the shiny
metal do all kinds of twisting, dangerous acrobatics. “But we do need to be
moving along, Frances. Get some of that honey into Frederic, it will help,
honest, probably the best thing for him.”
“Franny’s Fanny, did you really used to think
that about me?” she huffed, but she was smiling, a little.
“I am sorry, Frances, but please, don’t do
that, don’t go stomping about like an elephant in my head—yes, okay, I always
hated it when you left, but I always enjoyed watching you go, okay? There, it’s
out there, it’s been said, and I apologize. I really, seriously tried never to
watch you, too much, you know? I did my best, most of the time.”
She giggled, but felt
strangely...complimented. Because Hank had never given her any weird vibes, not
like Barney—that...that...that groper. Barney leered at her, all the
time, and after a few drinks he might reach out and pat her upon her...fanny.
She had always just let it go, and she had never said anything to Frederic
about the harassment.
But Hank, now Hank had always been a
gentlemen, humorous, polite, and kind.
“You always did have such a sweet little
butt, especially in your old jeans, you probably should have thrown those things
out years ago,” Rooster said, dreamily.
She gawked at him.
He dropped his ax, the tumbling edge of the
double-bladed weapon just missing his toes. He danced away from the ax, but his
eyes were staring at her, horrified.
“Did I
just say that out loud?” he burst, and when she didn’t answer, but just continued
to stare at him, he held up his hands again as if her pistol were trained upon
him. “I am sorry, so sorry, it just gets so confusing sometimes, I don’t know
if I’m thinking a thing or speaking it, but honestly, you know I would never
say that to you! Please forgive me.”
She snickered. “Sweet little butt. Sheesh. The things men obsess about!”
“I know, I know! It’s terrible, but I
wouldn’t say that I obsessed about your butt, I mean, you know—all the time! Not usually, oops, sorry,
I mean, oh boy,” he babbled, going almost as red as his absurd Mohawk.
“It’s okay,” she said, shushing him. “I was
just thinking about that creep Barney, and then you said that out loud.”
“I must have picked up the Barney Vibe,”
Rooster said, guffawing. “I’ve never said anything like that out loud before.”
And then he burst into inappropriate laughter, just roaring laughter. Even
Mister Bumbles alighted upon a boulder to watch. The big man doubled over, his
hands upon his knees, and he just—roared, like a lion, only it was laughter,
and not a roar!
On that note, Frances lifted the vial to her
lips and sampled her first taste of the golden honey.
A shockwave traveled throughout her body,
like sonar, rippling her soul from head to toes and fingertips, and then returning,
pinging back in amplification, all the waves combining up to where her lips and
tongue tingled, and exploded in power to the furthest reaches of her mind.
Yes, it was sweet, but that was the
understatement of the century, because it was...earthy—was that an inappropriate word to use in this world? Worldy, well that obviously wouldn’t cut
the mustard. But there was a distinct tang of the wildflower, the spirit of the
wildflower, to live and grow and die in a span of days, rearing up out of dark
soil, to live, to breathe, to exhale air, oh the colors, to offer such hue,
such beauty, oh she would take wildflowers over cultivated roses any day of the
week, or month, or year.
Yes, she tasted all the hues of the
wildflower, that succulent beauty and the tragedy of their passing, all those
colors, she could taste that, the spirit of the wild in this honey, this gold.
She almost fell over—it was a good thing she
was sitting. She felt like she had just survived an explosion. An explosion of
wonder, and beauty, and magic.
And that had been less than a teaspoon just
passing her lips! She hadn’t even swallowed yet. Frances felt as if a butterfly
were trapped, just beyond her teeth, fluttering alive upon her tongue—she
wasn’t certain she wanted any kind of feeling that might surpass what she had
just experienced, that detonation of her entire being. Holy shit, for a moment
there, she was a flower, and then a whole hillside of wildflowers, and all of
her skin still tingled with colors.
In for a penny, she thought, and she
swallowed. And she glowed. She felt the warmth all the way down. It was kind of
like throwing back a slug of the most potent whiskey, something illegal, the
way this heat spread throughout her body, even warming her fingertips and toes.
She blinked her eyes rapidly and felt like singing.
“Whoa drugs,” she murmured, and sat in a daze
for several seconds. She closed her eyes and imagined that she saw a billion
bees, all over the globe of High Vale, glittering like raindrops, and she felt
her body go into pieces, shattering, flinging out into every single burst of
light, and she saw, through a billion eyes times five, and countless upon
countless facets of those eyes, seeing movement not only throughout the world,
but into and through worlds, and worlds, other worlds and alternate worlds and
worlds to be and worlds dead long ago, and faces and flowers and bees and
people and wasps and spiders, and it all happened in a second.
“Okay, I get it,” she said, and threw back
her head, pouring the contents of the vial into her mouth. She was still here,
present, sitting next to Frederic, and Mister Bumbles was still sitting there
on the boulder, and Rooster was still laughing—in the slowest of motions,
everything had slowed down, or possibly she was moving and thinking faster than
she had ever conceived possible, but she leaned over Frederic, and she placed
her lips upon his lips—the approach was slow and beautiful and she didn’t care
if it lasted forever—and she pushed his lips apart with her mouth, and slowly,
she transferred the gold from her being, to his being, soul to soul.
And she knew him. She knew Frederic, in much
the way she knew Rooster, and Mister Bumbles, but in some ways she knew him
better than she knew herself. While the honey slowly transferred from her mouth
to his, it was as if he expanded inside of her, and they grew together, light
reflecting off two vast bubbles, iridescent, pearlescent, their thoughts and
dreams and fears all going translucent, interweaving and coagulating and
churning bright with tang and sweat and sweet breath until they popped, not
apart, but into one being, and more than ten times the size of either of them
separate. They were so much more, together, as one, than they could ever be
apart.
Frederic’s eyes opened as he swallowed, and
though his eyes were bloodshot and rimmed in pink and red, they actually saw, and he looked at Frances, and he
smiled.
“Hello,” she said, smiling at him, with her chest
upon his chest, her body half-straddling him, and holding both of his hands in
hers, she looked into his soul, and smiled.
“Quick,” he groaned, “get away from me
Frances! It’s happening! Get away!”
She pushed herself up, shocked, and with
growing terror, she heard the terrible gurgling noise in his bowels. She felt
the unsettling bubbles in his belly, and the way his chest undulated.
Rooster stopped laughing and hurried forward
as with incredible strength Frederic hurled Frances away with one arm, pushing
himself into a sitting position, and the projectile vomiting began. Mister
bumbles lifted off the boulder and buzzed in dizzying circles about them.
Frances rolled and came up into a crouch as Rooster seized Frederic from behind
and lifted him up, and held him about the waist, with poor Frederic folded
forward, vomiting, and in that yellowish, foamy bile were other things, living
bits, snapping claws, erupting from Frederic and jettisoning into the rocks.
Frances stared with alarm where the slimy things
were already stirring between the rocks, little crablike creatures, with long
rat tails dragging behind them—the abominations were no bigger than her little
finger, but they were more hideous than the vile things that had first erupted
from Frederic’s innards. There must be a hundred of the things, and she saw
many of them striking at each other, and supposed they would begin consuming
one another—survival of the fittest, like puppies pushing their weaker siblings
away from the teats—only these siblings were beginning to bite and swallow each
other, these puppies from hell.
Was the honey poisoned? If so, it hadn’t
affected her so, at least not yet! What if those little yellow crablike things
with rat tails were even now sprouting and scuttling about in her gut?
“The honey is cleansing him, like the grasses
did!” Rooster cried, bouncing poor Frederic like an infant over his arm, as
Frederic bellowed up more and more of the hideous little critters—they even
sounded...chitinous as they splat
against the stones and rocks. Cockroaches of the gut. This must be cancer
personified, or objectified, or at least stripped of its innocuous appearance
and revealed as it really was, evil.
After Frances had mouth-fed the chewed up
grasses, pulpy and half-dissolved like coleslaw, into Frederic’s mouth, he had
vomited several times after an hour of digestion, but had produced nothing
living. And he had suffered several bouts of diarrhea, which Frances was able
to predict, just in time, as the diarrheic explosions always gave forewarning
in tiny popping bursts of gas. When Frederic began the rapid popcorn farting,
Frances was quick to pull down his cargo shorts and get his body facing away
from camp. Afterwards Frances always swept away these messes, with lots of
sticks and covering dirt, and she had yet to see anything living in these minor
emergencies.
The grasses cleansed and purged the body, but
the honey—apparently the vile parasites could not abide the splendor of the
golden honey, and like monstrous vermin they were violently abandoning their
ship.
Frances heard the rapid popping coming from
Frederic.
“Rooster!” she cried, rising and waving her
arms as if she meant to fly, hopping forward, her voice increasing in agitation,
“we have to get his shorts off, he’s about to erupt!”
The big man, bouncing Frederic like a
toddler, gave her a look. It was an
almost scary look, although she knew old Hank always meant well, but this
Rooster would only take so much hysteria. Again, he required her to step up to
the plate. She nodded and came forward and jerked the shorts down while Rooster
cranked him about, holding Frederic over the still smoking fire ring, feet
several inches above the smoking ashes and dirt.
Rooster wished he hadn’t done such a thorough
job smothering the coals, because he had some inkling of what might explode
from Frederic’s nether portal. He had a very queasy feeling that it was going
to be bad, much worse than the projectile-vomited crabs (some of which were now
heading across the rocky ground, heading in their direction, apparently drawn
by their noise and drama and heat).
A loud popping noise burst from Frederic’s
anus, and a frightening wash of blood poured out of him—what looked like two
pints of blood, all at once—with a slithering mass of what at first appeared to
be a bundle of twined snakes, but then it seemed more like hair, like a massive
hairball came gurgling out, and writhed like Medusa in the firepit, with what
seemed thousands of squirming legs or arms.
Frances screamed. She felt faint. That was so
much blood. Could anyone survive losing that much blood?
“I think I’m going to faint,” Rooster said,
his voice sounding incredibly high, like he had just taken a hit off a leaky
helium balloon. “I don’t like blood, Frances, I don’t know, I don’t know...”
“You just stand fast, Hank! Damn you Rooster!
You stand up!” she roared at him, grabbing him by the shoulders and steering
him away from the bloody hairball, which seemed to be going for his ankles.
“Don’t you dare drop Frederic!”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re right, no need to faint,
just don’t look at all that blood,” Rooster blubbered, actually weeping now,
still bouncing Frederic like an inverted baby over his arm, he was holding him
backward now, butt forward and head the opposite direction—poor Frederic was
still vomiting up the yellow crabs while a second hairball squirmed out of his
ass, and Frances steered Rooster through the obstacle of putrescent nightmares
and horrors.
“I think I dreamed of Ivygarten,” Rooster
began to babble, bouncing Frederic, “we were in this bright place, warm as
honey. She told me she was dead, but that I could see her again, and I’ll
probably scare the devil out of her when she sees me again, that’s a weird
dream, right?”
“Would you shut up,” muttered Frances,
scuffing her shoes in the dirt, kicking away the little yellow crabs, some of
which were now larger than her thumb, and the hairballs, they seemed to be
writhing closer and closer to Rooster’s bare feet, and she wasn’t sure, but it
sounded like they were screeching, like tiny but intensely loud mice, or
hissing like snakes—something in between, a hiss-squeak-shriek—the hairball
strands, hairs, tentacles or whatever they were, were screaming and shrieking.
When she stepped on the crabs they crunched. Somehow, it sounded delicious—and
she almost puked down herself with the thought.
“That was just a dream, right? You weren’t
there, were you, sitting on a bench?” Rooster babbled, waltzed around by the
stomping and scuffling Frances.
“Yeah, yeah, big deal, I saw you there too,
with the Barbie doll, big deal,”
Frances snarled, almost tripping Rooster. That would be just great, if they
both were to tumble over into the mess of all these creeping, crunching, shrieking
parasites.
“Weird, the same dream,” Rooster said,
chuckling, and then he was vomiting, keeping it all away from Frances and
Frederic, but when Frances looked, she was intensely relieved to see that it
was just your everyday vomit, looking utterly banal, like Hank of old had
quaffed one too many bottles of frothy-dark stout.
Mister Bumbles dropped hovering down like a
helicopter and snatched up one of the hairball Medusas, and buzzed away with
it. He was back in a few seconds to snatch up the second hairball, and she
hoped he was disposing of them in the best way, like hopefully over the side of
a cliff, and then she was watching as Mister Bumbles did exactly that, scraping
the thing off the tips of its bee hooves, ensuring nothing of it remained—it
behooves us to have Mister Bumbles along, she thought, and almost giggled, and
then she heard a particular buzzing in her mind that almost sounded like
laughter.
“Thank God, he got rid of the hairballs,”
Frances said, just as the third hairball came squishing out of Frederic, this
one the biggest, hairiest, and loudest of all.
“Don’t faint, don’t faint, don’t faint,”
Rooster chanted, and then, oddly enough, he began mumbling: “Marshmallow,
marshmallow, marshmallow...”
“Great mantra,” Frances snarled, kicking at the
Medusa hairball, which was a whole lot more animated and had what looked like
several thick tentacles that were starting to wrap about Rooster’s ankle.
Then Mister Bumbles zoomed in neatly and
snapped up the creature, flying off and expertly disposing of it as he had the
other two, and it was almost as if Frances flew along with him, observing the
entire process. Good bee, she
thought, and heard, almost immediately, good
Soul Mistress, in her head.
“Okay, we need to get him up to the Hot
Springs,” Rooster said, “there’s a little stream about a hundred yards up the
ridge here, we can dump the fake water and get some real water.”
“I want to give him more honey,” Frances
said, attending to Frederic, trying to wipe off his face with her hands, and
was thoroughly disgusted when she plucked a little yellow crab out of his
mouth. She smashed the thing on the stones, and was viscerally pleased with the
crunching noise it made when she stomped upon it.
“No way,” Rooster said. “I doubt he’d survive
that. We’ll get some real water into him, we need to flood him with water, it’s
the best thing, he’s lost a lot of blood, Franny.”
“Please don’t call me Franny,” she snapped,
and then softened. “Here why don’t you let me carry Frederic for a while?”
“I’ve got him, you concentrate on everything
else. Make sure you have the canteen and water bottle, and all the honey vials,
just stuff everything into the backpack. We only have about a mile to go to get
to the Hot Springs.”
“Bake in the sun, bake in the sun,” Frederic
babbled. “Bake, bake in the sun.”
“What did he just say?” Frances asked,
frantically stuffing everything into the backpack, going over the checklist in
her mind, ensuring she wasn’t about to walk off and leave something important.
She struggled into the backpack, retrieved her spear-butt walking stick, and
then snatched up the canteen and water bottle.”
“I think he said he wants us to bake
something in the oven, I don’t know, cookies?” Rooster said.
“Yeah, maybe marshmallow cookies,” Frances
sneered.
“Why marshmallow?” Rooster queried, propping
Frederic over his knee, ascertaining if any hidden hairball Medusas lurked in
the nooks and crannies.
“You were just babbling that,” Frances said,
standing with her hand upon her hip, and her fist clamped on the spear-butt,
looking like an Amazon warrior.
“Yeah, but I got it from you, it’s what you
kept saying last night when you woke up after your dream. You kept repeating
marshmallow, marshmallow, and I don’t know, I just found it kind of, well...comforting.”
“Marshmallow? I wasn’t saying marshmallow,”
she said, shaking her head. No, she had been saying...what? She couldn’t quite
remember. Okay, perhaps it did sound something like marshmallow, that did sound
a little familiar. “I don’t remember.”
“That’s okay, marshmallow is good, it’s
white, mushy, sweet, and doesn’t do a whole lot of harm, what could be better
than that?” Rooster said, grinning, lifting up Frederic in his muscular arms as
easily as if he were carrying a toy poodle.
“It kind of sounds like the old Hank,” Frances
said, starting off up the path.
“Good old Hank,” Rooster said, “good
riddance.” He certainly didn’t miss poor, sad, old Hank.
“That honey gave me so much energy, it’s like
I’ve had a full breakfast,” Frances chirped, and then she looked back and,
walking backwards, she studied Frederic’s face. “Do you think he’s going to be
okay, Rooster?”
“We’ll get some of that fresh water into him,
up here high in the mountains like this, you don’t even have to worry about
amoebas—probably everything like that is the size of a toaster oven, anyway,”
Rooster chuckled.
“That reassuring, I guess,” Frances said,
suddenly feeling low in the spirits again. Being here, it was like flying along
on a rollercoaster, with all the slow parts, and rushing parts, and then the
terror parts, that was life here in High Vale.
“Wait till you try the water, it’s just a bit
up there, that way, just keep heading upward, it’s close,” Rooster said.
“I can see it, I mean, in the maps, yeah, we
are heading right toward the little spring, it’s like an underground river that
breaks through in this one place, and only has enough pressure to bulge up
through the rocks, it’s pretty much pristine water that is constantly churning
and moving. Ooh, I really like this,
it’s an aerial database, like satellite photography, only much, much sharper.
And I can pan anywhich way I choose, nice, ooh, that’s nice, look at that.
Yeah, I wonder why Google hasn’t done this?”
“Done what?” Rooster asked. Come through the
Red Door? Rid themselves of parasites? Participate in a Bee-Wasp War? Protect
the Wee Folk?
“Cameras, you know, on bees, I wouldn’t put
it past them, start mapping the world with bees. Doesn’t that sound like
Google?”
“Yeah, they’re probably doing that, right
now, but we have to remember, I don’t think any of that is real,” Rooster said.
“It’s real,” Frances said, somehow just
knowing it to be true, “only, there
is...less real, compared to here.”
“I guess you could see it that way,” Rooster
said, sounding doubtful. To him, there was real, and there was...not real—there was no less real.
“Don’t be such a boob, Hank, I mean Rooster.
Wouldn’t you say that Narnia is very
real, but less real than Middle Earth?”
“That’s different, it’s fantasy, we know it’s
not real,” Rooster said. He began curling Frederic’s body—he needed the
exercise, at least his absurdly massive muscles did, and it was weird, but it
felt wonderful, exercising. Exercise had certainly been a bore in the other
world—oh, it’s true, he had done some real lifting and curling with a lot of
doughnuts, but with very different results.
“That’s true, but it is a good analogy for
real and less real. You know, I hate fantasy, everything, all of it, Lord of the Rings and Narnia and all the Marvel and DC stuff, I
just go along with it to better understand Frederic. The Matrix was horrible, and all the time-travel movies, I cannot
for the life of me understand why men like that crap so much.”
“What do you like?” Rooster asked.
“War movies. Gangster movies. Kung Fu and
Karate movies. Good guys, outnumbered, overcoming the bad guys. Love that
stuff.”
“Those are all fantasy too, well, except for the
war stuff, but they usually present war in a fantasy way, too. Except for Mel
Gibson, he seems to understand war and reality. Damn, have you seen Hacksaw Ridge? Wow. Now that’s reality
that doesn’t seem real. And We Were
Soldiers Once...and Young—another one that doesn’t seem real, I mean it
couldn’t be, could it? It’s like more proof, you know, of the Simulation
Hypothesis, of Custer’s Last Stand
repeating itself in Vietnam, but with slightly different results. But The Patriot, and Brave Heart, come on, they were great movies, but they were
fantasy, too...”
“Would you stop that! Frederic is not a
dumbell,” Frances snapped, after glancing behind and witnessing Rooster doing
bicep curls with Frederic’s body.
“Barbell,” Rooster said, correcting her, but
respectfully complied with her rational demand, cuddling Frederic close.
Rooster expected that Frederic would understand, and would probably enjoy the
participation as well.
“I loved all of those movies,” Frances said,
dreamily, “especially Hacksaw. He
reminds me of Frederic, I mean Desmond Doss, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, I can see that,” Rooster said, “except
that Frederic is a gun nut. I mean, hell every single American loves guns, we
were hypnotized into loving them ever since we were children and Ayn could get
a pistol into our hands! But Frederic really, really loves guns.”
“That’s true,” she said, but wondered for a
moment, was it true? She seemed to
remember Frederic being afraid of guns. When he accompanied her to practice at
the shooting range, hadn’t he almost shot himself in the foot? But just as
strongly she remembered him confidently explaining the best posture, the best
way to hold the gun, how to aim properly. It was disorienting, but both
memories couldn’t be true, could they?
“You experiencing some double-memories?”
Rooster asked.
“You too?” she instantly shot back.
“Yeah, I’m remembering Frederic as a gun nut,
and kind of as Desmond Doss. They’re messing with us,” Rooster said, picking up
his pace. “The water is right up here.”
“Who is messing with us?” she asked, waiting
for him to catch up to her.
“Whoever does that, I have no idea,” Rooster
said. “We call it The System, and The Abyss.”
“Do you always capitalize the preceding...The?” she asked, grinning.
“No. Yes. I don’t know, really. Sometimes, I
guess, it depends on who is saying it, sometimes we just say Them, or They.”
“Never...The
Them? And The They?”
“That would be kind of weird, don’t ya think?”
he said, as they arrived at the small hole in the rock, which burst up three
feet higher than the rest of the ground, forming a small natural fountain, with
a basin of about two feet of water formed in an almost round pool that was
about three feet across. There was a nice glade of grass all about the
fountain, apparently from seepage, but the ridge was only about twenty feet
wide here, with natural rock walls that went up six feet on either side.
“We should have camped here last night,”
Frances said.
“Maybe,” he said, “but maybe not, as the
waterhole draws all the animals in, especially at night, even if most were out
on the plain eating to their hearts’ content. This is like an oasis in the
desert, except that it is a cold spring in the high mountains, I think there is
a kink in the underground river.”
“Mansplaining,” she said.
“I don’t think it’s mansplaining when you are
thinking out loud, figuring out what is most likely going on below the surface.
So, sexist!”
“Point taken,” she said softly, and almost
giggled.
“But fill the canteen and the water bottle,
and then really, just load up, drink as much as possible, and get as much into
Frederic as you can. This will make all the difference.”
“Water? Really? It’s going to make all the
difference?” Frances said, with some scorn, as it sounded like more conspiracy
theory nutcase nonsense, which she knew their group reveled in. Nonetheless,
she emptied both the canteen and the water bottle onto the grass. Just get rid
of the old-world water, and replace it with this new and improved stuff, yeah,
that’s right, step up folks and get yourself a shiny bottle of this here snake
oil, it’s really good, and can put curls in your hair if you want them, or
straighten your hair if you are sick and tired of all those damned curls.
Rooster began taking handfuls of water in his
cupped hands and cleaning off Frederic’s legs and buttocks, and the spray of
toxic vomit on his arms and chest. He washed the spindly man’s eyes and ears,
and finger-combed the water through his hair.
Then he began splashing the water into his
own face, but taking the water and cleansing himself a few feet removed from
the rock basin.
Frances filled the water bottle, and then she
took a sip, and she sighed. It really did seem that she was being cleansed.
This fresh, cold water, tasted crisp, and agonizingly pure. Her eyes
immediately filled with tears, and she splashed her face, and laughed, and then
upended the bottle above her face and poured water all over herself, it was
glorious, and refreshing, and somehow minty, not the artificially cloying taste
of mint in toothpaste, but when you actually snapped a sprig of mint and
inhaled the herb, the water hit you like this—she came awake, all her senses snapped
alert. She felt her filth melting away from her (from the inside and the
outside), and she gloried in it—feeling almost...holy.
“Try and get some of that water inside
yourself,” Rooster called from the other side of the basin. He finally got down
and put his face in the water and just—guzzled.
There was no drug-like experience with the
water as there was with the honey, but it was very true, she had never tasted
water until she tasted this water, which was effervescent without having
bubbles.
When she sucked the water into her mouth it
was like her teeth had always been on fire, and suddenly, miraculously, the
water put out all this flaming pain, and her mouth knew true peace for the
first time in her existence, in any world. Yes, she would drink this water, she
wanted to bloat herself on this water until her fingers were utterly pruny.
It was like living in a musty, moldy house,
and being entirely used to living in a world without fresh air, and then
suddenly having a rush of clean, virgin oxygen-rich air flood through the
house, knocking her off her feet and flooding her with life.
When she held the bottle up to Frederic’s
lips, at first he coughed, and gagged, but then suddenly he was sucking
greedily at the bottle, nearly inhaling it, so fast did it go down his gullet.
His eyes were fluttering beneath his lids, and his toes began twitching, his
fingers writhing, and then he was clutching the bottle and sucking in the water
so that the water bottle began to collapse in his fingers, until Frances eased
the bottle away from his mouth. She shook the bottle, amazed. He had emptied a
full twenty-two ounces in about ten seconds.
The second full bottle she upended in his
hair, and washed out all the dust and dried vomit, and it looked like even
worse things. In fact, as she studied him, she saw that his lips were chapping
uproariously, it looked like someone had painted his face with paste, and now
this was all dried and peeling away, with deep grooves at the corner of his
eyes, producing the most dramatic crow’s feet. As she washed him a whole lot of
this crustiness smoothed away, and his skin looked newborn in the morning
light.
“I think the water is really helping,” she
said, sounding as excited as she felt, her heart fluttering and her fingers
tingling.
“Wait until we get him into those Hot
Springs, those are really supposed to be magical. I’ve never been there, but I
could certainly use a hot soak.”
She was about to ask him how much farther it
was to the Hot Springs, but then, almost automatically, in her mind she
followed the beeline up the ridge to the caves with the steaming pools of
crystal-clear water, and she was able to judge it at half a mile, but which
included some heavy-duty climbing.
Mister Bumbles was now at the basin, slurping
up water so loudly it sounded like an old and faulty electric sump pump, but
the bee’s contented buzzing was so loud and satisfying that they hardly noticed
the irritating slurping cacophony.
Rooster collapsed in the grass, belly
gurgling, and he sighed, his thirst finally slaked. He lay back in the grasses
and watched the morning sky grow lighter, with the sun just now peeking over
the tall mountains, and all about their high station the music of songbirds
commenced. Even the bird calls were more musical—in fact, he thought he heard
snatches of very real melodies, and then answering birds contributing to the
music, with harmonies, and what sounded like the percussive rat-a-tat-tat of a
large woodpecker.
“Do you hear music playing somewhere?”
Frances asked, sounding enchanted, as she continued to wash away the grime from
Frederic’s skin.
“Believe it or not, I think that’s the birds
waking up in the morning,” Rooster replied, smiling gently as he stared at that
cyan-bright sky.
“This all seems so much like a dream, but
last night, I can remember huge portions of my dream,” Frances said, “and I don’t
usually have dreams, let alone remember them. But I remember this whole
conversation I had with this guy in a toga.”
“You were wearing a toga, or he was, or you
both were in one extra-large toga?” Rooster asked, but she could tell he was
being whimsical so she didn’t even give him a dirty look.
“Funny, but I don’t know what the word marshmallow
had to do with it, but that’s what you heard me saying?” she asked.
“Yeah, but I was groggy, I woke up when
Mister Bumbles snuggled in with you, at least I think so, or that might have
been part of my dream, but I distinctly remember marshmallow. You kept
repeating it, as if you wanted to remember it forever.”
“Marshmallow,” she snorted. “It must have
been a dream.” All of it, just another bizarre cleaning-out of the subconscious
mind, a little maintenance, a little detailing, and voilà, clean as new in the
morning, ready and rarin’ to go. Marshmallow. She thought she had been onto
something there, for a little while. Just let it go.
Rooster excused himself, and left the rocky
ridge to go down about fifty yards to where there was some good vegetation, as
his body was demanding relief, and soon.
Frances drank some more water, and got some
more into Frederic, and then she filled the water bottle again. Rooster was
right, this water was the thing, it was magical, and hey, if you drank enough
of it, it just had to improve things in the body, didn’t it? She would keep
Frederic hydrated, and she would keep hydrating, and she’d get more of this
wonder honey into him. She hoped they had seen the last of the parasites. His
body had to be clear now, didn’t it?
Rooster came jogging up the stony ridge,
looking worried, or at least concerned. It was difficult to tell, to say the
least, with that strange death-metal paint-job on his face.
“We better get a move on, just this last jog
up to the Hot Springs. The caves and pools will be easier to defend,” he said,
gathering their things off the grass, and scooping his arms beneath Frederic.
“What is it? Defend? Is something coming?”
“It’s the things, from yesterday, the first
things, the ones you and the bees and I kept throwing into crevasses.
Apparently they climbed up out of the crevasses and have been following our
trail.”
“Wait,” she said, snatching up the backpack
and following him up into the highlands. “What is it that is coming?”
“The pale thing that looked like a big
jellyfish, the one with tentacles? The thing full of a lot of moving little
things, like bugs? The thing that came out of Frederic and was real small?
Well, it ain’t so small anymore, apparently it was gorging itself on bee
corpses, and now even looks something like a bee, and something like a wasp,
but it’s creeping up the trail, and is not far behind. If we stick around for
about just a few minutes we’ll get to see it, if you really want,” he said,
jogging and somehow keeping Frederic amazingly still in his arms.
Mister Bumbles did looping wide circles above
them, seeming agitated.
“I knew it was too good to be true,” Frances griped.
“Maybe we could catch it back there by the basin, and maybe throw it over the
side?”
“I think it’s a little too big for that,”
Rooster said, maintaining his jog.
“Well tell me, Rooster, how big is it?” she
demanded, realizing that it sounded as if she was setting herself up for the
punchline of a joke.
“Bigger than you and me and Frederic and
Mister Bumbles, all of us together.”
“That big?”
“You didn’t let me finish,” he said.
“Well? Finish!”
“I was going to say that it’s about twice
that big, as big as all of us, and it’s got a lot of legs now too, that’s why
it is coming on so fast,” he said, not sounding all that concerned.
“Do you think it is going to catch up to us
today?” she asked, her heart hammering.
“I guess I’m hoping that we can make it to the
Hot Springs before it catches us.”
“That’s silly,” she said, her breathing
getting ragged, more from fear than all the fresh air and exercise. “There’s
the Hot Springs, I can see them up that steep grade, it’s about one city block
away.”
“Yes,” he said, picking up speed, going from
a jog to a run. “Just don’t look behind you.”
Like Lot’s wife she made the mistake, and
looked back.
© Copyright 2017 Douglas Christian Larsen. Rood Der.
Rood Der — Episode Twelve: Ecstasies Horrific
If you like Rood Der, try
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© Copyright 2017 Douglas Christian Larsen. Rood Der. All Rights Reserved by the Author, Douglas Christian Larsen. No part of this serial fiction may be reproduced (except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews) or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the publisher, Wolftales UNlimited, but please feel free to share the story with anyone, only not for sale or resale. This work is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or historical events, is purely coincidental (wink, wink).
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