The Bodies Of Many Men

The bodies of many men, more than a quick scan could count, hung precariously on a wire with a turbulent backdrop. The sky behind was uneasy, as if a demonic thunderstorm had reset the otherwise peaceful clouds. The pink and red swirls in the crystal blue canopy danced and celebrated as if they were responsible for the reign of terror that had been unleashed on the people below.

Some men just hung there, suspended by an unnatural force, and it seemed to the naked eye that life had already passed from them. Others moved ever so slightly now and then, when a stiff breeze threatened to tumble them to the ground and certain death. A few lucky ones were picking their way over the dead and dying, holding the wires above to keep their balance as they made their way to the pole that could take them to the ground. A woman stood on the ground looking up, multitudes of questions forming, there, but not quite yet.

Sparks flew in the distance, catching her eye, and she turned her head to survey the damage. Snapping and hissing on the ground were a few broken wires from the pole. The eerie sky painted the otherwise green landscape with hues of red and orange, and cast a ghostly glow on the few bodies that littered the ground. Most cars were parked nicely in their spaces, though a few were wrapped around trees and poles.

Groans from the men above pulled her eyes back to the left, where she saw the remains of a bus, a city bus it appeared to be, although the damage was too extensive to tell for sure. The top had been ripped open as if it were a giant can of soup and the bodies of the men who rode it were scattered above on the wires. Most still hung there somehow, although a few had fallen to the ground below.

A low scream turned her gaze back to the men suspended above. She watched in horror as a snake, at least as long as the bus itself, slowly slithered along the wire. It wore an evil grin as it moved toward its next victim. Opening its mouth wide, the serpent swallowed the poor man whole, although he appeared to have already passed from life. The man disappeared within a second or two, and left no mark of his existence behind, not even a bulge in the snake’s belly.

It promptly closed its mouth and moved on to the next man on the pole, and swallowed him whole in much the same way. As the men saw it approaching, they scrambled closer to the pole if they were able. Although it moved along at a leisurely, almost lazy pace, his feasting was very swift, taking only seconds apiece, and each man disappeared as the last, with no trace.

One man, being unable to stand, saw the snake coming for him and jumped from the wire to the ground below. It was a long fall, and he hit with a sickening thud that hardly gave promise of survival. The snake followed, landing as soft as a feather, and swallowed the man with the same ease as the others.

Surrealism faded quickly and the reality of it all formed in her mind as the snake finished his last meal and looked straight at her. It closed its mouth and began to close the distance between them. She took off in a run, desperate to get to her family before the monster did.

Several blocks later she ran to her doorstep and glanced behind her. The snake was nowhere to be seen. She dragged her three children to the family car, and tried to start the car as she waited for her husband to join her. She turned the key over and over again in desperation, but the car would not start.

Her husband pulled to the curb beside their house in a car she had not seen before. It was an old wagon, rusty on the panels, and very small. She ordered the children to the wagon and jumped in the passenger seat herself. The three children barely fit in the back seat, and had to sit half on top of each other. One decided to sit in the back, where the trunk normally would have been, and freed up more room in the seat. They took off at a break-neck speed, just as the snake crossed the road to their block. She sat in the seat, sweating and worrying as they sped past block after block of destruction and confusion.

As the husband drove slowly through a particularly devastated intersection, she looked to the right to see her mother standing over a car arguing with someone. She yelled at the husband to stop, but he continued on, a grim look on his face. She screamed and railed against him, and urged him to return. He tried to ignore her pleas, and she was confused that her otherwise gentle and loving man would not return for her mother.

They sat in tense silence for a while, until they came to a fork in the road. One way lead to relative safety, the other up a mountain road that circled around back to the town. She sobbed and shrieked until he gave in to her demands and made the turn to the right, up the ominous road to the mountains.

The snow was heavy, and the road hardly traveled. The old wagon sputtered and slipped along, barely staying on the ice-encrusted road.