NO BEARS ARE OUT TONIGHT

Copyright (c) 2019 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

NO BEARS ARE

OUT TONIGHT

By R. Peterson

We didn’t get many social calls to Burning Springs, the dirt-pile end of Clay County. Our neck-o-the-woods was so named because the stinky natural gas leaking into our creek could be ignited by a brawling muffler or by a tossed-away cigarette. This bit of deep woods witchery kept most folks sipping moonshine or tanking-in their drinking and washing water from some luckier spot in Kentucky. Those who drank the bad water were never the same.

I was happy to see all my relatives come raining-in the night before Thanksgiving. It had been powerful lonesome ever since Mary Louise and Henry David left. Papa said my brother and sister had growed into shoes …and moved off to school in the town. I had a baby brother or sister in Mama’s stomach … but he or she wouldn’t arrive until after Christmas.

Most all pa’s kin hitched themselves rides and then walked or crawled the seven miles from Manchester, but not Uncle John. He and his entire family, plus two dogs and a goat named Franklin, arrived piled onto the back of a barely-smoking Ford truck that papa swore wasn’t yet ten years old.

John Winston Clempshaw didn’t seem to take on any looky-heres. He hoisted up his store-bought britches and kicked at the chickens just like the rest of us.  We all stared at his spilling-over passel of young-ones wondering how it would feel to be so rich.

Mama was cooking a half dozen chickens for tomorrow’s dinner and she was getting plenty of help. I followed her to her special spot behind the barn right after she ran out the back door. She was crying and Papa was trying to coax her back inside. “There are too many cooks in my kitchen,” she said.

“There are too many hands on my plow,” Papa said. “But we host this gathering for our kin every year and there’s certain things that must be done.”

After a spell they went back inside.

Our house wasn’t big and it was getting dark when a couple of my uncles suggested us kids all play outside. “We grown-ups need to talk.”

“You can’t play games at night!” My cousin Ermine bawled.

“Sure you can!” Uncle Jack smiled. “Ever hear of No Bears Are out Tonight?”

“I want to play!” Mary Jane and Sue Ellen both squealed.

“You have to be shoe wearing age to play this game,” Uncle John snorted.

There were moans from the kids all around. I took Tommy Lee Clempshaw and my other cousins to a special box on the back porch. I don’t know why Mary Louise and Henry David left all their clothes behind when they went off to school … but they did. With help from some cotton balls we clomped back into the kitchen wearing shoes. Mine were Saturday night shoes, and they made me a whole-inch taller.

The grownups all laughed when they saw us, but I demanded they tell us how to play the No Bears game. Momma started crying and I heard her tell Papa “She’s too young!”

I begged and pleaded and Papa finally threw up his arms and said “Let her go!”

-------2-------

            We walked past the barn and into the orchard like we were told to do. I was the biggest so I went first. “No bears are out tonight,” I sang. “Daddy shot ‘em all last night!”

            “You sure he shot ‘em all?” Tommy’s eyes were as big as truck lights and he had ahold of my dress and wouldn’t let go. He kept gawking into the trees and after a while he had me and Sue Ellen both catching the creepers.

            “I didn’t hear any shooting last night,” I told them. “But the night before, Papa brought home a squirrel for our gravy.”

I sang again when we got close to the bridge. This time I made them both sing along. “No bears are out tonight … Daddy shot ‘em all last night!”

We weren’t supposed to cross the bridge, that land belonged to Grandma Moses and Mama said that Papa’s mother didn’t like kids pestering her at nighttime … even if they was kin.

We sang the song one more time just as we started back. We was just into the part where daddy shoots them all when we heard a snorting sound come at us from the ditch bottom. Tommy and I were too scared to scream, so Sue Ellen screamed enough for all. Whatever was chasing behind us smelled awful, like an outhouse that hasn’t seen lime for three years. I tried to look but all I could see was something big and black hunched over and occasionally running on all fours. I kicked off my shoes and so did Sue Ellen but Tommy wasn’t so lucky. He had on a pair of lace-up boots with plenty of cotton stuffed up inside and they made his feet get all tangled up. He fell and I was too scared to go back for him.

            I heard him scream my name “Ludenia!” just as we reached the back porch. I looked over my shoulder and saw the black thing lift him into the air … then we were back in the house.

-------3-------

            “A bear got Tommy!” Sue Ellen was bawling when we ran into the kitchen.

            “It did?” Uncle John and the others looked surprised but I saw smiles on their faces when they looked at each other. “Was it a bear?”

            “Was it a great big bear?” Uncle Jack was making his eyes big.

            “I couldn’t tell,” I said. “It was big and black and it carried him off!”

Uncle Jack slapped Papa on the back. “You sure you shot all those bears last night?”

            “I might have missed a few,” Papa said looking at the floor and trying not to smile.

Several of my older cousins seemed to know what was going on and they wanted in. “I’ll play!” Ben and his brother Dan both volunteered.

While the boys got ready, there was lots of talk about killer bears and such … they almost didn’t go.

            “Are you going with them, Ludenia?” Papa was looking at me and all I could remember was that big black shape and the smell. “Not this time,” I told him.

-------4-------

            Mama made ginger bread men while we waited for the boys to come back. Each one was as big as my hand and they smelled delightful when they came out of the oven. Mama sat the pans on the table to cool. Several of my cousins commented that it had been a long time and Ben and Dan still hadn’t returned. No grownups seemed to take any notice.

Finally Papa walked over to Mama and I could see him whisper in her ear. “No,” she bawled. I could see tears in her eyes. She didn’t look at me for a long time and when she did she looked like a ghost.

            “I need frosting for these ginger bread men,” she told me. Momma’s was a crying voice. “I’m out of sugar. Will you go borrow a cup from Grandma Moses?”

I didn’t want to go but when my cousins learned they could each have a frosted ginger bread man to eat tonight they drove me crazy with their begging.

Mama hugged me so tight … she almost forgot to give me the cup.

            “Take Sue Ellen with you,” Papa said when I was ready to leave.

-------5-------

            “It’s all part of their game they’re just trying to scare us,” I told Sue Ellen as we walked past the barn. I was making myself brave. We were supposed to sing the song right off but I held back. I figured this was a signal for Uncle John or whoever was wearing the bear coat to come out and chase us.

I’d never crossed the bridge at night. The moon was out but it was wearing clouds. Grandma Moses was stuck in a wheel-chair and usually had a blanket covering her head and body when she got pushed by one of her sons to family gatherings. I only remembered her face from very old pictures. She had a big nose with a wart on one side. Her eyes were black and what teeth she had was yellow.

As soon as we clomped over the bridge I started to sing. “No bears are out tonight …. Daddy shot ‘em all last night.”

My trick almost worked. The smell and the big black thing come up out of the canal on the other side of the bridge going the wrong way just as I planned but I wasn’t counting on how fast it could run. I held Sue Ellen’s hand and we tore through a corn patch and past a leaning rock-well. There was a bucket there full of water and I almost knocked it over. If we could make it to Grandma’s porch we’d be safe. That was the rules of the game.

I could see a tiny light from one of her windows probably just a penny candle. Papa bragged his mother was half-bat and could see in the dark. I thought we’d get onto the porch safe, but the black thing tore Sue Ellen out of my arms just before the first step. It reached for me too … but I twisted away.

-------6-------

            My heart was hammering and my breath was gone. I jumped inside Grandma Moses’s fallen down porch and found the front door locked. I looked behind but whatever took Sue Ellen must have slipped into the corn patch. I pounded on the door. There were clothes piled in one corner and I saw a dress just like the one Mary Louise used to always wear. It took a bunch of knocking before the latch finally moved … and the door opened.

            I pushed my way inside, the first thing I noticed was that same smell … I wanted to gag. The light from the penny candle in the kitchen made everything into shadows. One large black shape blocked out the light from the kitchen. It was moving away from me on feet … not on wheels.  Outside a dirty window, the clouds moved away from the moon and I could almost see. I blinked my eyes several times to be sure I was really standing barefoot on a carpet of bones. They weren’t from chickens; they were too large. They might have come from pigs … but I didn’t think so. I could see the empty wheelchair standing in a corner and I gasped.

The dark shape snorted then turned and came back. The hand that dug into my shoulder and tore my dress had claws or talons like a large bird.

I forgot about the sugar … I dropped the cup and I ran.

THE END ???

PLAYING CARDS

Copyright (c) 2019 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

PLAYING CARDS

By R. Peterson

          I stopped at the Dollar Tree on my way home for work. I needed pop and I was getting low on money.  Everything in the store was a dollar or less. Santana’s Black Magic Woman was playing softly from hidden speakers. I bought two large bottles of Shasta Cola and a bag of chips and was almost to the checkout counter when I remembered tonight was poker night and I was supposed to bring a new deck of cards. I found the place on the shelf where playing cards were usually kept but it was empty.

“Can I help you?”  The store employee startled me. Her skin was so dark it seemed to swallow light, and her head was completely bald … or shaved to look that way. Her face looked like two Wint-O-Green Lifesavers staring at you from the bottom of a burglar’s bag. The brilliant white dress she wore, printed with tiny flying ravens, galvanized the contrast and the twenty gallons of Sun Shine perfume she’d bathed-in before work … made my senses reel.

            “I’m looking for some playing cards,” I told her, “but it looks like you’re out.”

            “We’re out of the Bicycle brand,” she said looking behind several packages of poker chips and baseball trading cards, “but I thought we had one deck of off brand here someplace.” I looked at my watch. It was getting late and I needed to eat and shower before I went to Larry’s. It was a forty-five minute drive along the ocean with two lane traffic and a cliff on one side. There was another store I could try, but I didn’t want to be rushed getting to the game.

            “I’m kind of in a hurry,” I told her. “I’ll come back another time.”

I had just started to walk away when she laughed. Her hands moved so fast I thought for a moment she was grabbing an animal. I thought it was a cat. I realized I’d been holding my breath and I let it out. “There you are, Ouanga! You can’t hide from Boko!”

She tossed me a package of cards. MARIONETTE plastic-coated playing cards the cellophane-sealed box read. I’d never heard of them … but for a buck I didn’t need to.

            “Thank you,” I told her, handed over the cash, grabbed my purchases and scampered.

-------2-------

            Larry Conner had held Thursday night poker games at his house for the past three years. I had lost money at most of them, but never a fortune. “Ten dollars!” Thelma yelled as I walked out the door with the two bottles of cola in my hand. “You write a check to cover a bet and I’ll toss your body in the river!”

            “Even if I win?” I called over my shoulder. We’d been married five years; I knew her answer.

            “Especially if you win!” She smiled.

We had an agreement, Thursday night was my night out with the boys but the amount I could spend including my soda and snacks was fifteen dollars. Thelma had the same fifteen dollar limit when she went bowling or to a movie with her sisters. It was our way of budgeting money … and it worked usually.

            Larry was on his second beer and Chuck and David were counting out poker chips and placing them in neat piles in front of the four chairs spread around the kitchen table. The blue chips were a dollar, red ones fifty cents and the white ones a quarter. The pile in front of my chair was the smallest. Everyone knew about my budget.  I knew my way around. The new pack of playing cards felt oddly cold as I took them from my coat pocket and dropped them in front of Chuck. Larry was the bank so I handed him my ten dollars.  By the time I opened the bag of chips and poured them into a bowl, Chuck had three glasses filled with ice and David was filling them with my cola and a shot of his bottle of Jack Daniels.

Larry had the cellophane off the new cards and was removing the jokers. I stared at the cards. They looked like black cats dressed in human clothing and they appeared to be moving.

Larry started talking like an Indian, something he had a habit of doing when he was drunk. “Me think white man get plenty drunk from whiskey … lose squaw and teepee to brave warrior who drink-em beer!”

            “Not a chance,” Chuck told him as he took a drink.

“Are these cards marked?” Larry scowled as he expertly shuffled the deck with silicone slick movements. I could see he was staring at the dancing marionette that covered the back of each card. Something didn’t seem right; I blinked my eyes as he slammed the shuffled cards down on the table. The marionette on the top card was staring at me with violent beady eyes. I was afraid of him and he knew it. The marionette smiled as he lifted one of his legs and I could see a backward 4 and a red shape behind him.

            “Of course,” I blurted and my voice cracked. “But they came from the dollar store so they don’t tell you how.” I was beginning to think I was having a flashback from the acid I took in college.

They all laughed when I got up and splashed cold water on my face from the sink. “Got something in my eye,” I explained”

            “Poor baby crying cause he knows he’s going to lose his ten bucks!” Chuck teased.

            “All playing cards are marked at the factory,” David said ignoring me and pulling the top card from the deck. He flashed it to everyone. It was the four of diamonds. “You just have to know what to look for.”

            “Is that why you spilled your drink on the cards last week so we wouldn’t know you used them to lose eighty bucks to me and Larry?” Chuck and Larry both laughed as Chuck took the card from David and shuffled again.

            “Last week was a mistake … Tonight I’m feeling lucky,” David said as he reached over and cut the cards.

Chuck Burgess looked around the table and then smiled. “Five card stud,” he said then dealt each of us three cards.

I wasn’t aware of anything terribly wrong until I looked at my hand: the seven of diamonds, king of hearts and 4 of clubs and then glanced across the table. Chuck picked his three cards off the table and spread them out about three inches in front of his nose. The dancing marionettes on the backs of the cards were gone. It looked like the cards had been printed on clear plastic and I could see through them to the face. It was like looking into a mirror. Everything was reversed, but I could tell what the cards were: a six of clubs and two queens. I looked at the cards David and Larry were holding and they were also transparent. Two, three, five for Larry, possible straight in mixed suits and David was holding a pair of nines watched over by the jack of diamonds. The jack of diamonds winked at me. “Don’t you see that,” I blurted pointing to Chuck’s cards.

            “See what?” He said as he tossed a blue chip in the center of the table. “You want to look at my hand, you got to pay!”

I looked wildly around the table. Was I the only one who could see something was wrong with the cards?

            “It ain’t going to be me … I fold,” Larry said. He lay his cards face down on the table and I could still read them. Then he got up and refilled his glass with cola.

I looked at David. He had his poker face on and it was impossible to read but I could still see the two nines and the jack. “I’m in,” he said as he tossed in a blue chip.

Both of them were looking at me like I was a lit firecracker. A thousand thoughts ran through my mind in the few seconds that I stared at my hand. I could see myself winning, but that would be cheating. I’d never had a big night. I should tell everyone what I’m seeing but they’ll think I’ve flipped. Once I came home with eight dollars extra and I felt like a king. I usually always surrendered my ten dollars to someone else. Maybe tonight was my night. There was something magical about these cards and also something dangerous but only I could see it. I had nothing, but I still threw in a blue chip.

            “There’s a sucker born every minute!” Chuck smiled as he dealt us each another card.

I drew the six of hearts and I couldn’t help looking at what Chuck and David had. Chuck drew a six of diamonds. He now had two pair Queens and sixes and David drew the nine of clubs … he had three nines.

“Last card,” Chuck bellowed. He tossed in another blue chip. “But it’s going to cost you suckers another buck to see my hand.”

I folded. I was thinking about going home early. I could tell everyone I had a headache. “Too rich for Mr. Rockefeller here?” Chuck laughed and everyone laughed with him.

David threw in his blue chip and then threw in five more. “I’ll raise you,” he said.

Chuck smiled and counted out five blue chips and added them to the pile. “What’s that saying?” he chuckled. “A fool and his money are soon parted?”

Chuck dealt the last two cards. He ended up with a boat: two Queens and three sixes. I could see him biting his lip to keep from smiling. David drew another nine. I wanted to gasp but didn’t …. Four of a kind will beat anything except a Royal Flush! His face was like a brick.

            “Let’s make this interesting,” Chuck said. He counted out twenty five blue chips from his pile and tossed them into the pot.

            “I’ll go for that,” David said, “and raise you another twenty five.” Both my friends had to buy more blue chips from Larry.

Chuck moaned and David rose from his chair dancing around the table when the cards were turned over. David made the mistake of slapping my head when he gyrated past. “That’s how you win kid!” he chortled.

I forgot about going home early with a headache. Luck only comes around once to most people sometimes not at all!

            “Let’s play some cards I told them as I sat back down at the table.

I won a few hands but still played cautious. I was waiting for Acey Deucey where the pots sometimes get enormous. The rules are simple. The dealer lays down two cards and the player bets up to the amount in the pot that the next card will fall between them. If the first two cards are an ace and a duce the chances of the next card coming between them are very good hence the name of the game. However if the ace or the duce should appear then you lose. Chuck went first. He drew an eight and a three and bet fifty cents. He lost when the next card came up a jack.

            The game went on until all the cards were gone from the deck. Larry won twelve dollars when a seven came up between a queen and a three. Chuck lost eighty bucks when an ace came up between a three and a king.

I looked up once and I swore I saw the marionette from the back of the cards peering in through the kitchen window. We were playing a game but he was playing with us.

            It was late. We’d shuffled the deck at least five times and there was twenty-five hundred dollars in the pot including the title to Chuck’s pickup. Larry dealt me the ace of hearts and the two of spades. I didn’t want to look at the next card … but I did. The card waiting to be drawn was the Ace of spades. “Pass,” I said.

            “Are you crazy?” Chuck said. “That’s why you never win!” He wrote a check for fifty- five hundred dollars and tossed it in the pot. “I might have to call my bank in the morning, but the money will be there!” You could tell he had no intention of losing.

            “That’s a lot of money,” I told him. “Better think about it.” Chuck Higley was a truck driver that lived paycheck to paycheck. He had two boys at home with muscular dystrophy and his wife had recently been diagnosed with cancer. He was in for a rough time at the bank.

            “Everything is a gamble in life, kid,” he told me. “There is a price for everything and if you don’t take chances you never go anywhere.”

I didn’t want to look when Larry drew the Ace. The silence in the room could have wakened the dead. “Bad luck man,” was all anyone could say to Chuck as they continued the game. Three deals later Larry, David and I ended up splitting the pot. I could tell they felt bad … we all did.

            “Let me get some things out of my truck … er your truck and I’ll call my wife to come get me.” Chuck’s voice was just above a whisper. He had been silent as a mouse.

            “Don’t worry about it,” David said not looking Chuck in the eye. “Drive it home … we’ll settle up later.”

            “There is no later,” Chuck said as he walked outside.

We were all surprised when we heard the gunshot. At least we know what Chuck had to get out of his truck.

I stuck around until the police and the ambulance left. There was nothing anyone could do for Chuck. He’d shot himself in the head with a 44 magnum.

            “Don’t forget your cards,” Larry told me just as I was leaving. It was near morning. I felt guilty. One of my friends was dead and I was leaving the game nine hundred dollars richer. How was I going to explain this to Thelma?

The Marionette plastic coated playing cards were back in the box but I still didn’t want to touch them. I imagined the dancing puppet on the box biting my fingers as I picked up the box. When I climbed in my car my hand was bleeding.

            I intended to throw the cards in the ocean on the way home. I parked on a pullout next to a cliff and gazed down at the surf breaking on jagged rocks a good two-hundred feet below me. The sun was rising and the box was open when I pulled it from my pocket. The king of spades had somehow slipped from the deck and was lying on top.

The black figure on the card turned and spoke to me. His eyes looked into mine and I knew I was captured. I was powerless to resist what he told me I must do. There is a price for everything I thought as I walked to the cliff edge and then closed my eyes. There were strings moving my arms and legs. The wind felt like a hurricane as I jumped and it rushed past my face.

I left the cards on a bench.

I hope nobody finds them … but I think they will.

THE END ???

FAST FOOD

Copyright (c) 2019 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

FAST FOOD

By R. Peterson

            I was tired. It was just past 10 PM, and there were still many miles to drive before I got to Cleveland. My eyes hurt and every oncoming car refused to dim their high-beams. That’s the only excuse I can come up with for turning off highway 105 and onto a dirt road. All I wanted was to find a motel with semi-friendly cockroaches no larger than my size twelve shoes, grab a burger and crash for the night. I’d been listening to KNRR FM blasting out golden oldies from a few decades earlier. The drummer for Golden Earring was just edging into a drum solo when the radio-signal became a hurricane of static.

            It was as if I lost thirty seconds. I felt the car begin to slow and the next thing I knew I was making a right turn onto a graveled cow-path. The full moon silhouetted several dark and large shapes moving in a pasture. I prayed they were only cows.

Sure I was happy when the static ended and Rinus Gerritsen began thumping out the base lines to Radar Love but all I could do was beat my fist on the dash and yell “What the #&%$!”

The pounding caused my overflowing ash tray to spill cigarette butts onto the floorboards. I was driving a rental car and I couldn’t remember if the rental contract required the car to be returned in a clean condition as well as un-damaged. Both front tires slammed into a large hole in the cow path and I heard the muffler scrape the ground as we bounced out. The engine wasn’t noisy now, but it was going to be if I didn’t get back on the highway.

 Irrigation ditches ran on both sides of a road barely big enough for one car and I had to keep going to find a place where I could turn around. Five minutes later I found myself following at least three other cars and I still didn’t know where I was going.

Finally one of the ditches veered sharply to the left and the other kept going straight at a place where dozens of cars were stopping. I could see lots of flashing lights just beyond a group of trees and my first thought was some kind of rock concert or other night-time gathering. Most of the colors I could identify … at least two I’d never seen before. How can you describe a color no one has ever seen?

A pretty blonde girl, right out of Woodstock in 1969, wearing a vest and beads, stood with her arm extended pointing to a row where cars were parking and I stopped to ask her where the hell I was.

I rolled down the window, started to speak and then stopped. Something was not right with the girl’s face. She smiled every five seconds like clockwork but her skin and eyes looked like they belonged on a mannequin. She didn’t seem real and I was beginning to wonder if any of this was. I was going to turn around but I noticed at least a dozen cars behind me. One of the cars began honking his horn when I hesitated so I found an empty slot and parked.

-------2-------

I noticed the smell when I opened the car door. Heads shops that sold drug paraphernalia were a big thing when I was in high school. My buddies and I would spend hours looking at pipes, papers and strolling through the dark rooms where black-light posters showed you what glow in the dark colors could do to your mind. But that was many years and a life left behind.

Smoking pots of what smelled like vanilla incense lined both sides of a path that led into the trees. The smell was strong and at first I tried to cover my mouth and then I wondered why. I followed dozens of others walking toward the brilliant lights. Nobody was talking. Suddenly I was high and I hadn’t been stoned since my last year in college. Any fear I’d felt when I first turned off the highway evaporated as we came out of the woods into a large clearing. A lovely stream wound through a large grassy area filled with wildflowers and with a glistening pond at one end. I felt good, ready to accept anything … even the large metallic monstrosity that hovered just above the center of the subdued and gaping crowd.

-------3-------

I didn’t realize I was looking at a UFO … not at first. The massive forty-foot wide hunk of rusted metal hovering just above the water looked like the lid off from an oversized pressure cooker, the kind my mother used to can beans in when I was a kid. The elevator-sized glass cylinders on top could have been vent pipes and pressure regulators. Two concentric rows of openings covered the bottom of the craft and flames sputtered and crackled from some of them like the exhaust on a car with bad spark plugs. A stronger smell overpowered the vanilla incense and the closest I can come to describing it was the smell of coal oil being burned in a poor neighbors’ house when I was a kid. If this was an alien craft, their technology left much to be desired.

I was dazed and obedient. My eyes saw things that my brain refused to register. It was as if my mind was being controlled by someone or something else.

-------3------

A line was forming behind a ramp that led into the bottom of the craft. If I could have ran I would have. My conscious brain was working, but my subconscious the part of your mind that makes you walk, talk, run and scream was not. Two creatures right out of a B grade horror movie stood next to the stream and several looped cables dangling from the bottom of the craft.

The closest I can come to describing the aliens was that they were vaguely similar to bovines in their appearance. The creatures stood on two legs and where a cow’s hoofs would have appeared on their upper arms … flattened ovals of malleable flesh conformed like tools to any desired shape.

One of the creatures expertly stripped the clothes off a middle aged woman standing at the front of the line with what looked like a curved bone with razor blades attached to one side. The other alien laid her head across a tree stump and decapitated her with one quick motion of a similar but much larger weapon. This was all done in complete silence but I heard her scream in my mind.

When I was in Junior High School we took a field trip to a butcher shop. Seeing an animal butchered was bad … seeing a human butchered by animals is even worse. The first alien attached the poor woman’s legs to a cable loop and her headless and naked torso was hoisted into the air. The cut from her crotch to the upper part of her chest was clean and efficient. With several quick movements the intestines and other organs spilled into the water. A blue light glowed and a door opened in the bottom of the craft. Suddenly I could suddenly see my breath. It was like artic air had invaded our summer night. One hundred and twenty pounds of meat was hoisted into a sub-zero compartment in the ship and then the door closed and a new cable descended.

What I was seeing was a butcher’s assembly line for carnivorous aliens with a taste for human flesh. Inside my body I was screaming but I watched dozens of humans being butchered without making a sound. My only movement, other than blinking my eyes, was to take two steps forward each time the line shortened.

-------4-------

I can’t say how many humans were in the line ahead of me … I would have to guess dozens. The stream running through a meadow of wildflowers was a frothing dark crimson with various floating organs glowing under the moonlight by the time I reached the front of the line.

My life was over and I was about to be put in cold storage to be eaten at a later date and I was powerless to do anything about it. It was there at what appeared to be the end of my life that I suddenly saw everything clearly. An almost opaque lens had been removed from my eyes and I could look at the world as it really is, not as how I perceive it to be.

For the first time I understood people as if we were actually brothers and sisters. When you truly know people you neither hate nor revere them. The fact that we are not alone in the universe, that we are mere food to some species, brings us together.

I don’t mean to say that I wasn’t afraid. We all fear the unknown. The interstellar food-chain must be very large indeed. That these creatures used some sort of aromatic substance to render us humans all incapable of resistance showed a high level of technology but the rusty and battered craft that they arrived on this world in would make even the dorkiest disciple of science fiction dump his Cheetos on the floor.

-------5-------

The first creature reached out to me with his bone knife intending to remove my clothes when another light went on. This time it was one of the new colors I can’t describe. The second creature shrugged what for him passed as shoulders and they began to gather up equipment. The hippy chick who had been directing cars to park scurried past me and up the ramp as if she had wheels for feet. She did. Just before she disappeared into the bottom of the craft her clothing fell away and I could tell she was a robot. The smoking pots of incense were stuck to her frame as if magnetized.  She was no more than a rusty collection of rods and gears attached to a remote control device that allowed her to become a coat hanger for 1960’s apparel.

We were forgotten. The aliens didn’t even glance at me or the half dozen people in line behind. This was all just a fast food stop on a cosmic highway. Evidently the freezers were full and the travelers were leaving.

-------6-------

When the fuming pots of incense disappeared into the craft I began to get feeling back in my arms and legs but the sensation was slow in coming. Not so with others. With a rumble, a hot air blast, and a smell like dozens of badly tuned semi-trucks starting up in a truck stop parking lot at the same time the rusty space ship lifted into the air.

Blistering hear from a dozen engines turned several of the people in line behind me into charcoal statues. I was send flying backward through the air where I landed in the pond at the other side of the clearing.

When I crawled out of the water minutes later the spaceship was gone. I wasn’t the only survivor. I heard at least two human vehicles start up and race down the dirt path toward the highway.

I was too sick to walk and must have passed out walking back to the rental car. I don’t remember the cops or the ambulance arriving.

-------7-------

This is at least the fourth time I’ve told the story, not exactly the same each time as you’ve pointed out, but my mind isn’t exactly working properly. I doubt that it ever will. I know you don’t believe me. The smiles of the officers standing behind you in the interrogation room are a dead give-away. We’ve been here for hours.

 I wonder if you really went to get a drink from the vending machine or you’re consulting with the other officers about what to do with me. A mental hospital? I don’t know if I can handle that.

I’ve decided that when you return I’ll tell you something that you can believe … something to put an end to the endless questions … and hopefully to my nightmare. There has to be a plausible reason for the stream filled with bloody intestines … and all the missing people and the abandoned cars. I really need a drink.

I’m so sorry. My mind is returning to what passes for normal ….

There was a small army of armed Muslim terrorists in an old rusty school bus. I think they were ISIS! They detoured dozens of cars off the highway. They were burning, butchering and gutting infidels in the name of their god Allah.

It was lucky … that I escaped.

 No, I didn’t get a license number ….

THE END ?

FAMILY TREE Marks

Copyright (c) 2019 by Randall R. Peterson ALL RIGHTS RESERVED This is a work of fiction. All persons, locations and actions are from the author's imagination or have been used in a fictitious manner.

FAMILY TREE

“MARKS”

By R. Peterson

Pangaea …about three-hundred and eighty-million, six-hundred and twenty-eight thousand, seven-hundred and sixty-three sunrises ago …

            Gawa was worried, the gatherers had been gone for more than a hand’s fingers of sun widths and it was starting to get dark. The cave they had found the summer before alongside the river provided good shelter and a natural hole in the high ceiling allowed smoke from the fire to escape but food was beginning to be harder to find. She wrapped rabbit furs around her son and pulled He Who Stares next to her. He was more than two finger hands of seasons but still seemed like a baby, although he could talk better than most of his grown elders. “I love you mama,” he murmured.

While the other children of the cave spent time walking along the stream trying to knock fish from the water with sticks or pretending they were leading gatherers into the forest and making cuts on the trees with sharpened rocks to guide everyone back, her son was content to sit in the cave and watch as others worked. He would spend hours running his fingers over the grass baskets the women had weaved or endlessly examine the thin strips of dried flesh that joined furs together. He seldom went farther than ten steps from the cave, other than to watch others work

When the others in the cave first began to call him He Who Stares she had dragged her son to the river and placed him among the other children. His cries brought her back a short time later. With a head that was much larger than his body and legs like tiny sticks he was soon knocked to the ground and scorned by the others. “He is like a baby who never grows,” the son of Gorb declared. “He should be left in the forest when the cold comes.”

-------2-------

Gawa was almost asleep when a noise woke her and He Who Stares. Two women were struggling over a woven basket. “Give it to me, it is mine!” Juka said, shaking the basket and trying to dislodge it from her sister’s hands.

“It is mine,” Tona screamed. “I set it here when I went to the stream!”

He Who Stares left his mother’s arms and staggered toward the fighting women. He pointed to the basket. “This is the basket that Juka wove,” he said.

            “The basket’s all look the same,” Tona said. “How would a stupid boy like you know?”

            “Juka always pulls the stem to the outside before she starts a new row,” He Who Stares lifted the basket and showed the tiny stems protruding from the outside of the basket. “You always tuck your stems to the inside.”

            “I haven’t thought about that before … but you do,” Juka said taking the basket from He Who Stares.

            “Then who has taken my basket?” Tona demanded.

            “I watched you carry the basket with you when you went to drink water,” Oona, Gorb’s mate said. “You must have left it by the stream!”

Minutes later Tona returned from the stream carrying her own basket. She refused to make eye contact with anyone. Gawa smiled. Her son might have a too large head but he noticed details that no one else in the cave did.

-------3-------

It was fully dark and Gawa stood with the others at the entrance to the cave. They had built up the fire so that any wandering in the darkness might see it and find their way. It was dangerous for anyone to be away from the safety of the cave at night. When the moon rose from the horizon and began to cross the sky everyone had a feeling of doom. The gatherers had been gone too long. Many large animals hunted at night and a few crude clubs and sharpened sticks were no match for claws and razor sharp teeth.

Suddenly when the moon was almost directly overhead a cry came from Oona. The cave leader and four others stumbled out of the trees. Gawa and the other women moaned and a few fell to the ground and began to thank God. But the gatherers no longer carried the woven baskets they had been sent to fill. “What happened?” A relieved Oona asked when the group reached the safety of the fire. “Did you not use the marks?”

“We followed the marks to the clearing in the trees five sun widths from this cave.” Gorb said. “Many strangers had been to the streams gathering berries and roots also. When our baskets were filled we found that the trees were cut with marks in all directions. We are not the only ones who use the cuts in bark to find our way.” Gorb hung his head as if ashamed at what happened. “We followed the marks that we thought were ours and we came to a large camp of Zutoos. They had many clubs with cutting edges. They took our filled baskets from us and started to bind our hands to the trunks of trees.”

Gawa and the other women gasped. They had all heard stories about how the Zutoos sometimes raided camps and took prisoners. They traded the captives to other peoples for use as slaves. Those taken were force to gather every day all day long with only enough to eat to keep themselves alive. Everyone was glad the gathers had escaped but now the family would go hungry unless the gatherers could go back again tomorrow and return with filled baskets. The sudden quiet prompted Gorb to continue his story.

“Todar bit their leader’s hand and knocked him to the ground.” Everyone stared at Todar … and he smiled. “In the confusion we ran. Some of them followed but it was getting dark and they turned back. It was hard to see the marks in the dark and then we had to wait until the moon crossed the sky before we could see them at all! We found other marks in the moonlight and followed them back here!”

Oona hugged her mate. “We will return to the clearing tomorrow and once again fill our baskets,” Todar said. “We must have food!”

Gorb shook his head. “It is too dangerous. We must leave this cave and find a new place. We cannot find our way through the woods when so many people make marks.”

Gawa and the others were saddened. The cave was warm and it provided the family a good place to live. But the family must have food to live and the marks they made in the trunks of trees to find their way no longer worked. Everyone around the fire went to sleep very sad … and also hungry.

-------4-------

            It was early in the morning when Gorb directed the family members to start gathering their belongings. It would be a long day and maybe many days before they could find another place to live. He only hoped that they could find things to eat on the way.

Todar shook his head when he looked at the large stack of wood he had helped gather just inside the entrance to the cave. It had taken most of the summer to drag and stack. “Leave it,” Gorb ordered. “We will have to find more when we reach our new home.”

“Everyone is hungry, maybe we should send another group to gather at the clearing, Juka suggested.

Gorb shook his head. “We cannot tell whose marks we follow in the forest. They all look the same. If we find our way to the camp of the Zutoos we will never return.”

He Who Stares was helping his mother gather their belongings. “The marks are all different,” he said. “When someone cuts a tree with a sharpened stone he does it different than anyone else!”

Gorb scoffed. “A mark is a mark. No one can tell who made it!”

            “I can,” He Who Stares said. “Follow me to the practice tree and I will show you.”

            “He Who Stares showed us that each basket we weave is different,” Juka told him. “Maybe it is the same for the marks you leave on trees.”

-------5-------

Gawa and the others followed her son to the pace by the river where the young members of the family practiced making marks on the bark of a large tree. “These marks were made by Dua,” He Who Stares pointed to a group of white slashes in the bark.

            “How can you tell that?” Gorb demanded.

            “The marks are lower on the trees than the others and he uses his left hand. The cuts are deeper on the left and then taper off. The stone he uses has a nick on the sharp edge and it leaves a small notch in the wood.”

He Who Stares pointed to several other marks in the tree bark and then told who made them.

Todar commanded Dua to bring his cutting stone and when the boy did Todar took it from him. He looked at the stone and then at the mark in the tree. “He Who Stares is right,” he said. “The marks made in this tree are from this stone.

            “If you go with the gathers will you be able to tell which marks were made by this family?” Oona had asked the question and the entire cave held their breath waiting for his answer.

            “Yes, I can tell who made the marks,” He Who Stares said.

-------6-------

Gawa watched as He Who Stares led eight gatherers into the forest. She had never been more proud of her offspring, but she was worried. Gorb had made it known that if they followed a wrong path her son would be left in the forest. She worried about his wobbly legs. It was a long way to go and very dangerous. What if they were chased by a wild animal? Her son could barely walk there was no way he could outrun a tiger or a bear.

-------*-------

The sun crossed the sky at an agonizingly slow pace. Gawa had stared at the sun so many times her eyes felt burned. When the sun was sinking far in the west her heart began to sink with it. “It was foolish to send them off on the word of a boy,” Tona said. She pointed her finger at Gawa. “This is your fault. You should have left him in the forest when he was born!”

It was growing dark and the ground around Gawa was wet with tears when a shout went up from those staring into the darkness. Gorb led the gatherers toward the cave. Six of the men carried three large baskets filled to the top and spilling over with edible roots, fruit, seeds and berries. Two others carried a sleeping He Who Stares in a fourth basket.

“You son knows the marks,” Gorb said proudly. “He could not only tell who made the cuts in the trees but when they were made and under what circumstances. We even followed the marks of others to a new place that is closer where there are many fruit trees. He took a bite of a large red apple and then tossed it to Ooga. “But it was a long way and your son is very tired. He deserves his sleep.”

Gawa was so happy she forgot to eat. Several of the family members had begun to dance they wouldn’t be forced to leave the cave. Gorb and several others were already discussing having He Who Stares examine all the marks in the forest so they would know where the various peoples lived. “I’ve always said that your son is the offspring of a God,” Tona declared. “When he is old enough … my daughter would make him a good mate.”

-------7-------

            Gawa watched from her resting place near the fire as her entire family and many from other families gathered noisily in a circle around He Who Stares. Her eyes were dimmed by the whiteness inside them and she had to squint to see clearly to see in the back of the cave. A granddaughter brought her water and a wooden bowl and a handful of red berries. Gawa smiled, and patted the young girl’s back.

He Who Stares, now the most respected of the many families who lived next to the river, was also ancient with seasons… but still not as old as her. With shaking hands, and with help from one of several readers he was teaching, her son gently lifted one of the bark slabs from the numerous stacks by his sleeping place. The thin layers of wood cut carefully by his children from the trees he had selected were his most precious possessions. They had been arranged in a specific order. His swollen fingers traced over the marks in the bark and the light in his tired eyes slowly became brighter and he smiled. The magical cuts made in the wood of trees long ago brought back things from the past if you knew what to look for. They not only told who made the marks but they also told many things.

When the Keeper of Memories began to speak … everyone, even the leaders of other families, bowed their heads and listened. The spirit of God moved as a breeze across the entrance to the cave. Crackling embers in the fire suddenly became dry leaves being crushed by running feet. Her son’s normally loud voice was now much softer, but he spoke clearly so that everyone could hear.

“Gorb ran through the forest, followed by a large bear …he was afraid …”

THE END?