Shooting Crows

No one was left to pick up the dead. The bodies lay strewn in unmoving chaos, each frozen in a moment of perpetual madness. Some were as if fallen asleep in this brown twilight, their faces resting in the dirt. Others could not cover the violence done them by laying in the cooling mud. These were often piles of bloody contorted flesh hardly resembling the noble creatures they had been.

No one was left to watch over the dead, and a scavenger wandered in the contested land. He had a mask of rubbery skin over his head with a solitary tube leading from it to a little box which could drag something breathable out of the miasmic sulfur hanging like a cloud over all. It whirred as if in pain, the thick atmosphere pushing the device to its limit.

It would be hours before anything of an official move to tidy up after this battle was ordered, hours before the dense fog would settle into the earth, hours before anyone would dare venture onto the field. The scavenger did not know whose side had won, if any. Indeed, the retreating party had counted the loss of a few soldier and simply poisoned the air, forcing a stalemate. Thus the theatre closed its curtain until a more opportune time.

But this time was most opportune for the man in the mask. A body less maimed than others, a face staring horrified in the air—the eyes had gathered the color of the fog, bulging with yellow puss which swelled over the pupils—slowly faded into view, a dark spot upon the earth coming into focus with every step the scavenger took. The man approached. Kneeling by this soldier, the scavenger’s gloved hands searched the dead man’s pockets. A little worth the while: unopened cigarettes, perhaps he was saving them for latter, a flask which someone might buy, the bible was discarded, such a common book no one would need pay for, and a rather well sharpened knife.

The goods were stowed in his satchel, and the scavenger made to rise. Before he could take a step, however, he felt a fetter secure itself around his ankle. He groaned, reaching for his revolver. Beneath him, the soldier had awakened, grasping his leg in a desperate grip. You could never be sure when they would wake, or if, but it always seemed to be at the worst time. He scattered the zombie’s brains about the earth, and the hand relaxed itself. Shaking himself free, he wandered further into the mists.

The box continued to wheeze, barely able to filter the poisons. The Scavenger could feel its vibrating building at his side. It was time to leave. Upon the horizon a hill reached up, and he could see the last glimpses of the sun twinkling at its peak. For this star he wound his course, sidestepping the dead. All around him, he could hear the sounds of their waking. It was definitely time to leave.

He started running, and a shadow beside him he hadn’t noticed started running too. It was one of them, and not alone. He could hear their feet pounding earth, chasing hard after this desecrater. He took the hill, but not before a hand snatched at his box, pulling the device from his belt. It bounced behind him, dragged along by the tube. He began snatching up this tether in his hands, reeling his box in.

Climbing above the miasma, he breathed a sigh of relief. The creatures found it hard to climb, and were still in the coiling mists below. In a few steps he’d be over the hill.

Some miles away, a sniper saw a head peaking over the hill. It was a little early for the zombies to get this far, he thought. A solitary shoot rang out through the night.

(Some song is wanting here, but I cannot find one which is perfect. This, however, seems fitting.)