The Hunted

(Based on a dream)

Me and my hatchet. It is all I need as I hack my way through the jungle. Hacking through vines and brush and hacking any creature that dares to think me as food.

The jungle clears to a field of tall grass. I enter it cautiously, hatchet at ready. You never know what hunts you in the grass till it has you.

Immediately, as my foot touches the grass, a huge python like snake springs at me and I take its head in one swing. My caution fades as I kick aside its limp body. Chances that it has a friend nearby are slim and I lower my hatchet for a moment.

Moments can be long or they can be short. Sometimes a moment exists outside of time. There is no what was or what will be, only what is now. In that moment its friend struck.

I am knocked to the ground but I maintain my grip on my hatchet. This snake is much larger than the previous, as round as a spare tire. Fast for its size, it begins to wrap itself around me, but I too am fast, my arm raised high. My hatchet is quick, it is sharp, it is hungrier than the snake.

I roll its dead mass off of me and stand up. Hatchet ready, my caution is high. The chances of a third snake are less likely than the second but a fool I am not. I walk away through the path my foe made in the tall grass.

A few yards in I come across a large area of crushed grass, trampled by something large. Snake skin is everywhere but it is not natural. Snake skin should be dry but this is wet and smeared through the grass, looking like it was partially digested. The skin was not shed, it was vomited.

I scanned the area, knowing there was something bigger about. Ahead I spot an exiting path, wide and free of “skin”, I know that is the direction it left. I back away from that path, hatchet ready. Like a speeding train it broke through the grass a yard to the right of the path it left. Three times the size of the last snake, it slowed as it focused on me.

Jet black with no tail end to be seen, I have never seen any as huge. Filling me with an icy chill, its face is narrow eel like head with pronounced skull features almost human like, and eyes that are very human. Intelligence, hatred, and surety fills its eyes and it is all aimed at me.

I continue my walk backward, never breaking eye contact. Hatchet ready, drooling its previous victims blood. The demon snake creeps forward, swaying side to side as it moves, daring me to run. Still walking backward, I know I am loosing ground. I must take control, I am the hunter. I faint a stumble and the demon takes the bait. Thinking I have faltered it strikes at me.

My hatchet is quick...

It is a moment without time.

My hatchet is sharp...

There are no thoughts. There is no life nor death. There is no fear nor anger.

My hatchet is hungry...

There is me, there is the demon, and there is my hatchet sinking into its skull.

by Gabriel Wayne Long
Copyright © 2011

My World (Lich King)

(Based on a dream)

It is a dark night and I cannot feel the weather. I am possessed by the images playing before me. I stand outside a shop window watching a television on the other side of the glass.

I watch a grotesque picture show worthy of a cheep horror flick, but is not – it is the world news. There is an epidemic of birth mutations, seeming to be the world over. These are not the “normal” mutations one would imagine but these children do not appear to be human at all. Goblins, trolls, elves, and other creatures I could not name, coming forth from human mothers. Few were elf like and attractive but the rest were hideous abominations bringing screams from nurses and mothers alike.

The reporter focuses on one “child” mostly human in nature for one exception, it bore a second head of a hideous goblin. The head was centered in the chest of the child and they moved as one. As the baby screamed, it screamed. As the baby's head turned, it too turned. Together they opened their eyes, together they looked about, focusing together they looked at the camera and together they screamed.

I turn and walk away, suddenly indifferent to what my eyes had just seen. I follow the city streets till I approached my house and am met by my brother and his girlfriend. I do not invite them in but they follow anyway. They sit on my sofa and I take a seat across from them. Their eyes are hungry, transfixed on me as tho I were prey. I know what they have become.

“You are vampires.” I accuse flatly.

They bare a coy grin, both seem amused that I “guessed” their nature so quickly.

Again I am indifferent and emotionless, “Are you here to turn me or to feed on me?”

Their grins broaden to the edge of laughter, I am the blunt of a joke that only they know. I stand, they do not, still they grin staring past me. I walk past them, still they grin and sit as stone. They have no power over me.

Beyond them up a short set of steps is my library. I enter it taking in the details of all that I have held precious. Hundreds of antique books line the walls surrounding my desk. Beside the desk is a huge globe of lands not of this world. Near the desk, penetrating the fortress of books and shelves is a tall window. The paint on its panes is old and flaky and I am amused by this. I walk to the window and look out to a sky that should not be. Deep royal purple lit by a full moon but without stars. Thick gray clouds roll but travel nowhere. I admire how the buildings about capture the light of the moon. I look down to the grass a deep dark green and about seeing trees and other plants swaying to unheard music. There is no wind.

As tho somebody opened the books of nightmare and fantasy and spilled their contents, this world is forever changed. It was I who opened the books and I smile...

by Gabriel Wayne Long
Copyright © 2011