The Dead in June 10: Sample from The Eyes of the Dead

Its eyes were pools of absolute obsidian. Black howling portals of hell. Black as an ocean under a moonless night sky. The eyes froze the two soldiers where they stood. The scrawny naked thing cocked its head on one side, looking at them. A curving smile sliced across its thin, scabrous face. It showed them teeth that were cracked with decay. Splinters and needles, dark yellow and deep brown. Its fingernails were long and torn, clicking like hollow beetle shells.

It stepped forwards.

Then it fell.

It fell apart.

Wilson could not believe what he was seeing. The figure hit the ground in pieces. Hairy moving pieces. Squirming, shrieking pieces. A milling, verminous mass that came surging towards the two soldiers.

The paralysing gaze was broken. They turned to run. The rats were already under their feet. Writhing forms clustering, tripping them. They kicked and stumbled their way towards the steps. Tiny bones crunched underfoot. The vermin shrieked in unholy chorus. Wilson scrambled up the steps of the crypt, ahead of Smithy. The moon bobbing in crazy eights above him. He lunged towards the opening.

A scream pierced the air. Hands grabbed onto Wilson's legs. He was pulled back down the steps. Smithy had fallen. He was dragging Wilson down with him. The moon bobbed away. Abandoning him to the rats and the shadows. Wilson's front teeth cracked down on stone. Breaking, then slicing into his bottom lip. He spat out pieces of bloodied enamel. Turning his head, he saw what was making Smithy scream.

"Brookes! You let me go! That's an order!"

His torn throat flapping away, Brookes stared up at Wilson with glassy eyes. There was no life there. An emotionless grin cut its way across the dead boy's face. Brookes had Smithy by the legs. The old man was thrashing about, tugging at Wilson, trying to use him as leverage to pull himself free.

Smithy's voice broke, "Brookes, for pity's sake, let me go."

Rats swarmed over Brookes. Shredding his flesh as they passed. The corpse didn't flinch. The timbre of Smithy's screaming changed, rising high.

The rats had reached him.

Wilson's eyes swelled as he realised the rats would soon be upon him too. His stomach began binding itself into strangling knots at the thought. Feeling Smithy's fingers slackening, Wilson kicked himself free. Smithy pawed the air, grasping at Wilson, reaching out to him for help. Wilson shook him off. Smithy grasped again.

Wilson booted him in the face.

He drove one foot and then the other into Smithy's face. Cartilage gave way under the assault. Smithy let out a thick nasal yell. His broken nostrils spitting out thick streams of blood. Wilson clambered backwards up the steps, away from his comrades.

One, dead.

The other, soon to be.

Wilson felt sick, watching Smithy flounder, drowning under the grim, ferocious tide. His uniform hanging in shreds, as was his skin, Wilson could barely tell one from the other. Twitching scabby forms, slick with gore, wriggled over Smithy, chewing on him. As Wilson watched, Smithy's skin began undulating, rising and falling, bubbling.

There were rats under his skin.

Wilson gagged at the sight.

They were inside the Sergeant. Gnawing away his vitals. Smithy grasped one last time at the steps, trying to haul his violated body free. His eyes locked onto Wilson's. Smithy opened his mouth to speak. He could not speak. There was a lump in his throat. Wilson could see it, protruding, moving. Smithy tensed his oesophagus, trying to clear the obstruction. It didn't clear. The world spun in a hot, dizzy haze. Brilliant streaks of agony raced along the remnants of his nerves. Smithy felt hairs pricking his Adam's apple. Bony daggers raking the back of his mouth. Tooth and claw cutting soft membrane open. Blood ran into Smithy's mouth. Oblivion's brackish waters swept through his brain. He felt his bowels emptying, sending rats squealing away from the sudden gush. He couldn't stop his body convulsing. His mouth was filling with a mass of fetid skin and wiry hair.

His jaw cracked. Forced open. Splitting wide.

A black rat burst free from Smithy's mouth, robed in a miasma of blood and matter. Smithy fell. His eyes rolled up, revealing the whites. His fingers clutched-unclutched. Then he was still.

The rat looked at Wilson. He recognised it. It was the rat from the shell hole. Big, black and unafraid. It made no move towards him. Neither did any of the other rats. They all perched on the corpses of Smithy and Brookes. Dozens of tiny glittering eyes illuminating the crypt, calmly watching the shivering Private.

They know me, thought Wilson.

Wilson clambered up, one unsteady foot after another; he started backing up the last few steps to the surface. He looked at the rats. They looked at him. None of them moved. He felt rubble grind under his heel. Another few steps. There was a squelch underfoot. One more step. He felt a light breeze. He was back on the surface.

Out of the crypt.

Wilson turned and ran. The wail of shells was, for the first time, greeted by him with a smile. He flung himself onto the ground. Breathing in a mouthful of muck. It tasted good. Rolling over onto his back, he spread his arms wide. Rain hammered down on him from the heavens above. It mingled with the tears pouring from his eyes. Wilson looked up at the skies, at the empty darkness there, the cold and ancient light of the stars. He laughed out loud.

It was an awful sound.

© G.R. Yeates 2011

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