Jack

Chapter Four: How to Die

When Jack awoke, he found himself lying in a pile of debris. Upon closer inspection, he saw that it was the splintered remains of the gallows. This was not Jack's immediate concern; when he moved to get up, he felt a sharp pain in his back. He reached behind him and when he removed his hand he looked at it and saw blood. His shallow breaths caught in his throat. He twisted around onto his stomach and rolled off to the side; spots danced in front of his eyes and he felt as if he were about to pass out again. More carefully, he got onto his hands and knees and with fearful nine year old eyes surveyed the scene before him. 

The pile of splintered wood before him was caked with blood, but not his blood. Jack had felt an odd lump as he had rolled off of it onto the ground. He saw now that it was a corpse. A small smile twitched at the corner of his mouth as he held his breath as he crawled forward. He looked into the corpse's face, curious as always, and burst out laughing; it was the body of his mother, staring sightlessly into oblivion. 

Drawn by her eternal gaze, Jack looked upward. The sky was a tumultuous ocean of dark storm clouds, ominous and deadly. A drop of rain fell onto his face, then another. The heavens opened and a storm fell all at once, bathing the carnage in a torrential cleansing.  

Jack looked into his mother's eyes for a few seconds more. Something then caught his attention: her fingers. He reached down eagerly and began to pull at the base of the pale, stubby index finger until it snapped off with a sickening crunch. Jack uttered a triumphant cry, smiling the way a normal boy of his age might to finding a shiny new pebble. Muscle and ligaments tore and blood sprayed from the wound. Some landed on Jack's lips and he licked it off. He pocketed his new trophy, rose slowly onto his feet, and looked around. 

Stoic as he thought he was, the utter horror of what he saw caused him to stumble and fall again, shocked to the core and unable to move. Ten minutes passed before Jack could calm down enough to look up from the ground. He thought he knew death. He thought he liked death, enjoyed it, even. That was different, he thought now; not like this, never like this. 

As Jack rose to his feet again, he kept his eyes closed for fear of seeing it all again. He felt rain splatter against his hair, darkening and wetting it. He imagined his auburn hair took on the color of blood then. He swayed on his feet, clutched his stomach, and vomited as he had earlier. He stayed hunched over and panted like a dog to regain control over his body, desperate to prolong the time before he had to see it again. 

Finally he bolstered his courage, clenched his teeth and opened his eyes quickly. He was determined to be adamant. A life of pain and misery such as he had would not let him so easily forget his resistance. Thus Jack balled his hands into fist and set his feet wide apart when he again looked upon the ground.  

Blackened, mangle corpses littered the area before him. Men, women and children had all been singed by the blast of lightning to a bloody, unrecognizable mess. There were not even the telltale signs of an arm or a foot to signify that they had been humans at all. The dead piled up haphazardly in front of him, assailing him with an oppressive odor. It made him think of dogs left to rot in the road when they were trampled by wagon wheels. It made him think of blackened fruit and flies picking at the husks. It made him think mostly of the destroyed fetus of what could have been his little sister. He looked at the sky again. The clouds seemed to form a scornful face. It laughed. 

Pure sorrow overcame his defenses and took hold of him, ripping his composure apart like leaves in a strong wind. He fell onto his knees, punched himself in the stomach feebly several times and burst into tears. They fell onto his dirty face and rolled down it, stained black by his stained soul. Jack was ashamed to cry. It undid everything he had every strove for. His dominance over the shadow that was his father seemed to dissipate all in a cruel moment; so total and complete was his sense of doom that, through the shroud of unfeeling, he did not see a thin figure approach him from the side. 

"Son! Son!" Jack heard this as if it were a thousand miles away. He could not even recognize the words, much less the voice or who it could possibly belong to. Panic at this unknown presence was undermined by the chaos massacring his mind. Sobs continued to ravage his body. As cool, relaxed arms folded underneath him and brought him away, he faded once again to oblivion, comforted by its apathetic embrace.