A shriek of feedback ripped through the loudspeakers, then I heard the amplified voice of my old high school principal. A crow's nest tower looked over the football field, and Mr. Lawrence was standing on it, flanked by a pair of Home Guard officials.
"I just wanted to thank everyone for coming out today," He tapped the microphone. "Hope you got enough to eat. A special thanks to Herb and Bonnie Dobbs for donating the steers."
A weak applause limped through the bleachers.
"Well, we're about to start." With this, Mr. Lawrence heaved a giant sigh, the very end of which sent a scratchy roar through the loudspeakers.
He looked harried and stricken. I realized that he was being forced to speak. One of the officials handed him a document to read aloud.
"In accordance with the ruling of the honorable Home Guard Tribunal Council," he read, his voice echoing through the grounds, "the following individuals are hereby declared guilty of activities prohibited by ordinance 31.2E, including but not limited to harboring or fornication with TGV-positive corpi." Mr. Lawrence's voice quivered as he read out a list of names. "Jeremy Fitzwilliams. Margaret Vaughn. Tracy Lester. William Atwater. And Jason Gibbs." After a pause in which the entire crowd had gone completely silent, he read, "May we pray for their souls." Finally he drew another deep breath and hurriedly mumbled, "Let their suffering be a lesson to us all. Purity is our duty and our only salvation."
Onto the football field now marched the same ranger I'd seen smoking earlier. He lead a procession of five prisoners, two women and three men. Their hands were bound behind their backs. All of them were completely undressed. And they were soaking wet.
A low murmur passed through the bleachers.
What, exactly, was about to happen?
"Here we go again," Tuck Schroep mumbled and stared down at his shoes.
The stripped, wet prisoners were all shivering violently. Jason was the last of them in line. His soaked hair was plastered over his ears and his eyes. The ranger forced the prisoners to stand shoulder to shoulder at the football field's fifty yard line. Jason's legs buckled, and he fell to the snow. The ranger kicked him, and Jason slowly brought himself to his feet.
Now the ranger looked up at the crow's nest as if awaiting instructions.
But a commotion started to rise from the crowd at the sidelines. A man in a black parka seemed to be trying to run out onto the football field, apparently trying to stop whatever was about to happen. He pivoted and dodged one of the rangers guarding the crowd, but another guard caught him by the sleeve and pulled him back away from the row of prisoners. The man desperately tried to free himself, but the guard held tight, and now other rangers rushed toward the scuffle, guns raised.
Up in the crow's nest, one of the Home Guard officials gave a hurried nod to the ranger who'd lead the prisoners onto the field. Now the ranger reached into his flack jacket and removed the same lighter I'd seen him use earlier to light his cigarette. He held it to the elbow of one of the naked men, and flicked it.
The prisoners, all of them at once, instantly erupted into flames.
A chorus of resigned shock passed through the crowd. I cried out inadvertently, bewildered, totally taken by surprise. A second earlier I'd been horrified that the prisoners were going to be slowly frozen to death in the icy air, but they must have been soaked not in water, but in gasoline, and now they were each engulfed in raging flames.
I felt the heat on my face even from the bleachers. This was what the man rushing from the sidelines had been trying so desperately to stop. The prisoners fell to the snow, screaming in pain. Flames roiled from their limbs.
I couldn't just stand here watching this happen. I had to do something, anything, to help. . .
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