Write a horror story about a
powerful cantaloupe who explores a newly discovered planet.
Robert Wells and his son walked
side-by-side through the cantaloupe field of the Wells Estate Farm.
In an age of corporate buyouts and
genetic tinkering, Robert “Bob” Wells was the sort of man an
old-fashioned Texan would place on a pedestal for the world to see—to
prove that the old ways were the best ways. Most migrant workers knew
to apply elsewhere, and the first-timers got briefed as soon as they
hit town. The Wells Estate Farm was the pride of the county, the
finest melon growers in south Texas, and every solitary seed in the
whole shebang was operated by Bob and kin. How’s that for a big,
juicy slice of Americana?
Bobby Jr. trudged through the mud,
careful not to step on the looping vines that fed the swelling
fruits. The sack slung over his back had thrashed about when he had
first thrown it over his shoulder, but it was still now—save for a
gentle, warm vibration against his shoulder blade. Junior was pale
and gaunt, but that was the way of things in the Wells clan. There
was a lithe, sinuous strength that convinced the bullies to find
other quiet boys to terrorize.
“Robert Wells Junior, this is where
we stop.”
A flutter of pride tickled his ribs
like moth wings. The last time his father had used his full name was
on his ninth birthday, after his father had handed him his first
knife. “Robert Wells Junior,” he had said, “let this
tool serve you, just as you serve our Lord.”
That same knife bounced against his
hip now, sheathed in buckskin, held by the length of twine that
served as his belt. His hand had been stroking the carvings along the
handle of bone. Now it seized on the blade and slid it free. Junior
held it out and appraised it in the moonlight. Its keen blade glowed
the way Junior figured a ghost would, like a candle encased in
frosted blue glass. Dozens of eyes were etched in red on the bleached
bone grip. They stared in anticipation—ancestors witnessing a new
generation seizing the power they knew well.
“Are you prepared, son?”
“I am.”
Hesitation betrayed doubt, and could
not be allowed. The Lord abhorred doubters.
The two stood before the largest
cantaloupe on the farm, the crosshatching on its flesh like the web
of an impossible spider. Junior swung the bag to his father, who slid
his rough palm around sack’s neck as Junior let go. The contents,
no longer warmed by the boy’s shoulder, began to thrash once more.
Bob reached into the sack and grasped the contents.
Slippers, long-term resident of Mercy
Animal Sanctuary and veteran of countless back-alley fights, had
every claw at his disposal sunk into the white bulk of Bob’s arm.
His teeth could find no purchase, as the human’s left hand was
pressed around his throat. The animal could breathe, but only in
anemic gasps.
Bob was in no pain. There was only the
anticipation of the Becoming.
“I offer you the
feast of blood mingled with the essence of our ancestors.” Bob
began.
Junior bowed his
head in reverence, still brandishing his knife towards the scene
playing out before him. With practiced confidence, he spoke. “Out
of the scorching noon of Issac, out of the bosom of Earth, a fruit
emerged. Male and female together. The male is called Sama’el, his
female is always included within him.”
Bob raised his chin
to the room and cried out to it, “End of All Flesh, End of Days.”
Junior proceeded
forward to his father’s side, holding the knife as an altar boy
would a candle. He knelt, and held the blade against the cat’s
heaving chest. It struggled again as it felt the blade’s cold
touch. Junior’s hand remained steady. “He is full of fearsome
eyes. In her hand a sharp sword drips bitter drops,” Junior said,
sinking the knife through the cat and into the soft flesh of the
cantaloupe. “He kills the fool and flings him into hell.”
Dark blood slid
downward, across the plump expanse of the fruit. And then into the
soil, where the earth drank it with supernatural speed. The roots
were thirsty.
“Sama’el,
Mal’ek Ha-Maveth!” the father shouted.
“Sama’el Sheol
‘alah ached ahab’im re’uwth!” replied the son.
Bob’s grip
tightened until the vertebrae gave way. The ritual was finished.
Bob Wells crouched,
his hands between his knees. Bob Wells Junior did likewise. For some
time, they remained, the knife dripping against Junior’s boot until
it gelled on the blade.
“What comes
next?” Junior asked at last.
“It grows on its
own terms, just like any of its kind. But big as she is now, she’ll
be a shoe-in for a blue ribbon or two when fair-time comes around.”
From beneath the
soil, there came a shuffling, scratching sound. Like mice tunneling.
“I can hear it,
sir! Those roots are drinkin’ it in!”
Bob squinted. “No,
that can’t be. Not how it goes, boy.” But he had heard it, no
doubt. He pushed forward onto his hands and knees, and pressed his
ear to the earth.
“Do you hear it?
It’s still moving!”
“Boy, pipe down. I can’t hear a
thing with—“
Like a lance from Satan’s forge, the
root slid into Bob Wells Senior’s right ear canal and emerged from
the left. His body flopped to the earth as additional roots emerged
to explore his chest cavity, the meat of his thigh.
Junior scrambled backwards. Legions of
roots sprang from the field, pulping cantaloupes and piercing stout
trees at the boundaries of the field. The roots in Bob Wells began to
lift into the air, dangling his body like a broken marionette. His
eyes had been pushed from their sockets, and yet they still met
Junior’s gaze as he stumbled backwards through the quaking dirt.
The dead thing spoke to the child,
with a thousand voices that spoke in unison. “End of All Flesh! End
of All Days!”
Earth had a tumor, a cancer that drank
it dry—its flesh webbed, its insides sweet. Roots drank the salted
oceans, devoured the cities of men, crushed the mighty glaciers, and
soon the world was well and truly dead.
The cantaloupe detached from its great
umbilicus, leaving its destroyed placenta to the mercy of a violent
cosmos. It began to move with urgency, through the asteroid belt,
through the Oort Cloud and beyond. Somewhere in this black expanse
would be a place where its seeds could grow.
As it searched, the fragrant meat of
the cantaloupe hummed with the poetry of Legion. “There shall the
owl nest and lay and hatch and brood in its shadow.”
The blood within the fruit began to
reach out with unseen tendrils, searching for fertile soil. And they
too spoke. “Come unto us now and yield the secret of thy bosom!”
Time beyond reason passed, but the
cantaloupe was patient and vigilant. The aura of water and life drew
the fruit to a planet orbiting Gliese 581. Tendrils with colors
beyond the spectrum of human understanding grasped at the planet and
began to pull. A trillion seeds began to vibrate, the flesh began to
burn and flay open as the atmosphere gouged at the intruder. As the
seeds spilled across the surface of Gliese 581f, they sang together
as one.
“End of All Flesh! End of All Days!”
No comments:
Post a Comment