The Man

Written by Tom
Screams.

Roars

Weeping.

The man’s lungs burned with exhaustion. His arms like a wildfire, muscles screaming to stop. To rest. But on he pulled. His feet digging deep into the damp, sodden, crimson mud. Each step back he left a sullen trench, the depth of the body he was dragging.

Body. No not a body. A person.

His mind fogged, his lips dry, his face caked in mud and blood. His arms screaming. And still he pulled.

‘How did I get here?’  He thought hopelessly. ‘How did it come to this? Is this the end?”

Pull. PULL.

He edged further and further through the chaos. Bodies replaced grass. Red covered green. His foot sunk deeper than anticipated and he plummeted to the ground. His eyes stung from the mixture of crimson and brown  The taste of dirt and iron dance horrifically on his tongue, while his arms breathed a sigh of relief. No more pain, no more strain. Sweet respite from the heavy corpse he was pulling.

“Corpse. Why… why am I lugging this lifeless corpse? Let it go. You still live!”  Dark thoughts pierced in his mind like arrows through the air. “Run! No one would know. RUN!”

He outstretched his right hand, clutching tightly to the ground. Mud, oozed through his fingers like a peach squeezed in malice. The left, joined the right and weakly dragged the man.

‘Weak!’

Again his arms stretched out. A feeble attempt to crawl. His face slammed the sodden mud out of exhaustion. A wheeze escaped his lips, along with a gargle of bubbles. The noise was paired with another, a helpless whimper that chilled his spin. So unexpected, a sudden jolt of energy surged through the man’s body and he scrambled back. Almost completely sunken, a face stared up at him. Completely pale apart from the mud and blood from a gaping wound to the right side of the face. The eye resting perfectly in a pool of crimson where what remained of its cheek. Bubbles of death poured out of its mouth, dribbling down its chin, leaving a trail of red shining brightly against the white of the skin. A head was all that could be seen. What remained below was submerged in wet mud.

The man stared. Frozen in fear. The world around him became silent, all except the desperate gargling of the face. The screams, metal on metal, the cries, all became a distant whisper. He concentrated on the bubbles, rising and popping from the face’s mouth.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

Until the final bubble burst and the world turned silent. The man caught his breath, holding, holding waiting for another bubble. He stared intently, almost willing another to burst past those pale, red lips. He held for as long as his lungs could bare until a painful breath sharply escaped.

For a moment the man forgot how to breathe. Something he had done all his life, something that was stolen from the face, seemed foreign to him. Panic gripped his body and he reached out the clutch the first thing he could find. An arm. The arm of the corpse he was dragging. No, not a corpse. A man. A lord.

Reality slowly began to return to the man. Deep, painful breaths ebbed through his chest. The painful, aching of his arms returned. The sweet return of the burning ache.

Pull.

The man struggled to his feet, arms wrapped around the cumbersome Lord, decorated in metal and leather armour.

Pull.

He took one step, sinking deeply into the ground. Then another and another. His body screamed at him but he revealed in it. Challenged it.

Pull.

Minutes seemed like hours, days. The wails of chaos dimmed and the tranquil breeze of nature dominated. Finally the man collapsed on lush, green grass. His blood soaked hands scarring the innocence of nature.

A creation of art was before him, a painting of death, chaos and glory. And a single long paint stroke decorated the canvas of his journey. A single stroke, in a painting of many.