Knights of Harvest

Seth refused to open his eyes. He knew exactly where he was and what he heard. He knew what he smelled - the festering scent of rotting flesh and hot blood. Seth could only lie in his own sweat and pray he might never see again. This was no dream, of that he was certain. He prayed for death.

Seth’s eyes finally opened, and he returned to the world he left behind just hours ago. The nightmare was real.

Overhead, the birds winged in uncontrolled panic. They flew on a headless tack, startled by the guttural screams of Seth Cameron, who knelt in the weeds two hundred feet below. They soared high over the Linville Reeves farm, across the vast wheat fields, seeking escape from Seth’s screams. Doom, panic and fear frolicked in their primitive minds. Fear of the heat, the wind, the screams - each other.

Like magic and the magician: the two are never one and the same. The birds returned to the Linville Reeves farm, flaring in on fence posts, rooftops, in the trees and on the ground. They gathered together, nervously cackling and perking to the ominous cry of a hound not far down the road.

The flies relentlessly buzzed.

Seth Cameron stood on his knees, his gut still heaving as he pulled himself up on first one foot and then the other. He staggered backward, his eyes never leaving the flies and their fleshy breakfast. He groped at his mouth with blood-caked hands, trying to stuff the bile down his throat. He heard himself scream again as he tried to run, but the hypnotic buzzing held his legs firmly. The enraged buzzing manacled him to the ground and mercilessly held his eyes on their grisly breakfast.

Finally, Seth turned away and ordered his legs to run. He dragged himself through the wheat field, passing a hay barn and the adjoining pigpens that flanked a chicken house. Seth covered his ears, his legs pushing harder. He never looked at the small cabin behind a modest farmhouse - the cabin he had called ‘home’ for over five years. He ran faster on wobbly legs - past the farmhouse and brushing by his old pickup truck, a gift given him by his boss, Linville Reeves. Like Linville, the truck was dead, too. Pushing on, Seth reached County Road 84 and scrubbed his bleeding feet down the rocky path.

“God, please help me,” he gasped through his tears. “Just help me get to town. Please, God, just let there be a town left . . .”