by the White Book

He hobbled around the front of the van. The license plate was federal government issue. Its sliding side door was partially open to the night. He peered into the darkness inside. His flashlight lit the uniformed driver slumped over his wheel. A thickset passenger, also in uniform, hung in his seat belt, his forehead over the dashboard.

Through the side door, slid open in the impact, the sedan driver saw a narrow crate where rear seats would have been. Its cover was ajar revealing a small body bag inside. On impulse, he reached out to unzip the end nearest him.

His nose told him Cheddar cheese, cinnamon, and, more faintly, sulphur, but in the beam of his light, his eyes were transfixed by a small, somewhat leathery grey face with huge, elliptical, black eyes staring out at him. Featureless, without pupil or iris, they evoked an underlying presence that shook the man, made him recoil into his most secret core. A tiny, lipless mouth and negligible nostril slits completed the bizarre features. Unreality gripped him, a feeling of transgression into a world no human should experience.

Near panic and on thoughtless reflex, the driver re-zipped the bag and returned directly to his car.  He dropped heavily behind the wheel. The shadows shifted behind his head, a soft thud, and he collapsed, his head falling back, his face slack and still. A dark stain slowly trickled down his temple. His flashlight fell from his left hand onto the road. A figure in a checked jacket and red cap exited from the back of the sedan, striding quickly around the van to its open side door.

As if in response, the rasp of a starter cut into the night and headlights, high off the tarmac, lit up a deserted parking lot just off the intersection. Its tires chirped as a red pick-up truck of the extended cab type drew up to the open door of the van. The enclosed truck bed was flung open and one narrow crate was hurriedly substituted for another. Seconds later the red truck disappeared into the night.

***

“Where are they herding us to?” Gina asked. “To feed their young?”

“I shouldn’t think guard gnats would have young out in the woods,” Tagg suggested.

“The young hatch in live prey as maggots,” Naedaara stated helpfully. “After they have eaten it up, they moult into little gnats, and then they are on their own. Learned it in school.”

“Hush, girl!” said Gina. “We don’t need the ghastly details.” Then she wondered aloud, “What if we just stay where we are? Just sit awhile.” She sat, huddled, as if to illustrate, her back against a tree trunk. The rest stood at relative attention around her, waiting.

The gnats stood where they were for several minutes, dimly lit, hispid chimeras of ugly death. Presently they began chittering to each other, alternating back and forth. It was an eerie experience listening to their dry, rustling chirrups, a softly rasping conversation. A running commentary, or planning their menu?  Tagg wondered.

Suddenly one of the taloned horrors made a running leap, landing immediately in front of Naedaara. She screeched in terror, stumbling over the huddled Gina in a desperate and unsuccessful attempt to back away from immediate disembowelment. The image of the gnat ripping at the girl’s torso and Naedaara standing in rigid shock, her bloody insides hanging in gory loops to the ground would haunt Tagg forever. Formic acid was strong in his nostrils. He roared his anguish amid the cries of the others, then blinked as she appeared whole again as before with nothing disturbed but her tangled hair and her peace of mind.

The gnat resumed its previous position, its message harmlessly but effectively delivered.

They continued their forced march at once.