The last shred of Undead

THE LAST SHRED OF UNDEAD
It has been seven weeks and several months since I was originally nailed to this wall. Of course, when I say ‘nailed’ I really mean my restraints were attached to this brick imprisonment, and I have since dangled like a rag doll from the steal ropes that bind me.
Thankfully it was only after a few hours that the bombs fell from the heavens and landed with such a force as to remove my artificial sky and replace it with the grey matter that was clouds and sorrow. What was once a last ditch effort to imprison traitors such as I, is now nothing more than a shell of a shell. One wall, held together by blind faith. The very wall I am still very much attached to.
The fasting forced upon me has rendered me virtually comatose. Was it not for my immortal blood which happened to be handed down from century old generations, I would resemble the many skeletons I have created over the years. However, without the life force that runs its course through every person, alive or undead, my strength remains lost. Now the cast of my body, naked and defined by the bone structure that lay beneath, hangs before god.
Tis a shame really, since The Maker seems to have left for good, just as everyone else.

It happened the day I was captured. The scent of impending doom hung in the air like a lit match to methane. The storm, unperceived to be so potent, came at dusk. I knew, of course. Being an informant for the enemy grants you such godly insight. And being a being such as I, I had to be lured and captured like a beast.
The tainted blood came in the pie I like to call suckling pig. The boy was no more than four, and he was plump. The perfect meal for a horror. I should have known, should have smelt the warped blood that waited beneath his flesh. But I was a hungry man, having to keep my needs in the shadows so as not to be seen. The lad was an easy capture.
I watched as he wandered around like a lost lamb. The Sheppard instincts inside caused me to reach out, to touch. And eventually, to taste. As I fell to the ground, grasping the child and pulling him down with me, the King’s army poured out from the walls, the doors, the floors. My senses, waking me from the daze, allowed my eyes to open on the occasions that saw me being dragged, being held before a jury. Being tried without a voice. Being put before a firing squad and shot. And shot again. And shot a third time. On each shot I opened my eyes. With each opening I saw the men before me. Men I drank wine with. Had conversations with in their strange dialect. Fooling them with word play and making them believe I was one of them. Shot again, and finally my eyes gave me refuge. The darkness contained behind them was a curtain call to my known universe.
The next time my eyes opened was not before my ears heard the familiar sounds of the air-raid sirens. I looked down to see my naked body. The holes had been patched up by the unknown forces that dwelled beneath, but blood stained my chest. The river had run down to my useless groin, pooled and spilled out over my legs. When my eyes finally focussed, I saw the crimson lake that I swayed gently over. I knew it was mine, my blood, my nourishment, my life. The cracks in the cobblestones was dark, and my blood flowed away from me. Saddened to see such a beautiful sight such as I in such a mess, with the colour gone and the regal clothes the King’s men wore torn from my body, I searched around the chamber. Asides from a dank mess that sat in the corner, that could either hold a thousand rats or a dead man, the room was empty. The four walls were basic brick and crudely put together in a quick fashion. I knew I had been sealed up in a gas chamber of sorts. Lucky I stopped breathing seventy years prior.
My bindings were simple. A heavy bolt and some taught steal ropes, complete with a pulley system to my left. With the strength drained out of my body, I could do nothing but stay and enjoy the non-view.

I awoke from the vibrating wall I lay against. Like the snake I was, I could feel the reverb through the bricks of something approaching. Although the room was dim, as if blocked off and separated from the world to create its very own horror realm, a darkness blanketed my residence. T’were then that the bombs fell from the crafts. Falling with the grace of a dead elephant, they plummeted and landed near by. I could smell the fresh blood that soaked the stagnant air once the rubble had settled. My body received lashings, grazed by my gaol and thrashed about like a beggar child. Given my state, they were mere flesh wounds. Scratches added to a canvas depicting a narrative of a war well and truly developed.
I licked my lips and tasted nothing but dust and mortar and the end. As the roof caved in, my prison partner the ominous lump in the corner (t’were rats that scuttled, which seemed to have been feasting upon a body) was crushed. The sky opened up to me, and my eyes saw the godly crusade of my fellow country men. All that was left of my broken enclosure was the wall I hung so unprecariously.
Everything was sheathed in darkness, which I was thankful for. The flames that contorted around nearby buildings, places I knew to be the commons, the sleeping area and the recreational room, told me the story of defeat. I slumped against the wall, knowing that the advancement of my loan towards the heavenly father was to be payed, more likely in full, right where I rest my damaged body.

Days passed. As the fires died down, having consumed everything that was given to them, they fell away into a smouldering mess. The world, one that I had known to be so lush, so pure – the very one I stained with my two feet every day of my awakened life – was nothing more than a damaged soul with visible scars.
The sun never came. Seemed she had better places to look over. Instead, through daylight, I was treated to a strange spectacle. Dancing lights upon the horizon. Topaz and scarlet played tag, and the children began to sing and I would shake my head. The delirium taking control in my weakened state worried me. Never had I gone so long without the stream of life.
The rats, they would come and tickle my toes. But mostly they would stay away. They would eat those near by, and discus their meals amongst themselves. The recreational room became a baroque feasting area. The pompous aristocrats away on vacation. The new commoners acted like Irish folk tales and performed before me. They had danced on more than one occasion, playing the tune of a solemn foreigner who had fallen on hard times. And still the lights on the horizon would sing.
The rats, one by one, little Gaz and simple Gerry, left me and my company after some time. Soon it was just me and the breeze, caressing my empty ball-sack with its sickening scent.

The last sign of mortality I had seen, was two days ago. Out of the rubble, as I hummed along the tune of A minor, a being crawled on all fours. My head, cocked to the side like the full attention a dog would give a new bone, watched as the figure stood up. It looked around, and whistled.
The whistle shattered the silence. And during the cool of non-day, the sound pierced my soul. It was so solid that hair, falling in clumps, sifted down towards the two-dimensional ground. A ground I pitied for its restricting ways.
The being, who on one, hard, long, everlasting look appeared to be a fully grown male horse. He was covered in the debris of a world fallen apart, and shook the memories off from his mane. I croaked a response to his whistle, a sound resembling a dying marsh-fly. He looked around, walked a few steps towards a pile of shattered dreams, and fell through. He cursed when he got up. His hind leg looked twisted, and the red that formed from beneath the broken skin gave me goose flesh. I croaked again.
If you think that I’m coming any where near your sorry state, then I’m to inform you that you are sadly mistaken. The horse’s mouth failed to move through his short commentary.
But sir, I ask for just a simple bite. Think, you could be my steed. We would ride, my friend, my fiend, we would ride towards the ever lasting night. Create kingdoms of our own. I cocked a smile, knowing he understood me fully.
The smile faded when the horse snorted and resumed his own journey, picking the right path towards salvation. His tail swished as he limped, and dirt cascaded down towards the stones. I turned my head slowly and watched as he winked, tipped an imaginary hat, and left without a further word. With one final swish of his tail, my eye was drawn to the horizon. The lights – with their dancing – bowed and separated. In the middle was a brilliance I had not seen since my mortal years. A blue, so clear t’were to be compared to crystal. My crooked smile returned, cracking my lips and sending dust to the ground.

So, with my restraints tightening around my wrists, I fall more the inches closer to the ground as the skin thins around the shackles. The air has become still, and the topaz, finished with its quarrel with the scarlet, who blushes at such a public display of violence. And separating them is clear certainty that my demise will be short coming.
T’was time that I caught up to the rest of the world. After all, it has become nothing but dust on the wind.