North & South Prologue

Prologue


He was walking. He knew that much. And not even doing that good of a job at it; he was stumbling, falling in the dust, struggling upright, endlessly through out the night. Was it even night? He supposed so, but then again what did he know?

His mind swirled with images. One after the other; he couldn’t possibly be really seeing them all. It crossed his mind to wonder if his eyes were even open. He couldn’t tell.

He had lost most of his senses. He felt as though he might be hot, and he noticed a certain dryness in his mouth, but he could have been imagining it. Was he hungry? Was he starving? Was he going to die soon?

Was it seconds or hours that were passing? In this mental hell, and moment could be an hour, or an hour a single moment.

He closed his eyes and began counting…

1…
2…
  3…

A thrill of triumph went through him. Finally, something to hold on to! Even if he couldn’t be sure where he was, what he felt, what he was doing, who he was, he knew the passing of time! When he was younger-or had he ever been younger?-, time had never meant anything to him; he was always late for dates and appointments. But now, knowing how quickly time was going by felt precious as jewels.

8…
9…
  10…
    11…

His panic and confusion began to subside. Nothing was changed; nothing was resolved, except his bearing on time. He continued to stumble and fall. He still could not make sense of the situation. But he knew something: seventy seconds had passed. And that was enough to spare his sanity, at least for the moment.

81…
82…
  83…
  8-

Lights flashed in his eyes, causing him to lose count. He was completely blinded by it. The panic and confusion came back in a flood. He could hear wheels creaking on the ground and the stamping of hoofs down the… road? But this time he knew it wasn’t a hallucination.

The light came closer and closer. He was paralyzed with fear, but when it came so near he could make out it's faint outline, he turned and began running in the direction he came. He tripped.

Scrambling to his feet, he was sure he felt an intense pain in his leg. He attempted running again, but his legs buckled underneath him, and he fell to the ground.

The stamping of hoofs was getting closer and closer. It was nearly upon him. He covered his face with his hands; not that it would do much good now. He heard whinnying, and looked up.

A scream escaped his mouth as he realized the full horror of what was coming after him. It was a horse drawn carriage, except the horses were skeletons, their eyes a dark, evil red. The driver was a skeleton as well, a black cloak tied around his bony neck, whipping in the wind. His eyes were also a dark red, his bony fingers were curled around a black helmet, and flames scorched out of his eyes and mouth as he laughed malevolently. The entire carriage seemed to be engulfed in flames.

The skeleton driver whipped the horses harshly with a black whip, letting out another evil cackle as he did so. The carriage was speeding closer and closer to him. Ravaged with fear, he hysterically tried to scramble to his feet, but his muscles weren’t working. His terror was excruciating as he lay on the ground, unable to move. The skeleton man continued to cackle as the horses galloped nearer and nearer. They were about to trample him.

In desperation, he shoved with all his might and rolled off the road, and the skeleton man screamed angrily. He felt grass beneath him, but he did not stop rolling. He frantically attempted to grab onto something, but it was useless. He was falling and tumbling in an endless cycle. It felt as if the world had turned upside down and he was falling into the sky. It would never end.

But then it did; loud, sudden, and painfully. He moaned on the ground, for the first time able to hear himself. He worried that the skeleton man would hear him and come after him, but the pain was too much to keep quiet. Even after the pain subsided he lay still. Where was the skeleton man now? Searching for him? What would he do when he found him?

His heart beat loudly and painfully as he lay on the grass. He didn’t dare move. He could not tell if he was crying, but he supposed he was, because the intensity of his emotions had reached the bursting point.

“Please…” he moaned. There was silence. Several minutes passed.

He could no longer hear the stamping of hoofs, and the skeleton man’s cackle was nowhere near. Even after he decided it was safe to move, he didn’t. What seemed like twenty minutes later-he was no longer keeping count-he got on his hands and knees shakily. He was exhausted, but what other option did he have? He couldn’t just stay here.

He attempted standing up, but fell quickly back to his knees. He waited for a few seconds then, shaking uncontrollably, he put his right hand in front of his left and brought his left knee closer to his left hand. He continued this process until he was crawling at a steady pace. At one point he felt himself going up hill, which stressed his muscles nearly to the point of collapsing. But he kept moving. What are you exactly looking for? What do you expect to find? He asked himself, but continued crawling on regardless. To comfort himself, he began counting again.

1…
2…
  3…
  4…
    5…
   
He was on 876 when he saw it: lights in the distance. But this time they did not look scary or threatening; the light was warm and welcoming. He quickened his pace, forgetting about counting.

The hallucinations were returning, but not as badly as before. And he could feel again… and he knew that he was very, very hot, and his mouth was extremely dry. Still, he crawled on.

Several minutes passed. He had to stop and rest several times. He could feel his condition slowly getting worse… But maybe if he got to that light, he would find help there.

When he reached the light, he saw it came from a lantern, hung from the door of a large house, secluded in the front of a small wood. With the last of his strength, he crawled up the porch steps… if he could only knock on the door…

I'm not strong enough, he realized mournfully. Already hyperventilating and exhausted, he collapsed on the porch steps.

He couldn’t move… Perhaps if he rested a bit… But no. He could feel the end was near if he didn’t get help quick enough. But what could he do? He closed his eyes from the dim hallucinations and breathed in deeply, and waited.

He may have fallen asleep – he may not have. All he knew was that it seemed as if hours had passedand his condition was worse. Several minutes passed. He was drifting off to sleep…

Creak. His mind registered the noise and the sudden light, but it was too exhausted to comprehend its meaning. There were shouts and exclamations, but even though he could tell that their voices were loud and surprised, they sounded distant and whispered to him. Realizing something important might be happening, he tried to swim back into full consciousness, but the attempt failed and he sank gratefully back under the waters. Minutes passed, and then he was being picked up and taken indoors.

He didn’t know where they took him, but it was soft and warm. Water was fetched, and he could feel someone press a cold washcloth against his forehead. He didn’t remember much after that. He knew that whoever these people were they were trying to care for him the best way they knew how, but were not succeeding. He fell in and out of sleep. Sometimes when he woke up he would be perfectly aware of what was going on, and sometimes he would begin to hallucinate again.

Once when he woke up, he was unbearably hot. He moaned loudly, and a cold wash clothe was quickly place over his forehead and chest. He fell back asleep.

When he awoke some time later, the owners of the house were still waiting on him. And he was more unbearably hot than ever. He could feel himself sweating. His mouth was so dry it hurt. Licking his moist lips, he tasted sweat.

“W-w-w-” His voice was cracked and broken. He couldn’t properly form words.

“Water, he needs water!” he heard someone say. Water was quickly delivered, but when he drank, it seemed to go straight down his throat without touching the dryness of his mouth. He tried to ask for more, but the words were lost in the first convulsions of the night. He heard someone scream, and then orders were shouted. He didn’t have much knowledge of what happened next. Twenty minutes later, the convulsions stopped.

“Thank God,” a girl said, sincerely sounding as if she were about to cry. More water was fetched, and he felt water being wrung out over his forehead and chest. He fell in and out of sleep several times during the night. Sometimes when he woke he would begin convulsing again, but it would always end in less than thirty minutes, and he would fall back asleep.

He awoke again in the early hours of the morning; he could tell when he glassed out the dew coated window. He took comfort in watching the sun rise and watching the birds twitter on the tree branches outside the window. Then the convulsions began again. They were bad, but not nearly as bad as some he had that night. Than they got worse. Much worse. Through the thrashing and pain, he tried to form words…

“I… B-believe… In… You.” He gasped. Then the worst convulsions of the night took place.




The family of five glanced at one another, trying to make sense of his words. Perhaps he was having another hallucination, and thought he was talking to someone else? But he had seemed so aware…

Then the worst convulsions they had witnessed so far began. None of them knew what to do. They were quite violent, and they could not restrain him. Finally they stepped back and watched helplessly for the last five minutes of the boy’s life.