Horrors Below

Bodies upon bodies, all pressing up against one another. Each one pushing the others back, in an attempt to move forward themselves. Each hoping that by hindering the others, it would be favored.

Farron was only four. His mother was with him, that much was clear in his mind, because despite the mass of bodies around him, he wasn’t scared. The smell of his mother’s sweater, that odd musk that didn’t have a label other than “mom” in his mind, filled his nostrils as he tucked himself deeper into the crook of her arms. It was gathering day, which meant that the town amphitheater was packed with the townsfolk. There was a heavy sense of anxiety, and loud noises filled the air. The people, they were yelling and shouting among one another, all of them pushing forward.

Gathering day was always anxiety-ridden, but it was worse today. Something was different. Farron could tell by the lines in his mother’s face – the lines that usually only appeared around her mouth because she was smiling or laughing had moved to her forehead. She only got that look when Farron did something he wasn’t supposed to do, or when the men in the red coats came to their house. Farron hoped he hadn’t done something wrong, and hugged his mother tighter. He felt her arms squeeze him in response.

The shouting continued, and Farron felt his mother tense as the crowd began pushing forward again. Farron turned his face away from his mother’s sweater, toward the stage of the amphitheater. He could see the man in the suit raising his hands toward the crowd while talking into the microphone attached to the pulpit in front of him. His face was all scrunched up and red, trying and failing to be heard over the crowd even with the assistance of the microphone. Behind him, standing in a neat row, were the men in red coats. They didn’t move at all, keeping their hands behind their backs and staring out at the crowd, their hoods hiding their faces and their red leather coats hiding their features. Farron didn’t like them.

The crowd surged again, moving toward the man in the suit. The yelling was getting louder. Farron put his hands over his ears, the noise beginning to hurt his head. The man in the suit was turning a dark red now, his face scrunching up more as he began to yell into the microphone. Farron couldn’t hear him over the screams of the crowd. Suddenly, there was a louder noise. It sounded like the air had cracked from all the yelling, and suddenly the crowd was pushing away from the stage instead of towards it. All the yelling people were now turning around and screaming, their eyes wild. Their eyes were too white, the pupils nothing but pinpoints, darting left and right, their mouths wide open. Screaming in fear, Farron shoved his face against his mother’s sweater again.

He felt his mother moving, not fighting the push of the crowd but turning and actively riding the wave of bodies toward the exit. Farron glanced up over his mother’s shoulder, now facing the stage, and saw that the man in the suit was no longer at the pulpit, but was lying down on the stage behind it. Some of the men in the red coats were moving towards the crowd, while one stayed up on stage, leaning over the man. It looked like the man in the suit was trying to sleep on the floor of the stage, and Farron had time to briefly wonder how the man was able to sleep with all the noise in the amphitheater before his mother turned a corner.

Farron’s mother kept running, even when the crowd thinned and the noise had died down. Farron laid his head against her chest, and could hear her breathing. It was harsh, and came in fits and jolts. Looking up at her face, Farron saw that his mother was crying, her eyes wide and moving rapidly, as if she was searching for something. After a short time, his mother began to slow, her breathing coming in harsher gasps now, until eventually she slowed to a walk. Her eyes were still wide, and she kept looking over her shoulder as if something was chasing them. Farron reached up and grabbed hold of a strand of her hair that had fallen in front of her face, not pulling so much as trying to give her comfort in the few ways that he could. She looked down at him, and he saw her face soften. Her eyes began to return to their normal size, and her breathing began to slow. But she never stopped walking, and after giving Farron a brief forced smile, she looked back up, the tense look returning to her face.

Farron couldn’t tell how long they walked. The only method he had of keeping time was his mother’s breathing. As he counted the timing of her breathing, he wondered why they had left the amphitheater without the gatherings. That was why they went, wasn’t it? To get their big bag of food? Farron had noticed that the bags were getting smaller lately. Maybe this time the bag was so small he hadn’t noticed his mother grab it.

After awhile, Farron saw that they were home. His mother entered the small house, closing the door behind them. She placed him on the floor before slamming down the big metal bolt. It made a loud clang, and as if the noise signaled the end of the frantic race Farron’s mother had been running, she let all the muscles in her body relax, sliding against the door until she was sitting upright against it. Farron stood next to her, now even height with his mother. She looked so tired, and her cheeks were still wet from her tears.

After a moment, a man came rushing into the room. Farron looked worriedly at him, lacking the vocabulary to tell his uncle what had happened. His uncle didn’t look right either – just like his mother, the face that was normally so happy and smiling was pulled into a tight frown, worry painted across his features. He ran up to Farron and his mother and knelt beside them.

“Meredith, what...”

“No. Not in front of Farron.”

His uncle turned to Farron and gave a forced smile. “Hey Fare-bear. Wanna watch some cartoons?”

Farron shook his head no. He didn’t want to watch the silly pictures on the television, he wanted his mother and uncle to stop acting so weird. But his uncle scooped him up anyway. “Sure you do. Come on, let’s see if we can’t find you something to watch.”

Farron struggled a little, but after a moment relaxed and let himself be put on the couch. He felt drained, and didn’t have the energy to complain as his uncle tuned the old boxy television. Giving Farron that odd smile again, his uncle quickly returned to the front door, just around the corner. Farron sat quietly, his eyes on the television. But as a cartoon cat was chasing a mouse around and around on the screen, Farron strained to hear what his mother and uncle were talking about.

“...shot the Quorum, I don’t know who. Everyone was so angry, all the yelling...”

“What about the rations?”

“There weren’t any to get. Shortage, the Quorum said something about every other week now before the crowd turned on him.”

“Every other week?”

Farron tuned out. Many of the words were unfamiliar to him, and besides, the cat had finally caught the mouse. He was putting on a funny bib, and setting up a table with the mouse on a platter in the center.

“...I know.”

“How are we going to make ends...”

“We will.”

“But Meredith...”

“We will. We have to, John.”

The mouse had just pulled out a giant wooden hammer. The cat looked confused before the mouse hit him over the head with it. Birds began to fly around the cat’s head, and Farron gave a little giggle, the memory of the day’s events seeming like nothing more than a bad dream.

Just a bad dream.