Foodchain

by Jeff Jacobson

  The men laughed and applauded.

  Sturm put his arm around his son’s shoulders and finished his beer.

  The sun crawled across the sky.

  Four alligators went at Frank the next time. By then, he had nearly three feet of chain loose, and whipped it at the gators like he was popping a wet towel. He drove them off, but an hour later, he watched as every gator he could see get closer in slow, lazy movements.

  Heat waves shimmered off the water, attacking the air with shards of light.

  Frank splashed water on his face and chest, eyeballing the sun. He squatted again, now holding a chain loop almost five feet in length. He scooped up a handful of mud and smeared it across his scalp, his face, his shoulders.

  He couldn’t help himself and swallowed a few sips of water from his palm.

  * * * * *

  Sturm watched Frank the way a housecat will watch a rattlesnake, waiting, learning, full of hunger and reluctant respect. He bent down at the water and splashed some over his skull, imitating Frank’s movements, smearing mud across his face. Frank watched him right back.

  Sturm unzipped and pissed in the rice paddy. Some of the others looked like they had to take a leak, but weren’t sure if they were supposed to, worried that this might be some kind of important ritual. Sturm zipped and unsheathed his Iron Mistress. He dipped the blade in the water, held the blade to the sun, then sliced Theo’s shirt open. He touched the edge of steel to his own chest, drawing blood, and in a precise and methodical manner, cut into Theo’s chest, cracking the ribcage and prying his son’s heart out.

  Sturm held it out and sprinkled blood into the water, as if blessing the land with a sacrifice. He took a bite out of Theo’s heart and tossed it into the rice paddy. Jack and Pine silently wrapped Theo in a sheet, and put him in the back of Sturm’s pickup. Sturm pulled his chair closer to the edge and sat, watching Frank.

  Conversation bubbled up, like vultures going back to a dead squirrel after a truck had passed. An alligator took the heart.

  Frank vomited. He knew it was from drinking the water from the rice field, and it was his own damn fault. He retched again. It foamed around his shins and haunches. He didn’t know if the drugs were still affecting him anymore, and just as he began to lose faith in the pills to either kill him or give him a fantastic burst of energy, the whisper of the drugs wearing off was enough to corrupt the waves of energy that he imagined floating up through his chest and head, and he felt the fire go out as if someone had turned a knob, killing the BBQ burner.

  Frank tried to scare himself, to shock himself into an adrenaline overdose, something to clutch at the strength in his limbs. He sank to his knees, too exhausted and hurt to stand anymore, forcing himself to see it as it would happen, feeling the gators go after him like pack of pit bulls ripping at a three legged cat, twisting and tearing him until he was pulled apart like taffy, all while the men watched.

  The gators closed in, their tails sweeping great swaths of dead rice stalks in the creamy mud. Frank gripped the chain tight, tighter, cried out, and slashed it at the first couple, but the others came in from the side. He kicked out, using his heels and elbows. Teeth snapped on bubbles and steel.

  Two gunshots, flat and quick, ripped across the water.

  * * * * *

  It was Alice. She had a worn Remington semi-auto .12 gauge, moving quickly through the mud. The Glouck station wagon waited behind her, on the east bank. They had clearly come from Sturm’s, and Frank knew they had found their boys. Alice got closer and shot two more alligators. Fifteen feet from Frank, she stopped to reload.

  Pine jumped up. “Are you aware that these animals are private property?”

  Alice shot another gator. “You oughta be ashamed of yourselves.” The reptiles stopped stalking Frank long enough to attack their dead kin.

  Sturm stood. His voice boomed across the water like the shotgun blasts. “Ashamed? Ashamed of what? I’m ashamed abominations of nature such as yourself still walk the earth.” He drew his pistol and shot Alice in the hip.

  She spun, firing the second round into the white sky, fell into the water on her wounded side. Bobbing up, water still running off her face, she tried to take a breath and Sturm shot her in the shoulder. Her mouth was still open when she flopped back into the shallow lake.

  Frank lunged for the Remington.

  Alligators came out of nowhere, clamping down on Alice’s hand, her knee, her feet, her head. They twisted and rolled until the water exploded in a churning vortex of mud and blood. A tail slapped the shotgun away.

  Even over the thrashing water, in the baked silence of the valley, everyone could hear Edie’s howl. She floored the 4X4 and the motor growled as if matching her scream. Tires spun in the dust and she raced around the rice paddy.

  Sturm waited until Edie turned the final corner onto the highway, then yanked out both pistols and fired at the windshield. Glass popped and cracked. But Edie kept coming, faster and faster, gobbling up the highway. When Sturm was out of ammo, he dropped the pistols, turned to the men, said, “Finish it,” and unsheathed the Iron Mistress. He fixed his eyes on Frank and started into the water.

  The men began to shoot, careful and slow at first, then quicker, the firing becoming more dense, becoming a single deafening blast, the gentle squeezing of triggers becoming frantic twitches as the 4x4 roared down the highway like a tornado thrown by God.

  Edie slammed into the row of the pickups and everyone stumbled into the water to get out of the way. The station wagon rocketed onto the driver’s side door, glancing off Pine’s pickup, and rolled over upside down, half submerged in the water, where it finally stopped in a cloud of dust and steam.

  * * * * *

  Sturm was almost running when he got to Frank. The ten and a half inch blade sliced through the air. Frank smacked the length of chain across Sturm’s forearm, knocking the fist and knife away. Sturm whipped the knife back up, but Frank was already rolling his wrist, spinning the chain back at Sturm. Frank had nearly a foot and half over Sturm in height, and this, along with the chain, gave him an extra two and half feet.

  The folded chain caught Sturm in the jaw, snapping his head at the huge sky. Still, like in the arena, after fighting the lioness, Sturm held onto the knife.

  * * * * *

  The men crept closer to the upside-down station wagon. Besides the cops, only Jack and Pine were armed. Jack had a pistol, and Pine carried his M-1. For a moment, they heard nothing but the hiss of steam from the crumpled engine. Then Edie blew a hole through the back window with a shotgun, blasting a bigger hole in Jack’s chest.

  Everyone scrambled.

  Edie kept shooting, as fast as she could point and pull the trigger of her side-by-side double-barreled shotgun. She could fire twice and reload in less than a second. Olaf went down and didn’t get back up. Another blast folded the taxidermist in half. Herschell leapt behind his cruiser. Billy dove into the back of Sturm’s pickup, landing on Theo’s corpse. Pine slammed the bolt home on his M-1 and unloaded on the station wagon.

  He squinted through the steam and gunsmoke. He heard Edie reloading. As if that reminded him, he ripped out the clip and feverishly forced more rounds into it. But Edie was faster. She fired, taking out Pine’s left leg.

  He toppled face first into the mud, dropping the M-1.

  Edie scuttled out of the station wagon like some arachnid Jack-in-the-Box and snatched Pine’s rifle before wriggling back inside. Silence bloomed again. Her voice cracked with emotion as she called to her son. Her firstborn. “My boys…How could you…”

  Pine said, “Please—”

  Edie shot him in the head with his own rifle.

  * * * * *

  Sturm bared his teeth and rushed at Frank.

  Frank whipped the chain around and took a step back and slipped in the mud. In that faltering second Sturm rushed at him, landing on Frank’s back. The knife plunged at his stomach. Frank caught Sturm’s wrist with both hands, but Sturm snaked his left arm arou
nd Frank’s neck, squeezing at the carotid artery, trying to get Frank to black out as he clung like one of the spider monkeys.

  Pools of darkness grew in Frank’s eyes. He hung onto Sturm’s wrist and slowly toppled backwards. They hit the water and Frank slammed Sturm into the rice stalks and mud.

  Sturm hung on.

  Frank flattened the little man into the soft wet earth.

  Sturm bit him, at the base of Frank’s neck, in his right trapezius.

  Frank relaxed, letting go of Sturm with one hand, and simply guided the blade up and let Sturm slit his own forearm. Frank ripped himself away as Sturm jabbed the knife at his face. He found Sturm’s false teeth still embedded in his neck. He tried to slap them away, to tear them out, but they were stuck fast, like a starving tick.

  * * * * *

  Edie rolled out of the car, Pine’s M-1 slung over her shoulder, a shotgun held in front of her. She stayed low and worked her way up the bank on her back, sidling closer to the police cruiser.

  Herschell got brave and stuck his head over the trunk, fired a few times at the station wagon. When nothing happened, he edged around the bumper, gun up and ready. He didn’t expect to almost step on Edie as she lay on her back glaring up at him and had just enough time to look pissed, as if he’d thought this particular move was against the rules. She fired, and a deluge of #9 shot exploded up through his groin, his gut, his face.

  Edie was on her feet before Herschell hit the pavement. She reloaded and held the shotgun up to her right shoulder, good eye glaring down the barrel, the pale, unblinking other eye staring fixedly on the late afternoon sky. She advanced on Sturm’s pickup.

  Billy shrieked, “It wasn’t me—” Edie shot him twice at point blank range.

  * * * * *

  Sturm circled, mouth oddly puckered without his teeth. Frank pivoted in place, eyes locked on Sturm. Frank drifted to the south, then broke into a clumsy run, darting past Sturm the other way. He dropped, pretending to reach the end of his chain, landing sideways in the water.

  The closest alligator was ten yards away, mouth open slightly, black water spilling through the lower teeth. Sturm rushed at Frank.

  Frank drove his foot into the older man’s sternum. They both heard something crack. Sturm slashed at Frank’s leg. Frank kicked out with his other foot up and caught Sturm under the right armpit, knocking him into the air.

  Sturm dropped the Iron Mistress.

  Frank scrabbled at the mud. He grabbed at something that felt somehow both cold and hot at the same time. Jerking his left hand out of the water, he saw his fingers wrapped around the Mistress’s blade. Blood ran into the water.

  Sturm grabbed for the handle. Frank dropped the blade, and got hold of the handle in his right hand underwater. He drove it straight up, through the soft flesh of Sturm’s bottom jaw, up through his mouth, into his nasal cavities.

  Sturm smacked his sunken lips and bare gums and drooled blood. Frank saw how the blade had split the tongue in half lengthwise. Frank refused to let go. Sturm’s hands slapped at Frank’s arms, still some fight left, but it was leaving soon.

  Frank leaned in close. “When you die…you aren’t going to heaven. You will not see your son. Ever. Again. You will never see these animals. They will not serve you in the afterlife. There is no afterlife for you. There is only the long emptiness. That is the truth. Do you understand?” Frank used the knife handle like he was controlling a puppet and nodded Sturm’s head for him. “Good.”

  Frank ripped the Iron Mistress away.

  Sturm took one solid, confident step forward, just to let anyone watching would know that he was okay, that he was in control, then the mud grabbed at his boot and he went to his knees. Something underwater snapped at his leg and yanked.

  They tore him to pieces.

  * * * * *

  Edie settled into one of the lawn chairs and simply watched him.

  Frank couldn’t see her expression. He stood straight, tugging at his choke chain, but it was too tight. He fingered the padlock, and knew it was hopeless. There was no way to break it or the chains. He still held the Iron Mistress, but it was useless against the steel. He looked back to Edie, but she hadn’t moved, and a grim certainty descended up him.

  Frank realized that she hadn’t made up her mind to either help him or kill him. She was just going to sit there and wait and watch and see if he could make it out on his own.

  He held the chain limp in on hand, Iron Mistress in the other. Exhaustion didn’t creep up softly and seduce him; it ran him down and stomped on his head. Frank collapsed into the water. Water filled his mouth and he vomited again. He dry-heaved, somehow crawling backwards. His bare foot slid against the Remington.

  He shot two of the closest alligators. He fired again and missed. He squeezed the trigger one more time and heard the dry snap of an empty shotgun.

  He pulled himself over to the T-post and used the butt of the shotgun to start digging. He worked at it until his muscles screamed, his back twitched in agony, and his hands bled. The sun was nearly touching the horizon when Frank finally wrenched the fence post free with a small squelching sound.

  He fell backwards and stared up at the gathering twilight as if he’d never seen the sky before. He felt movement in the water and knew he had to keep moving. The other end of the chain had been padlocked to the fence post, so he ended up carrying the T-post. Halfway to the bank, his legs gave out and he had to crawl the rest of the way. It took at least half an hour. He inched out of the water, and collapsed in the mud in front of the chairs.

  Edie’s voice said softly, “My Alice is dead. She’s dead because she went out there to help you.” Frank rolled onto his back and stared up to the black chasms of her shotgun muzzle, inches from his head.

  Frank tried to speak, but his mouth wouldn’t work. It didn’t matter. There was nothing to say. Edie didn’t move. Tears slid down her high cheeks and fell from her chin, spattering silently on the shotgun, rolling slowly down the center of the two barrels and dripped on Frank’s forehead. She exhaled through her teeth.

  Frank closed his eyes.

  They both heard the far-off whine of an ATV. Several of them. It was the rest of the Glouck brothers, the ones that had helped bury Petunia. The four-wheelers roared up the highway to the pickups.

  Frank heard the shotgun clatter to the pavement.

  When he opened his eyes, Annie was staring down at him. The sun was nearly gone, sending light flat across the land, lighting her face in soft, glowing warmth. Her eyes were red. A coldness had settled within them, and Frank thought she might just pick up the shotgun and shoot him and be done with it. But instead, she squatted down, gently patted his head like he was a good dog, and walked away.

  * * * * *

  Frank managed to lift himself up into the cab of Sturm’s pickup when he heard the big cats snarling and snapping over the bodies. It was much later. Cold stars blanketed the sky. Strange howls and cries rose above the crickets.

  The Gloucks were gone.

  Frank fumbled with the glove box and found the First-Aid kit. He splashed disinfectant over his hand and used up the entire roll of white tape wrapping his fingers. He slumped back on the bench seat and slipped into sleep as he listened to the animals fight over the meat.

  DAY THIRTY-FIVE

  Everything hurt. Frank sat upright, squinting into the hideous sunlight. A few lionesses rested in the shade under the pickups, tails slapping absentmindedly at flies and mosquitoes. He slid over into the driver’s seat and found the ignition empty. Even through the throbbing pain, Frank knew if he stayed in the cab, he’d be dead of dehydration before the end of the day.

  None of the big cats moved when he cracked the door open. He stepped gingerly down, pavement already hot under his bare feet. He realized he was still naked. There was nothing else to do, so he walked, still carrying the damn chain and fencepost. He skirted around the rice paddy and headed back through the fields to Sturm’s house. None of the animals bothered him. He fig
ured they’d eaten well the night before, and didn’t feel the need to stalk and hunt prey now.

  The sky was alive with vultures.

  He went into the house first, straight to the kitchen sink, and stuck his head under the faucet, gulping water until he vomited again. The fridge was full of meat. He grabbed an apple from a bowl on the counter instead. Then he went upstairs.

  None of Sturm’s clothes came even close to fitting. Finally, he found a T-shirt and a pair of sweats in Theo’s room that came down to mid-calf. Theo had a pair of flip-flops that covered most of Frank’s feet. He poured Listerine over his hand, and put fresh bandages over the slices in his flesh.

  Sturm kept his liquor in the living room. Frank grabbed a bottle and went out and sat on the deck. The morning sun threw the shadow of the Lutheran cross over the entire back yard. Frank finished half before heading to the barn. There, he found a hacksaw and went to work on the choke chain.

  Later, he checked on the stall at the back of the barn. It still looked the same. Dust everywhere. He toppled the air conditioner off the freezer and let it crash to the floor. He froze as the sound reverberated around the barn, wondering if Princess and Lady were still around. But after a full minute ticked past, he figured they were either gone or weren’t hungry. He opened the freezer.

  It was empty. The gun safe was gone.

  Frank let that sink in for a moment, then carefully closed the freezer door. There was nothing left to do, so he grabbed two bottles of rum from one of the stalls and went out to the driveway to sit on the front porch. He settled into Sturm’s rocking chair and had been rocking for almost fifteen minutes when he saw the saddlebags hanging over the porch railing. He couldn’t remember if they’d been here when he first got to the house or if someone had left them here when he was in the barn.

  The bags were full of cash. Frank looked toward town, as if he’d find answers. Instead, he just saw a thick column of smoke, probably rising from the park. The gas in the fire engine had finally caught. Or someone had put a match to it. He wondered if it would spread to the rest of the town. Swallowing some more rum, he slung the saddlebags over his shoulders and started walking to the long black car.