The Last Seasons (Intro and Chapter 1)

No Country for Big Brother- 2016

The kid dug a finger in his nose. He didn’t care whether anyone was watching him. His brother snickered as he watched. The little kid wiggled his finger inside his nostril, trying to pry an annoying booger out.

“Find something good up there?” his big brother asked.

The little kid nodded. His brother threw his head back and laughed. Laughter often followed after almost anything his little brother did. He could be in their mother’s arms and he would fart in public. Mother would tell him, “Can you say excuse me?” the little squirt would just shake his head.

Whatever booger the kid found in his nose was probably better than what would come later. First off, there would come a time when there would never be a big brother. Or big sister for that matter. There wouldn’t even be a need to dig for boogers anymore, because, you see, science had found a way to make humans immune to all disease through its Project M.A.G.I.C.

Thing is, when there was no more disease, there were too many brothers and sisters. Too many people. And with too many people, there was too much trouble. Crime was a fancy word for it. Chaos. That was what Big Brother called it. So in a way, there actually was a big brother. But he never asked if you had found anything good. He took away everything good. Took it all away.

The Last Seasons

Daniel

Thousands upon thousands of birds were flying over the field of flowers, light filtered through them like shimmering diamonds of fire. It was quite the sight, Daniel thought. Thousands of shadows flew over the field around him, mirroring their aerial counterparts.

“Now this is relaxing,” Daniel said, stretching out on the flowers, which were as soft as fur. Not only were they soft, they were almost as uniform as a professional football field (Not that he had ever seen one in real life, because they didn’t exist outside of pictures anymore.) But unlike the bland grass of a football field, this one was flourishing with red, white and blue flowers, and infinitely more massive. How he got here, Daniel did not know and did not care. For all he knew he could be in some kind of after-life. Daniel pulled out his phone and raised it to capture a video of the birds, but it was off, and wouldn’t turn on no matter how many times he tried. Weird, he thought as he put it away, figuring that it wasn’t a big deal for his phone to not be working in the beautiful field. Why he had a phone if he was dead didn’t bother him either. He was much too relaxed to be worried about anything at the moment.

He yawned as he craned his neck up, swiveling his head around. The field went on for quite a while he saw. Feeling no more need to lay down he picked himself up off the grass and walked along the field.

He stopped as large shadows suddenly appeared over the field, cutting through the smaller ones. Glancing up he squinted against the sudden brightness of the light, and furrowed his brow as he saw several enormous, dark, mist-like shapes soar amidst the birds. Daniel stood there and watched as streaks of red and orange lights were emitted by the large shapes, lighting up the heavens like the fourth of July. It was actually pretty cool, until the sky burst with explosions.

The birds in the air screeched as fiery flowers bloomed, consuming hundreds and incinerating many more. He collapsed on his knees, stunned. Feathers scattered through the air like daggers, but quickly slowed down and floated in mid-air. As disgusting as what he had just seen was, the sudden slowing down of the feathers as they began to fall was oddly beautiful. But he coughed in disgust, remembering why they were falling in the first place.

Where was he, Daniel wondered. Surely this could not be the after-life. At least not the good kind, but why would he be in the bad one? He was not a bad guy. At least not really. He was not always the most considerate person when it came to talking to his friends or people he didn’t like, but he never did any really, you know, bad stuff.

No matter where he was, and why he was here, something really bad had just happened.

“Am I dead?” he said, hoping he might hear something reply.

There was no reply, instead he heard a loud hissing sound from above. Looking up, he noticed a weird, white mist being released from the big dark things, causing the bird’s feathers to fall off in clumps. It didn’t kill the birds, though, he noticed, instead it sent them into a violent frenzy against each other.

Grossed out by the brutal dive bombing, and stomach splitting carnage above Daniel began to pace along the field, trying to ignore the blood-curdling shrieks. Maybe he was dreaming. Either that or he really was in some messed up life after death. If this was a dream it was way too real. Not in what was happening, but everything else. His breathing, that was real. His twitching body, that was real- And the fear, it wasn’t just nightmare fear. This fear was real. As for those feathers that were falling. They seemed pretty real. And his conscience. It was as real as it was when he was awake.

“Tell me what I did to deserve this-tell me now! Am I all alone here!” he yelled. He waited, but no reply came. Frustrated, he walked on, biting his lips and clinching his fists. Feathers slowly made their way down all around him as far as he could see.

It didn’t take long for Daniel to notice that the feathers had left his arms stained with blood. Getting frustrated, Daniel swiped his hands over his shirt, brushing the feathers off himself. He gritted his teeth because that only smeared his hands with more blood.

“Bloody feathers,” he said, wiping the blood off on his pants. But then his face was covered in the crap, so he shot his hands back up to shield his face, and spat out bits of feather from his lips.

Daniel ground to a halt and squinted through a crack in his fingers, trying to make out a form through the torrent of feathers. It was hard to say, but he was sure that it was human.

Shouting, “Hey, you!” he ran toward the figure, his feet sinking into the feathers as the piles grew deeper. Yes, it was definitely human he realized as he got closer. Not just human, but a girl with dark brown hair. And even from this distance he could tell that it was very pretty one.

Stacey

Stacey didn’t dream much, but even when she did they were never this strange. Just not too long ago she had been dancing amongst the flowers, singing songs, enjoying every moment beneath the ceiling of soaring birds. But then came the scary, dark mist things. The horrible things had suddenly started to kill the birds, and then their feathers fell like comets, leaving her streaked with blood.

What kind of feathers were these anyway, she thought as she made her way through the constant rain of fluff. She did not have to wonder for too long, because eagles were now landing all around her, their wings flapping erratically.

“Aww,” Stacey said as they thudded to the ground, screeching and twitching. Some flopped on the ground like fish and others practically dragged themselves along the ground, screeching in agony.

“You poor creatures,” she said, bending down. She extended a hand out to one, and it cocked its head back up at her, its eyes piercing into her’s. Then she realized that it was a bald eagle. They all were. It was difficult to tell at first, because of their bloodied appearance, and the constant barrage of feathers battering her face. But sure enough they were.

Stacey clinched her fists, her tiny knuckles protruding out. This was just about too much for her to bear. These poor creatures were suffering, and she could not do anything about it. Just what kind of dream was this anyway? She did not watch any horror movies, so how could her subconscious create such a terrifying event? Whatever way this dream came about, Stacey decided to make the best out of it, and reached out to the dying eagle in front of her, carefully cradled it in her arms and pressed it against her chest.

“There, there,” she whispered, “I got you.”

The eagle cooed in her arms like a gentle dove, gazed up at her, fluttered its wings and then went limp. Sighing, Stacey set the dead bird on the ground. She didn’t have time to mourn, because over the quieting death cries of the eagles she could hear someone yelling.

Andrew

Andrew lifted his foot off of the eagle’s body, snickering. Beneath him, the flattened eagle lay on its side beside his shoe, and was quickly buried in feathers. Satisfied, Andrew karate chopped his way through the feathery storm.

This was kind of cool, he thought as he made his way through the field. Andrew liked nightmares because he could do just about anything he wanted and nobody would care. Not that he really did care what others thought of him. So really his persona in reality and his dream-self tended to merge anyway. That was good for him, but not always the best for others. But who cared about others? Not him. Others were just fun to use for his benefit, but not to care about.

The feathers, though. Those things were annoying. All they did was keep on falling. About that he did care, because they were really beginning to frustrate him. Frustration was among Andrew’s biggest pet-peeves. Andrew hated his pet-peeves. He hated pet-peeves. Hated them so much that he wanted to just slaughter anything or anyone that gave him trouble. That wasn’t just talk either. He had felt the pleasure of killing, and he liked it. Sure it was only just things like worms and bugs at first, which he had cut in half, baked in the sun, suffocated in oil, and many more awesome things like that. However, it was not too long ago that he had taken the opportunity to end some human lives as well. He was fascinated by how things died.

“Alright, this is really getting boring now,” Andrew said, throwing his hands up. But really, normally his dreams would morph into something new every few moments, but this one had stayed virtually the same throughout. It was actually like a pattern. First there was the dull calm, then the cool explosions, the bird combat, and now this annoying feather storm.

Bored, Andrew threw his arms back about to attempt to fly when he heard a girl yelling, “Hello! Is someone out there?”

There sure is, Andrew thought, smiling. Maybe this dream was going to be fun after all.

Chloe

Chloe had been laying on the ground for so long that she was almost completely buried in feathers. What else was there to do, but not do anything, though? Keep walking and get nowhere, look at the dead birds, try and save some? None of those were enjoyable options.

Brushing feathers off her face and plucking them out of her golden hair, Chloe sighed. For once dreamland was almost as depressing as being awake. But this wasn’t so bad. Because really, in the real world there were expectations to meet. Chloe despised expectations. She despised them because they were a part of having to interact with other people. Which she sucked at. She sucked at everything about it. For one, her stutter made her feel retarded. And secondly, she was often not interested in talking gossip with the people she hung out with.

Chloe opened her eyes as an explosion boomed above her. Yelping, she sprang to her feet and looked for somewhere to run as the colossal shadow things began to explode, sending out rings of smoke and fire, incinerating the feathers around them. And then just like that, every feather around her morphed into embers and then disintegrated into ash. Chloe waddled around nervously as the flowers around her lost their red, white and blue luster, and shriveled into gray skeletons.

Craning her neck up Chloe saw a barrage of fiery debris plummeting down toward her, roaring like a dinosaur. There wasn’t really anything to do, but let it hit her. She didn’t even bother to close her eyes as it crashed down around her. Hissing flames consumed her entire body, and debris pierced the ground like spears. Chloe inhaled, shocked that she felt nothing. She ran a hand through the fire, feeling nothing. She wept. She stood there weeping, and then giggling. This was insane. Even in a dream, dying should have at least woken her up, right? But no, here she was playing in fire.

Then she saw the man, and fell on her face. There he had been, in the fire with her. But this man-oh man. She had only caught a twinkle of him, but what she had seen was incredible. He had eyes of fire, and his face was brighter than any light she had ever seen. In his hand he was like-like levitating stars or something. She lay there, shaking, her face still to the ground, afraid to look back up. It wasn’t bad afraid, it was kind of like, what… respectful fear? Yeah that was it.

“Do not be afraid, Chloe,” a voice said. A thunderous, but beautiful voice.

“B-but I a-am,” she said.

“It is I, and I will be with you until the very end,” the voice replied. And as the voice faded the fire around was extinguished.

Chloe lay there, eyes closed, practically hugging the ground. Moment after moment passed, and then she finally opened her eyes, and blinked when she saw whiteness. She blinked again, panning her head around, taking in the snowy wasteland. Ash swirled through the air, and black clouds of smoke darkened the land.

“Is this the end?” Chloe said as ash collected in her palms. No one replied.

Her eyes grew wide as white fabric sprouted over her chest, spreading throughout her entire body. She thrashed, trying to get it off, but then, as the material expanded, and a hood formed over her head she realized that it was a coat. Nope, this isn’t the end, Chloe thought, her lips forming a smile.

Manna

Daniel shivered, and panted as the frigid air stung his lungs. He was almost to the girl, and he was not alone. Not too far off, a tall slender guy in a trench coat was also making his way toward her, his hazel eyes locked on the girl. There was something wrong with that guy, Daniel could tell. He was walking toward her, grimacing, like he wanted to snatch her up and… do some very bad things to her. Heck, he’d be lying if he hadn’t been thinking about doing maybe the same thing earlier, but he wasn’t anymore. Something was defiantly different about this dream, and his conscience was operating exactly as it would be if he were awake.

“Hi,” he said, reaching her before the other guy. He couldn’t figure what else to say, because up close he was mesmerized by her beauty. He could feel his eyes tear as she stared at him with dark blue, confident irises.

“Hello,” she said, hands rustling in her marshmallow coat.

Daniel couldn’t help but smile. Her voice was tender, yet strong. It was like hearing a beautiful eagle chirp like a gentle dove. “So, um, what’s your name,” Daniel had started to say before the other guy caught up with them. Wisps of vapor were coming from his clenched teeth, and his shoulders were heaving. Daniel did not like the crazed look of the guy.

“Get lost, man,” the guy said, beginning to stomp his way toward the girl, who apart from shuffling a foot to the side, kept her ground and faced him as he approached. But then he stopped as something under the snow thudded. He jumped back as the snow melted away, revealing a body beneath the clear, icy surface.

Startled, the girl put a hand over her mouth.

“It can’t be…” the guy said.

“What?” Daniel said, trying to make sense of what was going on.

“That guy,” he said, pointing a gloved finger at the body beneath the surface.

Daniel waited, but the guy said no more. He was about to ask him what he was going to say, but instead he raised a hand to point behind the girl. In the distance, corpses were stumbling toward her, their hands reaching out, touching each other’s shoulders as if they were guiding each other. Unsuccessfully, because a few fell on their faces, and were stomped on by the other corpses.

“Behind you!” she said.

“What is this?” the other guy said, still looking down at the body beneath the ice.

Daniel didn’t have an answer and shook his head. As he began to turn around his feet nudged something and pushed it out of the snow. But he didn’t look down to investigate what it was, because what he saw approaching petrified his nervous system. Time slowed as what had to be hundreds of uniformed men marched in his direction, eyes locked on him. Too scared to continue looking at them he gazed down at his feet and saw a boney thing poking out of the snow. He reached down and pulled up a jawbone. A big one.

“Stop!” the girl said, with such confidence and power that Daniel couldn’t help but feel warmth in his body. He turned toward her and his mouth dropped. In front of her the corpses were frozen as if someone had paused the world. They were absolutely terrifying to look at with their blood stained teeth, and sore, bump covered flesh. Never before had he seen anything like them before-except for maybe in textbooks that showed diseases of the past.

“Matthew, come out!” the guy commanded.

Both Daniel and the girl looked down at the body, and shot a glance at each other as it opened its eyes. This was just too much, Daniel thought, turning to face the advancing army of men, jawbone in his hands. He arched his back, ready to charge into the army of men, but then the ice behind him cracked.