Cloak of Ashes

Bells were Ringing

"Oh my friends, my friends, forgive me,

That I live and you are gone.

There's a grief that can't be spoken.

There's a pain goes on and on.

Phantom faces at the windows,

Phantom shadows on the floor,

Empty chairs at empty tables,

Where my friends will meet no more."

~Empty Chairs at Empty Tables from Les Misérables. Score by Claude-Michel Schönberg. English Lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer.

Placing a thin, pale hand on the first rod, Colby hoisted himself, pack swinging dangerously off his shoulder. He was weak, and he knew it. Maybe it was not such a good idea after all. There was no guarantee that if he reached the top, he could ever have the strength to come back down.

Suddenly, as if right on cue, the bells of the old clock tower chimed, in unison, three of them forming a musical chord that verberated throughout the silent, ruined city. The bells had to be hand rung. Which meant that there was someone up there.

The thought of seeing another human being was all the incentive Colby needed, and soon he was climbing again, like a monkey as he traversed the thick steel bars. As he climbed, Colby counted the bells

Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong,
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.
Dong.

Colby stopped a moment, making sure he hadn't counted wrong. Thirteen? What could that mean? The sudden strangeness of his situation suddenly overcame him and made his head spin, causing him to swing precariously off the steel bar. His satchel slipped sideways, and a few of his precious, burnt cookies slipped out to make their descent towards the ground, plummeting downwards and lost in the gray haze of ashes below.

Colby let out an anguished cry, something akin to "No!" It was silly, of course, to become so emotional over a few cookies, especially since they were raisin, but they were baked by his mother.

His dead mother.

Pushing away all thoughts of the fire for now, he turned his attention back to his climbing. The tower seemed, strangely, higher now, growing until it broke through the solid sphere of cloud. Was it a way out?

The bells sounded again, a harmonic answer to his unspoken question.

Dong.
Donggggg.
Dong dong dong.
Dong donggggg dong dong.
Dongggg
Dong,
Dong dong
Dong dong dong dong dongggg.

A chorus of dongs resounded, overlapping each other and creating an indescribable amount of noise. Each bell donged of its own accord, pitches melding and blending in a bizarre yet beautiful way.

Colby was encouraged farther, and resumed his arduous climb, going faster now, limbs scurrying over the bars of solid steel bigger than his arm. But then again, to be fair, his arm was skinny and bony.

As he neared the top, he grew more frantic, though his muscles ached with every breath, and his head throbbed. He had to get to the ringing. He felt as if his skull would split open if he did not, and he would be left a corpse hanging haphzardly from a steel beam forever in this cursed city of broken glass and lost people.

With an almost Herculean strength for his current condition, he pulled himself up onto the skeletal clock tower, all semblance of floor or walls burned away, leaving the steel structure. 

And the bells, of course.

Now in his area of expertise, the art of nimbly jumping from beam to beam, he was able to move quicker now, that he was not going up. Behind the large bell, he saw a pair of pants, sticking out the bottom and ruffling in the breeze. The sight of those, although boringly gray, pants gave him the drive he needed to continue his journey upon the precarious steel beams to reach the strange phantom figure.

Approaching the bell, which had stopped ringing since, he walked around to the other side, expecting to see a human being, welcoming him with open arms, glad for assistance and company in this dire situation. He yearned to find his phantom figure, so great was his loneliness, and he wanted to perhaps strike up a conversation with this surely eloquent lad.

But as he neared the other side, his heart dropped and the gleeful grin that he had allowed to spread over his face faded into befuddlement and disappointment. He was crestfallen.

For all it was, was a phantom figure indeed.