CAROLINE - the black death

Caroline part 2

Even after the screams died away and night became day the death toll continued to rise.

Mass burials became popular, and people were put to peace in shallow ditches, but over time even mass burials became ineffective.

Houses, street gutters, shops and roads were stuffed with the dead. The overwhelming smell of not only death and decaying bodies, but also the creatures that hunted in the shadows; took its toll on everyone, one way or another.

Some drank themselves senseless, waiting for death to take them, whilst others went on a killing rage.

Some believe that by whipping themselves with steel-tipped whips until there backs were strips of wet bloody muscle; would make up for their life sins and God will pity and forgive them.

Though most just walk around in a daze, not sure how to handle the situation, so instead they just shut themselves down.

I crossed the streets, my bare feet making hollow echoes on the roughly paved path.

I sidestep a rotting woman still clutching her deceased baby in cold dead hands.

A man, another child, mothers, sons, daughters, aunties, uncles, all dead, all in the street left to rot.

Rats scuttle over my feet and up my bare legs making me jump and leaving behind shallow claw marks.

A pair of dogs feasts on a child's corps and they growl threateningly at me as I pass revealing long, sharp teeth.

I listen to men and women laugh and yell in slurred voices from the tavern, hear the weeping of a mother as she cradles a dead baby.

I cover my ears and close my eyes, I don't want to hear it, I don't want to see it, none of it.

Make it stop.

I kneel amongst the dead, amongst the animals, among the blood, puss, rotting flesh and grime that blankets the road and the rest of the village.

I feel powerless, puny, alone, sad.

'Mommy, daddy,' I whisper to myself. I miss them; I miss them both so much.

I remember my mother's smile, and how it could light up even the gloomiest day and how she use to wrap me in a warm embrace when the nights got cold.

I always felt warm and content when she was around.

How daddy use to give me his proportion of food when rations were irregular, and how at night, if I had a nightmare he would tell me that he would keep me safe. That he would protect me.

But what now?

Nights have been getting colder without mommy to keep me warm. The nightmare creatures have been getting meaner because daddy isn't there to scare them away.

I cry.

I pray.

I scream.

I wisper.

My arm is itchy and no matter how much I seem to scratch it, it only flares up and itch more.

Agh...I feel a bit light headed.

Maybe I should ask one of the doctors for a birds kiddny to stop the aching...

I try to rise but the slight throb in my head turns into a full-on wave of nauseous, and no sooner had I risen do I fall back down again.

'Thump' I hit the ground.

I dont feel to well...

I cheak under my arms for any lumps...

Please let there be no lumps...

But there they are 1,2,3...

Not good...

I sit still for a while, shock? Pain? Fear?

No.

Happiness?

Yes thats right. Thats the best way to describe it.

I look up to the the heavens, the smile on my face feels foreign.

"Mommy, daddy," I say, "I am coming..."