Leda's Dream

Leda startles awake in pugilist form, tangled with sweat-soaked sheets that have clawed a tight grasp on her torso. She falls to the floor, her head making sharp contact with the bedside table. Grunting, stream of consciousness expletives rolling out on a hard exhale, as she tries to loosen the sheet’s cloying hold made more arduous by the bloated cotton fibers and the sweat still secreting from her pores. The tangy scent of adrenaline blended with fear waft from the wad of sour sheets as she slowly extricates herself. It’s a little past three in the morning. The moon hangs low in the sky, it’s ripened state casting elongated shadows on and around her body. Leda remains on her back while the rapid drumming of her heart slows as the epinephrine vapors of last night’s dream dissipate. Her eyes trace the length of shadows as they writhe on the ceiling to the sway of the soft breeze outside the barred window. The silence once longed for when the world was bustling and alive, now like a cavernous yawn that consumes, should you succumb to its stark whispers. Leda stares at the dead ceiling fan, now an appointed dust collector of yore since the sound of generators attract danger, willing the sheen of sweat to evaporate amid the stale air. As her body finally begins to cool, the dark void creeps in, leaving her shivering and restless. Leda works through her mind, sifting through the remains of the dream that awoke her.

Her conscious self quickly tries to tidy and hide the stains of this particular dream, a survivalist’s reflex, however Leda elbows past and reaches the door before it closes. Stepping through this doorway, she lands in a dark alleyway. Returning to a time from before, to the chaos of when the wall was built effectively closing the borders and trapping everyone inside this New American territory. A time when an opportunist rose quickly among the ranks of an organized group, who built their numbers on the vulnerable and lesser educated meat and taters variety. Persons regularly fed on xenophobic values that were taught at the pulpit and fortified with messages of distrust, self-abnegation and glorification of martyrdom. The echoing beat of collective feet striking and dragging in a disorganized rhythm alerts her to nearing danger. She crouches in the dark gloom of a fence line, every sense on alert, as she adjusts her eyes to the movement within this treacherous lane. Darting her eyes, she eventually makes out a horde, strangely and laboriously moving as a unit toward her.

The moon shining behind them provides detail to their outline alone, their faces obscured in darkness. The acrid smell hits her nose first, a combination of burnt putrescent flesh and the sulfuric scent that reminisces of battle fatigues and gun powder. Their heads are domed with helmets and a glinting can be seen from their right lapel, swaggering symbols of honor in a faction built on blinded faith. The sudden creak of a wooden gate to her right startles her and she tracks the sound. Summer is standing in the moonlight, the whites of her eyes glow as she is transfixed by the threat looming ever closer. Leda quickly grabs Summer’s hand and pulls her back through the gate, softly closing the wooden egress in hopes they had not been discovered. She performs a quick search of the ground and finds a branch which is quickly shoved into the aligned hole on the gate’s latch. Then spying a large rock, she aligns her body with the target and throws true, the rock flies over the alleyway hitting the aluminum roof of a shed with a resounding boom in an attempt to create a decoy. She squeezes Summer’s hand and they start running through the yard and enter the back door of a brick home. Summer turns the door’s bolt into place as Leda makes a quick scan of the place, assessing for vulnerabilities and seeking a weapon. She finds a sturdy wooden bat in the closet of the foyer and chokes up her one-handed grip until she finds the balancing fulcrum, that sweet spot of leverage, that allows the weighted swing to hit with accuracy and to hit hard. Once satisfied, Leda begins peeking through the chintzy curtains at the front of the house. She looks back as Summer enters the room, slinging a backpack over her shoulder as she softly says “I gathered some supplies, food, and water.”

Leda pulls her into a fierce embrace. Her face presses into Summer’s hair as she tries to memorize every note, every sensation, their hearts beating a duet. They simultaneously jump as the booming rat-a-tat-tat of an assault rifle sprays a short stream of bullets announcing the breach of the back gate and some remaining executive function from the festering throng. Their eyes meet as they quickly and silently run through their short list of options and then nod at each other in agreement. Linking hands, they approach the front door. Leda pushes the curtain aside again to view their exit plan. It appears to be clear—she pauses one more breath to observe for any movement. Leda soundlessly opens the door and they slowly start to make their way toward the end of the porch, keeping to the darkness, when they hear the nauseating click of a hammer striking an empty barrel stalling their progress. Anders is standing in the moonlight dressed in officer’s formals, hat cocked. The limited lighting shades his gruesome umbrage. Another friend, citizen, human being who succumbed to the eloquent pandering of a malignant narcissist, a con man turned evangelist.

Leda’s chest tightens as she recognizes him. She also sees the man behind this man—whose voice found greatest strength within a culture and society built on white-washed righteous values preached more than practiced. She is struck by the choice to decay instead of evolve. At least that was what it seemed like when the infrastructure was still operating, before the virus quickly made pudding out of the droves of people who showed up to support the growing movement. Power like a drug swayed, and it was a matter of weeks before the virus sliced through their ranks. At first silent and barely detectable, fostering the shared delusion that it was a conspiracy and then rapidly as behaviors became more erratic and flesh started showing the necrotizing signs of a terminal disease process. Borders quickly closed thereafter, and the walls that were originally built in New America to keep the others out during the rise of this totalitarian reign, became repurposed to control the spread within this disintegrating territory.

A wide moving gash on his cheek reveals white gleaming molars smeared with a putrid fleshy overlay, as slick wriggling bodies of maggots can be seen leaving trails down the front of his finery. Don’t be afraid their leader would say, don’t believe the lies they tell you, there is only all or nothing, never be weak, only I tell you the truth, never trust yourself or your neighbor, only I know what is good for you, stand by me and I will reward you with glory and power, rally up and hunt the others, seek them out and cut out the cancer, subordinate and dominate. The empty Ruger still threatening and pointing toward Leda’s chest lets out a second bile-purging click. Leda quickly releases Summer’s hand and swings the bat up into a double-handed grip rotating her body in tandem to increase the torque before slamming the end of the bat into Ander’s temple, taking the lead before he squeezes the trigger again. His body falls to the ground in a twitching, decorticate fashion and Leda launches herself onto his chest, legs astraddle. She lands with precision, her knees pressed into the dewy grass and using the weight of her shins she effectively restrains Ander’s arms. She can feel the fasciculations of his body beneath her. The gash now extends to his gaping mouth, widened further due to a dislocated jaw, creating a horrifying grin as he chokes on the maggots wriggling and pouring from this cavernous and fleshy opening. Leda inverts the bat and begins using the end of it to jab and further pummel his face. Anders’ remaining flesh quickly gives way to bone and her hands begin to ache against the tightened grip as she continues to strike until the bones cave to pulp. Each strike producing a squishing splatter of putrid blood, mucous, maggots, and brain matter. Leda’s breath is heaving, her eyes are wild and feral as the tunnel vision widens to take in the full extent of the mess she has made.

A sharp glint hits her eye as a small object slides from his jacket pocket, a heart-shaped golden locket with an embossed Edwardian design creating a visual paradox. This small object portraying the final remnant of his humanity before the virus laid waste to his neurological system. A reminder of the isolation and caged loss, of the ultimate cost of hierarchical values. Leda gently lifts the locket, heart pounding in chest. She feels Summer’s gaze on her as she takes in this disturbing scene and abjectly stares at her aching hands, salty tears stinging and filling her vision. Summer kneels beside her and guiding her face up with the gentle cupping of her palm, she wipes away the tears and blood holding Leda’s eyes with her unflinching gaze, as she leans in and touches lips. A final gurgle from Anders breaks their reverie and startles Leda awake. She instinctively moves her hand to her throat to find the locket that has since remained attached by golden chain, a reminder to survive her heart, amid a world of thought that is no longer sustainable. Finding her feet, Leda slinks her way out of the bedroom, seeking the warmth of the kitchen fire and Summer’s embrace.