Tradegy Of Crows: Chapter 2 (2) “Where are we?” a voice came through. Always, in every group, there’s been a slow one. In this case, the slow one was wearing a black jacket with metal buttons on the flaps. Virgil had a policy of never repeating himself. He had gone through all of the preliminary spiel before they left the mountain’s base. Going through it all again would hold up the tour, and there was a definite schedule to keep. Some of the demons were very particular about it, as well. They didn’t have too much else to do other than be particular about things that were beyond their control in the first place. Nevertheless, Virgil hated to give them any excuse to snarl, growl, or wave pointy things at the tour. It added something sickly comical to the whole process, and Virgil was never fond of playing the role of the strong-willed hero. Wasting wit on snickering demons was not an appealing transgression from his typical thought process. Neither was answering the redundant questions of his leather-clad tourist. “He who has listened well will understand,” Virgil replied. “Onward. We must press onward. Ahead we shall meet the ferryman Charon.” It was starting to look like the New York State Fair, Hazzard thought, before and after at the same time. A faint wind stirred charred debris. The masses were in noisy pockets, while a few straggles wandered from huddled crowd to crowd. They weren’t men, really. When he squinted, they dissipated into a gray fog. Eying them was half-imagining, as a child would conceive an image from the shape of a cloud. These low-level vapors traveled along the edge of their path. Phantoms surfaced on occasion like blurring photographs of fast motions. He could sense limbs, more than see them. He could smell sweat, almost taste it, too. The steam was of a human kind, a deep summer smell of grit amplified by impossible heat. Hazzard hated crowds, even the ghosts of them. He looked for Maria, but she was at the front of the line. Jen was in front of him again; eyes wide open staring at her feet. Supernatural exposure is a very difficult thing for most people. Adequate coping strategies have never been invented. Nothing earthly has proven sufficient as a means for preparation. The standard “freak-out” occurs when someone stumbles into a realm of the supernatural that they are not equipped to handle. A person who is apt to see ghosts, although possessing some internal powers, may fall prey to the standard “freak-out” when a demon or angel presents itself. Of course, some individuals fair better with angels and demons than with disembodied souls. Virgil never had to worry about any serious outbursts on his tours, primarily because all those meant to take the tour possessed a natural capability to handle frightful exposure to the supernatural. This is why the tour is considered somewhat of an honor. The common people, upon stumbling even close to Hell, turn back screaming, yelling, and return to the earthly world at least partially, if not entirely, insane. It is easy to spot a rising “freak-out” occurrence, and Virgil was trained in some minor first-aid for such cases. He found the training quite unnecessary, but he could not ignore the statistical evidence gathered by the record halls of heaven regarding insanity as the number one injury afflicting living souls upon entering Hell. The typical beginnings of the “freak-out” were a building chant that exemplified worry, regret, or lack of belief. “fuck… fuck… fuck…,” Hazzard whispered. The second sign, almost always included a disturbing change of facial expression. “What is it, are you hurt?” she said turning her head back. Hazzard was smiling… sort of. And the final sign was a prolonged period of extreme “okay-ness”. That wasn’t his term: “okay-ness”. One of the younger poets had coined the phrase, and Virgil found it quite stupid. Virgil hadn’t found adequate terminology in English. He tried “pretension of stability” or “defensive fallacious stability”, but these terms never caught on with the other tour guides. Okay-ness seemed to stick. Virgil never enjoyed the idea that one day he might have to tell an angel how a tourist exhibited alarming signs of “okay-ness”. It didn’t sound at all serious, but the term was intended to sum up a very complex emotional state. After an individual decides that the supernatural is not a delusion, he or she has a choice to make. Do I cling to something stable in the hopes of being guided to safety or do I refuse belief in the very idea of safety? Under Virgil’s shift every tourist had decided to accept him as the guide without question. None followed without complete faith in his directional sense. Had they known his record, every tourist would have felt a little comforted. Virgil had never had a major incident on any of his tours. He stabilized the frightened. He rerouted his travels around trouble areas, and he was somewhat respected by the demons of Hell. Dagon, himself, had made an appearance on one of his tours. He shook hands, patted some tourists on the head, said, “Stay out of Hell kids,” and went on about his duties. Virgil didn’t have to remind the demon that he had the divine powers on his side. Everyone handled him with the utmost respect. Thus, it was inconceivable that a tourist would not cling to him in an hour of doubt. All through his training sessions for the job of tour guide, he found it a ridiculous concept that a mind could say, “yes, this is happening” but…. “No, no, there is no hope,” he said coughing and shaking his head. “What?” she asked turning around again. She didn’t want to know, really. After seeing so many things (and things is barely word enough to describe the bizarre visuals associated with a first time arrival in Hell), she didn’t want to invite any more stimuli, at least not of a peculiar nature. She was considering her footsteps carefully, concentrating on happy thoughts like Vanilla Fudge ice cream and smiling circus clowns. Running through a dozen or so childhood memories, days in Central Park, the Niagara Falls grade school fieldtrip, and Fleetwood Mac’s “The Dance”, her mind relaxed into a marginal acceptance of the scenario unfolding before her. Instinctively, she was worried about anyone who sounded… off. Typically, she could hear a change in a person’s voice and before she knew it she was responsive somehow with a soft “awe” or a nervous “are you all right?” Even this casual response system had been shut down in order to keep her feet moving. She noticed it, though, and thought about forcing an “awe” or a “what can I do?”, but it was far too strenuous an undertaking. She had to keep her mind off her surrounding as much as possible. Besides, it was just Hazzard saying something or other that was probably meant to be confusing anyway. She tried humming, but it was dreadful how the sound dropped back behind the cluster of moaning that seemed to surround her. Instead, she returned to thinking. Images of large, Long Island homes with manicured lawns and sculpted shrubberies found a place in her fortifications. She progressed forward, slowly, safely, and ignorant of the coughing sound behind her. Virgil knew that assuming security was only a matter of adjustment. The tourist can see terrible things, accept them as real, and try to look to the most logical method of survival. With Virgil shining in the lead, the solution was obvious to most tourists. Of course, a few tourists rely on something silly to start, a lucky ring, the power of love, a desperate need to get home in time to see their favorite sitcom, whatever works. These things help for a while, but usually end up taking a back seat once the demons appear. After the tourist realizes that no one has the capability to reason with these beasts other than the tour guide, they start to depend upon the tour guide for their salvation. When this occurs, the tour guide shows them that the will of the divine is all they can truly depend on. The tour guide leaves them clinging to the divine, just as they had clung to him. This was Virgil’s job in a nutshell. Of course, all this works on the principle that all tourists want to save themselves. Hazzard reached into the inside pocket of his leather jacket and removed a pair of black, plastic wrap around sunglasses. Through the dark shades, he could see a sliver of red widening as they came closer. A crackle and churn sounded through the newly emitted heat. “This is unreal!” James shouted pointing across to a maroon streak rapidly advancing over a barely perceptible horizon. It was somehow bright and dark at the same time. No one could have missed it, if they were looking for it. No one was really listening to him, so James went unheard by most. Hazzard happened to catch the gist of the expression since James brushed a buckle on his jacket as he reached to point. “I guess,” Hazzard said. In no way did he mean to say that. He was in total agreement with James’ profound understatement, but something instinctive had rejected the statement. An attitude asserted itself in two words, but it was hardly a sign of what he felt about the advancing shred of maroon on the rise. Watching it widen as they drew closer, Hazzard could almost hear the squeak of his sweaty calves sliding around in his boots. It was all so real. His nose itched, and he scratched it. It was all so simple, too. Perhaps, he meant to say, “I guess” too, only louder so everyone could hear him. “What are you smiling at?” James asked with the desperation of a cry, and the conspiratorial tone of whisper. “Don’t you know where we are? I mean, where I think… don’t you know?” “Yes,” Hazzard replied. “I think so, maybe” “Do you know what this could mean?” James continued as the red-purple river crept closer, dark forms dancing on the shore. “And if there’s some kind of reason… if they’re some kind of… I don’t know… What are you going to say about this?” James looked at Hazzard as he often did from across a classroom. If Hazzard was showing a warning sign, a visual cue, James usually picked up on it. Hazzard always had something to say, once in a while, only when it was important. It felt important, anyway, to James. Of course, it was a bit compact, one long speech trying to fulfill all the class participation requirements in one shot. Hazzard wasn’t one for defending ideas, but the harshest, longest, and weirdest criticism had its beginnings with him. James thought of him when things were extremely boring in class. James barely thought of him after five o’clock, though. Both of them were on the verge of bold conversation with the unknown, James held it together for a while on his own, but ended up looking around for someone to raise a hand. The shock of it hit them all, but surely he wasn’t the only one starting to come out of it. Surely, he wasn’t the only one that realized what was happening, what it all meant. He just wanted someone to dare to articulate it. He needed words, something solid, a label to put on the whole experience as an answer to the screaming sense of “What is that?” tingling between his perception and understanding. “It’s important,” James said. Hazzard felt the understatement again, but this time it echoed in his head. He almost spoke it in response. That maroon line had widened into a liquid gap of stinking heat and dusty light. Ash rode thick in the sky, though it probably was never called sky down there. The atmosphere was choking with the added exhaust from the water, though it probably wasn’t anything like water at all. James gasped, then coughed, while Hazzard crack a smile, though it probably wasn’t anything like a smile, really. “We’re in Hell,” he said plainly. “I guess.” James moved ahead to see Jen. She was quiet except for muttering something that resembled a pop song. A few steps in front, Brian was checking his watch over and over. Maria stood tall taking long strides into the white and blue light around their guide. Virgil prepared himself for the melodrama of the ferryman, Charon. Since, Virgil had known him, not personally, Charon had been tiresomely theatric. Sure, he made the young ones scream and the even the most jaded of the living ogle at the fine bluish lightning at the tips of his white whiskers, but it was all a bit much for a guy who spends eternity as the undead equivalent of a bus driver. In the old days, the dead actually presented him with fairs, gold coins under their tongues and other treasures, but Charon lived on the boat primarily, never missed a second of work, and found an accumulation of gold coins too heavy to lug about on a small boat. Eventually, he had to find a place for all of it. No one knew where that place was or what good gold coins would be for a demon in Hell. Still, Charon’s deep, loud chest-rattling voice gave the impression that he was quite kingly. Perhaps the useless gold was just a story the devils whispered to coincide with Charon’s frivolous grandstanding. Virgil shook his head as Charon came into view. Tiny burst of lightning where snapping through a whirlwind about him as he stopped the boat by a rickety dock. Old twine, ancient lashing, and luck held the dock together. Maintenance in Hell never seemed essential until something simply broke. “You!” he shouted. Virgil cringed. Charon could always smell a tour. He leered with large black pupils filled with rings of orange flame. One of the girls was crying, the other put her arms to her side as if to hold the others back. Two were frozen in place, pale with jaws dangling loose. He was impressive with that robe nearly black as night, but glittering faintly like twilight, Virgil thought, but he wasn’t THAT impressive. Perhaps, it was a mortal thing. They always seemed to go to pieces at the sight of a demon. Charon was like any other demon, though. He had a post, an occupation, a small corner of existence to exert authority over. On that boat, he was a God, a wild spectacle of the supernatural with every imaginable effect, from the wind-caught, long white hair to lanky, long-nailed fingers. On that boat, though, not anywhere else, was he remotely consequential. Virgil knew this quite well. On the tour, he was the guide, the shining light. He took a sigh and accepted the coming of a scene they had both played out uncountable times before. “You who are living!” Charon called out over a crowd souls lined up by the docks. Docile and quivering, the souls murmured. The sound was an undercurrent of the one they had heard past the gates. “You must stay away from these dead souls!” “Yes, yes,” Virgil spoke dismissing him with a shake of his hand. “You all have nothing to fear from him. He is Charon, the boatman. I have arranged for our safe passage.” This group was not very responsive and had a very short attention span compared to most. Charon only had to breathe loudly and their eyes were back upon him. He spooned up a soul with his oar, trying to raise it up onto his ship. The soul slid onto the edge of the deck and slipped like a wet noodle into the soupy waters. There was a scream and a fizzle, too. The group was barely acknowledging Virgil with all the commotion. “Would you stop that for a moment, please,” Virgil called to Charon. “I’m trying to handle my group over here.” “I manage the souls of the damned. I deliver them to their eternal horrors. All who shall meet fire and ice come through me, and I see straight through to their souls…,” the deep voice moaned. “Yes, yes, of course,” Virgil said impatiently. “You know what we are and why we’re here, and you know that you can’t turn us back. So, there is no need for all this… show about it.” Orange swirls conquered the black of Charon’s eyes. Hazzard saw two orange sparkles flick on inside the tall shadow before them. Virgil’s light bleated out Charon’s image in a strange reverse eclipse. Lowering his sunglasses, Hazzard looked to the purple waters and eyed what looked like a burning man slapping about in purple fire. “He can’t hurt you,” Virgil said. “He can only hurt the souls of the damned. Great powers are with us on our travels. We have nothing to fear from him. Do not let his rage conquer your mind. You must be strong to endure the journey.” Maria took a deep breath and made no sound when she slowly let it out. Jen snuffed back a runny nose. Brian sighed and James sighed. Hazzard tipped his black shades back into position. Virgil led the charge up to the dock; the souls split around them shielding themselves from the light of the guide. Half smiling, Virgil stood face to chest with Charon who gripped his oar tightly with his bony hands. “Living souls do not belong in Hell,” Charon said. “They do not know the horror that awaits, the incomprehensible…” “Yes, of course,” Virgil interrupted. “But while you don’t find it hard to rage at me, I wonder how loud you would protest if Heaven’s powers came crashing down upon you. Who do you think the angels will punish first? Satan in his stronghold or you at the unprotected edge of Hell?” “You can not command me!” Charon blasted raising the oar fully out of the water. “No,” Virgil said. “I can’t, but I come from someone who can and does. Whether you like it or not, you will do what is willed. Whether you believe it or not, you are doing what is willed even now. I have nothing to fear from you, and you have nothing to fear from them. They are meant to see this place, and you will take us across.” “I know all who will pass this way! I know…” Charon began. “Stop your raging,” Virgil groaned. “Must we go through this every time a tour goes through? My pupils, please, follow me onto the boat. Hurry. We have so far to go, and so many of his lot will try to waste our time. It’s all they can do anymore.” Virgil stood on the dock and helped them one by one into the boat. Charon’s eyes crackled with orange circles as each steps was made upon his boat. He sneered at Maria, set trembles inside Brian with his grizzly bark, and caused James and Jen to wince as he raised his oar. Just when Charon was about to put the oar back in the water, his eyes met the black plastic of sunglasses. Charon knew every dirty trick a soul could play. He had heard every excuse, thwarted every escape, and denied every reprieve a soul could hope to sneak past him. Charon could kill hope. He had the unearthly orange radar of his eyes out scouring the shoreline for it. It was his job, and he did it well with a fast oar for whipping and a sharp mind for reference. In less than a second, he could run through the entire catalogue of the damned as he had memorized it, from start to finish, though he didn’t know what that finish would be. That unknown never bothered him. It was something so distant, he couldn’t even feel it coming closer. A merciless question crept up to the boat, coming closer, sheathed in black plastic. “What is this!” Charon shouted throwing an arm between Hazzard and the boat. “This one is not meant to pass my way!” “Well, of course!” Virgil blasted back. “None of them are…” “No!” Charon said taking his arm away to point into Virgil’s face. “Not any way! Nothing! I see nothing!” “Then it is not for you to see,” Virgil stated plainly. “Into the boat, you go.” Hazzard reached to lift his glasses, but when he saw exploding rings of orange flame, his hand dropped down. Turning to his classmates, he eagerly sidestepped the demon to take a place upon the boat. “You!” Charon spoke. Hazzard turned, but Charon did not say anything else. When he raised his sunglasses, Charon and Virgil were whispering together, Charon shaking in agitation. Gulping, Hazzard noticed the huddle of his group at the back corner of the ferry. He couldn’t move to them. Instead, he shook. After a few long minutes, Charon and Virgil took separate places on the boat. Both kept their eyes ahead. The oar went down somewhere ahead of Hazzard, plunking into the water with a soothing sound like a single hit of a bass drum with the sizzle of a snare. A rhythm built upon it. He was at ease with a rising song, until the boatman turned and leveled all his thought with dazzling orange eyes and a whisper. “Your future is lost to us,” he said. “We will be watching you.” Hazzard turned back to the group. No one seemed eager to speak a word. Alight Virgil’s glow, their faces cast empty gazes upon Hazzard, washed over to Charon, and flooded into one upon their guide. Hazzard looked down at the waters. Brian had a thought about him then, but it didn’t survive. Brain was thinking, “Now is no time to mess around…. Now is no time to interrupt.” *** Maria had a boyfriend when she was seven. A few of her girlfriends teased her about him. During recess, she found a way on top of the monkey bars. She showed everyone and cheered her friends on until they all could make it. A row of barrettes bobbled in the breeze and the flicker of sunlight cut into flashes by maple trees. She was wondering what you called it, that style of sunlight, the mode of breeze, that all around feel. And she laughed. Down in the shade of the tall metal slide, he was sitting alone, whipping his nose along the hood string of his blue and gray jacket. She waved to him, called for him to climb, and the other girls let out their giggles. They sang out “Maria has a boyfriend Maria has a boyfriend” and she like the rhythm of it. Of course, it was nothing compared to the sway in the trees, but it was a start. The boy eyed the high places, the sun-browned daggling legs with Keds and Reboks at the end, and the sun turning them all into silhouettes. He squinted and his face looked funny. And she laughed. He never tried, but surely one day, he made it, when he was big and tall, and no one was up there anymore.
Copyright © 2001 Scott W. Hazzard |