The Night is for Sleeping

Was it ringing? A searing bell or a demonic whistle casting nothing but sharpness into my ears? The pebbles of the dirt created an all too comforting bed to lie on while my vision stayed a blur and the blood from my ears pooled beside me. Flashes of light wisped in and out of my eyes, enough to make me dizzy if my body had the capacity for it. I forced my head to turn, touching my cheek to the cool damp ground. I tried to keep my eyes closed, but the persistent light tore through my eyelids, drawing my pupils towards its mystery. The sun? A heatless fire amongst a sea of darkness? I had never seen anything like it, until in an instant it had vanished. I was left only to the soft breeze around me and the cool moonlight, like one round eye staring down on me in pity.

I tried to move, to at least stand, but my limbs were being far from kind to me. My ears began to settle as the blood around them started to dry. I ached from hunger and could not ignore my longing for a drop of water. The fatigue hit me, and though all my senses told me to get up, to flee from all and anywhere around me, my soul told me to close my eyes once more. Maybe I should sleep just for a moment? I would rest just for a while, just until-

BOOM

My eyes shot open, my racing heart obliterating any residual weariness inside of me. Footsteps followed, along with the peculiar sound of a beast I could not recognize. I flailed my body, stammering to get my feet on the ground, to get them to walk one after the other until I could run far away. But all I could do was let out a feeble sigh, barely moving my legs an inch. They were broken. My wrists were broken. My hip, my back, maybe even my neck. All broken; useless. The sound of crunching leaves grew closer as the beast approached me. I could barely make out their shapes, but they stood high off the ground, speaking noise of dread and power. My breath tore through my nostrils, casting clouds of heat into the air illuminated by nothing but the blanket of moonlight surrounding us. Then, for a moment, the world was still. The beast’s movements stopped and they disappeared from my gaze. The trees above me danced in their eternal flow, feeling only the rhythm of the state of now, never repeating the same motion twice. I envied those trees, those leaves far from harm's way. The leaves that had no broken legs. 

Then all at once, a shot of pain projected up my leg and a cool force dragged me from my ankle. I let out a screech, and the beast was upon me. I kicked, screamed, bit, wailed, any and all of what I could muster to get away from them. But my attempts were demolished by the sheer power in the beast's grasp. They lifted me off the ground and my head swung under my body. A useless sack of meat was what I had come to. They continued their horrid noises, one after the other as if in some form of spoken communication. They hurled me onto an elevated platform, and while it felt safer than in the beast's grasp, I couldn't help but feel the impending doom. 

The movement they forced onto me had a greater effect than I initially thought. My ears began to bleed again, but this time my nose and mouth followed. The taste of iron and death coated my lips as I watched the beast lay a limb on me. It…it stroked me? Like the way my mother would stroke my back to help me sleep. The beast pet me, while howling soft noises into the night. My eyes darted to the other beast, now holding a long object in his hand. It was so bizarre, it was all so bizarre. I couldn't even remember how I got here. One instance I was walking through the forest, and the next I was on the ground, writhing in pain. And now I am here, under the grasp of this strange being. 

The grace of the moonlight showed the other beast approach his companion. They had water coming out of their eyes as the one touching my side took the long object into his other hand. I felt my mind going numb again, my sight getting blurry. My heart would be racing if I had enough blood to pump, consequently, my breath was shallow and my pulse slowed. A rattle fell beneath me and the moonlight's glow dimmed, a casted-out light taking its place. One of the beats scurried away while the other stayed with me. It stroked my head, my side, even my legs. It sat with me while silence flooded my ears and a wave of tranquility crashed through my heart. The moon kept its eye on me while the wind reminded me I was still alive. The beast took his limb off of my foot and stood even taller than he was before. He took the long object in his hand and jerked it around. I was too tired to be scared of it, to question what I was seeing. I simply saw. 

The object let out a click and the beast sighed. He announced more strange tongues and noises that I couldn’t understand. He pointed the long object at my face. I glanced at the moon once more. It had always been more of a comfort than the sun. The moon, changing shape night after night, as if no singular structure could confine its adventurous nature. It watched me as I watched it. I felt the object touch my head, cool and hard. It didn’t bother me. It didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. All I could feel was the breeze against my body and the moonlight on my-.

…

“Do we tell anyone?”

“No. We did the right thing. It wasn’t our fault.”

“Its mom is going to be horrified.”

“Its mom will be fine.”

“We killed it, Jon.”

“It would have died someday anyway. Running out into the street like that would have gotten it killed by anyone. At least we didn’t leave it to suffer.”

“It was just a baby Jon. It had probably never even encountered a street before. Hell, just the noise of you slamming the door scared it half to death.”

“What’s done is done. I will need you to wash the blood out of the bed tomorrow. I have a job at Sally’s and need to use the truck.”

“You know, I used to want a pet moose when I was a child. Still kinda do.”