Dead Strings

(Author note: contains violence and NSFW language.)

“Shhhh.” 

A hand wrapped around my mouth, stopping my squeak in its track. You’d think after five years I’d know better. Know not to be afraid. To bite my tongue and keep my calm. But fear’s a tough bitch to shake, a real leach if you ask me. Once it gets its teeth in you, it ain’t looking to let go. And it don’t matter how many times I’ve seen ‘em staggering about with those milky white eyes dripping black, sludge tears; the sight them will haunt me till the end, I suppose. It’d take a madman to not fear the Stringers. Good thing the hand around my mouth belonged to the craziest motherfucker alive: Ears Mitchell. Only met him a few days ago, but he’d already saved my life more times than I can count. 

“Let ‘em pass a bit and I’ll slice me up some cords,” Ears said. His voice was a low, growling whisper, but I could still feel the eagerness slopped on top of each word. I gave him a thumbs up and reached for my sword, but Ears stopped my hand. “Said I’d slice ‘em, didn’t I?”  

“Yeah, but you might—”

“Need ya to piss your pants again?” He grinned and adjusted the wolf pelt on his head. 

Heard it said Ears killed the beast with his bare hands. Others say he had a knife on him, but either way, Ears was the only one that walked out of that fight. Skinned the wolf’s head and wore it as a hat. Even fixed its ears to stand up like a dog that just heard a branch crack in an empty forest. Made him look like one of the Savages that controlled the ruined city of Uto; the ones of us who went feral when everything went to shit. 

Hell, maybe he is feral. 

Ears let a little growl out as if he heard my thoughts, the grin still plastered on his face. He lept from our cover in the tunnel and sprinted at the two Stringers that were walking aimlessly through the overgrown grass. Heads dropped low like their necks were broken, and for all anyone knew, they were. What happens when you get hooked is still a mystery that no one is too keen on figuring out. 

The instant the Stringers heard him charing, their aimless walk turned into a grotesque backward sprint. Knees bending and snapping in all the wrong ways as they moved toward Ears. That was the shit that boiled my fears; seeing how damn wrong their bodies could move. Hammered home how there was nothing human left in ‘em. And if there was, well...I don’t like thinking that way. Never know if you’ll be hooked next, you know? 

But Ears didn’t care. Not one bit.

He rushed at ‘em at full speed ahead with his make-shift sword in one hand. The sun cast a shadow over him as he ran and I swear to The Forgotten that Ears looked more wolf than man. One Stringer was nearly on him, but it picked the wrong guy to try and hook. Ears slid under the first Stringer’s newly deformed legs and popped up behind the fucker. A glint of the sun bounced off steel and the Stringer collapsed in a heap. Ears had sliced through its cord with one smooth swing. Black ichor spurted out of the severed cord like a broken sprinkle trying to remember its purpose. 

“On your left!” I shouted, but Ears already knew. 

The other Stringer charged Ears with its palms open. A hole the size of a nickel sat in its center. From that hole, a new cord slithered out, dripping slimy black muck. It wanted a chance to latch onto Ears’s neck. 

Didn’t get one. Ears came prepared. The man with the wolf head pulled something shiny from his belt and threw it like a frisbee. A second later, the second Stringer dropped dead. Ears lifted his hand up and caught the bladed boomerang on the blunt side as it came cycling back. 

“How the hell do you get that right every time?” 

“Luck,” Ears gave the boomerang a kiss on the part that wasn’t covered in sludge. “I’m a pretty lucky guy.” 

He unstrapped the wolf’s head from his own, giving me a glimpse of a time when that luck had abandoned him. If you’re wondering how Ears got his name, all you had to do was take a look at the guy. On both sides of his brown, leathery face, two things were missing: his ears. A mess of savage scars and two thumb-sized holes were all that was left to mark the spots. Made me nauseous just looking at ‘em. Also stirred up some admiration in my stomach. The way I heard it, the guy had both ears ripped off by a Stringer that nearly hooked him. Ears snapped its neck with his hands and ripped the cord before it could add him to the horde. Tough thing to do, considering how much stronger Stringers are from us barenecks.

“You just gonna stare at me all day,” Ears spat something nasty out the side of his mouth, “or help me send those fuckers a message?” He asked, pointing up to the sky. 

God, I hated looking up. 

Black lines snaked up toward and past the clouds and stars as far as we knew. Looked liked someone took a pencil to a painting of the sky and just started scribbling lines with abandon. So many lines. All connecting a Stringer to something...else. Goosebumps spread along my arm like a case of hives. Ears must’ve smelled my fear, cuz he looked up, too. 

“Somethings ain’t worth a wasting a thought on,” he said, that grin still savage. “I don’t know what’s up there as much as the next handsome, earless bastard. I don’t know what language they speak—if they even speak one.” He bent down next to the Stringer he’d just killed and grabbed its ear. “But I can guarantee one thing,” he lifted his blade. “They’ll understand this.” In one smooth motion, he sliced through all the cartilage and ripped the ear clean off. 

He held it up to the heavens, shaking it and laughing like a mad man. Hell, I laughed with the guy. Ears had something infectious about him, that spark you look for in a man leading you through the fields of hell. Didn’t matter that I’d only known him for a few days—some people wear their quality on the outside so you can see it plain as day. Ears was one of them. 

I stepped out from the tunnel entrance and walked over to the other Stringer. It was still twitching on the ground like a fish with epilepsy, but that happens sometimes. Didn’t scare nearly as much as a live one, that’s for sure. I took my blade out, cut off a pair of ears of my own, and held them to the sky. Ears looked over at me, laughing still. 

“There he is,” Ears bellowed, “Squeak fucking Thompson, the bane of all Stringers!”