Kealan Burke: Concrete Gods

Copyright © 2003 by Kealan Patrick Burke and Harry Shannon

"Whoa! You've got to be kidding."

Andy Scanlon closed his eyes and gripped the ropes holding the platform in place as the universe twitched and trembled. What the fuck was that, a gust of wind? He'd been washing windows for more than six months, but still hadn't gotten used to the intense feeling of vulnerability. Andy's cousin Barney seemed to love dangling twenty stories up, but then Barney was known to be a couple of cans short of a six-pack.

Andy swallowed his fear, forced his eyes open. If he squinted, he could see past the reflected sunlight and into the crowded office on the other side of the window. An obese woman wearing a telephone headset stared back at him; eyes popping, jaw dropping, chocolate pudding girth shaking uncontrollably. Christ, she felt it, too!

He shaded his eyes, peered inside. Several confused men wearing slacks and white short-sleeved shirts with cheap ties had dropped their stapled papers, manila files and Styrofoam cups of coffee to seek the perceived shelter of a doorway. Andy felt his bowels loosen. He reached for the pulley, saw that his hand was shaking badly. He started lowering the platform. The large plastic bucket of detergent began to slosh back and forth in bubbled waves.

The building rippled like a body in the throes of fever. He tried lowering a bit faster. He was one floor lower, now and could see people screaming and struggling to make it to the exits, the stairwells, the elevators. Something popped and singed; a loose wire from the scaffolding.

Andy screamed, too.

The platform eased away from the office building, lazily twisted in the wind. Two of the support ropes hissed and began to unravel. Andy had just enough time to take a deep breath and then the scaffolding slammed back into the side of the building and dissolved into splintering pieces. His head burst open. His scalp ran red. Andy floated through the screeching atmosphere like a skydiver. The ground below seemed motionless, frozen for a few seconds and then it rushed at him--a hungry mouth with asphalt teeth and a sidewalk for a tongue.

Seconds later, he crashed into the cement, colliding with and killing numerous pedestrians who hadn't thought to look up. What remained looked inhuman, multi-colored entrails festooning the sidewalk and pints of fresh blood flowing down the gutter and into the bowels of the city.

It was time.

From restless dreams of smoke and shadow, it has awakened…

At first, confusion reigns. And then this new dawn sends rays of realization to stroke the stone walls of its domain.

Itsskin.

It is alive again. Aware.

For decades it has lain still, pondering, growing hungry; weathering the repulsion that sends ripples through its mind. It despises the feel of those bags of skin and bone that traipse over its hide like fleas on a drowsy dog. Humans burst apart like fleas when bitten, and they are parasites who serve no greater purpose.

It bears its disgust well but unlike so many of its brethren, its patience has worn thin. It growls. Now and again a shudder escapes and those fleas panic, feeling the skin shift beneath their feet. This brings an inner smile to the city. It drinks down the blood and offal; an appetizer while it ponders its return.

And as it crouches and thinks (such a glorious novelty, this consciousness!), it determines it shall rid itself of the multitudinous parasites wearing tracks upon its nerves.

Bo Whitley was savoring breakfast from a screw-top wine bottle when the alley began to tremble.

Any semblance of clarity had left his plagued mind hours ago, consciousness departing on a train reluctant to see another familiar station. For Bo, the soporific deadening of his schizophrenic mind was sheer bliss.

The trembling started in his weakened legs--a slight vibration in his bones that didn't even warrant his attention at first. And when his shoes began to slip from his feet and a trashcan began a crazy, rattling dance near the mouth of the alley, Bo just smiled. He was accustomed to seeing a lot of remarkable things. But when the mouth of the alley bent into an arch as if the two buildings through which it ran were leaning over to study him, that smile faded. Shit!

Dust rained down on his forehead, coating his protruding tongue like cobweb-shrouded snowflakes. Bo coughed and pushed himself up from the comfort of a torn blue sleeping bag; but then the ground wavered, or else he did. Bo wasn't certain. All he knew was it was no longer possible to stand.

Somewhere in another time and place, a woman screamed. Police sirens wailed. Horns honked. Cars screeched to a halt. The walls of the alley shimmied and boogied and chuckled like October dark.

And Christ, was that some shadowy eyeball forming on the side of the building in front of him?

Sure. Right.

That was, of course, impossible.

But there it was, blinking and shot through with gossamer veins. Bo knew it was a hallucination--punishment perhaps for his violation of countless oaths of abstinence--but it inspired him to try harder to stand. Eventually he turned his back on the eye, lowered his gaze and watched his torn tennis shoes as he wobbled toward the mouth of the alley. He was muttering, now; reassuring himself with phrases that would have made no sense to anyone else. Finally, he looked up.

Figures whipped past the alley entrance, moving too fast for his booze-heavy eyes to follow. He cursed the fleeing blurs. Another siren, close. Cops? Had he done something wrong lately that he should really try to remember? Those friggin pigs were always on his ass about something.

The earth rumbled, cracked, and heaved him toward the far wall. His palms slapped hard against the cold stone. The daylight narrowed to dusk, or was it just his rheumy eyes?

No.

What the hell?

He glanced over his shoulder and frowned. The alley was… closing . But how could that be?

I'm as drunk as a skunk , he thought and chuckled, thin streams of drool dripping from the corners of his mouth. Man, I'd kill for a cheeseburger right about now.

The wall moved. Shifted. Rocked. Bo looked up and was struck with a vertiginous sense of dread.

The top of the frigging building was tipping its hat at him. Howdy, Bo!

He opened his mouth to moan in dismay, finally realizing that the drink was not to blame, not for this waking nightmare. In fact, now the alcohol was rapidly escaping from his body, soaking his legs as the hat tipped, slipped and a legion of falling slates increased Bo's number a thousand fold.

Nearby, Alistair Corby saw the wino's death but paused only momentarily to grimace before the tilting pavement propelled him onward. Like everyone else, he tried to run without knowing why or where.

What the hell is going on?

It was an earthquake. It had to be. But earthquakes were rare in Ohio, and one of this magnitude seemed impossible. Yet that was the only satisfactory explanation as to why the ground was heaving upwards, lifting cars on their rear wheels and rending the street apart.