James Scotson - Planets Falling

I still have my responsibilities to the gardens. It is mid-summer now and Eliza is crawling in a patch of velvet moss while I tie vines to a trellis. To my muted delight, I’ve recently discovered that my baby girl sees the green ones. The creatures make the very best nannies, playing with Eliza as long as she remains interested. She accepts them as if they were a common beetle or a blade of grass. I suppose they cared for me when I was a baby while mother worked the gardens so many years ago. The day’s one of the best since I lost father and Wenn, with the anger and sadness seeming far away in a distant bog, tamped down in a remote recess of my soul. It’s one of those warm but dry days, where the sky is the darkest blue and the clouds are impossibly white and soft. My work is going well. I feel light, as if nothing could trouble me.

Evening arrives and my spinster aunt, Felicia, fetches Eliza for dinner. She’s my mother’s sister and did not seem to receive the gift that my mother and now I have. In fact, she shows little interest in the gardens at all. However, Felicia adores Eliza and helps tremendously when she’s not working at the bakery. I enjoy the silence. I’ll follow in a little while, but I have a few more vines to truss. I light my oil lantern to beat back the encroaching twilight. I’ve finished with my work, wiping my hands on my apron, when I sense something amiss that I can’t quite place. I head toward the path home and glance at the sky. It’s the new moon that is wrong. All the tiny pricks of colorful light are gone — the shadowed black disk is no longer illuminated. I’m petrified by the sight, which clearly bodes ill for all of us. The ancient ones have abandoned us. Or the gods have wiped them clean from existence once and for all.

I run down the path and drop the damned oil lamp. It’s dreadfully dark without the light of the houses on the moon, or whatever they were. All I know is that those moon lights used to be quite handy and now I can’t see. My eyes adjust and I continue heading home. The house is warm and inviting in the unusual darkness. My panic lifts as I open the door to see Eliza sitting on the floor, cooing at my arrival. Theo is rolling a ball to her and she’s laughing.

“Hi Sprouter. I sent your aunt Felicia home. Mom will be here soon, but I’d thought Liza and me’d play catch up.”

“Theo, have you noticed the moon?”

“Whatcha mean? It was there last I checked.”

“The houses, I mean lights, on the surface. They’ve gone out.”

Theo runs outside and returns dazed. “I’ll be scorched in pitch. They’re gone. How’s this possible?” We can hear other townsfolk shouting their concerns in the streets.

“This can’t be good, Theo. You don’t think this is the start of the return of the ancient ones? Teacher says — “

“Amy, relax. This isn’t the return that Teacher’s foretold. I’m sure it’s just some clouds or bad weather.” His face shows me that he’s not confident about his conclusion.

I know Theo’s completely wrong. He’s never seen a giant black bug-like god step out of the forest. I have.

We both jump at a bang on the door. Eliza throws her ball across the floor. “Theo, Marksman, are you in there?” It’s Bets. She’s the only one that calls me by my father’s family name.

Bets comes crashing in, adorned in her leather and hemp hunting clothes with a bow strung over her back. She’s clearly not here for a social visit. Bets ignores me, thrusting the hilt of a hunting knife at Theo. Theo responds. “Bets, this ain’t your knife. Where’d you get this?”

“I just removed it from the body of a stranger on the outskirts of the village. It seems that outsiders are on the move with the moon going out. I’ve heard of raids on other towns, but never thought it’d happened to us.”

I clarify. “Bets, I presume that the body was a person before he met you?”

“Yes, Marksman. This person was going to kill our people. And there’re more out there. Theo, we need to get the militia moving.” Without looking at me and the baby, she heads out the door. “Theo, come on.”

Theo looks at me. “Amy, stay in the house. No matter what you hear outside, don’t you go outside until I come to get you. He hands me a small blade. “I’m assuming you know what to do with this. Of course, there’s more in the armory out back.” I put Eliza into her bed, turn down the oil lamps, and hope that no one suspects we’re here. The voices of the townspeople fade as the town militiamen tell them to go indoors. Eliza’s auburn curls sprawl on her pillow, wrapping her tiny head in a warm cocoon. I wish I could feel her peace.

A single, muffled scream slices through the baby’s room. I grasp the knife and draw closer to the baby’s bed. More screams and shouts drift toward us, getting closer. A smoky, acrid funk fills the room. The front door rattles; it clearly is time for us to retreat. I grab Eliza and head to the corridor that attaches to the armory. The weapons storage building is fortified with stone walls and a sheet metal roof. The building predates our village and my father often called it the bunker, whatever that means. Eliza’s bawling and I feel like puking. If the entire village burns to the ground, the armory should hold. Of course, it also may pique the curiosity of the attackers. We have no food or water to sustain us during a siege. I light a single candle and hope that Theo, Bets, and the remainder of our protectors are winning the fight outside. I can only imagine what’s happening to my fellow villagers in their unfortified dwellings.

We call the building an armory but it holds more than weapons. Father and Wenn use it to store spare tools as well as common items that they fashion such as stirrups, hammers, crowbars, spoons, and nails. The walls are adorned with father’s favorite items, including some that he didn’t make but collected over the years. Some of these items are strange sticks with hollow barrels and a thickened end. He called these guns and told me never to touch them. A few times a year, father, Wenn, Theo, and some other men take a bottle of shine out into the woods with the guns. They come back all riled up, usually carrying some unusual game — strange birds, impossibly large elk, and once a huge brown bear. These guns are powerful weapons, opening up new opportunities for hunting and accelerating the mens’ joy in killing. They scare me.

Eliza is fussing. I offer her my breast and that seems to calm her and I feel better too. The walls of the armory mute the terrible sounds outside. It does seem that the cries and shouts are abating, which heartens me. The smoke smell is filtered by some material in the vents near the ceiling, so I have no idea whether the burning continues. It’s impossible for me to measure time in this space but I’d guess we’ve been in here for several hours. I’m half conscious when a distant pounding on the external door stirs me. My heart skips. I wrap Eliza in blankets and tuck her behind some barrels. If something happens to me, perhaps a friend will find her and provide protection. I especially hope Felicia is alright. She’d make a great foster mother.

I cautiously approach the door and peek through a tiny glass hole. Relief flows through my veins. It’s Theo. I crack open the door — a terrible smell of smoke and something else, burnt flesh, perhaps, assaults me. My mouth opens but no words come. I’m terrified for the very first time.

Theo looks horrible — his face a montage of ash, sweat, and blood. His left eye socket is swollen. “Amy, get Liza. We’ve got to go.” His voice is raspy and shrill but very controlled. His bravado is gone, replaced by the true, brave Theo I’ve always known lurking below the surface.

I rush back into the armory to fetch Eliza. I kneel down by the barrel and search her blankets. She’s gone. My terror is now heightened by panic. My vision blurs and I swear I’m going pass out. Instead, motherly instinct takes charge and I begin calling her name while frantically searching the space. Certainly, she crawled away and must be hiding says the strong mother inside me. I look down the room to see light that shouldn’t be there and my very core freezes. The instinctual mother vanishes and I’m nothing more than a frightened little girl.