March 3, 2012

The sky was black with crows and ravens.

One time country and western superstar Toby Keith and his friend du jour, Emile Penzance, had just finished a grand supper of weiners, beans and a jar of olives.

“It’s getting dark,” Toby said, wiping a blob of beans from his chin. He squinted as he gazed out the window of the Buffalo Café in Whitefish, Montana.

He and Emile had arrived in the resort town the night before after fleeing Kalispell. Toby was hanging with Emile, who he met in Galveston, Texas a month after the disappearance.

Toby was supposed to be performing in Corpus Christi the day of the disappearance and spent the first month entangled with a variety of hangers on and weirdo criminals when he met Emile, who suggested they beat it in his plane, and search for a better way of life. Toby was keen on the idea because if he heard some toothless moron ask him if he’d like a beer in a red Solo cup one more fucking time he would go berserk.

So off they went, into the sky and on many crazy adventures – Emile and Toby, BFs forever – or at least until Toby could ditch the somewhat effeminate Louisianan and he was getting a hankering for that very thing when they had to land in Kalispell and ended up being captured by a small band of cannibals, cut-throats and cattle sodomizers. Only Toby’s massive fame kept them alive.

When they landed at Glacier International Airport, they smelled a delicious meat cooking from across the tarmac and followed their noses into a hangar where they latched eyeballs on a formerly fat white supremist named Foggy Golnard, slowly turning over a halved barrel spit.

“It’s fucking Toby Keith,” bellowed a gangly, pale cannibal named Carl.

Three hours, 65 beers and five renditions of Red Solo Cup later, Toby and Emile found a chance to sneak away from the snoozing pack of stuffed and drunken creatures, peeping man meat gas and mumbling.

Foggy Golnard congealed on the spit and a greasy swirl of grey smoke rose to join the thick cloud lining the top of the hangar.

Toby walked to the front door of the Buffalo and looked up. His eyes widened and he shouted for Emile “to come have a look.”

The sky above Whitefish was black with a murder of corvids that had learned to work together to hunt for ever scarcer food.

At first, after the disappearance, corvids went about business as usual but by February, starvation forced most to resort to attacking other crows or ravens.

But a miracle of nature and evolution occurred one day when a large raven from Dryden, Ontario, which was followed around by a small murder of scraggly crows, led a successful attack on a railroad track wandering pyschopath from Thunder Bay. It was a dandy, fresh meal.

Corvids were now officially predatory and in a matter of a few weeks, the big raven’s murder had grown to more than 1,000. They moved from town to town, hunting down sundry, tasty evil people. With each town munched through, the murder grew and grew and soon the wise, dangerous Canadian corvids moved south into Minnesota and made their west across the great plains, pecking apart hundreds of naughty people.

By the time the murder hit the Continental Divide, it was about 10,000 in number. The weakest fed the moving cloud of pecky peril, which made it all the more special.

It was a natural thing to step outside and look up, which is what Toby and Emile did. Toby thought that his eyes had to be deceiving him. He’d had a few run-ins with pesky crows in the last few months and had eaten his share of bitter scavenger meat, but this was awe-inspiring.

The sound of 10,000 pairs of black wings beating gave him an idea for a song – something he’d work beer and America into – and then he was seeing Emile being swarmed by about dozen flapping menaces.

Before he could react, Toby was knocked to the sidewalk and he marveled at the sudden weight of the corvids on top of him, bashing and slashing their beaks into his body. One slipped into his right eye and he screamed for God to help him. Emile was already dead and the feast was on.

Crouching on the roof of a nearby shed, an emaciated cougar shivered – spared on this day by country and western superstar Toby Keith and his pal du jour, Emile Penzance, who now rested in pieces all over a sidewalk in downtown Whitefish.

Nearby, rolling against the side of a gutter, was a red Solo cup. It was the last thing Toby Keith saw before his left eye was jabbed out by a yearling raven.

 

Ridley finally found Madeline and Serena’s cozy camp after hours of bushwacking. He wasn’t even sure they would be where he was looking but his knowledge of the park paid off.

After hugs and smiles, Ridley looked west toward the edge of the ancient caldera and whistled.

“It’s massive,” he stated. “Completely unbelievable.”

Serena smiled warmly. “It won’t be long now,” she said. “A week or two maybe.”

Madeline groaned. She was growing tired of freezing and starving. She held complete trust in Serena and Ridley but she was, afterall, still a teenager.

She missed her Smart phone and television, the Internet and hot showers. She found herself craving the strangest things, such as lemon merangue pie and almond crusted, pan fried trout.

Madeline let out a whoop when Ridley pulled a large chicken out of his backpack – relieved from the freezer in the kitchen at the Grant Village Lodge. He wasn’t positive it would still be good but figured Serena could tell. It smelled okay, he thought. Big frigging chicken. Good eats.

He also let a whoop when Serena announced it “would do nicely.”

They spent that evening celebrating the glory of a fire roasted chicken, expertly cooked by an ancient angel, who seized the chance to prepare her charges for what was to come.

Madeline was terrified of the prospect of having to wait for Yellowstone to erupt and couldn’t understand how Serena knew it was going to.

“You said it hasn’t blown up in 640,000 years or something like that,” she said. “And you can determine when it is going to blow up again? How?”

Serena told her that wasn’t important. What was important was her having the faith to stand before the chasm and step into the vortex that would appear right where they were camping and they’d be off to the new world. Madeline and Ridley would arrive in their new world as fresh souls embarking on the same paths that Serena and Kenneth had blazed before them on this world.

Ridley chuckled at Madeline’s questions. The chicken pepped her up nicely, he thought.

“Nothing to be afraid of girl,” he said.”Right Serena? Piece of cake. We take off through a wormhole, after a fracturing of the time/space continuum – precisely formed for our traveling pleasure and when we emerge on the other side, we’ll pop out of a vagina and start life anew!” He laughed out loud and whistled, shaking his head. “At least it’s something like that, right Serena?”

She said it was and smiled again.

Madeline’s eyes moistened and she put a hand gently on Serena’s back. She knew that when the time came, Serena would die.

“There’s no room on a new world for an old angel,” she’d said numerous times when telling Madeline about what was to come.

Madeline thought it completely unfair that Serena had to spend thousands of years keeping people safe and preparing mankind for its eventual extermination and then when the big moment comes, POOF, she gets to die.

“Will we be people?” Madeline asked.

Ridley turned and shot a look at Serena that shouted ‘hey, I never thought about that!’

“Yes, you will be people. I think,” Serena replied with a small chuckle. “Never got the memo that said ‘thou shalt be reborn as giant cockroaches or raccoons or anything like that. Good question. But my gut tells me that yes you will be reborn as people. At any rate, does it really matter?”

Madeline said she supposed it didn’t.

“Life is life, I guess,” she said.

“Never take life for granted, dear,” Serena said.

About 500 yards away the bulge pushing out from the caldera wall, which had grown by more than 75 feet in the past two days, burped and gurgled, and a boulder broke loose. It crashed down into a thicket of dead trees, sending a shower of twigs and bark flying.

“She’s due anytime,” Serena smiled.

 

It took Kenneth an hour to walk back to West Yellowstone. His old heart raced with despair. If anything happened to Carrie and Stacy, his entire existence would be for nowt.

When he neared the street where he found the Camaro, the pulsating green light of a crackling sky cast eerie shapes before his eyes and then he realized he was looking at bodies. He yelped and raced forward to the nearest body of one of Andy’s latest victims and exhaled deeply when he saw a man’s face.

Kenneth exploded into a sprint and raced to the B&B. He moved freakishly fast for a boney old man. Hitting the front door, Kenneth barked, “Stacy! Carrie!” and he skidded into the front landing, where he ran into me.

“Wha tha bloody fekk?” He shouted, “Where’s…”

I grabbed his knobby elbow and whisper-shouted “shhh, you’ll wake her up. Where you been?”

Kenneth ignored me and shook off my hand with a waggle of his arm. He stiffly walked to Stacy’s room, showing noticeable relief when he passed Carrie who was standing in the nearby kitchen.

Kenneth flicked the door open and he spat with exasperation, “what the fekking hell have you done?”

Andy appeared before him, making Kenneth seem small and insignificant. “Quieten down. She’s resting well.”

Kenneth sat on the bed beside Stacy and felt her forehead. He pulled the blanket back and inspected her bandages.

Carrie filled him in on what happened.

“They saved our lives,” she told him. “Whatever you believe, whatever you think, whatever you say – they saved our lives. He could have done whatever he wanted but he’s here and he saved us,” she said, pointing at Andy. Her voice had risen an octave, as it did when she became agitated and annoyed.

I couldn’t help myself; I wrapped my arms around Carrie and whispered in her ear that I loved her. I think that may have been the happiest moment of my life. The love and respect and pride I had for her became in that instance burned into my soul and it keeps me alive to this day.

Kenneth didn’t say anything but he believed Andras was merely being devious. He needed Kenneth as Kenneth now needed him.

As if reading his mind, Andy said, quietly enough that only Kenneth could hear him, “Pretty mind blowing, eh? Who would have thought?”

 

Kenneth said he agreed. “No one could have thought such a thing and no one is going to think such a thing because this will not happen.”

Carrie asked what wouldn’t happen.

“We have to get moving as soon as possible,” he said, looking at Stacy. “But we can’t move her in that condition. She’s lost a lot of blood and is much too weak.”

Carrie repeated her question and I added, “yeah.”

Andy laughed. “You need me and you know it – more now than back in the park. You need to get back to Long Valley. How are you going to do that with her in this condition and her,” he said, looking at Carrie, “well, how is she going to manage when you get swarmed by a pack of dogs?”

I snapped. “You know, for someone who should be a brilliant, calculating genius, you strike me as nothing but a snarly old prick with an ego the size of China! What harm is there in us helping you get to California and completing your mission? After all these thousands of years, are you really willing to fuck things up because you can’t trust us?”

Kenneth shrieked, “Trust! Trust bloody Andras! You laddie – I knew you were bad news the moment I had the misfortune of latching me bloody eyes on you.”
Andy chortled. “I guess the fact that it was you who brought them to him is whatt chafes his wrinkled old bum,” he said to me. “Talk about an ingrate. Is that the way good people are supposed to be? Set an example old man.”

Kenneth waved him away.

“For her, you can stay but know this Andras, when the time comes, I will deny you your escape.”

Carrie’s hand found mine and she tugged me toward our bedroom. “I’ve had enough. Let’s go to bed,” she said. She didn’t need to ask me twice.

As we shut the door behind us, Kenneth and Andy continued to spar and trade barbs.

Ian Cobb/e-KNOW

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