Mind and Flesh Page 5

  But they are swarming from all over.

  They jump from higher places.

  They will reach my structure…

  I do the only thing in my power.

  I need to unplug the cables around my structure.

  This is my only way to protect my body from them.

  I unplug.

  My ass and my throat hurt.

  My brain hurts.

  All the rest of my body hurts.

  I feel the loss of gravity.

  I get plastered on the ceiling.

  It hurts. It hurts. IT HURTS!

  The sense of vertigo comes with the fall.

  My mind is overwhelmed with signals.

  “Look who is there.”

  My eyes are almost half open. My field of view is very narrow. Is it my colleague I can almost see? And someone I don’t know close to him. They are both looking at me. Their silhouettes seem a bit twisted, I can’t quite stabilize my eyes on their shapes. What is wrong with them? They are getting closer to me, filling almost all my vision. But I thought that I saw someone else, on the side.

  “For a moment, you had us worried.”

  I am so tired. I am lying down in a bed, I could just slip away and sleep at any second. I already don’t feel my body, as if I was weighing nothing. I feel so light.

  “Where did you hide all your data on the machine, all the modifications you made and how to use it?”

  Can’t they just leave me in peace with that? I am so tired of all this pressure. At least right now I feel good. And light. I think that they are still talking, but their voices are getting increasingly muffled. I am glad, I don’t want to hear them. I think about my wife.

  She is in the kitchen. I can hear her moving around and using the sink.

  I am lying down on the couch, all alone now.

  I think that I was sleeping. I am well rested and more relaxed now.

  I have experienced confusing dreams lately.

  A complete mess.

  Something is wrong in this room.

  There is a big box in the corner, it is not supposed to be here.

  I hear some rattling noise coming from it.

  There is a black sheet covering the box, I can only make out the squared shape under.

  The rattling noise again.

  I get closer.

  Should I stay away, or should I remove the cover?

  My wife comes in the room.

  She smiles at me.

  I notice that she is carrying a cake.

  She loudly exclaims happy wedding birthday.

  It has been two years.

  I ask her if she is happy.

  She hesitates for a second, then answers yes.

  The hesitation is not a good sign.

  I ask her if there is something wrong.

  She takes a deep breath.

  She then says that she is happy, but there is indeed something wrong.

  She gets closer to the box and touches it with the tip of her fingers.

  A strong rattling noise can be heard briefly. Then stops.

  She says that what was missing…

  She grabs the black drape on the cover and removes it in a swift movement.

  …was a pet.

  Under the black veil is a cage.

  A white bunny is in the c age.

  The bunny looks afraid and quickly moves to another position, emitting a rattling noise as it moves in the litter.

  This is wrong. This is so wrong.

  I look at her, puzzled.

  She has a defiant smile.

  She says that I will take care of it.

  I know that she is trying to trap me.

  Should I behave as if I noticed, or behave as if there was nothing?

  She can’t expect me to not notice, so should I behave accordingly?

  Do I want her to be happy, or do I want to keep my pride, fight her trap and enter conflict?

  She went to great length to trap me. And I want to stop her fight, it is annoying me. I will not swallow my pride, I will take her on.

  I tell her that her joke is of bad taste.

  That using our wedding birthday was a low blow.

  She stops smiling.

  Her face now looks like she is hurt and hateful at the same time.

  She doesn’t say anything and goes to the bedroom.

  She asks me not to follow her.

  I don’t.

  I stand in the room, powerless.

  I look at the bunny.

  The bunny seems terrified.

  I don’t even think she will care for it.

  I leave it be and turn on the computer.

  I sit down in front of it and sigh.

  I guess I will just abandon myself into work.

  I am strapped to a chair.

  Around me, a bandstand.

  Farther than the bandstand, a park.

  Green grass, water fountains, flowers of different colors in precise arrangements, carefully spaced trees.

  I can’t get out of the chair.

  From the corner of my eyes, I see the shape of someone standing beside me.

  I can’t really distinguish the face, but the proportions seem off.

  The person bends down and whispers in my ear that I should pay attention.

  The voice is low but squeaky.

  The show is about to begin.

  As I was wondering what show, a dozen of balls bigger than a soccer ball are rolling in the grass towards the bandstand.

  They stop about a meter from it.

  After a second, with an impressive synchronicity, they deploy themselves.

  Huge feathers of a green color, with big blue dots.

  A blue body. Peacocks.

  They start to roll around and make figures.

  Their beautiful feathers are mesmerizing me.

  I barely notice a tickling on my hands.

  The figure standing near me bends down and asks me if I like them.

  I answer yes and try to look at the person whispering in my ears.

  I feel an intense stab wound on my back.

  I scream and try to look at my aggressor.

  The figure gets closer to my side so I can see.

  A beak drenched in blood. My blood.

  Small yellow eyes.

  White feathers.

  The head of an eagle, on a body looking human, wearing a black suit.

  White gloves covering the hands.

  The eagle takes my head in its hands and makes me face the peacocks again.

  It asks me to keep watching the spectacle or it will stab me again.

  I look at the peacocks.

  Their beauty makes me forget the wound.

  Every once in a while, they stop and glance at me.

  They are happy to have an audience.

  It keeps going until one of them rolls into a ball.

  They all get back to a ball shape and stop moving.

  The eagle stabs my back again.

  I scream of pain.

  Then I yell that I am watching, but they stopped.

  The eagle gets its face very close to mine.

  My blood is dripping from its beak to my shoulder.

  It whispers to me that I need to feed the peacocks so they resume the spectacle.

  I ask how.

  The eagle gnaws at my hand, removes a few fingers.

  It moved too quickly for me to even prepare.

  As I scream, it spits back my fingers to the peacocks.

  The peacocks swiftly deploy once again, and throw themselves at the fingers with joy.

  The chase each other off to get a few bites.

  I look at my hand. Three fingers missing.

  Some blue down feathers are growing on my hand.

  I am losing blood. Starting to panic.

  A sharp pain in my back.

  I hear the low voice again, asking me to keep watching.

  With great anger, I execute myself.

  The peacocks are dancing again.


  One of them moves it small head up, opens its small beak and swallows.

  I guess it was my finger.

  I become restless and try to circumvent my bindings.

  The peacocks are merrily making figures.

  Suddenly, they stop, open their beaks and shake their heads in my direction.

  As they get get back into ball shape, I just have the time to prepare myself to receive the pain.

  And indeed, my back tears open.

  I sense the eagle getting closer to my other side, to the complete hand.

  No, I won’t let it hurt me this time.

  I am fighting back.

  It bends down at shoulder length.

  I bite the nape of its neck as hard as I can.

  The eagle tries to move away.

  I maintain my grasp. Fucker’s not going anywhere.

  Damn, it still managed to move away, tearing its skin.

  I have a chunk of flesh in my mouth that I spit in its direction.

  The peacocks are attracted by it and fight to get it.

  The eagle fell on the floor, using the guardrail of the bandstand to try and get back up.

  The peacocks are excited by the position and the sudden weakness of the eagle.

  Several of them jump on the eagle, maintaining it aggressively down with their beaks while they try to copulate with it.

  As the eagle is… busy… I don’t feel restrained by bindings anymore.

  Indeed, I can get up.

  I look at my hands.

  They are not hands anymore.

  Claws. Down feathers at their base, then real blue feathers higher.

  The mutilated hand has the claw broken.

  If I had watched the show for longer, I would have become a peacock.

  I am walking in a shopping centre.

  I don’t remember what I am looking for.

  So I keep walking and looking around.

  At my right is a shop selling… something looking like flesh.

  I stop by.

  Ears fill the shelves. Occasionally, there is an eye in the earlobe.

  Intrigued, I enter the shop.

  I pick an ear up.

  It feels soft and warm.

  It squeezes itself in my hand until it reaches my palm.

  Once there, it fuses with my skin.

  I am disgusted.

  I take the auricle in my fingers and tear it from my hand.

  The ear withers and dies.

  It left a burn mark in my hand.

  I leave the shop and get back on my way.

  Next is a lingerie shop.

  As I look through the window, I see my sister.

  She is trying out a bra in the middle of the shop.

  She sees me and waves at me with a smile.

  She signs me to join her.

  I enter the shop.

  She asks me what I think.

  I feel embarrassed.

  I notice she is not wearing panties.

  A shop assistant comes by her and gives her a red bra.

  She removes her previous one, uncovering her breasts and nipples.

  I feel excited.

  And I feel guilty.

  I look away.

  The shop assistant gets closer to me.

  She asks me if I want to try something.

  I am now looking at what she is doing.

  She grabs my hand and moves it to my sister’s vulva.

  She guides my finger at the entrance to her vagina.

  I look away once more.

  And then I see them.

  My parents are further away in the store.

  For a few moments, I don’t dare move.

  They did not notice me.

  I need to hide.

  I crouch.

  I remove my hand from my sister’s intimate parts.

  I stand back up and quickly run out of the shop.

  I feel terribly guilty and ashamed.

  I keep walking for a few more moments.

  Once I feel safe, I stop.

  Close by, there is a small artificial park with a few benches.

  I decide to sit on one of the benches.

  I try to remember the reason why I was in the shopping centre.

  Perhaps I needed electronics parts for work.

  Parts I don’t want to be registered if bought through the normal route.

  I set out to find an electronics store.

  I keep walking and looking at the shops around, scanning for the one I am looking for.

  I can’t find it.

  And somehow, I see shops I have already seen. Multiple times.

  Am I lost?

  I can’t orient myself.

  The layout seems even more complicated than a neuronal map of the brain.

  Whichever direction I go, I can’t find the electronics store.

  Should I ask my way to the people walking around me in the alley?

  I attract the attention of a woman walking in my direction by waving my hand and apologizing for stopping her.

  She reaches my level and stops in front of me.

  I ask her if she can help me.

  Her eyelids retracts, showing big open round eyes.

  Her mouth opens wide.

  I can see her white teeth, her pink tongue, and the darkness of her throat.

  It seems like she is about to scream, but there is no sound.

  She seems to become red and contracted from some sort of effort.

  As her skin starts to wrinkle, I see something coming out of her throat.

  Her body collapses gradually as all sorts of organs and parts come out of her mouth.

  It’s as if her insides were now out, and her skin curls in a new inside.

  All her bones seem to have melt, because there is no apparent structure or solid piece standing out.

  What’s left of her falls on the marble floor.

  Other people have stopped and are staring in my direction.

  I tell them that it’s not my fault.

  I just wanted help.

  They keep staring at me as their eyes widen.

  Their mouths open.

  All-together, in a unified movement, they wrinkle, extrude their organs and collapse into place.

  I don’t want to stand here, in the middle of them.

  I decide to run away.

  My foot doesn’t touch a hard surface.

  The floor is… melting.

  Collapsing.

  A stream downwards, spiraling down as if it was almost liquid.

  I get attracted towards its center, with the lumps of flesh and new people that appeared on the scene.

  As I get closer to the center, I am horrified.

  There are big teeth masticating everything that falls in their way, leaving only bloody lumps of flesh and clothes sliding further down.

  I try to grab anything that might slow my movement, but all that I can reach are people or what is left of them, sliding down with me.

  I panic.

  Try to claw my way up with my nails.

  But the surface is wet and slippery.

  My feet hit something solid. The teeth.

  A lump of organs falls on me, pushing me slightly deeper.

  No!

  The teeth close down on me, crushing my left arm.

  I am filled with pain.

  I scream.

  I am home, in my bedroom.

  The lights are off, but I can see fairly well from the public lighting.

  Everything is messed up. The drawers are open and their content is emptied on the floor.

  Clothes have been torn from the dressing.

  Papers fill the space.

  I feel dizzy.

  I look in the living room.

  The bunny in the cage is looking terrified.

  My computer is smashed open.

  As I inspect it closely, the hard drives are missing.

  I feel angry.

  I hear a swirling of water. Coming from the bath
room.

  I enter the kitchen and pick up the largest knife I can find.

  I move carefully in the direction of the bathroom, trying to avoid making any noise.

  I definitively can hear the same noise at irregular intervals.

  The light is turned on in the bathroom.

  As I reach the bathroom, its door is wide open.

  I lean and discreetly look inside.

  The curtains are drawn on the bathtub.

  But I see the shadow of something big behind.

  It is gently moving, making swirling water sounds.

  The fucking thing is enjoying a bath, in my home, right after I have been burgled.

  I bend down, and slowly get closer to the bathtub

  I hold the knife in front of myself with a firm grip.

  With my other hand, I am about to open the curtain.

  I think that I am sweating.

  I need to focus and get ready to fight whatever is there.

  After calming myself a bit, I decide that it is time.

  I open the curtain in a swift movement.

  The thing turns its head in my direction.

  The rabbit costume!

  It suddenly stands up.

  Only the upper part is covered by the costume, the bottom part revealing naked human and female genitalia and legs.

  I am stunned.

  The rabbit takes that moment of hesitation to jump on me and pound me to the ground.

  My head hits the floor tiles.

  It hurts.

  The rabbit follows my fall and uses its weight and arms to hold me still.

  I panic.

  I try to break myself free.

  Again and again.

  At some point I notice that I am not holding the knife anymore.

  The rabbit gets its head close to me and strongly uses it to push my head on the floor.

  I can’t move.

  The rabbit is exercising an increasing strain on my arms.

  I feel them stretching.

  It hurts more and more.

  I try to kick it with my legs and knees, but its own legs are barring me from moving.

  Suddenly the pain becomes greater in my left arm, the strain increases, increases…

  …then disappears.

  My left arm has been torn off.

  I scream.

  The rabbit uses its now free hand, covered in blood, to push my pants down.

  The rabbit then moves its bottom forward to position its vulva over my penis.

  And it grinds on me.

  I am distressed and disgusted, still trying to break free, but my own movements compress my testicles...

  …IT HURTS.

  A sharp, acute, pain.

  I am screaming.

  My whole body contracts to distract my attention from the pain.

  The rabbit looks down and seizes my penis in its free right hand.