The Lost Country, Episode Three

by | Wayne Kyle Spitzer-5

I HAD TO ADMIT, FIREHANDS Jack—or Blake, as we’d come to know him—knew how to put on a show, nor was he without talent—as his electric rendition of AC/DC’s “Squealer” continued to prove while we watched from the hedgerow on the other side of Capitol Way and looked toward the Tivoli Fountain; which, while not actually on, had been filled with something—gasoline, maybe, based on the smell (although it was hard to tell through the powerful ammonia of the rex urine). None of which changed the fact that the psycho had lashed poor Penny to a cross while yet another totem stood nearby, its crucifee covered with a tarp so that we were left to wonder if it was, in fact, Fred. More—as if all that weren’t enough—the dude was playing his guitar from the top of my ‘71 Cuda while wearing a black Halloween robe (with the hood thrown back, as was everyone) and big, black engineer boots, which would dent the f*****g roof. So—you know. He and I weren’t going to be f*******: friends any time soon. I could say that with some confidence.

Linda and I, meanwhile, had decided on our plan.

“Penny for Valerie,” I repeated, confirming—and Linda nodded. “A one for one exchange. Plus the car.”

“Ha!” exclaimed Valerie—but quieted when the stegosaurus looked up (for it had been feeding on the hedgerow opposite us, oblivious to the concert and the crowd, even before we’d arrived). “Whatever, Boomer.”

Linda, meanwhile, was eyeing the grazing herbivore. “Is he going to be a problem, you think?”

I watched the stegosaur as it mulled the bushes, breaking off the coarse branches with its beak—that’s what it looked like, anyway—moving its jaw side to side. “I don’t see the Flashback in its eyes, if that’s what you mean. Shouldn’t be a problem.” I looked beyond the crowd and the scaffold and the trash-strewn park, at the ruined capitol building. “Okay, then. Let’s do it.” I gave her a little wink. “Knives out, baby.”

And we stepped out: Linda aiming her g*n at the crowd even as I gripped Valerie’s arm and did the same—but targeting Blake, specifically. The proverbial front man. The head of the snake. Nor were we noticed—at least, not at first; that is, until the stegosaur reared up suddenly and unequivocally and mewed, loudly, alerting those in the back but also ourselves—to the predator. The allosaurus. Which was directly behind us.

“f**k! Go!” I managed—even as Valerie headbutted me and bolted and I fell, briefly. Even as the dinosaurs hissed and parleyed and finally collided and the people in the back of the crowd trained pistols—telling us to drop our weapons, which we did (after which they rushed over to bind us). Telling us to face the makeshift stage and to listen—even as the band seemed to falter and Blake looked our way; and said into his headset simply but decisively: “Y’all need to stop.”

After which, somehow, someway, everything did—stop, that is—even the warring dinosaurs (for the stegosaur had fallen and was now being eaten). After which, at last, there was silence, or nearly so, for the sound of flesh being rent and devoured continued. Until Blake strummed his guitar once, declaratively, starkly (letting the note hang, letting it dissipate), and said, brusquely, “For those about to rock, or, as the case may be, to offer themselves on our behalf, we salute you!”

And the crowd, as they say, went wild.

I looked at Linda and she looked back—even as our captors held us firm—each of us, I think, wondering what that could mean: ‘to offer ourselves on their behalf;’ each of us feeling frightened and helpless, like lambs before the s*******r.

“Look at them,” said Blake, indicating first us and then the animals, as if to contrast. “See how the beasts have but followed their natural instincts, which is to eat and be eaten, and troubled us not at all.” Cheers welled up throughout the crowd, like so much glitter and tossed confetti. “How instead of pursuing us they’ve merely fed on the plants and on each other—the way God intended. The way it was meant to be.”

More cheers, more applause.

“And rightfully so. For we have slaked the New Gods’ bloodthirst with our festivals and our sacrifices, our music, and now walk the earth free of want, and of fear—aye, free even from predation, as only the pious can. Indeed, as only the Architects of the Flashback would allow.” He pointed at the lights in the sky, dramatically, ecstatically. “The Architects! To whom we offer our blood and souls!”

At which the crowd roared, shaking the very earth, rattling the air.

“These three shall be our gift today—our gift to Them, the lights. These three, for whom the bell tolls; whom Valerie has led back to us through their—the Architects’—savage and beautiful night. And may their blood be enough to keep the power on and the beasts at bay—if only for a while longer.”

And then we were being jostled through the mob toward the front even as I lashed out at random and struck someone in the nose, squashing it like a plum. Then we were being forced to our knees in the mire even as thunder rumbled and Linda cried out and something steel hit the back of my head—exploding my vision like a supernova; rendering me totally unconscious.

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