Dell

Dell

"Even the strongest rock will run into ruin if at the mercy of water for years"

Unknown

Dell’s first movements were intentional but hardly graceful.  And he let out a cry of pain when he landed on the ground.  That was when the large figures formed around him again.  They were taller than him but still human.  Probably a good thing. Cloaked in gray and green robes they gathered around.  One, with a meager patchwork of the gray-green pattern wasn’t hooded at all.  He had a big chin and broken whiskers like the ones grown out from omission rather than grown for a full beard.  The one next to him was a woman.  Dell could tell, because even the baggy garb couldn’t conceal the definition of large breasts behind it.  He couldn’t see her face but he saw a long pointed nose stick out from the shadow of her hood.  Next to her was a man with a hood but also a short white beard.  As Dell looked around the circle he was able to make out faces more clearly.  The light source, a torch or fire, he figured, was behind the large nosed woman making the shadow dance across her face.  The rest of the faces were stoic and their glances would shift between one another. 

A woman broke through the wall of hooded people carrying a wooden bowl with her.  She was breathing heavily when she knelt next to Dell and said, “Drink the mother’s milk.”  She smiled and nodded moving the bowl forward to Dell’s mouth.  The large awkward smile on her face made Dell smile back and uneasy.  Her hands were callous and large, probably larger than his.  When he looked down he was happy to see that the liquid could not be breast milk: it was clear and gave off no scent.  Being very thirsty Dell took the bowl from the girl, closed his eyes and hoped for the best.

The taste of water seemed like the first sip of water he ever had.  And then he thought about the Pan-Atlantic River.  Somehow he was one of the travelers in the body bags now.  Only he could look around and up and down.  The river spanned at least forty yards across with limestone towering above he and the river at either side.  And then there was the girl on top of him.  She sat, legs apart, on his thighs letting the water catch her grey-green tunic then slowly creep up it.  Dell wanted to tell her that they would sink.  This is not meant for two people!  But she just smiled.  He had her same wooden bowl too and lowered a lip of it in the river.  When she offered it to Dell he refused this time.  Her persistent smile faded and she started to swat at the river.  The tantrum sent river water up and around their flimsy flotilla.  But it wasn’t until she started pouring water on it from her bowl did they begin to sink.  And when the river met Dells own skin darkness came.

Water became nothing.  So did the limestone.  The girl was gone and he woke up again.  This time things were different he was home and had pissed himself.  He knew he was home because he smelt his dad’s aftershave.  And he knew he had pissed himself because he also easily distinguished the scent of pneumonia.  His lower half was all wet too which all but confirmed this pissing theory.  He sat up and saw the girl again.  Guess I’m not at home either.  “Who are  you?  Where am I?”

She turned around quickly and looked across to his pants. “You pissed yourself,” she said defensively.  A large man burst through the door.  He had been the hooded figure with the beard except now he was no longer hooded and his beard seemed longer now.  He was tall so his strides across the room had to be checked by his own volition as to not knock into things.  The room they were in was hot and cramped.  Opposite the bed the girl was cooking over a cast iron range.

“Our scouts poisoned you and captured you,” the man said and the girl turned to begin cooking again.  Dell figured he was being address although it wasn’t clear.  The man was searching for something and hadn’t looked at him yet.  He tossed rags around and shifted pots.  He moved a dresser and even picked up the girl checking beneath her before setting her down right where she had been.  “Seems you pissed yourself, eh, that will happen.”  It must have been the smell that cued the large man’s comment since still he gave no glance or notice to Dell yet.  “The poison, it weakens your bladder and that stuff.”  He grunted approval having found a small wooden object.  “Don’t touch my daughter or my things and leave when you will.”

He turned to Dell.  He had thin eyebrows and high cheeks.  His eyes were two different colors: the left jade and the right blue.  “Sorry for the mix up.  I know your father.  Tell him he’s welcome among our ranks anytime.”  The man thought about that and laughed so loudly the girl yelped.  “I am Apex Oblivion you are a guest of the largest sect of World Worshippers in south central Newtopia.”

“World Worshippers?” Dell thought out loud.

“Yes but you better clean up.  I don’t want my people seeing you like this.”  He left the room when Dell was about to say something and the girl was turning around to do the same.  Dell quickly looked back to her and smiled.  His dad once told him to smile whenever he didn’t have something to say.

“It may save your life,” he had said. “Or get you laid,” Rundell had added.

“So can I go?”  Dell asked the girl through a forced smile. 

“Of course not, you have to clean.”  She said mimicking Oblivion.

“Was that your father?”

“Ok so the towels are in the closest,” she said ignoring his question.  “What you will like most about this place is the water.  It’s fresh and it’s cold.  Moisture is good for the body and the world.  Even the strongest rock will run into ruin if at the mercy of water for years.”  She had turned back and tended the food.

“Yea but then you ruin the rock.  And I don’t like cold showers.” 

Her attempt to ignore him failed this time, “My dad just saved your life.  You just an outsider.  You think we’re Americans or Vegetarians and we’re not.” She put down the wooden ladle she had been using and turned to him, “and we’re not pacifists, we eat meat, just not some.”  She made a ‘tisk, tick’ noise. 

“All I said was ‘I didn’t like cold showers.  You’re being very presumptuous.”  She is younger than me, he could tell that now.  Her bent eyebrows and open stance was as defensive as it was forced.  She maintained eye contact, “It’s just something I hear all the time. But you were being rude and ‘presumptuous’ isn’t a word.”

“That’s true,” Dell yielded, “I get sarcastic and bitter when I don’t know what’s going on.”

“Yea, I wasn’t quite myself there.”  She took a step forward with the wooden spoon in one hand.

“Yea? Well tell me about you.  I see you cook, do you like it?”  Her figure was lean and she was tall for a woman.  But her uneven stance and defensiveness earlier suggested immaturity. 

Smiling she said, “Oh, this?  It’s a mixture, a drug.  If you ate it you would die of brain hemorrhaging, dehydration, and diarrhea minutes after application.”

“You can die of diarrhea?” Dell mused.

“Well no, of course not,” she tilted her head, “But you would be, you know doing what diarrhea does, the whole two minutes before you died of the hemorrhaging.”

“And the dehydration,” Dell added.  “So what are you supposed to do with it if the bad guy doesn’t eat it?”

“Then you put it on your knife and stick them with it.” At that she stabbed Dell with the blunt wood spoon she had been using.  He fell back and onto the bed.  She continued walking closer in a wide gate as if still in combat.  When she got to the bed she leaned in towards Dell and said, “You smell like piss, clean yourself up.”