Working to Armageddon

The rain spattered down, running in rivulets across the clods of fresh-turned earth. Pale yellow light from the distant street lights reflected off pools gathered in the hollows. Mr. Dig pulled the brim of his derby hat lower over his pale eyes, lips quirking in a self-satisfied smile above yellowed teeth. A good night's work, this, he thought. Beside him, Mr. Call stared down at the turned soil, the expression on his long, gray face inscrutable.

"Is it time, Mr. Dig?" Mr. Call hissed, breath not quite steaming in the cold night air.

"Time?" Mr. Dig questioned. Could it be that his companion was correct? "No, too soon," he answered, sure of himself. It took time for the soul-madness to set in, time for death to turn, and the change to really take.

Or was he wrong? Mr. Dig could not afford to be wrong. Not at this hour, and not with these stakes.

He extended one scabrous arm over the grave, hand held palm down. He sought the pulse of life from beneath the mix of soil and mud. Invisible questing tendrils snaked down from his hand, penetrating the cold, wet earth. Down and down the tendrils went into the heavy, pressing darkness. A brief, dim flash heralded an earthworm, severed during Mr. Dig's earlier excavation, still twitching as its remaining hearts beat out their ichor into the dirt. A brighter flare - only a vole, creeping to explore the sheered-off edge of Mr. Dig's handiwork. The tendrils dove down farther, foot after foot until they found it - a pulsing heat, a heartbeat that was a mere echo of reality. A breath of fetid air birthed in the sulfurous environs of Hell-That-Was.

It was indeed time.

"Mr. Call, I do believe you're correct. If you'd be so kind?" Mr. Dig said to his companion.

Mr. Call shook off his heavy overcoat, letting the thick fabric crumple to the sodden grass beneath his hobnailed boots. He raised his long face to the blackness above, uttering an ululating keening. Mr. Dig reveled in that sound, that finger-gnawing, bone-grinding, blood-thumping wail. It's a sign of the end, Mr. Dig thought to himself, smiling his yellowed smile once more. Mr. Call's cry undulated across the landscape, reflecting, refracting, shattering reality's fragile illusion and revealing the cracks between the worlds.

There was a sudden snap, like neck bones cracking beneath taut knuckles, and a third figure joined the duo.

"Mr. Dead, it is time," grated Mr. Dig, again extending his hand, will-tendrils confirming once more that the work was done.

"Time enough, time for me, time, time, time," muttered Mr. Dead, his voice the scratching of a needle across the eye, moist but sharp, and tinged with the same flavor of pain. He chattered his teeth in laughter, pulled off his tall hat, and tossed it away into the dark.

Time indeed, thought Mr. Dig, already savoring this newest victory, not yet torn from the clutch of the black earth beneath their feet. One more victory in the long road. Mr. Call thought of their work as building a wall, brick by slow, fleshy brick, but to Mr. Dig, it was a road, each victory one more bony cobble on their path.

Mr. Dead stooped over the fresh, dark soil. To the casual observer, it might seem as though his thin, worm-like lips smiled, and then that he grinned. But the grin continued to grow, Mr. Dead's mouth opening wider and wider, jaws popping from their sockets, pistol-shot loud in the night. A glimmer in the darkness of his throat and green light sprayed from that maw, spattering across the soil and leeching down, away, in search of death and madness.

Mr. Dead wrenched his jaw back into place, dark eyes reflecting the distant arc-sodium as he turned back to Mr. Dig.

"Now, my dear Mr. Dig, it is your responsibility. I have planted the seed, yes, yes. Now you must reap our harvest!"

Mr. Dig's pale eyes lit with glee. At last, his turn again! He leaped in the air, the tails of his coat flying up behind him. Mr. Dig landed on one knee in the wet mush, and brought his right fist down, hammering it into the soft earth before him. A deep rumbling came from below, shaking and vibrating the clods not yet turned to liquid mud. Emerald light glittered, muted by clutching roots and stones. Mr. Dig brought his other fist down, pounding it into the soil beside him.

The earth moved in the grave before the trio. Mr. Dead laughed softly, while Mr. Call's long face creased in a greasy smile. Mr. Dig did not look. He was concentrating on what lay beneath. It comes, he thought. Ecstasy mingled with awe flooded his soul.

Before them, the soil of the grave fell down, and the green light changed, becoming murky brown, then clarifying to a brilliant rubescent glow. A figure rose from the earth, thick and bold and strong with ropy muscle, yet old as time itself.

I am War, the dead man whispered in their minds. I shall lead you down the road to Armageddon.

Mr. Dig laughed. One more cobble in the road.