When the Birds Fled

Word Count: 5,954

The sun scarcely peeked over the horizon when I heard the blasting off in the distance begin for the day. Several years ago, work on the railroad began in this region. More recently the demolition crews began to create a pathway through the mountains which would allow the trains to travel further east. I awoke to the sound of dynamite exploding every day for more than two months now. It was beginning to seem like they were never going to finish that daunting task. 

We had to relocate our cattle to the land of another rancher because the stress of the constant noise was causing some of them to fall ill. Our laying hens were producing a fraction of their normal yield, but we were not able to travel every day to collect the morning eggs. My family was going to have to make do with what food they did provide us. 

On this particular morning it did not take me long to tend to my daily duties. I got what livestock we still had at home fed and then pulled weeds in the garden with a couple of hours left until mid-day. I pulled a few carrots and other vegetables per my mother’s instructions and brought them in with me when I went in for dinner. My mother and sister took them to prepare the vegetables for the supper meal as my father and I ate. As soon as we finished up, it was back out working in the garden again. 

Normally during the summertime, we would nap after the midday meal, but no one could get any sleep with those deafening detonations going constantly. Instead, I helped my father hitch the horses and get the wagon loaded with hay to bring out to the cattle. Once he set off to the neighboring ranch, I started getting a recently cleared section of the garden ready for another planting. 

It was shortly after noon when the loud explosions from the demolitions happening only a few miles away stopped. I kept waiting for the unnerving blasts to resume, but they never did. I was glad to have at least a short break from the constant noise of the dynamite tearing apart the mountains. I did not know why they stopped, but I hoped it was not because of a fatal accident. Three people already died in the two months since the workers began. 

My father returned home several hours later, and he was as surprised and relieved as I was the noise of the blasting ceased, even if only for a few hours. Normally the explosions stopped a bit before sunset, so we hoped the crews were done for the day. I was helping my father unhitch the horses when they began to grow jittery and unsettled. As my father and I tried to calm the horses so we could get them disconnected from the wagon, the chickens began acting up as well. These horses were very well trained, but we could not get them to settle down at all. 

Finally, my father told me to help him get one unhitched and then we would take care of the other. As soon as the animal was free of the wagon, it ran off like a bat out of hell. This only caused the second horse to act up even more. We finally got him loose, but not before it damaged the wagon wheel. It was not until after the horses ran off and things got quiet when my father and I both noticed a deep moaning which seemed to come from the very earth itself. 

Why did the blasting stop all of the sudden? What did they do? 

Mother ran outside to see what was going on. She said the dishes were dancing on the shelves from the vibrations. We were just as baffled as she was, and we could provide her with no answers. Almost as if on cue, the sky became dark as countless birds burst forth from above the forest. All different species flocked together as they fled the distant mountains. The sounds of their collective cries were almost deafening. 

My father ushered my mother inside and came back out a few minutes later with a rifle for each of us and both of our six shooters. I did not know what he thought these were going to do against millions of birds, but I was glad to be armed anyway. We watched the spectacle unfold for more than half an hour, and when the birds were gone the groaning in the earth seemed to be stopped as well. 

We were both in something of a state of shock as we watched the black stream of birds fade off into the distance. Neither of us knew what to say, so we just stood there in silence for a bit. Eventually I was able to muster up the words to ask my father what was going on. He had no more of an idea of what was happening than I did. After another half an hour or so, he told me to go inside and keep an eye on my mother and sister while he tried to go and round up the horses. 

I could not see the horses anywhere around, so I hoped they did not run off too far. It was not an ideal situation for my father to go off by himself at the time, but someone needed to stay with the womenfolk just in case. My father was a tough man and was perfectly capable of taking care of himself. I did as he said and went back into the house with my mother and sister. 

I closed and barred all of the windows except for one, in front of which I slid a chair where I could sit and keep an eye for anything outside. My little sister was terrified, and my mother was doing her best to keep her calm. I am sure my demeanor was not helping them at all, but I had to keep my focus while I stood guard. 

It was almost dark when my father finally returned home with the horses. Luckily, they did not run off too far, and he found them drinking from a stream about a mile into the forest. By the time he came home, my sister already cried herself to sleep, and mother finished up cooking supper. With my father back, mother woke my sister and the four of us sat down to eat. 

Once the blessing was said, everyone was quiet through most of the meal, including my sister. As we ate our supper, I waited for my father to tell me about getting the horses, about anything to help me understand what was happening. Finally, I asked him if he saw anything out of the ordinary, but he said no. Hoping for a little more than an abrupt, one-word answer to my question, I wanted to probe him for more information. I knew my father though, and that would only serve to irritate him. 

Father began to talk once he finished his meal. He explained how he tracked down our horses and found them drinking from one of our best fishing streams. He did not see anything out of the ordinary. As a matter of fact, he did not see anything at all. Not only were the birds gone, there were no other animals to be seen with the exception of our horses. He was not sure if they were hiding, if they fled or if it was some of both. Father did not have a good feeling about the whole ordeal, and neither did mother nor I. 

The only one who slept well was my sister. Exhausted from all her crying earlier, she slept through the night. The rest of us could not stop wondering what was going on, what happened in the nearby mountains. 

Father woke me about an hour after sunrise. That was the first morning in months I did not wake to the sound of dynamite blasting away at the stone in the mountains. If it were not so disturbing, I would have found it a relief. I really had to wonder what happened up there. I could not imagine what would make them stop their demolitions after continuing day after day for months. 

Could they have caused a landslide or possibly an earthquake, and that was the moaning that seemed to be coming from the ground? 

Out of all the possible scenarios I could conjure to my imagination, those seemed to be the most plausable. I shared my thoughts with my parents, and they both agreed those seemed to be logical possibilities. They were not able to offer up any better explanations than those. Still feeling uneasy about the situation, we had chores that had to be done. 

After getting the chickens fed, I went back over to the wagon where my father was attempting to repair the damage caused by the horses the previous day. We were fortunate that the only damage they caused was to one of the wheels. There were two extras inside the shed, so I went to retrieve one of them. 

As I was in the shed moving things out of the way of the spare wagon wheels, one of our neighbors, Mr. Schmidt came riding up on his horse. I could not hear what he and my father were discussing, but I assumed it had something to do with the cattle we were keeping on his land. The instant the man rode away, my father began yelling frantically for me to hurry. Forgetting about everything else, I pulled one of the wheels free and let everything on top of it fall where it may. 

Why my father was yelling for me like this, I did not know. Never in my life did I ever see him in a state of panic such as he was in now. As I was running back to the wagon carrying the cumbersome wagon wheel, my father ran inside the house and was shouting something at my mother. Going back to the wagon, he told me to hurry as he waved his arms through the air. 

I was running as fast as I could, but that was not fast enough. Having waited only a few seconds for me to arrive, my father finally ran to me to help me carry the large wheel to the wagon at a more rapid speed. We immediately started changing the wheel, my father being blunt in his instructions as he told me what to do to help. My mother and sister suddenly came out of the house carrying jarred vegetables and preserves. Loading these into the back of the wagon, the two ran back inside to grab more supplies. 

Trying to ask my father what was happening did me no good at the time, as every time I spoke my father gave me more instructions. No sooner did we get the wheel replaced, than my father told me to go get the other spare wheel while he took care of getting the horses. Whatever was going on, I hoped the horses did not go crazy like they did yesterday. All this effort in a frantic rush would be worthless if our animals acted up again. 

My mother and sister were still loading the wagon with whatever supplies they could. Father was already at the wagon with both horses by the time I returned with my charge. I got the weel mounted on the back of the wagon as my father finished up with the horses. We helped my mother and sister finish loading the wagon and we left everything else we had in the world behind. 

Once we were going, Father finally began to explain why he just had us load the wagon with all the essentials and leave our poultry and livestock behind. The neighbor told my father the blasting crew from the railroad unearth something ancient, something evil that was imprisoned in the stone. I had a hard time believing it, but Schmidt said a lot of our neighbors were evacuating the region. This unknown horror consumed everything in its path. Mr. Schmidt sent his family ahead and was going around the area warning the neighbors. 

My father did not say what it was the demolition crews set loose because he did not know. Schmidt did not get into too much detail, but apparently, he was very convincing for my father to have us pack up and leave like that. He was a good person and allowed our cattle and few sheep to graze his land so they could be further away from the constant explosions. There was no reason for us not to trust him. 

Several hours before dark, we saw two more wagons ahead of us in the distance. The road was very difficult to see because it was overgrown with grass and other foliage, and in some places one had to know where the road was to find it. I recognized the families in the wagons. The lead wagon was that of a family who lived closer to the mountains than us. The second wagon was that of Schmidt’s family. Mr. Schmidt caught up to us as the sun began to set behind the trees. 

Unfortunately, he was not able to convince any of the other families in the area to flee their homes. They thought he was being hysterical and overreacting. Everyone in the region who knew Mr. Schmidt knew he was a good and honest, God-fearing man. He was not the kind to spread a panic just because of a simple overreaction. I had no real evidence to draw this conclusion, but I could not help but believe those families that did not heed their neighbor’s warning would be dead soon. 

When darkness came, the earth again started to moan as if the very land itself was in tormented agony. Somehow it seemed closer than it did yesterday, but that could be my terrified imagination deceiving me. I could not hear any insects in the grass or in the forest located only fifty feet away on either side. Everything seemed absolutely quiet except for those cries of pain coming from the ground all around us. We pulled two of the wagons abreast then had the women and children get in between. The men sat either in the wagons or on the ground outside of them. 

Everyone including the women, but excluding any children under nine years, were armed. Women out here had to learn to shoot every bit as good as a man with the wild animals, bandits and occasional vagabond. I had my rifle in my hand and my six-shooter on my hip. I carried as much ammunition as my belt would hold. 

The moaning in the ground stopped after two hours, so the men began taking turns sleeping, while the others helped keep each other awake and on their guard. The women did the same. Only the smaller children were permitted the luxury of sleeping through the night. 

I was still terrified when my turn to get a few hours of sleep came, but I was so exhausted both physically and mentally that I had no trouble drifting into a slumber. 

The sun was minutes from peeking over the horizon when my father woke me. There were already some eggs and coffee made. I had nothing to eat since breakfast the day before, and the food smelled absolutely inviting. It was of course an extreme relief to know nothing happened, not to us, during the night. 

We could all feel it. No one was talking about it, but we could literally feel the unholy aura of something that was supposed to remain buried. As soon as everyone ate and the horses were tended to, we were again on the move, taking the most direct path away from the mountains as possible. 

I hated when we had to pass directly through the forest instead of alongside it. At least when the road passed through a field, we could see almost to the range of our firearms. In the forest, something could be hiding behind every tree, underneath every rock. If something attacked our small caravan, we might not ever have time to react. 

We finally exited the timberlands and were about to rest our horses when the moaning once again emanated from the earth. Several of the smaller children began to cry as we continued forward. We were simply going to have to work our horses a little longer. Everyone here was experienced with farm animals, and we knew when they were almost to their limit. 

The crying of the earth did not last as long this time, but it sounded even louder than before. Whatever came out of those mountains appeared to be catching up to us. When the moaning stopped this time, we took the time to water the horses and let them graze. I pointed out to my father my observation, and he pointed it out to the others. While we gave the horses some much needed rest, all three families began going through their wagons and discarding as much as they could. If we could lighten the loads, the horses could travel longer and at a slightly faster pace. 

Leaving behind some of the cast iron pots and pans would greatly help reduce the load, but none of the women would agree to be the one to leave hers behind. The same went for several things for both the men and the women. No one wanted to agree to be the ones to part with what few things they had remaining in this world. I was afraid that, if we did not pick up the pace, all this fleeing would be in vain. Hopefully the adults could come to an agreement on who leaves what before it was too late. 

Around an hour before sundown, we met up with two more wagons, two more families fleeing from a south-western facing direction. The members of one family claimed they saw the ancient entity with their own eyes. According to their account, a giant black mass flowed down from the mountain consuming everything organic in its path. 

Everyone still wanted to make some distance before dark, so the other two wagons joined ours and we traveled for another hour. Once we stopped, we got the five wagons in a circle and started a small campfire in the center. Men were keeping guard from each wagon the entire night, sleeping in shifts as we had before. The O’Riley family, the family that saw the dark abomination, told us it would not do us any good to use guns if that thing caught up with us, but we all stayed armed nonetheless. 

Mr. O’Riley waited until the young children were asleep before he got into the specific details of what he saw. He watched as the flowing darkness burst through the forest line and into the field housing his flock. The unburied horror was engulfed in massive whisps of black smoke that seemed to appear and disappear constantly. The sheep began to melt as the thing approached them, with very little being left of them when it arrived. It was not only the sheep either. O’Riley said even the trees and bushes melted as the thing approached. 

I did not want to hear anymore, so I went to join someone in one of the wagons keeping a watch for the rest of us. There were fifteen fighting aged men now, so we would be able to take shorter shifts and sleep a little longer. I joined another young man my age, and for the first hour neither of us spoke. He was one of the O’Riley kids, and one of the few people here to witness what came down from the mountains. 

The O’Riley boy did not want to talk about what he saw, and honestly, I did not want to know. If we got away, I would never have to know those details. If we did not get away, I guess it really did not matter. Instead, when we finally started talking, we discussed where we thought we might go if we could not go back home. I mentioned going west where the government was handing out homesteads to whomever wanted it. There was not enough open land left to settle in the east, and none of our families had anything of value with which to start life over. 

That thought made us take a pause to think about everything we lost. We lost our livestock, we lost our land, we lost our homes and we lost most of our belongings. I wondered if those neighbors who did not believe Mr. Schmidt’s warning were still alive, or if they melted away like the O’Riley’s sheep. The thought made me want to vomit. I tried to think of something else, but my mind kept going back to those who stayed behind. I never asked the O’Riley boy about their neighbors, and he never brought them up. 

Thank goodness I knew better than to hold my rifle with my finger on the trigger, because my father came up behind us and told me to lay down and get some sleep. I jumped and almost fell to the ground. Once we climbed out of the wagon, my father climbed in. 

I thought it would take me some time to get to sleep, but I again fell asleep very quickly. The exhaustion and anxiety wore on me more than I thought, but in this case that was a good thing. I did not want to lay there for hours wondering if something was going to get me during the night, so drifting into unconsciousness quickly was a blessing. 

I awoke minutes before the sun broke the horizon when the ground began to groan and vibrate underneath me. Everyone was up with their firearms in hand faster than a jackrabbit with its tail on fire. We all circled around the inside of the wagons protecting ourselves from every direction. Minutes passed and the sun began to illuminate the new morning. No one saw anything out of the ordinary, but we kept on our guard for ten minutes after the moaning stopped. The womenfolk got breakfast ready as the men took care of getting the horses hitched back up to the wagons and the gear packed again. 

We ate quickly and loaded back up into our wagons. Some of the children would not eat, as children sometimes do, so the parents finished feeding them as we were on the move. The moaning in the earth that morning was louder than it ever was, and everyone wanted to put as much distance between us and the mountains as we could. 

When the wagon train stopped to allow the horses to eat, drink and get a bit of rest, we started going through the wagons and settling on who was going to leave what behind. The women did not want to leave their cast iron cookware behind, but there was no point in having all five wagons weighted down with them. Despite all the arguing the first time this proposal was made, the adults were able to come to an agreement rather quickly. 

As we continued about our way, we left a whole wagon’s load of things behind. That should allow our horses to move a bit faster and for a slightly longer period of time. As far as we knew, only five families managed to escape the horror released up in the mountains. 

How many people were going to die in the name of progress? 

I wondered if that thing, that mass of black the O’Riley’s saw descending from the mountains was following us. There was so much in the way of livestock for it to eat, it seemed rather foolish to think it was following us specifically. I tried to tell myself that, but every time we heard the moaning in the ground, it was louder than it was the time before. Every instinct in me told me whatever this thing was, it was pursuing us. 

Did it see the O’Riley family and was following them? Could it be they led the thing to the rest of us? 

Trying not to let such paranoid thoughts build up in my head, I turned to the back of the wagon to see if there was anything I could do to help my mother. That was when I saw it off in the distance. Initially I thought my frightened mind was simply playing tricks on me, but after a few moments it became clear I did indeed see a dark mass headed in our direction. 

I screamed out to everyone what I saw, and once they turned and looked at it for themselves, the drivers spurred the horses as fast as they could get them to run. The thing was just as the O’Riley father described. It appeared to be a mass of fluid darkness with giant whisps of smoke forming and quickly dissipating. To me it seemed like the ebony horror was trying to create tentacles, but they continued to dissolve as fast as it could make them. 

Everything, every tree, every shrub, anything that was alive or once alive melted away as the thing from a time long before man approached it. By the time the main body of the thing reached a location, absolutely everything organic was gone. It was almost like this thing was digesting its food even before it reached it. 

Everyone began throwing whatever they could out of the sides of their wagons hoping to gain a little more speed. The dark terror was still a long way behind us, but it was moving very fast for something of its immense bulk. After unloading virtually everything but our food, we began to put some extra distance between us and the black mass. That thing from the netherworld was moving almost as fast as we were, and we were driving our horses as hard as we could. 

I was sure our horses would reach the point of exhaustion before we could put a safe distance between us and that thing whose name was lost to time. The rail-road demolition crews never considered what they might be unearthing with their constant dynamiting of the mountains. There was no doubt the reason they stopped blasting is because this thing ate them first. Now the few surviving families from the region were fleeing for dear life. 

Suddenly something quite unexpected happened. The large mass slowed and eventually stopped its progress. Giant ripples rolled across its entire form as it slowly began to sink into the ground. As it slowly faded from view, the earth all around us began to moan. It was almost as if the earth was groaning with pain as this thing sank down into it. When the last of the mass disappeared, the moaning ceased. 

Now we knew this deep sound meant it was going dormant for a time. Everyone assumed this entire time the moaning meant the thing was on the move, when it turned out that was when it was, for the lack of a better phrase, going to sleep. Perhaps it could only stay active for a certain time, or perhaps it reached its feeding limit. Whatever its reason for sinking into the ground was a mystery to us, but everyone felt a large measure of relief when the thing vanished. 

It would be counterproductive to continue pushing our horses at this speed. We would literally drive them to death if we did not stop. The men were trying to remain calm, or at least put on the façade of being calm, but the younger children were in hysterics. As the women tended to the little ones, the men tried to decide what to do. We let the horses rest and graze as we debated our options. 

Eventually it was decided it would be best if we left two of the wagons behind. The Schmidts already had three horses for their wagon. If we took four off two of the wagons and put them on the remaining two, we could greatly increase our speed. Keeping the oats, grits, and meat and vegetables that were dried to preserve them, we ate everything we could of the jarred food and left the rest behind. Only keeping enough water for drinking, we had to hope we could find some fresh water with which to cook when it came time. 

Praying the reduced number of wagons and continually decreasing weight of the wagons we kept would give us the boost we needed, we were on the move once the horses were sufficiently rested. All of us could not help but wonder, since the moaning occurred when the monstrosity sank into the earth, would we have any warning if it became active and came for us. 

Only keeping the horses at a slow run, the idea was not to drive them too strenuously so we could make the greatest distance possible for the day. If we disabled the horses, that would be the end of us all for sure. There was no possible way we could travel fast enough on foot to stay ahead of that thing, that entity that killed everything it approached. 

Fully aware of the direness of our situation, no one spoke for some time. I thought everyone was in a mild state of shock. I knew that to be the case for me. My mind was almost a complete blank. I could not think of anything but the image of the flowing mass of black death. The sight of it was vividly burned in my mind, and I could now understand why the O’Riley family did not like to talk about it. 

When we stopped again to allow the horses some rest, we stopped by a nice clear stream. I looked around at everyone, and all of us except the small children were holding one or more guns. For a moment I thought I was literally going to chuckle. I could not imagine what we thought we were going to do with that flowing horror with these tiny weapons. 

A sickening dizziness washed over me when I realized there was another very good reason to keep our guns very close. It was an idea I did not want to consider, but if I was ever going to consider it, this was the time. Having witnessed the way living things melt away like ice in the hot sun in the path of the approaching wall of death, it would be wrong of us not to spare the women and children that gruesome fate. 

It felt like I should cry over the thought of having to carry out such an action, but I was far beyond the point of terror. It was almost as if I felt nothing at all. I looked at my little sister standing next to my mother and tried to resign myself to the fact that I may very well have to carry out this act. My father was standing close to them with his rifle in hand. 

As I stared at them, my father turned and caught my gaze. He patted the butt of his gun then turned his head to my mother and sister. I put my hand on my six shooter and nodded my head, indicating to him I understood what he was telling me. I could not believe my father and I were having such a cold, silent conversation as this. 

Less than two minutes later the men started to gather together rather than getting the horses hooked up to the wagons. I reached the group in time to hear them agree, we were not going to get away from whatever this giant horror from inside the heart of the mountain was. We had to do the merciful thing and spare the women and children the fate that would be coming upon us very soon. 

The conversation came to an end, and each man went to his respective family. I looked at my beautiful little sister, and it saddened me deeply that she would not grow up to have children of her own someday. I could tell she was scared, even though she was not saying anything. Mother told my sister to stay calm, that everything was going to be just fine. Grabbing a blanket, my mother draped it around my sister so she would not see what was about to happen. 

With tears streaming down her face, Mother mouthed the words “I love you both” then turned her head to the ground. I raised the barrel of my rifle, and my father did the same. Someone pulled the trigger and fired off a shot, igniting a volley of gunfire all around the camp. In three seconds it was all over with. 

All the men stood in absolute silence except for one man who was cursing God at the top of his lungs for making him do what he just did. My mother and sister lie there on the ground as my mother still had her arms wrapped tightly around my sister. Nothing seemed real anymore, this all seemed like some horrible nightmare from which I would soon wake. 

Suddenly I felt a searing stinging sensation on my right arm. I glanced down to see what it was. It appeared to be some sort of insect or arachnid. It only had four legs, and its shiny black body reminded me of the look of shattered obsidian. It bit a salt grain sized piece of my flesh loose and flew away. Almost immediately I felt another pain in my ear, and in seconds I had dozens of these things biting me. 

The other men in the camp were being eaten as well, with most of them screaming and trying to swat the carnivorous bugs off their bodies. I dropped my gun in a futile attempt to rid myself of the flying pests. We never saw whisps of smoke coming from the creeping mass; we saw swarms of biting bugs engulfing the black horror. 

That was why it looked like everything melted as the eldritch monstrosity approached. These tiny bugs consumed everything bite by bite and returned it to the main body. The ebony horror was made up of an unfathomable number of these small mineral-like insects. 

More and more of the biting creatures arrived, and my whole body felt like it was on fire. Piece by piece they pulled me apart. My father raised his gun to end the pain for me, but the gun fell from his hands as the diminutive monsters rapidly consumed his fingers. Although the pain did not last any more than a few minutes, it felt like an eternity. As these things carried my body away in small bites to feed the main mass, I tried to think and take comfort knowing my mother and sister were spared this horrible death. 

My family, as did others, assumed the blasting in the mountains stopped because there was some sort of major accident. It was disconcerting when the explosions we became so accustomed to hearing suddenly ceased, but we still did not have any reason to believe we needed to evacuate. We did not pay attention to nature, and now we had to pay the price. There was a good chance we could have escaped the flowing hoard if we had left when the birds fled. 

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