He rose to consciousness from nowhere, face down in the long grass, salt in the back of his throat.
He opened his eyes to sunlight (too bright), a roaring in his head and the sight of a couple of red ants exploring his forearm as if he were some mutant Gulliver.
He rolled over and sat up lethargically, brushing the ants away and resting his forearms on his knees.
John Gabriel, he knew that his name was John Gabriel. But that was all he knew – his mind contained no detail – general information only.
He found himself to be on a grassy dune facing a mesa of sandy red stone. The source of the roaring in his head, he realised, was the sea that pounded the beach on either side of him. He sat at the apex of a spur of land with a sandy beach receding into the salty haze at thirty degrees to his left and right, giving him the feeling of being on the bow of some giant organic ship.
As he stood he was overcome by a wave of vertigo and nausea, a sense that there had been a fundamental shift in the earth’s gravity and that nothing would ever go back to the way it had been – whatever that was.
He turned from the red mesa and faced the prow of the land, the beach now sweeping back past his shoulders in a vee from the rocky peninsula ahead of him.
Embedded into the wet black rocks at this apex was a rusted metal ring measuring two metres in diameter, and attached to the ring was a chain with giant rusty black links. The chain was attached to the ring and ran out in a straight line ahead of him into the sea where it sagged just above the surface to disappear into the haze a squinting distance from the shore. He could hear the corroded metal links creaking from some unseen force being exerted somewhere out there in the salty haze.
He stumbled on tentative legs down to the right, sliding down the grassy dune and over toward the water’s edge. The waves crashed and slid up the beach before running back from the sand leaving it smooth and new before his footprints. A large seagull landed just out of reach of the waves’ foaming fingers. It looked at John with eyes that were hard and black and quite familiar with the appearance of humans.
“don’t go in” it squawked, “dangerous”
John looked at the bird as it tilted its head sideways to study him from a different angle.
“dangerous” the bird flapped into the air and began to circle John's lone figure on the beach.
He opened his eyes to sunlight (too bright), a roaring in his head and the sight of a couple of red ants exploring his forearm as if he were some mutant Gulliver.
He rolled over and sat up lethargically, brushing the ants away and resting his forearms on his knees.
John Gabriel, he knew that his name was John Gabriel. But that was all he knew – his mind contained no detail – general information only.
He found himself to be on a grassy dune facing a mesa of sandy red stone. The source of the roaring in his head, he realised, was the sea that pounded the beach on either side of him. He sat at the apex of a spur of land with a sandy beach receding into the salty haze at thirty degrees to his left and right, giving him the feeling of being on the bow of some giant organic ship.
As he stood he was overcome by a wave of vertigo and nausea, a sense that there had been a fundamental shift in the earth’s gravity and that nothing would ever go back to the way it had been – whatever that was.
He turned from the red mesa and faced the prow of the land, the beach now sweeping back past his shoulders in a vee from the rocky peninsula ahead of him.
Embedded into the wet black rocks at this apex was a rusted metal ring measuring two metres in diameter, and attached to the ring was a chain with giant rusty black links. The chain was attached to the ring and ran out in a straight line ahead of him into the sea where it sagged just above the surface to disappear into the haze a squinting distance from the shore. He could hear the corroded metal links creaking from some unseen force being exerted somewhere out there in the salty haze.
He stumbled on tentative legs down to the right, sliding down the grassy dune and over toward the water’s edge. The waves crashed and slid up the beach before running back from the sand leaving it smooth and new before his footprints. A large seagull landed just out of reach of the waves’ foaming fingers. It looked at John with eyes that were hard and black and quite familiar with the appearance of humans.
“don’t go in” it squawked, “dangerous”
John looked at the bird as it tilted its head sideways to study him from a different angle.
“dangerous” the bird flapped into the air and began to circle John's lone figure on the beach.
7 comments:
I stopped twice to lick the taste of salt fae my lips. I'm enjoying where this is taking me.
Pisces, sorry to get round so late on this. Been busy of late (too busy ). This is heading on and interesting course...
Sorry Pi, I got lost in the alien landscape of grassy dunes (presumably sand) beneath a sandy red mesa above a sandy beach being pounded smooth and new by a sea that hid the nether end of a black chain tethered to wet black rocks and missed the danger of which Kali warned completely.;)
Word verification, no shit: poxit
Intriguing. I look forward to the next instalment...
Why do I get this Hitchcockian feeling all of a sudden?
sounds slightly like a baffling episode of Lost...where does the chain lead?; how will the seagull menace the protagonist, or is it just a portent? btw, i have heard there is no such animal as a 'seagull', they are merely 'gulls'. Neat stuff!
Jimmy: more will follow
Subby: no apologies required
Yodood: don't you go getting lost now.
Justin: next installment on Wednesday
James: Birds?
Tom: I wrote this some years before Lost came out - although the similarities are only superficial (Island, mysteries etc).
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