VESSEL

Giacco returned, finally- he carried with him the spoils of hunt and labor; a carcass hanging heavily on broad and gristled shoulder. Giacco stepped, and the Earth shook and hummed. He spoke:

“It is for you, Hart,”

With that, there was a heave and a thump as carcass met ground.

His was a low voice, it rumbled with the roil of Earth and clay. Giacco was a large man- tired, but sturdy and sure to manage. He was apparently hairy- though he wore a thick, grey, rubbery, and pilfered trench coat, still you could see tufts of hair poking out from the dip of the coat. His head was shaggy, he had a beard and hair in every place save for his eyes. He wore decaying shoes or boots, they could hardly be made out at this point. His ankles were covered by yellow-white socks cut off by the coat.

“Giacco… let me die…”

They were together in the mouth of a jagged and shallow cave, and it truly was a mouth; it had stalagmite teeth, it stretched into an abyss, there was a big rock in the middle that lolled as a tongue does…

Hart was splayed there, on the tongue, Giacco just now crossing the lips and into the mouth, the lump of flesh he labored for waiting behind him and near the entrance. Sitting up, slowly, wretchedly, Hart straightened himself into a seated position, so as not to seem too cowardly or meek as he addressed his visitor.

“Giacco-”

-but his voice gave up, and in a spectacular way. The end of that word, Giacco, transformed itself into a heave, a cough, and then into a drawn-out groan, finally ending with more intense hacking and a fetal attitude.

A thought flashed in Giacco’s eyes as he watched this fit, and Hart could see the thought, so in no time after the words tried to leave his mouth, Hart was defeated. Hart would not cry, Giacco knew this, but still there was a shared understanding as Hart lay his head back on the tongue, this time his body curling into itself.

There was a moment of silence, with neither man looking at or acknowledging the other- Hart with his head pressed to tongue, Giacco with his eye on something near the ground. It took a moment, but Hart, realizing himself, started himself back into a seated position, saying:

“Giacco, if someone comes to check on me, they’ll expect me to be dead by this point,” He finally stopped his fetal position and reached his arms upward, as high as they could go, and then out, stretching and revealing an emaciated, elegant, and twitchy frame. His stomach caved into itself as if it were nothing. Above, the skin of his chest flattened against the cage of his rib, tightening at the sharp and protruding blades of his shoulder which stretched out over whatever little flesh he had on bones-for-arms.

“Has been five weeks since I was left here, Giacco. They’ll come for the body, soon enough. When they find me instead alive and well, they will not just call me Stranger, as already they do- they will also call out Demon.”

Giacco turned around and away from Hart at the word: Demon. Hart could not see it, but the word danced in Giacco’s eyes.

Not a moment after turning, Giacco began to walk back to the lip of the cave, slowly, minding his step, as if in thought. He whispered, his voice almost inaudible as it was in direction with the breath of the cave. Hart heard these words, but he knew they may not have been meant for him:

“They know not the meaning of such Words. I know not. They know not…”

The final sentences were grumbled as Giacco met the carcass at the entrance to the cave, so those words were distant from Hart and almost unknown to him. To Hart’s ear those last words were like wind, almost nothing, yet he felt their meaning because Giacco said them with such weight. Giacco squatted down and towards the carcass, and as he did, he peaked an eye over his shoulder and spoke more directly:

“Minds are knives. I keep mine dull. Theirs are kept sharp. So, I am here with you, they are there, without. I would not seek to define you, even if I could… anyway, you will not let me close to you. I do not know you.”

With that, Giacco removed something from his coat, a weapon, a knife: and so began the arduous process of incising and moving flesh with metal. The carcass was already field-dressed by Giacco, as it was, with no single trace of organ or entrail within the hollow body of the animal. Hart noticed now also the blood on Giacco’s hands, surely from before, whenever it was that he ripped the innards from their place. Still, the skin and the cuts remained on the carcass, so Giacco toiled.

He started somewhere near the legs, awkwardly lifting the body at points to get the knife wherever it needed to be, digging under skin to find his mark. The incisions were precise yet done with a haste that leaned towards lax.

Hart had seen this many times, yet still, he could not escape the snapping of tissue as hide was torn from flesh. It did not bother Hart, but it drew his attention in a peculiar and oddly sincere way. Eventually, a cut was made at the tailbone, and Giacco put his knife down, using his hands to tear the rest of the hide off of the meat.

The hide did not come off easy: it fought for its place but eventually gave way. Hart looked upwards, now, and away from Giacco.

“The meat gets dirty when you don’t hang it while you do all that. Rocks. Stuff. And your last….. the meat from your last kill still hasn’t dried and it is not cold enough here, anyway. I don’t think the meat is edible.”

Giacco, who had started to lift the carcass, stopped in motion. He did not look to Hart, remaining squat near the body, but reacted in his way:

“I will find berries.”

Hart did not look as Giacco made his way through the stalagmite and back out into the world. He remained, his eyes on fire while tracing the ceiling of the cave, as if with purpose.

This is an excerpt from a short story I am working on that is set on a post-apocalyptic Earth. Thank you for reading, and I hope it was valuable in some way for you. Have a beautiful time