When the moon dogs stand guard

"I will make Babylon a desolate place of owls, filled with swamps and marshes. I will sweep the land with the broom of destruction. I, the LORD of Heaven's Armies, have spoken!"
~
Isaiah 14:23



It began with an explosion that sounded more like the wet fart of some strange leviathan fermenting a bellyful of rotting carcasses. It echoed backwards and forward across the boondocks, making all manner of creatures pause in their nocturnal wanderings or fidget uneasily in their sleep. Sweat beaded Harlem Buttery’s brow. The eerie sound coming from the swamp made his skin crawl.

He had lived alongside the Bile Swamp all his life in a wooden shack his grand pappy built. It was not a bad place to live. Well, most of the time, but every now and then something happened to the swamp. Not so often as to make folks want to pack up and move on. Maybe once or twice in a person’s lifetime, Harlem figured it was no different from living in the shadow of a fire mountain, or in a place where the ground shivered from time to time. His grand pappy taught him the signs to watch out for, taught him to be prepared.

Harlem’s grand pappy had been a piano player in a honkytonk in his youth. Syncopation that was the word he used. He said you had to listen out for any change in the rhythm of the swamp.

“Swamps got the squitter’s, bad things follow.”

Harlem sat in his rocking chair on the rickety porch of his shack repeating his grand pappy’s words. Behind him was a circular hex painted over the screen door of his shack. Above his head, three-dimensional hexes hung from porch beams, turning in the stale breeze. He laid his hands upon the shotgun resting across his knees, sunk his chin into his chest where a small vile of dark liquid nestled in his breast pocket and waited.

“I’m ready.” He said.

It was a night of bad omen; moon dogs guarded the bright lunar disc as it rose into the sky. The river Bile coiled through the bleak landscape below, reflecting the cold light like a vast pale serpent seeking redemption. There was no salvation for the river, its sluggish course petering out into the putrid corruption of the swamp. Moon dogs were rare over Bile County, and unexpected, a definite hiccup in the rhythm.

Somewhere out in the darkness a bulge began to form on the oily surface of the slough, expanding like a blister, swelling up out of the sucking mud higher than a tree. In the blink of an eye it burst. Harlem Buttery watched from his rocking chair as a tongue of green flame erupted skyward a mile or so to the south west of his position. Not long after that, a foul stench reached his nose, carried on the breeze, it smelled like old fish guts and rotting cabbage.

Harlem knew the swamp and its moods from his own observation and the words of wisdom handed down by his pappy and grand pappy. Winter was the dead time. From fall onwards, everything froze solid. After the spring thaw, the swamp began to stir. Phosphine, hydrogen sulphide and methane plopped and bubbled away day and night. There was no smell. At night, tiny flames winked in and out of existence all across the swamp. These were the natural and often comforting phases of the swamps annual cycle. It had remained that way since Harlem was a boy. This night would be different, he was certain of that, just like, it had been that one night when he was a child, the night his papa disappeared.

~***~

“When the moon dogs stand guard and the air is ripe with the putrid stink of devils eggs bad things will happen.”

Those were the last word’s Harlem heard his pappy utter, they echoed back to him through time.
The swamp stirred and groaned then as it did now. Harlem, no more than five years of age had to stay on the porch, the same porch he sat on now. His pappy and grand pappy had been out collecting scrap as usual. That is how they made their living. Scouring the network of pathways only, they knew for discarded artefacts regurgitated by the swamp. Once a month they would take them to the nearest town and sell them on market day.

It was long after dusk when his grand pappy returned alone clutching the bloody stump of his left arm, severed below the elbow. The following day, search parties of family, friends, neighbours and their hounds came and went. While Harlem watched from the porch.
For five long days, he waited. His grand pappy healed up and continued searching months after the others had given up but it made no difference. Harlem’s pappy never came home.

His grand pappy lived to the ripe old age of seventy-six, minus the lost arm. On his deathbed, he whispered in his grandson’s ear.

“”Don’t fret the small things, boy. Save your energy for the big stuff but keep praying it never happens. The Swamp gives and the swamp takes away. You might not like it but there’s diddlysquat you can do about it. I’m going to visit your papa now and I’m leaving you in charge.”

He died an hour later. Many folk turned up for the funereal. They even brought out a Honkytonk piano on the back of a wagon pulled by two mules. After all was said and done, Harlem took the wrapped body deep into the swamp by paths only he now knew and gave up his grand pappy according to tradition.

~***~

Out in the swamp a dimple the size of a dewpond and resembling a moon crater was all that remained of the bubble. Something pricked the concave surface, pushing upward from the black mud, a rectangular shape sliding up from the ooze with all the grace of a giant phallus. It creaked and groaned, then flopped over backward to lay half-submerged in the stinking sludge.

Sweat trickled down Harlem’s back, soaking into the seat of his faded bib-n-braces. His lips moved in silent prayer. He prayed his mojo and the shotgun resting on his knees would keep him and his kinfolks safe from the evil that was surely leeching out of the swamp.

Over in the south-west where the column of flame had lit the sky, he could see strange dancing lights and hear voices calling out in confusion.

The lights became erratic when the screaming began.


“Sometimes its people, sometimes its devils, sometimes its devils looking like people, but the monsters are the worst and when they all fetch up together its hell on earth.”


Behind Harlem, the screen door batted open on well-oiled hinges, a small cool hand settled on his shoulder.

“I’m scared, Papa. I seen corpse candles floating in the swamp through my bedroom window. I’m scared the devil is out there.”

Harlem turned in his chair and smiled up at his son. The boys eyes were like dinner plates, he had his thumb in his mouth, a habit Harlem thought the boy had grown out of years ago. He placed a calloused hand on the boy’s tousled blonde locks and held his sons wide-eyed gaze. Searching for the words that might ease his sons fear. He remembered his own grand pappy’s words to him when he was a scrawny nipper.

“Boy, while you live, tells the truth and shame the Devil."

He saw momentary puzzlement crease his son’s brow then understanding softened the boy’s features.

“Saying I’m scared is telling the truth papa. If that old devil comes here then I’m gonna throw mud in his eye.”

“That’s the spirit boy, if you’d said you weren’t afraid I’d call you a liar. Nothin wrong with being scared as long as you do the right thing, oh, and faith helps too”

The boy grinned as his father pointed upward with his thumb at the intricate devices constructed from swamp willow, interwoven with horsehair, animal bones and feathers. Nathaniel did not understand these things; his schooling had not touched upon such arcane matters yet. However, he knew his father believed they were powerful.

The disturbing sounds out in the night were becoming more sporadic. Harlem recalled a time when he was a boy. He discovered a fire ant colony close to a nest of ground hornets. Out of curiosity, he decided to mix the two up a bit with a shovel. He then crouched, watching the chaotic battles that raged between the insects he had thrown together. He imagined it was a bit like that out in the swamp.
He strained to make out what sounds he could and realised that some of them were getting closer.

“Run along now boy, tell your mother that afore long we might have visitors. Tell her to fetch her long rifle.”

Nathaniel’s eyes got big and round again; he turned on his heel and went into the shack.
As the screen door slammed shut behind Nathaniel, a high-pitched scream scythed through the dark close by. Harlem rose out of his chair and faced the night with his shotgun.

Lit by the full moon he could see out across his property to the tree line where stunted oak and contorted willow grew. Tussock grass dissected by boardwalk paths crisscrossed the marshy ground in front of his shack.

Beyond the treeline, something moved. Snapping branches, heavy, splashing footfalls and grunting sounds growing louder. Harlem’s grip on his weapon tightened. A startled Screech owl burst through the trees protesting loudly as it gained height across the clearing. Behind him, the screen door opened and outstepped his wife toting her long rifle.

She wore a brown calico dress that reached to her feet. Her hair she had tied in a loose bun and speckles of white flower dusted her freckled cheeks and nose.

“Hanna,”

“Harlem,”

“Thought you might like to join me on the porch, it being such a pretty night,”

“I got baking to be doing, my dear; I don’t have time to be dealing with interlopers or devils.”

“Well, you know I appreciate you lending me a hand dearest. I'm not entirely sure how to deal with them if they're interlopers. If they’re devils, well I’ll just let you level them with that pop gun of yours.”

Nathaniel slipped out from behind his mother carrying a pair of slab-sided man stopper pistols.

“I can help to papa; help you do the right thing.”

Harlem grinned, caught the severe look Hanna dealt him and winked back at her.

“We watch each other’s back’s and holler out if in doubt okay?”

Harlem held out his hand. His wife and son placed theirs on top of it.

“Look there.”

Hanna pointed with her long rifle. Three dark shapes lurched and stumbled out from the tangled treeline. Harlem’s heart beat faster; he stepped down from the porch and walked toward the shambling figures. About thirty feet out he stepped onto a thick wooden beam to cross a deep ditch and came to a halt on the other side resting the shotgun in the crook of his arm.

Interlopers Hanna had called them. His grand pappy called them overner’s. Harlem had never seen one before and the things that came from the swamp were not always, what they seemed. They could be devils.

He watched them struggling. One of them had chosen badly and was falling behind, staggering into mud holes and tripping on tussock grass. The other two were making better progress, they had found one of the boardwalks that Harlem built and maintained and were supporting each other. They paused when they caught sight of Him.

They did not look evil or dangerous to him, they just looked desperate and terrified of something that followed close behind..
“Keep moving if you want to live.” He called out, raising his hand above his head to beckon them on.

They hesitated, turned around at the sound of wood splitting. Something big forced its way between two stunted oaks shattering their trunks and shot forward toward the straggler. The other two began to run toward Harlem and the shack. They did not look back again. The creature moved with incredible speed despite having no discernible legs. It propelled itself by means of five long tentacles attached to the front of its body and reminded Harlem of a hunting spider, only it was as big as a horse and wagon combined. Three more of the creatures skittered out of the surrounding trees and headed toward the struggling interloper.

The two found their way to Harlem’s position. They stopped short of him, bending double to catch their breaths. One, Harlem noted was a young man, the other he was almost sure was a girl but her mode of dress puzzled him. She wore trousers like a man. Her hair (if indeed it was hair) looked close-cropped and to Harlem’s amazement was vermillion in colour.

“Please, can you help that man? “She said.

Harlem thought the girl had a crazy look in her eyes. The kind of look that says I am far beyond caring so don’t blame me if I hurt you. He turned to look in the direction she pointed and shook his head.

“I’m sorry, it’s too late.”

They all turned and watched as the creatures surrounded the flagging interloper. He tried to evade capture, making little feints. The beasts closed in with raised tentacles quivering as the man darted backwards and forwards.
A well-aimed tentacle shot out, grabbed the man’s leg. He fell prone. Another of the beasts snatched at one of his arms. Stretched between two of the creatures his bones popped like fireworks, eclipsed only by his screams piercing the night.
Other tentacles lashed out tugging at the man’s body lifting it into the air. One of his arms ripped free under the combined pull of the competing creatures. The wet snapping sounds as limbs tore from their sockets became a part of the frenzied tousle as the creatures fed on their prize.

“How could you let that happen?”

Startled by the vehemence of the girl with flaming hair Harlem looked her in the eyes and shrugged.

“He’s already dead. When they are done, they will come for us.”

“For God’s sake, Charlotte, he’s right. Look.”

The man with Charlotte had caught his breath and Harlem was pleased to see he had some sense about him. Already some of the creatures who had received less of a share were turning in their direction.

“Run.”

Harlem took some satisfaction from the fact that they did not need telling twice. He watched them run across the wooden beam then followed behind walking backwards as the creatures sped towards him.

Once across the heavy plank he paused to push it with the toe of his boot, turning it until its whole length plopped into the ditch and sunk into a viscous black liquid.

“Harlem, look out.”

A tentacle wrapped around the barrel of the shotgun, yanking it from Harlem’s grasp. He looked up to see one of the creatures straddling the ditch its tentacles fanned out. In the centre of the fan where the tentacles joined, its ovoid body a rudimentary mouth twitched like a puckered anus with inward facing rows of serrated teeth. The stink of rotting carrion filled the air as that cruel orifice respired.
Out of the corner of his eye, Harlem could see the other monsters manoeuvring to surround him.

“I’m right behind you my darling. “ Hanna said.

“Damn, I must be getting old. Those critters move faster than I can think.”

“Just do what you gotta do please Harlem.”

Knowing that his wife stood behind him with the long rifle aimed at the creature closest to him, Harlem inched his hand up over his bib n braces and reached into his breast pocket to take out the vial he kept there.

“Now.”

The crack of the rifle shot reverberated around the clearing as Harlem tossed the little vial of dark liquid into the ditch. It exploded instantly in a ball of bright fire that ignited the stodgy tar in the bottom of the ditch.

Harlem backed away from the monstrous creature towering over him, as Hanna’s long rifle discharged, the beast had been on the verge of pouncing he was sure of that but now it recoiled, its beak shattered by the bullet from his wife’s gun. The other creatures were surging forwards

A curtain of fire rose up and spread in opposite directions racing around the ditch until a wall of flame encompassed the entire area around the shack. The screams of the Creature straddling the ditch were hideous to listen too. Mercifully, they did not last long as the creature’s tentacles withered and the fat body burst open in the conflagration. The screams from the other beast, Harlem felt sure were screams of rage.
He turned to Hanna and swept her into his arms.

“That was a close one, thank you for watching my back my dearest.”

Hanna squeezed him tight around his waist with her free hand, not trusting herself to speak and together they turned and walked back to their shack.

Nathaniel stood on the porch steps holding the pistols out in front of him. The interlopers lay exhausted behind him. He had made up his mind to defend them come what may, but he desperately wanted to stand with his mother and father, while they were in terrible danger
He carefully lowered the pistols that had grown heavy in his hands and smiled at the interlopers sitting on the porch steps.

“Everything will be okay now. Would you like to stay for supper, my mother makes great pancakes.”

He turned to watch as Harlem and Hanna Buttery walked arm in arm toward them as if they had just been out for a stroll together.

“My name is Nathaniel Buttery what’s yours?

The two interlopers stirred on the porch step, Nathaniel thought they looked very tired and afraid, but the man sat up straighter and offered his hand for the boy to shake.

“My name is John Bowers and this is my fiancée, Charlotte Darby.”

Harlem watched his son shake hands with the stranger with great pride as he and Hanna arrived at the porch. The interlopers seemed harmless enough, at least compared to some of the things that came out of the swamp on nights like this. Although he had only been a child the last time, perhaps things had improved over the years. At least it was over now.

“Can anybody tell us where we are and if there is a consulate nearby? Charlotte and I have lost our passports.”

“What’s a passport?” said Nathaniel.

“What’s a consulate said his mother and father together.”

“Those things…creatures, are we safe here? “John said.

“The tar in the ditch will burn until after the sun rises. I don’t think those things will stay around here till then. Now come inside and eat with us you both need nourishment.”

Harlem led the way into the shack and closed the door once everyone was inside. He turned to find Hanna waiting for him. She placed a hand on his chest. He could hear Daniel talking to the interlopers in the kitchen.

“Is it over, Harlem?”

“I hope so dearest.”

“But you doubt that it is.”

“I know I would love to get some of your pancakes inside of me and a mug of coffee. It may turn out to be a long night.”

They headed into the kitchen to join the others.

Out to the southwest in the dark heart of the swamp the oily surface had begun to swell again.

~The End?~