Fiction Assignment

Based on Florence + The Machine's "Dog Days Are Over"

The rumbling below her stopped suddenly; she felt utterly still. Rising, she glided toward the window with rouged cheeks and bright eyes. Happiness hit her like her train on its tracks. Beyond the veiled glass, a forest of ember colored oakes bathed in the sun, rising from behind snow peaked mountains

She ran across the cabin to her parents, sleeping beneath a scratchy counterpain. She shook them violently, then more gently at their protestations. “We’ve made it! We’ escaped!” She was jumping now, waking her brothers and sisters with her joy. Her father waved his hand in a placating gesture. “Sshhhh.” She groaned.

A knock sounded from the reinforced door. The waking children ceased and became the very element of silence. She backed up slowly toward the window, but gasped as her heel toppled the boxes behind her. Sirens blared. “Run!”

She couldn’t remember the last time her heart beat so hard. Shimmering shards of glass blew her to the ground, but she jumped to the girders above her head. From her ledge she watched men in black and black and yellow uniforms swarm below her. Breathing hard through her nose, her eyes searched for the access hatch.

***

Once more off the ground, she fell asleep. her head rested on autumn’s leaves and tribal  dreams. She couldn’t remember how long or how far they had traveled, but the Horsemen always followed. They long ago abandoned their horses, but their charging machines - with lightning in their eyes and thunder in their hearts - were terrifying all the same.

Beyond the ridge, her tribe rested, and her love waited. What tragedy, to be held for him for so long, and longer still! But she had hope, and she still dreamed. The bird in flight, the song in fermata, the train in its tracks. She woke to the buzz of a drone floating through the branches of the next tree. Move, she thought. Now!

A bright blast blazed through her last branch as she jumped to her next arboreal stepping stone. The drone buzzed an order: “Halt! You are an enemy of the Party. You will be vaporized!”

She hesitates as she surveys the surrounding trees. In her sleep the world had changed from the emblazoned autumn eve to a cold and clouded winter morning. She thought of the bird in flight, and before she knew it, she was swinging from barren branch to barren branch. Electric furry radiated anger behind her, but she kept on, humming bird songs. “Halt! Halt!” A blast at her feet. Falling. “Never!” she responded, running between the thinning trees. The horizon was not far off now; not so off as it was from the train, or the station before that, or the burning village from which she ran with adolescent haste.

Lost it, she thinks. The snow of the mountain’s peak burns her bare feet. She wonders why she should attempt to make even an ember of a fire if the snow should burn her so. It would definitely be easier to lie in it’s great white embrace. As the night fades she sees the village in the next valley, lit like the stars clouded by the moon. Memories spark up at the sight of it: the boy, the bounties, the proposals, the joy. She slips into sleep again, but finds the memories transfigured by darkness; the Iron Horses, the brutal men, the conquest with its flags and fires, falling from the sky like rain...

The going gets easy descending the peak. She rolls snow balls across the fields and between the wild farrows. Anticipation rises in her grown body as she retraces her steps on half remembered stones and retraces faces on half forgotten neurons. She loses the iciness of the mountains and falls into the swing of the mountain side’s beauty, bursting with life.

A fallen tree - two. A well and a windmill. The abandoned cabin by the stream - finally! The Willow Marsh! She climbed the last boulder of her trail to gaze on its vast settlement. She imagined she could see the chief’s home at the edge of the lily covered lake, waiting for her jubilant arrival.

But what do you know? She could see it after all - with its slick tan tarps and decorated walls. And her family was right there, waving frantically to her in the distance.

She suppressed a squeal and ran fast as the train that brought her so far. She dreamt dreams for the future, for her plans and hopes.

She didn’t see the drone dropping from the sky. It fell like a teardrop as it whizzed toward the chief’s house. The Horsemen weren’t far behind. Their stampede got caught up in the beat of her heart as she raced to hug her father, her mother, her brothers and sisters. She fell into his arms, and covered him in kisses until he fled to the God-man for his blessing.

He saw the horsemen first. They drove into the village, putrefying the air with their exhaust and burning up the marsh with their hate. They ran again, but they stumbled. At the edge of the marsh her mother gave her a knowing look. “You can’t love and long if you want to survive.”

Song lyrics:

"Dog Days Are Over"

Happiness hit her like a train on a track Coming towards her stuck still no turning back She hid around corners and she hid under beds She killed it with kisses and from it she fled With every bubble she sank with her drink And washed it away down the kitchen sink The dog days are over The dog days are done The horses are coming So you better run Run fast for your mother, run fast for your father Run for your children, for your sisters and brothers Leave all your love and your longing behind You can't carry it with you if you want to survive The dog days are over The dog days are done Can you hear the horses? 'Cause here they come And I never wanted anything from you Except everything you had and what was left after that too, oh Happiness hit her like a bullet in the back Struck from a great height by someone who should know better than that The dog days are over The dog days are done Can you hear the horses? 'Cause here they come Run fast for your mother, run fast for your father Run for your children, for your sisters and brothers Leave all your love and your longing behind You can't carry it with you if you want to survive The dog days are over The dog days are done Can you hear the horses? 'Cause here they come The dog days are over The dog days are done The horses are coming So you better run