Notes from the Future: Prophet's Reckoning

Before I know it, Max and I are whisked through the curtained labyrinth, into the kitchen and out a side door into bright sunlight and the smell of burning. The two bearded Ezekiels and Nice Rachel are leading us, and Rachels and Ezekiels are running all over the place -- sweeping, raking, trimming, some just running from place to place like crazy people. Which is appropriate, I'm thinking, because they must all be crazy. Except for Henrietta and Nice Rachel and Young Nurse Rachel and some of the Ezekiels. The bearded ones, actually. Looking around as we move through the scattered panic of the compound, I begin to notice that the clean-shaven Ezekiels look unfocused, crazed, shaking, one guy just stopped and pissed his pants near the garage door of the Hospital House. Meanwhile, every bearded Ezekiel I see is moving with strength and purpose, getting something done. This means something.

Now everybody is lining up on the graveled driveway below the decking and balcony of the main house, all eyes on the balcony; there is a final scrape of gravel as some Rachel dashes to her spot, then silence. I can't even hear anyone breathing. Max wants to go make friends with a squirrel to our right, and I wind his leash up on my hand so he's right next to me and can't pull. It seems dangerous to talk, so I just hold him there next to me as strong as I can. I need to get out of this weird-ass place.

The French doors open and onto the balcony comes the Prophet, scraggly-bearded and crazy-haired, clearly just having awakened, flanked by Iron Rachel, Short Fat Bald Ezekiel and Eerily Forgettable Ezekiel. The Prophet is in a tattered, filthy robe that may once have been white terrycloth but is now smeared and splotched with stains that look like blood and shit. He has a mug of something steaming in his left hand, he sips it as he opens his robe and pisses at length, between and onto the balusters, most of it arcing down into the dusty gravel where it raises a small cloud. There is a sighing whine and a Rachel stumbles forward, almost as though she was pushed, then throws herself bodily into the stream of his urine, smiling but crying, looking up with her mouth and eyes open, literally bathing herself -- fully clothed -- in the Prophet's piss. When his stream peters out, she sits in the piss mud and starts rubbing it all over her face and hair and clothes, rocking back and forth, smiling. Sobbing. I think I can't stop watching her, but then the Prophet speaks.

"Lo, how the land smoketh! Lo, how the Woman is in her place!" A gesture to the Piss Rachel. "Lo, and behold: each of my Prophecies hath come to pass!"

"So saith the Lord," this from the assembled Rachels and Ezekiels. Where is Mother Henrietta, I wonder, and is Tad safe? What if he needs medical attention?

"We have visitors among us, as I am reminded by Rachel, Ezekiel and Ezekiel. Today is a special day, and I have a Man's Hunger!" Several of the women stiffen around me, and the Prophet heads for the same staircase I was lead down this morning. He does not go toward the gardens, but comes directly to the group. To us.

To me.

"Where is a woman's proper place?" he screeches in my face. His breath is foul, literally it smells like he's been eating poop. For a moment, I am stunned by the smell.  Then he backhands me and I don't really feel it at first, I'm just suddenly on the ground, gravel cutting my hands and knees and I realize what he did as I feel his grimy hands take hold of my hair and my head is jerked back and I hear men laughing as the Prophet screeches, "A woman's proper place is under the Prophet! Whore of Babylon! Jezebel!"

There's a rhythmic smacking noise and I realize, absently, that he must be tugging on himself, tugging on his pitiful little dick. In an instant I realize what he meant by a man's hunger, and I berate myself for not escaping when I had the chance; at almost the same moment, I vow that if he puts it in my mouth, I will happily die after ripping it off with my teeth. There's another noise, too, something that alarms me but I can't figure out what it is, I am filled with white hot rage and the most amazing feeling of calm I have ever known. He's saying something, but I haven't been listening; now I focus on his words because I want to be able to use them to get him close to me.

"A proper woman would have me hard in a nonce!" Shouting, he is jerking at my hair; I begin planning other moves, just like in Chess, just like ... no, can't think about him now, can't think of the hospital bed and the tubes ... have to focus on the Prophet. "A woman of faith makes me hard for her willingly!" If he doesn't put it in my mouth, I will whisper until he gets close enough for me to go for his jugular. "A woman who is willing to please the Prophet is the only woman who can be allowed to live! Rachel!" His shrieking voice grates on my ears, and along with the noise I can't place, I hear scrabbling footsteps as I am yanked around by my hair; coming toward us is Piss Rachel, smiling pleasantly, eyes vacant. I've seen that smile on women before. Oh, God, no, I think. But then she's there and the Prophet is shrieking again. "Offer yourself to me, Rachel! As I have come from the wilderness to save you, so you must offer yourself to sate my hunger!"

Piss Rachel pulls open her blouse, or, no: it's a dress with an apron over it; up close I see sores all around her eyes and mouth; is that from the piss? My scant nursing education clicks in and I realize: he's got something, and he's given it to her. If I bite his dick off, I hope they kill me quick, because I do not want what she's got. And she's completely nude right now, with some of the prettiest boobs I've ever seen.

"Give me of yourself, Rachel!"

Piss Rachel lifts her breasts half-heartedly, still smiling, but the Prophet shrieks again. What is that other noise?

"Give me of yourself, Rachel!"

She reaches toward her sex, but he backhands her and she remains standing, still smiling as blood trickles from her lip and nose. How does she do that?

"Give me of yourself, Rachel!"

There is a moment's pause in which the strange sound grows louder and I feel his hand getting a better grip in my hair, and I see his dick beginning to stir and I see the briefest flicker of protest in her eyes before she offers her left hand, fingers limp. He takes it by the wrist and jerks her down to her knees, there is a popping noise -- did he dislocate her shoulder? She hardly makes a sound, though she is sobbing. He is holding her hand in front of my face, opening his mouth to expose uneven, jagged and sharp teeth, diseased gums, going to bite he's going to bite her, he's tearing her flesh with his teeth and he's going to make me watch him eat her and there's that noise again, the noise that's been there all along and I haven't been able to figure out what it is. Until now.

I try to say no, stay, but it comes out in a whisper as Max, barking furiously, attacks the Prophet, knocking him to the ground and pinning him there as the Rachels and Ezekiels gasp and shout, as Piss Rachel crumples into a ball, clutching her torn hand to her and the Prophet is shrieking in terror, now. He let go of my hair when Max leapt at him and I stand, looking around: the lines of Rachels and Ezekiels are in disarray, Iron Rachel and her Ezekiel minions are frozen, uncertain, because Max is a large black dog and terrifying if he wants to be.

"Good Boy!" I say, and I see his tail wag twice, but he doesn't let up.

Then a whistle: high, loud, piercing, and everyone goes quiet. Even Max turns his head toward the hillside garden. It's quiet and then I think I'm crazy because I hear something impossible.

The Barber Theme,I think Tad calls it. Not sure if that's what it's really called. From Sweeney Todd. It's what Sweeney whistles when he's preparing to cut Judge Turpin's throat. Tad whistles it all the time. Tad trains every dog he loves to come running when he whistles it.

Max is taut, tense, poised atop the Prophet. The whistling reaches the end of the melody and stops. I see Max's ears prick up and the silence seems interminable.

The whistling begins again, one third up from where it began last time.

Just like Tad.

Max goes tearing off across the gravel, up the deck, under the arbor and into the garden where we lose sight of him. When did I unhook him from the leash?

The Prophet is on his feet, screaming and screeching and Iron Rachel is bellowing, but the Prophet's words cut through the noise and suddenly all the Ezekiels are running up the steps to the deck and up the hillside next to the garden and around the back of the house as the Prophet continues to shriek, "Find him! Find the whistling hound of Satan! Find the hound!"

I'm grabbed by two Ezekiels and the Prophet rounds on us, pointing his dirty, cracked fingernail at me. "Take the whore, lock her up. Get her out of my sight until we can find and cook her dog!"