Miller Cherryl

Something Red

Something Red The river ran red. It was not a bright, brilliant red colour one would expect from sediment or the reflection from the bottom. It was a dark, almost purple red. The consistency was not of flowing water. It was thicker, sluggish and appeared congealing. It seemed to heave and bubble almost like producing clots instead of swirls, eddies and whirlpools associated with a river. The animals came down to drink at dawn. They came up to the edge of the water and immediately backed away. Their heads jerked back, they snorted, nostrils furled, confused. They became agitated, skittish. This was not what they expected. It was new. It was different. It was not the river they knew or expected. The river smelled foreign; not of fresh clear water, but of something totally revolting. The stench was overpowering and sickening. They slowly backed away and went back into the bush. Some stopped to look back again and again to see if what they had smelled and seen was still there. The animals went back again and again at dawn. The river was always the same - fetid. This went on for a few days and then suddenly it started to clear and become drinkable again. Everything seemed right again with the river. Then a few weeks later the same thing occurred. The river became the thick, bubbling and congealing mess of before. The animals snorted and pawed the ground thoroughly confused. Some took off down the river bank and some up the river bank. Unaccountably a quarter of a mile in each direction the river was clear and drinkable. It was as if there was a line drawn across the river at either side. The water would start out a pale pink at the edges and darken toward the middle of this churning repulsive chaos. This time it seemed much worse. The river looked like it might never recover from this disaster this time. It was much worse than before and the stink was travelling further up and down the river. The animals abandoned this section of the river never to return. This same occurrence was being seen by animals in other rivers around the world. Always in very isolated places. Even in Africa the hippos were coming out of the water with their hides covered in this almost viscous like substance. It clung to them. No matter how much they rolled in the mud or walked in the brush, the substance would not come off. The crocodiles were behaving differently too. Instead of heading into the middle of this mess as before, they were wheezing, swimming with difficulty to the shore. They looked like giant lizards trying to move forward in jelly, which was trying to hold them back. No humans were around to witness this phenomenon. It was regularity occurring at spaced intervals in each place, each allowing the river to clear for a time before being contaminated again. These occurrences carried on for periods of time in these remote areas - only the animals knew it was happening and they could not tell anyone about it. One night as the moon was shining, the stars winking, and the air finally smelt clean and fresh, there was suddenly a loud humming in the sky. The whole river seemed to vibrate with the noise. Blood curdling screams could be heard emanating from a collection of unseen souls, cut off instantly by a flash of white light. The screaming ceased. Then hundreds of bloody, shredded bodies were ejected into the river from a great height. With a whoosh the river banks overflowed. Almost on clue the river began to churn, froth and turn that sickening thick, putrid, congealing disaster. It was as though something in this part of the river was waiting for this delivery and devouring, at leisure, this banquet of flesh. This was something not of this world – or was it??? Was this the agenda of another world to eliminate the people from other planets to take over the universe or was it a human endeavour to take over our world, as we know it, by mass extinction. Cheryl Miller April, 2014