The 31st Fire: A Tale of Nightmares

You ever have one of the nightmares from childhood that you'll never forget? I do. Honestly, puppets used to scare the ever-loving fuck out of me when I was a kid. And it mostly had to with this nightmare. Now some embellishments have been made, of course, but the essence and descriptions of what my younger self dreamt is still here. I can't forget it.

Making Friends

Times were happy and everything was sunny on the street of integrated and diverse puppets and people. No one is quite sure how the citizens of this short block obtained the means for production and sustainability, but they seemed to get along without murdering each other for scraps of food.

They would fill their time with trivialities, such as singing, drawing alphabet shapes in the air, and learning about sharing what precious few resources they still had. No one worked, except the grocer, but he was a racist.

Another sunny day, clouds away, where the air is clean, even in a Bronx-style neighborhood. All they have to do is sing about trees and recycling and, suddenly, everything is all better and the real problems creeping over the world have no sway.

Why was it so here? How do these fuzzy monsters and clueless humans live together in such harmony? How does their little street manage to hide itself from a planet crawling with scum and villainy, ready to exploit and subject?

Answers to those questions are not why he came.

A storm began in the distance. A storm centered around a giant castle, high on a mountainous plateau. No one was sure how it got or even how long it had been there.

Thunder shook and the clouds darkened. The smell of ozone was so thick, a pounding rain must surely be above. But no water drops hit, no sprinkles fell on the fuzzy felt faces.

As the clouds crept towards the street filled with so many diversified characters, a horror struck them. Not a crazy, goofy sense of panic that they experienced during word scrambles and missing numbers, but a genuine, heart-dropping terror crossed both their faces and their souls.

They fled in a panic, a figure began floating down from that dark and thunder-illuminated castle. All that could be made out from the distance was that he was a boy, he had on a cape, and he sat cross-legged. The closer he got, the more apparent the reason for panic was.

His eyes were permanently upturned, the same yellow-white color as the puss oozing from them and his fingers, ears, and nose. A sickly expression was painfully plastered on his evil grin as he floated closer to the once peaceful street.

He raised his finger and floated over to the first character, a Dracula cosplayer. This vampire, however, was not immune to human maladies, for when he was touched by this disturbing child, he fell under the same mysterious illness.

First, a low moan of pain erupted from his usually jovial voice. He fell back on the ground, quivering, convulsing. Puss began to ooze out of his fingertips, ears, and nose. As his body slowly fell still, he kept groaning at a constant tone of discomfort, his eyes rolled up into head, only the yellowish whites exposed.

The possessed child continued down the street, his fingers touching everyone and causing them to fall under the same sickness. They lay there on the streets and in their homes, sick and dying from the oozing puss that pulsated from their now-decaying bodies.

The storm worsened, the skies got darker, and the possessed child began to laugh. He had so many new friends, just like him!

All were finally made equal.

All had become deaf, blind, mute, and paralyzed, fighting for life.

A perfectly equal utopia.

The streets were filled with the various monotoned rattles of death as the young child floated over his new friends, soon to die from their sickness, and left back home to his dark castle.