The Order of Nature

Charlie felt the cold metal of the gun in his hand. 

“You know how to use that thing?” asked Joel, one hand on the steering wheel. 

“Sure,” Charlie said, doing his best to sound confident. 

“Of course he knows how to use it,” said Knox from the front seat. “We got a real killer back there.” Knox let out a harsh cackle and removed a cigarette from the pack in his hand. 

The truth was Charlie had never shot a gun before. As a young boy, his father would take him deer hunting, but Charlie had no interest in shooting the beautiful brown creatures. It just didn’t seem right to him. On one such trip, his father snatched the rifle out of Charlie’s hands and grabbed the boy by the neck. “Dammit, son! We’re the top of the food chain. This is just the order of nature.” Charlie cried in the truck on the way home. His dad died in prison two years later. 

“No one is doing any killing tonight,” said Joel, shaking Charlie out of his brief reverie. “Everyone sticks to the plan and we come home rich.”

“I love a good plan,” said Knox. “And I love a good backup plan too.” Knox leaned back in his seat and began humming a familiar tune. Charlie wasn’t sure which man made him more uneasy. 

Charlie carefully pocketed the handgun inside his jacket, happy to have it out of sight. The small green clock on the dashboard showed 12:02am as the car cruised down the highway. “We’re ten minutes away,” said Joel, as casually as if they were headed to a baseball game.

They had gone over the plan ad nauseam. The mark was an elderly man who lived alone. The three of them would drive to the man’s house and enter through the back door. According to Joel, the man had no neighbors, no family, no dog, no nothing. He was a hermit and had not left his house in weeks. Joel and Knox would go upstairs, grab the man out of bed, and make him open a safe that was concealed in the closet. 

“What if he refuses to open the safe?” asked Charlie. He heard Knox chuckle. 

“Don’t worry. We’re gonna ask him real nicely.” 

“Just do your part and let us handle it,” said Joel. “You keep watch downstairs and pull the car up when I tell you to.” 

As they drove closer to their destination, the night grew blacker and quieter. Charlie watched trees pass his window like wooden sentries. He felt the weight of the handgun in his pocket. Knox continued to hum jovially. Charlie wished he would shut the hell up. 

Charlie felt the car slow and make a right turn onto a gravel road. The crunching of the small rocks under the tires reminded him of the rock candy he used to eat as a kid. The memory brought a sad smile to Charlie’s face. He wished he could go back and be young again. Before it all went so wrong. 

Joel killed the headlights as the house came into view. It looked smaller than in the pictures Charlie had seen on Joel’s phone. The roof was in disrepair, with black shingles hanging askew like sleeping bats. Lush green ivy had grown over most of the two story home, obscuring its large windows. Charlie could not see any lights on inside the home. The soft glow of the moon was the only source of illumination as the car came to a stop. Joel and Knox took out flashlights from the glove compartment and flicked them to life. Charlie held out hope that one would be provided to him, but as the men exited the vehicle, that hope died. 

The three men closed the car doors quietly and approached the house. Charlie’s heart was beating so frantically he wondered if Joel and Knox could hear it. 

This was a mistake. He had thought he wanted to do this, but he was wrong. The allure of a quick payday had blinded him.

“Maybe this isn’t a good idea,” he said to his companions. Even at a whisper, Charlie thought his words sounded loud as thunder. 

“If you’re getting cold feet, you better put on an extra pair of socks,” responded Knox with a toothy grin. Charlie watched him walk toward the house. He carried himself with the swagger of a street cat. 

“Just do your part,” said Joel for the second time that night. 

The men came to the back door of the house and Joel removed a small leather kit from the inside of his coat. Charlie could see silver instruments gleaming inside. For a moment, he had grotesque visions of Joel and Knox using the instruments to torture the old man inside the home. But to Charlie’s relief, Joel bent down and used the tools to pick the lock of the paint chipped door. As Joel worked the lock, Charlie heard the sound of an owl calling from the woods behind them. He suppressed an icy shiver. 

The door opened without protest and Charlie followed his two companions into a kitchen. Black and white tiles checkered the floor. A large wooden table took up most of the space and as Joel shined his flashlight, Charlie could see that that the table was coated in a thin layer of dust. It looked like no one had eaten at the table in a long time. Charlie wondered if the man they had come to rob had died. 

The three men tiptoed out of the kitchen and into a sparsely furnished living room. As they entered, Charlie heard a cracking sound that paralyzed him with fear. “Did you hear that?” he asked. Charlie followed the source of the noise until his eyes gazed upon bright orange flames inside the fireplace.

“You could make a cup of coffee nervous,” whispered Knox. 

Joel removed a gun from his waistband. “Stay here until we call for you to get the car.” Before Charlie could respond in the affirmative, the men were heading up the stairs to the second floor. Charlie listened as the old wooden stairs creaked and moaned like they were in pain. 

Charlie stood close to the fireplace. The inside of the home was warm, but Charlie felt cold deep inside his bones.

This will be over soon, he told himself. 

Charlie looked around the room. There was a cracked leather chair facing the fireplace and several bookshelves on the opposite wall. He walked over to one shelf and pulled a book at random. He blew away dust particles and considered the book’s title. Principles of Anatomy and Physiology Fist Edition. Charlie traced the gold lettering on the cover with his finger. The spine of the book dated it as from the late 1800s. He flipped to a yellowing page and saw a detailed drawing of the human heart. Charlie closed the book and returned it to the shelf. He stood still for a moment, listening for any sound from upstairs, but all was quiet. Perhaps that was a good sign.

Charlie stared at the walls of the living room and noticed that no paintings or pictures adorned them. A small ornate clock on the mantle ticked off the seconds. Only a handful of minutes had passed since he entered the room. Time was passing much too slowly for Charlie’s frayed nerves. 

He walked to the leather chair and sat down. As he did so, his foot knocked over a heavy drinking glass next to the chair. The glass hit the floor noisily, spilling thick red liquid. Charlie worried that the men upstairs would hear the noise and come rushing down, but thankfully that didn’t happen. 

As Charlie reached down to retrieve the glass, his fingers brushed against a small item. Charlie picked it up and saw that it was an old photo album. He opened the delicate gold clasp and stared at several pictures. Each photo showed a well-dressed man with long blonde hair. The man held the same pose in each picture, his posture perfect and his heels together like a soldier. The man’s cheekbones were sharp and his skin a perfect porcelain color. In one picture, the man stood on a boat, dark eyes staring into the camera. In another, he stood in a ballroom, surrounded by smiling faces. Charlie noted that some photos were in color and some were in black and white, but the man looked identical in every photo. 

He flipped a few more pages and observed a picture of a beautiful young woman smiling from a chair. The woman wore an exquisite white dress, as if she had just returned from a party. Charlie turned the page and there was the woman again, but this time her smile was gone. Her head slumped to the side and her arm dangled over the edge of the chair. The woman’s eyes were open, but the spark from the previous picture was gone. With growing dread, Charlie turned the page again. The woman sat in the chair, her mouth agape, frozen in what was clearly mid-scream. The white dress she wore was now stained with crimson. Charlie stared at the woman’s pale throat and followed a trail of blood resembling a twisting red river. 

Charlie threw the photo album to the floor and leapt to his feet. He sprinted for the staircase and hurried up the noisy stairs. As he reached the second floor, he shouted for Joel and Knox. 

“We have to leave right now!”

Charlie paced toward a door at the end of a dark hallway. A dim glow of light shone from inside the room. He called out for the men again, but there was no answer. 

Charlie removed the gun from his pocket, comforted by the weight of it in his hand. He moved closer to the door, listening intently for any voices or noises. He slowly pushed the door open with the barrel of the gun and peered inside what looked like a bedroom. A lit candle sat on a nightstand next to a pristine looking bed. The candle’s flame danced as Charlie walked past it. 

“Hello?” he asked the darkness, but received no reply. He moved deeper into the bedroom, toward the closet where Joel said the safe would be. The valuables inside that safe were now far from Charlie’s mind. 

Charlie sensed that someone was inside the closet. He could hear a muffled noise coming from within. Charlie stopped and listened. He heard the sound of Knox’s familiar humming and relief washed over him. He stepped inside the small space. 

“Can we please get the hell out of here?” he asked impatiently. 

The closet was dark save for a flashlight on the floor. Charlie grabbed the torch and illuminated the darkness. 

The first thing he saw was Joel curled up on the floor with his back to Charlie. He looked peaceful and for a moment, Charlie foolishly wondered if the man had fallen asleep. Above Joel was the metal safe on the wall, but it was unopened. Charlie could still hear Knox humming, but was unable to locate him anywhere inside the closet. As Charlie approached Joel, he felt liquid dripping on his head as if it had started raining inside the closet. Charlie raised the flashlight slowly and held it toward the ceiling. 

Charlie could not make sense of what his eyes were seeing. A tangle of arms and legs were suspended in the air above his head. Charlie could hear a wet sucking sound coming from the dark figure. The flashlight beam jumped up and down as Charlie struggled to keep his hand from shaking. Suddenly a pair of eyes snapped opened and Charlie went weak with fear. A thud hit the floor in front of his feet and Charlie looked down at Knox’s crumpled body. The man’s throat had been ripped open to reveal a bloody tangle of sinewy muscle and bone. 

Charlie released a horrified gasp and jumped backward, tripping over Joel’s lifeless body. He dropped his gun but managed to hold on to the flashlight. Charlie aimed the torch at the ceiling once more and saw a thin, sallow-looking man staring back at him. The man was bald, with tufts of blonde hair poking out of his scalp. His face was creased with dark lines. His mouth slowly formed a smile displaying crooked teeth stained with blood. 

Charlie bolted from the closet and out of the bedroom. He raced down the stairs, taking the steps two at a time. Breathlessly, Charlie ran for the kitchen and out the back door. 

Charlie’s legs carried him toward the parked car. He was about to reach for the door handle when he realized he did not have the keys. They were still with Joel. Charlie stared at the dark woods behind the house. It was his only hope. 

He sprinted into the tree line, feeling the crunch of the late autumn leaves beneath his feet. Charlie’s heart felt like it was going to burst inside his chest, but he refused to slow his pace. He could not shake the image of what he had seen inside the closet. 

Charlie ran deep into the woods, the moon above just bright enough to guide him.

He ran for what felt like an hour, sucking cold air into his lungs with each step. At last, he came to a clearing and saw a house up ahead. Charlie picked up his pace, willing his exhausted body forward. Delirious, he stepped out of the woods and felt his feet hit a gravel road. 

He froze. 

Charlie looked up at the house, focusing his eyes in the darkness. He saw ivy on the house and let out an anguished scream. 

He had run for miles. He was sure of it. How had he ended up here again? The front door of the house suddenly flew open and the man from the closet stepped outside. It was the same person, there was no doubt, but he appeared different. The man’s blonde hair was fuller, longer. He moved with the fleetness of a younger man. 

Charlie sprinted back into the woods, adrenaline flooding his body. He could hear footsteps behind him and knew that the man was close. Charlie weaved between trees, praying that his feet would find sure footing with each step. Just as he felt like he was gaining on the man, he heard a loud snarling sound from behind him. Charlie looked back to see a black four-legged beast hot in pursuit. Charlie was fast, but the animal was faster, its sharp teeth snapping at his ankles. Charlie could see a low tree branch up ahead and grabbed for the thick limb. The gamble paid off, as the beast sprinted by underneath his legs. 

Charlie quickly worked his way up the tree, reaching for each branch like a drowning man reaching for air. He climbed higher, the animal below him growling with frustration, frothy saliva flying from its mouth. Charlie climbed to the top of the large tree. The animal was now a small dot on the ground below him. Charlie’s muscles relaxed slightly. Nothing would reach him up here. He was going to survive. 

And suddenly there was a loud crack and Charlie was falling. 

He awoke on the ground, staring up at the starless sky. Pain exploded through his body. Charlie could hear something approaching him. Slowly. Methodically. Charlie was paralyzed, though he could not tell whether it was fear or his broken body that kept him motionless. Charlie waited for the animal to appear and tear him limb from limb. 

The man from the house stepped into Charlie’s field of vision. His blonde hair flowed down to his shoulders like a waterfall. The skin on his face was without blemish. His dark eyes twinkled in the moonlight. Charlie recognized him as the man from the photo album. 

The man bent down and whispered into Charlie’s ear. His voice was smooth as honey. 

“Don't worry. I will take the pain away.” 

The man placed his cold fingers on Charlie’s neck and turned his head to the side. Charlie looked into the distance and saw a deer grazing through the trees. 

As he watched the animal, his father’s words echoed in his head.

We’re the top of the food chain. 

Charlie knew that wasn’t true.