A. L. Kaplan

Tag: escape

  • AIN’T GOOD

    crow composit

    “Look at all them owls in that tree,” said Lowell. His jowls wobbled as he wiped sweat from his face with an already soaked and disgusting orange sleeve.

    Harvey wrinkled his nose. The putrid scent blowing down the hill wasn’t much worse than Lowell’s odor. If he didn’t still need the despicable little man, Harvey would have strangled him on sight.

    “They’re vultures,” said Harvey. “Owls ain’t up in daytime and don’t flock like that.”

    “Well they stink. I don’t wanna go this way.”

    “It’s this or rot in prison.”

    Lowell continued to whine. “You said you had a way out, a secret way.”

    “I do,” said Harvey, as he trudged to the top of the ridge and gazed at the vultures.

    Lowell joined him a moment later, gasping from the exertion, eyes closed. It was a full two minutes before Lowell opened his eyes and saw the partially decomposed bodies strewn under the tree. Their telltale orange jumpsuits marked them as prisoners. His meaty hands grasped Harvey’s arm.

    “Those are guys who supposedly escaped.” Lowell’s voice rose in pitch. “They’re dead! We’re gonna die!”

    “No, Lowell,” said Harvey. “WE ain’t gonna die.”

    Dozens of beady black eyes watched as Harvey cut Lowell’s throat and pushed him against the tree. Blood coated the bark, which began to glow.

    “Hurting little girls ain’t good, Lowell. Judge went too easy for what you did to my sister.”

    Harvey watch Lowell’s eyes widen as the birds descended then stepped through the portal.

  • BEYOND

    Tanya gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles, struggling against the air that seemed to press down on her. Sweat streamed down her back. The erratic thump, thump of her heart drowned out the honking horns behind her. Drivers gestured and screamed for her to move aside. She was holding up the daily commute, one that she hadn’t partaken of since coming to this place with him, asleep, in the dead of night.

    There was nothing out there for her, he’d said. No hope, no love, no people. Only he would have her. Confidence slowly eroded, just like the banks of the island. Her world shrunk until all that was left was his will.

    This wasn’t the first time she’d hovered at the edge of this bridge, staring as it disappeared into the distance. Each time, fear had held her back, the panic of that big empty expanse of water with only a thin layer of concrete and steel for safety. Fear of how she could survive alone, without him.

    Nausea gripped her as she struggled to decide. She’d suffered his poisonous words for years, even the occasional slap, but last night left more than her self-confidence beaten. If it was just her, she’d suffer through, but this wasn’t a life to bring another into.

    Movement caught her eye. He was coming, charging down the road, mustache twisted up into small horns. Even at this distance she could see the fury in his expression.

    Hands shaking, she slammed the accelerator. The car rocketed into the unknown. Free at last.

  • PORTAL

    Papa?”

    Davis looked at the child. Her pale face smiled as she lay in the hospital bed. Dark smudges surrounded her eyes, eyes bereft of lashes. Tubes and wires stretched from her to the bank of monitors that bleeped, dripped, and ticked. Each sound a symbol of what life had become. His baby girl, barely starting life only to have it cruelly yanked away.

    Eyes clamped shut; he sucked air through a constricted throat. He couldn’t watch anymore; couldn’t bear any more pain. The doorway shimmered behind him. He’d turned away from it during the war and when his wife died. Living through life’s adversities was the best teacher, but what was there to learn from watching a death like this? One step through the portal and this experience would be left behind. He could escape the grief. But if he passed it by again would it return?

    “Where’s that door go, Papa?”

    His eyes sprang open. If she could see it her life was at a brink, teetering; waiting for her choice.  It meant she was like him in more ways than he thought.

    “It leads away, Ariel, around the pain. But it makes you forget who you were.”

    She pursed her lips a moment, thinking. “I think I’d rather stay here.”

    He stroked her skeletal hand. The taut, yellowed skin felt dry. So frail, so young. All he had left. He couldn’t leave her. Every second was worth the pain. Maybe this treatment would be the cure….

  • FLOWERS

    Tears stained her face as she slipped from the car. A loud snore made her jump and cringe. Last night’s beating marred her face. He never let her stop here, the one place that made her happy. If he woke….She didn’t breathe until she was sure he still slept.

    Bright yellow flowers stretched as far as she could see. They called to her, singing, swaying in the sun; a peaceful contrast to her turbulent life. She pushed through thick stems to take a picture.

    Flower heads pressed against her. Their bright yellow faces bent and swiveled like no plant should. Sweet perfume filled her nostrils. Fear and pain vanished. Sunshine kissed her lips. When she opened her eyes thousands of yellow faces beamed at her as she hovered above the field. She smiled back. What a beautiful place to rest. No pain. No tension. Far from his reach.

    A patrol spotted her car later that day with her husband still passed out in his seat. Searchers followed a wide trail to the center of the field where they found her battered body under a blanket of flowers. Amongst the bruises a peaceful smile graced her face.

    Denials were useless. The officers were as moved by her husband’s tears as he had been to hers. Those same fists that had hit her so brutally shook when they cuffed him. They hauled him away, far from the beauty he denied her. Forever locked in shadows while she soared free.

  • The Golden Castle

    “Get in there, English scum,” said the guard as he shoved John into the tiny stone cell of El Castillo de Oro, or as the inmates called it, The Place of Bones. “I don’t care how many prisons you’ve escaped from, you’re not leaving here until you’re rotted bones.”

    John held out his hands. “My good man, you seem to have forgotten to remove my shackles.”

    “You want them off so bad, start chewing.” The guard slammed the door shut and left.

    Unfazed, John smiled at the man across the hall. “Greetings. To whom have I the pleasure of addressing?”

    “Only the gentleman pirate, John Deane, talks like that. Paul’s me name. You done gotten in too deep this time, Mr. Deane. There’s no escapin’ this place.”

    “Don’t be so sure, Paul.”

    John knew the history of this prison and the English translation. There was far more to the Golden Castle’s name than the stones, which shimmered gold in the setting sun. He extracted a pencil sized cylinder from its hiding place and gave it a few twists. Off popped the shackles, then the door lock clicked open. Casually, he stepped into the hallway and walked deeper into the prison. At each cell he released prisoners by pointing the cylinder.

    “You’re going the wrong way,” said Paul.

    “You can continue to the traditional exit and die,” said John. “Or you may come with me and walk away with as much Spanish gold as you can carry.”

    Paul glanced at the prisoners who ran for the exit, then back at John. “Gold?”

    John knew the lure of gold would do its trick. He smiled as Paul and a few others followed him into the bowels of El Castillo de Oro. Escaping the prison and finding the gold was easy. Convincing his new crew to go through the portal would be the challenge.

  • Freedom Jump

    “Quae me domum ad locum regione viarum.”

    Ramone spoke the words of the spell as he ran, praying that the improvised components he had collected would work. Powdered rat liver just wasn’t the same as that from a hippogriff. Same went for the cockroach legs he had substituted for locust. But it was all he had.

    Vines tangled his feet, sending him crashing into the hard packed dirt and rock. He muttered curses as the spell slipped from his grasp. Ignoring the lancing pain in his knees, he scrambled to his feet and continued to run. Only once had he seen the outside of the island prison, fifteen years ago when they had shipped him here, but he had heard plenty of stories through the years about the snake infested jungle and deadly cliff that sandwiched the place.

    That same cliff loomed ahead. The other inmates called it the leap to freedom. Ramone had no more desire to die than he wished to rot in a dark stone cell. He wanted true freedom. It had taken years to dig a tunnel under the walls. Now his only hope lay in a handful of junk and a half remembered spell. Behind him the hounds closed in, close enough to hear their panting.

    Grasping the last of the components, Ramone repeated the spell.  This was his last chance.

    “Quae me domum ad locum regione viarum.”

    He leaped from the cliff’s edge just as the portal opened and disappeared into the void.