The Trees Swallow People: Part 22

We were all waiting to die when Sibhann Sullivan came out with trays of teas, biscuits, and chocolates. She apologised; they were unopened from Christmas, which was only a problem for the old biddies recoiling in dismay. I took a Twirl and a chocolate digestive because of Sibhann's goading. Eric Sullivan, her closeted husband, was hurrying out with more cups when I earned a raised eyebrow from Sibhann by saying I took my tea black and without sugar.

Those of us who were whiling away the time watched others panic packing whatever they could rush into suitcases and into their cars, driving off. Some forgot the kids, leaving them crying at the door. Most didn't turn back for them. They were unlikely to get far. Though interest in the trees had waned somewhat to the outside world, an unofficial stance was taken that we were to be isolated as much as possible to Leixlip. Fewer buses and trains ran through the village these days. Those of us who commuted for work were made to Work-From-Home, or else were let go entirely out of the blue, as though what was happening here was contagious. Given the news about the airstrike, we speculated the roads were bound to be blocked off. To everyone outside of Leixlip, we were as much the problem as the trees. After all, people in Lucan don't have killer trees, so it must be something we're doing, right?

I was eavesdropping on the gossip between Hannah Kyteler and Fran Reilly about Cathleen Bailey having it off with Adam MacDiarmid shortly before Declan arrived.

So then, you know what she says to me!

Go on love, what did she say?

She says, listen to this, have you ever heard this, she says what I do and don't do with whoever is none of your business, Mrs. Hannah Kyteler, so I'll thank you to find someone else's life to vicariously live through!

She did not!

She did!

The cheeky cow!

Oh, she's fierce for mickey, that one, so she is! Mad for it! Froths at the mouth! Always has.

No surprised there. Just look at her mother.

No!

Aye!

A banged up, matte silver, mid-two-thousands Toyota chortled and rattled up the road into the estate, screeching as it took the hard turn, scattering a few residents as they leapt out of its way. Declan, puffing with rushing breaths, climbed out of the car with some difficulty, rushing up to me, asking demandingly what have I been doing.

I was sitting on the wall in front of my house with Diva beside me, attempting to sneak the chocolate digestive biscuit from my grip. Everyone in the estate was now staring at us; an eerie, anxiety inducing feeling only further heightened by the darkness enshrouding us all. I turned back to Declan, who, somehow, was looking even worse than before. What little skin was previously exposed was completely covered with more bandages. His hair, formerly left to sit upon his crown like an animal's pelt, was nowhere to be seen. His right leg was encased in an orthopedic boot; thick, black, and, going by Declan's throwing stride, heavy. But none of this was what caught my attention the most.

I used my nibbled biscuit to point and ask what happened to his left hand, which was missing.

Oh! That! Yeah... don't worry about that! Now come on!

Declan went to pull me into the car, spilling my tea and dropping the biscuit. I yanked myself from Declan's grip, picked up Diva, who swore at me for grabbing her just before she could chow down on the biscuit, and rushed her back into the house, despite her barks of protest. I returned to Declan, asking what was he in such a hurry for. Again, he huffed and puffed, aghast and flustered, as though I was the reason he was late for some important appointment. At last, he just pointed up at the sky... or at least where there would be sky if not for the hulking tree spanning overhead. I followed his finger as he gave out, shouting and swearing about this being our chance to burn the mega-tree, and stared up at the tree, drowning out Declan's insane rambling, hoping he'd get the message that I wasn't interested in going with him. I told him as much when I asked what did he need me for. He started and stopped several times, searching desperately for something to use against me and carry me off in a gust of aspirational conviction. What he managed was a little more pitiful.

You're the Tree Guy! That has to mean something! It has to mean something! It has to!

I stared at him. A man with his skin flayed away, one limb broken, another missing. That's where his meaning had gotten him; a slow cooked human. But it did occur to me that he was on to something. Surely a target as big as the heavens would be easier to set alight than before. What was the cult going to do? Stop us in hot-air balloons? And if we could set the mega-tree on fire, perhaps it would stop the jet fighters before they arrived. We just needed to get high enough. But how?

Jumping into the car with Declan, which was littered with cigarette butts and crumpled cans of cheap cider, stinking of smoke, pus, and the dying gasps of a discoloured car air-freshener, I was surprised once down the hill that he took a left towards the Salmon Leap and not right towards Maynooth. Another turn and a drive five minutes later, and we were pulling into the nearby Weston Airport. You'd often see the planes, usually small seaters, often for recreational flyers. We drove up the road to the car park, circling the main building. Though it was quiet, we could just make out the darkened silhouettes of staff in the control tower. Declan didn't slow down as we came into the car park. On the contrary, he sped up, driving into and breaking through the metal fencing.

Declan knew better than to slow down and instead sped up, skidding and leaving marks as he took a hard left, heading for a small grouping of light aircraft left in the open, either on display or awaiting use that day. Declan screeched to a halt and again struggled to get out of the car. I rushed over to his side, looking up at the control tower, just making out figures frantically pointing at us and banging on the windows before vanishing from view. I tried to hurry Declan along.

THE BOOT! THE BOOT!

I mistook Declan for a moment as I thought he wanted me to pull him out by his orthopedic boot first, but when he repeated himself, angrier this time, I realised he meant the car boot. I open it and found a sloshing pile of molotovs, seeping in their own leaking juices, either cracked or loosened from the bumpy ride. I grabbed as many as were still in good enough condition, cradling a dozen, following the hobbling Declan to an untethered plane; a Cessna Seventeen-Two-A. Something suddenly struck me. I asked Declan, just before he ducked under the wing and punched his heavily bandaged fist through the window, where were the other members of the arsonist group.

Oh? Well... Either the trees got them or the woke mob did. You know who I blame?

It's that time again! Let's play everyone's favourite game; Guess The Reactionary Bullshit! Thirty seconds to answer correctly. Is it, A, Feminists, B, Foreigners, C, The EU, or D, George Soros? Input your answers now!

Both thankfully and unfortunately Declan didn't keep me in bated breath.

The Feminists! All my friends told me their wives told them to stop coming to the meetings. They used feminism against them.

To this day I still don't know what he meant by “using feminism against them”. I asked about the boy, the one he sent into the shit farm. I didn't have long to mull over his silence as Declan climbed in through the broken window and kicked open the door for me, just as the staff and security finally made their way out. I tossed the bottles of murky whiskey and unsettlingly yellow vodka into the back behind our seats, just as Declan started the engine and propellers, erupting into a hellish cry of shrieking, deafening noise. We both looked around, searching the roof above us, but there were no noise mufflers. There was no time to worry about our loss of hearing, as security was closing in on us. Declan pushed down on the accelerator and we crawled forward, picking up enough to evade the security struggling not to collapse from exhaustion behind us. We followed a track onto the runway, picking up enough speed for the force to press us back into our seats before pulling back the steering wheel and slowly rise into the air, heading for the crevice of light in the distance.

It was strange, coming back into the light of the afternoon as easily as one steps out into a rain shower from under a shelter. Suddenly, but completely. Once we were far enough out of the shadow cast by the mega-tree, the sun flooded and drown us instantaneously. Declan, flinching to shield his eyes, dipped the plane a little. My stomach lurched in the free-fall so badly it took a little while before I felt okay enough to look out through the window. It really was a gorgeous day. The unencumbered sun shone down on the stretches of green and the speckled spots of towns and villages littering the land. Ghostly wisps of grey blurs brushed past, bringing a further chill into the plane through the broken window, but it did little to ruin the jigsaw puzzle of fields and homes revealing itself to us. Looking up to the horizon gave the impression of a haze bleeding into the pastel blue sky, with only the most miniscule interruption by distant planes descending into Dublin or a pillowy puff of cloud wandering off towards Westmeath. I would have happily forgotten what we were up here for if it wasn't for Declan listing us to the left, turning a full one-eighty, bringing the mega-tree back into focus.

With the distance and height, I could now see the mega-tree wasn't as arched as it appeared on the ground, but rather had the shape more aligned with an unbent staple; up relatively straight from the paddock, shooting across the village in a straight line, and then vertically plunging into Maynooth. Judging by how the motorway to my right appeared to be going underneath it, the same motorway I had to cross to get to the Job-Way meetings, I knew for certain the mega-tree was burrowing into the business park.

The surrounding growl of the engine, the translucent, whirling blur of the propellers, and the frigid whistle of the elevated wind pouring through the broken window meant myself and Declan had to shout as loudly as possible to even come close to being heard.

WE'LL GET OVER IT AND YOU DROP THE MOLOTOVS! I THINK IF I STRAFE TO THE LEFT WE CAN RUN UP ITS BACK OR WHATEVER AND SPREAD THE FIRE! HOLD ON! WE'LL NEED TO GET CLOSE SO THE MOLOTOVS AREN'T SUFFOCATED ON THE WAY DOWN!

Closer and closer we got, descending slowly. I think Declan was experiencing the same sensation of spooks as I was because, as the mega-tree grew ahead of us, I could see his throat flex with sharp inhales before dipping the plane up slightly. Perhaps he was fighting his own urge to flee. I think this has to be one of the few cases where someone literally has a flight-or-fight response to danger.

With the unencumbered sunlight hitting the topside of the mega-tree, coupled with the closer look at what we were dealing with, we made out the branches were still rippling in melodic rhythm, just nowhere near as pronounced as the shudder the estate had witnessed earlier. Strange still, the billowing waves were interrupted by the odd flick, whip, and coiling of tips, like green tentacles searching for prey to crack open and tear apart. Amidst this sea of thick overgrowth, floundering desperately to survive, came the wild pleading hands and wide-eyes calls for help. It was the man from the bed that was raised up and carried away by one of the trees. I called to Declan, going hoarse with the yells needed to overcome the noise in the plane, that we needed to get lower and skim over the surface to try rescuing them.

WHAT COLOUR IS HE!

Oh for Christ's sake.

Before I could admonish him, there was a whooshing gust streaking past us, shunting the plane aside with the force of the slipstream. Another on the opposite side rattled us so violently Declan lost control of the wheel with his remaining hand. I grabbed hold of it to level us out and stop us from listing further to one side. The two light aircraft planes ahead of us were joined by a third that came out from under us. As one turned on its wing, we caught a glimpse of some recognisable faces; members of Shepard's cult. And with them turning around, heading straight for us, just short of clipping our wings as I dipped out of the way, it was clear they were here to stop us. So much for hot air-balloons.

There was nowhere to run or hide; I don't think you can get any more exposed than the sky on a clear day. Declan managed to regain his composure and grabbed the wheel again. Ahead of us, the third plane coming out from under us leveled out with the door opening on the left side. I leaned forward, squinting, desperately trying to focus on the hands stretching out from the co-pilot seat, busy at work on the hinges of the door with what looked like a power drill. Once I saw the top bolt zip past us in the air, I grabbed hold of the wheel from Declan and pressed forward, diving the plane out of the way of the door, finally unlatched, careening in the air, though it did still strike and tumble across our roof. Declan was too busy swearing at me to fully appreciate I had narrowly saved us from losing our left wing.

Declan corrected our flight path as we reached the mass of the mega-tree, tantalisingly close to brushing the licking tongue-like branches, working laboriously hard to try and savour the taste of rubber and metal just out of its reach.

DROP THE MOLOTOVS!

I screamed back about the man still clambering to stay afloat in the bramble. He was a squirming speck at this distance, but with the speed we were going we would have less than a minute to decide what we were doing.

HOW DO WE KNOW HE'S NOT TRYING TO TRICK US!

How! How and why would someone risk their own life to be rescued, randomly, by a plane it didn't even know would be flying past? I tried explaining I had seen this man get swept up by the trees as they grew from our gardens. If we didn't save him, he was either going to be swallowed up by the mega-tree, burned alive by the molotovs, or else obliterated once the jet fighter got here.

Declan went silent. For a brief moment, I had the fleeting hope that finally I had gotten through to Declan. That was until he had another go.

MIGRANTS!

...What!

MIGRANTS! THAT'S WHY! THEY SNEAK IN, DON'T THEY! FIRST THEY PRETENDED TO BE ASYLUM SEEKERS, THEN THEY TRIED GETTING HERE ON BOATS, NOW THEY'RE USING THE TREES! WE SAVE ONE AND WE'LL HAVE A THOUSAND NEXT WEEK! IT'S ALL PART OF THE LEFTIST AGENDA TO DEPOPULATE US AND---

Shut up! Shut up! Shut the fuck up, you thick, stupid cunt!

Declan fell silent, stunned. So stunned, he paid little attention to the cult member who had just jumped out of a passing plane overhead, landing on top of us, lost their grip, and fell off, vanishing into the mega-tree with a muffled scream. I just kept going. I kept at him. Did he hear how all this sounded? How much word-salad he was tossing about without the faintest idea of what he was saying? Why! Why would there be a conspiracy for every little thing? How can someone see people just as scared, lost, and terrified as them, but instead of wanting to help they just listen to made up bullshit! People are dying and you're crying about people you don't like? Why! Why are you willing to isolate yourself from people because of your fears? Why!

Declan, still silent, looked out to the front of the plane, but I could see how unfocused he was. He didn't even react when one of the cult's planes nosedived straight into the mega-tree, swallowed up as easily as if it fell into water. The thin, chapped and sickly smoothed lips tucked in. I looked out ahead as well, but likewise, I wasn't really paying attention. I was sitting with him, waiting for him to parse his hurt feelings.

I have to be right.

The engine was still roaring, and the wind was still whistling, yet I heard him as clear as if both had abruptly disappeared. Maybe our ears had adjusted, or I could guess from context how to read his lips, but I sat there, letting him speak.

I have to be right. I have to be... because otherwise it means I don't know what's going on. So I have to be right... right?

I disliked Declan strongly. I'm sure if I had been more hostile and dismissive upon our first meeting, he would have quickly distanced himself from me. But for those brief seconds, before he opened his door and three himself out, dropping down and vanishing into the mega-tree with the battle cry “give me back my hands you bastard”, I felt a twinge of pity. It didn't absolve him, no more than it would anyone else, but it was at least reassuring to see that the fear we were all experiencing was shared by the arrogantly confident. It's just such a shame that those with tenacity are so often terrified to the point of self-harm and lashing out. I'm sorry you were scared, Declan. It's a shame you couldn't see we all were too.

BANG!

The plane rattled and shook, scooping me back from my melancholic malaise, grabbing hold of the wheel, I jumped into Declan's former seat, pulling up slightly. I couldn't see the man anywhere ahead of us, and the plane moved with a delayed heft; I think he must have grabbed on to the joint between the two wheels. Once again, another body smacked into the plane from above, this time rolling onto the nose and getting caught up in the propellers, hurled around for a few rotations before getting fired off over the side of the mega-tree, shrinking on the way down. Morbidly leaning over to watch, I caught sight of three glints in the distance, growing in size quickly. It was the RAF.

Listing to the right, I kept my eyes on the growing dots of shimmering silver, gradually stretching out into pin thin widths as their wing span came into focus. Eerily, beside the thunderous rumble of the engine, the sky was uninterrupted by the jets approaching, traveling far ahead of their own broken sound barriers. It was strange to behold. I mean... it was, until I noticed, from the corner of my eyes, to my left, the mega-tree once again pulsating, shivering along its length. Then, contracting first, as though inhaling, the mega-tree shot out a thick, stretching branch, worming and slithering in the air as easily as an eel in water, racing for the rapidly approaching jets. It listed widely to the West, seemingly missing the jets, but with ungodly strength and swiftness, the bushy tentacles, casting a slithering shadow across much of Leinster, swatted the jets and vaporised them in a puff of explosive debris and smoke. The tip snatched and coiled around a collection of falling wreckage and retracted back into the mega-tree with such speed I can never be sure if I did or didn't see the pilots desperately trying to free themselves. I tell myself some nights it was a trick of the light. Either way, so much for the RAF.

You may be surprised to hear this... but I don't know how to fly a plane. Yes, the basic steering is the same as a car, just with the added features of going up and down, but the rest of the intimidating buttons, dials, and levers in front of me might as well be for a quantum computer. I could turn and go up and down. That was it. Even if I could land, it's not like I could go back to Weston and risk arrest. And then there was the issue of our friend on the wheels, if he was still there. I couldn't keep flying indefinitely either, though I was beginning to develop an appreciation for the vast freedom of the skies. My only option was to jump and hope for a soft landing.

With no clue if my friend was dead a couple hundred meters below, I bellowed out the broken window for someone to hold on. We descended over the side of the mega-tree, churning its branches as though chewing. Once low enough, I leaned over to the left and spotted Maynooth station, a short way from the end of the mega-tree burrowing back into the Earth. Strafing over the tracks, I followed the canal, returning into the colossal shadow. It was like stepping through a waterfall; a heavy curtain of force that suddenly weight down upon you punishingly. A few times, I had to pick up as we dipped further still, much to the whine of the engine. The propellers were starting to slow, damaged from the body falling into it. We were just feet above the surface of the canal when we got to Louisa Bridge. The Hill would be the next stop, but at this height, and no give from the plane as I tried gaining air, this seemed as good a place to bail as any.

I listed the plane to the right, turning the last corner before Confey Bridge, an old stone convex archway crossing the canal, unfortunately at the same height as our trajectory. It was either jump or crash. I climbed out of my seat and kicked open the door, struggling to keep it open with the speed we were going at. Climbing out, holding onto a stabilising beam for the wing and the door, I looked down and saw the man, still holding on to the joint for the wheels, latching on like a baby animal. The poor man was shivering in his underwear. His eyes caught mine.

Outside, the plane was a little more bearable when it came to hearing myself shout for him to jump. Anguished, his teeth bared in a feeble grimace, he shook his head and shouted back an unintelligible string of words probably amounting to a simple no. I repeated myself, this time pointing at the canal. No doubt it would be frigid, even in Spring, and jump at this speed was bound to be ungraceful and disorientating, but the bank was right there. Again, he cowered, huddling back into him, hiding his face behind the beam. I sat back in the chair, still holding the door open with my foot, leaned back and stretched for one of the molotovs. I stood back up, and look backed at the man.

HEY!

The man looked back at me, and I gave him no warning as I skulled him in the face with the butt of the bottle I fired, sending him rolling into the canal. I had wasted too much time. Maybe I knew that when I turned around, looking ahead of the plane, and found the stonework engulfing my view. It's a little muddled what exactly happened next, but there were flashing streaks of light and darkness, a chorus of shattering, scraping, crumpling, and splashing, followed by numbing, pulsating thumps, sharp, stabbing cold, and consuming, smothering, water. I can't remember everything, but I can remember the blackness; the closest to death I've ever been.