What happens to unclaimed corpses?

This is a mistake. He thought. What happened at the banquet? What have I done?

The more the artist thought and shifted, the more the light began to take shape in his eyes. He could see that he was in a container of cadavers, mistaken for human waste. He perceived a slight quaking. The bodies, their hair, held the smallest drift from side to side. It was not born from his movement. The container itself was in transit.

“Help!” The artist shouted. “I should not be here. I am alive!”

No body answered. No body moved.

The artist tried to roll to his side. Perhaps there was more light, or even an exit, on the other side. He tucked his right shoulder into the body beneath him then pulled his left leg back to anchor against a body behind him. As he tried to push against the corpses around him, the pile shifted. One body fell and then another, and the dam of death began to swallow him whole.

The artist clawed at the edges of the human quicksand. His foot found a hold sandwiched between the lumbars of two fellow passengers. His hand caught a grip in the tangled trusses of another’s blonde hair.

The tug of his weight revealed the face of his savior. He recognized the sharpness of her now cold eyes, the subtle curve of her missing smile. The artist remembered seeing her across the ballroom. He wondered what it would be like to talk to her. He could create wonders after speaking to such a muse. Now not a shred of her satin blue dress remained. The former brightness of her style could shed no light to aid the artist. She was dead, a stone in the artist’s unforgivable climb.

The artist’s misbegotten muse continued her descent into his death hole. The bodies to either side sank into her former resting place and the trap tightened around the artist. He pushed against the falling rocks of their backs and shoulders and faces in a fight to resurface from this slumping sea.

“Someone please. Can anybody hear me?”

The artist had survived the sinkhole, but the silence of these transient souls still swallowed his shouts. The bodies in the container were unsteady.

The artist could now see the edges of his prison, but which side held his exit? If he survived the impossible crawl across the length of the container, was there a guarantee of his escape? Could he bear to make the climb again? He had not eaten since the banquet. No, before the banquet. Once in the ballroom, all he could remember was the toast. How long ago was that?

He took a moment to recall all that he could about the transport of the deceased. Departed loved ones were taken to facilities specifically designed to manage the disposal of the remains. Individuals were given ceremony and respect before committal back to the earth. There were rites respecting the life cycle: dirt to delivery to death and back to dirt.

He was not residing in a respected repository. What was it that happened to unclaimed corpses? Why was he with them? He was very much alive.

The artist had to gamble. There had to be a way out. He creeped along the carrion canvas with care. If a body shifted beneath hand or foot, he would freeze and seek a way to perch upon another. Each quiet breath he took tasted like a latrine. He could only imagine why the corpses seemed so eager to slide upon one another.

As he crawled, the artist looked for more familiar faces. He hoped that they may hold an answer as to how they arrived here. To his right he spied a member of the catering crew, likely a fellow creator that did not bear the luck of a formal invitation. He reeked of stolen champagne. The artist continued along. To his left he saw a painter from his table. He had worn no tie and no jacket but showcased suspenders he must have made himself. Now he was just a clean slate. The artist continued along.

“Is there anyone out there?”

The artist froze when he found his final companion. He was atop the celebrant at the center of the reception he had attended. The Harrison Endowment had poured out invitations among many of the primary and secondary creators in the territories. This sculptor was to be the inaugural recipient of their premiere award. Her hair still held a fragment of stiffness from her preparations. Its fading rigidity was transferring to her lifeless limbs. He could be accidentally discarded, but she was adorned with honors. Her end should have been one of grandeur. The most successful sculptor the artist had ever known was now a floorboard accomplice in his escape. This was not a pile of forgotten corpses. The artist sat atop a mound of creators crushing each other under the burden of now barren minds.

The artist paid his respects with a shove off the sculptor’s shoulder. He poked along his perished peers until he lay at the perimeter of the pile.

“Help me.” Another voice rang out from amidst the pile. “Please. I am trapped.”

The mortifying mutton of makers muffled her cries.

“Can you move?” The artist replied.

He looked down along the wall he had periled to reach. With careful repositioning, a panel door could be by his feet.

“I found a way out. Can you move?”

His question was answered by a depression of the deceased followed by indistinguishable intonations. Whomever this was, she deserved to be buried among these bodies as much as he did.

The artist’s preplanned path was no more. His slow, simple slither was now a hastened race against the tumbles and slides of fellow creators’ spines. He reached the ridge of sinking bodies and shoved his hands down along their stomachs and backsides. He could feel his arms gaining the immortal brown lubricant of the end, and he could smell the afterlife more clearly than ever before.

“If you can feel me, take my hands.”

He shook his hands in the little space they held. He waited for the pressure and his weight to force a dive into the depths of the dead. He pushed deeper into the creases between the cadavers, unfurling and grasping his fingers as much as possible. He held his breath as rot and feces tried to dance along his tongue.

A pulse reached his fingers. He dove deeper. He pushed aside the remains of possible rivals to sink further into the hoard of husks. The final contents of his companions coated his head, his shoulders, until finally a hand locked in with his.

He could feel her pulling, drawing him deeper into her despair, but he swore not to let go. The artist tried to tuck his knees towards his chest. He sought a body locked into its station. His knees searched for a spot to gain leverage. His right hand pulled on the woman with all its strength. His left hand sought skyward for salvation.

Slowly, caked and crusted brown hair breached the barrier of beings. As she looked up into the bubble the artist had built, she released a howl that would put a banshee’s cry to shame.

“My shoulder. Please.”

She pushed on with all her might. Her torso was now freely in the haven the artist was trying to provide. Her shoulder hung like paint stuck in a brush.

The artist released her hand and wrapped his arm around her rib cage. He planted his feet on the personages in his periphery and pulled her body through the crevice of the capsizing pile.

“Place your feet near mine. Can you stand?

The woman regarded his request. He could feel one of her feet settle into the solar plexus of their steppingstone. She straightened into the slipping sanctuary the artist had amassed along his back.

“There is not much room at the top of the pile. I will push you through. Are you able to crawl?”

“It will hurt, but do I have a choice?” Her attempted chuckle was choked out by a bouquet of bodily fluids.

“Crawl for the far side once you are out.”

The woman set her foot atop the artist’s thigh. As she pushed herself up, it began to slide in the swamp mud sweat that was accumulating on both their bodies. The artist caught her by her hamstring. He helped lift her up, first one leg and then the other. He held secure until her toes slipped over the edge of his carrion ceiling.

The artist trembled like Atlas. The burden of bodies and unborn ideas was becoming too much to bear. He tried to turn and holdback the tumbling tower that was sliding all around him. If he had managed to save a life, it was not his own. He sank into the sliding remains of unknown associates, soon to be another carcass in the container.

Five fingers wrapped around the minor protrusion of the artist’s remaining hand. A weak tug pulled his confidence back into place. The artist clashed against the cave in. Rib cages became rungs and shoulders became steps. Soon the artist and the woman lay atop the collection of creative corpses.

He took the first real look at her face and recognized her. He had not seen her at a banquet but on a book jacket. She was a writer. Even through the dirt and disgust etched across her face, he could see the endless worlds in her eyes.

“I read your book.” He mumbled.

She peered into his painted brown eyes and laughed.

“Thank you,” she snickered. “You said you found a way out?”

“I did.” The artist pointed to the far side of the container. “There is a door on that wall. I have no idea if it opens.”

“Do you know where they are taking us?”

“Nowhere good. After you.”

The artist swept his arm through the sliver of unfilled space. The writer shifted around and began her crawl. The artist tracked her closely, trying to keep their supporting cast from caving in. The writer stalled for a moment. The artist knew that she had reached the sculptor now contorted and crammed into a chasm.

They continued along to the edge. Carefully they rotated to place their feet upon the wall. First the writer, then the artist. The writer looked at the artist. Her eyes were starting to sink back into their sockets. He could see a spring welling up to wash her face.

“I do not want to go back down. What if we cannot get it open? We will be trapped.”

“If that door does not open, we will be trapped either way.”

“I would rather be trapped on top of the bodies than beneath them.”

“Do you know what happens to unclaimed corpses?”

Tears bubbled beneath the writer’s eyes. “We are still alive.”

“I know,” the writer nodded. “If we get that door open, we will remain that way.”

The artist thought to reach out and wipe away the water from her face, but he was afraid that the spread of the scum that covered them both would only worsen. He cautiously set his feet against the wall of the container. He pulsed in his knees to create space and slid into the hole beneath his feet. The writer mirrored his movements.

The cornered creators stared at the double door before them. There was no need for a latch on the inside. Was it possible that the dead were left alone without a lock?

The artist braced himself against the bodies at his back. The writer set her good arm against the door. They both pressed forward full force and bulged their barrier outward. When they relaxed, each panel clattered shut.

“Help!” The writer shouted. “Please!”

The artist slammed against the doors again. The gateway gave no further than in their first attempt. He repeated his barrage again and again, accompanied by the cries of his companion. The doors would not budge. However, the bodies behind them started to collapse under the pressure. The artist and the writer would soon find themselves against the doors with thousands of pounds behind them.

The artist pressed into the doors with all his strength. The departed slid in and joined him, pinning both the artist and the writer against the doors. They created a crack through which daylight rushed in. The exterior winds and breeches were no longer muffled. They could hear the huff and hustle of a speeding train. A thin pair of bars pressed against the crease in the doorway.

“How small are your hands?” The artist asked.

The writer struggled to remove her smothered hand from its prison against the door. The artist aided by breaking through the barrage of bodies. The writer freed her hand and wriggled her fingers into the cavity in the door. She pinched one of the bars between index and middle finger. The writer pulled the lower bar to the right. It would not budge. She tried in the other direction to no avail. She rotated the bar towards herself. A weight tried to work against her fingers. She strained to hold the bar and slide it aside. The writer inched the bar aside until it was out of sight. The artist and the bodies pushed the doors further open.

“One more.” The artist encouraged.

The writer could now use her whole hand to manipulate the bar. Her cramped fingers fought and slid the rod out of place. The doors burst open and slammed into the walls of the car ahead of it. The avalanche of the dead pushed the writer and the artist into the narrow gap and clumped both of them into another door.

The artist found his footing first and helped the writer into a safe position with his good arm. Wind screeched along the top of the car and into the container. It was not enough to hold back the emboldening stench of death. The writer tested the handle of the next door. It turned and opened out into the gap. The artist wrapped his right arm around her waist and anchored his left arm and foot in the opening of the corpse container.

The writer pulled the door open and set her shoulder into it to keep it that way. She then pushed open yet another door. The artist released his arm, so the writer could step into safety. Once she passed through the threshold, he followed.

The next car was full of crates. Only a narrow aisle separated the floor to ceiling stacks of opaque packages. The smell of unfinished wood was an upgrade from the unkempt smells of the last container. The artist looked amongst the crates for a crowbar or any lever he could use to search for answers.

“Harrison’s Home-fed Helpings,” the writer read.

The artist widened his eyes. The words were stamped across every crate. Harrison’s Home-fed Helpings. The end time food solution.

“We need to open these crates,” the artist said.

He gave up his search for a tool and clawed at whatever cracks he could find. Splinters of wood bit into his fingers. Sawdust swarmed into his eyes.

The artist sat back into the crate behind him. He turned to the writer who had already sank into the floor. She stared at the door ahead of them. A large padlock sat upon it.

The artist sprang back up and pried at the edges of the crates. This is a mistake. What have they done? He pulled and pulled until exhaustion overcame him. The writer rested upon the crates by her side. The artist fell alongside her.

The writer sighed through closed eyes. “I know what they do with unclaimed corpses.”