Farther Outfield by Bretton Cadigan

Farther Outfield by Bretton Cadigan

The team decided to go to the grave as a bonding trip. Well, Otto decided it. He’s the team captain after all. A few of them had never seen the great Ted Williams’ grave before, and Otto said it was important. How else were they gonna understand how to play baseball if they couldn’t understand how the game had been back when grownups played? Yeah sure, the grave was in the woods. Yeah sure, it wasn’t safe. Yeah sure, it might not even be his real grave. But if the team was gonna come together and not lose like yesterday, something had to change.

So the team set out in the morning, six kids looking small in their oversized caps and uniforms, shortstop Otto leading the way. Neesha and Bambi wanted to stay home at the ballpark, but Bil and Jeck started cracking jokes about how “the pitcher and the baby were afraid of the trees” and soon enough everyone was going. No one really liked Bil and Jeck when they got like that, but they’re older kids, only two summers younger than Otto. Besides, they’re teammates.

Bambi brought a few snacks from the concession stands. The food was stale and there wasn’t much to choose from other than peanuts and crackerjacks. The hot dogs ran out a long time ago, and by then they were making everybody sick anyways. The older kids mostly ate the tree-fruits, but most of the younger kids couldn’t stand the stuff. Neesha was getting older, but she still couldn’t eat the tree-fruits. She couldn’t stand the way the trees looked at her when she plucked them.

Walking through the woods, the Bambi felt like the trees were spying on them. Like there was a secret connecting all of them. That they whispered amongst themselves, plotting some conspiracy. But trees are trees. They just stand there. They don’t move. Except for the eyes. The eyes followed every step the kids took.

Otto pushed past Bambi from behind. “Don’t make eye contact. Keep moving.” So he did. But Bambi knew they were still looking at him. Thistle walked up alongside Bambi, placing himself between the boy and the trees and tried to comfort his fellow outfielder.

“I’ve spent a lot of time out here. The trees aren’t nothin’ to be afraid of. The forest is safe during the day. Did you know that a long time ago, there were trees with leaves? Leaves were kinda like green feathers, and they covered every branch all summer long,” Thistle explained, hoping to calm the little left fielder or at least distract him. Thistle was as old as Bil and Jeck, but the right fielder didn’t fit in with the rest of the kids his age. The two bullies were hard on him, even harder than they were on the rest of the team. He’d always been a bit strange, so it figured he’d be a target. They knew Thistle understood the woods in a way the rest of them couldn’t. So if he said not to be afraid, Bambi trusted him.

Sometimes the older kids came out to the edge of the woods to party and drink old beer. If there was one thing they had plenty of, living at the baseball stadium, it was old beer. Bambi couldn’t understand why the grown-ups had so much back then. But that was a long time ago now.

To pass the time on their hike, Otto told the team about famous players from back in the day. Willie Mays, Joe DiMaggio, Ty Cobb, Hank Aaron, all of them legends, just like Ted. Otto still remembered how things used to be before, at least when it came to baseball. Bambi asked him to tell a story about Babe Ruth, his favorite player, and his namesake thanks to Otto. The team groaned. They’d heard all those stories a hundred times. Instead, Otto taught everyone a song called “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” and the team all sang as they marched through the forest, trying to ignore the staring trees.

They were just finishing up a raucous rendition of the line “I don’t care if I ever come back” when their shortstop stopped them short. Captain Otto grinned and turned to his team.

“We’re here. This is it boys. Hallowed ground.” The graveyard was big, but Otto knew the way by heart. Their stadium was old, oldest in the country according to Otto, but the graveyard was even older. After a short walk, they all stood in front of Ted Williams’ grave. It was unmarked, the stone letters worn away. But Otto was sure: this was the one. He took the last game’s ball from his pocket and rubbed it against the front of the stone, like a holy ritual.

“It was a good game Ted. We lost, but we played our best. Wish you could’ve been there.” Otto whispered, holding the ball to his lips.

“Should we touch the grave too?” asked Bambi, eager to always imitate his role model.

“No. No, just, pay your respects. Like this.” He took off his hat and held it over his heart with a serious expression. The team took off their hats and followed suit. A moment of silence passed.

“The greatest player there ever was.” Otto recited.

“C’mon, Ty Cobb was the best.” Bil contested.

“Nah, it’s Willie Mays. Or maybe Hank Aaron.” Jeck mumbled.

Otto turned with a scowl. “Not in front of Ted!” he shouted. Bambi jumped up in surprise, his eyes glistening. Otto steadied himself and passed the game ball to Bambi to provide some comfort. “Okay, let’s go. We oughta make it back before dark.”

Neesha stood still while the rest of the kids marched away. The pitcher looked back at the graveyard. She didn’t really understand what a graveyard was for. Otto told them that a long time ago, when people were done living, they put them underground and then put a rock on top of them. It didn’t work like that anymore, the living or what comes after. But most everything was different now compared to how it was during the grown-ups’ time. Now Otto’s the oldest, so when he tells them his stories, what are they supposed to believe?

Neesha caught up and they walked back into the thick woods. All around them the naked pale gray branches shook in the cold. Something like wind whistled softly.

& & &

After a long time walking back, the team was getting restless.

“How long til we get home? I’m tired.” Bambi whined.

“Soon,” said Otto, not for the first time.

Bil scratched at his thin veiny arms. “I told you we shoulda turned at that big rock. That’s what we did on the visit last summer. I think we’re lost, boys.”

“Fat lotta good it does tellin’ us now, Bil.” Otto shot back, his thick eyebrows pressed together. “And we’re going the right way now, I’m sure.”

“Yeah, shuttup Bil.” snickered Jeck.

Neesha looked up to the sky, her pitcher’s sense keen to the slightest change in the weather. It was still cloudy, but she could see some dark-blue sky through the edges. It was getting late. Only Otto, Bil, and Jeck had been in the woods before. Well, Thistle spent a lot of time exploring the forest, but he’d probably lead them deeper. You could only trust Bil or Jeck to make things worse. Once again, they all had to count on Otto. Whenever they were losing a game, the worse it got, the more Otto would insist that they still had a chance. Even in the last inning, if anyone even mentioned the score he’d insist that scores were just a number. It was about the “size of the fight in the dog” or “you only lose when you give up” or some other line. “I heard it in a movie.” he’d answer if they asked him what he was talking about. “It’s true.” Neesha didn’t know about movies, but they seemed like they were full of bad ideas.

After another long walk, the thick woods opened up to a clearing. The waning light revealed a patch of grass with a scattering of small trees. In a different time, it would be peaceful, even pretty. But something there stopped Otto dead in his tracks.

“Wha— It’s him. It’s Dev.” He staggered forward and Bambi started to shadow him, but Jeck grabbed his shoulder and held him back. Otto walked up to a short tree in the middle of the clearing and took a knee in front of it, his eyes level with the tree’s gaze. A boy’s face stood in relief on the bark. Otto lifted up a hand and softly placed it on the trunk.

“Dev. Have you been here all along? I missed you man. D’y’know, I took over as captain after you left. I–I’ve been running the team just like you did. Look, I understand that you hadda go, but why—” Otto’s voice broke, ‘why’ cracking like glass.

Dev’s human eyes slowly blinked. A low groan echoed from the tree, maybe a response from Dev, maybe just the wind. The trees don’t speak, but they’re not quiet.

The rest of the team shuffled uncomfortably. Bambi started nervously eating crackerjacks. They didn’t like seeing Otto like this. Otto always put the team first. Maybe that’s why he was the oldest player still around. Bil slowly walked up to Otto and the tree. “Hey, uh, Dev. I don’t know if you remember me, but I used to be on your team too. I played first base. Still do, but now I’m a starter with Otto and the rest.” He looked back at the team. Jeck waved him on. “Well, it’s good to see you… I hope you’re doing good, y’know, here.” He made an awkward attempt at giving the tree a friendly pat on the back. “Alright, about time we get going, huh Otto?” Bil reached down to offer Otto a hand up. But Otto pushed it away.

“Hey Otto,” Neesha called. “We really gotta get back, cap.”

Otto waved his hand dismissively. “I’m gonna stay out here with Dev. You all go. Don’t worry about us.”

Bambi looked at Neesha, who looked at Thistle, who looked scared while he spoke. “He can’t stay. It’s nearly night-time. He just can’t. They’ll be coming out any minute.” Thistle knew a lot about what happened in the forest, maybe too much. Neesha nodded, and approached Jeck, who was staring at Bil and Otto. “We gotta get him to come back with us. He can’t stay here.”

Jeck sighed. “Yeah, I get you. But it’s not our choice to make. Everyone goes to stay in the woods someday. Maybe it’s finally his time.” The catcher rubbed the back of his head.

Bambi wailed and ran up to Otto, throwing his arms around his neck. But Otto was in another world. He didn’t respond to Bambi’s touch at all. Bil turned around, a look of disgust on his face as he walked back. Neesha stepped towards him, ready to argue or start a fight, anything. Someone needed to step up and do something.

And then there was a crash. The kids all spun towards the noise. Dry dirt floated in the evening air. As it cleared, they could see what happened. A tree had fallen to the ground a dozen yards away. The air started to smell sweet and sour the way tree-flesh smells, like fresh pulp and old meat. And then Neesha noticed the shape next to the tree. She slowly raised a finger to point it out to her teammates. A round shape, at least seven feet tall, stood outlined against the vertical bars of the forest, staring back with two glowing eyes, its toothy mouth wet with red juice. It wasn’t a tree. It was moving. And it was moving towards them. The team was frozen. Until Bambi screamed out.

“Run!”

And they scattered.

& & &

Thistle was off running first, alone. He had sensed something was off and was already edging to the outside of the group by the time the beast attacked. He didn’t lead the team in stolen bases just because of his speed. He had a good sense for the right time to run, a skill life had taught him well.

He bounded through the forest, dodging branches and roots as best he could. Soon he was covered in scratches, but he barely noticed. His adrenaline was pumping with fear, but also exhilaration. The woods were a sight to see. He never went exploring with the other older kids, but it wasn’t the woods he was scared of. In fact, he was fascinated by the trees. He was old enough to remember some of how the world used to be, so he could see how magical the world had become. Back at the stadium, he kept a journal in his locker with all his research on the woods and the changed cycle of the seasons, trying to learn what would happen if the summers continued to grow fewer and further between the many winters. If only he had more time… he could spend decades studying the forest.

He leapt over a big root, clearing it easily. But the next step he took landed on an incline and soon he was rolling downhill. With a splash he landed in cold muddy water, pulling him through rapid currents. He floundered, trying to get his head above the river’s surface when something sharp pierced his side. Moments later the rest of his body crashed and jammed into a jagged wall of sticks. Blood streamed into the dirty water around him as he tried to pull out the branch stuck in his gut. But his attempts to remove the lance just led to yelps in pain. His vision flashed with bright spots of light. He blinked to try to get his sight back, but his head was wedged into a dark hole in the thick pile of sticks.

As his eyes adjusted, a few pairs of the bright spots still remained. He gulped. Eyes glowed in the dim light, just like the beast in the clearing. The eyes watched him from inside the structure of sticks. He started and the dam shifted. A thin beam of twilight illuminated the scene in front of him. Four furry brown beasts huddled in a circle, their flat leathery tails facing outwards. Their bodies faced a flat object, propped up towards Thistle. He squinted and then gasped. A final set of eyes looked back from a human face, its wooden features grimacing in pain. One of the creatures stepped forward and bit off a piece of wood-grained flesh. And then the rest of the creatures moved towards Thistle.

& & &

Neesha took off running as soon as she saw Bil take off. Bil was a jerk, but if he wasn’t sticking around to crack mean jokes, things had gotten real hairy. She followed at a run until she caught up alongside him. “Where’s the stadium already?” she panted.

Bil scowled. “How the hell should I know?”

“What!?” Neesha stopped. “You’ve been talking about where Otto shoulda been going for hours. Now you’re saying you don’t know the way back?”

Bil slowed down and rubbed the back of his head. “Well sure, I did. But after you led us all the way out here…” He gestured around them and stuck his chin out, daring her to hit first. Neesha snarled, but resisted the temptation. After getting thrown out of three games this season for fighting, she was working on self-control. “Alright, Bil, if I’m the leader, then I’ll get us back.” She spun to the right. “This way.” Bil shrugged and trundled along behind her, muttering jokes and laughing to himself .

It wasn’t long before the scenery around them changed. The trees, which had been standing so tall, vibrant, and full of life and blood, began to spread thin. Around them, dozens of logs had started to decompose. They reminded Neesha of the old Moxie soda billboard at the park, gray, peeling, and unsettling. The trees’ facial expressions looked tired, sad, and old, eyes looking downwards, bloodshot and puffy, like they’d been crying. Tree sap leaked from a few eyes and noses. Neesha slowed her pace and started to walk carefully, avoiding the fallen logs, branches, and rotten wood pulp.

“Hey! What’s that noise?” Bil shouted.

“You, dumbass.” Neesha sneered. “Just shuttup Bil.”

“Nah, really. Can’t you hear it? Like a ‘Knock-Knock’?” He smiled at his unintended joke setup. “Who’s there?” he answered himself in a sing-song voice.

“Bil!” hissed Neesha.

“Bil who?” he chuckled. But Neesha’s patience had run out. “I swear Bil, why the hell did I stick with you? Always testing, teasing. You’re worse than useless.” She started walking away from him, when she heard it too.

KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK

Bil threw up his hands, vindicated. Neesha looked around. The noise was close, but she couldn’t see anything on the ground around them. She looked up. A small angular shape was hugging the trunk of the tree, about thirty feet up. Its tiny head smacked against the trunk of the tree. She needed to get a closer look.

Neesha stepped forward and started climbing a nearby tree. The tree’s face winced as her foot pushed off its thick nose and let out a low groan. “What are you doing?” Bil whined, but Neesha ignored him. Soon she was a good way up the trunk and she took another look at the shape. It was a bird, and like the beast from earlier, it gave off a strange glow. It pecked violently at the tree, producing the loud knocking noise from earlier. In the distance Neesha could hear similar knocking from its fellow birds. “What are you doing?” Neesha wondered, trying to get a better look at what it was pecking for. Red sap leaked from the hole that it had carved. Small glowing black dots were wriggling in the sap.

Bugs! Neesha whistled softly. That must be why all the trees were falling here. They were infested. Maybe the bugs liked eating the soft tree flesh or the sweet sap. Another reason she would never eat tree-fruit herself. Something inside her screamed out that there was something wrong with eating anything from these trees. But at the same time something else groaned with desire. She lowered herself down from the branch and fell to the ground, curiosity satiated. But when she landed, she realized that Bil was gone.

“Bil!” She whisper-yelled. “Bil!!”

“Over here!” Bil responded. Neesha turned to see him sitting on a log, eating a tree-fruit. “I was hungry. Go get some yourself, there’s plenty.” A thick piece of wet fruit-meat fell from his lips onto the log. Neesha gagged.

“Dammit Bil! Let’s go.” But he shook his head. “Lemme finish this, I need a break anyway.” He kept eating while Neesha glared. But then she noticed something on the log. The same glowing black bugs from the tree. They moved as a group crawling up the log towards the fallen piece of tree-fruit. Why were there so many?

“Bil…” She took a step back. Bil pursed his lips. “Just give me a minute Neesha, dammit!” He lifted a hand from the log to flip her the bird, but when he raised his hand he saw the dots crawling along it.

“Ah!” he yelped and fell backwards over the log. An old man’s face glared up from the spot on the log where he had been seated.

“Bil!” Neesha ran over to the other side of the log. Her jaw dropped.

Bil was covered in the bugs. The decomposed log’s bark had split open, revealing a pulpy mess of tree guts and swarming termites. Bil must have cut himself in his fall, because a thick gash had opened on his arm. Bil blubbered in fear and pain, his mouth still full of tree-fruit. But none of that had made Neesha gasp. It was the inside of the gash that took her breath away.

“Your skin…” said Neesha. Because it wasn’t muscle or bone in Bil’s cut. It looked more like…

“Wood.” Neesha backed up. Bil’s blubbering started to escalate to screams. “They’re biting me Neesha, the bugs— they’re trying to eat me!” Neesha kept backing up. This wasn’t— she couldn’t—. She turned and ran. Bil’s yells echoed off the trees behind her. “Neesha! Come back! Neesha!!”

& & &

Bambi had been scared senseless when the beast showed up. When everyone scattered, he instinctively followed the largest runner. After a few minutes, the boy tripped on a root and fell into a mud puddle. He looked up from the ground and was surprised to see that he had been following Jeck, not Otto as he thought. Jeck reached down and easily pulled him back to his feet.

“Where are we?” Bambi asked. He wondered if Otto had already made it home.

“I dunno. Some old building? Just—just hang on. I’ll take a look around.” Jeck walked towards a thick grove of trees, arranged in near perfect rows. Bambi followed a straight path through the grove until he got to a low stone platform, with a single twisted tree. The tree’s face was wrinkled and ugly, but a wide smile spread across it. A gnarled branch held a pewter goblet coated in sticky residue. The tree’s eyes fluttered sporadically and Bambi turned away, unsettled. He looked back at the rows of trees, all of them facing the stone platform.

Most of the walls on the stone platform had fallen. A few long red moldering banners hung from the tops of the remaining stone pillars, showing strong-looking men laid over strong-looking trees. Vibrant green leaves covered the tree branches, a contrast to the bare gray of the trees beneath the banners. Bambi looked back at the crowd, watching their eyes flutter ecstatically.

“Jeck, you’re almost as old as Otto, right? Do you ‘member stuff from the grown-up’s time?”

Jeck was trying to climb up a stone pillar to get a better view, but he paused to look down at Bambi before answering. “Naw. I musta been real young, I don’t even remember Ted retiring like Otto does. All I know is how things are now, y’know, living at the baseball field, practicing with the team, playing the other teams from the park each summer… It’s been a good life. I don’t wanna know any more than that.” He jumped down from his perch.

Bambi wrinkled his nose. “But aren’t you curious? I mean, what was it all like back then? Why did everything happen like this? How long have we been playing baseball?”

Jeck scowled. “Geez Bambi, what’s with all the questions?” He walked up to the lone tree and pulled off a fruit. “Oh! I remember Peter Pan. What a great movie.” The fresh fruit pulsed in his hand, the thick tubes roped around bifurcated flesh leaking sweet thick fruit juice as he bit into it. “Wow! This is a good one. Might be the best one I’ve tasted yet. I wish Bil could try it.” He took another big bite. “Here Bambi, taste one. You’re old enough.” He pulled another from the twisted tree. But Bambi shook his head. The tree-fruit never looked good to him, but these ones looked even worse. Instead of the normal red and purple sheen, these were closer to a blue-orange. And the smell was terrible.

“Nah Jeck, I’m not hungry.” lied Bambi. Jeck shrugged and kept eating, grabbing another fruit for good measure. Bambi continued, “I just can’t help but think about the team, y’know? I’m the youngest kid I know. And I’m already eleven summers old. How are we ever gonna get to nine players when all of you go off into the woods and don’t come back?”

Jeck laughed. “You sure are curious when Otto’s not here.” He wiped some juice off his face and onto his red and white uniform. “Yeah, one day I will stay in the woods. So will Bil. Even Otto. But I ain’t gonna regret it. Cuz every summer, I got to play baseball. What more could I want? Except maybe more of this fruit.” He laughed, sputtering juice all over himself.

Bambi sniffled. Maybe Jeck was right. But he looked disgusting right now. How could he be this hungry? He just kept shoveling the fruit into his mouth. Bambi turned away from the sight when the lone tree’s face caught his eye. Its eyes weren’t fluttering anymore. They were looking directly at Jeck. He turned to the grove of trees. Every single row was also looking directly at Jeck. Bambi started to whimper. “Jeck…” But when he turned to Jeck, he screamed. The older boy had changed.

Jeck had grown, gaining at least three feet in the last minute. His juice soaked uniform was bursting at the seams. His nut-brown skin had become the pale gray of the trees around him and was rapidly growing taller and taller. His expression hardened as the skin of his neck sprouted up to surround his face and climbed towards the sky. His arms and legs thickened into trunks, splitting into pale roots and crooked branches. With a crack, his body doubled over as the weight became too much to support on two limbs. His broken back arched as his eyes rolled ecstatically. And still he grew. Bambi scrambled backwards like an animal. This wasn’t Jeck at all anymore. Bambi had to run. He needed to find Otto.

& & &

Back in the clearing, Otto squatted behind Dev’s trunk, trying to stay hidden and breathe quietly. For almost an hour the beast had been walking from tree to tree, and knocking them over. It chewed through the fleshy trunk and then pushed until the tree would fall with a bang. It would eat all the tree-fruit that fell to the ground. And then it would move on to the next tree.

A loud creaking groan echoed from the trees and the beast turned towards the noise. Suddenly from the other direction, someone came running towards Otto, scratched legs and arms pumping as they fled. Neesha! She slid behind Dev and exhaled in exhaustion and relief.

“Otto! I’m so glad I found my way back here. I heard that tree fall— You won’t believe what happened.” But Otto was barely listening, still intently watching the beast. The creature had stopped chewing and was staring in the direction of the strange moan. Neesha followed Otto’s gaze and they observed quietly until something wrapped itself around Otto.

“What the hell?!” But it was just Bambi. Bambi started crying again while hugging Otto and telling him about the strange building, and Jeck’s mutation, but the story was cut short by a roar from the brown beast. Bambi hadn’t come back alone.

Jeck had fully transformed into something otherworldly. Long thick limbs like tree trunks stretched from a tall curved barky body. Jeck’s wooden face smiled dreamily. His human eyes fluttered. The Jeck-tree-thing bellowed again, its coarse wooden roar challenging the furry brown beast. The two clashed, branches against claws, scratching, biting, mauling.

The children watched in horror, unsure of what to do. “Is that… Jeck?” murmured Otto, and Bambi nodded solemnly. Then Neesha gasped and pointed. The tree-beast had turned, revealing another face on its back.

“And Bil!” Neesha whispered, her eyes growing wide in horror. Sure enough, Bil’s face looked out from the back of the tree-beast’s body. Somehow Jeck must have found his friend and merged with him before Bil was completely consumed by the bugs. Bil’s face was still mottled with holes, curving tunnels carved by the glowing termites. The bugs swarmed over the Bil-Jeck abomination as its body continued rippling as it metamorphosed.

The remaining teammates looked at each other, terrified, and unsure of what to do. It was too late for Bil and Jeck, but no one was willing to make the first move while the beasts were distracted. Finally Neesha gritted her teeth and slapped her cheeks hard. Shaken from her stupor, she quietly led the team away from Dev and the chaos, towards the edge of the clearing. They had nearly escaped the grove when there was a loud crack like lightning and they all turned.

The Bil-Jeck monster had finished its transformation, but had become completely immobile. Rooted to the spot, the gnarled tree stood stock still, arms raised in pantomimed defiance. With its opponent disabled, the furry beast had split the trunk nearly in two, sealing its victory. The creature fell back onto its four feet and scanned the area. The children froze, as the beast planned its next move. Bambi clutched the baseball tightly, wishing he was back on the baseball diamond. After sniffing the air for what seemed like hours, the huge creature turned its back on the children and returned to its previous routine, knocking over the trees and consuming their fruit.

Bambi smiled in relief and turned to Neesha, who grinned back and turned to Otto, but Otto’s attention was elsewhere.

“Dev!” He whispered. And he took off running back towards the middle of the clearing. Sure enough, the next tree that the beast had selected was Otto’s old friend. Neesha and Bambi screamed at him to stop, but he was beyond reason. When he reached Dev, he ripped a thick branch from Dev’s trunk and started wildly swinging the improvised bat at the massive beast. The furry monstrosity roared and turned around to lock its claws onto the weapon, the beast’s great weight immediately forcing Otto to one knee. It was hopeless: Otto was outclassed by five hundred pounds. Neesha and Bambi exchanged a despairing look. Within seconds, their captain would be ripped to shreds. Neesha took a few steps forward, one arm raised helplessly towards the doomed shortstop. Bambi looked to the sky and squeezed his baseball as he started to pray. Ted, please, help us!

And then from the branch above, an acorn dropped on Bambi’s head. He had an idea.

Bambi gripped the ball and stood up, turning to Neesha. “Hey, pitcher!” She turned. “Pitch!”

Neesha’s hands flew up instinctively to catch the ball. She stared at it for a moment before realization dawned on her face. She nodded the same way she did at the mound. She stepped forward and stretched her fingers to the sky, the baseball clutched between them. She let out a loud whistle.

The shrill shriek shook Otto and the beast from their fight and both turned to look at Neesha. She nodded to Otto and began her wind-up. Otto gaped for just a second and then yanked the branch backwards out of the distracted beast’s reach. He stepped back and lifted the thick branch, holding the bottom end with two tightly gripped fists. And in the nick of time: Neesha had just ripped a fastball.

The ball hurtled towards Otto as he breathed in deeply through his nose. As the ball entered his range he swung hard. The ball cracked loudly against the bat before it scorched towards the beast. With a thick thud, the ball collided with the stunned beast’s thick skull. The woods were quiet for a moment, and the team held its breath. until the beast fell.

“Run!” Neesha yelled and the team took off together.

& & &

Miles away but only minutes earlier, Thistle had figured out how to communicate with the small brown beasts. They had helped remove him from their dam and repaired the hole his forceful entry had created. They lifted him from the water onto the land and laid him in a clearing on top of a raised mound of dirt. He was dying, of course. The wound in his side had drained him of most of his blood, but the knowledge he had gained from the beasts was worth more than a single life. Before he took his final breaths, they placed the wooden face over his own and anointed him with the juice of the tree-fruit. They laid small sticks on his chest in a decorative pattern known only to dam-builders and chirruped in unison in a circle around his body. They beat their flat leathery tails on the ground until dust rose in the air and the ground was flat. And then they went back to their dam, their rite complete.

Thistle looked up at the darkening sky and saw the moon. He wasn’t afraid of the oncoming change. He would have so much time now. More than enough time to learn everything there was about the trees of the forest. What better way to understand something but to join it?

A small sapling grew from his chest as the light passed from his eyes. It grew rapidly and he felt his consciousness expand and his sense of time slow. But before he lost sight of his humanity and his love of baseball, he sent out a message through the undergrowth. And miles away, an acorn fell from a tree onto a small boy’s head.

& & &

As the remaining teammates escaped the chaos behind them, running towards what they hoped was the stadium and salvation, their lucky baseball sat abandoned on the forest floor. Dev’s eyes stared down at it, more focused than they had been all day. Something was coming back to him, something that hadn’t been there in a long time. A root extended from the ground and wrapped around the baseball. It pulled the small scrap of leather, cork, and twine into itself, absorbing it into the innards of the treeflesh. Dev’s eyes blinked. And slowly, over the course of a few summers and many, many winters, the tree grew a smile.

* * * *  THE END * * * *
Copyright Bretton Cadigan 2024