Karthik waited in his holding room. He pondered the prospect of being eaten alive. He knew it was coming. He had known of it as a possible fate since childhood. Such was the way of the Alathur settlement.
However, he had developed a contingency. He had a plan to swap out the numbing narcotic he was given with a harmless substitute and then flee once his minder started to escort him to the feeding area.
For some reason, however, Karthik had kept this as a distant contingency rather than as a full throated course of action.
“Come. It is time”, commanded Aran, the minder.
Together, they stepped out of the brooding darkness of the holding room and stepped into the bright winter air.
Karthik’s family were not there for the day. However, he could hear his mother’s distant wailing from somewhere in the settlement. A surge of pain ran through his body much like the volts of electricity that used to run all over Pre-Crunch Earth. The pain urged him to call out to his family one last time. On a more rational level, however, he knew it was easier and more humane to have them stay away. He had known this fact since the day that his name had been chosen in the sacrifice ritual.
The day after which a dark cloud had hung over his family. Karthik’s kin had done their best to maintain a stoic stance from that point. However, he could sense the collective dread that was drowning his loved ones.
Unfortunately, he and his family were bound to acquiesce to the decision of the ritual. After all, they had all benefited and filled their bellies with the eggs that their people had been been receiving from the flock of Chicino’s lived near them.
Karthik’s settlement neighbours and fellow citizens had come out to see him off to his final destination. Regret and guilt oozed out of their ashen faces. However, they too were bound to silence and complicity. Partly out of their past participation in this grisly ritual of transaction. Partly because they were relishing the continual bounty of eggs that the creatures would provide after Kartik’s sacrifice.
He and his minder crossed the boundaries of the small settlement and crossed over the nearby hill towards the forest. As they scaled the incline, Karthik wrestled with the fact that he was not fully committed to escaping his situation. On an intellectual level, he wanted to live. However, something deep in his soul prevented him from executing on this will to live.
“You really should take the Xorox, my friend” the minder advised him. His advice was laced with an empathy and a sense of care. This was clear despite the minder’s reluctance to make eye contact with Karthik.
Karthik new that his minder had accompanied countless other members of their settlement to the Chicino’s. Karthik wondered if the business of mass sacrifice had taken a toll on the man or if he had learned to separate himself from the system in which participated. He could not help think that, despite the minders calm demeanour, the accumulation of lives sacrificed had built up and infected the mans soul.
On the other hand, perhaps the minder just did what he had to do to maintain his own constant access to the highly nutritious Chicino eggs.
Karthik twirled the small vial of placebo between his fingers. He had swapped it with the Xorox whilst the minder was distracted. Surely this would be the moment to run?
It was at that moment that he saw them. The flock.
Around twenty Chicino’s had gathered at the edge of the forestto greet him.
He had to admit that the Chicino’s were impressive creatures. Tall, elegant and visceral. Coated in gloriously shiny feathers in various exquisite colour patterns. Talons and beaks that looked like lovingly crafted blades of war.
As death loomed upon him, Karthik still could not grasp onto any kind of survival instinct. This lack of desire to live upset him greatly. It was as if something within him was broken. Something missing that would have made him a true human being.
Karthik looked into the eyes of the flock of Chicino’s. The air buzzed with the sounds of the flocks collective, rythmic humming and crows.
There was no expression in their eyes that could be discernible to humans. In fact, the Chicino’s – especially the handful of fearsome looking male Roosters at the front of the flock – had a fixed look that was a combination of aloofness and anger. Even though they were clearly calm, their faces still had a quiet intensity despite being incapable of expression.
At that moment, a revelation came to Karthik. The creatures were about to feast on him. A child of the Alathur settlement.
And, yet, he and his people had survived for generations by consuming the eggs that the Chicino’s had willingly left for them. The Chicino’s had sacrificed many of their own unborn children, in the form of eggs, for their human neighbours. In reciprocation, the Chicino’s partook in consuming the willingly volunteered human flesh from the settlement to maintain their own existence.
Humans and Chicino’s. Locked in a circular trade of giving and taking. The foundation of mutual renewal. One side could not continue surviving without the other.
Karthik pocketed the placebo and, instead, retrieved the vial of real Xorox.
His minder had already faded away. He made way for the flock, which now surrounded Karthik. They fixed him with their blakc shiny eyes.
Karthik swallowed the entire vial of Xorox with great purpose. He had not expected his conscious related to start dissolving so quickly. It seemed that the settlement had learned how to make their sacrifices as painless for the victims as much as possible.
His vision was filled to the brim with the Chicino’s that surrounded and looked down on him like a panel of judges. The ground rushed up to him as his mind lost connection with his body.
The flock collectively brought their beaks down to feed. Ash could feel a few momentary stabs of pain as as skin and flesh around his body were sliced open.
And then he felt nothing.