The Red Rain

 

       Revenge came to Dan in a dream... a dream so very real it was not nearly a dream. It was a day like any other, a rotten day, but the dream made it all worthwhile.

       His boss had bitched him out twice before he had fired him. Damn him anyway! He knew his wife and mother in law would really be in a fiery mood when they found he had lost another job.

       "Damn bitches, anyway!" The whole world was bitching, as far as Dan was concerned. "Damn it to Hell, damn the whole stinking population and this stinking planet they call home. Just damn it!"

       He decided to go up town rather than home. Flagging a taxi, he could taste the beer he would order at the pub.

       Suddenly, a young woman pushed ahead of him, into the door Dan had just opened on the taxi. Grabbing the door handle, she swung it shut and glared at him as the taxi sped off.

       "Damn her! Damn the taxi driver, damn them all!!" His day was running true to form. As usual, nothing was going right. "Damn it!" He needed a drink and he needed it now.

       Still swearing, Dan looked up and down the avenue for another taxi. Seeing one coming, he flagged it and jumped into the back seat as soon as it stopped.

       The driver waited for instructions silently. There was something strange about the man, Dan thought as he gave the address of his favorite bar, his 'home away from home'.

       Traffic was slower than usual and Dan felt himself growing drowsy in spite of his anger. He caught a glimpse of the driver’s eyes in the rearview mirror. They were yellow. How strange! Yellow and almost glowing.

       The taxi halted and all of a sudden Dan and the driver were standing on the pavement in front of the Pub. The taxi was nowhere in sight.

       "Damn you, what the Hell is going on? What are you trying to pull? Who the Hell are you anyway? Damn you to Hell and all of your kin." Dan was furious.

       The driver turned and seemed to draw himself up several feet taller. His yellow eyes glowed in his face. Two large ears stood out on both sides of his ugly face.

       He bowed and rose still larger than before. "I am called Mogaan," he said. "I am sent by our master and I have come to fulfill all your Damnations, sire."

       Taken aback, Dan surmised that he must be dreaming. That was it! He had fallen asleep in the back of the taxi. "Oh, well, go with the flow..."

       Wow, this was different and a little scary, maybe a whole lot scary. This so called Mogaan was changing before Dan’s very eyes. There was long black sparse hair where clothes had been and a large hump on the back between two large clawed wings. The eyes glowed and dimmed and glowed again.

       Mogaan spoke. “Mount upon my back. I would show you what your one-thousandth damnation can bring, if you so desire.”

       Afraid to disobey, Dan climbed on Mogaan's back, trying to hold his breath from the fetid odor that rose from the hairy humped body. He climbed until he sat between Mogaan`s great wings and held to the coarse hair that grew in patches here and there.

       In what seemed to Dan a split second, they were flying over the East Coast. He could see NYC below and the gentle rolling hills that led back to the West just below the mountains.

       Rain had started to fall. It was different than any rain had ever been. It was red, glowing blood red.

       Below, traffic was coming to a halt. Smoke had stopped coming from the giant chimneys of the factories... What was happening?

       Mogaan spoke again. “It is as you desired, Dan.” Stunned, Dan peered closer at the red drenched rain landscape as Mogaan swooped lower and glided in gentle circles, allowing Dan a close-up of the people below.

       As the rain touched them, they started to disintegrate. Flesh was falling from them as they walked, their guts pouring out and tripping their skeleton legs until they fell over them in disarray... just piles of bones and ragged clothes.

       The leaves were being eaten from the trees and the very pavements were acid pocked. The huge buildings were also slowly being destroyed. Dan looked back to the West and saw that the hills were now flat and the mountains were slowly becoming barren plains.

       “Is it as you wish, Dan?" Mogaan`s voice had a patronizing tone in its deep hoarseness.

       Dan looked up as the red rain came down... running in soft rivulets down his face. He spread his hands in front of him, palms up, and caught the red drops in wonder. They were clear on his hands. There was no red stain or hue to give any clue that there was anything different about them.

       He could see the raindrops in the air, as red as the sinking sun that was just falling beneath the horizon. Dan knew that in the morning the Earth would never be the same ever again.

       He leaned nearer to Mogaan`s misshapen ears and whispered, "Yes... yes... yes…"