They'll Be Coming for You

He jerked his thumb in the direction of the young prisoner in front of him. “They’re coming for him next. Then they’ll be coming for me.” His tone was grave, his words dark and foreboding.

Like himself, the young prisoner was exhausted and filthy. His clothes were nothing but bedraggled rags. His grimy wrists and ankles were imprisoned to each other by think, clunky, black metal chains and cuffs. His face reflected age well beyond his years.

He peered forlornly down the line. There were tons of them, maybe even hundreds of them, modeled in a single-file line. Each were adorned in tattered rags and bound in shackles and chains. They were in a room, a dark, cold, dank room that reeked of sour sweat and undeniable fear. The weeping walls stretched high toward the heavens and had windows that obstructed the sun with their grime and freedom (and hope) with bars.

He nodded his beard-covered, longhaired head slowly. His forlorn, beady eyes never blinked. “I don’t know how long we’ve been here. I don’t even know where here is. The only thing I know is where we’re going.”

He thought they must be in the dungeon of some great castle. They must be safely tucked away in the hills of Tipperary, Ireland, for surely their screams could be heard for miles and no one had come to their rescue. Somewhere in the distance a clock chimed a quarter till the hour. But he did not know what hour it was chiming. He wasn’t even sure if it was day or night outside the tall dungeon walls. He didn’t know anything for sure, but the sound coming from behind a pair of heavy black iron doors. A pair of muscular, stony-faced watchmen, who were holding long, pointed spears, guarded these doors.

The silence was shattered by an ear-piercing scream. His body tensed then shuddered violently, and there was a brief flicker of terror in his eyes. His lips trembled noticeably. “I know where he went. No doubt about that. Where we’ve been, where we are is not important. The real question is where we are going when they come for you.” His eyes suddenly mirrored all his fear as he clutched the rags that were his clothes. “And they will you know. They will come for you. Because you’re in line. When you’re in line you will eventually be next.” He risked a glance at the young prisoner ahead of him and dropped his voice to a conspirator’s soft level. “Just like him. He’s in line and he’s next. They’ll be coming for him next. Then they’ll be coming for me.”

There was another blood-curdling screech from behind the heavy iron doors. He flinched back and strained against his chains as the doors suddenly crashed open. The young prisoner ahead of him screamed and began wailing, pleading for them not to take him. But the guards would not be dissuaded and snatched a hold of his chains and hauled him kicking and howling behind the iron doors. The faint chime of the clock struck even on the hour.

He exhaled a body-raking sigh. “You’d think by now it wouldn’t bother me.” He came forward in line reluctantly. “Yessum, I’ve seen this about a thousand times. By now it wouldn’t bother me, wouldn’t you think?” With his shoulders hunched slightly he scratched the beard on his chin. “But each one is worse than the last.”

There began screams, terrible heart-hitching squeals, from behind the iron doors now. He fought visibly hard to contain the tears, but he lost the battle as one by one they rolled silently and slowly from his weary eyes.

There was one last faint cry and then all was silent as death. The iron doors suddenly sprang open, causing him to exclaim in surprise. Inside, a pair of watchmen were towing the limp body of the young prisoner away. More guards were inside waiting. As they approached him, he heard the clock strike a quarter after the hour, and he turned and in a voice so lifeless, so foreboding it was almost not human said, “They’re coming for me next. Then they’ll be coming for you.”