Honeybee

Chapter 5

June 23^rd 2016, Leicestershire, England

A bird dropped from the sky, hitting the ground with a hollow thud, followed by another a few feet away, and then another. Frank James looked on in disbelief as a dozen more littered the ground around him. A golden Labrador excitedly retrieved the birds and brought them back to his owner, dumping them in a pile at his feet. Bending down, Frank picked one of them up and inspected it.

‘No gunshot wound.’ He said to himself. ‘In fact, no sound of gunshots.’

He looked up into the sky and then out across the fields and saw no signs of a disturbance.

Upon further inspection of the birds, he noticed a few featherless patches and correctly assumed that the birds had suffered from some sort of disease. Leaving them in a pile, he made a mental note to report it when he got home, and then continued his walk. The same walk that he took at the same time every day since he had opted for early retirement from a management position at a large pharmaceutical company two years ago. It got him out of the house and gave him time to rest his mind and most importantly gave him the exercise he needed to fend off the dreaded middle-age spread. The bouncy Labrador followed closely behind before bounding across the field to his right and setting off on his next exciting adventure.

Reaching the woods, Frank began to feel wheezy. He was a healthy fifty-four year old and had never suffered with any health issues, yet today, right now, he was struggling to breathe and his head was light. His eyes stung and were watery. He assumed it was hay fever, as the pollen count was reported as very high today but he had never suffered from hay fever in his entire life. The air was dry and hot and he started to sweat. Settling on the hard ground, he rested for a while until the feeling eased a little, the Labrador lovingly licking at his face.

“It’s okay boy, just having a little rest. That’s all.”

Those were the last words he would ever remember saying. A moment later the skin on his arms started to itch and then he noticed a strange rash start to develop on his forearm. More of a patch than rash, and it began to spread, moving up his arms and onto his neck, itching unbearably. Frantically scratching at his neck, he told himself he shouldn’t. It would make it worse. But at the same time it felt so good. Then the itching did get worse. The scratching got harder until he had broken the skin. His watery eyes sent tears streaming down his face as he dug his fingernails into his scalp. Leaning against a tree, he rubbed up and down to ease the itching on his back. And then, throwing his head back, he pounded it against the tree. His mind was crazy and he would do anything to relieve the irritation. The patches on his skin were developing into growths, a rough circular shape with a dimple in the middle. The brownish colour with a hint of green looked like rotting flesh, but the rapidly growing patches appeared to be very healthy. Within a few more minutes, the blood in Frank’s veins had turned dark green. Any broken skin had quickly been replaced with new skin, only it wasn’t human skin, it was an organic membrane. In his mind it was hard to believe, as he stared in shock at his hands and arms, that he was turning into organic matter. The last thought to go through his head was that of hunger, a deep hunger. He needed to feed. And then Frank was gone, his mind had been taken over by the desires of the plant-like creature he had become.

Barking uncontrollably, the Labrador bounced around the being in front of him, scared and unsure of what was happening. The being, half walked, half dragged itself away into the woods, its leafy body perfectly camouflaged against the browns and greens of the undergrowth.