It was the darkest night in all memory, rivulets of rain drops whipped against the grim trees the wind howling  like an ethereal wolf  devouring a whimpering new-born, as he struggled forwards and onward. He felt as cold as a block of ice. He was soaking wet and shivering. His eyes were downcast as if his soul had deserted him and pure muscle motion made him shudder forward another step. His mind was blank and all he could think of was his hunger.
The lights in the distance were getting closer now. They seemed unwelcoming to strangers like him; unused to companionship and habituated to the wild. Solitude is endured until everything becomes blank. Black as the shadows that hide by the fireside.
Then a shout
"Fair Robert!"
"Fair Robert returns brothers!"
"Eye, eye, Robert come close to the fire, take a seat and a drink!"
"Here, here, eye, some roast mutton, rest now brother, sleep unto the morning comes"
The rain lashed the tarpaulin as he sips from the flask. The whiskey tastes as bitter as arson and as warm as the embers left afterwards. It is not strange for men like these to sit around the fire in the wilderness in silence on nights like these.
The ghosts of men who lived here long ago comfort the forlorn. They vanish into the mist to cling to the rugged hills at mornings first grey light. He must have fallen asleep because he wakes. Some dream has carried him into another's mind on the other side of the world in the night and for a minute he does not remember who or where he is.
His mouth is parched and his breath is rotten, there is no tea and toothpaste for him here. He shakes life into his heavy limb, dropping the last yellow drops into the musk and soil beneath his feet.
A nearby stream its water as clear as polished glass, as cold and refreshing to him as the morning breeze upon his brow.
For a moment his torpor is lifted and he looks up at the brooding hills and sniffs the acidic aroma of the pine forests that cluster upon their haunches.
Even Robert must feel hope in the morning to send him onward. The mind plays tricks on all of the creatures of the Earth. They must carry on breathing just like all the rest.
On a ledge in a clearing up above upon a hill a ram watches him approach, cajoling beside a ramshackle wall made of misshapen boulders built by men who left only ruined houses like relics wrecked and thrown upon the rubbish pile like a mound of pottery buried beside the hills of the eternal empire of Rome.
He hymns to himself 'All creatures Great and Small, the lord God made them all' as he takes aim with his rifle. The butt of his rifle shudders gently next to his chest and the Ram's head explodes an instant later.
 A never ending drizzle floats down from the grey clouds above as he mechanically cuts and gouges portions of flesh. The remnants of the carnage of the corpse wallow in a rusty muddle puddle as red raindrops drip down from his black and bloody hands.

He sits watching the flesh roast. A supersonic screech engulfs the landscape. High above the Bombers are flying there daily mission. Lexington class super fortresses had been bombarding Pittsburgh for almost 300 days now. The Generals had run out of ideas and all they were doing was carpet bombing the ruins. Lord knows they were having as much good effect as when the Germans bombed Stalingrad. They were just turning into a fortress of ruins and tunnels. He remembered the hand to hand combat trying to take some high rise apartment block. They had tried to use helicopters at first but they lost too many. The drones circled high above killing indiscriminately, collaterally soldiers and civilians from both sides. You could be using ropes to climb up to the 23rd floor and the enemy could be using ropes on the other side to sneak down to the 21st floor. He could never be sure who was on his side, only the men is his company. One by one they had been gunned down or failed to return until he was left. Mad-eyed and shivering in the corner in the dark like some junkie on remission. Only god knew his terror as he abseiled down from that ruin, his rappelling seeming like thunder in his ears as he listened to the battle and whispers of men and machinations of diabolical devices of war. Then like a Rat he had sneaked his way from the city out here into the wilderness.
It was a blood-bath, it was chaos, and it was never ending. Two hulking beasts of stags equally matched brutalizing each other to death in a struggle for supremacy. Who even cared anymore? Maybe they were running our of meat for grinder now.
The mutton was ready know and he picks the seared flesh from its skewer and takes a minute to chew savor each exquisite piece, and let the juice and blood drip over his chin.

Now that his belly was full, he rested. He began to walk again. The familiar rhythm was comforting to him. It felt good to release energy. It was directionless wandering like an ancient nomad, or a dumb animal searching for new territory. He followed his feet and his instincts West, North or South every day. The clouds had cleared now and the sun was bright and the air was cool.  He was climbing steadily up a fairly steep incline and as he reached the top he saw the highway beneath him.
The highway was jam packed full of abandoned cars, or so it seemed because all was drearily quiet except the mournful wailing of gulls echoing on breezing zephyrs. The sun glinting of smashed glass, and windows. He could spot the occasional body lying prone beside the edge of the road, or caught in some ungainly position trapped between cars or rammed upon the windscreen like skeletal scarecrows. He descended downwards to investigate further. A morbid human curiosity drawing him towards the wreckage of his own kind when an animal, or a dog, or a wolf, would have recoiled and withdrawn the wild. He looks upon his reflection in the car windows, a familiar face glimpsed, our first egotistical love, comforts him, and his human brain begins to waken. To want more than the wild and the solitude. It makes him sad to see the children's toys, and the suitcases left in the cars, sometimes their contents strewn and buffeted by the wind.

At the side of the road there appears to be a dozen shelters make of junk and tarpaulin. People are sprawled around them. A man notices him, his dark complexion flushing, he starts to wave frantically,
"Hey buddy, Hey buddy, over here!"
He starts to bang a couple of tins together. A few of them stand up and squint at him as he approaches.
"Hombre!, mister!, sir! , how do you do?"
Two of them amble forwards, they are maybe 30 or 40 or 20, unshaven and dressed in modern rags, and offer there dark brown hands for him to shake.
"Make yourself welcome"
They slap his back and show him into the center of the encampment. A low burning fire smolders in the middle. Mostly women slouch round the fire staring listlessly into the distance. Small children sit playing with empty tin cans, a little boy smashes stones together his face dusty and muddy. Their pale faces seem surreal to him as he blinks in the morning light as he mumbles and nods.
A thin women with red hair asks him " Are you hungry mister?
He shakes his head, she asks him " Where you going mister? Where you coming from Hombre?"
He tries to smile but does want to grimace, so he tries to look as kindly as he feels seeing the little ones, and he does not know how to answer her questions.
She does not wait " Well we were on the road from Pittsburgh when we ran out of Petrol. We walked this far. There were tens of thousands of people at first, but we just stopped mister. We were so tired we could not walk any further. Where were we going anyway mister? Nowhere that's where! Just walking our feet down to the bone, just following people to more trouble. The promised land has been defiled mister. God's own country sinned too much. We ate the forbidden fruit mister. Do you believe that bullshit mister? Did you listen at Church? We stayed here, and here we remain until now.
How long was it Candice? I have not even been counting? Have you been marking the days in the calendar John? 6 months now. Living every day of baked beans. They had parachuted into tonnes of baked beans. Just walk down the road for a couple of miles and we has thousands of tins of baked beans. Did you know you could make hooch out of baked beans mister? Do you want some hooch mister? Yeah, mister, you better watch out after we has eaten here, all we do is sit around and fart all day like that movie mister. Are you a Latino Hombre? You speak English mister? Fuck it some of us lived in tents before the war, what's different now? Except there is no TV, maybe its better that we get to talk, but not to Fiona and George over there by the side. You do not want to talk to them, Mister, the simple life is god's life"
A younger red-headed women smiles and says "Don't listen to Mom, she likes to talk" and she giggles coquettishly " Is that a gun you have got there? Or are you just pleased to see me?" She giggles again, this time uncontrollably. The whole mess of them starts to chuckle.
"Welcome mister, the whole fucking world has forgotten about us, and you have just found us!"

Dusk slowly settles over the landscape in all the shades of deep orange, red and yellow. They are small shadows dotted upon the landscape and they squint into the horizon at the serene vista. Ripples of heat ascend like waves upon the sea into the sky. Engorged like a voluptuous flower in the autumn. A blazing simmering peach hue as the sun slips beneath the horizon. Solitary clouds race into the ether funneled by the stratospheric winds. Wind chimes whistle and clink alongside cans clanking in the breeze. The cars rust on the highway grinding down slowly into dust that mingles with flakes of skin and is discombobulated into particles. The men return. A group of five have been out hunting. They can hear them whooping and hollering in the distance. Their mission has been successful. They have found riches beyond compare in the road.
" Booze and Cigarettes"
They are already swigging from bottles, half tipsy as the long shadows hide beneath their back .They barely even notice them as they pass round bottles and potions for all asunder to enjoy. Before long the night has come and they are all wasted. They sing and dance with a joy he can never understand, no music nor rhythm is more free of care and self than them in this moment. He wonders what they talk about when they walk of by themselves. He wonders what they see when he can only observe. They stagger of piss in the bushes and shout to each other.
"You never seen a women taking a piss?"
They fall down and vomit. Smiling they return to drink some more.
In the grass he can hear them fucking like animals, groaning and giggling.
The fire burns down to its embers, he watches it wishing for a moment of rest, to sleep, to dream, life is but a mirage in the desert heat, and a dream is just a reflection of an emotion upon a dark and cool lake shaded by the trees.

Awake! Awake! Fair Robert. Thy time is here.
He wanders out into the field.
A lion lounges there, its mane shaggy and long.
It growls, a deep guttural sound, that echoes unto the night.
Around it Lionesses pace and frown.
Fear is not for the brave. Caution is for those who will have nothing to remember in their dotage.
This mighty beast bares its fangs and walks towards him.
It roars again, he can feel its pure breath upon his brow like the coolest wind. It freezes the tempest which is the madness of the molten flow of his concept of the uncertainty of purpose and fate.
For a moment he is calm. For an instant he is sure and he reaches out his hand and runs his fingers through that golden hair.!
Eye! Eye! Eye! This magnificent spirit which is the consciousness of the animal most proud. This thing, the maelstrom of kinetic energy, this killer of enormous strength, flicks an ear and listens to the air.
Arise! Arise! Fair Robert this is thy steed.
This beast falls upon its haunches and he mounts himself upon its bareback. Then stands and roars more mighty than all the horns of Jericho. Roars ten times.
The King of men and the King of Beasts. Then charges through the night with him upon his back at some distant foe. Lionesses following in his wake to hunt the evil of this earth and banish the cowardly and feast upon their quivering flesh.

He wakes. The fire burning to its lowest embers. Bodies are littered around him surrounded by broken bottles. Wheezing and coughing. Spluttering, phlegmatic morning has come.