people standing in a field of dried leaves.

I heard the gang coming before I even saw them. They were a very noisy lot. Their boots stomped and squelched into the ground, and they dragged our deaths through the soil.They fanned out, each looking for a particular victim. The wind carried our whispers and protests, our pleas for them to go away. As for me, I stared at the sky and prayed.I’d lost friends, brothers and relatives to these men and every day I breathed a sigh of relief that I was still alive. But not today. A shadow fell across my own and every part of me drooped.The leader—the Boss—bigger than the rest, taller than the rest, stood ramrod straight in the cemetery of my friends. His shadow shot into ours like an accusing finger.“Begin.”It was small at first, a surgical cut, a nick on my skin. Then it screeched as its teeth bit deeper, through every vein, every capillary. There was blood everywhere, on the ground, on my neighbours who were already starting to sway, dizzy with the pain, and on the overalls of my murderer, who wiped the sweat off