The Wrath of Jeremy

by Stephen Andrew Salamon

  “Who’re the good guys here, and who’re the bad guys?” Jeremy asked out loud, with his tears starting to fall again. “I don’t understand, God, I’m Lucifer, but I’m delivering the wrath for you. You’re a good guy, but then what’s Jastian? He can’t be the bad guy,” cried Jeremy, fearing this exasperation was going to get out of control.

  Just as his nerves were ready to burst, the door to the room opened up. A cold draft entered once the door was fully opened, causing shivers to travel through his flesh. Jeremy turned around and saw a man with beautiful almond skin holding a briefcase in his left hand, draped in a suit of elite material and shoes that gave out an aroma of fresh leather. He sat down in Jeremy’s chair and just smiled at him, as if he found some humor in Jeremy’s reactions of exhaustion and drowned out, submerged nerves that were still trying to grow in him.

  The man cleared his throat, held a piece of paper in his hands with a list of names on it and spoke: “Alright, Jeremy, I have to talk to you urgently. I heard Michael, David, Gabriel, Sam and Mary’s story about what the hell is happening and why they went to Amman, Jordan. I already talked to you yesterday and you told me the same thing. Jeremy, I can’t accept your story about you all being the deliverers of God’s wrath.”

  Jeremy began pacing up and down the room, pleading, “But it’s true, all of it is. Listen to me, Josh, I want to not believe it, but I know what I saw, and I know now what I am!”

  Josh got up from his seat and threw his briefcase on the floor with infuriation and anger, yelling, “Jeremy, if you say you’re the cause of the sun being black, and the seas being drained, and Grewsal vanishing to dirt, then your crazy ass is putting yourself on the line here!” Josh grabbed Jeremy by his arm and guided him to the window in a fast manner. “Look at that, some of those people are believers of your story and some aren’t. Some of those people believe your lies!” Josh screamed out before Jeremy pulled away from his clench. “Ever since this story leaked out, those extremists and the chaos that’s already occurring have doubled, all because of you!”

  “They’re not lies, I’m telling the truth, Josh. This whole thing with the rain, wind, drained seas, Grewsal and the sun, those are our doings; we caused that to happen!”

  Josh grabbed onto Jeremy’s arm again and pulled him up to the window once more, screaming with rage, “Look at those people! You’re going to have to tell them all of your tall tales, those are what the people out there are going to expect to hear from all of your mouths!” Josh then let go of Jeremy and walked back to the table, trying to calm down, attempting to breathe more slowly and construct his posture by standing up straight so he could take breaths more easily. “Okay, listen to me, Jeremy, just let it go, let this whole story go. If you don’t, you will pay for it. This story of yours has reached the minds and eyes of the entire U.S.A. and almost the entire world. If you say it was all a lie now, it won’t be too late. But if you keep on saying that it’s true, then when December twenty-fifth comes and the wrath doesn’t happen, this world who believed all of you will hate you,” said Josh in a calm fashion, picking up his briefcase from the ground.

  “You got Sam Anderson involved in this, you got Mary Callahan involved…last but not least, you got all of your parents involved. Every single one of your parents says that Curtis Henderson and Victor Hayes said the same story that you all speak of. But Curtis and Victor deny that, and look what happened; your parents are in a mental institution in Kansas City. The reason why you boys aren’t in that same institution is because of all those people out there,” Josh explained, pointing toward the window. “Some of those people believe you all, and, like I said before, some don’t. They are the reason why you were spared from going to Kansas City!”

  Josh then paused after he noticed Jeremy was starting to cry, a sort of weep that only a man with innocent bewilderment would give. Jeremy put his left hand up to his face and felt the tears that fell from his eyes, not wanting to cry anymore. He then took his hand away and looked at the wetness on the tips of his fingers, seeing cuts on his fingers that were caused by the cross back in the Holy Land.

  Calming down from the tears that he saw from Jeremy, Josh said in a subtle way, “If you let your story go now, Jeremy, and say it was one big prank, then your parents will be allowed to leave the institution, and everything will go back to normal again. That’s the deal. I admit, the seas being drained caused me to believe your story a little bit. But just a little. Wanting to understand the unexplainable would cause anyone to be desperate enough to turn to your story. Everything that happened to the sun, seas, and Grewsal happened because of nature, Jeremy. Scientists will and are going to find out what happened very soon; they have to. It’s all a part of evolution. Anyway, just say that you all are lying and I promise you that your lives will not be harmed because of this little prank,” he explained as Jeremy kept on looking at the cuts on his fingers.

  Jeremy walked up to one of the mirrors, emulating his reflection with its large, clean body of glass, and looked at his cuts in the image closely. He then turned to Josh’s reflection as he wiped his tears away with his other hand. “Do you believe in that?

  “Believe in what, Jeremy?”

  “Evolution? You mentioned it.”

  “Yes, yeah I do. Why?”

  “Did you fail to realize that evolution is only a theory that man, somehow, some way acts as if it’s a proven law, one hundred percent true? Accessing something that’s seems so simple to our eyes, versus the complex strategy that believing a God could only do it, allows us to accept it, to believe, to teach it, and to honor it as the truth. I remember my teacher taught me about evolution and he used it just like you used it; like a proven law, preaching it to us like it was a law of science. Even the science books taught it like it was a law. It’s a theory, Josh, a theory that caused the existence of God to be argued upon, as if science became the new religious belief that one goes to first, instead of going to a God they should believe in. And what’s the Bible, Josh? Is that a theory? No, it isn’t, it is the word of God, but people still argue that it could have been written by anyone. If science taught the Bible the way they do evolution, everyone would believe it. But because the Bible is true, it doesn’t need anyone to defend it. Go figure.”

  “But on a deeper, more personal note, ever since I discovered who I really am, and why I was sent to this earth, I realized that my sickness was not a sickness at all. When Jesus told all of us that we would be cured if we went to the Holy Land, I thought ‘Hey, why not go? I’ll be cured and everything will go back to normal.’ But now I realize that we were never ailing to begin with, they just forced that into our heads, just like that damn evolution being a law when it’s not… I thought I was crazy for a while, but now that I see the cuts on my fingers, I understand that it all happened and it wasn’t a figment of my imagination.” Jeremy’s voice came to a stop and a smile of relief came to his face, absorbing the truth of his sanity with a zealous feeling. He turned around to face Josh and showed him his smile.

  “My life was normal before, but after my seventeenth birthday it changed to being totally abnormal. Yet, now I understand that it was normal the whole time, I was just too caught up in man’s clichés of a person being crazy and untamed. They say if you see angels flying, you’re crazy. They say if you see statues moving, you’re insane. And lastly, if you admit that you’re Lucifer, you’ve lost it. But I’m not crazy and I didn’t lose anything. Everything we admitted to you people we admitted through our souls, not our minds. I’ve heard of a crazy mind before, but not a crazy soul. Josh, this is not a prank, it is true what we speak. We are the deliverers of the wrath.”

  Josh opened up his briefcase and pulled out a stack of papers in a speedy fashion as the anger grew inside of him toward Jeremy’s monologue of—to his ears—insanity. “Alright, you little shit, you all speak about some ‘Unbounded Testament’; no one has ever heard of it. You all speak of eight signs to the wrath, but the Bible doesn’t speak of it. Last but no
t least—” Josh said in an annoyed nature before he pulled out the Shroud and Kerchief from his briefcase. “You all say that this is what Jesus looks like, and that this is what he was buried in. You talk about flashing light that came from these two garments, but how come I don’t see flashing lights now? This story is so far-fetched that scientists won’t even give us the time of day to test the carbon amount in these garments to see their ages.” Josh threw the Shroud and Kerchief toward Jeremy and they fell to the ground as Jeremy watched Jesus’s image fall face first to the green floor.

  “You also say that you have powers, but ever since you’ve been here, I haven’t seen any powers come out of any of you. Jeremy, I have been watching the interview that was taped the day you came here, over and over again. Every time I watch it, I try, Jeremy, I try to find some plausible thing that your story has, but nothing is plausible about it. Nothing in the Bible can vouch for your story. This story is making many religions furious; it’s also making many religious people afraid. You want to know what they are afraid of, Jeremy?” Josh yelled out, piercing his rage-filled vision toward Jeremy picking up the Kerchief from the ground. “I said, ‘Do you want to know what they are afraid of Jeremy?’ Huh?”

  “Yes, I want to know: what are they afraid of?”

  “They’re afraid that you all might be telling the truth. Every priest, every rabbi, every sinner, and every religious person is afraid that your story has truth to it. The Pope even fears it. In just five days, you have been able to scare the shit out of every human being on this earth almost. I want to know why you’re doing this, Jeremy, why?” Josh screamed at the top of his lungs while Jeremy kept on focusing on Jesus’s image on the Kerchief.

  Jeremy placed the Kerchief on the table and Josh looked at it. He then walked up to the window slowly and wept, “So, you want to know why we are doing this?” He walked back to the table and Josh nodded to his question. “You know, whenever a human being doesn’t see the truth with his or her own eyes, then to them it’s a lie. If they’ve never seen God, then they don’t believe he exists. Not all of course. This Unbounded Testament that we told you about is a good example of what I’m trying to explain. For instance, you all feel if the Bible doesn’t speak of it, then it’s a lie. But why is it that you all believe in the Bible’s words? I mean, you don’t know for sure if it’s true. Well, the reason why you believe it is because of faith, and also the clichés humans gave to it. You feel that the Bible is good: well, why can’t it be bad? You feel that God wrote the Holy Book, why couldn’t someone else have written it? You feel that it is a non-fiction book, why can’t it be fiction?” Jeremy explained before he picked up the Kerchief and began staring at Jesus’s image again. “The Unbounded Testament that we speak of is something that I don’t even understand, but I know it’s true. The powers that we have are no longer with us because the Lord wants the people to believe without seeing … he wants them to use their faith. He took away our powers of having him create miracles for us because of that. The reason why we are doing this is very simple and it’s something that we’ve told you over and over again for the past five days. We are doing this because we were chosen. We made a promise to God that we would deliver his wrath and break his promise for him, the promise to never attempt to destroy the earth again. But I made the greatest promise of all as I explained to you before. I made the promise to deliver the wrath, and after that, I will no longer be called a fallen angel. If we succeed in delivering it, then my soul will be filled with my father’s love once again and I will sit on the left-hand side of him like I did at another time. The only memories that I have are why I’m here and who I am, as I was told, that’s all. I—” Jeremy attempted to elucidate in a clear manner when Josh interrupted him.

  “That’s another thing that I don’t understand. Jeremy, how is it that you remember who you are and why you’re here, but you don’t remember anything else?” asked Josh in a roar. “I mean, either you remember or you don’t remember!”

  “Well, it’s sort of like a baby being born and having the father leave it while it’s still in the delivery room. Through that child’s life, the mother shows it pictures of its father and tells the child what he was like. Finally, when the child grows older, the father returns and the child knows him because of the photos his mother showed in the past. The child doesn’t remember anything about him; all the child remembers is that he is its father. That’s what my memory is: I know who I am and why I am here, but nothing else. When God touches his feet on the earth that is when our memory will return fully. Luke said to me that some memories might slip into my mind here and there, but I pray they don’t. I mean, every laugh, every cry, every moment that we had in Heaven will come to our memory once again fully when the wrath is complete. I’ve seen Gabriel, Michael, David, Christopher and Peter picking on me when I was an angel in Heaven. But I don’t remember it, I’ve just seen it. I already explained that to you before and you keep on asking me about that,” said Jeremy with stress, handing the Kerchief to Josh quickly.

  “Here, I don’t care if you believe me or not. I don’t care if you don’t believe that this is Jesus’s image. All I care about is my loved ones, and I don’t want them burning. So, I have to deliver the wrath, I have to in order to save their souls, as well as my own!”

  Josh gawked at Jesus’s image on the Kerchief and paused for a moment. “You know, Michael, David and Gabriel are in rooms like this one in this building right now, and they’re probably saying the same story as you, Jeremy. Sam and Mary left two hours ago and went to New York where they are waiting to go on The Frederick Redone Show in two days. That’s what this is about, Jeremy. The Frederick Redone Show is a big-time talk show, and he reaches millions of people every day. All of you are scheduled to go on his show in two days, and I was sent here to try and stop you all from this story of yours,” Josh explained in a calm tone.

  “You told me that some guy by the name of Luke said to spread your story to all the people, and try to make them believe in your story without using powers. Jeremy, when you go on that talk show, you have to understand that the people aren’t all going to be nice to you. What I’m trying to say is if you go on the show and explain in detail about your story and mission, it will change this world for the worst. What do you think will happen when a person from the audience asks you why the sun is no longer there? What do think will happen when you reply ‘Ah, well, my friends and I are the cause of the sun’s disappearance, sorry’? I’ll tell you what will happen, they’ll get angry at all of you and maybe, just maybe, someone will try killing you. This isn’t a game, Jeremy!”

  “Listen, Josh, it wasn’t our idea to go on this stupid television show, it was Curtis and Victor’s idea. They want us to go on it for the simple fact that they know once the people hear our story by us telling it live, that they will definitely try stopping us from also delivering the wrath. Curtis and Victor feel that if they have the whole world on their side, then there is no way in Hell we will be able to go to the Holy Land and deliver it. But they’re wrong, we will get to the Holy Land before December twenty-fifth, and we will deliver it. I know this isn’t a game, but I think that you all do,” Jeremy stated, turning around and facing the mirror. “I know there are people behind that mirror, they’re probably tape recording this whole session. Well, to make the record straight, this isn’t a game!” Jeremy yelled. The people behind the mirror took a step back from it and began to feel fear.

  Josh put the stack of papers back into his briefcase and slowly walked up to Jeremy. He looked at Jeremy’s face through the reflection that the mirror gave and smiled, saying, “Jeremy, I have been working for the FBI for thirty-two years, and I have never, ever, ever had a case like this. I have dealt with killers, convicts, rapists, cult members and even bombers, but I have never dealt with a story like this before. You are a seventeen-year-old boy with an incredible story, and personally you top all of the rapists, killers and others that I have ever seen. I never feared any case I worke
d with, but, strangely enough, I fear yours. Jeremy, I want to know who the good guy is in this story of yours. You speak of Christopher and Victor as if they were the bad guys, but then you say that they’re trying to stop the world from ending. You say that you all are trying to destroy the world, and that you are Lucifer. Personally, I feel that Lucifer is a bad guy, and also attempting to destroy the world is bad. The only difference that makes your story confusing when deciding between good and evil, is that you all were sent by God. Jeremy, the plane is leaving in an hour and it will take all of you to New York where you will tell your story on that talk show in two days. Before you go, I want you to answer that last question. Who’s the bad guy, and who is the good?” Josh asked in a pleading, but calm voice, seeing Jeremy turning away from the mirror.

  Jeremy began to walk over to the table, picking up the Kerchief from it gently. He showed perplexity on his face, and with it came tears that fell from his eyes once again. He pivoted to face Josh again. “I don’t know…why is it for us to decide between good and bad?” asked Jeremy while his tears dispensed from his eyes more quickly. “Maybe there aren’t any bad guys. Maybe it’s just good trying to be better, and arguing in the process. Josh, when I found out that my name was ‘Lucifer’, I tried to believe that I was still the good guy and that Curtis and Victor were the bad ones. But now I feel that really no one is the bad or good guy. If I heard a story about people wanting the world to end, I would believe right away that they were the evil ones. But the thing is, God isn’t evil, and he’s the one who wants us to deliver it. They say that sinners are bad, but are they? Maybe the sinners are really good inside. Satan was an angel before, and that means he, or I, was a good guy before. But maybe we’re all sinners, and this world is our Hell, therefore we all are bad guys trying our hardest to be good. All these questions will be answered when Judgment Day comes into hand.”