This was all going to change tonight. The real world would now recognised his genius, his rapier wit, his encyclopaedic knowledge of all things related to science fiction in books, films and TV shows. Payback was a bitch and he had plenty to dish out.
Tunney knelt within the circle of salt and chalk on the bare floor boards he’d found beneath the moist, ratty carpet. The Summoning had to be done with concentration and solemnity, satanic royalty would expect it. He had found no ancient words to utilise on Google, so he made up his own, putting them through a translation website to change the English into Latin. Over and over again he made his incantations with genuine fervour, belief and respect until his knees were bruised and bloodied from splinters from the floorboards.
A wan grey light insinuated beneath his perma-drawn curtains, nearly daylight. He had prayed to Ipos for many, long hours, his joints creaking and sharp with discomfort. Tunney got to his feet, kicking the candles’ smouldering stubs in disappointment, there had been no demonic visitation. Bugger all had happened.
Feeling idiotic, a dejected and angry Tunney shambled to the bathroom, tripping as his jeans fell to his knees. He pulled them up with a jerk only for them to fall down again, had he lost that much weight? Overnight?
For once, he looked in the bathroom mirror after wiping away the accumulation of dust and cobwebs, Tunney gasped as a strangers face gazed back. He knew he was pasty in complexion, with an ever present smattering of spots and his sparse, brittle attempt at a blond beard. Not this version of Simon Tunney. He had indeed lost weight, his complexion was clear, cheekbones sharp and defined. His myopic pale blue eyes, focussed and a deeper blue. Even his thinning hair was changed, now luxuriant, flowing and a rich shade of gold, to his delight he had a matching neatly trimmed and full beard.
Ecstatic, Tunney dropped back onto his now healed knees and began to shout at the top of his voice, “Praise Ipos, praise the High Prince of Hell!”
The Summoning had worked, the Infernal Bastard had actually come through for him. Unsure what to do with his new look and the surge of positive energy raging through his being, Tunney cleaned up his bedsit, no longer a fit dwelling for a grateful servant of a demonic Prince. Later he raided his savings and kitted himself with a sharp new wardrobe, throwing away most of the faded fan convention and heavy metal band T shirts and now oversized jeans. Simon Tunney was cool, how could the luscious Serena resist him now?
***
Armed with a visitor’s pass under another alias, Tunney sauntered through the crowds packing the Westminster Conference Hall. For once he was impressed; so many new conventions were badly attended disasters or ‘cancelled’ at the last minute, the organisers taking the ticket money with them. YookayCon had delivered, all the TV and film guest stars had arrived, the main hall jam packed with traders, the announced well known authors and artists were there, available for face to face discussions with their fans.
With his confident stride and relaxed demeanour, Simon Tunney found himself actually happy, even the midst of this seething maelstrom of enthusiastic humanity. He felt his usual urge to accidently trip up the entertainers moving through the crowds, the stilt walkers in their realistic Predator or Alien costumes.
Normally it was just a wicked dream, now he could act on his impulse, sending a clockwork-winged steampunk character on stilts sprawling, hitting a trade stand, scattering piles of World of Warcraft cards. As people rushed to the entertainer’s aid, Tunney laughed. He hated steampunk.
On route to the convention, he had discovered a downside of his gift from Ipos, a sulphurous whiff from his body, one he was unable to disguise with liberal applications of aftershave but once within the exhibition hall, the stench of sweating humanity soon appeared to overcome this unwelcome side effect. Another was a curious sense of detachment when he spoke. Words, clearly pleasing from the reaction of people came from his lips but Tunney had no control or understanding over what he was saying. The Summoning spell had profoundly changed him, gave him everything he craved for but it felt tainted, a perfect, delicious apple with a worm at its rotten core.
Tunney realised he had been naïve to think a Hell-spawned Prince would be purely benevolent, bestowing the gifts of better looks, confidence and wit to some insignificant human. Ipos was a demon not some fucking saint. The noxious smell was some sort of side effect, one he had no choice but to accept, he had come too far to turn back and abandon his greatest chance of gaining the success he so deserved.
Pushing such negative thoughts from his head, Tunney made his way to where Serena Brent held audience, a queen among the many younger pretenders to her science fiction star throne. His heart fell at the length of the column waiting to have an expensive photograph of the great lady signed by her fair hand. In the past, he had sneered at the patient masses at conventions, queuing to meet their idols, this time he was one of them. With no other choice, Tunney waited his turn in line
Surrounded by so many other Serena Blake fans, Tunney swore - at least he tried too - something else came out of his mouth, something the more determined people around him stoically bearing up against the sulphur stench laughed at.
Tunney baulked at first, being mocked was something he could not tolerate in any form but so powerful was the demon’s spell, he realised they were laughing with him, amused by something witty he’d said. He attempted to smile and was rewarded by good natured banter from the others in the queue. Tunney was popular.
He was however, still impatient. Standing in line with all these moronic inferiors who could not know the meaning of true devotion was unbearable, they were a living, delaying barrier to his fate-driven meeting with his goddess. Tunney gagged as the hellish smell became stronger, he considered briefly fleeing in embarrassment but found himself progressing quickly as people moved out of the queue to avoid the vile smell. As his impatient wait in line shrunk from hours to minutes, he decided this revolting side effect was a true gift from Ipos after all
Ignoring the repulsion of the more resilient or determined in the queue, Tunney stubbornly kept in line, a paperback copy of his book wedged under his arm. He would use his newly silvered tongue, his rapier wit to charm the lady into accepting his work of genius. Once he was recognised, rich and famous, no one would dare mention the unpleasant odour…he would be above them all. Untouchable.
The longed for moment came, Tunney stood before his goddess, who looked tired, far older than he imagined with tell-tale creping of her neck and back of hands. Botox and good makeup had given Serena Brent an illusion of youth from a distance, photo shopping had doctored her close-up images in the media. Desire for her faded in Tunney’s loins but not the desire for her contacts.
As he approached, her nostril’s reacted to the hellish reek, her eyes glancing up to her burly minders for help. Tunney acted fast, spinning her a line of clumsy compliments which Ipos changed into silken words of charm and seduction. Serena raised one heavily be-ringed hand and placated her entourage before fluttering her false eyelashes, over-laden with mascara or crushed miniature crows at the dashing admirer. One so much more interesting than the earnest teenage fan boys and middle-aged men losing the battle to cover their beer bellies with Endless Universe T shirts.
To the extreme annoyance of the impatient and bored waiting queue behind him, Serena lapped up the blond god’s admiration, leaning forward to expose her aging breasts as he praised her performances and her unchanging beauty. At least that was what Tunney hoped he was saying the curious detachment made it impossible for any of his gilded words to make sense in his mind. His big moment arrived, the rapport between them enough for Tunney to whip out his book and present it to the lady who could open doors for him, get past the industry gatekeepers, make his dreams come true.
Her hand reached out to take the proffered book, Tunney’s heart beat faster as her purple lacquered finger tips touched the cover. A barrage of buttons shot towards the startled celebrity as Tunney’s newly svelte six pack returned to paunchy flab. Straining from
the growing bulk, the waist band of his trousers gave way, forcing Tunney to grab them tightly. No doubt the pristine grey Calvin Klein’s beneath had returned to baggy, stained boxer shorts. The cruelty of his humiliation burnt in his face, his stomach churned, ready to retch in front of his idol as a gross form of tribute at her feet.
Appalled and frightened by the transformation, Serena Brent leapt up and scurried to the safety of the celebrity green room, ignoring the groans and consternation of her adoring fans. Focusing their ire on the shabby man in the ill-fitting suit who had upset her in some way, Tunney fled the convention hall, scuttling like a cockroach through the crowds.
He reached home angry and confused. He threw his undiscovered masterpiece on the floor and tore off what remained of the suit, replacing it with his last remaining old jeans and a well-worn, pizza stained T shirt. What had he done wrong? Had the Summoning been incomplete? Had he made a grave mistake over the words? With no blue candles left, there was nothing he could do that night, so Tunney spent an evening spewing vile comments on line. Reaching a new low in malice and cruelty, he did not let up his barrage until a mocking, bright morning and the rumble of overhead rush hour traffic forced him from his laptops and falling onto his sofa, exhausted.
By the following evening he had restocked the ridiculous sweet pea scented blue candles, pulled back the ratty carpet and re-chalked the protective circle. Last time he summoned Ipos with fervour and desperation, this time it was with a sense of grievance and anger. For hours, he chanted the cod-Latin phrases of supplication until he slumped back on his heels, exhausted and disappointed, a total failure.
There was no reek of hell-born brimstone, no sharp fall in the room’s temperature. The now clean bedsit was unchanged while outside, the morning bustle of the outside world stirred into life. He had been abandoned by his fickle benefactor. Grunting with the effort, Tunney struggled to get back to his feet, stiff and bruised again.
A lightning strike of yellow green energy coursed through the flat, bouncing off the walls, rippling as if alive across every surface and through his body, followed by a thunderous blast that sent him sprawling back onto the floor. Lying, terrified and helpless on his back, the pressure of the detonation did not fade but kept him pinned down as if a giant foot pressed down on his body, threatening to crush him, a helpless insect against unearthly power.
Silence. A long, utter silence unbroken by the mundane, no overhead traffic rumble, dripping taps, or background buzz from his many computers. The pressure on his body had finally eased but there was no entity to grovel to, no hellish being to offer abject pleas for mercy in return for Tunney’s continued loyalty and worship. He raised his head to see his surroundings unchanged but he did not relax, Tunney held his breath, convinced there was more terror to come.
A subtle tearing sound around him and a growing sense of wrongness and dread permeated every cell of his body as all the comforts of reality warped into a chilling unknown. Tunney broke into terrified shivers, his blood glacial despite the clammy warmth of his room. Silence fell again, lasting seconds, feeling like decades then the ripping noise returned, growing in volume and intensity until Tunney’s ears bled from a cacophonous, tortured banshee scream as space and time itself was rent by a brutal intrusion from an alien dimension.
A blurred maelstrom of fractured reality opened before him, mesmerizing with its whirling chaos, he could make out brief flashes of images, a monstrous eye, a fragment of charred, vast wings. Glimpses of hideous creatures in impossible forms. The descriptions of Ipos from the old manuscripts had been ridiculous, a clumsily realised beast of many parts. Could past summoners have seen these glimpses as in a maniacal kaleidoscope and their fear-maddened minds created the demon’s appearance?
Paralysed by his fright, Tunney watched as the shattered hole in reality began to slow down, to become stable. Chittering, winged things, oily black, sinuous and malevolent clambered through the rent and scuttled away into the shadows. Some giggled from their hiding places, chillingly human.
Tunney dropped his head to the floor and began to weep. Another presence now shared the scruffy bedsit, one imperious and daunting and vastly superior to the cowering human. Quaking, Tunney shut his eyes tight, too terrified to gaze on what he had brought before him. He muttered a garbled litany of supplication and desperate pleas for mercy.
The room filled with the scent of dead and decaying flowers as Ipos spoke in a deep yet curiously androgynous voice. He was that which had never been human, a cursed celestial being, a Prince of the Fallen. His angelic beauty charred, ruined by the cruel descent from grace, his universal love warped into cynicism and loathing by the curse of an unforgiving deity.
“What a curious specimen of primate.”
Tunney felt the demon all around him with no fixed point of existence, Ipos was not here on Earth, instead reaching out from a hellish dimension and touching not the human’s body but his soul. The stench of the dead, rotting flowers became overwhelming, Tunney forced back a powerful urge to retch and void himself, biting down hard on his knuckles to stay in control of his bodily functions. Losing the battle, he added self-disgust and shame to the cocktail of terror and weakness.
“My eternal burden is to ferment discord and hatred, ruin the morale of Earth’s infesting humans,” the demonic prince continued, “but it seems my aeons-old efforts are as nothing compared to the tools of this modern age.”
The sense of grievance rose above his terror, Tunney found enough strength to address the corrupted angel, his voice whiney and petulant, “Master, I did everything right, I followed all the rules to summon you. Why did you abandon me?”
A rumble of amusement echoed around Tunney, picked up and continued by the entities in the shadows, some giggling like hideous babies.
“You vain sack of flesh, shit and piss, how could you summon one such as I? A Prince among noble yet blighted angels. Your pathetic ritual merely drew you to my attention.”
Tunney’s deep ingrained sense of entitlement was unabated. “But you gave me those gifts, of confidence and wit. Made me attractive and popular!”
Ipos sent another energy wave, flattening the human onto the floor, crushing him down with a painful, bruising force. The creatures, a myriad of hellish forms, scuttled out from their hiding places, poking him with long, needle-like talons and biting him with razor-sharp fangs dripping with black ichor, their sniggering cacophony hurting his blast damaged ears as the demon spoke again.
“Your malice is exceptional, remarkable. You spread emotional pain and anguish without the faintest possibility of remorse. I amused myself with you, raised you high then sent you falling, humiliated. Gave you more incentive to spew your poisonous bile.”
Tunney felt the demon’s presence lessening, as if preparing to leave.
“So you are now one of my servants, a loyal minion, continuing to work your wickedness in this world, until you join me forever in the next.”
Horrified, Tunney tried to batter the small tormentors away but they clung with piercing teeth and nails onto to his clothes, his skin and hair, relishing his fear and anger as the source of their energy.
“I can stop this, I can go to a church, ask for sanctuary, repent.”
“You are welcome to try,” replied Ipos, his amused voice fading as it echoed across impossible distances of time and through many universes. “But you have no true sorrow for anyone but yourself, never a thought for the victims of your spite. There are many like you, but the depths of your malignancy is a thing of wonder even for a demon prince. Do what you do best, Simon Tunney. My servants will remain to protect you and keep you focused at your task.”
***
His bloodshot eyes had sunk back into deep shadowed sockets. He sat, coated with and surrounded by his own ordure and urine, his exhausted body filthy and skeletal, his clothes hanging loose, stiff with dried sweat. Tunney rarely left his computer, it was not worth risking the painful harrying by the voracious, untiring minions of Ipos. Instead
he surfed the internet under many guises, continuing to insult the recent dead, stirring up racial and religious hatred and making vile homophobic and misogynistic taunts. He sent chilling death threats and lied about his sordid encounters with the young children of celebrities. Simon Tunney was hated, hunted and living in his own hell.
The troll who lived under the bridge.
J Is For Jerobaal
The Torment of Saint Anthony
Jonathan Green
“Was nothing like that.”
I turn from my study of the painting to the old man slouched on the bench behind me, a scowl on my face.
“They looked nothing like that,” he goes on, having got my attention. His wheezing speech is slurred, but whether it’s the result of drunkenness or senility I cannot tell.
He certainly appears old. His bald, liver-spotted pate looks like little more than a skull covered with brittle parchment, the skin looking like it might tear at any moment. The beard sprouting from his chin is the longest I’ve ever seen, and so white with age it has acquired a jaundiced tinge. I see stick-thin fingers, the folds of skin covering the nodules of knuckles pale and even more blemished than the polished dome of his head. Seeing him like this, I can’t help thinking he should have died long ago.
I’d say he looks like a tramp except for the fact that he’s wearing what is either a monk’s habit, or an itinerant friar’s robe. It doesn’t change the fact that I can smell him from where I’m standing.
“I said it was nothing like that,” he snaps, becoming irritable. Although he’s speaking – or should that be ‘slurring’? – English, there’s a strong accent there that I can’t quite place. North African, perhaps? Whatever it is, he’s clearly a long way from home.
The Demonologia Biblica Page 12