"Hey Jarrod, we were looking for you. We're going to head off now, thanks again." Jarrod replied flatly
"No problem." Cassandra smiled at him
"Are you going to be all right?" Jarrod managed a courageous smile
"Yes, of course." They raced together down the remaining steps and jumped into the cab. Even then they could barely keep their hands off each other, both flushed with excitement and anticipation.
Jarrod watched the cab drive off. It was impossible not to imagine their passionate embraces and the evening before them. He'd never felt such overwhelming despair. He loved Cassandra beyond all measure. He ached for her smile or the touch of her hand on his face. He would do anything for her. But to her, he barely existed. She had chosen someone else – and every time he found himself in this dream she always did and always would. Early in the morning the battalion would make a last stand against an overwhelmingly superior enemy – intent on destroying them and taking from them everything they had – including their lives. Jarrod now looked forward to the battle – he would go out in a blaze of glory. He would lead a charge against the enemy guns. Screaming out his rage and defiance – before a burst of machine gun fire exploded into his chest and expunged his life.
But then, as always, in the harsh and immediate logic of the dream he found himself holding a loaded pistol. Why wait? He felt just so achingly sad and empty. He released the safety. He held the pistol up to the right side of his head and pressed the muzzle into his temple. He felt his finger on the trigger. He couldn't think of a single reason not to blow his own brains out – here and now.
Chapter 23 – Council of War
Jarrod arrived at the entrance of the Department of Pride. The door was made of thick plates of black metal – immense and forbidding. But he felt a great sense of anticipation. When Belial had taken Cassandra, Lucifer had left Jarrod lying on the ground beside the Pit of Despair and simply walked away. Jarrod had tried to get in here earlier but without success. Now finally, he’d been summoned. For this at least Gaap had been of some use. He shuddered when he thought of Gaap – so incredibly obnoxious. How could they ever have been allies in any way? He put him out of his mind. Right now he had more important things to consider. He had to be ready to confront Lucifer. The Lord of Evil! The Prince of Darkness! He remembered his first impressions from outside the Great Hall – Lucifer was clearly sly, treacherous, ruthless, and a force to be reckoned with. Jarrod didn’t know what Lucifer wanted from him but he wanted something - and Jarrod wanted Cassandra back.
The door opened by itself and he went inside. He walked down a long wide corridor with thick black carpet and grey walls – dark and oppressive. Somehow he knew the way. He turned left and followed another corridor down to where it ended. There was a door there but it was closed. But as he approached, it also opened for him. He made his way into a large drawing room and then despite all that he’d seen so far what confronted him next still managed to shock him profoundly. He said out loud
“What the fuck?” There were five very old men and Lucifer, all of them watching a live view of the world showing up on the main wall. The five old men were all still in uniform. He recognised them instantly. He’d seen their pictures many times. Reichsfuhrer Himmler, Reichsmarschall Goring, Obersturmbannfuhrer Eichmann, Reich Minister Goebbels, Obergruppenfuhrer Heydrich. Fucking Nazis! He couldn’t see Hitler anywhere. He glanced up at Lucifer, and then it occurred to him
“Oh no, don’t tell me.” Lucifer looked over at him. He could see what Jarrod was thinking, he smiled cynically.
“Yes, that was me. My last incarnation! What a hoot that was.” Jarrod thought to himself
‘Not exactly how I would have described it.’ Lucifer and the Nazis were obviously waiting for something to happen. The live view was of the Middle East, seen from a great height. Jarrod could make out the eastern Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf and all the countries in between. It was still day time, just - so even the largest cities were only barely discernible smudges. Jarrod remembered that Heaven and Hell ran on Jerusalem time. He wondered what they were waiting for – he was sure it was nothing good.
Bizarrely, the Nazis seemed to be making a toast. They each held a small glass of cognac. Reichsmarschall Goering held up his glass and said simply
“To Sophie.” They all replied, most of them grudgingly
“To Sophie” and then drank their cognacs. Jarrod felt like he was floundering. He understood none of this. He asked
“What? What are you doing? Who is Sophie?” Goering answered, somewhat pompously.
“We are saluting fallen enemies. Sophie Scholl was a twenty two year old German girl from Munich. She was attending the University of Munich during the war. She helped to form the White Rose Resistance group. They held meetings, published pamphlets – protesting about us. A lot of pamphlets! Widely read! The Gestapo arrested her and her friends.” He glared at Himmler, who just shrugged. Then he continued. “They were interrogated. You can imagine what that was like. The officer in charge - Colonel Richter - offered her a deal. Repudiate her views and inform on the others and he would let her go. Of course he just wanted to fuck her. She refused. She was beheaded by guillotine along with the others. Butcher. That was no way to treat a fine German girl - an opponent surely, but a worthy one.” Obergruppenfuhrer Heydrich called out
“To Sophie” and they all drank another cognac. Goering seemed wistful
“If more of our own men had had that kind of honour and loyalty we would not have lost.” He replied to Heydrich
“To honour and loyalty.” And they all drank yet another cognac. Jarrod watched with amazement, he wondered how long this had been going on for. All he saw was a bunch of depraved and evil old men getting slowly drunk and burying themselves in self-deceiving, self-deluding nostalgia. They all deserved so much worse than this. He really didn’t want to ask the next question but couldn’t stop himself.
“So where is she now, not .... “ He braced himself for some perverse and intolerable reply. But Goering answered quickly
“Oh no, no, someone like her doesn’t end up down here.” Jarrod was relieved. Well at least something was right about the world. He noticed that Goering was now staring into his glass morosely. He was down here after all and so were all of his gang. He wondered what Goering was really feeling, how much was just posturing. He felt no pity for any of them. They all seemed to him to have gotten off very lightly.
Lucifer called out, drawing their attention to the live view on the wall. Something was happening. As they watched there were several very bright flashes and three expanding circles of light appeared somewhere in Israel. The Nazis clapped their hands and cheered with delight. Jarrod had a pretty good idea what must have just happened but he asked anyway
“What was that?” Eichman responded gleefully
“The Persians just nuked Tel Aviv, Haifa and one of the missile silos.” Despite getting the answer he expected he was still stunned. He mumbled
“Oh, No.” It was immediately obvious to him that this was the beginning of the end of the world. Lucifer was amused by his reaction. He walked over towards Jarrod and stood beside him. He spoke to him, mocking in tone
“What is your problem? Your own department helped set this up. Very shortly we’ll activate the terrorist attacks in New York and London. We’ve been planning this for decades - long before you went back there. Most of it was your idea by the way.” Jarrod didn’t reply. He didn’t believe Lucifer, he couldn’t – demons lie. Lucifer turned his attention back to the live view. It rapidly switched through several different scenes. Lucifer and the Nazis watched with rapt attention. Suddenly they all screamed with delight. Lucifer explained it to Jarrod.
“The American fifth, sixth and eighth fleets have just launched fighter bombers and cruise missiles – thousands of them. They’ve activated a contingency plan to erase Iranian military capabilities – bases, ships, people, all of it, everything – should take about thirty minut
es. And the Jews have launched their surviving nukes. It’s going to get awfully hot in Tehran and Qom in a couple of minutes. NATO, the Russians, the Chinese, Pakistan, India, North and South Korea – are all going to full nuclear alert. Everyone with a nuke - or a gun or a stick – is getting ready. Everyone is staring down everyone else. In about an hour we’ll contact our units and have New York and London destroyed. After that it will escalate out of all control, unstoppable, irreversible.” He paused, pleased with himself. He started laughing
“Oh, this is just too fucking good.” The five Nazis were reacting similarly. They were patting each other on the back and congratulating each other. Evidently they had played some part in the planning. Jarrod watched all of it with rapidly escalating despair. He had no idea what to do. Worse than that, he had had some role in it - possibly. He noticed with some surprise Lucifer quietly turn and leave the room. He got up and followed him out. He wanted to scream abuse at the Nazis, something - but what could he say that was even barely sufficient.
Lucifer walked back to the main corridor, turned left, walked along it for another thirty metres or so and then went into another drawing room. Jarrod followed. This one was smaller than the other but at least it had a window. Jarrod looked out – of course, what else, a view of the pit. The rate at which the lost souls were pouring down into it had, of course, vastly increased. At least from inside the room he couldn’t hear them screaming. But what about down here – the rest of Hell? Jarrod wondered if Asmodeous was still out there carefully selecting the finest females and the occasional male for barter or for his own personal use. With the portal closed and war breaking out everywhere. Marbas would no longer be going up there on raids picking out the tasty ones to bring back down and barbecue. There would be no new TV shows for Paimon’s hordes. They would have to continue jerking off to endless reruns of ‘Charmed’. Gaap was no longer concerned with merely human mathematics; he had gone far beyond it - he wouldn’t care at all. At worst he would be short an assistant or two. And then there was Belial! He stared at Lucifer. They had much to discuss.
Lucifer took a seat and then just sat there looking smug. He was waiting to see what Jarrod had to say. Jarrod snapped at him
“What are you doing about ... back there?” Lucifer replied calmly
“Nothing yet. We’ll wait a few hours and then intervene. I’ll stop them from slaughtering each other completely. We want someone to rule when we take over.” Jarrod was confused
“Take over? When?” Lucifer stared back at him with a harsh and evil look.
“Tomorrow afternoon, all going well.” Jarrod waited impatiently for him to continue, which he eventually did.
“Tomorrow morning you and I and half a million soldiers – all of our best legions - are going to attack Heaven. There is a portal not far from our main gate. It opens into a valley which opens onto the Plains of Anticipation and on the other side of that, the gates of Paradise - closed to us since the Fall, but not for much longer.” Jarrod knew of the plan by now but it still shocked him to hear it expressed so bluntly. He replied bluntly
“Didn’t we try this before?” Lucifer snarled
“Not exactly, we were thrown out. Anyway this time we’ll win.” Jarrod was not so sure about this.
“And you know this, because?” Lucifer looked at him with a pained expression.
“You must know this. We’ve been working towards this for thousands of years and never so hard as in the last hundred. Yahweh’s power is weakening – or at least his interest is – we’ve been driving them away from him all of this time. World War Three currently under way on Earth is the icing on the cake. He will be disgusted with them and they with him. The connection will be broken – or at least severely weakened. When we get to Heaven he may even be gone completely. This is what you have always predicted. Whatever forces remain will be no match for us. We will destroy them easily.” Jarrod looked at him with astonishment.
“So we are, in fact, attacking Heaven?” Lucifer replied simply
“Yes. Tomorrow morning. At dawn.”
Jarrod hadn’t yet had the chance to ask Lucifer the question that was most on his mind.
“What about Cassandra?”
Lucifer looked at him coolly.
“I still don’t know what your game is. Your actions make no sense. But, help me, be part of the attack, no tricks and you can have her back. If you don’t or if anything goes wrong I’ll have her thrown into the Pit. The certainty of this must limit any ambition you have or will have to deceive. To tell you the truth you are not much use to me in your current form. But there’s no way I’m leaving you here.”
Jarrod could see that he didn’t have any choice, he replied simply
“All right”
At some deeper level, somehow, he knew that this was what he had wanted all along. This is the way he would achieve his own goals. But what were they? He was puzzled by these thoughts but was careful to reveal nothing.
Lucifer watched him carefully. He couldn’t understand Beelzebub’s actions in any way: his life on earth, his return in human form, the female. Beelzebub in love – what an absurdity! Was it possible that whatever plan he did have had gone off the rails and now he was stuck in his own trap? Stuck in human form because of his connection to the female? Or was this just what he wanted them all to think? Lucifer remained wary. He continued watching Jarrod for some time then he asked him directly
“Why are you still in human form?” Jarrod just shrugged
“I don’t know.” And he really didn’t. He knew no other form; to him this was who he was. It continued to worry him immensely that Lucifer and all of the other demons so easily saw someone else. But Lucifer persisted
“Why did you incarnate the way you did. It makes no sense. What were you trying to accomplish?” Jarrod shrugged again
“I really don’t know.” Lucifer was watching him intently – with great malice and suspicion – and Jarrod knew this. But he honestly didn’t have the slightest idea. Lucifer mocked him
“You told me you wanted to make a study of love - to understand it. You said it’s why we always lose. What a load of crap. And we don’t lose that often by the way.” Jarrod looked back at him, puzzled. He had some faint memory, some pale hint of recognition. He spoke slowly
“I vaguely recall that conversation.” Lucifer continued to mock him
“If that was your goal you certainly fucked it up. Fuck up after fuck up. Yes I was watching, very carefully. Your first girl friend, the student - who you obviously felt nothing for - randomly killed in a park. And after that, you were even more useless, pathetic. No connection, no empathy. You just didn’t have it in you. All those women! You were cold and dead, you might as well have been fucking rubber dolls – because that’s all they ever were to you.” Jarrod listened carefully. It did put his short and unhappy life into some kind of perspective. He’d never understood it at the time. He ignored the irony of being lectured to about lack of empathy by Satan. He was starting to feel morose. He thought to himself
‘But then it did after all, almost end well.’ But this didn’t help. He spoke out loudly, in his own defence
“I did fall in love at the end.” Lucifer replied harshly
“Ah yes! Cassandra! The mighty Beelzebub pining over a fucking female. Doubly pathetic. And you fucked that one up too. She left you. Her choice. I was there.” Jarrod couldn’t deny it and didn’t reply. If only he could just see her again, talk to her; ask her why she did it. He had to see her. There had to be some small chance. He was suddenly lost in an image from his recurring dream. He was once again dancing with Cassandra in the concert hall in Vienna. She was wearing the same long red gown, face glowing, eyes shining brightly - her beauty simply dazzling. They held each other tightly and moved elegantly to the rhythm of the waltz. He felt a pang of loss and longing that was almost unendurable.
Lucifer watched all of this with cynical disdain. He knew Beelzebub was lying. He just didn’t know how or why
. There was a knock on the door and one of the lesser demons came in. He spoke quickly.
“Master, you summoned me.” Jarrod was surprised for a moment. Then he remembered the telepathy. That would be a very useful skill. While he was thinking this, Lucifer replied to the demon.
“Ah yes, Botis. Get two soldiers and take out those five old assholes in the main drawing room. Do it suddenly, cut their throats and throw them in the Pit. Botis saluted
“Yes Master.” And then turned around and left. Jarrod looked at Lucifer incredulously
“So much for loyalty and honour.” Lucifer smirked
“Their words not mine. I’m just tired of them. They are of no further use to me. I don’t know why I put up with them as long as I did.” He put on a fake and exaggerated expression of disappointment and rejection, almost pouting, before continuing. “And after all this time, still, none of them will put out. Well, not willingly, and I’m sick to death of having to beat them into submission every single fucking time.” Jarrod was not displeased by this latest revelation. It was a stark image. Maybe the Nazis hadn’t got off so lightly. Fucked up the arse by Satan nightly and then thrown into the Pit to rot for all of eternity. Good ! He replied sarcastically
“Another little glimpse into life in Hell.” Lucifer snarled at him
“Fuck you.”
Jarrod was starting to feel angry. The situation was just so absurd and so impossible. Cassandra had left him by her own choice. He didn’t see any way of getting her back. She didn’t want him. As for the other women Lucifer referred to and his whole wretched life on Earth, how much of it was his own fault, really. Other people in general were impossible to deal with: treacherous, self serving, vain and so very easily offended - above all intellectually, so utterly limited – and that was putting it mildly. Constitutionally incapable of simple direct honesty, any semblance of objectivity! Women in particular were a complete enigma. How was it possible to ever have even the slightest fucking clue what they wanted? Except for when they wanted to rip his face off because he was not sufficiently infatuated with them. That bit was clear enough. He thought of every slight and every insult that he’d ever endured - each of them recalled in complete excruciating detail. Had he not always done his best to avoid trouble – to simple stay out of the way of the multitude of overly aggressive mediocrities who just wanted to shit on him for some reason or other or simply because that’s what they liked doing? And for what? For this? He didn’t deserve this. None of it was his own fault. He’d thought that Cassandra was different – that she got it. Then she betrayed him too. It all hurt so badly and the only possible response was rapidly growing anger – white hot burning rage.
The Department of Hate - A Love Story Page 25