by Bruce Talmas
It never ceased to amaze me how beautiful a city could look from on high, and how incredibly ugly it was when you were down on the ground. All night long, I found my gaze drifting away from the city and out toward the unseen desert, my thoughts following, wondering what choice Junk had made in the end and whether he would survive it or not. Did he go back for the water, or was he just tripping his face off in the desert, waiting for the end to come?
The first bottle of wine didn’t do much for me, so I grabbed one of the other open bottles and tried hard to get drunk. Whenever I chose, I could drink as much as I wanted without getting intoxicated, as I did in Jeung’s bar the night before. I had control over how my body processed alcohol, so if I needed to stay sober it was no problem. Unfortunately, sometimes I had trouble just allowing the alcohol to work its magic. Once I would get to a certain level of drunkenness, my body would naturally begin to sober itself up. It was one very annoying side effect of being a demon.
The whole time I looked out the window, a part of me was dreading what was to come next. The following day was going to be a long one, and I hadn’t slept in four nights…not counting my catnap on the plane. I had put it off as long as I could, but it was unavoidable. I needed rest, and, like it or not, I was going to have to let go of consciousness for at least a little while.
My sleeping disorder had to be taken into consideration though. It was a unique disorder: Every time I nodded off, I went to Hell. Not just bad dreams or restless sleep. Actual Hell. As a demon, I was psychically linked to the land of my origin, which would be no big deal if the tyrant who ruled my homeland didn’t hate me. Unfortunately, since he did, he used those times when I was most vulnerable to have his revenge.
Lucifer never understood why I did the things I did. He viewed me as a Jesus wannabe—which was really about as bad as it could get in his eyes. As such, his favorite thing to do was to crucify me every time I went to sleep. A bit clichéd, I thought, for one of his stature, but it was effective. His punishment was not just the psychic remnants of remembered pain, but a true physical torture that caused bleeding wounds in the waking world.
The technical term was stigmata, but most stigmatics were very religious people. They devoted their entire lives to honoring God.
The joke was on them. All I had to do was piss off the devil.
So, with pounding heart and frayed nerves, I lay down on the plush hotel mattress and waited for it to begin.
As it turned out, I was more exhausted than I thought. It didn’t take long at all.
I am back in the desert. It is similar to the desert in which I’d abandoned Junk, but it is not the same. There is no desert on Earth like this one. This desert is on fire. Pyres burn every hundred feet or so, and amidst each inferno stands a cross. This is the desert I know. This place, in many ways, is more home to me than anywhere else. It is pain and suffering and torment. All things with which I am comfortable. All things which in many ways I crave.
I hear some of the people cry out, but most have been here so long that they simply suffer in weary silence. It is inaccurate to say Hell is unbearable. The soul can bear so much more than most people could ever guess until they get here. This is where they find their limits. But suffering is just like any other human endeavor: the more you push, the higher your tolerance. Hell is all about finding your limits. It’s an admittedly sadistic form of self-actualization. Tony Robbins ain’t got nothin’ on Lucifer.
The endless stream of suffering passes before me, a funeral march for the damned. I assume it is the same for all the others, but I take no solace in that belief. There is no safety in numbers here. We are all forced to bear the burden of our sins alone.
I can see it all: the torment that I have caused, and the torment that has been done to me. I feel it all: the anguish of a lifetime distilled to a single moment of suffering that can last as long as Lucifer wishes.
I see the girl named Anna as she once was. A young girl of fourteen, innocent and pure. I see the wound open the pale white flesh of her neck and the blood spill onto the fiery sand below. She holds her hand there for a moment and touches her finger to the crimson liquid flowing from the wound. She points at me as if to say, You did this…
I see my Father. My human Father: the man who had taken me in and raised me as his own when the rest of the world had forsaken me. He is on his knees praying for salvation, but not his own. It isn’t his to give though. God no longer hears his voice. Not after he allied himself with me. God does not abide such treachery. Still, the old man continues to pray, even as I raise the knife and plunge it into his back…
I see Junk wandering through the desert, delirious from the heat and withdrawal. He moves slowly, staggering from exhaustion. He falls to the ground. Tries to get up, but he is too weak. Finally, after a herculean effort, he gets to his knees, but that is all. The hand of a long-buried Angel reaches up from the ground and clutches him in its grasp, pulling him down into the depths below…
I see Katie Silva, naked and bound, as Anthony Jeung rapes her. She’s waiting for me, but I will be too late. The most recent of my many failings. I see her try to scream, but no sound can escape as Jeung chokes her. I am too late…
I bear witness to the cruelty of the world, a cruelty that I add to every day of my abominable existence. The shame is suffocating. My soul crushes under the weight of it, just as my body is crushed under the weight of gravity as I lay nailed to the cross. I don’t remember how I got there, but it doesn’t matter. It is where I belong.
The words I’d spoken to Katie ring in my ears, mocking me.
“We all have things in our past that make us ashamed. Things that we’ve done, and things that were done to us.”
I want to cry out, but I will not. Never. Sentence me to a thousand eternities, I will not break. Not here, and not on Earth. I will continue. Punish me for my sins? I’ll show you sins you’ve never seen before. I will show you fear in a handful of this barren dust.
Every time it is the same. Every time it is different. Too many sins to recount. Only when I am back in Hell for good will I be able to have all of my sins laid out before me.
This is just a taste.
Chapter 10
I woke up in a cold sweat. The sheets were soaked by a mixture of sweat and blood from my pierced hands and feet. I forced myself to remain still until my breathing returned to something approaching normal. When I was finally calm, I healed the wounds on my hands and feet, watching as they scabbed and peeled to reveal the pale pink scars that Katie had noticed two nights earlier.
I opened my eyes and looked at the clock. It was 7:06 am. I’d been asleep for a little less than six hours, but it felt like years. Hell had a funny way of fucking up my sense of time. The smell of sulfur still filled my nose. I could even taste it on my tongue. Staggering to the bathroom, I managed not to vomit until I got to the toilet. After puking out all the wine from the night before, I felt a little better, but the sulfur smell remained. A couple dry heaves later, and even that began to dissipate. Unable to trust my legs to keep me upright, I leaned on the bathroom sink and stuck my head under the cold water. It did the trick. I could feel it washing away the heat and stench of Hell. Once I felt clearheaded enough, I toweled off and returned to the bedroom.
It looked like a crime scene. Blood was spattered all over the silk sheets and pillowcases. The covers were singed around the edges and were blackened with scorch marks in the shape of my body. Bloody footprints tracked my path to the bathroom, and a sickly burning smell hung in the air. The Bellagio cleaning staff was not going to be happy with me. This was a non-smoking room.
The thought made me want a cigarette. The room already reeked of burning flesh and sulfur, so adding a little cigarette smoke wasn’t going to make things any worse. A quick search of my bundled clothes yielded a cigarette and a lighter. I had to wait for my hands to stop shaking before I allowed myself to light the cigarette. One big drag brought the world back to me in relative normality. My jaunt th
rough Hell quickly started to fade from my memory, just like any other dream.
Fuck, did I hate that.
I finished the cigarette slowly, letting my jangled nerves stop quivering. It took a while, but eventually my pulse and breathing returned to normal. I stopped sweating and rolled my neck around, trying to get back my equilibrium.
A shower and a shave got me to the point of feeling almost human, which, given the fact that I’m almost human, was as good as it was going to get. I began to think ahead to what I needed to accomplish that day. The first priority was to not get killed. If nothing else, my little Hellish getaways were a damned good motivator to keep from dying.
The last time I’d been to Vegas, Marcus was running a battered-women’s shelter on the far end of the strip. He was the man I needed to see. I hadn’t heard anything of him in years, so I assumed he was still there. If anyone in this town had knowledge that was useful to me, it would be him. Unfortunately, if anyone in this town had reason to kill me, it would be him as well. It made asking for advice a little bit tricky.
Thinking of possible tacks I could take to try to get Marcus to help me, I finally decided I was just going to wing it. My mind was still too muddled to form a coherent strategy, and deep thinking was only going to hurt my head at that moment. Improvisation was always my biggest asset in times like these.
I walked out of the Bellagio and into the bright desert sun. Vegas in the morning was a strange animal. The normal pulse of the city is different from anywhere else on earth. Most of the visitors who’d been partying all night had just recently gone to bed, but there were still the actual residents of the city that had jobs and commutes and all the other garbage that working schlubs everywhere had to deal with. Those contrasting energies plowed into each other all over the city, lighting the atmosphere like a daytime aurora borealis to my demon sight. The rest of the world could have their booze-besotted, neon-lit Vegas nights; for me, this was when Vegas really sizzled. It always gave me a strange sensation of temporal displacement that made my head buzz, like I was in two places at once. Having just spent what felt like years in Hell didn’t help.
I decided to walk the strip instead of getting a taxi or stealing a car. I normally tried to avoid the daylight, but after the night I’d had, the natural heat of the sun worked to burn away the effects of the supernatural Hellfire. It made me feel like just another citizen, and for once that wasn’t an entirely unpleasant proposition.
It’d been a long time since I’d seen Marcus, but he was infamous for holding grudges. I tried to envision how our meeting might unfold, but most scenarios ended with him trying to kill me. I only hoped that spending all those years at the women’s shelter had mellowed him out a bit.
After walking for a good long while, I found the mission that housed the shelter. There was a faint Obscuring masking the place, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. The shelter had been Obscured the last time I visited Marcus, but it was done as a measure of protection for the women from their abusers; it wasn’t done to prevent Marcus from being discovered. Even if he’d left the shelter, he might have maintained the Obscuring for the women’s sakes.
I went up the steps and through the revolving front door. The shelter was laid out like a business, with a reception area in front furnished with uncomfortable vinyl chairs and large stacks of outdated women’s magazines. The room came complete with a stern-looking older woman with her hair pulled back so tightly I couldn’t tell if her attempt at a smile was just that or if her face was ripping apart at the mouth. She gave no other indication that she was at all happy to see me.
I couldn’t blame her for her cold demeanor. She spent her days dealing with women who’d been beaten by their husbands over and over again. Hard not to look at all men as the enemy after dealing with that. She also wore a wedding ring of her own. If she was married, I felt sorry for her husband. This was the type of woman who would take her work home with her.
Also, I was an assassin and partially-reformed serial killer, so the distrust was absolutely deserved. It probably meant she was a good judge of character. That could be a problem.
“Can I help you?”
“Is Marcus around?”
She frowned as though my question were completely unexpected. Maybe Marcus had left after all. I waited in awkward silence, unable to tell if she was unhappy with me or if she was simply pondering my question.
“I’m not sure,” she said finally. “Let me check. Who may I tell him is here?’
I thought about giving her a fake name, but getting in to see Marcus through subterfuge didn't seem like the best way to try to mend fences. On the other hand, if I gave my real name he might just refuse to see me altogether. Then what?
I flipped a coin in my head. “Jacob,” I replied.
“Last name?”
“Just Jacob.”
The receptionist left the room, eyeing me the whole way out the door to make sure I didn’t steal anything. I figured Marcus was there. The receptionist wasn’t a good liar. I just needed to see him face-to-face without causing a scene. I sat down in one of the chairs and read an old copy of Cosmo. I took a test on what kind of man I was attracted to. It turned out I was drawn to bad boys. Who'd have thought?.
“I’m sorry,” said the receptionist as she came back through the door less than two minute later. “Mr. Valentine is not available at the moment.”
“Okay,” I said as I put down the magazine. “Thanks for your time.” I then headed through the door she’d just come through.
“Wait! You can’t go in…” was all I heard before the door clicked shut behind me.
I entered a gymnasium-sized room with cubicles like you’d expect to see in an office building, except the partitions extended six feet high. Last I’d been here, this room was simply rows of cots for anyone who needed a safe place to sleep for the night. At least now the women had a little privacy. Marcus must have been doing okay with his charity work.
The receptionist hadn’t followed me. Which meant that Marcus had told her not to. Which meant Marcus was expecting me. I didn’t know what the hell that meant, but I was sure it wasn’t good.
I walked around the perimeter of the cubicles and realized that I probably wasn’t allowed in here. Not because Marcus didn’t want to see me, but because there was no one here but women and children. I felt like an intruder, but I didn’t let that stop me. If I only visited places where I was welcome, I wouldn’t be able to go anywhere.
A couple of defiant stares marked my passing through the shelter, but the scowls did little to mask the fear behind their eyes. I could see the women wondering which one of them I’d come for. It made me ashamed to be a male. Between Katie’s stolen innocence and the fearful stares of these women—not to mention Anna’s accusing finger back in Hell—I was ready to cut off my dick and join the angelic choir as a falsetto. Okay, that may have been an overstatement. My dick and I, while not always on the best of terms, still had shared values and common interests. I wasn’t ready to part ways just yet.
And the stares did help me to locate Marcus. He was not just their benefactor, but their protector. The only time their eyes left me was to look at the door in the far corner of the room, where one of the locker rooms would have been if this place were still a gymnasium.
I followed their gaze and went to the door. I didn’t have it in me to question any of them as to where Marcus’s office was. Their faces, some still bruised, some with split lips, but all radiating the same intense fear, were like a slap in the face to me. I had enough guilt for things I’d actually done. Fuck if I was going to take on the guilt of my entire gender on top of that.
There was no sign on the door their eyes had led me to, but I could feel Marcus inside the room, waiting for me like a spider eyeing up a particularly juicy fly. My demon-sense was pulsating. He wasn’t happy, I could tell that much without even seeing him. Waves of menace rolled through the closed door like a tidal wave of hostility. No surprise there. I decide
d knocking was a useless gesture; we both knew I was there. I simply opened the door, and Marcus shot me in the chest.
He used a silencer. More likely it was for the benefit of the women than an unnecessary attempt at stealth. A gunshot in a battered women’s shelter would have caused a panic. The gun was a 9mm Smith & Wesson. I wasn’t a big fan of S&W semi-autos, but voicing my disapproval of the type of gun he’d just shot me with seemed a bit superfluous. It’d be like complaining about a dirty needle while being given a lethal injection.
“Ouch,” I said instead. Not much better, but at least it didn’t come across as quibbling.
I could tell he wanted to shoot me again, but we both knew it’d be an empty gesture. He’d made his point. It was probably good that he got it out of his system right at the start. At least he hadn’t shot me in the face.
“Feel better now?” I asked, still rubbing my chest like I had a bad case of heartburn.
“What do you want, Jacob?” he asked.
Shooting me seemed to relax him, which was good. He was a very large black man. At least six-seven or six-eight. His weight had to be edging toward the three-fifty range, and it was all muscle. He had a shaved head and a low, booming voice to complete the package of visual and aural intimidation. He made Jeung’s goons look like the JV team.
“I want to not have a hole in my chest,” I replied as I sat down in a crappy office chair with a ripped cushion that was oozing some kind of sickly green foamy material. It squeaked loudly under my weight, which made me wonder if it was strong enough to hold me, or if this was part two of his retaliation: Shoot me first, then humiliate me with a breakaway chair that would dump me on the floor.
He didn’t say anything. He simply shrugged as though he’d flipped a mental coin and was mildly disappointed with the result, and then put the gun in his desk drawer and locked it with a key he wore around his neck. I took that as a truce.