What Would Satan Do?

by Anthony Miller

  “That was my gun,” said Liam.

  “I need one,” she said. “They took mine. Besides, you just got shot in the head. You’re in no condition to carry a gun.”

  Liam smiled and nodded. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said.

  She gave him a meaningful look. At least, it was probably a meaningful look. Liam wasn’t sure what it meant, or even if it meant anything at all. It just seemed like one of those looks that people give each other when they mean things. He had no idea what to do, so he smiled. Lola returned his smile with a half-smirk, half-smile of her own, and looked down at the ground. She ran her hand through her hair, tucking it behind her ear.

  “Me too,” she said.

  “Well, okay,” he said.

  “I’m glad you’re here, too,” said Raju.

  Lola ignored him. “Look,” she said, pointing out across the parking lot full of trucks and soldiers.

  “What?” asked Liam.

  “A whole fleet of limousines just pulled up.”

  “Those aren’t limos,” said Festus.

  “He’s right,” said Liam. “They’re Town Cars.”

  “Whatever,” said Lola. “That one has something sticking out of its trunk.”

  “It looks like a metal box,” said Liam.

  “Oh,” said Raju. “That’s one of those frozen yogurt machines.”

  “You know, I think you’re right.” Liam sighed and shook his head. It wasn’t the weirdest thing he’d seen today – not even close – but still.

  The group enjoyed a moment of silence, there among the trucks and naked guys and soldiers and mayhem. They watched as soldiers scrambled this way and that – some charging toward the new arrivals, while others ran away. The soldiers closest to the Town Cars started attacking the cars and their occupants. At least one Humvee actually ended up on top of one of the Town Cars. Shots rang out periodically over the sound of men shouting. The gun fire was intermittent – almost casual in its sporadic report. One guy held down the trigger on his automatic weapon. He was too far off to tell whether he was shooting at the cars or just firing at random, but he quickly ran out of bullets – the clip on most automatic weapons holds maybe one tenth as many bullets as movie makers seem to believe – and the noise stopped.

  “Is that—” asked Festus, moving his head this way and that and squinting. “Shit,” he said. “That’s the KW. We need to leave. Now.” But everybody ignored him. They were too busy being knocked to the ground by the shockwave of a rather large explosion.

  Chapter 47. Our Heroes Run Away

  “Wow,” said Liam. He’d landed on his back, and was now propped up on his elbows, as if he were just enjoying a casual afternoon in the park.

  “What the shit?” asked Raju, his arms and legs wrapped around a tree.

  “What was that?” asked Festus.

  The four started to get up, dust off, and stagger around – as people who nearly get exploded often do – but were immediately knocked back down to the ground by the force of a second explosion.

  “Huh,” said Liam, from where he lay prone.

  “Perhaps we ought to consider,” said Lola, “heading in the other direction.”

  “Yes,” said Liam. “Perhaps.” He continued to lie where he was, listening to the bustling sounds of men and equipment set against a backdrop of sporadic gun fire.

  “Oh,” said Raju, “that sucked.” Festus moaned his concurrence.

  There was a third explosion, but Liam, Lola, Festus, and Raju saved themselves the trouble of having to fall over by not having got back up in the first place.

  “What the hell is going on?” asked Festus.

  Liam spoke to the grass and dirt immediately in front of his face. “I think that someone is blowing shit up.”

  “Oh,” said Festus.

  Lola stood and brushed herself off. “We need to move. Now,” she said. Liam concurred to the grass. The others moaned a bit. Lola kicked Raju and then turned to nudge Liam with her toe. “Come on.”

  “Okay,” said Liam, his face still pressed to the grass.

  Lola nudged him again, and then turned back to deliver another good kick to Raju. Festus received something between a nudge and a kick. “Let’s go back the other way,” she said.

  Liam slowly climbed to his feet. “Agreed,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  The group headed back toward the Deliveries entrance, and went into the church. Inside, things were surprisingly calm – in stark contrast to the madness outside. The hallway leading from the deliveries entrance was cavernous and empty. There were no noises other than their own quick footfalls and the sound of Raju, tagging along in his own time, humming a tune that could have been from a porn movie.

  “Where are we going?” asked Festus.

  “Shhh!” said Lola.

  Liam slowed and leaned over to Festus to whisper. “We can just walk around to the other side, and try to find a different exit.”

  “Shhh!” said Lola, again. The urgency of her shushing, however, was diminished somewhat when, as they came around a corner, they ran straight into Bill Cadmon and Dick Whitford. The two men were engrossed in conversation, and were accompanied by a handful of soldiery types, each of whom wore or carried a gas mask.

  “Well, they shouldn’t have burned down my goddamned mansion,” said Whitford.

  “But I can’t have your military guys all over—” Cadmon stopped, and the surprised expression on his face made it look as if he hadn’t been expecting to find a Messianic doppelganger and his cabal of friends, which wasn’t that odd, really, because he had not, in fact, had that expectation at all.

  “This is the one,” said Cadmon, pointing to Festus. “The one I was telling you about.”

  “What?” asked Whitford.

  “The guy – I told you about – dressed like Jesus?”

  Whitford raised an eyebrow – not too far – just enough to suggest that he had no clue what the hell Cadmon was prattling on about.

  “I’ve been telling you about this for— never mind.” Raju finally wandered around the corner and into view. “Jesus Christ! How fucking many of you are there?” It was a shocking thing to hear a famous television preacher say, and there was a moment of awkward silence while everyone focused on walls, the floor, and pretty much everything other than Cadmon. Even Dick Whitford grunted.

  “Hi,” said Raju, with a cool head nod. “‘Sup?”

  “Hello,” said Cadmon, now the polite, telegenic preacher again. Then he shook his head, presumably to get rid of the niceness. He stepped forward and grabbed Festus’ cassock. “What’s your name?”

  “Uh, Festus?”

  Cadmon slapped him. “What is your name?!”

  “Ow!” Festus rubbed his face.

  Keeping the upper part of his body rigid and regarding the soldiers out of the corner of his eyes, Raju scooted surreptitiously over to Lola. “Hey,” he whispered, “where’s my gun?”

  Lola shooed him away.

  “My name really is Fes—” But before he could finish, Liam had torn Cadmon’s hand away and put the man in a headlock. He snatched one of the soldiers’ guns, shoved Cadmon toward the wall, and pointed the weapon at Whitford’s face.

  “Liam!” said Lola.

  “Holy shit!” said Festus.

  “Cool,” said Raju.

  “Hi, Dick,” said Liam. Cadmon mumbled something indecipherable and vowel-intensive.

  “Shoot this man,” said Dick Whitford, sliding behind one of his soldiers.

  Liam looked directly at the soldiers. The one standing in front raised his gun to shoot, but then seemed to forget what he was doing. He dropped the gun and ran screaming from the room. He was, no doubt, far more concerned with the fact that his whole head had just lit on fire. It was either that, or the fact that he’d suddenly remembered he had somewhere important to be. But that seems, on balance, to be the weaker of the two possible explanations, because it really doesn’t take into account the man’s cranial conflagration.


  “The rest of you,” said Liam, “will put your guns down. Right now.”

  The soldiers glanced at one another. “Okay,” said one. Another nodded, and they leaned over to set down their guns.

  “Wow,” said Lola.

  “Dude,” said Raju.

  “Now,” said Liam, “I want each of you—”

  Whitford looked at his soldiers, his eyes wide open and incredulous, but the uniformed men no longer seemed to be particularly inclined to do anything even remotely soldiery, let alone make use of their firearms against Liam or his compatriots. In fact, they seemed to be pretty pleased with the state of the world in general. They smiled.

  “—to lay down on the floor, face down,” continued Liam.

  “Fine!” said Whitford. He lurched forward, shoving a soldier aside, which wasn’t really necessary because the soldier wasn’t actually in his way. In fact, it was just kind of mean, but that’s just how Whitford rolled. “I’ll do it myself,” he said, scooping up one of the soldiers’ guns with surprising dexterity and far less wheezing than might be expected of a man of his girth. He raised the gun and stopped, distracted by the sound of an explosion.

  A distinguished looking gentleman in a pinstriped suit came around the corner, followed by several old men in engineer’s coveralls. He had, in his hand, a shotgun. It was on fire.

  “Please allow me to introduce myself,” said the Devil.

  Chapter 48. Whitford Flambé with Lemon

  Satan stood, silhouetted in the light from the far end of the broad hallway. He wore a dark, pin-striped suit that, on anyone else, would have clashed horribly with his flaming shotgun, but he made it work. Behind him two grizzled, slightly dispirited-looking old men stood hunched over in their red coveralls and sighed in the weary, resigned way that old men sometimes do.

  “I,” Satan began, but then he stopped. He turned and ran his eyes up and down the length of Lola’s figure, pausing at the curvier parts. “Hello,” he said, drawing out the ‘o’ as he reached for her hand.

  Lola regarded the Devil with a wary eye, and attempted to pull her hand back. The Devil’s dainty grip, however, was surprisingly strong. “Hi,” she said, in as uninviting a manner as it is possible to speak a greeting. The word thudded to the ground with a splat, like a brick tossed into a mud pit.

  The Devil posed – his head held high, his shoulders back, and one foot forward – in the foppish, prancy manner of a fencer who preens and struts before dispatching his opponent with ruthless – yet artful – efficiency. “It is a pleasure, madam, to make your acquaintance.” He bowed with a flourish, swooshing the flaming shotgun backward in an elegant arc as he bent forward to kiss her hand. There he lingered for a moment, breathing in as if he were trying to inhale her fingers.

  “I’m not sure you actually made my acquaintance,” said Lola, finally wrenching her hand free. She wiped her fingers on her pants.

  Liam, Festus, and Raju made suspicious faces as they peered over and around Lola at her Satanic suitor. Raju rested one hand on her hip, but only for a second.

  Satan stood and stepped back, resuming his dramatic – though somewhat effete – Conquistador pose. He had a wry look on his face. “Oh,” he said, “I already know who you are.” They locked eyes for a moment. The Devil’s chest heaved – ever so slightly – and he seemed to drink Lola in with his eyes, like a telenovela actor staring down a busty mamacita, or a really fat guy eyeing a Twinkie. The Governor made a volcanic throat-clearing sound, and Satan’s eyelids drooped to half mast as he took one last, dramatic breath before whirling around to face the phlegmatic politician.

  “Who the hell are you?” asked Whitford, his jowls flapping somewhat less indignantly than they might if there had been, say, less weird shit going on that day.

  “I am the Devil.” Satan bowed a polite bow.

  Behind them, Raju attempted to bend the fingers of the hand that had been on Lola’s hip.

  “Wait a second.” Festus stepped forward, his head tilted and eyes squinty. “Who are you?”

  Satan spun around and did a double take as he saw Festus. “I just said—” he said. “Why are you – dressed up like that damned – like the Son?”

  There was a lot of murmuring and nodding. This was apparently a sore point among other folks there in the hallway. In fact, if he’d been facing a mob armed with pitchforks and other garden implements, Festus might have been in real trouble. Fortunately, it was just the Prince of Darkness, an evil Governor, a corrupt preacher, and a bunch of guys with guns, and so Festus ignored the question. “It’s just that I’m not sure I ever read it prophesied anywhere that the Devil was going to show up with a flaming shotgun. This doesn’t seem right to me,” he said, half to himself. He scratched his beard and looked the Devil in the eye. “I thought you were supposed to have scales. Be a giant snake or something.”

  There have been, throughout history, times when the poor, the meek, and the stupid have overcome and crossed the vast gulfs of economic and social circumstance (or the electrified fences) that hold them back, and come face to face with their betters. In these moments, there is always a fleeting instant of openness – the tiniest of tiny pauses – during which the would-be oppressor is thrown off by the sheer, unexpected absurdity of encountering a fool who does not know or recognize his authority (usually born, of course, of inherent superiority). And in that instant, when the face of the Very Important Person falls, shedding its usual protective façade of bemusement and/or disdain, it is possible to see the VIP as he truly is. Satan slumped a little and curled his upper lip in the expression that, everywhere in the known universe, stands for “Huh?”

  Festus stared into the weary eyes of the man – or being – in front of him. His own eyes grew so wide that they looked as if they might pop out of his skull. “Tell me, please,” he whispered. “What is your real name?”

  Satan regarded his bearded inquisitor for another half instant before regaining his composure. He nodded, took a step back, and unfurled his hangdog posture to stand erect, swinging his arms out to his sides. The flames from the Shotgun of Divine Justice made shwooshy, flapping sounds like a flag buffeted by a gusty wind. He drew a deep, long breath. “I,” he boomed, “am that which results from the cause of causes; the tenth and last emanation. My name is in him.” The walls and floor shuddered and then were silent.

  Festus did not move. Whether this is because he was pretending to be a statue, or was adopting the tactic of rabbits and deer who don’t want to be eaten, or just felt like this was a good time to pause and reflect on things for a bit is not certain. The only part of him that provided any hint that he was not made of wax was his face, which moved in slow motion as it rearranged itself into an expression conveying alarm, distress, and general not-wellness.

  “You’re the Devil,” he said.

  “Isn’t that what I just said?” asked Satan.

  “Yes,” said Festus, in the awestruck manner of someone who has just converted a perfectly good corn field into a baseball diamond and is now watching dead guys in pinstriped pants warm up, “you did.” He continued to stand very still.

  Though effective, pretending to be a lamp post was not the favored reaction of all those present. There was a smattering of holy cows, holy craps, and holy shits behind Satan as the soldiers hurried and huddled and ran in circles trying to figure out what to do with themselves. Whitford and Cadmon were slightly less vocal or Brownian in their motion as they realized, apparently, that they had other places to be. They both turned and attempted to go to those places, but Satan did the ground-rumbling, building-shaking, amplified super-voice thing again.

  “Stop!” The lights flickered, and more little clouds of plastery stuff drifted to the floor.

  All the soldiers, governors, and other jerks who hadn’t already hoofed it around the corner stopped immediately, for Satan had not merely said the word – he’d spoken it (past tense: spake). And he had not just spoken it to the soldiers – he’d spoken unto them. So they h
adn’t really had any choice about it. It is, after all, well known that when the Devil incarnate speakest unto thou, thou oughtest to listen the fuck up.

  “Do not move!” spake he. But then he turned unto Festus, and, his earthquaking complete, resumed a much less astral aspect. “That okay with you?”

  “Uh, them? Stopping? Pssh … Sure.” Festus waved it off, as if he’d planned to stop them too.

  “No, you twit. My name.”

  “Oh, yeah. Cool,” said Festus, nodding and feeling not very cool at all. “Thanks.”

  “No problem,” said Satan. He winked.

  “Dude,” whispered Raju, sidling up beside Festus, “that was totally badass.” Festus nodded – the badassedness of it could not be denied. Raju held his hand out, securing a surreptitious five.

  Lola rolled her eyes. “Where did Cadmon go?” she asked. But nobody seemed interested.

  “So,” said Whitford, holding up his meaty palms. “Can we get on with whatever this,” he waved at all of this, “is?”

  The Devil spun slowly on his heel to face the Governor. He glanced at each of the soldiers. “You, you, you, and you,” he said, “kindly fuck off.”

  The soldiers looked at one another and then around at the walls and floor. Where should they fuck off to? There were a couple of popping sounds, and suddenly, where before there had been several confused soldiers, there were now several equally uncertain ferrets. One decided, apparently, that he should fuck off in Satan’s direction. Satan indicated that this conclusion was incorrect by kicking it. It went flying down the hall, and the others scampered after it.

  Whitford didn’t even blink. “So…?” he said, grimacing.

  “So.” Satan flicked his wrist, waving the fiery shotgun around.

  The shotgun exploded.

  “Damnit!” said Satan. “Why does that keep happening?” He put a singed finger in his mouth and then spun to hurl the remnants of the shotgun at one of the old guys.

  The old guy ducked out of the way. Satan held out his hand, wiggling it impatiently. “Give me yours.”