I think I'd rather be English than American.
Though it's close.
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. We're catching up.
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Watch out.
The gap in the door... it's a separate reality.
The only me is me.
Are you sure the only you is you?
The gap in the door... it's a separate reality.
The only me is me.
Are you sure the only you is you?
DON'T TOUCH THAT DIAL NOW, WE'RE JUST GETTING STARTED
Most Recent Posts
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. We're catching up.
Location: Chicago
#2.01
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
๐ฎ๐๐ ๐ด ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐?
๐ด ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐...๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ด ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐.
๐๐๐๐, ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐, ๐ด ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐.
๐ด'๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐, ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐.
๐ด ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐, "๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐?".
๐ด ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐.
๐ด ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐, "๐ด ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐."
๐ป๐๐๐๐๐...๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐.
๐ฌ๐ ๐ด ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐?
๐ฌ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ด ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐?
๐ฑ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐?
๐ด๐ ๐๐'๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐...๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐?
๐ด๐ ๐๐๐๐๐'๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐...
๐๐๐ ๐๐'๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐.
It had been a little over a year since John had left England and his troubles and his sister behind; he'd seen his twentieth birthday in New York, shortly after arriving, and had spent it commiserating and drinking heavily, against his better judgement - trying to dull the pain so pure and clear that such a milestone was passing without the company of Cheryl, for whom he had fought so hard to bring home. Her absence was somehow crystallised into an even sharper relief by the knowledge that she was, in fact, out there once more, returned from her abduction, but now on the other side of an ocean representing a gulf some three-and-a-half-thousand miles wide. After Chas and John had both found New York to be unwelcoming and distateful to their appetites and attitudes, they'd moved to Chicago, the Windy City more aligned to their indulgences, and suddenly a year had passed and John's twenty-first was spent in Chi-Town dive bars and the local pizza joint.
After the move, life settled into a routine, much as it always does. Chas had little trouble renewing his driving licence for the relevant American bodies, and his time in the black cabbies of London had battle-hardened him well for the clichรฉd yellow sedans of Chicago's taxi fleet. He suited the work, finding distraction in the lives of his passengers, always able to spin a yarn over drinks and regale his immediate company with embellished tales and insights witnessed second-hand in his day-to-day. John had no such luck with his own licence, having never attained it in England and faring much the same on new shores; instead, he had a bike, and he used it to deliver, a 'gig' employee, transporting everything from food to parcels to court summons from wherever it was to wherever it needed to be. It wasn't glamorous, but it paid for rent and cigarettes, and it suited John as much as the taxi work suited Chas: he could smoke, and listen to music, and minimise his interaction with the general public as much as he liked. He could even manage a daily catharsis exchanging vicious insults with whichever cunt arsehole driver du jour endangered his life with some dickhead manoeuvre.
The year had passed them by almost shockingly uneventfully. Despite the lurking fear of Nergal's recompense for humiliation, the move to America has seemed to succeed in its goal of allowing John to drop off the radar. There were times, inevitably, where a stranger stared at him from across the street a little too long, or someone cocked their head at too much of a funny angle, or the delivery he was entrusted with smelt of too much incence that still failed to cover the hint of sulphur beneath it regardless; but he'd hung up the coat since the first couple months after landing, and with it seemed to have also hung up the title Mammon had 'gifted' him with as well. There were days, and some sleepless nights, that fright and anxiety crept in alongside morbid curiousity, and he wondered what might the Golden Wolf be doing, where might Nergal be reconstituting himself, which Hellish agents might be watching and reporting his every move - but as the Sun and Moon rose and set in a decoupled waltz, days bleeding into weeks and then months, the seasons pushing through the city and painting morphing landscapes across its streets and skyline...those anxieties ebbed away, draining out into the sea, so much so that John began to feel comfortable. It was foolish; but what of mortal men isn't?
A year had at least been enough to make new friends, and John was thankful for their company on cold and dark nights. He hesitated to get too close, to open himself up, the image of Gary's stiffening corpse on the bridge in the dark back in Liverpool an ever-looming spectre that tainted every interaction and conversation - but he enjoyed their gathering all the same, a welcome distraction if nothing else. Chas did most of the talking anyway, and John was happy to let him. The longer Chas talked, the longer people kept putting beer in John's hands, and with the weak crap that seemed to be slung as standard in the states, John needed plenty to feel that familiar warm buzz. Benny Cox was the youngest, brash and foolhardy in a way that indicated he'd not yet felt hardship touch his life, but this unwitting naivety belied a keen academic mind that was currently engaged in studies at the University of Illinois Chicago. Frank North was older than any of them, a more steady presence in the group, and had been the first of them John had met - he'd purchased the bike he now made deliveries on from Frank, and whatever he'd paid, Frank had surely renumerated him twice over in liquid form by now. And then there was Judith Ashram, a beautiful contradiction, a sharp mind in her own right and dutiful student at the private Jesuit institution of Loyola University, but also a self-declared 'tantric practitioner'. There had been a short time after introductions that John had longed to heed her teachings on his knees before her, but he'd since cast such superficial fancies aside. He didn't need the complications. They'd instead formed quite the bond over long discussions of a theological nature, John keeping his own practical experience perfectly to himself.
So was the routine. Chas drove and John pedalled and they both explored the city in their own ways, and when they grew tired or the weather turned sour they retreated to a local hole-in-the-wall and sipped and smoked until they stumbled home and fell asleep. They'd put the past behind them, some memories easier to lock away than others, and avoided talking about Liverpool and what they'd lived through there. When John would dream of Cheryl, or Gary, or Nergal or Mammon or worst of all, of Jacob and his ancestors and that dark grove with that blood-stained rock, he'd jolt awake, shouting in his sleep; and then he'd pad quietly to the kitchenette, where Chas would already be sitting with two fresh-hot mugs and a pack of smokes. In the silence there was understanding; in the shared still hours, there was forgiveness. John would not deign to ask for anything more.
It was late in the afternoon when John got the job post through to his phone. It was a neat little app, pitched by some new young upstart in silicone valley that Forbes called a 'mover and shaker' without even a hint of irony, whose grand contributions consisted of his parents' no-questions-asked angel investment and 'groundbreaking' ideas that mostly took the form of declaring various combinations of "[app] for [new function]", and letting someone else figure out the practicalities. Well, this one was "Tinder for Deliveries". If people wanted stuff shipped within the city (or sometimes the state), they could entrust it to the great institution of the US Postal Service, or they could pay a premium for a vetted and organized courier company like UPS or FedEx. Or, this app pre-supposed, they could instead post a listing of what they wanted delivering and where, along with the fee they were willing to pay to get it done (with a recommended nominal amount for those inclined toward having their pockets picked), and an enterprising freelance courier could 'swipe right' on their job and collect and deliver the package in the very same day. John couldn't believe it had taken off, but there was no end to the things people would pay for if you could convince them of how inconvenient not paying for it really was.
In any case, this job was strange off the bat. The package was large and heavy and came with an accompanying letter, and the collection location was a P.O. box in downtown Chicago, and the delivery address was on the outskirts of the city in a neighbourhood John hadn't heard of. That in itself wasn't outlandish - John had only been here a year, after all, and Chicago was a big city - but the fee on the order was huge. Like, six months' rent huge. One parcel would pay for half a year's living and enough left over to have a good time while he was there. So all combined, it begged one very big question: why hadn't anyone else snapped up the job already?
"I'm workin', Johnny." Chas answered, his voice crackly and distant on the end of the line. John leant against a deli, phone held to his ear in one hand, a bell-pepper Italian Beef dripping gravy through his fingers in the other. A cigarette chaser was tucked behind his ear, ready for the post-lunch afterburn.
"Take off for the day, lad. Need a ride."
"Ha! I may be a taxi but that doesn't mean I'm yours. What's wrong with the bike?"
"Trip's too far and my legs are tired. Got a drop-off needs doing."
"So much for mister 'calves of steel'. Less beer, more pasta - like how marathon runners do it."
"I'm serious. Big drop-off."
"I'm serious. On yer bike, son. Literally."
"Split the fee with ya."
John rolled his eyes as he heard Chas snort down the phone, and took another bite of his sandwich.
"I ain't that hard-up for cash, lad, and you need every penny for your share of the rent. I'm already subsidising your drinking."
"That's a big word. Gonna cross that off your calendar?"
"Fuck off, John. I'm working. I'll catch you lat-"
"It's twenty thousand dollars."
There was the screech of tyres and the loud metal thump-and-crunch of some kind of collision, followed by extremely emphatic shouting and a chorus of horns. Chas fumbled, shouting his own swears across a muffled and scratchy line as his shuffled the phone about, desperately trying to find somewhere to pull over that wasn't half-way embedded in a sidewalk newspaper vendor, and once parked, he cleared his throat and replied.
"Well, that'll pay for a new fender, at least."
"I'll text you where I am. I gotta say, Chas, this one feels a little...weird. Could be bad voodoo."
"You don't want it, I'll do it. Twenty thousand? Christ, I'd deliver dead babies to the Pope himself for that kinda money."
"I'm just saying. It gives me a strange feeling is all."
"We can exorcise feelings, John-o. Cash is a wonderful balm."
"Alright, alright. I get the picture. I'll see you soon."
"Yes you bloody will, lad. Twenty thousand! We could buy a dryer that actually dries, instead of mildly warming wet laundry..."
Chas trailed off and John hung up, quickly texting his location for pick-up before finishing his sandwich. The bread and meat did little to soothe the strange blossoming pit in his stomach, and he lit his cigarette with shaky fingers, trying to figure out what the Hell it was that had him so frightened.
The house was pretty non-descript, all things told. Given the payment on the order John had expected either an area so upscale he could only dream of gazing wistfully through cold iron gates, or something so plain and unadorned that its constructed inconspicuousness wrapped all the way back around to a blindingly obvious mob affiliation. Instead, it was just...normal. A little bigger than your average outer-city two-bed but nothing extravagent; its most notable features were a porch, a window indicating an attic room, and its semi-detached nature. It bore a handsome facade, tasteful but understated, and held the airs of something once-proud that had since fallen into neglect. Paint peeled and wood was worn and chipped and there were clear signs of long-term weather damage, but none of this was so far gone as to make it unlivable by any means. The more John looked at it, the more banal it seemed, which only made his suspicion grow.
"Looks off to me." John said, not moving to undo his seatbelt or open the car door as Chas set the parking brake and switched off the engine. He leaned across John to glance up at the house through the passenger window.
"Looks completely normal." He surmised, and John sucked his teeth in response.
"Exactly. This parcel and this letter," he said, holding up both in demonstration, "represent ten grand apiece, according to whoever put the job up. Don't you think wherever they're being delivered to should be a bit more...notable?"
Chas raised an eyebrow.
"Don't know why you're so insistent on poking holes in the easiest twenty large either of us will ever make."
"Because don't you think people with our history should be wary when something seems too good to be true?" John shot back. "Or is a year long enough to forget everything that happened in Liverpool entirely?"
He regretted it even before he'd finished getting the words out. Chas looked back at him with a stony face.
"A lifetime won't be long enough." He said quietly. The pair took a long pause. Chas drew a deep, steadying breath.
"I understand the impulse. I do. But sometimes, things that seem too good to be true just seem it, and they are actually true. Don't you think we've earned some good luck? I can't look at everything through cynicism, John. I wouldn't survive if I did. I don't know how you do."
John stewed, unable or unwilling to answer.
"Look - it's a parcel. I'm not going anywhere. I'll keep the engine ticking over and leave the door open. You get even a whiff of funny business, you ditch the package and dive back in and I'll have us both shot of here before your arse even touches the seat. And if it's all tickety-boo, like I strongly think it is, I won't even ask you for my half."
Chas nudged John with an elbow, and this got both of them to crack small grins.
"Alright," John relented. "Two ticks."
"Gotcha." Chas said, switching the engine back on and preparing for a quick getaway.
No one answered when John knocked. He didn't really want to wait around, but the job listing specified the parcel wasn't to be left outside, and either way he needed someone to verify and sign for the package or he wasn't getting a penny of the twenty grand promised. He knocked again, hearing the bangs echo into the house beyond the door, but still there was no answer. The doorbell didn't even work. John sighed. Too good to be true indeed. He thumped again, harder this time, venting irritation at half a day wasted through his fist as he pounded against the wood. The entire house seemed to tremble and creak in response, meek protest against his blows, before growing still once more. Nothing else sounded within the house, and John officially gave up.
He turned away, only to hear a low wooden groan peel out behind him. He looked back over his shoulder at the now slowly-opening front door; there was only a small grap between the door and the frame, and only darkness to be seen beyond it - but something felt strangely inviting, beckoning him in from the gloomy interior.
Against his own good judgement and several hundred screaming instincts, John turned back around and entered the House. The door closed softly behind him, and locked with a near-inaudible click.
After the move, life settled into a routine, much as it always does. Chas had little trouble renewing his driving licence for the relevant American bodies, and his time in the black cabbies of London had battle-hardened him well for the clichรฉd yellow sedans of Chicago's taxi fleet. He suited the work, finding distraction in the lives of his passengers, always able to spin a yarn over drinks and regale his immediate company with embellished tales and insights witnessed second-hand in his day-to-day. John had no such luck with his own licence, having never attained it in England and faring much the same on new shores; instead, he had a bike, and he used it to deliver, a 'gig' employee, transporting everything from food to parcels to court summons from wherever it was to wherever it needed to be. It wasn't glamorous, but it paid for rent and cigarettes, and it suited John as much as the taxi work suited Chas: he could smoke, and listen to music, and minimise his interaction with the general public as much as he liked. He could even manage a daily catharsis exchanging vicious insults with whichever cunt arsehole driver du jour endangered his life with some dickhead manoeuvre.
The year had passed them by almost shockingly uneventfully. Despite the lurking fear of Nergal's recompense for humiliation, the move to America has seemed to succeed in its goal of allowing John to drop off the radar. There were times, inevitably, where a stranger stared at him from across the street a little too long, or someone cocked their head at too much of a funny angle, or the delivery he was entrusted with smelt of too much incence that still failed to cover the hint of sulphur beneath it regardless; but he'd hung up the coat since the first couple months after landing, and with it seemed to have also hung up the title Mammon had 'gifted' him with as well. There were days, and some sleepless nights, that fright and anxiety crept in alongside morbid curiousity, and he wondered what might the Golden Wolf be doing, where might Nergal be reconstituting himself, which Hellish agents might be watching and reporting his every move - but as the Sun and Moon rose and set in a decoupled waltz, days bleeding into weeks and then months, the seasons pushing through the city and painting morphing landscapes across its streets and skyline...those anxieties ebbed away, draining out into the sea, so much so that John began to feel comfortable. It was foolish; but what of mortal men isn't?
A year had at least been enough to make new friends, and John was thankful for their company on cold and dark nights. He hesitated to get too close, to open himself up, the image of Gary's stiffening corpse on the bridge in the dark back in Liverpool an ever-looming spectre that tainted every interaction and conversation - but he enjoyed their gathering all the same, a welcome distraction if nothing else. Chas did most of the talking anyway, and John was happy to let him. The longer Chas talked, the longer people kept putting beer in John's hands, and with the weak crap that seemed to be slung as standard in the states, John needed plenty to feel that familiar warm buzz. Benny Cox was the youngest, brash and foolhardy in a way that indicated he'd not yet felt hardship touch his life, but this unwitting naivety belied a keen academic mind that was currently engaged in studies at the University of Illinois Chicago. Frank North was older than any of them, a more steady presence in the group, and had been the first of them John had met - he'd purchased the bike he now made deliveries on from Frank, and whatever he'd paid, Frank had surely renumerated him twice over in liquid form by now. And then there was Judith Ashram, a beautiful contradiction, a sharp mind in her own right and dutiful student at the private Jesuit institution of Loyola University, but also a self-declared 'tantric practitioner'. There had been a short time after introductions that John had longed to heed her teachings on his knees before her, but he'd since cast such superficial fancies aside. He didn't need the complications. They'd instead formed quite the bond over long discussions of a theological nature, John keeping his own practical experience perfectly to himself.
So was the routine. Chas drove and John pedalled and they both explored the city in their own ways, and when they grew tired or the weather turned sour they retreated to a local hole-in-the-wall and sipped and smoked until they stumbled home and fell asleep. They'd put the past behind them, some memories easier to lock away than others, and avoided talking about Liverpool and what they'd lived through there. When John would dream of Cheryl, or Gary, or Nergal or Mammon or worst of all, of Jacob and his ancestors and that dark grove with that blood-stained rock, he'd jolt awake, shouting in his sleep; and then he'd pad quietly to the kitchenette, where Chas would already be sitting with two fresh-hot mugs and a pack of smokes. In the silence there was understanding; in the shared still hours, there was forgiveness. John would not deign to ask for anything more.
It was late in the afternoon when John got the job post through to his phone. It was a neat little app, pitched by some new young upstart in silicone valley that Forbes called a 'mover and shaker' without even a hint of irony, whose grand contributions consisted of his parents' no-questions-asked angel investment and 'groundbreaking' ideas that mostly took the form of declaring various combinations of "[app] for [new function]", and letting someone else figure out the practicalities. Well, this one was "Tinder for Deliveries". If people wanted stuff shipped within the city (or sometimes the state), they could entrust it to the great institution of the US Postal Service, or they could pay a premium for a vetted and organized courier company like UPS or FedEx. Or, this app pre-supposed, they could instead post a listing of what they wanted delivering and where, along with the fee they were willing to pay to get it done (with a recommended nominal amount for those inclined toward having their pockets picked), and an enterprising freelance courier could 'swipe right' on their job and collect and deliver the package in the very same day. John couldn't believe it had taken off, but there was no end to the things people would pay for if you could convince them of how inconvenient not paying for it really was.
In any case, this job was strange off the bat. The package was large and heavy and came with an accompanying letter, and the collection location was a P.O. box in downtown Chicago, and the delivery address was on the outskirts of the city in a neighbourhood John hadn't heard of. That in itself wasn't outlandish - John had only been here a year, after all, and Chicago was a big city - but the fee on the order was huge. Like, six months' rent huge. One parcel would pay for half a year's living and enough left over to have a good time while he was there. So all combined, it begged one very big question: why hadn't anyone else snapped up the job already?
"I'm workin', Johnny." Chas answered, his voice crackly and distant on the end of the line. John leant against a deli, phone held to his ear in one hand, a bell-pepper Italian Beef dripping gravy through his fingers in the other. A cigarette chaser was tucked behind his ear, ready for the post-lunch afterburn.
"Take off for the day, lad. Need a ride."
"Ha! I may be a taxi but that doesn't mean I'm yours. What's wrong with the bike?"
"Trip's too far and my legs are tired. Got a drop-off needs doing."
"So much for mister 'calves of steel'. Less beer, more pasta - like how marathon runners do it."
"I'm serious. Big drop-off."
"I'm serious. On yer bike, son. Literally."
"Split the fee with ya."
John rolled his eyes as he heard Chas snort down the phone, and took another bite of his sandwich.
"I ain't that hard-up for cash, lad, and you need every penny for your share of the rent. I'm already subsidising your drinking."
"That's a big word. Gonna cross that off your calendar?"
"Fuck off, John. I'm working. I'll catch you lat-"
"It's twenty thousand dollars."
There was the screech of tyres and the loud metal thump-and-crunch of some kind of collision, followed by extremely emphatic shouting and a chorus of horns. Chas fumbled, shouting his own swears across a muffled and scratchy line as his shuffled the phone about, desperately trying to find somewhere to pull over that wasn't half-way embedded in a sidewalk newspaper vendor, and once parked, he cleared his throat and replied.
"Well, that'll pay for a new fender, at least."
"I'll text you where I am. I gotta say, Chas, this one feels a little...weird. Could be bad voodoo."
"You don't want it, I'll do it. Twenty thousand? Christ, I'd deliver dead babies to the Pope himself for that kinda money."
"I'm just saying. It gives me a strange feeling is all."
"We can exorcise feelings, John-o. Cash is a wonderful balm."
"Alright, alright. I get the picture. I'll see you soon."
"Yes you bloody will, lad. Twenty thousand! We could buy a dryer that actually dries, instead of mildly warming wet laundry..."
Chas trailed off and John hung up, quickly texting his location for pick-up before finishing his sandwich. The bread and meat did little to soothe the strange blossoming pit in his stomach, and he lit his cigarette with shaky fingers, trying to figure out what the Hell it was that had him so frightened.
The house was pretty non-descript, all things told. Given the payment on the order John had expected either an area so upscale he could only dream of gazing wistfully through cold iron gates, or something so plain and unadorned that its constructed inconspicuousness wrapped all the way back around to a blindingly obvious mob affiliation. Instead, it was just...normal. A little bigger than your average outer-city two-bed but nothing extravagent; its most notable features were a porch, a window indicating an attic room, and its semi-detached nature. It bore a handsome facade, tasteful but understated, and held the airs of something once-proud that had since fallen into neglect. Paint peeled and wood was worn and chipped and there were clear signs of long-term weather damage, but none of this was so far gone as to make it unlivable by any means. The more John looked at it, the more banal it seemed, which only made his suspicion grow.
"Looks off to me." John said, not moving to undo his seatbelt or open the car door as Chas set the parking brake and switched off the engine. He leaned across John to glance up at the house through the passenger window.
"Looks completely normal." He surmised, and John sucked his teeth in response.
"Exactly. This parcel and this letter," he said, holding up both in demonstration, "represent ten grand apiece, according to whoever put the job up. Don't you think wherever they're being delivered to should be a bit more...notable?"
Chas raised an eyebrow.
"Don't know why you're so insistent on poking holes in the easiest twenty large either of us will ever make."
"Because don't you think people with our history should be wary when something seems too good to be true?" John shot back. "Or is a year long enough to forget everything that happened in Liverpool entirely?"
He regretted it even before he'd finished getting the words out. Chas looked back at him with a stony face.
"A lifetime won't be long enough." He said quietly. The pair took a long pause. Chas drew a deep, steadying breath.
"I understand the impulse. I do. But sometimes, things that seem too good to be true just seem it, and they are actually true. Don't you think we've earned some good luck? I can't look at everything through cynicism, John. I wouldn't survive if I did. I don't know how you do."
John stewed, unable or unwilling to answer.
"Look - it's a parcel. I'm not going anywhere. I'll keep the engine ticking over and leave the door open. You get even a whiff of funny business, you ditch the package and dive back in and I'll have us both shot of here before your arse even touches the seat. And if it's all tickety-boo, like I strongly think it is, I won't even ask you for my half."
Chas nudged John with an elbow, and this got both of them to crack small grins.
"Alright," John relented. "Two ticks."
"Gotcha." Chas said, switching the engine back on and preparing for a quick getaway.
No one answered when John knocked. He didn't really want to wait around, but the job listing specified the parcel wasn't to be left outside, and either way he needed someone to verify and sign for the package or he wasn't getting a penny of the twenty grand promised. He knocked again, hearing the bangs echo into the house beyond the door, but still there was no answer. The doorbell didn't even work. John sighed. Too good to be true indeed. He thumped again, harder this time, venting irritation at half a day wasted through his fist as he pounded against the wood. The entire house seemed to tremble and creak in response, meek protest against his blows, before growing still once more. Nothing else sounded within the house, and John officially gave up.
He turned away, only to hear a low wooden groan peel out behind him. He looked back over his shoulder at the now slowly-opening front door; there was only a small grap between the door and the frame, and only darkness to be seen beyond it - but something felt strangely inviting, beckoning him in from the gloomy interior.
Against his own good judgement and several hundred screaming instincts, John turned back around and entered the House. The door closed softly behind him, and locked with a near-inaudible click.
โ ๐ฑ๐ฅ๐ฆ๐ซ๐จ โ'๐ช ๐ค๐ฌ๐ฆ๐ซ๐ค ๐ฑ๐ฌ ๐ก๐ฆ๐ข ๐ฆ๐ซ ๐ฑ๐ฅ๐ฆ๐ฐ โ๐ฌ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐ข.
He is English afterall...
A grievous insult these days. Best watch yourself.
This is maybe the second time ever I have a sheet ready before the IC of a game goes live so just let me enjoy the moment.
Location: Hell
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________#1.10
"You know, John, I have lived for over forty-nine thousand years. Nearly fifty centuries stretch out behind me. I've walked Earth since the first great cradle of civilisation and seen nearly everything there is to see upon that rock. But over the course of those millenia, I think I have learnt one lesson above all others: humans are so surprising."
Nergal crept forwards out of the dark, appearing with no more aplomb than a vulture landing softly beside a starving man. He bore a wicked smile, and leant over John's dead body to neatly pluck the bloodstained cross and rosary from what remained of his ragged throat.
"So dramatic of you, John, but I can't deny its efficacy." He mused, running a black tongue across the surface of the wooden icon, lapping up John's blood. Nergal sighed, sated and satisfied. "That Constantine vintage does have such a uniqueness to it."
All the while, John watched on with a faint spectral awareness; he perceived Nergal simultaneously looming over him like a fat child over a freshly-opened packet of crisps, and also from behind the demon, regarding his unfurled wings and flicking tail and the way he stooped and twitched his fingers in anticipation. Nergal hadn't let a single second go to waste - John's corpse was still warm, rivulets of blood still trickling from his throat down his chest and face, staining his features with streaks of crimson until John could barely recognize himself. Oddly, John found himself compelled to speak, drawing breath into ethereal lungs and producing sound from lips that did not move.
"Quick on the draw, Nergal."
Nergal smiled wider, continuing to address the cadaver even as the words echoed around him from all directions and none.
"Oh, hello Johnny. Good to see you're still with us for the foreseeable. Hell is tricky in that way. Yes, I never miss my opportunity; though you've done far better than I expected. Family is oh-so-complicated, isn't it? I think you'd know more that more than most by now."
๐โ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐น๐๐ ๐ธ ๐๐โ๐โ ๐๐ผ๐๐น๐ธโ๐-
"Do pack it in. You've no horse left in the race now; the prodigal son has been slain by the other prodigal son. A nice straight-forward gambit played out well, and now you've got nothing. You're just a pack of ghosts."
๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ธ๐๐พโ๐โ๐พ ๐๐ธ๐พ๐โ๐๐ธโ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐๐ผ ๐๐ผ๐-
"Hell is tired of you, dears. We've our own machinations to be getting on with. Now, do fuck off. I've business to attend to."
Nergal clapped his hands in two short sharp raps, and there was a strange slurping, sucking sound; and then a pop in John's dead ears as the atmosphere shifted, and he was left with the feeling of a sudden absence.
"So what now?" John asked, feeling lighter and lighter by the minute. The blood flowing from his body's neck had finally ceased, and now what little heat remained in his cadaver was leeching out into the ground. Nergal rubbed his hands together greedily.
"Oh, quite simple, John. I collect, and that's the end of the whole mess. I'm impressed with how far you came, I have to admit; I'm almost tempted to grant you reprieve. Ah, alas - a deal is a deal."
"Certainly is," John replied, non-chalant, "and I don't want anyone saying I don't make good on my debts. So - here you go. One Constantine soul."
Nergal licked his lips, bending low and repeating once more the brushing motion across John's body like he'd done so with Gary's on the bridge, so many lifetimes ago - and came away with a misshapen, speckled, dimly-lit orb of...something. Nergal inspected it, and his features lost the slimy smile he'd been sporting, his expression twisting into one of contemptuous rage.
"What do you think you're doing?!" He demanded, and somewhere off in the distance, John picked up the grin Nergal had discarded.
"I promised a Constantine soul, musha. Not mine. Jacob's is as perfectly good as the next one - take it or leave it. Maybe if you'd had the good sense to be a little more precise..." John replied, revelling in parroting Nergal's facetiousness back at him in this small moment of triumph.
Nergal raged. Apoplexy took him over, and he thrashed about, flailing his limbs and clawing the ground and tearing the trees of the grove up by their roots. He slammed a fist against the stone block Cheryl had laid upon mere moments ago, and the entire thing split in half, sundered by the force of the blow. The demon slumped over the cleaved rock, furious and beaten. He heaved breaths in and out, and eventually raised his head to look at John's body over the lip of the slap with a terrible wicked gleam in his eye; slowly, carefully, he drew himself up, marching on the corpse with malevolence in his gait.
"Think you're clever, do you? Think because you're a Constantine and you got one over on your disgusting undead fetus of a brother you can play hopscotch with Hell? You are a speck, John Constantine, and you are playing with powers far, far above your station."
"We made a deal. We both made good on the terms set out."
"Undoubtedly. A bargain struck and a debt paid. But you're dead, Johnny-boy, and you've got a litany of missteps on your soul that He does not look kindly on. Suicide. Murder. Another suicide. So debt paid or not, you'll find that you're due down here, and if you're going to insist on being so insolent about it, I think I'll just ferry everything along and take what's mine in the process. After all - what can you do to stop me?"
"Not much," John admitted, watching Nergal raise himself to full height, splaying his wings in a show of force, brandishing a vicious claw to strike John's spirit down for good, once and for all, and claim it as his own, absconding with it into the dark corners of Hell to inflict atrocity after atrocity upon it as due recompensive for perceived slights...except none of that happened. Instead, there was the briefest of flashes through Nergal's upright figure, and he made an odd, strangled, throttled coughing nose; and then his body peeled apart from tip to taint, bile and blood splashing out of the newly-bifurcated halves. Mammon rose out of the mud, ooze already scouring itself from his distinct scarlet hide, those golden spikes already shining through. In his hand he hefted a magnificent greatsword, gilded and jewel-encrusted and as wide and tall as John was himself.
"He might have something to say, though."
Mammon picked one half of Nergal from where it had collapsed in the muck and regarded it with open disdain, an expression matched by the bisection of Nergal's face as the singular eye whipped around to spy its slayer.
"Most ill-mannered miscreant," Mammon rebuked, carefully running the edge of his blade between the skin and flesh of the portion he held. "Even in the bowels of Hell, a bargain struck must be duly honoured. 'Tis the only thing left that remains holy. Befoul my kingdom no longer, wretch."
The blade finished its smooth motion, cleaving Nergal's hide from his body, and Mammon dropped the flayed muscle back in the dirt as he began to fashion his leathery skin between delicate claws. Once finished, Mammon held a longcoat out before him; the mud had stained Nergal's once soft-red skin an earthy, clay-like tan, and when Mammon concluded inspecting his work he nodded satisfactorily.
John watched him cautiously from his diaphanous, far-off hiding place, feeling the call of some deeper misery pulling him away, try as he might to resist; and then Mammon snapped his fingers again, and there was a powerful wrenching sensation, something seizing upon the absolute base foundations of John's very being - and then he woke up, dragging air desperately into his lungs in great ragged breaths through the tear in his throat that gurgled and spasmed as it knitted itself back together. John sat up, shaky and disconcerted, wary of Mammon. Mammon simply tossed him the coat.
"Thou hast impressed and amused me two-fold, John Constantine. Once with thy promised vanquishing of thine detestable kin, and once more with thine trickery of Nergal. Rare is the human who gambols with devils and exits favourably. Thou hast truly blazed through Hell like so few before thee."
John sat in the mud, pulling the coat on over his cold, sodden arms. It sat comfortable and warm against his skin, exuding a faint sense of bolstering. From the inside pocket, an eyeless lid batted fruitlessly back at him.
"So what's the deal? Back to life and a new coat to say, 'thanks for kicking those arseholes out my front yard'?"
It was, but Mammon would never admit it.
"Believe what thou wilt. I need give no reason." He replied, in a tone that told John not to question him further. John was more than happy to oblige, not wanting to look a gift demon in the mouth. "Thou art still stained in your soul, John Constantine, and bound hither when next your fate arrives; of that, Nergal didst spake truth. But until then - there hast ne'er been a Laughing Magician so entertaining. Thine predecessors were all so frightfully dull. If thou art to be truly the last of thy line - Hell would benefit from what trouble thou canst yet conjure."
"Then I'll thank you once again, Lord Mammon." John answered, aware he'd pushed his luck as far as it would go. "You have been most gracious."
"Indeed. My magnanimity hast reached its boundaries. Get thee gone, wastrel; I wouldst say thine business here is concluded, and mine with it. Shouldst we meet once more, be assured - I shalt not indulge thee thusly again."
And with that, Mammon clapped; John blinked; and when his eyes fluttered open, he was back on the bridge, having returned from Hell with a coat, a scar, and a sister once more.
TWO WEEKS LATER
John, Cheryl, and Chas all sat around Chas' kitchen table in his flat in London, steam drifting up from each of their mugs, fresh tea cooling off in the ambient air. On the countertop next to the kettle sat a small ceramic urn filled with ashes. John felt a squeeze around his fingers as his gaze lingered on it, his sister reaching across to him. He dropped his eyes from it and looked at her instead, taking in every pore of her soft, warm features. In the two weeks since she'd woken back up on the bridge in Chas' arms, she'd been struggling to re-adjust, as well as re-align with all that had happened in her two years away; yet, slowly but surely, she was coming back to reality, able to leave the flat and be among people again, even if John made it a point to never let her out of his sight. She couldn't blame him for it. His story had been bizarre and difficult to swallow at first, but Chas corroborated as much of it as he could, and the rest of the tale John told with such solemn conviction that Cheryl didn't have it in her heart to disbelieve him. The scars across his neck and the coat that never left his back both seemed to endorse his apparent odyssey, and from what little he'd revealed about those two peculiarities, Cheryl was reluctant to probe further. Fragments of awful feelings and memories flitted through her mind when she did, and down that path lay Ravenscar. She was just happy to be home again; happy to know he'd never given up on her. Happy to see him again.
The wistful smile that had crept across her face as she'd looked over John faded as he pulled his hand back, cradling his mug with both palms and clearing his throat. His eyes fell to stare at his wrists as he began difficult, painful words.
"When it was teenage practitioners asking for sigiled autographs, or dumb yanks in suits begging for a quick transmutation, or even some half-breed with a few choice swear words, it was almost funny. A bit of notoriety. Splashing the surface of a new pool and seeing what came up to check out the ripples. But today...today an honest-to-God devil, no half-anything about it, came to me with a message from Nergal. And when you're wearing the skin of the demon that's sent someone to deliver a threat - it's no longer funny. It's something we need to take seriously. It's something I should have been taking seriously."
It had been almost enjoyable on first return; John's escapade and the things he'd come back with - trophies, titles, knowledge of hidden things - had illuminated a secret world previously darkened to him, a new layer and depth revealed that made everything seem so alive in a way he'd not thought possible before. Mammon naming him as some historically-significant figure certainly hadn't hurt, either; who would turn their nose up if they'd landed in some strange and fantastical new land, much like their old world but not quite, and at the same time some mighty king had declared them powerful and famous? John was but a man, and could not help himself revelling in it, even if just a little bit. But then, that devil had approached him with horrible intent, bearing a vengeful portent from Nergal and it had been like sinking into an ice bath. The mantle of the Laughing Magician was not merely one of fame; it bore with it a target pointed squarely at his head, and today he had been reminded that he'd already made at least one powerful enemy, and more than likely had inherited several more.
"So what's your point, Johnny?" Chas asked, taking measured sips from his mug while he watched John over the rim with a careful gaze. John met his stare, equally steady.
"I'm dangerous. I've got a target on my back, and I don't think anyone - anything - coming after me is going to care about collateral damage. I'm a bomb. I've got a blast radius. And you two are both in it."
The three of them shifted uncomfortably as John paused and looked pointedly at the urn on the counter. Even before his jaunt, John's curse had claimed one of their number already. The silence was clear; he wasn't about to risk what was left.
"I should have a say in this," Cheryl announced. "You spent two years ruining yourself coming after me, and now you, what, want me and Chas to hit the road? Or fuck off yourself and leave us behind? We're meant to help you, John. Protect you. That's what friends do."
John smiled. God, he loved her.
"You spent seventeen years protecting me, Cheryl. Ever since the first night Dad brought me home. I think it's my turn now. I spent all that time searching for you and I found you. I can't accept, after all that, that I might be responsible for you getting hurt. Even accidentally."
Chas huffed, and both Constantines looked at him.
"What's even your plan? You can't just tell us to fuck off. This is my flat. And if you think you're gonna start living rough again I will drag you back here. Unconscious if I have to."
John chuckled, but he knew Chas was serious.
"I've scraped every account I've ever had. Pooled all my cash. Pumped the last out of my UC payments. Even got into some of Dad's money, which I really hope he's going ballistic about somewhere. And I bought myself a ticket."
John put a hand in the inside pocket of his coat and pulled out a small white envelope. He opened it up and fished out the contents, laying it in the center of the table: a one-way plane ticket from Heathrow to New York City. It was leaving tomorrow.
"Oh, you bastard." Cheryl said, exasperated. Chas raised an eyebrow.
"How were you planning on getting to Heathrow with no money left?" He asked. John cleared his throat, seeming to shrink in his seat.
"Well, uh, I um, I thought you might be able to give me a lift...?" He answered sheepishly. Chas huffed again, and then stuck his hand in his own jacket pocket; in one quick motion, like playing a game of cards, he slapped his own ticket down on top of John's.
"You ain't as slick as you think, fancy title or no."
"Oh, you bastard!" Cheryl yelled. "And what the bloody fuck am I supposed to do?"
Chas stood up, walking to the front door of the flat and unhooking his keys from a little rack that hung on the wall. He tossed them to Cheryl, who fumbled as she caught them and then looked dumbfoundedly back up at Chas.
"As the only one of us who got a job after everything went to fuck two years ago, I had savings. Last week I paid a year upfront and stuck your name on the lease. John's got a right to protect you, but that doesn't mean the little spunk-stain can't have anyone to look out for him."
Cheryl stood wordlessly and moved to hug Chas, who welcomed her in with outstretched arms. After a moment, John stood up too, and the three of them embraced quietly, no more words needed.
The next day, John and Chas hefted hastily-packed rucksacks over their shoulders as they scanned the departures board for their gate number. Cheryl sat quietly nearby, picking nervously at the skin around her fingernails while she bounced a leg.
"There it is," Chas said, breaking the tension. "B47. We're up."
This was it. John exhaled a deep breath, trying to steady his emotions. Beyond the glass walls of the terminal building, the sun was beginning to set, and John couldn't stop the feeling that the light was fading from a life he'd only half-lived for twenty years, and would now never have the chance to do properly. Beside him, Cheryl stood up, and though John had tried to steel himself, the wetness in her eyes as he turned cracked through him until, in all of a single deleterious second, they were sobbing in each other's embrace.
"H-harder than I th-thought it'd be." John choked out, and Cheryl just squeezed him in response. He squeezed back, and in that moment, focused for an instant; between them, something ethereal and invisible snapped, a hidden tether severed and cast away. Synchronicity - the silent power of the Laughing Magician. Without having to worry about causality, Cheryl would be safe. She could be happy.
"No one's finding you now unless you want them to. You'll be safe. For good." He said, pressing his forehead against hers. She nodded and wiped her cheeks.
"I'll miss you two." She said. John felt a hand on his shoulder.
"We'd better not miss it." Chas said, and John nodded.
On the steps up to the cabin, John looked back, just for a second, to the window at the terminal gate. Cheryl waved, and for a tiny calamitous moment, John was seized with the overwhelming urge to dive from the stairs, hit the tarmac, drop his bag and sprint from here back into the building, see her one last time, give her one last hug, share with her one last goodbye; and then someone walked in front of her, and once they passed, she was gone.
"C'mon, Houdini." Chas said, stood above him up the steps at the cabin door, holding a hand out. "Let's go."
"Alright, mate." John, answered, taking the hand offered in his own. "Let's go."
Nergal crept forwards out of the dark, appearing with no more aplomb than a vulture landing softly beside a starving man. He bore a wicked smile, and leant over John's dead body to neatly pluck the bloodstained cross and rosary from what remained of his ragged throat.
"So dramatic of you, John, but I can't deny its efficacy." He mused, running a black tongue across the surface of the wooden icon, lapping up John's blood. Nergal sighed, sated and satisfied. "That Constantine vintage does have such a uniqueness to it."
All the while, John watched on with a faint spectral awareness; he perceived Nergal simultaneously looming over him like a fat child over a freshly-opened packet of crisps, and also from behind the demon, regarding his unfurled wings and flicking tail and the way he stooped and twitched his fingers in anticipation. Nergal hadn't let a single second go to waste - John's corpse was still warm, rivulets of blood still trickling from his throat down his chest and face, staining his features with streaks of crimson until John could barely recognize himself. Oddly, John found himself compelled to speak, drawing breath into ethereal lungs and producing sound from lips that did not move.
"Quick on the draw, Nergal."
Nergal smiled wider, continuing to address the cadaver even as the words echoed around him from all directions and none.
"Oh, hello Johnny. Good to see you're still with us for the foreseeable. Hell is tricky in that way. Yes, I never miss my opportunity; though you've done far better than I expected. Family is oh-so-complicated, isn't it? I think you'd know more that more than most by now."
๐โ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐น๐๐ ๐ธ ๐๐โ๐โ ๐๐ผ๐๐น๐ธโ๐-
"Do pack it in. You've no horse left in the race now; the prodigal son has been slain by the other prodigal son. A nice straight-forward gambit played out well, and now you've got nothing. You're just a pack of ghosts."
๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ธ๐๐พโ๐โ๐พ ๐๐ธ๐พ๐โ๐๐ธโ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐๐ผ ๐๐ผ๐-
"Hell is tired of you, dears. We've our own machinations to be getting on with. Now, do fuck off. I've business to attend to."
Nergal clapped his hands in two short sharp raps, and there was a strange slurping, sucking sound; and then a pop in John's dead ears as the atmosphere shifted, and he was left with the feeling of a sudden absence.
"So what now?" John asked, feeling lighter and lighter by the minute. The blood flowing from his body's neck had finally ceased, and now what little heat remained in his cadaver was leeching out into the ground. Nergal rubbed his hands together greedily.
"Oh, quite simple, John. I collect, and that's the end of the whole mess. I'm impressed with how far you came, I have to admit; I'm almost tempted to grant you reprieve. Ah, alas - a deal is a deal."
"Certainly is," John replied, non-chalant, "and I don't want anyone saying I don't make good on my debts. So - here you go. One Constantine soul."
Nergal licked his lips, bending low and repeating once more the brushing motion across John's body like he'd done so with Gary's on the bridge, so many lifetimes ago - and came away with a misshapen, speckled, dimly-lit orb of...something. Nergal inspected it, and his features lost the slimy smile he'd been sporting, his expression twisting into one of contemptuous rage.
"What do you think you're doing?!" He demanded, and somewhere off in the distance, John picked up the grin Nergal had discarded.
"I promised a Constantine soul, musha. Not mine. Jacob's is as perfectly good as the next one - take it or leave it. Maybe if you'd had the good sense to be a little more precise..." John replied, revelling in parroting Nergal's facetiousness back at him in this small moment of triumph.
Nergal raged. Apoplexy took him over, and he thrashed about, flailing his limbs and clawing the ground and tearing the trees of the grove up by their roots. He slammed a fist against the stone block Cheryl had laid upon mere moments ago, and the entire thing split in half, sundered by the force of the blow. The demon slumped over the cleaved rock, furious and beaten. He heaved breaths in and out, and eventually raised his head to look at John's body over the lip of the slap with a terrible wicked gleam in his eye; slowly, carefully, he drew himself up, marching on the corpse with malevolence in his gait.
"Think you're clever, do you? Think because you're a Constantine and you got one over on your disgusting undead fetus of a brother you can play hopscotch with Hell? You are a speck, John Constantine, and you are playing with powers far, far above your station."
"We made a deal. We both made good on the terms set out."
"Undoubtedly. A bargain struck and a debt paid. But you're dead, Johnny-boy, and you've got a litany of missteps on your soul that He does not look kindly on. Suicide. Murder. Another suicide. So debt paid or not, you'll find that you're due down here, and if you're going to insist on being so insolent about it, I think I'll just ferry everything along and take what's mine in the process. After all - what can you do to stop me?"
"Not much," John admitted, watching Nergal raise himself to full height, splaying his wings in a show of force, brandishing a vicious claw to strike John's spirit down for good, once and for all, and claim it as his own, absconding with it into the dark corners of Hell to inflict atrocity after atrocity upon it as due recompensive for perceived slights...except none of that happened. Instead, there was the briefest of flashes through Nergal's upright figure, and he made an odd, strangled, throttled coughing nose; and then his body peeled apart from tip to taint, bile and blood splashing out of the newly-bifurcated halves. Mammon rose out of the mud, ooze already scouring itself from his distinct scarlet hide, those golden spikes already shining through. In his hand he hefted a magnificent greatsword, gilded and jewel-encrusted and as wide and tall as John was himself.
"He might have something to say, though."
Mammon picked one half of Nergal from where it had collapsed in the muck and regarded it with open disdain, an expression matched by the bisection of Nergal's face as the singular eye whipped around to spy its slayer.
"Most ill-mannered miscreant," Mammon rebuked, carefully running the edge of his blade between the skin and flesh of the portion he held. "Even in the bowels of Hell, a bargain struck must be duly honoured. 'Tis the only thing left that remains holy. Befoul my kingdom no longer, wretch."
The blade finished its smooth motion, cleaving Nergal's hide from his body, and Mammon dropped the flayed muscle back in the dirt as he began to fashion his leathery skin between delicate claws. Once finished, Mammon held a longcoat out before him; the mud had stained Nergal's once soft-red skin an earthy, clay-like tan, and when Mammon concluded inspecting his work he nodded satisfactorily.
John watched him cautiously from his diaphanous, far-off hiding place, feeling the call of some deeper misery pulling him away, try as he might to resist; and then Mammon snapped his fingers again, and there was a powerful wrenching sensation, something seizing upon the absolute base foundations of John's very being - and then he woke up, dragging air desperately into his lungs in great ragged breaths through the tear in his throat that gurgled and spasmed as it knitted itself back together. John sat up, shaky and disconcerted, wary of Mammon. Mammon simply tossed him the coat.
"Thou hast impressed and amused me two-fold, John Constantine. Once with thy promised vanquishing of thine detestable kin, and once more with thine trickery of Nergal. Rare is the human who gambols with devils and exits favourably. Thou hast truly blazed through Hell like so few before thee."
John sat in the mud, pulling the coat on over his cold, sodden arms. It sat comfortable and warm against his skin, exuding a faint sense of bolstering. From the inside pocket, an eyeless lid batted fruitlessly back at him.
"So what's the deal? Back to life and a new coat to say, 'thanks for kicking those arseholes out my front yard'?"
It was, but Mammon would never admit it.
"Believe what thou wilt. I need give no reason." He replied, in a tone that told John not to question him further. John was more than happy to oblige, not wanting to look a gift demon in the mouth. "Thou art still stained in your soul, John Constantine, and bound hither when next your fate arrives; of that, Nergal didst spake truth. But until then - there hast ne'er been a Laughing Magician so entertaining. Thine predecessors were all so frightfully dull. If thou art to be truly the last of thy line - Hell would benefit from what trouble thou canst yet conjure."
"Then I'll thank you once again, Lord Mammon." John answered, aware he'd pushed his luck as far as it would go. "You have been most gracious."
"Indeed. My magnanimity hast reached its boundaries. Get thee gone, wastrel; I wouldst say thine business here is concluded, and mine with it. Shouldst we meet once more, be assured - I shalt not indulge thee thusly again."
And with that, Mammon clapped; John blinked; and when his eyes fluttered open, he was back on the bridge, having returned from Hell with a coat, a scar, and a sister once more.
TWO WEEKS LATER
John, Cheryl, and Chas all sat around Chas' kitchen table in his flat in London, steam drifting up from each of their mugs, fresh tea cooling off in the ambient air. On the countertop next to the kettle sat a small ceramic urn filled with ashes. John felt a squeeze around his fingers as his gaze lingered on it, his sister reaching across to him. He dropped his eyes from it and looked at her instead, taking in every pore of her soft, warm features. In the two weeks since she'd woken back up on the bridge in Chas' arms, she'd been struggling to re-adjust, as well as re-align with all that had happened in her two years away; yet, slowly but surely, she was coming back to reality, able to leave the flat and be among people again, even if John made it a point to never let her out of his sight. She couldn't blame him for it. His story had been bizarre and difficult to swallow at first, but Chas corroborated as much of it as he could, and the rest of the tale John told with such solemn conviction that Cheryl didn't have it in her heart to disbelieve him. The scars across his neck and the coat that never left his back both seemed to endorse his apparent odyssey, and from what little he'd revealed about those two peculiarities, Cheryl was reluctant to probe further. Fragments of awful feelings and memories flitted through her mind when she did, and down that path lay Ravenscar. She was just happy to be home again; happy to know he'd never given up on her. Happy to see him again.
The wistful smile that had crept across her face as she'd looked over John faded as he pulled his hand back, cradling his mug with both palms and clearing his throat. His eyes fell to stare at his wrists as he began difficult, painful words.
"When it was teenage practitioners asking for sigiled autographs, or dumb yanks in suits begging for a quick transmutation, or even some half-breed with a few choice swear words, it was almost funny. A bit of notoriety. Splashing the surface of a new pool and seeing what came up to check out the ripples. But today...today an honest-to-God devil, no half-anything about it, came to me with a message from Nergal. And when you're wearing the skin of the demon that's sent someone to deliver a threat - it's no longer funny. It's something we need to take seriously. It's something I should have been taking seriously."
It had been almost enjoyable on first return; John's escapade and the things he'd come back with - trophies, titles, knowledge of hidden things - had illuminated a secret world previously darkened to him, a new layer and depth revealed that made everything seem so alive in a way he'd not thought possible before. Mammon naming him as some historically-significant figure certainly hadn't hurt, either; who would turn their nose up if they'd landed in some strange and fantastical new land, much like their old world but not quite, and at the same time some mighty king had declared them powerful and famous? John was but a man, and could not help himself revelling in it, even if just a little bit. But then, that devil had approached him with horrible intent, bearing a vengeful portent from Nergal and it had been like sinking into an ice bath. The mantle of the Laughing Magician was not merely one of fame; it bore with it a target pointed squarely at his head, and today he had been reminded that he'd already made at least one powerful enemy, and more than likely had inherited several more.
"So what's your point, Johnny?" Chas asked, taking measured sips from his mug while he watched John over the rim with a careful gaze. John met his stare, equally steady.
"I'm dangerous. I've got a target on my back, and I don't think anyone - anything - coming after me is going to care about collateral damage. I'm a bomb. I've got a blast radius. And you two are both in it."
The three of them shifted uncomfortably as John paused and looked pointedly at the urn on the counter. Even before his jaunt, John's curse had claimed one of their number already. The silence was clear; he wasn't about to risk what was left.
"I should have a say in this," Cheryl announced. "You spent two years ruining yourself coming after me, and now you, what, want me and Chas to hit the road? Or fuck off yourself and leave us behind? We're meant to help you, John. Protect you. That's what friends do."
John smiled. God, he loved her.
"You spent seventeen years protecting me, Cheryl. Ever since the first night Dad brought me home. I think it's my turn now. I spent all that time searching for you and I found you. I can't accept, after all that, that I might be responsible for you getting hurt. Even accidentally."
Chas huffed, and both Constantines looked at him.
"What's even your plan? You can't just tell us to fuck off. This is my flat. And if you think you're gonna start living rough again I will drag you back here. Unconscious if I have to."
John chuckled, but he knew Chas was serious.
"I've scraped every account I've ever had. Pooled all my cash. Pumped the last out of my UC payments. Even got into some of Dad's money, which I really hope he's going ballistic about somewhere. And I bought myself a ticket."
John put a hand in the inside pocket of his coat and pulled out a small white envelope. He opened it up and fished out the contents, laying it in the center of the table: a one-way plane ticket from Heathrow to New York City. It was leaving tomorrow.
"Oh, you bastard." Cheryl said, exasperated. Chas raised an eyebrow.
"How were you planning on getting to Heathrow with no money left?" He asked. John cleared his throat, seeming to shrink in his seat.
"Well, uh, I um, I thought you might be able to give me a lift...?" He answered sheepishly. Chas huffed again, and then stuck his hand in his own jacket pocket; in one quick motion, like playing a game of cards, he slapped his own ticket down on top of John's.
"You ain't as slick as you think, fancy title or no."
"Oh, you bastard!" Cheryl yelled. "And what the bloody fuck am I supposed to do?"
Chas stood up, walking to the front door of the flat and unhooking his keys from a little rack that hung on the wall. He tossed them to Cheryl, who fumbled as she caught them and then looked dumbfoundedly back up at Chas.
"As the only one of us who got a job after everything went to fuck two years ago, I had savings. Last week I paid a year upfront and stuck your name on the lease. John's got a right to protect you, but that doesn't mean the little spunk-stain can't have anyone to look out for him."
Cheryl stood wordlessly and moved to hug Chas, who welcomed her in with outstretched arms. After a moment, John stood up too, and the three of them embraced quietly, no more words needed.
The next day, John and Chas hefted hastily-packed rucksacks over their shoulders as they scanned the departures board for their gate number. Cheryl sat quietly nearby, picking nervously at the skin around her fingernails while she bounced a leg.
"There it is," Chas said, breaking the tension. "B47. We're up."
This was it. John exhaled a deep breath, trying to steady his emotions. Beyond the glass walls of the terminal building, the sun was beginning to set, and John couldn't stop the feeling that the light was fading from a life he'd only half-lived for twenty years, and would now never have the chance to do properly. Beside him, Cheryl stood up, and though John had tried to steel himself, the wetness in her eyes as he turned cracked through him until, in all of a single deleterious second, they were sobbing in each other's embrace.
"H-harder than I th-thought it'd be." John choked out, and Cheryl just squeezed him in response. He squeezed back, and in that moment, focused for an instant; between them, something ethereal and invisible snapped, a hidden tether severed and cast away. Synchronicity - the silent power of the Laughing Magician. Without having to worry about causality, Cheryl would be safe. She could be happy.
"No one's finding you now unless you want them to. You'll be safe. For good." He said, pressing his forehead against hers. She nodded and wiped her cheeks.
"I'll miss you two." She said. John felt a hand on his shoulder.
"We'd better not miss it." Chas said, and John nodded.
On the steps up to the cabin, John looked back, just for a second, to the window at the terminal gate. Cheryl waved, and for a tiny calamitous moment, John was seized with the overwhelming urge to dive from the stairs, hit the tarmac, drop his bag and sprint from here back into the building, see her one last time, give her one last hug, share with her one last goodbye; and then someone walked in front of her, and once they passed, she was gone.
"C'mon, Houdini." Chas said, stood above him up the steps at the cabin door, holding a hand out. "Let's go."
"Alright, mate." John, answered, taking the hand offered in his own. "Let's go."
Location: Hell
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________#1.09
Beyond the boundaries of Mammon's court the mud grew thick and hard and crusted over until the bog disappeared and in its place lay a dry and barren salt flat, sterile and dead, not even the insects and plants of Earth's deserts present to breathe tiny life into its colourless, desolate plains. Dust kicked up around John's boots with each step and the muck caked to his clothes and skin and hair was finally beginning to dry out, cracking and flaking and bringing with it a new itchy, chapped sensation, a fresh discomfort. Hell never let up. Ahead of him, the wolf-fiend padded along, its misshapen form heaving left and right, naked flesh slapping against the dirt as it lead him on a merry hunt, occasionally stooping over awkwardly to sniff and snort in the dirt with its lupine snout before pivoting direction. All the while it paused regularly to look back at John, regarding him with beady black eyes, almost salivating. John was very sure that only Mammon's word was preventing him from being wholly devoured.
The ruined cathedral that housed Mammon's court, crumbling yet still ostentatious and intimidating, had now shrunk from view behind them completely, and with its disappearance John now felt truly untethered from even tenuously 'recognizable' landscape. In absence of landmarks and features and flora the very ground began to crack and split open, fractures in the dry mud growing and deepening into fissures that rent the earth asunder, opening to further depths below them until all that remained were the chasms and ravines plunging into an inescapable darkness. The wolf-fiend was treading around the edge of one rupture, its nose twitching and sniffing feverishly at the surface of its depths. John caught up and peered carefully over the lip, trying to force his eyes to adjust to the darkness and discern even some minute detail; alas, the blackness was impenetrable. He could see nothing. The wolf-fiend stilled and pointed down - the meaning was clear.
"You're joking, right? I'm not bloody Bear Grylls, mate."
The wolf-fiend stayed pointing, but it added a snarl to the mix by way of motivation. Its bared fangs dripped with appetite.
"Alright. Heard." John said, morose, and they began their descent.
The deeper they descended the more John felt a terrible sense of dread pooling in his stomach and clogging up his windpipe until it felt like it was going to spill from his mouth. A keening fear, sharp and potent, accompanied by the undeniable feeling of deja vu; these dark cliff faces were familiar beneath his ragged palms, and as they approached the ground at the very bottom of the ravine the feeling only compounded itself exponentially. When John's boots finally touched slick black earth his knees almost buckled beneath him as terror gripped every facet of his mind. He strained, listening, expecting a sound but finding none. There was no thudding left down here; no further butchery needed. As they walked, John knew what to look for before they could even see, before the darkness parted and a singular soft glow broke through the gloom like a lighthouse atop a rocky shore, and indeed once illuminated there it was, John's dreams revealed as premonitions, his fright now justified: a grove. A circle of burnt and blackened trees. A mound of soil, writhing with insects and the carcasses of small, torn-up animals. The block. Oh, God, the block.
โ๐ผ๐๐๐ ๐๐โโ. ๐๐ผ โ๐ธ๐๐ผ ๐น๐ผ๐ผโ ๐๐ธ๐๐๐โ๐พ.
An invisible force seized John's entire body and pulled him inexorably forward. He struggled, leaning away and trying desperately to turn back but he was dragged all the same, his heels gouging lines in the dirt as the trees and the mound and the block grew closer, closer, ever closer; there was a canine whimper to his side and John turned his head to see the wolf-fiend being dragged along beside him, thrashing and barking and snarling to no avail. As they approached the block, John and the wolf began to rise into the air, now free-floating and removed from all purchase, unable to reach or grasp anything that might offer resistance to the compelling force that directed them forward. This close, John could see a figure lying on its back upon the slab, a dirtied white shroud draped over their form. Their chest rose and fell softly in a slow rhythm, but otherwise they displayed no movement except for a subtle and disturbing writhing and distention across the surface of their belly. John's heart simultaneously broke and soared. This was her. He'd finally actually found Cheryl.
๐โ๐ธ๐ ๐๐ ๐โ๐๐ ๐น๐๐๐๐ป-โ๐๐โ๐ป? ๐๐ธโ'๐ ๐น๐ผ๐๐ ๐ฝโ๐๐ผโ๐ป, ๐โ ๐ธ ๐๐โ๐๐ผโ๐ โ๐ผโโ๐ธโ๐?
John hung restrained in the air as the wolf-fiend slowly drifted closer still to the grove, inspected by a hundred invisible eyes. Its growls and barks petered out and changed to discomforting, frightened whining, and then to pained yelps and finally a repulsive, disturbing wet gurgle as spit and blood dripped from its jaws as its body cracked and folded in on itself, ankles forced backwards until the soles of its feet hit its calves, then the knees snapping the wrong way and tucking shins into thighs, legs splaying and splitting sideways as they parcelled up against its torso; all the while its arms mirrored the horrific manipulations and finally, when it was all done and every joint and bone twisted and snapped and sundered, skin torn under the pressure of impossible movements and severed arteries gushing forth - the wolf alive and screaming through every second - its head turned and turned and turned, a cork turning on the screw, more flesh rupturing, more blood spilled, until the entire thing came loose with a wet tear and a pop. The body went limp and collapsed beneath the head still aloft, crumpling to the ground below, askew and discarded like a ragdoll, completely unrecognizable as its once-humanoid form in the wreckage it had become. The head spluttered its last and ceased, spine dangling beneath like some red-stained ivory necktie. It too dropped, rolling and tumbling away into the darkness. John vomited down himself.
๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ฝ ๐๐ธ๐๐๐โ'๐ ๐๐๐๐. ๐ธ โ๐ธ๐โ๐ผ๐๐โ โ๐ผ๐ ๐ฝ๐โ ๐ธ โ๐ธ๐โ๐ผ๐๐โ โโ๐ผ๐ธ๐๐โ๐ผ.
Whatever was commanding his body, John now felt the full pressure of its attention fall upon him. He felt flush, suddenly sweating in fear. Damp warmth spread across the groin of his trousers.
โ๐๐๐ผ, ๐๐โโ. ๐๐ผ๐ผ๐ ๐๐๐โ ๐นโ๐๐โ๐ผโ. ๐โ๐ผ ๐โ๐ผ ๐โ๐ ๐โ๐๐๐๐ป-โ๐ธ๐๐ผ-๐น๐ผ๐ผโ.
John began to float down, drawn towards the block and the shrouded figure. He tried to resist, desperate to struggle and thrash and flail as he was pulled near, but his legs remained stiff, his arms pinned to his sides. Only his eyes spun wildly in their sockets, searching this way and that for whatever hands now dominated it.
"Don't! Don't fold me up like the wolf Jesus Christ please-"
โ๐๐โ, ๐๐โโ. ๐๐ผ ๐โ๐ธโ'๐. ๐๐ผ โ๐ผ๐ผ๐ป ๐๐๐โ ๐๐ผ๐๐๐ผ๐ ๐โ๐๐ธโ๐.
The writhing beneath Cheryl's stomach grew wilder and more twisting, as if whatever snaked through her belly now became more and more impatient. John caught a glimpse of some gaunt, all-too-familiar face imprinted through the skin and against the shroud, and shut his eyes, screwing them closed tight until they hurt, willing the image to disappear from his mind; when he reopened them, the shifting roiling madness in his sister's flesh was moving, pathing upwards from her belly past her lungs - horrible popping sounds bursting from her sternum as it crawled up her ribs - pushing bones and blood vessels aside to finally come to a rest at her throat, wrapped around her esophagus. Cheryl's whole body spasmed, and then one hand seized the edge of the block in a white-knuckle grip before she rose, unsteady, the shroud covering her still but falling across her features as she sat up, some grim parody of a sheet-ghost, instead creating the effect of a macabre death mask over her obscured face. She drew a pained, rattling breath, and then spoke in a nightmarish blend John would never forget.
"Hello, brother." Said Jacob through their sister's mouth. "I have been waiting a long time to meet you properly."
Even through the shroud, John was close enough to smell Jacob's breath, stinking of death and rot.
โ๐โ๐ผ๐๐ผ๐ผโ ๐๐ผ๐ธโ๐. ๐๐ผ๐, ๐๐ธโ๐ ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐โ๐ผโ๐ ๐โ โ๐๐ธโโ๐โ๐พ ๐น๐ผ๐ฝ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐โ ๐น๐โ๐โ.
"And my death at your hands. Did you enjoy it? Did it make you happy? Do you even remember?"
John floundered, unable to answer.
"I remember. Choking in the warm dark wet. Spat out of our dying mother. A corpse birthing a corpse. You're cursed, John. You've always been cursed. Even since conception."
โ๐ผ โ๐ธ๐ ๐ธโโ๐๐๐ผ๐ป ๐ผ๐ธโ๐๐๐ผโ ๐โ๐ธโ โ๐๐ธโโ๐ผ๐ป. โ๐ผโ๐พ๐ธ๐ ๐๐ธ๐ ๐ธ ๐ป๐๐๐ธโโ๐๐โ๐๐๐ผโ๐ ๐น๐๐ ๐๐ผ โ๐ผ๐๐ธ๐โ ๐โ๐๐โ๐ผ๐ป๐ผ๐ป ๐ธ๐๐ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ธ๐๐ผ. ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ธ๐๐พโ๐โ๐พ ๐๐ธ๐พ๐โ๐๐ธโ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐๐ผ ๐ธ๐พ๐ธ๐โ.
"Yes. Your intrusion in an inconvenience at worst, just for the effort spent in holding you. Sooner than we'd planned for, and Gary certainly was useless in the end, but I suppose you've solved that little hiccup for us. No more subtlety; no more shadow manipulations. Now we have all the pieces, and all that's left to do is fit them together."
Jacob laughed in a low, throaty chuckle, relishing every moment.
"Isn't it exciting, John? Death isn't so bad. You'll have plenty of time to get used to it. Just like I did."
Pain erupted across John's body. Christ, it was like nothing he'd ever felt; no beating from Thomas or scalding shower at Ravenscar or self-destructive blade across his thigh could compare. Hidden needles pierced his organs, bypassing the skin directly to sink deep into the soft flesh within his body; a thousand stings and slivers, like swallowing shards of glass - spines pushing through bone into the very marrow itself, tearing at him in his most hidden and intimate places. He grit his teeth until they began to crack, the agony simple and pure and too much to even yell out or writhe; no, to express his suffering would be a way to cope, a way to alleviate it, and this was something Jacob would not allow. Sweat poured from his skin and he began to feel like he would go into convulsions, but still the black-and-white strobe behind his eyes offered no relief - any seizure his body threw in response he was made to feel in full consciousness. There would be no passing out, no simple lapsing into blackness, nor would the pain kill him through shock, even as his heart pushed past the cusp of bursting. Jacob just hurt him in a singular, clarified way. Pain. Pain. Pain.
โ๐ธ๐๐ผ ๐๐๐โ ๐ฝ๐โ. ๐ป๐ โ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐. โ๐๐ ๐ธ๐๐ ๐๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ป๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ธ๐๐.
Cheryl- Jacob- the dead twin wearing the skin of the sister - whatever the body was now, it whipped its head around, the shroud fluttering and rippling with the movement. It addressed the unseen voices, its own words brimming with impatience and outrage.
"Wait? I have spent nineteen years waiting! What is there left to do? Everything has aligned. He's here, now! We have everything we need! We only have to flush him out and let me be put in. This is it! This is what it's all been for!"
โ๐. ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐๐ โ๐๐พโ๐. ๐๐๐ โ๐ผโ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐พโ๐๐๐โ ๐๐ผ๐; ๐๐๐โ ๐๐๐๐๐ผโ'๐ ๐โ๐โ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐โ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐ ๐โ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐ธโ๐ผ โ๐ผ๐ธ๐ป๐.
"NO! We do this now! You give me this now!"
The pain eased off, even slightly, even for a second, enough for John to breathe and let his vision return and think. Jacob was in the fits of pique, thrashing Cheryl's body about, the skin twisting and raging as he ravaged through her flesh, seeming for all appearances to be in the throes of a tantrum. He ranted furiously, hurling curses and abuse; he was demented, out of his mind. He was at the cusp of everything, and being flatly denied in his fated moment.
"Near two decades I have spent as a wastrel! A wretch! An ethereal nothing, scheming and plotting and waiting, always waiting! Two years I have supped from my sister, nursed from her - what could be left?! What alignment remains?! Transform me! Deliver me! You'll deny my destiny no longer - now hand it to me!"
โ๐. ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐๐ผโ'๐ ๐โ๐โ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐โ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐, ๐โ๐๐ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐๐พโ๐.
A single, terrible, inevitable idea popped into John's head.
"What if my soul fed you?!" He blurted out, and Jacob ceased in his frenzy, attention returning to John. The pain ebbed, but did not stop. From beneath the shroud, Jacob breathed heavily, hungrily.
"What if you didn't empty me out? What if I let you in, and you took the vessel you wanted, but without needing to wait?"
๐โ๐ผโ๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐ โ๐ผ๐ผ๐ป. ๐๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ ๐โ๐๐ ๐๐ธ๐-
"Quiet!" Barked Jacob, before replying to John. "Why would you do that, after all this effort and coming all this way to kill me, again?!"
The pain ratcheted back up, Jacob vindictive and angry and venting his frustration on John's body. Through gritted teeth, John tried to answer.
"Didn't...come here to kill you...only came to save. Cheryl. Eat my spirit...don't need hers. Can let her go!"
๐โ๐ผโ๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐ โ๐ผ๐ผ๐ป.
"I said shut up!"
Slowly, very slowly, Jacob lifted one of Cheryl's hands - bruised, scraped, knuckles split and nail caked in filth - and pulled the shroud off. John screwed his eyes shut once more, unwilling to let the first sight of his lost sister after two years searching be her piloted by this evil creature masquerading as his brother. He felt her- him- it creep close, rancid breath hot on his cheek.
"You would do this? For her?"
"Swear...to return her...unharmed. Back to bridge...where she can be found."
๐๐ผ โ๐ธ๐๐ผ ๐ธ๐๐ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ผ ๐โ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐โ๐๐ป.
"Why shouldn't I wait, and just get what I want anyway?" Jacob hissed. He was holding back, but John could feel him being reeled in.
"Nineteen years...in the pits of Hell. Ever...eaten? Drank? Had...a beer, a ciggie? Treated yourself...to a wank?"
Jacob licked his lips. He began to softly pant, appetites of all description igniting in his core.
"I'm all of that...and more, Jakey boy. Get some...rain on your skin. Take a dip in the...river. Have a stroll in the sunshine."
๐ธ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐๐ผ ๐๐๐โ โ๐ธ๐๐๐ผโโ๐ผ.
"I just return Cheryl, and you let me in? Right now?"
With herculean effort and his eyes still screwed shut, straining against chains he could not see but felt heavily, John pushed a hand out toward Jacob.
"You let Cheryl go free...I let you in. And you walk out of Hell...tonight."
Jacob dragged a rough tongue up John's face, laughing in a sinister murmur that gave John goosebumps.
Everyone has an angle.
๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ธ ๐โ๐ธ-
Jacob seized his brother's outstretched hand.
"Deal."
A light drizzle had settled across Liverpool, slicking the ground and muffling all sound, even if ever-so-slightly on both fronts. It wasn't a particularly cold night, but the rain didn't exactly warm Chas as he came to, sprawled out across the Runcorn Railway Bridge. He head hurt and he felt groggy, but other than that his lungs breathed and his heart beat and his body moved with minimal protest as he dragged his arms underneath him and pushed up, unsteady at first but quickly getting his bearings back as he got to his feet. Headache aside, he felt alright; he surveyed the bridge again, thinking there was something he was forgetting. Something important. His eyes fell to Gary's still body, and it all came crashing back to him.
"John?!" He called out. Vague recollections swam around his head - some odd, uncanny stranger poring over Gary, John scrambling on his knees towards them - but he was alone now, just him and the corpse. He sighed, that deep sadness settling back in as his gaze lingered on his old friend's dead body.
He turned to look down the bridge. He assumed no one had passed by already - one corpse and one unconscious man were tricky to ignore, even in these callous times (or so he hoped, at least) - but there remained the slim risk someone still might. The night had plenty of hours left to wile away before sunrise, and there was no telling what else it might yet have in store. Chas couldn't see anyone currently, and he hoped it would stay that way. He still didn't have a better idea than dropping Gary into the river, but now that the panic and the terrible moment had passed, he was no longer sure he could stomach such an ignoble end for one of his oldest friends, regardless of however wretchedly it had all ended. He pivoted on his feet to look the other way, just to make sure they were safe from both directions, at least for now, to make sure he had some time to think and plan and figure out where the fucking hell John had gone-
There was another figure lying prone on the bridge a little ways down, just outside of the pools of light provided by the barely-there bulbs. Chas rushed over, worried that it was John, that he'd found a similar fate to Gary, that after two years and a return to this bridge he'd finally gone and bloody done it while Chas was out cold...
He slowed as he approached and began to make out details and features. Chas couldn't help but drop to his knees at the figure's head, dragging their unconscious body into his lap and overflowing with joy to see the soft rise-and-fall of their chest and feel the shallow pumping of their steady pulse in the skin at their wrist. Chas couldn't believe his eyes, and soon he couldn't see out of them either as tears welled up and spilled over. The drops splashed down onto the figure's face, whose eyes flickered and slowly opened, peering up at Chas.
"Fr...Francis?" She croaked out, her voice hoarse and quiet.
"Hi, Cheryl." Chas replied, and then he just held her for a while as they wept.
I am curled into a fetal ball, spinning and kicking aimlessly in a void of soft-light nothingness. I cannot see - my senses are blinded, numbed - but all around me, pressing against my skin, I feel the presence of another.
Everything is dark and John feels too full. Claustrophobic in his own body; not enough space to stretch out. Something else filled the space, pushing and needling him. Nudges and prodding became shoves and elbows and then blows were raining down upon him, accompanied by quick-flash stabs from an invisible blade. Jacob was relentless in his assault, and John summoned every last ounce of strength he had to raise a bulwark against his brother. Jacob railed against him, bringing forth all the hatred and anger and envy the dead twin had harbored for the last nineteen years, two decades of wrath and ambition and the poisonous prophecy of the Laughing Magician whispered in his ear bolstering his fury. He wailed at John, feral raving about his destiny, promised power, the deal struck between brothers. John didn't want to lose himself, but Cheryl was safe, spirited out of Hell back to Earth, the deed done, the mission complete. He could feel his soul slipping away. The sense of his own body started to fade, growing distant from him like his limbs were stretching out. Jacob was slithering into the cracks, worming his way in around John's receding edges. He was pulling the body on like a glove, sliding his fingers into place, gliding across the surface of John's diminishing will like oil on water to seep into the spaces left behind. The battle between the brothers raged and John knew, slowly, surely, steadily second by second, that he was losing. His false deal and sly intentions didn't matter; Jacob was simply mightier than him, and he supped on John's soul from a gilded cup to replenish his own.
Quietly, John accepted that these were his last moments. The plan had failed. He'd struck the bargain and Jacob had taken it and now, regardless of his designs, he was set to forcibly make good on the conditions of his own deal. Welcome to the consequences of your actions, John Constantine. They were bound to catch up with you one day. You lay down with devils, you get up with your soul leeched away into senseless oblivion.
He spent his final thoughts lingering on the few golden memories he had left.
He thought about Gary, sharing drinks in his bedroom and shuffling through CDs while arguing over bands and albums, getting messy in the put and throwing each other around at gigs.
He thought about Chas, sharing a quiet cigarette in brief retreat from burgeoning chaos, indulging in a vulnerable moment in the night while several beers deep, belly-laughing over unflattering impressions of their much-loathed parents until their faces were red and tears streamed down their cheeks and they clutched at their ribs trying to catch their breath.
He thought about Cheryl, about days spent under the summer sun running about the docks and watching the light play off the surface of the water, about a camera roll filled with imperfections that John would still hang proud in a gallery for all to see, about nights shivering in the bathroom, door locked, his sister gently washing and dabbing fresh welts across his back. About being taken into her arms as the proud bravado fell away and he sobbed into her shoulder.
Jacob was battered by this tide of overwhelming, alien feelings and memories, unable to parse or categorize, lost amidst waves of emotion he had no point of reference or comparison for. It all confused him, confounded his mind and muddled his purpose; for only the briefest of moments his steady advance against John's consciousness ground to a halt completely and John found himself suddenly back in full control of his faculties. He had precious seconds - there would not be another chance once Jacob recovered and resumed his assault. He concentrated, focusing all efforts on a singular limb. The rosary still hung from his neck, and he could faintly feel the weight of the cross still resting against his sternum. With stiff fingers and a hand battling the resistance of a hundred generations of ancestral Constantines, John wrapped his palm around the wooden icon and pulled outwards; distantly, he felt the chain snapping and beads spilling to the floor.
๐ ๐ธ โ ๐ -
Jacob snapped out of his fugue, pushing the confusing, troubling feelings away, returning his attention to subsuming John with distractions dispelled; but it was all too late. It was already in motion. With one final burst of control, the hand that clutched the cross plunged it into John's throat, and then tore itself across.
John spluttered. Jacob screamed, furious, impotent. Blood rushed forth, staining John's chest and the ground beneath his collapsing body. The last sputters of John's life petered out, a single rattling breath expelled; and then John died.
The ruined cathedral that housed Mammon's court, crumbling yet still ostentatious and intimidating, had now shrunk from view behind them completely, and with its disappearance John now felt truly untethered from even tenuously 'recognizable' landscape. In absence of landmarks and features and flora the very ground began to crack and split open, fractures in the dry mud growing and deepening into fissures that rent the earth asunder, opening to further depths below them until all that remained were the chasms and ravines plunging into an inescapable darkness. The wolf-fiend was treading around the edge of one rupture, its nose twitching and sniffing feverishly at the surface of its depths. John caught up and peered carefully over the lip, trying to force his eyes to adjust to the darkness and discern even some minute detail; alas, the blackness was impenetrable. He could see nothing. The wolf-fiend stilled and pointed down - the meaning was clear.
"You're joking, right? I'm not bloody Bear Grylls, mate."
The wolf-fiend stayed pointing, but it added a snarl to the mix by way of motivation. Its bared fangs dripped with appetite.
"Alright. Heard." John said, morose, and they began their descent.
The deeper they descended the more John felt a terrible sense of dread pooling in his stomach and clogging up his windpipe until it felt like it was going to spill from his mouth. A keening fear, sharp and potent, accompanied by the undeniable feeling of deja vu; these dark cliff faces were familiar beneath his ragged palms, and as they approached the ground at the very bottom of the ravine the feeling only compounded itself exponentially. When John's boots finally touched slick black earth his knees almost buckled beneath him as terror gripped every facet of his mind. He strained, listening, expecting a sound but finding none. There was no thudding left down here; no further butchery needed. As they walked, John knew what to look for before they could even see, before the darkness parted and a singular soft glow broke through the gloom like a lighthouse atop a rocky shore, and indeed once illuminated there it was, John's dreams revealed as premonitions, his fright now justified: a grove. A circle of burnt and blackened trees. A mound of soil, writhing with insects and the carcasses of small, torn-up animals. The block. Oh, God, the block.
โ๐ผ๐๐๐ ๐๐โโ. ๐๐ผ โ๐ธ๐๐ผ ๐น๐ผ๐ผโ ๐๐ธ๐๐๐โ๐พ.
An invisible force seized John's entire body and pulled him inexorably forward. He struggled, leaning away and trying desperately to turn back but he was dragged all the same, his heels gouging lines in the dirt as the trees and the mound and the block grew closer, closer, ever closer; there was a canine whimper to his side and John turned his head to see the wolf-fiend being dragged along beside him, thrashing and barking and snarling to no avail. As they approached the block, John and the wolf began to rise into the air, now free-floating and removed from all purchase, unable to reach or grasp anything that might offer resistance to the compelling force that directed them forward. This close, John could see a figure lying on its back upon the slab, a dirtied white shroud draped over their form. Their chest rose and fell softly in a slow rhythm, but otherwise they displayed no movement except for a subtle and disturbing writhing and distention across the surface of their belly. John's heart simultaneously broke and soared. This was her. He'd finally actually found Cheryl.
๐โ๐ธ๐ ๐๐ ๐โ๐๐ ๐น๐๐๐๐ป-โ๐๐โ๐ป? ๐๐ธโ'๐ ๐น๐ผ๐๐ ๐ฝโ๐๐ผโ๐ป, ๐โ ๐ธ ๐๐โ๐๐ผโ๐ โ๐ผโโ๐ธโ๐?
John hung restrained in the air as the wolf-fiend slowly drifted closer still to the grove, inspected by a hundred invisible eyes. Its growls and barks petered out and changed to discomforting, frightened whining, and then to pained yelps and finally a repulsive, disturbing wet gurgle as spit and blood dripped from its jaws as its body cracked and folded in on itself, ankles forced backwards until the soles of its feet hit its calves, then the knees snapping the wrong way and tucking shins into thighs, legs splaying and splitting sideways as they parcelled up against its torso; all the while its arms mirrored the horrific manipulations and finally, when it was all done and every joint and bone twisted and snapped and sundered, skin torn under the pressure of impossible movements and severed arteries gushing forth - the wolf alive and screaming through every second - its head turned and turned and turned, a cork turning on the screw, more flesh rupturing, more blood spilled, until the entire thing came loose with a wet tear and a pop. The body went limp and collapsed beneath the head still aloft, crumpling to the ground below, askew and discarded like a ragdoll, completely unrecognizable as its once-humanoid form in the wreckage it had become. The head spluttered its last and ceased, spine dangling beneath like some red-stained ivory necktie. It too dropped, rolling and tumbling away into the darkness. John vomited down himself.
๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ฝ ๐๐ธ๐๐๐โ'๐ ๐๐๐๐. ๐ธ โ๐ธ๐โ๐ผ๐๐โ โ๐ผ๐ ๐ฝ๐โ ๐ธ โ๐ธ๐โ๐ผ๐๐โ โโ๐ผ๐ธ๐๐โ๐ผ.
Whatever was commanding his body, John now felt the full pressure of its attention fall upon him. He felt flush, suddenly sweating in fear. Damp warmth spread across the groin of his trousers.
โ๐๐๐ผ, ๐๐โโ. ๐๐ผ๐ผ๐ ๐๐๐โ ๐นโ๐๐โ๐ผโ. ๐โ๐ผ ๐โ๐ผ ๐โ๐ ๐โ๐๐๐๐ป-โ๐ธ๐๐ผ-๐น๐ผ๐ผโ.
John began to float down, drawn towards the block and the shrouded figure. He tried to resist, desperate to struggle and thrash and flail as he was pulled near, but his legs remained stiff, his arms pinned to his sides. Only his eyes spun wildly in their sockets, searching this way and that for whatever hands now dominated it.
"Don't! Don't fold me up like the wolf Jesus Christ please-"
โ๐๐โ, ๐๐โโ. ๐๐ผ ๐โ๐ธโ'๐. ๐๐ผ โ๐ผ๐ผ๐ป ๐๐๐โ ๐๐ผ๐๐๐ผ๐ ๐โ๐๐ธโ๐.
The writhing beneath Cheryl's stomach grew wilder and more twisting, as if whatever snaked through her belly now became more and more impatient. John caught a glimpse of some gaunt, all-too-familiar face imprinted through the skin and against the shroud, and shut his eyes, screwing them closed tight until they hurt, willing the image to disappear from his mind; when he reopened them, the shifting roiling madness in his sister's flesh was moving, pathing upwards from her belly past her lungs - horrible popping sounds bursting from her sternum as it crawled up her ribs - pushing bones and blood vessels aside to finally come to a rest at her throat, wrapped around her esophagus. Cheryl's whole body spasmed, and then one hand seized the edge of the block in a white-knuckle grip before she rose, unsteady, the shroud covering her still but falling across her features as she sat up, some grim parody of a sheet-ghost, instead creating the effect of a macabre death mask over her obscured face. She drew a pained, rattling breath, and then spoke in a nightmarish blend John would never forget.
"Hello, brother." Said Jacob through their sister's mouth. "I have been waiting a long time to meet you properly."
Even through the shroud, John was close enough to smell Jacob's breath, stinking of death and rot.
โ๐โ๐ผ๐๐ผ๐ผโ ๐๐ผ๐ธโ๐. ๐๐ผ๐, ๐๐ธโ๐ ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐โ๐ผโ๐ ๐โ โ๐๐ธโโ๐โ๐พ ๐น๐ผ๐ฝ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐โ ๐น๐โ๐โ.
"And my death at your hands. Did you enjoy it? Did it make you happy? Do you even remember?"
John floundered, unable to answer.
"I remember. Choking in the warm dark wet. Spat out of our dying mother. A corpse birthing a corpse. You're cursed, John. You've always been cursed. Even since conception."
โ๐ผ โ๐ธ๐ ๐ธโโ๐๐๐ผ๐ป ๐ผ๐ธโ๐๐๐ผโ ๐โ๐ธโ โ๐๐ธโโ๐ผ๐ป. โ๐ผโ๐พ๐ธ๐ ๐๐ธ๐ ๐ธ ๐ป๐๐๐ธโโ๐๐โ๐๐๐ผโ๐ ๐น๐๐ ๐๐ผ โ๐ผ๐๐ธ๐โ ๐โ๐๐โ๐ผ๐ป๐ผ๐ป ๐ธ๐๐ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ธ๐๐ผ. ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐ธ๐๐พโ๐โ๐พ ๐๐ธ๐พ๐โ๐๐ธโ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐๐ผ ๐ธ๐พ๐ธ๐โ.
"Yes. Your intrusion in an inconvenience at worst, just for the effort spent in holding you. Sooner than we'd planned for, and Gary certainly was useless in the end, but I suppose you've solved that little hiccup for us. No more subtlety; no more shadow manipulations. Now we have all the pieces, and all that's left to do is fit them together."
Jacob laughed in a low, throaty chuckle, relishing every moment.
"Isn't it exciting, John? Death isn't so bad. You'll have plenty of time to get used to it. Just like I did."
Pain erupted across John's body. Christ, it was like nothing he'd ever felt; no beating from Thomas or scalding shower at Ravenscar or self-destructive blade across his thigh could compare. Hidden needles pierced his organs, bypassing the skin directly to sink deep into the soft flesh within his body; a thousand stings and slivers, like swallowing shards of glass - spines pushing through bone into the very marrow itself, tearing at him in his most hidden and intimate places. He grit his teeth until they began to crack, the agony simple and pure and too much to even yell out or writhe; no, to express his suffering would be a way to cope, a way to alleviate it, and this was something Jacob would not allow. Sweat poured from his skin and he began to feel like he would go into convulsions, but still the black-and-white strobe behind his eyes offered no relief - any seizure his body threw in response he was made to feel in full consciousness. There would be no passing out, no simple lapsing into blackness, nor would the pain kill him through shock, even as his heart pushed past the cusp of bursting. Jacob just hurt him in a singular, clarified way. Pain. Pain. Pain.
โ๐ธ๐๐ผ ๐๐๐โ ๐ฝ๐โ. ๐ป๐ โ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐. โ๐๐ ๐ธ๐๐ ๐๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ป๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ธ๐๐.
Cheryl- Jacob- the dead twin wearing the skin of the sister - whatever the body was now, it whipped its head around, the shroud fluttering and rippling with the movement. It addressed the unseen voices, its own words brimming with impatience and outrage.
"Wait? I have spent nineteen years waiting! What is there left to do? Everything has aligned. He's here, now! We have everything we need! We only have to flush him out and let me be put in. This is it! This is what it's all been for!"
โ๐. ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐๐ โ๐๐พโ๐. ๐๐๐ โ๐ผโ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐พโ๐๐๐โ ๐๐ผ๐; ๐๐๐โ ๐๐๐๐๐ผโ'๐ ๐โ๐โ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐โ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐ ๐โ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐ธโ๐ผ โ๐ผ๐ธ๐ป๐.
"NO! We do this now! You give me this now!"
The pain eased off, even slightly, even for a second, enough for John to breathe and let his vision return and think. Jacob was in the fits of pique, thrashing Cheryl's body about, the skin twisting and raging as he ravaged through her flesh, seeming for all appearances to be in the throes of a tantrum. He ranted furiously, hurling curses and abuse; he was demented, out of his mind. He was at the cusp of everything, and being flatly denied in his fated moment.
"Near two decades I have spent as a wastrel! A wretch! An ethereal nothing, scheming and plotting and waiting, always waiting! Two years I have supped from my sister, nursed from her - what could be left?! What alignment remains?! Transform me! Deliver me! You'll deny my destiny no longer - now hand it to me!"
โ๐. ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐๐ผโ'๐ ๐โ๐โ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐โ๐๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐, ๐โ๐๐ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐๐พโ๐.
A single, terrible, inevitable idea popped into John's head.
"What if my soul fed you?!" He blurted out, and Jacob ceased in his frenzy, attention returning to John. The pain ebbed, but did not stop. From beneath the shroud, Jacob breathed heavily, hungrily.
"What if you didn't empty me out? What if I let you in, and you took the vessel you wanted, but without needing to wait?"
๐โ๐ผโ๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐ โ๐ผ๐ผ๐ป. ๐๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ ๐โ๐๐ ๐๐ธ๐-
"Quiet!" Barked Jacob, before replying to John. "Why would you do that, after all this effort and coming all this way to kill me, again?!"
The pain ratcheted back up, Jacob vindictive and angry and venting his frustration on John's body. Through gritted teeth, John tried to answer.
"Didn't...come here to kill you...only came to save. Cheryl. Eat my spirit...don't need hers. Can let her go!"
๐โ๐ผโ๐ผ ๐๐ โ๐ โ๐ผ๐ผ๐ป.
"I said shut up!"
Slowly, very slowly, Jacob lifted one of Cheryl's hands - bruised, scraped, knuckles split and nail caked in filth - and pulled the shroud off. John screwed his eyes shut once more, unwilling to let the first sight of his lost sister after two years searching be her piloted by this evil creature masquerading as his brother. He felt her- him- it creep close, rancid breath hot on his cheek.
"You would do this? For her?"
"Swear...to return her...unharmed. Back to bridge...where she can be found."
๐๐ผ โ๐ธ๐๐ผ ๐ธ๐๐ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐๐๐ผ ๐โ ๐โ๐ผ ๐๐โ๐๐ป.
"Why shouldn't I wait, and just get what I want anyway?" Jacob hissed. He was holding back, but John could feel him being reeled in.
"Nineteen years...in the pits of Hell. Ever...eaten? Drank? Had...a beer, a ciggie? Treated yourself...to a wank?"
Jacob licked his lips. He began to softly pant, appetites of all description igniting in his core.
"I'm all of that...and more, Jakey boy. Get some...rain on your skin. Take a dip in the...river. Have a stroll in the sunshine."
๐ธ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ โ๐๐๐ผ ๐๐๐โ โ๐ธ๐๐๐ผโโ๐ผ.
"I just return Cheryl, and you let me in? Right now?"
With herculean effort and his eyes still screwed shut, straining against chains he could not see but felt heavily, John pushed a hand out toward Jacob.
"You let Cheryl go free...I let you in. And you walk out of Hell...tonight."
Jacob dragged a rough tongue up John's face, laughing in a sinister murmur that gave John goosebumps.
Everyone has an angle.
๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ธ ๐โ๐ธ-
Jacob seized his brother's outstretched hand.
"Deal."
A light drizzle had settled across Liverpool, slicking the ground and muffling all sound, even if ever-so-slightly on both fronts. It wasn't a particularly cold night, but the rain didn't exactly warm Chas as he came to, sprawled out across the Runcorn Railway Bridge. He head hurt and he felt groggy, but other than that his lungs breathed and his heart beat and his body moved with minimal protest as he dragged his arms underneath him and pushed up, unsteady at first but quickly getting his bearings back as he got to his feet. Headache aside, he felt alright; he surveyed the bridge again, thinking there was something he was forgetting. Something important. His eyes fell to Gary's still body, and it all came crashing back to him.
"John?!" He called out. Vague recollections swam around his head - some odd, uncanny stranger poring over Gary, John scrambling on his knees towards them - but he was alone now, just him and the corpse. He sighed, that deep sadness settling back in as his gaze lingered on his old friend's dead body.
He turned to look down the bridge. He assumed no one had passed by already - one corpse and one unconscious man were tricky to ignore, even in these callous times (or so he hoped, at least) - but there remained the slim risk someone still might. The night had plenty of hours left to wile away before sunrise, and there was no telling what else it might yet have in store. Chas couldn't see anyone currently, and he hoped it would stay that way. He still didn't have a better idea than dropping Gary into the river, but now that the panic and the terrible moment had passed, he was no longer sure he could stomach such an ignoble end for one of his oldest friends, regardless of however wretchedly it had all ended. He pivoted on his feet to look the other way, just to make sure they were safe from both directions, at least for now, to make sure he had some time to think and plan and figure out where the fucking hell John had gone-
There was another figure lying prone on the bridge a little ways down, just outside of the pools of light provided by the barely-there bulbs. Chas rushed over, worried that it was John, that he'd found a similar fate to Gary, that after two years and a return to this bridge he'd finally gone and bloody done it while Chas was out cold...
He slowed as he approached and began to make out details and features. Chas couldn't help but drop to his knees at the figure's head, dragging their unconscious body into his lap and overflowing with joy to see the soft rise-and-fall of their chest and feel the shallow pumping of their steady pulse in the skin at their wrist. Chas couldn't believe his eyes, and soon he couldn't see out of them either as tears welled up and spilled over. The drops splashed down onto the figure's face, whose eyes flickered and slowly opened, peering up at Chas.
"Fr...Francis?" She croaked out, her voice hoarse and quiet.
"Hi, Cheryl." Chas replied, and then he just held her for a while as they wept.
I am curled into a fetal ball, spinning and kicking aimlessly in a void of soft-light nothingness. I cannot see - my senses are blinded, numbed - but all around me, pressing against my skin, I feel the presence of another.
Everything is dark and John feels too full. Claustrophobic in his own body; not enough space to stretch out. Something else filled the space, pushing and needling him. Nudges and prodding became shoves and elbows and then blows were raining down upon him, accompanied by quick-flash stabs from an invisible blade. Jacob was relentless in his assault, and John summoned every last ounce of strength he had to raise a bulwark against his brother. Jacob railed against him, bringing forth all the hatred and anger and envy the dead twin had harbored for the last nineteen years, two decades of wrath and ambition and the poisonous prophecy of the Laughing Magician whispered in his ear bolstering his fury. He wailed at John, feral raving about his destiny, promised power, the deal struck between brothers. John didn't want to lose himself, but Cheryl was safe, spirited out of Hell back to Earth, the deed done, the mission complete. He could feel his soul slipping away. The sense of his own body started to fade, growing distant from him like his limbs were stretching out. Jacob was slithering into the cracks, worming his way in around John's receding edges. He was pulling the body on like a glove, sliding his fingers into place, gliding across the surface of John's diminishing will like oil on water to seep into the spaces left behind. The battle between the brothers raged and John knew, slowly, surely, steadily second by second, that he was losing. His false deal and sly intentions didn't matter; Jacob was simply mightier than him, and he supped on John's soul from a gilded cup to replenish his own.
Quietly, John accepted that these were his last moments. The plan had failed. He'd struck the bargain and Jacob had taken it and now, regardless of his designs, he was set to forcibly make good on the conditions of his own deal. Welcome to the consequences of your actions, John Constantine. They were bound to catch up with you one day. You lay down with devils, you get up with your soul leeched away into senseless oblivion.
He spent his final thoughts lingering on the few golden memories he had left.
He thought about Gary, sharing drinks in his bedroom and shuffling through CDs while arguing over bands and albums, getting messy in the put and throwing each other around at gigs.
He thought about Chas, sharing a quiet cigarette in brief retreat from burgeoning chaos, indulging in a vulnerable moment in the night while several beers deep, belly-laughing over unflattering impressions of their much-loathed parents until their faces were red and tears streamed down their cheeks and they clutched at their ribs trying to catch their breath.
He thought about Cheryl, about days spent under the summer sun running about the docks and watching the light play off the surface of the water, about a camera roll filled with imperfections that John would still hang proud in a gallery for all to see, about nights shivering in the bathroom, door locked, his sister gently washing and dabbing fresh welts across his back. About being taken into her arms as the proud bravado fell away and he sobbed into her shoulder.
Jacob was battered by this tide of overwhelming, alien feelings and memories, unable to parse or categorize, lost amidst waves of emotion he had no point of reference or comparison for. It all confused him, confounded his mind and muddled his purpose; for only the briefest of moments his steady advance against John's consciousness ground to a halt completely and John found himself suddenly back in full control of his faculties. He had precious seconds - there would not be another chance once Jacob recovered and resumed his assault. He concentrated, focusing all efforts on a singular limb. The rosary still hung from his neck, and he could faintly feel the weight of the cross still resting against his sternum. With stiff fingers and a hand battling the resistance of a hundred generations of ancestral Constantines, John wrapped his palm around the wooden icon and pulled outwards; distantly, he felt the chain snapping and beads spilling to the floor.
๐ ๐ธ โ ๐ -
Jacob snapped out of his fugue, pushing the confusing, troubling feelings away, returning his attention to subsuming John with distractions dispelled; but it was all too late. It was already in motion. With one final burst of control, the hand that clutched the cross plunged it into John's throat, and then tore itself across.
John spluttered. Jacob screamed, furious, impotent. Blood rushed forth, staining John's chest and the ground beneath his collapsing body. The last sputters of John's life petered out, a single rattling breath expelled; and then John died.
Location: Hell
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________#1.08
The cloying mud was reluctant to let John go but the tree-creatures wrenched him up and out of the muck with surprising ease, tossing him carelessly through the air; bits of bark and twig snapped and splintered around him as he fell heavily and splashed against an intricately-carved stone floor. Whatever previous stir there had been now stalled at his arrival, and all beings present first looked from the trees to John's prone and clagged form, and then finally, inexorably, to the figure sat at the head of the court.
"Wherefore dost thou see fit to disturb my court?"
The first of the tree-creatures prodded John sharply, who was busy coughing and spluttering foul-smelling ooze from out of nearly every orifice.
"Answer our lord, worm."
"I address thee."
Mammon lifted a claw and gestured at the clustered trees. They creaked and snapped, faltering.
"My- my lord," said the second, "this mortal wishes-"
"Begone." Mammon commanded, and flicked his outstretched finger. All three tree-creatures exploded into uncountable fragments; with unearthly howls, the fiery essence that writhed beneath their bark was exposed, whipping and twisting about itself until it erupted upwards, exorcised with a single pained scream as a gout of flame and then extinguished. Mammon looked faintly amused, and then he spoke to John.
"Human. Declare thine purpose."
John craned his neck up, getting his hands beneath him and pushing himself up off the ground to rest on his knees. The figure before him was grand and mighty, there could be no doubt; the demon towered several feet over him even in his seated, relaxed position, and his rotund and bulging form, skin a deep crimson, was adorned with all manner of golden jewellery and ornate piercings. Golden spikes erupted from his shoulders, elbows, the top of his head, curved horns jutting out and bursting through the skin, and his belly bore hideous stitching barely holding together a great crossed wound; there was the glint of further gold behind that torn flesh, if you caught the right angle, and when he moved, his belly jingled and rattled with the metallic sound of coins on coins. His court was filled with all manner of fiends and devils, their own forms ranging from the mundane to the incomprehensible, each cowing under his heavy gaze. Above all else, the throned demon radiated greed, avarice, and an unquestionable power, and there was no mistaking: this was Mammon. Prince of Greed; Plutus the Golden; the Treasurer of Hell, the Avaricious Wolf, the Master of the Gambling Houses. And he was not to be toyed with.
"I'm looking for my sister." John answered plainly. Mammon scoffed.
"I hold no concern for such trifles." He said, waving dismissively and then gesturing to two attendants. "Take him hence; put him to suffering."
The attendants moved quickly to seize John and he panicked, darting out of reach. The mud, unpleasant as it was, was also slick and slimy and made finding a grip on John as he weaved through grasping claws difficult. Stubby, clubbed digits and ragged nails pulled at John's jacket and legs, slipping away as black muck squeezed through the seams between their fingers until finally one fiend tackled John entirely, and once again he was on his back, stone digging into his shoulder blades, some new devil pinning him down. This one had the body of a man but lumpy and malformed, and its head was of the wolf, the skin at its neck rupturing and torn where tufts of fur threatened to burst through. It snapped viciously at John with powerful jaws, adding foamy drool to the myriad slimes that coated him. Two more devils flanked him, and they lifted him bodily into the air, intending to parade the catch about the court and make a show of him; John cried out in pain as claws sunk into his shoulder, and this in itself already elicited jeers from the audience. As they jostled him, the rosary fell loose and dangled forward; under Mammon's vaguely-bored gaze, something caught his eye.
"Halt!" He called, and the proceedings ceased. He snapped a claw and pointed to the base of the dias his throne rested upon. "Fetch him hither. Present unto me his necklace."
John was carried to be held before Mammon, and here he caught pungent wafts of metal and blood as the great demon leant forward, examining the rosary carefully between two claws. He snapped again.
"Release him." He ordered, and John was dropped to the ground. "Human - by what rights didst thou acquire this? Conquest? Bargain?"
"Nergal gave it to me."
"Charity! Nergal is a loathsome, ambitious cretin - yet cunning; but ne'er charitable. I find thine claim hard to credit."
John remained silent, his face set. Mammon studied his expression, and then sat back in his throne. He looked almost curious.
"Very well. Tell thy tale."
The court quieted, and John pulled himself back to his feet, drawing sharp breath as the pain of the fresh puncture in his shoulder was added to his suffering.
"I'm John Constantine," he began, and almost imperceptibly Mammon shifted, a new attention paid to John's words, "and I'm looking for my sister. She's here, somewhere, trapped in your kingdom. My ancesters - the Laughing Magicians," and at this there was a wave of murmurs through the court, quickly silenced by a pointed glare from Mammon, "have her. They've got a terrible plan for her, one I intend to stop. I struck a deal with Nergal to bring me to Cheryl, but he dumped me on the outskirts on a technicality. The rosary is proof of our bargain, and a way for him to find me later."
Mammon raised an eyebrow. "That doth ring truer to Nergal's nature." He surmised, leaning back in his throne, seemingly satisfied. "I am acquainted with thy family. What plot do they weave?"
"My dead cunt of a brother should have been the next incarnation. They want to use my sister to revive him. Once they do, the whole bloody lot of 'em are marching on Hell - you first. They'll take your throne, and your power, and then they'll sweep through the rest of Hell, one lord at a time. And after that, there'll be no one left to stop them. Not even Him."
Mammon shifted, John's words rankling him. Even the implication that something could usurp him was dangerous, seditious talk that would encourage an unwelcome line of thought within his court. For this insect to suggest such a thing so openly in front of him was remarkably brazen; either John was markedly bold, or markedly stupid. Mammon oscillated between enraged and impressed.
"I am unconquerable; a bastion against all foes!" He announced, his voice reverberating and the court shuddering as he crashed his fist against the stone arm of his throne; his audience quivered, the display quelling any idea of a coup. "I shouldst slay thee where thy stand for the mere utterance of such a notion."
"Kill me then. I'll see you around Hell when my brother does the same to you."
The court became very still. John's heart beat like thunder in his chest. He was in a very large amount of very varied kinds of pain; he was cold and wet and uncomfortable; he was grieving a friend he'd just killed and another he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to see again; he was sore, and achy, and above everything else, he was tired. So tired, tired all the way down to his toes, so tired that even the unconscious acts of pushing blood around his beaten body and sucking this rancid, fetid air into his lungs were an almost unbearable effort. And he had run out of patience. He had two plays left: one here and now for Mammon, and one when he finally tracked down Jacob. If between now and then, or even after he succeeded, he dropped dead - he couldn't care less. At least none of this shit would be his fucking problem anymore.
Mammon erupted in great booming laughter, the court echoing with that jangling metallic sound as his belly heaved up and down in fits of amusement. Cautiously, the rest of the court attendees joined in, the stone walls chattering with the snickering of a dozen devils and more.
"Thy undergarments belie the vastness of thine cullions, John Constantine!" The demon lord declared, and he reached a lechorous hand forward to grope and tickle John's mud-sodden groin with calloused, thick-clawed fingers. John jumped back, outraged and disquieted, and this made Mammon laugh harder.
"Pray, tell, on what ground then shouldst I spare thy life? Make thine counsel."
"You kill me and my ancestors will soon be knocking down your door bringing war with them. Even if you win, I'll be dead and Nergal will have my soul and, like you said, he's ambitious. He'll make a play and you'll have another fight on your hands."
"Say then I allow thine exit alive, fine; but thy family squabble 'tis not my concern."
"They don't care. They'll come down on you anyway. Maybe you win, but it'll hurt you and your kingdom regardless. Why fight at all? And if you lose - well, imagine how happy the rest of Hell's gonna be when they find out the war breathing down their necks could have been nipped in the arse before it ever started."
"Hmmm. Thou wouldst possess a third proposal, then?"
"Sure. You don't kill me, and you help me kick my rotten family down to the ninth circle for good. You'd have the vanquishing of the Laughing Magicians, once and for all, to your name. That kind of trophy could be very profitable for you."
"Hmmm."
Mammon took a long silence to weigh his options. The power of just one Laughing Magician was well-regarded; in truth, he could not predict the scope of the might held by the entire ancestral line. Throughout history, the Constantines had never played fair, even when constrained by the Earthly plane. Down here, mortal shells discarded...he would never admit it, never show it; but a fragment of fear slithered into his blackened heart. He shifted forward in his throne and finally lifted his hands, delivering a short sharp clap.
"I am loathe to depart my court; but I can send thee in my stead. Thou shalt be directed hence to thine rogue family, and be assured of their dispatch. Shouldst thou fail or falter, I shalt be forced to slay thee all without mercy."
Mammon gestured again to the wolf-head fiend.
"Serf - show him whither his ancestors make their den."
The wolf-devil bowed graciously, and bounded away, waiting paitently at the threshold of Mammon's court for John to follow.
"I grant thee the protection of my kingdom, Constantine," Mammon said, waving lazily across John's body as the air shimmered and some new pressure settled into his skin. "Know that I shalt remove my boon at mine own pleasure. Do not misrepresent me."
John shivered. He knelt, making his best attempt at showing sincere deference.
"Thank you, Lord Mammon."
"Do not fail, John Constantine. Thine agony can still surely sink to greater depths than thine mind can possess."
John nodded, heeding Mammon's warning well, and then turned and left, more than a little surprised he was still alive at all.
"Wherefore dost thou see fit to disturb my court?"
The first of the tree-creatures prodded John sharply, who was busy coughing and spluttering foul-smelling ooze from out of nearly every orifice.
"Answer our lord, worm."
"I address thee."
Mammon lifted a claw and gestured at the clustered trees. They creaked and snapped, faltering.
"My- my lord," said the second, "this mortal wishes-"
"Begone." Mammon commanded, and flicked his outstretched finger. All three tree-creatures exploded into uncountable fragments; with unearthly howls, the fiery essence that writhed beneath their bark was exposed, whipping and twisting about itself until it erupted upwards, exorcised with a single pained scream as a gout of flame and then extinguished. Mammon looked faintly amused, and then he spoke to John.
"Human. Declare thine purpose."
John craned his neck up, getting his hands beneath him and pushing himself up off the ground to rest on his knees. The figure before him was grand and mighty, there could be no doubt; the demon towered several feet over him even in his seated, relaxed position, and his rotund and bulging form, skin a deep crimson, was adorned with all manner of golden jewellery and ornate piercings. Golden spikes erupted from his shoulders, elbows, the top of his head, curved horns jutting out and bursting through the skin, and his belly bore hideous stitching barely holding together a great crossed wound; there was the glint of further gold behind that torn flesh, if you caught the right angle, and when he moved, his belly jingled and rattled with the metallic sound of coins on coins. His court was filled with all manner of fiends and devils, their own forms ranging from the mundane to the incomprehensible, each cowing under his heavy gaze. Above all else, the throned demon radiated greed, avarice, and an unquestionable power, and there was no mistaking: this was Mammon. Prince of Greed; Plutus the Golden; the Treasurer of Hell, the Avaricious Wolf, the Master of the Gambling Houses. And he was not to be toyed with.
"I'm looking for my sister." John answered plainly. Mammon scoffed.
"I hold no concern for such trifles." He said, waving dismissively and then gesturing to two attendants. "Take him hence; put him to suffering."
The attendants moved quickly to seize John and he panicked, darting out of reach. The mud, unpleasant as it was, was also slick and slimy and made finding a grip on John as he weaved through grasping claws difficult. Stubby, clubbed digits and ragged nails pulled at John's jacket and legs, slipping away as black muck squeezed through the seams between their fingers until finally one fiend tackled John entirely, and once again he was on his back, stone digging into his shoulder blades, some new devil pinning him down. This one had the body of a man but lumpy and malformed, and its head was of the wolf, the skin at its neck rupturing and torn where tufts of fur threatened to burst through. It snapped viciously at John with powerful jaws, adding foamy drool to the myriad slimes that coated him. Two more devils flanked him, and they lifted him bodily into the air, intending to parade the catch about the court and make a show of him; John cried out in pain as claws sunk into his shoulder, and this in itself already elicited jeers from the audience. As they jostled him, the rosary fell loose and dangled forward; under Mammon's vaguely-bored gaze, something caught his eye.
"Halt!" He called, and the proceedings ceased. He snapped a claw and pointed to the base of the dias his throne rested upon. "Fetch him hither. Present unto me his necklace."
John was carried to be held before Mammon, and here he caught pungent wafts of metal and blood as the great demon leant forward, examining the rosary carefully between two claws. He snapped again.
"Release him." He ordered, and John was dropped to the ground. "Human - by what rights didst thou acquire this? Conquest? Bargain?"
"Nergal gave it to me."
"Charity! Nergal is a loathsome, ambitious cretin - yet cunning; but ne'er charitable. I find thine claim hard to credit."
John remained silent, his face set. Mammon studied his expression, and then sat back in his throne. He looked almost curious.
"Very well. Tell thy tale."
The court quieted, and John pulled himself back to his feet, drawing sharp breath as the pain of the fresh puncture in his shoulder was added to his suffering.
"I'm John Constantine," he began, and almost imperceptibly Mammon shifted, a new attention paid to John's words, "and I'm looking for my sister. She's here, somewhere, trapped in your kingdom. My ancesters - the Laughing Magicians," and at this there was a wave of murmurs through the court, quickly silenced by a pointed glare from Mammon, "have her. They've got a terrible plan for her, one I intend to stop. I struck a deal with Nergal to bring me to Cheryl, but he dumped me on the outskirts on a technicality. The rosary is proof of our bargain, and a way for him to find me later."
Mammon raised an eyebrow. "That doth ring truer to Nergal's nature." He surmised, leaning back in his throne, seemingly satisfied. "I am acquainted with thy family. What plot do they weave?"
"My dead cunt of a brother should have been the next incarnation. They want to use my sister to revive him. Once they do, the whole bloody lot of 'em are marching on Hell - you first. They'll take your throne, and your power, and then they'll sweep through the rest of Hell, one lord at a time. And after that, there'll be no one left to stop them. Not even Him."
Mammon shifted, John's words rankling him. Even the implication that something could usurp him was dangerous, seditious talk that would encourage an unwelcome line of thought within his court. For this insect to suggest such a thing so openly in front of him was remarkably brazen; either John was markedly bold, or markedly stupid. Mammon oscillated between enraged and impressed.
"I am unconquerable; a bastion against all foes!" He announced, his voice reverberating and the court shuddering as he crashed his fist against the stone arm of his throne; his audience quivered, the display quelling any idea of a coup. "I shouldst slay thee where thy stand for the mere utterance of such a notion."
"Kill me then. I'll see you around Hell when my brother does the same to you."
The court became very still. John's heart beat like thunder in his chest. He was in a very large amount of very varied kinds of pain; he was cold and wet and uncomfortable; he was grieving a friend he'd just killed and another he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to see again; he was sore, and achy, and above everything else, he was tired. So tired, tired all the way down to his toes, so tired that even the unconscious acts of pushing blood around his beaten body and sucking this rancid, fetid air into his lungs were an almost unbearable effort. And he had run out of patience. He had two plays left: one here and now for Mammon, and one when he finally tracked down Jacob. If between now and then, or even after he succeeded, he dropped dead - he couldn't care less. At least none of this shit would be his fucking problem anymore.
Mammon erupted in great booming laughter, the court echoing with that jangling metallic sound as his belly heaved up and down in fits of amusement. Cautiously, the rest of the court attendees joined in, the stone walls chattering with the snickering of a dozen devils and more.
"Thy undergarments belie the vastness of thine cullions, John Constantine!" The demon lord declared, and he reached a lechorous hand forward to grope and tickle John's mud-sodden groin with calloused, thick-clawed fingers. John jumped back, outraged and disquieted, and this made Mammon laugh harder.
"Pray, tell, on what ground then shouldst I spare thy life? Make thine counsel."
"You kill me and my ancestors will soon be knocking down your door bringing war with them. Even if you win, I'll be dead and Nergal will have my soul and, like you said, he's ambitious. He'll make a play and you'll have another fight on your hands."
"Say then I allow thine exit alive, fine; but thy family squabble 'tis not my concern."
"They don't care. They'll come down on you anyway. Maybe you win, but it'll hurt you and your kingdom regardless. Why fight at all? And if you lose - well, imagine how happy the rest of Hell's gonna be when they find out the war breathing down their necks could have been nipped in the arse before it ever started."
"Hmmm. Thou wouldst possess a third proposal, then?"
"Sure. You don't kill me, and you help me kick my rotten family down to the ninth circle for good. You'd have the vanquishing of the Laughing Magicians, once and for all, to your name. That kind of trophy could be very profitable for you."
"Hmmm."
Mammon took a long silence to weigh his options. The power of just one Laughing Magician was well-regarded; in truth, he could not predict the scope of the might held by the entire ancestral line. Throughout history, the Constantines had never played fair, even when constrained by the Earthly plane. Down here, mortal shells discarded...he would never admit it, never show it; but a fragment of fear slithered into his blackened heart. He shifted forward in his throne and finally lifted his hands, delivering a short sharp clap.
"I am loathe to depart my court; but I can send thee in my stead. Thou shalt be directed hence to thine rogue family, and be assured of their dispatch. Shouldst thou fail or falter, I shalt be forced to slay thee all without mercy."
Mammon gestured again to the wolf-head fiend.
"Serf - show him whither his ancestors make their den."
The wolf-devil bowed graciously, and bounded away, waiting paitently at the threshold of Mammon's court for John to follow.
"I grant thee the protection of my kingdom, Constantine," Mammon said, waving lazily across John's body as the air shimmered and some new pressure settled into his skin. "Know that I shalt remove my boon at mine own pleasure. Do not misrepresent me."
John shivered. He knelt, making his best attempt at showing sincere deference.
"Thank you, Lord Mammon."
"Do not fail, John Constantine. Thine agony can still surely sink to greater depths than thine mind can possess."
John nodded, heeding Mammon's warning well, and then turned and left, more than a little surprised he was still alive at all.
Location: Hell
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________#1.07
John had the strong sensation of falling, yet his feet never left the ground.
The world rose up around them, the landscape stretching and bleeding into itself as the night sky shrunk to a focal point somewhere far above them. Building and terraces buried themselves in the clouds, expanding, distending, drawing perspective askew as they curved toward a single shared event horizon. The vanishing point swallowed the architecture and soon they were instead surrounded by tarmac, asphalt, concrete, then soil and dirt and soon the very mantle of the Earth itself, the ground devouring them as still they did not move but everything shifted around them; dark, light, heat, cold, the myriad methods John sensed his world all blended together, synapses firing off in unison and telling his brain every simultaneous and contradictory thing he witnessed and experienced, a great pressure accompanied by a weightlessness inside and out, a terrible silence that drowned out all other noise, a confining darkness that illuminated all to be seen, and still John remained planted, steadfast on the slick metal flooring of the Runcorn Railway Bridge, never to leave, never to return.
The first thing John noticed about Hell was the chill in the air. It seeped through his clothes and latched onto his bones, leeching even the potential for warmth away from him. It did not matter how he gathered his jacket about himself, or rubbed his hands until the friction burnt red-raw, or shivered until his knees knocked together. The cold persisted. But behind this permafrost, there was a second immediate shift, a strange new feeling - or more accurately, the absence of one. Yes, something was missing from this place, and subsequently from John. It stung like a fresh wound, every next moment picking at the scab, inflicting new injury. Such pain enveloped him and came with a solemn truth that it would not end, not ever, no matter the length of the journey or how many steps taken upon it. The agony superceded all other emotion, swallowing hope and love and joy into itself, gobbling up all feelings in search of remedy but finding no success in the debilitating attempt. This was not a place ever meant for man, and he suffered catastrophically for his presence here.
"God," John said, his voice strained and breath heavy from the effort of simply existing, "how do you bear this?"
Nergal raised a single eyebrow, his expression grim.
"I don't."
They stood upon a rocky outcrop overlooking a scattered, blasted landscape, every kind of barren earth and environ imaginable stretching out before them. Their surroundings slowed and finally ceased movement, and out of the corner of his eye John saw Nergal stretch and shake, his previous visage - adjacent to human, but not convincingly so - sloughed off, replaced with leathery, scaly skin, his feet splayed and claw-tipped to match his hands, and now sharp-pointed ears joined a monstrous forked tail and pair of ragged, powerful wings to complete his true demonic facade. He rose to full height, and stood tall and proud as they surveyed the desolation below.
"Where are we?" John asked, keen to get to the matter at hand and spend as little time here as possible. Already this void within him sapped his goodwill, and his urge to find and rescue Cheryl began to shift from a mission of love to one of pragmatism.
"We stand on the precipice of Mammon's fiefdom. The land below belongs to him, and his rule is final."
John chafed as he began to realize what lay ahead. Nergal planned to cheat him.
"You said you'd take me to Cheryl. That was part of the deal."
Nergal didn't look at John, only bearing an expression of mild irritation as he preened, fawning over his wings and tail.
"The bargain struck was to take you to where your dear ancestors are keeping her. They are keeping her in Mammon's domain, somewhere, and so here we are. I would not venture further into his kingdom, and you cannot compel me to do so. Perhaps if you'd had the good sense to be a little more precise in your terms..."
John flushed, angry. "What about the help you promised? Going back on that too?"
Nergal simply provided a loathsome smile, his tone dripping with condescension. "I promised you no such thing. You agreed to a deal for 'some' help, not my help. I have made good on the terms I agreed to. I'm sure at least one soul out there is of a charitable mind." He laughed, a wicked, piercing sound. "Mortals. Such fun."
John took a short pause as he stewed, stung by the trickery of devils. Eventually, Nergal clapped him on the back, and then produced the rosary once more, draping it across one callous palm before tipping his hand and dropping it into John's grasp.
"You may as well take this trinket with you. It shall make it simpler to find you when it's time to collect. Do take care of it, if you wouldn't mind; it is a particular favourite of mine. My, those Sisters of Mercy could have better learned their dogma of clemency..." he trailed off, lost in fond recollection of foul deeds and souls corrupted. John looked from Nergal to the rosary, opting to loop it around his neck. The wooden cross hung from the chain cold and heavy against his chest, and offered no solace.
"How do I...use it? When I'm done?" He asked, and after a stunned second of Nergal staring at him bug-eyed, the demon burst into raucous laughter. Through guffaws, he managed to choke out a reply.
"You- you really think you'll succeed, don't you? Ah, aha, the hubris of mortals! I shall never grow weary of it. How delightful!" He chuckled some more, theatrically wiping joyful tears from his eyes. "No, Johnny, it'll simply call to me when you die, however that happens. 'Use it' - oh, goodness me."
Nergal collected himself, and then unfurled his wings, wafting them wide and slow to feel the air beneath him.
"I'll be seeing you again, John. Rather soon, I imagine. I wish you fair or foul luck; whichever gets you killed quicker."
And with that, his wings beat a hideous rhythm, and he was aloft, soaring away into the endless oblivion. John, for his part, spent little time floundering or faltering, and began to descend into Mammon's kingdom proper.
John navigated his way down the ragged crevasse cautiously, mapping out each move before he made it. The stone was treacherous and jagged, and more than once an errant edge cut at his flesh; by the time he reached the bottom, his palms and forearms were criss-crossed with scratches and slices that stung and leaked blood down his skin. Another agony of Hell. Now returned to solid ground, his feet sunk into a mire, soaking his boots and adding to the bitter cold of the realm. He scanned the landscape ahead of him and paused to take stock, and in doing so could not stop his mind from wandering; he entertained, briefly, the thought of the ramifications and implications of this place. If Hell were real, and demons were real, then was He real? His Heaven and His angels? What of His son? Suddenly John thought of those he knew and found himself weighing their deeds: his father would end up here, surely, if he wasn't already, but what about his mother? What fate had Nergal in store for Gary, with that soft warm glow plucked out and hidden away? Did John narrowly avoid this damnation when he'd been pulled from the Mersey, or was the mere attempt enough, and this was now his inevitable, inescapable doom? The existential weight of it all crashed down upon him, and there was a moment where he considered he may have cracked completely. Perhaps killing Gary had been the final straw. Perhaps his mind had simply rejected the horrible truth and instead created a new narrative, constructing demons and souls and other planes around him to shield John from reality. Perhaps the climb down the cliff-face had in fact been scaling the side of the bridge. Perhaps the muddy water he stood in now was actually the silt bed of the river.
He dismissed such notions. That train of thought served him no purpose. He had to see this through, real or not.
He picked his way across the wasteland. The ground was uneven, cobbled together without logic, land smashed into itself and left to rot. Dessicated trees played neighbour to shattered boulders and heavy, oozing vines snaked across the landscape without rhyme or reason. Every so often he would think he spied movement, something shifting underneath the ground, something else darting out of sight from the corner of his eye; at the same time, myriad sounds of suffering echoed all around him, harmonizing into a symphony of despair, yet no source could be found, no origin rooted out. His arms stung as he pushed through brittle shrubs and splashed himself with and muck and ooze every step, matched only by the continuing vacuous agony of absence within him. This place was raw despondency, and John began to grow lonely, yearning for some, any manner of companionship or partner - yet he also could not bear the idea of subjecting another to the pain of Hell. Slowly he crept forward, no true direction in mind other than one foot in front of the other, journeying ever-deeper into Mammon's fetid domain.
John's wandering daze was shaken off when he stumbled, a stray vine entangling his foot and causing him to trip over, planting himself in the bog. He turned, his jeans soaked through, and reached to release himself, swearing in frustration as he wrangled with the vine; it had coiled around his ankle and held him fast. Try as he might he could not unwind it from about his leg, and instead just sighed, putting a hand down to lean on as he looked around for a stray rock or jagged piece of terrain to sever the vine with - but suddenly his arm was seized as well, something cold and rough wrapping around his wrist and pinning it to the ground. John looked down and struggled, shocked to see a gnarled hand gripping him; the vine around his foot shimmered and then it too was a wood-like claw grasping his ankle. The mud around him erupted, and out of the muck a small group of strange, tree-like creatures dragged themselves up and to their feet, dirt and sludge cascading down their knotted, bark-layered backs. They cracked and groaned like splintering trunks, twigs snapping off them as they hauled their bodies to stand straight and gather around the now-supine John, another dendriform limb seizing upon his remaining free arm and pushing his elbow back into the mire.
Whatever these fiends were, they moved slow and laboriously and had the sheen of parody about them, like their resemblance to earthly trees was a deliberate, mocking choice. Their faces were disorganized messes, bark and faux-leaves and caked-on mud obscuring any recognizable features - except for their eyes, misplaced pits of cold, ever-burning fire, traces of that same flame seen through gaps and gashes across their bodies: a hidden essence, guarded by twisting bark, full of anger and hatred. When they spoke, it was with the noise of a gale ripping through the forest and tearing trunks from the earth, the crackling rush of a wildfire burning and killing the trees it raged through down to the root, the industrial roar of chainsaws and machinery felling log after log after log, acres lost to greed.
"Another to feed the swamp..." groaned one, taking arduous steps closer to John and inspecting him. "Curiously alive. Those that walk this mire are usually dead already."
A second tree-creature leaned over John, joining the inspection and prodding painfully at his body with a sharp limb.
"Hmmm...only the strong dare tread here while living. Yet this one seems...puny. Fragile. Perhaps escorted?"
"Look, there - about its neck. A curious trinket. Perhaps it believed it would be protected?"
The third had lifted something that might have been a hand and extended something that might have been a finger to trace the mud-caked chain of the rosary that hung around John's neck. It tapped against the wooden cross, and then creaked and snapped rhythmically. The noise had the cadence of a laugh, but sounded as far removed from mirth as John could imagine.
"Symbols of Him. Mortals often misplace power in His icons. He will not tend to you here, worm."
John's mind raced. The more he writhed and struggled the firmer the wooden limbs held him down, and soon he could barely twist without the harsh bark cutting into his skin. He needed something, anything to give these fiends pause, some lie to spin - and then he seized upon an idea.
"Look closer!" He called, putting as much gravitas and bravado into his inflection as he could muster. "It is no mere bauble, and certainly not worn in His name."
The first tree-thing peered closer, tracing a careful gaze around the rosary.
"The mortal speaks truth. There is Hell about this relic; if it was once made in His honour, it has been corrupted since."
"It is Nergal's!" John announced, and this caused a stir in the fiends; they looked to one another, moaning and creaking with every motion. Again, the first scrutinized the relic, and then a hole opened beneath its eyes and a thick wet vine snaked out, running across the carved wooden cross before retracting.
"Truth once more. This icon reeks of Shamash. The mud has dulled the scent, but his repugnant taste cannot be masked. How did you come to have this, mortal? The Whore-killer is an ugly, repellant, covetous thing. Have you come as his emmisary?"
A subtle contemptuous tone in the question told John that 'yes' would be a very bad answer, so he switched track, thinking on his feet.
"I have subjugated that odious fiend. This relic was one he was most fond of; an apt trophy of my conquest."
The trees stirred again. This time, the third spoke.
"How did a simple mortal accomplish such a feat?"
And this was the big one that really needed to land.
"I am the Laughing Magician Constantine. I am reborn, and my power is vast."
All three creatures burst into that same rhythmic laughter again, and now John was raised off the ground, held in mid-air level with their eyes.
"It has been generations since the last. If you are who you claim to be, why do you struggle so? Why have you not freed yourself? A trifle, for one with magic so potent."
John maintained a serene expression, putting on the calm face of one with absolute confidence and conviction.
"This is Mammon's kingdom, is it not? His eminence is known throughout Hell, his might and wisdom revered."
The trees murmered.
"It is. You seek our lord? You wish to conquer him as well?"
"No - such an attempt would be churlish. I seek his audience, that we may forge a pact for mutual gain. If I were to wreak havoc upon his land and his serfs - such rash action would be unbecoming, would it not?"
The trees deliberated over his words, and all the while he held strong. They faltered, and John could feel the bonds around his limbs loosen.
"Deliver me, and I would consider myself indebted. I will prove a powerful ally." He said, offering his final gambit. There was a tense pause as the fiends made their final considerations - and then:
"Very well."
The bonds wrapped tighter than before, and all three creatures sunk beneath the mud; John had time to draw a single breath before the roots and vines enveloped him completely, and then he was dragged under as well.
The world rose up around them, the landscape stretching and bleeding into itself as the night sky shrunk to a focal point somewhere far above them. Building and terraces buried themselves in the clouds, expanding, distending, drawing perspective askew as they curved toward a single shared event horizon. The vanishing point swallowed the architecture and soon they were instead surrounded by tarmac, asphalt, concrete, then soil and dirt and soon the very mantle of the Earth itself, the ground devouring them as still they did not move but everything shifted around them; dark, light, heat, cold, the myriad methods John sensed his world all blended together, synapses firing off in unison and telling his brain every simultaneous and contradictory thing he witnessed and experienced, a great pressure accompanied by a weightlessness inside and out, a terrible silence that drowned out all other noise, a confining darkness that illuminated all to be seen, and still John remained planted, steadfast on the slick metal flooring of the Runcorn Railway Bridge, never to leave, never to return.
The first thing John noticed about Hell was the chill in the air. It seeped through his clothes and latched onto his bones, leeching even the potential for warmth away from him. It did not matter how he gathered his jacket about himself, or rubbed his hands until the friction burnt red-raw, or shivered until his knees knocked together. The cold persisted. But behind this permafrost, there was a second immediate shift, a strange new feeling - or more accurately, the absence of one. Yes, something was missing from this place, and subsequently from John. It stung like a fresh wound, every next moment picking at the scab, inflicting new injury. Such pain enveloped him and came with a solemn truth that it would not end, not ever, no matter the length of the journey or how many steps taken upon it. The agony superceded all other emotion, swallowing hope and love and joy into itself, gobbling up all feelings in search of remedy but finding no success in the debilitating attempt. This was not a place ever meant for man, and he suffered catastrophically for his presence here.
"God," John said, his voice strained and breath heavy from the effort of simply existing, "how do you bear this?"
Nergal raised a single eyebrow, his expression grim.
"I don't."
They stood upon a rocky outcrop overlooking a scattered, blasted landscape, every kind of barren earth and environ imaginable stretching out before them. Their surroundings slowed and finally ceased movement, and out of the corner of his eye John saw Nergal stretch and shake, his previous visage - adjacent to human, but not convincingly so - sloughed off, replaced with leathery, scaly skin, his feet splayed and claw-tipped to match his hands, and now sharp-pointed ears joined a monstrous forked tail and pair of ragged, powerful wings to complete his true demonic facade. He rose to full height, and stood tall and proud as they surveyed the desolation below.
"Where are we?" John asked, keen to get to the matter at hand and spend as little time here as possible. Already this void within him sapped his goodwill, and his urge to find and rescue Cheryl began to shift from a mission of love to one of pragmatism.
"We stand on the precipice of Mammon's fiefdom. The land below belongs to him, and his rule is final."
John chafed as he began to realize what lay ahead. Nergal planned to cheat him.
"You said you'd take me to Cheryl. That was part of the deal."
Nergal didn't look at John, only bearing an expression of mild irritation as he preened, fawning over his wings and tail.
"The bargain struck was to take you to where your dear ancestors are keeping her. They are keeping her in Mammon's domain, somewhere, and so here we are. I would not venture further into his kingdom, and you cannot compel me to do so. Perhaps if you'd had the good sense to be a little more precise in your terms..."
John flushed, angry. "What about the help you promised? Going back on that too?"
Nergal simply provided a loathsome smile, his tone dripping with condescension. "I promised you no such thing. You agreed to a deal for 'some' help, not my help. I have made good on the terms I agreed to. I'm sure at least one soul out there is of a charitable mind." He laughed, a wicked, piercing sound. "Mortals. Such fun."
John took a short pause as he stewed, stung by the trickery of devils. Eventually, Nergal clapped him on the back, and then produced the rosary once more, draping it across one callous palm before tipping his hand and dropping it into John's grasp.
"You may as well take this trinket with you. It shall make it simpler to find you when it's time to collect. Do take care of it, if you wouldn't mind; it is a particular favourite of mine. My, those Sisters of Mercy could have better learned their dogma of clemency..." he trailed off, lost in fond recollection of foul deeds and souls corrupted. John looked from Nergal to the rosary, opting to loop it around his neck. The wooden cross hung from the chain cold and heavy against his chest, and offered no solace.
"How do I...use it? When I'm done?" He asked, and after a stunned second of Nergal staring at him bug-eyed, the demon burst into raucous laughter. Through guffaws, he managed to choke out a reply.
"You- you really think you'll succeed, don't you? Ah, aha, the hubris of mortals! I shall never grow weary of it. How delightful!" He chuckled some more, theatrically wiping joyful tears from his eyes. "No, Johnny, it'll simply call to me when you die, however that happens. 'Use it' - oh, goodness me."
Nergal collected himself, and then unfurled his wings, wafting them wide and slow to feel the air beneath him.
"I'll be seeing you again, John. Rather soon, I imagine. I wish you fair or foul luck; whichever gets you killed quicker."
And with that, his wings beat a hideous rhythm, and he was aloft, soaring away into the endless oblivion. John, for his part, spent little time floundering or faltering, and began to descend into Mammon's kingdom proper.
John navigated his way down the ragged crevasse cautiously, mapping out each move before he made it. The stone was treacherous and jagged, and more than once an errant edge cut at his flesh; by the time he reached the bottom, his palms and forearms were criss-crossed with scratches and slices that stung and leaked blood down his skin. Another agony of Hell. Now returned to solid ground, his feet sunk into a mire, soaking his boots and adding to the bitter cold of the realm. He scanned the landscape ahead of him and paused to take stock, and in doing so could not stop his mind from wandering; he entertained, briefly, the thought of the ramifications and implications of this place. If Hell were real, and demons were real, then was He real? His Heaven and His angels? What of His son? Suddenly John thought of those he knew and found himself weighing their deeds: his father would end up here, surely, if he wasn't already, but what about his mother? What fate had Nergal in store for Gary, with that soft warm glow plucked out and hidden away? Did John narrowly avoid this damnation when he'd been pulled from the Mersey, or was the mere attempt enough, and this was now his inevitable, inescapable doom? The existential weight of it all crashed down upon him, and there was a moment where he considered he may have cracked completely. Perhaps killing Gary had been the final straw. Perhaps his mind had simply rejected the horrible truth and instead created a new narrative, constructing demons and souls and other planes around him to shield John from reality. Perhaps the climb down the cliff-face had in fact been scaling the side of the bridge. Perhaps the muddy water he stood in now was actually the silt bed of the river.
He dismissed such notions. That train of thought served him no purpose. He had to see this through, real or not.
He picked his way across the wasteland. The ground was uneven, cobbled together without logic, land smashed into itself and left to rot. Dessicated trees played neighbour to shattered boulders and heavy, oozing vines snaked across the landscape without rhyme or reason. Every so often he would think he spied movement, something shifting underneath the ground, something else darting out of sight from the corner of his eye; at the same time, myriad sounds of suffering echoed all around him, harmonizing into a symphony of despair, yet no source could be found, no origin rooted out. His arms stung as he pushed through brittle shrubs and splashed himself with and muck and ooze every step, matched only by the continuing vacuous agony of absence within him. This place was raw despondency, and John began to grow lonely, yearning for some, any manner of companionship or partner - yet he also could not bear the idea of subjecting another to the pain of Hell. Slowly he crept forward, no true direction in mind other than one foot in front of the other, journeying ever-deeper into Mammon's fetid domain.
John's wandering daze was shaken off when he stumbled, a stray vine entangling his foot and causing him to trip over, planting himself in the bog. He turned, his jeans soaked through, and reached to release himself, swearing in frustration as he wrangled with the vine; it had coiled around his ankle and held him fast. Try as he might he could not unwind it from about his leg, and instead just sighed, putting a hand down to lean on as he looked around for a stray rock or jagged piece of terrain to sever the vine with - but suddenly his arm was seized as well, something cold and rough wrapping around his wrist and pinning it to the ground. John looked down and struggled, shocked to see a gnarled hand gripping him; the vine around his foot shimmered and then it too was a wood-like claw grasping his ankle. The mud around him erupted, and out of the muck a small group of strange, tree-like creatures dragged themselves up and to their feet, dirt and sludge cascading down their knotted, bark-layered backs. They cracked and groaned like splintering trunks, twigs snapping off them as they hauled their bodies to stand straight and gather around the now-supine John, another dendriform limb seizing upon his remaining free arm and pushing his elbow back into the mire.
Whatever these fiends were, they moved slow and laboriously and had the sheen of parody about them, like their resemblance to earthly trees was a deliberate, mocking choice. Their faces were disorganized messes, bark and faux-leaves and caked-on mud obscuring any recognizable features - except for their eyes, misplaced pits of cold, ever-burning fire, traces of that same flame seen through gaps and gashes across their bodies: a hidden essence, guarded by twisting bark, full of anger and hatred. When they spoke, it was with the noise of a gale ripping through the forest and tearing trunks from the earth, the crackling rush of a wildfire burning and killing the trees it raged through down to the root, the industrial roar of chainsaws and machinery felling log after log after log, acres lost to greed.
"Another to feed the swamp..." groaned one, taking arduous steps closer to John and inspecting him. "Curiously alive. Those that walk this mire are usually dead already."
A second tree-creature leaned over John, joining the inspection and prodding painfully at his body with a sharp limb.
"Hmmm...only the strong dare tread here while living. Yet this one seems...puny. Fragile. Perhaps escorted?"
"Look, there - about its neck. A curious trinket. Perhaps it believed it would be protected?"
The third had lifted something that might have been a hand and extended something that might have been a finger to trace the mud-caked chain of the rosary that hung around John's neck. It tapped against the wooden cross, and then creaked and snapped rhythmically. The noise had the cadence of a laugh, but sounded as far removed from mirth as John could imagine.
"Symbols of Him. Mortals often misplace power in His icons. He will not tend to you here, worm."
John's mind raced. The more he writhed and struggled the firmer the wooden limbs held him down, and soon he could barely twist without the harsh bark cutting into his skin. He needed something, anything to give these fiends pause, some lie to spin - and then he seized upon an idea.
"Look closer!" He called, putting as much gravitas and bravado into his inflection as he could muster. "It is no mere bauble, and certainly not worn in His name."
The first tree-thing peered closer, tracing a careful gaze around the rosary.
"The mortal speaks truth. There is Hell about this relic; if it was once made in His honour, it has been corrupted since."
"It is Nergal's!" John announced, and this caused a stir in the fiends; they looked to one another, moaning and creaking with every motion. Again, the first scrutinized the relic, and then a hole opened beneath its eyes and a thick wet vine snaked out, running across the carved wooden cross before retracting.
"Truth once more. This icon reeks of Shamash. The mud has dulled the scent, but his repugnant taste cannot be masked. How did you come to have this, mortal? The Whore-killer is an ugly, repellant, covetous thing. Have you come as his emmisary?"
A subtle contemptuous tone in the question told John that 'yes' would be a very bad answer, so he switched track, thinking on his feet.
"I have subjugated that odious fiend. This relic was one he was most fond of; an apt trophy of my conquest."
The trees stirred again. This time, the third spoke.
"How did a simple mortal accomplish such a feat?"
And this was the big one that really needed to land.
"I am the Laughing Magician Constantine. I am reborn, and my power is vast."
All three creatures burst into that same rhythmic laughter again, and now John was raised off the ground, held in mid-air level with their eyes.
"It has been generations since the last. If you are who you claim to be, why do you struggle so? Why have you not freed yourself? A trifle, for one with magic so potent."
John maintained a serene expression, putting on the calm face of one with absolute confidence and conviction.
"This is Mammon's kingdom, is it not? His eminence is known throughout Hell, his might and wisdom revered."
The trees murmered.
"It is. You seek our lord? You wish to conquer him as well?"
"No - such an attempt would be churlish. I seek his audience, that we may forge a pact for mutual gain. If I were to wreak havoc upon his land and his serfs - such rash action would be unbecoming, would it not?"
The trees deliberated over his words, and all the while he held strong. They faltered, and John could feel the bonds around his limbs loosen.
"Deliver me, and I would consider myself indebted. I will prove a powerful ally." He said, offering his final gambit. There was a tense pause as the fiends made their final considerations - and then:
"Very well."
The bonds wrapped tighter than before, and all three creatures sunk beneath the mud; John had time to draw a single breath before the roots and vines enveloped him completely, and then he was dragged under as well.
Location: Liverpool - England
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________#1.06
"Jesus fucking Christ, you've killed him! He's fucking dead!"
John scrambled on his hands and knees toward Gary's limp corpse. He cradled the body in his arms, rocking slightly, alternating between frantic whispered apologies and desperate denial, willing life back into the discarded cadaver to no avail. Chas threw himself about, still woozy from his head wound but unable to deny what he had witnessed, now reckoning with the implications, the complications, the consequences.
"H-he was attacking us, he w-was going to k- to ki- to kill you, i-it's self-defense, didn't, didn't mean to-to kill h-him back, just slipped, slipped is all, and h-he's so weak, h-he was gonna d-die anyway, all the, all the d-drugs, o-on his way out..." he rambled on, reeling and spinning justifications, excuses, anything to explain away the ghastly truth of it all, the terrible sin laid bare before them. He picked himself up and stumbled over to John, pulling him by one lax arm to try and get them off the bridge and away.
"Stop fucking apologizing," he hissed to John, "didn't do anyone any good and now he's dead, alright? He's dead and you killed him and it's done now so fuck all this we need to go!"
"I- I can't just- can't just leave him-" John choked out, swallowing his own sobs, "not here, please, not on this bridge, oh God not on the bridge-" he descended into wracking cries, both of them now grappling with the full scope of his actions. Chas let go of his arm and John dropped back to his knees, pawing at Gary's legs, nearly prostrating himself in panicked grief and remorse at the feet of his friend's still-warm corpse. Chas froze, staring bug-eyed the body, feeling nauseous at the sight of it, at the uncanny angle his head hung over the edge from his snapped neck, at the unnatural bumps beneath his skin from protruding splintered vertebrae.
All at once Chas dropped to one knee at the body's feet and wrapped his hands around the soles of Gary's worn-out, ragged shoes. The ground was wet, working against him as his own boots slipped, unable to find purchase, but steadily, ever-so-slightly, he began to push. John looked up when he felt the body start to shift beneath him, and he wailed sharply as he tackled Chas away, sending the both of them careening and scuffling to the floor.
"Don't!" He shrieked, keenly aware of the abominable pragmacy that had seized upon Chas.
"Let go! We have to- be weeks before they find him- we'll be long gone- they won't even care- just another junkie suicide-"
"NO! He's not a suicide he can't be- that can't be all anyone remembers of him - can't be what his mum hears!"
"Then what?!" Chas roared; panic had given way to anger and he had very little patience in him now for the architect of this fresh calamity. He wrenched John up, holding his wrist firmly and twisting his arm up and around his back in a way that made it difficult and painful for John to move. He towered over John, using his height to force attention. "You gonna walk yourself down to St. Anne street and hand yourself in at the station? It won't be Ravenscar this time John, they'll throw you in the nick, and then they'll forget you and Gary and what good will any of it do! Huh?! No one left to mourn either of you!"
"Chas, my hand, Jesus let go, my hand-"
"Don't you try and twist your way out of this, fucking listen to me for Christ's sake-"
"Chas, my hand!"
The rosary had been steadily gaining heat, and before John could let go it had gotten white-hot, and the flesh of his palm where the beads still dug in hissed and smoked. The pungent smell of burnt flesh filled their nostrils. This was the last straw for Chas and he couldn't stop his stomach turning, forced to unhand John as he spun to vomit over the edge into the river below. John dropped the rosary, and it fell to the ground and sizzled against the slick metal while he clutched his seared palm to his chest.
The heat of the rosary continued to climb and it started to achieve a soft glow that spread into the metal immediately beneath it. John wondered briefly how the wooden beads didn't spontaneously combust, but such curiosity was quelled as he scrambled away from it and the heat was soon accompanied by a sound that begun as a swarm-like buzzing but escalated to a sharp, keening ringing, an infinite edge dragged across rusted iron, that was quickly more akin to the pained screaming of animals than any inorganic sound; and now the brightness of the burning glow spread and expanded and encompassed all vision in a brilliant, blinding white. Cutting below it, just barely on the edge of audible, were shouts and yells, John and Chas calling out to each other, frightened, confused - and then it all stopped. The noise ceased, the light dropped away, and as their vision returned, readjusted to the gloom of the still-young night, there was only the lingering scent of sulphur; and then a man stepped out of the darkness, casually suited, smoothing his jacket and bearing an expression of fading excitement lapsing into irritated disappointment.
"Oh John," he said with a weary sigh, "you really are just such a let down."
He took two short steps forward and bent at the waist to retrieve the rosary from the ground. The beads still hummed softly and maintained a dim glow from the heat, but this didn't seem to bother the stranger at all as he inspected the chain, pinched between two fingers.
The man was, in a word, ugly. Tall, but hunched over, his skin was of a strange stained-red hue and dry, cracking at the joints. His fingers seemed too long to be natural and tapered into thick, clawed nails. The suit he wore was ill-fitting, tight and bulging, and its strain at the seams was mirrored in the strain across his body as a whole, like his very skin was a costume a size too small that he'd stuffed himself into regardless. He was bald, liver-spotted and criss-crossed with surface veins, and his scalp culminated to an odd, elongated cone-like shape. A frog-like face completed the repugnant image; a nose too flat, a mouth too wide, a tongue too long. His eyes, wide-set and lying beneath a heavy brow, were a sickly yellow, cleaved down the middle by cat-slit pupils. John was almost too dumbfounded to be afraid of this grotesquery, but fear crept in regardless. The stranger ceased his study of the rosary, and stepped deftly across John to pore over Gary's corpse instead. Chas managed to bark out a sharp "L-leave him alone!" but the only response was a waved hand and the word:
"Sleep."
And Chas did.
John swallowed a growing lump in his throat, and spluttered, choking out a singular question.
"Who-who are you?!"
The stranger stood and turned, grinning large and odiously. He drew himself up, seeming to eclipse all light, and answered with an air of pomposity.
"Shamash, Son of Enlil. Whore-killer. Archduke of Mendacity. God of the Inflicted Death. He Who Comes Out Of Meslam. Lord of the Big City. Keeper of the Mace and Sword." He maintained the grin, reveling in his many titles and epithets. Arrogance shone out from him like a star. "Your people have given me many a name through the centuries; I admit, I am fond of them all. But for simplicity - one I have recently reclaimed - you may call me Nergal. And I've come to collect; although, to my aggravation, it would appear you have robbed me, John Constantine."
"Robbed you? I haven't stolen anything! How do you even know my name?!"
Nergal waved dismissively and moved back to Gary's corpose, brushing a hand across his still form before coming away with something that gleamed softly. He held it in the way one would hold a snotty rag.
"This is not the soul I was promised for my assistance in the matter, Johnny." He said, seemingly by way of an explanation, and tucked the glow into his jacket pocket. "Oh, your ancestors will be upset. First the debacle with your little dip in the river, then the delay at Ravenscar, and now this little stumble. The Laughing Magicians do not take upsets to their plans well; but you are quite the persistant roadblock, aren't you?"
John was bewildered. This unnatural stranger, this 'Nergal', he talked so casually, so familiarly, but about things John could not conceive of, terms and names he struggled to comprehend.
"Souls? Ancestors?! Who are the 'Laughing Magicians'? What are you talking about? Who- what, are you?!"
Nergal looked at him, perplexed, an expression of pure and genuine disbelief plastered across his unpleasant visage.
"You really are ignorant to it all, aren't you?"
"Yes. Please. Enlighten me. Give me some semblance of understanding on what the fuck is going on!"
Nergal paused a while, considering John carefully. Then he shrugged.
"This will be worth some small amusement, at the least."
And he told John of the circumstances of his life.
You killed your brother in the womb; of this much, at least, I'm sure you are aware. Strangled him with your own umbilical cord. Deliberate? Accidental? Impossible to say; commendable all the same. But that is where it all began - the first sin. The Constantines are a lustrous, storied bloodline; your family holds quite the legacy of magic and wizardry. But the true jewel of your line is the Laughing Magician: a wielder of extraordinary power, bending the world on a whim, subjugating reality beneath their will. Reincarnated again and again, over and over, all the way back through history. This was your brother's destiny, you see - the next in line, the first reincarnation after many generations absent, no less. Dear Jacob was set to change the world, a sorceror unlike any we'd seen in decades; but you killed him! Yet as entertaining as the cruel twist was, your ancestors - the Laughing Magicians that had come and gone before - they failed to find it amusing, and were instead upset. Deeply so. You had committed a grievous wound against them - against fate itself - and such an error required correcting; and your ancestors, tragic as it is for you, can become quite vindictive when they're upset.
They were patient at first, admirably. Set up all the pieces. Stole away Jacob's errant soul from under His nose. No one is sure how - but that has been the refrain of the Laughing Magician through the ages. 'Not sure how, but they did'. They nurtured it, kept it safe, hid it away - but such a measly thing would never grow of its own accord, not having never known life to begin with. No, they needed an incubator to cultivate it, to do what your dear mother failed to. So they waited - they have always been so very Proper, you see, which is so very dull - they waited until your sister was ripe. And then they stole her away too. A lovely little womb to nourish Jacob's soul; one half of the puzzle, but the other part was the body. The original one - the one you killed - useless. Dead flesh doesn't grow, doesn't wield magic, and whatever did manage to slip out of your mother's cunt after you'd done your deed was long-rotted anyway. But you know what wasn't rotten, Johnny? What walked and breathed and lived and grew? You, John. The surviving twin. The perfect vessel. They just needed to break you first - needed to empty you out so they could pour Jacob back in once he was ready. They were, unfortunately, a little too effective in that regard. That whole suicide business nearly put the whole scheme out of commission. Funny. I wonder if they'd ever considered they might have to save your life after ruining it so thoroughly. Hard to believe they could be so naive about what people can be driven to, considering they were once people themselves. How we forget.
Once they assured you'd be dragged out before drowning they thought they could get right back on schedule, but then you were sent away to Ravenscar. Oh, they broke you, but not in the right way, and now if they wanted to use you still they needed to let you put yourself back together. Irony is so delicious when sampled from a distance, don't you think? And so they were delayed while you 'healed'. But once you got out - they'd had time to plot, to formulate, to try something a little more subtle. So they put you on a path to dear Francis, and then the pair of you to the late Mr. Lester here, and this is where I shifted from audience to participant; they made me one Hell of a deal, you see. This rosary, a pact to deliver you, a few corrupting whispers in dear Gary's ear - and for my trouble, once they'd shucked you out and returned Jacob to the world, I'd get your soul. A ripe and juicy Constantine soul. Oh, Johnny, the wicked, wonderful things I could do with a soul like that.
But you fucked it up, as seems to be your sole virtue. Now all I get is this dirty little Lester soul, and I assure you, it is not worth what I paid for my side of the deal. So we come to a crossroads. Gary failed - that much is obvious - but the terms of the pact remain unsatisfied. Your ancestors do not have their promised vessel; I do not have my promised soul. Alas, many a bargain dissolves in Hell. These are turbulent times. I suppose I should just take my consolation prize, and leave you to whatever horrors the Laughing Magicians will conjure next. I would think, now, that they grow weary with 'subtlety'; I imagine whatever happens next will be somewhat more...direct.
John reeled. He bubbled with a multitude of emotions, simmering and churning within him, but of all of them only one seized his heart and steeled his resolve: anger. Fury, rage, righteous indignation at the sheer injustice of it all, the tragedy and horror that had plagued his entire life not simply the product of a single misfortune, a lone stroke of poor luck, but also the orchestration of a cabal of unseen forces, concerned for nothing but the incomplete destiny of a long-dead stranger. And not only that, but the web that had been spawned from it, entrapping everything he'd ever cared about, people so disconnected from the catalysing injury yet ensnared and brought to ruin all the same. How dare some faceless ghosts of the past toy with his life - with Chas and Gary's lives - with Cheryl's life - all in selfish pursuit of some bygone fated power. He was irate. He was outraged. He was sickened.
"Well, if that's all, my business here has long-since concluded. I'll be keeping an eye on you, John - as a purely impartial observer, of course. I'm sure you understand. It's all shaping up to be rather entertaining."
Nergal turned to leave; cogs whirred in John's head, rage-fuelled plotting weaving a singular idea, one John hoped would be his masterstroke.
"Wait!" John said, stepping after Nergal. The fiend paused and looked back, one brow cocked with intrigue. "So you're some, some devil, right? A demon?"
Nergal looked put-out, bordering on enraged. "I am not some devil, you impudent little worm. You pathetic mortals are all the same - tiny, ignorant, purile little specks of excrement-"
"But you make deals, don't you." He said, interrupting Nergal now that he was riled up; his ochre eyes sparked with curiosity. John had him.
"I do."
"And you want a Constantine soul?"
Now Nergal smiled.
"I do."
"So what if I propose a new bargain?"
Nergal's grin split his face, and eager saliva oozed from serrated teeth. His eye sparkled with fascination and appetite.
"And what, pray tell, would be the terms of your proposal, John Constantine?"
"If my soul really is all that - if it's really worth all this trouble to you - then here's my bargain: you take me to wherever they're keeping Cheryl - and I get some help to save her from them - and you'll get your Constantine soul."
John put his hand out, nervous under Nergal's gaze and with the distinct feeling he was plunging into an ocean far, far deeper and darker than he could possibly hope to understand. He put on as much bravado as he could muster. Nergal weighed him up, tossing the idea about in his own head, balancing the scales. Finally, he reached out his own claw - at the last second, John whipped his hand away, stipulating an addendum:
"But not until my sister is safe from them. Not a moment before."
"Hmm. Deal."
They clasped hands, shook once in a singular, firm motion, and Nergal erupted in a sly smile - and then everything changed.
John scrambled on his hands and knees toward Gary's limp corpse. He cradled the body in his arms, rocking slightly, alternating between frantic whispered apologies and desperate denial, willing life back into the discarded cadaver to no avail. Chas threw himself about, still woozy from his head wound but unable to deny what he had witnessed, now reckoning with the implications, the complications, the consequences.
"H-he was attacking us, he w-was going to k- to ki- to kill you, i-it's self-defense, didn't, didn't mean to-to kill h-him back, just slipped, slipped is all, and h-he's so weak, h-he was gonna d-die anyway, all the, all the d-drugs, o-on his way out..." he rambled on, reeling and spinning justifications, excuses, anything to explain away the ghastly truth of it all, the terrible sin laid bare before them. He picked himself up and stumbled over to John, pulling him by one lax arm to try and get them off the bridge and away.
"Stop fucking apologizing," he hissed to John, "didn't do anyone any good and now he's dead, alright? He's dead and you killed him and it's done now so fuck all this we need to go!"
"I- I can't just- can't just leave him-" John choked out, swallowing his own sobs, "not here, please, not on this bridge, oh God not on the bridge-" he descended into wracking cries, both of them now grappling with the full scope of his actions. Chas let go of his arm and John dropped back to his knees, pawing at Gary's legs, nearly prostrating himself in panicked grief and remorse at the feet of his friend's still-warm corpse. Chas froze, staring bug-eyed the body, feeling nauseous at the sight of it, at the uncanny angle his head hung over the edge from his snapped neck, at the unnatural bumps beneath his skin from protruding splintered vertebrae.
All at once Chas dropped to one knee at the body's feet and wrapped his hands around the soles of Gary's worn-out, ragged shoes. The ground was wet, working against him as his own boots slipped, unable to find purchase, but steadily, ever-so-slightly, he began to push. John looked up when he felt the body start to shift beneath him, and he wailed sharply as he tackled Chas away, sending the both of them careening and scuffling to the floor.
"Don't!" He shrieked, keenly aware of the abominable pragmacy that had seized upon Chas.
"Let go! We have to- be weeks before they find him- we'll be long gone- they won't even care- just another junkie suicide-"
"NO! He's not a suicide he can't be- that can't be all anyone remembers of him - can't be what his mum hears!"
"Then what?!" Chas roared; panic had given way to anger and he had very little patience in him now for the architect of this fresh calamity. He wrenched John up, holding his wrist firmly and twisting his arm up and around his back in a way that made it difficult and painful for John to move. He towered over John, using his height to force attention. "You gonna walk yourself down to St. Anne street and hand yourself in at the station? It won't be Ravenscar this time John, they'll throw you in the nick, and then they'll forget you and Gary and what good will any of it do! Huh?! No one left to mourn either of you!"
"Chas, my hand, Jesus let go, my hand-"
"Don't you try and twist your way out of this, fucking listen to me for Christ's sake-"
"Chas, my hand!"
The rosary had been steadily gaining heat, and before John could let go it had gotten white-hot, and the flesh of his palm where the beads still dug in hissed and smoked. The pungent smell of burnt flesh filled their nostrils. This was the last straw for Chas and he couldn't stop his stomach turning, forced to unhand John as he spun to vomit over the edge into the river below. John dropped the rosary, and it fell to the ground and sizzled against the slick metal while he clutched his seared palm to his chest.
The heat of the rosary continued to climb and it started to achieve a soft glow that spread into the metal immediately beneath it. John wondered briefly how the wooden beads didn't spontaneously combust, but such curiosity was quelled as he scrambled away from it and the heat was soon accompanied by a sound that begun as a swarm-like buzzing but escalated to a sharp, keening ringing, an infinite edge dragged across rusted iron, that was quickly more akin to the pained screaming of animals than any inorganic sound; and now the brightness of the burning glow spread and expanded and encompassed all vision in a brilliant, blinding white. Cutting below it, just barely on the edge of audible, were shouts and yells, John and Chas calling out to each other, frightened, confused - and then it all stopped. The noise ceased, the light dropped away, and as their vision returned, readjusted to the gloom of the still-young night, there was only the lingering scent of sulphur; and then a man stepped out of the darkness, casually suited, smoothing his jacket and bearing an expression of fading excitement lapsing into irritated disappointment.
"Oh John," he said with a weary sigh, "you really are just such a let down."
He took two short steps forward and bent at the waist to retrieve the rosary from the ground. The beads still hummed softly and maintained a dim glow from the heat, but this didn't seem to bother the stranger at all as he inspected the chain, pinched between two fingers.
The man was, in a word, ugly. Tall, but hunched over, his skin was of a strange stained-red hue and dry, cracking at the joints. His fingers seemed too long to be natural and tapered into thick, clawed nails. The suit he wore was ill-fitting, tight and bulging, and its strain at the seams was mirrored in the strain across his body as a whole, like his very skin was a costume a size too small that he'd stuffed himself into regardless. He was bald, liver-spotted and criss-crossed with surface veins, and his scalp culminated to an odd, elongated cone-like shape. A frog-like face completed the repugnant image; a nose too flat, a mouth too wide, a tongue too long. His eyes, wide-set and lying beneath a heavy brow, were a sickly yellow, cleaved down the middle by cat-slit pupils. John was almost too dumbfounded to be afraid of this grotesquery, but fear crept in regardless. The stranger ceased his study of the rosary, and stepped deftly across John to pore over Gary's corpse instead. Chas managed to bark out a sharp "L-leave him alone!" but the only response was a waved hand and the word:
"Sleep."
And Chas did.
John swallowed a growing lump in his throat, and spluttered, choking out a singular question.
"Who-who are you?!"
The stranger stood and turned, grinning large and odiously. He drew himself up, seeming to eclipse all light, and answered with an air of pomposity.
"Shamash, Son of Enlil. Whore-killer. Archduke of Mendacity. God of the Inflicted Death. He Who Comes Out Of Meslam. Lord of the Big City. Keeper of the Mace and Sword." He maintained the grin, reveling in his many titles and epithets. Arrogance shone out from him like a star. "Your people have given me many a name through the centuries; I admit, I am fond of them all. But for simplicity - one I have recently reclaimed - you may call me Nergal. And I've come to collect; although, to my aggravation, it would appear you have robbed me, John Constantine."
"Robbed you? I haven't stolen anything! How do you even know my name?!"
Nergal waved dismissively and moved back to Gary's corpose, brushing a hand across his still form before coming away with something that gleamed softly. He held it in the way one would hold a snotty rag.
"This is not the soul I was promised for my assistance in the matter, Johnny." He said, seemingly by way of an explanation, and tucked the glow into his jacket pocket. "Oh, your ancestors will be upset. First the debacle with your little dip in the river, then the delay at Ravenscar, and now this little stumble. The Laughing Magicians do not take upsets to their plans well; but you are quite the persistant roadblock, aren't you?"
John was bewildered. This unnatural stranger, this 'Nergal', he talked so casually, so familiarly, but about things John could not conceive of, terms and names he struggled to comprehend.
"Souls? Ancestors?! Who are the 'Laughing Magicians'? What are you talking about? Who- what, are you?!"
Nergal looked at him, perplexed, an expression of pure and genuine disbelief plastered across his unpleasant visage.
"You really are ignorant to it all, aren't you?"
"Yes. Please. Enlighten me. Give me some semblance of understanding on what the fuck is going on!"
Nergal paused a while, considering John carefully. Then he shrugged.
"This will be worth some small amusement, at the least."
And he told John of the circumstances of his life.
You killed your brother in the womb; of this much, at least, I'm sure you are aware. Strangled him with your own umbilical cord. Deliberate? Accidental? Impossible to say; commendable all the same. But that is where it all began - the first sin. The Constantines are a lustrous, storied bloodline; your family holds quite the legacy of magic and wizardry. But the true jewel of your line is the Laughing Magician: a wielder of extraordinary power, bending the world on a whim, subjugating reality beneath their will. Reincarnated again and again, over and over, all the way back through history. This was your brother's destiny, you see - the next in line, the first reincarnation after many generations absent, no less. Dear Jacob was set to change the world, a sorceror unlike any we'd seen in decades; but you killed him! Yet as entertaining as the cruel twist was, your ancestors - the Laughing Magicians that had come and gone before - they failed to find it amusing, and were instead upset. Deeply so. You had committed a grievous wound against them - against fate itself - and such an error required correcting; and your ancestors, tragic as it is for you, can become quite vindictive when they're upset.
They were patient at first, admirably. Set up all the pieces. Stole away Jacob's errant soul from under His nose. No one is sure how - but that has been the refrain of the Laughing Magician through the ages. 'Not sure how, but they did'. They nurtured it, kept it safe, hid it away - but such a measly thing would never grow of its own accord, not having never known life to begin with. No, they needed an incubator to cultivate it, to do what your dear mother failed to. So they waited - they have always been so very Proper, you see, which is so very dull - they waited until your sister was ripe. And then they stole her away too. A lovely little womb to nourish Jacob's soul; one half of the puzzle, but the other part was the body. The original one - the one you killed - useless. Dead flesh doesn't grow, doesn't wield magic, and whatever did manage to slip out of your mother's cunt after you'd done your deed was long-rotted anyway. But you know what wasn't rotten, Johnny? What walked and breathed and lived and grew? You, John. The surviving twin. The perfect vessel. They just needed to break you first - needed to empty you out so they could pour Jacob back in once he was ready. They were, unfortunately, a little too effective in that regard. That whole suicide business nearly put the whole scheme out of commission. Funny. I wonder if they'd ever considered they might have to save your life after ruining it so thoroughly. Hard to believe they could be so naive about what people can be driven to, considering they were once people themselves. How we forget.
Once they assured you'd be dragged out before drowning they thought they could get right back on schedule, but then you were sent away to Ravenscar. Oh, they broke you, but not in the right way, and now if they wanted to use you still they needed to let you put yourself back together. Irony is so delicious when sampled from a distance, don't you think? And so they were delayed while you 'healed'. But once you got out - they'd had time to plot, to formulate, to try something a little more subtle. So they put you on a path to dear Francis, and then the pair of you to the late Mr. Lester here, and this is where I shifted from audience to participant; they made me one Hell of a deal, you see. This rosary, a pact to deliver you, a few corrupting whispers in dear Gary's ear - and for my trouble, once they'd shucked you out and returned Jacob to the world, I'd get your soul. A ripe and juicy Constantine soul. Oh, Johnny, the wicked, wonderful things I could do with a soul like that.
But you fucked it up, as seems to be your sole virtue. Now all I get is this dirty little Lester soul, and I assure you, it is not worth what I paid for my side of the deal. So we come to a crossroads. Gary failed - that much is obvious - but the terms of the pact remain unsatisfied. Your ancestors do not have their promised vessel; I do not have my promised soul. Alas, many a bargain dissolves in Hell. These are turbulent times. I suppose I should just take my consolation prize, and leave you to whatever horrors the Laughing Magicians will conjure next. I would think, now, that they grow weary with 'subtlety'; I imagine whatever happens next will be somewhat more...direct.
John reeled. He bubbled with a multitude of emotions, simmering and churning within him, but of all of them only one seized his heart and steeled his resolve: anger. Fury, rage, righteous indignation at the sheer injustice of it all, the tragedy and horror that had plagued his entire life not simply the product of a single misfortune, a lone stroke of poor luck, but also the orchestration of a cabal of unseen forces, concerned for nothing but the incomplete destiny of a long-dead stranger. And not only that, but the web that had been spawned from it, entrapping everything he'd ever cared about, people so disconnected from the catalysing injury yet ensnared and brought to ruin all the same. How dare some faceless ghosts of the past toy with his life - with Chas and Gary's lives - with Cheryl's life - all in selfish pursuit of some bygone fated power. He was irate. He was outraged. He was sickened.
"Well, if that's all, my business here has long-since concluded. I'll be keeping an eye on you, John - as a purely impartial observer, of course. I'm sure you understand. It's all shaping up to be rather entertaining."
Nergal turned to leave; cogs whirred in John's head, rage-fuelled plotting weaving a singular idea, one John hoped would be his masterstroke.
"Wait!" John said, stepping after Nergal. The fiend paused and looked back, one brow cocked with intrigue. "So you're some, some devil, right? A demon?"
Nergal looked put-out, bordering on enraged. "I am not some devil, you impudent little worm. You pathetic mortals are all the same - tiny, ignorant, purile little specks of excrement-"
"But you make deals, don't you." He said, interrupting Nergal now that he was riled up; his ochre eyes sparked with curiosity. John had him.
"I do."
"And you want a Constantine soul?"
Now Nergal smiled.
"I do."
"So what if I propose a new bargain?"
Nergal's grin split his face, and eager saliva oozed from serrated teeth. His eye sparkled with fascination and appetite.
"And what, pray tell, would be the terms of your proposal, John Constantine?"
"If my soul really is all that - if it's really worth all this trouble to you - then here's my bargain: you take me to wherever they're keeping Cheryl - and I get some help to save her from them - and you'll get your Constantine soul."
John put his hand out, nervous under Nergal's gaze and with the distinct feeling he was plunging into an ocean far, far deeper and darker than he could possibly hope to understand. He put on as much bravado as he could muster. Nergal weighed him up, tossing the idea about in his own head, balancing the scales. Finally, he reached out his own claw - at the last second, John whipped his hand away, stipulating an addendum:
"But not until my sister is safe from them. Not a moment before."
"Hmm. Deal."
They clasped hands, shook once in a singular, firm motion, and Nergal erupted in a sly smile - and then everything changed.
Location: Liverpool - England
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________#1.05
The bridge dominated the landscape ahead of them. It was all-encompassing; it stretched to each edge of the periphery and spanned the horizon in between, subsuming all other architecture and cityscape into its oppressive presence. While in view, nothing else existed. The bridge - the past actions taken upon it - the approaching reckoning it harbored for them; there was a feeling that this bridge, this damn bridge, was all there was and would be. John saw in their steady advancement toward it a great long thread, stretching all the way back to his birth, one terrible path set from his very first breath leading to his end on this bridge and in the murky, troubled waters beneath. It all seemed so neat, so logical: a murdered brother and dead mother - a hated father and a taken sister - friends who fled in the wake of darkness encroaching. The thread ended here, deftly cut and knotted; The Life And Death Of John Constantine, from waters to waters. It seemed so clear, here, now, in the shadow of this ruinous bridge, that the mistake - the great blunder of the world - had not been the tragedy of John's suicide. It had been his survival.
John was so lost in his calamitous revelation that he had not noticed Chas coming to a standstill some ten paces back. It was only his calling out to him that shook John from his lapse. He stopped, tearing his gaze away from the brick and steel of the bridge to look back at his companion, still feeling the omen on his spine.
"We shouldn't do this." Chas said, simple and obvious and yet so, so futile, so late. Chas could see it in John's face, the solemn determination; but if he just let him climb up there without a word, without voicing even a fraction of how insane this had all become, he would never see another restful night again. "Please, John. Nothing good will come of this, for anyone. Not for me, not for Gary, not for you. We've taken it this far - but don't you feel it? It's all wrong, John. It's all perverted and crooked. We should just walk away. Please."
John breathed a deep sigh. He could not deny the truth to his friend's words any more than he could deny the impotence of the attempt. He walked back to stand beside him, and simply pulled Chas into a brief embrace.
"I'm sorry, Chas. I'm going up there. You don't have to come with me - but at this point, it's not even about finding Gary anymore. I am grateful you took a chance and came back - glad we reconnected. I can't tell you how indebted I am just for coming this far with me. But if I turn away now - if I run from this - I'll just be confirming all my worst fears about myself. My life would be defined by this bridge forever. If I want even a modicum of control back over my own destiny - I need to climb back up there. One last time."
Just to prove that I tried. John thought, saving just that small piece of his soul for himself. Chas did not reply - but he got a stoic, steely look in his eye, and his jaw clenched and set like he was enduring great pain; and then he nodded. The two forged on, their bond now forever-set.
The climb up the bridge was difficult and taxing and by the time they crested the end of the causeway the sun had well and truly set. Only a series of small and worn-out bulbs illuminated the way ahead, and a mist was descending around them as the night drew in that obscured even that. They paused for a moment, catching their breath but also peering through the darkness down the bridge to try and spot their quarry; it took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the gloom, but once they had, Chas spied a shadowed figure lurking roughly halfway across. He nudged John and pointed.
"That could be him, lad. But this all feels hideously wrong. We can't, John."
John could feel it too, a pressure all around them, a subtle push that sent chills down his spine and made him dig his heels in on instinct. It didn't matter.
"We must." Was his only reply, and he set forward. They crept along the bridge, hopping from one feeble pool of light to another, each step meticulous and calculated. The waters of the River Mersey rushed beneath them, and John very pointedly did not look down, did not peer over the edge to witness those dark and roaring floods down below.
They approached the veiled figure quicker than they'd have liked, and it was Chas who took the initiative as they grew near:
"Gary?" He called out, cautious and low. No part of him wanted a response.
The figure jerked, twitching as it stood straight and turned toward them. It took one agonized, lumbering step toward them and, in the process, moved into the light. John and Chas froze, unable to suppress a gasp.
It was Gary, unmistakeably so - after all the asking around, the chasing, the sheer rigamarole of it all, they'd really found him - but he looked...even taking the ravages of two years of substance abuse into account, he looked terrible. This wasn't the visage of a mere junkie - he was almost skeletal, parchment-dry skin stretched over sun-bleached bone. What hair remained hung limp and lifeless from his pockmarked scalp; his arms and chest were carpeted with sores and scabs and needle tracks, and his eyes were sunken deep into dark, maddened sockets, bloodshot and darting this way and that in some paranoid fit. He raised a hand to scratch at a rough, shingles-like abrasion that marred his neck, and John noticed several fingernails chewed down to the quick or missing entirely, the skin on his knuckles and palm red and cracking. But all of this aside, there was something else about Gary, something that haunted him and distorted his outline, made him dizzying to look at. It seemed to John like one of those magic eye puzzles: if you squinted at it just right, at just the proper angle, it would all align and reveal its secrets. As it was, Gary just vaguely hurt to behold, frayed around his edges like a sketch yet to be lined in.
"Gary?" John asked, hesitant and afraid.
"H...hhellooo, John..." Gary answered, all hiss and rasp, his voice like a belt-sander to the ears. Nothing about any of this was good or right, and John wished deeply that he had listened to Chas. It was all too late now. John took a deep breath.
"Gary. I'm sorry. I'm two years late, but I'm sorry. That's why I had to find you, why I've been looking for you. And I'm glad we have," he lied, "and if you need any help then I'll do whatever I can. But I just wanted to tell you I'm sorry, for everything I said and did and how I left things. I want to work things out. I want to make things better. I want to be friends again. I want to try."
Silence, but for the dark waters beneath them; then a gurgle from the depths of Gary's throat, a wet death-rattle hissing, and a dry bark that may or may not have been a laugh. Gary smiled a smile John would see every night for the rest of his life.
"No." He answered. "I don't forgive you. But not because of some, some drunk yelling two years ago." His voice was harsh noise, the slightest reverberation layered behind his words; John felt every syllable echo up his spine and through his jaw. "I don't forgive you for lying. I don't forgive you for crocodile tears and scheming." Gary crept forward as he spoke, every step toward John and Chas matched by their step back. "I don't forgive you for inviting devilry into our lives. Two years, John! Two years, I've been waiting for the chance to fix everything. Two years spent learning the truth of it all! Learning about how you played God, about all the things you'd happily discard just to play at having power!" He was raving like a madman, loud and final; the situation was spiralling out of control - if they'd ever had any to begin with - and John could feel Chas pulling on his arm, trying to drag him away. "Witchcraft, John - you're a fool! All those sacrifices made in vain. You tore everything to shreds, and got nothing in return! But I can fix it. Here. Now. I can rectify the great error and put it all right again. Your deepest sin, John, unpardonable, inexcusable - surviving. Getting a second chance - when Cheryl never even got her first!"
He was fast - Gods, he was fast. He shrieked inhumanly and suddenly he was on John, wailing and beating and biting and clawing, feral, a man possessed; above the din rang out Chas' shouts as he tried to pry the two men apart, catching his own stray blows in the process. Gary snarled and they fell to the ground, writhing and wrestling, rolling around on the wet metal flooring, every flail pushing them closer to the edge of the bridge. Chas tried to wrench them back to their feet, but a foot found its mark in his chest with the force of a mule and the kick sent him sprawling back, tumbling over himself and knocking his head against the brickwork - dazed and reeling, the fracas was reduced to only the manic Gary, feverish in his murderous zeal, and John desperately fighting back, reckoning both with the realization that Gary truly intended to kill him, and also that he didn't want to die.
They rolled and Gary was beneath him, and John felt something cold slip around his neck; he barely managed to slide two fingers underneath what was a strange black-and-brown beaded rosary before it was pulled taut, pressing into his throat. Gary meant to strangle him.
"Just let it happen, Johnny. Slip away. Go be with your brother..." Gary hissed in his ear. John kicked and struggled, pulling at the rosary, gasping and clawing for air. The chain dug into his neck and he felt his strength fading, his mind going white. John looked at Chas, splayed out on the ground and clutching his head, spots of blood seeping through the seams between his fingers. He couldn't do it...couldn't get free...it was all going dark, fading away. He really was going to die on this bridge. John saw the thread of his life again, drawn across the backs of his eyelids, looping back on itself to finally tie the knot where it had slipped two years ago.
Is dying really all you're good for?
John kicked Gary's ankle hard in a split-second of freedom from his twisting limbs and felt the frail bone give way beneath his boot. Gary howled, anguished, and John had a crystalline moment to suck air into his screaming lungs and twist them both whole-body, rolling over and pushing up, Gary toppling, John coming down on top of him and now their positions were reversed: Gary was sprawled out on his belly, his head dangling over the edge of the bridge - John pressed his knee down on Gary's back - the rosary now winding through his own fingers as he glided it around Gary's throat, the length of it far longer than it had been mere moments before. Behind the pounding of his heartbeat and the rushing pulse in his ears, John could hear Chas' muffled voice, weak and disoriented, imploring him to stop. John looked up. Behind Chas was the ghostly figure of Cheryl, saddened but calm as she watched on; behind her was the shadowed outline of something altogether unworldly, resting delicate clawed hands on his sister's ballooning belly. John's eyes glazed over; his hands twisted of their own accord. Gary thrashed and clawed and snarled, the only thing he could see the very same waters John had thrown himself into two years ago.
No, not the same waters. Not the same John.
There was a sickening, grinding crunch, and then a wet and visceral snap, and Gary fell limp. John felt an indulgent wickedness spreading warmly throughout his body; and then it all came back into focus as he fell back in horror, the night quiet once more.
John was so lost in his calamitous revelation that he had not noticed Chas coming to a standstill some ten paces back. It was only his calling out to him that shook John from his lapse. He stopped, tearing his gaze away from the brick and steel of the bridge to look back at his companion, still feeling the omen on his spine.
"We shouldn't do this." Chas said, simple and obvious and yet so, so futile, so late. Chas could see it in John's face, the solemn determination; but if he just let him climb up there without a word, without voicing even a fraction of how insane this had all become, he would never see another restful night again. "Please, John. Nothing good will come of this, for anyone. Not for me, not for Gary, not for you. We've taken it this far - but don't you feel it? It's all wrong, John. It's all perverted and crooked. We should just walk away. Please."
John breathed a deep sigh. He could not deny the truth to his friend's words any more than he could deny the impotence of the attempt. He walked back to stand beside him, and simply pulled Chas into a brief embrace.
"I'm sorry, Chas. I'm going up there. You don't have to come with me - but at this point, it's not even about finding Gary anymore. I am grateful you took a chance and came back - glad we reconnected. I can't tell you how indebted I am just for coming this far with me. But if I turn away now - if I run from this - I'll just be confirming all my worst fears about myself. My life would be defined by this bridge forever. If I want even a modicum of control back over my own destiny - I need to climb back up there. One last time."
Just to prove that I tried. John thought, saving just that small piece of his soul for himself. Chas did not reply - but he got a stoic, steely look in his eye, and his jaw clenched and set like he was enduring great pain; and then he nodded. The two forged on, their bond now forever-set.
The climb up the bridge was difficult and taxing and by the time they crested the end of the causeway the sun had well and truly set. Only a series of small and worn-out bulbs illuminated the way ahead, and a mist was descending around them as the night drew in that obscured even that. They paused for a moment, catching their breath but also peering through the darkness down the bridge to try and spot their quarry; it took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the gloom, but once they had, Chas spied a shadowed figure lurking roughly halfway across. He nudged John and pointed.
"That could be him, lad. But this all feels hideously wrong. We can't, John."
John could feel it too, a pressure all around them, a subtle push that sent chills down his spine and made him dig his heels in on instinct. It didn't matter.
"We must." Was his only reply, and he set forward. They crept along the bridge, hopping from one feeble pool of light to another, each step meticulous and calculated. The waters of the River Mersey rushed beneath them, and John very pointedly did not look down, did not peer over the edge to witness those dark and roaring floods down below.
They approached the veiled figure quicker than they'd have liked, and it was Chas who took the initiative as they grew near:
"Gary?" He called out, cautious and low. No part of him wanted a response.
The figure jerked, twitching as it stood straight and turned toward them. It took one agonized, lumbering step toward them and, in the process, moved into the light. John and Chas froze, unable to suppress a gasp.
It was Gary, unmistakeably so - after all the asking around, the chasing, the sheer rigamarole of it all, they'd really found him - but he looked...even taking the ravages of two years of substance abuse into account, he looked terrible. This wasn't the visage of a mere junkie - he was almost skeletal, parchment-dry skin stretched over sun-bleached bone. What hair remained hung limp and lifeless from his pockmarked scalp; his arms and chest were carpeted with sores and scabs and needle tracks, and his eyes were sunken deep into dark, maddened sockets, bloodshot and darting this way and that in some paranoid fit. He raised a hand to scratch at a rough, shingles-like abrasion that marred his neck, and John noticed several fingernails chewed down to the quick or missing entirely, the skin on his knuckles and palm red and cracking. But all of this aside, there was something else about Gary, something that haunted him and distorted his outline, made him dizzying to look at. It seemed to John like one of those magic eye puzzles: if you squinted at it just right, at just the proper angle, it would all align and reveal its secrets. As it was, Gary just vaguely hurt to behold, frayed around his edges like a sketch yet to be lined in.
"Gary?" John asked, hesitant and afraid.
"H...hhellooo, John..." Gary answered, all hiss and rasp, his voice like a belt-sander to the ears. Nothing about any of this was good or right, and John wished deeply that he had listened to Chas. It was all too late now. John took a deep breath.
"Gary. I'm sorry. I'm two years late, but I'm sorry. That's why I had to find you, why I've been looking for you. And I'm glad we have," he lied, "and if you need any help then I'll do whatever I can. But I just wanted to tell you I'm sorry, for everything I said and did and how I left things. I want to work things out. I want to make things better. I want to be friends again. I want to try."
Silence, but for the dark waters beneath them; then a gurgle from the depths of Gary's throat, a wet death-rattle hissing, and a dry bark that may or may not have been a laugh. Gary smiled a smile John would see every night for the rest of his life.
"No." He answered. "I don't forgive you. But not because of some, some drunk yelling two years ago." His voice was harsh noise, the slightest reverberation layered behind his words; John felt every syllable echo up his spine and through his jaw. "I don't forgive you for lying. I don't forgive you for crocodile tears and scheming." Gary crept forward as he spoke, every step toward John and Chas matched by their step back. "I don't forgive you for inviting devilry into our lives. Two years, John! Two years, I've been waiting for the chance to fix everything. Two years spent learning the truth of it all! Learning about how you played God, about all the things you'd happily discard just to play at having power!" He was raving like a madman, loud and final; the situation was spiralling out of control - if they'd ever had any to begin with - and John could feel Chas pulling on his arm, trying to drag him away. "Witchcraft, John - you're a fool! All those sacrifices made in vain. You tore everything to shreds, and got nothing in return! But I can fix it. Here. Now. I can rectify the great error and put it all right again. Your deepest sin, John, unpardonable, inexcusable - surviving. Getting a second chance - when Cheryl never even got her first!"
He was fast - Gods, he was fast. He shrieked inhumanly and suddenly he was on John, wailing and beating and biting and clawing, feral, a man possessed; above the din rang out Chas' shouts as he tried to pry the two men apart, catching his own stray blows in the process. Gary snarled and they fell to the ground, writhing and wrestling, rolling around on the wet metal flooring, every flail pushing them closer to the edge of the bridge. Chas tried to wrench them back to their feet, but a foot found its mark in his chest with the force of a mule and the kick sent him sprawling back, tumbling over himself and knocking his head against the brickwork - dazed and reeling, the fracas was reduced to only the manic Gary, feverish in his murderous zeal, and John desperately fighting back, reckoning both with the realization that Gary truly intended to kill him, and also that he didn't want to die.
They rolled and Gary was beneath him, and John felt something cold slip around his neck; he barely managed to slide two fingers underneath what was a strange black-and-brown beaded rosary before it was pulled taut, pressing into his throat. Gary meant to strangle him.
"Just let it happen, Johnny. Slip away. Go be with your brother..." Gary hissed in his ear. John kicked and struggled, pulling at the rosary, gasping and clawing for air. The chain dug into his neck and he felt his strength fading, his mind going white. John looked at Chas, splayed out on the ground and clutching his head, spots of blood seeping through the seams between his fingers. He couldn't do it...couldn't get free...it was all going dark, fading away. He really was going to die on this bridge. John saw the thread of his life again, drawn across the backs of his eyelids, looping back on itself to finally tie the knot where it had slipped two years ago.
Is dying really all you're good for?
John kicked Gary's ankle hard in a split-second of freedom from his twisting limbs and felt the frail bone give way beneath his boot. Gary howled, anguished, and John had a crystalline moment to suck air into his screaming lungs and twist them both whole-body, rolling over and pushing up, Gary toppling, John coming down on top of him and now their positions were reversed: Gary was sprawled out on his belly, his head dangling over the edge of the bridge - John pressed his knee down on Gary's back - the rosary now winding through his own fingers as he glided it around Gary's throat, the length of it far longer than it had been mere moments before. Behind the pounding of his heartbeat and the rushing pulse in his ears, John could hear Chas' muffled voice, weak and disoriented, imploring him to stop. John looked up. Behind Chas was the ghostly figure of Cheryl, saddened but calm as she watched on; behind her was the shadowed outline of something altogether unworldly, resting delicate clawed hands on his sister's ballooning belly. John's eyes glazed over; his hands twisted of their own accord. Gary thrashed and clawed and snarled, the only thing he could see the very same waters John had thrown himself into two years ago.
No, not the same waters. Not the same John.
There was a sickening, grinding crunch, and then a wet and visceral snap, and Gary fell limp. John felt an indulgent wickedness spreading warmly throughout his body; and then it all came back into focus as he fell back in horror, the night quiet once more.
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