Of Hell

Chapter One - Through the Door and The Greeter

The graveyard was empty. The moon hung low on the horizon, riding the line between night and dawn, holding on as long as it could. The air was damp. A morning mist huddled around headstones and mausoleums. The rusty smell of dead leaves mingled with the cold. Crows scraped their beaks against sinking cobblestones, ruffled their feathers, and rocked from one foot to the other; a tense little dance.

A priest strode from a maintenance building with a business-like manner spiked with urgency. His face was tight, jaw clinched, and eyes narrowed. His features were singularly unremarkable but collectively attractive. His stubble was whiter than his short unkempt hair. His priestly garb was wrinkled and dusty as if it had been found in the attic of some abandoned church. The once white collar was now yellowed at the edges. A black leather bound bible, King James edition, was tucked under his arm, looking newer than the robes.

The priest arrived at an open gave site. The six foot deep pit was not dressed for public burial but rather a civil “drop and ditch”. That's what the grave digger had called it when the priest had given him the fifty dollars to have it dug. The priest reflected on their conversation as he opened his Bible to the marked page.

“So you want one dug,” the grave digger had said, his lower lip bulging with chew. “Who for?” He sat on a pile of artificial turf that was used to mask the unnerving sight of open graves. The thought of a loved one crushed under dark earth was something mourners shouldn’t have to endure.

“No one, just need a grave.” The priest’s voice had been raspy that day from too many cigarettes and the coughing they brought.

A look of resentment grew on the diggers face. He had dealt with priests before. “Fine. Be done tomorrow. Row 1 isle 1.” He hoped this would bring objection, placing the site in the far corner of the grave yard where maintenance was much more than lacks. Instead the priest turned and walked out.

Now standing over the pit he could tell the thing had been dug with purposeful disregard. Its edges were uneven. The removed earth had been piled too closely and some had fallen back in. The backhoe was also left nearby, which was tacky and against proper procedures.

The priest was reciting the passage, his eyes unfocused on the page. He knew the rite well and days of preparation had ingrained the words. He focused on slowing his heart, which was racing. From the outside he was the icon of calm contemplation, but inside his mind swam in dark possibilities and remembrances of his wife. Her hair. Eyes reflecting a sunset. Images of their honeymoon flowered into his thoughts. Peaceful understanding that he had done the right thing by leaving his duties in the past, moving forward into the glowing future. He had been broken and this woman had repaired him. The innocence of it all, the poetic moment when they became lost in each other. They were untouched and pure, both of them.  Then gave themselves to each other without the sense of accomplishment or arrival found in angst youth but the relief, the comfort that comes with understanding. He was different back then, better.

He began to read. The night seemed to pull in tight. The air thinned and he had to forcefully pull it in with each breath. Then it clung to his lungs, unwilling to leave. The words he spoke began to feel heavy and strange, hard to remember as if in a second or third language. The edge of the priests vision began to blur and take on a shifting emptiness. He found himself pausing without reason and strange sounds pulled at his attention. He clinched his jaw and focused himself. The images of his wife which he held in his mind began to change against his will. Her eyes filled with ink and her skin drew back against her bones.

He lowered his Bible and looked at the casket laid out before him. From his coat pocket he pulled a vile of red liquid with a layer of yellow on top. The stopper rotted away in time lapse and the liquid vibrated with an unfelt pulsation. He tipped the vile out onto the rim of the casket, his hands shaking. He did not feel them shake, only saw them shake. With clumsy motions he smeared the red pool around the casket’s rim until it made a complete circle. The red smears twitched and squirmed. The priest blinked hard to clear his eyes and tried to focus on smaller details. Vapors rose from the pit, colorless and distorting. The priest backed away, opening the Bible to another verse. He spoke but his voice had changed. It was lower, sounding like a tape recording slowed to a near halt.

The memory of his wedding night played back in his mind but now he and his wife were replaced with ruined forms that showed none of the gentleness or respect they had shared. The priest tried to speak louder to drown out the vulgarity leeching in but the words themselves now brought long echoing pain with each syllable. Each reverberating echo of faint pain riding out longer than the sound that brought it, doubling over one another, culminating in white noise. The red smears shivered on the casket, its paint peeling back. The wood showing through the paint gnarled and grew in spurts. Knots of yellow wood boiled from its surface, cracking, oozing black pitch.

The Bible became oily, its leather binding seemed to breath, blue capillaries snapped in the cracks of its cover. The printed words blurred then reformed in red letters the priest couldn’t understand. He dropped the book. The thing was no longer a Bible but a clump of grey mildew smelling of low tide and garlic.

With words the priest had never learned he touched the ring of red then lay himself into the casket. Once inside everything became still. The commotion of the ritual still played out but appeared to the priest as if distant and detached from his reality, a film playing in the background. Then even that stopped.

Time was slow now and his thoughts were clear. This was it. He had gone through with it.

Time pulled itself in reverse. A ghost image of the priest stepped out of the casket leaving the priest with his consciousness and visual perspective intact. The Bible that lay on the ground rose to the ghost images’ hand. The words he had spoken a moment ago sounded in reverse, their low strange surges sped up as time crashed backwards into the casket.

“And let it be know that His will is done in Heaven as my will be done in The Great Below. You have asked my favor and I grant you this, though you know not what you do. We move beyond The Shadow of The Valley of Death and enter the House of Temptation.”

A wave of sorrow washed against the priest. The memory of losing his wife was now faint and isolated. Pulled away from the once debilitating sense of loss. The understanding of it all seems to make his grieving cheap and pathetic. What he felt now was first degree sorrow. This sorrow was true. This sorrow had no past. This sorrow was pure. This was the knowledge of good and evil.

It was then that the ghost image of the priest, played in reverse, moved forward in time as the rest of reality continued backwards. The ghost moved to the casket and stood over it looking in. The ghost did not follow its previous paths. It had its own will now, its own voice.

“Now that you understand your small sorrow surely you understand that you will be lost in The Great Below.” The ghost lowered his head with a cold expression of reflection. The scene around the casket was shaking with violent shifts and spiking time fractures. The boiling knots of wood pulled back, scraping wounds into the earth. The colorless vapor solidified, turned to ice, then steam. The red smears twitched and flickered like neon light fueled by sin. The backhoe rusted in an instant, falling to the ground in a pile of dust and ruined parts. Time pulsed forward then back, forward again, then back hard onto itself, overlapping. Everything collapsed, racing, crashing, slamming, all back into the casket.

The ritual was over.

The smell came first before opening his eyes. There was a salty heat in the air. The permeating scent of ashes with a sickly sweet after taste. The air was stifling.

The priest opened his eyes and saw that he was standing vertically in a box that he knew to be a casket. It was not the one he had preformed the ritual in but not much different. There was something on his tongue, like a hair. He spat, then tried to pull it away with his fingers. It was cobwebs. Thick layers covered him from head to bare feet. Claustrophobia slithered around his mind. He thrust forward against the thin pine lid of the casket that splintered under his weight. Dust filled the air in billows. He thrashed. Flailing his limbs trying to free himself from the spiders’ wrap. He hung his head and collected himself. Long streamers of cobweb floated from him, aimless in the still air. The heavy grey dust hang sluggishly in the air turning the scene into a grainy monochromatic photograph.

That’s what gets me, the priest thought, spider webs. I spoke those words and some webs make me lose it?

His limbs throbbed. A tightness he had known in his youth, the kind you feel the morning after passing out on the floor of your dorm room. He stretched. As he moved, the sound of sun-bleached cloth tearing was followed by the sound of dry bones snapping and grinding against each other. His mouth was dry. His tongue scraped over his gums and lips.

“A drink perhaps?” Came a voice from somewhere in the dark. The priest spun about searching for its source. A man stepped into view from somewhere beyond the dust and webs. He held two glasses, one outstretched to the priest. The glass appeared to be fine crystal shaped into an elegantly narrow flute.

The priest nodded and took the glass while taking in the strangers form. His eyes were deep set, cadaverously so, and his skin was smooth and pale. His hair was combed back and held in place with what appeared to be wax and spider webs. Dressed in a tuxedo he seemed out of place amongst the void like space clouded with dust and webs. His white shirt was pressed and crisp. It was clear all of his attire was tailor fit. His pants were creased front and back. His cuffs were French, giving only the slightest gap. The hand that held his glass featured long thin fingers without nails and where a thumb should have been, only another index finger. His shoes were narrow coming to a squared toe and made from polished black leather.

“Thank you.” The priest said scanning the void.

“Most welcome.”

The two stood in silence for a moment until the priest drank deeply from his glass. The stranger seemed to unlock, and drink as if he had only then been given permission.

“So, what is it we can do for you?” The stranger asked, his brow raised in question.

“We?” The priest returned.

With this the stranger looked gravely at his glass then turned in a circle, the glass disappearing somewhere along the way and replaced with a ledger and pen.

“Yes, I see here that you have come on the matter of…” The strangers eyes scanned his papers. “…on the matter of… It appears that you are not on my schedule at all. I must admit I was startled by your arrival, but assumed I had simply lost track of time. I now understand that you are in fact not scheduled what so ever.” With this the raised brow lowered into a furrow.

“No.” The priest returned, feeling a sickening well up with in himself.

“Well that is simply not the way things are run here.” The stranger said, his words crowned with sharp S’s. “Things are run smoothly.” The strangers hands twisted slightly, the fingers reaching out. Muffled words slithered between the strangers lips. Hisses and guttural sounds that breached the space between himself and the priest. The air sizzled with tension and a new hate.

Through the pitted pain, still growing, the priest noticed the stranger was gazing straight at his stomach. With this knowledge the discomfort did not fade but rather detached from his body, morphing into a concept rather than actual sensation.

The strangers hand snapped back to his sides and a look of palpable regret crept through his skin. The priest watched the strangers mental retreat, noting how the stranger avoided his eyes. The stranger tensed his muscles as if bracing himself against an impending attack.

The priest swam in confusion. What had happened? Who was this stranger? Why was he so afraid? Had this other worldly being caused the pain in his stomach? The weight of the day gathered in the priests mind and exhaustion collected in a deep sigh.

“Thank you.” The stranger said, visibly relaxing. Then backed away with head hung low.

“Wait.” The priest called. The stranger, now obscured by the still hanging dust and webs, froze in place.

“Yes?” The stranger began a slow reluctant shuffle back to the priest, akin to a dog that’s dug up a flower bed. The priest wondered at how the strangers demeanor had changed. The cool efficiency and confident grace had melted away and in its place was left the manner of some toadyish lackey.

“Who are you?” the priest asked. His eyes chasing the strangers.

“I?” The stranger returned, looking up for a moment. The fear still hung over his shoulders like a rolled up rug, heavy and cumbersome, but was now joined with curiosity. “I am The Greeter, of course.” The statement sounded like the response a child gives his teacher when asked an obvious question, one meant to do nothing more then reengage the student.

“A greeter?”

“No, not A greeter. The Greeter.” An expression of understanding fell across his features. “This was a test then? You are right I am The Greeter. I should not have left you here to do as you would. Please forgive me! It is just that you shrugged away my hex so easily I became fearful.” The excuse made The Greeter cringe even as he said it.

“Hex?” The priest replied, not wanting to give away the fact that he did not understand the situation or the advantage he had gained.

“I… What is it your asking? I’m not sure I understand.” The regret and fear slipped slightly, making room for suspicion.

The priest felt the advantage fading and moved to regain it, his words coming out in harsh whips. “Yes! I shrugged it off, your hex, and why might that be? Answer!”

“Yes, I ah.” the Greeter paused to straighten himself and pulled back his shoulder, a formal stance that indicated he had gone through some type of training. His eyes were pinned forward looking out into nothing.

“I am The Greeter. I protect the gateway between The Second, and The Third. My hex are granted by the Bishop. I will only use my hex to fulfill my duties least they be stripped from me, and my life forfeit to The Great Below.”

“Good!” The priest barked, folding his arms behind his back while stalking around The Greeter, scrutinizing every nuance of him. The Priests questions and fears were masked behind a sociopaths commitment to a false persona.

“Tell me the basics of hex.”

“I… what do you mean? I don’t understand.” The formal stance slacked. “You want to know about my magic? That’s… somewhat inappropriate isn’t it?” The Greeter turned to face the priest. His eyes were once again shielded under a furrowed brow.

The priest knew he had lost the deception and backed away slowly as the drill sergeant persona dissolved.

“Who are you?! This is no test! Explain yourself!” The Greeter snapped, his skin pulling back from his teeth. He back peddled in a circle like a prize fighter measuring his opponent. The fear still held but had become primal, the kind of fear a young wolf might feel while meeting an alpha. “You’re out of place! Something is wrong.” The Greeter hunched over and raised his hands, striking a Greco-Roman posture. He fainted lunges at the priest, small threats.

“I am a priest, or was.” The gap between The Greeter and the priest was wide, some 30 feet but this did little to comfort.

“No! Lies! You are no priest! You would have been on my schedule! The Bishop would make sure! You are not one of his!” The sound hissed between The Greeters bare teeth. His once smoothed hair bristled. His heart sounded through his chest and muscles twitched. His eyes twitched like a rattle snakes tail.

“I don’t know who The Bishop is. I was a priest in Salem, Massachusetts’s.” The priest saw The Greeter straighten. His hands lowered. The fear in his eyes subsided.

“You’re…” The Greeter paused. He walked slowly to the priest and held him by the shoulders in a brotherly way. The priest shrunk away then gripped The Greeter by his lapels, pushing him back. “No, no. No need for that. I pose no threat to you. You’re from The Second. You’re still alive. There is life in you.” The last words seemed to spill out of The Greeter like tears.

The priest gently pushed The Greeter’s to arms length then locked eyes with him. “You need to back up!”

“You’re alive.” The Greeter echoed himself softly pulling the priest closer. There was a sad worshipful look in his eyes. “Why did you come to The Third? Why would you leave The Second? Good man, what are you doing?”

Again the priest pushed The Greeter back, hand still gripping his lapels. “Look, I don’t know what your talking about! Just get off of me!”

The Greeter looked down as if he noticed for the first time that he was clinging to the priest, seeing for the first time that he was scaring the priest. “Forgive me.” The Greeter whispered, letting go of the priests shoulder. He moved to withdraw but found himself holding the priest by the wrists. “You’re alive, its just…” Then shrugged as if his words were an excuse that should be understood.

The priest twisted his wrists and found The Greeter let them move freely, not seeking control but merely maintain contact. “Where am I?” The priest asked while pushing against The Greeter’s strange advance.

“Surely you know. There is only one way the living come to this place, though it has not happened since I have been here, a man coming from The Second to The Third. Why?! Why have you come?” The Greeters eyes were listless and sad, his questions painted there in tears. The Greeter slowly reached for the priests face but was parried. He reached out again as if not remembering his first attempt.

“Please, just. Slow down. I am confused. Just…” The priest slapped The Greeters arms way, finally regaining the space between them. The Greeters eyes were deep with needful tears. The repentance the priest saw there was frightening. It reminded him of when he was a parishioner, when he would hear the confessions of humble people whom saw themselves as evil. Genuine repentance.

“I was a priest at one point, yes, but I do not understand what you are talking about! I don‘t know about The First or The Second, or where I am!” The priest scanned The Greeter for a reaction, one that came on slowly and was accompanied by wonder.

“Oh my…” The Greeter exhaled the words. “So much is wrong here. So much you do not know… How do you not know these things yet stand in The Greet Below? What have you done…?”

Silence swelled as they both lowered to the floor, exhausted. The Greeter sat in place but still reaching towards the priests.

“Please, tell me where I am.” The priest said cutting through the gathered silence. His voice, although a whisper, seemed to boom in the dust filled void. The priest look around remembering the featureless surroundings.

“You are in The Third Place.” The greeters voice was hollow.

“Hell?”

“The youngest of your kind use that name, yes. This place was made by your kind, the men of The Second.”

“The Second?”

“Yes, Earth.” As The Greeter answer the priest he grimaced, turned his face away. His realization of the situation was solidifying.

“We made this? We made hell?”

The Greeter squinted as if peering through all the questions. “Yes, you made both Heaven and Hell. How do you not know this? ”

“On earth we haven’t heard of these ideas.” The priest said his mind coming to terms with the conversation. “On Earth we know nothing of this, I am sorry. On Earth we read the Bible and pray to God, live as best we can, and know nothing of the other places. Nothing of the First and the Third.”

The Greeter stood and raised his hands out to his side, adopting the form of the crucifixion. “Let it be done in The First as it is on done in The Second and what is not done in these must fill The Great Below, The Third Place. Dogma! The men of Earth thinks all things into existence.”

“Well, we know about Heaven and Hell, but only as ideas, we didn’t make them.”

“Only ideas? Only?! What do you think Hell is, but an idea! Same as Heaven!”

“I understand Dogma, God’s allowance for the church to affect Heaven, but we didn’t make those places! God did.”

“God? What do we call living men if not God?! Do the God, the living men, not know what they are?! Does God not know what they do?! You are part of God yet fail to see yourself! You know not what you are! You…”

Heart break. Undoubting and absolute faith sheathed in porcelain flesh fell to the floor, its mind shattering like a mirror breaking against a mirror. The Greeter slumped there in the open space of this void. The dust and webs catching on him here and there making it look as though he had always been in this place, on the floor, still. He was a ruin of a man. “The Great Below take me.” The words came from his soul and with them bled the last of his sorrow. It was the last surrender.

Gradually his fine suit frayed. His skin dried and crack. It must have taken well over an hour before last of his hair drifter to the floor. While this decay played out the priest stood by too afraid to look away.

“Some one should be here to witness this… I suppose.” He sat a few feet away copying The Greeters seated position, his legs crossed  and raised to his chest. The priest watched while The Greeter let The Great Below take what it would. He puzzled over how there seemed to be a spark still lingering behind The Greeters eyes even as the last straps of dried muscle fell from the bones.

That spark remained. Amidst a pile of ash and bone a spark. The priest moved closer, leaning in. There was no sense of life. It was inanimate matter, as if it had never been a person. There in the dust something gleamed. Ash crumbled as the priest reached between the bones to withdraw a  thin sliver of black crystal. Its surface was glassy smooth yet reflected no light. It was darker than black. Its dimensions could only be seen as an outline, contrast with the void.

Whatever it was the priest did not know but the desire to keep it close was undeniable. “It’s mine.” The words seemed to be said aloud though the priest had not uttered a sound. The thing was true black, so complete, utter, total. It was all one thing, no parts, no unmaking it, elemental.