Deicide

Prologue

Pacing the living room and hallway of his hoard-laden apartment, Peter Adams carried a sawn-off shotgun in one hand and a near-empty bottle of scotch in the other. Between his television, computer, and mobile devices, there was a cacophony of talking heads droning on about the election being stolen, murderers and rapists traveling with impunity, and a massive effort by the mainstream media to strip God-given rights from the average citizen, even going as far as faking a global pandemic to do it. Pete wasn't afraid. The fear had long since passed. No, Pete was furious.

When his thoughts turned to violence, as they often did lately, Pete would fall back on the words of wisdom that had carried him through the darkest periods in his life: What would Jesus do? As much as he fantasized blowing the heads off poison peddling satanic billionaires, Pete was pretty sure that Jesus wouldn't approve. But there must have been something that he could do while keeping his place in heaven above. And so he paced, or tried to anyway. When he was passing through the hall, he stumbled into a stack of toilet paper rolls, causing him to lose his fragile balance and fall into the bedroom door, flinging it open and collapsing on the ground.

Pete rolled around on the floor for a moment in a futile attempt to stand on his own, then crawled over and onto his bed, all the while refusing to lose his grip on his bottle and shotgun. When he finally balanced himself in a sitting position on his bed, he put the bottle to his lips, but could only extract a few drops. He looked down at the carpet, and saw another new stain starting to set in, then threw the bottle across the room in a rage, shattering against the back of the closet.

He forced out a roar, letting the emotions flow out of him in the only way he could think of. Pete yelled until his throat couldn't handle it, then fell over onto the bed, exhausted. As he stared at the water-stained ceiling, his anger gradually gave way to a sense of despair and helplessness. The tears began welling in his eyes and a tightness grew in his stomach. Pete struggled to keep it down, turning to his side to try and get comfortable, but then saw the picture sitting on his bedside table.

Pete was happy. The happiest he had ever been, standing behind his gorgeous wife and their two beautiful young children, care-free and loving life. As the memories came flooding back, Pete could no longer contain himself and openly wept as he grabbed the picture. It had been over a year and a half since he last saw them, and all because of the stupid, pointless quarantine. He felt abandoned by all the people he loved. His brother, his father, his wife and kids, even Jesus didn't seem to be on his side anymore. He sat back up at the edge of the bed and stared at the photo.

At this point, Pete began to doubt himself. Maybe it wasn't everything else. Maybe it was him, the common denominator to all the terrible things that had happened recently in his life. Then he realized he was still gripping his shotgun. Pete thought he felt the presence of God everywhere throughout his life, at every decision he made, but recently, the Lord had been increasingly silent. Even now, as Pete repositioned his grip on the shotgun, he listened with all his being for a sign, telling him that this was not the way.

By the time the barrel was under his chin, the sign still hadn't come. Or perhaps silence was the sign. Perhaps God's lack of intervention was a sign that he was doing the right thing. All that Pete could do at this point is continue forward, and hope that Jesus would forgive him for what he was about to do. He fingered the trigger as tears ran down his cheeks.

From down the hall in the living room, Pete heard his phone screech out the sound of an emergency alert. The distraction was all that was needed for him to remove the gun from beneath him. He took a sharp breath and groaned as his body released its tension. He shook his head and rubbed his eyes, then stood up and walked to the living room to find out what the ruckus was all about. As he was grabbing his phone, he noticed that the current events livestream on his computer and the 24-hour news broadcast on his television were both flashing their individual breaking news banners. Each of the reporters came into view appearing pale and unnerved. Pete increased the volume on his television.