Visions (Hell Portals, Book One)

Chapter Five: OK, We Screwed the Pooch

THE SUN STREAMED THROUGH THE MOTEL ROOM WINDOWS, TOO BRIGHT FOR THE WAY JACK WAS FEELING. He had purposefully neglected to set his alarm, hoping perhaps to just keep sleeping all day. To not wake up and have to psychologically deal with the "events" of the previous night. Jack lay in his bed, staring at the ceiling, haven unintentionally awoken at 9:45AM (to his grave disappointment). Nate was still sleeping. Jack could tell by his breathing patterns and the slight wheeze coming from his nose as he exhaled.

This was insane. All Jack could think about was how they had failed. Everything went sideways and people died horrible deaths because of them. He knew the deaths were in fact unthinkable and tortuous, since he had worked with Nate in the morgue, the night before, moving all the severed pieces of the dead into that sickening remains-blender.

Charlie's remains were the most difficult to process. His head had been severed, along with most of the other parts of his body, with an expression of sheer fright and pain permanently set into his precious little face. Jack wondered if he would ever forget that face. How old was that kid, maybe seven or eight? That was just fucked up beyond fucked up.

Jack and Nate had also been dismembered brutally. However they had already been dead at the time, so no torture had occurred, thankfully. But that thought didn't make Jack feel much better. The other three victims had been tortured alive. And it was ultimately his and Nate's fault.

So what was the score? One demon dead, one living. However one extra victim tortured and murdered: Stephen, the guy Durk had been wearing. Jack wondered if it was worse to be possessed by a Durk and forced to do unthinkable things, or to be freed and then subsequently tortured with a scalpel, bone saw, and other tools of pain infliction. Was it an ultimate relief to be freed from demon bondage, even in such a horrific manner? He wished he could believe that. Right now, he couldn't possibly know the answer. He just knew he and Nate had screwed the pooch on this one. Farnsworth, had been forthright about that.

But Farnsworth had also been encouraging. It was strange the way he began by shaming the boys with his disappointment in them, and then moved into offering encouragement. Jack couldn't quite figure out Farnsworth. All he could think of was that Farnsworth had been doing this for how many long years? "Millennia," he remembered Farnsworth had said. And so Farnsworth must know what he's doing.

One thing was certain. Jack and Nate's question about what would happen if they were killed in action had been answered last night. They would end up being flung back through a dark tunnel into the morgue, get a lecture from that silly-ass twit, and then clean up the mess. It would always be a long fucking night. A night of utter horror, dealing with the carnage produced by their failure. Maybe it was meant to teach the boys the importance of their mission. The result of failure. The pain and agony that their opponents would inflict upon innocent people. The utter lack of empathy for human life that the demons demonstrated. Jack realized that processing the dead's remains was the perfect teaching tool. But he still didn't like it one friggin' bit.

In all of Jack's displeasure at his new existence, he did feel a sense of purpose. More so than ever before. That was a consolation. His life up to that point had been self centered and yawn-inducingly normal. He realized that even when he had given up the normalcy of working a nine-to-five job, sold everything and become a biker, that it was just a token, a gesture, of doing something different.

This new existence, in contrast, was the real deal. He was living a purposeful life with the result of his efforts being true life and death for real people. Was this a little like what a cop feels when he intervenes and saves people's lives? When a detective catches a serial killer and ends his future killing sprees? Or when a fireman carries out a little girl from a blazing inferno? He guessed it shared at least some of the same feelings of true heroism. But what he and Nate were now doing was so much more raw. He was, for the moment, glad of that. He'd made the right choice, he thought.