Halo And Horns

Knocking on Hell's Blazing Iron Gates

His life had ended before it began; ruined by someone who should have made life wonderful for him. He thought he had escaped that when he moved away but it looked as if his grave sin had caught up with him; in the form of karma. In the form of a tragedy. He chose a path he never wanted to choose and he ended up with a death sentence.

It had been weeks since his sentence was passed. He wore an orange jumpsuit everyday now. It felt like months in prison. Even the prisoners avoided him. They either avoided him or tried starting fights with him. They always lost. He didn't know when he had become so dangerous, so good at hand-to-hand combat but as it turned out, he was amazing at it. And because of that, he had ended up in solitary a couple of times as well. He broke a guard's nose, snapped a prisoner's wrist and done a few more of those deeds to cure himself of boredom. It wasn't like in the movies. There was no huge prison riot, unfortunately.

It was morning, he laid on the bed which had no sheets; just one hard mattress and a pillow. He knew today was the day his sentence would be carried out and like it or not, he was just a little bit nervous. He didn't know when they would take him so he waited, quietly for once.

Three guards approached his cell. The one in the middle unlocked and opened it. Keys rattled. "It's time," he said.

Nick didn't protest, he didn't make a scene and obediently got up from his bed and reached his arms out to be cuffed. One of the other guards cuffed him and two of them grabbed him by his arms then started pulling while the middle-guard watched from outside. Their plan was to drag him all the way to his execution. They wanted him to beg and scream but he didn't plan to give them that satisfaction and instead, he pulled away from the guards. "I'll walk on my own."

A visible scowl on the middle-guard's face but they didn't touch him again and instead let him follow the guard, the two other guards on either side of Nick. He walked through the mess hall where long tables were lined up in the middle of. Cells lined the walls of that hall and he had gotten out from one of those cells. The prisoners in the rest of them moved forward to watch quietly as they went and at that moment Nick understood that they didn't avoid him or try to start fights with him because they were frightened or because they hated him. They did it out of respect. They avoided him because he had worked alone all those years and they thought he preferred being alone and those who fought him did so because before they died, they had wanted to be known to have had a fight with the Joker.

One guy in a cell started the chant and the rest of them followed close by and by the time they exited the hall, that place had been filled with their synchronized chants. "Joker! Joker! Joker!"

He was led into a large, dark room. The only light came from one light bulb which hung by its wires from the middle of the ceiling. There was a two-way mirror window on one side of the room where the witnesses, in this case probably just Charles and a few others, would watch as it happened. There was one chair in the middle of the room, right under the light bulb. It had leather straps ready to restrain Nick.

One of the side-guards shoved him forward lightly and he glanced back and scowled at him before moving forward and sitting down on the chair. As soon as he sat down, the side-guard who shoved him, approached the chair and strapped him in; his wrists onto the arms of the chair, his ankles on the front legs of it. One long strap across his chest and another across his stomach. Once he was strapped in, the guard fell back to stand beside the middle-guard who Nick now understood was the executioner. The other side-guard then handed the middle-guard a revolver and one bullet.

Nick took a deep breath and raised his chin. He would die proudly. The bullet had been loaded and the gun cocked. The executioner raised the gun in front of his face and aimed at Nick's head. A chill rose up his spine and he blinked. In the split second, by the time he opened his eyes, the room was filled with the ghosts that haunted him in the past. The guards and executioner didn't see them but Nick did. Blood soaked, deadly pale ghosts staring right at him with no expression on their faces. Nick would not scream. He would not die screaming. "It's time my friend," Said the devil's voice from behind his chair and two hands came and touched his shoulders lightly. The devil was standing right behind him. "You've been knocking on the gates of hell all these years. They're finally letting you in."

"Any last words you would like to say?" the executioner asked.

"Yeah," said Nick. "I thought you were going to use the lethal injection or electric chair, or whatever you call it."

The executioner shrugged. "New method."

Nick grinned. "Alright then. I'm ready."

"Rest in pieces." And bang!

There is a lot of things which could lead you to change. You will not live life without changing yourself at some point. You are born into this world an innocent angel but life is a necessary evil which can turn even a halo into horns.

~The End~