Between Heaven and Hell

by Jeff Kirvin

  Yeah, he thought as he got into the limousine John had waiting for him, he had it all figured out, and everything was going according to schedule.

  Lying back in the plush seat of the car, alone with his dreams (John didn’t really count), the soon to be most powerful man in the world disappeared into the traffic of San Antonio.

  The Inquisition

  ONE MONTH LATER.

  The Interrogation Chamber was a specially constructed room inside an old warehouse Daniel’s team had modified for their mission. Constructed of titanium reinforced steel, the room was just large enough to accommodate a small group of interrogators and one subject strapped to an angled table. The room was a vault, designed with demonic strength in mind. It was just outside this room that Daniel stood, waiting.

  He’d just received word from Jack that they finally had a captive. After four long weeks of searching, the team had finally located another demon, reportedly named Uzziel. Jack had informed Daniel that the capture had been made cleanly, and that they were bringing the subject in.

  The door to the warehouse flew open and the DTF van drove in. Daniel walked over and helped open the rear door to the van, then helped Jack and Heinrich wheel the gurney with the rapidly healing demon into the Interrogation Chamber. They soon had the demon secured to the table, and by the time Uzziel was fully conscious, they were ready to begin.

  Daniel did most of the talking. “You are the demon named Uzziel.”

  “Bite me, mortal.”

  “I’ll take that as a yes.” Daniel picked up a clipboard and began taking notes as he talked.

  “Do you know where you are?”

  “Disneyland.”

  “Really.”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Come now, you aren’t the slightest bit worried about your situation?” Daniel asked.

  Uzziel stared back defiantly. “Oh, don’t get me wrong. You and your little band of witch-hunters have quite a reputation among my people. We all know what you’re capable of.

  “But I served as a lieutenant to Gabriel’s personal guard before the Fall. I’ve served under Beelzebub ever since. Once you’ve had to answer to them, you mortals are strictly small time.”

  “I see,” Daniel said. “I’ll cut right to the point. We need to know the location of Hell, and we believe that you, as a demon, know where it is. So you’re going to tell us.”

  Uzziel spat at Daniel. “Fuck you, human.”

  Daniel seemed completely nonplused. “Heinrich, you may begin.”

  Humming a happy and familiar little Christian hymn, Heinrich set to work. The first thing he did was to grab a large, sharp knife and peel the skin from Uzziel’s arm like he was peeling a potato, then pour copious amounts of salt on the wound.

  “This the best you can do, mortal?” Uzziel hissed through clenched teeth. “Were our positions reversed, I’d be tempted to do something really nasty.”

  “We’re just warming up,” Daniel said with a smile. “Now tell me, where is Hell?”

  “In your father’s basement, under the ashes.”

  The smile disappeared from Daniel’s face, and he became very still.

  “Sir, are you all right?” Jack asked.

  “Fine,” Daniel answered, shaking it off. “Heinrich.”

  Heinrich opened a small metal box and pulled out a metal rod. At the touch of a button, the tip of the rod began to glow red. Heinrich moved the rod slowly towards the demon’s face, then plunged it carefully into each eye until they burst, oozing fluid down Uzziel’s cheeks.

  The demon clenched his teeth and tensed every muscle in his body, but did not make a sound.

  “Where is Hell?” Daniel asked more forcibly.

  “Up your ass,” Uzziel croaked, though his wounds were already beginning to heal up.

  Daniel nodded again to Heinrich, who in turn sawed off the demon’s left hand. Uzziel screamed, but said nothing coherent. Crimson blood flowed freely from the wound for a few seconds, then tapered off.

  Daniel took a step closer. “Where is Hell?” he screamed into the demon’s face. He received no answer.

  “Do it,” he said to Heinrich. The young German picked up a long, sharp knife and made an incision down the length of Uzziel’s torso. He then grabbed a metal hook and began pulling out the demon’s intestines.

  “Even for someone as old as you,” Daniel said, “you can’t have faced much worse than this. It can’t be comfortable. All you have to do to make it stop is tell us what we want to know.”

  “And then you kill me,” Uzziel whispered, his breathing ragged and faint. “Fuck you, Cho. I’m not playing your game.”

  “Heinrich, the torch.”

  The young German put down his hook and ignited a small blowtorch. After spreading open the hole in Uzziel’s torso, he began scorching random organs.

  “Where is Hell?” Daniel demanded.

  “You know,” Uzziel observed, speaking each word with great difficulty and concentration, “it just occurred to me how much you look like your mother. You should have heard how she begged just before I snapped her neck.”

  Before either Heinrich or Jack could react, Daniel had one of the knives in his hand and was straddling Uzziel. “Where is it, you son of a bitch?” he screamed as he began wildly hacking away at the demon. “Where’s Hell, motherfucker?”

  Daniel went into a frenzy, mercilessly slashing and stabbing with the knife, the demon’s blood splashing the metal walls five feet away. “Tell me!” Daniel thundered. “Tell me, you fucking monster! You sadistic son of a bitch, tell me what I need to know!”

  Daniel gradually became aware of someone calling his name. He turned and saw Jack standing behind him, pleading for Daniel to step away. As Daniel pulled himself back from the pile of torn and severed flesh that was quick resolving itself back into a demon, he noticed that he was covered in blood, and that Heinrich and Jack weren’t much cleaner. Daniel was ashamed of himself. He wasn’t much of a leader if he let himself lose control like that.

  Daniel and Jack stepped away, not out of the demon’s earshot, but comfortably away from most of the blood.

  “It’s no use,” Daniel said. “He’s not going to tell us anything useful.

  “Destroy him.”

  “Sir, do you want me to take him out in the van and…” Jack mimed pushing down the plunger on an old fashioned dynamite detonator.

  “No, we don’t have time for that,” Daniel said. “Just drop him in the shredder and make sure you burn the pieces.” The warehouse came equipped with an old waste shredder, essentially a large metal hopper feeding into motorized spinning blades.

  “And find me another interrogation subject.”

  Daniel walked out of the Interrogation Chamber, closing the door behind him.

  Updates

  Daniel sat in Marie Motumbo’s office and tried to think of a way to put a positive spin on the way things had gone. Motumbo spoke before he could think of anything.

  “I have to admit, Colonel, I’m a little disappointed.”

  So was Daniel. In the three weeks since the incident with Uzziel, things had gone no better for his team. “Yes, ma’am. We are too. We’ve interrogated three demons so far, and none of them has told us anything important. If we don’t get something soon, we’re going to have to write off this whole method of inquiry.”

  Motumbo got up and stood by her office window, staring out into space. It was something Daniel had often seen her do when she had something important on her mind.

  “Daniel?” she asked.

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  She turned back to face him. “Drop the ‘ma’am’ for now, okay? I just want to talk person to person.”

  “Sure, Marie. What’s on your mind?”

  “How are we doing? Really?”

  “What do you mean?” Daniel asked.

  Marie began to pace. “I sit up here in this office all day and orchestrate a global assault against inhuman monsters. That’s my job, and I think I do
it well. But I never really get out in the field anymore. I know what’s going on in this war only by the progress reports I read. That, and the newspapers.”

  She stopped and leaned against her desk, facing Daniel. “And what I read scares me. Things get worse out there every day, more hysteria, more innocent people dead or ostracized, with no end in sight. You walk the streets every day, so I want your opinion. How are we doing?”

  Daniel eased back in his chair and gave it some thought. “Well, we’re making headway. We know there’s a finite number of them, so each one we take out, no matter how long it takes, is one step closer.”

  “That’s just what worries me, Daniel. It’s taking too long. Demons have always been agents of chaos, and chaos is just what they’re getting right now. I’m beginning to fear that by the time we destroy the last demon, they will have already won.”

  Daniel stood up and straightened his uniform. “That’s not going to happen. We’ll find Hell soon, and when we do, we can end this once and for all.”

  Instead of responding, Marie Motumbo turned and stared out the window again. Daniel left her alone with her thoughts in the silent office.

  Susan had hit paydirt. At least, she thought she did. She’d been spending most of her time following up on Sal’s lead, doing an in depth study of the hysteria and the people it affected.

  In the hundreds of highly publicized accusations of demonic ties and sympathies, almost all of them, if you dug deep enough, could be connected to one man.

  Senator Timothy Phillips.

  Susan had suspected as much. Over the last few months, she’d literally gotten sick of reading his name on her nightly newscasts. To suspect was one thing however, now she had proof.

  Susan got up from the desk in her apartment and walked to the window. What could she do about it? As far as she could tell, Phillips had done nothing technically wrong; no laws had been broken, no official rules of the Senate stepped on. Phillips had personally done nothing but make suggestions, inferences.

  Inferences that were quickly whipping the public into a paranoid frenzy. The man had to be stopped. Susan had always been taught that the news media was not a place to air personal issues, and she was a deep believer in journalistic objectivity, but Sal was right. She was probably the only person that could speak out against Phillips and this witch-hunting insanity without being accused of demonic sympathies. Too many people had already lost their livelihoods, or their lives, because someone else accused them of being in league with demons. It had to stop.

  And once again, Susan found herself not just reporting the news, put preparing to make it.

  Timothy Phillips was nearly beside himself with exhilaration. He had just received all the necessary permits and authorization to hold a rally against the demons on the Mall in Washington D.C. He was virtually guaranteed maximum press coverage, and he’d already seen to it that a number of stories about highly placed demon sympathizers would break just before the rally. With any luck at all, the publicity from this rally would begin the wave of popularity that swept him into the White House.

  There came a knock at his office door.

  “Come in.”

  John walked in, carrying a tray with cups and a coffeepot. “Your coffee, sir.”

  Phillips waved a dismissive hand. “Just set it down anywhere.”

  As John placed the tray gingerly on Phillips’ desk, he said, “Great news about the rally.”

  Phillips sat back in his chair. He loved talking about his accomplishments. “Yes, yes it is. How’s that speech coming?” Although Phillips selected the topics and major themes of his public speeches, it was more often than not John that wrote the actual words. He seemed to have a gift with the kind of fiery, inspirational writing Phillips needed so much these days.

  “Very well, sir. Another draft or two and it’ll be ready.”

  “Wonderful. That will be all, John.”

  With a submissive nod of his head, John Williams left the office.

  Phillips turned his chair so he could stare out his window, the view overlooking the Mall with the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument visible in the distance. One day soon, Phillips thought, all this will be mine.

  Daniel made his way on foot through the streets of New York, deep in thought. He’d decided to walk back to the temporary headquarters his team had set up so he could figure out a course of action. It was obvious that the interrogation idea was a wash. Even when he managed to restrain himself and conduct the questioning rationally and methodically, the demons simply wouldn’t talk. Not to him. Not to a human.

  And time was running short, perhaps shorter than even Marie understood. The world was quickly polarizing into two distinct camps, and Daniel could tell just by the way people looked at him on the streets which they fell into.

  Some saw the cobalt blue of his DTF uniform and smiled, maybe even added a bit of spring to their step. They were the people Timothy Phillips spoke to, the people who, like Daniel and every member of the DTF, felt that the demons were the greatest threat in the history of mankind and that they had to be wiped out, whatever the cost.

  Only Daniel wasn’t sure just how much of that he believed anymore.

  The primary reason for his doubt was the look of the others he saw on the streets. People that scowled at him openly, or muttered “witch-hunter” under their breath. Often accused of being somehow in league with the demons if they aired their views too openly, these were the people that Marie was concerned about. While the vast majority of them held no love in their hearts for the demons, they opposed the “fanatical methods” used in the demons’ extermination. They felt no threat was worth the revocation of their basic human rights.

  As long as the demons existed, the people of the world would be thusly divided. And as long as that division existed, the tension would continue to threaten a fragile world peace it had taken centuries to build.

  And so Daniel had to find a way to destroy the demons he had inadvertently discovered. Before the world fell into chaos and terror, before the demons won.

  As Daniel walked into their makeshift headquarters, an old firehouse, Roberto flagged him down. “Hey, boss! You’re just in time. You have a phone call.”

  Daniel walked over and took the phone. “Who is it?” he asked Roberto.

  “He wouldn’t say, but he said you’d know him.”

  “Hello?” Daniel said into the phone.

  “You’re a hard man to reach these days, Daniel,” said Uriel’s voice on the other end of the line. “I think we need to talk.”

  Inferno

  Deep inside a supposedly abandoned missile silo in the Nevada desert north of Las Vegas, Satan waited. The demon sat in a large room lined with television screens, each tuned to a different channel and all muted. In the glow of the monitors, Satan looked young, like a human in his early thirties. His full, black hair was swept back from his forehead, accentuating his high cheekbones and aquiline nose. His azure eyes held a look of intense concentration as he absorbed information from the screens, which randomly switched channels every thirty seconds.

  “My Lord,” called a deep voice from the edge of the room.

  Satan snapped out of his trance and hit a button on the armrest of his chair, blanking all the screens at once. He looked to the doorway and saw Beelzebub, who had grown a full head of ebony hair since Cho had released pictures of him to the humans.

  “You wished to see me?” Beelzebub asked.

  “Yes,” Satan replied with a charming smile. “Take a look.”

  He turned on the screens again. “Look at them, old friend. They’re frightened. Chaotic. Even in the broadcasts that don’t address the ‘Demonic Threat’ directly, there is increased sexual imagery, more violence. Every single one of these screens practically screams ‘War.’ We’re winning.”

  Satan rose from his chair. “Walk with me,” he said.

  The two demons left the monitor room and began an informal tour of the stronghold they called �
�Hell.” The missile silo had been expanded significantly during the conversion process and was now an underground fortress the size of a medium sized town. More than twenty stories deep and nearly a mile across, Hell was the focal point for the world’s demonic activity, and the temporary home for nearly half the demons, at least until the hunts blew over.

  “Overall, I’m very pleased,” Satan said as they passed the library, a hall of books that rivaled the Library of Congress, except that Hell’s library had quite a few ancient tomes that could be found nowhere else on earth. “Only one thing troubles me.”

  “The DTF?” Beelzebub guessed.

  Satan chuckled. “No, my friend. For the moment, they’re more help than hindrance. As long as they exist, the tension between fanatical demon haters and liberal human rights activists remains high. Without knowing it, they work in our favor. No, my worry is an individual human.”

  “Timothy Phillips, then,” Beelzebub said. He hated it when Satan played his little guessing games, but he could do little about it.

  “No, he too serves our purpose, though in a very roundabout fashion. He makes people afraid, and I want them afraid. Besides, when he’s no longer useful to us, it will be easy enough to dispose of him. No, our problem is his nemesis.”

  Beelzebub cast a sidelong glance at the power station as they passed. Hell ran on geothermal energy, and the power system took up nearly a quarter of their space. Satan often joked about Hell being powered by the “fires of the underworld.” Beelzebub racked his brain, but he had no clue to whom his boss referred. “His nemesis?”

  “Yes. A young newscaster named Susan Richardson. I’m sure you’ve heard of her.”

  Beelzebub merely gave Satan a sour look.

  “At first,” the head demon continued, “she was of some use to us, in that in publishing that fool Zagam’s files, she stirred the fires of fear and unrest that we’d let die down. Our exposure actually helped our cause, as it was a destabilizing influence.”