Death Sucks

by Andrew Mallen

  “Apologize, I am running out of patience Mr. Grant,” Jones insisted.

  Bobby struggled to fend off the agony and find the word.

  “Come on boy, last chance or it’s off to the Flames.”

  “Ssssssss……” Bobby labored to push the word out.

  “What’s that Mr. Grant, can you speak up?”

  “…sssorry.”

  “Very good,” Jones replied, clearly disappointed by Bobby’s little victory. “So where was I?”

  The fire burned and Bobby along with it. He’d done as asked but the vile creep had not released him from whatever spell or curse causing such excruciating pain.

  “There are rules,” Jones went on as Bobby thrashed. “It is understandable most of you are here because of your affinity for breaking rules but these cannot be. Here, as I’ve already said, there are no second chances. Here, there is no ‘F’ word. Here, the punishment for failure is swift and just, and all who falter will live forever in unparalleled agony.”

  Bobby squirmed, his guts felt like he’d swallowed the sun and his every bone turned into a red-hot bar of molten iron. He heard nothing but his own screaming. He knew nothing but misery.

  “Oh good gracious me, Mr. Grant, I have forgotten to release you,” Jones cooed as he glided toward Bobby until he stood beside him. “So inconsiderate of me. Here you are, suffering miserably I’d wager, and here I am, blabbing on about rules and such, having forgotten all about you. Will you ever let me live it down? I think not. Were I in your stead I think I would nurse a bit of a resentment. Now, be a good chap and assure me you will not let my obviously unintentional oversight taint your opinion of me. It would crush my delicate heart, literally crush it. Would you be so kind as to see passed this miniscule error on my part?”

  “Okay,” Bobby groaned.

  “Pardon me Mr. Grant, but I didn’t quite understand you,” Jones babbled on, choosing his words carefully and enunciating every syllable with exaggerated care. “Americans have such a bad habit of mutilating the language of my homeland and sometimes I feel like you lot are speaking an entirely different dialect altogether. If it’s not too much trouble, and I realize that at this moment you might not have the faculties to fully control yourself because of the pain, but I will require that you repeat yourself. And, if you can of course, with the clarity the language, when spoken properly, and when properly I mean with a British tongue, a bit louder so all of us can hear you.”

  “I forgive you,” Bobby hissed through clenched teeth.

  “Oh no!” Jones cried. “The F word! Now you’ve done it Mr. Grant, now you’ve gone and done it.”

  With the flick of his wrist he raised Bobby high above the crowd before slamming him down onto the stone with incredible force.

  “Now…”

  Up. Down. Pain.

  “you’ve…”

  Up. Down. Pain.

  “done...”

  Up. Down. Pain.

  “it!”

  Bones cracked, skin split, organs ruptured and still Jones kept at it. Each impact more brutal than the one before it.

  “You…pompous...Yankee…prick!...You…shall…not…use…the…F…Word.”

  Bobby was nothing more than a ruptured bag of shattered bones and tattered guts but, through whatever foul magic Jones possessed, his mind remained intact. He felt everything.

  “Do… you… understand?”

  It stopped as suddenly as it began. Jones waited. Broken and gripped by immeasurable agony Bobby was just lucent enough to realize that if he didn’t answer it would never end.

  “We’re waiting,” Jones warned and raised Bobby up once again.

  Bobby tried to form the words but couldn’t. Pieces of his jawbone with his teeth still attached, littered the bloodstained floor below him, and he’d swallowed most of his tongue.

  Please… I can’t…I can’t talk but I get it. No more, please, no…no more. I…I understand.

  “Crude but considering your circumstance I am willing to accept it,” Jones replied and released Bobby to crash back to the floor one last time. “Take your time getting up Mr. Grant, it’s been an ordeal to say the least . Oddly enough, you’ve given me a convenient transition into my next lesson.”

  Booby didn’t hear a word, the fire in his guts and the pain emanating from his pulverized body consumed him.

  “Healing!” Jones shouted to draw all eyes from Bobby’s ruined body back to himself. “You will all heal, even from the most traumatic of injuries. It is not a pleasant experience mind you, quite the opposite if I am to be honest. A small price to pay, if you ask me, for the privilege of eternal existence. You cannot die, one would think such a thing need not be said but I’ll say it nonetheless. You are all dead. You cannot die again. You can feel, you can suffer, as Mr. Grant and the priest have so conveniently demonstrated, but there is no end for any of you other than this one. This is it, ladies and gentlemen, this is the end.”

  Someone whimpered and Jones smiled. “You see, someone gets it. I do believe it is a rather large pill to swallow but swallow it you must. Once you have released any foolish hope of redemption or defection then and only then will you be free. Free to serve the Master. Free to become what is expected of you.”

  A new, more exquisite brand of suffering overcame Bobby. As his shattered bones knit and his ruptured organs reformed, the pain dwarfed that of the violet cause a thousand times over. If he could scream, he would have burst every eardrum in the chamber. If he could cry, his tears would drown them all. He writhed in utter misery as Jones droned on. Hate welled up from beneath his agony, hate so black it could only be born in Hell, and he seized it. He embraced it like a drowning man would a life preserver as his body continued to pound him with wave after wave of indescribable anguish.

  And then it was gone. He was whole.

  *

  “Rule number three,” Jones announced.

  Bobby hauled himself from the floor, his muscles as tight as bowstrings. Jones who went on as if he hadn’t just beat him to a literal pulp.

  “You are there to claim the souls that rightfully belong to our Master. Those stuck up pricks are there to steal them from him. They are the enemy, never to be trusted or underestimated. They, like you, are there to claim the soul for their master. You must deny them! You must! It is the very reason for your existence. You must, by whatever means necessary, claim every one because if you fail you will face consequences so dire that even I am reluctant to envision them.”

  Jones surveyed the ranks of terrorized, confused faces, snickered and amended his lesson, “I overestimate people sometimes, let me put it more plainly shall I. When the living die, their souls are up for grabs. If they do not ask the enemy for forgiveness, then they are yours for the taking. The enemy will try to stop you. They will cut you down without hesitation. It is there and then, within the confines of those precious seconds, where you must fight. It is there, all that I mean to teach you, will pay the greatest dividends. It is there a Reaper proves their worth.”

  “Fight fight?” Mr. Shu asked and Jones turned his evil attention on the young man.

  “Is there another meaning for the word in your language Shu?”

  “The one word in yours has many in mine and all have different meanings,” Mr. Shu replied and bowed in submission.

  Jones considered the answer for a moment before responding. “I will let your ignorance slide since you’re no doubt baffled by the fact that we are now speaking a language foreign to you all. I will admit, it threw me for quite a loop when I first arrived. For those of you who have yet to catch on, none of you are speaking the language you used in life. You think as you did, but your words are formed in the tongue of our Master. The ignorant call it the 'heavenly tongue’ but it is no such thing.”

  “We kill’em?” Van Holt interrupted.

  “Oh Mr. Van Holt, if only it were so easy but I do appreciate your enthusiasm although your delivery lacks even a hint of common courtesy.”

  Va
n Holt frowned.

  Clearly not the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

  “So can we?” Van Holt asked again.

  Jones snickered, smiled and continued, “I forget how stupid some of you truly are. Mr. Van Holt, you may try but they will not offer you their breasts. They carry golden swords, quite flashy things really but deadly nonetheless. Their blades will not kill you, as I’ve mentioned, you’re already dead. They will, however, elicit a one-way trip to the Flames if you end up on the wrong side of the enemy’s sword too many times.”

  “I’ll kill’em, all of’em,” Van Holt snorted.

  “Mr. Van Holt, these are not your usual prey,” Jones said, turning toward the big man as he spoke. “They are warriors who believe their task is one of the utmost importance. They fight with their hearts and will do all they can to save those who believe in their cause. Bravery, the cloak in which you wrap your weakness, is easily worn when facing those without defenses. Murdering women, children and outnumbered men is nothing worthy of the pride you brandish. You have done nothing brave in life as evidenced in the fact that you gave up your ass as your last act in life."

  “Bullshit!” Van Holt roared. “No nigger ever put me down motherfucker!”

  “Now Mr. Van Holt, don’t be ashamed,” Jones chuckled. “There is no shame in enjoying a little cock.”

  “Fuck you weirdo, you don’t know shit!”

  “Now, now Mr. Van Holt, I’ll only put up with such disrespect for so long,” Jones hissed silencing Van Holt, leaving him wide-eyed in terror as he tried uselessly to pry apart lips that no longer existed. “Since Mr. Van Holt has called my honesty into question I feel obligated to prove it otherwise.”

  Behind Jones the massive wall melted, shimmered then blossomed into a picture of a prison cell in high definition clarity. “This was our Mr. Van Holt’s final residence before death,” Jones explained. “Please pay close attention and you will all see just how fearless he is when the lights go out.”

  Jones snapped his fingers and the picture came to life.

  *

  Two bunks stood against one wall of the narrow rectangle, its blue-green paint barely visible through the glossy collage of naked women, all of them big, black and beautiful. “Bunk check in five,” a robotic voice warned from the speaker mounted in the ceiling outside the bars.

  A tall, lean young man glided into the cell. He wore the standard vomit brown, string-tied pants of most prisons, a black do-rag and a yellowed tank top that revealed arms of hard muscle. Reaching into his pants he pulled the shank from its uncomfortable hide and inspected the weapon. It was nothing more than a shard of ragged sheet metal melted into a head of a toothbrush but he admired it as if it was Excalibur. Crouching into the lower bunk he slipped the crude blade under his pillow and waited for his prey.

  “One minute,” the robotic voice called out.

  Van Holt entered the cell, his chest puffed out, his arms raised from his sides to make himself bigger. He wore the same clothes as his cellmate minus the do-rag. Every inch of his exposed skin was a patchwork of anti-everything ink; anti-black, anti-Jew, anti-brown, anti-government and anti-god. He wanted everyone to know he hated them and everything they stood for.

  “I hope you wiped that ass real good because it’s mine tonight,” the young guy warned while smiling ear to ear from the shadows of the lower bunk.

  “Fuck you nigger!” Van Holt growled. “The only thing you’re having tonight is an ass kicking.”

  “Umm,” Van Holt’s roommate smiled even wider, no fear lived there.

  Clearly Van Holt was unaccustomed to such a reaction and stood staring down at the relaxed young man, clenching and unclenching his fists as if trying to pump courage into them.

  “You lovebirds done kissing good night?” a fat guard quipped from the doorway.

  “I don’t want to sleep with no nigger,” Van Holt turned his anger toward the guard.

  “That’s why there’s two bunks shithead,” the guard replied and shook his head.

  “Fuck that, get the Warden!” Van Holt demanded.

  “Thirty-six check!” he shouted to an unseen coworker and with that the door to the cell slid closed with a hollow clang.

  “You fucking piece of shit race traitor!” Van Holt screamed through the bars.

  “Traitor? Me?” the guard feigned indignation. “Don’t you know we are all the same on the inside you Hitler loving bitch.”

  “Dead! You’re fucking dead!” Van Holt screamed charging the bars and reaching through the narrow openings to reach the guard.

  The guard stood just out of reach of Van Holt outstretched hands and spoke passed him, loud enough for only the two cellmates to hear him, “We’re all pink on the inside, right JoJo?”

  “Damn right Mr. Lubick, damn right.” Van Holt’s cellmate chuckled.

  “This guy any different JoJo?”

  “We’re going to find out tonight,” JoJo cried, clapping his hands together and rubbing them like Will E. Coyote readying to feast on his long-awaited roadrunner dinner.

  “Fuck that!” Van Holt roared, his rage erupting as he strained against the bars to reach the giggling guard’s throat.

  Lubick shook his head, “Nice try tough guy. Now usually attacking a guard would get you three days in the hole but I’m guessing you know that. I’m guessing you want that. Well too fucking bad asshole, there’s no way you’re getting out of there, not tonight.”

  “Hey bossman,” JoJo called out as Lubick turned to leave. “You watching the game tonight? Supposed to be a good one.”

  “Yeah, got twenty bucks on the Steelers, they’re going to crush the Jets this time.”

  “Going to be quiet then?” JoJo asked with a wink.

  “Real quiet. All of us will be in the control room, Hildenburg brought his IPad and he’s got that NFL Live package,” Lubick replied with a wink even Van Holt’s simple mind picked up.

  “Hildenburg, he’s German right? I thought you Jewish folk didn’t like the Germans?” JoJo asked as Van Holt’s shoulders dropped even lower, his situation had gone from bad to really fucking bad in a hurry.

  “He’s good people,” Lubick replied with a shrug.

  “Enjoy the game,” JoJo waved. “Go Steelers.”

  “Fucking kike! Hitler should’ve burned you all!” Van Holt roared.

  “Sweet dreams asshole,” Lubick replied and moved on to the next cell.

  Van Holt stood frozen, gripping the bars as if willing them to disappear. Lubick’s voice echoed from further and further away as he called out cell numbers. The clang of closing doors answered every time and the speaker relayed the last bit of information for the evening, “Lights out in two minutes.”

  “Best pray whitey, you got two minutes, two seconds before this party kicks off,” JoJo made his own announcement.

  “I’m going to kill you slow monkey,” Van Holt growled and turned to face him.

  “You know you a bitch. I know you a bitch,” JoJo spoke slow and low, letting his words carry their truth deep into Van Holt’s fear stricken mind. “You all talk big man but your eyes ain’t backing that shit up. Your eyes look scared whitey, scared like a motherfucker.”

  “Fuck you!” Van Holt seethed.

  JoJo laughed, “Doesn’t matter to me boy. I’m gonna take you no matter if it’s nice and easy or rough and bloody. I got to get my nut off and you gonna catch it.”

  Van Holt said nothing.

  “Scared cracker?”

  “You’re the one who should be scared monkey.”

  “Hell naw! I love me some vanilla ass. The bigger the better son! I had me some fat white, some bony white, even some nice tight young white, but it’s you hairy muscle-head whites that really get my dick hard. Asshole be so tight it’s like cracking pussy for the first time. You be all like quivering because you can’t believe you being fucked but yall loosen up. Hell bitch, if your boys don’t cut you up for being done by black you might even come back for more.”

 
JoJo climbed from his bunk and slid the shank from beneath his pillow so Van Holt could see it.

  The lights went out.

  The two men stood five feet apart, neither moved as their eyes adjusted to the darkness.

  “So what’s it going to be cracker? The shank then the cock or just the cock?” JoJo asked intimately.

  Van Holt stood frozen in fear.

  “My dick ain’t gonna wait all night,” JoJo growled and stepped toward him.

  Van Holt flinched and backed up. JoJo smiled, “Come on bitch. You ain’t gotto die tonight. It’s you and me, nobody else gonna know. Give it up, it ain’t worth dying for is it?”

  “Fuck off,” Van Holt groaned.

  “Say that again and I’ll cut your fucking tongue out.”

  Van Holt swallowed hard but said nothing.

  “Let’s do this. You a bitch. You can be a dead bitch or a live bitch, my dick’s going in your ass either way.” JoJo took a step closer, his easy smile morphing into an evil grin.

  “No one…no one will know?” Van Holt whispered.

  “Naw bitch, shits private,” JoJo lied.

  It wasn’t private and it wasn’t pretty. Van Holt died ugly, screaming for mercy he’d never receive as the cell block cheered. His final image in the living world was of JoJo standing over him with a smile of pure satisfaction plastered across his blood spattered face.

  *

  What the fuck?

  “Indeed,” Jones replied to his thought. “W.T.F indeed.”

  Bobby didn’t know whether to be horrified, revolted, angry or just plain shocked. He turned, as most of the others did, to Van Holt. The big man studied the floor at his feet.

  “Any other bold denials Mr. Van Holt?” Jones asked.

  Van Holt raised his face, his eyes were dry but only because they were no longer capable of tears. His mouth had returned, his lips quivered. “Fucking bullshit,” he whispered.

  “Indeed,” Jones said again but seemed satisfied at the complete destruction of the man’s defiance and self-esteem. “Now where were we, with so many interruptions I’ve lost track?”

  “You were talking about the language,” the tall woman with the accent played teacher’s helper.