The Missionary Incision

 

By Richard Paul

 

December 13^th was not the nicest of days.          

Ironically enough however, it started with me waking up to find myself underneath a naked woman. My sluggish brain came to life with haste once it registered this fact, let me tell you. My first thought was that Sabrina had made her way inside and was making a rather less-than-subtle play for my soul.           

My instinctive reaction was somewhat confusing. One hand, controlled by the irrational and lustful part of my brain felt about for breasts, while the other hand tried in earnest to push her away.           

What soon became apparent however was that this was not Sabrina. This was a dead human woman whose head had been sliced off. Viscera and loathsome blood-gunge had trickled from the exposed neck throat onto my chest and, as a result, the corpse was stuck to me.           

Fucking Dennis! Once again he'd disposed of his teenage victims in my flat; this time in my bed no less, with me in it! He was always doing this, although normally the bodies turned up in the fridge or the wardrobe.           

All these months working for Sabrina, and by extension Satan, had introduced me to such sights that desensitised me somewhat to blood and gore. Of course there was nothing for it but to wince and cringe as I peeled my cadaverous bunk mate off of my torso.           

I pushed away a few loose ceiling tiles and crammed the body up into the roof with the other five, almost electrocuting myself on the mouse-chewed power cables up there. That done, I threw the duvet cover in the bin and then went for a very long shower.         

There was a knock on the door just as I'd finished. Thus, stark naked and shivering, I dried my self as best I could with ten seconds to work with, wrapped a towel around my waist and made for the door.       

I pulled it open and found myself face to face with a male teenager of about sixteen years of age. He had black hair, ludicrous looking square sunglasses; (interesting choice for the middle of December), and also a pair of white, feathery wings.           

He smiled, drew a gun and shot me in the throat. The next thing I saw was blood landing at my feet. The pain, I have to say, felt odd. It fucking hurt, obviously, and I probably would have screamed were it not for the fact I'd had my windpipe blasted to ribbons. At the same time though there was an odd familiarity to it, as if I'd been shot in the throat every day since I was born. That can only be demonic influence rewarded to me for the souls I'd consumed; race memory perhaps.           

On top of it all, of course, I was now dying; and the abrupt incongruity of the situation left me in too frenzied a state of mind to properly appreciate the fact. Thus my body, too lazy to make sense of any of it, decided to pass out instead.

 

Three Hours Later

 

For the second time that day, I woke up in a flurry of screams and flailing limbs. The bullet wound in my throat was no more however, my neck was whole and there was no pain.           

Right, good. I'd survived. No unpleasant plunge into hell for Simon today.           

At least I didn't think I was in hell. I certainly wasn't in my flat; the walls of this place were stone-clad and gothic. Carved figures of horned, winged women were fifty strong on each wall and most of the ceiling, all of whom seemed to be enacting bits of the karma sutra. There was a portable radiator next to the mattress I was sprawled on top of, which coincidently had no bed attached to it and was bedevilled by ominous brown patches.           

I sat up, and to my further surprise found that I was wearing a pair of black jeans. That was probably a good omen; in all representations of hell I'd seen the sinners were markedly devoid of clothing; to that end there was also an overt nature to their grisly fate; no coyness nor subtlety.           

A door opened to my right and Dennis walked in, answering the question for me. I sighed in relief and my head collapsed back onto the mothball of a pillow.           

"You're moving in here." He said, quite literally throwing a mug of coffee at me. The liquid magically refused to escape the cup until I drank from it. There was no sugar in it; figures.          

"What happened?"

"An aspiring angel shot you in the gullet and ran off. I ‘felt' it happen, for lack of a better word. I zipped in, got you, and zipped out before the police arrived."           

Angel? I thought with instant scepticism.

"Police?" I asked instead.

"Yes, police. You got shot in a residential area in broad daylight. Your neighbours were understandably worried."

"Oh, right. Thank you."

"You're welcome; like I said though, you're moving in here until the matter is dealt with, or until you've fully ascended. One or t'other. It seems the opposition may be making a play for our little patch of the country. If more of them follow their vanguard, we should..."

"Opposition?!" I said finally; the obvious implication hitting home.

No one had ever saw fit to tell me that we had enemies on the mortal plain. I thought the whole point was for us Demons and demon-thralls to cull the weak and sinful. The strong were meant to resist us through sheer strength of character alone, not gun us down. For heaven's sake, God was renowned for his laizez-faire attitude, or at least I thought he was.
       

Dennis stared at me for a moment in that way he presumably did when he was a high school teacher, resisting the urge to strangle his pupils.
           

"Why didn't you tell me?" I said, the demonic influence of my last consumed soul chasing away the pauses, stammers and jitters that graced so much of my speech in time's past.

           
"I hardly expected them to show up here." He muttered, unrepentant and seemingly amused by the uniqueness of the situation, "Besides, it was difficult enough trying to keep our own side from killing you off."
           

That was true, that night with Sabrina where I only managed to save my soul by making myself so violently ill that I passed out naked in my own vomit still gave me nightmares.        

"That's not all of the bad, err, that's not all of the news."
           
That was a curious thing to say.

"What else?" I asked.

Dennis, with an uncharacteristic look of embarrassment, took a badly creased envelope from his pocket and passed it to me. I fished out the ragged letter inside and began to read.

 
To any and all misguided Satanic slaves in the Plymouth area.

 

I am writing to inform you that at midday today, one of our number attacked and killed one of yours. Consider then that the soul of this young man is now in the clutches of Satan, where it shall undergo torments unimaginable for the remainder of eternity.

            I want you to think about that. Visualise it as best you can and then put yourselves in his place; because that is exactly what awaits you if you persevere on this mad path to damnation.

            I represent the earthy forces of God; we are the shining beacons of light and hope that stand against all those who would corrupt the innocent and condemn humanity to eternal damnation. This city is now under our protection, and I give you this one chance to leave here before the end of tomorrow; after which time you are to spend the rest of your days in repentance, and hope that God sees fit to spare your tainted souls.

            If you fail to heed my warning then you will die by our hands as you deserve. I don't think I need to tell you what follows after that.

            Don't count on your wretched Succubus patroness to come to your aid either, we have taken her and shall punish her greatly for all the souls she has bewitched with her whorish charms.

 

Your humble servant

 

FGWyman

 

Francesca Wyman
     

I'd almost been tempted to laugh until I read that final paragraph. Then, for lack of any angelic throats to put between my hands, I ripped the letter to shreds.         

Dennis shook his head.
           
"Don't worry about Sabrina. She'll probably have fucked out half their souls before morning."  

For some reason that didn't make me feel better.

"Nevertheless," Dennis said, "we have been challenged and must strike the self righteous twerps down."     

That did make me feel better. With the handy demonic alterations to my soul and psyche, I found that no pesky human self-doubt or recrimination was allowed to trouble me in the face of impending bloodshed.         

"So then," I said as I stood up, "Where, when, who, how and with what?"

"Somewhere, soon, them, nastily and with blade and fire." He replied, smirking at his own wittiness. "I'll go see if I can sniff out their location. You get dressed and then grab a knife from the closet in the living room. Up the stairs, second door on your right."

"Aye sir." I said before I could stop myself. Bloody insidious Star Trek influence.     

Dennis left, I dressed myself in some of the less garish items I could find in an untidy pile next to the bed and then went upstairs.
      
Once out of the quasi-infernal basement, I couldn't help but notice that Dennis had quite a nice house. For ‘nice' in fact, read ‘ordinary'. Inexpensive laminate flooring from Wickes adorned each room. A vinyl Beatles record was playing in the background, discarded coffee mugs and Indian take away containers lay strewn about the living room floor. Add to this were dozens of family photos on the walls. One which sticks out was of him, pre-ascension, and his son at his graduation from university. They both looked so humanly pleased
           
Dennis had never once mentioned his son. It was Sabrina who'd told me he had one; specifically about the black looks he'd give whenever she mentioned his name. It's a sign of a good parent that they don't let their male offspring anywhere near demonic temptresses.
           
At the thought of Sabrina my heart started racing. The thought that she was in the clutches of the enemy left me with an urge to grab a weapon, charge out the door in a random direction and hope that I stumble across her captors so that I might kill them. That was stupid though, for more reasons than one.

Dennis was right; she wasn't some shrieking violet who'd fallen into the clutches of a nefarious menace. She was a dangerous, soul stealing demon who'd probably let herself be taken so that she might extract some angelic souls. They were probably in more danger from her than she was from them. By the time we got there there'd probably be nothing left to do except hide the winged bodies.         

So, feeling a little calmer, I did what Dennis bid me do and took a long, curved machete from the converted wine cabinet in the living room. There seemed to be no weight in the thing whatsoever. The metal blade was blood red and felt hot to the touch, and touching it left my fingers stained with warm, sticky blood, despite the fact that the blade itself was dry. It had doubtlessly been fashioned in Hell, much like the fleshy parchments on which I wrote soul-ownership contracts for Sabrina.           

"We're in luck, my boy." Dennis said loudly as he burst into the room, making me jump in the process and almost drop the knife on my foot.

"Are we?" I said after composing myself and stowing the knife on a nearby bookshelf.

"We are. I've sniffed out the wretched ones to a lair at the Barbican."

"That didn't take long."

"Demonic noses are trained to recognise the scents of the enemy. You'll find out when you get one."

"Great, so is there anything else I should know? Or do we sally forth and rip them all to shreds?"

"There's plenty more you should know." He said in his finest school teacher voice, "I'll explain on the way though. Take your weapon Simon and let's be off."           

I took my weapon, and we were off... to the bus stop at the end of the road specifically.           

"We're taking the bus?" I asked, resisting the urge to either laugh or punch out one of the glass windows of the shelter. I'm not quite sure which.

"Yes."

"We're setting out to do battle with our nemeses and, in theory, save a captured comrade; and we're taking the bus."

"Well it's a two hour walk isn't it? And my car's out of action until I can get the windscreen repaired."

Try though I most earnestly did, I could find no flaw in the logic, despite the inescapable absurdity of riding to battle onboard the number 23 to the Plymouth Pavilions.

"Got any change?" I asked.

"Should do."

"Good."           

The bus, rather predictably, was late. It was a ramshackle, filthy thing crammed full of chavs and push chairs. The driver glared at us as if we were a pair of cosplaying matrix fan boys. Shoulder length silver hair is something of a mixed blessing.           

"Pair of twats." I heard one unwashed youth mutter about us as we moved to an empty seat at the back. It's a funny thing being insulted when you know with complete certainty that you can murder the perpetrator and get away with it.           

"Jack Nyman." Dennis told me as we sat down, flicking his chin at the heckler, "he'll not live past the end of the week."           

I nodded, relishing the prospect despite thinking that the boy was probably right. We did look like a pair of twats.           

The knife was safely buried in the huge pocket on an overly long brown coat I'd found in the pile. I half expected it to cut or burn its way through the fabric and down the length of my leg, but it didn't.           

This was a silly afternoon.           

The journey was long and cumbersome. At one point the driver took a turn too quickly and caused an elderly gentleman to fall out of his chair. To top it all off; when we finally arrived near the Barbican, it had started to rain.           

Considering I'd damn near died that morning, I suppose I shouldn't have felt such indignation at these developments, but I was really not having a good day, and thus everything was annoying me.      

There was something else that I'd been trying not to think about as well; what if me and Dennis were slain instead of the angels. What if I was about to plummet headlong into the mouth of hell?           

I'd asked myself that question no end of times before, and each time had found that there was nothing for it but to get on with it and hope for the best. Call that a flimsy rationale if you will but it's true. Besides, Dennis seemed confident of victory; that was good.           

"There should be five of them." He said as we walked towards an unassuming looking shed behind a seafood restaurant. "Newbloods all, assuming Sabrina hasn't taken a couple. Francesca's the only real potential problem. Leave her to me."

"Five against two? That's not encouraging."

"When I say Newbloods, I mean Newbloods. Trust me, most of them would try six times to stab you with the blunt end of a knife before they realised that their hand was bleeding. They'll fall like flies."

"And Francesca?"

"Is ascended, true; but then so am I. Just keep the fledglings from making a nuisance of themselves."           

My knife literally leapt in my pocket. It wriggled and squirmed like an upturned hamster until I grabbed the hilt. I could feel its eagerness to be drenched in quasi-celestial blood. I could it fuelling my own urge to oblige it.           

"Do they know we're coming?" I asked.

"Maybe, but then maybe they're suitably distracted."

"Meaning?"

"Never mind that, it's time to begin."           

Never one for subtlety, Dennis kicked the door clean off its hinges. Any bystanders in the area neither saw nor heard any of this, thanks to the infernal tinkerings of the Master.           

There were two in the first room. One was the little fuckwit who'd shot me earlier. He looked at me, mouth hanging agape. He looked like a boy whose mother had just walked in on him whilst he was masturbating.         

The other one was female, she looked the more sensible of the two. No foolish sunglasses to try and enhance their image, a practical, cropped haircut which presumably made flying easier, and an Uzi in her hands.           

Dennis saw her off with a stream of fire shot forth from his sleeve. It caught her in the chest and soon she was ablaze, shrieking and flailing as her body was turned to charcoal.           

I lunged at my would-be murderer before he could collect himself. I think the knife swung itself and just let me hold onto it as it did so, but all the same we tore the kid's throat open. He clutched at it with his right hand, but I swatted it away. Let him bleed and bleed heartily.           

The cut was, in theory, a mortal wound. That wouldn't do though, I abruptly decided. I wanted this kid destroyed.           

We swung again, burying the knife deeper into the wound with inhuman accuracy. I pushed for all I was worth and tore the ghastly little prat's head clean off his shoulders.           

"Incoming." Dennis said with an amused calm.

"What?"           

A woman's pained scream tore through the air. It was short, angry, and despite the ever changing voices she uses, I knew that it was Sabrina.           

My hand tightened around my weapon, my knuckles turning white. I felt the knife's approval at my growing wrath.          

Two more angels burst through the door leading to the backroom where Sabrina was being held. Both were male, both were forgettably pretty. Both were also dead once Denis shot them with what I can only describe as a steam punk berretta.           

 "Fools!" I heard someone, doubtlessly Francesca, shout. "You, stay here. I'll handle this myself."

"Step back Simon," Dennis said, "leave this to me."           

I did so. Soon enough, Francesca Wyman, head of the angelic contenders to Plymouth, stepped through the door. She had almost exactly the same build as the three we'd butchered so far, save for the fact that she was in her forties at least.           

Dennis wasted no time in shooting more flames from his sleeves. Francesca responded with a similar tactic. Her own fire was white however, and physically painful to behold.           

I toyed with the idea of throwing the knife at her. If the knife had any thoughts on this than it kept them to itself.           

"Satair." She hissed, stating the fucking obvious in the midst of battle. No wonder three of her followers were dead.

"Cunt." I replied, despite myself, mimicking her hissing tones. Despite the noise of the fiery exchange we could all hear each other perfectly.           

She looked at me with the outraged eyes of a scorned Sunday school teacher. That moment's distraction let Dennis' infernal flames creep closer to their target. He noticed this, nodded once and smiled one of his trademark evil smiles.           

"Simon." He said slowly, forcing himself to keep focused, "sneak around the back and free Sabrina. She'll finish up for us."

"Got it." I said.           

Francesca's eyes went wide. She knew that if Sabrina was freed, she'd become hopelessly outnumbered and then die horribly, if she was lucky. Foolishly, she swung one hand towards me and cast a jet of flame my way. I ducked, just before it passed over my head and completely obliterated the wall behind me.           

That was all Dennis needed, his flames broke through and caught her straight in the face. Her head exploded, showering blood, skull bits and brain tissue all over everything. What was left of her fell forward onto the wooden floorboards.           

Victory, I suppose.           

We stood there for a few seconds, picking grime out of our hair and blinking away the bone dust from our eyes.           

"That's it?" I asked at one point.

"There one angel wannabe left." Dennis said tiredly, the excursion of duelling leaving him understandably tired, "I'll leave it to you."           

The knife jumped again, and I made for the door with haste. I suddenly wanted very much to get this all sorted out, then go home and watch some suitably dull television program which would smother each of my thought processes.           

Of course my home was a crime scene now wasn't it? Very well, in that case I hoped that Dennis had Sky Digital and wouldn't mind me lazing on his couch for the next three days.           

I pushed the door open, steadily made my way inside, and saw two most lovely sights.           

First was Sabrina. She was stark naked and her arms were chained to the ceiling. There was not a single mark on her pale frame to suggest that she'd been harmed by the whip on the floor, or the branding iron in the bucket of coals.           

She was sporting two demonic horns that jutted out from her forehead and long black hair which fell past her waist. She looked like the kind of Succubus you'd expect to find in an amateur porn film, or as a pin up in an Anne Summers' window. Of course, I felt the stirrings of sexual interest that any heterosexual male or homosexual female would find at the sight of a beautiful naked woman in chains, but there was a vague artificiality to her form that demanded a raised eyebrow.        

"Simon." She muttered weakly, her voice betraying a faint flicker of hope.           

Her head hung weakly on her neck. I instantly moved towards her and extended my empty hand to her shoulder in a reassuring gesture. I wasn't sure what to do but it seemed like a good first step.      

"She's fine!" Dennis shouted from the back, "Don't let her fool you with a ‘grateful damsel in distress' act."

"You be quiet!" Sabrina shouted out the door, her head now moving effortlessly and her voice anything but weak, as my ringing ears could suddenly attest.           

Because you may be asking yourself; what was I playing at while there was still one angel left alive, let me assure you that I was not so stupid as to ignore them in favour of a seemingly helpless Demoness. Suffice to say I noticed them early on; they were the second lovely sight. She was pressed up in the corner of the wall, hidden partially beneath her white wings and sobbing uncontrollably.           

"Are you ok?" I asked Sabrina, ignoring the howling idiot on the floor for now and trying very hard not to show my considerably relief at the obvious fact that my friend and would-be murderess was just fine.

"Much better now," she said with a grin, dragging one foot up the inside of my left leg towards my crotch. I hadn't really expected anything less from her but after the day I'd had, I really wasn't in the mood to play along.

"Sabrina," I said wearily, stepping backwards, "not now, ok?"

"You're right." She said, her grin unchanging, she swung around to stare at the weeping twenty something girl in the corner, "Of course if you want, I can think of something fun to do."           

A little later, Sabrina was unchained and in her place stood the last remaining Angelic potential. We'd stripped her and gagged her, mainly because her sobs, screams and incessant pleading for mercy were starting to do our heads in.         

She was attractive, I suppose. Nothing compared to Sabrina's standards but enough to justify sticking around. I'm not sure if Dennis was still there, but if he was than he was choosing not to partake in the festivities.           

Her's was a head of shining blonde hair, a respectable bosom and enough of an angelic aura about her to awaken the demonic elements of my changed body. I got the distinct impression that what was about to happen would make up for all the shit I'd been through today.           

No more recriminations; never again. Human gives way to Demon and here before me was captured prey.           

"Arf hff ghinf uuh reff mih?" She muttered through the gag between whinges and sniffs. What she said, I somehow knew, was ‘Are you going to rape me?'

"Of course he is." Sabrina said, flashing me a comradely look, "What kind of a question is that?"

 

The End

 

P.S: As it turns out, God's holy warriors were none too happy about our destroying five or their number, nor for that matter did they appreciate our raping one and then torturing her to death. I don't think they took too kindly to our recording the five hour spectacle and putting segments of it on the Satair's Youtube channel either. A fifty strong team of avenging angels was to descend upon Plymouth, sparking a conflict that was to lay waste to half the city.
 

That however, is a story for another bedtime.
 

P.P.S: Sorry if you were expecting the story about the skirt and poorly written ransom note that I mentioned last time, in truth however it's comparatively uninteresting.

 

The (actual) End.