Infernus Read online

  “It is,” he said. “Confused? Good. I intend to tip over every preconceived idea you have about conventional narrative. To you, young lady, I would repeat what C.S. Lewis wrote in the beginning of Mere Christianity. ‘To hell with your standards.’ I forge ahead with my own. Just wait, folks, until we get to the end of Chapter Eight. You are really gonna wanna hang me then.”

  “Maybe we really will hang you.”

  “And not hear the end of the story?” He laughed. “How tragic!”

  He put on his clothes and left.

  * * *

  The next week he came back, stripped off his clothes, quite unashamedly, stacked them neatly again, laid out a rug on the hardwood floor to sit on, and read four or five chapters in a row. A student, Dante, recorded for posterity that when one student objected to the shortness of the chapters, the nude model remarked that his records only showed them as fragments, not in their entirety. Many students reminded the man that he had proclaimed, more than once, that he had written them himself, not found them somewhere.

  The old man seemed to enjoy laughing at them.

  CHAPTER TWO

  “THE CANTATA OF PAIN, OPUS 10”

  A smile appeared on the handsome face of Red. His voice raked through the man’s brain like a claw. “Do you know what arouses me, my child?”

  A puff of smoke hung in the air between them.

  “No, my father,” the man said weakly.

  The impossibly-muscled demon sat upon a thick throne. His two black orbs rested on the marble like massive rocks. He began pumping his member into the base of his beard. The orbs were dragged upward in their leathery sack and then quickly released to fall with a wet smack on the stone.

  He rolled his head with pleasure and began to breathe heavily. He tightened his grip on the member and jerked it upward. The orbs kept slamming onto the stone, countless times, always the same.

  “What really arouses me is when my son shoves his head up my ass as far as he can and… yes, that’s it, like that, my only son… and then breathes in the soul of his father. You can hear the sound of my great testicles slamming even in there, can’t you, my son? Yes, you can. Now, because you have done this great favor for me, I will do something for you. I will give you the present of always having the presence of me living inside you for eternity.”

  Of course, the man knew that he was unable to do any such thing.

  * * *

  (In the time of the great explosion of the twenty suns — no Earth time can coordinate your understanding; here was a momentous occasion, the man was sitting in the soul of another. There are no separate identities here, only illusions of such things.)

  The new arrival, a young lad of eighteen or so, spoke from blackened, smoldering lips, little puffs of smoke finding their way out now and again. “My, what is going on here? I will never again be me, will I? I will always be this entity of three.”

  “Be happy, harpy. There are others who will do more than we, but you must awaken to this knowledge later. It’s no good thinking of it just yet. A green demon, your father/trainer will arrive soon. We (my father who occupies me) are only torturing you until he comes; to let you know that this is all there is. It amuses me to be in you, yet controlling you. It is orgasmic. And I will help him torture you when he arrives.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “FALLEN LEAVES ARE ALREADY DEAD”

  The young, baking Spanish woman ran wildly through the crowd of frying, milling villagers. The demon and his trainee watched from a hill that leaned over the village. The woman flailed her arms as she screamed into all the brains of Infernus.

  “Don’t you see, my many relatives, this man you think is the killer, whose name we cannot speak, is allowing you to feed your inability to see the truth. Lo, the sun sinks. I must work my mischief. You are all doomed. You’ve known all along. I will now express myself.”

  She spread her arms high toward the blazing crimson sun. All the villagers fell to the ground like paper kites with no wind and disintegrated. She fell as well, and scattered harmlessly behind them.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “LESSONS TO LEARN”

  Red, radiant in sweat and erotically glorious, spoke bile into the man’s mind. “My son, approach me.” His phallus was erect and stood straight along his heat-stretched jawbone.

  The man, who no longer was the man he had been many thousands of centuries ago, walked in a regal fashion to his father.

  “Lick the hair that is on top of my feet, slave.”

  And he did, for three million generations’ worth of time. It has been said by some demon lords that soon (again the reference to time) there will be an inability to communicate anything in such concepts. These sayings must not be said in the first person or punishments will follow. For even thinking them.

  In a standard generation (what the man is experiencing at this “moment”) the demon is describing (for the man) three sets of a dozen little plays called collectively The Writhings. He performed them upon a surface of the man’s skin for many millennia. The plays enabled all to feel the pain at once. It was exquisite.

  ONE LESSON

  A woman, who was skinless, asked Red and the man if they knew where The Domes of Wares could be found.

  She bled while standing there.

  They ignored her, for she was full of foolish talk.

  “Ah,” said the demon. “Watch these large black stones slam hard on the rock. I shall now cover myself like a blanket.” A great viscous liquid exploded into his beard and continued flowing until his whole body was lost in the glue of it.

  The man walked over to his father and began licking as an animal will when it wants to remove afterbirth from its young.

  “For doing that service,” the demon said, “I will grant you a present. Feast from the part of my body of your choice. I will let you eat me.”

  The man, who was now one with Red, pulled a large dark foot into his lap. With effort, he drew it to his lips. The toe pushed past his ragged gums and shattered teeth. He tasted the dry saltiness of the digit before he began to gnash through it. Red gasped, but else, said naught.

  The man moaned as he sucked the blood through the wound. He swallowed the toe and it fell, hissing, into his empty stomach. He loved his master even more.

  “My son,” the demon began, with blood dripping from the corners of his mouth. “Now we are one, and ever will be for eternity. My love to you.”

  As the man heard these words echoing through the flames, he realized that Red was digging into his once-human flesh with a burning metal scoop. Great round balls of cooked meat were being brought forth from his hips to the lips of the other.

  ANOTHER LESSON

  “Water sports, my son,” the monster belched. “Now that I have wet you down thoroughly, come and enclose your father’s ass with your mouth.” The man did as his lord dictated. “I will fill your guts with the eternal stench of my gases.”

  And he did. He consummated the marriage of their souls by filling his son with the gases of his bowels. The man’s head caught fire as a result. He fell unconscious to the blazing floor and remained that way for one thousand years.

  And even though the demon dared to sodomize the man hundreds of thousands of times, nothing could be done to rouse him.

  A THIRD LESSON (BUT BY NO MEANS A FINAL LESSON)

  With an absolute lack of expression on his stone face, the demon grabbed the man’s hair at the back of his head and drew him close. Red’s poisoned tongue played over the man’s face.

  “My son, I want to teach you another lesson. This one thing I know — you must crawl to me on your hands and knees in profound humility.”

  The man looked at his body as it obeyed and noticed that it was the same as that of the burned bodybuilder he had seen earlier (only a moment ago and realized… ).

  Later, after he had taken all Red had to offer, the demon said, “Anytime I want you to do anything — anything at all — you will do it, at once. This is my total and singul
ar commandment. Obey me in love, my son. Or fear!”

  * * *

  If truer eyes could pierce the deceptive veil for even a moment, they would have seen two smoldering corpses lying at the bottom of a blackened, mile-deep shaft. One body, shivering uncontrollably in its nightmare-soaked sleep, was of a large, muscular man in his late thirties. The other, who had been there first and joined later by the other, looked to be the quaking body of a slim, red-haired youth, no more than fifteen or sixteen. But, there was no light there, no one could see them, nor could they see each other. They were eternally sleeping, unable to awaken or end this dream. They were both quite incapable of telling anything to anyone. Their true desires were unfulfilled; they wanted to stop this programmed dream. If that were only possible. That would almost be bearable.

  * * *

  “Rub my back, my son, and try to pass your hand through my blood-soaked pelt.” The demon turned his back. “See how your hand catches the ripples of flame.” Red raised his living lower member to the man’s lips and commanded him (in darkness) to lick the pus out of the green-foamed slit.

  The man obeyed. The demon folded his crispy wings around both of them and became extremely violent within these confines. There were long sounds of ripping, and organs splattered on the rocky floor. There was a gunfire sound and the crackling of large bones breaking.

  There was a grateful spirit hovering nearby; it was singing in a continual scream.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “AN OMITTED SECTION”

  [Now follows a description of an omitted section:]

  The reason for this omission seems to be that this chapter is what is known as “The Untranslatable, Unspeakable Topic.”

  The entire chapter seems to be thirteen poems that “prove” (to any mere mortal) the non-existence of God.

  It is said to have been deliberately misplaced because it resulted in the deaths or suicides of the five people who read it. It was omitted after the first printing of this “fiction” was distributed to the public. The publisher, because of threats and lawsuits, saw fit to “lose it.”

  Lord Jedfrie, in the only book he ever published, stated that three living persons knew of its whereabouts, but nothing on Earth could force these women to reveal its location.

  “Even the meter of the lines being read aloud permanently damaged the minds of anyone listening,” wrote Lucy Karpe, M.D. “It was all screaming and ranting from the dead!”

  CHAPTER SIX

  “ESOPHAGUS”

  Blood ran in ever-widening rivers down the man’s legs as he passively allowed the demon to pound him three million times from behind.

  Red never tried to stop and the man never ceased feeling every fresh painful thrust as if it were the first. However, the inexplicable horror was knowing that it would never end.

  To be the eternal victim was more than mere mortals could stand. But these were not mere mortals. They were shaped into supernatural beings, who were allowed to continue in a perpetual state of death with indestructible bodies.

  They could withstand the combined torture of all (ex-) humanity for three billion infinities and yet reconstruct the body in moments.

  The tearing sounds coming from his own body did not concern the man; it would go on being broken over and over.

  That which never heals is this body, and yet cannot be destroyed.

  * * *

  “I must ram my massive arm down your throat, my son, and tear your esophagus to ribbons with my claws.”

  As has been explained earlier, all mouths are permanently fixed open in a continual scream that is so loud that the flesh of all faces vibrates all the time. It is not horrible to those who are here — it is normal. Through disuse, the lips of all are long and flap nerveless like a flag of despair in an unholy burning wind.

  Red thrust his forearm down the man’s bleeding throat and began ripping cords and arteries with his sharp, blood-crusted claws. The man could feel the hand’s thick matted hair brushing his gullet deep down. The man loved it and wanted it to continue forever. It only went on for [a third set of turns of time].

  When Red slowly pulled his arm out of the man’s throat, it was dripping with yellow mucus. The demon slung it to the ground and rubbed the rest into the black fur below his belly button.

  * * *

  Green flame danced all over the man’s body, first one place, then another. He didn’t seem to notice. He stooped to walk through the archway, his path predetermined. He headed forward, for there was no way to go back. He knew what was back there. In the distance, he heard his father call him. He carefully chose his steps through the dark hall.

  As he came out on the other side, he saw Red standing perfectly still, staring at a figure of a man, its feet crudely (one might say rudely) nailed to a pedestal. It was baked red as clay in a kiln. Red’s right shoulder was low from leaning on the burning floor with his fist, and it sizzled. The stance reminded the son of the way a gorilla might pose in a zoo. The father casually looked his way.

  “Come here, my son.”

  The animated figure was pointing in the distance with its left arm and tirelessly plunging a knife into its chest, over and over again.

  “What’s this?” the man asked.

  The massive demon drew him nearer with a thick forearm around his neck. He nuzzled his throat with his mouth, searching the man’s Adam’s apple and ear. The man could feel Red’s hot breath.

  The demon whispered into his ear. “See the plaque on the base of the pedestal? Yes? Always answer me when I ask you a question, or you could be feasting on your own testicles soon. Or, worse yet, force-fed mine. Now, what does the plaque say?”

  The man squinted as he approached the animated statue, and then looked at the plaque nailed there. “It says, ‘Man’s Best. Man’s Best…’ What? ‘Friend’?”

  “No,” Red replied. “This is the best that man can do.”

  The figure opened its mouth and spoke. “I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you.”

  It kept its left arm locked outward, pointing toward its unseen enemy. It always plunged the knife, gripped tightly in its right hand, down into its chest, over and over again with malicious intent, and snickered. Red spray splattered them and they heard bone scraping beneath the knife. The son vomited onto the steaming floor; the smell was indescribable.

  “This!” exclaimed the son. “This is the best that man has to offer?”

  “That’s right,” Red said, following it with a deep laugh.

  The man sighed. “We’re screwed. Poor statue. Thanks for reminding us of how doomed we all are.”

  “It’s not a statue,” the father replied calmly, then laughed at the shock on his son’s tormented face.

  The giant demon took the man, coupling with him in a nearby, pitch-black corridor.

  * * *

  Most of the students, by now, were somewhat used to his gross narration, and sat quietly. One pupil asked to be let out of the class, permanently, and promptly reported the professor and the nude model to the dean of the university. But it came to nothing, for there really were laws in place that gave people the right to say anything they wished.

  However, in the following week, when he returned to read chapter seven, the old man was challenged again, and quite unkindly.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “LEGS”

  “Son, do you see the hair on my thighs?”

  The man said that he did.

  “Find the hair that puckers around my hole and moisten it with the tip of your tongue.” Red pulled the man’s hair until his head was between his legs. “Get under there and do your service to your father.”

  The man searched through the endless blood-matted hair. He was sure that he found a bit of wet flesh (that did not belong to the demon) lingering among the copious volumes of strands. He found the leaking hole and lovingly daubed it with his tongue. In this warm nest, he lingered for a billion times.

  * * *

  “My son, take this pus cup I present to you and
drink it.”

  The man took the cup and drank the hot contents in one gulp. He licked his lips.

  “My son,” Red said with love quivering in his voice, “approach me.”

  The man drew near to his father.

  “You will now become a part of me for exactly one million generations.” Red drew the man to his muscled chest, and continued to pull him closer. The man cracked and flattened until he was the thickness of paper. He faded as he was absorbed into the demon’s body.

  “Now… we will tour the park.”

  * * *

  The narrative must repeat itself concerning dialogue. No such thing happens at all. In a body that far outstrips human abilities, vocalization is unnecessary. The hundreds of things the body can communicate by the merest movement are astounding.

  The only thing that can be done is scream (the base unit of existence). And since no one can die or grow older, it is the Eternal Base Unit. The demon could not express itself in an elegant manner, for such things require reflection and ruminating over matters, and no such thing can occur here. It is only my own narrative device. The thoughts are just there, hanging in space like raw wounds — pay attention or not; they will occur as he proclaimed them. Nothing can prevent this torment from one so high on the Order’s ladder. (And unless I am very much mistaken, my copyist, you must continue to write this until it is finished, bastardly task that it may be![2])

  * * *

  “We cannot proceed past the limits of my park. You must always remember this. I am the prince of this park.”

  The man and demon (who were now one) came to a tree where two men writhed as one.