Stuart Slade: Pantheocide

Olsen thought for a few moments. “It was warm, the temperature was going up even as the pressure went down. That’s unusual, usually a storm like that is cold.”

“Interesting. Anything else.”

Olsen replayed the pictures in his mind. Suddenly one thing really seized his mind. “Yes, the clouds. They were spinning fast but usually hurricane clouds are gray. These were black, jet black, as black as Yahweh’s heart.”

Heavengate, Hell, November 2008.

Corporal Dripankeothorofenex had decided, upon mature consideration, that he liked humans. In a manner of speaking, he always had in a culinary sense, but now he was working with them, he was beginning to see that the way they did things had decided advantages to offer a poor footslogger.

Take Heavengate for example. The chamber containing the black ellipse that offered direct access from Hell to Heaven was in the center of a massive fortress, one designed for the sole purpose of stopping the Heavenly hordes from invading Hell. It has served that function, and served it well, for millennia beyond counting. The problem was that the way the daemons had organized the defense, there had to be a guard detail inside that chamber. This had led to a game being played over those millennia. The Angels would stage a raid, pile through the gate, kill the guard and retreat the other side before reinforcements could arrive. Then the daemons would retaliate and stage a raid of their own. And so it went on, millennia after millennia. Greta fun for the Lords who could boast in Satan’s court about it, not so much for the foot-soldiers who died.

Then the human army had come and they’d killed Satan, destroyed his court and put their own leader into power. After a while, they’d found Heavengate, looked at the chamber and shaken their heads sadly. Then they’d made a few modifications of their own. They’d walled up the original entrance to the chamber, leaving just a massive steel door for access. They’d built a new room off to one side, with armored glass windows so the occupants had a good view of the portal. Then they’d brought in comfortable chairs for the guards, run a power capable in from a generator outside and even installed a refrigerator so the guards could have a cold fungus ale now and then while on duty. After all, as the Sergeant in charge had said, ‘any damned fool can be uncomfortable’. Then they’d rigged the inside of the chamber with their dreaded weapons.

Dripankeothorofenex remembered what had happened next, remembered it fondly. He’d been on guard when a group of angels had burst into the chamber, intent on slaughtering the daemon guard. Then they’d stopped dead, looking around them in confusion at the empty chamber. While they did so, Dripankeothorofenex had picked up the telephone and called the human reaction force waiting outside.

“Hi Drippy, anything happening in there?” The human voice at the other end might have been relaxed but Dripankeothorofenex wasn’t taken in. Humans could do more killing while totally relaxed than daemons could achieve with a week’s concentrated effort. He was a little proud though, he’d noticed that the human soldiers tended to invent slightly abusive nicknames for each other and the fact he had one of his own suggested they were accepting him as a comrade.

“Angel raiding party just arrived.” His report was interrupted by a series of explosions as his Sergeant set off the killing machines. ‘Claymores’ the humans had called them. “We just blew them up.”

“Good for you. We’re on our way.”

Dripankeothorofenex had settled back in his seat and waited for the humans. This way of warfare, sitting back and killing by remote control, was much preferable to a desperate hand-to-hand fight. He had looked into the chamber, seeing the charnel house resulting from the killing machines. Not an angel had survived. Then the humans had come, taken away what was left of the bodies and reset the charges. “When we will stage a raid of our own?” ‘Drippy’ had asked the Sergeant commanding the team.

“We won’t. Why should we? We don’t know what is that side, we can guess it’s probably much the same as this. Why waste lives? Anyway, they sent a raiding party through, it never came back, what would you do?”

Dripankeothorofenex thought for a second. “Send another one through to find out what happened to the first one?”

“Right, Drippy. And we blow that one up too. We could get half a dozen groups before they give it up as a bad job and that’s the end of this raiding problem, right?”

That’s when Dripankeothorofenex had decided he liked humans. He entered the observation room and relieved the previous watch of their duty. Once his own group were in place, he visually checked the Heavengate Chamber and saw that all was in order. Next item on the checklist, he picked up the telephone and advised the human reaction team outside the fortress that he had the guard and all was well.

At that point he turned around, opened the refrigerator and looked inside. There were flasks of fungus ale, some slices of foodbeast and some metal cans of human beer marked ‘Coors’. He took one of the cans, in truth he preferred fungus ale but beer was human so it had to be better didn’t it?, opened it and swallowed the contents. As he turned around he looked again into the Heavengate Chamber and it took a second for the change to register. When it did, he dived for the telephone. The black ellipse wasn’t there. The Heavengate was closed and couldn’t be reopened. Ever.

Interstate 95, just south of Dover, Delaware. December 2008

“That’s the turning, Interstate 666.”

The green sign made it quite clear. “Interstate 666, Delaware City, Middletown and Hellgate Golf.” John McLanahan swung the family car on to the exit ramp and started to follow the signs for the Hellgate. The whole road was new and showed signs of the hurried construction. The signs though were unambiguous. ‘Military Convoys Have Absolute Right of Way.’

“Are we there yet?” John Junior sounded impatient and fretful.

“Nearly honey. We’ll be seeing Grandma again soon. We’ll make sure she is all right now she’s dead.” Naomi McLanahan and her husband exchanged slightly guilty glances, they were making this visit, one that was using a substantial proportion of their monthly gasoline ration, for reasons that were not quite so altruistic.

Ahead of them, Interstate 666 split, the main lanes curving off towards Hellgate Golf, the rest reverting to the prewar road network. Another preemptory sign, ‘Civilian Traffic, Right Lane. Left Three Lanes, Military Traffic Only.’ McLanahan started to swing right and felt the Toyota Corolla lurch as a ten-wheeled Oshkosh HEMTT roared past. It was followed by more of the same mixed in with tank transporters carrying Abrams tanks and Bradley armored fighting vehicles. The sign about military convoys having absolute right of way wasn’t a joke, if the Toyota had been in the way, it would have been pushed out of it. McLanahan shook slightly, being at war took a lot of getting used to. Iraq and the Persian Gulf wars hadn’t been anything like this.

Ahead, the road rose before falling away to the area surrounding the gate. Cresting the rise, he could see the whole extent of the human side of Base Hellgate-Golf. There would be more the other side of the ellipse but that was hidden behind the black shadow. “See that Junior? That’s the Hellgate. Anybody from your class been through it yet?”

“No.” Junior was staring at the lines of vehicles and helicopters parked outside. Most of them were red-stained and battered, waiting for the repairs that the vicious environment of Hell made essential.

Another sign. ‘Civilian Parking’ and an arrow leading off to the right. Once again McLanahan followed the indicated route to a parking lot. It was much smaller than he had thought, he had been expecting a sea of cars, left while their owners visited newly-deceased loved ones. Then reality set in, there were only a limited number of permits to visit Hell issued to civilians and the McLanahans had been lucky. Most were not. He parked the car and his family got out, looking around as they did so. There was a small shelter nearby, marked “Transit Bus”. It drew them over and they stood in the metal lean-to, welcoming the cover it offered from the drizzling rain. A few minutes later, a dark green bus, looking for all the world like a schoolbus pulled up.