Timothy Long - The Apocalypse and Satan's Glory Hole

Pestilence’s steed trots proudly from the alley into the street, its hooves making great clop-clop noises that echo off the remains of the casinos. General O’Coddle strides to his left with the zombie horde stumbling behind him. A few random screams sound in the distance, and they are met with terrifying howls and cackles. The zombie horde pays the screams little attention. They stagger after their general, knowing he will find them more flesh.

Pestilence eyes the pickup full of shit topped by the obese demon corpse and shakes his head. Rows of headless bodies are piled high in the sex shop parking lot. Most wear the desert camouflage of their earlier deserters, and he reaches down and slaps General O’Coddle’s shoulder to show the dead officer.

“Serves the chicken-shit douche eaters right,” the general grumbles. He looks away from them quickly. They are not worthy of his time.

Somewhere behind the shit-filled pickup, a high voice gurgles, “Death? Is that you? I’m not dead; I just lost my head during a shit. Put me back and I’ll be fine.”

Pestilence follows the voice and finds a fat horned demon’s head lying with its forehead against a tire. The head rolls, and tiny beady eyes squint to see the man under the hood. The decapitated head whimpers, “Oh, shit, it really is you. Please have mercy!”

Pestilence swings his legs over his steed and drops to the concrete. His legs buckle, and he grabs the reins to steady himself, then leans down to the demon head. He wraps one long-fingered hand around each horn, and with some effort, he hefts the big demon head. He nearly drops it once, then he shoves it at General O’Coddle. The general holds the head by its chin so the horns rest against his broad chest. Pestilence cracks his neck and asks the demon head, “Who is smoking tweek? And where are they?”

“I don’t know. I’ve been staring at the weak fucking tread of a tire for the better part of the afternoon,” the head chortles.

“Okay,” Pestilence nods to the tiny face. “I guess we’re done with him.”

He gestures toward the pickup, and General O’Coddle nods, his gray lips curling into a smile. O’Coddle turns on his heels and raises the demon’s fat head over the feces-filled cab. The demon’s small face crinkles as though to cringe away from the stench, and it shrieks in short bursts that squirt boiling hot blood out the stump of its neck.

“You CAN’”T drop me in there ,” it whines. “Put me back on my body! I’ll join with the shit! No! That’s my shit! Put me on a corpse! I’ll serve you the way a master with mercy deserves to be served! Please! No! Don’t!”

Pestilence and O’Coddle look at each other while the demon head wails and cries above its own defecation, and they start laughing uproariously. General O’Coddle glares at the small legion of zombies around them, and they grunt and moan in unison, the best expression of mirth they can manage. O’Coddle turns from the zombies back to Pestilence, but the hooded horseman is already walking toward the back doors of the sex shop. O’Coddle grunts and drops the screaming head into the truck full of demon dung. It lands with a plop and sinks quickly, screaming until shit fills its mouth.

Someone has boarded up the back door to the sex shop. Pestilence reaches one slender hand through the boards, and the doorknob pops open. “Idiots,” he mutters. He shoves the door open and peers through slits in the boards. Thin yellow smoke stinking of chemicals stings his eyes. His nostrils flex and pull a mist of the yellow smoke into them. The secondhand meth smoke hits his twitching brain right away, and his eyes dilate and bulge.

“Bingo,” he whispers over his shoulder to General O’Coddle. Pestilence hears excited voices chattering back and forth in whispers just out of his line of vision. He can’t tell what they are saying, and the more meth smoke he inhales, the less he cares. Drool rolls down his long chin, and he shouts, “Let me the fuck in and get me HIGH!”

His voice rattles the building and sets a few loose angel feathers aflame. A fat man waddles into his line of sight and stomps out the burning feathers. Pestilence hisses, “I see you, fat man. Let me in.”

Again the building rattles and loose feathers engulf themselves in flames. The fat man has his back to Pestilence. He stops on the flaming feathers and raises his hands above his head as though he were being arrested.

“I’m not taking you to jail,” Pestilence screams and then whispers, “I want all your drugs or I’ll fucking gut you and feed you to my zombies!”

The fat man is shaking and crying, but he starts to turn around behind the door. Pestilence hears someone addressing the fat man in a half-whisper. “Jerome! No, mother fucker, don’t you turn around!”

Jerome ignores him and turns around. His tearful eyes glance behind the door before falling on a grinning Pestilence. One heavy foot falls forward, then another. A skinny priest with a shock of bright red hair darts from behind the door and shoves Jerome away from Pestilence. The priest looks at Pestilence with eyes as round as saucers and his jaw popping back and forth. The young priest looks lost for a minute then shouts, “Leave here, foul demon!”

Pestilence leans his head back so far that the hood falls, revealing his thin greasy hair, and he roars laughter. He laughs so hard he hacks and spits on the sidewalk. General O’Coddle doesn’t laugh. He leans in when Pestilence leans back. The general spots a skinny shape with a bright red top. He squints his eyes, and the blurry shape yells a second time (with even less confidence), “Leave here, foul demon!”

“Little brother Don,” General O’Coddle growls between the boards, “I’ve thought about you a lot!”

The general smashes his arms against the boards, splintering the wood. Pestilence stops laughing and stares at the general as the dead officer screams and pounds at the makeshift barricade. Inside, Father Don O’Coddle recognizes his brother Mac. He also recognizes the fact that Mac wants to kill him.

“Holy limping hooker fuck, Jerome,” the young priest gulps. “That’s my crazy fucking brother out there.”

Jerome unfreezes and runs around Father O’Coddle to slam the door just as General O’Coddle destroys the last of the boards. Jerome dives behind the counter, jumps back up, tosses Father O’Coddle the store shotgun, then dives back down and covers himself with scraps of busted counter and floppy dildos.

General O’Coddle kicks the door so hard it breaks off its hinges with a shrieking sound and flies inward. Father O’Coddle pumps the shotgun and pulls the trigger at the first shape that approaches through the stirred dust. The blast shreds the shape as it picks it up off its feet. A second takes its place, and Father O’Coddle turns the barrel and blasts it as well. As he chuckles to himself, a massive gray fist zooms out of the smoke at the end of his shotgun and into his nose. His nose shatters. When he breathes, tiny shards of cartilage shoot down his throat.

“Mac, no,” Father O’Coddle gasps. “I’m sorry, Mac. So sorry.”

“Fuck you, Don,” General O’Coddle yells as he picks his brother up by his bright red hair. “I bet she loved this hair. Mine is this elegant white, earned through battles of war and love. And yours is like clown hair.”

Big tears roll down Don O’Coddle’s cheeks as he tells the general, “I like your hair, big brother.”

“Oh good. Then you won’t mind if I take yours.” General O’Coddle smiles before ripping his little brother’s scalp back with one firm yank. He drops the screaming Don to the floor and admires the bright red scalp in his hand. Then he kicks his little brother in the ribs and stuffs the hair into his shirt pocket, which quickly grows sodden with dark blood. Father O’Coddle tries to crawl away from his brother, but both his hands and the floor are slick with his blood. Mac grabs Don by his priestly collar and picks him up.