Bad Jack ((Ascension: Book 1)) (26 page)

Chapter 68: Lucifer

The pulsating death ball hovered off the floor by five feet. It spun on an axis radiating a heat they could feel even from a distance.

It spun faster and faster until it was moving so quickly the motion was impossible to detect.

Everyone moved away from it except Jack. The ball was calling for him and he felt compelled to help.

He put one hand on one side of the ball and the other on the opposite side.
His hands were now a mere six inches from either side but the heat no longer bothered him.

All eyes were on Jack. This was the moment they’d all been waiting for.

Jack clapped his hands together, crushing the death ball flat as a pancake. The ball had willed him to do this and he had obeyed.

When he pulled his hands apart, instead of a floating ball, there was a floating hole. It had gone from three dimensional to two.

Jack felt a wind escape from the hole in space. It smelled like charcoal and burnt hair and bacon grease. A nearly opaque wisp of smoke floated from the hole.

He looked through the hole to the realm on the other side. It was fantastical. Flames danced around and dark
indistinguishable shapes flitted past in the distance. He could even hear a type of moaning, punctuated by an occasional scream. It was hell, he knew and he was the first mortal to ever lay eyes on it.

This should have frightened him. His survival
instincts should have kicked in by now.

He put his eye right up to the hole to get a wider
, panoramic view.

Then
, not an inch in front of the hole another eye appeared from the hell side. It was looking straight into his eye and Jack imagined, straight into his soul too.

He was stunned by the sudden appearance but despite his trepidation he held his ground.

The eye on that side was ancient and contained a beauty Jack could barely comprehend. The
color of the eye was unknowable. It was simply soulful and contained equal measures of despair and hope.

Tears streamed down Jack’s face.

This was a fucking perfect angel stuck in hell to suffer for an eternity. It was a fucking travesty and he wasn’t going to stand for it.

He put both hands inside the hole and
, with his fingers, started to pry it apart with all his might. The hole widened by a few inches which made his heart leap with joy.

There was a part of his brain that was screaming for him to stop and assess the situation first but he was on cruise control now
, he knew what had to be done.

He
felt something touch his fingers from the other side of the hole. Lucifer had touched him to stop him. Jack felt dizzy from it. It was like a shot of adrenaline to the soul.

Lucifer telepathically asked him to stop. They had to agree before commencing.
There had to be mutual consent.

Jack left his hands in the hole as Lucifer opened a
vivid telepathic link between them. As he did, Jack regained his senses and yanked his hands away. He realized he’d nearly let him out without so much as thinking about the consequences.

Chapter 69: Sympathy for the Devil

The fallen angel on the other side of the hole said,
“I’m sorry for my brothers’ behavior. They’re always looking for brownie points with the big guy. They were wasting their time though because he wouldn’t care if they stopped me.”

Jack understood fully that Lucifer meant that the white
man and woman he’d killed just fifteen minutes ago were actually rouge angels. It came out of the blue as an epiphany.

“Some of
them will never learn that he’s beyond pleasing. He’s beyond anything anymore.”

Jack sensed a profound sadness as Lucifer spoke.

He changed the subject, “I understand you need my permission to cross over to this side.”

“Yes but I don’t need a yes or a no, I need your acceptance. I need you to r
emove doubt from your mind. I’ll be disappointed if you won’t allow me to be free but I’ll accept it.”

Jack appreciated the fact
that Lucifer already knew he’d say no and had forgiven him in advance for it.

“Then I say no.
Sorry for wasting your time.”

Lucifer laughed. “It’s not about words Jack. Let me try and convince you.”

Jack mentally buffered himself against any kind of brainwashing that Lucifer might try but it turned out to be unnecessary. Lucifer spoke plainly:

“
I don’t send souls to hell, God does. But he also doesn’t do a damn thing to help those poor forsaken souls. God has had nothing to do with his creation for a very long time. You are truly on your own. You know this innately. He did nothing to stop your family from being killed. He didn’t intervene when your high school sweet heart was murdered. He didn’t lend a helping hand when your uncle left you all alone. These are slights that affect you on a personal level. We won’t even get into Genocide or natural disasters. He left humanity marooned on island earth and has found better things to occupy his time. You have every right to be angry about this.”

Lucifer
paused and his eye looked about, like he was trying to take things in all around him.

He resumed,
“Do you know what Samantha’s up to right now? She’s being fitted for her wedding dress. She’s forgotten about you. She hurt and warped you but now she’s in a type of pre-marital bliss, but with a different man.

Your uncle Nick’
s living in a hippie commune in Florida. When people ask him if he has any family he says they were all killed in a car wreck, you included.

The guy who murdered your girlfriend in high school is a successful realtor with a family. He plays golf on the weekends.

The cop that wrote that unfair ticket that has stalled your life is retired now, living on a fat pension you paid for with your tax dollars. If you walked right up to him and told him who you were and what he did to you he wouldn’t have the foggiest idea what you were talking about. He forgot about you a decade ago.

The mother of your child
, who abandoned him for dead, is two states away watching a romantic comedy, laughing with her new boyfriend. She hasn’t thought of Jessie in months and she certainly hasn’t thought about you.”

Lucifer’s eye shimmered with tears, “God doesn’t care about any of that. He thinks it’s petty.”

Jack was seething with indignant anger. Everyone who had hurt him throughout his life had forgotten he ever existed. He was a bane to them and they’d all been happy to move on. He was a speed bump on their way to a real life.

He
took a deep breath and then remembered Melanie. She loved him. She wasn’t trying to get away from him. And he was a new dad too. Well, a new dad to a ten year old, but still.

With a great deal of concentration he broke eye contact with Lucifer and looked at Melanie. She was rigid, as were Daniel and Oliver.
Even the air around them appeared still. Jack somehow realized that time had frozen for them. That or he was having this conversation outside of the normal constrictions of time. Dust particles hung in the air free of gravity’s pull. The world was silent.

He looked into that bright eye once again and said, “S
o they didn’t like me and they’re happier without me? What’s the problem with that? It’s called free will.”

Lucifer
sighed. “So are you telling me that the guy who murdered your old girlfriend should be let off the hook because he didn’t get caught, because his free will allowed him to do it? Your uncle was free to abandon you and he did. Does that mean he should have in the first place? I’m not saying God should intervene in all things mortal but how about just the big ones, like stopping people from murdering and raping? Couldn’t he try and discourage that just a bit?”

Jack
asked, “If I set you free would you help stop these atrocities?”

“Absolutely I would. There needs to be checks and balances or the whole machine
breaks down. Look about you, it’s already happening.”

“So you would replace our old complacent boss with a new improved version. You would be a micro manager
type, right?”

“Now Jack, you’re missing the point. I
have a strong desire to right the wrongs he’s inflicted upon you, to all of his creation. I only want to help and to protect.”

Jack tried a new tactic
, one completely out of left field. “And how would you treat an atheist then? I choose to disbelieve. This supernatural stuff makes me sick. How would you handle someone like me?”

Lucifer said, “You are willfully blind to the obvious. I do not see what purpose that serves.”

“It keeps me sane I guess.”

Lucifer said,
"If you were standing on a bridge and you suddenly had the thought that bridges can't possibly exist, would it actually disappear? Would you fall to your death because of a thought? No you wouldn't. I'm giving you facts and you're saying you'd prefer to side with your beliefs. Isn't that kind of the opposite stance of an average atheist? Shouldn't you be inclined to believe evidence over theory? Listen, we need to break through this unreal wall you've built up as a means of protecting yourself before we can continue."

Jack hesitated. Lucifer was right. He'd built this wall within his mind because he refused to believe a God would willfully ignore his
personal trials and tribulations.

"Ok, I'm listening."

"You know, Jack, I shouldn't even be having this conversation with you. You just rescued a child who can make his dreams manifest into reality. Supernatural creatures that I, Lucifer provided via those dreams helped you in your escape. Now you're having a psychic conversation with a fallen angel through a gateway that was once an orb that killed on contact. What more proof do you need?"

Jack shook his head, but only because he was starting to understand what the angel was trying so hard to tell him; that Jack was an ignorant dumbass.

He said, "So what are your ultimate plans if I choose to release you?" He could barely believe he'd just said that as though he was actually thinking about going all the way through with this.

"First of all, I would really like to no longer call hell my home. It sucks here. Secondly, I'd like to help humanity as I feel a kinship with you. After all, we were both forsaken by our self righteous creator. And thirdly, I am going to fucking kill God."

Jack felt a twitch from within his guts. The go-juice was emptying into his system like a geiser. He instantly knew Lucifer was right. God had to be destroyed and Lucifer could do it. But only if Jack helped him shuck off the shackles of hell. Jack hated God more than he'd ever allowed himself to realize. He realized that Lucifer wasn't the root cause of the hatred in man's heart, God was the creator of man, the heart, and the hatred.

Lucifer's hands were clean; he'd been tucked away in hell the whole time.

Before he could stop himself, he said, "Let's kill that mother fucker."

Lucifer cocked his head to the side and a lopsided grin played on his lips. "You won't regret this, I promise."

Lucifer reached his charred fingers through the opening of the hole and began to pry it wider, inch by inch. Jack reached inside and helped him. Together they were able to really put some muscle into it. His fingers brushed against Lucifer's and he felt a thrill run through him; he couldn't wait to meld himself with this perfect being. He couldn't wait to unleash Lucifer's awesome power against their complacent, lazy, good for nothing God. Lucifer would have to help mankind out on his own because Jack couldn't give two shits about his fellow man anymore.

When the hole was roughly four feet around, Lucifer put one charred leg through. Jack reached in and took his hand to help. Lucifer grabbed it
in a tight squeeze. Jack felt that thrill once again, but also something else. He felt uneasy, like what he was so sure of a second ago would not turn out well for him at all.

Lucifer reached through and grabbed his other hand with unreal force. He pulled himself free from the hole and stood before Jack in all his sp
lendid glory. He let go of Jack's hands and started to brush the charred bits of flesh off of his body. When he was done, the floor around him was covered in two inches of ash. But the amazing thing was that Lucifer looked exactly like Jack when he was done, even more so than the clones ever had.

Jack
shook the disbelief from his thoughts and said, "So what now? How do we do this?"

Lucifer laughed heartily. "I can't believe how eager you are. I can't believe the strength of hatred you possess. It is perfect. You are perfect."

Jack smiled and nodded.

Lucifer mused aloud, "I tricked an
atheist into releasing me from hell. I'm a fucking genius. Hey atheist, did it ever occur to you that I am about to make free will a thing of the past? God gave you free will, the greatest gift ever bestowed, and I am about to take it away. You knew that and yet you released me anyway. Your hatred for God overpowered your rational thoughts."

Jack furrowed his brow. This wasn't really going the way he'd expected it to.

Lucifer said, "Get in the pit." With that, he grabbed Jack around the waist and picked him up. Jack was startled by it and tried in vain to resist but the angel had him in a death grip.

As Lucifer walked towards the still enlarged hole, he said, "He'll be watching to see if
my embittered soul has escaped. He does check in from time to time, just to make sure I haven't found a way out. When he looks in and sees your twisted carcass of a soul, he'll assume all's well in hell. He'll think you're me."

Jack yelled out but the only people who might have been able to hear him were frozen in time.
He finally gave up and mumbled to Lucifer, "It wasn't supposed to happen like this. Please stop."

Lucifer smirked and said, "Yeah, I can't be trusted. Most people know that. Sorry pal but there's no other way."

Lucifer shoved him forcibly through the hole, into the firey agony of hell.

"Sorry
again buddy, I wish it didn't have to be like this, I really do, but you have to take my place."

Jack's skin erupted. He screamed
out in agony as his clothes disintegrated away from his body. As his skin bubbled, his hatred intensified, but not his hatred of Lucifer. God could have stopped this at any time. God was to blame. His tears of frustration and torment immediately sizzled as they left their ducts. He helplessly watched as lucifer pulled the hole shut on him.