Heaven and Hell (18 page)

Serena discovered a lone vent directly in her path. The slightest trace of steam issued from the salt-encrusted opening. She swallowed hard. She had kept a careful eye on her selected route, and this particular geyser hadn’t erupted in the last half hour. She wondered if that increased or decreased the danger. She looked for a detour, but other paths would only lead her closer to more active vents. There was no way around it, she had to continue.

As she drew closer, her sandals made a grinding sound on the wet, briny salt deposits. She saw small pools of water here and there confirming that this geyser had erupted in recent times. Judging from the distance to the vent, when it erupted, it threw scalding hot water over a wide area. This was not good. She hoped that there would be some warning before the next eruption.

She was less than 50 feet from the vent when she noticed a coal-black chain coming out of the mouth of the geyser. A chill swept through her. “Oh God, not again,” she gasped. Once more she considered taking another route, steering as far from this vent as possible, but in the end she stayed the course. What horrors were within the geyser? She had to know; she had to better understand her adversary.

Serena drew to within a few feet of the mouth of the geyser. The formidable chain was firmly attached to a heavy stone block set into the ground. From there it led into a roughly circular vent, less than a yard in diameter. The chain seemed under tension, as if holding a considerable weight. From the depths of the vent, Serena heard moaning. It was a woman’s voice, she was certain of it. Cautiously she approached the hellish well and peered in. All she saw was darkness, so she dropped to her knees to get a better look—a foolhardy act.

Perhaps 15 or 20 feet down into the semi-darkness she saw the form of a young woman about her own age. She had long, brown hair, wet, and matted, a slender yet muscular build, and a pale complexion. She hung limply from the chain by her shackled wrists, which were extended high above her head. For a moment she looked lifeless, yet sensing the presence above her, the woman slowly lifted her head. At first what she saw didn’t seem to register; then her eyes opened wide with surprise.

“Who are you?” she gasped.

“My name is Serena.”

“No, you’re just an illusion, you can’t be real.”

“I assure you, I am,” Serena said, glancing again at the black chain. She remembered satan’s warning about assisting the victims of Hell’s fury, but right now she didn’t care. “Look, I’m not that strong, but maybe we can work together and get you up out of there. At least we can try.”

“What a kind offer,” replied the woman, her voice languid and weary. “But there’s a problem with that.” She swung her shackled feet back and forth, revealing that they were not only chained together but linked to three other chains that radiated downward and were mounted securely to the tunnel wall at three places, perhaps a dozen feet farther into the depths. “It didn’t used to be like this,” she continued, “but I guess I was a bad girl.”

“How long have you been here?” asked Serena, leaning farther over the dark opening.

The woman shook her head slowly. “I really couldn’t tell you. I died in October 1983. How long ago was that?”

“Twenty-four years and two months,” replied Serena.

Again the woman shook her head. “Has it been that long? After a while here, time seems to lose its meaning.”

“I only wish that there was something I could do for you,” lamented Serena.

“So do I. By the way, my name is Gwen, Gwen Thomas. And let’s see, I guess I’m 44 years old.”

“How can you go on?” Serena asked. “How do you stand it? How do you keep from losing your mind?”

“You go on because you have to,” replied Gwen. “I don’t know how others react to this place…you see, I’m sort of isolated. I guess many scream and curse and cry, but what good does it do? After it’s all over and you’ve screamed yourself hoarse, or cried your eyes dry, you’re still here. All you can do is take it, and somewhere deep in your soul, hope that someday there will be an end to it all.” Gwen hesitated.

“But tell me, Serena, how is it that you are wandering around loose up there? I can hardly imagine satan letting the likes of you run free. That sadistic pig loves to put women in chains and torture them.”

“I’m not as free as you think,” lamented Serena. “I guess satan has just given me a little time to think about it before he starts working on me, before I begin my eternity in the sea of fire.”

“Sea of fire…that sounds nasty,” Gwen said, staring up at Serena.

“I guess I’m going to find out,” replied Serena.

“No, we don’t want to talk about things like that, I want to hear about you,” said Gwen. “I so desperately need to hear another human voice. I haven’t heard another human voice in so many years. I want to understand who you are. I want to hear about anything but this place.”

Serena did her best to describe her life on Earth, and the situation that brought her here to Gwen. When it was over, Gwen shook her head sadly.

“Being separated from your husband must make it all the worse. As for this little slice of freedom satan granted you, I don’t think the pig did you any favor.” A momentary groan emanated from Gwen’s lips as she pulled upon her chains. “I really didn’t leave anyone behind. Maybe it’s better that way.”

Serena’s next question was natural enough. “Tell me about you, Gwen. I’ve been doing all the talking.”

“I’m not much for talk anymore,” said Gwen, “but, in a word, I was a prostitute.”

“Why?” asked Serena, who only now realized how potentially offensive her question was.

“Because it meant escape and money,” replied Gwen. “I thought it was the only way I could support myself. Life had screwed me over pretty bad growing up, so I decided to screw it back, and I didn’t come cheap. If men wanted me, fine, but they paid. You see, I had dreams, Serena, and I wasn’t afraid to take chances to reach them.”

“What kind of dreams?”

“I was a gymnast, and I was very good. The rings, the parallel bars, the horse, I did it all. My greatest dream was to make it to the summer Olympics, to bring home the gold. From white trash to Olympic gold—there’s a dream. But it takes more than talent, it takes money to do all that. I paid for it by selling off my dignity, my self-respect.”

“Did you ever get to the Olympics?” asked Serena.

“No, I never got the chance. Maybe I should have quit my night job sooner, maybe I got a little greedy. I had enough money, and more. It was right there, all tucked away in CDs. Maybe that’s why this all happened to me. Maybe that’s why I’m here.”

There was a pause. Gwen gasped, pulling on her shackles. A trickle of blood flowed from beneath her left wrist restraint and down her arm. Serena could only imagine the strain on Gwen’s arms and legs especially because of the barbs that lined the inside of her shackles. It had to be pure agony.

“I was always a high class girl, and I was an outlaw, through and through.”

“An outlaw?” asked Serena.

“Yeah, what I mean is that I didn’t have a pimp, I ran the whole show myself. Men only want women for what they can get out of them. No male pig was going to run my life; take all the profits, while I took all the risks. No, I was calling the shots, choosing my own clients. And I catered to the best. You know, I always figured that if something did happen to me, that it would be one of my clients that would do it, but it wasn’t.

“No, it happened to me on my way back to my car after a particularly busy night. I was tired, sore, ready to get a few hours of sleep before a long day at the gym. It all happened so fast. To this day I don’t know exactly what went down. All I know is that this guy pulled me into an alley and slit my throat wide open. It was a horrible feeling, a sickening pain. The rest is history.”

Serena only nodded. What could she say that would make any difference?

“Satan took great pleasure in sentencing me to this hellish hole in the ground,” continued Gwen. “He was such a pompous ass sitting on his throne; lord of all he surveyed. Forget anything noble I might have done during my life; he focused only on my months of prostitution. He acted as if I had been doing it my whole life, as if I had enjoyed it. He said that because I had tried so hard to hide my sins from the light of society, that he would torment me for it in a hidden dark place, where I would feel the heat of his wrath. He sentenced me to this place. Two of his dark demons carried me here. They shackled me hand and foot, and threw me into the throat of this steamy hot geyser.”

“I’m sorry,” said Serena.

“Not as much as I am,” retorted Gwen. “When the chain went tight that first time, it nearly pulled my arms out of their sockets. They told me all about this place as I hung there—about the game.”

“Game?” asked Serena.

“Oh yes, game,” confirmed Gwen. “The rules are quite simple, really. They told me about the eruptions, about the scalding hot water that exploded out of this geyser every few hours. When it happened, I’d more than likely be thrown out by the sheer force of the eruption. But you see, the throat of this geyser was my prison, and my sanctuary. To be safe from the demons, I had to remain inside, always.

“If the erupting waters threw me out, I was to scramble back in as fast as I could. If they managed to catch me outside, they won, and got the pleasure of hacking me up with their claws, before throwing me back into the geyser again. There I’d hang by my chain, healing, waiting until the next round, the next eruption. If I managed to get back in before they caught me, I was safe, but I still lost, if you get my meaning.”

Serena got it. Then a terrible thought hit her. “How often does this thing erupt?”

“You don’t have to worry,” assured Gwen. “As best I can figure, there are about five or six hours between eruptions. Most of the time, I just hang here in this steamy heat and suffer, alone. I get a lot of time to think down here, between eruptions. I don’t know, maybe that’s the worst part. But the eruptions; they’re terrifying. Believe me; you don’t even want to know what that feels like. The rumbling starts about a minute before the scalding water reaches you. The heat increases, you can hear it coming, a roaring sound from far below, growing louder and louder; it’s terrifying as the boiling water works its way through the narrow cracks in the rock below this cauldron I hang in.

“There is a blast of scalding hot air and steam that hits me first; then I can see it, a frothing boiling mass, bursting out of the darkness. If engulfs me in seconds. The violent turbulence tosses me against the walls, cutting me up real bad, before it pushing me up and out of the vent. I quickly run out of chain and am yanked hard, thrown to the ground, showered in boiling hot water. It lasts for about a minute, but it seems so much longer.”

Gwen began to gasp as she flailed around at the end of her chain. Serena could see the pain in her eyes as she pulled in futility upon her bonds. She grunted and groaned as tears came to her eyes, shimmering in the faint light. Then she went still again.

“Are you OK?” asked Serena.

“Not hardly,” said Gwen. “It’s just cramps, that’s all, they’ll pass.” It was over a minute before she could continue. “I remember that first eruption. When it was over, I was left dazed and confused, out there on the plains. I looked like a lobster—red and covered with boils. It was horrible. I was in such pain. The gritty salt all around me made it all the worse. Then I looked a little ways away to see another poor soul who had also been thrown from her geyser. For a moment she laid there, just like me.

“Then, one of those black demons pounced on her. He came out of nowhere. He clawed at her, ripping huge chunks of her flesh away with his sharp talons. Blood and guts were flying everywhere. The whole time she just screamed. What else could she do?

She couldn’t die again. Then, he threw what was left of her into the vent of her geyser, and turned to me. I scrambled for the still steaming vent. I barely managed to plunge back in before he arrived. He cursed at me, taunted me from up there for the longest while, then he left.”

Serena shivered as she pictured that horrible moment, and she could picture it only too well.

“I hung there for a long time,” continued Gwen. “Then I decided to do something, I put my skills as a gymnast to work. I reached for the chain attached to my wrist shackles and began to climb. It wasn’t easy, but slowly I made my way up the chain to the surface. Reaching the top, I looked around; no demons in sight, I crawled out. I looked for any way that I might release these shackles, or bust the chain anchored into the rocks, but I couldn’t figure it out. All the while, I kept an eye out for the black demons. I could see them in the distance all right, but none of them came anywhere near me. They focus on the erupting geysers to find their victims, there was no point in checking up on the quiet geysers because their occupants were trapped inside, hanging from the end of their chains. They are all women, former prostitutes, hardly the sort who were going to find the strength to climb up the chains to get out. And hauling them out was against the rules.”

“So, what did you do?” asked Serena.

“For a time I just sat there, trying to keep a low profile. Eventually I felt the rumbling of the geyser as it prepared to erupt again. I tried to get as far away from it as I could, which wasn’t very far. Still I was able to escape the worst of the spray. Sure, I got burned some, but nothing like the first time. When the eruption was over, I made for the vent. Sure enough, there was one of those black demons on its way toward me, but I was able to duck into the vent before he got anywhere close. I hung on to the chain, watched him from just inside the vent until he turned away in search of other victims. After a few minutes, I was out once more.