Hell's Pawn (3 page)

J ohn entered through the spinning door. I f he was a wanted fugitive, the woman behind the counter didn’t show any sign of it. The same lady who had been there before was still on duty. S he was petite, modernly fashionable, and wearing a completely false smile.

“What can I do for you?”

J ohn stared for a moment, realizing that he hadn’t prepared what to say. “I don’t know what to do,” he blurted out.

The woman’s smile became even more forced.

“Let’s take a look in your file,” she said.

As they both stood motionless, J ohn realized that something was expected of him.

Another person entered from the street, the footsteps echoing loudly in the hollow room. S oon a line would form behind him, which would only increase the pressure he was feeling.

“I don’t have my file.”

The smile disappeared. “R esidents are required to keep papers on their persons at all times, must consult them a minimum of three times per daylight period, and present them to any authority figure who requests to see them. Failure to comply can result in identity branding or therapeutic incarceration.” J ohn seriously considered running again. “W hat if someone loses their papers?” he ventured cautiously.

“R eplacement of your file is subject to a 300-point demerit along with another 150-point demerit for processing.” The smile on the woman’s face returned as if she were beginning to enjoy herself. “I also see—” she glanced down at a screen in the desk, “—

that you haven’t completed your acclimatization period and are not chaperoned, an offense that is punishable by—”

“Lay off, Nancy,” said a voice from behind. “I ’ll pay for his file replacement, and I ’ll be his bleeding mentor.”

J ohn turned, eyes widening with surprise when he saw Dante. G one was the safety-pinned leather jacket and S ex P istols T-shirt. I n its place was a finely cut suit that, while a li le outdated, still spoke volumes of his status. I f the clothing wasn’t enough, the scruff was gone from his face and his wild hair was neatly slicked back.

Nancy balked, but soon recovered. “Application for mentorship must be registered in the presence of the official chaperone.”

“So punish the original chaperone for failing in their duties,” Dante countered. “You can’t hold J ohn responsible, seeing how he’s not out of his acclimatization period. He hasn’t even had the rules presented to him, have you?”

“No, I haven’t!” John said, still entranced by Dante’s transformation.

“As I recall,” his would-be lawyer continued, “in the event that an assigned chaperone can no longer perform his or her duties, the responsibility passes to the nearest authority figure, which would be you.”

“M e?” Nancy spu ered, finally losing her composure. “B ut I have my own duties.

Chaperoning is a full-time engagement!”

“Day and night, around the clock,” Dante agreed. “S till, he’s a quick learner. I ’m sure he’ll be out of your hair in a few months. Unless of course—” Dante broke off meaningfully, eyebrows raised and waiting for Nancy to make the next move. I t didn’t take her long. I n a flurry of activity and whirlwind of technical jargon, she handed over papers to be filled out and signed. J ohn felt like a newly purchased appliance as his file was presented to Dante and they were pushed out the door.

Dante Stewart: 1,750 redemption points,
a voice manifested from thin air.

“We can spend those right away,” Dante beamed. “I didn’t know chaperoning paid so well. I wonder if that’s a weekly rate.”

J ohn stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, intending to demand an explanation, but lost his train of thought when he noticed that Dante had completely reverted to his first guise as an Irish punk.

“I recognize that expression,” Dante spoke before J ohn could. “You’re on the verge of going off your rocker. You want to know what’s going on, and rightly so. J ust keep it together for five more minutes so we can do this over a pint, yeah?” This was the best idea that John had heard all day.

* * * * *

Welcome to Purgatory.

This was printed with a flourish across J ohn’s file in a cursive font that wanted desperately to appear hand-wri en. J ohn stared at it, set the file down, and carefully drained half of his beer. The taste wasn’t exceptional, and the brew itself was room temperature instead of ice cold like he preferred.

“You’ve caught on quickly there,” Dante said with a nod. “Downing it is the only way to get plastered in this place.”

J ohn shook his head, refusing to be sidetracked by tangents of information.

“Purgatory?” he asked.

“Not a C atholic then?” Dante chugged his pint, motioning to the waitress for more while still guzzling from the glass. “S implest way to put it,” he began after a satisfied sigh, “you’ve got Heaven up above, you’ve got Hell down below, but what’s in between?”

“Purgatory?” John ventured.

“That’s right.”

“But, why?”

“For all the in-between cases. S ay you kill Hitler. Knifing the bastard to death is doing humanity a favor, but it’s still murder, right? O r maybe you run a li le kid over, and you honestly didn’t see the little brat until he was under your wheels.”

“Jesus! Keep your voice down!”

“Nothing taboo about death on this side of the curtain,” Dante said. “Anyway, you get my point, right? All those trouble cases, the ones too hard to judge either way, they end up here. So what did you do?”

J ohn considered the question while he caught up with his drinking. He had been no saint in life. He had carelessly broken more than one heart, and his teenage years were riddled with the usual self-destructive behavior, but he had long since left his adolescent anger behind. S lowly, over the last ten years, he had grown more considerate of others’ feelings and taken responsibility for his own actions. This, when added to his innocent childhood years, meant that he had been “good” for two-thirds of his life. He couldn’t remember any morally hazy events in his past, not like Dante had described.

“I don’t know. Why are you here?” John asked. “Any idea?” Dante waited until the waitress set their beers on the table and left before he answered. “M e? I saved a man’s life. A good man. O ne who commi ed his life to charity, helping others and all that bloody nonsense.”

“A priest?”

“No, I said a good man. All priests are good for is pu ing you to sleep with sermons or breaking in choir boys.”

J ohn grinned before considering what was really being said. “S o if you only made it here because you saved a man’s life, that means—”

“That aside from that one uncharacteristic deed, I was a very, very bad boy.” Dante’s dark eyes glimmered wickedly over his glass as he drank to his own decadence. For one brief moment, J ohn wondered if he wasn’t actually in Hell, having a pint with the devil himself.

“W hat did you do?” J ohn ventured, unsure if he really wanted to know. After all, this was his only associate in the afterlife. I t would be a shame to become repulsed by his new friend so soon.

Dante shook his head. “Funny. I thought you’d have more questions about Purgatory. Instead you’re giving me the third degree.”

“Fair enough. B ack to P urgatory. S o souls here don’t fit into Heaven or Hell.” J ohn’s mind raced, connecting the puzzle pieces of the day’s events. “S o we play games, earning points to go to Heaven?”

“I f you consider foiling fake bank robberies and helping old ladies across the street games, then yes.”

As if on cue, a patron at the table next to them began making choking noises while motioning to his neck. John stood to help, but Dante grabbed his wrist.

“Not tonight, kiddo,” he muttered. “Sit.”

J ohn sat, only able to relax because so many other people came to the choking victim’s aid. He watched as an ill-informed version of the Heimlich maneuver was performed by a Native American chieftain. O nce J ohn overcame his surprise at seeing the classical depiction of an I ndian, he noticed that the choking person’s face was just as nondescript and featureless as the bank robber’s had been.

“C rap like this happens all the time,” Dante complained. “Drives me mental. You can’t walk down the street without a Prop setting up a good deed for you.” J ohn’s blood rushed, partially because of his buzz, but also out of excitement. “Then it’s easy! How long can it take to work off a few paltry sins? I play the game, and before you know it I’m in Heaven!”

Dante shrugged. “I f you’re so eager to get there. M ight as well take a look in your file. I ’m going to get us another couple of beers. I think the waitress had her fill of easy reds for the night. That’s short for redemption points, in case you’re slow.” J ohn nodded distractedly as Dante left, full a ention on his file. The first page included a photo of him wearing the same jacket he was currently wearing. The short blonde hair in the photo was messier than he preferred, causing him to reach up and fix it self-consciously. As soon as he did so, the photo changed, reflecting the adjustment he had just made. He thought of Dante’s drastic change in appearance at the administration building and realized that this must be for security purposes. I f Dante could change from a punk into a cleanly shaven bureaucrat, surely others could also easily adopt disguises. Thus the need for instantly up-to-date identification.

Below the photo were a number of statistics with the qualifier of “upon demise.” Age: 28

Height: 5’11”

Weight: 165lbs

Build: Normal

He skipped down the list, bored with the details that he already knew. Further down the statistics became more interesting. Listed was the fluctuating spectrum range of his aura, the diameter of his psychic field, and even the average pulse rate of his chakras.

The numbers listed after each entry were nothing to him, since he didn’t have the slightest idea what they meant.

At the very bo om of the page, in large bold text, were the meager 146 redemption points he had earned since arriving in P urgatory. B elow that was the amount needed until graduation, which was currently just under 100,000 points. J ohn did some quick mental calculations. E ven if he only managed to earn 100 points a day, that meant he would have to spend 1,000 days in P urgatory, somewhere close to three years. That wouldn’t be too bad, really. B e er than the eternity in the fiery pit that his grandma had always threatened him with.

And that was only the minimum of 100 points. He had already earned 146 by pure chance. I f he really applied himself, he would be out in no time. B ut where exactly was he going? He was sure it would be Heaven, but he couldn’t imagine what existence there would be like. B lue skies and clouds maybe, and every pet he had growing up, even the turtles. R elatives too, and angels, maybe even G od himself. The thought, or more likely the beer, made his head swim. The idea was too much to consider, so J ohn returned his attention to the file.

He flipped to random pages, noticing that dozens were passing by even though the folder appeared to contain at most ten pages. He played with this phenomenon, watching the pages whiz by until he was sure that they numbered in the hundreds. He stopped on a random page and read:

“Despite the promise of paternal assistance to the extent that a specific time and date had
been set, subject proceeded to rebuke responsibility, engaging in subterfuge involving the
avoidance of communication and intentional deception during three subsequent physical
intercommunication sessions.”

J ohn’s brow furrowed as he reread this paragraph. He mu ered a grunt of gratitude when Dante placed another beer in front of him and sipped it while scanning the text a third time. His increasing drunkenness might partially be to blame for his confusion, but there was no doubting the amount of technical jargon and run-on sentences.

“Find something juicy?” Dante inquired.

“I ’m not sure,” J ohn responded. “I think it’s talking about the time I promised to babysit my sister’s kid, and then blew it off.”

“I f you farted and someone else had to smell it, it’s in there. Don’t sweat the details.

There’s no pop quiz at the end of your time here. All that matters is getting reds.”

“Seems pretty straightforward.”

“I t is.” Dante’s words were beginning to slur. “This is the new system, the humanitarian way. I n the old days they used to burn the sin out, or so I hear. O ld J acobi could tell you things. He’s been here for ages. S tories that make your skin crawl.”

J ohn wasn’t particularly sure he wanted to hear them. W hat he needed to do, once his head was clear again, was to focus on working his way out of P urgatory. Hopefully Dante could help him in this regard, since he was now his chaperone.

“Better drink up,” Dante warned. “We don’t have much time.”

“I’m already tipsy.”

“Not for long. Drink! I promise you won’t have a hangover.” J ohn drank the rest of his beer, warily sizing up his new friend and wondering if there was a reason for the encouraged intoxication. W hat did he have to be afraid of? I t wasn’t like Dante could rob him, and even if he could, J ohn barely had any reds to call his own. Aside from that, he was already dead, so he couldn’t be murdered or harmed.

Could he?

“S o, dead means we’re okay, right?” J ohn was struggling to arrange his words. “I mean, you can’t get beaten up or anything. Right?”

Dante looked amused and opened his mouth to reply, but a voice from the air interrupted him.

Dante Stewart. Intoxication. 78 point demerit.

“What was that?” John managed to say before the voice spoke again.

John Grey. Intoxication. 78 point demerit.

Instantly and without warning, John was completely sober. He looked questioningly to Dante, who rolled his eyes.

“That’s all you get. Half an hour of fun before they cut you off and hit you with demerits. Kind of makes you wonder if we’re really in Hell, huh?” He pushed himself from the table. “I’ll get us another round.”

“No,” J ohn said quickly, glad for the sudden sobriety. “L ook, what I really want to do now is focus on getting out of this place.”

Dante sat back down with a sour expression on his face. “S o you want to graduate and go where, exactly?”