By Christopher Chance ©2021
The night is coming in fast as the evening light fades to complete darkness with the coming storm. I keep stretching my body to get a look at the last glimmer of daylight and the falling snow through the cell window. I become mesmerised as the snowflakes settle on the coils of the razor wire mounted on the high walls of the prison. The lightning creates strange momentary visions of prisoners that were here before me, and their last messages on the walls that faded long ago. I put down the small journal I’ve decided to write in order to help my mind and body to survive; the light slips away and it is hard to write anyway. Now I’m left with this horrible ache of what I anticipate will be the beginning of my insanity. My mind screams, why am I HERE?
I am disheartened to see the shadows dance across the bleak countryside through the wire and my spirits fall to a new low. The silence in between the loud snaps of thunder screams into my ears, as I realise it is my screams that compete with the thunder that wins and fades out into the night; screams that no one hears, or if they do they don’t care.
“God, you must be pissed with us tonight?” I whisper, as the deafening crack of crashing thunder shakes the window, and again the lightning illuminates the dank cell walls like an evil disco strobe light as the torrential rain washes away the snow.
Even the name of the prison sounds ominous. Daroca. Say it to yourself. Daroca. It’s not a nice word is it?
“Daroca!” I scream again and again. I laugh as I realise it goes well with the bleak landscape and the raging storm. Is it thunder or the distant screams from the dark cells housing very dangerous men?
Most of the inmates here have committed the most atrocious crimes, and here I am sharing my space with cannibals, child sex killers, murderers, and rapists. Men who should have been put to death for their barbarism are just on the other side of these urine-stained walls.
That smell still fills the air with their internal evil. My prison cell is my safe haven, or so I thought.
I climb into what they call a bed, as the night envelopes the prison and the volume of the rumbling thunder increases. Pulling the dirty stained blanket around me to get some warmth and comfort I listen to the sound of the night in this evil place – thinking about my day and the people I now share my space with in this dark corner of the world as I try to slip into the welcome escape of sleep.
A face looms into my thoughts – an eerie calm face, with bushy eyebrows over large ice-blue eyes. He stares at me across the dining table in the comedor (canteen), his eyes cut right through me as if he is elsewhere, but he just keeps staring. He reminds me of a wild Arctic Husky dog with his salt and pepper hair, ice-blue eyes, intense stare, and the way he eats the meat, tearing into it as if he had not eaten in weeks, and grunting with sounds of great satisfaction that are almost sexual.
I have a strange realisation. I’m breathing the same air of a man who ate his wife – very slowly, a finger, a toe, arm, leg – as she still lived, and then slowly cutting her open to take slices of her liver and kidneys – a cannibal – and here he is within touching distance, chewing on a piece of meat and looking at me! A sub-human that is pure evil! My mind wonders if, like a virus, I too could become this monster by just breathing in close proximity to this cannibal.
Oh wait – he’s talking to me now, as he prods his food with his plastic fork.
“This is my wife’s arse, sliced thinly and cooked rare.” He grunts then pokes another piece, “This piece here is the first slice of her breast. Look how beautiful it is with the nipple in the centre, cooked exquisitely in butter. I would offer you a piece, but she’s too precious to share – especially with an Englishman such as you.”
My stomach turns over and I swallow my own bile, as the nausea sweeps over me and I stem the urge to puke. Bizarrely, this is the moment I felt great sorrow for a woman I never knew. Even more strange is that he devours everything put in front of him thinking it is his wife he is eating. He would not have been caught but for the police finding her fingernail at the bottom of the freezer. After she finally died he then butchered her into sizeable chunks ready for the frying pan or the oven. I wondered what he did with her bones. Why did I think that? His name is Emilio, the Spanish wife eater.
Sitting at the table in this insane canteen my hunger dissipates as I realise who I share Hell with. I am surrounded by evil and wonder if this is some kind of sinister, satanic ambush. To my right is a young man who calls himself Julio. He chopped off his uncle’s head with a Samurai sword. He chats amiably to the man next to him who raped and mutilated his thirteen-year-old niece. Thirteen was unlucky for her, and especially considering the length of time it took for her to die, after being raped and her nipples ripped out with a pair of pliers and her genitals torn apart by secateurs.
I could continue describing the creatures around me, but it would become unbearable for me to go on and survive even my own mind. Is this kind of evil catching? Will you doubt my word? There is, however, another I can’t leave out of my notes. A necrophiliac who killed his child victims and sexually assaulted their little dead bodies until the stink of decomposition necessitated burial. He calls himself Brujo – the Warlock.
The storm is now a tempest and the thunder is reminiscent of ice cracking across a pond but a million times louder. The lightning is alarming and illuminates my decrepit cell, giving me the forlorn feeling that it’s heralding the arrival of something evil and malevolent.
I can hear Herbie the giant cockroach scratching the floor under my bed as he searches for food, and beneath that I hear the susurrations of the sleet and rain as it runs in rivulets down my cell window. Sleep eludes me. My brain is surrounded by thoughts of evil. The thunder and lightning just gets louder and louder and it seems the lightning strikes are inside my cell, just missing me.
WHACK! Again and again, crashing thunder shakes the window and lightning illuminates the walls, but now brighter, showing photos and a calendar in stark detail. I turn to look at the calendar hanging there. A black cross is drawn on 14th February.
“Oh bloody hell! It’s Saint Valentine’s Night. My missus will be heartbroken. I didn’t send her a Valentine. Oh, Christ almighty!”
The thought occurred to me that I should make one for our wedding anniversary. Feeling guilty and depressed over the Saint Valentine’s card I hear the large cockroach noisily crawling around the cell floor looking for food that isn’t under my bed. Funny I can still hear him above the thunder. How is that possible? I tried to clean the floor today and it did look better. I tried to clear the stench of shit and urine that is now part of the cement. The cockroach, still looking for food, seems to be unafraid of me as I look down on him.
“Hello Herbie, I must have upset your meals today, sorry. Look at the storm hey – looks like we won’t sleep tonight mate.”
The muffled sounds of the screams of madmen are barely audible through the thick walls, but they are there – the storm taking its toll on the warped minds of my fellow prisoners.
I feel sleep is finally starting to close around me so, like a baby I curl into my foetal position before taking a last look outside. I can see condensation on the glass fogging my view of the night sky through the bars of the cell window. The pale glow of the sodium security lights shine through the rain onto the cracked glass creating a ghostly shimmer, as I slowly fall into welcome peaceful sleep.
Or so I thought! Damn! My heightened sense of imagination plays havoc with my mind’s eye, as again I open my weary, sleepy eyes and peer through the glass. The rainwater distils what seems like two shimmering points of light, which slowly change colour to that of red, glowing, piercing coals. Pinpointed in the centre of each red glow is a glittering diamond, which form the eyes of Satan. He is here, hovering over Daroca prison – sinister, hostile and threatening.
His murky features take shape and form with the movement of the outside cloud and the upward glow of the stark prison light. El Diablo is here, spreading his evil shadow on the netherworld of the hell called Daroca. A numbing sensation sweeps over me, paralysing me with a feeling of total helplessness as the fetid face looms nearby. His fangs move as though gnashing his teeth and every sinew of his monstrous form drips with evil. I realise he has come for me… ME!
An evil silence descends. I freak out internally and choke on the scream that won’t come out. It’s as though I am lying face down on a waterbed that has suddenly flipped over suffocating me with its weight. The terrifying emotion of stress and panic creates a feeling of intense heat across my back followed by ice under the hot skin. My arms and legs feel like they are covered with raspberries because of the size of the goose bumps. I am frozen with fear as I feel his force searching my soul.
“My God and His son Jesus Christ are in there; now get ye behind me Satan!” I scream. The prayers spill out of me, the fear intensifies and the terror gnaws into my heart as the evil looks over me trying to consume me. I cannot move.
“Of all the evil in this place why are you here for me?” My screams now blend with the thunder – loud, deep, cracking – the beating of my heart grows louder and louder. My heart races as the monster’s evil face slowly descends toward mine.
“Why me? Why me?” I cry as my mind races back in time seeking a reason for this catastrophe.
The kaleidoscope of visions slows to a halt just where Satan wanted it to – now I am on the deck of the yacht Harlekin somewhere in the Mediterranean Sea several years ago. Another nightmare on top of the one I am already in. A davit swings out over the stern with a body hanging from it, hands and feet tied to a rusty old anchor. A deckhand lowers it into the sea and completely submerges it for a minute before cranking it back out. He leans over and rips off the gag. The spine-chilling screams coursing out of the doomed man will remain with the crew members forever. A reminder not to be seen talking to a policeman. The screaming man was again slowly lowered into the sea cutting off the screams. Moments later he was raised again to scream for all he was worth, until eventually being released to plummet to the sea bed strapped to the old anchor. I was witness to that man’s death, ordered by the boss – a Dutchman who hates police informers, because four of his crewmen received long prison sentences due to the dead man’s low cunning and deceit.
It seems now is my turn to pay for my sins and that rusty old anchor is coming my way. My chest feels crushed as if an anvil is in there slowly pressing harder and harder. My insides start to pop, my stomach starts to liquefy as those horrible lips descend to touch mine; and then a hoarse, guttural sound – words and weird noises, a garbled message telling me to be calm.
“That heavy anchor is not for you Christopher, though you do deserve it because you didn’t try to stop it. No, I need you just for me. It is many centuries since I had a Christopher just like you; a being who can soothe me and praise me just like you do with the other monsters.”
“What other monsters?” I hear myself reply.
“Jesus, Mary, God the Father. He’s not your father. He’s nobody’s father. You have prayed to them all for years and what have you got in return? Nothing! You are here because the Angel Gabriel guided you here.”
“Why would he do that?” I asked.
“Because he knows you are mine and he will fight me for you.”
The sounds from Satan’s lips change to a whining, purring sound, like that of a wild cat-like creature, as he closes his lips on mine and whispers.
“Come, feel me. Join my soul where I can love you like no other, my beloved Christopher. You don’t really know the monster in you yet. Kiss me. Kiss me.”
I tense with trepidation as his lips cover mine and immediately relax as they mollify me with their softness. I feel a strange, exciting sensation as his tongue seeks mine and the excitement intensifies beyond anything I’ve ever experienced. His honey-tasting tongue slides further down my throat igniting powerful, erotic sequences of delight, and I feel the electricity in my loins that wants to explode with pleasure. His kiss like no other induces affectionate feelings of Svengali charm and seduction.
I am amorously smitten by him and totally bewitched, but something in my mind is warning me to back off. A shock, like a bolt of lightning, brings me to my senses but I fear it is too late as Satan draws me further in and he whispers in my ear.
“You’re not strong enough to withstand the storm.”
Then I shout back into the Devil’s ear.
“I AM THE FUCKING STORM!”
My lips, teeth and tongue melt and flow down my throat – then my nose, eyes and face are drawn into the space between Satan’s dribbling lips as the rest of me enters the place of fallen angels. I am on my way to hell. The noise is like nothing I’ve ever heard before – akin to prehistoric beasts bellowing in savage combat as they tear each other apart, mixed with a clatter of giant cymbals echoing in my molten ears. A vision appears above me with Satan ferociously attacking the Angel Gabriel. A great swirl of fire and smoke engulfs the two combatants and I am alone and moving at great speed.
Thoughts elude me on this journey to hell, as ghostly unrecognisable faces flit through my vision, distorted by the raging turbulence of evil wrath. Suddenly the aroma of sulphur and volcanic ash are in my senses as another world begins to appear, with horizons and oceans and tsunami giant waves crashing over seemingly flaming seas – but no sign of life, just a maelstrom of exploding energy.
Suddenly I find I have the power to think for myself again and realise that Satan is not a being but a parallel universe and I am helpless within it, hurtling around encased in a capsule of invisible energy powered by Satan. I am orbiting his world.
The distorted faces again come flitting through my vision and I sense something familiar about some of them as they are whisked away in the opposite direction to me. One of them has a vague resemblance of my grandmother and similarly others like my uncles and friends who died long ago.
In my terrified mind I reached out to catch one of them; a woman, a beautiful woman, of such beauty I could not believe my eyes. I realised she has passed me several times during this passage around Hell. She slipped away giving me a sad smile. I knew I would see her again because she was orbiting in the opposite direction to me. I will be prepared next time.
Myriads of mountains are spewing flaming lava as I pass above them. The air I breathe is getting hotter and the burning feeling of hopelessness and distress grows stronger from gazing at these distorted faces.
The beautiful woman comes near and I manage to catch the invisible bubble in which she travels. I now experience telepathy for the first time as she speaks to me.
“Touch my husband Emilio with your little finger when you see him. I ripped off my little fingernail when he put me in the freezer. He butchered me when I was frozen but I knew they would find the fingernail. He is the cannibal at your dining table.”
“Why are you here, circling hell?” I asked.
“We are in purgatory awaiting entrance to paradise.”
Suddenly a beautiful sound – a sound like no other – was heard as she was whisked away before I could reply. It was at that moment I heard the sound of a key in a door and the crashing sound of a great bolt opening a metal gate. I could see an enormous sun rising beyond the horizon with a light so bright I thought it would burn out my eyes.
“Recuento, recuento! (counting!)” Shouts the prison officer as he performs the final head count of the day. He opens all the prison cells one at a time to check the inmates are alive, or dead. His voice and bright light dissipates the evil red eyes of Satan who is gone in a flash. In his accented English, Don Gabriel the duty prison officer speaks to me.
“Good night Christopher, the storm has gone. Sleep well. You are still under my wings Englishman.”
He slams the big steel door and noisily crashes the massive bolt home as he goes to chase the demons from the minds of his inmates in the cells on his wing of the prison. I look under my bed to see Herbie the cockroach looking back at me.
“That was the Angel Gabriel, the angel in a prison officer’s uniform.”
At breakfast I asked the man opposite if he was Emilio?
“Si,” he replied, “por que?”
I shook my head and answered, “Nada,” as I touched his hand with my little finger. His look was one of terror as his heart stopped and I knew that the Devil had returned for his new recruit – one he did not have to kiss.
That night as I lay in bed I smiled as the screaming began in my neighbour’s cell. The Devil had come for Emilio.
I looked for Herbie the cockroach and he was nowhere to be seen. It was at that moment I realised I have something the Darkness could not take from me. My soul.
Book can be ordered via www.strandpublishing.co.uk
