"And this is the body of Christ, which will be given up for you."
The memory of Father Mahoney, his mighty voice echoing throughout the walls of old St. Viator church, was the single picture of God that Justin had. Amazingly loud to the seven-year-old, compassion and concern riding upon a soft lilting Irish accent, his was a voice of power.
Father Mahoney’s appearance nearly inspired as much fear as it did trust: every Sunday morning he stood upon the holy dais, staring out upon his flock with his large, steel-grey eyes, his wide back before a gigantic painting of the crucifixion. He wore a white robe with green embroidered Latin letters running down the front. Justin had asked his mother what the strange symbols meant. She had replied, "It says 'Lamb of God, You Take Away the Sins of the World.' And do you know what it means?"
At the time, he hadn't; his head shook side-to-side, the black hair flopping about like a pair of basset hound ears. His parents had only started taking him to church a few months prior.
"It means that Jesus gave up his own life so that we could go to heaven when we die. It was a great sacrifice he made for us; one he didn't have to make, but did. He loved us, as God loves us."
And this is the blood of Christ
Justin walked down the fleshy hallway, navigating its turns and straight passages. His
foot steps crunched softly upon the dirt ground; their tiny voices smothered, covered up by the
surging sound of pumping blood. It came from everywhere, all around—from the walls, the red sky above, the dirt; yet, the sound seemed small and thin, as if it originated from very far away.
Justin felt like he was in the intestines of a great giant, working in the meat tubing like a microbe breaking down digested food. He performed a necessary service, while the rest of the body worked in ignorance of his existence, the heart still beating, forcing blood to flow to the flesh that housed it. It pulsed somewhere beyond his sight. But it did not pulse for him. This lifeblood did not nourish his body. It beat for someone, something else.
which will be given up for you
During his mother's funeral, Justin sat and stared at Father Mahoney, who had stood next to the wooden altar, arms upraised as if pleading for God to grab him.
Justin studied the priest, his proud posture, his showmanship. He thought of a radiant hand, more blinding than the sun, reaching down from the clouds encircling the priest. The hand kept the priest safe from evil, protected by the might of God; then the grip became too tight, the blood cut off from Father Mahoney's head as his chest shattered inward, snapping the priest's ribs one by one, sending ivory shrapnel plunging into his heart and lungs. Justin heard the cracks, a sound that machine-gunned throughout his mind, reminding him of the sounds of metal and glass crashing in, killing his mother.
Then Father Mahoney smiling, his face glowing with rapture that traveled beyond orgasmic.
After the closed-casket funeral, Justin and his father stood next to one another during the internment. Father Mahoney presided again; the service was for the three of them only. The boy’s father wore his dress blue uniform; Justin wore his only suit: blue pinstripes, which made him look like a small stockbroker.
His father never cried, never emoted anything other than military steel; he was as sensitive as one of the ships he periodically sailed upon.
When the dark brown coffin was lowered into the moist Virginian earth, Justin imagined his mother within, her eyes opened wide, the orbits full of dark blood that ran from the corners like thick tears. She was still smiling, caked-on blood and shattered teeth exposed.
She was happy to be dead, Justin knew. Happier than when she was alive. Happier than when she was with Daddy.
These were his thoughts as he made a turn in the twisting maze of flesh … and saw Father Mahoney.
* * *
The priest stood wearing his sacramental robe with the familiar green letters. A small concavity in the wall housed him, as if the fleshy surface was afraid to touch the holy man. Justin had not seen him since the funeral. Once his mother was dead, his father had lost all interest in
religion, in God, in him. In everything but hatred.
Father Mahoney's eyes instantly said all that, said it silently. The grey eyes nearly wept with concern for what had happened to Justin's family, and especially to Justin. Wisdom beyond teaching gave the softly padded face and drooping jowls a strength it had not possessed in life. Father Mahoney, Justin knew, had died of a stroke two years after Justin’s fifth Dead Guy.
The hammer trembled, from fear or from hunger. Justin did not know which.
"Justin, it's me, Father Mahoney," the priest said, the words feathering from his tongue like silk against glass. "It is good to see you here in this, the most supreme church of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Come, kneel before me and receive the Word of God."
Justin looked around the priest, seeing only the several yards of distance the pulled-back flesh walls had surrendered. Red mud, a mixture of the brown dirt and blood from the living walls, formed the sticky ground. The scent of decay, of rot, was stronger here than in the passageways.
Father Mahoney had both arms raised, his hands red, stained. The white robe was streaked with blood. Crimson tears poured from both eyes and from numerous open wounds along his arms, face. He looked as if he were infected with leprosy, turning into a bloody beast.
"I know the Word of God, Father," Justin said, "The word is..." He stepped toward the priest and stood in front of him, feeling the warmth and glory of God emanating as a physical sensation from him. His hair tingled at the root as if the priest were electric.
"power."
The memories of the priest controlling all the people at mass like helpless sheep played rapidly, of how everyone stood, knelt, gave money, cried, sang, all at Father Mahoney’s whim. A power that God gave him.
Memories too, of the vapid look on his face when he’d laid his mother to rest, the words hollow, practiced, meaningless.
The priest's eyes closed as he channeled the might of God in order to bless Justin.
The claw hammer fell, bursting the priest's left eye on impact. Justin wrenched the tool free. The crack from the bone around the eye socket was beauty defined. It sent a stone current down his spine as he swung the hammer in again. It pierced Father Mahoney's skull downward into the sinus cavity. The priest twitched spastically. The legs of the body collapsed, bringing the entire red and white mass to the ground. Justin let go of the hammer. It remained in the skull, its soft oak handle striped red. The Dead Guy trembled automatically as the last currents of energy sent messages to all body parts, dictating a single message: I am dead.
The bowels sent a deluge of shit belching forth. Piss streamed out, staining the holy robes. A light blue liquid that Justin knew as cranial fluid seeped out the skull hole; dark red globs of meat that could only be mangled pieces of brain floated in the fluid. It pooled upon the dirt surface, forming a circle around the priest’s head like a bloody halo.
Justin bent down, grasped his hammer and managed to wrench it free again. It came up, brilliantly red in the crimson glow from his afterlife world. He held it aloft and stared. It was a crucifix: the steel head parallel with the soil, the hilt vertical. It was drenched in blood—blood from a life it had taken, a life that had been fastened to it.
Just like the original cross.
"Our father, who art in heaven..."
Justin heard the voice of the Dead Guy. It rustled with a fluid quality, as if it were choking. Drowning. He looked down and saw the ruined skull of Father Mahoney turn towards him. He was no longer a simple Dead Guy. He was Dead, and he was moving. The right eye locked upon his; the left socket was empty except for hot blood seeping out, the eyeball dangling from the optic nerve, swinging like a pendulum across his cheek. The mouth, teeth stained red, opened.
"Hallowed be thy name."
The voice that spoke during his mother's funeral, that spoke the Word of God, that looked and sounded and acted exactly as he had pictured God looking and speaking and acting.
"Thy kingdom come..." The bloody body began to stir, to sit up.
Rage filled Justin’s chest, eclipsed coherent thought from his mind. It rose from his stomach, a tightly clenched ball that felt as if it were devouring itself, dissolving his flesh, and radiating outward in all directions, cooking his lungs, making his breath hot and rancid.
His right hand held the hammer white-knuckle tight.
"Thy will be done..." Father Mahoney stood.
Dead Father Mahoney.
"On earth, as it is in heaven..." He reached out, hands dripping blood like stigmata, leaving crimson drops upon the ground. He stepped toward Justin.
The hammer shook.
The hatred, the fear, the power of rage was complete. Total. It seeped out of every pore of Justin's skin. Tiny rivulets of blood seeped from his ears, the corners of his eyes, his nose, anus. This is what God can do, he thought. This is His power.
there is more, Justin, there truly is ... and you are the One—the One we've been waiting for...
Yes, I am the One; the thought was clear as spring water, the truth of it, undeniable.
The hammer fell.
The steel head plunged into the ground. It stirred up a small mound of dust, then settled softly.
Justin looked at the priest, his own arms reaching out. He stepped forward.
They embraced, and everything made sense to Justin.
I am the One.
INTERLUDE: Faith
The bodies piled upon the banks of the door had returned to their ways of destruction, of struggle. The momentary pause had given them hope, had brought the long-forgotten thought of tranquility to their shattered minds. It was soon lost. Their great need, a desire that was the single element of existence for them, rose up. It dug its barbarous hooks and knife-sharpened claws into their sad, sad souls, and pulled. They must fight. Fight for the promise upon the dead winds. Fight for what is theirs, what was promised them when they were born, and when they died.
For what is theirs by right, for what life owes them, for what Death will pay them.
They just need to fight for it.
So the eternal battle began again—the rolling mounds of bodies, a tumult of limbs and blood, of screams and orgasmic moans. Nails digging into tender flesh, separating the skins and exposing tough muscle; teeth gouging out lumps of muscle to reveal ivory bone; fists pounding in, pummeling the bone to dust.
All so the cycle can continue.
Copyright 2000 Joseph Moore and Brett A. Savory
