Don't mind me, I'm just a son of a gun

Seeing something that wasn't Hell and not having to feel the incredible heat against my skin all the time felt like Heaven. There was actually a blue sky over my head with puffy, white clouds scattered all over it. Underneath my palms were grass and I had no idea I could even miss something I'd never even liked when I was... alive, I guessed. You came to Heaven or Hell when you died, so maybe I had really died when I'd made the deal with the Devil.

Anyway, it didn't matter - what mattered was the clouds over my head and the soft breeze playing with my hair. The air tasted sweet somehow, not as musty as it did in Hell. I finally had fresh air in my lungs and the feeling was almost like getting high - it felt just as damn good anyway.

I felt so light, as if I could fly, and when I looked down I realized that the grass had left my body and were several feet below me. Feathers seemed to have grown out of my arms without my knowledge, and I laughed. The laugh was like bubbles floating in the air, they had the same colour as bubblegum and it was just as sweet. I laughed more, couldn't stop the feeling of absolute happiness exploding in my chest.

I just felt so fucking free.

Suddenly something changed. A pit of darkness seemed to open up in the ground and suck everything it could get in it. Terrified, I tried to fly away from it, but my wings were gone and helplessly I fell to my fate.

"Oh Johnnyyy!"

Scattered laughter bounced in my head, people chanting my name. It felt like as if maybe - just maybe - I was a rockstar people were waiting for, longing for, but that illusion was shattered the second I managed to open my eyes. I wasn’t a rockstar; I was a caged animal in a zoo. Demons were walking by outside, almost causally in most cases, but everyone turned their heads when they passed me, grinning a soul-chilling smile and chanted. Maybe I would’ve felt how cold they made me if I had actually had a soul left. I was pretty sure that even if I had one it didn’t even belong to me anymore.

I looked at them, trying to seem as empty as possible. I had noticed that playing along to the tunes of the Devil’s violin made them kind of leave me alone, thinking I was completely broken. In fact, every punch and every bone breaking in my body made me even more determined to get out of there. I was going to get out so I could see Claire’s smile, feel her heartbeat in my ear, touch her fair skin. There was probably something wrong with me, since I’d gotten to see the other lost souls trapped in Hell now; most were either just laying with their backs against the bars, shaking, or they were making noises like madmen. I was the only one who seemed to be remotely okay, even though the Devil had been right. There was lots of ways for him to break me.

But my problem was that he didn’t break me. He and his demons were trying and I just put on an act to make it seem like they were succeeding. Maybe I was just more broken than he had estimated.

Everytime the bars were lifted I just got more determined to... survive. I planned everything in my head, looked it through a thousand times to see every little detail that could fuck anything up. The plan needed to be perfect, I couldn't allow the Devil more loopholes than he'd already found, if I wanted to get out.

So one day I was done and for move I was awake when demons started arriving. They seemed rather confused, so they walked by quietly. I barely glanced at those - my gaze were permanently glued to the hill where the Devil's throne were placed. Sooner or later he would show up and I wanted to be ready.

"You're making my boys worried, Johnny."

The thing with the Devil is that he doesn't even have to be there to be heard. He was nowhere to be seen but his voice were very loud and clear. I didn't think it was just in my head too, because all the lost souls tensed up and the demons seemed to stop and listen.

"Are you okay?"

"Yes, in fact I am", I replied with a huge smile on my lips. "I've never felt better in my whole afterlife! So whatever you did to me really must have worked, so thank you!"

I laughed at the confusion I created. For once I felt like I actually had some power, or at least like I had a chance to survive. I wasn't ready to give up yet, and for some reason my will to survive had just gotten stronger during all the time they had been trying to break me.

"What have you got for me today, you handsome Devil?"

For the record, I had no control whatsoever over my mouth anymore. It was smiling and talking on its own - I was actually terrified. But a part of me hoped that acting insane would grip the other lost souls out of their own insanity and join me somehow. I needed help to get out; of course I couldn't do it on my own. They weren't really where I were though, so I figured they could use some help.

The Devil laughed. "Your spirit is admirable, I give you that. You've lasted longer than anyone else so far. But I don’t see what you’re trying to achive, so maybe you can enlighten me?”
“Huh, I thought Lucifer meant carrier of light or something. Aren’t you light enough on your own or are you simply too emo to function?”

Was there a giggle? I couldn’t tell. All I knew was that I was on a roll and to be rolling in Hell you needed to be on fire, which I kind of felt like I was.

Suddenly the Devil himself showed up inside my cage, and he looked annoyed. “Do you think you’re funny? Because I have had enough of you now. What’s your secret, huh? How come you’re not like every other lost soul in here?”

“Oooh, I didn’t expect company! If I’d known you’d show up I would have cleaned up a little. I’m sorry for the mess that isn’t me”, I said with a giggle. He took me by the throat and violently threw me up against the bars. Of course I couldn’t breathe, but it didn’t really matter when you were kind of dead already. “So no foreplay then? I’m sensing you’re a top kind of guy…”
“I don’t get it.” The Devil was looking at me but I wasn’t sure that he was actually talking to me. He seemed frustrated and confused, and I loved knowing that that was my fault. “How are you still… alive?”
“I was making a sexual innuendo. A joke. Y’know, that you’re -”

Stars danced in front of my eyes when he bashed my head against the bars. I didn’t really look at it, but it felt like as if my head made the bars bulge like frying pants did in children’s cartoons. Maybe there was a Johnny’s-head-shaped buckle in the bars, maybe not. All I knew was that it hurt like hell.

He alone is stronger than all the demons I’ve fought so far. Oh dear, how did I expect to ever survive this?

“You’re supposed to be dead”, he hissed, staring at me with insane eyes. I thought I’d seen insanity in the junkies’ eyes, but this frenzy was way worse than the hell I thought I had seen people in.

“Well, I’m not anyway. Suck it up.”

My knee flew up to meet his crotch, making him doublefold and let go of me. I sank down to the floor and tried to see past the stars that was still dancing in front of my eyes. I had temporarily lost control of my own body and couldn't do much but just lay there and wait for the Devil to collect himself, lift me up by the collar and throw me so hard the bars broke and I flew outside. The ground was solid rock and hurt my everything when I actually bounced and rolled further away, and I only stopped when I hit the bars of another cage. I groaned when I forced myself to sit up and walook around; I seemed to be in a huge cave with smaller caves just like the ones I'd been trapped in up until now, and there seemed to be no end to it. There were even stairs climbing upwards.

Well, I'll be damned. I had no idea.

"How... dare... you..." The Devil walked towards me, all tall and impressive. His skin seemed to glow from a fire within and of course he freaked me out. I was just too stupid to act on it.

"I guess you can say I'm sort of a daredevil." I grinned and tried to get up on my feet, but he kicked me away again. Apart from the thuds I made when I hit the ground, Hell was for once really quiet. No insane screaming, no devilish laughter. Nothing. Everyone were keeping their eyes fixated on what went on at the bottom of the pit.

"You're supposed to be mine!" His voice boomed throughout every corner of hell, and somehow he seemed to have grown a bit. Maybe it was because I was still crawling on the ground. "What  makes you think that you can defy me?!"

"Nothing, really, I just happen to be this way. Although", I said when he lift me up by the collar and held me up way above the ground, "I think that maybe you underestimated me when I got in here. You said you could already break me more - guess what? You haven't. You failed. How does that feel?"

He gave away a close to animalistic scream and started to hit me very hard and rapidly. I couldn’t breathe, I felt really dizzy and my mouth tasted like blood. But yet I just laughed, because I had just pissed off the Devil and given back some of the frustration he had given me since I had gotten there.

“WHAT ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?!”

“I want to give you an offer, but I kind of need you to stop hitting me. Can you handle that, you think?”
“Is it about your freedom again? Because you’re never going to get out and you might as well fucking give up!” He threw me down into the ground at the end of the sentence, and I could literally feel the ground break underneath me. “You’re never going to succeed, you were a failure in your life as well, so why do you think things have changed down here? You’re nothing more than a disgusting cockroach that deserves to be crushed under my boot until not even one of its kind will recognize it.”

What he said was kind of true though, so cudos to him. It hurt being reminded of how I so easily gave in to stupid stuff and disappointed literally everyone I interacted to. I would never forget the shame I felt everytime someone looked so done with my bullshit, and how I straight afterwards shot up some more drugs into my system. I couldn’t stand disappointing everyone, but the problem was that I always did. A genetic fuck-up, that was what I was. I was so selfish I had no idea how to please anyone at all.

But things had finally started to change when the Devil came to get me, and I just didn’t want to abandon all hopes that I could never change.

“Yes, I’m totally disgusting. But I want a second chance because I really feel like I can do this. You see, I’ve learned that if you just sit on your ass all day, nothing’s gonna happen. You need to be creative and be willing to fight, that’s all.” I wanted to say that my body wasn’t so badly broken that I could stand up, but to be brutaly honest it was just pure willpower. I looked around me, looked at all those poor souls, and decided that it was time. “You all can do it! So please listen closely - I can’t do this on my own. But if you just help me win against the Devil… I will let you all free. I’ll figure out a way to do it but it’s time to fucking do something. WAKE UP!”

The Devil may laugh, but my words seemed to work as a wake up call for all the souls that could hear me. I wasn’t sure how many would be able to do that, but I could hear stomping and rattling as if they were shaking the bars and cheers. The laughter of the Devil disappeared as the confusion on the demons faces gradually got over their heads.

For once, noises in Hell didn’t sound like as if I was in an asylum.

“So what do you propose, young Johnny?” the Devil asked quietly with not even a hint of a smile on his lips.

“I want to fight you. If I lose, I’ll give up and just exist here forever. You can create the worst Hell possible for me and I’ll just suck it up, to use your own words. But if I win… you’ll let me and all these souls go.”

“Brave words for a weakling. And how do you intend to win?”

“I count on the lost souls to look out for me, because I know this won’t be fair in any way at all.”

He nodded, turned his back to me and started to walk away. “Let the game begin.”

“Behind you!”

The shriek made me turn around in time to notice an especially ugly demon run towards me, holding some kind of sword-like thing in his hands. I dodged him, pushed him so hard he lost his balance and took his weapon. The Devil seemed to believe that I wouldn’t last long enough to get to him, but with my weapon and the help from a thousand helpful souls I did quite well. I put down a few of his minions before he even turned around to look at me, and the surprised look on his face would be permanent as I had already jumped towards him and separated his head from his own body.

At first there was silence. Then there was a noise of screaming and cheering so loud I felt like covering my ears, but I stood in shock as I hadn’t realized what had happened yet. My gaze wouldn’t leave the head of the Devil laying in a puddle of blood on the ground, and my hand let my weapon go with a lot of clattering.

I thought you couldn’t kill the Devil. I guess I was wrong. Maybe he’s just strong, but not… immortal.

“Sir?” I looked up at the demon who spoke to me and I quickly jumped back. He held up his hands in a way that told me that he wasn’t there to fight me. “It’s not over yet.”
“What is there left…?” I said in a very weak voice.

“You must collect the crown of fire in the former chief’s quarters. Then you must either take his throne or hand it down to someone else, milord.”
I nodded. If I had started this I might as well finish it properly. “Can you show me the way, maybe?”
Walking through Hell felt… strange. The ground underneath my feet should hurt and make my skin burn, but nothing really happened to me. It felt like as if I was levitating, like I had done in my dream, but there was no wings on my back.

We walked down a couple of stairs and then he stopped and pointed even further downwards. “I’m not allowed to go further, sir. It’s just down there. Watch your step.”
“Thank you.” Highly confused that the demon didn’t make an attempt to stab me in the back I kept walking down, feeling the darkness close in on me. I walked in silence and prayed to anything that would listen that I wouldn’t slip and fall into the very core of the Earth, because I imagined that that of all things actually would hurt.

Suddenly there was light and a growling noise and I instantly raised my arms to cover my face. Fangs clamped shut around my arms and I started to yell. “Down!” was the first thing that came out of my mouth, and to my surprisement the beast actually let go. I let my arms down by my sides and looked at the whimpering dog that layed down before my feet. “That’s right”, I muttered as I proceeded into the room I assumed the dog was protecting. “I haven’t gone through hell to be stopped by a fucking bitch.”

The room looked like a typical study, with a large desks and lots of bookshelves. I looked at the papers that were stocked everywhere, and they seemed to be contracts with the Devil. Maybe mine was there somewhere as well. My thoughts wandered away to completely different stuff, like Claire’s smile and how great it would be to see her again, when I looked for the damn crown of fire.

It turned out to be a literal crown made out of actual fire. At first I was scared to touch it, but it proved to be fine. I brought it with me up all the stairs, finally being able to see more than my hand in front of my face, and it felt like as if it was way quicker to get back to the cheering souls and the beheaded Devil than it was to find what I searched for. I held up the crown and my own personal crowd cheered even louder, roaring out their joy.

“So what does Sir wish to do now?”

I looked down at the crown and tried to figure out what to do. This thing was my exit ticket, it would let me see Claire again, but… I felt so powerful. I had never really had any power when it came to myself and my own life, because in my early years my parents decided what was going to happen with me, and when I started to rebel against them the drugs took their place. The drugs were my lord and saviour, and I was never really allowed any control.

But was I really going to throw away my chance to finally have my own life for power?

I smiled and looked up to all the souls. They got quiet as they expected a speech, and I felt more insane than ever. “To be honest”, I said, “I never thought that this day would come. I thought everything was impossible from the second I sat my foot down here, in Hell. But, tell me something - why should you sinners be saved? You wouldn’t be free without me. I’m your leader, your saviour, your King. And I’m not ready to leave.”

I put the crown on my own head as the souls realized what I was saying and raised hell like insane persons inside an asylum again.

You would imagine that it takes time to make deals with poor, stupid humans and collect their souls, but it wasn’t. It came natural to me.
I simply took over every contract the former Devil had made himself, and it felt so good to be able to rip my own apart with my own bare hands. Either I was out in the real world, collecting lost souls, or I sat on my throne and pushed my demons to do such horrible things to the poor fuckers stuck down here with me. My minions seemed to enjoy having me as their leader, and I couldn’t give less of a fuck about the other souls. It was their own fault they were down here anyway, as it had been no one but my own when I put myself in the hands of the Devil, and I had been the only one who had stepped up and tried to do anything about it. They deserved every punishment they got, because I just wanted them to suffer as much as I had done my whole life.

I snapped my fingers and turned up onto the surface of the Earth. My location was an alley next to a huge street I faintly remembered from my time as a human. Maybe I was close to where I had lived.

But I wasn’t going to walk down memory lane - I was working, and a human being with a gross, beating heart was standing right in front of me. I cleared my throat to turn her attention to me, and if I still had a heart it stopped beating.

“...Johnny? What are you doing here?”
I shook my head and felt tears starting to fill my eyes. Even when she was blurry she was the most beautiful person I had ever met, and she still had the ability to break down all my walls and turn me human again.

“What have you done… Claire… what did you do…”
“What are you talking about? I haven’t seen you in fucking forever! Why haven’t you returned any of my fucking calls!?”

“How… how long…”
“Six months. You’ve been gone for six months.” She was quiet when the tears finally started dripping down my cheeks. “What is even going on, Johnny? I don’t understand…”
“Why did you have to go make a deal with the Devil?” I whispered and looked up at her. I wanted to hold her so fucking badly, but she seemed so… different somehow, and it broke my heart to see her in a time like this. I wasn’t supposed to - she was supposed to live happily ever after with some dude she loved and be surrounded by kids and loved ones, and just live.

“Why were you so fucking stupid? Why did you have to…” I couldn’t talk. My voice stopped working completely, so my words just trailed off into the distrance and I threw myself over her, holding her as tightly as I could. She still smelled like vanilla and flowers and reminded me of happier times.

“Johnny… how do you know I did that and what are you doing here? I still don’t understand…”
“I am the devil”, I whispered as soon as my voice could handle it. “I… I made a deal with him myself and I killed him… Claire I beat the devil… and took his place… why did you… Claire...”

She was silent for a moment, and then she put her arms around me. “I thought you were lost”, she whispered, “so I wanted him to bring you back to me… funny how the universe works, huh?”

I shook my head and grabbed her face with both my hands as I pressed my lips against hers. “You’re so fucking stupid”, I said through my tears. “You’re so fucking stupid Claire you shouldn’t have done that I love you so much I don’t… I don’t…”

“It’s okay”, she mumbled with a smile as she was touching my cheek gently with the sweetest smile I’d ever seen. “I mean, it can’t be that bad, right? I’ll get to see you every day…”

“You don’t know what it’s like down there.”

She kissed me and I shut my eyes shut as hard as possible and snapped my fingers. She was sent down into Hell and I fell to the ground, screaming out my heartache, feeling myself be ripped apart from losing her all over again.

Her private Hell was lying in a hospital bed, connected with a machine that wasn’t bleeping, with me sitting by her side, crying and she couldn’t do anything to help me.

Oh hell, I knew, because I was sitting there, by her side, every single damn day.