“What is the machine behind him doing, Father? I nearly fear to know its meaning.”
“And well you should, bastard. He also dreamed he had a son that looked just like him. He dreamed that this foolish puppet-son took over his wonderful ministry and propagated even more slimy lies. The son has always been here inside what is called The Mounting Machine. You and I know that this filth had no son, but it vexes this hideous, religious creature to no end to think that he was responsible for bringing him here. We are endlessly delighted. We have permanently fused — made one flesh forever — the son’s mouth over the spewing, splattering buttocks of the ancient, sweating father, and he feverishly grips all his father can give. Do you know the grief this must bring the father, to know the great gift he has bestowed on his son?”
The father was right. The son nearly never stopped laughing over that one. His satyr sides split like rotted leather and his empty sockets burst rusty clots. The veins on his forehead throbbed and bled profusely.
“Hey, wait, Father! He is not a Milling Murderer. He cannot go anywhere.”
“I know, isn’t that priceless?”
They laughed again until a century of leap years were past.
“Let’s go to another exhibit, my son. Even more horrible than this one, if it can be believed.”
“It cannot, my father, it surely cannot!”
In a smoldering pit — in the bottom of a cavern — there were two quivering corpses. Some would say they were dreaming the dreams of the dead. They had shivered for mere hours, but it seemed in their fevered dreams that billions and trillions of eons had passed.
Under this intense heat, the quaking dreaming shapes were becoming ash-colored mounds. And still they slept, unable to awaken, unable to cry out, unable (more horrible still) to cease their dreaming.
The dream they shared would go on and on and on and on…
The session was interrupted when one of the young students asked what these mounds were.
The old man laughed in the nude. “Oh, come now, you’re pulling my leg. Anyone can see what they are. Let’s get back to our story.”
“Of course. Yes, of course. Let’s.”
[Handwriting analysis has clearly determined that this next section was not part of the original manuscript. The Greek is modern, not Koine Greek at all. The consensus is that a vindictive writer put his/her enemies in this tableau as an older type of fiction known as “revenge literature.” But, having said that, the editors have determined that it should be included, because it is so much in keeping with the playful spirit of Infernus.]
Through a narrow archway they crept. The satyr was amazed when it opened into a wide dimly lit countryside. Nearly swallowed by the weak light of an orange moon, he could barely see a large grassy expanse that ran up to a cliff. He could hear waves crashing loudly below them and to their left. A wooden sign, covered with gray vines, was posted just outside the archway.
“Oh, Father, I cannot read the sign. It’s too dim in here.”
“Pick up a handful of hot coals from the corridor we just passed through and read it.”
He obeyed and asked, “Is it always this dim, Father?”
“Yes. You’ll know why in a moment. Look there.” He pointed a talon at a cold, orange globe that hung in the distant heavens. It seemed to hang in the sky long dead, glaring accusingly at them. “Do you see that, son?”
“The moon is waning here, making everything glow orange.”
“It is always orange here, my son, because that is the sun. And it has been waning for many thousands of years now.”
“Surely not, Father.”
“It is so.”
The son held the glowing embers in his hand calmly, for no heat of such small consequence could affect him. He brought it nearer to the sign until he could read it. The vines partly obscured the lettering, so he pulled the dry, cracking fingers aside. As they gave way, he could smell a musty aroma, like earth and wood. When the coal illuminated the sign, he saw, tucked deep inside the vines, a skull, cracked and gray. He thought he heard, coming from the center of it, a woman weeping softly.
“Father, there is a skull pushed back, entangled in the vines. It is barely lit by the light. Maybe it was never meant to be discovered.”
“Sometimes, you are so dull of wit that I wonder if there really is any hope for you.”
“Surely there is not, my father. Surely not. The sign says: ‘The Cliffs At Hintz-Balzer.’ Were these cliffs of historical significance?”
“No, for when the preacher and his accomplice, the village idiot, dreamed of another world, as they have for thousands of lifetimes by now, their beautiful murders were never discovered. So clever were they.”
A few yards away, there were shadowy blobs, pale in this light, involved in heavy, hurried activity.
The father said, “Approach softly and you will see their gorgeous pleasure-quest.”
What the son saw was a man lashed with tight leather straps to a wooden wheel, clothed only in an opened long coat, completely exposing his nakedness. Seven or eight dwarves swarmed ceaselessly over his face and lower extremities. His eyes were punched with such force by two or three of them, that from a distance they could hear the smart thuds and bones cracking.
“But, Father, I cannot see — oh, Father, they are chewing off his… his genitals. I can see that the eyes and lower extremities heal instantly, then they, oh, Father, no man could ever-”
“It isn’t painful to me,” the demon said, “so it doesn’t concern me.”
“And near his feet is the head of a Neanderthal. A brute. Like the head of a gorilla. With its brain exposed.”
The son saw that in their haste to pound the man’s eyes into oblivion, and their failure at it, and the chewing of his lower extremities, they often stepped into the soft, green sick brain. It cursed and cursed and wished it could reach them. Every filthy thing spewed from its mouth, but it had no calming effect on the dwarves.
“But, Father, it can’t talk if it is only a head. The voice box would-”
“Beneath the ground is where the rest of its nearly seven-foot frame exists. Be silent and I will tell you of their dream they believe was their world before.”
The son fell silent, eager to discover the answer to this enigma.
“When that world was not so old,” the father began, “the preacher cut a handsome figure in his long waistcoat and lengthy, straight black hair. No one ever suspected he had an accomplice in town, for they could not have been more different.
“This head believed he was the village idiot, and was never called anything other than ‘the ape, Jerrod.’ His heavy brow only caused the primitive villa to hate him more and fear him. He was never allowed to mix with the townsfolk or date their women. He was frequently chased through the streets by children throwing rocks at him and shouting, ‘Go up, you ape! Go up!’ He slept in barns and wept piteously.
“Every year a fair came to town and they loved it. But one year a very different wagon appeared. Its outside was painted bright oranges and reds, and was a festive wagon indeed. The occupants were dwarves, seven or eight in all. They put on plays, sang songs and played many wild instruments that delighted everyone in town, except one individual. The preacher was jealous of the people’s love for them, and became adamant with Jerrod the ape that they were cursed by God, and their small shapes were a sign of their accursed nature. He told the monster ape that it would be a grace to God if they were stolen away at night, locked in their wagon, and driven over the cliffs to be dashed on the rocks below.