Covenant: The enemy of my enemy...
Los Angeles International Airport:
Two friends sit together at a corner table looking into their cooling off coffees.
"You sure about getting on that plane James"?
"Positive, I gave up my life here, it's all yours David".
"With the Sadist waiting out the competence hearing that we all know he's going to fail there isn't much need for the Roman now James".
"So you'll what"? "Just hang the suit in your closet and go back to the agency then"?
"Maybe". "Yeah, maybe I'll do just that.
"David don't be ridiculous, you're hooked into this lifestyle like a junkie, you'd no sooner hang up that goofy outfit as stop breathing air".
"James, you have to believe me I had no intention of leaving you with no where to go, I never thought you'd be so unwilling to accept your own limitations at that time". "When we went after that crazy in the apartment complex we where there for the same reasons".
"Not the same reasons".
"James look me in the eyes and tell me you didn't want him just as dead as we all did".
"Wanted him dead, of course, after Archer...my marriage, the booze...everything, yeah I wanted him dead but want and willing aren't the same, I always wanted him locked up that was the point".
"Well we're even with the tazer issue now". "Right..."?
"Of course David, I never would have done it if I hadn't known your armor was up to the punch, and I knew you'd have never done time with your connections, much less them passing the "super hero" law here in California".
"Yeah...with us being "registered and legalized" to "meet the growing criminal threats in the metropolitan areas" you flying all the way back to New York seems a waste".
"You can have James Stabler David, Archer can see his famous father in the papers and you get to play dress up, I don't want the L.A. experience anymore, you can have nostalgia over being a team, I don't need a team, I need to be back in the grit of the Big Apple again".
"And your military friends"?
"They said they're gonna freelance the whole damn nation, I have their numbers, just like I have yours David, we'll keep in touch I'm sure, small community and all".
"Speaking of numbers and calling, James I'm sorry for...for your situation". "If you'd have been more clear as the numbers of them and the situation involved I'd have come out there as well". "You know...".
"Stop right there David, I had backup didn't wait for it, that's not your fault and as far as my "situation" I couldn't be happier". "Yeah I know that sounds odd, but let's face it how many of our kind get the chance to fight evil on its terms and with its powers"?
"Only a few crazies I know".
"Well David count me in with them now". "I wont regret what happened, not now".
"Can you...can you control it"?
"Perfectly, oh it's taken some handling and I've had a few embarrassing moments, but I've got it down now, it doesn't happen unless I will it to now".
"And them...you don't feel the need to...".
"To what David, go off and howl at the fucking moon with them". "No...no sir not one bit". "If their entire society is like what I ran into I'll seek to destroy it in it's entirety, as a matter of fact that's part of what's got me in a hurry to head back".
"Oh"?
"Got intel on a pack running in Ohio, gonna hit home long enough to touch bases with Raveness and then I'm off to Ohio".
"Funny her choice to move out there now as well".
"Not really we lost a lot of our people out there when it all hit the fan and became legal, plenty of work out there, not so much out here".
"So you and her...".
"No". "Nothing of the sort, after you told her I was the one who saved her she contacted me and we got to talking, it might be there on her side but that's just hero worship, I wont build a relationship off of that". "Anyway she's nearly 20 years younger than me, it would be weird".
"I've seen weirder James, trust me, and not so long ago either".
"Speaking of weird, what happened to your little genius protege"?
"Agency has him, probably knee deep in needles being questioned about China and his involvement with the killings of the Sadists family members".
"You think he'll see the light of day ever again"?
"James I've known that kid for a good long time, if he can get it together I have a feeling we'll all be seeing him very soon, and if he doesn't we may still see him again...very soon".
"Whu...".
"I know the agency and I know how they respect assets, that said I know what the kid is capable of, the agency still lives in the prime material world, they don't get the internet, they don't know what it's capable of, if the kid gets a few moments alone with a terminal...who knows".
"Comforting".
"No one ever said this world was build on comfort James".
An automated voice begins reading off boarding plane information.
"Well that's me David, thanks for the coffee and the ride, like I said we'll be in touch I'm sure".
"Alright old friend, but before you go, just remember I never wanted or expected things to end up this way James".
"Don't worry about it David and from now on remember, you're James Stabler...from now on you can call me Ulvbane".
"Catchy, some sort of an abbreviation".
"No David, my father's language look it up sometime".
"Will do old friend, safe flight and good luck".
"You too...old friend".
An every day man waves as his friend boards the commercial jet, he stands alone at the long glass window. "Beware of stray dogs James, be safe". The every man whispers to the glass in an almost fathering tone.
Baracoa, Cuba:
Filthy hands, crusted with the dirt and grease from the mechanics garage, the kind of impacted grit that the Lava soap doesn't even get all the way off. Filthy hands pressing into the small of her back, the filthy hands one on her forehead the other over her mouth.
The smell of dirt and sweat, the misuse and the shame are as vibrant in the smell of the stale cigarette smells of those filthy hands. Those hands, his hands, hands she knew so well she could draw them from memory even now. Hands that had hurt her in ways that left dark pits where a childhood should have been.
The weight, the terrible weight and the impending moments leading up to what always happened. She moans and whimpers both in her dream and in her sleep. It's dream memory, it clues us in on certain things, she must be thirteen or fourteen, she's buried alive in her own pillows and comforter, gasping for air with his filthy hands on her forehead and over her mouth.
The conscious thoughts flow at times like this, she dreams and remembers thinking how odd it was, always the same routine. His left hand on her forehead pulling her head back painfully, his right hand over her mouth. She'd stopped trying to scream or cry out years ago, but still that hand finds her mouth like a moth finds a porch light.
She knows she's thirteen at least because that's when he started making her lay on her stomach, it's when he started shoving it in back there instead. That's what he's doing or trying to do right now. She gasps in her dream and in her sleep. There's no warning anymore, there's no tears or apologies after wards anymore. Why should there be, this isn't their first Rodeo and she whimpers in her sleep because she knows this wasn't the last dance either.
He finally gets it hard enough, he finally finds the right spot, she moans through his hand as his dick knifes into her asshole with drill precision. Gotta give it to the ole' man once he found it he was always good to go until he was done. The pain and the shame of it all come rushing in, vivid dreams are for sunny days doesn't God know that. Vivid dreams aren't for things like this, her dreams have been hell for more than a decade and there is NO ESCAPE.
This one goes on for the usual amount of time, but it drags on like dream eternity. The ole' man wasn't into softer moments, not for his daughters no sir. Every thrust starts from somewhere back in left field and pounds forward until she swears her head is going to explode. As the tension builds inside him they don't get faster they just get harder. His filthy hands tighten, her mouth feels crushed under his might, the hand that had held her forehead retreats to her scalp and collects an ever tightening wind of her hair.
She always wondered if he pulled her hair to help her forget what he was doing down there, or if it just helped him finish. She was always thankful for good mattresses, the Ole' man never pinched pennies. Not since the "incident", she was eight and he was doing it to her like he used to and the bed started squeaking. Mother knocked at the door asking me what I was doing on my bed so late at night. It was the instant pleading look in his eyes that allowed her to make her self a full accomplice in her own misery. Those haunted eyes of his at that one moment, she could draw those free hand just as easily as his hands. "I was jumping on the bed Mom, I'm sorry, I'll go to bed now". Her mother said good night and turned off the hall light as the ole' man got off and collected his things, just like...just like having the wife almost catch you with your mistress.
She knew it then, she had power in it, she could use it like he used her body, and she did, she was her fathers whore and since she didn't think there was anyway to stop that she made certain the ole' man always knew she'd seen his eyes like that. But that was eight and this was thirteen and at thirteen the ole' man had a new favorite whore.
As his hand dug ever tighter into her scalp and the thrusts became as deep as they ever would. As his filthy hand pinched her chin. As he exploded inside her asshole, Hanna could only remember thinking one thing in her dream. At least it was her and not her sister tonight. The ole' man would pretty much HAVE to sign her school field trip and let her sleep over at her friends house this weekend. She'd bought that much with her body.
The thought dug in her gut and wrenched her awake. Hanna came awake nearly flailing from the bed she shared with Randal. The rough yet some how soothing (to her) sound of the sin eaters voice came from the other side of the bed. "Hanna, just a dream, he can't hurt you now".
She settles back down, restless but unwilling to disturb him until he falls back into a deep sleep. She only dares to shimmy out of bed when she knows he's out cold again. She reaches for her sandals and her handbag. Stupid...stupid habit, stupid timing, stupid thing to be hiding from a man who she knows wouldn't care about something so trivial. But after that she needs something to calm down with at 3 am in Cuba a million miles away from the warn out bed and those filthy hands.
She doesn't bother slipping past Big Boy, the old spook always knows when anyone else is up anyway, he's sitting in front of the cripples computers still fruitlessly digging for information on where the mouth breather ran off to. Who cares, these last few weeks have been bliss without the constant bee hive drone of that voice box constantly accusing, or arguing, or speaking sweet words of "she who cannot be named".
"Indulging in bad habits...nurse"?
He knew she was in the room before she'd even exited the hallway from the bedrooms. Cool but creepy.
"Oh you know me big boy".
"Mind if I join you".
"Nope, but you're buying the next pack at the rate yer bumming them off me".
They find themselves out in the cool early morning breeze, overlooking the beach and the vast expanse of the surrounding Caribbean sea.
"Another one of the dreams of yours"?
"No, just thought I'd get up and smoke at 3 in the morning, after that I'll go make some waffles".
"You're starting to get his sense of humor".
"I'll take that as a compliment Big Boy".
"It was meant as one, in a way".
"Any more information on where Para ran off to"?
"News wires just released the details on the capture of the Sadist". "He was there I know it, I just don't know why the Sadist is still alive, would have bet money the kid would have torn him limb from limb".
"Anything from the junkie in the cell"?
"What, the ole' green spider"? The big man belches out a laugh between drags.
"Why don't we just put him on a plane and send him to prison along with the Sadist"?
"SE thinks he and Para are involved, you know that". "As long as there's a chance of it, we have to talk to Para on our own terms with that freak around to squeal his side". "We need to gauge just how crazy Para is Hanna".
When he figures he wont be getting any more conversation out of her big boy flicks his smoke out to the beach and heads back in. A few more hours on that infernal machine and maybe he'll exhaust his mind enough to give up and catch a nap for a while.
Rome, Italy:
Eyes more foreign than the local populace have coveted the odd couple who only hours ago exited a plane from the United States. The tall lean man who looks to all the world to be a blues singer mindfully holds the hand of the white blond woman who looks something like a soccer mom as they cross the street.
"I'd always wanted to see Rome, I can't believe I'm here, and I can't believe I'm on some crazy mission to find an immortal with the spirit of the brother of Jesus floating around in my head".
"You believe me miss, it wont be the oddest thing you've had to come to terms with or stand up against before this thing is done".
"Where are we going anyway, you haven't said two words since we got off the plane".
"We need to find some shelter miss, we need to find a place where I can safely converse with what it is you have inside of ya".
"Well we're out of funds so it better be some place sheet Poppa".
The two take a few turns off the beaten path and find their way to a lodging house not far from the down town area. The two shake out their pockets and tell expert lies about having their travelers checks stolen. The kind hearted owner offers them a place for the night while they make the necessary calls to get additional funds sent to them.
They are mindful to take the last room on the row as they size up the closest church to run to in case of emergency. The minister reminds nurse Kathy for the third time since they got to Rome that "the churches here are as likely to belong to the enemy as they aren't and that they are no guarantee here". Kathy seems ever willing to argue this matter until the minister finds more useful topics to speak on.
They are only in the room for a few moments when Poppa Evars advances on her. Kathy finds her self rushed and her head clamped between his wide callused hands.
"Come on outta her". "Jesus...no God, your Father commands it, now come on outta there"!
"Poppa...poppa stop yelling, I don't know how to make it happen okay, I told you that in Los Angeles".
She goes to rubbing her face and smoothing down her hair as the old man paces the room.
"Sorry miss, just don't know what to do next and I can feel 'em on us".
"Them"? "On us...".
"Yeah, the eyes of the enemy, they're all over and I can't figure why they haven't made an attempt yet, can't for the life of me understand why we're left unharmed here, I must find him, he'll know what's going on by now I just know it".
They sit in silence as the minister looks deeply at the young woman seated on the bed.
"We don't have time miss, I'm awful sorry for this, but I gotta speak to what's inside of ya".
He advances on her as her confusion grows to fear.
"Poppa, wha...what are you going to do...please..."
He reaches her and takes her by the arm, he raises his other hand sharply in the air and brings it down across her face. There's sharp pain yes, shame and humiliation, even her father never...her thoughts become disrupted.
"Why the FUCK did you do that damn yo..." Her voice stops and her face goes blank. An otherworldly and completely androgynous voice rings out from her slightly parted lips.
"Resorting to violence already".
"God dammit I figured out who you are, now why did you put this young lady in harms way, it wasn't for me I know that, why"?
The blank face stares on...
"Listen dammit I don't have time, where is he, you have to know, they're out there and we don't have time".
"Time is relative and this young lady is more capable than you know old man, and time being the relative thing it is, you are very right it has run out, get to the church old man, go now".
"Damn, damn, damn, damn". The minister chants as he dances around grabbing their bags, he's opened the door when he realizes she's still sitting on the bed, staring blankly.
"Come on miss, we have to go".
She still sits a small line of drool forming at the corner of her mouth, he goes back and shakes her just enough to wake her up.
"Wha...what happened, why does my face hurt".
"No time, we gotta go".
"Are, are they coming"?
"Yes miss they coming and they coming cast we have to get to that church we say and we gotta hope it'll hold".
"I hope it...well I hope -I'll- know what to do if they attack".
"Of that I have no doubt miss, no doubt at all".
The two exit nearly running from the boarding room, they've made the parking lot as a number of small shadows begin descending on them and amongst them.
One reaches with in a foot of the minister before he recoils in disgust realizing it has a child's face entwined with in the darkened mass of its true form. The thing lungs but is met with a dose of holy water.
It kicks off screaming into a brick wall and vanishes as if it never where. Two more careen down upon the hapless and hunched figure of nurse Kathy. Its only until they've entangled into her hair and they've begun digging scratch marks into her back that she yowls something in the otherworldly voice, a simple phrase of power renders the things to dust around her.
As the two race to the church the down town area of Rome becomes a black mass. The Sun seems almost blanked out in the shadow of a coming storm the likes no man has seen since the eruption of Vesuvius. The mist children dig at the two as they run and are met with holy water and howls of Hebrew for their trouble.
The two hit the door step of the church and manage to heave the doors closed just as something far bigger than the mist children hits the doorway with a resounding thud. Like many of the old churches the building looks far bigger from the outside, the two look around to see a wide and high temple main with a small confessional and area for prayer laid to the side.
One of the two priests who likely holds sway over the church enters through what is likely the only door to his quarters. He seems fatherly enough with his white hair and his thick midsection. He announces his self to the pair laying on the churches floor as Father Miaz of the Church of The Father's Grace. He asks if there is something he can do for the travelers and he seems willing enough to allow them to sit for a few minutes while they let the coming storm pass.
"Uh, Father my uh husband wondered if he might use the font for blessing"?
"An odd request for a storm, but by all mean my child".
The priest eyes them suspiciously as they advance to towards the doors they flung closed only moments before. A great wind and thundering resounds outside the church as the two stand beside the font.
"Seems like you two where right, that is quite a storm".
The two make only the most vague of polite responses as they make sure to keep their backs to the father.
"I'll just, uh head back to my quarters and make sure the windows are closed, I'll only be a moment please make your selves at home here while the storm passes".
The woman says thank you as they keep their backs to the priest.
Father Miaz wonders back to his living area contemplating taking a moment to tidy up to bring these strangers back here to keep the temple clean when he sees the thing in the window. Its gargantuan and leans down to peer into the window.
The priest wets himself as his sinners soul is laid bare before something that knows all about that sort of thing.
"Do you think he suspects something Poppa"?
"No, like most of the collar kissers he doesn't think beyond what they trained him for".
"Poppa, please we go through this everytime".
"Miss you stop pretending to be catholic and we wont have to got through this no more".
The two continue to bicker as they both eagerly fill up small containers of holy water. Arguing the finer points of religious right and wrong keeps the minister busy, too busy with his age and the tasks of filling his containers of holy water to notice the priest and what he has straddled behind him in his right hand.
Kathy only notices at the last moment that the priest has not only re-entered the room but he's gotten taller, leaner, and there is something very wrong with his eyes. She doesn't even get out the word WATCH before the minister is OUT. Knocked out cold by a statue of the Virgin her self, if he wasn't out cold Poppa Evars would be forced to laugh at the severe Irony of it all.
As it is the minister is kissing marble tile as the priest drops the statue advancing on the shocked form of nurse Kathy.
"Why...why would you"?
The only things coherent that leaves her mouth before she's yanked up by her hair and drug kicking and screaming up the aisle between the pews.
"It's been...eons since...I've had a woman". The priest/thing hisses as it hauls Kathy Masterson bodily over the back of the first pew before the altar.
The better parts of Kathy, the smarter parts of Kathy begin doing a system check list, the manual shutting off of things it doesn't need as it knows what is coming next. The mind is an amazing and thankfully sympathetic thing. It doesn't allow more than we can stand most times, and for that the human mind should receive some kind of life time achievement award.
She takes the time to smell the lemon oiled rose wood of the pew seat her nose has been so rudely introduced to. She bothers more with thinking about how old this pew must be than she does with the fact that the thing behind her has torn everything free from the waist on down. She takes time to notice that the "thing inside her" isn't bothering to help her, it isn't giving her immense power. It hasn't bothered to save Poppa from getting knocked cold by a statue of the Virgin Mary and it seems nonplussed by the idea of it's "vessel" being raped by a demon wearing a priests robes.
A cruel world she's lived in her whole life comes crashing down around Kathy Masterson's ears and she can't stop thinking about this one time when she first started as a nurse. They brought in a girl who was all smiles, they said it was a rape case, they had the head doctors come in. Everyone was waiting for her to come unglued. Finally Kathy came in one late night, and Kathy was young, as young as the victim. She asked a stupid question, "Why aren't you crying or freaking out"? The girl just looked into Kathy's eyes and said "I just pretended it was my boy friend, he was more rough but it wasn't bad, I just plaid along, it beats screaming and getting your teeth knocked out right"?
She keeps focused on that, thinking of the look in that girls eyes, the eyes that met hers that night. Vacant, as if someone should have hung the sign over where the girls soul should have been. Rape is worse than murder, it doesn't just kill a body it kills away a part of someone's soul. On the other hand, thinking of that girls eyes and that stupid rookie question kept Kathy from even noticing the thing.
It was always hammering away before she snapped back enough to notice, and who cares, if Poppa is going to bleed out on a rug, this thing doing that seemed only some salt in the would of never finding the immortal. The mission died with the old black man on the carpet. The mission died when they landed in Rome. Land of the enemy indeed.
"When I'm done with you, I'm going to devour your soul you ignorant cow".
The thing hissed as it pounded away hammering Kathy against the pew.
She could feel something stir from within her, something dirty, something rotten but not from with out herself. The thing inside her had rooted up something, something ugly from the days of needles and letting boy friends invite their friends over for "sex parties".
"You'll...have...to...eat...an...awful...lot...of...me...to...find...
my...fucking...soul...you...filthy...pig".
Kathy grunts out between thrusts.
The former priest, the thing in the priest casing grunts in anger.
"I'll eat your entire human form bitch, don't egg me on, or you wont even get these pathetic moments of life".
"Why don't you just taint my soul you piece of shit"?
The thrusts stop.
"Oh...switching sides for your pathetic soul bitch"?
"Cant beat 'em right". "Let's finish it ON the Altar...Demon".
"Gladly you dirty cunt".
She's physically lifted by one hand as the thing begins messily sloughing off it's tight "priest skin suit". It grows in more ways than one as it takes the few steps to the altar, she's flung onto the velvet covering her body throwing aside the trappings used during the mass.
It's the hot wax from still burning candles that upon hitting her skin ignite the fire the thing with in her was looking for. Memories of Poppa slapping her come rushing in. Simple...so simple, yet so embarrassing. Simple and stupid like one of those gross Anime flicks one of her boy friends back in the day used to make her watch. It was all about pain, so was this, this thing...this thing hiding inside her was triggered one way, shock...shock and...and PAIN.
The demon red skinned and horned living in the flesh in front of her climbs on her on the altar to God. More willing participant than tool of destruction. He becomes as any man in the right circumstances. Simple as to being moronic. One thing, one area, one simple motive. Even otherworldly they only end up wanting one thing.
Not enough...this wont do it, there must be more.
"You like that do you bitch"? "When we're done I'll take these curtain runners and make a leash I can lead you back to my master with". "Let her sniff at you". "You can be a camp follower for my army". "Good enough for you huh"? "Better than you deserve".
"Shut up and stick it up my ass you Son of a Whore".
Every part of her is in uproar and demand for explanation. Fucked on the altar to God, ass fucked on the Altar of God in some blind hope of getting hurt enough to conjure up what ever it is that takes hold of her to destroy this evil thing once and for all. It's too fucking surreal. More of those upper functions with in Kathy go ahead and switch from green to red. If there really is a merciful God he will forgive her somehow, if there is a God this will work, if there isn't she'll wake up Satan's fucking lap dog.
The demon stops in mid thrust, as if the idea of Anal sex some how shocked it. The idea is so funny to her Kathy bursts out laughing. The demons features contort as if challenged on a segment of "America's most Evil" for the winning title prize.
"Fine whore, have it your way".
The thing hauls her bodily off the altar, slamming her back down on it face down. The force alone is enough to make something with her jar loose. Good...now come out DAMN YOU, she thinks in her own head. Nothing as the thing kicks her legs open and forces itself inside.
A howling agony rips away at the middle of Kathy's very being. Her scream is nearly ear splitting as the thing pounds inward. Then it happens, Kathy's mind is engulfed as if by a tidal wave, she gladly sinks into nothing as something ancient rises past her with the momentum of a great white making for a seal at the surface.
The thing is thrusting madly away gladly earning itself a grand concubine for hell's army when the back of the woman's head becomes it's front. The Head literally spins on its neck as if there where no bones beneath the flesh. A trap. A trap and its to late.
The demon goes to raise itself off the conquered body when the woman's arms shoot out backwards grabbing the demon by its horns with frightening speed and power. The woman's mouth barely opens but a metronomic voice, not man nor woman reigns free from the woman's mouth.
"You can claim my house, my body and my goodly possessions, but you cannot defile my father's holy places".
The demon looks on dumbfounded.
"Now die you ignorant horny TOAD"!
The demon renders onto ash as it laid atop Kathy's prone body.
A whirlwind of noise and commotion begin rising in volume around the church. The stain glassed windows that have survived centuries explode inward as the doors of the church buckle from their moorings flinging inward.
Black and Red figures come pouring through openings. As Poppa Evars lays unconscious on the floor before the font his former charge mounts the churches altar naked from the waist down. She grasps a Crucifixion cross in one hand and a chalice of holy water in the other. She begins howling prayers in Hebrew upon the catholic edifice of God's glory.
The thing that has taken temporary hold of Kathy body and mind works with cat like graces utterly rendering the largest of the legion that stands before her. Her pain her guide, her pain her path in life. Jude has chosen wisely, if not strangely to do the bidding he's been sent to do. Kathy meets the first wave head on before having to retreat behind the altar when a well dressed average looking man with rather intense eyes comes bounding through the front doors of the church.
In one hand he wields a sword of old English design in the other he stabs with a spear of roman making. Holy relics he's acquired in his months of searching for the answers he has sought to the motives and identities of the demon that seeks him out. Those answers he has, and he's come to do the one thing he would swear he would never do.
He has sought out to save the old friend who has so foolishly put himself in harms way but he has found the brother of the man who died on that hill of skulls so long ago. The very essence of that idealistic self interested pompous ass who stands before him on the Altar of God clothed in the trappings of a 30 something woman. He has come to make the enemy of his enemies his friend...at any cost.
Marylin Manson: The Speed of Pain
they slit our throats
like we were flowers
and our milk has been
devoured
when you want it
it goes away too fast
when you hate it
it always seems to last
but just remember when you think
you're free
the crack inside your fucking heart is me
(thought, not spoken):
i wanna outrace the speed of pain for another day
i wish i could sleep
but i can't lay on my back
because there's a knife
for everyday that i've known you
when you want it
it goes away too fast
when you hate it
it always seems to last
but just remember when you think
you're free
the crack inside your fucking heart is me
(thought, not spoken):
i wanna outrace the speed of pain for another day
lie to me, cry to me, give to me
i would
lie with me, die with me, give to me
i would
keep all your secrets wrapped in dead hair
i hope at least we die holding hands
for always.
Rolling Stones: Gimme Shelter
Oh, a storm is threat'ning
My very life today
If I don't get some shelter
Oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
Ooh, see the fire is sweepin'
Our very street today
Burns like a red coal carpet
Mad bull lost its way
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
Rape, murder!
It's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
The floods is threat'ning
My very life today
Gimme, gimme shelter
Or I'm gonna fade away
Los Angeles International Airport:
Two friends sit together at a corner table looking into their cooling off coffees.
"You sure about getting on that plane James"?
"Positive, I gave up my life here, it's all yours David".
"With the Sadist waiting out the competence hearing that we all know he's going to fail there isn't much need for the Roman now James".
"So you'll what"? "Just hang the suit in your closet and go back to the agency then"?
"Maybe". "Yeah, maybe I'll do just that.
"David don't be ridiculous, you're hooked into this lifestyle like a junkie, you'd no sooner hang up that goofy outfit as stop breathing air".
"James, you have to believe me I had no intention of leaving you with no where to go, I never thought you'd be so unwilling to accept your own limitations at that time". "When we went after that crazy in the apartment complex we where there for the same reasons".
"Not the same reasons".
"James look me in the eyes and tell me you didn't want him just as dead as we all did".
"Wanted him dead, of course, after Archer...my marriage, the booze...everything, yeah I wanted him dead but want and willing aren't the same, I always wanted him locked up that was the point".
"Well we're even with the tazer issue now". "Right..."?
"Of course David, I never would have done it if I hadn't known your armor was up to the punch, and I knew you'd have never done time with your connections, much less them passing the "super hero" law here in California".
"Yeah...with us being "registered and legalized" to "meet the growing criminal threats in the metropolitan areas" you flying all the way back to New York seems a waste".
"You can have James Stabler David, Archer can see his famous father in the papers and you get to play dress up, I don't want the L.A. experience anymore, you can have nostalgia over being a team, I don't need a team, I need to be back in the grit of the Big Apple again".
"And your military friends"?
"They said they're gonna freelance the whole damn nation, I have their numbers, just like I have yours David, we'll keep in touch I'm sure, small community and all".
"Speaking of numbers and calling, James I'm sorry for...for your situation". "If you'd have been more clear as the numbers of them and the situation involved I'd have come out there as well". "You know...".
"Stop right there David, I had backup didn't wait for it, that's not your fault and as far as my "situation" I couldn't be happier". "Yeah I know that sounds odd, but let's face it how many of our kind get the chance to fight evil on its terms and with its powers"?
"Only a few crazies I know".
"Well David count me in with them now". "I wont regret what happened, not now".
"Can you...can you control it"?
"Perfectly, oh it's taken some handling and I've had a few embarrassing moments, but I've got it down now, it doesn't happen unless I will it to now".
"And them...you don't feel the need to...".
"To what David, go off and howl at the fucking moon with them". "No...no sir not one bit". "If their entire society is like what I ran into I'll seek to destroy it in it's entirety, as a matter of fact that's part of what's got me in a hurry to head back".
"Oh"?
"Got intel on a pack running in Ohio, gonna hit home long enough to touch bases with Raveness and then I'm off to Ohio".
"Funny her choice to move out there now as well".
"Not really we lost a lot of our people out there when it all hit the fan and became legal, plenty of work out there, not so much out here".
"So you and her...".
"No". "Nothing of the sort, after you told her I was the one who saved her she contacted me and we got to talking, it might be there on her side but that's just hero worship, I wont build a relationship off of that". "Anyway she's nearly 20 years younger than me, it would be weird".
"I've seen weirder James, trust me, and not so long ago either".
"Speaking of weird, what happened to your little genius protege"?
"Agency has him, probably knee deep in needles being questioned about China and his involvement with the killings of the Sadists family members".
"You think he'll see the light of day ever again"?
"James I've known that kid for a good long time, if he can get it together I have a feeling we'll all be seeing him very soon, and if he doesn't we may still see him again...very soon".
"Whu...".
"I know the agency and I know how they respect assets, that said I know what the kid is capable of, the agency still lives in the prime material world, they don't get the internet, they don't know what it's capable of, if the kid gets a few moments alone with a terminal...who knows".
"Comforting".
"No one ever said this world was build on comfort James".
An automated voice begins reading off boarding plane information.
"Well that's me David, thanks for the coffee and the ride, like I said we'll be in touch I'm sure".
"Alright old friend, but before you go, just remember I never wanted or expected things to end up this way James".
"Don't worry about it David and from now on remember, you're James Stabler...from now on you can call me Ulvbane".
"Catchy, some sort of an abbreviation".
"No David, my father's language look it up sometime".
"Will do old friend, safe flight and good luck".
"You too...old friend".
An every day man waves as his friend boards the commercial jet, he stands alone at the long glass window. "Beware of stray dogs James, be safe". The every man whispers to the glass in an almost fathering tone.
Baracoa, Cuba:
Filthy hands, crusted with the dirt and grease from the mechanics garage, the kind of impacted grit that the Lava soap doesn't even get all the way off. Filthy hands pressing into the small of her back, the filthy hands one on her forehead the other over her mouth.
The smell of dirt and sweat, the misuse and the shame are as vibrant in the smell of the stale cigarette smells of those filthy hands. Those hands, his hands, hands she knew so well she could draw them from memory even now. Hands that had hurt her in ways that left dark pits where a childhood should have been.
The weight, the terrible weight and the impending moments leading up to what always happened. She moans and whimpers both in her dream and in her sleep. It's dream memory, it clues us in on certain things, she must be thirteen or fourteen, she's buried alive in her own pillows and comforter, gasping for air with his filthy hands on her forehead and over her mouth.
The conscious thoughts flow at times like this, she dreams and remembers thinking how odd it was, always the same routine. His left hand on her forehead pulling her head back painfully, his right hand over her mouth. She'd stopped trying to scream or cry out years ago, but still that hand finds her mouth like a moth finds a porch light.
She knows she's thirteen at least because that's when he started making her lay on her stomach, it's when he started shoving it in back there instead. That's what he's doing or trying to do right now. She gasps in her dream and in her sleep. There's no warning anymore, there's no tears or apologies after wards anymore. Why should there be, this isn't their first Rodeo and she whimpers in her sleep because she knows this wasn't the last dance either.
He finally gets it hard enough, he finally finds the right spot, she moans through his hand as his dick knifes into her asshole with drill precision. Gotta give it to the ole' man once he found it he was always good to go until he was done. The pain and the shame of it all come rushing in, vivid dreams are for sunny days doesn't God know that. Vivid dreams aren't for things like this, her dreams have been hell for more than a decade and there is NO ESCAPE.
This one goes on for the usual amount of time, but it drags on like dream eternity. The ole' man wasn't into softer moments, not for his daughters no sir. Every thrust starts from somewhere back in left field and pounds forward until she swears her head is going to explode. As the tension builds inside him they don't get faster they just get harder. His filthy hands tighten, her mouth feels crushed under his might, the hand that had held her forehead retreats to her scalp and collects an ever tightening wind of her hair.
She always wondered if he pulled her hair to help her forget what he was doing down there, or if it just helped him finish. She was always thankful for good mattresses, the Ole' man never pinched pennies. Not since the "incident", she was eight and he was doing it to her like he used to and the bed started squeaking. Mother knocked at the door asking me what I was doing on my bed so late at night. It was the instant pleading look in his eyes that allowed her to make her self a full accomplice in her own misery. Those haunted eyes of his at that one moment, she could draw those free hand just as easily as his hands. "I was jumping on the bed Mom, I'm sorry, I'll go to bed now". Her mother said good night and turned off the hall light as the ole' man got off and collected his things, just like...just like having the wife almost catch you with your mistress.
She knew it then, she had power in it, she could use it like he used her body, and she did, she was her fathers whore and since she didn't think there was anyway to stop that she made certain the ole' man always knew she'd seen his eyes like that. But that was eight and this was thirteen and at thirteen the ole' man had a new favorite whore.
As his hand dug ever tighter into her scalp and the thrusts became as deep as they ever would. As his filthy hand pinched her chin. As he exploded inside her asshole, Hanna could only remember thinking one thing in her dream. At least it was her and not her sister tonight. The ole' man would pretty much HAVE to sign her school field trip and let her sleep over at her friends house this weekend. She'd bought that much with her body.
The thought dug in her gut and wrenched her awake. Hanna came awake nearly flailing from the bed she shared with Randal. The rough yet some how soothing (to her) sound of the sin eaters voice came from the other side of the bed. "Hanna, just a dream, he can't hurt you now".
She settles back down, restless but unwilling to disturb him until he falls back into a deep sleep. She only dares to shimmy out of bed when she knows he's out cold again. She reaches for her sandals and her handbag. Stupid...stupid habit, stupid timing, stupid thing to be hiding from a man who she knows wouldn't care about something so trivial. But after that she needs something to calm down with at 3 am in Cuba a million miles away from the warn out bed and those filthy hands.
She doesn't bother slipping past Big Boy, the old spook always knows when anyone else is up anyway, he's sitting in front of the cripples computers still fruitlessly digging for information on where the mouth breather ran off to. Who cares, these last few weeks have been bliss without the constant bee hive drone of that voice box constantly accusing, or arguing, or speaking sweet words of "she who cannot be named".
"Indulging in bad habits...nurse"?
He knew she was in the room before she'd even exited the hallway from the bedrooms. Cool but creepy.
"Oh you know me big boy".
"Mind if I join you".
"Nope, but you're buying the next pack at the rate yer bumming them off me".
They find themselves out in the cool early morning breeze, overlooking the beach and the vast expanse of the surrounding Caribbean sea.
"Another one of the dreams of yours"?
"No, just thought I'd get up and smoke at 3 in the morning, after that I'll go make some waffles".
"You're starting to get his sense of humor".
"I'll take that as a compliment Big Boy".
"It was meant as one, in a way".
"Any more information on where Para ran off to"?
"News wires just released the details on the capture of the Sadist". "He was there I know it, I just don't know why the Sadist is still alive, would have bet money the kid would have torn him limb from limb".
"Anything from the junkie in the cell"?
"What, the ole' green spider"? The big man belches out a laugh between drags.
"Why don't we just put him on a plane and send him to prison along with the Sadist"?
"SE thinks he and Para are involved, you know that". "As long as there's a chance of it, we have to talk to Para on our own terms with that freak around to squeal his side". "We need to gauge just how crazy Para is Hanna".
When he figures he wont be getting any more conversation out of her big boy flicks his smoke out to the beach and heads back in. A few more hours on that infernal machine and maybe he'll exhaust his mind enough to give up and catch a nap for a while.
Rome, Italy:
Eyes more foreign than the local populace have coveted the odd couple who only hours ago exited a plane from the United States. The tall lean man who looks to all the world to be a blues singer mindfully holds the hand of the white blond woman who looks something like a soccer mom as they cross the street.
"I'd always wanted to see Rome, I can't believe I'm here, and I can't believe I'm on some crazy mission to find an immortal with the spirit of the brother of Jesus floating around in my head".
"You believe me miss, it wont be the oddest thing you've had to come to terms with or stand up against before this thing is done".
"Where are we going anyway, you haven't said two words since we got off the plane".
"We need to find some shelter miss, we need to find a place where I can safely converse with what it is you have inside of ya".
"Well we're out of funds so it better be some place sheet Poppa".
The two take a few turns off the beaten path and find their way to a lodging house not far from the down town area. The two shake out their pockets and tell expert lies about having their travelers checks stolen. The kind hearted owner offers them a place for the night while they make the necessary calls to get additional funds sent to them.
They are mindful to take the last room on the row as they size up the closest church to run to in case of emergency. The minister reminds nurse Kathy for the third time since they got to Rome that "the churches here are as likely to belong to the enemy as they aren't and that they are no guarantee here". Kathy seems ever willing to argue this matter until the minister finds more useful topics to speak on.
They are only in the room for a few moments when Poppa Evars advances on her. Kathy finds her self rushed and her head clamped between his wide callused hands.
"Come on outta her". "Jesus...no God, your Father commands it, now come on outta there"!
"Poppa...poppa stop yelling, I don't know how to make it happen okay, I told you that in Los Angeles".
She goes to rubbing her face and smoothing down her hair as the old man paces the room.
"Sorry miss, just don't know what to do next and I can feel 'em on us".
"Them"? "On us...".
"Yeah, the eyes of the enemy, they're all over and I can't figure why they haven't made an attempt yet, can't for the life of me understand why we're left unharmed here, I must find him, he'll know what's going on by now I just know it".
They sit in silence as the minister looks deeply at the young woman seated on the bed.
"We don't have time miss, I'm awful sorry for this, but I gotta speak to what's inside of ya".
He advances on her as her confusion grows to fear.
"Poppa, wha...what are you going to do...please..."
He reaches her and takes her by the arm, he raises his other hand sharply in the air and brings it down across her face. There's sharp pain yes, shame and humiliation, even her father never...her thoughts become disrupted.
"Why the FUCK did you do that damn yo..." Her voice stops and her face goes blank. An otherworldly and completely androgynous voice rings out from her slightly parted lips.
"Resorting to violence already".
"God dammit I figured out who you are, now why did you put this young lady in harms way, it wasn't for me I know that, why"?
The blank face stares on...
"Listen dammit I don't have time, where is he, you have to know, they're out there and we don't have time".
"Time is relative and this young lady is more capable than you know old man, and time being the relative thing it is, you are very right it has run out, get to the church old man, go now".
"Damn, damn, damn, damn". The minister chants as he dances around grabbing their bags, he's opened the door when he realizes she's still sitting on the bed, staring blankly.
"Come on miss, we have to go".
She still sits a small line of drool forming at the corner of her mouth, he goes back and shakes her just enough to wake her up.
"Wha...what happened, why does my face hurt".
"No time, we gotta go".
"Are, are they coming"?
"Yes miss they coming and they coming cast we have to get to that church we say and we gotta hope it'll hold".
"I hope it...well I hope -I'll- know what to do if they attack".
"Of that I have no doubt miss, no doubt at all".
The two exit nearly running from the boarding room, they've made the parking lot as a number of small shadows begin descending on them and amongst them.
One reaches with in a foot of the minister before he recoils in disgust realizing it has a child's face entwined with in the darkened mass of its true form. The thing lungs but is met with a dose of holy water.
It kicks off screaming into a brick wall and vanishes as if it never where. Two more careen down upon the hapless and hunched figure of nurse Kathy. Its only until they've entangled into her hair and they've begun digging scratch marks into her back that she yowls something in the otherworldly voice, a simple phrase of power renders the things to dust around her.
As the two race to the church the down town area of Rome becomes a black mass. The Sun seems almost blanked out in the shadow of a coming storm the likes no man has seen since the eruption of Vesuvius. The mist children dig at the two as they run and are met with holy water and howls of Hebrew for their trouble.
The two hit the door step of the church and manage to heave the doors closed just as something far bigger than the mist children hits the doorway with a resounding thud. Like many of the old churches the building looks far bigger from the outside, the two look around to see a wide and high temple main with a small confessional and area for prayer laid to the side.
One of the two priests who likely holds sway over the church enters through what is likely the only door to his quarters. He seems fatherly enough with his white hair and his thick midsection. He announces his self to the pair laying on the churches floor as Father Miaz of the Church of The Father's Grace. He asks if there is something he can do for the travelers and he seems willing enough to allow them to sit for a few minutes while they let the coming storm pass.
"Uh, Father my uh husband wondered if he might use the font for blessing"?
"An odd request for a storm, but by all mean my child".
The priest eyes them suspiciously as they advance to towards the doors they flung closed only moments before. A great wind and thundering resounds outside the church as the two stand beside the font.
"Seems like you two where right, that is quite a storm".
The two make only the most vague of polite responses as they make sure to keep their backs to the father.
"I'll just, uh head back to my quarters and make sure the windows are closed, I'll only be a moment please make your selves at home here while the storm passes".
The woman says thank you as they keep their backs to the priest.
Father Miaz wonders back to his living area contemplating taking a moment to tidy up to bring these strangers back here to keep the temple clean when he sees the thing in the window. Its gargantuan and leans down to peer into the window.
The priest wets himself as his sinners soul is laid bare before something that knows all about that sort of thing.
"Do you think he suspects something Poppa"?
"No, like most of the collar kissers he doesn't think beyond what they trained him for".
"Poppa, please we go through this everytime".
"Miss you stop pretending to be catholic and we wont have to got through this no more".
The two continue to bicker as they both eagerly fill up small containers of holy water. Arguing the finer points of religious right and wrong keeps the minister busy, too busy with his age and the tasks of filling his containers of holy water to notice the priest and what he has straddled behind him in his right hand.
Kathy only notices at the last moment that the priest has not only re-entered the room but he's gotten taller, leaner, and there is something very wrong with his eyes. She doesn't even get out the word WATCH before the minister is OUT. Knocked out cold by a statue of the Virgin her self, if he wasn't out cold Poppa Evars would be forced to laugh at the severe Irony of it all.
As it is the minister is kissing marble tile as the priest drops the statue advancing on the shocked form of nurse Kathy.
"Why...why would you"?
The only things coherent that leaves her mouth before she's yanked up by her hair and drug kicking and screaming up the aisle between the pews.
"It's been...eons since...I've had a woman". The priest/thing hisses as it hauls Kathy Masterson bodily over the back of the first pew before the altar.
The better parts of Kathy, the smarter parts of Kathy begin doing a system check list, the manual shutting off of things it doesn't need as it knows what is coming next. The mind is an amazing and thankfully sympathetic thing. It doesn't allow more than we can stand most times, and for that the human mind should receive some kind of life time achievement award.
She takes the time to smell the lemon oiled rose wood of the pew seat her nose has been so rudely introduced to. She bothers more with thinking about how old this pew must be than she does with the fact that the thing behind her has torn everything free from the waist on down. She takes time to notice that the "thing inside her" isn't bothering to help her, it isn't giving her immense power. It hasn't bothered to save Poppa from getting knocked cold by a statue of the Virgin Mary and it seems nonplussed by the idea of it's "vessel" being raped by a demon wearing a priests robes.
A cruel world she's lived in her whole life comes crashing down around Kathy Masterson's ears and she can't stop thinking about this one time when she first started as a nurse. They brought in a girl who was all smiles, they said it was a rape case, they had the head doctors come in. Everyone was waiting for her to come unglued. Finally Kathy came in one late night, and Kathy was young, as young as the victim. She asked a stupid question, "Why aren't you crying or freaking out"? The girl just looked into Kathy's eyes and said "I just pretended it was my boy friend, he was more rough but it wasn't bad, I just plaid along, it beats screaming and getting your teeth knocked out right"?
She keeps focused on that, thinking of the look in that girls eyes, the eyes that met hers that night. Vacant, as if someone should have hung the sign over where the girls soul should have been. Rape is worse than murder, it doesn't just kill a body it kills away a part of someone's soul. On the other hand, thinking of that girls eyes and that stupid rookie question kept Kathy from even noticing the thing.
It was always hammering away before she snapped back enough to notice, and who cares, if Poppa is going to bleed out on a rug, this thing doing that seemed only some salt in the would of never finding the immortal. The mission died with the old black man on the carpet. The mission died when they landed in Rome. Land of the enemy indeed.
"When I'm done with you, I'm going to devour your soul you ignorant cow".
The thing hissed as it pounded away hammering Kathy against the pew.
She could feel something stir from within her, something dirty, something rotten but not from with out herself. The thing inside her had rooted up something, something ugly from the days of needles and letting boy friends invite their friends over for "sex parties".
"You'll...have...to...eat...an...awful...lot...of...me...to...find...
my...fucking...soul...you...filthy...pig".
Kathy grunts out between thrusts.
The former priest, the thing in the priest casing grunts in anger.
"I'll eat your entire human form bitch, don't egg me on, or you wont even get these pathetic moments of life".
"Why don't you just taint my soul you piece of shit"?
The thrusts stop.
"Oh...switching sides for your pathetic soul bitch"?
"Cant beat 'em right". "Let's finish it ON the Altar...Demon".
"Gladly you dirty cunt".
She's physically lifted by one hand as the thing begins messily sloughing off it's tight "priest skin suit". It grows in more ways than one as it takes the few steps to the altar, she's flung onto the velvet covering her body throwing aside the trappings used during the mass.
It's the hot wax from still burning candles that upon hitting her skin ignite the fire the thing with in her was looking for. Memories of Poppa slapping her come rushing in. Simple...so simple, yet so embarrassing. Simple and stupid like one of those gross Anime flicks one of her boy friends back in the day used to make her watch. It was all about pain, so was this, this thing...this thing hiding inside her was triggered one way, shock...shock and...and PAIN.
The demon red skinned and horned living in the flesh in front of her climbs on her on the altar to God. More willing participant than tool of destruction. He becomes as any man in the right circumstances. Simple as to being moronic. One thing, one area, one simple motive. Even otherworldly they only end up wanting one thing.
Not enough...this wont do it, there must be more.
"You like that do you bitch"? "When we're done I'll take these curtain runners and make a leash I can lead you back to my master with". "Let her sniff at you". "You can be a camp follower for my army". "Good enough for you huh"? "Better than you deserve".
"Shut up and stick it up my ass you Son of a Whore".
Every part of her is in uproar and demand for explanation. Fucked on the altar to God, ass fucked on the Altar of God in some blind hope of getting hurt enough to conjure up what ever it is that takes hold of her to destroy this evil thing once and for all. It's too fucking surreal. More of those upper functions with in Kathy go ahead and switch from green to red. If there really is a merciful God he will forgive her somehow, if there is a God this will work, if there isn't she'll wake up Satan's fucking lap dog.
The demon stops in mid thrust, as if the idea of Anal sex some how shocked it. The idea is so funny to her Kathy bursts out laughing. The demons features contort as if challenged on a segment of "America's most Evil" for the winning title prize.
"Fine whore, have it your way".
The thing hauls her bodily off the altar, slamming her back down on it face down. The force alone is enough to make something with her jar loose. Good...now come out DAMN YOU, she thinks in her own head. Nothing as the thing kicks her legs open and forces itself inside.
A howling agony rips away at the middle of Kathy's very being. Her scream is nearly ear splitting as the thing pounds inward. Then it happens, Kathy's mind is engulfed as if by a tidal wave, she gladly sinks into nothing as something ancient rises past her with the momentum of a great white making for a seal at the surface.
The thing is thrusting madly away gladly earning itself a grand concubine for hell's army when the back of the woman's head becomes it's front. The Head literally spins on its neck as if there where no bones beneath the flesh. A trap. A trap and its to late.
The demon goes to raise itself off the conquered body when the woman's arms shoot out backwards grabbing the demon by its horns with frightening speed and power. The woman's mouth barely opens but a metronomic voice, not man nor woman reigns free from the woman's mouth.
"You can claim my house, my body and my goodly possessions, but you cannot defile my father's holy places".
The demon looks on dumbfounded.
"Now die you ignorant horny TOAD"!
The demon renders onto ash as it laid atop Kathy's prone body.
A whirlwind of noise and commotion begin rising in volume around the church. The stain glassed windows that have survived centuries explode inward as the doors of the church buckle from their moorings flinging inward.
Black and Red figures come pouring through openings. As Poppa Evars lays unconscious on the floor before the font his former charge mounts the churches altar naked from the waist down. She grasps a Crucifixion cross in one hand and a chalice of holy water in the other. She begins howling prayers in Hebrew upon the catholic edifice of God's glory.
The thing that has taken temporary hold of Kathy body and mind works with cat like graces utterly rendering the largest of the legion that stands before her. Her pain her guide, her pain her path in life. Jude has chosen wisely, if not strangely to do the bidding he's been sent to do. Kathy meets the first wave head on before having to retreat behind the altar when a well dressed average looking man with rather intense eyes comes bounding through the front doors of the church.
In one hand he wields a sword of old English design in the other he stabs with a spear of roman making. Holy relics he's acquired in his months of searching for the answers he has sought to the motives and identities of the demon that seeks him out. Those answers he has, and he's come to do the one thing he would swear he would never do.
He has sought out to save the old friend who has so foolishly put himself in harms way but he has found the brother of the man who died on that hill of skulls so long ago. The very essence of that idealistic self interested pompous ass who stands before him on the Altar of God clothed in the trappings of a 30 something woman. He has come to make the enemy of his enemies his friend...at any cost.
Marylin Manson: The Speed of Pain
they slit our throats
like we were flowers
and our milk has been
devoured
when you want it
it goes away too fast
when you hate it
it always seems to last
but just remember when you think
you're free
the crack inside your fucking heart is me
(thought, not spoken):
i wanna outrace the speed of pain for another day
i wish i could sleep
but i can't lay on my back
because there's a knife
for everyday that i've known you
when you want it
it goes away too fast
when you hate it
it always seems to last
but just remember when you think
you're free
the crack inside your fucking heart is me
(thought, not spoken):
i wanna outrace the speed of pain for another day
lie to me, cry to me, give to me
i would
lie with me, die with me, give to me
i would
keep all your secrets wrapped in dead hair
i hope at least we die holding hands
for always.
Rolling Stones: Gimme Shelter
Oh, a storm is threat'ning
My very life today
If I don't get some shelter
Oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
Ooh, see the fire is sweepin'
Our very street today
Burns like a red coal carpet
Mad bull lost its way
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
War, children, it's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
Rape, murder!
It's just a shot away
It's just a shot away
The floods is threat'ning
My very life today
Gimme, gimme shelter
Or I'm gonna fade away