Chapter 2: Sacrificed to Molech

Note: Thanks to b0b for beta reading this! Saturday, September 28th, 2013 – Mayor Colton Bray – Tacoma, WA

The Majestic Brandon, the supreme God of mankind, gasped and moaned atop the almost comatose body of his wife, Desiree. I stood not far away before the great fire lit in the center of the jail's exercise yard, my wife Yoon at my side. Desiree's face was bloodied and battered, beaten unconscious for defying Brandon. The foolish woman was loyal to that false god Mark, and her husband had to brutally chastise her.

Shame filled me for ever worshiping Mark Glassner as a god. Luckily, Brandon had come along, awakened me to his divinity, and captured the false god Mark. He lay imprisoned somewhere in this very jail, his body battered by Brandon's soldiers.

There could be no doubt in my mind that Brandon was a god. I had been standing with Mark before the courthouse this morning when Brandon's soldiers had attacked. Mark had fled like a coward, leaving me and my wife—whom he had fucked only moments before—to the mercies of his enemies. But Brandon was merciful once Yoon and I swore our allegiance.

I gripped my wife's hand. Yoon was a radiant creature, short and petite, her Korean face round, graced with a lush smile and sparkling, almond-shaped eyes. She had been a major support to me during the exhausting mayoral campaign last year.

The heat from the fire washed over me, crackling with its hunger. We weren't the only ones in the courtyard of the jail. Women captured by Brandon, but not selected for his personal harem, crowded naked and afraid, under the watchful eyes of his soldiers.

"Why do you think our Lord needs this fire?" Yoon whispered.

"Something grand," I answered her, exultation soaring in my soul. I was permitted in the God's inner circle, allowed to witness him at his most intimate.

"Yes, it will be," General Brooks said. He was a tall man, his graying hair balding. He stood with his back ramrod straight dressed in army fatigues. He was the commander of the US Army's I Corps and Joint-Base Lewis-McChord. All the soldiers on the military base had joined Brandon's cause, led by this man to attack Mark and usher in Brandon's divine rule.

"What is it for, General?" Yoon asked with excitement.

"Our Lord God has commanded my silence."

"Oh, of course," Yoon smiled. "But will my husband and I be permitted to witness what grand action our God performs with this fire?"

"You two are necessary," the General said, his face somber.

Yoon smiled, but her hand gave me an excited squeeze. "I'm so glad to be helpful," she answered, concealing her true feelings.

I nodded. "Indeed. Imagine our rewards."

Yoon's smile grew hungry. She was an ambitious woman. We had plotted out my political career so many times in bed, dreaming of claiming that ultimate prize—the President of the United States. Surely our God will reward my service.

"God, I love Viagra! Three times without rest," our God laughed. "And I definitely feel like a fourth. What do you say, Desiree? Want to be on top, this time? My knees are killing me."

"I'd rather die, el de atras," his wife slurred.

Yoon made a disapproving noise. Desiree deserved worse punishment than she had received for her continued insolence.

General Brooks marched over to Brandon. "My Lord, sunset approaches."

Brandon rose, his naked body round and short. You would never know he was a God just by looking at him. But physical appearances were always deceiving. The God looked down at his battered wife, his seed leaking out of her raw pussy. Brandon ran a hand through his balding hair as he considered his wife.

"I can't have you looking all ugly," Brandon said with a shake of his head. He bent down and touched her. With a single, muttered word, our God performed a miracle. Scarlet light enveloped Desiree. When the light faded, all of Desiree's injuries had been healed. "Stand up, Desiree, I want you to see something."

His wife obeyed, rising on unsteady feet. She lifted her chin, her back straight, her face full of defiant pride. She was fit to be the God's consort. I had never seen a woman more beautiful than the cream of her nut-brown skin, her heavy breasts swaying, or the perfection of her face.

I prayed Brandon could break the spell poisoning Desiree's thoughts and chaining her to the false gods.

"You are familiar with the Magicks of the Witch of Endor?" Brandon asked.

Desiree nodded.

What was the Magicks of the Witch of Endor? Was it a book?

"Well, it teaches a variety of ways to summon demons," Brandon continued, leading his wife to the fire. "They all will make Pacts with you. The only problem is the cost. Most demons want your absolute worship and obedience to grant your wishes. While others will have you perform tasks that will seem innocuous, at first, but will actually lead to your downfall. There are only two demons that have fixed prices: Lucifer, whom Mark and I both have already dealt with, and Molech. Of course, Molech's prices are very demanding."

Did our God get his powers from the same source as the false god? Confusion trembled through me.

Brandon held out his hand. "General Brooks."

From behind his back, where it must have been tucked into his belt, General brooks produced a long knife. The knife's blade glinted orange and yellow in the firelight as it flashed through the air. What was he going to do with it? I stared in fascination at the blade.

Brandon struck, sinking the blade into my chest. Hot pain flared through me. My heart screamed in agony. I stared down at the blade sunk in my chest, my blood blossoming red through my white shirt. Why did my God stab me?

Yoon screamed in horror next to me, her hands gripping my side. I opened my mouth to speak, to ask my god what I had done wrong to deserve such a punishment, but only blood poured out. Thick and salty, choking my words.

General Brooks shoved me into the bonfire. Fire engulfed me, licking at my flesh. I burned, agony pouring into my body. I tried to scream, but only fire escaped my mouth. I was being consumed, devoured, destroyed.

Yoon fell to her knees, sobbing her grief.

My God stared at me, clutching the bloody dagger. He spoke. "Molech, I give you this offering of noble blood." His words cut through the roar of the fire and the agony of my torment. "Cloak yourself in coals and flames and appear before your humble supplicant!"

A fiery hand seized my soul. I was ripped from my body.

I was falling, falling, falling into darkness.

Into fire.

A great, fiery being rose, following the path my soul fell, using my death to escape into the world. His name was seared on my soul. Molech. I was his, sacrificed to him by my God, my soul chained to the demon's blackened soul. I landed on coals, my flesh cooking as other blackened skeletons howled around me.

I screamed and cursed my hatred of Brandon. He was no true god.

No god would brutalize his worshipers like this.

Agony kissed me. I rolled my body, trying to find comfort on the endless sea of coals. My flesh burned, but was not consumed. Around me were all the victims that had been sacrificed to the terrible demon Molech, their flesh consumed over thousands of years. But they still writhed in pain, even reduced to nothing more than charred skeletons.

A flaming figure fell into the coals beside me and shrieked in pain.

"Yoon," I moaned. My wife's body was naked and blistered. Her thighs were blackened. I understood what that meant. When Molech had chained me, I learned of his brutal lusts. My poor wife had known Molech's embrace. She had been raped to death by the flaming monster.

Anger roared into me. I crawled across the coals to my wife. I seized her hand. She squeezed back, sobbing flaming tears.

"Colton," she moaned. "He ... he..."

I grabbed Yoon, pulling her fragile form onto my stomach. I lay with my back to the coals, forcing myself to endure the pain to protect her for as long as I could. She shivered and writhed atop me, weeping flames onto my chest.

Another woman fell upon the coals, also brutalized by Molech. She screamed her torment. One by one, the bastard Brandon sacrificed woman after woman to the demon. They came in regular intervals. First five, then ten, twenty, forty, then sixty women howled about us, their flesh cooking.

I couldn't do anything for them. I could barely protect my Yoon. I held her on my stomach until the pain was too unbearable, and then I would roll over, dropping her back on the coals as my belly pressed into the heat.

She'd scrambled onto my back, clinging to me. I didn't know how long I could keep protecting her at the sacrifice of my own flesh. I loved her, but the pain was never ending, all-consuming. Every moment I protected her increased my suffering.

Mad moments trickled through me where I hated her. Where I just wanted to dump her on the coals and witness her suffering. Why should I burn in agony alone? Why shouldn't she suffer?

I fought those terrible urges down, clinging to my love. Her voice whispered in my ear, thanking me for my kindness. I clung to that, to her touch, to the memories we had when we lived. I fought against the oppressive pain of Hell.

And then a change happened. The chain about my soul shattered.

The coals grew cold. The torment ended.

A figure fell into our midst. He was a scrawny being made of dying coals, his fire cooling like the ground around us had. The pain began to fade. I regained my full senses. I stood and Yoon rose beside me. The burnt flesh faded into pink skin, my body healing.

I frowned. I didn't heal, my body merely returned to the way I believed it should be. This wasn't the material world. We were in the spiritual. This had been Molech's realm, and he shaped it into the bed of coals to roast his sacrifices upon.

But now he lay broken and battered, groaning in pain. Something had happened above. Someone had defeated the demon and robbed him of his powers. A great, powerful hatred filled me. The other sacrifices rose, the fresh ones looking around, some with hatred on their faces, others fear. Many ran, fleeing the blackened skeletons cackling with madness.

The skeletons fell on Molech, tearing at his coal flesh. He screamed and howled as his victims feasted on him. The women that stayed, the citizens of my city of Tacoma, watched with obvious glee as their rapist and murder was brutalized.

"What do we do?" I whispered, holding my wife's healed body.

She looked around. A great, searing wind blew across the coals, reeking of sulfur. Molech was defeated, his power broken, but we remained condemned into Hell.

"You need to lead," she whispered. "There has to be other horrors down here. You're the Mayor. These are your citizens. Lead them."

"How can I?" I swallowed hard, looking around at the blasted world. The coal beds stretched for miles, roaming with blackened skeletons, the victims of Molech who had been driven mad by eons of torment. The fresh women that had fled were seized by the twisted victims, pulled down and savaged by charred, bony fingers.

Fear clutched me. The victims had been tormented for so long, they had forgotten their humanity. And we were surrounded by them.

I had to be strong. My will had reshaped my body, perhaps I could accomplish more. I swelled up, my body growing stronger. I was the Mayor of Tacoma. I had led a city of 203000 people. And my leadership was still needed.

"Ladies," I bellowed. "We have been freed from our tormentor. Your rapist had been defeated and is being brutalized, but now what do you do?" He pointed at the women that fled and the horrors stalking around them. "Will you flee into the night to be victimized again? Will you stand alone while the terrors of Hell make easy pickings of you?" It was like being on the stump again, speaking before rotary clubs, PTA meetings, and town hall meetings.

"What are you saying?" asked a strawberry-blonde woman, her arms folded beneath her naked, pierced breasts.

"That's it," Yoon whispered in my ear. "Be the leader."

"We need to band together," I continued. "We may be weak apart, but together we can be strong. We can defend ourselves from the predators that haunt this terrible place. None of us asked to suffer this torment. None of us deserved the agony Molech inflicted upon us. But that's done. There is nothing we can do to change that. All we can do is seize this moment and carve out some existence."

"It's Hell," another woman said with a bitter snort, tossing a mane of blonde hair. "You make it sound like we can find some measure of happiness here. Some place of safety."

Molech had shaped this entire place into a bed of coals with his will. Could I do the same? I had to try. Molech's will was already slipping. Beneath my feet, the coals melted like marshmallows in the rain, dissolving into sharp, red rock. The true landscape of Hell emerging. Molech once had power and had shaped miles of this twisted realm to his cruel delights.

Maybe I could shape mere feet.

I concentrated, willing green grass to appear at my feet. I pictured the grass spouting out of the red rocks, appearing as lush and vibrant as a golf course's green. My teeth ground together as I fought against the material of Hell.

"That's it, dear," Yoon whispered, seizing my hand. "Inspire them."

Her will mixed with mine. She somehow sensed what I was doing and gave me her will, her power. The ground rippled about my feet. Green blades of grass sprouted, so vibrant against the blood-red rocks. It was life. It was beauty. It shouldn't exist in Hell, but I had created it anyways.

"Together, we can change things," I declared. "If we combine our efforts."

The redhead and the blonde stared at me in awe. "How do we combine our efforts?" the blonde asked, her bitter tone vanished. The other women gathered, surrounding me.

"Tell us how," another woman called out. Twenty gathered around me.

"I..." I looked at my wife, not sure what to say.

"It's like with Molech," she whispered. "Why did he need sacrifices?"

I shook my head. What did she mean?

"Swear to him," Yoon declared and fell to her knees. She clutched my hand and, while looking up at me, pronounced, "You're my master and my husband. You have my fealty, my soul, forever."

I gasped as energy sprang up between me and my wife, a chain flashed for a moment about her neck, connecting her to me. I felt more power swell inside me, channeled to me. She still had her own will, but I felt like I had doubled in strength.

"Yoon," I whispered, touching her face in awe. "What have you done?"

"One of us has to lead," she answered. "One of us has to grow strong. That's what Molech had done. That's why he demanded sacrifices. We all were chained to him. We all gave him strength. Well, someone broke those chains. Didn't you feel the connection shatter when he fell, our power snapping back into us?"