The Sinner's Canon

ios mio ... where am I ... oh, wait, Jack? Jack Benton? What’s going on here? Sandra ... and Jessica? And who are you?” Rita Escobar stood in her novice’s habit now, truly shaken up by having had the Devil grab her and bring her here to face me and two of my other girlfriends, plus Lilith ... and Tyler, of course.

“I’m Lilith, of course. Yes, THAT Lilith. Queen of the Succubi, you see. Sex demoness par excellence. Nicki and I are lovers, of course, but that’s not all Nicki is, of course,” Lilith introduced herself to Rita now.

“You mean Satan. Nicki is Lucifer. The Devil. The Morning Star. The Princess of Darkness. That’s so Elizabeth Hurley it’s not even funny. Doesn’t she have a male form at all?” Rita wondered now.

“I can take one, but I can’t stay in it for long. I’ve been sentenced to spend eternity as a female, you see. One of Jehovah’s most spiteful acts of all, though I’ve turned it to my own favor in many ways, you know. And Hell, of course, where he sent me, is now very much under my control, not his. Which means that I can promise whatever I like and keep my word, thus letting me make pacts with mortals, of course. If they are so inclined,” Nicki let that notion drop as bait to see if Rita would grab it.

“So ... no burning, no pain, no none of that, but my soul would still be yours to do with as you please, is that right? For eternity. Basically, slavery ... eternal bondage ... to the Devil. No escape clause, I would tend to assume. An ironclad pact, this deal with the Devil. How many wishes would one get?” Rita’s ears perked up, “you see, my family pushed me into this because they’re ashamed that I gave up my virginity to Jack here. They’re ... part of Opus Dei. You heard of them? Also because I’m pregnant to him. Yes, Jack, I’m having your baby.”

“Opus Dei, the ultra-religious Catholic secret society committed to reforming the world according to their own puritanical version of Catholicism? Might have heard of it. They’re going down, anyway. Once the world is mine, well, you get the idea. And it will be mine, very soon, Rita. Much sooner than you think,” I warned Rita, whose mother’s dark almond Peruvian eyes blended well with her father’s light olive Andalusian skin.

“You’re ... the Antichrist?” Rita guessed now.

I burst into laughter, as did Jessica, Sandra, Tyler, Lilith, and Nicki herself.

“Close, but no cigar. Rita, that whole plan was scrapped ... well, most of it. The Lake of Fire, plagues, and Great Tribulation were scrapped. Armageddon, too. And the mark of the Beast. And the persecution of Jews, of course. That was never gonna happen. Not my style, which just proves that he can’t choose the right adversary, you know, for his little evil plans. But, yes, I have powers, and I was the one originally intended to be the Antichrist. The Beast of Revelation.

“You see, Jehovah kinda changed his mind about half that stuff, had a sort of mid-life crisis, and chose me to rewrite the canon, which I have. I wrote the really unpleasant stuff out of Revelation, among other things, of course. But I’m still immortal, as is Jessica, and I’m still gonna rule the world. It’s all in the Book of Jack,” I showed Rita the Tome, pointing to the passages scrawled out in my own blood.

“You ... wrote this in your own ... blood. Why is it in Enochian?” Rita showed me where it appeared in that ancient celestial tongue, but then altered back to English, “holy smokes, it just translated itself for me! Woah, this is really real ... it’s really ... real ... really happening!”

“Yes, well, I’m not quite done yet. Here,” I wrote a bit more in blood, adding Jack’s Own Commandments in contrast to the Ten Commandments.