Posted by Will Turner, Karaoke King at nat0.ucc.ac.uk on March 24, 2004 at 07:07:29:
Appreciate all opinions (Disclaimer: This is purely an academic piece. I'm not trying to get Kev to make a film of it or anything like that)
The Man Who Saw Hell
One Vision
It happened in a club, a maze of leather chairs.
“We are messengers from the true Zion”, the beautiful blond women announced. “We have come to take you to a world of eternal bliss”. “Have you now?” John retorted in what he believed was a witty way. He reached out for his drink, sipped and nodded, trying to pretend his eyes weren’t travelling southward.
John woke up only to find the club had disappeared, replaced by the foul stench of sulphur. He struggled to see through the heat haze, burning into the back of his eyes. It was a world of intense yellow and orange, with howls and shrieks all along. It was a landscape of jagged points, ragged cliff faces. In the centre was the twisted choreographer Lucifer himself, as ugly and impenetrable as the surroundings. His dark aura radiated across the infinite orange wasteland, his laughter pierced John’s eardrums and the smell of his own burning flesh put a fear of God into him that no minister ever could.
It was that vision that brought him to Moses Beagle. His real first name was Max but had it changed since the formation of the Exodians, “followers of the Exodus.” This was John’s first step into the Church of the Exodians.
Exodus
The church of the Exodians was a small, disused school, complete with a white board and uncomfortable chairs.
"And he [Moses] said to them, 'Thus says the Lord God of Israel: "Let every man put his sword on his side, and go in and out from entrance to entrance throughout the camp, and let every man kill his brother, every man his companion, and every man his neighbour."' So the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses. And about three thousand men of the people fell that day. Then Moses said, 'Consecrate yourselves today to the Lord, that he may bestow on you a blessing this day, for every man has opposed his son and his brother."
Exodus 32:27-29
Moses was dressed in a shirt and tie. His other-worldly voice did not fit what looked like an executive.
He certainly did not seem like someone who would talk to John, sullen and wearing a faded AC-DC shirt and black jeans, stroking his greasy long hair, hanging over his face like a veil.
“Why are you so interested in me?” John wondered, trying to look for signs of the conman. Would he ask for a donation? Would he need him to tend a field or leave his family? Moses’ reaction surprised John.
“Tell me exactly what happens in this vision, and I can tell you your next course of action. I am not here to tell you what to do, John. But I am here to help.”
Psychoanalysis
As John retold the details of his vision, Moses wrote down a list of words.
Heat…burning… yellow…orange…cliff…
“Heat is a symbol of stress, a need to release. The burning and colour orange symbolise the fire inside. Yellow shows you have confidence in yourself but will encounter opposition. And the cliff suggests a conclusion to these affairs.”
John was shocked. It sounded rational, almost scientific. It gave him a sense of purpose. Perhaps his vision was not a curse but a blessing, one he could share with others.
“John, I can help you understand yourself. Join the Exodians in the New Zion. I promise you we can help you through this, we will steer you away from sin, away from Babylon.”
And with that, John shook hands with Moses and agreed to become an Exodian.
The journey on board the ship was tiring. The cabins were roomy and had comfortable beds with soft peach duvets. It was so pleasant that John did not notice the man coming into his room and stealing all his possessions.
John yawned. He struggled to get to his feet then cautiously made his way to the top deck.
There Moses stood, smiling as he flung a Dell 5.0 laptop into the sea. Treating the sea like his stewpot, he threw Rolex watches, Beatles albums and Zippo lighters into the frosty broth. John was half tempted to dive in when he saw his Red Hot Chilli Peppers albums floating by too.
“Relax.” Moses smiled. “You will be adequately compensated.”
John snorted. He had lost all his things. What could…possibly…compensate?
Behold The Sentinel
There in front of him was The Sentinel. As Moses explained, it was the centre of the island, the icon to which all prayer would be directed. This was not blasphemous, as it was designed purely to focus minds and was not in itself an object of worship and therefore not a craven image.
A layman however would be more cynical. The giant purple tower, with footlights on its four corners and three windows resembling a face, loomed over the island, its gaze visible across the horizon.
While The Sentinel was an awe inspiring sight, it still left John with the nagging question of why his Spiderman comic collection was in the briny deep.
“Essentially, we remove the capital from capitalism. Using the insurance money we have re-routed, we will be able to create communal entertainment and clothes. There will be rationing and time schedules and there will be some censorship. Here, we make the rules.”
John did not like the numerous references to “We”. It sounded almost like a royal “We” that in reality, “we” meant “him”. He was certainly not comfortable with his money being “re-routed.” And the way he spoke with a horrible glint in his eye gave him a kind of sinister benevolence.
“If you worry about your loss of identity in a communal context, please do not be alarmed. I regularly send my trusted messengers to the mainland and they will deliver any messages you entrust to them.”
Although John was still not fully satisfied, he was nonetheless reassured to know that his family would know he wasn’t dead. That was if he had a family. In fact, John realised he couldn’t remember much at all since the vision.
Upon arrival, the island looked like a holiday resort, complete with candy-striped deckchairs, a golden mile of arcades and hotdog carts. The only difference was the giant purple church tower in the middle of the island. Its scornful glare darkened the horizon around it.
The bell rung, and all around him knelt in the direction of The Sentinel. From the roof, Moses stood, holding aloft a stone tablet. He was now dressed in a purple gown and he had lost the look of twinkling charm.
“I will not fail to punish the children and grandchildren to the third and fourth generation for the sins of their parents. Mark the words of Exodus 34 and remember why you are my Exodians!”
With these words, he violently threw the tablet off the roof, smashing into a thousand pieces.
Memory Lane
“Not a bad show, huh?” laughed a man. “The name’s Karl Engels.”
“John. John Dee.”
“As in Sloop John D?” the pair laughed. It was a relief for John to finally meet someone normal.
“So, what do we do now?”
“I’m guessing you’re new here. You get your purple star then they give you vitamins. It’s a bit of a drag, but then there’s bowling. And because of this whole equality thing, you can play all night and it doesn’t cost a thing. I mean they ration all the perishable stuff, bit of a downer but you should see the rooms we get here!”
“In the Sentinel?” The Exodians stopped to glare at John. As soon as he was silent, Karl made a chopping motion across the neck, suggesting that topic was closed. “No, the rooms are on the other side of the island.”
Karl was obviously a nice guy, but he mostly babbled on about nothing, enjoying the fact he could bum around for the rest of his life in a kind of eternal Butlins.
In fact, he was still talking as John was getting injected. This was good as it distracted from the pain. Then again, the pain distracted from Karl’s obsession with space hoppers, Spangles and everything else he loved and cherished from the seventies. He then said his memory was pretty hazy past the year 1990.
As the days went by, John listened and looked around. There were very few cars. Karl gave everybody lifts in his GMC custom van while he waxed lyrical about the A-Team. The arcade had games from the seventies and eighties. The cine ma was playing “The Best Of British” (Tonight: The Italian Job 12pm Brief Encounter 3pm.) Indeed, the sense of being in a time warp was compounded by the sight of kids with hula hoops, a surreal kind of Amishness, as if anything past the nineties was the devil.
But it was more than that. John could not remember seeing a single book on the island. He saw an open-air classroom, and the kids were bright and could read every sign on the island and could add up bowling averages in their heads. But no child ever so much as held a crayon in their hands. Nothing was written down!
But one thing bothered him above all others. Why wasn’t he allowed in The Sentinel? What was inside? And why were they so fearful of its power?
Interior
“I’m going in there.” John finally announced, as Karl composed poetry about Joanie Cunningham. Karl was starting to piss John off now. Although he couldn’t remember his former life, it had to be better than this freakish world.
“You can’t. You’ve got everything here, why bother looking over the fence?”
That was another reason why John hated Karl. He said stupid things like “Live as if you’ll die tomorrow, dream as if you’ll live forever”, thinking them to be profound when all he did was sit around thinking them up while waxing his surfboard or experimenting with his blond hair. Indeed, the most searching question he seemed to ask himself was ponytail or dreads.
John looked around, his air of discontentment clouding the landscape. The Exodians were happy and content in their little routine. They did their work, broke their tablets then indulged for the rest of the day. Their smiles were as plastic as the buckets and spades. John now knew it. He was living a life in a postcard.
He yearned to hear an argument, see some teenagers piss on a back street, some form of rebellion. The comfort was too much to bear, John urged for reality. John wanted the truth and the truth was in the one place nobody dared to go.
As the bell for the final prayer stopped and the sun set over the vast horizon, John readied himself to enter The Sentinel. He waited patiently as the four footlights stood to attention, feeding light into the cavernous eyes of the island’s guardian.
Precisely on schedule, a burly looking gentleman stood to attention, holding a less than Christian gun. John carefully avoided the lights then went behind him, grabbing him by the neck.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” He said, staring directly into the burly man’s eyes. The burly man threw him over his shoulder, leaving John bloodied and on the floor.
Smiling, he leaned over to pick up John, eyes shut, out cold. But as he leaned over to pick him up, John kicked him in the nuts and then ran for dear life inside The Sentinel.
The inside was more impressive than the outside, complete with a giant banqueting table and opulent staircases and medieval tapestries. However, the darkness gave the items edges and corners, the icons all around seemed to peer straight into John’s soul. He felt his eyes begin to strain in the dark, but continued to struggle forward.
Moses looked on in his chamber, his camera picking up every second of his subject’s treachery. But he was not nervous. After all, how can you discover the truth if you have no idea how to look for it?
John reached the files, flicking through them. He then came across something that disturbed him. It was “Engels, Karl.” Only the Karl in this picture had straight black hair and was a hired cult deprogrammer. His file contained his phone number
And was labelled “Threat Grade B”.
It was then he reached his name…
Semiotics
Durkheim, John
Profession: Interpol Investigator
Threat Grade A
John looked at “his” picture. He had short, army cadet hair and glasses.
Last known whereabouts: The Loft, Norwich
Then it all hit him. The messengers, they were not there to reassure family, they were there to abduct people! This whole world was a lie.
“Yes, John, it is all a lie. A beautiful lie! I have created a world far better than the filthy empire you are part of! It is no coincidence they call it the Western World! We exist in hemispheres, more shut off than here. Everyone here is in either blissful harmony with their nostalgic dreams, or has been given a future without stress or harm. I have created them, they are docile because that is how I have moulded them and how you should have been!”
John revealed his arm. His purple stamp was stuck on a bit of plastic.
“I will have you silenced! You will never leave here alive! You will pay for your ingratitude!”
John smiled. “Would you care to repeat that?”
“Why?”
“As you have just broadcasted it via your speaker system” laughed John.
Moses did his best to steady himself. He adjusted his tie. He then slammed his fist through his monitor. Moses stared directly into John’s eyes. The vision returned.
“You could have lived in a vision of perfection, John. Instead you have chosen to be condemned to hell and to bring my followers with you.”
“You lied to me and everyone. I don’t know what the world did to you but you will pin this on me! You brought everyone here! You fucked up their brains! This is not the work of God! This is your mess and nobody else’s! I don’t believe in God, because no merciful God would create YOU!”
“AAGH!” yelled Moses, fuelled by righteous indignation. He flung himself toward John, raining punch after punch on his head. John swept his leg down, before opening Moses’ head against the concrete floor. John tried to run but Moses grabbed his leg. John kicked him in the face, running away from the madman as fast as he could.
Unsure what to believe anymore, the Exodians threw themselves into the sea. By contrast, Moses was now certain- all those around him were tainted by the cynical glare of the world and must be punished.
He grabbed a petrol can, laughing as he poured flames over his darling sentinel. He lit a match and laughed with glee as the fire tickled his toes and spat furious damnation on his once loyal subjects.
As his flesh burnt and his eyeballs became blackened with smoke, he sang out with joy…
Jesus knows me and he knows I’m right!