A Game Of Faith

He doesn’t feel any pain initially. Just shock, as the finger is cut from his hand and lies on the dirty barn floor separate from the rest of his body. But the shock is quickly replaced, and he screams. A scream that hasn’t emanated from the back of his throat since he was a boy, and his older brother locked him in the basement for six hours as he went out drinking with his friends. Darkness and cold, and all the monsters that kids imagine in their heads to the point where the distinction between those fears and reality begin to run perpendicular. The noises, the sounds, the foundation of the house are all ghosts who have been waiting for a moment alone with a ten year old boy who is locked, without sight, and without hope.

But now he sees true evil standing inches away from his face, smiling with crooked teeth and an emptiness in his eyes that make him feel cold, helpless, like there are no succession of words in the English language, or any language for that matter, that could get him out of this. He’s here, wherever here is.

And the man talks to him in riddles. He presents himself as a God or a brother, or son, or emissary. He talks about a God who enjoys death, hunting, enjoys blood that soaks into the dirt until it can’t, and then floods the earth. He’s speaking about man. The duality of man. The breaking of man’s spirit, and how many things a man will do that he swore he’d never do. How many ways he can make a man question his faith, his judgment, and his whole world. He tells Peter to simply call him, the God, for that is what he is playing.

“These eight behind me, know this is just the beginning,” the God says, as he grabs the finger from the floor and taps Peter on the forehead with it. Then he points to a row of four men and four women standing behind him in dirty clothes. Dirty white clothes, streaked with dirt and mud, and their faces, the same.

The God takes a knife from the back of his pants, and stands up slowly, a crack of his knee is heard. The screaming has stopped, but now the pain begins to throb like a speed induced heartbeat. The heartbeat that’s about to come out of his throat any time now.

“Faith is broken too easily. We believe until someone gets sick, and then we blame. We believe until we lose love, then we blame. We believe until we’re robbed of our humanity, one limb at a time,” The God holds the finger up, and smiles. “And then we blame. But these folks here are believers. Their spirit cannot be crushed. It cannot be broken. And a faith that absolute, deserves divine reward. And tonight they shall receive it.”

The God grabs the knife and walks to the far end of the row. There’s a man with a shaggy beard of matte black, with white strands down the middle, under his chin ,and eyes that are staring straight ahead, no fear that Peter can see.

The God rubs the man’s hair, and kisses him on the lips. A deep one, and he slips his tongue into the man’s mouth before slitting his throat and watching him drop to his knees.

“You see this?” The God says, “This woman next to him is his sister. They shared a womb, and shared their 37 years on this planet together. Not a single evening spent apart. Now, this would crush you,no?”

Peter is panting now, and he can feel acid and bile climbing up his stomach, slowly but surely. His eyes water, pushing out and down his cheeks and oxygen refuses to enter his body. He feels like he's on the moon, or another planet. He feels like he’s in the dark basement, and everything is closing in on him. The world is closing in on him.

“This would crush you, no?” The God repeats. And Peter nods his head. It would crush him. He’s already lost his faith. Most of his faith left with his finger, and the rest just exited the strangers throat. Spilled on the barn floor. Liquidated.

“Now look at her?”

He does.

“Nothing. She cannot be shaken because her faith cannot be shaken. That is divine faith, sir. Faith is the belief in something that you cannot see. It is the belief in something no matter what goes wrong on this planet. If you believe, and you have faith, it isn’t a matter of what can keep it. It’s a matter of what can break it. And for these here, the answer is simple. Nothing. Now, let me ask you? How is your faith since losing your finger, and watching this man die?

Peter’s jaw feels wired shout, and he stares.

“You must answer before we begin our game of faith.”

He tries to speak, but his throat is dry and closed and at first the words come out in an unintelligible croak.

“Try again,” The God says.

“I-I still have faith.” He doesn't know why he says that, but he does. A last feeble attempt at rebellion.

“Do you?”

“Yes”

“Well we will see at the end of this evening, whether you lose your faith, or your head. Because sir, you cannot keep them both.” And he laughs. “Follow me my loyal servants.” He says and opens a large steel door, and allows the remaining seven to leave.

“Start running.”

And they take off. The God closes the door, and returns to the nine fingered man. Returns to Peter.

He leans down in front of him, his finger still in hand. He looks around, and up at the steel rafters and around the old barn, like he’s deep in thought. Peter is shaking, and now the pain is deep, and he feels sick, drenched with sweat. The God hauls a black lighter from his breast pocket and lights it. “We’ll need to cauterize that wound before I explain what’s going to happen.”

“Please, no. God, no.” He sobs like a helpless child. “Please.”

The God grabs his hand in his, and his grip is tight, and mean, like he could tear his arm from the rest of his body without trouble. His hands are calloused and rough, and his knuckles have strands of dark hair. He smells like turpentine, mixed with sweat, and other God awful scents that make him feel sick.

He holds the flame from the lighter, and stares into the man’s eyes as he places the flame on the open wound. The nine fingered man screams with primality, like an animal. Screams loud. And after five seconds, the God takes the lighter away, and Peter finally throws up in front of him, before falling in the puddle. The God stands up, and drops the knife that he used to cut his finger, to the ground, inches from his face. A splash of vomit, hits his cheek and crawls down.

“God has asked me to find you, Peter. He’s asked me to find you, and see if you’re worth saving.”

“W-why me?” He says weakly. “Wh-y me?”

“Well now, isn’t that a question, Peter. Isn’t that a question. It is five minutes to 11,” The God looks at his watch. “At 11, we will start a game of faith. A religious experience, if you will. That is if you want to live. Do you want that, sir?”

He looks down, and Peter nods his head, slowly rising from the puddle of bile, and chunks of previous meals. He’s on his knees, his face caked in slime, tears in his eyes, but now obedient. No longer screaming, no longer hoping. He’s listening.

“The seven out in the field want to die, Peter. They want to because death is but just the beginning. They’re happy to die at your hands, Peter. So, you will have to kill them. They will make a game of it. They will run, and they will hide. They know these woods, and these fields, and the river’s edge. They know the grass, the wheat, the pebbles on the shore. They know it all. So they will make a game of it. And you sir, will have the evening to kill all seven. And every hour, you will lose another finger, if the seven are not dead. Do you understand?”

Peter stares at him, stares into his eyes to see if he can find any humanity, to see if there’s anything at all except an empty void. And there’s none. This man, this thing, this God, can not be bartered or bribed. There is nothing in this world that will keep him from doing this. Nothing. Seven people, he thinks. Jesus, this has to be a dream. Seven people. Kill seven people before the sun rises or lose fingers, and then his life. Kill or be killed. Either way, he know he’s royally fucked.

Peter, finding strength he didn’t know existed, stands up slowly, and grabs the knife beside him. The God smiles, like he’s two steps ahead at all times.

“I know what you’re thinking, Peter. Kill me and make a run for it.” He laughs. “You don’t know where you are, but I'll tell you this you're far away from home. And the seven have been instructed to hunt you down if you do not begin your hunt. Like I said, they know every inch of this land. For this is our home.” And he rubs Peter’s shoulder, and looks back at his watch. “Let the hunt begin.”

Peter drags his feet, and opens the door as a soft breeze feels like heaven on his skin. He closes his eyes, and sucks the clean air, deep into his lungs. This could be beautiful, he thinks, a world away from the world. And when his eyes open, he hears the rustling of footsteps, and soft giggles from the women, and bird calling from the men. Leaves crackling under foot, and the water streaming until it forks into a river, and leaves this place behind.

He walks with the knife, the grip sticking to his palm, trying to accept that this is reality and not a horrid dream. But it’s too vivid, much too vivid. For a moment before the hunt, he thinks about taking the knife and slicing his jugular. He saw on a crime show once that ear to ear would do the trick. It would be long and deep enough to end his life in a matter of seconds. His wife was gone, his kids gone, finger gone. Was this world worth the pain?

He takes the knife, and gets down on his knees. He holds it just under the left earlobe, hands shaking, eyes again closed, clenching his teeth. Can he end his own life? Can he actually do it?

Then the loud noises from the woods snap him out of his intrusive trance, and Peter realizes he can’t.

And if he can’t end his own life, then he needs to try and rationalize the taking of these lives. Tell himself that the people out here want to die. Is that murder? Murder is the taking of a life, but what if the life is handed to you. Then were you really taking it?

Not fully convinced, not even close, He gets up, and heads left into the dark woods of maple trees, birch trees, oak, and pine, towering high above, planted hundreds of years ago in some cases. Life that was here long before people massacred this world, and many would still live to see people become the massacred.

In the darkness of the woods, he’s reminded of the basement. Darkness like thick cement walls, impossible to escape. He breathes as deeply as he can. Telling himself there’s air in here. That darkness doesn’t devour oxygen, just light. Just illusions.

Giggling. Two voices. One says, “Are you going to send us home? We’re so excited to go home, mister. We can hardly wait. We’re trying to hide, sir, but please find us soon. Please, we can’t wait to go home.”

And they both giggle, and he can hear jumping like schoolyard children finding out the cute boy wanted to take them to the spring dance. Jumping, ecstatic. Is it murder, if they are giving you their life? Begging you to?

He can’t see, and he holds his hand in front of his face, searching. The giggling, the laughter getting closer, and then one grabs him by his shoulders, and yells inches in his face.

“TAKE US HOME! TAKE US HOME!”

Her breath decrepit and dying, and she laughs maniacally. Peter screams, and a reflex sends the knife straight into her stomach. She gasps, surprised, and then she smiles. Teeth as dark as coal, with matching eyes, and she falls. And as she falls, she whispers, “

"Thank you,” And the other giggles, “Yay, yay, yay! She’s going home. Me next! Me next, mister!”

“Oh Christ,” Peter says, hands shaking. “Jesus Christ, what the hell is this?”

Then something hits him in the side of the head. It hurts, like a small piece of wood. A branch, maybe.

“Me next, mister. Come on, don’t lose your stomach now.” And she giggles, and he knows that after this, if he makes it through this, that those giggles will never leave. That every time he’s in the darkness of his bedroom, he will hear them. “Me next,” and laughter, and he’ll go crazy, he knows it now, he’ll go fucking insane.

Another piece of wood hits him in the side of head, now he’s bleeding above his left eyebrow, and he can feel the warm blood snaking down the side of his face. And then another hit in the same spot, a rock, a small rock and it stings so badly, and he screams,

“FUCK!”

And then the woman appears in front of him, “Me next!” and he tackles her to the forest floor, the crunch of dead leaves under the weight of her body, and he slits her throat. And then he falls on his back, and cries like a child.

“I can’t do this. Jesus, I can’t do this anymore.” And he cries, uncontrollable sobs, and he screams loudly, and the echo is answered only by the sound of the remaining five.

He stares up at the darkness of the towering trees, and hears the breeze, and again wonders if the knife to his own throat is the better option. Then he thinks maybe this crazy fucking cult is right, maybe there is something better because God knows it can’t get much worse than this.

Then his feet are taken. Two men, each with one foot in hand, drags him through the forest. Both of them cawing like crows. “CAW! CAW CAW!” and they drag him over rocks, and branches, and brambles. He screams, his back bleeding through his shirt from the rough ground, bleeding and his head is smashed off the side of a round boulder, before he exits the wooded area, and is dragged through the rocks of the river’s edge and into the water.

His head is held under, and then pulled up, “CAW! CAW” and then put under again. Then pulled up, “CAW! CAW!” then back under. He screams, and inhales cold lake water deep into his lungs, and when they pull him up again, they throw him to the pebbles, and he tries to breathe, but the water is caught deep in his lungs, like the whole world is a ziploc bag placed over his head. He wants to live. He knows at that moment, if air will return to his lungs, he will kill these two fucks. He wants to live.

And then he throws up water, that splashes on the rock in front of him, and some hits his face. And it’s a revelation. This is a religious experience, he thinks. And he looks at the two men in front of him. Both in long white clothing, like Scrooge’s pajamas.

Smiling delinquent, insane smiles, knowing that they did their job. If they wanted to be killed by the hands of another, then they needed to dig deep inside of his soul, and pull out his heart. Create a killer. And they could see in his eyes that that’s exactly what they’d done.

And they close their eyes, as Peter lunges at them, taking them both down and stabbing at both of their chests. A dozen times each, and he’s sweating, and they’re laughing. They hold each other's hands, and look into each other's eyes, and one says,

“See you on the other side, my brother.” And the other smiles before his life is cut out of him.

Four down three to go.

He lies by the water, and in the exhaustion of the game, closes his eyes. Like cement.

And when he wakes, two fingers are gone. Blood leaks heavily from them, and he can feel heat. Heat behind him. A small fire, made with two logs crossed like an x among the stones, and he knows what it's for. The blood loss is making his head light, and the water is salt, as good as poison, and he will do more damage if he drimks it.

He crawls to the fire, holding his left wrist, which now consists of a thumb, and a pinky, and nothing else. He places it in the fire, and again falls unconscious. When he wakes, his head throbs like a construction crew on the largest highway on the planet is fitted directly inside his skull, and they’re all working the jackhammer. A river of water next to him, but it would kill him, and wasn’t that God’s great joke.

He doesn’t know how long he’s out, but he’s sure it doesn’t matter. He needs to get up before he can again hunt. He needs to get up.

“You’re doing well.” The God says. “Three more, and you’ll have your life.”

He cranes his head to the right, and sees the God in the water up to his waist, wading his hands.

“That time you were only out for 20 minutes. You still have time.”

“I’m going to die.” Peter says weakly.

“It’s not God’s will, my son. You will live, if you decide to finish your work. That I promise you.”

And he closes his eyes again, “I will finish the job,” he says weakly, and when he openss them, The God is gone.

He pushes himself to his knees, and then to his feet and heads back towards the woods.

The sun rises above the water, and Peter looks at it. He dreamed about Melissa sitting on the hood of his car, smoking cigarettes with a black leather skirt. So many years ago, God she was beautiful. And he dreamed about his son being born, cutting the umbilical cord, and holding him and whispering in his ears that he’d never let him go.

His left hand is wrapped in gauze, and it looks like there are no fingers left. But he’s alive, at least he thinks he is.

He gets to his feet, and walks through the woods, and as he exits, there are seven bodies lying in a row in the open field next to the barn. By the door of the barn, The God claps slowly.

“I did it?”

“You did.”

“Only lost four fingers.”

“Not bad.”

And he looks at their faces, there is peace in them.

“Is this real?”

“It is.”

“How do you know?”

“Because that’s my home. I’m here to find those who are in need. Do you want a home?”

He looks at The God, or the man, or whoever, or whatever he was. And before he can speak his head is bobbing slowly up and down, and he’s on his knees. Crying.

The God walks up to him and places his hand on his shoulder.

“I’ll need a new congregation. Would you like to join me on a recruitment mission?”

“I would. And then I’ll get to go home?”

“You will, son. You will join them in due time.”