TASK #1: DEMONS
Jason liked the little cook boy, the one broken like a leather shoe. Little robot, little machine. He liked the way his green eyes drifted, and how his short black hair covered them when he was being shy. Jason always tried to spy him when he returned back to the shanty with the other hunters. He’d carry his kill high, twisting the leg through his arm and grabbing onto its arm by the torn sleeve. The cannibals would cheer for them, and push around to see if the animals were fat, to see if they would feast that day. Jason would watch the women’s lips pull back in abysmal grins of blackened teeth and tongues. He’d listen for the men to holler into the air, screaming whoops and barbaric nonsense. The little cook boy would always watch in silence, his pretty green eyes looking for the youngest dog, the youngest rabbit, the youngest human. Once Jason understood that it was spiritual to eat someone your age, he seldom brought home grown-up cadavers anymore, rather the fattest babes of The Fringe. It was reward enough to see the boy’s face light up when he carried the dead children in.
Several weeks past before Jason learned his name. Obviously, it wouldn’t be as simple as asking him for it; that would have been humiliating. In this shanty, everyone knew anyone important. It was a disgrace to be called something no one knew, and while another cannibal might have approached the cook boy with the request, Jason wouldn’t insult him like that. Everyone knew Jason, the devil boy, the demon child. His savagery made him famous, and even then, at only twelve, he was respected, naturally, because he was feared. The other hunters brought back elder people, thinner people, who could be good for soups perhaps. They were easy to kill, and despite their denial, really didn’t mind death. They’d scream and beg for their lives, but Jason knew they loved it. The wails and sobs bore holes of shame into the other’s bones, but it was that shame which made him better than the rest.
And so, when Jason didn’t hunt, he watched. He watched the little cook boy when he pulled out organs from fresh cavities and he reveled in the quick ways he moved his clever fingers. The other cooks called him runt. Sometimes they called him boy. Finally, they called him Little Henri, and Jason whispered his name as a breath lest it escape before he could work his tongue around the delightful sound. They didn’t see Henri like Jason did. They couldn’t sense his delicious innocence, or smell the tainted blood in his heart. That would be their fault, their mistake, and Jason’s misfortune. Perhaps if they watched Henri’s hands tearing holes in the flaccid bloody lungs on the butcher table, they would have protected him better. It was as simple a complex as an animal’s scent. Jason was attracted to death, and Henri reeked of it.
Time passed, as it does, and Jason couldn’t stop thinking about him. He couldn’t stop thinking of good Henri and of his wrists and what they would look like braceletted by his own, larger, hands. Henri became a parasite of the loveliest nature, occupying his soul and his body and his mind. The sweetness of his gentle soft voice replaced his own when he recited instructions to himself, and his lullabies before bed. The ghost of his imagined touch followed the ellipses of Jason’s wet footprints that trailed him to his bed. He didn’t understand why it happened, nor what higher power made him leave the bodies at Henri’s doorstop, but he did. One at a time, small at first- little birds with broken wings, and then rabbits and sleeping babes and the best parts of the fat civvies. He’d butcher them himself, and even though his hands weren’t close to as gentle as his Henri’s, Jason still worked, careful as he could, sticking his tongue out and focusing.
Henri never confronted him about it, but he knew it was Jason leaving the food, and because it was Jason leaving the food, he should have eaten it in public for the world to see. It was insult that Henri chose to hide himself. It was an insult that he slowly stopped leaving his shanty anymore – but Jason wouldn’t stop. He’d made him mad, now. He piled Henri’s doorstep with meats and then drying fruits and got nothing in return. It wasn’t long before Jason snapped.
Jason loved his mothers. He loved them because they were kind to him and because they were smart. He loved them because they taught him how to kill things quickly and how to make them suffer. Indirectly, they taught him how to hurt Henri – little boy broken with Jason’s hand covering his pretty mouth. Jason wanted to hear his sounds, but knew better. Henri’s Papa was in the other room, sleeping sound and smelling strongly of tipple as usual. Jason stared into Henri's scared cerulean eyes with his own dead ones, and twisted the blade up in his ribcage. It wasn’t difficult to subdue Henri – he was so thin that Jason could press into his stomach and feel his spine. Why hadn't he just eaten Jason’s food? Henri’s hollowed cheeks were wrong. They were wrong on his beautiful face, as were the bruises on his back and arms. He needed to be punished for doing this to himself, couldn’t he tell that his body wasn't his own to damage? He’d close to broken himself, so it only made sense that Jason would finish the job. His body slumped into Jason and he let go of his gaping mouth, convinced that he couldn’t scream any longer.
The rise and fall of his chest resulted in pained sounds delicious in Jason’s ear. Henri was dying, and it was because of him. Finally he could play Lucifer, and what a shame because he would have rather liked to have someone like Henri rule at his side. Jason let go of his blade, letting it stay suspended in his boy’s flesh. He pet his hair and crooned in his ear, murmuring sweet words of encouragement, that it was okay because he’d forgiven him already and that he loved him fiercely. Henri’s voice came out hoarse and shaking, “Jay- son, thank- you,” he whispered, and swallowed, and wet his cracked lips and forced himself to smile,
Jason pet his Henri's cheeks and tilted his jaw up to kiss him. Even then, with his lips quivering and his mouth stinking of metallic death, Jason couldn't have asked for a more beautiful possession. It was then that Henri weakened - he could feel it in his dying lips, practically tasted them turning cold. Henri stilled and Henri died. Jason sucked his eyes out of his skull.
