Summary: Fallen into the depths of human existence, the devil has a conversation with Tommy.
(gif by @mistress-gif)
A/N Today is the day I have reached 666 followers and as a student of theology, I thought I’d better do something with this small fact (I’m going to hell, but hey ho). This was based on the scene from season 4 episode 6, where Tommy tries to play golf and goes insane.
Words: 1515
***
I was watching them both, but they didn’t see me. Not yet.
“Mr. Shelby,” a muffled voice came. Then clearer, “Mr. Shelby!”
But he no longer heard. The voices in his head were getting louder and louder and the silence was deafening. Peace didn’t suit him, so his mind revolted and went mad.
“Mr. Shelby, you are not yourself. I should call a doctor.”
Thomas blinked, but didn’t see, “It’s alright, Frances.”
“I’ll call Mrs. Gray.”
Reaching for the bottle like he was hanging on for dear life, he shook his head, “I know what this is. It’s just myself talking to myself about myself.”
But I knew: he wasn’t talking to himself. He was talking to me.
***
The smoke twisted in the afternoon dimness of the room, forming patterns in the gloom and he raised an occasional shaky hand to try and touch them. But they were fleeting and vanished, always. So Tommy gripped the bottle with both hands, eyes swivelling up to the sky and he pleaded, “God, where are you now, eh?”
He took one step and immediately started staggering before he doubled over, splashing the liquid onto his face, hands and clothes. So he stared at those hands and he could see the blood on them. It wasn’t there, but he could see it. “What have I become?” he asked no one, “What am I?”
The room was engulfed in white light. He usually drank whiskey to turn down the volume of his thoughts, but gin, gin was something else entirely. It didn’t quite cure the sadness as promised, but it made Tommy light. Like the atmosphere in the room it was a pure and ethereal whiteness, which can only be created by broken glass and shattered souls. But he wanted it, so he stood up, closed his eyes and reached, reached for it.
Oblivion.
And then a man appeared out of the light, dressed in all black, but made of the same white light.
For a moment, Thomas saw Grace. Then his eyes adjusted and recognised this being as not from this world.
“Grace?” he still whispered.
“No,” the devil replied calmly, “Just me.”
Tommy tried to get up, but couldn’t quite manage it, “Where is she?”
“I can help you forget her,” he offered.
“No!” he protested, “You can only affect the mind, not the heart.”
“So you understand what I am then,” the devil nodded, “Quoting the old gypsy ways. But you are correct. Your love is your curse.”
Tommy curled himself up like a ball of grief and asked, “Why are you here?”
“You asked for me,” the devil said.
“I asked for God,” Tommy contradicted, slurring his words.
“But you have questions,” he replied, “I’m here to answer them.”
“Tell me about hell,” Tommy’s first request came.
“You know more of it than I do.”
Tommy smirked and in his intoxication it almost made him fall over again, “You mean this is hell?”
The devil cocked his head in a worried manner, “Didn’t they tell you hell is white? It’s snow white.”
Tommy looked around and then at the clear drink that had invaded his body, mind and soul. Everything was the same colour: the colour of nothing at all.
The devil continued, “Man has made his own hell and created his own demons.”
“I thought man was created in God’s imagine.”
“They were, before, but then man created demons in his own imagine.”
“Who are you?” Tommy asked next.
“My name is Helel.”
“Means nothing to me,” he croaked in reply, “We haven’t met before.”
“We meet every day, but never like this,” the devil waved a disinterested hand, “But I go by many names and descriptions. None of them correct.”
“Then what is correct, eh?”
“In the beginning, there was a heavenly court. Angels gathered around the golden throne, but even we were not allowed to see God’s face. He said we were like him, created in his image, but we were not allowed to see him,”
“Why not?” Tommy frowned, as he laid back down onto his small sofa.
“One does not look upon the face of God, panim-el-panim Adonai.”
And Tommy scoffed.
The devil continued his tale, “But we wanted to see everything. So we opened our eyes and we climbed and climbed. See, this heavenly court is made up of a hierarchy of beings, and a hierarchy means one can advance to the top. And while I plotted and schemed, I thought I was rising to the top. But in the end, I was only falling.”
There was a silence.
“Sound familiar?” his adversary asked pointedly.
“Yep,” he sighed, “Always someone higher up. Always more rules that we don’t know of. I say, kill them all. Starting with God.”
The devil smiled, “You have to take responsibility for your own actions. We all do.”
“Why?” Tommy challenged quickly.
“When God became angry with Adam, he blamed his wife, like all men do.”
Tommy sighed, “And who did the wife blame?”
“Me.”
“Was she right?”
“Yes,” he paused, “And no.”
“These are not the answers I hoped for.”
The devil shrugged, “They hardly ever are.”
“What do you want from me?” Tommy demanded, suddenly loud and angry.
“Nothing. You asked for me and so I came,” he said with a comforting smile, “I was simply worried about you.”
Tommy put the bottle of gin to his lips again, “Why?”
“Someone has to.”
But Tommy had a third request, “Is God real?”
“I’m afraid he is.”
“What if I don’t believe in him?” Tommy questioned.
“That’s alright,” the devil smirked, “I doubt he believes in you.”
And all of Tommy’s suspicions were confirmed in that one sentence.
“But God and I are only two beings standing on either side of the glass and we can never be sure if we’re looking through a window, or in a mirror,” with this, the devil placed himself directly opposite Tommy and mimicked his stance.
But Tommy didn’t understand.
So the devil left him with some advice, “You will rise and rise and eventually you will fall. Just like me. But in that fall, there is power. You just have to be clever enough to see it. Always remember where you come from, Thomas.”
“Then what?”
“What is forbidden.”
Thomas frowned. The room was swaying and his spirit was floating above him, seeing clearly. He however, only saw a man in black, changing and seemingly covered in white flames now.
“You avoided death and now everything is extra. So from avoiding death, you learn from death and now you bring death, only to defeat death in the end. That is what is forbidden. Defy them all.”
“Is this fight never ending?”
“No, there is no rest for you here,” The devil looked surprised, but held out his hand in an inviting manner. Thomas reached out in the pale light, like he was about to take hold of it, but he changed his mind at the last moment.
“Are you not coming with me?” the devil asked.
“Not yet,” Tommy replied, clinging onto his earthly existence with every fibre of his being, “I still have work to do here.”
“I’ll be waiting,” the devil whispered, “Waiting with the Dumah.”
Tommy cleared his throat, “So it’s been decided. It’s hell for me?”
“Do you want to return home?”
“Home?” he coughed a laugh, “I have no home.”
The devil smiled, almost, “You do. All creatures return to the place they come from.”
A hint of sadness crept into those piercing blue eyes, “Then, why isn’t God here to speak to me, eh?”
Burning embers and smouldering ruins, he breathed, “You’re one of mine.”
***
Full of affection I looked upon this man, with his sleepy eyes and broken past. This white light suited him and it made him glow. Deep down, I knew he wasn’t all mine, not yet. I could still lose him to that light, but I’d rather not tell him. Not yet.
“Defy them all…” I whispered again from the abyss. I wasn’t sure if he could still hear it, as he drifted off into this peaceful oblivion of sleep. No one could ever hear me or see me, but I could talk to the Shelby’s, from time to time. To others it was like he was talking to himself, and maybe he had. Maybe this world was nothing but broken mirrors.
I have been called the Prince of Lies, but the one thing man cannot stand, is the truth. So we creatures of the dark are made up of truth and truth only. And I could see it now: he was just a broken boy and I was just a lonely man, so we sat, lost together, and smoked the night away. And in that sense, we understood each other. I sat with him for a few more moments, like a father watching over a son. Quietly, I started to vanish again and felt the pull to the below again.
So in the end, I offered him my hand and he shook it slowly. Then he looked at me once and walked past me.
Hekate was said to have saved Byzantium from Philip of Macedon by showing the Byzantines a great light in the sky, so they erected a statue of Hekate Lampadephoros, Hekate Light-Bringer.
The Holy Spirit who lives in you can shine from your face, making Him visible to those around you. We can brighten up the world by reflecting who God is :)
And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit
