Read Online Jump: The Fallen: Testament 1 by Steve Windsor - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Steve Windsor
Tags: Religious Fiction, Psychological Suspense, metaphysical fiction, Religious Distopian Thriller, best mystery novels, best dystopian novels
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best way to scare the shit out of someone. The results are better than yelling.
Maybe it is just for effect . . . or maybe he wants to bash out my brains. Whatever he’s thinking, he keeps smiling, letting me imagine all the things he could do to me.
“You are smart,” he says. “You are terrified, but you realize it is better to appear calm—a good contrivance, poker face. No, I’m not eating souls and ripping flesh apart any longer. I have no need for that. You are being tortured enough by life.” And he looks up into the air briefly and when he looks back down he’s got a grin like . . . I don’t even know what. “You are far more efficient than I ever was. Those are tales, nothing more. Remember?”
“Well. . .” I struggle for the words. I know where this game ends. He’s toying with me—cat playing with his meal. “This must get . . . boring.”
“You have no idea,” he says. “But my time is limited. Lots of work to do, you know . . . so, stories.”
There’s a ray of truth in his words. What does he want? “Stories about the Dev—” I say it without thinking, but he cuts me off, then his face turns angry.
“There’s no call to be vulgar!” he roars. Then he calms himself back down.
Interrogation 101. Shit.
He has a scowl on his face. “That word,” his voice is down to a low growl now, “so . . . negative.” He fakes a shiver on purpose. “Like saying . . . ‘guns,’ I imagine. No need to call someone evil, just say that they have an affinity for firearms. Then they are evil. Hah, ignorance, my favorite. Yet, I like them. One of your better inventions, actually.”
Him, liking guns? I can imagine the Protection PR campaign on the PIN now: “Guns—Hell’s Christday present.” But, I never thought about the language part of it. I guess you say “Jew” in the wrong tone long enough, pretty soon . . .
“Yes, exactly,” he says, “language, how I love it! Distorting, inflammatory . . . eviscerating. It is all language. That’s how you pervert the truth. Nothing is inherently good or evil. The line dividing them cuts through the hearts of every being. You know this is true. You can use a weapon to protect or you can use it to blow an innocent baby’s brains out. But the weapon isn’t evil, it’s the fist that wields it.” He pauses for a second, letting the truth of it sink in, I guess. But I think he likes the sound of his own voice, because that doesn’t last long. “In the same way, my name means what you’ve been told it does—evil, treachery, defiance. But . . . what if that’s not the truth.”
“Preaching to the choir,” I say. I know he’s playing me, telling me what I want to hear. Trouble is, it’s working. It is what I want to hear. I want to talk to someone who hasn’t lost their ability to think. Too bad I have to go this far to find him. “Is this where you make me the offer I can’t refuse?” I ask. “Because I’ve had a rough day and I’m in no mood.” I wince the tiniest bit after I say—no idea who I’m messing with.
He ignores me. “You’ve played the game,” he says. “With spirits and flame and lust in the air.”
I know what he’s referring to. We were all animals. “What of it?”
“That’s how it happens,” he says. “The truth, the lie . . . the Word. Someone—many of them in this case, actually. They whisper a little story in someone’s ear. Then that person whispers it to the next person. Then they decide to write books about it. And then—”
“Ya know, I just jumped off a building,” I say, “so if you don’t mind—”
His eyes glow a little red for a second and then they’re back to blue. When he speaks now, it sounds like an eagle screaming at a rabbit he just swooped down on, “Think about it, a story that’s over two thousand years old! You think that the version they tell today has any resemblance to the truth that was? You think I’m the soul-torturing monster in that book? You’ve
Maybe it is just for effect . . . or maybe he wants to bash out my brains. Whatever he’s thinking, he keeps smiling, letting me imagine all the things he could do to me.
“You are smart,” he says. “You are terrified, but you realize it is better to appear calm—a good contrivance, poker face. No, I’m not eating souls and ripping flesh apart any longer. I have no need for that. You are being tortured enough by life.” And he looks up into the air briefly and when he looks back down he’s got a grin like . . . I don’t even know what. “You are far more efficient than I ever was. Those are tales, nothing more. Remember?”
“Well. . .” I struggle for the words. I know where this game ends. He’s toying with me—cat playing with his meal. “This must get . . . boring.”
“You have no idea,” he says. “But my time is limited. Lots of work to do, you know . . . so, stories.”
There’s a ray of truth in his words. What does he want? “Stories about the Dev—” I say it without thinking, but he cuts me off, then his face turns angry.
“There’s no call to be vulgar!” he roars. Then he calms himself back down.
Interrogation 101. Shit.
He has a scowl on his face. “That word,” his voice is down to a low growl now, “so . . . negative.” He fakes a shiver on purpose. “Like saying . . . ‘guns,’ I imagine. No need to call someone evil, just say that they have an affinity for firearms. Then they are evil. Hah, ignorance, my favorite. Yet, I like them. One of your better inventions, actually.”
Him, liking guns? I can imagine the Protection PR campaign on the PIN now: “Guns—Hell’s Christday present.” But, I never thought about the language part of it. I guess you say “Jew” in the wrong tone long enough, pretty soon . . .
“Yes, exactly,” he says, “language, how I love it! Distorting, inflammatory . . . eviscerating. It is all language. That’s how you pervert the truth. Nothing is inherently good or evil. The line dividing them cuts through the hearts of every being. You know this is true. You can use a weapon to protect or you can use it to blow an innocent baby’s brains out. But the weapon isn’t evil, it’s the fist that wields it.” He pauses for a second, letting the truth of it sink in, I guess. But I think he likes the sound of his own voice, because that doesn’t last long. “In the same way, my name means what you’ve been told it does—evil, treachery, defiance. But . . . what if that’s not the truth.”
“Preaching to the choir,” I say. I know he’s playing me, telling me what I want to hear. Trouble is, it’s working. It is what I want to hear. I want to talk to someone who hasn’t lost their ability to think. Too bad I have to go this far to find him. “Is this where you make me the offer I can’t refuse?” I ask. “Because I’ve had a rough day and I’m in no mood.” I wince the tiniest bit after I say—no idea who I’m messing with.
He ignores me. “You’ve played the game,” he says. “With spirits and flame and lust in the air.”
I know what he’s referring to. We were all animals. “What of it?”
“That’s how it happens,” he says. “The truth, the lie . . . the Word. Someone—many of them in this case, actually. They whisper a little story in someone’s ear. Then that person whispers it to the next person. Then they decide to write books about it. And then—”
“Ya know, I just jumped off a building,” I say, “so if you don’t mind—”
His eyes glow a little red for a second and then they’re back to blue. When he speaks now, it sounds like an eagle screaming at a rabbit he just swooped down on, “Think about it, a story that’s over two thousand years old! You think that the version they tell today has any resemblance to the truth that was? You think I’m the soul-torturing monster in that book? You’ve
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