Episode 14 Delirium

Episode 14 Delirium

The wrath of God.
What is that supposed to mean?

Is it thunder?
Fire falling from the sky?
Or just the quiet certainty that something is watching you drown and refusing to help?

The resurrection.

Why does it matter so much to them?

If a man rises from the dead, does that change anything between me and God?
Does it repair the broken wire between heaven and the human skull?

Or is it just a story…
A magnificent story.

The kind people cling to when the world begins to rot.

They will call me names for saying that.
Heretic. False prophet. Madman.

Funny.

Jesus warned about false prophets.
Maybe I should strike first and point them out before they point at me.

Anger…
anger is powerful.

It lights the bones.
It moves the body when hope refuses to.

I tried kindness once.

I tried smiling, saying the right things, trying to make someone happy.

What came back?

Mockery.
Needles disguised as words.
Little curses thrown like stones.

Pain returned for every kindness.

And Christianity?

Ah, Christianity.

For thousands of years men had wives, concubines, lovers, slaves, prostitutes.
The world was messy, yes, but honest about its mess.

Then came the new priests of purity.

Now desire itself is the crime.
Now the body is the enemy.

They call us sinners.
Fornicators. Corrupt.

They shame the blood that runs in our veins.

So people twist themselves into knots trying to escape their own nature.
They mutilate their desires.
They smile wide holy smiles while quietly suffocating.

Saved, they say.

Saved from what?

From being human?

The word of God…
something happened to it.

Something ugly.

It was bent.
Twisted.
Handled too many times by too many holy hands.

We were promised joy.
Prosperity.
Rejoicing.

Instead we get suffering.

We arrive screaming, struggle through mud, and die confused.

If hell exists, perhaps it already opened its gates.

Perhaps this is it.

Earth.

Humans walk around pretending otherwise.

They open their mouths and release warm clouds of lies just to survive the smell of themselves.

Swamp gas in human form.

I found myself in the Bible once.

Not as a hero.

As someone written there to suffer.

Maybe that's my role.

Maybe Christ was never meant to build a religion at all.

Jesus was not a Christian.

That came later.

Layer after layer of doctrine poured like tar over whatever he actually said.

Now the temple smells like a waste factory.

And we call it holy.

Maybe God placed me here for something else.

Maybe the Antichrist isn’t a destroyer.

Maybe he’s a mirror.

Someone sent to expose the rot.

And the law?

Ah yes.

The law loves its theater.

You have the right not to testify against yourself.

But place your hand on this Bible.
Swear your eternal soul.
Speak the truth or burn forever.

What a magnificent contradiction.

The Constitution says we may pursue happiness.

But every road to joy is guarded by priests, judges, and moral toll booths.

Pay the fee.
Confess your sins.
Apologize for breathing.

Otherwise…

Damnation.

And they call this righteousness.

The room smells like copper and wet paper.

I’m not sure where I am anymore.

The ceiling hangs too low, like it’s sagging under the weight of my thoughts. The walls breathe slowly, inhale, exhale, like the room itself is alive.

Somewhere a clock ticks.

Or maybe it’s water dripping in a cave.

I turn my head toward the corner.

Something moves.

Not a shadow.

A hesitation in the air.

Then it steps forward.

Tall. Crooked. Made of smoke and bone. Its eyes glow faintly like coals buried under ash.

I squint at it.

“Oh,” I whisper. “You again.”

It tilts its head, amused.

Another one crawls out from beneath the bed. This one is smaller, thin as a starving dog. Its skin looks stitched together from torn pages of scripture.

Words crawl across its body like insects.

I laugh weakly.

“Scripture demon,” I say. “Of course you’d show up.”

The creature hisses.

The words rearrange themselves.

WRATH
SIN
JUDGMENT
HELL

I roll my eyes.

“Old words,” I mutter. “You people only know old words.”

The tall demon leans closer. Its breath smells like burned incense and courtroom wood.

Behind it the walls ripple again.

Now I see them.

Rows of figures standing in the shadows.

Priests with no faces.
Judges with hollow eyes.
Saints whose halos flicker like broken neon lights.

They’re all watching me.

Waiting.

I reach toward the bedside table.

My hand finds a notebook.

Or maybe it was always there.

There’s a pencil too.

Good.

If I’m going to lose my mind, I might as well document it.

I start writing.

Billy's Journal, found fragments – The Fever Pages

Journal Fragment – Page 3

The wrath of God.

What is that supposed to be?

Lightning?
Earthquakes?

Or silence?

Maybe the wrath of God is simply God refusing to speak anymore.

The tall demon crouches beside me and reads over my shoulder.

“Don’t cheat,” I tell it. “Write your own theology.”

It smiles.

Or maybe its skull cracks a little. Hard to tell.

Journal Fragment – Page 7

The resurrection.

Everyone says it changes everything.

But does it?

If one man rises from the dead, does that repair the broken wire between me and God?

Or is it just a story powerful enough to keep people from asking questions?

The scripture demon climbs onto my chest.

It’s lighter than it looks.

“Careful,” I whisper. “I bruise easy.”

It presses one claw against my shirt.

The word HERETIC crawls slowly across its arm.

I sigh.

“Yes. That one again.”

Journal Fragment – Page 12

They will call me a false prophet.

Funny thing is, Jesus warned about false prophets.

But the loudest voices warning about them are usually the ones building temples to themselves.

Maybe prophecy isn’t about predicting the future.

Maybe it’s about disturbing the present.

The room shifts.

Suddenly I’m not in the room anymore.

Now I’m in a courtroom.

The ceiling stretches into darkness. Wooden benches rise on either side of me, filled with pale spectators whispering to each other.

On the judge’s bench sits something enormous.

A figure made of melted church bells and black robes.

The gavel slams.

The sound explodes inside my skull.

“Swear the oath.”

I blink.

There’s a Bible in my hands.

Its pages bleed ink.

I laugh.

“You people love this part.”

Journal Fragment – Page 19

The law says I have the right not to testify against myself.

But then they place a Bible in my hand and threaten my eternal soul if I lie.

What a brilliant contradiction.

Swear to God or burn forever.

Justice with a theological knife at the throat.

The judge leans forward.

Its face splits open like rotten fruit.

Inside there is nothing but darkness.

The scripture demon claps its little hands like a delighted child.

I close my eyes.

“Hell,” I whisper.

When I open them again, the courtroom is gone.

Just the dim room again.

The breathing walls.

The demons sitting patiently like nurses waiting for the fever to break.

Journal Fragment – Page 26

Christianity promised joy.

Prosperity.

Rejoicing.

But most people I see look exhausted.

They carry guilt like bricks inside their chests.

Maybe the gospel got lost somewhere along the way.

Handled too many times.

Bent.

Twisted.

Used.

The tall demon sits beside my bed now.

For the first time it speaks.

Its voice sounds like wind moving through broken cathedral windows.

“Then why do you keep writing?”

I stare at the ceiling.

A crack runs across it like a fault line in the earth.

My lips split into a tired smile.

“Because,” I whisper,

“someone has to leave a map through the maze.”

The demons lean closer.

My pencil moves again.

And somewhere deep in the labyrinth of my mind,

the maze keeps growing.