A short story by: Brad Warmhold
Some men aspire to
accomplish great things during their lives. To these men, putting time and
effort into the betterment of society is something worth living for. Lars Alighieri
was not one of those men. In fact, Lars probably lived the most boring and non-impactful
life of any man that had ever walked the earth. Lars was an unimpressive man of
ordinary stature, spoke in monotone, and had no redeeming qualities about him.
He played no sports, he never once did anything charitable, and being an
atheist, nothing about spirituality or salvation ever interested him. After
graduating from Community College, Lars became a Systems Analyst for a small banking
software company, where he worked for 9 years. Ironically, Lars’ mundane life
ended in a most dramatic fashion. One evening after work, a few of Lars’
co-workers asked if he wanted to join them down at the local bar. Lars
nonchalantly accepted the offer. After drinking the night away, Lars, heavily
intoxicated, attempted to drive home-a choice that concluded in a massive car
accident. Lars did not survive. As Lars’ spirit leaves this world and goes on
to the next, it is here where our story begins.
“Hey…hey…time to get moving……WAKE UP!” After being
smacked across the face with extreme force, Lars’ spirit awoke. His head was
throbbing and in great pain; this was without a doubt the worst hangover he had
ever had the displeasure of experiencing. He slowly began to come to his
senses, and when he was finally able to make out his surroundings, he found
himself in a small square room with crimson walls and a receptionist desk on
the opposite side of the room. He discovered that he was sitting in a small,
and quite uncomfortable, chair, and on the wall behind him, above where he was
sitting, hung a sign that said “Waiting Area”. A tall, pale woman with long
jet-black hair stood over him menacingly. Looking up into her eyes, he was
horrified to notice that they were completely black.
“Well it’s about time. His Wickedness is growing
irritable; you better not keep him waiting any longer.” Her voice, deep and
chilling, left him paralyzed with fear. “His office is behind the door on the
right. Get moving.” Lars, dazed and confused, finally plucked up the nerve to
say something.
“Wait…ugh…Where am I….What am I doing here?”
“His Wickedness will tell you as soon as you get in his
office!” Her answer was harsh and stern. Lars didn’t want to try her patience
any longer, so he clumsily rose from his seat. Standing upright, he noticed
that his clothes were torn, and that he was covered in gashes that stung
whenever he moved. Confusion permeated his thoughts. He could not remember
where or how he attained such painful wounds; quite frankly, he couldn’t
remember anything that occurred the night before. Fighting off the pain, Lars
trudged towards the door and entered into another small, square room. Unlike
the previous room, this one had an elevator on the wall to the right of the
entryway, and in the center there was a huge ebony desk, sitting upon a round
floor mat with fiery designs. At the desk sat a large, devilishly handsome man
in a tuxedo. The man was reading the obituary section of a newspaper until he
noticed Lars come in.
“Finally, you’re here! You’ve kept me waiting for quite
some time. I’m a very busy individual, and I don’t have time for unfortunate
souls like you to lag around. Let’s get down to business.” The man set aside
the newspaper on his desk and pulled out a sheet of paper from a desk cabinet.
“Let’s take a look at your resume quickly…” The man began to swiftly scan the
paper. “Lars Lazarus Alighieri…aged 32 years………huh, it says here you died in a
drunk driving accident.”
“Died!?”Lars, shocked and alarmed, finally asked the
question that he had been dreading to ask since he woke up, “Where…am I?”
A grin shone across the man’s face, and then in a
sadistically happy tone the man said, “Lars, welcome to Hell!”
Complete hysteria overcame Lars. He stood frozen with
fear and disbelief. How did he end up in Hell? The man continued to speak, “I
hope you’ve guessed my name.”
“You’re the …devil?”
“You bet.”
“Oh….You look a lot different than what I thought the
devil was supposed to look like.”
“Yeah, I know, everyone says that.”
“But what am I, ugh…” A sudden surge of pain reverberated
in Lars’ head; the hangover was intensifying. Satan chuckled.
“How’s that hangover doing? I’ve got some news for you
squirt, that hangover, along with those gashes, won’t go away in Hell.” Satan
was getting a kick out of seeing Lars in pain, and he was getting even more
pleasure out of exacerbating his misery. “Anyway, before we go off on any more
tangents, let me finish reading your resume so I can determine where you’ll go…”
Satan started to swiftly read Lars’ resume again, and when he finished, a look
of disappointment appeared on his face. “Well…Lars, I’m going to be completely
honest with you, and being the Father of Lies, this is tough for me. This is,
without a doubt, the most unimpressive resume I’ve ever received. No instances
of grisly mass murder or juicy political scandal; you only committed all the
boring sins in life that everyone else does. Fortunately for you, however, Hell
is the only place that doesn’t say “no” to newcomers, so…I think the best place
for you will be… the second circle.”
Just as Satan finished his sentence, the door to the
elevator slid open, and Satan proceeded to forcibly take Lars by the arm and
fling him into the elevator, laughing ruthlessly while doing so. After Lars
slammed against the back of the elevator wall, Satan made his way into the
elevator. A panel of 10 buttons labeled 0-9 was attached on the inside, and as
soon as Satan pressed the 2 button, the door slid shut and the elevator began
to descend at a supersonic rate.
“Now, before we get to the second circle, I want to dismiss
a popular misconception. All those stories that you may have heard about Limbo,
the circles being based off a specific sin, or basically anything you may have read
about in Dante’s Inferno, are all
lies. Have you ever read Dante’s Inferno?”
“Once for 10th Grade English class I had to. I don’t concern myself with
supernatural subjects…”
“That’s right I
forgot; you’re an atheist. Look pal, I like your style of thinking, but even I know there’s a God out there.” Satan’s
obscenely happy manner suddenly subsided, “…Even I do…and how I abhor the very thought of it” Satan whispered to
himself.
“Wait, then how do the circles work?”
Relieved by the change of subject, Satan’s disgusting
smirk returned, “Oh you’ll find out soon enough.” The elevator suddenly stopped,
and the door slid open again. As soon as Lars caught a glimpse of the second
circle, he couldn’t believe what he saw. Everywhere he looked, there were
cubicles-an infinite amount of cubicles as far as the eye could see.
“CUBICLES!?” Lars could not comprehend his own disbelief.
Wasn’t Hell supposed to be a place of fire and brimstone, or so he was told?
“Yes Lars, cubicles. You see, Hell is like a giant company
hell-bent on the condemnation of heathens. In fact, Hell is an acronym for House of Eternal Lamenting
Lives. Each circle functions
as a different type of business sector that helps Hell continue to thrive as a
booming industry. This sector, the second circle, is my Human Resource
Management sector.”
“Human Resources? Why in blazes would Hell need Human
Resources?”
“It’s kind of a cruel ironic joke actually. Your
responsibility will be to assist me in placing condemned souls in their
appropriate circles and to provide their “benefits”. “Benefits” meaning what
types of torture they’ll receive and at which appointed time. It’s really just
a benefit for me since it helps me keep track of who I need to agonize and
when.” Satan chuckled at his own callous witticism. Lars didn’t think it funny,
but he got the irony of the joke. Although the idea of working in a cubicle for
eternity (and for Human Resources no less) still sounded terrible, Lars figured
that it couldn’t possibly be worse than burning alive forever. The moment that
he took his first step out of the elevator, that idea went right out the
window. The floors were paved with burning hot brimstone, causing the entire
place to reek with the horrid smell. Even worse, Lars discovered that his shoes
had gone missing, forcing him to walk across the burning floors with his bare
feet. The receptionist had disposed of his shoes before he regained
consciousness; Satan sees shoes as a luxury and of course there are no luxuries
in Hell. The walls seemed to go on forever, and not one window was to be seen
on them. There was however, one door close to the elevator that was labeled “Conflagration
Room”. Satan crossed over towards the door.
“This room leads to an endless sea of flames. I use it whenever
I need to punish workers who are not cooperating, aren’t doing a sufficient
job, or if I ever just feel like watching someone burn.”
This place is
getting worse and worse, Lars thought to himself. His spirit began to
overflow with despair, to the point where Lars uttered something he had never
said before, “God help me…”
Satan slapped Lars across the back of his head with
super-human force. His eyes were glowing with a fiery incandescence, and flames
spurted forth from his mouth. “SUCH LANGUAGE IS NOT TOLLERATED HERE! THAT
CHOICE OF WORDS WILL GET YOU THROWN IN THE CONFLAGRATION ROOM!!” Lars was
stricken with an intense fear that he had never felt before. He didn’t speak
another word until Satan brought him to his own cubicle.
“Here’s where you’ll work for the rest of your condemnation.”
The cubicle looked exactly like the cubicle that he
worked in during his time as a Systems Analyst, except for an old, outdated,
and perpetually slow computer, and a calendar that hung on the right side of
the cubicle that had every day of the week labeled Monday, because in Hell every
day is a Monday. Once Lars sat down in his chair, he felt a stream of
electricity shoot through his entire body! Of course, it was an electric chair
disguised as a normal office chair (Satan is sneaky like that). Seeing Lars’
pain and disheartenment put a smile back on Satan’s face, and then he proceeded
to extend to Lars…a present?
“What the heck is this?” Lars asked in a very discombobulated
manner.
“Think of it as your “welcoming present”, from me, your
new boss, to you.” Satan flashed a deceiving smile. Lars knew something was up.
“I don’t trust you.”
“Well then I’ll open it for you!!”
Once Satan opened the box, Lars began to cough violently,
and then he noticed there was nothing in it!
“WHAT WAS *COUGH* IN THAT? *COUGH COUGH*”
“Tuberculosis!” Satan was having a field day with his new
employee. “Well Lars, as much as I love tormenting your poor soul unmercifully,
I must go. I’ve got people to lead astray and many other lives to ruin. If you
have any questions about your job, just press the personal demon button on the
left side of your keyboard. Although I must warn you, my henchmen enjoy
haphazard affliction as much as I do, and they will probably drop in
sporadically just to do so. Have a great damnation!” After the burlesque
goodbye, Satan vanished in a puff of highly noxious smoke.
Now alone, helpless, and hopeless, Lars couldn’t help but
cry. He wasn’t a bad person; he never committed any crimes; why Hell? Lars
continued to mourn for a little while longer. It was at the point when he felt
that there was no hope left for him, that a strange message suddenly appeared
on his computer. The message read, Alright,
I’m here. Lars figured that it was another one of Satan’s pranks, but since
he didn’t want to do work anyway, he decided to respond.
Who is this?
God. You asked for my help earlier,
remember? Lars was skeptical.
Yeah, sure you are.
If you’re really God, why don’t you get me out of this infernal pit?
You brought this upon yourself by
choosing to ignore me your entire life. You might not have killed a man or
robbed a bank in your lifetime, but you lived a lifestyle that focused on
nobody except yourself! Very truly I
tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Also, you refused the
grace and love that I wanted to give you. Though it pains me to say this, this
is where you must go. Unless…. Lars’ eyes opened
wide! What did this guy, God, mean “unless”?
What do you mean
unless!? Can you really get me out of here!?
Will you deny yourself, take up your
cross, and follow me? Lars couldn’t believe this! Could this
guy actually free him from an eternity of Human Resource Management!? At this
point, Lars was willing to say yes to anything.
PLEASE!! I’LL DO ANYTHING JUST GET
ME OUT OF HERE!!
Then press the Escape key on your
keyboard. Lars did just as he was told, and a great blinding
flash engulfed the room…
Lars awoke in a cold sweat. He found himself sitting at
his own dull cubicle at his old boring job.
“It was only a dream…thank you Lord.”
You’re welcome!
Lars leaped out of his office chair in surprise. If it really was a dream, then
how was this God fellow still sending him messages? After calming himself down
he responded.
Wait, if that was a
dream then how are you still able to communicate with me?
That’s because I am no dream. I
simply used your dreams as a way of showing you what’s waiting for you at
eternity’s end.
Lars was dumbfounded, awestruck, and his mind was blown.
Nothing this amazing had ever happened to him (but in retrospect that’s not
saying much). His old desires of avoiding anything that had to do with God left
him. A sense of thankfulness overcame him, but there was still one more thing
he wanted to know.
Well, thanks for
showing me that dream then. I’m sorry that I have ignored you all my life, but
you didn’t have to show me that dream. I never did anything for you or for anyone
my entire life. Why did you save me?
After sending the message, a Bible appeared on Lars’
desk. He opened the Bible, and on the
back of the front cover, a note read, because
I love you Lars.
