Magic, Myth and Mysteries

A Seriously Bad Trip, Chapter Three - Emily Conover

Tas had no intention of sodomizing Ron with the candle, or anything else for that matter. For one thing, that wasn’t the type of deity he was. While he had a broader definition than most of what counted as fun he didn’t derive s****l pleasure from acts of sadism. Even now the pleasure he was experiencing from tormenting Ron was more grim satisfaction than anything else.

For another, Dike had strictly prohibited s****l assault of any kind to be used as a punishment while mortals lived, well before it was defined as a war crime by mortals, or a felony in their courts of law. Once someone’s shade landed in Tartarus and in the hands of Kerry, however, all bets were off. Tas had a feeling that Kerry would have something extra nasty in store for Ron once he finally snuffed it. He’d need to mention the snakes to her.

With a sigh, Tas snagged another glass of wine and leaned against the wall to watch Ron. From Ron’s perspective, he was running down an endless hallway with floors that undulated and shifted beneath him causing him to stumble. To everyone else present Ron Cochran was running in place, tripping over his own feet, and crying like a toddler who hadn’t taken a nap.

Tas let Ron run until he was on the verge of exhaustion. By now the other guests had been ushered out of the ballroom and only Ron’s manager, Dom, remained; alternating between trying to talk sense into Ron and screaming into his cell phone at the EMT dispatcher. Tas would have felt bad for the dispatcher if he didn’t know it was Fraus.

Dom stalked over to Ron with a look of disappointment on his face. “Come on, Ron, get your s**t together, kid,” he grumbled in annoyance.

Tas would have felt bad for Ron’s manager too, if he didn’t know that he was more concerned about his meal ticket disappearing than anything else. Tas studied Dom. He was a man with a slicked back hairstyle that was intended to camouflage that it was thinning, and even though the suit he wore looked expensive, the weak chin, sloped shoulders, and slight paunch he carried made him look seedy.

The thick gold chain around his neck and an ostentatious pinkie ring he wore did nothing to detract from that vibe. Tas found it hard to believe that this man wasn’t privy to the sordid details of Ron’s life so, despite not having been instructed to do so, Tas reached out and poked him in the belly.

Dom dropped his phone and began to bray like a donkey. Tas wasn’t in charge of whatever altered reality he was experiencing. That was all the fault of the man’s subconscious. He checked the time as Dom began to disrobe.

“Time to take you outside, big boy.” Tas altered the hallucination so that Ron could find the door and spurred him on by jumping next to him and screaming in Ron’s face. Despite his exhaustion Ron ran for his life, desperate to outrun the visions he was experiencing. Tas snapped his fingers as he skipped down the hallway, easily keeping pace with Ron who crashed into walls and the furniture in the lobby.

“Please leave me alone!” Ron screamed as he tried to get out the front door.

“Don’t you realize by now, Ronald? You can’t get away from me. I’m in your head,” Tas whispered in his ear and then barked. Ron ran out of the Hotel Beaumont, directly into oncoming traffic where he was hit by a drunk driver.

“Ooh! That’s gonna leave a mark,” Tas commented as Ron’s body skidded across the pavement.

“You weren’t… supposed… to kill him.”

Tas turned towards the voice of his older brother, Tor. “And I didn’t. He’s not dead. He is, however, going to spend the rest of his life on a ventilator, trapped in his own personal hell.” He pointed to his arm. “I had a timer. Look! There’s the ambulance.”

Tor huffed in exasperation. “This.. wasn’t exactly… subtle.”

“You don’t ask for the Daimone of Hallucinatory Dreams to help punish the wicked if you want subtlety. I didn’t want to be subtle. I wanted something splashy.” Nemesis appeared beside Tas and Tor. “Well done, Phantasos.”

Tas preened at her praise and Nemesis patted him on the head before explaining things further to Tor. “With Ron incapacitated this way he suffers for years here on earth before he suffers in Tartarus. He has no wife, no children, no siblings, and both of his parents are deceased. The courts will appoint a legal guardian who will uncover all of the nasty souvenirs he kept in his safe. His victims and their families will finally get their due.”

“And the drunk driver?” asked Tor. “Did he… deserve… his role… in this?”

“It was either he hit Ron or he hit a bunch of teenagers coming home from a concert, killing two, paralyzing a third, and causing the fourth to lose their leg.” She pointed up the street to where a group of teenagers were all standing in open mouthed shock in the crosswalk. “Two birds, one sedan.” Nemesis let those be her parting words as she disappeared from the mortal realm.

Tas turned to his brother, a grin plastered on his face. “Want to head to the all night diner with me? I could demolish a giant stack of pancakes.”

Tor wrinkled his nose. “I’ll pass.” He smoothed the lapels of his gray suit.

“You going to pay her another visit?” Tas asked as he examined his teeth in a side view mirror of a car.

“I don’t know… what you’re talking… about,” Tor replied before disappearing.

“Sure,” Tas scoffed. He might seem like he was in a perpetual state of disassociation, but he was actually very astute. You can’t bend reality properly unless you are aware of all its infinitesimal details. His brother had fallen in love but was too proud to admit it.

Tas supposed that since Tor was the Daimone of Nightmares that he thought love was something he was incapable of feeling, but that was ridiculous. If the Daimone of Misery could fall in love then anyone could. Why she had fallen in love with his other brother, Morpheus, was beyond his understanding though. Tas stretched and began walking down the street towards the diner, imagining all the food he was going to order.

Pancakes? Definitely. Cheese fries? Tartarus, yes! Milkshake or ice cream float? Hmm…..that one he needed to think about. Pie? Probably. Tas started to whistle and soon he seated in his favorite booth, smiling at the waitress as she set both the float and milkshake down in front of him.

Tas never did run across a wedding so perhaps he’d see if; he stole a peek at her name tag, Debbie, was up for a romp when he was finished refueling. She’d make a divine s****l partner. Mortals always were, which is probably why Jupiter kept getting his d**k wet with them. Tas didn’t like Jupiter so he put the mental images of that god out of his mind so that he wouldn’t lose either of his appetites.

A few days later Tas read the newspaper at the breakfast table in the home of his Uncle Mors and his lovely wife Evie. The official verdict on the accident was that Ron Cochran had been tripping on some bad acid at the time and the driver, while impaired, wasn’t solely at fault.

Tas quirked his mouth into a grin. LSD was always getting blamed for things he did. True, he did create the stuff, but touching him was what could drive people into the realms of madness. He wondered what Ron was thinking of at that moment, but his imagination was interrupted by a blow to the head.

“Ooooowwww,” he whined as he looked around for the culprit and whatever had beaned him in the temple. He spotted the sippy cup on the floor and noticed it was changing colors. He beamed at his niece who was peeking at him from the doorway.

“Oh, does Uncle Tas’s favorite Technicolor girl wish to play?” he asked her. She answered him by turning him purple from head to toe. “No fair starting without me!” he mockingly yelled as he leapt up from the table to pursue Coloris through the house.

That was the last time Tas thought of Ron, but Ron spent the remainder of his long life trapped with an endless cycle of lurid images playing through his mind, while Tas laughed at him from a throne.

Author Information

A Seriously Bad Trip - this story is a companion to Loving Death.

Emily Conover (pen name)

Other works available on In.ki.tt are Loving Death, The Fox’s Tale, and Alpha House

https://www.inkitt.com/emilyconover2569

Fac.eb.ook group: Emily Conover Writes