JUDGED TWELVE
Thanks to everybody for their reviews. Apologies that these chapters are shorter than normal, this is to ensure that the chapter will end on what I hope is a cliffhanger.
Suddenly Ben smelt something familiar above the burning. Cinder toffee. Something he had loved when he was small, on one special night every year. The flames lowered to the size of a normal bonfire. And, as he looked up at the sky, he saw the fireworks, remembered chuckling at the bangs and gasping at the pretty colours. He'd not walked into hell but into his favourite childhood pleasure, Firework Night. Suddenly, Sapphira was running towards him.
"Oh Ben, my love… what you went through for me!"
He held her to his chest, burying his face in her hair.
"There was no pain… just a little fear…. And nothing can hurt us again…" he reassured her.
He saw his parents running towards him, and pulled them into the circle of enternal love. Soon he would turn and embrace Dylan, too, but Dylan was busy enough hugging his own parents, and stroking Dervla – the old dog must have passed on – and the joy on his face meant that he wasn't to be disturbed.
David closed the door, looking satisfied. He hated it when the good-hearted made mistakes on earth and he felt vindicated when they finally found their peace by making the right choices. He'd deliberately not shown Ben what he'd rejected. There were animals in that room, true, but if Ben had moved closer to them he would have seen their injuries or signs of incurable diseases - and been unable to move to help them. A true hell for somebody so compassionate, just as the constant sight of the starving people would have tortured Ethan for eternity.
His look remained inscrutable as he gazed at Honey.
"Your turn."
Honey shuddered, then straightened her spine and nodded.
"First, the left door."
Honey saw through the space David had left… but all she saw was a deep blackness. It scared her.
"The door on the right." David motioned with his hand.
This was better! Inside the door were lots of models reclining on couches, strutting down catwalks, putting on what had to be expensive make-up. Honey opened her mouth eagerly to say she wanted this door… but stopped. She'd been bad and greedy, she reasoned like a child, and her dad had died because of it. She couldn't join these beautiful people; she wasn't worthy. She had to grow up and face the darkness on her own.
"I want the left door please."
David nodded once, then led her by the arm to the door that held the darkness. He gave her a little push inside…
And on came the lights. People she loved were cheering, her dad among them, and leading her to a seat in the middle of a table with everybody she loved sitting around it.
"Well done, Honey, love!"
Honey knew she'd have to be brave again; if this was the good door, the scary man would want her to see the bad one.
"Go and look through the door on the right, Honey, then join your family again."
Honey opened the door and almost wept in shock, but the shock was tinged with relief. The models' true faces were shown now. Skin cracking to show the rotten faces underneath the masks. Some of the limbs, broken for fashion's sake in this nightmare world, were twisted at strange angles. A sobbing girl was slapped sharply in the face, her attacker's sharp ring leaving her bleeding and scarred.
"You needn't look any more, Honey. This isn't your door."
She let David close the door and almost ran to the one on the left again, to be embraced and soothed by the people who really mattered to her.
"Lily. You're next."
Lily stood, head erect, and followed David to the doors that he indicated for her. She wondered briefly what had happened to those who had already gone through.
David opened the door on the left and Lily saw a conference table, around which were seated immaculate-looking men and women in executive suits. She noticed a place had been marked for her, and she felt a surge of pride that they wanted to add her to their ranks. They must be the crème de la crème of hospital staff, she reasoned. Then the warning voice beat in her temple. Pride was what caused your misery before. Look at the other door.
David led her to the door on the right. Nursing staff, but on what she would have once sneeringly called the bottom level. Nurses, orderlies, porters. But their eyes were kind and their faces friendly. Lily knew what she had to do. Swallow her pride; begin at the bottom.
"Right door or left door, Lily?" David's cold voice asked.
"I choose the right."
David merely nodded. He led her back to the first room, where the executives' smiles seemed more patronizing, felt they were appraising her.
And then-
"You're to blame for my daughter's death, you arrogant swines" the new voice in the room rasped.
Lily saw somebody making a swift movement, and suddenly there was a loud bang, followed by fire, blood and carnage.
The dead revived, but without joy. They would relive this scene, the shock, the pain, the death, for eternity. The price of arrogance.
David's voice was softer now.
"Enter the other door again, Lily."
She did. A motherly-looking woman ran to embrace her.
"Come in, Lily, lovey. You'll be fine with us. Come and sit down now…"
Lily smiled as she was led into what she now knew to be her second chance.
"Bloody hell mate" grumbled Iain, "You like playing this one out, don't you? I bet we could have been sorted a lot quicker, but you just like piling on the agony don't you?"
David's glare chilled him to the bone.
"More agony for you, Iain. You can wait until Rita and Robyn have made their choices."
Iain sniggered.
"Sorry, Maxy, you get the really short straw. You have to wait till the very end, don't you?"
"Mean to the last" commented David, in a voice filled with loathing, and his voice as he gave his hand to Rita was almost gentle.
"Let's see what you choose, Rita."
