The Devil's son - 1. Setting the stage

I’m sure you heard stories about how the Devil is always trying to increase his power on our planet. But the truth is, he’s not trying to increase his power; he’s trying to get some power over our world.

Oh, Lucifer is certainly not without power but most of that is through his followers. Satanists are very real and some are truly dangerous. Certainly not all and probably not even most of them, but some are truly touched by the Devil and can use some of his Hellish powers, like magic. Don’t get me wrong! Not all magic is dark. Most magic is white and marvelous, but some magic, used for personal gain, to inflict pain and sorrow or even control of death, is very dark and comes directly from the Prince of Darkness.

The best way to gain a stronghold on Earth was for Lucifer to have a child with a human woman. Remember the movie “End of Days” with Arnold Schwarzenegger? Terrible movie but with a ring of truth to it. During the Millennium Satan would be able to enter our plain of existence to breed with a human woman. But the woman wasn’t pre-selected. Oh, lots of women hoped it would be them or their daughters but Satan didn’t want a woman whose soul was his already. No, he hoped to get one who was pure and good.

Another thing that was wrong about that movie was the timeframe. When the whole world was celebrating the millennium it was actually the year 2009. The real millennium had been 9 years earlier and no one knew because there was uncertainty about when the year 0 actually was. The monks responsible for our calendar made a mistake but what is 9 years in a millennium, right? So, when all kinds of religious watchdogs and supernatural bounty hunters were watching, trying to keep the Earth safe, Lucifer was nowhere near our reality. No, he had made sure his affairs were in order when the real millennium passed, 9 years earlier. He had found his pure and noble woman and, within 24 hours, seduced her and slept with her, causing her to get pregnant. And well before the clock stroke midnight, Satan was back in his dark realm, knowing he had succeeded in getting a son.

The next nine months were ….. difficult, both to His Darkness as to the woman carrying his son. A normal pregnancy is though but carrying Satan’s child is, forgive the pun, Hell. The young woman, not really much more than a child herself, was ill for nine months until she gave birth to Satan’s son. Of course she was never meant to survive the delivery and as soon as Satan’s child left her womb she succumbed to the complications of her giving birth. The doctors called her parents to make sure the child would have a home but when her parents finally arrived the child and all evidence the young woman ever giving birth were gone. The police searched everywhere and all local and national media were covering the disappearance of the young boy but over time other affairs began to replace the search as the number 1 subject in the news and 5 months after the boy had disappeared the media didn’t mention it anymore. But, of course, the case file was never closed.

As soon as the mother had died one of the nurses had contacted an acquaintance of hers to tell her the baby was born. This woman came to the hospital where the nurse had already destroyed all records of the baby’s birth and prepared the baby for a journey. She gave the baby to her acquaintance and left the hospital with her. Several weeks later a half-decayed body was found in the woods not far from the small city our story began but there was nothing to identify it with. But it was found in a clearing in the woods where satanic rituals were not unheard of.

The dark magic that had needed a human life to be performed sent the baby to his father in the flesh. Almost all entities in Hell are their in spirit alone, except for Lucifer and some of his aids and now his son. A son Lucifer called Jayden because his mother had loved that name so much. He figured it was the least he could do for the woman who gave him his son.

Over the next 17 years Jayden grew up in Hell. Trust me, it’s not the place you would want to raise a child but it was the best his father could do. Remember, Lucifer couldn’t just leave hell to go and raise his son in, let’s say, New Jersey (although I don’t think Hell is that much worse than New Jersey) so Jayden had to do with Hell and the little devils and demons living there. He learned about things like torture, mutilation, destruction, death and the use of his demonic powers. Being the son of the Nr. 1 in the Underworld Jayden’s powers were pretty strong which was as it was meant to be because the prophecies said the Son of Satan would be the instrument of destroying both Earth as Heaven. So Lucifer wanted to be sure his son knew very well how to use his powers.

Yet, in his vanity, Lucifer had made a mistake. He hadn’t realized Jayden had a soul. He himself had not much of a soul and his aids, devils and demons had none at all so he had no idea what a soul could mean to a person. And Jayden had a beautiful soul, both because his mother had been a beautiful and kind woman and because Jayden had never been tempted to commit any sin. This proved a problem but Satan didn’t understand what was wrong. When his lower demons were torturing a human soul he got all exited and boned up. He was practically drooling and always needed to jerk off to release some of the pressure. Jayden, however, was appalled by the things he saw and, most of the time, used his own demonic powers to destroy the demons that tortured the soul. More and more Jayden hated Hell and his father’s minions and he longed to see Earth. He started asking about it and his father told him about it, thinking that would settle things and Jayden would be more comfortable in Hell. But Satan was wrong. The more Jayden heard about Earth the more he longed for it. He became alienated from his father and decided he wanted to go to Earth.

And so came Jayden’s 18^thbirthday. Jayden had decided today was the day his father should know he was ready to leave Hell and go to Earth. As soon as he came in his father’s Great Hall he saw something was different. For one, his usual birthday present (a snowglobe filled with human souls) wasn’t there and neither were his father’s minions. Lucifer was all alone, waiting for his son.

“Father, what’s going on?” Jayden asked.

“So you desire to leave me and the place you grew up? You want to leave Hell?” Lucifer asked.

“Yes, father. I feel Hell is not my place. I need to be somewhere else but I don’t know where. Earth seems like a good place to start my search” Jayden answered.

Jayden didn’t know Lucifer had consulted with other higher level demons and they all had come with the same answer: Jayden must be confronted with sin and lots of it. The best place to do that, was Earth and in particular, New York City.

“Very well, so be it” Lucifer said. “Go and gather your stuff. You’re leaving today”.

So Jayden was thrilled. Not only would he go to Earth and leave Hell behind but his father was also okay with it. Little did Jayden know his father had other motives.

Because Lucifer was also afraid. Before today he never felt that emotion. Anger, hate, jealousy and all other negative emotions he had felt before, but fear was never among them. Why would he be afraid? Who could harm the Prince of Darkness? Well, the answer was: Jayden. As the prophecies said, the Son of Satan would help his father destroy Earth and conquer Heaven. But what would the child of the Son of Satan do? And to be sure he would never find out, Lucifer used his own dark magic on his son. Jayden would not know he was the Devil’s son but Lucifer made his son gay as well, so he would never reproduce and never pose a real threat to his father.

Later that day Jayden hugged his father goodbye and said goodbye to one of the demons he got close to, Phjierl. And as he hugged his father Lucifer used his magic to do his bidding. Seconds later, Jayden was standing in a nice apartment in Manhattan, with a fake identity and a fake memory, vaguely remembering he had magical powers but nothing of their origin and nothing of the previous 18 years of his life. He only knew two things. He had finally made it to New York and he was horny as Hell.

Arthur cursed the day when he decided to become a doctor. He loved his job but today he was so tired. He was an intern at Bellevue Hospital Center in New York City and he had to complete 4 more hours of his 48 hour shift. Than he would have 2 days off before he started a new shift for another 48 hours.

“This is insane” Arthur whispered to himself. “Who can have a life next to this profession?” And Arthur craved for a personal life. He thought that he would finally have some now that he left his parents, but unfortunately no such luck.

Arthur was a nice guy and a good doctor. He was smart and eager to learn (except at the end of an 48 hour shift). He wasn’t bad looking either. He stood 1.90 meters in height and weighed a little over 70 kilograms. He had curly brown hair and, strangely enough, emerald colored eyes. He worked out (well, as much as you can when working as much as he did) and ran as much as he could. Arthur liked to look good and who could blame him?

But Arthur also had a couple of secrets. First, no one knew Arthur was as poor as a church mouse. He was, what the more privileged colleagues called, “white trailer trash”. Arthur grew up as the youngest of four sons and was the only one with a brain. His oldest brother Ray was a soldier in the US army. He was killed during the first days of the invasion in Afghanistan. He got a funeral with military honors and found his final resting place in Arlington cemetery in Virginia.

His second brother, Leo, was a mechanic and made a living the honest way, most of the time. Sometimes he overcharged a customer for a repair and sometimes he sold a car or some car parts off dubious origin but that was pretty much it. Arthur was convinced the local law enforcement knew what was going on but didn’t feel the need to interfere.

Arthur’s youngest older brother was a complete disgrace. Tom was either drunk, high or both 90% of the time and the other 10% he was busy getting drunk, high or both. He had served a 2 year sentence on selling drugs already and was currently doing 5 years in a federal prison for smuggling. Arthur didn’t know where Tom was and when he was going to be released and neither did he care.

Arthur’s parents were good decent people although they wouldn’t win a science award anytime soon. His mother was friendly and hardworking and you could still see she had been a good-looking girl, one day. His father was strict but righteous. He was a no nonsense kind of guy and demanded respect and obedience from both his children as his wife. But he was never violent or unreasonable. He was just a man who had the bad luck to be raised in a trailer park without any opportunity to get out. At least he was not a drunk like most of his neighbors. He worked hard for small pay, but they had enough to live on and they were happy.

Arthur noticed early in college his heritage should be kept a secret. At first he refused to do so but then he was called in by a guidance counselor.

“Arthur, you have said you want to go to medical school. Do you think they will ever let you in when they know you come from a trailer park?” the counselor said. Arthur had left the office steaming in anger. He went to his dorm room and started packing his stuff. He walked towards the atrium where they had a couple of payphones and called home, explaining he was coming home that weekend to never return to college again. That didn’t go as planned.

The next afternoon his parents came to his dorm and talked some sense into him. Arthur never spoke with anyone about what happened, not even his friends in college, but every other student heard a heavy argument in Arthur’s room and Arthur had been a little girlish when sitting down for a couple of days. But Arthur did not leave college and never brought up his family again, except on graduation. Both his parents and his second brother were sitting there, being proud of their son and brother.

No, his first secret was maintained more because he was used to it than because it could hurt him. One or two of his colleagues were higher class (their families lived at the upper east side of Manhattan) but one of his other coworkers, an Asian looking guy, explained his father was of mixed American/Vietnam heritage and had come to the US to find his father when he was 18 years old. His father accepted him as his son and he got married with an girl from Puerto Rico and got a son, who they called Samuel. Samuel was a nice guy and Arthur and him got along fine. Samuel was also the only one of the interns who knew Arthur was trailer trash but he kept silent because of it. No, his first secret wouldn’t be a big problem for Arthur, should someone find out.

His second secret, though, would be somewhat more of a problem. A lack of a social life also had it’s benefits because it covered up Arthur’s second secret. You see, Arthur was gay. The thought of sleeping with a woman repulsed him so much it would make his stomach upset for hours. Arthur longed for a boyfriend but didn’t want to risk his career. Gay male nurses were pretty normal, especially in New York. But gay doctors was something not many people felt comfortable with. And besides, with his working hours no boyfriend would stay for a long period of time. So far Arthur had had one boyfriend (at least Arthur thought of him as a boyfriend. Other people would refer to him as a fuckbuddy) and some loose experiences. One day he had sex with his roommate in college and really thought his roommate and him would become boyfriends now. Unfortunately for Arthur, his roommate played the “God, was I drunk!” card and claimed to have no memories of the previous night. But both Arthur and his roommate knew he did remember because the camaraderie they had shared before was gone, and after summer his roommate had been assigned to another dorm building.

But, even though a boyfriend was what Arthur wanted most in the world, he also had his needs. No man can live without sex for more than two weeks and Arthur was no exception. So he took his refuge to the known meeting places for gay men, where they could have quick, dangerous and meaningless sex and sometimes visited the sex shops with video booths and the saunas. Arthur felt dirty every time and promised himself he would never go there again; that he would wait till he found himself a boyfriend to have sex again. But his male urges won every time and every time he found himself being fucked in a park, in a video booth or in a steam room, loving the feeling of being fucked but hating the feeling it was by some stranger at the same time.

Ok, so Arthur’s second secret was a little more serious, especially if they would ever find out he had had unprotected sex with an HIV-positive man. When the guy had cum in his ass, both had been startled by the blood on the guy’s dick. 6 months later the HIV-tests were still negative which meant he didn’t contract the virus from that man. His doctor (not in his own hospital, of course) told him he had been very lucky because for most men this would have been a death sentence. Arthur was very careful ever since and had not been to the saunas for a few months. But, in the end, his balls were overheating, his dick was hard 24/7 and he needed his ass to be filled with something else than a rubber fake dick. So he went again, although he never had sex without a condom again.

But Arthur’s third secret was something that would really cost him if someone would find out. Arthur had very strange dreams. Not sexually strange or the kind you woke up from and thought: “Well, that was peculiar”. No, strange, disturbing dreams. Dreams that would keep him awake at night. Dreams of combat, of blood and entrails, of severed heads and chopped off limbs, of creatures that could only be referred to as demons.

In these dreams Arthur was looking through someone’s eyes, as if he was participating in the fighting. One or twice Arthur had seen his reflection in a shield or something and what he saw scared the hell out of him. He was wearing a shining piece of armor and held a sword made out of fire in his hands. He wore a gold band around his forehead, keeping his long brown curly hair from falling in front of his face. He also had a bow half on his back and a tube filled with golden arrows. But that was not the scariest thing. The thing that scared him the most, were the large white wings on his back, as an angel.

In his dreams Arthur had once heard someone call his name, or something that sounded just like it: Ar’Thurian. And although it was not his name, it was at the same time. That morning, when he woke up, he thought about the name Ar’Thurian and he felt complete for the very first time; like he had always known Arthur wasn’t his whole name. But only hours later he wished he had never heard that name, because when he searched the name on the net, he found out the name Ar’Thurian was used for an Angel who was both a warrior angel as a guardian angel. He would be the guardian angel for the one he loved most and save his immortal soul in the end, whatever that meant. Arthur started taking sleeping pills to lock out the dreams. It didn’t work. All it gave him was an addiction to prescription drugs and it has cost him an awful lot of effort to overcome the addiction. So Arthur learned to deal with the dreams by ignoring them. But he noticed he fell more and more accustomed to being called Ar’Thurian and started using the name in daily life as well. Thank God his fellow interns thought he was being effected by sleep deprivation and paid no attention to it, except Samuel. Being a good Christian Samuel recognized the name Ar’Thurian and knew if God sent one as powerful as Ar’Thurian to Earth something big was about to happen. But Samuel never spoke of it, with anyone, not wanting to endanger whatever it was Ar’Thurian came for.

So, Arthur was doing ok, until three days ago. That night his dreams changed. He walked around in Central Park in the middle of the night (Arthur immediately knew this was a dream because no one in his or her right mind would walk in Central Park at night) and he appeared to be searching for something. The bow and arrows were on his back and his wings folded. The sword made out of flames was hanging from his hip and, when he came to the lake, he saw the golden band around his head glowing, like a halo. All of a sudden he heard something and he spread his huge wings. For a moment Arthur was surprised to see the size of his wings. They were at least 3 meters each when unfolded and were completely made out of white feathers with a pearly shine to it. With even less than a thought he took off, flying above Central Park in seconds. And then he saw it: a creature, dark with dark clouds surrounding it and with wings like those of a bat. The creature saw Ar’Thurian coming but didn’t attempt to flee or getting ready for a fight. In stead it spoke. It said:

“Help me, Arthur. Only you can save me”. And with that, Arthur woke up, startled. But the next morning he was startled even more, when he found there was mud on his shoes and a bow, a tube with golden arrows and a sword were hanging from a hook in the wall.

That same morning they first heard about a mysterious illness that was hitting the gay community in New York City, especially around the saunas and video booths.