Sean & Wormwood, The Friendly Satanists | Canto I

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Prologue

According to The Satanic Apocrypha (Third Edition Revised), when Cain murdered Abel he shed twelve tears. Each one formed itself into a crystal shard as it fell, and these twelve shards were scattered by wind, tide, and happenstance to the five corners of the Earth.

As the millennia passed, these shards were located by philosophers, alchemists, and people with nothing else particularly interesting going on. They changed hands, were lost, found, hidden, discovered, gifted, stolen, and accidentally fell behind any number of filing cabinets, not necessarily in that order.

In time, each was incorporated into a separate artifact, giving said artifact all the potency of Cain's rage and regret. After more time passed, these artifacts became known as the Relics of Unimaginable Power. After just a little bit more time, like six months tops, a legend arose: It is said that whoever is able to find all twelve Relics of Unimaginable Power, reunite them, and merge them in an unspeakable ritual, will get a Thirteenth One Free.

It is my fate and task to record the chronicle of the two members of the Megachurch of Satan who were sent forth on an unholy quest to find the Relics of Unimaginable Power and do that thing I said above. They are Sean and Wormwood, the Friendly Satanists.

Canto I

TROPHAEUS CANIS FARCIMINIS

I will here describe the principal figures to this chronicle, so that you may picture them in your mind as you learn of their unforgivable deeds. Those of you who are unable to form images in your mind can probably find fan art somewhere on the Web.

Wormwood, the junior member of the cohort, was not as tall as most Sons of Adam. He was in fact what would today be referred to as a “short king.” His hair was a lawless meadow of flame-red cowlicks with forelocks that reminded some of demonic horns and others of the Wu-Tang Clan logo. His eyes were blue. Just normal blue. When not buck naked, he nearly always wore the ceremonial garb of satanic initiates, a garment described by Amazon as “Black Hooded Robe Cosplay Halloween Cool Medieval Monk Cloak.”

 Sean, the senior member, was as tall as Wormwood was short, which is to say “quite.” His lifespan had been extended beyond that given him by God, or possibly his life had ended quite a while back and he was animated by unholy magic, or maybe he was one of those people who always looks old but well-preserved no matter what their age, like Tommy Lee Jones.

Whatever the reason, Sean’s complexion had a pale grey cast like one of those people who take too much colloidal silver, and his eyes were sunken and yellow. His skin was not so much wrinkled as etched by the tolls of time (again, think Tommy Lee Jones). His hair was jet-black, he was as slender as a child’s promise, and he typically wore a meticulously tailored black suit with black tie and a white pocket square for that extra bit of class.

This chronicle begins one morning when Sean and Wormwood walked into Western Subterranean Satanic Base Epsilon Epsilon Upsilon, Tertiary Operations Complex, Room 121.

“Hail Infernal Demonic Overseer George!” Wormwood said with a smile and a perfunctory throw of the horns. “What's the haps?”

“Hrmph,” said Infernal Demonic Overseer George. He was a middle-aged man with greying black hair, a dusky complexion, and a perpetual frown. He was sitting behind a large desk. He had spent so many decades hunched over a desk that even sitting in the bath he looked like he was about to send out a sternly worded memo. He did not look up from his laptop. “I’ve consulted the auguries, the omens and the shift schedule, and I've got a job for you. There's a hot-dog eating contest taking place today in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. We have good reason to believe the trophy is actually one of the Relics of Unimaginable Power. Retrieve it.”

Infernal Demonic Overseer George was not one for small talk. He was not one for talk of any stature. He was one for handing out assignments and getting back to the job of filling out a complex form confirming that the assignments had been handed out.

“Awesome!” Wormwood said. “One stolen tchotchke coming right up!” Wormwood could take or leave small talk, but he’d worked for Infernal Demonic Overseer George to know the drill.

“No, no. You can't just steal it. The artifact only holds power for the rightful owner. You have to win the contest.”

“Even better!” Wormwood said. He turned to his tall, ashen counterpart. “How are you with hot dogs, Sean?”

Sean’s voice conjured the spirits of abandoned attics and forgotten graveyards. “All food is bile and ash to me.”

“Then I guess--”

“Bile and ash and artificial maple flavoring.”

“Then I guess it's up to me!”

“Hrmph,” said Infernal Demonic Overseer George by way of dismissal.

The twisting paths of the Satanic Megachurch wind into corners unsuspected by those who walk in the light of ignorance. And so it was that by secret pathways, forbidden conveyances, and public transportation, Sean and Wormwood made their way to the Ninety-Third Annual Champaign-Urbana Hot Dog Eating Contest.

Over the last six months, several qualifying rounds of intense competition had narrowed the field of competitive eaters down to three, plus Wormwood, who had received a last-minute special invitation from the American Scarfer’s Federation thanks to a generous donation of eight million liters of pink bismuth antacid from Unremarkable Non-Satanic Holdings LLC.

Wormwood accepted a rule sheet from the chipper young Jaycee at the registration booth. “This shouldn't be too tough. The rules say the trophy goes to whoever can first finish 20 hot dogs, 16 corn dogs, 12 bagel dogs and…oh, wait, this doesn't look good. One can of Vienna sausages.”

Sean's face showed no expression. “Can you not consume these sausages of Vienna?”

“No, nobody can. Vienna sausages are so repugnant, so vile and slimy, that they can only be consumed by those of true Viennese heritage.”

Sean's face betrayed not the slightest trace of emotion. “I would then infer that you do not share in this heritage.”

“Not a bit. You don't get hair this color by marrying Habsburgs.”

Sean's face...I'm going to level with you. Sean is not the most facially expressive person, assuming he's a person at all. So just take it as given that when he speaks he's staring, unblinking, with his sunken eyes tunneling into the soul of whomever or whatever he's looking at, assuming it has a soul. I'll let you know if he cocks an eyebrow or does that Elvis sneer or whatever.

Sean said, “Then we are doomed in our quest.”

“Maybe, but--”

“As all living things, and even the oceans and stones, are doomed.”

“Maybe, but--”

“Doomed to suffer, doomed to fall, doomed to end.”

“Maybe, but let's take a look at the other contestants. There’s a good chance they can't eat the Vienna sausages either.”

Sean and Wormwood strolled along the tables behind which the other contestants were already seated. In front of the first contestant was a placard reading “Gary Freud.”

Wormwood scowled. “That's not good. I can tell from his cigar and his grey, schnauzer-like beard that he's descended from Sigmund Freud, the Viennese father of modern psychology.”

The pair continued to the next opponent, whose placard read “Rick Schubert.”

“Blast the luck! His foppish ascot, high forehead and pube-like hair mark him as a scion of Franz Schubert, the famous Viennese composer.”

Cursing underneath his breath, Wormwood headed to the final opponent, whose placard read “Thierry Beauchamp Thibodeaux.” The slender contestant was wearing a beret and softly humming the Marseilles.

“Well, okay, he's screwed,” said Wormwood, “but those other two guys are trouble!”

Sean’s voice was like the memory of a night spent alone and terrified. “Then we are doomed in our quest, as all—”

“Wait a sec!” interjected Wormwood “Nothing says you actually have to eat the sausages!”

“It is called a ‘hot-dog eating contest.’” Sean replied.

“Tchtchtch! Do you still have that hypodermic needle you got at the Wiggles concert?”

“Of course.”

“Awesome, I have a plan.”

In due time, the contestants were called to their seats, their demanding victuals were placed in front of them, and the referee blew a whistle to signal the initiation of ingestion. Using a technique he learned from scrolls so cursed they'd sear a baby's hands, Wormwood quickly reduced the Vienna sausages to a pink goo and loaded all of it into the hypodermic needle.

“Yay!” Wormwood said, holding it aloft. “Tie me off!”

Reader, there are many terrors ahead of you if you continue perusing this chronicle. I will describe things that will chill your soul and set your conscience aquiver in antipathy. But this is the beginning of the tale, so I will spare you from a description of what Wormwood now does with a hypodermic needle full of Vienna sausage slurry. Instead, I will only relay the words he spoke as his opponents looked on, horrified.

“Ooh yeah! I'm mainlining processed meat product!”

Also: “Gimme more of that sweet sweet 'V'!”

Also: “Now that's what I call junk food!”

Minutes later, Wormwood climbed the steps to the awards stage. Before he had even finished “ingesting” the Vienna sausages, all his opponents had been disqualified—two for regurgitation, one for suicide.

“Well yay,” Wormwood said after receiving the Relic of Unimaginable Power, which in this instance took the form of a brown plastic trophy topped with a golden plastic figure of a muscular man holding a unreasonably large hot dog. “Let's get this thing back to the lair.”

* * *

Upon return to their Subterranean Complex, Sean and Wormwood once again visited their administrator. “Hail, Infernal Demonic Overseer George, Most Sinister and Baneful!” said Wormwood. “I got your dealy-bop.”

“Hrmph,” Infernal Demonic Overseer George replied, “Keep it. As a reward for your unquestioning service and minimal use of your expense account, you are hereby assigned to retrieve the remaining eleven so we can use them to summon the prophesied Thirteenth One Free.”

The administrator reached into his desk and retrieved a small card, then punched a hole in it with an unhallowed obsidian hole punch. He handed it to Wormwood. On the card were emblazoned the words “Tears of Cain Super Saver Club” and below were the image of twelve teardrops, neatly arranged. The first one had a hole punched in it.

“Well yay,” said Wormwood. “I'll take the fabled artifact and put it with my stuff. Probably in the garage.”

Sean's voice held the echo of the final whispering whine of the last member of a wolf species long extinct. “We have no garage. We live in the bowels of the earth with all other creatures who must hide themselves from God's gaze.”

“We don't? What's that big room then?”

“Mud room.”