The Penance

By Aykut Tufekli

After Jesus Christ was crucified, things started to change between good and evil. Satan took this as an opportunity and tried to distance people from Christianity and other religions at every opportunity. The archangel and his companions were the last servants of God. The peace in the world was not stable. Satan had some plans for ruining religions in the mortal world.

On a regular and hot day in hell, an ordinary devil did something that the prime devil would not like. The archdemon sent him into temporary exile. To avoid further consequences, the devil was tasked with spreading corruption in the mortal world. Bowing low before the prime demon, he listened as his fate was sealed.

“I hand over all the power I have to you for now, granting you the ability to wreak havoc in the mortal realm. I command you to shatter the lives of those poor creatures, leading them away from the path of Jesus and into our dark lands. You will be there until you make that damn world worse. In the end, it will be our side that prevails!” the prime devil said, putting his red, long, and pointed fingers on the smaller devil’s shoulder and making him feel how superior he was to him.

“The Supreme Archdemon, in accordance with your desires, I shall comply.” The disgraced devil answered with concern about not being acquitted of his sentence.

The archdemon sent the condemned demon to the mortal world, thus leaving the disciple demon’s home, hell, until his sentence was over. He fell in New York, softening his fall with his wings. The devil took on a human form to complete his mission. He first went to a skyscraper near Times Square. The disciple opened a fake front office on the sixth floor of a skyscraper. The 6-foot-tall sign he hung read: “Attorney at law, dietitian, mediator, plastic surgeon, psychologist. We can help no matter what, Red Wings Company.” He filled the empty office with brand new furniture and computers. He placed a beautiful secretary at the entrance to the office. After two days, one customer showed up. He was an overweight, medium-sized man with sparse brown hair. He approached the secretary.

“I need someone to talk to about diet,” the customer said, sweaty and out of breath.

“Of course, Mr. Wyll will take care of you. He’s waiting in his room,” the secretary said with a smiling face. Mr. Wyll was the name he would use to pass himself off as one of the mortals. The customer knocked on the door and entered the room. Mr. Wyll grinned from ear to ear and extended his hand.

“Good afternoon! I’m Theo Wyll. What can I do for you?” he said.

“Hugh Jenkins,” the man replied, shaking the offered hand. “I want to take help with my excess weight. I just… I can’t deal with the bullying anymore.”

“You’ve come to the right place,” Mr. Wyll said with unshakable confidence. “I’ll arrange a diet for you; one and a half months later you will hit your dream weight,” Mr. Wyll said it with the utmost confidence and as if he were a truly licensed dietician.

In the first session, they talked about where that problem started. Wyll got into his mind by telling him about a pill that would help him lose weight even if he wasn’t on a diet. Hugh’s eyes lit up like the sun rising in the dark when he heard this. He said that he wanted to take that pill. But he couldn’t afford that pill since he had been unemployed for months. Unfortunately, he had to sell the car that his late father had bought with great effort. Mr. Wyll charged his first customer cold heartedly. Six thousand was too much for that broke guy. After taking that pill, there was obviously a metamorphosis in Mr. Jenkins. He lost 60 pounds of weight in just one week. He was at his target weight, but when he got it without any pain, he wanted to lose more weight. After his pills ran out, he wanted to continue using them. Wyll was so caught up in the dietitian game that he wanted to warn Hugh.

“You are already good now. More pills can affect your health in a bad way. I don’t recommend you.”

Hugh did not give up his insistence. He wanted to lose more weight. This was the best representation of his greed. His dietitian told him that there was an increase in the price of medicine. Unfortunately, Hugh couldn’t afford it and asked if it was possible to pay later.

“No, but I can only help you if you sign a promissory note.”

He accepted helplessly just because he wanted to lose more weight. As soon as Wyll snapped his fingers, the secretary brought the file and pencil. Hugh took the pencil and tried to sign the paper in a rush, but the pen did not write despite all efforts.

“It must have run out of ink,” said Wyll, and he handed him his own pen.

“This pen writes in red. Are you sure there will be no problem with the document?”

“Don’t worry, it’s a concept of the Red Wings Company. Every document of ours is signed in red.”

After he signed, the last sparkle in Hugh’s eyes was slowly fading. Wyll saved some of Hugh’s blood test when they were looking at blood values, for the reason of putting it in that pencil so that he could be able to sign the paper with his own blood without knowing. After starting the second box of the pill, Hugh began to lose weight rapidly. Within a week, he looked like a skeleton. He had difficulty walking, staggered, and limped, and strange wounds appeared on his body. He was yelling at his dietitian, saying how this medicine could have such a side effect.

“I told you not to use that pill anymore. You were already fit, but you didn’t like it,” Wyll said.

One week later on that day, Hugh’s situation got worse. Because he is alone and couldn’t reach the phone for help. Passed away in his own bed. Before meeting Wyll, he was fat but alive.

After all, nobody noticed his absence. Wyll was happy because he had managed to ruin the life of the first mortal he met.

Two days later, a young blonde woman that looks like arrogant had come to her last stop, so to speak. She was the second step of Wyll. The secretary directed her to Wyll’s room.

“Hey dear, my name is Ella Vation. I was looking for a plastic surgeon. There was a sign about that, but only that there was so much in that sign. Is that real?” The young lady spoke in a rush, just as if she were in a hurry.

“Don’t worry about that; we are a big company that includes every service. We would like to serve you. What do you need?” Wyll asked as he smiled with thirty-two teeth.

“I want surgery for shaping my nose, a face lift operation, a brow lift, liposuction, and ear reshaping. Did I count my nose? Oh yes, I did.”

“Well, you have too much in your mind; those will be expensive, Miss Vation,” Wyll wanted to inform her.

“Do I look like I have economic problems? I don’t have those problems; you don’t know who my ex-husband was, right?”

“What a shameful person; she can’t tell that she killed her husband for his money. He was already old. She threw him off the roof and made it look like an accident. It must happen because of my lord’s specter. My Lord might like her just because she is like one of us. If I end her life in this world as soon as possible, maybe my lord will want to make this heartless narcissist her mistress,” Wyll thinks to himself. While she was handling the payment, Theo was writing a letter.

“My dear lord, the prince of darkness, the gatekeeper of hell,
In the mortal world, I found someone who is still mortal but who can compete with us in evil, who can be the mistress of hell. I just wanted to report my progress, sir.”

After completing the letter, Wyll folded the paper and set it on fire, threw the ashes of the paper, burned out the window, and went back to the room where she was. She was impatient and insisted on getting plastic surgery as soon as possible. While they were talking about it, a bright red light surrounded the city. Owner of the hell was there. Before appearing, the lord made that lady faint. He was highly strung because his disciple had disappointed him.

“I got your letter; why did I put you here? Do you think that killing seven ordinary people would be enough for your penance? Did I send you to this world to find me a lady? You are not worthy of us! I was really hoping you’d do something, but you’re such an incompetent. From now on, you are no longer my right-hand man,” the lord shouted angrily and made the heavens and earth shake. He turned away and left without listening to the disciple.

Wyll was sad but also angry at the prime devil. The lady was still unconscious. Wyll snapped his fingers and woke her up. She was already overwhelming Wyll with talk about the surgeries. Wyll snapped again, and Ms. Vation had all the surgeries she wanted in the blink of an eye. Wyll’s morale was not good at all. He was abandoned by his Lord. Wyll was depressed, went to the fridge, and opened a whiskey. He forgot about Ms. Vation still being there. She asked him why he’s day drinking, but Wyll preferred to offer one glass to her. That day they drank and chatted together until the evening. Days turned into weeks, and Ella was starting to like him sneakingly. She invited him to dinner or drinks at every opportunity. Even though he tried to refuse her, he spent time with her a few times. At the last time, they ate dinner and drank rose wine. As Ella got drunk, she couldn’t hide her emotions and shouted how much she loved him. He tried to calm her down, saying it was just an obsession and it would pass. Ella took out the gun she hid in the drawer and said, “You’re either mine or nobody’s.” Wyll took the gun from her hand and shattered it in his palm with one move; the shards fell like raindrops. “Would you die for me?” asked Wyll, and without thinking, she said yes. For a moment, Wyll showed his true demon face, a grotesque mask of red. Ella was so drunk she couldn’t distinguish between reality and delusion and leaned to kiss Wyll, but soon she felt something in her heart. No, it wasn’t love; it was Wyll’s fingers that she felt; he gently inserted his fingers and ripped out her heart. No matter how searing pain she felt in her chest, she didn’t even make a sound. Wyll watched her fade, her expression unchanged, and then he vanished into the night.

Weeks passed like days; Wyll looked like he was going to regret it, but he never did. He had never experienced love after his late wife in his mortal life; maybe that was the whole problem. One day, while he was drinking out of boredom as the only customer of a not very popular bar, two young ladies came to Wyll; he wanted to push them away. They said, “It’s not what you think; we are here for an invitation, an invitation to the great lord’s place.” He couldn’t understand why his lord invited him after all this humiliation. They saw the misunderstanding in his ideas and told him they were not from hell. “We are the archangels of God; he told us to invite you to our side.” God wants him by his side. Wyll was torn between two choices: on one side is the prime devil who humiliates him, and on the other side is the god who calls him. He was torn between the darkness that consumed him and the glimmer of salvation offered by these celestial messengers. Could he trust it? They tried to convince him by saying, “You can’t live here forever; you don’t belong here. In a way, you are in purgatory. You are lucky to choose your side; others do not have the right to choose.” Saying these words seemed to lessen Wyll’s uncertainty. He was sneakingly afraid of his former lord; what would he say about this change of sides? On the other hand, Wyll would have been right since his lord had banished him. “I’m just a devil that came out of hell; how will I belong in heaven?” Wyll was questioning celestial servants. After a long time trying to persuade, Wyll asked for permission to go out and think about it. The moment he stepped outside, he saw something he didn’t expect to see. His former Lord was right in front of him.

“I forgot to take back the powers I gave for your task; oh, how forgetful I am!” said the prime devil, taking all his unearthly powers. The moment his powers were taken away, he literally became a silhouette of a soul. Archangels were just watching it silently. They thought they would get Wyll on their side, as he had completely broken away from the archdemon and would agree to join their side. Wyll’s indecisiveness was visible on his face. The removal of his powers trapped him in this body he had previously chosen. The supremes of the two opposing sides were facing each other but were silent towards each other, and in the midst of them stood Wyll. He had served the archdemon for decades, but he got abandoned at his first mistake. Wyll screamed everything inside him, his emotions, and why he was wasting his time with those two people, by directing his humanoid index finger towards his former lord. “I just wanted to feel like human again! I was having fun and spent time with humans. Apart from talking to Hugh and Ella, I met people outside; I ate and drank together, but why am I telling this to you? You are just thinking of being evil, but without good, evil cannot exist!” Prime devil mocked him with a mocking laugh. “No matter what you do, you’re not mine anymore,” he said and left.

“You are going to join us, right? You can repent for everything. We saw the sparkle in your soul,” the angels tried to persuade, though Wyll would not open his mouth. “They invited me to their side, but at what cost?” Wyll is questioning things in his mind. “Can’t I just have my way?”
Wyll demanded his freedom; he wanted to be free. “Can you help me live a human life once again? I know I was human once, but I left so soon. I want twenty more years, please! Living only 56 years, I couldn’t taste life enough,” he begs unceasingly. “Are you sure that this is what you want? We promise you to be one of us, but you want to live as a human,” the archangel said. They told him to spend some time on thinking. Nobody ever had the right to choose before; what was the difference of his? Who knows? The next day, they met at the place they had previously determined, that suburb bar. His decision was final; he wants to spend some time like a human. They agreed on twenty years of human life without any extraordinary powers, but the only condition was that he would be one of them when he finished his time. As archangels flapped their wings, Wyll started to walk towards the unknown in his new life.

Aykut Tufekli is a 21-year-old student from Turkiye, studying English Language and Literature since 2021. He has a keen interest in storytelling and enjoys exploring different perspectives through his writing.