Our Lady of Perdition

The Lower Gate - Furia

The twilight grew dimmer and into a full-moon night as we rushed down the shore. We didn't know which direction to go or the shortest route back to the apple trees and fishing gear, so we dashed furiously away from the endless sea of undead. 

But our breaths couldn't last forever. When I thought my lungs were about to burst, I spotted some water trembling rather than the continued onslaught of dead men from the sea. The moonlight struck the surface of the little lagoon, showing that the water led into a moist cave. I pointed it out to Bugs and said, "Let's go this way." 

So we ran for the cave, legs churning through the sand and a few straggling corpses, until the rocky surfaces hung from every side around us. Upon reaching the haven, we stopped and lingered near the entryway.

"I thought we were dead men," Bugs admitted. "For sure. Dead." 

I agreed with a nod. 

Bugs bent such that his hands rested on his knees, then breathed hard, deep, recovering. "I shouldn't have joined. I should have just let them put me in prison, no matter how long that was going to take." 

I waited while Bugs took a rest. They say guys who smoke a lot can't run as far as those who don't, so I supposed that might be the case with Bugs. I thought about giving him a pat on the back, then held off when I realized how easily that could be misconstrued. "Well, what were you being tried for?" 

"Didn't... ok, I didn't go to trial," Bugs said. "Cops said they'd drop charges if I joined up, and I thought it'd be better than having a crackpot judge give me thirty years or something." He spat to the side then stood straight, walking onward in the last of the twilight. "But it probably would have been bad. I wasn't a good guy, Walt." 

"Nah, come on. You seem to have a rapport with Mary, right?" 

"Oh, yeah, God will forgive me - eventually, at least, if I stay contrite and shit - and Mary comes along with that. But Walt, you don't know what I did. They put Italian guys like me in the slammer for a long time for that kind of stuff." 

I tried not to seem upset when I asked a second time, "So, what'd you do that was so bad?" 

"I..." I could barely see him turn his head in the moonlight, couldn't see his face. "I nearly killed Pops. He might have died yet - when they shipped me off, he was still in the hospital." 

I bit my lip. 

"See? I told you I was bad. I was just so... so angry at him, and I couldn't stop once I had bust his lip. I had to make sure he wouldn't mess with me or my sister again."

"What'd he do to make you so upset?" I asked. "You're not the kind of guy to just fly off the handle for nothing." 

A hand crept up on my shoulder, a hand that wasn't Bugs's. 

I turned my head to see a woman behind me. She grabbed my shoulder hard, her fingernails digging through my flak jacket, and turned me to face her. She hissed with a husky voice, "Or would he kill someone wantonly, my little sailor? How well can you really know him?" 

Two cackling women pushed Bugs against a rock, knocking his breath out with a wheeze. I remained still, and the woman holding my shoulder didn't move to hurt me. 

"It's living men," one of the women holding Bugs down said. This one's voice was a bit higher pitched and absent the vocal fry of the first one. "How are they even here?" 

The one holding me rubbed my chest, trying to be alluring, but I just felt fear as her claw-like fingernails scratched my flak jacket. "Either way, they won't be making it any farther. This one trembles, and I like it." A feather from her hat or hairdressing tickled my face as she leaned forward to sniff me. 

"You were always the lucky one," the third voice popped up. 

Bugs pushed back on the ladies holding him down, or at least it sounded as such, when he said, "What gives? We was just coming here to get away from that hellscape on the shore, and tomorrow we'd keep trying to find our way off this island." 

All three women chuckled, and the one released her grip on me. 

"No one living has ever come through this passage, and only through the passage can you possibly escape," the husky voice called. 

"It's a bad place you've come to, little men, and I'm afraid going backwards isn't an option," the high-pitched voice answered. 

"And look, you'd hoped someone would save you. No one would save you, little men, not with your filthy hearts and dilapidated minds," said the last voice, pitch in between the two others. 

They cackled as they hooked their sharp fingernails into our clothes and dragged us deeper into their cavern. I kicked and fought against their grips, but fighting back just resulted in a slap to the face. For women, these ladies showed miraculous strength. 

But, then, a light shone at the end of the cavern from which we'd entered. All I could tell was that a human figure held the light and held it up above its head. 

The three women screeched when they noticed the light. "What is this?" the husky one asked. 

"I don't like it," another answered. 

The torch bounced as its bearer ran toward us. As she came closer, I recognized the blue cloak surrounding her, the hood having fallen from her head while she ran. Her right hand held the blazing torch high, upon her head was a crown of radiance, and in the crook of her left arm she held a stone tablet. 

The crones holding on to me and Bugs let go of our jackets and pulled away in the dark. They put their clawed hands over overwhelmed, heavily shadowed eyes. They cowered against the walls in their silk dresses of fringed crimson, scrambled in their patent-leather high heels. 

I scrambled up and grabbed Bugs's arm. "Come on!" I said. "This is our escape! Hopefully Our Lady of Perdition's going to pull through for us!" I pulled him up, then directed him to run deeper into the cavern. 

He ran with me but argued, "Don't call her that - it sounds heretical." 

"Like 'Our Lady of Shit Island' is better?" 

"Definitely better," Bugs answered. 

I let it go. Our Lady of Shit Island it was. 

The light from the little girl's torch became brighter as she ran closer, and the furious western whores screamed at her approach. But I didn't look back, just in case that moment of slowing or ounce of curiosity would revoke the girl's favor. 

Bugs said a breathy Hail Mary as he ran, as we left the little girl to fight off the crones.