Fiction by James Tombe
So I'm sitting in the office, right? Not doing much, it being the Sabbath, and all. I figure, hey--even deities have to take a day off every now and then. So anyway, I'm fiddling around with a hobby of mine, creating things from primordial clay™--you know, that stuff that's like cosmic Play-Doh™--when he comes knocking at my door.
Of course, I know who it is. I'm omniscient. And he knows I'm omniscient, so I let him wait outside for a little while. You know, just to show him who's boss. The last time we parted company, it wasn't on the best of terms. I mean, hey, I may teach people to turn the other cheek someday, but at this point, I was still pretty wrathful about the whole thing.
So, after an appropriate length of time, I wave my finger at the door, and voila, it opens to reveal that smirk that I detest so much. When we had our first argument, I'll admit, harsh words were exchanged on both sides. But when I told him where to go, I meant it.
"Satan®," I say in my best no-nonsense voice. I've been practicing, and it seems to work pretty well with folks on Earth (patent pending). Just the right amount of rumble. He looks like he's been traveling. But he always looks tan, so it's hard to tell. "Where have you come from?"
"From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it," he replies.
"Speak English, man--and not that King James© stuff! You know how I feel about that!" I put a little extra rumble in it, just for good measure.
"I've been around," he shrugs.
He knows I don't like it when he talks "King James©." He's the one who'll get everyone riled up on "thees" and "thous," arguing about semantics instead of just listening to what I was saying.
I try to keep things simple, but people don't want simple. I mean, ten commandments®--ten! You tell people, "Don't kill each other," and then someone comes along and asks, "What do you mean by that?" Oy, don't get me started.
So where was I? Oh, yeah. So I can tell Satan® has something up his sleeve. He's got this thick file under his arm, full of hand-scribbled notes. He's been doing his homework--he reads my stuff more than I do--and he thinks he's got me.
"What do you want?" I ask, only because I know it irks him. He knows I know, and that's enough for me.
"You're omniscient," he replies. "Why don't you tell me?"
"That would be cheating."
It's then that I get an instant message via p-mail. You know, prayer. Usually, it's just the same scams: offers to increase the size of my following by over 10% and messages from other so-called deities who claim that they need your help in moving millions of souls into your heaven, if you'll just give them your personal information. But this was different.
This was from my favorite worshipper, Job. He was making his daily offerings, and asking me to forgive his kids if they did anything to offend me. A nice touch, I thought. I was considering having a kid myself, someday, so maybe I was a little over-zealous in my blessings. I pull up his file on the computer and add 7,000 sheep™ to his account.
I proudly point the p-mail out to Satan®, and ask him why he can't be more like Job. Man, he really hates it when I compare him to what he refers to as "the hairless apes." It was worth it just to see the corner of his smirk waver.
"You know," he starts, "Job would curse you if you took away all of his toys. 'Spare the rod and you spoil the child,' I always say."
"Right." Then, inspiration struck. I turn the monitor around so Satan® can see Job's account, and then I hand him the keyboard and mouse. He looks at me, suspicious.
"Take it all away," I tell him, smiling. I sit back in my chair with my hands folded behind my head and my feet propped up on the desk. It was my day off, after all.
So Satan®, not believing his luck, gleefully erases all of it: the sheep™, the camels™, the oxen™, the she-asses™. All of it. He even took Job's land and family.
Of course, it didn't quite work out the way he thought it would, so next Sabbath, there was Satan standing in my doorway again, looking miffed.
"You know," he says, adjusting his glasses again--he always does that when he's nervous, "Job would curse you if you took his health away. If he doesn't have his health, what does he have?" So, again, I turn the monitor around and hand the mouse and keyboard over to him.
This time, he tries something tricky, and he quickly clicks the "Delete" button on Job's file. Of course, I already knew he was going to try something like that, and he curses when he sees the pop-up that warns him that he doesn't have permissions to delete files. So instead, he adds a bunch of viruses to Job's account.
Job's wife and friends, of course, decide that I've cursed him. I think it's funny that the same people who can't figure out what I mean when I say "Don't kill each other" think they've got me all figured out.
So it's after this that I realize just how much of a whiner Job can be. He's still not cursing me, though, which is a good thing. But now my p-mail is crammed with "Can that which is unsavory be eaten without salt?" and "Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese?"
So I took a little trip, in the form of a whirlwind™. You know, just to be creative. It's what I do.
I find Job, scoop him up, and I give him a little pep talk.
"Are you the one who knows everything? Can you throw lightning™ around? I didn't think so." I hated being so harsh, but if I never hear one more comparison to curdled cheese, it will be too soon.
That seemed to do the trick. Job agreed to let me work in mysterious ways, and I won my bet with Satan® (which he was none too pleased about, mind you). As soon as I got back to the office, I took out my back-up copy of Job's file and replaced everything he had lost, doubling his livestock for old time's sake.
Satan® came into the office looking pretty glum, and I tried not to gloat, which got his goat™ all the more. He just shook his head and left in a tizzy. He's famous for his temper tantrums.
He keeps asking me why I bother doing all this if I know how it all ends; what's the point?
I just smile.
"Thank you for agreeing to this last-minute interview, Mr. Kovacs. I really--is something wrong?"
I am not Kovacs. I am--
"No. Nothing. I ... I just haven't gone by that name in a long time."
"Ah. My apologies. Would you rather I called you by your crime-fighting alter ego, Ror--"
"No."
Yes!
"Call me Walter."
"Okay ... Walter. So, are you ready to begin?"
I've been waiting to end.
"Sure."
"So, tell me a little about your upbringing."
Filth. Dirty things. Shameful things.
"What would you like to know?"
"Well, how about telling me a little about your mother."
Whore.
"Is everything all right?"
"I'm sorry ... she died when I was a boy."
Slut.
"We don't have to talk about this if you're uncomfortable with it ...."
She died in an alleyway. Thrown out with the rest of the trash.
"No, it's okay. I was 16 when I heard that she had been killed."
Her pimp had forced her to drink Drano. Even that couldn't cleanse her of her sins.
"How did you feel about that?"
Good.
"It's ... complicated. Can we move on to something else?"
"Yeah, sure. No problem. So ... when you started your crime-fighting career, you were called a masked vigilante. What do you think about that label?"
Your labels mean nothing to me. You are just trying to confuse the issue.
"Well, a lot of us heroes had to protect our identities by wearing masks--"
I protected mine by taking it off.
"--I mean, we did operate in a grey area outside of the law."
There is good and there is evil. There is no grey.
"What was it like back then?"
"Well, a lot of us heroes were doing our own thing, when we decided to get together and tackle the problem as a group. It was a great support network, of sorts."
We were weak. I am strong.
"How did that go?"
"Good, at first. We shared ideas, helped each other out. In fact, one of them made this grappling hook gun for me--Daniel was an inventive genius."
He was blinded by his brilliance. He could see things, but he could not see the truth.
"Is that real? Does it still work?"
"No. It was disabled after ... my arrest."
I shot a SWAT officer in the chest with it in my attempt to escape. I was framed, but I knew they wouldn't believe me. They were weak and unable to see the truth.
"That's right. The Jacobi murder. Did you know Edgar Jacobi, aka 'Moloch?'"
"Not personally."
He was a criminal. That is all I need to know.
"But you did know him."
"Y-Yes. We were on different sides, but in the end I hope he--"
--burns in Hell--
"--found peace."
"Around 1975, your methods became a bit more ... violent. Do you want to talk about that? What made you change your modus operandi?"
"It was a ... difficult case. There was a missing girl ...."
She had been raped and murdered, her body dismembered and fed to a pair of large German Shepherds.
"What happened?"
"I ... don't remember much. The shock ...."
The impact of the meat cleaver splitting the dogs' skulls sent a shock up my arm. I handcuffed him to the wood stove and set the building ablaze. My last gift to him was a hacksaw and a choice.
"Wait a minute. Wasn't that the time of the Gerald Grice killing? You were implicated in that murder, as well, weren't you? Are you sure you can't remember anything?"
He never left that building alive.
"I'm sorry ...."
"That's okay. We don't have to talk to about it. How would you compare the difference between the early days and your latter years as a crime-fighter?"
"Well, it was a lot less ... complicated back then. It was a simpler time."
Back then I was Kovacs pretending to be Rorschach. Now I am Rorschach pretending to be Kovacs.
"Mm-hmm ... 'a ... simpler ... time.' Come to think of it, how did you avoid going back to prison after your escape in November of 1985?"
"My friend, Adrian; he ... helped me out. He had the influence."
What? Adrian? No. Not a friend. A monster.
"Soon after that you met your wife, right?"
"Yes. She was a grief counselor. A beautiful woman. She helped me work through a lot of my ... issues."
Something's wrong.
"And your sons. One's a highly decorated police officer, correct?"
"Yes, and the other is a journalist. I'm very proud of both of them."
No. Something's wrong.
"Now, you officially retired sometime in the mid-to-late-eighties, right?"
"Y-yes. That's correct. After a trip to Antarctica."
"What happened during the trip?"
I was betrayed.
"I ... I'm sorry. What was your name again?"
"Jon."
You killed me.
Yes, I did. And no, I haven't. I want to give you this one last chance, Rorschach. A chance to live your life out.
No.
You see what it would have been like. You'll have a family. A wife and two sons.
No!
All you have to do is see that Adrian was right. It was for the greater good.
No compromise. No regrets.
Rorschach. Walter. This truly is your last chance.
Do it.
... I'm sorry, Walter. I really am.
DO IT!
© October 19, 2005
Characters borrowed from Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons.