Disclaimer: I don't own any characters from "Red Eye".

Deliver Us From Evil

By First Noelle

Prologue

Winter

The low watt bulb in the bedside lamp cast a false sense of daylight into a room that knew no real connection with the natural world. Its valiant attempt to banish the darkness was futile; clumps of shadow, like weeds, retreated, but did not cede the battle. The steady hum of a central heating system cycled on and off with a regularity that lent a sense of rhythm and order to this small world, and a reminder that what came would pass, and would come to pass again.

The man's world was not defined by days and nights, or by meals and conversation, but by his body's rhythms, by the cycle of pain. The arc began its upward journey with a subtle tug, like a discreet 'ahem' from a junior manager seeking a subtle interruption of busy executive, and would distract him from the enthralling world of morphia. He would frown inside, shunning the interruption, but the tug, not to be ignored, would come again and again, finally forcing him to consciousness, to the reality of this small room with its false light and musty ventilation system. Once he awakened, when the pain had his full attention, it would graduate quickly from a mere nuisance to a full-out fury that must be mastered. Each time this happened, he knew he would master it, that he would climb on top of his pain without intervention; but each time he fell short, and was forced to wait in hell until respite, in the form of a gentle hand on his brow, would come. Then he would bite forcefully on his lips, stifling a groan, before parting them, desperate for the deliverance to be found in the pain pills. Always after this, his angel, as he thought of her, remained with him, stroking his forehead, easing the spiky, sweaty strands of his lank brown hair away from his face, back behind his ears, until, on the downside of the arc, the drugs began to spread peace through his battle-worn body. Then he would sleep again.

Only once was this cycle disrupted. Instead of his angel, a man smelling of old barber shops sat beside his bed. He rested cool, calloused hands on the invalid's pajama-clad arm and spoke to him in measured tones. His words sliced neatly through the wall of pain. "I have your pills here in my hand," he said. "This won't be pleasant, but I'm afraid I must know what you told them." The patient smiled inside, reminded finally of who he was, and what he was capable of. After a long while, after a monstrous battle and a deep dark trip into a fiery red abyss of pain, he received absolution and was granted the solace of the pills. After the man left him, trailing afterburn whiffs of lavender in his wake, the patient allowed his lips to curve into a real smile.

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A/N: Short prologue, I know – I hope to get a full chapter up very soon

Although some of these characters are based on real people, situations and atrocities, please bear in mind that this is a work of fiction.