Fort Gilmore

It was the Great War, the War Between the States; it was the 'Civil' War as some call it. Well friend, wasn't much 'civil' about it at all. No, not one bit, civil, ha!

My story? Well, I was the first commissioned officer, the first man in the Union Army to ride through the gates of Fort Gilmore, that famous southern camp, the one where they held captured Union soldiers during the war. Funny though, being a 'southern' fort, I'd have thought it would have been warmer, but looking back, all I remember, all I felt was a damp, cold shiver that climbed up my spine as I rode into that evil place.

But friend, you've already heard stories like this. The starvation, torture, beatings, killings the cruelty of man can be a damp, cold thing indeed and I guess that's a part of what I felt when I rode in to free our boys. I have to tell you though, there was more. I say, it was the evil in the air, the presence of Satan himself. Hell, it even seemed to spook my horse!

My company of men rode in behind me. It should have been a joyous occasion, but no one ran out of the tents, huts, barracks or ditches to be liberated. No, the rebels didn't leave many witnesses to what had happened.

The few cripples or walking skeletons we did find, died quickly. A couple of survivors would have been better off if they had died as well. Not a man in my unit, battle hardened soldiers had a dry eye after surveying this dark and evil place.

I sent out patrols and my brave, righteous soldiers caught a gaggle of rebs here, a loner there after about a week, we had done captured about two hundred of the camps former rulers. In two weeks, actually sixteen days after we first came into Fort Gilmore, with hundreds more in accordance with military law, I convened a courts martial where in we set our sights on justice. Our dead silently cried out for it from their freshly dug graves!

It wasn't more than a week after that before these cowards were being dragged to the gallows to meet the hangman and divine judgement. I know, you think that this is it that this is the story I mean to tell you. This is what you think I have wasted my breath to tell or what I wasted precious ink and paper on. No, please read on, this is only where my tale starts.

That first night in the camp, the night we liberated Ft. Gilmore at the end of the war none of us slept well. There was that damned damp, cold air, there were feelings that we all shared a palpable 'taste' of evil in the air and there were the sounds. I can't exactly explain it, but there were sounds all through the night!

Well, the courts martial brought a lot of horrors to mind. It all twisted your mind a bit and after a while, maybe we started treating the rebs as bad as they had treated their prisoners. Then, the hanging started. By the end of the first trials, I have to confess that I think we were all committed, to a man, to hang each and every one of those Confederate bastards!

You get used to a lot of things I guess. The damp cold, even the strange noises at night. But, after the rebs started hanging, the noises at night seemed to get worse! Sharing a pot of coffee around a campfire outside my office, the first-sergeant joked: "Maybe it's the devil and his demons come to collect the souls of the rebs!" He meant to be funny but no one laughed being God fearing men and all; we just looked at each-other.

I have to guess here; I think it might have been a few nights later maybe three or four nights. You understand that none of us, no one from prisoner to guard to me was getting much sleep back then. That's what makes this story so hard to tell. I can't even be sure; the days all sort of started blurring together.

It was another day of courts martials and hanging. For the rebs, just another day of lyin' and dyin'! The bodies were stacking-up faster than we could bury them, stacked them up like cords of fire wood that day, all around the fort, even next to my quarters. The cold, well, we figured the cold would preserve them until we could plant them in their unmarked, unblessed, unholy graves out there beyond the gates. Damned-it, from the evidence, it was more than they gave our boys.

Must have been around the witching hour somewhere's around midnight, maybe a little earlier, maybe a little later. Like I said, it wasn't as if any of us were well rested or anything. I had finished a walk around our fort, if it ever was really 'ours' to begin with; somehow Fort Gilmore never felt like ours. I drank some hot coffee to scare away the chill. I laid down to rest not remembering what it meant to sleep anymore.

The howling wind began anew; it struck against the outer wall and closed window shutters with a vicious vengeance! The noise grew in ferocity until it struck against my every nerve! I stood up and dressed, determined to face Mother Nature herself anything, but lay there naked and helpless in the dark. I held my service revolver in a trembling hand for no logical reason; I opened the door and stepped out into the night.

A horseman in black, a huge man of ashen complexion and muscular build awaited me, he expected me. Without speaking, he beckoned me. My hand dropped from my side, my jaw dropped, leaving my mouth open, I couldn't resist walking towards this man.

With an outstretched hand and an effortless motion, he guided me up behind him on his magnificent black beast. I never moved so fast, I never rode a horse so hard...not even in battle! Yet we rode through the damp mist and cold darkness of this night, faster and harder with each gallop.

I don't know how or even when exactly, but I suddenly realized that I was this dark stranger's prisoner and a shiver raced up my spine at the thought that indeed, I too might soon be on trial for my own life. At that self same moment, the man laughed and his horse neighed for a second, as we rode down a darkened alley surrounded by shadows and darkness, I foolishly imagined that they both were reading my very mind!

We galloped as if in a race, the thunderous claps punctuating our trek, punishing the trail below a route I had never followed in my weeks here. It was a trail as yet unseen by mortal eyes and shrouded by darkness and evil.

The soul taking me on this journey soon dropped me off his stead. I nearly broke my back as I fell to the hard ground! Looking around, I witnessed an eerie red glow in places here and there, some close and others appearing very far away. Alone, I imagined small campfires of defeated rebs crouched together to evade Union Army capture and justice. I also feared that I could be in the midst of bands of wild Indians, determined to met out their own frustrations on a white man, a white man in uniform.

In a lot of ways, it felt as if we traveled a thousand miles that night, in a lot of ways, it felt as if we hadn't traveled six feet. I could still hear the wind howl and moan. I didn't feel the wind, I didn't feel the cold as a matter of fact it was uncomfortably warm.

The atmosphere was indeed hotter and stank of sulfur; but there was something like dampness, a cold and lonely dampness that hung in the air and somehow crept deep into my bones. The dank, damp feeling in a way that I can not explain made me feel empty and lonely and sad; very empty, very lonely, very sad. I found myself wearing a heavy mantle of unexplainable, relentless guilt, which gnawed at my stomach.

Searching the heavens, I saw no stars, no moon or clouds that I could discern. Along a kind of rim, I noticed those same red glows I saw earlier, layer upon layer of glowing red embers! Then, suddenly and without warning, what felt like a thousand, ten thousand fiery needles pierced my flesh! It felt as if I fell into some burning cactus...except I knew that I didn't fall. It was all I could do to keep standing!

My flesh, my eyes every part of me, my body, my limbs, every part of me was stabbed again and again! I couldn't see, I couldn't bear the pain, my world spun in wretched agony. This is when, to my horror, I suddenly realized, I was in a pit. No, I must not downplay this; I have to be honest if I want you to believe my story. Somehow, I found myself in the pit of eternal damnation!

My heart broke, my stomach seemed to fall, the fear and terror and pain of finding yourself in hell is much too much to bear, I tell you! At about this very moment, I felt a sudden deeper, harder, more discernable pain in my side. Turning, I discovered a hideous she-devil, a literal demon __ who had stabbed me with a glowing, red-hot stick of some kind. The lost soul was covered in bloody gashes, wounds, bruises and warts. Her hideous face was dotted with festering boils...brown, pink and yellow trails of oozing puss slowly flowed down her neck and stained the torn and filthy rags that she tried to wear. She reached out to me, but repulsed and in pain, I tried to pull back!

The witch had the nerve to beg: "Don't you pity me?" She was asking for emotions that I didn't have and couldn't share. After all, I just found myself in hell and, for God's sake, she was stabbing me! She was stabbing me!

I burned my hands when I grabbed at the glowing, hot stick in my side. It burned through my clothes, cut through my flesh, I could feel it scrapping against my rib! In desperation, I jerked my body forward, then back, then I flailed from side to side, pulling away from this evil witch finally, somehow, I freed myself from her stick!

As you might imagine, at this point I just ran and ran and ran, the witch's shrewish voice chased after me with the ridiculous plea: "Don't you pity me?" Her hellish voice tormenting me, no matter how hard or how fast I ran: "Don't you pity me?" The voice never waivered, it was worse than the pain from the bleeding gash in my side: "Don't you pity me?"

I turned a corner, only to see another deformed and hideous soul, it was a male, I believe. And, somehow though I ran far, although I ran away, somehow the witch was there with this man! He struck the unfortunate wench, he hit her so hard she fell down; he struck her and then kicked her. The savage kicked her harder yet until the witch's festering boils burst, leaving her face covered in various shades of oozing puss and what looked like blood!

I paused; I stopped, I yelled, demanding that he cease immediately! I thought of physically helping the wench. I started to open my heart and feel sorry for her as, well, as a kind-of being (for I could not call her human, this much I knew from my past experience with her). I was compelled as a gentleman and an officer in the Union Army to do something.

I approached cautiously, keeping an eye on the brute. The witch, I could see out of the corner of my eye and I imagined that she would run away. Instead, the she-devil grabbed her stick. I imagined she would attack the savage and give him some justice! Her gripped tightened on the red-hot stick and she lunged at me, stabbing me again! I cried out in horrible pain, her eternal partner grabbed the stick from her and twisted it deeper in my gapping wound! They both laughed, the she-devil, with a toothless grin cried out in a deafening cackle: "Don't you pity me, don't you pity me, don't you pity me?"

Distracted and in pain, I didn't notice when her mate maneuvered close enough to strike me then, again and again and yet again he tirelessly pummeled my face and head with fists of iron! Somehow, he was on my left and on my right, deftly he danced around me. A blow to the back of my head had the effect of completely disorientating me then there was another jab at my jaw, it was impossible to fight back.

Taunted by her mocking pleas of: "Don't you pity me" and wounded by his furious fists and her continued stabbings, I finally collapsed only to be kicked and poked and stabbed even more! I prayed my death would be swift. I fell into a fetal position, I closed my eyes and yet their cackles of nervous laughter and her repeated pleas, painfully etched themselves into the creases and folds deep within my brain.

I don't know when the beating, kicking, stabbing, yelling or cackling stopped. I can't remember. In hell, time doesn't matter so much, in hell, there is no time. I just remember that the demonic wolves jumped on me, ripping off my sweat and blood stained uniform, everything, until I lay there, naked and bloody.

The she-devil stuck her claw-like, razor sharp, gray-green-yellow, deformed nails into my soft, warm flesh! I yell and scream, I twist and turn and pull, but I can not escape the demons. As if my flesh, my very skin were but another vestment of clothing for them to steal...the soft skin, the warm blood, I don't really know what it was but they stopped beating me and she stopped her evil cackling. They just looked at each other with the most confused expressions on their wretched faces.

The ragged wench said many things to her demonic partner, she used words in a choppy, undecipherable language I couldn't understand, she was excited and very animated. The only word I understood her twisted tongue pronounce was: 'alive!' She repeated herself, saying it over and over again: 'alive, alive, alive!'

The male demon nervously mumbled many things back at her. One word, 'babe,' at least I think he said that or called her that. It was about the only thing I thought I understood. In the midst of all this, almost bearing true emotion, the terrible she-devil looked sadly down at me and whispered: "Don't you pity me?" Wounds and all, at this moment, I almost did.

The fiends then grabbed me by my lower limbs and brutishly dragged my bruised and bloody carcass along. We followed a path that took us up and down, left and right, forward and back...it was the most confusing, maze-like path that anyone could imagine. I couldn't make out much, it was dark, I was frightened, being dragged and having been beaten...not to mention in shock after finding myself in hell!

Along the way, I saw flashes of light, kinds of visions; I witnessed people or souls, parts of souls ripped from other parts of souls. The eternally damned were eternally separated from everything and everyone they ever loved, anything familiar, anyone they ever knew. I saw the hideous creatures writhing in pain, lamenting their fate and cursing themselves in misery.

My back feels it before any other sense __ from a broken, filthy floor...suddenly, I'm being dragged across a smooth, polished surface. The tortured, lonely, sad souls are gone, demons, hideous and frightening in appearance replace the separated, broken entities all around me. As we slowed our pace, I noticed that the countless ambers that had glowed here and there, up and down, dotting the rim of this pit, from here, they came together to form a perfect, glowing, red-orange wall of the damned!

As we continued through this part of hell, at nearly every step along this polished floor, my tormentors and I were stopped and challenged by demon after demon. Each and every one of these demonic guards proved more hideous and deformed than the last. In my wildest imagination, I could not have conjured such vile and wicked creatures as they conferred with my own devils in words that I couldn't understand. The conversation always ended quickly when the witch spit out the one word that I did understand: 'alive!'

Too many demons to count finally moved aside like a sea of disease carrying, flea-infested rats gathered in darkness and suddenly exposed to bright light. They hissed at me, many lunged forward, kicking me with goat-like hooves. They bared their teeth and fangs, they spit vile, acidic mucus at me and angrily cursed me as I was dragged deeper into the devil's own labrynth.

I can't tell you everything, I can't recount every detail and there are many missing details. Because of the beating and loss of blood, because I was in shock and somewhere beyond terror, there were times I fell into the dark, black realm of unconciousness. I'd wake-up, still being dragged only to discover another demon kicking me, punching me, or feeling the burning pain as some fiend's spittal burned through my own living flesh!

By now, blurried-eyed, senseless, worn down and fairly apathetic, I found myself dragged in a dark and empty chamber. As I lay on what seemed like a polished glass-like floor, my two demons argue and bicker, the witch screaming in her foreign tongue! Her partner yells back in his own kind of gibberish, then he slaps her down. The ugly she-devil looks up and cackles: "Don't you pity me?" The brutish demon reaches towards her, roughly grabbing her arm and picks her up, the witch then promptly slaps her lover!

An unexpected clap of thunder silences the buffoons before me. Five gray and ashen, naked souls of formerly beautiful women run to the center of this chamber. Four of the souls create a chair of their forms a kind of throne. The youngest of the five, maybe the most beautiful in her former life, bends her form at the foot, making herself into a footrest or stool.

A second, louder clap of thunder explodes and echoes through the chamber and hell, it's so loud that I fear it may be heard throughout the world of the living as well! Everything stops! All movement in the underworld, all sound, time itself, everything stops, it's really quite remarkable. Everything stops except the pain from the thousands of burning needles, everything except the pain this cursed pair of wretched demons have caused me, the pain doesn't stop, it only seems intensified! I am afraid, very afraid that the pain will never stop as my body throbs and aches and burns and bleeds.

A darkened shadow, a malevolent and powerful presence fills the chamber. No one need make an announcement, even I am aware that this is the dark prince Lucifer, Satan himself. The stench is overwhelming, the devils and demons and fallen angels, even my own tormentors stare at me as I cough and gag in disgust __ as I wince and moan in pain while my body continues to burn and bruise and bleed.

Sitting on his obscene throne, Satan cocks his head and studies me. He stares with his red eyes and penetrates me layer by layer until I would swear he touches my very soul. I feel that I should say something, but the pain and agony and the stench, my own fear keep me from uttering my own words.

The dark prince slowly turned from peering into my soul towards his demons who were still staring at me. Giving them a sharp look, Lucifer barks out: "Does no one kneel in the presence of their god?" The dark one stretches out the word god in a slimy, sticky way that not so much blasphemes the creator as it insults the very word itself. To hear him say it is somehow disgusting.

One unfortunate named Daniel catches Satan's wrath! He is suddenly melted into a slimy, oily puddle on the floor, then the puddle boils and the slimy oil evaporates. Daniel never escaped hell though...nothing 'escapes' hell. He is merely sent to another place in this pit, someplace worse to suffer more. Even in hell, it can always get worse!

I know, you're wondering what 'he' looks like, obscenely handsome some believe, horribly disfigured from the eons of damnation others would tell you my friend. But, to tell you the truth, it is very dark in this pit, and you feel more than you see. You feel the pain others in here have given to innocent, good people, to be in the dark prince's presence is to be nearly crippled in pain, unbearable pain, I fell to the floor and gasped and cried and yelled out for the pain to stop!

I swear then, though I was in his evil presence, I swear I still don't know what he looks like. Though I also felt the pain of another evil presence, the witch or she-devil that brought me here and I realized that she was a woman my grandmother once knew, an evil, bitter woman who's only pleasure was to gossip of other peoples miseries or their secrets. I dispised her then, I dispised her even more now, this horrible wench who twisted facts and told lies. Only now did I realize the terrible truth that there are devils amongst us in the world of the living. They are always amongst us.

The demon that shared in committing her tormented deeds on me...I knew him in my childhood as well! He betrayed a friend's sacred trust, he broke his friend's heart and he was nothing but scum with special loathing and torments in this eternal prison! The thin, filthy, repulsive looking soul turned to look at me and I finally saw him for what he was, a thin, sickly shadow of a soul, not much at all really, not even in a place like this, not even in the after-life.

That such twisted people bore such twisted souls should be no surprise, but it was. My world spun, my beliefs were shaken, my mind contorted in sharing the pain these people had caused others and in the pain they now felt as subjects of the Dark Prince. The pain grew in strength and ferocity until it moved me, it pulled and pushed and forced me to fall prostrate before Lucifer's obscene throne.

"Mortal'; an evil, angry, loud voice thundered from the serpent's mouth: 'Mortal'; he yelled again as I trembled on the floor, afraid to look up. The chamber was silent, except when the witch whispered: "He doesn't pity me." "Silence'; the devil shouted back at her. 'Mortal'; he spit out the word angrily and with disgust for our species.

I didn't know what to do, how to respond, still racked with pain I could hardly breathe in the sulpherous air, but I responded meekly: "I am Captain Gore of the United States Army." Satan laughed, the demons laughed; the chamber erupted in the insane cackles of heinas and the hoots of a plagued and sickly den of hungry wolves. Regaining my composure, I pushed the words past my pain and declared a little stronger: 'I am Captain Gore of the United States Army!' The chamber erupted in even more laughter as the demons mocked me, my title, my name, my government and my army.

'I am Captain...'; I began to yell out before he cut me off. 'Captain Gore who has killed hundreds, maybe thousands of rebel soldiers?' 'I am'; I declared proudly. 'Pride, even here, even now'; Satan paused and rubbed the flesh upholstery of his throne: 'I like that in a man.' He laughed again, the demons and all the gathered laughed in their sickening way.

Slowly massaging the firm, round, bare breast of one of the women forming his royal seat the devil mockingly repeats the phrase: 'blood and gore, blood and gore, blood and gore...' Alternately, the beast plays with the breast of one woman's soul, then the other, as if using them as props to conceal his thoughts. He pulls his two fleshy armrests together, the women's faces come together in a obscenely sensuous kiss folding on to his lap as if blanketing the demon from some ill-imagined cold.

'Human'; Lucifer spits out in a serious, disgusted and angry tone: 'Why dost thou trespass in my realm, why hast thou polluted my home with your presence?' I was amazed and stunned, I had no words, I had no idea how to answer such a ridiculous question. 'Human'; he demanded: 'Answer!' Gasping in pain as he pointed at me, I drew a deep breath, the sulfuric stench burning my nose mouth and throat, but I finally uttered my complaint that I was brought here against my will by the monstrous man in black on his huge steed. 'I had no choice'; I cried out before collapsing on the floor before all the demons and fallen angels in hell!

When I came to, I was dressed in my torn and bloody clothes. I was also much closer to the Dark Prince's throne. Leaning forward he tells me that he can not just let me go. 'It has never been done'; he declared, then pauses and twists his head slightly and grimaces, admitting: 'Well there was that one exception but even the devil has no control over Him.' Satan looked upward and sadly lamented in another tongue: 'Oy vey.'

This close to the devil, I found it hard to think clearly. I was unable to concentrate, his own evil deeds, dark, unspeakable deeds throughout the ages filled me with dread and guilt and fear. His deeds filled my heart with unbearable pain that crushes any evil I felt any pain or guilt that I shared before in this evil, foul, terrible place.

"Captain Gore"; He yells out in his deep voice: "I have an idea, a pact we can make..." He smiles with charm and eyes his audiences while massaging the ample, fleshy breasts of two of the unfortunate women who make up his throne. "I will grant that perhaps you don't belong here, I will agree that perhaps someone has made a mistake and yet your sins are many, some of the men you put to death were innocent, your own evil became legend...even here!" "I think, had you departed the realm of the living, an strong argument could indeed have been made that, indeed, you belong here." "Yet, this mistake is not a common one and rules do not exist." The evil one's eyes sparkled as he made me an offer, appealing to my own vanity and pride: "You fancy yourself a good writer, don't you?" "I can allow you to write a story, a poem, one of those Army reports, anything you'd like." "You can write as many stories or anything you'd like, I will allow you to deliver it to the world you left behind." Then, he challenged me: "If your words can affect anyone, if they can change just one life, I will personally deliver you up to your realm!"

Overwhelmed by the thought of escape, freedom, deliverence from all this pain and guilt and returning to my own life I jumped up to agree! Before I knew what I was doing, before I thought of how my actions were damning my body and soul, I heard my voice witness before the fallen souls, before all those in hell, I heard my voice shout "Yes!" I found myself at a hard and cold marble table a relic of an old pagan altar used to worship Satan when he used his long forgotten name in an ancient civilization that he enslaved and forced to offer innocent victims in a ritual of blood, this stained table would be my desk.

I found myself looking at blank sheets of paper, just like this paper wondering how to explain my story in simple yet profound words to any mortal. I pressed a pen to the paper, releasing my fears with aged ink made from the blood of those victims and others, even my own maybe. I found my own ego and pride humbled to reveal my own foolishness, my faults and the sins of a lifetime, crowned by what did as an officer, what I thought was justice, a faint excuse for vengeance.

Not more than a few days ago a man drove his horseless carriage down a paved road, I think you call it a highway or freeway or some such name. The carriage was bigger and longer than most, it had lanterns in the front and back, doors or metal, windows and expelled a foul odor from a pipe in the back. This vehicle carried a family of four, two little ones, a boy and a girl, a man and his wife. They stopped at a sign, where the fort once stood. A few walls, a foundation, not much remained.

The wife walked off with the children leaving the father behind at a sign that said: "Fort Gilmore National Park." From my hellish cell, somehow I could watch as this short, dark, balding man read the words on the post: "Dedicated to the brave men who fought for freedom, democracy and the American way of life in the Civil War and Mexican-American War." The man looked lovingly at his wife and their children then returned his gaze at the plaque "1980 - Jimmy Carter, President of the United States of America."

That's when he saw it, the paper I carefully folded and jammed in-between the plaque and the post, hoping someone would read this story and learn of my fate. Hoping it would make a difference in their lives and make them change enough so that the devil would have to release me. I can't tell you what it felt like to watch as he pulled out the paper and unfolded it, he started to read it he seemed interested, I thought and hoped and prayed he was taking it to heart.

My own anticipation forced the ground behind the old building I once stayed in to tremble. The glow from the many flames in hell escaped a little, sulfuric fumes passed unnoticed in the atmosphere! Surely this was the mortal who could release me, as I felt his own guilty thoughts and reflections!

The man looked over at his wife and thought of his love for her and their children. He also thought about his job, his employer, he thought about the money he embezzelled. He felt bad, he thought about ending the affair and returning the money. I felt his pain as if he were another soul already trapped here in hell. The pain made me sure that he was ready, that he would change and help release me!

The ground opened further, the glow from the sun was visible to me. I could see it and feel the warm, beautiful, living sun; I could actually taste the fresh air! The man read and I felt myself lifted up towards the opening, the air was fresher, the sun was stronger and brighter.

The man was a good man down deep; I could see that and feel that too. I felt good that this was the one, that this was the person, that we could help each other. He read on, intensely devouring every word of my account...just as you are! He reflected on his professional, family and moral life. Tears of joy streamed out of my eyes and over my cheeks!

My finger presses out of the crack in the earth, I feel the air, the sun, a gentle breeze. My hand escapes, I feel life...for so long, death has been my only companion, pain my only feeling, Satan has tormented me for over a century and I feel myself smile, I hear myself start to laugh nervously as I slowly move back into the realm of the living and life. I tell myself, I promise my God that I will never be in hell again!

The father's son, a very cute young lad runs up and sees his father is reading something. "What's that dad"; the son asks. The father answers: "Something nuts!" While he crumples the paper and tosses it on the ground I scream: "Noooooooo!!!!"

I fall back into the pit...down through the gaseous sulfur, into the flames...back into eternal damnation without a chance to be judged! Then I sit and I think, I reflect on what has just happened in this year of the Lord, 2000. I think about the Lord, I reflect on God Almighty. I reflect on the promises of the Christ, Jesus and the stories my parents told me as a child. The priests many sermons at church.

Again tears stream down my face, though they are tears of sadness, not joy. I beg God forgive me, and I grow dreadfully tired, so tired, I collapse on the floor...so tired that I suffer a delusion, that of Satan standing over me nodding his head with a sad kind of grin, telling me: "You finally figured it out." I start to laugh, start to answer how obscenely ridiculous, I start to tell the dark prince how I have no idea what he's talking about.

I see a light brighter that the usual glowing ambers, brighter than the sun and again I feel myself rise. Another delusion I gather...and then I turn to see the devil below me and I see my earthly body as well. I rise into the light, the light surrounds me and I am bathed by the light! I am saved by the light! I feel the emotion of tears of joy as I finally realize that the devil can only trap you if you agree to let him trap you.

An angel takes this story from me to the earth; somehow he delivers it to you. I leave this last note for you, one last story so that you don't fall into hell, so you don't agree to let him keep you in darkness. I leave this note for you and I go join our Father in heaven. I am free, I have escaped; yet I pray that this story helps you and changes you, though not for me anymore, for you my friend. From above, I am watching you read this...maybe with some doubt, but I feel it, I know you want to believe in the meaning of this story and the words I have written for you. We are all watching, we are all trying to help you avoid my own experience. God bless you and Amen.

Created: March 29, 2000r.
Last Updated: May 23, 2005r.