Apocalypsis 1.01 Demons Read Free

times, Peter had been allowed to watch Don Luigi doing his work, so he knew the procedure. The prayers, asking the demon for his name, the commands to retreat and not to return. Don Luigi was not a crank. He sent most of the allegedly possessed to doctors and psychiatrists immediately. And often it was the psychiatrists who sent the worst cases back to him. Don Luigi made a clear distinction between illness and curse, and he knew that he had the full support of the Pope. Evil was the price we paid for our free will and the demon was everywhere, even in the Vatican. A census of all known demons had been conducted in 2004 and revealed a total of 1.75 billion. Throughout the course of his life, Don Luigi had cast out close to fifty thousand of them, and he practiced his strange profession as unexcitedly and with as much solemnity as a handyman who was sealing a pipe leak. Don Luigi was a plumber of evil.
    Peter sat down on one of the vacant chairs and continued to watch the young nun as she placed a bottle of water and two glasses onto the table.
    »Which religious order do you belong to?« Peter asked her, more to break the silence than out of curiosity.
    »I am from the Union of the Merciful Sisters of the Blessed Virgin and Dolorous Mother Mary,« she replied, smiling mildly as she saw the baffled look on Peter’s face. »I am a Clemens Sister.«
    »I have never seen you here before, Sister.«
    »I’ve only been here a short while,« Sister Maria said, pouring some water into their glasses and sitting down opposite him. She looked him over. »I worked in Uganda before coming to do a kind of … internship.«
    »An internship with the chief exorcist of the Vatican?« Peter took a sip of his water. »If you cast out all the demons that exist in Africa, there won’t be much left of the black continent.«
    She didn’t seem to think this was funny. She just looked at him disapprovingly.
    »Have you ever been to Africa?« she asked.
    Peter cursed himself; thanks to his remark, she had stopped smiling. The sounds coming from the adjacent room had gotten louder; they could hear sobbing, suppressed gurgling and gasping for breath.
    »I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you.«
    She didn’t say a word but continued to look him over with steadfast eyes.
    »What are you thinking right now?« Peter interrupted the silence.
    »Don Luigi has a high opinion of you. I am wondering why.«
    They were startled by an obscene and bloodcurdling scream coming from the adjacent room. » Maledetto! Porrrrrca Madonna!« There followed a tirade of blasphemous curses occasionally interrupted by Don Luigi’s sonorous and authoritative voice repeating time and again: »Tell me your name! What is your name? Tell me your name!«
    Peter knew that the demon became vulnerable when he revealed his name. Then you had him by the collar, so to speak.
    Five minutes later it was all over. A heavy woman of around forty entered the kitchen. She looked slightly flushed but otherwise well, and she greeted everyone in the room before making a few remarks about the weather and the forthcoming garbage workers’ strike. Behind her, two stocky deacons stepped into the kitchen followed by two seasoned Carthusian Sisters, holding rosaries. They washed their hands and then they dug out their cell phones and started to text. Don Luigi welcomed Peter with a handshake that almost crushed Peter’s hand, and then he introduced him to Maria.
    »We’ve had already the opportunity to get to know each other a little,« Peter said. »I have to admit, though, that I behaved like a complete idiot.«
    Maria raised her eyebrows and Don Luigi looked at them both for a few seconds, visibly amused. Then he asked the mother and her son to follow him into his treatment room, signaling Peter to join them.
    »Come on, Peter,« he said with verve. »It may well be that the boy starts to vomit nails or soars up into the air. Then you would finally be forced to change your agnostic view of