Serpentine Machine

The Serpentine Machine
“A machine for decay slowly digesting pain. On the other side I see my scars still burn the same. The light at the end of the tunnel.”
The two young men sat on the couch in their two bedroom rental. Mixing magic and machinery is not recommended to anyone, but the two naïve amateurs knew no better.
It started with small things, black outs and flickering electricity and bad television signals, it would change to channels automatically and with a seeming reason and intelligence as they smoked their concoctions of various drugs. Street drugs, herbs from the herb store, medical marijuana etc.
And then there was the goo in the fridge which for some reason attracted an array of various almost exotic tones.
Melted candles gave off a little heat in the dim light of the apartment.
Titus spoke quietly and in scattered religious terms as he hardwired the computer.
He talked of Lord Adonay and Tetragrammaton as if they were a part of everyday laymen vocabulary.
He spoke of an angel with bloody scabbed wings like that of a dying insect.
Simon Pulled out a gas mask from a cardboard box and put it on and wore it for a while. He spoke in response but Titus had a hard time hearing him at points and would just give him cold stares for minutes at a time.
He took off the mask and went outside for a smoke.
“Hey this compost heap has got to go buddy it‘s stinking up the place.” Simon tossed a cigarette into the fruit peels and soil and walked back inside.
It pissed Titus off.
Cigarette butts would ruin the compost.
They’d been getting into strange things as of late.
Besides the drugs, black magic rituals and other odd behaviors.
Definitely strange things, satanic kabalah symbols strewn in red across the walls smeared in blood and food.
The constant mixed smell of the drugs with the smell of Titus cooking raw beans and incense burning out from a skull on the table filled the whole apartment.
They both wore all black and their faces were pale besides the black goatees.
Titus wore make up thick and ugly.
Simon had his wrists slit silly with dried blood from no effort to clean after ward, sloppy mother ****er.
They lit the charcoal for the hookah and smoked some shish.
The magic began brainwashing the populations of people around them, at least they were sure it was so. It is never recommended to use magic against your neighbors, they didn’t care much for love thy neighbor. They’d scream at the top of their lung in heated arguments on Nietzsche’s Anti-Christ in the middle of the night. Often neighbors would have to knock and ask them to be quiet. They didn’t care. They hosted strangers often who would stay briefly then get freaked out and leave.
They honed in to one frequency without diversity or discernment oblivious to the world around them.
Neighbors would stare at the apartment in a trance. And when they stepped outside everything always stood still in frozen and awkward silence, people stared as they walked by in cold moments of contempt.
Senselessness occurring and crimes of unimaginable horror from their online following.
Cults popping up as mindless sheep.
New age religious extremists had a desire to escape the nihilism and revise the meaning of life to any one.
Some of the spells uploaded brought things out of control. Titus got into hacking. New viruses that could destroy your hard drive and put up permanent images on your monitor every time you start up that would bother anyone.
Portals of consciousness were being opened with no way of being closed, spirits primarily benign or malicious could come through and go and invade anyone’s consciousness for dreams fading for miles. Drones of frequencies transmitted for canny levels brainwashing of any ones making. the spells were working from the machine itself.
It only really required a couple of computer programs and a few supplies you could pick up from a tech store and a little handy knowledge and the ability to follow simple directions.
The machine was flickering and wires began popping black-white against the noise of the boiling water.
Titus, sick of it all, grabbed the water and poured it directly onto the machine.
He started an electrical fire.
he flames started small and Titus just watched, he didn’t care to put it out.
Simon was sleeping off a hangover in the next room.
When the smoke became unbearable Titus ran out the door, he made an indifferent mumble that the house was on fire that Simon could not hear at all.
Simon awoke in a dark cloud of smoke about ten minutes later.
Where is that ****ing gas mask when you need it.
He fumbled around for a minute grabbed his snake from its cage and ran through the smokey hall like a tunnel, the light of the fire burning at the end.
The door appeared as a bright red square at the end of the hall.
A light at the end of a dark serpentine.
He coughed his way through and burnt his hand on the door handle.
The machine was dead.
He got outside and Titus was downstairs just watching the smoke pummel from the door and windows. The fire visible in the window.
Simon walked down the grimy concrete steps and joined him for a smoke.
He kissed his snake and set it free knowing he’d never be able to take care of it now.
They watched as months of futility went up into flames and smoked their cigarettes.
“Man, what a great waste of time this place has been.”
“I know, right.”
“Well…” Simon faded off into silence then thought of something.
We better get the **** out of here before the cops show up.” He said.
They walked away slowly looking over their shoulders, disconcerned as the fire spread the neighbors’ apartments.