Death, the final frontier, these are our own individual Versions of Hell whose ongoing mission is to boldly scare us where nobody has been scared before..... Or is that Star Trek?

Hell, the place where we may just go to encounter our deepest fears.... just think what it could be like. Imagine dying and going down that long tunnel until you end up at the door to Heaven and have to confront St Peter.

”Name?”
”Er... um.... er..... Luan?”
St Peter thumbed through the index of a dusty book. “Luan? I am sorry, we don't have a Luan here. Do you have any other names?”
“Er... um.... er..... Albert?”
”Aaaaaaaah, here we go, this is you alright. Tell me, are you related to Queen Victoria at all?”
”Huh?”
”Forget it. Let us see what we have written up in the book for you.”

St Peter drew another thick dusty book from a nearby stack, computers had not reached Heaven yet, although Windows was very popular with the denizens of the Darkness. He paged through the book until he found Albert's pages. Suddenly Albert felt much smaller and wished that he had eaten all of his food and tidied his room and not destroyed his clothes.

”Aaaaah, yes, I know all about you, wow, you do have lots of bad marks and demerits next to your name”. He pointed vaguely at a page full of entries and devoid of gold stars or merits. Albert regretted those hours spent in front of the TV and computer.
”Is it bad?”
”Bad?” The saintly figure smiled wryly, ”lets put it like this, it is not good and you could be going thataway.” He pointed to a scarred red door, which had smoke coming out from underneath it.
”I am a white belt karate man, I am not scared, show me what I did wrong.”
”Well, according to our tally, you did not eat 28 934 peas, 67 542 grains of rice, 453 gem squashes, 900kg's of beans and 127 mielies. However, on the plus side you did eat 89 643 green peppers and 788 kilo's of assorted chicken bits. Not to mention drinking 16 432 litres of green cool drink and 1 845 half cans of creme soda.”
Albert was amazed, they HAD kept count all these years, he was in deep trouble and would have to find a way out of this mess and quick.
St Peter continued, ”then there is all the juice that you never made.... 1876 litres, and the times when you never fed the dogs.”
”But but but... that was George's job!”
”I wouldn't worry too much about that, soon George will be here, although it could be a long while, he is still in the bath.”
Albert knew he was doomed, but he was also really brave, after all, hadn't he destroyed countless small civilisations and aliens in the many computer games he had played? He could survive, as long as he managed to get to the toilet for some time out.

”Well, I am not sticking around here while you point out my faults, I am going straight to hell and you can keep the R200-00 too!” Grabbing his scooter, marbles and Pokemon cards he scootered to the red door and opened it. ”Here I am...”

The entrance to Hell had a window where a very bored ex home affairs employee sat rhythmically chewing a Chappie.
”I am Albert! I want to see the devil!”
”Take a number and wait in the queue!”
Albert took a number from the dispenser. There were no other people in the room.
“Number 2” the clerk mumbled.
“Number 3” she mumbled 2 days later.
“Number 4” was mumbled after 3 weeks.

Albert looked at his number. It was 537423.
“Agh no man, I could be here for eternity.” He tore the 37423 portion of the ticket off and hid it in his pocket.
“Number 5”
“That's me, here I am. Me me me me me!!!!!!”

The clerk moved her chappie to her other cheek, “The Devil is watching Egoli at the moment, he cannot see you. Take a new number.”

There was a loud bang and clouds of billowing smoke filled the room, ”Albert baby.... is that you? I have been waiting sooooooo long for you. Been busy have you? how is Quake XVMCLVII doing? and what about that alien in Power Strike 329? Kewl huh??? I designed it myself.”
Albert was awestruck, he had met the devil in person and he was still not in flames.
”Yo…. I got 231899 kills in one night and destroyed most of the planet of Kronos.”
Stats like that really impress the devil and this was one of the those moments. “Jislaaik Al that's great. do you have any Spiderman cheats? I am stuck and keep on getting beaten by that Spiderman,”
Albert was non-plussed, “Me? Cheat? No ways! Just look at my report! I shouldn't even be here.”
The devil continued, ”Hey Al, I am afraid you have to be here and go through your version of hell, you know how it goes, rules, regulations, paperwork. Mind you, I am sure we can get you through this chop-chop and then we can hit the games ok?”
Albert sidled up to the devil and leaned on him, ”Yeh, I will get a gold medal here because I have heard all the rap music and know eminemnenenenen backwards.”
The devil pushed him away. ”Ok, lets get this started... we need you to make juice......”
”Juice!!! GEORGE!!!! its your turn!!!!”
”No no no... I am afraid you have to do it Albert. Tell you what though, we will make it easier, usually we give the people who have to make juice a leaking paper cup, you can use a proper cup instead.” He handed Albert a small china mug with “I Love Verwoerd” written on it.
”The water is over there....” A pair of binoculars appeared and Albert peered through them at a tap which was situated on top of a high mountain surrounded by crocodile infested swamps.
”But but but.... I'm busy and its George's turn.”
”Off you go lad.... quickly, I am thirsty.”
Albert picked up the small cup with a sigh, it seemed to weigh 100 kilo's and the handle was made out of razor blades. ”How much must I make?”
The devil pointed towards the Kimberly hole.... ”Maak vol skaap.”
And so it was that our hero (Albert) started out on his quest. He bravely crossed the raging waters of the river, fighting off legends of small blonde girls who wanted his cellphone number. Then he climbed the 10000 stairs to the ledge where the juice bottle was and filled the cup with chilli juice. ”Just you wait George! I will not give you any!” Now he just needed water to mix it with.

Remembering where he had seen the tap he took the heavy cup full of juice and headed towards the mountaintop he had seen in the binoculars, it had looked far and he quickly found out that it was. The road undulated through swamps and marshes, across quicksand filled clearings, past cardboard sign holding beggars, coathanger salesmen and leaflet wielding people. When he got to the tap after 3 decades he found out that it was 90 feet up in the air and only 1 drop fell out of it every 3 years (and he had missed that by 2 days). He sat down next to the tap and started to wriggle his finger into the collar of his shirt, ”I'm tired, this cup is too heavy, and I need to go to the toilet.”

He slept for about 3 years and was woken up by a drop of water, which dropped, onto his forehead from the tap.
”Agh no man! jeez, I could be here for ages.”
“Hey Albert!!!!!!”
The voice came from George who was struggling up the hill with a huge bowl heading towards a mountain of baked potatoes. “Albert, its your turn to feed puppy!!!!”
“Agh no George I did it last week.”
Again there was a bang and a cloud of smoke. ”Albert China.... drop that, we need you down the road.” It was the devil himself, dressed to the nines in a Hawaiian shirt and jail pants with a back to front baseball cap. ”No time to explain we have to go.”

More smoke and a loud bang later, Albert found himself seated at a long table. It was laden with food, he recognised most of it because it was all of the meals he had not eaten since the day he was born. There were baby bottles full of milk, mouldy eggs, plates of peas, huge heaps of rice krispies, toast for Africa, piles of bread crusts and mounds of potatoes. ”Aaaaaaaaaarrrrggggh!! But I'm not hungryyyyyyyy!!!!”

”Too bad Albert, because this is where you will be spending eternity......” The devil laughed maniacally, ”this is your destiny.”
”Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo..............”

Albert woke up with a thump, his face covered in peas and rice, he was seated at the dinner table and the whole family was laughing at him.
”Huh? what happened?”
”You fell asleep at the table.” they all chorused.

Embarrassed, he grabbed his fork and started to shovel peas into his mouth with a frenzy ”I have to catch up, otherwise one day when I die I will be watching my food forever.”
Usually it felt like it took Albert forever to eat his supper, but from then onwards he was always the first to finish and George always had to clear away the table afterwards.

No Albert's or George's were hurt during the production of this story.

© DR Walker 2001.