"FWLS34" - читать интересную книгу автора (A Future We'd Like to See)

A Future We'd Like To See 1.34 - Hell
By Twoflower (Copyright 1994)

I hit the ground really, really, really hard. Probably the
only way I could have hit it harder would be to put myself in a
high-powered cannon and shoot straight down from orbit.

God, life sucks. Death is even worse.

The ground shouldn't be this red, though. I mean, when I
fell out of the orbit shuttle, I'm pretty sure the ground that
was rushing up to meet me was green. It's hard to forget
something like that. And now, here I am, on some reddish soil.
Very warm, too. I got up and immediately regretted it.

Fire, brimstone, lava, the works. Everything. I had strong
suspicions I'd be going to hell, and it looks like I was right.
I didn't really mind. I mean, you don't exactly get away with
torching apartment complexes for cash and end up playing the
harps.

But this didn't look too much like hell. It was only warm,
not really scalding. There weren't any screams of pain. And I'm
very sure there wouldn't be any convenience stores, like the one
I had apparently landed outside of.

This was a minimall. Had to be. There were parking spaces
(many of the cars were real junkers... can't exactly expect
anything other than lemons in hell), a yogurt shoppe, and even a
two day holo rental store. And here, a minimart. "H-MART," the
sign blinked in red neon. I shrugged and entered.

Looked like any other everything-under-one-roof type store.
The lighting flickered, there were unidentifiable black things on
the tile floor, and there were mislabeled shelves everywhere. I
grabbed a newspaper.

"Citizens demand a ski slope," the headlines read. "Today,
a group of concerned citizens demanded that a ski slope be
constructed. Hell authorities attempted to explain that snow
didn't stand much of a chance anywhere in hell, but the citizens
persisted. They were promptly escorted to the torture camps for
the rest of eternity."

"Can I help you with anything?" a pale, tired looking clerk
asked, pausing in his sweeping. It didn't seem to dent to grime
count in the store any.

"Not really... well, yeah. Where am I supposed to go next?"
I asked. "This is purgatory, where I get to burn for all time to