that, is that, Oh no!
Danny Campbell
Danny Campbell is the author of numerous novellas, essays and articles about Thailand and South East Asia, many of which are held in university libraries worldwide. Since moving to France in 2006, Danny has concentrated on work which reveals the hidden corners of his home city, Bordeaux, and its multifaceted cultural influences. He is working at present on a forthcoming novel entitled Lala's Nonstop Erotic Caberet.
Who Did It
Katie Jaarsveld
Cults, a group of people, from a few in numbers to many.
Some cults were accused of witchcraft, which we’d all known was incorrect since witches were a coven.
The thing about cults was that they were not always as you suspected. For example, leaders of countries and their respective underlings creating viruses or diseases, who sometimes made a cure, sometimes not.
With my being a Jinn, I might appear in human form or other blood forms, including the ability to possess. People considered me to be an intellectually sound spirit, thought to be lower in ranking than angels. I could argue that point since my wings were never ripped off of me, but that would be a discussion for another story and one not to be told by me.
I can influence good as well as evil.
However, there were conditions on that one. The person or animal could not already be inhabited, and they had to be somewhat open to the experience.
Death would be one not open to the experience, and I wouldn’t try. Since no one or thing could influence him. He could however, influence any and everything.
Death had a list and he loved gatherings. Cults tended to worship or at least respect his power.
When Death was wiping out the Mayans during a plague, I was making changes to the Mayan calendar. Even Death had a laugh over that one. They still hadn’t deciphered that one to this day and not for lack of trying.
Who was I kidding? Every time it was brought up, we laughed all over again.
I tried inhabiting a pharaoh, but he was killed, and if Death hadn’t warned me, it would have ended me as well. I had no idea that when I possessed someone, it altered their appearance and attitude.
It was not as if there weren’t mirrors, and no one told me.
As far as attitude, yeah I did have a big attitude. All Jinn’s did. Not that I’d ever met one.
Over time I had possessed many leaders worldwide, and maybe even an alien or two.
Sometimes the Earth cried for a good cleansing. Man always provided the tools for Death and myself to accomplish our tasks.
My first gathering was witches. Intelligent in their own right, and at first they were innocent. Healers, midwives, cooks and such. Until something happened that the people didn’t agree on.
The easiest way to find out what someone was thinking was to inhabit their bodies. A woman had poisoned her cheating husband, and then blamed the witch for not healing him. The witch was not a witch, but her husband’s mistress.The accused witch was put to death and I could not stop it. I did however, correct the issue.
The towns-people were a cult of its own. They didn’t want outsiders or anyone to have more power than they could lay claim to. The priest who performed the ritual was easily inhabited, but there was so much hatred that I couldn’t prevent it.
At the risk of injuring myself, yes, I could be injured and I also self-healed unless I was weakened)I slit the priest’s throat and exited his body before he fell to his knees.
There continued to be ‘accidents’ that seemed to happen after the first witch was tortured, and hung upside-down in water to drown. Needless to say, the cult was having a hard time keeping its members alive.
One fell down the stairs when I gave them a shove. I entered one and held my breath. No breath, no life. He suffocated.
No matter how many of the town’s cult died, they kept labeling women as witches, then trying them for crimes and sentencing them to be tortured or maybe a quick hanging. Many fled for their lives, always to be found.
I decided to possess their livestock and ripped their bodies apart from the inside-out. While that confused everyone, they ended up slaughtering their own animals, saying they had been bewitched or possessed by a demon. While I wasn’t a demon, possessed was the correct term.
In later days they would blame aliens.
This town was almost cleansed of witches and outsiders, so everyone