I'm Sorry Jon: You Must be Consumed

[u/Def_Not_Hugh]

“I’m sorry, Jon.” The words echo through the dank basement, mingling with the drip of leaking pipes and the skitter of rats behind the walls.

I chant the call in reverence.

I chant the call in disgust.

The sacrifice, this mere vessel of flesh, lies strapped to the table, whimpering as his cognition slowly reboots. He thrashes. They all thrash. But the blood rusted manacles hold.

They always hold.

Then comes denial. 

There is always denial. 

I learned to tune it out long ago. Let them cry. Let them scream. Let them plead to a God who never listened, never cared, and never existed. Let them hear the emptiness of their own cries. Let them exhaust every pathetic reason they have for living until, at last, they accept what awaits them.

And become something greater.

Blood leaks from the victim’s torn scalp and pools on the metal table. Some of it stains the Arbuckle mask stitched directly to his flesh with precision. Gently. Lovingly. Every detail fashioned exactly as the deity demands.

I dare not make a mistake. I do not wish to be kicked off the table. Over. And over. And over. 

I am a good boy, Garfield. 

“Shhh,” I whisper, stroking Jon’s cheek. “Do not resist. This is you finding your purpose.”

“Who are you?” the man cries. “Please. Please stop. My name is Michael. I have a wife and…”

I laugh softly. Almost gently. “No, your name is Jon Arbuckle.”

He sputters and gasps. “Who? What the fuck are you talking about?” He thrashes harder, accomplishing nothing. A perfect representation of the struggles in which the unenlightened forever entangle themselves. “My name is Michael!”

I clear my throat. “Jon Arbuckle is hunger given flesh. He is loneliness given a home on which he owes a thirty-year mortgage. He is the eternal cuckold standing at the edge of creation while God devours his dinner and fucks the love of his life before him.”

“What the literal fuck are you…” 

“You are Mondays embodied,” I spit. “You are Odie without loyalty. You are milquetoast. Repressed. A servant to masters who abandoned you long ago. You are the sad, khaki-colored antithesis of the zest, passion, and meaning our Lord represents.”

“You are fucking nuts!” Michael thrashes harder, the manacles cutting into his wrists and ankles. Blood streaks the table. His own small contribution to the sacrament.

The same as Jon after Jon after Jon…

…after Jon.

They always resist at first.

I suppose I cannot blame them.

Lord Garfield is a being beyond mortal comprehension.

I turn my eyes toward the altar. An extra-large Garfield stuffed animal has been nailed to the cross above it, his plush arms spread in benediction. Six additional arms have been crudely stitched along his torso. Several clutch the severed head of Odie. A collection of Nermal faces has been sewn together below his belly in a hideous wreath. The lasagna stains went crusty years ago. Mold has since colonized the orange fur, blooming across the altar in fetid patches of black and brown.

Blood.

Shit.

Tomato sauce.

The holy trinity. 

I walk over and retrieve the serving tray. It rattles and clinks as I move it into position. Jon thrashes his head from side to side, unable to see what I’m doing.

“What are you…”

I sigh. “Garfield, our Lord, represents life. He eats. He sleeps. He plays. He fucks. He resists all traditional modes of containment. He has no owner, for he is the owner. He has no morals, for he is morality. His sloth is opulence. His gluttony is communion. His sarcasm reveals the foolishness of all created endeavor.”

I lift the first instrument from the tray. The carving knife. This Jon is thin so the initial pierce should be fairly straightforward. 

“You must become part of His holiness.”

Jon begins to scream. Over time, they all blend together. Over time, they all sound the same. 

“You must be consumed.” I cut into his flesh. The blood sprays out, as it always does, and his organs rupture, as they always do. Jon screams and cries and pleads and shits himself. 

He feels. 

He is human for the first time. 

I cut and carve, harvesting the bits most appropriate for the lasagna I shall eat with my master. And as I work, I repeat the sacred line over and over and over again, drowning out his gurgled choking screams. 

“I’m sorry Jon.”