'Confirmation on Sunday', my calendar reminded me. I wasn't going to make it. Something had come up.

Something that made my blood cold and tested my faith.

I got my rotating index off my desk and flipped it to Father Dublin's number. I had crossed it off. There wasn't a new number. I sighed, I hadn't called my brother in years.

The fear I felt was tangible. I could almost see that Christmas from so long ago. Chills ran down my back and not just from the sweat. There was something cold and cruel touching me.

"Goddammit." I muttered. I loosened my clerical collar and wandered into my kitchen for a drink. While I was pouring it, I glanced up at an old crucifix hanging over the entryway. It was there when the parish moved me in. As far as I knew it was there when the parish had bought the house.

I didn't feel protected. I felt terrified. I was alone in the house with something I hadn't even really believed in. It was real and I was not safe. I was afraid.

"What are you looking at? You gonna come down here and help me on this one? No? I've got this, huh?" I asked Jesus.

Jesus didn't respond.

"Typical." I looked away and tipped my drink into my throat. "Could you at least fix the tap to pour out more of this?"

I gulped, hoping that my challenge would be met by a power greater than myself. I felt alone and endangered. Nobody was going to save me.

I held my empty glass up and then I ran it under the sink and had a glass of water to drink. Jesus didn't come through for me and I said: "No miracle booze today."

The sinister moan of a deathrow convict groaned from the open door of my basement. I heard the man's voice: "Come back, Father Dublin. I want to confess something to you. It's going to be a good one." Then the voice added in a loud whisper: "I swear."

I trembled in unresolved tremors. Part of me was committed and the rest of me wanted to flee. I wanted to get into my car and drive as far away as I could. I wouldn't look back. I couldn't look away. I had already crossed the point of no return and I was there and there was no escape.

"I'm coming. Hold on." I responded. There was a loud thumping noise from down there as though someone were lifting and dropping something very heavy and very quickly over-and-over.

I shuddered, dreading my return to face the horror I had already witnessed.

I looked at the print-out I had of Roman Rituals. I realized it was time to call Arch Diocese. I was in way over my head. I should have gotten help right-away. I worried that after what I had done, it might be too late.

The phone was in my hand when I reached the middle of my terror. How it began was coming back to me, bit by bit. I wasn't sure if that moment with the phone wasn't how it all started. It had started earlier, with a gradual progression of seemingly unrelated incidents. Perhaps it had begun when I had used zip ties on a little girl to detain her in my house. Perhaps it had begun a thousand years ago when the creature in her had first walked among the world of men. Perhaps the story would begin with my defeat and the rise of some new and horrible abomination. I could not be certain.

Until my phone rang and I heard my brother's voice, I wasn't sure of any of it. I needed to confess to someone. It was when I told the truth that things became clear to me, that I could see what had happened and piece it all together. Until that moment it was all just a series of things happening, without any connection.

When I started my story with "I have to tell you what I did." that is when it truly began. He was listening to my confession. He stopped me and said:

"No - no. Start at the beginning. I don't understand what is happening."

So, I told him:

"Two weeks ago, there was this couple that came in, asking me all these weird questions. No wait, three days before that there was a break-in down the street, no wait, it was the last day of last month. This guy comes in and asked me if he could do confession, he looked homeless and he smelled really bad." I gasped, realizing that what was happening to me had started so long ago. I had no idea how far it would go, to what extremes the horror would escalate.

"Slow down. Just start at the beginning." My brother, Father Dublin, told me.

I am also Father Dublin. I chuckled, a soft cough, as I said his name. Nobody ever got confused that there were two Father Dublins in the same diocese. I mean, as a joke, obviously it causes some confusion.

"I'm okay." I lied. I caught a glimpse of myself in the hall mirror. I looked like a mess.

"Homeless guy comes in and asks for confession." He started me off.

"Guess it started with our new soup kitchen." I sighed, "Weeks before he came in."

"What is going on?" He worried at my scattered details that seemed to be going nowhere.

I realized that he had called me out-of-the blue and I asked him:

"What made you call me?"

"I was praying for you, and I started getting this feeling. Remember that Christmas, all those years ago?" He asked me. He sounded like my big brother, protective and concerned. I was able to agree to talk about it briefly:

"I remember that Christmas. I am sorry."

"I'm sorry too. It felt like that. I felt like I needed to call you. I was going to apologize, see if you wanted to get a coffee or something." He paused. "Or get a drink."

"Let's do that, I need a break." I said. He said:

"Tonight, at O'Malley's. Get it together. Whatever is happening, I will help you." My brother promised.

I agreed to meet him and hung up. I glanced at the open door of the basement. I felt watched. A horrible sinking feeling was in my stomach as I took a step and then another toward the entrance. Then I was there and I closed the door.

Exhaustion crept up on me and I sat down in the living room, listening to the ticking of the grandfather clock. Somehow a dreaded sleep overtook me. I had always found the sleep of the restless to be profound, having provided grief counseling to the bereaved and to victims. A kind of restfulness without actual sleep, a kind of sleeplessness without rest. Dreams do not come to those who suffer such a slumber.

My drive to O'Malley's was slow and rained on. When I got there, I found Father Dublin waiting for me. We had both taken off our collars and wore black.

"I am sorry I didn't believe you; I knew you were telling the truth." Father Dublin told me. "I was a coward."

"I'm sorry for telling you that you were being a coward." I apologized right back. We were both sorry about that Christmas, all those years ago.

"Alright, I am here now, ready to listen and to believe this time, whatever you tell me." He took a deep breath and took a drink and watched me, his eyes told me he was fighting his reluctance. He could see I was badly shaken and disturbed by something. He had heard the convoluted beginnings of something awful, could tell that at any moment he would know why I was so afraid. He didn't want it, but he had given himself no choice.

"We opened up a soup kitchen." I sipped and eased into it. "From there we got some traffic. One of these guys came into the sacristy." I paused while he frowned.

"I told him: 'not right now, I am preparing for First Communion.' and he said it couldn't wait. He just had to confess. I couldn't get him to leave, and he smelled so awful. I thought he would get my vestments dirty. I let him confess right then and there, on his knees. He muttered some kind of weird prayer or spell or something and then he left, without receiving penance. That was the last I saw of him, never came to the soup kitchen or anything. I asked about him and the other soupys didn't know where he was."

"And did they?" My brother asked, finishing his first drink.

"Yes. He broke into a guy's house, attacked the little girl. He bit her. The guy shot him, reloaded and shot him again." I explained. "They knew. I could tell they knew, and I found out why."

"He was a fugitive? The one on the news?" Father Dublin nodded. I glanced up at that exact moment and saw the face of the missing child I had in my basement on the television. My eyes widened and my face color changed. I started sweating.

"Yeah." I agreed, almost choking on the word, so I just nodded.

"The guy who killed him, he and his wife?" Father Dublin was piecing my story together without me having to tell him too much. I wanted him to stop doing that, afraid he would come to the worst conclusion of all. I was terrified he would figure out I had kidnapped a little girl and had her locked up in my basement, without first understanding why.

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"They started asking me all these questions about..." I hesitated and lowered my voice. "Demons and stuff like that. You know what I mean?"

"Elaborate for me. Think first." Father Dublin got up and went to the bar to get more drinks. I finished mine while he was away from our table. When he came back, I was ready to tell him what they had asked.

"They asked me if someone who was baptized could be demonically possessed. They told me their little girl was baptized. I found out that theirs was the house that was broken into. Their little girl had spent the night in the hospital after the intruder attacked her and bit her. When she came home, she was different."

"Well how about that?" Father Dublin grimaced.

"Exactly. I told them she needed their care, their love and that they should also seek counseling. I told them I would pray for them and that I could ask for special prayers from the church." I agreed with his facial expression, at least at the time of the interview. I had come to agree with their original assessment of her, of course, but I wasn't ready to tell him that part of what was happening.

"Let me guess: you eventually agreed to see her, and it turned out she is possessed and now you have her tied to a bed in your house?" Father Dublin smiled, thinking he was telling a joke and that I was upset about some other development. When I said nothing, he kicked me under the table and said in a completely different voice: "Tell me that isn't what is going on!"

"She's in my basement." I swallowed. He stared at me for a long time, processing the awfulness of my situation and deciding how he was going to take it.

"Goddammit." He growled at me. "You've sure put me in a spot."

"You have to see for yourself." I reminded him. "You have to believe me this time."

"I know." He recalled. "I gave you my word. I owe you one."

"There's no time to waste. She is becoming dehydrated."

"Freaking Christ." Father Dublin pushed away the rest of his drink, unfinished. "Let's go. I will drive, you drive like a grandma in a school zone under construction with a cop following."

"Sure." I stood up and tossed some wadded Hamiltons onto the table. We left O'Malley's and took Father Dublin's car back to my house.

Outside he looked at me and asked: "Is this for real?"

"I'm afraid so." I testified. We went in and he found my printout of Roman Rituals and asked:

"You believe in demons?" Demonic possession?" He wondered. "That's you, now? Christmas and soup kitchens have changed you."

"That's right." I told him. "And you won't be the same either."

"Alright, show me this kid." He took a deep breath and rolled up the printout like he was going to swat something with it.

I opened the unlocked basement door and led him into the darkness. I felt the fear rising up and we descended. I was afraid of the creature I had captured; I didn't understand it, I did believe in what I had seen, and I knew it was deadly.

"Father Dublin, you have brought a friend." A man's voice spoke from the shadowed corner. When I turned on the light, my brother gasped.

A little girl was unconscious, her hands in cruciform, held to the pipes with zip ties. Her legs were free, and she sat on the floor, a puddle under her, soaking her pajamas.

"What the hell?" My brother grabbed my shoulder. "No way! No, no, no!"

"What is the matter, Christopher? Don't you like fresh scented goodness?" The creature spoke from her mouth, the voice of the dead man. I suddenly recognized that she was using the vagabond's voice. She looked up, her eyes sick and yellowed. We could see the bitemark between her neck and shoulder where her clothing hung loosely. It looked infected and bubbled with saliva and pus.

Father Dublin looked at me and then back at her. The fear in his eyes gave way to some kind of resolve, as he remembered his ministry. He took from his pocket his Roman collar and fastened it to his own neck.

I had mine in my shirt pocket and put my own collar back on. I was shaking with fear, and I wanted to flee back up the stairs, to escape into the night, from the nightmare under the light. We held the papers together and began to read aloud to the demonic thing. It just laughed at us.

"You think that some stupid words from the Internet will cast me out? I own this body, I am in her. She is mine to be, I am a violator, a trespasser. You cannot tell me where to be or what to do. You have no authority over me. I grow stronger as she grows weaker. You shall see." The man in the little girl told us.

"She is innocent! Let her go!" I told the demonic thing.

"That is what you think. You see a little girl, but not what she has done. You know nothing, Father Dublin. Nothing!" The creature seemed irritated by my plea. I blinked and looked at my brother.

He had noticed the change in its attitude also. It had gone from confident and terrifying to defensive and annoyed simply by my mention of its host's innocence.

"She, uh, couldn't have done anything wrong. She is just a child. An innocent child." Father Dublin lowered Roman Rituals and spoke carefully. The creature realized we had caught on, to whatever it was trying to conceal from us.

"You're right. She is just an innocent child." The demon agreed, grinning evilly. It said nothing more. It wanted to taunt us, to toy with us. The exertion was weakening the girl, and that was its game. If she gave in, if she expired, then it would have her body for its own. Her soul was still in there, her mind, her memories, still intact within it. Behind those yellow gleaming eyes, she was watching, trapped within.

"You are Bal-thash." My brother said without any meaning. I had no idea what he meant.

"I know you are, but what am I?" The horrible thing mocked him.

"That's from Pee Wee Herman." Father Dublin nodded grimly. "Let's go. There's nothing we can do for her."

We went back upstairs and I closed the door. I asked, my voice shaking with fear:

"What do you mean there is nothing we can do for her?"

"Bal-thash was the demon that possessed all those children on the Pee Wee Herman Show. When you told me about the children singing the Christmas carols backwards and that they had changed the words to make it Satanic, I eventually did some research. There were two exorcisms, and the name of the demon was Bal-thash. The same demon from Christmas and the same one tonight. It will have two other children. To destroy this demon, we must exercise all of them, at once. We don't have much time. She is getting very weak. If she dies: it will own her remains. Bal-thash will walk among us."

"Wait. You knew about this? It has come back to me?" I was confused, terrified. I couldn't understand what I was up against.

"When the 'Pee Wee Herman exorcisms' freed two of the children the third was kept out of it. Bal-thash had another chance. There was a grown man out there, somewhere, carrying part of Bal-thash." Father Dublin considered.

"And Christmas?" I asked.

"A manifestation. You heard something, a warning, perhaps. I don't think the children were possessed. Nobody else heard anything weird in their singing. I don't think you were drunk, like they said. I think it was a spiritual encounter. Bal-thash and your destiny - mysterious ways."

I sat down and a whole rush of emotions came flooding into me. Fear and relief, horror and redemption. I felt reunited with my brother, with my faith and at the same time we were in deathly peril and our faith was about to be tested.

I stopped shaking and began to cry.

"You alright?" Father Dublin asked me. He got a drink of water in the glass on the table. He didn't offer it to me, he gulped it down.

"That is what you think?" I asked. I wiped away my tears. My brother's faith meant the world to me.

"It is." He promised.

"There's two more children out there." I realized suddenly.

"We need something stronger than zip ties. That thing will break those when it reaches its full strength." He pointed out.

We left my house and went to a hardware store that was still open. We got enough chains and locks for all of them and more zip ties. The person at the checkout looked at us weirdly.

"We're gonna lock up some stuff." I explained weakly.

In the car I asked my brother: "How will we find them?"

"They will be around." My brother supposed.

We went back to the church and started looking at some of the recent records, phonecalls, anything that could be a clue. I found something on the message machine and was listening to it when Christopher said:

"Who cancels Confirmation?" He held up a postcard, shaking it like it was one of our targets.

"Listen to this." I played the message for him. A distraught mother from my parish was asking for a housecall for her daughter.

"Do these girls know each other?" He asked. I shrugged. I didn't know the people in my church as well as I should.

"Come on Randal, you've got to have something." He prodded.

"Sunday school." I guessed. "There's two classrooms."

We walked through my church at night, feeling like intruders, in the dark. In the classroom, where the three girls attended Sunday school, we spotted three missing places on the Jesus wall. They correlated to three removed art works on the teacher's desk. Demonic visages.

"These girls got into something." Father Dublin dropped the papers back onto the desk. They fell like they were heavy.

"We'll get their addresses." I felt sick. I had already kidnapped one little girl, why not a couple more?

It was just before dawn when we were parked outside the first of their houses. I thought about the bum that had gotten shot repeatedly after breaking into someone's house. I was afraid. We realized:

"We are wasting time."

I crept around the back until I found her bedroom. The window was not locked and I was able to open it. I climbed into her room and found the creature sleeping in her bed, in her body. Before it woke up and raised an alarm, I was upon it. I wrestled it to the ground and zip tied it and gagged it. I handed her, struggling and kicking, to my brother, who was outside her window.

We stuffed the little girl into the trunk of my brother's car and drove off, the sun still hadn't risen.

The final kidnapping took place as she left her house, yelling profanity at her single mother. She wasn't going to school, she was coming with us. We pulled up next to her as she walked to the bus stop and grabbed her and forced her into the car. Then we sped away. I knew we were spotted doing so, two priests taking a child. Someone called the police and gave them a description of what they had seen, me and my brother, the car, everything.

Back at my house we took the little girls down to my basement and chained them up. We printed out a backup copy of Roman Rituals from the PDF and began exorcising Bal-thash, just after sunrise.

The demon cried out in the man's voice, a threefold entity. It had each of them in different stages of possession, but all three of them were the same. As our prayers and chants unified the being and bound it, we cast holy water onto it, weakening it and strengthening the faith of those it would own.

We were both very afraid. Fear nearly silenced us, but our faith bound us and we stood together, facing the evil. The creatures roared and hissed and spewed hot venom onto us. One of them laughed as it focused its eyes on Christopher's copy of Roman Rituals.

My brother's papers burst into flames and he fell over, his sleeve on fire. He had to stop and drop and roll before he could resume. My voice had reached a high pitch, the terror rising within. I stood alone against the shrieking and cackling demons, trying to pray, trying to have faith. As the exorcism reached a crescendo, I heard the doors to my house being kicked in. Police were entering my home.

I shouted the final words of Roman Rituals and blessed the little girls, praying for their souls. I added, in my own words:

"This is it, Jesus, if you're ever going to help, now would be super-fantastic!"

The door to my basement opened while I was finishing it. Police were coming down the stairs into the basement, guns drawn. They were telling me to be silent, to drop the paper and put my hands up. Father Dublin intercepted them as I was ending it.

I heard gunshots and his body thumped. I realized I had heard that heavy thump already, I had heard it over-and-over. I flinched and completed my prayers anyway:

"Amen."

And then the police tackled me from behind. The police held me down and beat me with their nightsticks and called me names while they did it. While I was sitting in handcuffs in one of their cars the parents of the girls showed up.

They were reunited, freed from the horror. The demon was gone, never to return. We had somehow done it.

My brother's body was down there, bleeding in my basement. I knew he was dead. I hoped he could hear me as I said goodbye. I told him:

"I love you bro, thanks."