Published in Issue 145, January 2026
As if losing her job wasn’t bad enough, now Deb had to contend with the demon she’d summoned and a friend who was “deeply concerned” about the choices she was making.
“Do you think you might be self-sabotaging, just a little bit?” Sybil asked.
“Well, I didn’t exactly fire myself, did I?” Deb retorted.
Deb only dabbled in the dark arts, but you can do a lot with a little rage, the power of intention, and a summoning circle drawn on the floor of your corporate office. But to be fired for something like that seemed grossly unfair. They’ll give three warnings for sexual harassment, but smear a little pig’s blood on the walls, and you’re fired?! Effective Immediately?! She boxed up her things — a philodendron, an empty bottle from the butcher shop, red stains visible through the clear plastic, a framed photo with the glass broken and her ex’s eyes blacked out — and she left. A little green demon shuffled behind and followed her home.
—
The demon sunk into the sofa and kicked its feet. Its legs didn’t reach the ground. Charnokc (that was its name) gazed up at Deb with large yellow eyes and scratched absently at a boil that erupted from its bilious green skin. She looked at the demon, and thought, So this is what my anger looks like.
Sybil seemed to float into the room, her flowy skirt swishing in an invisible breeze. She carried burning sage in an abalone shell and waved an eagle feather to fan the smoke. Charnokc leapt off the couch, retreating to the corner and making a sound that could have been a hiss or a wheeze.
“Syb, stop! You know Charnokc’s allergic to sage!”
Charnokc sneezed.
Sybil regarded the demon, expressionless, “Oh no, Charnokc. If you’re uncomfortable here, maybe you should go back home. To hell.”
“We’re all going to have to leave if I can’t pay rent,” Deb said. “I’ve been looking for a job, but apparently, I spent my life training to be a robot and now we have AI. No one is hiring for my skillset.”
In a voice that crackled like hellfire accompanied by a chorus of disharmonious echoes, Charnokc, crouched in the corner, whispered, “Your rebellion in the workplace is timely and honorable. You broke your chains and unleashed vengeance upon the world. I am that vengeance.”
Sybil sat next to Deb, set the sage on the coffee table, and smoothed her skirt. “Well, I can’t get a job right now. This is my job. Helping my friend is my job, but— ” she looked at Charnokc, “I heard Taco Bell is hiring.”
—
The manager at the Taco Bell was a teenager named Corey, with curly hair that had a flash of purple peeking out from underneath his Taco Bell logo baseball cap. He consulted his clipboard in a manner that he believed was officious: “So, Charles.”
“Charnokc.”
“What’s your full name?”
“I am Charnokc, the Disheveler, Bringer of Disarray, Steward of Shadows, Shiver-maker of the Otherworld, Proprietor in the Plains of Despair, Champion of the Downfall.”
“Char-les Dish-evil-er. Can you spell that?”
“No.”
“Ha, right. Tell me about what kind of job experience you have.”
“I tended the fires of hell.”
“Oh, right on. Like a pizza kitchen? I did that for a while too. Those pizza ovens get pretty roasty-toasty, am I right? So, you have prior food industry experience.”
“I commanded a legion of devils.”
“My dude, I am loving the management experience, but it makes you overqualified for this role. We’re really just looking for someone to work the drive-thru window.”
“That position sounds abysmal and hence it is acceptable.”
—
The sounds emanating from the broken drive-thru intercom vacillated between clarity and tongues and on the other end sat a demon with a headset saying, “Welcome to Taco Hell, what is your desire?”
Customers ordered Crunchwrap Supremes and Chicken Chalupas with extra Diablo sauce — “So fresh you will feel the grit of brimstone between your teeth.”
An ordinary day at the Taco Bell drive-thru took a turn. The interaction began like any other. They wanted a Mexican Pizza with a side of Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes, but there was something off, an edge to their voice. Charnokc could recognize hanger when he heard it, sense their rage ready to ignite.
“Mortal, I sense your discontent through the speaker system.”
There was an empty fuzz of static before the voice responded: “What?” There was a sharp annoyance to the tone, a terse staccato. The “t” jutting out like a knife.
“You seethe with unrighteous anger.”
“What the hell— ”
“I compel you, Mortal.”
Unwillingly, annoyance oozed out of them like lava ready to burn the world down, to encase the planet in igneous rock, to make the surface of the earth into a new level of hell. They hated everyone and everything, but especially the people closest to them, and especially people who were happier than them.
“How terribly lonely that must be,” said Charnokc. “Let’s ruminate on that.”
After twenty minutes of conversation, siphoning their dismay, Charnokc surged with power made visible, an electrical current that made the overhead lights flicker.
They were crying now, tears materializing as storm clouds that gathered over the curved, bell-shaped roof of the Taco Bell.
“I just wish that my dad would apologize, you know?” they sniffed.
“The pain of childhood never leaves us,” Charnokc coaxed. “The world must know your pain. They must suffer as you have suffered. We should set ablaze the— ”
“Charles, my dude, what’s the sitch?” Corey interrupted. “There’s a line of cars outside. This isn’t In-N-Out.”
“This customer is in deep distress.”
“Try to communicate a sense of urgency, please. We’ve got to get this line moving.”
“Your lack of patience is admirable. I will comply. Apologies, hungry Mortal. This is the end of the line. What manner of feast do you crave?”
“Oh, right, it’s just so nice to have someone to talk to. I, uh, I guess I’ll have those Fiesta Potatoes.”
“Would you like to make a pact with that?”
With the demon out of the way, Sybil opened windows. She cleaned, she cleansed. She vacuumed around Deb, a lump wrapped burrito-style in blankets only moving to change a channel or pick up her phone again. Sybil filled the apartment with protective crystals, Demon Be Gone candles and sacred sigils.
Charnokc returned after a long day of work to find Sybil lying in wait.
As soon as the demon crossed the threshold, she burst out, brandishing a rosary: “Be gone, Devil! I banish thee! Return from whence you came!”
Charnokc glared, sniffed the air, shrinking slightly from the warding scents, from the fresh air circulating through the open windows. The demon hissed.
“Charnokc, is that you?” Deb called from the other room.
Thereby summoned, the demon dropped its dirty apron on the floor in defiance, and said to Sybil, “You fail to understand my nature so you will never destroy me.”
Trudging past her to the living room where Deb waited, Charnokc held out a crumpled, greasy paper bag. “I have brought sustenance. It is called the Supreme Taco Party Pact.”
Deb reached out to accept the bag. Charnokc went to the kitchen, took one of Sybil’s organic sodas out of the fridge and opened it with a clawed finger, slurping down the viscous contents.
—
The next day at work, Corey told Charnokc, “This is so weird, my dude. I cashed out your drawer yesterday, and every order came out to exactly $6.66, and the grand total was $666. What are the odds?!”
—
The grievances were delicious. Most people were tired. Many were hangry. Some were on road trips, trying to escape cults, arranged marriages, families that didn’t accept them. Their friendships were broken. Their romances were disappointing, fleeting, and laden with drama. Their dreams didn’t pan out. Their stomachs twisted with a hunger that went beyond physical emptiness.
After Charnokc had been there a week, word got out. The parking lot filled with people making videos from their cars. TikToks that started, “I can’t believe I’m crying.” Then, ended, “… and then a little green demon in a Taco Bell hat handed me a Mexican Pizza, and I just felt better.” They said, “This Taco Bell gives a new meaning to the phrase ‘comfort food.’ Not a sponsored ad.” Or, “Te quiero a side of therapy with your Taco Bell? Not sponsored.” Or, “Avocado Verde Salsa, Fire Sauce and someone to listen to your problems? Not sponsored, but my DMs are open.”
—
Sybil finally convinced Deb to take a walk for her mental health. As depressing as it was to walk alongside traffic amidst chain restaurants and strip malls, it seemed to help. When they got to the corner, they could see storm clouds gathering over Taco Bell.
“I saw clouds like that the day I summoned Charnokc,” Deb said.
Sybil didn’t respond but narrowed her eyes at the Taco Bell.
—
The time had come for an exorcism. That’s what Sybil decided. She called for reinforcements. Aside from Deb, the only people she knew were in her drum circle and amateur coven. They assembled in the Taco Bell parking lot. Wind howled; clouds billowed. Dust twisted in a taunting loop like a miniature tornado, accentuated by the vibrations of the drums. The drummers wore festival attire — tie-dye and beads. Cars honked, hungry, grumbling and desperate for a demon’s radical empathy.
Sybil stood before them: “Drummers keep drumming. Coven, have your crystals at the ready!” She held a standing point quartz overhead. “The power gathers at the base. We attack with the point. Avoid kyanite, selenite, azurite. Anything brittle. Get ready to hurl your palm stones and clusters on sight. We’re going to Baja Blast this demon into the next realm!”
Deb hadn’t been invited or warned, but she wandered out of the house in sweatpants and slippers for a solo stroll. She craved a quesadilla, felt curious about the crowds and drumsong. Sybil didn’t notice her arrival. Her eyes were on the double doors of the Taco Bell as they burst open saloon-at-high-noon style. Charnokc stood there and loosed a laugh that unsteadied the drummers and shook the earth. With a wild battle cry, Sybil ran toward the demon, charging with a massive cluster of tourmaline.
The demon leapt at her and uttered a guttural cry, “Kchlktal!” The wind picked up.
“The roommates are fighting again,” Deb muttered. She tried to call out to them, but her voice was carried away amidst the swirling dust and wild drumming. Deb shivered in the cold wind and piercing grit. Crystals flew through the air.
Like so often when Deb looked at the demon, she found it difficult to focus on its shape and features. The effort was so taxing that she felt the urge to crawl under one of the cars in the drive-thru line and go to sleep right there. She squinted, determined to see, to refine the blur of sickly green, to enhance the quadruple horns and mottled skin, to recognize the embodiment of a pain and distress she could not name.
“Charnokc charnokc charnokc,” said Deb, quietly — too quietly to be heard. Yet, the demon stopped in its tracks, turned its yellow eyes in Deb’s direction. “Charnokc the Disheveler, Bringer of Disarray, Steward of Shadows, Shiver-maker of the Otherworld, Proprietor in the Plains of Despair, Champion of the Downfallen, Middle Manager of Pain, Taco Bell Team Member, Drive-thru Operator, Granter of Wishes, Destroyer of Stars, Advocate of Rage, Sympathizer of the Wounded.”
Sybil looked to where Charnokc’s attention was drawn, noticing Deb for the first time.
“Debbie, you left the house on your own! I’m so proud of you!” Sybil’s grip on the crystal relaxed. It fell from her hand, and it bounced off the pavement of the parking lot.
Deb extended her arm, and the demon reached back to her, the tips of their fingers touching, lightning striking the air between them. Deb, Sybil and Charnokc stood in the center of the circle, drums pounding.
Charnokc whispered to Deb, a cacophony of dissonant echoes behind its words. “Pain and misery has been unleashed upon the world,” said Charnokc. “You are no longer alone.”
They were three silhouettes and Taco Bell against the sunset. All around them, TikTokers danced. Their videos were going viral.
Zoe Marzo is an LA-based writer and depth psychologist. Her writing has been published in The Rumpus, Popshot, Tahoma Literary Review, and other publications. She’s currently working on a time travel novel and finishing her dissertation for a PhD from Pacifica Graduate Institute, titled, “The Century of Athena: Archetypal Dynamics of the Digital Era.” Follow her for more work on Instagram | Bluesky
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