Mysterion, May 2024

“Profane Intervention” by Shawn Vincent Wilson

Reviewed by A. Bruin

“Profane Intervention” by Shawn Vincent Wilson is set in a game store in California. The owner of the store tries to keep the place clean of bad influences and run an honest business. He cares so much for the community he has gathered around his store that he makes a deal with an ephemeral internet contact claiming to be a demon who could get a young man off drugs. The story opens with the young man returning to the store having just graduated from rehab. The story centers around the demon calling in the payment according to the terms of the contract. The story setting is well developed, providing sufficient details to firmly ground the story in a particular place without so many details that it obscures the emotional arc of the story.

At first the story seems to be about whether a demon can also do good things, or whether a good man has been tempted into a fall into sin for the sake of doing good towards another. As the story develops, there’s a twist. It turns out that like the cops send out undercover informants, Heaven also sends out undercover agents to catch the infernal powers who attempt to play by their own rules rather than Heaven’s. The story was well developed, and the twist at the end resolved the story in an unexpected but satisfying way.