Surprisingly, John didn't balk at the question about Hell, but perhaps it was because she'd been honest with him, despite her loyalty to Sam. He could return the same honesty, as a sign of trust. And maybe talking about it with someone who wasn't Mary or Dean or Sam was the next step. John wasn't sure.
But he was sure that telling Faith didn't come with any strings attached. Telling her wasn't going to make her feel responsible, it wasn't going to horrify her from being too 'evil'. All it could do was make her see the truth about what he was now and he was learning that he couldn't keep running from that, from everyone understanding what kind of monster he really was inside.
"Nothing like they go on about in church about burning in hellfire, unless it's metaphorical. What we walked into in LA? Alastair had made it as much Hell as anything could be, but the real thing was a hundred times more. Hotter than anything here, the air itself the damn color of fire, and the smells..."
John closed his eyes, as even if someday he was able to say he'd 'healed', he'd never forget any of it, especially the smell of all that flayed, sizzling flesh and that red-orange haze.
"For every day up here, it's about a year down there," he said after a few moments, regaining the 'teaching' tone he was using to cover the emotion, "and every day down there is a new one for every soul on the Rack. They literally tear you apart, piece by piece, every day, and remake you new the next to do it all over again, over and over. Sounds simple enough to endure if every day you're put back together, but even when you forget your own name by the end of the day, you always remember what's done to you, the physical torture and the mind games."
Despite doing better since Alastair's death about all the doctored coffees or outright drinking to keep it all at bay, John still couldn't get through talking about this without that aide, something to take the edge off. Digging into his jacket, he pulled out the flask and tipped it into the cup, then set it aside if Faith wanted some. God knew he'd understand if anyone listening to this wanted a drink.
"But it's not neverending torment if you don't want it to be, because they give you a choice, at the end of every day. If you want off it, you have to put souls on it. It's that choice that's the first step, but that choice isn't the worst part. Choosing to get off the Rack is desperation, cutting into that first soul is desperation, but after that? It's just a relief and eventually a pleasure. It's freedom from the pain and as long as you keep torturing other souls, you're not being torn apart. Avoiding the pain is addicting, but it doesn't change that there's still a choice. The head games don't stop then either, but what a person starts to become with the knife in their hand, it's still by their own act."
Looking off into the distance, John's pace slowed, the 'informative' part of this clearly becoming reflective. "So humanity goes, day by day, year by year, until it's gone, and what's left is a demon. It's why the demons of our world are so different, because they're forged in selfishness, in taking pleasure in hurting others, in having something that feels like control. "Sam probably thinks it's something that can be made all better, because he wants to fix everything, but it's not. A person can heal from that someday if they weren't at it long, like Dean is, by finding humanity again in being here, alive and with whole souls, with reasons to live and love, but those who were at it long... they're never going to be as good as they once were, let alone better."
He looked back at Faith then. "And that's what I don't want for Sammy, to think he's doing good to the point he pushes these powers too far, to the point that he likes hurting things for the sheer pleasure and is blinded by false control, because I can't let my son become something that's all but a demon and hope he'll come back from it. He fought this blood better than most of those kids did, but I don't know that there's a human anywhere who can come back once they've gone too far."