The Many Faces of Evil

My first day on the job was relatively uneventful in the first few hours, but things could get heated up when guarding Satan.

"What do you want, now, Baal?" I sighed, leaning against my master's throne.

"Well, I'm a bit concerned with the way that Satan is running this place," the jackass demon explained. "We can't have anything as powerful as you interrupting dinner parties. Besides, you're an angel, what are you doing down here?"

"I was put here to be made tough," I replied, my left hand tight on the hilt of my sword. "And now I am. What other treason do you have to spout, baby-eater?"

"Stop calling me that!" Baal cried, throwing off his cloak to reveal a wicked dagger in his hand.

"Well, you do eat babies," I pointed out, drawing my own sword. "Now, why do you want to fight me?"

"You insult me--" he began.

"You insulted me," I continued to correct him, displaying a rather unnecessary display of showmanship by swinging my blade between my hands. It came to rest in my right as I dodged a sudden stab from the opposition.

"Today, you die like a true warrior," my opponent said, licking his lips. "No hiding behind your cheap tricks, just swordplay."

"I accept your offer," I said, raising my sword, lazily. "Now, let's fight. Like men... I bet you possess humans."

"That is it!" Baal cried, lunging with gusto.

I parried the short blade away with ease, assuming an en garde stance. He came in with a slash, which I ducked to avoid, countering with a lunge, swiped away. He riposted, but was kicked in the knee, mid-swipe.

"I will kill you," Baal panted, gripping his leg.

"You can try, but I can't guarantee your success," I said, checking my nails.

He took this opportunity to cut my throat, but I circled him and hit the demon in the kidney.

"Slick," I taunted.

He got back up from his knees and went on a frenzied spree of strikes, all of which were half-assedly parried away by Solaris.

Satan still appeared uncomfortable in the presence of that blade, but it was a damn fine weapon.

Baal caught me by surprise with a kick to the shin, but even then, I jumped out of the way. My blunder in that split second cost me an advantage as my opponent pushed me down. He crossed his curved knife with my sword, pressing my own blade against my chest. I let go of my weapon and took him by the arms, throwing him over my head and into a wall before I picked up Solaris again. Baal was disoriented from the blow and had dropped his dagger on impact. I kicked the dinky little blade away and pointed my own, larger one at his throat.

"You wouldn't dare," he spat, wiping black ichor from his lips.

"I said that if you insulted my family again, I would make you suffer," I told him. "You didn't, so you are entitled to a swift death. The fact that I swore to Satan to protect him against bastards like you doubles the chances that I'll put this blade through your throat. That brings me to a probability of approximately... carry the one... three hundred fucking percent."

With that, I pushed Solaris forward and through Baal's throat. He spasmed and gurgled for a moment before lying still. I pulled the sword back, emphasizing the movement before turning back to Satan and bowing with a flourish.

"How'd I do?" I asked.

Satan, who had been sitting, frozen in his throne, with a shocked look on his face, snapped back to attention and replied, "Oh, uh, just fine. I like how you... that thing with the... yeah. Good job. That bit about possessing humans; what did you mean?"

"Didn't you get the memo?" I explained, wiping the black sludge from my blade on Baal's tunic. "After Adam and Eve, humans were completely below demons. Possessing one is a complete insult to demonkind and a stain on your honor. Didn't you set the bar on that one?"

"Oh, I suppose I did," the Prince of Darkness mumbled, sitting back. "I should get out more."

***

Baal's influence had spread to other demons. A small revolution had started in the proletarian demon class, demanding just as much power as any Prince of Hell.

Five such proles hung from the rafters of Satan's throne room, watching their master being beaten to death by that bastard Daniel. He was a master swordsman, yes, but they had the advantage of surprise. They jumped down, landing on their feet and somersaulting to regain footing.

"What the fuck?" I asked, turning around to face my new opponents.

"You killed our leader," one of the proles said, drawing a well-worn longsword. "And now we kill you."

"That's not usually how it works," I began to point out, but the demon lashed out at me. I dodged the swing by inches and fumbled for my own blade. "Okay, I'll play. But this time, it's my rules." With that, I rolled backwards, reached behind my back and threw a knife at one of the demons. It hit him in the abdomen, causing the fellow to double over; I would finish him off later.

The leading figure that had spoken to me lunged once again for my throat. I parried, knocked the blade clear away, before going in for a stab through the rib cage. Discarding the body, I turned to face the other three, all of which were carrying those ill-treated longswords.

"You may as well be coming at me with butterknives!" I exclaimed. "Either way, you can't touch me."

The taunt did not faze them, and they stood their ground just ten meters down the hall. This inconvenienced me, as Solaris was only about four feet long.

Luckily, I didn't have to fight fair anymore, so I channeled a tongue of flame through my right arm, up the sword and out at my targets. Being demons, the fire did not harm them, but I meant it as more of a blinding maneuver. Engulfed in flames, they could not see their attacker.

I followed up the fire with a quick burst of energy to the leftmost demon's chest. The power punched a hole through the poor guy and he collapsed. The other two, becoming more discouraged, began to converse on tactics. Making their decision, they ran at me, then separated, taking different flanks. A tough spot, but I had learned this one years ago with five plus enemies.

Leaping three meters into the air, I kicked the right demon's head, snapping off one of his stubby horns, then aiming a beam of energy down at the left demon, completely vaporizing him. When I landed, I kicked the downed right demon in the abdomen, further incapacitating him and followed up with a decapitating stroke.

Shall we not forget the lamentable son of a bitch who took a throwing knife to the gut? I approached him and unceremoniously snapped his neck. Satisfied with my work, I cleaned off my sword and knife once again on Baal's tunic before sheathing them and returning to my post.

"I believe I owe you my life," Satan remarked, taking a sip of wine from his gold goblet.

"Well, considering Baal has quite some influence with the proles," I pointed out, "I think we haven't seen the last of them."

"What were the odds of that happening?" my master muttered, shaking his head.

"Surprisingly high," I answered, smoothing the wrinkles from my robe. "I'm surprised this hasn't happened before. Ah, well, call up Beelzebub and tell him I did a good job, 'cause I am outta here for the day."

"It's hardly noontime!" Satan exclaimed. "You can't just leave!"

"Okay, lunch break," I said, shrugging. "And you're the head demon. Can't you protect yourself for one hour?"

"Um, an hour," he contemplated. "I suppose--"

"Thanks a million. See ya," I stated, already out the door.

***

So maybe the revolution Baal had started was a bit larger than I made it out to be. Most of the proles were up in arms about the death of their leader and his operatives at the hands of an angel in service to their oppressor. Other than that, it's exactly how I described it.

Urebor was considered a low-life, even for a lower-classman. His horns were larger than most lesser demons and protruded quite clearly through his combed-back, jet black hair. He quite enjoyed the idea of a revolution and very much enjoyed its efforts. He had gained influence from his brutality in the back alleyways of Dis and was now standing in front of a crowd, his fist raised to excite his audience.

"Daniel is still half angel!" he announced to the crowd of hundreds beneath him. "He has defiled the impurity of Hell and serves the symbol of oppression in this hole. Satan must be brought down so that this place may be ruled properly. We must destroy Daniel and Beelzebub to cripple the military."

"How do we defeat such powerful warriors?" someone in the front row asked.

Urebor heard the question and lifted the demon by the throat and looked him in the eyes. "Strength in numbers, brother," he answered before throwing the doubtful one back into the crowd where he was trampled to death.

"You see," he went on, "we can achieve great things if we all work together. And together, we shall rid our home of these bastards who seek to push us down. But we shall rise!"

***

I sat back and enjoyed a nice sandwich in a bar down the road from my house. Clancy, the barkeep, recognized me as his most devoted patron and made sure that my first five purchases were on the house. I sipped my soft drink and looked up to see him fussing over a newspaper (well, it was a clay tablet, but doesn't newspaper sound so much better?) article.

"Get another bad review?" I asked, savoring a bite of the scrumptious sandwich.

"No, just some uprising in the inner city," Clancy answered, offering it to me.

"Oh, yeah," I mumbled, skimming through the story. "Yeah, I killed their leader. This Urebor chap sounds like a pretty formidable replacement, though."

"I heard stories 'bout that guy," the bartender noted, shivering. "He does some bad stuff in dark alleys, stuff that Satan would regret. Lord knows how he got in the people's favor."

"Well, if he tries to make an attempt on Satan's life," I chuckled, "he'll end up past the business end of a certain blade. And besides, what's the probability of that happening?"

"Hundred fuckin' percent," Clance muttered, cleaning a beer mug for no apparent reason.

I finished off my meal and still had 45 minutes to kill, so I headed down the road back to my house. Once inside, I trotted down to my basement where I found my pet project sitting on a workbench in the far corner. On that table was a black glove attached to a metal wristband.

It was a new weapon I had devised: a wrist-blade. The wristband contained a dagger that would pop out when I flicked my wrist and then retract when I repeated the gesture. The blade was positioned so that it would appear underneath my hand for more stealthier approaches. The mechanism was almost ready; in fact, I could complete it in the next 15 minutes.

***

Outside my house was a group of very angry demons of the lower class, holding rather nasty-looking implements of destruction. Urebor stood at the head of the group, a torch gripped in each hand.

"He is an angel!" the leader announced, waving his arms. "He shall burn like a man!"

With that, several other torch-bearers joined Urebor in dousing the base of my house with oil, then preparing to drop their torches.

***

There was a crack in my foundation that I had not yet fixed. It allowed oil to flow into my basement, attracting my attention.

"Is it flooding?" I asked. Then I remembered that the lake was filled with blood. That smell was... "Oil! Shit!"

The wrist-blade was ready. I quickly took off my right-hand glove and replaced it with the mechanism, then ran up the stairs as the oil ignited. My front door was already engulfed, but I knocked it down and jumped over the lit oil...

... and right in front of a crowd of angry demons.

"Oh," I said, looking at all the glaring faces. "Uh, hi. If I said that I was the housekeeper, would you believe me?" I was answered by a collective shaking of heads. "Ah. Right."

With that, I bounded to the right and dashed around the corner of my house. The lake was just ahead. My only way out. I dove and felt the burning of boiling blood pressing against my skin, but I kept swimming, hearing splashing behind me as I was followed into the the thick liquid.