Chapter Text
Blue eyes gleaming. Blue eyes all alight. But no. Not in the way they light up for him in tender moments between dusk and dawn. Not twinkling, all self-satisfied, after wresting moans from his swollen lips. And not in the heartrending way they sometimes glisten after he’s needlessly acted the villain. Instead, he sees with horror that the twinkling is a reflection of flames. Mortal danger beheld in blue eyes he knows well enough to recognize the terror they contain.
Crowley wakes with a gasp and bolts upright. Despite the dark, his snake eyes easily perceive the shadowy interior of the barn. Belatedly, he realizes he’s gripping a Hellfire blade in a trembling hand. Above the sound of his ragged breathing, he hears someone behind him scoff.
“I still do not szzee why you sleep.”
Staring resolutely ahead, Crowley grits his teeth and tries to control his frantic breathing. He searches the shadows for threats. “Sssix-thousand-year-old habit.” Longer? He wonders how long they’ve been at this madness. He abhors the involuntary sibilance, but being hunted puts one on edge. He asks, “Besides, why do I want to be conscious right now? I’m bored and cold and miserable, and sleep helps pass the time.”
“You could stand lookout for a change,” sneers Beelzebub. Crowley ignores them and tucks the blade back into the bag that contains, for admittedly irrational reasons, a miraculously charged cell phone and a scorched tire iron.
The Prince of Hell prods him further, “Do you always awake so suddenly? With such fear?”
Crowley expects to see smugness when he reels around to glower. Instead, his boss is sitting stone-faced with their back against the wall of the barn, legs straight out, and arms dropped unceremoniously to the dirt by their hips. 'Like a ragdoll,' he realizes sorrowfully. Like someone relinquishing their grasp on fading hope.
Yet, Beelzebub’s small grey eyes shimmer like cold steel in the moonlight streaming through the window in the loft. Across the dusty beam, Crowley feels skewered on the prince’s unflinching gaze. He swallows all his snark and mutters, “Just since the war.”
“Hmm,” comes the pensive reply.
Crowley leaps up, suddenly too antsy to remain lying on the hay-strewn dirt floor. He begins pacing across the length of the barn, dodging damaged boxes and rusted farm tools. A couple pitchforks, he notes with irony.
He asks, “Any word from Dagon or Hastur?”
“Dagon returned an hour ago,” answers Beelzebub. “She was unable to open the portal north of here. She’s outside keeping watch. Perhaps you would conszzider relieving her?”
Eager to clear his head, Crowley slides out the barn’s large front door. As he passes under the door frame, the powerful wards raise goosebumps. It isn’t a dark and stormy night. In fact, the moon over the roof of the barn is nearly full, and he can easily see Dagon leaning over a wooden fence across the yard. She looks too deflated to be described as lurking.
Evidently hearing him approach, she turns to fix him with an appraising look. Crowley slouches over the fence in a gesture he intends to be nonchalant but which, he knows, lands much closer to exhaustion.
“I came to keep you company.”
“You mean our Lord told you to relieve me.”
Feeling no need to answer what was clearly not a question, Crowley persists. “I heard you couldn’t open the portal.”
“No, those fucking angels sealed it,” she spits. “I don’t know how the opposition is locating them so blessed quickly.” The two stand in charged silence for a minute before Dagon inquires in a hushed voice. “How are they?”
Crowley need not ask to whom Dagon is referring. “You’d know better than I.”
Dagon’s shadow in the barn yard shakes its head. “They’re keeping me at arm’s length now.” There is another brief pause before she proceeds, almost wistfully. “You should have seen them during the war. Calling down pillars of fire everywhere. Cursing hundreds of angels at once. They were incredible.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Crowley can just distinguish the look of pride on her dark face. “Don’t let Lord Beelzebub hear you talk like that. Like the war’s over.”
Dagon scoffs. “The war is over. Half the planet’s on fire. Most if not all the humans are dead. And you and I and those two -- ” she hitches her thumb over her shoulder at the backlit outline of the barn, “ -- are hiding out in some random forest in a desperate search for an open portal to scurry back to Hell. And if we’re somehow lucky enough to locate said portal, I don’t know what the fuck we’re going to do once we get back down there.”
Dagon’s candid outburst is genuinely shocking. Crowley feels both an unprecedented impulse to comfort the Lord of the Files and a wariness at how to manage it without having a limb bitten off.
And always, ceaselessly, there is his preoccupation with the mission of finding his angel. Aziraphale is a warrior, Crowley reminds himself almost hourly. He was trusted with that flaming sword for a reason, even if he hadn’t been inclined to keep it long.
And though millions are dead, and both sides have suffered enormous casualties and appalling destruction, he cannot rationalize giving up. Because then, for the first time in a lifetime of devastating losses, he would truly have nothing.
Each time Crowley had seen an angel roasted alive on the battlefield, he’d wanted to scream. Sixteen years of romantic bliss -- sweet icing on top of six thousand years of burgeoning friendship that sustained him through Hell -- and that insolent, beautiful bastard had to get himself discorporated right at the end of everything. Six millennia spent dashing in to rescue Aziraphale from the angel’s own reckless schemes, and Crowley fails right in the last moments.
A nagging sickness swells, the suppressed undercurrent of his nearly every thought: they’d still be together if Crowley had never Fallen. Come Eden or the Apocalypse or the heat death of the universe, they could proclaim their love in the open.
Willing the words to be true, Crowley mutters to Dagon, “When we get back to Hell, we take stock. We’ve lost wars before. We’ll see what’s survived.” See who’s survived, he doesn't say.
“Never pegged you for an optimist.”
The serpent smiles. “Six-thousand-year-old habit.” To avoid becoming truly maudlin, Crowley deflects. “Do you think they’re sealing the portals from this side or from -- ” He pauses. He had planned to say ‘from our side,’ but the words taste bitter. “ -- or from Hell’s side?”
“The one I found had runes on the outside. The Earth side.”
Crowley squints at his enormous watch. “Hastur’s been gone a long time. I’ll bet that creep just leapt through his portal and abandoned us here.”
“Nah, he’ll at least message you a text. He won’t risk angering Beelzebub.”
Before he can mock her flawed jargon, Crowley swears quietly. “Shit!” He turns on his heels quickly, calling over his shoulder in a stage whisper, “Left my phone in the barn.” Just as Crowley slides open the door, he notices his skin isn’t tingling from their wards. He pauses.
In the next moment, he notices the doorframe is lit up. In fact, the whole front of the barn is illuminated. He has one second to recall the location of the moon and recognize something is wrong before Dagon yells.
“Angels!” She sprints towards the barn.
A dozen brightly glowing, white-winged creatures illuminate the distant sky. The beings careen towards the barn at incredible speeds, and Crowley notices that one is glowing particularly intensely. He dashes into the barn just as lightning strikes the ground where he’d been standing. The power of the blast launches him deeper into the barn, where he crashes into a hay bale.
Through his dizziness, Crowley hears Beelzebub swear loudly. ‘Get up,’ he thinks. Get up get up GET UP! He twists to see Beelzebub calmly marching towards the plume of smoke billowing through the front doorway. They raise both hands out to their sides, and in the next instant, the entire barn ignites. ‘Hellfire,’ Crowley realizes. He is cocooned in a fortress of Hellfire.
Just as the demon staggers to his feet, a second lightning bolt explodes behind him, blasting apart the back wall and showering him in flaming shards. He lunges into one of the empty horse stalls. Both lenses in his sunglasses are broken, and he flings them across the barn.
Angels in white uniforms navigate through the debris slowly, pouring holy water onto piles of burning rubble as they creep forward.
With his serpentine vision, Crowley is able to track their movement through the dense cloud of dust, smoke, and now steam. He loathes what detestable acts the war has required of him. And continues to demand of him. Desperately, he shoots Hellfire at the encroaching Heavenly troops.
One plume strikes a tall, thin angel directly in the chest. He crumples over sideways and wails. The ear-splitting scream is briefly audible above the roar of the inferno, but it fades quickly.
Don’t let my angel be here! The demon silently prays to anyone.
From the far corner of the barn, Crowley hears Beelzebub’s crazed laughter. They are crouched inside another stall, launching Hellfire at the enemy soldiers approaching from the front. Smoldering pieces of lumber crash down from the loft as Beelzebub diverts divine missiles into the ceiling.
Another barrage of lightning zips past Crowley’s face just as he tumbles back into the stall. A blast of Hellfire catches another angel in the arm, and she shrieks horribly as the other soldiers rush to douse her with holy water.
The sheer magnitude of ethereal and occult power in the room makes Crowley’s head pound. The combined energies shake the ground, and the demon feels the fabric of reality straining. The shuddering barn groans as it threatens to collapse.
Suddenly, a jet of water arcs down the middle of the building, as if from a firehose. What sounds like another jet of water collides with the side of the building, and the subsequent steam makes Crowley gag. His eyes burn. Holy water. Holy steam?! He panics and starts firing wildly at angels as he rushes clear of the stall and behind a burning pile of timber.
Immediately, an angry male voice can be heard from outside the barn. “Stop. Stop, you idiots!! We want them alive!” The thunderous crash of jets stops abruptly, and the same man calls through the doorway. “Lord Beelzebub, I know you’re in there. Surrender!”
By way of an answer, the Prince of Hell immediately hurls a fireball out from the smoldering wreckage of the barn.
“Beelzebub, it’s Gabriel. Be reasonable!” His tone is placating.
From across the room, Crowley can see a brief flash of panic cross his boss’ face. Their eyes dart back and forth as they consider options. But they quickly recover and roar, “Ha! And be drug off to Heaven in fucking chains?! Spend an eternity aszzz Heaven’s plaything?” They duck quickly around the stall door into the neighboring space, inching closer to the corner of the barn.
“You don’t have a choice. All the portals to Hell are sealed.” A pause. “It’s over.”
Beelzebub’s mad grin falters again. Crowley watches them worry their lip and hunkers further down behind his barricade. Through the warped air, he can see that the angels are standing a careful distance from the smoldering wall.
The war can’t be over. Gabriel has to be lying. Crowley smiles, anticipating how Beelzebub will sound while accusing that holier-than-thou prick of bearing false witness.
However, when Beelzebub speaks again, they just sound determined. “Then destroy the barn.”
There is another short pause. Gabriel sounds astonished when he chides, “No, come out. Be reasonable.”
“I am being reasonable,” they reply soberly. “Do your Arch-adversary a favor and don’t szzzubject me to the tedious pretentiousness of angelszzz for all eternity. I’d rather cease to exist, and you fucking well know it.”
“I’m not destroying the building.” There is another delay in which Gabriel must consider his next words. “Look, Beez, you’re making assumptions. As your adversary, I’m advising you to surrender.”
Crowley sees the muscles in Beelzebub’s face twitch. Then, they press their hand against the inside wall of the barn, and Hellfire gradually spreads out from their palm in rippling waves. They are reigniting the barn, Crowley realizes, but in a surprisingly controlled manner.
Before Crowley can ponder why his boss is suddenly being oddly cautious, he hears a rustling overhead. Crowley looks up just in time to see two Heavenly soldiers plummeting through a hole in the ceiling. One kicks him in the face and he collapses sideways. As he crawls away in a daze, something strikes the back of his head.
*** ***
Pain. He is in agony. Mostly his head. His senses are scrambled, and only fragments of information enter his mind, as if cast through shards of a broken window pane. White rectangular tiles warp and twist before his eyes. Piercing white light. His fucking sunglasses must be gone. He closes his eyes, presses his face against the cold stone beneath his cheek, and wills the room to still.
“Son of a bitch…” He teeters upright gingerly, jostling his throbbing head. The room sways around him. Something metallic encircles his neck. When he reaches for it, his arms snag. Handcuffs. Less than ideal. His pulse quickens.
Dimly, part of his brain tells him to take stock. Remain calm. ‘And demon on,’ supplies another part of his brain. He considers whether his situation warrants jokes, but he blames the blow to his head.
The white tile walls remain still when he opens his eyes again. A heavy bolted steel door is set into the wall opposite him, and the floor is indeed made of stone. ‘Heaven has seen too many cliched war movies,’ Crowley thinks derisively. Nevertheless, he struggles to ignore a mounting sense of complete vulnerability. Trapped. He tastes bile.
His powers feel horribly remote. His bony fingers deftly feel along the metal collar for etchings, at least some of which must be impressive runes. Rejecting the crystallizing truth of his circumstances, Crowley picks the bookshop in London and, with a thought, tries to miracle himself there.
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuuuck!” It feels like someone has wrapped barbed wire around his neck. Electrical shocks radiate down his arms from the collar, causing excruciating muscle spasms. The skin on his neck warms. He hunches over and trembles furiously against the pain, grateful at least that no one is watching.
He hadn’t really expected the miracle to work, but who knew these overstuffed pigeons could design devices capable of inflicting such suffering. His throat tightens. ‘Helpless,’ his mind supplies, but he shoves the thought away again.
Beyond his roaring pulse, from all directions, Crowley hears muffled yelling and thunderous banging. From the proximity, he presumes the responsible beings occupy neighboring cells. He feels an unexpected surge of pride when, from their bellicose ferocity, he surmises them to be demons.
Above the background noise, Crowley hears footsteps drawing closer. He darts towards the front wall just as someone clicks open multiple locks. He presses himself flat and holds his breath as the steel door opens into the room.
Two men clad in dark green military uniforms enter the cell -- one a tall blond and the other a lanky brunette. Before they can turn around, Crowley slides behind them through the open doorway and flees the room.
Crowley runs headlong into something large and sturdy, and he sprawls onto his back on the hallway floor. Before the demon can get his bearings, an enormous hand clutches him by the throat. In the next instant, he is lifted clear off the ground and pressed firmly against the wall.
“Found him,” snickers the behemoth holding him aloft.
“Aw, he tried to slither away,” laughs the blond from the doorway. “Isn’t that cute.”
Snake jokes, really? Crowley dismisses the alarming truth that these idiots know his identity.
The serpent can do nothing but grapple impotently at the giant’s forearms as the man dumps him unceremoniously against the far wall of the cell. As the blond with the snake puns reaches for his shoulders, Crowley acts on instinct. They want a snake, do they? He sinks his teeth into the man’s arm ruthlessly and refuses to let go of the bleeding flesh until the brunette soldier smashes a foot down on his ankle.
As Crowley yells, someone kicks him in the head. The room grows fuzzy again. He lies motionless, face down with his cuffed hands under his chest. He just needs to clear his head. Make the room stop spinning.
He is vaguely aware of a fourth person entering the cell. A snide voice from overhead drips with malice. “That was really stupid.”
Trite drivel doesn’t deserve acknowledgement.
“Get him up!” Hands grip his upper arms and dump him into a corner, knocking the back of his head against the tile and further wrenching his ankle. He focuses on not hissing.
The snide voice continues. “This building is a fortress. You have no chance of escaping from here.” The naysayer is a thin, fair-skinned man with eyes so pale as to be nearly opaque. He has the bearing of one who projects defiance to overcompensate.
‘A chip on his shoulder. Because he’s short,’ Crowley snickers inwardly.
The man is clad in a dark green uniform, though one significantly more embellished than those worn by his compatriots. His face is carved with laugh lines. His lips curl and his frosted eyes twinkle. And in another circumstance, Crowley might have assumed the man to be a jolly person. But in that moment, the serpent reaches for his demonic senses and finds that the figure before him reeks of disgust and anger.
The blond angel steps forward cradling his mangled arm, from which oozes a thin gold liquid. “The wretched beast bit my arm, sir!”
The commander never breaks his intense glare at Crowley. “Then you should be more careful handling wild animals. You’re dismissed.”
“Yes, sir.” The man leers at Crowley before turning smartly to leave. Crowley clicks his teeth at the retreating angel, miming another bite.
The commander speaks again, slowly and greedily and with obvious anticipation. “You’re going to regret the first impression you’ve just made.”
Crowley has spent six millennia navigating assignments and arguments with denizens of Hell. This angel’s bland threat barely registers. “What is this place?”
“You are in the Ministry of Demonic Rehabilitation.”
Before he can stop himself, Crowley throws his aching head back and laughs hysterically. “Rehabilitation?! And I suppose ‘war is peace’?”
The angel’s eyebrows knit together in confusion.
Crowley shakes his head and laughs softly. “Nevermind.”
“I am General Daebial, commander of the Imperion.” Scowling impatiently, the short officer gestures behind him at the two remaining soldiers. “We are charged with protecting the peace here in the capital Pelanx. In particular, we are currently tasked with overseeing the critical work of this Ministry.”
Crowley chuckles again, letting his head loll forward. His laugh becomes less genuine, but he’ll be damned a second time before he’ll let these assholes know. “For the record, this is a rhetorical question. But what measures are you planning to use to rehabilitate me?”
At this, the Imperion general finally cracks a smile. It’s the salivatory smile of a predator. “The High Council is still deliberating about what to do with prisoners of war. Obviously, I’ll defer to the Council’s sacred wisdom whenever they finally make their decree. For now, the Imperion have devised strategies for reforming demons -- strategies that provide some job satisfaction for my men.”
Crowley ignores how the giant grins and licks his lips.
General Daebial continues, “So. Before we get to rehabilitation -- whatever that’s supposed to mean -- we’ll start with something else.” A crazed look crosses Daebial’s face as he gradually places one foot on Crowley’s broken ankle. “Retribution.”
*** ***
“One hundred and szzeventy-four. One hundred and szzeventy-five. One hundred and – ”
The cell door slides open noisily and a short man in a bedazzled green uniform enters, flanked by two other men in matching blazers and slacks. The lead angel bows his head curtly. “Lord Beelzebub. On behalf of the entire Host, I welcome you to Heaven.”
Beelzebub reclines on the bench in their cell, their back against the tile walls and cuffed hands in their lap. The prince cocks an eyebrow impatiently but makes no other reply.
A disappointed look passes across the angel’s face for an instant before he continues. “I am General Daebial, commander of the Imperion. We are the police force who oversee the security of the capital city Pelanx. As part of that mission, we carry out the important work here at the Ministry of Demonic Rehabilitation.”
“Rehabilitation?” Beelzebub asks incredulously. They shake their head and chuckle softly. “I thought Dagon had cornered the market on euphemisms, but I stand corrected.”
“I actually just saw Dagon. She bargained for her life. Hastur threatened mine. And the serpent made a foolhardy escape attempt and had to be…subdued.”
Beelzebub smiles fondly. Their underlings are paradoxically predictable chaos incarnate.
Daebial is undeterred. “I’ve come to inform you that the High Council is deliberating about the fate of demon’s captured during the war.”
“Pleaszzze tell me extinction is on the menu.” They fume again at that lavender-eyed buffoon for not destroying the barn. The angel can be so fucking selfish.
The general considers his prisoner for a moment. “It is actually one of the options being discussed, but -- ”
“Good!” Beelzebub swings their legs over the side of the bench. “I choose that. Obliterate me.”
The commander grimaces at being interrupted. “You’re accustomed to governing large unruly masses, many of them malcontent following a protracted and costly war. You’ll understand why someone recently suggested to the High Council that there could be a significant boost in morale following a public display of demonic contrition.”
“Nope. Extinction.”
Daebial nods. “More’s the better. The High Council might have weak stomachs, but I personally think that Pelansians will stop their grumbling if they see Lord Beelzebub herself dissolved in a tub of holy water.”
Ignorant, they think. “And I’m only too happy to oblige. I want the last thing I see to be the look on dozens of faces when they see how a demon meets Death.”
Daebial’s smile widens acerbically. “Oh, more than dozens. But before I melt you in front of the unruly masses, someone has to convince the High Council to approve the execution of demons. In the meantime, you’ll remain in the MDR while Heaven attempts to rehabilitate you. And for starters, you have a visitor.”
The general strolls out only to be replaced by a tall, dark-haired man with violet eyes.
Beelzebub scowls. “You selfish, szzelf-righteous – ”
The archangel Gabriel holds his hand up to silence them. “Before you continue, know that our Mother hears all that is said here.” He peers at the demon meaningfully.
What an oddly pointed thing to say. “Understood.”
*** ***
Crowley spits blood onto the floor. “Are you featherweights going to hit me or just keep tickling me?” He’s chained upright against one wall of the cell by his wrists.
One of the Imperion guards grips him by the collar and tugs him as far forward as possible. “Is that your idea of begging me for mercy?”
Crowley emphasizes his response just right to splatter ichor from his lips across the guard’s face. “Fuck your pretenses at mercy.”
In response, the guard growls and slams the demon into the wall. Crowley’s head connects hard with the white tiles, some of which are stained black now.
The demon forces himself to laugh. “Good thing you two goody-two-shoes toed the line and stayed angels. Mediocre craftsmanship like this? You’d never have gotten work in Hell’s prisons.”
Goading these cops makes them sloppy. It also makes them vindictive. A second guard pulls out a baton.
“Now you’re not even going to use your own hands? That is some candy-ass pathet--”
The angel buries one end of the baton in Crowley’s chest, knocking the wind out of him. Can’t make snappy retorts with no air. Can’t scream either.
He rasps, “You angels are all soft. Tell you what, I’ll give you a free course.” He sucks in a breath. “Let me down, and I’ll give you a hands-on lesson on how Hell treats prisoners. No charge.”
One of the officers snaps his fingers, and Crowley is released from the wall and falls forward. His ankle is still broken, and he crashes to his knees. When he tries to catch himself, he finds that his wrists are now cuffed together.
Crowley sneers. “Not what I meant, wank wings.”
The guard delivers a sharp punch to his face. With his good foot, Crowley scoots towards the corner. The chain links between his wrists rattle as he gasps and instinctively raises one hand in defense.
A guard, nearly drooling with excitement, towers over him. Around the brute, Crowley locks eyes with a stoic Imperion captain in the far corner.
The man is a damn statue. Like church decor. A mausoleum ornament. He just stands there placidly, leaning back with crossed arms and a contemptuous expression on his severely lined face.
The panting guard, ichor dripping from his knuckles, also turns to face the captain. The question goes unspoken. Continue? The officer nods once.
Crowley closes his eyes, grits his teeth, and lets out a resigned breath.
*** ***
Captain Perathriel, the smug silent bastard in the corner, is present every time the guards torture Crowley. General Daebial had merrily introduced him as “the officer assigned to your case.”
The angel has broad shoulders and a commanding bearing. He seems always to be imagining himself on a parade ground, inspecting inherently lesser beings. He has tightly-cropped black hair and sparkling blue eyes that catch the edges of Crowley’s vision in moments of bitter confusion.
Perathriel does two and only two things: appear dreadfully bored and give permission to the men under his command to commit acts of violence. He never asks questions. He never provides the pretense that this torment is an interrogation.
Again and again, the captain enters the cell with a posse of interchangeable brutes. And again and again, the man observes impassively while his henchmen beat and burn the serpent.
Punitive stints in Hell taught Crowley that he can remain detached from the pain by mentally cataloging his injuries. Through narration, one might remain removed from the trauma.
Are his ribs broken? Yes definitely. It shouldn’t hurt this much to breathe. And his wrist? Yeah, those don’t bend like that. Two of the police officers stand over Crowley in his cell. Or is it four? How can you have double vision if you can only open one eye?
“Hey filth!” One of the guards nudges him. “D‘you feeling sorry for the war yet? ‘You going to beg me for mercy?”
Crowley forces himself to answer despite his muddled senses. “Shouldn’t you morons be practicing trussst fallsss together?” He slurs his words as if drunk. Thoughts jumble around the base of his skull, unwilling to line up orderly.
One of the guards kicks him in the gut, and he vomits ichor on the floor. Through the delirium, Crowley wonders who has to clean up this mess.
General Daebial’s appearances are unpredictable. In a lucid moment between sessions with the Imperion guards, Crowley reasons that such a high ranking officer must have other responsibilities. Protecting the peace? At the very least, he is probably paying lip service to rehabilitation efforts in other cells.
When the general drops by, he does not lean disaffected in the corner with the omnipresent Perathriel. Rather, Daebial salivates over violence. He laughs maniacally at the crunch of breaking bones. He becomes giddier with each scream torn from the demon’s throat. His cackling echoes off the tiles while Crowley writhes in agony.
In particular, Daebial seems to delight in suspending Crowley from the ceiling by his wrists. The general and his henchmen reach for clubs and knives and that loathsome whip as they torment the demon. All too soon, the sound of Daebial’s voice makes Crowley shiver.
Whip slung over his shoulder one day, Daebial ponders, “How many human souls reside in Hell?”
“Not my department,” mutters Crowley sullenly.
“But your doing. Your responsibility.”
Crowley knows better than to engage with Daebial. “Piss off!”
The general expertly snaps Crowley in the shin with the end of the whip, causing the demon to hiss loudly. “You’re the foul hateful beast who infiltrated Eden and ruined paradise. You corrupted Her greatest creations!”
Crowley bites down around retorts. He’s not going to get drawn into some philosophical debate with this self-righteous sadist while strung up by his arms. Another crack of the whip. The sting glances against the demon’s exposed side along his ribs.
The general continues, “Eve’s original sin in the garden resulted in six thousand years of human suffering. You’re culpable in this great sin, which condemned all of humanity.”
Crowley shuts his eyes. This is lunacy. The whip strikes him square in the back this time. He grits his teeth to keep from crying out. Hastur’s routine retraining sessions were worse, and Crowley survived those ordeals with fragments of his dignity.
“Say it, you wicked filth. Eve’s disobedience was immoral. Your temptation of her was immoral,” commands Daebial.
Crowley continues catching his breath. This is preposterous. This whole situation is preposterous. He’s not going to engage with this cocky fool like this. “I’m not fucking chatting with you like this.”
Daebial scourges Crowley in the side again as the demon hangs exposed. His voice rises in fury as he snarls, “You demons are recklessly independent. You must give up being stubborn. You will do as I bid because I am your better.”
The serpent squeezes his eyes closed and curls his head down instinctively. In response, Daebial slices Crowley’s back open until ichor streams down the trembling demon’s legs and puddles where his toes scrape the ground. The assault finally halts, and Crowley whimpers as he’s dropped hard onto the cold cell floor.
Daebial pants quietly as he kneels over Crowley. “I’d tell you to consider the consequences of your choices, but since when did demons care about the ramifications of defiance? Just do what feels good, hm?” The angel backhands Crowley. “Does being stubborn feel good right now?!”
Days later, when the bleeding has stopped and lash marks are healing, Daebial returns to the cell. Crowley is again dangled from the ceiling by his wrists.
In full view, the general unfurls the whip out of thin air. “Why did you corrupt humanity? What was Lucifer’s purpose?”
Crowley again tries to block out the angel by closing his eyes, keeping his breathing steady, and allowing the pain of the whip to wash over him. It’s harder to withstand the onslaught this time, knowing that Daebial can and will keep this up until he gets what he wants.
An unknown time later, Daebial says, “Eve was given an explicit command. Don’t eat the fruit. What did you say to tempt her into an immoral choice?”
In the haziness of overwhelming pain, Crowley’s impertinence outpaces his reason. “Immoral by what ssstandard of right and wrong?”
“Her action was in direct defiance of the Mother’s law,” replies the angel matter-of-factly. “Therefore, it was immoral.”
Crowley commits to this insane debate. “Who decided the Almighty was the highest authority on morality? Was it Her?”
Daebial’s eyes flash with fury. “You dare challenge Her supremacy?” He swings the whip with practiced skill, slicing again at Crowley’s side as he circles the serpent. The demon sucks his teeth. Then Daebial proclaims, “What the Mother says is right, is right.”
“How do you know?”
Crowley experiences Daebial’s frustration through a series of multiple unrestrained, vicious lashes. The angel’s voice rises. His chest heaves with exertion and with anger. “Because it is written. Because She is the source of all!”
“Awfully convenient for Her. She orders all Her little minions not to question Her. Wish I’d thought of that gimmick.”
Seething, the general finally loses control. The debate instantly ends, replaced by a relentless punishing barrage of lashes until Crowley is in too much pain to cobble together complete thoughts if he had wanted.