Most of the army of Hell surrendered, following their leader’s example. The princes of Hell resisted; Phanuel, Raguel, and Michael slew them. But Beelzebub did neither.
      “I followed you into Hell,” he said, wings folded tightly together. “I would follow you out of it again.”
      Beel-
      “No. No, I have a name. I don’t ( Read more... )

      Jesus walked easily onto the battlefield, his simple armor shining in the starlight, his broadsword gleaming diamond-bright. His expression was as serene and unflappable as ever. As he passed through the archangels, each of them embraced him briefly: a last-minute reassurance, though for him or for them Satan could not tell.
      ( Read more... )

      The earth was battered, broken, reeking of radiation and oozing with sickness. Millions of humans were dead; the mortals had fought a war between good and evil, and no one could tell who had won. Perhaps there was no difference between the two sides anyway.
      Satan had held a final council of war with the princes, and now strode out ( Read more... )

      Michael was the one who cast him into the pit, and Uriel was the one who chained him in the darkness. If he saw tears in her eyes, he did not mention them.
      He struggled and railed against his imprisonment for a while, just to put on a good show. But when the angels’ attention was elsewhere, he slumped down, and offered thanks to who ( Read more... )

      Her name was Evelyn, Eve for short. Satan had nearly choked with laughter at the aptness of the name, and bestowed upon the mother as many worldly riches as she desired. For Evelyn had grown up perfectly.
      The Antichrist danced through the world, leaving destruction in her wake, and smiled and charmed and flitted among the ( Read more... )

      Understand me when I say this, said the homeless man from under his large floppy hat, blowing on his fingers in the cold.
      “What?” said the toddler.
      On your head rests everything I am, and everything I fight for, said the frazzled woman herding students in from their lunch hour.
      “Who are you? What do you fight for?” ( Read more... )

      Seven thousand years. Finally the time had come.
      Beelzebub found the woman. He’d refused to let Satan pick, even though Satan would be the father. That had been an interesting conversation.
      (I think I can find an adequate woman to bear my child, Beelzebub.
      “And I think you would pick the first woman to cross your ( Read more... )

          Each of the princes of Hell liked to walk the earth occasionally. Moloch, Mammon, Belial, Asmodeus, Leviathan-each of them had their habits, their preferences on how to make God’s precious second children miserable. Belial twisted politics and devoured the broken; Mammon struck the uncertain with goldsickness and greed; Moloch ( Read more... )

          Satan’s scream of anger echoed through the halls and plains of Hell, and both damned and demons cowered; but nothing would satisfy him. Death had been destroyed. The humans would now not only have life, but everlasting life.
           Jesus had won.
           He collapsed onto his throne, and gripped the armrests so hard they ( Read more... )

          It had been twenty days in the desert thus far, and Satan was beginning to be frustrated by the solemn, unsmiling, stubborn Son of God. Any other man - and a few angels too - would have caved in by now, would have seen the error of their stupid loving ways, would have Fallen and Fallen hard. But Jesus just walked around the desert, ( Read more... )