Satan is a tragic sort of character to write- condemned, beautiful... with no chance of salvation. I enjoy trying to develop him as a person, because people are so fast to hate him.

Sachairi

The Games We Play

He knew that his act was getting old. The same tired tricks, over and over again. It was strange, how they never caught on. Not the smartest blokes, are they? He wasn't even angry anymore. He hadn't been angry about it for a long time. He wasn't bitter- there'd be time for that later- along with whatever regrets that may come. He hated it.

There were a lot of things that he hated. He hated the fighting. It was true that it was the only thing that he was good at anymore, besides deceiving people. He was a Master of the sword, although you'd never guess it from his slight frame. He hated the fact that he knew what was coming- and that there was nothing that could be done about it.

Stuck in a cosmic role as one of the main players, and there wasn't even anything he could do to stop it. Once He got His mind onto something, there was no turning from it- and everybody else just had to bathe in the blood. Lucifer frowned. Yes, there'd be a lot of blood on the Last Days. He entertained no delusions that he'd get away unscathed- in fact, he wanted to be out in the thick of it. If he was going to go down, he was going to go with a bang.

He walked into the Heavenly courts- yes, he was still permitted to be there- and greeted God. God ushered him to a seat, and got out the chess set. "I'm white" He announced. Lucifer rolled his eyes. He's always white. S'not like black is that awful a colour. He nodded anyway, as he knew that this was one of those millions of arguments that he'd never win, and they set up their pieces.

""Where have you been?" God asked, in a would-be casual voice. Satan was quite used to this, it was always like this. The same script, over and over again.

"Oh, around. You know, all over the Earth. Lucifer the vagabond" He smirked to himself as he moved a pawn. He hadn't used the 'vagabond' line before. Perhaps this wouldn't be such a bad day after all.

God nodded, moving His own pawn. "And have you noticed David? He is one of the finest I've had in a long time- a man after My own heart"

Lucifer refused to be baited, just yet. He does this with every servant He has! "I thought he died… surely You're not talking about the David that slept around with that whore, Bathsheba"

"Yes, that David died. And why must you always throw that in My face? You know I don't appreciate it"

"Yeah- it's not nice to have Your past constantly thrown back at You time and time again, now is it?"

God glared. "You know the David of which I speak. He has proven himself faithful. What do you think of him?"

It's always easier to return to familiarities. Not one person has ever completely liked change. Change was uncomfortable and unpredictable. With that, Lucifer allowed himself to step back into the game of cat and mouse they were always playing. "Yes, I have noticed David. Bright young lad, with a promising future" He paused, and chewed his lip for a moment. Here it was- the part he hated most about his role in the game. "He's only faithful because of your protection of him. Take it away, and he'll rebuke you"

God nodded "Very well. Do what you want with him, and his family. Just don't kill him" Satan moved another piece.

"Alright. I'd best be on my way- souls to destroy, and all that"

"Right. Checkmate" Satan stood. He hardly ever won in these petty games. He often wondered why they bothered playing at all- God always knew what was going to happen before it did. "See you later, Lucifer" With that, Satan excused himself.

Two weeks later, Satan once again found himself sitting in front of the chessboard across from God. "Haven't seen you in a while"

"Well, I've been busy wrecking that David kid's life, now haven't I?" And he certainly did. His mother died from a heart attack (at 38), his father went bankrupt, David was inflicted with boils, his little sisters got an awful case of lice (which had resulted in the cutting of their beautiful, long, curly black hair) and David's favourite uncle had been put into jail for stealing a car and drunk driving. That had really baffled the neighbourhood, seeing as the man was an upstanding individual.

"Yes, that's true. And how did it go?"

"You know how it went. David is still very faithful, despite my doing everything in my power to change that" He shifted uncomfortably. For being the Father of Lies, he was actually pretty bad at it face-to-face.

"Did you now? We both know David's weakness for pornography. Why didn't you use that? You love using that card. It's a good one, I admit, gets them most of the time" Lucifer shrugged. He hated how God could always see through him.

"Wasn't in the mood for it, I suppose"

"The Prince of Darkness that I've always known wasn't a lazy man"

"There was nothing lazy about it. Did you see it? It was perfectly orchestrated- an entire family, wrecked in two short weeks. They'll have financial problems for the rest of their lives, and You know how those humans are with their money" Lucifer made a face. Sometimes, he disgusted himself. Correction he thought, I always disgust myself.

"I see" His voice said that He didn't believe a word that the blonde was saying, but Lucifer didn't let it bother him too badly. After all, he was the Devil. "What else have you been up to?"

And here it was, once again. "Not much" he said slowly, wishing to draw this out. "Wandering all over the Earth, as usual. It's as beautiful as it is disgusting"

"Have you noticed young Lise? What do you think of her? She's pure and righteous, despite her illness"

"She's five years old, of course she is. Wait until she's fifteen or so, then we'll see" Lucifer liked Lise, she was a sweet kid. She had been diagnosed with leukemia about two years before, and it was really serious. She had had a period of about three months where it went into remission, but it came back full force. It claimed an entire lung, and half the other. A large part of her brain was also sick. God had told him once that she would not see seven.

"We know that she's not going to last that long"

"She could, you know" He said. It wasn't often that he got to try and bait God. He really didn't want to attack such a young girl.

God shook His head "No. Her time had been set, many millennia before. You have freedom to do what you want with her. Checkmate"

Satan sighed, standing up. "You win, again. Well, I'm off"

In all honesty, there wasn't much you could do to corrupt a child of five. They didn't have any of the crap that adults carried around on their shoulders. Satan did get her to stumble upon her older brother's porn stash so God wouldn't be able to use that against him again, but she showed nothing but curiousity in it. As expected. He knew, of course, the one thing he could do that would destroy the child.

Her older brother was an atheist, and was jealous of his sister. He knew a lot about the Bible, more than some of those so-called Christians did. All he needed to do was get the brother to tell Lise that God was punishing her for being bad. The girl already thought that, from time to time, when she was lying alone in the hospital. But… Satan liked her. She was determined, a fighter. He always admired the strong.

Satan walked in, being greeted by Paul (who wasn't pleased to see him). Satan couldn't care less. Paul was a wanker, anyhow. He was the most racist, sexist, homophobic person that Satan ever had the misfortune of stumbling upon. He was very grateful the man wasn't in Hell, because he would surely kill the man.

"Good day, Lucifer. Come, sit" God indicated the seat opposite him, the chess board already set. "Where have you been?"

Like a broken record. "In Hell. The place needed sprucing up. The seventh level of Hell was missing, can you believe it? The minions are lacking"

"Well, good help is hard to find these days" There was an uncomfortable silence, except for the occasional 'click' of a piece on the board. "You killed her" God sat back, surveying Lucifer carefully.

"You never said that I couldn't. Besides, You could've stopped me, and You didn't"

"You didn't even make her suffer. No boils, no plague, not even nightmares."

"I think that the plagues and boils are more up Your alley, mate" there was a pause.

"You made her go in her sleep" God pointed out. "Are you having some sort of mid-life crisis? Should I get you to a therapist?"

"No, I'm fine, alright? I just felt like pulling an old Freddy Kruger, is all. Minus the nightmares. Why are You bothered by this? You were right, she was faithful, right up until the end, and she gets to sing Your praises, ad nauseum, for all of eternity"

"Because you're not even trying-"

"Bollocks! I used the porn card, You saw it, I know You did!"

"You used it on a five year old child that you knew it would have no effect on. You didn't even use that awful hard core crap that he has lying all over the place."

"I didn't want the poor girl's eyes to burn out. It gives me the willies, and I'm the one that bloody invented it!"

"You didn't use what you knew would be your trump card, Lucifer. I don't know what's up with you. Did you know that the only wars going on on Earth right now are the small ones in Africa, and that one between the Israelites and the Arabs? They're not even wars, they're just doing the political battles!"

"You're telling me that I'm not doing my job by not being evil enough?" By now, they had abandoned their game. Satan had an eyebrow raised in surprise.

"Yes! How will there be spiritual growth if there is no evil to fight against?"

"Right. Need the little critters to get their growth. I'll… do better" The words were sour in his mouth, but at least God and himself were having a decent conversation- one that they never had before. Then again, he'd never been that bored in his role that he'd been given.

God smiled, and Satan could see the moment God became at ease again, and he knew that they fell back into their places. So, he knew what was coming. He wasn't disappointed. "Have you noticed Catherine?"

"Yes" he said, grinning deviously. She'd be difficult. A challenge, one he hadn't had since Job. "But take away her protection, and I swear she'll curse You"

God nodded "You may do what you want- but you can't kill her" He was just about to reach to place His next move when John the Baptist ran in- head firmly attached.

"My Lord! You must come, immediately!" God tuned to Satan, uncertainly.

"Go on. I know how backed up paper work can get if you don't attend to these things quickly. We'll continue our game after I destroy Cathy's life, alright?" With that, Lucifer calmly popped out of the room.

Catherine was an older Catholic woman, 51 years old. She owned her own Christian bookstore, which was doing well for itself. She was kind, and friendly. There was a boy who lived with her, having been kicked out and disowned by his family for being gay. Lucifer never understood those people. You very well couldn't help what your preferences were- he lost track of how many times he tried to get a person to 'turn' gay, but it never worked. You were who you were, and there was nothing to be done about it.

Even though Lucifer liked doing grand and showy, he also enjoyed the subtle. The best thing he ever did was to convince people he didn't exist, and it made them more prone to attack. Catherine lived in a very Christian community, so subtle was best. If he did anything dramatic, he'd be pinned and they would have one (or many) of those rotten prayer sessions of theirs. Hell, he was blamed for some of the things God did in this town.

So, little things he did. He talked Catherine's daughter into not talking to her mother anymore- telling her that she was simply 'too busy'. He made Cathy get bouts of clumsiness. He gave her a cold, making her miss a few Sundays. He got the boy, Eric, to spend more time out with his boyfriend, making him come in at late hours of the night. Her and her husband began arguing, over stupid things- like who took out the garbage and who was the last one to do the dishes. He had people coming over at odd hours, selling this, or asking to support that, or to please go to their church.

She was frazzled by the time she got better- but her church family had turned their back on her. They were condemning her to Hell for housing 'a sodomite'. They said that he would surely 'turn her to his ways'. Satan snorted and rolled his eyes. God forbid you actually help someone in need. That would make sense, you lot being Christian and all. Maybe he was lucky that he was kicked out of Heaven, after all.

She ended up kicking the boy out, and Satan shook his head in disappointment. He thought that she was better than that. The poor lad was homeless now! There was no way that his family would let him back- and they didn't. Gits, the whole lot of them.

He increased his attack on her then, being angry with her, and her stupid church family. He made it difficult for her to sleep, and gave her a loss of appetite. He gave her guilt over throwing Eric out- a lot. He made it impossible for her to get any prayer time, or to even read any verses that might help her spirits. He gave her husband a heart attack, one that left him partially paralyzed.

His anger was mostly abated by then, and he felt bad for attacking the husband. His goal was Catherine, after all. So he went back to her- giving her terrible nightmares. He made sure her eyes stayed a moment too long on the porn mags in the stores. Her eyes began following, of their own accord, the young, good looking men of the town. Satan smiled- this was how he worked- slowly desensitizing a person until they didn't even notice any more.

It was finally after she had a particularly raunchy dream of a young man in her bookstore the day before that Satan knew that he won. She had woken up, alone, and wept. "Why, God! Why are you doing this to me! Haven't I done good for you!"

"And my work is done here" Satan said, quietly, and left the woman to herself. If anybody ever said that he wept that night, he would vehemently deny it. After all, he was the Devil. This was child's play, right?

"Good to see you again, I thought you had gone among the missing"

"I was, for a while. She was difficult" Which was true. It had been two months since he was last in audience with God. Satan glanced down at the chessboard, and blinked in surprise as he realized they were just one move away from having the game done. "Checkmate" he said, moving his black rook into place. It wasn't often he won against God.

"You beat Me" God said quietly, and Satan didn't do anything but nod, still staring in the direction of the board. "You destroyed her, Lucifer"

"Wasn't that what You wanted? I did my job, nothing more"

God nodded "You did. Hey, have you noticed-"

"No. I haven't. I'm going now" Satan turned and began walking away.

"Where are you going?"

"To Hell, where I belong. Obviously."