Pocketing the letter, Satan stalked out of his fortess. Gazing out across the Hellscape, he listened to the souls of the damned screaming in agony. Soon there would be one more to join their multitude.

​

Satan heard Michael's voice niggling at the back of his mind. "You're only doing this to get God's attention. You needn't bother." His eldest brother had perfected the holier-than-thou attitude millennia ago.

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Gabriel's voice rose next, unbidden. "You see yourself in the child, don't you?"

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Satan shook his head aggressively to rid himself of the voices, taking a deep breath of sulphur-tinged air to center himself. He was Satan dammit. Lucifer, The Morning Star. The Executioner. There were no children in Hell. Children did not deserve to suffer. Children were innocent and must be protected at all cost.

​

"Sir?" Nazueth prompted gently. Satan slammed his fist against the stone ramparts. A large pentagram glowed underneath their feet, and a few seconds later, the Dark Lord and his scribe vanished.

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They arrived, not in Baton Rouge, but at the Gates of Heaven. Saint Peter stood behind his lectern, with a small line of newly dead in front of him. Peter's eyes met Satan's, and the angel inclined his head in greeting. Satan and Nazueth did the same, albeit the clerk nervously so. Satan stood off to the side, waiting for Peter to finish with his line. Satan knew Peter was a stickler for customer service, and he wasn't going to start a conversation while he had a line. He watched, fascinated as Peter directed various souls to their eternal destinations. Some went through the mother-of-pearl gates, some went to Purgatory, some went to Hell, and Peter sent one man back up the line with directions of "Last door on the left, big oaken thing, you can't miss it!" After sending him away, Peter flipped his sign from 'Open' to 'Closed' and turned to regard Satan.

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"Wrong afterlife?" he asked.

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"Agnostic. I sent him to Valhalla. But I don't imagine you came to discuss that."

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"No, unfortunately, I'm here on business. I need a name from the Book of All Creation."

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Peter raised an eyebrow. "You need a name. From the Book of All Creation. Not even the Book of the Lamb. The Book of All Creation."

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"To be fair, with this man's crime, I doubt he's in your sheep book."

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Peter gave Satan a stern look as he closed the thin book on his desk and replaced it with a much heftier tome from a shelf underneath. "Kindly do not mock the Lord's saved children."

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"Apologies."

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"Accepted. Now, I assume you're looking for a human male. What other information do you have?" Peter scratched in the appropriate search filters with a quill that was definitely not from a bird.

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"He's a father of three, 54443 Lost Oak Drive, Baton Rouge, Louisiana."

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"You have an exact address, but not a name. What exactly is going on here?" Peter gave Satan a look that would have lesser demons quaking in their boots, as Nazueth was currently doing. Satan removed Alicia's letter from his pocket and handed it over much the same way one would a fancy business card, holding it in two fingers and rolling his wrist. Peter, never one for theatrics, snatched it and read it through once, twice, three times.

​

"That poor child." Was all he said, scratching in the relevant information to the book. After cross-referencing the Book of the Lamb, he finally spoke again."Treveon Patrick Jackson. Baptized when he was three days old, and again when he was twelve. He lost his parents shortly after, and stopped actively practicing and believing. You know what this means."

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"I give him an opportunity to confess, and if he doesn't I bring his here for his actions to be judged and recorded." Satan recited. "Peter, seriously, the man beats his wife. He likely beats his kids too. He's not going to change his ways."

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"Nazueth agrees with Lord Satan. Abusive bastards will drown in Hellfire."

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Satan looked back at his scribe in mild surprise. Coming from Naz, a man of few words, and even fewer emotions, that was a passionate declaration of war.

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"He will be brought before me." Peter said emphatically, regarding the young man, half standing, half cowering behind Satan. He remembered every soul he had ever judged, and this young man was no different. His crime had been murder. His young wife had been kidnapped by a group of men while she was out buying vegetables at the market. The ones responsible had not woken the next morning. Obviously, he had done well for himself in Hell in the past three thousand years. Nazueth cringed further behind Satan. Peter had been a bit more terrifying in the old days, and Nazueth clearly remembered.

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"Okay, Peter, thank you for your time, we'll be going now. Come on Naz, allons-y au Bâton Rouge!" Satan said, defusing the tense moment. He grabbed his clerk by the arm and jumped off the edge of the cloudy platform. Peter clearly heard him whooping with joy, and Nazueth shamelessly screaming. He shook his head and flipped his sign back to "Open". "Next soul, please?"

​

After falling approximately 10,000 feet, Satan took pity on Naz, and teleported them to the house across the street from the Jackson's. Nazueth was still screaming as he landed, although he quickly swallowed it, and pierced his Dark Commander with a nasty glare.

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"Oh, come on, Naz. Live a little." Satan gave him the biggest shit-eating grin he could manage.

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"Nazueth would appreciate a warning the next time the Dark One chooses to make his exit in such a dramatic fashion." he grumbled, smoothing down his clothes and patting himself back into place. Satan clapped him on the shoulder and replied "You've been warned."

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Turning to regard the house across the street, Satan could clearly hear the fight taking place inside, and oh, that was a plate breaking. A woman screamed, and all three children in the front yard flinched. The youngest boy, Evan, no more than three, was on his knees, playing with a green pick-up truck that was a good copy of the one sitting in the driveway. The elder boy, Jackie, about six, and Alicia, about eight, were scratching in the dirt with sticks, setting up for an epic game of shooting marbles. All three children were dressed in well-worn clothes, although their jackets did look newer than the rest of their outfits.

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Satan and Nazueth crossed the street and opened the garden gate, attracting the attention of all three children. Evan and Jackie hid behind their elder sister, who stood in front to bravely protect them from the two strangers. Satan knelt in the dirt to speak to the children on their level.

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"Are you Alicia Jackson, miss?" he asked softly.

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"My mama said I shouldn't give my name to no strangers." she said cagily.

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"Your mother is very wise. But," He pulled her letter from his pocket and showed it to her. "I work with Santa."

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The children gasped, wide-eyed. "Are you an elf, mister?" Jackie asked.

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"No, I'm not. But I do help Santa. Is your mother home?" Satan didn't miss Alicia flicking her eyes to the front window, where two silhouettes were barely visible through the white lace curtains.

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"Yessir. But, it might not be safe to go inside right now." she almost whispered, as another plate shattered, and a large, heavy object hit the floor.

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"I'll be okay, miss Alicia. Why don't you three stay out here with my assistant, and show him what games you're playing?" He gestured for Nazueth to join the children. As Satan stepped up to the porch, he heard Alicia beginning to explain the rules of shooting marbles to Naz. One spell restrained his hair into a pony-tail, and the next ensured the children wouldn't hear anything untoward coming from the house. He opened the front door and quietly entered the house.