A devil of high
Hellish rank harasses my
family. Pestering falls flat, so she
escalates from threats & bribery
to sabotage--improper though
it is for all angels, fallen or no:
God's law permits seductive speech,
but thuggery's a breach.
Queen Bee-El
kidnaps my grandniece next! I go
gunning for Bee. Archway, carved: Wel-
come to Bureaucratic Hell.
Caverns. Desks. Smoke-shadows, though
mere outer shell, not the searing fire below
the below, at core.
She's broken quite
the deepest devil-rule (for
Lindberghing vies with murder atop Hell's
felony list, like ours) so I've no
squeamishness with desk-devils--
bluntly level--"I'm here
To kill her." Make it scorchingly clear
to the clerks I face at first--timid, mere
low-level devils:
Mortal damned who joined the firm, they sin-
cerely feel they help reform the evil.
Abrasive, I erode them--bevel devils! They
cave and tell. I track her down. And slay.
Defy Deep Hell to punish me. I-
ronic. Her high
Luciferian charge had zero to do
with luring humanity astray; her job was to
tempt souls in Hell to improve themselves
and leave. Leaven till Heaven. But she
obsessed on hassling folks like me.
So I take up her task--someone has
to do it! Why not me? I rehire
her secretary--a sweetie who she fired
for competence; Bee looked bad. Next I
interview workerbees. Shake on their knees.
All agree: my repressive fore-
devil forbade them ever to tell
the waffling billions gridlocked in Hell
how to shape up and go. And yet their role's
to change not mortals but stuck souls.
I let them follow that urge--ignore life to resume
tutoring the damned! A goal I can endorse
sans remorse. Devil-smiles, staff room--
fanglight slowly banishes gloom.
Stars here in abyss.
Devil: a helping profession. I never knew. Did you?
Every devil knows my sin; surely a Prince will come
to avenge her death. But even archdevils feel a glee
that her reign (all those memos of flame) are done.
As a viceroy I'm a nice boy. So they leave me free
to raise... well...fun.
