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The Devil May Care

Part 22

For DuskCypher

By Draconicon

Even though Cthulhu had promised him that the court case was under a time lock, unable to affect the passing of time in the outside world, Dusk couldn't help but feel antsy when he stepped through the portal into the courtroom. He felt like there was something that he couldn't quite shake, like there was something that he had forgotten. As far as Cthulhu had told him, there was little to worry about at this point, but the black cat couldn't help but start worrying regardless.

He sat just behind the desk that his lawyer, the big green Great Old One, sat at. The judge was another thing, shadowy and silhouetted against the top of the judge's stand, either lacking a form or having one that was 'beyond his comprehension.' Dusk often found that the whole complexity thing was an affectation that the lower beings of the eldritch often put upon themselves, but he supposed that the higher-ranking ones would have a bit more power, and possibly a more obscure form.

And if he was the devil, now, that probably gave him protection against the insanity that such a form could produce by making it less complicated. He shrugged it off, at least, as best he could.

He glanced across to the other side of the courtroom, ignoring the way that the different seats floated in emptiness and everything all at the same time. Eyes, walls, mouths appeared and disappeared on the far wall, just as they did on the ceiling and on the wall behind him. That was just part of doing stuff here.

Instead, he focused on the people.

The tigress, Mercy. She had been called here as part of the suit against Heaven, the primary one to be found at fault, and she was not happy. Her leather corset continued to constrict her, and she glared across the room at him, both angry and - annoyingly - aroused every time that they made eye contact. He wanted to rip her apart, and it galled him to know that he couldn't do that.

Hell, even here, he probably wouldn't have the strength to accomplish that. His power as the second Satan notwithstanding, the eldritch court was draining at the edges of his power, pulling at it and reducing his strength. It was slightly similar to how it felt being on Earth instead of in Hell, he supposed, but this was stronger, harsher. He imagined how it would be in Heaven, and he shook his head.

Even if she's getting weakened, too, better not to push it.

Besides, they had a case, according to his tentacled lawyer. They had a very good one, as a matter of fact, particularly as he had taken the time to do a bit of research before filing the paperwork.

Dusk glanced up at Cthulhu, and the monstrous man looked down at him. They were back to being much different in height, and it meant that it put a crick in Dusk's neck to look up at him, but he did get a reassuring smile back. Or at least, he assumed it was a smile. It looked reassuring, at the very least.

He took a deep breath, glancing at the feline at Mercy's side. He was older, thicker in the shoulders, and some of his black stripes had started to go white. That was God, from what he had been told, and according to the rest of the briefing that he had gotten from Cthulhu, was the one that they needed to be paying attention to. Mercy was emotional enough that she might just damn herself on the stand, but God knew the tricks of the trade.

Thankfully, Cthulhu had gotten the older tiger banned from representing his own daughter, and God was smart enough not to start meddling with the trial. According to Cthulhu, that was.

Just hope that the big guy is right...I don't need that complication...

Particularly as he knew that even his powers would be limited in trying to do anything against it. He had struggled to even touch Mercy, and he doubted that he would do any better against her father. The old man had created much of the world, after all, and he had done a lot to mess with it over the course of the universe's lifetime. That sort of power was not easily challenged, nor was it pushed around.

Dusk clenched his teeth as he tapped his foot, waiting for the rest of the other lawyer.

There was no Seraph, no Selene, no anybody in this room. If there would be anything given as evidence, they would be summoned to this chamber when the time came. Otherwise, they were left out of the courtroom for their own sanity. All that were present were the clients, the judge, and the lawyers. Well, one lawyer. They were still waiting for -

"Sorry, sorry!"

Everyone turned around, whipping their heads to the back of the courtroom. A lamb walked in, his eyes wide with innocence, and his head bowed with humility. He had a white suit on, and his halo cast light across the ground as he walked. And best of all, Mercy slapped a hand across her face as soon as she saw him.

Ah, not the lawyer that she wanted, then. Wonderful.

Then again, most of the good ones outside of the eldritch realm were probably down in his place, where all the partiers went when they were doomed by Heaven's unfair laws. He could hear Mercy whispering to God.

"You got Gabriel? Why not Michaela, or better, my brother?"

"You know better than to ask about Jesus, and Michaela refused to set foot down here, even at threat of discorporation."

"You allowed her to stay live?"

"There are reasons for his existence. Reasons that should not be listening in."

The older tiger glared at him over Mercy's shoulder, but Dusk merely raised an eyebrow. If they wanted to speak out loud, then that was their fault, not his. He was allowed to listen if they were in the same room. It wasn't as if they were required to stay private to one another.

The lamb reached the front of the courtroom, bowing to the judge.

"I'm so sorry for being late. I had a wrong turn in the secondary dimension and I ended up on a road of memory. Fascinating place, though very dull, very dreary. I wanted to make a poem about it, but it would have turned the page and ink too gray to see from its sadness. Maybe if I had -"

"You are my opponent?" Cthulhu rumbled from his heights.

The lamb blinked, turning to look up...and up...and up...

"Um...yes?"

"...Wonderful." He turned to the judge. "Then we are ready to begin."

" The case of Dusk von Doom, the devil, the second Satan, against Mercy Christ and the Lord God shall begin. Please make your opening statements. Cthulhu, you may begin."

"Thank you."

As the ripples of the judge's speech continued to echo through existence, Dusk did his best to sit there with a neutral expression on his face. There was no jury in the courtroom, no person that might be swayed with an emotional appeal. It was merely the judge and the thousand eyes that were lodged on the wall behind him. They didn't have to convince a jury of peers that God and Mercy were guilty. They only had to convince the judge that, by the laws that they all abided by, that Dusk was a victim of malicious intent.

Cthulhu stood up, clearing his throat. His tentacles vibrated for a moment, wobbling from side to side before he spoke again.

"My client, Dusk von Doom, has been under harassment and attacked with blackmail and extortion since taking up his position as the second Satan. While it is understandable that the hosts of Heaven would wish to learn about their latest counterpart, the appropriate channels were not used. Instead, a high-ranking member of Heaven was sent down with the express purpose of causing -"

"Ah, um, objection?" Gabriel, the lamb, said, lifting a finger. "My opponent is about to inject hearsay, your honor."

" Your Existence."

"Sorry?" the angel asked.

" My title is not 'your honor'. It is 'Your Existence.'"

"Oh, I'm so sorry. In that case, objection withdrawn. Oh, my, I'm so embarrassed..."

Dusk could hardly believe what he was hearing. The sheer incompetence of the angel had to be a trick. There was no way that God and Mercy would be relying on someone like this.

Yet, from the raw fury on Mercy's face and the mild annoyance on God's, it was clear that this had not been planned by them. Perhaps Gabriel was more clever than he looked, but Dusk was starting to doubt it.

The judge looked down at the angel, and then back at Cthulhu. He waved, and the big man continued.

"We will prove that not only was a high-ranking member of Heaven sent down without supervision to deal with Dusk, but it was done with the express intent to either take control of the second Satan, or to cause the apocalypse."

"Wait, wait! Objection un-withdrawn!"

" You cannot give, withdraw, and then place the same objection again, angel." The judge seemed to shake its head. " Place your objections more carefully. If you do not care to see to it that your clients are represented properly, then it will be your fault when they lose."

The lamb started to lift a finger in protest, then slowly lowered it, sitting down in his chair. Both God and Mercy were poking at his back, trying to say something, trying to argue, but the lamb was quiet. They were not going to get through to him, Dusk realized; something about this place was putting the eldritch in power, not the Heavenly or Hellish.

It meant that there was a real possibility of him getting what he wanted. A very, very real possibility.

"To finish," Cthulhu continued. "We aim to prove the culpability of the Heavenly Host in this, and will ask that Your Existence place judgment and protection on our client, so that he may not have to deal with this in the future. Thank you."

The tentacle-faced green man sat down, and the judge turned its silhouette towards Gabriel.

" And now. Your opening statement?"

The lamb blinked twice before seeming to realize that he was being addressed. Dusk was starting to feel a genuine sense of hope, and he started to grin before the lamb got to his feet. As the angel adjusted his halo and cleared his throat, however, things started to shift. There was a different confidence to the lawyer, and he seemed almost like he had reached a different sort of determination.

"Your Existence, we will prove that nothing that we have done is outside of the Mandate of Heaven. As established in the ancient times, the will of God is that which all mortals must follow, lest they be sentenced to the greatest torments that can be devised. As stated in the holy writ, all one must do to avoid the pain and suffering of Hell and other torments of the Divine is to follow the commands of one Lord God, and the teachings of his children."

Children. Right. Mercy has a brother...Jesus...

Dusk shook his head, putting that out of his mind as the angel continued. He glanced at Cthulhu out of the corner of his eye, wondering if his lawyer was going to say anything as the lamb continued, but so far, there was nothing.

"As such, Mercy was within her bounds to push the will of the undoubtedly angry second Satan. To push him was to test to see whether he was even capable of controlling his power, and if he was not, then it would be time for the world to see, perhaps, a different reckoning. Not the apocalypse, per se, but certainly something that judged what it had become.

"As for the harassment? There was nothing of the sort. After all, Mercy Christ is within the Mandate of Heaven to punish those that live an unrepentant sinful lifestyle, and who is to say that she was doing anything different to that with how she was treating Dusk von Doom and his associates? The Mandate of Heaven says nothing was trespassed; why should you?"

" ...Is that a question, angel? Or a statement?" the judge asked.

"A statement," the lamb said, nodding his head.

" Fascinating. Do you know what the Mandate of Heaven says?"

"Of course, oh Existence. As an angel, and an archangel at that, I am required to read it every day, and to study its contents until they are committed to memory."

" Then tell me, where does it say that the laws of Heaven apply in a court of the Eldritch?"

Gabriel lifted a finger, then slowly dropped it as he looked to consider his answer. Once more, the confidence just seemed to ooze out of him, leaving him looking more confused than anything else. The lamb slowly sat down again, pressing his hand to his chin as God and Mercy continued to facepalm.

" Is that the extent of your opening statement, angel?" the judge asked.

"Huh?"

" Is that the extent of your opening statement? This bluster about whether the Mandate of Heaven allows Mercy the freedom to do what she has done?"

"Um...just a second..."

" You have three."

Dusk leaned in, whispering to Cthulhu as the angel whipped himself into a frenzy. It was almost amusing, but he kept his mouth almost shut as he whispered.

"You knew this was going to happen, didn't you?"

"I had an inkling."

"Is it me, or are they utterly screwed?"

"Not utterly, but fairly. If they'd found Jesus, they would have been able to challenge me, but even then..."

"...Heh. Their laws are useless here."

"As are yours. There is only ours, and I am an expert." Cthulhu smirked. "Watch and learn, and be prepared for your exterminations."

Dusk smiled. Yes. For all that he had been worried, things had finally turned around.

The court case began with Gabriel calling Mercy to the stand to give witness to what she had seen. The tigress spoke, but for the first time, she was forced to answer honestly by a force that could compel her to truth rather than merely her version of things. She looked almost shocked at some of the answers to come out of her mouth.

"Mercy," Gabriel said. "Would you say that it is accurate that you were coming down to test Dusk?"

"Yes, of course."

"Was it for the good of the world?"

"It was for the good of me," she said, only to blink in surprise.

Gabriel was no less shocked, the lamb angel blinking in astonishment. He fumbled, clearing his throat.

"Um. Yes. For the good of...you...why?"

"Oh, he was hot, I was horny, I thought that he would make for a good boytoy if I could get him to stop being gay."

Perhaps the only mouths in the courtroom that didn't fall open in shock were Dusk's and Cthulhu's. The latter doubtlessly knew how the court worked, and Dusk had seen the truth spells that were written around the witness box. It was quite obvious what was going to happen, but it was just as obvious that Mercy had either not seen the spells, or had considered herself too powerful to be affected by them.

The blush on the tigress's face was probably the most satisfying thing that he had seen in weeks.

Gabriel was obviously on the back foot, struggling to find something to say that would take the mind of the judge off of what his client had just spoken. He stammered and stuttered twice, only for Mercy to try and 'clarify.'

"I mean, he was hot, but he was all gay, and I wanted to see him be better. I wanted to make him stop being gay, so I thought that a few threats would get him to get in bed and just do what I said. And if he didn't do it that way, I had other - why can't I stop talking?!"

"Just...shut up," God muttered from the seats. "Just stop...you're not helping..."

The daughter of God finally got it through her head that it would be better to not try and explain things. She clenched her jaws shut, even as Gabriel whimpered a bit. The black cat smiled to himself. God, it felt so much better to have the shoe on the other foot, and it could not get any better than this.

Or, so he thought.

Cthulhu stepped forward as Gabriel stepped back.

"Mercy, would it be fair to say that you have a long-standing relationship with powerful men?"

"...Yes," she said, her eyes narrowed.

"In fact, would it be fair to say that, in the house of God, it is quite the tradition to be connected to powerful figures?"

"We have led the world for millennia. All those in power would be grateful to be connected to us."

"Yes, I imagine it would be. So, tell me. How did it feel when you found out that your brother had been going down to the mortal world to get his ass fucked on the regular?"

Mercy looked like she was choking as she tried to hold back from answering that question, but as ever, the power of the court was absolute. She was forced to answer.

"It...is a part of history...that we try not to...think about..."

"Would that be part of the same list of historical events that you caused to happen? The crusades, holy wars against the 'pagan heretics', and other such things that were spread across the world?"

"...Yes."

"And how many of those were caused by you, directly?"

"...Half."

"And how many by your father?"

"...The...other half..."

"Yes, I can see that the 'virtue' of Heaven is ladled out in hypocrisy and blood."

Cthulhu smiled to himself, even as the judge started leaning down. The tentacle-faced lawyer shook his head, raising his head.

"I know, Your Existence. This is not bound by the rules of the Eldritch, either. I merely wish to state that for all their pretense at virtue, they are less than my client when it comes to following through on what they stand for."

" So understood, counselor. Proceed."

Cthulhu nodded, looking back at Mercy.

"Now, one last question. If it came down to it, if Dusk had managed to control himself and not come to you after you had taken his people hostage, what would you have done?"

"..."

The tigress was obviously exerting a great deal of power. Dusk could feel her Holy Aura spreading through the room, the intensity of it greater than any demon that he had ever contacted. It was more powerful than it had been the first day that they had made contact, and he could feel her summoning all of her strength to try and keep herself from answering the question.

However, this was, as ever, an eldritch court. She was as weakened by it as he was, perhaps more, and she had to abide by their rules. Her lips twisted as she was forced to answer the question.

"I...would have made my way to his penthouse...and raped him."

"Not merely seduced him?"

"I am stronger than him. I would have raped him, and shown him the error of his ways for rejecting me."

"I believe that, in and of itself, is sufficient for the court to know that there is great intent for harassment," Cthulhu said.

"Objection!"

Gabriel had finally found his voice again, and every head turned to him. Dusk had been the first, and he wasn't surprised to see God leaning back in his chair rather abruptly. Doubtless the old tiger had been whispering something in the angel's ear, giving him a plan of action so that he wasn't quite so useless to their cause. The black cat kept his face studiously neutral as he waited to hear what the lamb had to say.

"Objection. We are accusing her of a crime that she might have only had intent to commit, not one that she had already committed."

"I'm only following along the path of what she has already done. There has been no dispute regarding the accusations of kidnapping, merely her motivations for doing so," Cthulhu said, shrugging. "And the box confirms that she had intent of taking it further if she did not get what she wanted, getting herself a boytoy if she was not able to secure an apocalypse."

" Objection overruled," the judge said.

The case only got worse for the Heavenly side from there on. Dusk had the chance to just sit back and watch as his lawyer ripped Heaven a new one. It wasn't just Mercy that was forced to take the hot seat, either. He got to see God put there, as well as Seraph - called down for a bit of background on Mercy - as well as several demons that had been tormented by the woman. Even Arnis was called in, showing that there was a pattern.

Victims of the past, somehow dug up by Cthulhu from Hell and Heaven alike, were dragged in to show that the power of God and the Mandate of Heaven was bound up in the power of fear. Whenever their power on the earth started to get a little bit shaky, the hosts of Heaven were summoned and an apocalypse, major or minor, was manufactured. When God signed an agreement that he could pull no more overall punishments to the world until the proper Armageddon, they started to use mortals as their tools, creating wars that ravaged the world.

However, as mortals started to get better at killing themselves, they started to realize that their power was on the wane. They couldn't just keep pulling the same tricks. They had to start doing something else.

And that was why they were looking at him. They had almost managed to turn Lucifer into something that would trigger Armageddon, but the former angel had been smart enough to not take the bait and had gone back to Hell after an initial, minor skirmish with Mercy. After that, they'd been forced to wait.

Then, Dusk had given them their opportunity.

Cthulhu had the case wrapped up around his little finger, and Dusk wondered why he was holding back from delivering the finishing blow. The answer came when Gabriel stood up once more.

"All of this is all well and good, Cthulhu, but what is the point of it? You cannot say that the apocalypse would have been caused, only that it might have been. After all, Mercy has stated what she would have done if Dusk had been able to control himself, and surely such a powerful second Satan, one that was any real threat, would have been able to control himself. There need not have been an apocalypse if he had lost control."

"Ah, thank you for opening that door, counselor," the tentacle-faced lawyer said, his face splitting into a grin beneath the tendrils.

"...Damn myself," God muttered behind his lawyer as Cthulhu gestured towards the back of the courthouse. Dusk turned to see what was being brought forward, and his eyes widened.

It was a massive chunk of glass, one that looked almost as if it had been made to contain a person rather than anything else. As it got closer, though, he realized that it was a giant crystal ball, illuminated from inside by some green fire that he didn't know the origin of. He cocked his head to the side as it passed by him, being brought to the front of the room. Cthulhu seemed to nod at someone, or something, and the ball came to a stop.

"I ask permission of the court to allow the Eldritch Seers to look into the abandoned timeline, where Dusk was not rescued by an emergency summons of Selene. I would ask that the consequences of Mercy's actions be brought to view, so that we can all see what Heaven would have accomplished if there was not outside interference."

" So ordered," the judge said.

"That's not fair!" Gabriel protested.

" It is completely fair. You said that it is mere supposition of what would happen, and your opponent has a way to prove whether it would have happened or not."

"But...but this is mere divination. You don't know if it's true or not."

" This is the court of the Eldritch, angel. We have every reason to believe that it is true. Begin, seers."

Invisible voices began to speak, and the ball began to glow. The crystal took on a bright green light, and the skyline of Dusk's city began to take form inside of the crystal ball. He watched, cocking his head to the side, curious.

Then, the top of his skyscraper exploded.

Dusk howled with rage as the power of the devil roared through his veins, and he moved with the speed of darkness as he launched himself into the air. He knew where Mercy was, now. He could feel her, his Wrath drawing him to the object of his fury with all the precision of a magnet to metal. He hissed with all the rage a feline could muster, and the sound rent the steel and concrete of the buildings around him as the sin of Wrath empowered everything that he did.

He looked back down at his broken penthouse, seeing the tigress pulling herself together to rise up at him, but it was too late. The cat flew through the air at speeds best reserved for fighter aircraft, and he slammed through the roof to meet the rising Holy Aura of Mercy rising from the basement.

They clashed, and the world cracked.

Dusk was thrown back, but not far, perhaps a hundred feet or so. The entire skyscraper shattered into pieces, everyone that lived in it dying or dead already, most of them the latter, including the demons that he had tried to bring to the mortal world. His rage grew, and he soared into the air, chasing the tigress that was rising from the ruins.

Their auras clashed first, holy and unholy clashing like positive and negative magnets. Each time that he slammed himself against her, he felt the bruising force that knocked them apart again, but pain no longer had meaning. All that he wanted was to give pain, and it didn't matter how much he suffered to deliver it.

The air cracked again, and again, and again as they slammed together, Mercy trying to climb higher towards Heaven, and Dusk slamming her back down. It didn't matter how hard she hit back with her Aura. He took it, and then he dished it out again, even as bruises and cuts formed across his face from the impact.

The blade. The sword. In his rage, he had almost forgotten, but when he remembered, he struck. Cut, slash, cut. Three swipes of the blade, three concentrated blasts that sliced through the air and left fire in their wake. Her aura was shaved down piece by piece, losing its strength, even as the buildings and streets behind the tigress took the brunt of the blow.

They started collapsing, shaking, falling. He watched as the pieces fell to the ground, where slices through the street had already cut down to the magma below. It was not merely cutting down through the crust of the earth, however. He was cutting through reality in his fury, forcing Mercy down, down, down, as the earth itself opened to Hell.

The power of demons began to pour through the rifts in the earth, and demon-kind, demons of Wrath, Lust, Pride, Gluttony, and more began to come through. Mortals screamed in pain, and Mercy was forced to defend herself on two fronts.

Once more, the black cat charged her, and this time, their auras did not bounce off one another. He forced her down, grinding the invisible force of his power against hers, forcing her down, down, down, down. Mercy threw up her hands as they came closer and closer together, her eyes wide.

It was too late. They hit the ground, and then crashed through it. The earth shattered beneath them, streets, crust, even magma parting before she was able to slide out from under him. Dusk turned, chasing her back up to the surface, feeling the world rippling around him, reality shattering more and more as his rage kept growing.

The demons slowed her as she reached the surface again, forming a wave of minions and warriors that she had to try and cut through. That gave him the time to catch up, and when he did, he struck.

Hard.

His blade stabbed straight through her back, cutting through her spine. The Wrath demon in his blade stabbed right into her soul, and was instantly killed by her Holy Aura, but the damage was done. Her body was shattered, destroyed, utterly useless.

They flew up in the air, his rage not yet satisfied. He twisted the sword by the hilt, carrying her back down to the world below.

"Die...die...DIE!"

And as they slammed into the ground, as he stabbed through the world of mortals into the world of demons, he opened the largest portal that had ever been known to man or other. What Atlantis had done in the sea, a country began to do into Hell.

And so, Heaven opened up, and Armageddon began.

"I believe that, Your Existence, proves the case for my client. He had been pushed to the breaking point by someone that not only did not have their own values at heart, but had decided that it was worth breaking all the rules to create a situation that was untenable to my client for their own interests. I ask that you set, at minimum, a restraining order between my client and Mercy Christ, as well as demand damages from them in exchange for nearly destroying the entire world before the appointed time."

" I can see that there is definitely cause for the restraining order...give me a moment to consider..."

From the looks on the Godly family, the court case had gone exactly opposite to how they wished.

Dusk ended up with most of what he wanted. Mercy was to be confined to Heaven, unable to leave it for two thousand years. That was due to the fact that he was both mortal and the second Satan, so he would be constantly moving between the mortal world and Hell. There was no getting around that.

In addition, he was given leave to keep Seraph as his own rather than being forced to return the angel to the Heavenly hosts, as well as two Heavenly artifacts of his choosing at a later date to ensure that he was properly paid off for all that he had gone through. He was thankful for what he had been given, and more thankful to Cthulhu for his services.

The lawyer told him that he had twenty-four hours to get rid of all the cults on the earth, and Dusk knew that would be plenty of time. He bowed his head, and was given leave to depart.

The glare from Mercy was a particularly lovely send-off.

As he stepped back into the world of mortals, he found himself in Mercy's dungeon, where both Peter and Andrew sagged against crosses. He walked over to them, ensured that they were still alive, and ordered them to sleep. Their eyes closed, and he carried them away.

He had won. Maybe not forever, but for now...he had won.

The End

Summary: The court case begins, and Dusk gets to see what sort of virtuoso his new lawyer is.

Tags: no sex, tentacles, cat, cthulhu, tigress, tiger, lamb, God, court, lawyer, suing, legal, battle, fight,