With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

Day 5
16th March 2013
08:03 GMT

Oh.

I mean, I know he's invulnerable, but…

I'm looking at a demon who is halfway between a chaos warrior in full armour, a yautja and a velociraptor-. The proper reptile version, not the crap feathered version. And even though I know that him being submerged in a bath of high-quality demonic poison would diminish Stercorax somewhat, the lack of animation and the proof of his defeat…

But he's smaller than me.

"The brother of my father. Stercorax. Do you know how I defeated-?"

"Tricked him into eating poisoned prisoners, then dumped him here. Pretty clever, given how young you were." I glance at her, working through the timelines. "Still are, actually."

I take my daiklave out of subspace and-.

"That won't be sufficient."

I nod. "You're probably right. I guess it's a man-thing, you know? 'He can't be more invulnerable than I am powerful'." I smile with mock-sheepishness, and shrug. "Serious attempt comes next. Oh, could you please formally authorise me to kill him? As.. head of the house and whatnot."

She raises her right hand, making the horns. "For your attempt to overthrow me the very moment you heard of my father's death, I condemn you to death."

"Thank you." I step up to the poison bath, take the daiklave in a two-handed grip with the tip touching the middle of his chest.

Deep breath. Enact the Magistrate's Sentence.

And shove down! Kill!

And duck as the tip of the daiklave snaps and flies across the room.

I hold up the rest of the blade for a moment, and sigh. I mean, at least I know that I'm stronger than the materials I used to make this. And I-.

Huh.

"Hey, look! I actually made a tiny groove."

Rosacarnis frowns and comes closer for a better look. Then she leans in so she can actually see it.

"Oh."

"How does his invulnerability work, anyway? Usually the word gets used to describe people who are merely very tough, but this looks a bit more conceptual."

"I never found out."

"Did you consider hiring someone to investigate? Or however that works here."

"No. That would allow others to discover that he was still alive. It would risk him escaping when they studied him. And if they discovered it, what would stop them using that secret against me?"

"Binding magic? Whatever you've got going on that keeps Druoth in line?"

"Druoth is loyal to my family."

I frown as I amble across the room to where the tip of my sword flew, picking it up when I arrive. "Why?"

I turn around to see her smiling. "A god is asking a demon why they're loyal?"

"Your father bothered raising you, and had some sort of working relationship with his brother. You have an actual house here. But you tortured your father to physical destruction-"

"I-."

"-when he regrew after the angels burned most of him to ash. Perhaps in revenge for him making you torture and murder your nursemaid, perhaps because you like being in charge. I haven't got a complete handle on how demon aristocracy works yet. I could see various demons clustering around you for protection, offering their service in exchange… Or maybe there's some sort of instinct in play. But a negotiated position is very different from actual loyalty."

She's looking at me with a mixture of concern and respect. Good, yes, I do know about you. And now to cement that idea.

I repair my daiklave and stow it as I amble back towards the recumbent form of Stercorax, keeping my eyes on her as she tries to work out how to respond. And then without moving my head I draw the Sword of the Fallen and shove the points directly into Stercorax's forehead.

It cuts through easily, and I slice it out through the left side of his head before flicking the brain and blood residue off it and returning it to its scabbard.

And now there's fear.

"There, dead. Perhaps you can find some other use for the body, though I suspect that the cut will remain even if it gets occupied by someone else."

"How did you do that?"

"Preparation. I like being able to kill anything. It's a remarkably calming way to exist. I don't have to worry about certain classes of potential enemy." I clap my hands together, and she flinches. Just a little. But I notice, and she knows I noticed. "So, back to work! How do you see your role in Gull?"

"I facilitate certain trades, and my guarantees keep the parties involved from doing anything unwise."

"And your father did the same?"

"Yes. Amongst other things."

"And his spat with Constantine?"

"The First likes to bestow certain tasks on us. He likes to remind us who is in charge. Despite my youth I was called upon to play a small role in removing Remiel and Duma from Pandemonia."

"Ah yes, whatever happened to them?"

She reaches into her dress and pulls out… A very small knife.. ring. Designed to scratch and poison, if I'm any judge. She carefully holds it out to me. I take it and give it a scan-.

Unable to comply. / Ping

Oh? Now that is interesting. I hold it up to take a closer look. Black, matte… Presumably at least somewhat hard if she had it made into a knife.

"What is it made of?"

"Kaahuite. It… Accretes, in the lower levels of Masak Mavdil. It can be used to negate certain angelic powers. Collecting it is a highly regarded profession of the demons who brave the depths."

"Fascinating. And this substance allowed you to nullify their abilities?"

"Not at first. Shield against them, wound them, yes. But angels are not generally known for their cunning."

"You tempted them into going to a place where they'd be surrounded by it. What lure did you use?"

"Masak Mavdil is where we keep captured angels. Naturally, they were concerned for the rehabilitation of their fallen brethren."

"P-heh. Walked into it. Was Neron involved in that in any way?"

"He struck the final blows after they were weakened. He is a temperamental fool, but he has power."

I nod. True enough.

"Alright then. As a stake-holder, how and why would you change Hell?"

 

Day 12
20th March 2013
16:44 GMT

The nightmarish amalgamation of fleshes and spirits before me tries to smile, but it looks like the… Nerves? Animation spells? Of its flesh-mask aren't quite connected up right. Or perhaps it's deliberate. In either case, the face doesn't move correctly for the expression.

"I admit that I'm surprised. So few people take any interest in the workings of the Odium."

In general shape it has definite stiltman vibes, two elbows and two knees allowing disproportionally long limbs to extend towards handholds in different parts of the room, hands and prehensile feet occasionally reaching out to twiddle with the controls on one machine or another.

"I can hardly perform the task which the First has set before me if I ignore Hell's industrial base. I understand that most of your components are alive?"

"I've found that distributing my intelligence reduces response times and allows severed parts to act independently."

"Ah, no. I mean the components you use in your work, not your personal components."

"Oh, it's been some time since I had to explains things to a rank outsider!" The demon before me sounds rather happy about having the opportunity. "In essence, Hell is a more arcane realm than Earth, but still has a strong element of physicality. Outside of Masak Mavdil, we are actually a somewhat material plane."

"Oh?"

"Oh, yes. If we were purely arcane, things would be very different. You should visit the Dream if you want to see what that is like. And while Masak Mavdil follows different rules, it also serves as our anchor point, tethering us and allowing us to accrete a concrete nature."

"And… Why has no one mentioned this to me before now?"

"We're demons."

I make an amused hiss. "Fair point."

"But it's so hard to make progress when people don’t share information."

"Oh, I agree. But to return to the topic of raw materials?"

"As I said, we're a realm of both physicality and magic. As such, our materials must be composed of both."

"Do you have trouble sourcing what you need?"

"No, nooo. It's a fun day out for all the apprentices!"

"And what does it involve?"

"They get to take the rending engines for a test drive."

"Where?"

"Anywhere! We need things that are magical and physical, and the best source of things like that is anywhere those things are already one!"

"The souls of the damned."

"No! Those are purely arcane. They can be used, certainly, but they need to be broken down and bound to tangible materials first."

"Then..?"

"Demons! The slow and the unlucky. Our rendering engines chase them down and split their tissues up! Demon essence and demon flesh, just what we need!"

S-? Seriously?

"I don't imagine that makes you particularly popular."

The demon shrugs with two shoulders and a hip, bending in ways that make my own joints ache.

"We're demons. And we make useful things!"

So… Random murder… Or mutilation, if they retain any sort of consciousness in their new form. I should ask.

"Do the resulting artefacts remain aware?"

"That depends on what exactly is used. The spiritual power of a demon is essentially malleable. Consciousness is an emergent phenomenon. If I took your brain and cut it in half, and attached the half to the half-brain of someone else, would it be you? Would it be them? Would it be a new and fascinating person?"

"Probably that last one."

"But you're a god. You function as a being of spirit even more than we demons do. And your spirit is as much in your arm as your brain."

"That sounds like a fascinating area of study. But can you make… Mundane things as well?"

The demon's limbs still. "Like what?"

"To pick an example at random… A car."

"A car."

"Yes. They're a-."

A.. part of the demon's body which I had taken as being a hump… Opens up, revealing a series of inhuman brains linked together with.. organic tubes. One elongated arm reaches around and twists the assemblage, and-. Oh, I see. It can only read from one brain module at a time.

"Human machine for travelling. I could build one, but the wheel is not an organic shape." The demon flicks its hump closed. "It would be easier to build a novel beast. That's the sort of order I get most frequently."

"Is most of your work in the form of bespoke commissions?"

"As opposed to what?"

There was a definite edge to that 'what'. So this is a master craftsman who finds the idea of mass production insulting and degrading.

"'You' in the sense of the renderers as a whole. The sort of repetitive task you assign as a training exercise to apprentices while you personally focus on things requiring a greater level of skill."

"Ahhh…" The humps pops open again and is twisted two places around. "Medical and augmentative work forms the bulk of what we do. We use parts of demons to add to demons with currency to trade. Next comes the weaving of human spiritual energy with mundane matter; very time consuming and usually produces sub-par results. Then we're on to equipment."

"Do you produce cybernetics?"

"Not in the technical sense, though we do make mechanical golem limbs."

"Can human souls use your services?"

"I don't see how they could before becoming demons themselves. Living humans have been known to make contact, but the requirements are different."

"Do you trade for raw materials with them?"

"It depends on the difficulty of the job, but yes, it has been known."

"Okay. Would you mind showing me your ledgers?"

"That can be arranged."

 

Day 15
23rd March 2013
07:13 GMT

Alright, halfway point. The first time I've visited the office in Praetori which the First assigned to me. The demons here aren't exactly physically imposing, but they all look like they've modified themselves… Or been modified, to be better at searching through paperwork, carrying ledgers or writing with their own fingers using built-in reserves of your choice of ink or blood. None of them are a physical threat and the impression my god-senses are giving is that they're either devoted to their jobs or can't remember not to not be.

So what have I learned?

Demons have ork-levels of empathy. Neron's tantrums and the renderers' drive-by harvesting missions are… They're treated like course-hazards, not as decisions made by individuals who could be overcome by numbers and slain. Technically, law enforcement in Hell is headed jointly by Agony and Ecstasy, but the only thing they appear to have an interest in is the rule about them owning you if you lose to the same enemy three times in a row. They very obviously don't care about actual order, or the laws that would normally be established to maintain it.

Their staff are similar. They do occasionally receive direct instructions from their bosses, but for the most part are effectively left to enforce various pacts to the best of their ability/as far as their strength allows/when they can be bothered. Agony and Ecstasy do occasionally enforce discipline, but it's fairly haphazard and…

Again, it's a course hazard. Except the ones who actually derive satisfaction from being tormented by their bosses.

And then there's Satanus. The Chief Renderer made it pretty clear that he was lying to me about his raw materials. Combined with the comment that really old souls are unusual in Purgatory it seems likely that he's got a soul smelter set up somewhere. Probably on Earth. My best guess is that he focuses on the older ones because they're most likely to know nothing about modernity, and to have learned to accept the empty mists that the realm had before he took over. They can't help him as much and wouldn't want to anyway. Which means that the bricks, the soil… The souls of the mildly damned are mixed up in all of it.

Lovely.

Neron is creating improved warriors. He does actually treat his best soldiers with a degree of consideration. Based on Rosacarnis's reports, it looks like he was probably more annoyed that the new strength-focused giants couldn't casually rip me apart rather than their failure as individuals. The shining light I saw may well have been him attempting to tune up the spells, or him giving up and removing them. I might be able to get some of them to talk about it by claiming to have permission to talk to them and speaking with approval of the modification scheme, but it's the first sign I've seen that Neron is doing something useful with his position.

So, I suppose one of my first recommendations would be for the First to review all modifications and identify the most useful. Some sort of reward for whoever came up with it, and maybe a subsidy for demons considering getting it. But… Neron seems to prize destructive ability above everything else, and that's only really good for fighting other demons. Which probably isn't something that the First would want to encourage.

On a related note, I've also learned that the First has a marionette harem. Which… Isn't something that I particularly wanted to know, but it does suggest that he is perfectly happy to eliminate free will amongst the demonic population, at least at strategically useful points.

I think… Huh. Demons-. New demons come from three places. Firstly, existing demons use a part of their own innate energies to create them. This can look like normal sexual reproduction, or take the form of a parasitic implant inserted into the weaker party, or… One of a hundred different things. Secondly, a human soul can ascend to demonhood by absorbing Hell's magic until all of the virtuous traits have been boiled away. Most souls fall apart well before that happens, but even Nergal was a mortal man once upon a time. Thirdly, a naturally occurring locus of Hell's magics can give rise to a new demon. That's where Slime Demons come from, in their case not taking much power to come into being. Others… Well, it's not entirely clear that the abominations who exist within Masak Mavdil are demons, but that's how they arise and they're a good deal more…

Powerful.

Huh.

The thought occurs that while the Second and Third of the Fallen were demons, the First… He's more like an angel. Meaning that there's a good chance that he's vulnerable to kaahuite. Must remember to tell Constantine about that.

"Think of the devil..."

I look up as… That's not.. John-. Ah. No. It is, his other half.

"Do you prefer 'The Demon', 'John', or will 'Constantine' do?"

He drags a chair over from one of the other desks and takes up station across from me.

"Please, be seated."

"Got a fag?"

"You can't get one of the most popular narcotics in the world in Hell? I hadn't realised that the place had a 'no smoking' policy."

"They always put weird shit in it."

I shrug. I can imagine. I hold out my right hand-.

"Shouldn't you be more careful, asking people for things in Hell?"

"You're not a demon."

Silk cuts it is, then.

I pass the packet over, and he raises it to his nose and sniffs it. Then he smiles the smile of a forty-a-day man forced to go cold turkey before sliding a thumb nail through the plastic wrapping and popping open the packet.

"But you are a gent. You know who I am?"

"Roughly. A golem made using parts of John Constantine's memories and character, supposed to take his place in a ritual sacrifice."

"Did take his bleeding place in a ritual sacrifice. Saved the soul of every child in Hell an' still ended up down here."

"There's no justice."

"Gets better. Originally, I had a damned soul bound to me who was supposed to absorb all of the suffering, so I could just wander around. Wouldn't have been so bad, except some bastard up on Earth summoned it a few years later."

His eyes shimmer with dull red light as he pulls out a cigarette.

"So I went from looking just like him to this."

"You still look…" Alright, his jaw line's a little stronger, his hair's sticking out a bit and then there's the eye thing, but otherwise… "Pretty much like him."

"A demon, is what I mean."

"On the plus side, you can't get lung cancer again."

"Yeah, you better bloody believe he let me keep that memory."

"And since you managed to become a demon, just being here doesn't make you suffer any more, so why are you talking to me?"

"You've got a problem. You need to fix this place up a little, but making Hell work better is going to be worse for Earth, and everyone's running their own little games and generally taking the piss."

"So I should let you run your own little game and generally take the piss."

"Alright: do you think you're more cunning than John Constantine?"

"No."

"So why not tell me what you've put together so far and then we can put our heads together?"

"Because you're John Constantine with added demon. Neither thing exactly recommends you, and the two together don’t cancel each other out."

"No?"

"I think I'll give myself a chance at solving it first."

"Alright." The end of his cigarette catches fire and he waves it, the smoke tracing out a runic shape. "Give me a bell when you admit defeat."