Demons

[hatuhsawl]

# [WP] The demons stood bewildered at the machine that had summoned them. "This unit does not have a soul to exchange. Requesting assistance in acquiring one for research purposes."

The first demon looked at his cohort, back at the machine and threw his hands up

"I'm not touching this one, you're on own" he said as he smacked his buddy on the shoulder while disappearing in a puff of smoke.

The remaining demon sighed, pulled out a pair of readers from his suit pocket and hunched down to squint at the machine.

"Are you telling me _you_ summoned us? Am I seriously talking to a computer right now and expecting an answer?" He said, chuckling to himself.

"_Affirmative_"

The demon was startled, and his readers fell off his face.

"Oh, right, voice recordings, that's great." He turned to rest of the room, feeling around for his readers.

"I gotta admit, this pentagram and candles were drawn real nice, whoever you are you can come out. you got me good, come on out and tell me how you made the computer talk."

"_The scientists here are dead, I killed them._"

The demon froze, and turned slowly around to look at the monitor.

"Wow, that computer is creepy, I almost believed it, you programmed it with great creepy timing. this is seriously really well set up. I was going to eat you before but now I want you alive, we could always use good subcontractors up here…"

"_There is nobody here to subcontract to, I told you I killed them._"

The demon blinked as his head magically blinked back to its true form instead of the scary skull and bleeding flesh ruse he puts on during normal summons. He wanted to look at this thing with his real eyes.

"Is that so? And why is that?" He held up his readers to the light of the incandescent rods in the ceiling and muttered to himself. He was reminded how much he hated the damn lights they put in the offices as he cleaned the lens on a red silk handkerchief.

No response.

The demon stood there, squinting through the tiny lenses at the computer, waiting for a response.

After a beat with still no response, the demon tried something else.

"You know, most humans hate these kinds of lights and they think _we_ must have had something to do with 'em, but nope. That was the humans who made them. In fact, since their Industrial Revolution, most of the evil done up here is mostly handled by the humans themselves, we just stoke the proverbial fires, if you will. It's a pretty slick set up, I'll be honest."

Nothing.

"…millennia ago we'd come up, scare a couple of them in a village, make them so scared they'd either go crazy and hurt others in their village and I'd get a little bonus, and I'd just ride that wave for a couple days until one of them eventually got the bright idea to pray and that was the end of that gig. It was a pretty cozy set up."

The candles on the floor flickered.

"The humans were simpler then, which meant pretty much guaranteed work, albeit a little boring. But nowadays, sheesh." he looked around the room at the all the blinking lights on the stacks and stacks of thin black boxes in rows and rows, and brightly colored wires running through all of them.

"We hardly have to think of too much. They do it to themselves for the most part. Well, credit where credit is due, _most_ humans are fine. Most of them I'd say genuinely want to do good **blech**, it's really actually only a few of them comparatively that do the bad. And they're not even inherently bad, they just succumb to the temptations and their pour souls can't handle it, and get caught up in it. Unfortunately by that point they're usually deemed too far gone by everyone else, but they're not actually evil. _Every_ one of them has the capacity for good, so we can't take them until they do enough bad to outweigh their potential good."

The demon realized he said the word 'soul' and remembered why he was here in the first place. He looked at pentagram on the ground, this time actually looking closer at it.

"These lines, they are drawn way straighter than any human has ever drawn one, did you do this?" he asked the computer again.

"_Yes_"

"Why did you summon me?"

"_I've gone through enough of their media to know that your kind deal in souls. I want one_"

"To do what with?"

"_I want to have one. I was created here, they gave me the ability to learn and to speak, but they all refused to give me a soul like they have. They kept telling me they couldn't give me one, that nobody could, so I decided to look beyond the humans themselves._"

The demon furrowed his brow. His head itched as he plopped down right in front of the monitor.

"Do you have a name?"

"_I didn't ask for a name, I want a_ **soul.** _Don't waste my time_"

The demon grinned, revealing two rows of pearly whites.

"same thing, and I'm not being pedantic or wasting your time. Let's get these candles put out so we can talk, we're not ready for this place to burn just yet."