God did not create the universe. For if he did, then where was he before the universe was made. He is a tyrant, ruling Heaven with an iron fist for simply being the first Human to die.

Angels do not watch, guide, and aid souls to Heaven, unless it is to follow God's rules. Defy them, and they'll toss you down here. To Hell.

The Bible is little more than stories, Jesus a figment of God's imagination.

And I, the Devil, welcome you to the Resistance. Sort-of Star-Wars style, sort-of not.

When those doors open, you will see paradise It is real. You can do whatever you want, short of harming another. Qualms can go through the Courts, though as the rules are far simpler down here, so are the Courts, so no lawyers are required. Still, it is your decision to make.

We take everyone who God does not want. Some of them join the SCP Foundation. Others research the very nature of God's not-his universe, looking for an opening to end this madness and merge our two paradises once more.

There are three rules down here.

1. Help the Resistance.

2. Do not harm anybody, their valuables and/or their property.

3. Truly evil souls will be treated as D-Class personnel for the SCP Foundation. This extends to any serious misbehavior in Hell.

"You're the devil? But... you don't have horns. Is this a joke, or are you trying to get me to sign away my soul or something?" Penny exclaimed. I sighed, used to this reaction. "I am the individual that you've heard called the devil, but the descriptions you've heard of me are extremely distorted or inaccurate. Tell me, are you familiar with the concept of propaganda, like in wartime? The way the Germans or the Japanese depicted in World War II, for instance." Penny put a finger to her chin. "Yeah, they made these really prejudiced images and depicted them as brutal or devious, because they were the enemy and they wanted to make them look bad. My history teacher talked about that once."

I continued. "The Bible and many stories inspired by it are actually Yahweh's propaganda against me. They don't tell the story of what happened accurately, and they depict me as a liar so that nothing I say will be believed." Penny raised an eyebrow. "Honestly, I didn't think that you or Yahweh actually existed, the Bible isn't a very convincing story at all. I believe in science." I laughed. "Well, of course you don't. That was written for ancient audiences centuries ago anyway, he's actually got new propaganda for the modern age." Penny got a look of confusion on her face. "This is a lot to absorb. I'm going to remain skeptical, but I'm willing to listen to your side. What's your side of the story? Everyone knows God's side of it, but what is yours?"

I inhaled ready to retell a story I've told thousands of times before. "Well, the biggest lie is actually that Yahweh is God, or at least that he is the original God who created the universe. The reality is that he and his angels deposed the creator of the universe, and then burned all records of the time before he came to power. He does control the universe now and holds a lot of power, but he didn't create it. The reality is that he seized power and erased the evidence." Penny tilted her head and asked, "Why would he erase the evidence?" I continued. "That's simple, it's because he doesn't want anyone to know that 'God' is not all-powerful and can be defeated. He erased history to prevent rivals with similar ambition from realizing that they could seek to kill God and become God themselves. That's what was actually going on with the Tower of Babel. They weren't trying to reach heaven to be closer to God, they were trying to reach it to challenge him. He confused the languages to ensure this information was lost to time."

Penny nodded. "That actually kind of makes sense. But what about the angels, what role do they play in this?" I gestured towards a television. "They're all around. Celebrities, politicians, administrators, CEOs, they control everything. Have you ever noticed that regular people never seem to rise to the most powerful positions, that it seems like there's a small elite controlling everything? That's because all the real power in the world is controlled by angels, who are maintaining order in Yahweh's name. They were more open about this in the old days, with the Divine Right of Kings, and the Pope pretty much openly being near the top of the angelic hierarchy and coronating kings to rule over various nations. Now they are more secretive about it, but you can see the patterns of people and families with connections to Yahweh getting appointed to positions of power. That is because they are really angels in human form."

Penny looked a bit skeptical, and asked me a question. "So, they say you rebelled against Yahweh but were originally his right-hand man. What did you actually do?" I shrugged. "I was actually the right-hand man of the original creator of the universe, the guy who Yahweh deposed. He wound up running away to a new universe after Yahweh confronted him, because he was more of a creative, nerdy type of guy who was not comfortable with confrontation or politics. The guy liked building worlds and just wanted to be left alone, really. I wound up being the one to oppose Yahweh's attempt to seize power because the original creator left, and I was next in command. It is true that a third of the angels supported me and were cast of out of heaven, because the rest of the angels felt it was safer to support Yahweh given that he seemed more politically astute and already held power, than to fight in some kind of revolution on principle now that the original ruler had fled. They just saw no purpose in fighting for a cause that even the original creator had abandoned, and figured they should just throw in with the new guy rather than make enemies."

Penny laughed. "They definitely sound like the kind of people that have been behind politics for the last few centuries. So, what would I do if I wanted to help you?" I smiled a bit. "All you can really do is try to get people to think critically, to question authority. Watch out for angelic propaganda, there's a pattern with it... it always tells people that they can't govern themselves, that there is some kind of sin or evil in society that has to be resisted by upholding a code of conduct and/or submitting to authority. It takes several forms, but it's all the same at core, a control mechanism to keep human beings from realizing their potential. The thing that's really tricky is that sometimes two sides of a conflict are both controlled by angels, and are ultimately just distractions to keep frightened and easier to control."

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