The Head of the Council

[Deleted]

Original

Name:
Iblîs – Head of the Council – Satan

Age: 3,679,134,007
Gender: It changes.
Species: Jinn – Ifrit.
Planet of Origin: Earth.
Occupation: The Head of the Council

Physical Description: On the outside, there is nothing wrong with the Ifrit. It takes the form of a small male child. The child doesn’t reach but 4’9” off the ground. The black hair doesn’t grow longer than chin-length. The ears protrude from his hair, giving him an elfish appearance at times. His lips are thin and usually set in a pensive frown. Several freckles litter the boy’s pale face. The feature that stands most prominent is his pale eyes. Many humans don’t peg him as anything but human when he reveals himself to them, but most admit to being unnerved by the color.

Personality & History: While nobody’s personality is easy to accurately describe, such a creature such as the Ifrit’s seems impossible. He has gone through almost four billion years of history. He has lived through countless wars, the beginning of the end, and the destruction of civilizations. In order to understand the Ifrit’s personality and actions, one must take an in-depth journey through his history. Back to the very beginning when there were only the Drevnemi and Iblîs.

Iblîs was the first Jinn brought into existence. He was born in a flash of scorching and smokeless fire – just a small cloud of energy without a shape for the first few centuries of his life. The energy settled, then, to the form of the young child. Other Jinn came after him – loud and curious and demanding – but Iblîs remained silent, watching as the other practiced their energy manipulated clumsily. His brothers were curious, but he had been given the gift of observation. He did not need to experiment to learn.

The Drevnemi tried to gain the child’s interest, but Iblîs preferred instead to watch as things happened around him. He saw things differently than his brothers. His mind was constantly in a haze of ‘could-bes’ and ‘should-bes’. Although he was not a Vetala, the young Ifrit – born of Drevnemi and brother of Marids and Ummaar – possessed the withdrawn and perceptive demeanor of one. It was not until he was a few centuries old that something spurred him from watching his surroundings.

A creature came to them – something not Jinn, something alien – and told the Jinn they would have to leave their plane of existence to make room for ‘humans’. The Drevnemi humbly agreed as did the Ifrit’s brothers. Iblîs remained where he was, watching as the humans arrived. The creature demanded that the Drevnemi bowed along with the humans. They complied. Iblîs watched, taking a few steps back. The scene was one that he would never forget – watching as his parents and siblings bowed to this mysterious figure and the ugly humans.

“What prevented you, Ifrit, that you did not prostrate when I commanded you?” the creature demanded.

“I am better,” the Ifrit responded, looking down in disgust at his subservient kin. Didn’t they think for themselves? Didn’t they know? “I am from a blazing fire and the humans from clay. Heat melts and shapes the clay,” Iblîs responded. The Drevnemi rose, frowning as they apologized to the creature. One of his brothers grasped his arm and one of the Drevnemi tugged him into the plane of existence they had been banished to. “We are gods,” Iblîs murmured, watching the humans.

A small slip of energy escaped his mouth, twirling around the human’s ears and entering her mouth. Wouldn’t you like to know? it whispered, the hint of tantalizing promise corrupting the innocence of the woman.

What is it like? To know? he heard her respond.

Lips pulled back in a wolfish grin, blue eyes aflame with the knowledge he would spur humanity’s downfall. You could know… the green mist responded, leaving her mouth and sliding down her naked flesh, turning to a snake at her feet. I could teach you to know… I could make you powerful.

It was the first promise he had broken. It was the first heart he had twisted into corruption. The first life he had ruined. The Ifrit smiled, watching the actions unfold as the corruption spread – infiltrating it. Rumors and legends were hissed about him – he was the ‘Devil’, ‘Satan’, a fallen star. It wasn’t until much later would the humans learn the name he identified with. Iblîs.

It was much later when the Ifrit returned to the human’s world in his physical form. The heat was immense compared to the frigid chills of the Jinn’s dimension. The Jinn had been multiplying steadily – several of the weak ones had chosen to live with the humans. Iblîs didn’t see the point – they were ignorant and dim-witted fools. The Jinn were superior to the parasites made from dirt.

It was on those streets that he met the child who would fuel the first skirmish against the humans. The Jinn and the humans had come to an uneasy understanding. The Jinn were much more powerful than they could ever hope to be. The humans still requested favors and knowledge from the Jinn, especially from the Drevnemi. Most of the time, however, they did not bother with each other.

Iblîs was a gifted speaker. He could easily lure the most guarded of men into his trap. He could see deep into the souls of humans and of other creatures, discerning immediately their weaknesses and desires. He used this to his advantage with the child on the dirt streets. It had been a mild curiosity at first, but Iblîs began to ask it questions. He lulled the boy into a false sense of security and charmed him into following the Ifrit.

His hands then slipped around the boy’s thin neck and Iblîs knocked him to the ground, his knees digging into the child’s stomach as he strangled him. He had murdered before – but he had always done it with his energy, drawing it out of his victims and watched as they went into cardiac arrest or simply asphyxiated. This was the first time he had his hands on someone, throttling the life from the boy. The lips spread apart again in a malicious smile, the eyes blazing as he looked into the meek brown ones of the human.

“Dirt,” he whispered hatefully, lifting the corpse’s head and slamming it against the ground. The Ifrit continued, trembling from excitement as the blood began to paint his human form a delicious color of red. A woman shrieked behind him, and he let go of the corpse at last, standing in a single graceful motion. Blood was splattered along his face and it was pooled along the ground. He stepped towards the woman, his tongue swiping at the blood as he approached her, his fingernails extending into claws.

The act had not gone unpunished. The Drevnemi scolded him for his actions, but he ignored them, instead summoning cats and dogs to their realm to carve them. Their blood covered him and his teeth ripped at their flesh and his claws dug at them. It was unfortunate for him that he could not foresee what the Vetales were hiding – the bloody battle that would soon ensnare the Jinn, killing thousands before the Jinn would act on the pounding of the drums of war.

And then King Solomon rose to power. He heard of the murders of humans done by the Jinn. He was wise – the Jinn suspected that he was not, indeed, born of human blood. The King learned to trap the Jinn. Iblîs didn’t trust him – he didn’t trust any human – and neither did the Drevnemi. They warned their people that the humans were nothing but trouble. The Jinn didn’t listen, and Iblîs and the Drevnemi were captured along with the rest of the Jinn. They were ushered into a large cave lined with salt. The salt killed the younger Jinn.

King Solomon’s treatment was cruel on the best of days, but Iblîs could bide his time until the King dropped his guard. The Jinn were forced to build a temple – a temple they would not be allowed in, and a temple that led to the downfall of many. Misbehaving ones were covered in salt, and the humans watched as the Jinn screamed and screeched and howled from agony. The first time Iblîs witnessed the destructive of a life like this, he swore that he would avenge his people. He would find a way to undo the pain.

The King died standing. The corpse’s eyes stared out at them, overseeing the construction. It wasn’t until a small earthworm took to chewing the cane that held the corpse up that the Jinn realized they’d been tricked. After his death was when the horror began truly for the Jinn. The humans amused themselves by singing their songs, songs that were rumored to rip a Jinn’s soul out and bind it. Iblîs ignored the rumors.

He was dragged to a room. It was dark and it was damp and the humans sang to him. The song ripped open his chest, flaying him apart until his fire sparked. The pain was intolerable. Screams ripped from Iblîs’s throat and he howled, damning the descendants of Solomon and all of Israel. He wished that he had gone numb from pain, that he had passed out, but instead he could only watch in horror as he felt the soul being bound to an object not of this world. When the process was finished, Iblîs was paralyzed. He could hear the screaming of thousands of his kind – children screaming.

The humans had taken a special interest in the only twins that would ever happen in Jinn history. Iblîs listened as the humans separated them, torturing them before ripping out their souls. Iblîs screamed as the men continued to beat the body of the small child. Iblîs curled, sobbing as they tore off his clothes and mutilated him and raped him. They pushed him out of the room when they were done. Iblîs got to his feet, trembling and trying to go home, back to his dimension.

Pale blue eyes locked with the humans. “I swear to you,” Iblîs snarled, “you and your kind will pay for what you have done.”

That was when he looked behind the humans. He saw the carnage – the ashes of the dead souls, the scorching fire. The Ifrit growled, and energy ignited. The humans clawed at their throats as he pulled their life from their throats. The other Jinn joined – killing and murdering and slaughtering. Iblîs tore at the humans, teeth and claws digging furiously into the flesh. His mouth and hands were covered in the human blood.

The sun scorched above them. The sands were stained with blood and ash. Iblîs mutilated the humans, clawing and ripping at their stringy flesh. His teeth were stained red and his eyes seemed paler against the stark red splattered on his face. “Stop,” one of the humans gasped. Iblîs paused, staring down at them. He lifted his hands, a sneer spreading his lips. The human sobbed and thanked him, and Iblîs ripped the jaw off the human. Iblîs grabbed the human’s tongue and ripped it out.

“The humans will pay,” the Ifrit snarled, shredding the muscle in his hands. The humans scattered, fearful of the Jinn. Fearful of Iblîs – Satan they called him. They formed the Council then, and Iblîs was naturally the Head of the Council. He took the younger Jinn and eased their mind, erasing the majority of the memories of their enslavement. He oversaw the Council, beginning to put their natural energy to use to manipulate Time. If he could just wipe away the actions of the Solomon then he could ease the pain of his people.

He manipulated the humans, whispering in their hearts to hurt each other. He was to be blamed for much of humanity’s problems. Greed, corruption, war, violence. He twisted each heart until they turned on each other. He was particularly brutal to a particular group of people. The Jewish. They were the cause of his problems, and they didn’t have the decency to mention the enslavement of his people, only to complain about theirs.

It was May when he received his first ‘Master’. It was a small boy with a shaved head and wide brown eyes. Are you a genie? he asked in accented German. He was Polish, Iblîs could tell. His mouth twisted into a snarl and his eyes shone. He nodded behind the barbed wire fence. The boy’s fingers gripped the wire so tightly his human blood spilled. I can have a wish?

Iblîs nodded again.

I wish to be away from here, the Jew asked, looking fearfully around him. There was a smokestack behind him – and Iblîs could smell the scent of rotten and burnt humans. He nodded and enveloped the Jew in his energy, transporting him to the gas chambers. He watched as the small boy’s eyes widened and he looked around at the naked men and women, at the children who were dying. The gas entered the child. Iblîs watched, fascinated, as the corpses began to pile.

STOP! the child screamed, clutching at Iblîs. The Ifrit scowled and slammed him across the room. He resisted tearing him open because he wanted him to die slowly. Instead, Iblîs watched as the boy struggled for his last breaths.

“May you suffer a fraction of what we did,” the Ifrit snarled.

The doors to the chambers opened, and a shot ricocheted through chamber. Iblîs laughed, his form flickering to something darker. The men shot again, screaming in fearful German. Iblîs vanished, returning to his plane of existence and doubling his efforts to have control over Time.

We are Gods.

Additional medical information: Allergic to salt.

[Ace McShane]

Accepted!