Demonic Influence (I hate my co-workers)

The Moon Shines Bright (but so do your eyes)

A/N: Mmh yes cringy titles give me life. Hi everyone, thanks for checking this out! Before we start, just a quick note. This work contains cursing, as well as some religious commentary of sorts. If you're offended please don't keep reading. Also: if you didn't already see it, this work was inspired by nonsenseverses "Holy". It's such a good work, and if you haven't seen it you need to check it out ASAP. I borrowed some inspiration from them, and their work is just so freaking good it inspired me to write this, so 10/10 would recommend! Thank you so much and I hope you lovelies all have a good day! :D

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Whenever Eddy was feeling down, he liked to think of the golden rule, and check that his actions were following those guidelines.

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

Eddy was currently ripping the still beating heart from a sinner's chest, and shredding it to pieces with his claws. His eyes glinted red in the moonlight as he made direct eye contact with the man in front of him, the man who now sank to his knees with a small thunk, and watched the rest of his life fade from those same eyes.

Eddy was a minor demon, having only been around for two hundred years or so. Contrary to popular opinion, he wasn't super angry with heaven, nor did he have a lot of pent up anger to get out. He was just one of the unlucky schmucks to get the short end of the stick- depression. Oh, and the whole ambiguous sexuality thing.

Honestly, it wasn't like anyone in hell really cared about that anyway, they were all equally depressed and sexually ambiguous. Honestly, Eddy didn't really think much of his job or coworkers at all, all the demons really did was try to go around and eliminate sinners, same as heaven did, none of that wacky "corruption" shit. They just did it on a much smaller level than heaven, and had separate methods.

Eddy had lived on Earth for at least sixty of his two hundred demonic years, yet he had never encountered an angel. He supposed that was rather for the best, seeing as angels were scary, each more dedicated than the last to their work and were all perfectionists. They hated the idea that anyone might even look at them with disdain, and would go so far as to dismember demons and leave them to bleed out if they got in their way. There were fewer angels than there would ever be demons, which was no surprise. To become an angel you had to have lived a picturesque life, something straight out of a Hallmark movie. As a result, they were all brown nosing snobs.

Wow, what a great group of people to give divine power to and send forth to watch over the rest of humanity.

Unlike when demons encountered a sinner, angels treated death as a courtesy. And it just so happened that they chose to ignore that courtesy entirely. No angel had ever killed a human, no angel that lived through the week at least. To kill a human was to lose your status as an angel. The also didn't blend in well with humans, a stark contrast from the demonic community.

Eddy would honestly rather play his violin than kill people any day. He also frequented bars, and generally enjoyed watching Youtube in his spare time. Once, as an experiment, he went on strike, just to see what would happen. No one cared, except Fred, the demon in charge of his particular division, who sent him a very nicely worded letter by raven requesting that he kill at least one or two sinners a week, just to keep up the image of hell (and also so Fred could win his current bet, that his division would kill the most sinners that month, with Suzie). Eddy hated Suzie, so he reluctantly agreed that he would continue doing his job and penned Fred a lengthy apology.

Eddy had an extremely good sense of self preservation as well, seeing as he had very little power, even compared to other demons. He generally kept his head down, didn't form any meaningful relationships with other demons and co-workers, and lived out his afterlife almost invisibly.

This unfortunately changed sooner than he had hoped for it to. Eddy had left the man's corpse in the alley, as per usual, and was just walking home when he felt it, a tingling that seemed to travel through his very being. As though steered by a lead, Eddy followed that feeling through the center of the street, down the sidewalk for about two hundred paces, and then left into a dimly lit alley. That was where he heard it, someone being assaulted.

Eddy cocked his head as he listened. Or maybe they were just being mugged at gunpoint? Whatever. It never hurt to work a little overtime, that always made people pleasantly surprised, seeing as there was no real work ethic in hell to begin with. Most of them were fueled on pure spite alone.

"Put your hands in the air and back against the wall!"

As he approached, his eyes began to glow red in advance, nothing more than a cheap party trick that always seemed to scare the living daylights out of people. However, he paused where he stood as he heard the second voice speak.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

The man who appeared to be doing the mugging snorted out a small laugh. "I said, put them up, or I'll put this bullet through your head. That's an order!"

"I don't take orders from you." The second voice was completely monotone. "Please just leave me alone."

Eddy frowned. Usually, when a human was being mugged, they screamed, or cried, or even attempted to fight back. This man stood completely still, however, and in the dim light of the alleyway, Eddy could barely see the almost bored expression adorning his face. He was slightly shorter than the average male, and wore glasses. Nothing about him was remotely intimidating.

It appeared his attacker agreed. The stocky man grinned, advancing on the small man and backing him against the wall easily.

"I'm warning you, don't touch me!" The shorter man spoke, slightly louder than before, a bit of panic touching at the edges of his statement. The boredom seemed to fade from his face. His attacker just raised the gun a little higher, cocking it.

Eddy made to move forward, to shove the man out of the way, when there was a sudden rush of air, and the tall man flew back from his victim, the back of his head smashing into the brick wall behind him with a sickening crack. He slid down the wall in almost slow motion, hitting the floor and laying there, a slow trickle of blood oozing out from under him, his eyes wide open and glassy in the moonlight. The gun lay beside him, unfired.

His victim let out a small gasp and ran to his side, all but flinging himself on the ground next to him and cursing. "Shit, shit, shit- oh fuck!"

Eddy was gaping. He closed his jaw very carefully, swallowing once.

"How did you do that?" His whisper seemed almost too loud, and perhaps it was. The man stiffened, whirling around to face him with the guiltiest look Eddy had ever seen adorning his face.