Satan had had enough. He had to make sure the situation turned back in his favor.
He observed SCP-682, standing straight ahead of him, already distorting the local reality by its mere presence.
Every second spent in the Circle of Wrath worked against him.
So he decided to use the trump card he had prepared. Even if SCP-682 had escaped once before, this time he intended to take advantage of the terrain.
His eyes closed for a fraction of an instant.
Then he clapped his hands.
Satan once again forcibly sent SCP-682 into his pocket dimension.
SCP-682 appeared in the void.
A void… false.
Before him stretched an entire universe.
Billions of stars.
Spiral nebulae.
Galaxies slowly colliding.
Cosmic clusters so dense they warped the space around them.
A young, unstable, violent cosmos.
And at the center of it all…
Satan.
He no longer had his usual draconic form.
He had abandoned all restraint, deciding to take his true appearance.
His body unfolded on an impossible scale.
Seven heads emerged, each crowned with massive horns.
His wings covered entire stellar systems.
His serpentine body stretched across light-years, coiled around flows of matter and energy.
His scales appeared engraved with ancient texts, judgments, condemnations.
Each beat of his wings caused stars to collapse.
This was the being cited in biblical texts: the Dragon of the Apocalypse.
— Here, thundered the voices of the seven mouths in unison,
Space vibrated.
— You are in MY universe, and only damnation awaits you, miserable creature!!!
SCP-682 floated for a moment, silent.
Its multiple eyes observed the situation with palpable indifference. For it, no matter the terrain, the result would always be the same. But it could see what this dimension truly was.
This space was not an illusion.
It was not a simple standard dimensional plane. For a moment, it was impressed by its complexity, but that changed nothing about its objective: to make this red idiot regret his arrogance.
SCP-682 slowly smiled.
As if to answer, Satan raised a claw.
A dying star, millions of times more massive than the Sun, was torn from its orbit and hurled at relativistic speed.
The impact was cataclysmic.
SCP-682 was engulfed in a stellar explosion.
Billions of tons of plasma vaporized it.
Space around it tore apart under the pressure.
Satan continued.
A second gesture.
A rocky planet, then another.
Then an entire cluster of celestial bodies, compacted, accelerated, transformed into gravitational projectiles.
— Crush it.
The masses collapsed onto SCP-682.
Gravity reached absurd levels.
Tidal forces attempted to tear it apart at the atomic scale.
Its body was pulverized.
Dispersed.
Scattered throughout the universe.
Silence.
Then…
The fragments stopped drifting.
They slowed.
They returned.
Filaments of matter assembled, reconnecting across the void, defying distance.
New structures appeared, functional in a cosmic environment.
SCP-682 was reforming.
Less massive than before.
But more optimized.
Satan bared his fangs.
— Very well.
He spread his wings.
An entire galaxy folded in on itself.
Its spiral arms contracted, its stars fused in a silent roar.
Satan hurled the galaxy.
The impact annihilated everything across millions of light-years.
The structure of the local universe itself tore apart.
SCP-682 was hit head-on.
Its body fragmented again, this time more violently.
Its previous adaptations were insufficient.
Satan observed carefully.
His goal was only to brutalize SCP-682 until the Foundation arrived, but even he knew that even if the situation currently seemed favorable, the longer the fight lasted, the more invincible SCP-682 would become.
SCP-682 roared in frustration. Even though the massive damage it was taking would eventually allow it to become stronger, it was still infuriating to endure it all without being able to do anything for the moment.
It tried to bite space.
This time…
Its jaws met resistance.
The boundary did not give way.
Satan had taken measures against that maneuver.
Satan:
— Go on, bite. Try to bite. Maybe you'll manage to escape, hahaha.
682 stared at the being that dared show such condescension toward it with a dark gaze, but it decided to ignore it and had something to say as well.
Its eyes fixed on the seven heads.
— Then continue. Throw everything at me. Let's see how long you can sustain this, and when I surpass all your tricks… razor smile …we'll see who desperately tries to run away. growl
...
The pocket universe trembled.
The galaxies hurled by Satan continued to collapse into one another, creating gravitational waves capable of disintegrating entire realities. SCP-682 continued to endure, its body battered but functional, its adaptations accumulating, stacking, overlapping.
But as Satan bombarded SCP-682 with increasingly destructive and powerful attacks…
A white, pure, absolute light materialized above the artificial universe.
Chains of celestial symbols descended from the void, wrapping around Satan's titanic body. Each glyph carried an injunction, an ancient command, engraved long before the existence of the Seven Deadly Sins.
— I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I must intervene.
Gabriel appeared.
Wings spread, each feather vibrating with divine authority. Her gaze held no hatred. Only resolve.
Satan roared.
The galaxies around him exploded with his rage.
— WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING HERE!!!
He tried to move.
The celestial chains tightened, not to crush him, but to freeze him within his own domain.
He knew this ability very well. Huriel had imposed it on him during their first encounters and battles.
Sealing: Edict of Heavenly Restraint
A seal intended for major conceptual entities.
Temporary.
But absolute as long as it was maintained.
Satan turned his seven heads toward Gabriel.
— Release me immediately.
Gabriel did not avert her gaze. She smiled.
— No.
She then raised her hand… toward SCP-682.
A unique symbol imprinted itself onto the surface of the lizard. She imposed a concept upon it, and one might wonder why she would do that, since it would eventually evolve and surpass it. The reason was simple: the concept in question was the only thing capable of truly endangering SCP-682.
— Stagnation.
The word echoed across all dimensions.
SCP-682's body partially froze.
Its recent adaptations ceased to exist.
The structures acquired during the fight with Satan dissipated as if they had never been.
Gabriel had to remain focused to maintain the concept of stagnation on SCP-682.
Calculating the damage caused by the attack, if she were to evaluate SCP-682's evolutionary level, she would place it at 123,000,000. But with the concept of stagnation, this level dropped, and its various immunities continuously disappeared. At this rate, she wouldn't even need the Foundation's help.
She couldn't help but smile at how the situation was unfolding.
Satan exploded with rage.
— WHAT DID YOU DO?! I WAS DOING JUST FINE BEFORE YOU SHOWED UP!!!
He strained against the seal, cracking entire constellations inside his own domain.
— We could not allow one of the Seven Deadly Sins to benefit from the abilities provided by the Foundation. And your plan of feeding SCP-682 until the Foundation arrived with its two anomalies was based solely on the assumption that the Foundation would be able to stop SCP-682. If that hadn't been possible, the situation would have been disastrous.
Satan could only frown at these words, but he knew she was right. Unlike her, he did not wield the concept of stagnation. The level of the most powerful angels of Heaven, like Gabriel, surpassed his own.
But just as Gabriel thought Satan would understand her decision, and she even intended to lift the seal restraining him…
Satan's anger became uncontrollable.
He focused all his remaining authority on a single point.
— THEN DIE.
Gabriel:
— Huh!?
He attacked.
A stream of conceptual fire, mixed with judgment and pure rage, struck Gabriel head-on.
She blocked it with ease.
Gabriel:
— Are you insane?! Do you really think this is the time to attack me? A rational person would swallow their anger and understand the stakes. Sure, I'm preventing you from gaining the Foundation's abilities, but aren't you powerful enough already?
Satan:
— I don't give a damn. Release me so I can continue my fight.
Satan could not allow the demons of Hell to see an image of their sovereign being subdued by an angel, and he was still furious that the angels decided what should be done without him.
Gabriel:
— No surprise there. Huriel warned me—you completely lose it when you're angry.
A few seconds.
That was all it took.
Those few seconds of interaction between the pigeon and the lizard were enough.
SCP-682 did not wait.
It turned its jaws toward the boundary of the pocket universe.
It was weakened by the fact that Satan was currently chained.
It bit.
This time, space gave way.
A tear appeared.
SCP-682 slipped through without hesitation.
Gabriel had no time to react. SCP-682 had already escaped.
Gabriel stared blankly at where SCP-682 had been, a golden tear running down her cheek. Behind her, Satan closed his eyes, barely holding back laughter.
Then he felt the angelic energy reach an uncontrollable point. Before losing consciousness, the last thing he heard was a scream.
FAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!
Human World
The Atlantic Ocean.
Ten kilometers from the Bermuda Triangle.
The air vibrated.
The surface of the water distorted.
SCP-682 briefly emerged above the waves, its body still steaming with residues of cosmic combat.
It had calculated that it had lost 20% of the evolutionary abilities it had gained from fighting the red dragon. It decided to avoid, as much as possible, any pigeon with multiple wings it might encounter, and to recover the evolutionary level it had lost—and surpass it.
It intended to take refuge in the sea, but just as it was about to dive, it stopped.
Something was there.
Deep within the ocean, sealed within multiple layers of dimensions and realities.
A crushing pressure.
An existence whose mere proximity would be enough to annihilate this physical shell. Even if it would not harm its true body, creating a new manifestation in this reality would be difficult.
SCP-682 did not feel fear.
But it calculated losses.
It slowly turned its head.
And changed direction.
It moved away from the ocean, as far as possible from that presence.
— What kind of world did I end up in?