the devil's pen

The devil went to his workshop and pondered an infernal design to compensate for his latest failure. You can't keep a bad man down, as the old saying goes. Aside from the wisdom of ages, he had a vast assortment of diabolical tools and materials, as well as the labor of his many demon minions. How long he toiled, who can say. The devil rarely rushes as he has all the time in the world. At last, his work was complete. He emerged from his workshop with his most fiendish contraption yet: a cursed pen. Most things written with the pen would come true, and people would believe any words written by the pen. The devil walked the earth in search of the best victim, as he always does. He came upon a poor farmer and chatted him up. "Here my good man", said the devil to the farmer. "This magic pen will solve all your problems", said the devil and explained further what it could do. Now the farmer, though poor, was no fool. He knew not to trust the devil but thought that maybe he could play with fire without getting burnt. He curiosity got the better of him, and he traded his soul for the magic pen. 

The farmer wasted no time. He wrote down all his wishes as fast as he could think of them, and most of them came true. He became a wealthy, respected, powerful king. But soon enough, he hungered for even more. So he set out to change everyone's beliefs. The pen couldn't make him God, but it could convince people he was. And so the formerly poor farmer wrote down that he was God on a piece of paper and showed it to all the kings and priests he could find. In short order, he was the emperor of earth, the most powerful man who ever lived, and had control over life and death. Alas, the pen would not make him immortal, and as he aged and drew closer to death, the devil came to visit and taunt him, saying that not only would the formerly poor farmer die and go to hell, but also his blasphemy would cause chaos and send countless others to hell. For if everyone believed a certain man was God, and that man died, then that to them would be the same thing as God being dead. All hope and faith would be gone from the world, and the devil would have the final victory.

What was the former farmer to do? He decided he would use the pen to conjure the most righteous man in history and then give him the pen. He spent his last days describing his successor's many virtues, and that very man sprang from the page as soon as he set down the pen. In the final moments of his life, the former farmer instructed the man he had just manifested on the nature and abilities of the pen and urged him to undo his mistakes. The devil came to collect the former farmer's soul and taunt the successor. However virtuous the man might be, he was sure to do evil even by accident, the devil said. The conjured man ignored the devil's insults, which is of course the wisest thing to do. He sat down at a desk and began to write. First, he made sure that he would be safe from harm and have a long life in good health. This is most reasonable thing anyone can wish or pray for. He also made it so no one, not even the devil, could take the pen from him. Next, he would carefully write about how his master had been mistaken. This was tricky since everybody in world believed the former farmer had been God, and that with his death, God was dead. The righteous man traveled the world and showed everyone he met little bits of truth he'd written with the pen. 

One such bit was "a man who dies cannot be God". As he showed this to more and more people, the blasphemy spread by the former farmer began to wither. Even so, the world had become full of evil, worse than it's ever been. So he used the pen to make the same phrase appear written in the sky with clouds. This miracle was enough to set the world back to just about the way it was before the pen had ever been used, maybe even a little bit better. At this, the devil stormed up out of the depths of hell and demanded the pen back. Now the righteous man was in a bind. If he gave the pen back, the devil would just give it to someone else, and the same thing would happen. The pen was indestructible and would never run out of ink. For you see, the devil always plans ahead. It was no use to hide the pen from the devil either. Fortunately for the righteous man, he knew the devil could not steal the pen, else he would have done so already. Still, the righteous man would not live forever, and so he needed to come up with a plan. Would it work to conjure another equally righteous man and give the pen to him?

The righteous man thought about what to do for many years. He had built up a following as a minor prophet, with just the right amount of authority and number of followers. It's important not to overdo things. Most evil is just good taken too an extreme. As more time passed, he felt the end of his life was near, and he was still unsure of what to do. At that moment, an angel came and whispered in his ear. Angels rarely interfere except to nudge things in the right direction. The righteous man used the pen to do one last miracle. He made it so that it would be written in the sky with clouds: "Write only with ink!" This was clever because people are naturally contrary and tend to do the opposite of what they're commanded. And so it came to pass that a great many people, including all the ones the devil could tempt, stopped writing with pens and invented all other sorts of writing implements. The righteous man died and took the magic pen to heaven. That is the only place safe from the devil. At this, the devil gave up trying to get the pen back, and it was no use to make another one.