I know it's a bit heavy-handed as a metaphor, but it was fun to write.

Darkness Rising

The shadow of the Beast fell across the Earth, a tangible gloom that sucked out all light and life, leaving souls dangling from it, withered and twisted. The Beast surveyed his Kingdom and was satiated, his job complete; the cold, lonely void of its existence now shared by all the Sons of Adam. His skin flickered and winked with a myriad neon lights, an otherwordly glow that bathed all before him with darkness and blotted out the stars from above. Words formed from the lights: 'Sony,' 'Pepsi', 'Nike' - Short. Empty. Meaningless.

Like a coat of dazzling armour, other images, square like the scales of a reptile, bristled on his hide, raining down a swirling cacophony of insanity upon the docile crowd in front of him. Images revealing men, women, children and animals performing nonsensical acts while ghostly, unseen laughter, rigid and drained of emotion, applauded them; images of groups of men chasing a leather sphere around a field, while the onlookers cheered, tears in their eyes; images of people shooting at one another, of explosions, of strange creatures not seen on Earth, of blood being shed, crimson droplets of life spraying into the air as though worthless.

He grinned and black smoke, acidic and noxious, poured forth from his decayed mouth; thick tendrils of liquid blackness that spread into the air, curling around the clouds and turning their sweet water sour, eating into the roots of trees and leaving their leaves stained brown like the teeth of a tobacco chewer. He gazed at his audience; happiness welling in his chest like a spring as he noticed their blank expressions, the grins etched onto their faces, the dull sheen to their eyes. Dead. They were dead, despite their beating hearts, their regular breaths. What amused him was the fact that he'd enthralled even those people that were meant to be saviours - those people with their turbans and beards; their scarves and long dresses. Yes, even those people were laughing along with the others, cheering along with the others, staring blankly at the spilt blood with all the others.

Wait. Something had caught the Beast's eye. A star twinkling out from the throng, a beam of unwavering of light that wasn't laughing, cheering or even staring blankly. He was simply smiling; a genuine, sincere smile that gave his face a coat of faint radiance. He sat cross-legged, his palms pressed together as he rested his bearded chin on the tips of his fingers, his lips moving in whispered breaths.

The Beast spoke, and his voice was a melody of song, the croon of the sensuous teenage girl mixing with the innocent charm of a group of young men, all singing about a love that they'd never experience in their lives, all captivating their listeners. Other voices joined with theirs, the harsh, bitter barks of people wrapped in violence, a mind-numbing rhythmic thump thump thump bouncing along with their words. The Beast said: "Why aren't you following the others?"

The Human looked up, surprise touching his features as though he'd noticed the Beast for the very first time. "O Mankind, worship your Lord who created you and those who went before you in order that you might receive taqwa."

The Beast hissed, his yellow eyes narrowing to glowing slits. A troublemaker. "No," he barked. "This is all there is. This is all you can become. There is no need for anything else."

The human cocked his head to one side, amused. "Verily, I am about to place a Khilafah on Earth."

"Impossible!" the Beast growled. "You're worthless, weak. You could never represent the Lord of the Worlds. You could never represent His Rahma, His Glory - you're not fit for that role. It's a dream, a passing fancy, it could never be a reality. You could never reach such heights."

"We have ennobled the Children of Adam..."

"No!"

"...and then brought him to the lowest of the low."

"Yes!" a satisfied smirk spread across the Beast's face. "I'm glad you see that." He beckoned with his hand, the wires that made up his veins pulsing with crackling blue light. "Come - join the others. I will grant you security. I am all there is - what I offer you will bring you happiness."

"In the Remembrance of Allah do hearts find satisfaction."

"Temporarily!" The Beast gave an exasperated snort. "What I bring lasts a lifetime!"

"...the hereafter is better and more enduring."

The Beast's singsong voice shot up an octave. "Forget about it. You'll never reach it. You don't have the strength to fight yourselves. I just whisper with my voice and you're under my spell. Not one of you has ever become the Khilafah of Allah; not one of you has reached your potential; not one of you has ever defeated yourselves to such an extent that you finally grasped the whole reason of your creation."

"And you have in the Messenger of Allah a perfect example for one who seeks Allah."

"No!" He pointed at the other would-be-saviours. "They all failed. They weren't steadfast. They had no patience. All I did was allure them, and they chased me greedily. They knew only I could fulfil their hopes."

"Had only the people of the cities believed and had taqwa, We would have opened up for them blessings from the heaven and Earth."

"There is only misery and darkness from both" the Beast spat.

"Allah is the light of the Heavens and the Earth..."

As though fuelled by anger, the Beast grew in size, his form filling the horizon. "Look on me and fear. I touch your hearts everyday. I whisper to you - listen to this, it relaxes you, yes, there's nothing wrong. Watch that, yes, you know where the limits are, you know when to stop. Talk to her, yes, maybe you'll marry, it's all legal. I whisper to you and you listen! I make you happy! There is no God!"

"Except Allah" the human said, still smiling.

"I make you happy!"

"In the Remembrance of Allah do hearts find -"

"No!" the Beast snarled. "You can't sustain it. You can't fight. You reach one height, then I drag you back down - and you come willingly!"

"And cause me to reach the righteous."

"You're satisfied with a little flicker of light in your heart. You don't know how to nurture it, how to make it grow. You think you touch a wave of light and you've reached the end. You think that's enough. Then you go back to your old lives as though nothing had changed. You can't do it. No one will help you do it."

"Allah does not change a people until they change what is within their own selves."

"I despise you. I despise you because you never even try to reach the potential you were created for. I despise you because you listen to me so easily."

"O Sons of Adam, did I not tell you not to listen to Shaitan? He is your enemy manifest!"

"Then don't listen to me. Listen to your own soul...your very soul craves the delights that I offer. You obey it without a second thought."

"Have you not seen the one that takes his desire as a god?"

The Beast reached out a clawed hand, blue sparks sizzling from his skin. "Then leave my presence.You cannot escape me."

"And whoever has taqwa, We will make for him a way out and provide for him from where he was not expecting."

"You don't really believe that. If you did, you wouldn't be filled with grief and anxiety; you wouldn't search out my delights in order to forget about the pain in your lives."

"Surely Allah is with those who have taqwa and beautify with excellence."

"I will hate you and afflict your kind till the end of time. And you will come to me, smiling and happy. All of you!"

The Beast's fingers curled around the Human. Still, he didn't flinch, this last truly alive member of his race. "There is none worthy of worship except Allah." He looked up, his face set firm. "You're nothing. You're a little speck in His Creation. I am the Khilafah of Allah and I banish you from my heart and mind with the words...I seek refuge in Allah from shaitan, the accursed."

Screaming, the Beast dropped the Human, and stepped back, his body fading, the sky clearing of his pollution. A few of the others blinked, their gazes broken from his diminishing form.

"I seek refuge in Allah from shaitan, the accursed."

One by one, the images and lights spread across the Beast's skin shattered, the power in those simple words driving his touch away from the Sons of Adam. The singsong voice faded, the smoke dissipated, and slowly, slowly, slowly, the Beast began to dissolve, the chains that tethered the souls of humanity to him snapping one by one.

The Human watched on impassively. "And We saved those who believed in Us and had been people of taqwa." The Beast collapsed in on itself, as though the air was being sucked out of his body, until he withered away into a puff of black smoke. "Whoever obeys Allah and His Messenger and knowingly has taqwa of Allah, they are the victors."

Still smiling, the Human turned away, not pausing to see the confused faces of the others, blinking as the sun dared to peek out from the melting darkness, spreading its warmth and life over the land, comforting the abused plants and bringing joy to the burdened clouds. He paused, a sudden thought springing up in his heart, and turned back. "Help one another with righteousness and taqwa, and don't help one another in wrong-doing and aggression." Another thought came to him, and his lips mouthed the words: "Do you command people to righteousness and forget yourselves?"

The people turned to him as one, puzzled and afraid. "What does it mean? What were we meant to be?"

"Verily, I am about to place a Khilafah on Earth."

"To do what?"

"I have not created jinns and mankind save to worship Me"

"But how?"

"O you who believe! Turn to Allah together with sincerity in order for you to have success."

"What is success?"

"That is the Garden which We give to whoever of Our servants had taqwa."

"And now?"

"Surely for the people of taqwa is a beautiful end."

"But we've slipped so many times."

"Do not despair of the mercy of Allah. He forgives sins over and over."

"You sound so certain. How do you know? We listen to the arguments and they sound so empty.We've been lied to before. We want to experience it. We want to be more than what we are now. How can we know if He's near? Do we ever feel it?"

The Human laughed, spreading his arms wide open in a gesture of welcome. "Surely," he said, partly in answer to their queries. "Surely Allah is with the excellent ones!"