Bath and Bauru

Bath and Bauru are two lesser spiritual beings who were once under the sway of the Satanic Rebellion, but have since repented and now work for good by the grace of God. When they do take physical form, they appear most often as shadowy beasts, Bath being round, beaked, and with a booming voice, Bauru as a tentacled serpent, subtle in speech.

They were initially a type of daemon (in the ancient sense), loosely obedient to God but more interested in doing what was easy. As such, when the spirits they worked closest with became caught up in the arrogance of the Satan, Bath and Bauru found it compelling enough to go along and pursue their own ideas of what would be good for the universe, which mostly consisted of occasionally frightening a civilization for fun and enjoying the blind devotion of lesser beings. However, in Diyos' first rise to power, his study of sorcery led him to Bath and Bauru as powers greater than him but far from cosmic. So, Diyos attached himself to them and channeled their power, among many other beings, technologies, and forces. In doing so, Diyos became powerful enough to actually force the hands of the dark powers he supposedly served. Some lesser beings were ensnared in Diyos' influence and realized too late, and were eventually absorbed into his own spirit. Greater beings still held sway over Diyos and were content to use him for their own ends. But Bath and Bauru were at that inflection point where they were deeply frightened by what Diyos was capable of, but still powerful enough to break themselves free. When they saw not only his arrogance but his utter hatred and wickedness in the opening attacks of the First Interstellar War, they realized what they had not cared to notice in the spirits who had led them astray: death, in all its worst and cosmic fullness. The path of rebellion led only to destruction, not to some life apart from God. So for the remainder of the First Interstellar War these two daemons sought to disentangle themselves from Diyos, and in fact when they finally succeeded, the loss of power for Diyos was a major factor in his loss of the war.

In the centuries to come, Bath and Bauru sought to repent of their complicity with evil and work once again for good. Finally they came across a spirit who remained in the light and was entirely suspicious, but they convinced him to lead them to the wisest archangels, who were likewise doubtful, for they had never known a demon to repent, and did not know whether they could be redeemed even if it were true. What they did know was that the Creator was both just and gracious, so if they surrendered themselves to Him, whether they were destroyed to end their misery, or forgiven and redeemed, they could trust it would be right. So they were led to the very Throne Room of heaven and pleaded their case. They desired to do good, but had been corrupted by the darkness so that they did not know whether they could ever know the good well enough to do it. The Great Judge told them that the key to their redemption had not yet been completed, but that no being, however corrupted, who submitted to the True Throne would be abandoned to the abyss.

So Bath and Bauru submitted themselves willingly to the custody of heaven for millennia. They watched and learned of the comings and goings of the great courts, but still they found that the darkness in their own hearts kept growing as quickly as they could resist it. But, at the appointed time, they watched in wonder as God Himself stepped bodily into creation, strove with the Enemy face to face, made atonement once and for all, and vanquished even the mighty darkness of Death. Then Bath and Bauru knew that the time of their redemption was finally made possible, along with everything else that longed to be free of rebellion. They were released from their custody and set out to learn the ways of life.

Today, their redemption is still not complete, nor will it be till the renewing of all things. Having once separated themselves from the light, they cannot fully subsume their actions within it. As such they act independently and imperfectly, just like their unredeemed demon kin, but unlike them they act with a desire to further the Kingdom of Heaven, and repent when their imperfections stand in its way. They also have imperfect knowledge of the divine plan, so their involvement with the universe is still based on their own best judgment, which can often come across as mischievous or clumsy. Also as a result of their demonic past, they can still be summoned by sorcerers and their powers can still be harnessed by mortals, but they are much more choosy about who they will empower, and even when called upon to do things of dubious moral quality, will actively seek to twist them into something wholesome and good-- rather the opposite of the genies of legend.

Because of their history, they are unable to take a beautiful physical form and retain rather monstrous features, but by the power of God's Atonement their appearance is no longer foul or evil, but simply ominous and dark. Their words and deeds quickly show that they have no love for the darkness.