It's not that I'd like Dominic Deegan better if the bad guys won all the time, and in the grim darkness of the past-present with magic there was only war.
But if Celesto would temper his psychopathy with the merest touch of practicality, gosh, it would make him ever so credible.

Like, he's got a whole mess of tentacles there. He could war-shiv the kid and justify himself post-facto. Unless he's meant to be stalling for time because he doesn't actually want to do this? The reason he keeps talking is because, when it comes right down to it, he doesn't really want to have to do this, but it's the only option that he feels he has?
That could have credibility if he hadn't waited in the middle of a densely populated town for TIM to show up so they could shoot lasers every which way.