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"Hear my hope, let it echo," was the first thing Alastor heard when his ears stopped ringing after he'd dragged himself away from the damned Vees, the cruely oblivious Princess and her paramour and the other Overlords still milling about, hiding in the shadows to gather his bearings. His Shadow was making worried faces at him and even his microphone staff had an expression of concern. He can't fault them for it, for his stitches had opened yet again and now he had a new chunk of flesh missing to contend with.
If he were attacked right now, it would be messy, even if he'd manage to walk - or limp - away victorious.
He wasn't safe here, he knew that. The weapon was seconds away from blowing, perhaps not literally, but not too far off from it, either. He needs to catch his breath, get rid of the spots clouding his vision and focus so his Shadow can safely drag him into the darkness to a safe distance. He thinks they'd be able to make it to the red wastelands between the Pentagram and Imp City. There are abandoned huts there that he can use to lick his wounds in. He'll be able to avoid the blast that will kill thousands, if not millions of sinners and hellborn in Sin City. He'd heard Carmila mention half the Pentagram and he hoped that included Cannibal Town. While he'd miss their supplies and lovely shops, he'd be rid of his leash and Susan if it was destroyed in a flash.
'I should rescue my tailor,' came the absentminded thought as he shook his head clear of nonsense and focused. Which was when he heard Charlie start singing, too, and he almost rolled his eyes.
"Take my hand, never let go."
Alastor was all for music, theater, drama and musical theater. He liked singing, dancing to and playing music, or listening through a radio or seeing a live performance. However, was now really the time to sing a friendship song?
"Raise your voice, light the fire," came the familiar deep, husky voice and Alastor leaned against a pillar to peer around it and there he was, indeedy, his dear friend Husker had joined. He, Charlie and that little seraphim - admittedly rather lackluster, as had been the other one that had appeared at Vox's rally - were standing a few feet away from Vox's latest toy, hand raised and streams of magic feeding ... some sort of shield? Barrier? Was that measly thing meant to contain the overloaded weapon? They sure seemed bolstered enough to think that, especially as the rest of the Hazbin Hotel crew and co came to stand by them with these beaming smiles as if any of them was doing anything. Well, besides his darling Niffty when she joined in, of course. She and Husker were never useless.
The power input, however, was all wrong, they couldn't sync it up so the shield was not growing from its meager beginnings. Angelic magic was clashing with demonic energies and it was a wonder it didn't just completely overpower it and cause even more damage to the demons attempting to help. Charlie being there, as the daughter of Lucifer, balanced it out somewhat, preventing the worst from happening, but that was a coincidence. The girl had clearly had no training in how to use her powers and it showed because if she had, she and the little seraphim should have been enough.
No, that was a lie. That thing was powered by Lucifer, and even as exhausted as the motherducking King had to be by now after Vox's previous rampage and temper tantrum with the weapon, he would be too powerful for these youngsters to contain his power. Why, it would probably take all the current Overlords in Pride to destroy the weapon before it unleashed the angelic power it had taken from the King! And that's only if both Alastor and Rosie, as the arguably most powerful Overlords currently in existence, joined. And Rosie has kept herself away from this whole mess, wanting as little attention on her as possible.
As for Alastor, well ... They'd all left him high and dry enough times to not give a damn. When he's a safe enough distance away, he'll just yank Husk and Niffty to his side - those two are his people, after all, and it'd be a shame if they were gone. Angelis shouldn't be so easily undone, so his little savior and the King should be fine. Charlie is a nephilim, supposedly - the girl herself doesn't even know what that means and Lucifer never brought it up, so it was possible that that bit of Christianity lore is made up - and her father would never hurt her, so there's a possibility that she'd be fine, too. Good riddance to the rest of the Pentagram, as far as he's concerned. It will be repopulated within a couple of months and Alastor will remain at the top of the food chain.
However, in the case that something went wrong and Charlie got hurt or worse, or if the same happened to the little seraphim, things could go beyond sideways. The first possibility will kill Lucifer so thoroughly that anyone would be able to use him like Vox had and Alastor rather didn't like that thought. Who would entertain him with daily banter? The second possibility, which was likely considering the little one had a hurt wing from where she'd been blasted by Vox's cannon while saving Alastor from that shark, would lead to Heaven undoubtedly declaring war on Hell. Every day would be Extermination day and there are only so many shadows he could hide inside before even he's hunted down. If Heaven didn't deploy something more powerful.
And speaking of Heaven, a portal opened and out came the Exorcist who'd mourned Adam's death a couple of months ago and a young man who could only be the first buffoon's son. Vaggie immediately started arguing with them, Charlie and the little seraphim were trying to reason with them. Alastor nearly facepalmed, if it weren't so beneath him, when Vaggie said "Everybody dies if we don't do this!" to the Exorcist who had been killing sinners with glee and relish for seven years. Is she trying to encourage her to just take the little seraphim - Emily, apparently - and go? That's got to be the stupidest thing he'd heard her say in the time he'd known her, including the assumption that he gave a genuine crap about the hotel in those early days or expecting him to 'humanely' get rid of those weird little egg creatures that only Frank remained of. Truly, it is never a dull day with the fallen Exorcist, but this statement takes the proverbial cake.
He's not surprised when Vaggie and Adam's right hand woman start fighting and he's honestly not surprised to see Vaggie on the backfoot. The young woman is an excellent warrior, without a doubt, but she lacks the bloodlust the other is exuding and the natural penchant for violence, to boot. Not to mention that she'd let Charlie dull all her sharp edges, which might be good for her as a person overall but is terrible for her as a warrior.
Adam's son - if the constant yelling of the name Abel at the young-looking fellow is anything to go by - was of little use himself, hiding away and having a mental breakdown at everyone demanding things of him when he's barely in control of his own situation, let alone the situations happening around him. Alastor can actually sympathize with that, having gone through something similar recently, and thanks to the boy's father no less, but he'd had the wherewithal to stall his own loss in composure until the genocidal, arrogant idiot of the day had been dealt with. And while Vox is indisposed, the raging Exorcist wasn't and she was endangering the future of the Pride Ring by fighting Vaggie and distracting the Princess, making her slip in her concentration because of her worry.
'Why don't they try to rip it off?' He thought, eyes narrowing. He's pretty sure he saw Vaggie leaving the canon earlier, hadn't she told anyone what was powering it and where he was? If they just disconnected the cannon from the power source, only the collected energy would remain and Lucifer could be pulled out of his confinement and, you know, actually safely dispose of the excess energy. He felt his face deadpan. 'It didn't even occur to them, did it?'
Some days he feels like he's found a few peers for himself in that hotel. The snake fellow had been knowledgeable in technology and Alastor had picked his brains about radios once or twice without actually cracking his skull open, which had been a pleasant novelty for the Radio Demon. Didn't mean the snake was any less afraid of him, though, as it should be. Husk was more clever than people gave him credit for behind that drunken front he refused to shed. If the man drank less and actually engaged with the world around him, he had quite a bit of wisdom to share. Alastor had never seen someone match him so well at reading people, nor had he met someone with such a finely tuned bullshit detector. He'd actually helped Alastor hone his own! Vaggie was quite knowledgeable of blades and Alastor always loved learning new ways to perfect his weapons maintenance. She'd even asked him to spar, once, but they'd never gotten to it, what with Alastor becoming more elusive because of his injury. Niffty was a darling who knew many, many things, most useful of all to Alastor her stitching knowledge and her brilliance with cleaning products, for both killing and cleaning purposes. Baxter will only serve to further both of their knowledge with his own extensive experience with chemicals. And Charlie was clearly intelligent, but so naive that it hindered her. Alastor wished he'd had more of a chance to ask her about the rest of Hell, but the opportunity never came up.
He didn't talk much with their resident adult film star and his one eyed bombastic friend, but he's sure they had their own finer qualities. After all, Ms Bomb made her own bombs while he's sure Angel Dust knows every drug in Hell and how to get through both the high and the subsequent low without wanting to kill yourself in the process.
And then there was the King himself, surprisingly intelligent considering his childish tastes in everything, even more surprisingly naive. He supposes it comes with being invincible. He hadn't so much as flinched during his fight with Adam, from what Alastor had heard and seen in the clips in the news whenever someone left the cursed picture box on in the lobby. As expected of a being older than time itself, Lucifer held a lot of knowledge in that pretty, golden head of his, it's just that it wasn't useful anymore, what with the universe set in motion. Still, he was witty, creative, well-read, had an extensive vocabulary and caught on to things pretty well. He wasn't good with names, though, or rather with names that didn't matter. For some reason, for which Alastor preens probably more than he should, the King remembered his name since day one.
Would he have thought up to just rip off the cannon from the power source in the ground? Alastor would like to think that a person who can keep up with him in a verbal spar would, but he also knows the King is more apathetic to things around him than he lets on. And he'd been lured into a truly stupid trap by a truly stupid trick.
'I'm surrounded by idiots.'
The Overlords weren't moving to help, the shield or sphere of influence or whatever they were actually trying to do wasn't stabilizing or covering more of the weapon, Heaven was of no use besides dear Emily.
It was up to Alastor to adhere to logic and actually save the day, wasn't it?
He was going to regret this, wasn't he?
With a sigh, he peeled himself away from the pillar he'd been leaning against, fixed his appearance so as not to look weak and marched right out into the open, in view of everyone who bothered to look. But all the attention was on Adam's son again as Abel seems to have grown a spine and was berating the Exorcist, stopping her fight with Vaggie and the latter's almost death. Alastor almost applauded the young archangel(?) but he had bigger fish to fry, as it were.
"Alastor!" Niffty cheered when she saw him and he felt a little warmer at the hope in her adorable, big eye. Clearly she knew he was here to help.
Her cry alerted others to his presence and Abel and the Exorcist paused where they were about to walk through the portal the former had opened to expel the Exorcist. Alastor paid them no mind besides waving at Niffty. Instead, he took a deep breath, braced for the pain and allowed his body to grow into his demon form. Usually, he would grow taller than the Vees' tacky tower, but his stitches had already ripped and his chest was already in quite the bit of pain, so he only grew until he could easily envelop the so-called Might of Lilith in one hand. He wasn't stupid to actually grab the thing in his bare hand, not when it was pulsing with divine energy like that. No, he coated his hand in enough shadows so that when he did grab the unstable weapon, he only suffered minor burns. With a buck bugle and a screech of radio frequencies, he heaved and ripped the cannon up from the underground chamber where Lucifer was trapped.
Peering inside with one giant eye, he was met with the sight of Lucifer looking up with tired, unfocused eyes, hair rumpled from all the trashing he'd been doing, sweat sticking a few strands to his forehead, hat askew, blood pouring from his chest, back and sides where Vox's cables had pierced him to maximise the output of the machine. "Bambi?" His voice was also wobbly and tired and Alastor frowned from above. How dare someone else torment Lucifer? That was his job!
The Might of Lilith still sizzled with power off to the side where he'd left it, the cables still connecting it to the chamber Lucifer was trapped in. A shock of radio waves fried the equipment in the little control room beneath the base of the weapon, unlocking Lucifer's restraints inside of the angelic-steel-based glass chamber. Lucifer slumped against the glass, hitting his head with a halfhearted "Ow" before just remaining where he'd landed, clearly too relieved to have his limbs free and especially his arms down to bother moving further. The weapon started cooling down, glacially slowly, but it was happening, the hum of energies slowly dimming. Still, Alastor reached down into the hole he'd made by ripping off the cannon to carefully pluck the whole chamber out, trying not to jostle Lucifer within.
The King perked up a bit in curiosity at being elevated back to the surface and above. He brightened up in this awkward, loving, guilty, desperate way that Alastor could never imagine on himself, smiling at his daughter when he spotted her. "H-hey, Char Char! Charlie! My most beloved, favorite daughter! H-how's it going? Fancy seeing you here! Love what you did with your hair, sweety!"
Charlie stared up at the two of them, jaw on the ground. "D-dad!?"
Her paramour winced beside her. "Shit, I forgot about that!"
The Princess whirled on her in an instant. "How could you forget about my dad!? Wait, was he in there this whole time!?"
"Don't go down there," Lucifer called down, sounding a bit loopy. "It's a place of pain!"
Alastor, meanwhile, had looked over the top and base of the egg-like chamber, searching for weak spots. The locks would no longer be protected as he'd fried all systems with those earlier bursts of his frequencies, but they would still be firmly in place physically. However, having been there when Carmila had demonstrated how the thing locked and having seen Vox place the trap, as well as how it locked Lucifer inside, Alastor had a fairly good idea of how to free the King. It took some probing, a bit of rotating the thing before he found the locks. And while they, too, may have been made of thick, angelic steel, they were much more fragile because of their complex components and the empty space it created in between. A little squeeze, a little wiggle of a claw tip and a little shadow guidance and the chamber popped open, Lucifer tumbling straight into Alastor's palm when he lifted the upper part of the chamber.
Unfortunately, he had to catch him in his burned hand, since he'd needed the strength and dexterity of his uninjured one to break open the chamber. As such, he barely hid his reaction of pain when the Fallen Angel fell into his hand, so at least the people below were oblivious to the extent of the damage.
Lucifer, however, was not and recoiled as his mere presence in the giant palm drew small amounts of blood. "Whoa, there, Bambi! You need to fix that!" He frowned, eyes almost going crossed. "Wait, you can't, you were burned by holy energy! Okay, I can do it for you!" Sticking out his little snake tongue in concentration and wearing a far to giddy smile for someone who supposedly wasn't about to collapse from exhaustion, the Devil casually bit his own palm until he bled, used the golden ichor dripping from the wound to draw what Alastor recognized as the Sin of Pride's sigil, the image no bigger than a coaster and Alastor just knew the man was teasing him again. But when the sigil lit up with a snap of Lucifer's fingers, Alastor's whole being twitched as all the angelic power polluting his body vanished immediately, leaving him to heal at an astonishing rate, one he'd never achieved before as a bound soul. It seems Rosie was making the afterlife even harder for him than he'd thought, and for much longer, at that. His burned hand was back to normal in barely two blinks of an eye and his chest wound sealed up and healed beneath his clothes in seconds. The agony and pain he'd felt for months felt like a distant memory despite him still having felt it mere seconds ago. It was much easier to maintain this giant form now that there were no pulled stitches. Even the bite Vox's pet had taken out of him had healed, as had whatever lingering aches he'd acquired in this last fight. "There! Good as new! Now you can just come back and be the bellhop instead of dumping all your duties on others. I even fixed up your funky staff that keeps frowning at me! Maybe it'll stop now ... "
Alastor arched an eyebrow at the little King. "Who said I was going to return to the hotel? I quit, remember?"
"WHAT!?" Both Charlie and Vaggie yelled from below and Alastor rolled his eyes.
Lucifer either didn't hear him or didn't care to register what he'd said. "We have nearly a month of bantering to make up for. Ya owe me, Red Guy, I was so bored, I barely left my room! You are the cause of exactly two thousand sixty two new ducks, so you need to make up for that! Also some asshole broke your mug and I had to fix it, so you have to come by my room later ... Or did I pack it up with me and take it to the palace?"
The Radio Demon glared down at the babbling King in confusion. "Why would my mug be at the palace? What do you mean you took it with you?"
The Princess flinched at that and Alastor decided he didn't have the will nor the energy to deal with whatever that mess was. He just turned and started the trek back to the Hazbin Hotel, still in his giant form, uncaring for the sinners he stomped on his way. They'd cheered and jeered when he'd been humiliated by Vox, they deserved no mercy.
Lucifer, still chattering despite looking like he needed a century of sleep, peered over the giant hand, making no comment on the crushed sinners. In fact, his tail emerged and any time a sinner was crushed beneath a giant hoof, it wiggled and swayed in pleasure. Alastor noted that the King was far more sadistic than people gave him credit for. The Devil indeed.
Lucifer, however, made a sound of disgust when he caught sight of the still charged Might of Lilith. "Ugh, she'd hate that thing, it's so ugly. Or maybe not, it resembles runway high fashion, she liked that ostentatious shit for some reason. And that's coming from an angel used to seeing ostentatious forms for an eternity before humanity was even a concept of an idea."
"We should probably destroy it," Alastor mused, eyes zeroing in on Carmila Carmine standing close by. He'd have to find a way to deal with her later. She'd proven troublesome in the past as well, not just recently by killing an Exorcist. But the amount of angelic steel she had and the things she'd learned to make with it ... Perhaps an audit of the Sovereign Overlords list was needed once again. This new younger generation has turned out to be just as rotten, if not more, as the one he'd encountered upon landing in Hell.
"Oh, yeah, sure," the blond babbled, snapping his fingers and the weapon just ... vaporized, turned into golden stardust that drifted up and melded into Lucifer. Immediately, the man looked a bit better, as though some of his stolen energy had been restored. "Anyways, enough about that nonsense ... Musical theater! How do you feel about it?"
The deer arched an eyebrow, continuing his path to the hotel they still called home. "I'd consider myself a fan and a bit of a connoisseur."
Lucifer lit up. Like literally. Like Alastor was holding a star in his hand, but he didn't get burned nor blinded by its brilliance.
"Great! There's this great piece I wanted to see but had no one to go with me-"
The Overlords, the Hazbin Hotel crew plus Emily, the Vees and Abel and Lute all watched as the huge form of the most terrifying sinner Hell has ever been graced with lumbered off into the distance to the background noise of an explanation of some play involving ducks and musical numbers.
Rosie poofed into existence at Charlie's side with a wry expression on her face. "Well, there goes any chance of getting him back, I guess." She was not happy that she had no negotiating power and hoped their previous amicable relationship could continue, even though she doubted Alastor would ever come to her willingly ever again. Once burned, twice shine and all. Shame, she'll miss their tea sessions, he always had all the best gossip! But at least he'd saved the city. He could've fled and done nothing, she's sure he was tempted, especially since he was free now. She'll have to keep an eye out for him, from now on, because a wildcard has suddenly become ten times wilder. Hopefully he won't interfere too much with her own play.
"Sinners can do that?" Abel squeaked out, portal still open to the command room where he'd been about to escort Lute back to, shaking. All the demons looked weird and kinda scary but that big deer made him wonder if Heaven was even ready to defend itself against Hell when those are the punches they're packing now that they know how to kill angels.
Lute was just as stunned. She's the most experienced Exorcist, she and Adam had been coming down to kill random sinners long before the Exterminations were established as an annual culling of the sinner population. She's seen sinners of all shapes and sizes and even some of the higher ranking hellborn. She has never seen a demon grow that large. Perhaps those Ars Goetia or the Sins could, but never a sinner. And this one? He'd been the one who made the shield, who'd fought Adam. He'd survived?! It made her wonder why he hadn't turned gigantic back then, too? He took out the most of her sisters as it was, with that shield, but he could've taken out even more. She'll need to keep a closer eye on him.
Emily, on the other hand, was so freaking grateful she'd rescued Charlie's friend because he'd saved her from straining herself too badly by taking care of the weapon. Emily would have preserved until the weapon was either destroyed or detonated on all of them. She was scared by the power display from both of them, the big red deer demon and the Morning Star. She'd never felt such overwhelming power. No wonder it had so easily destroyed the shield Sera and the others had made around Heaven! She's just grateful they were both on their side.
Charlie and Vaggie were having words and this time, Vaggie couldn't complain about Charlie's fury because she really had forgotten to tell her that her dad was strapped into the machine. She also blamed Carmila in her mind because the woman could have helped her free Lucifer instead of sending her after wires that were useless in the end and may have further contributed to the overload of the weapon. Vaggie was even starting to doubt whether that had been the goal all along. Carmila's daughters were nowhere near the event tonight, after all, which was telling considering Carmila considered the safest place for them by her side.
Husk and Cherri basically knocked Angel out when he tried to go back to the swiftly retreating Vees as sinners started booing after them. Cherri put the spider sinner back into the bag she'd used on him earlier that night and they put in double-time to make it to the hotel as soon as possible. A single call to Niffty from the bartender had her picking up Baxter and following, no matter how much he complained about wanting samples.
The Overlords remained in a limbo of uncertainty and incredulity at what had just happened, exchanging looks and wondering what they should do going forward. The structure of power had shifted once again, effortlessly, at that, and it was becoming all the more obvious the previous power shift was little more than a ruse. And they'd fell for it, painting targets on their backs for the Overlord killer to come back for them. And he would. Alastor had cleaned the slate once before, he'll have a much easier time with them, they all knew that. Even Carmila was recalculating how quickly she could make an impenetrable fortress that would actually be capable of stopping teleportation or shadow travel.
"So, just so we're all clear, Vox isn't the strongest sinner in Hell, right?" Hatchet asked and Prick snorted.
"No shit, Sherlock."
FINIS