Chapter Text
It was difficult to feel dignified while descending into the entertainment district of Pentagram City. This was a place meant to be slinked into at the dead of night, swallowed by crowds and loud music. Not many cars even bothered driving down here; traffic barely crawled through the streets beneath waves of sinners spilling from clubs and theaters only to vanish into the next glowing venue down the block. Advertisements climbed the sides of skyscrapers in dizzying layers of animated colors.
Charlie sat rigidly a few seats away from her father, arms crossed tightly as she watched the view shift from sophisticated estates and towering mansions into concrete and glass towers.
Lucifer, meanwhile, looked delighted.
“See? This is good!” he chirped, straightening the cuffs of his coat. “Productive. Structured. Very healthy for you emotionally.”
Charlie glanced toward him. “You say that like I was put on a watch.”
Lucifer made a hissing sound as he sucked in air between his teeth. “Well, Sweetiebelle, you were wandering around Hell asking cannibals philosophical questions for… a few days.”
Charlie rolled her eyes and looked back out the window. “Took you two whole days to notice I was gone.”
She expected some clever excuse, bad joke, or theatrical deflection, but the tense silence that followed caught her off guard. Charlie looked back toward her father and found him suddenly very interested in adjusting his cufflinks.
“You weren’t the one who noticed I was gone, were you?”
“Your manicurist was very disturbed when you missed your three o’clock last week,” Lucifer replied brightly, trying to force the mood back upward.
Charlie opened her mouth, then shut it again. What was the point? Her father was Lucifer Morningstar, Great Satan, father of lies and impossible conversations. Sweet-talking people came as naturally to him as flying once had. They could argue for hours and somehow, by the end of it, she would wind up apologizing for being upset in the first place.
Conversations without her mother there to mediate always felt useless.
“Well, whatever. Your stupid doctors checked me and found nothing wrong with me.”
“I mean…” Lucifer began carefully. “They found nothing physically wrong with you.” He gestured vaguely between himself, Charlie, and even the driver, as though they had all attended the examination together. “But, as we all agreed, you need direction. A reason to get up and smell the coffee in the morning.”
He smiled, brighter now, trying to rebuild momentum.
“Apparently lounging around a palace all day, however appropriate for your station, is not good for your mental health. Who knew?”
“You’re meant for a higher purpose,” he continued, his voice softening with a touch of sincerity. “Just like your mother.”
The comparison was absurd emotional blackmail. Lilith’s voice could command armies, soothe riots, even speed up healing and recovery time. And here was the love of her life equating her talent to her daughter’s dalliance in commercial voice work. Charlie had inherited her mother’s power to be mortifying, like making people cry if she got too emotional during karaoke.
“Yep,” Charlie muttered. “Just like Mom. Maybe I’ll make millions recording toothpaste commercials and leave you someday too.”
The bitterness hit her tongue before the words had fully left her mouth.
Too far.
She stared stubbornly out the window, unable to look at him anymore. The joke had worked, though. Lucifer did not speak for the rest of the ride.
VoxTek’s lobby could best be described as corporate overstimulation. The air smelled faintly of burnt coffee and overheated electronics. Demons and sinners of every imaginable shape hurried across the massive lobby while giant screens flooded the walls with looping advertisements played across every wall. Only the wall beside the elevator bay escaped the visual assault, interrupted by a small ground-floor café overflowing with people waiting to place an order.
The lone stationary figure in the chaos spotted them immediately and hurried forward clutching a cardboard drink tray. He was a thin shark demon in an expensive vest already darkening with nervous sweat.
“Your Highness!” He nearly spilled the drinks in his haste, tripping over himself as well.
“Welcome, welcome! We’re honored— deeply honored— to have you here at VoxTek. My name is Koray, I’m the producer that will be working with Princess Morningstar.”
Lucifer waved a dismissive hand. “Yes, yes, thank you.”
Charlie offered an awkward smile. She could at least manage to be polite.
“Hello, Corey. Looking forward to working with you.”
The shark demon stared at her like she’d personally blessed his bloodline. “It’s truly an honor. It’s not every day someone gets to work with royalty.”
He thrust the drink tray toward them.
“We took the liberty of researching your preferred orders as a demonstration of how VoxTek values its—”
Lucifer took a random drink from the carrier, nearly sending the entire tray sideways. The shark demon was barely able to save it as the King of Hell took a long deep sip of the beverage.
Once Koray regained his composure, Lucifer simply said, “Don’t make it weird,” and took another drink.
With that, the conversation effectively died. Koray pivoted immediately and began ushering them toward the elevator.
“Right this way!”
He did not bother offering a drink, content to function as a drink stand the whole trip down.
“We’ve got Studio B prepared! We weren’t entirely sure what equipment requirements Her Highness’s powers might involve, so we reinforced the booth walls and installed emotional dampeners—”
“You did what?” Charlie asked.
Koray waved a hand quickly. “Oh! Standard precautions! The last thing we need is another mass hysteria incident. It was all in your file.”
Lucifer coughed lightly into his fist.
Charlie turned toward him slowly. “I don’t remember a mass hysteria incident.”
“You were eight.”
“Dad.”
“You sang at a zoo opening.”
“Oh my god.”
“The goats became amorous.” Lucifer shrugged. “The point is, you have talent! Real talent! Hell responds to performance, Char-Char. Your mother understood that.”
The elevator doors opened with a soft ding. Charlie immediately stepped out before the conversation could continue. She wished he would stop bringing up Lilith like this. Her father only seemed to invoke her mother when he wanted something from her. It had been two years, and neither of them had even heard from her.
For one moment, Charlie wanted to lash out again. But the guilt from earlier still sat hot in her chest. So instead she only muttered, “Right.”
It was much quieter than the lobby upstairs. People did not linger in the long hallway. The walls were painted a muted dark red, broken up by black studio doors and platinum records mounted like trophies. Small circular windows offered flashes into the studios. There was an unmanned front desk with a be right back sign, but with the hands ripped off the little clock.
Before she could decide whether it was worth pointing out, Koray was already steering both her and her father down the right wing. Studio B sat at the end of the long hallway. A pair of imps wheeling an empty snack cart hurried out just as they approached while muffled shouting from the neighboring room erupted.
Koray swiped his keycard against the scanner beside the door. Then, with a soft click, the door opened. The studio lights hummed to life.
“This is actually our largest studio while still maintaining a very intimate recording environment.”
Once Charlie’s eyes adjusted to the low lighting, she had to admit the space was cozy. Near the entrance sat a worn leather couch beside an overstocked snack bar, arranged for the sort of casual group hangouts she’d never really had. Across from it, computer monitors flickered with graphs and soundwaves she couldn’t read. As Charlie moved closer to the control panel, she could see expensive microphones suspended from metal arms through the thick studio glass windows.
It was odd. She had always imagined just one microphone on a stand.
Charlie could feel her dad watching her as he hung back.
“I know this isn’t…” He paused awkwardly. “Exactly your dream job, but it’ll be good for you, kiddo. And if you hate it, feel free to quit! I’ll find you something else.”
Charlie didn’t necessarily disagree. She was an adult now, almost two hundred years old. It would be a way to earn her own money, separated from the Morningstar estate. Everyone in Hell’s demon royalty had a role to play. She would not shirk this responsibility like some people.
Though it was unlikely Charlie would ever truly rule Hell—she’d have to kill her father for that and, despite her lingering affection for him, it would be more trouble than it was worth—she still had to take on her role as princess. It would just be helpful if Hell had had a princess before so she’d have a pre-established path.
It had a queen once. No longer.
“It’s okay,” she said softly. “I want to try.”
The relief on Lucifer’s face came and went so quickly she almost missed it.
“That’s my girl!”
Before she could react, he crossed the room in a single stride and pressed a quick kiss against her forehead.
“I do unfortunately have a meeting in…” He checked his watch. “—six minutes involving something about ice.”
Charlie blinked. “Ice?”
“Melting ice? ICE the organization? Honestly, I stopped listening halfway through the briefing.” He was already halfway to the door. “Either way, gotta skoot my boot. You’re clearly in good hands with Courtney.”
“Corey.”
“I don’t think that’s right either.”
And just like that, he was gone. The heavy studio door clicked shut behind him.
Koray was already hovering nervously beside the control console, clearly trying not to let the lingering tension settle back over the room.
“So!” He fumbled with a stack of folders. “We actually prepared several potential demo tracks for today depending on your comfort level. Mostly commercial work—hot sauce sponsorships, nightlife branding, emotional ambience packages—”
“Emotional ambience packages?” Charlie asked.
“Oh! Mood-based audio branding. Restaurants, casinos, luxury torture lounges, that sort of thing. Your vocal resonance powers make you uniquely suited for subconscious emotional reinforcement.”
Charlie decided not to unpack any part of that sentence.
Instead, she drifted closer to the booth window. Beyond the thick studio glass, the recording booth waited in perfect stillness. It was much smaller, probably only able to comfortably accommodate three people. Soft recessed lighting glowed amber against dark acoustic paneling.
“Whenever you’re comfortable,” Koray said gently, gesturing toward the music stand waiting inside the booth. Studio headphones rested neatly beside a stack of paper. “Also, I still have your coffee—tea, I mean. Your father accidentally took the coffee instead of the hot chocolate meant for him.”
The door shut behind Charlie with a heavy thud. It wasn’t completely silent as she expected. The room still breathed softly around her. Ventilation hummed overhead. Electronics buzzed faintly through speakers. But compared to the sensory assault outside, the booth felt impossibly calm. Safe, almost.
“Not is fine too.” Koray’s voice crackled through the speakers at the corners of the room. “Right. Anyway, We can also disable the two-way mirror function if being observed makes you uncomfortable.”
Charlie immediately pointed at the window. “That. Yes. Please.”
The control room vanished behind a smooth dark reflection. Charlie blinked as her own face appeared staring back at her now, softened by the booth’s warm amber lighting. It was grounding somehow, despite how she felt she largely looked the same.
She inhaled deeply.
“…Okay,” she whispered to herself. A nervous grin spread across her face. “Commercial Princess of Hell. Totally normal career path.”
The microphones waited patiently above her.
She picked up the lyric sheet.
HAPPY HOT SAUCE — RADIO SPOT #12
Charlie snorted. “Well. Could be worse.” She slipped on the headphones.
Right. Okay. Simple.
She read over the lyrics and asked, “I’m guessing no improv.”
“If you wouldn’t mind, Princess.”
“And… the music?”
There was a pause before Koray responded. “We were told you would be providing that.”
“No… I mean I can.” Charlie laughed nervously. “I guess… we’ll see how this goes.”
Just sing.
Charlie traced the words with her fingers as she let her voice ring out.
“♪ When your tongue starts cryin’ and your dinner tastes deaaad… ♪”
The music bloomed. Soft piano notes appeared behind the melody despite there being no instrument in the room. Warm brass followed a heartbeat later, playful and bright.
“♪ Need a little fire put back in your heaaad? ♪
♪ A drop! A dash! A little happy heat! ♪
♪ Turn your misery to something sweet! ♪”
The music swelled with her confidence. It was overproduced, exactly the kind of thing that would get stuck in someone’s head for three days. But it worked. The whole booth seemed to vibrate with heat and color, her voice turning the cheap words into something warm, inviting, almost joyful.
“♪ So smile through the smoke and laugh through the paaain— ♪”
A trumpet burst triumphantly behind her.
For a moment, Charlie forgot to be embarrassed. She could feel Hell responding to her again the way it always had. She smiled. Not a polite smile. Not a princess smile. A real one.
By the time she reached the final note, the invisible brass section hit a triumphant sting and vanished as silently as they arrived. The booth settled back into its soft mechanical hum.
“…Okay,” she said under her breath. “That was kind of fun.”
There was no answer from Koray.
Charlie lowered the headphones slightly. “Koray?”
Still nothing. She frowned, taking off the headphones. “Did I break something?”
The mirrored glass snapped clear. Another tall man stood beside the producer, his expression unreadable. Koray looked like he was moments away from dissolving into nervous sweat entirely. The newcomer stood much closer than Charlie expected, one hand resting lightly against the edge of the massive control console
Charlie knew who he was, vaguely. Everyone did.
Vox.
One of Hell’s overlords. Media mogul and cult leader who entered Hell with a throng of souls.
“Well,” he drawled smoothly, voice humming through the speakers with a digitized distortion that Charlie couldn’t tell if it was natural or not, “that explains the choir of emotionally compromised interns outside.”