#fizzerolli

"Oh you absolute FUCKER-..."

And the library was about to get rearranged but Lucifer paused when he realised the other was too deep in his sravtion cycle to even pose a threat. Which pissed Al off more but really, what can he do but hiss and spit?

And that's how it starts. Alastor doesn't really eat other foods, except for the chance to feel (briefly) 'full' despite it being about the same empty calories as a plate of fairyfloss. It's not helping but it can make his stomach shut up for a while.

It's intriguing the lengths the others will go to keep him fed despite it all, Alastor thinks as he's fed a strawberry milkshake with an odd edge to it. But perhaps it helps to some degree, because he does feel a little better...

And then there was a very heartfelt attempt (they were close but someone held back on the spices, one should NEVER hold back on the spices) on several meals he'd made in the past. Again, not actively nourishing, but... perhaps spiritually, as much as physical satiation for a moment. To let him concentrate on anything else.

The paperwork was diabolical, though. The letters and missives alone were dated even millennia back. How had this gone so violently, disgustingly wrong? Well, anyone could see the King was quite... detached and depressed, but really. He had entire courts of Goetia who got aroused by parchment, could he not have asked one of them to be secretary? Maybe a judicious office of hellborn?

Give them a chance to move up in the world and secure a better future for their families over the centuries. Even just sorting this into piles would have been some form of efficiency.

When Lucifer first showed him the ballroom sized piles of crumbling paper and ominously glowing objects, he'd been a bit put off... but he had poppets to help-... ah, of course. Not at this time.

It was only when he realised this was one of many rooms filled with the mess that he really felt the existential dread of hellish punishment. But his pride insisted he could do this.

His shade was good at categorising as well, they worked as two sets of hands with a mind fast enough to split between them. He paused to check in on the hotel, or when someone brought a meal, or simply to let himself die for a bit before getitng up (the palace staff were quite gracious about it, they often left a pillow under his head, a blanket over him to prevent chill and a bottle of water outside of reforming flail-reach, for when he returned to life).

It took a few weeks, but eventually, half the room was overturned into piles of paperwork with chronological order to them. He did read or skim most of it to decide if it was current, hstorical, worth putting in a quick report, or for the pile for the trash.

Imps often popped in for the piles when they got too large, and would take notes if he explained any updates for the king. Such as an intriguing odd series of accounts about Envy, and an outbreak of hynarian pox in Greed that seemed to be cyclical. Almost every 12 months on the dot, actually, around tax time... Mammon was really pulling the one with bells on, wasn't he?

Let Lucifer deal with the idiot.

Alastor justified this all to himself by seeing this not as creating order from chaos, but instead organising the chaos into piles of future misery, sowing future chaos, and being able to use words to topple sins. How the little king's face paled when he saw hidden missives from the Sins begging to meet Charlotte, all hidden away in different corners of the rroom and his heartbreak at realising this was deliberately done?

How fascinating to eavesdrop on Lucifer calling different sins and goetia to account for things in reports they thought long-since brushed under the rug... as he reminded them that he was eternal, and judgement could be just as long if they attempt to play these games.

How... oddly endearing to see him overturn a conviction against a hellborn falsely accused (and the evidence was Right There, Satan was just being a big bad tough cowboy swinging his genitalia about like he owned the place, ugh). Sometimes, though, centuries too late for the individual, but a pardon to the relatives was appreciated and lifted some of the social stigma of the censure from them all.

It was not Nice that the King was finally doing his job, but it felt less... stale in the ring, now. Like things were chugging back to life, no matter how the engine spluttered and fought back , bellowing smoke (or hellfire in the case of Satan during what Alastor liked to think of as his Little Tantrum the other day).

The damned lizard had dared to imply that Alastor and the report writers / appeal seekers / clerks of his own court were all falsifying records. It had taken a few moments of pure revulsion to tap about on the phone Charlie had insisted Alastor have (though he held it like one does a full vomit-bag) to find a video of the most recent court drama for proof. Against one of the princes, no less.

And that, of course... had been delicious drama.

He'd actively asked his shade, and the few poppets he could manifest now, to seek out more on this matter and found a few propositions and appeals and requests about the matter. Collating it and putting it before ucifer with a pointed missive about how he felt the whole thing was a joke, and that the guilty party had been rewarded... and a request to please let him at least try eating a goetia to see if that might help things.

In all truth, if he'd met an Andrelphus or Stella when he was alive, they'd be in his cooking pot so swiftly the self-righteous bastards wouldn't even have time to call their daddy to ask him to get a lawyer. Spoiled rich brats with no empathy always stepped on others... and to blatantly try to murder Prince Stolas for his power? Well, expected for Sinners but not Goetia. But to do so when the ffather was, for all Alastor could read into it, the only one showing any level of love and care to their child together... whom Stella seemed to see as a key to power?

Hmmm. He couldn't help but feel a sympathetic pang of resonance for this goetia princess, and see a trace of his mother in Stolas. Sentimental nonsense, of course, but... Stella and the peacock fellow seemed like all the worst traits of the people he'd murdered slapped into two overpowered bodies.

Lucifer, infuriatingly, had told him no. Then amended that he would love to see Alastor throw down with a Goetia and he might even be inclined to give him a boost just to watch the insufferable pair crumble (they'd been part of a group of Goetia just fawning over him since he'd come back to power in a flagrantly false attempt to covet favour and Lucifer apparently had the same distaste for it that Alastor did when newer sinners tried to cozy up for no-deal based protections)... but right now Al was more likely to throw up and die than anything.

Asked if maybe Al would like a sinner? What if they sauteed it or put it in chilli or whatever that spice was that made even him hiss in surprise the other night?

Alastor coldly turned it down and left. "I'm going to eat both of them... I rarely choose a female victim, so do let this shrieking harpy and his sister know how honoured they are."

He doesn't notice, as the first room clears to almost nothing but a few tables of paperwork, that he is getting more strawberry milk than usual. Meals are done when focused on different tasks and letters. It's easier than to try and fight himself.

Perhaps there's somehting in it, in the hearty stews and unusually sweet pastries he normally abhors, that is helping. Because suddenly he can conjure more poppets...

Perhaps they grew complacent, then, because it was working. As, one day as he was midway through a rather ludicrously long report [about one Goetia being entitled to land from another but their third cousin's sister's uncle's best gardener's fourth son's preschool teacher had broken an agreement with both parties and blurred a legal line. He'd read it eight times and the nature of the complaint only grew more bizarre as he read it... Alastor had started checking the damn thing for cyphers, just in case this was some other hidden meaning to this frivilous nonsense] he absently bites into a sandwich and is halfway through the next before the taste catches up.

...there's no denying it's not breef or chimkin or pyork or whatever the feesh situation is down here. That's sinner. Well-cooked, and fantastically seasoned but unmistakeable.

He would get the best from raw meat, but this... this also would be helping. He's suddenly aware of how well-spiced his meals have been, how carefully flavoured everything he was brought had been.

It wasn't the fault of the lovely little imps who ran the food back and forth, (he'd taken pains to learn their names because the idea of treating them as faceless entities appalled him... for various reasons, and not merely because his mother had been some faceless maid to be treated as the owners willed). This was planned.

He tips the milkshake over... now he thinks about it, it was an odd choice for every meal, no matter what was served. The liquid spilled across the table... and then a few gluggy strands of something red that was clearly NOT strawberry flavouring eeked out at the bottom.

Ah.

The cakes though? He'd seen no way to hide blood or bone or sinew or flesh in them? A thought occurred, like a lightning bolt. Surely not?

They had had caramel and buttermilk frosting, he didn't normally enjoy such things, but they'd tasted... too sweet. Much like the angelic delicacies from after the extermination... he was certain if he watched the kitchen he'd catch angel blood being slipped in a drop at a time. Rosie was behind that one, he's sure.

She'd sent him boxes of fingers, but he just didn't feel for it... and gave them to Niffty and Mimzy apiece. They couldn't go to waste.

Rosie'd even tried bringing him a still-trembling heart a while back, and that had done nothing but give him a headache as the revulsion and hunger started a war between them. She'd also offered it to Charlie, as a way to 'ensure a growing gal has the strength of her enemies to rely on' which had turned the princess the most charming shade of Green that it'd really lightened the mood.

She'd also offered him a piece of her flesh, which Angel had initially shouted something lewd about and 'eating her out right' until he recognised Rosie was rolling up a sleeve and offering Al her arm. Watching Angel look like he was ready to jump off the hotel roof had almost been distracting enough to help Al ignore the equally enticing and disquieting lure of Rosie's flesh.

It's not unusual for close friends, family and even lovers to share bits of flesh as a means of bonding, of helping one another regnerate, and the like. He'd lost more than a few little chunks here and there and once a whole arm to Rosie... and at least a finger to that damned Susan, but she was the kind of ornery bitch you wanted to keep around, if only to use as a shield during Exterminations. He desperately hoped to one day see her demand to speak to heaven's manager and bully her way through the gates. It would be DELIGHTFUL!

He'd turned it down.

Rosie had threatened to tell Vox, and you know the man would send him eight interns all sauteed, in a heartbeat. Despite their tiff... they were friends once. Also they wanted to kill each other, Vox was more likely to send his own arm over to avoid Alastor dropping dead to this pathetic fate of starvation, than anything.

Ah, Vox. This had the digital fingerprints of the boxy fool all over it. just the sort of thing he'd done when Alastor had been severely injured back in 1962 and refused to seek help, but the infected wound refused to heal or kill him. Vox had slipped medication into bowls of warm blood and pretended Alastor was just healing normally later on. They'd fought about it, naturally. But had Alastor not done the same later n slolwy reattuning a broken pathway for Vox, when the other was too stubborn to have it fixed by a professional?

A wave of comforting static and his own would be slowly repairing and nudging it into place until ,w ta dah! it worked miraculously one day. 'See, I knew it would heal...' Vox said, and realised what had happened. They fought then too.

How long had they been slipping bits of sinner in his meals?

It's not like he could die forever like this, it was a mere inconvenience of several days dead... but he could come back.

To ignore his choice and-... and it was so obvious that it was working, wasn't it? His poppets? The extended periods between death cycles? Being able to play the radio without a physical one close by... they must all be patting themselves on the back, at having pulled one over on the radio demon.

He was growing FURIOUS.

He was growing... period. It'd been nearly six months since he was last able to manifest his demonic form, and while it felt shaky and tenuous, it was as exhilarating as always. He broke a wall entering the hallway and was still surprised that he could stand upright in there, with only some antler scraping. Given how tiny Lucifer kept himself...

But then, he did used to entertain Sins in their intermediary forms, all towering power but not the full unfettered selves they could be. Of course they'd need the space.

He's not really thinking of anything but his rage and humiliation and indignation as he slams open the door to the throne room.

Lucifer pauses mid-conversation with a smug-looking Asmodeus and a furious but cowed looking Mammon. "Oh... well, I'd ask you not to get mad, but I'm assuming you aren't feeling like letting me explain."

"Did you think it was funny?" he snarls, the stitches pulled and even snapped in some locations as the form fought him. The little king, oh so squeaky-toyy like with their size differential, walked over to him, waving the sins away.

"I mean, I did... at first, but you know how important you are to Charlie... and it was killing her seeing you that way. All of them, for some reason, have an insane attachment to you despite the fact you're a-... I'm not listing off your resume, I know you consider those your good points."

Alastor croches, hands bracing himself so he can look the little King right in the eyes. "Then WHY?"

"Because they care, you fucking idiot, and seeing you die over and over again for something so stupid was ridiculous. You're lucky I didn't let the TV guy have his way, he wanted to try hypnotising you..."

"It doesn't work. It's never worked, same frequency..."

"Usually? Sure. Now? I stiff wind could have killed you. What would you have done if someone had demanded a battle? Just let Hunk and Nixxy go to whoever defeated you? You're an ass, and you definitely should apologise for the threat to the cat guy, yeah i saw that i have like a dozen eyes here deer-boy, but you don't seem to actually hurt them. Not like the moth guy you killed... not like some of those you killed before."

"So why not? Why set up ths charade of paperwork... just to trick me to eat?"

"Well, it was this, or one of three other options and you would have HATED them. Charlie was going to do intensive hug therapy everyday for two hours to build self esteem and positive-talk or mindfilled-mess or whatever it is you through the whole thing."

Alastor reared back in pure horror.

"Yeah, thought you'd say that. Option two was Vox... and option 3 was me letting Beezlebub up here to like, forcefeed you in her super peppy way, but I think you would have found angelic steel rather than that. And she's also... a hellhound sorta, and Hunk said you aren't a dog fan so..."

"You wanted to let a Sin force-feed me sinners?" Now he was just perplexed, especially if Charlotte was also involved in such a plan. That seemed like something she would sign off on. "And... I do not mind hellhounds, as long as they aren't sprung on me. However I stand by hurling the dog sinner out of the hotel, he was being vile to everyone..."

"The one that tried to hit on anything that moved and didn't like the word no? Yeah, I was going to make him play fetch with his own spinal column, you just got there first." Lucifer grmaced. He'd been hit on for centuries but... that was quite the experience. He normally loved dogs, but that one was (heh) barkin up the wrong tree with lines like that. And then he went to Char Char and Maggie to make a suggestion like THAT?!

"You didn't answer my question."

"Hunh? Wha-...? Oh, no. It's not funny to us, it's not a game... your little aversion and death cycle thing was freaking them out. You saw even Maggie-"

"Vaggie"

"Vaggie brought you sinner options, right? I thought she'd rather rip her wings off again than be part of that, but she volunteered. Because you might be an asshole, but you're the one they like around the hotel... and I don't think you're as annoying as you were when we first met. Although if you drop another piano on me, I 'm going to send you to Lust... wearing one of Angel's tiniest outfits."

The sheer horror that pulsed through Alastor at that moment...

"Hey, don't make it cound like that, Lulu! We're ALL about consent... people can wear what they want in my realm and it's hands-free baby." Asmodeus interjects, feeling his sin maligned. "No one would touch if you didn't want them to, but they sure might look..." he winks.

Those gargantuan ears flip back and forth in confusion.

Lucifer starts to laugh. "Oz, this guy would rather face an extermination solo than be in anything less than his suit in its entirety. It's exhausting... you know it's not the 30s anymore, right? You can show off an ankle without someone getting flustered..."

"I own several casual outfits, thank you very much, but I just don't think that anything Angel owns would be flattering on my form."

"They would." Okay, the king said that way too fast. "I mean, comparatively, you're about the same size and shape... I don't see why it wouldn't? Wanna test the theory? I got good at proportions when snapping clothes up for Lillith and Charlie..."

Radio static warbled and slipped into an emergency alert.

"Oh, and you mock the tv guy when you send him into a meltdown... but look at you, the idea of putting your wrists on display and you're the one buffering."

"You're stalling. Why are you stalling?" Alastor asks, feeling heavy and slightly dizzy. This conversation was not the confrontation he'd anticipated...

"Because in about ten seconds you're going to use up that burst of energy you got from the sinner meat and drop. Then, when you're less of a hazard to my ceilings, we'll talk."

Out of pure spite, he lasted eleven seconds, before the power dissipated, leaving him on his hands and knees, shaking. His ears pressed flat, hating to feel so vulnerable and defenceless right now.

Lucifer flopped to the floor next to him, wings haphazardly in all directions. "We don't have to fight, you know... I mean, we can when you're well, because it was fun to go head to head with someone who wasn't afraid of me... but, we're helping each other here. You've managed to work out nearly a millennia of paperwork in a few months and cleared out a whole ballroom through sheer bloodymindedness... and I'm keeping you as alive as I can."

"Wait, this is the administrative cu[clown honk] who got me dragged before you?" Mammon yelled, storming over and growing bigger.

Alastor sat back, glaring up at the sin. "Your own reckless stupidity brought you before Lucifer. You could have at least changed the times of the alleged outbreaks or fabricated a better ailment... it was like a child writing their own sick note and signing it 'My mum and dad' and expecting a teacher to believe it."

"Luce, who the fuck is this c[clown honk]? He's a spicy little bastard... with an attitude. No respect..."

"No deals between Pride and Greed, you know the rules." Lucifer sighed. One of his wings tried to block Alastor from view.

"Oi, I'm all about entertaining you know that, Luce... and he's the-... the radio guy right? I could make him bigger than that! You're cockblocking my progress!" Mammon whined. "Well, what about it? Working for Mammon gets you like, some sort of perks... not money, but something."

"At half my normal power I can reach radios, phones and any devices touching my airwaves in all the rings. The only boundary is not being able to push past the pentagram in the sky... much the same as the picture box. What could you possibly offer that I would care for?"

"Uh, fame?"

"Notoriety is more fun..."

"Bitches?"

"No thank you."

"A litle bit of money?"

"I own millions of souls, money has never been an issue for myself or for them."

"What? You PAY your employees? That's just bad business!"

"A well-paid and cared for soul is less likely to rebel, because then the money and the housing and the safety stops. You should try it... and not with that vile little mammon-coin nonsense you've been spouting. The hellborn may not know about scrip, but there are a lot of sinners who would go out of their way to ensure they learn, and rebel against you for such a heinous slight."

"Who the fuck do you think you are?"

"Alastor, the Radio Demon... displeasure to meet you, I'm sure. Do you always smell of fried chicken and flopsweat, or did you plan to impress us all with this cologne?"

Asmodeus flared brightly as he tried to hide his laughter.

"Alright, legend... let's fuckin' go! I'm gonna KILL YOU!" Mammon roared, and twisted into his gargantuan form.

"Oh, do go ahead... I've been doing it all week. What's one more regeneration?" Alastor sighed, rolling his eyes. "I'm not getting up, so do as you will..."

Lucifer was going to put a stop to this, but Mammon paused at the lack of reaction. "Er, hey... what the fuck mate? Trying to kill you here and you're not really living up to expectations."

"Well I'm certainly not going to start running around waving my hands in the air and shrieking, unlike you I do rather care for my dignity."

"Okay enough. Mam, we'll talk about the tax thing later... but you're also forbidden, by royal decree, to bother Ozzie's boyfriend or try anything. Including sending other people to try something. The little guy has been through enough."

"But he's my top earner!"

"Just do whatever with those twins from Envy, they're new and fresh and whatever right?"

"Eh, they're okay..." Mammon shrinks back to his normal size. "But don't you worry rudolph, I'll find something you want sooner or later and then you can run my ads throughout all the rings on your little talky show or whatever, get the oldies and the sinners all hot'n'bothered for me."

"Lucifer... if I said eating a sin would help, would you let me?"

There's a very long, loooooooooooooong pause of consideration.

"Hmmmmm, no..." Lucifer replied slowly, "I think he'd be a worse experience than the psychotropic moth was and we'd never get you to eat again..."

"Hmmm, shame."

"Okay, you keep the freaky fucker away from me, Luce. I'm outta here!" Mammon exploded into a loud array of confetti and circus sounds.

"Does he do that every time? Quite obnoxious."

"Says the guy who turns into shadows to escape anytime he doesn't want to deal with emotional nonsense..."

"Well of the two of us, you're the-... well I was going to say better emotionally equipped to parent Charlie's needs in that department, but then I remembered who I was speaking to."

He's immediately smacked with a wing, which nearly knocks him over, and Lucifer has to grab his shirt sleeve.

"Whoops. But how dare you! What're you going to teach her now? How to be a condescending prick to people who could kill you in a second and then how to bluff your way out of it? I already taught her you don't take shit from other demons."

"Yes, and that's why she walked right into the Moth's studio the first time and nearly got herself molested and Angel killed. Try tempering the information with the reality that you sheltered your little princess so intensively she has no concept of pain or suffering or how the world leads to the outcomes sinners have... that a song and dance won't make a lifelong addiction disappear because she wills it hard enough. The trust falls, on the other hand, will certainly get someone redeemed, I'm sure."

"Hey, you butted in and decided to be Dad part 2, you have to deal with that side of things. I'll do the hugging and other fun stuff... you be creepy weird uncle dad guy who eats threats to her, and reminds her how sinners work." Lucifer rolls his eyes. "Buuuuuuut, for that to happen, you gotta eat... and you know what... or should I say who... you gotta eat. If you want, I can transform them into other stuff until you get the taste for it back... or I can erase your memory of discovering our subterfuge. Let you work it out again later."

"You will do no such thing! It may avoid your notice, your lowness, but the very few things sinners can hopefully cont on are having a body they may own the rights to and having some of their memories intact." He snipes back, incensed. how could htis little fool say something like that?

"Whoa, there's a lot of tension here... you two need couples counselling? I've got some amazing-..." Asmodeus steps in, and startles the pair, who forgot he was there given Mammon being Mammon.

"...that would not be necessary, we are most certainly not together. I merely decided that Charlotte needed a better and more consistent father figure in her life and used that as a verbal knife in his side when the king swept into the hotel and sneered down his nose at us all. Metaphorically."

"I didn't sneer-..."

"You looked disgusted from the moment you walked inside, refused to acknowledge a single sinner, got everyone's name wrong and talked over Charlie to the point she was distraught. I could see you intended to be helpful, but you DECIDED what she needed instead of asking. And then you were rude to me, which earned you the piano."

"Oh? What would have happened if I told you to get the fuck out and made it a royal demand?"

"Then I would likel have asked Vox if he still intended me to join the Vees and started a multi-ring slander campaign that would have sent you scurrying back to your palace a broken creature, for centuries."

"You think I wouldn't just smite you all?" Lucifer didn't sound furious, he was coldly curious. There was an age behind those eyes that was fascinating and terrifying to behold; like if you looked at an antique doll and the eyes sparkled in a way that reminded you it had watched generations live and die and play with them. And it would outlast you too.

"Given how easy it was to bait you into a song battle with a few words about Charlotte, and how quickly you fell into despair at her disappointment... no. Safe to say we could watch an angelic panic attack within five seconds of a broadcast."

"You'd upset Charlotte."

"True... but if I apologised or pretended to, she'd believe it."

"Hey, fuck you."

"Poetry. Now are you going to cease this infuriating nonsense of hiding flash and blood and bone in my meals like im a dog that needs a pill hidden in bacon... or shall I simply have to stop eating again? The meals don't technically do anything but blot out the hunger for a time... it would just be inconvenient, because it hastens the death cycle."

"Oh for fucks-... no, you're going to eat even more sinner and whatever else we can put in there. This can't be how you want to spend eternity?"

"I have lived... or unlived... through exactly this on several occasions before. I can survive it, it's merely invconvenient."

"Bullshit, when?"

"Well, falling here I didn't have an instruction manual for whatever the hell I was and theey didn't exactly have wendigos on the curriculum at school... the little any of us were allowed to attend. Rosie explained the whole thing when we ran into each other hunting the same sinner... hah, that was quite the story. She loves to tell it when she's quite tipsy."

"Well that's one..."

"And after the battle, that one was more a nuisance though. Because I couldn't actually let myself die and regenerate when I had a chest of holy light, I wasn't certain how that would play out. But it's hard to hunt like that... Niffty did her best to bring bits of sinner corpses, but it's never quite the same as flesh."

"Well you could have just said something..."

"Absolutely not. It dissipated on its own eventually..."

"No, M-Vaggie just figured it out and went to Charlie, who went to me about it. Had to get Angel to dose you with something when you weren't looking and then I fixed it for you. You're welcome."

"I don't recall-..."

"You wouldn't. He put this patch on your skin, it's fast acting, and you were out in seconds. Wipes your memory, apparently... once I heard about it, I sent some people out to find where it was being made and distributed to have it removed from the Rings. That's dangerous to have for many reasons... excepting medical. Ozzie here is working on removing the last traces of Love Potiokn from shelves... I know you hate that one too."

"You realise admitting to hiding things in my meals, lying to me and drugging me to have your way against my consent is absolutely giving me cause to never return to the hotel, yes?"

Lucifer actually scrambled back with a horrified expression on his face. "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Don't put it like that! That's not-... I would never-... Charlotte and Vaggie were there the whole time... I didn't even really have to touch you to fix it... just pulled the light out. Don't say it like that-..."

"But I would never have consented to it, and you let a porn star slip me something unknown to enable it. Doesn't sound too good from the outside, does it?"

"Okay, look... sometimes the therapeutic approach requires you rebreak a bone so it sets right. Or that you have to drug someone before they die of Grace eating them alive, because they're stubborn as fuck."

"Not exactly making this more appealling. How do I know you won't simply do whatever you want or have the staff turn against me in such a manner to take revenge, in future? You've already proven completely untrustworthy."

"No, no stop that line of thought it's a spiral you don't want to go down. I know you overlord types are paranoid, but you don't want to go there. Besides, what other option do you have? Your original tower was annihilated in the battle... and you were away for like ages apparently?" There's a pause, "Actually, you've never said where you were."

"And I cannot. Suffice to say... it was a very long seven years, but it adequately prepared me for this very situation. So if you can leave me to either complete your paperwork without being harassed, or just let me leave altogether and forget this, it would be appreciated."

"And go where? Run off for seven years again? You'd devastate Charlie... and the flower lady? Maybe even the rude little flapper who brought the loan sharks to the hotel? Misery was it?"

"Mimzy. She has others she asks for aid from, I'm not special." Lucifer's words register, and Alastor fights the transformation desperate to rip free, because there simply isn't enough energy there for it. "Do you think... for one second... I CHOSE to GO ANYWHERE?! Maybe if you hadn't been such an ABSENT KING AND FATHER YOUR W-..." it chokes off.

The chain is tugged sharply... and the collar, humiliatingly, glows violently violet in the now too-silent room.

Lucifer seems shellshocked. "Is that...? Lily? Did you-... how did she-... where is she?"

"Up."

"No. She can't be."

"Yes... having been in contact with God's specialist boy... though I wonder how that works given he is deceased now."

"What does she have on you? What does she want?"

"Charlotte's safety..." he seems to roll the words around, trying to test for barriers and deciding the words were allowed. "Your abscence. The failure of-..." that cuts off.

"Failure of the hotel? Redemption? Char Char?"

Alastor half-nods. There's nuance there he can't provide.

"And what about if we took the fight to Heaven?"

"Not to raise arms against Heaven."

"Wait... is that why you refused to ake angelic steel to the roof with you? Charlie was very worried about that when she couldn't find you after the battle. Said she should've insisted."

"Perhaps."

"And you... you were with Lily? Up? For... the whole time you were away?"

"...yes."

"Why?"

"She refused to take no for an answer, a common trait of the morningstars, when I turned down her initial deal. She felt starvation and torture would change my mind. It didn't. But she did find a fmaily member in heaven and threaten them... which forced my hand."

Lucifer looked like he was going to be sick. "No... no she wouldn't do that."

"Uh, Lulu? Yeah she would. Something's been weird with her for the last four centuries, she went cold, man. Blocked us from seeing Char Char and locked off the rings. Told us you didn't want to see us anymore." Asmodeus added, reminding them all he was there. A small imp poked his head ou from amongst Ozzie's flames to peer at them. "This is my partner, Fizzarolli... he's very discrete, I promise."

"The one you're at war with Mammon over." Alastor stated idly, claws digging into the tiles to keep him upright. "I dislike the television and the little phone videos, but I did quite enjoy hearing you tell him to go fuck himself, my good man..."

"It was amazing, and terrifying, and I oved every moment of it!" Fizzy replied. "Its so surreal to meet you, though... Blitz and I used to listen to your programming all the time when we were younger. Before his dad sold the radio on us... tightwad. Really liked the screaming parts."

"Hmmm, I have them recorded somewhere on my staff, anyone in particular?"

"Er, I kind of liked how melodic the screams of that one Opera Overlord were. She used to come to our ring and do fucked experiments on the hellborn all the time... it was nice to hear her suffer."

"I'll cue it up when next I have my staff, for you and the rest of your ring."

"Later, when you've actually eaten sinner meat... Ozzie, stop giggling or I'll never get him to do it... and stopped dying."

"Oh psshaw, I'm fine enough."

"I had my like, limbs burnt off in a big fire at the circus once... took a while to learn how to live so fucked up and with these robo limbs. Fire used to freak me out, couldn't eat anything that'd been cooked... you ever tried to eat a raw thing of brockalli? Hard as a rock... well, I mean yeah, naturally, but its fine if you cook it." Fizzarolli started talking and couldn't stop the words. "And it took a while, but I came back around to food of the cooked variety... slowly. Got tricked too, little by little bit. Until I felt able to eat it... and then I met Ozzie, and I realised fire isn't all that bad. Look at me now!"

He kisses each of the three heads in the flames and not a single ember burned him.

"See, in compaison to that, you've got nothing to complain about." Lucifer said, gesturing.

Fizz looked startled, "Whoa your Majesty, I didn't mean it like that..."

"No he's right... it's not like he's the worst thing I ever ate, but the mixture of drugs, biochemistry and whatever in the seven rings he'd contracted all warring against my healing was a protracted nightmare I won't soon enjoy repeating. But it wasn't worth all this fuss... I know it's silly and I hate that I can't get over it."

"Well, being a baby over a case of Fuck Around and Find Out does that to a sinner..." Lucifer mumbles. He yelps as Alastor pulls on his wing. "Whoa, rude! Do you see me grabbing you by the tail? No... 'cause it'd hurt if someone started pulling at things fused to your body..."

A blurb of static exploded. "How do you know I have a tail? What else did you do when you had Angel drug me?"

"Whoa, no, no not that! We had to take your coat off and the concealment charm was damaged in the lining... I fixed that, by the way, you're welcome. No one did anything other than that and check the wound for infection. You want apinky promise on that one?"

Alastor settled slightly. "If that is all... I suppose I will need to accept the indignity of it all. It's hard enough to exist with Vox's little electornic eyes everywhere, without finding out the people of the hotel I have to guard might give him direct access to such things by taking photos or videos when I was compromised."

"The tv guy? Hunk said he was kind of a stalker."

"We were close friends, he wanted more and didn't like my disinterest in the matter... he tried to kill me several times over it, in fact. Shockingly, that also didn't bring the interest he craved surging forth. So he settles for watching my every move. I can distort myself to cameras, but it takes thought when my abilities are low."

"Why not just kill him?"

"...thought about it. He was a friend, and occasionally I see that in there still... also sentimental garbage. What's the odd betrayal amongst friends and family in hell, after all?" He laughed.

"Well... that sucks. Would you consider eating something proper if only to make sure you can keep yourself blurred to his electronic eyes?"

"When you put it like that... I can try."

"Then we work out how to stop whatever Lily's planning because I don't like that. But... if you do feel like going back to eating sinners and not just giving my staff a heartattack each time they find you dead, would you still consider finishing the paperwork? I don't even know where to start in the next room and you've cleared one in under a year."

"If you give me just enough power to match the icy bird and his heinously mannered sister... I do so want to devour them."

"Paimon might be pissed about it but... yeah, I'm willing to consider it. When you're well."

"Alright, I will go finish up in the primary mailroom or whatever you were calling that mess..."

"Nah, I mean you've used all your energy for today, you can just chill and take a nap or something."

"And ruminate on hunger unitl I die? I've been there and done that for years at a time, your shortness, not a fan. It's worth the distraction."

"I don't think so." Lucifer reaches out with a wing and drags the startled sinner over, latching onto a forearm with one hand before he could shadow out. At this rate he might fragment across pride, and that's not something anyone wants to do...

He deftly bats aside the claswed hand coming for his face, and presses a glowing hand to the sinner's forehead. "Sleep"

Alastor crumples into his lap, and Lucifer looks very old in that moment. Hovering a glowing hand over the other, letting little trickles of healing flesh out some bits lost to starvation, to give them more time to work on it.

The shade snarls at him from the floor, but winds about Alastor's form like a protective blanket.

There's nothing he can do when the issue is deep in the mind like this, that's why Belphagor was the best option here but Al wouldn't allow it. Soem psychoses he could help with, like breaking through delusions or hallucinations or using angelic light sparingly to guide someone back from a full panic attack.

This though...

"Lulu, baby, you just promised not to do exactly that again... I don't think he's ever going to trust you or that hotel of Char's after this."

"Well he'll be alive and healthy enough to spit in my face, I guess." He sighs, deflating. "This is so fucked, Ozzie... Charlie's dream led to war with Heaven, this guy nearly died fighting Adam and his weird little not-daughter stabbed the guy to death. This idiot does something nice for once in his afterlife murdering this rapist moth overlord to free someone else... well, all of them actually... and then gets a cripplng aversion to flesh, which keeps him alive. And now I find out he's trapped in it all becaus eof Lily... who has been in heaven for who knows how long. What is this? What am I meant to do with any of this?"

"That's a lot. Sounds like you're frustrated that you're beginning to care about Charlie's rag-tag group of sinners and suddenly it hurts that you were forced to agree to the Exterminations. Because now your heart is thawing you're wondering... how many sinners that were killed could be as weird and multifaceted as these sinners I know? Am I right?"

"Like a slap to the face."

"Good. Like the way your Overlord friend has been breaking down the ballroom, we're going to approach this mess the same way. Methodically, piece by piece. Work out what needs to go where, and make plans. It will be okay, Lulu. You have Charlie and all of us, and some of the sinners are on your side too I hear."

"...true. It's just... they look to me for answers and I am so very, very old Ozzie, and I don't have them at all."

"No, YOU expect you to have all the answers. The rest of us are just as flawed as you and your sharp-toothed pal there, its the imperfections that make us real. Just let go of that expectation, and we'll make it through."

"I suppose I could try. Now are you gonna help me get this gangly fucker off me or just stand there trying not to laugh as your king is stabbed to death by sharp boned sinners?"

"Now who's being the big baby?"

"Shut up, and stop saying we're friends. I wanted to smite him the first time we met and the desire grows every single damn day he opens his smug mouth. He thought he could swoop in and take my daughter... the AUDACITY!"

"Well you are coparenting well enough from what I heard..." Fizzy interjected, and got a glare from The Devil Himself. "Hey, I call em like I see em..."

Asmodeus took Alastor into one giant hand, and grabbed up Lucifer in the other. Much in the same way a mother cat would scruff her kitten. Lucifer wriggled and hissed much in the same way.

"Hey, I'm your King!"

"And you're adorable... now, show me where this guy sleeps, and then you can come chill with me and Fizzy-frog here in your room 'til you also fall asleep. I think everyone would benefit from nap time..."

"We're millennia old, nap time is for infants..."

"No, Bel was just saying that an overworked mind and bpdy need additional rest periods to avoid burnout. Let's try it, okay? We can even snuggle if you want..."

"What?"

"Don't you like making a nest and then snuggling? You ued to."

"Yeah but... I mean, I don't actually have to sleep, so I've just been ignoring that. Oh, this door... gave him the guest room closest to the ballroom-mailroom-nightmare admin place. Just drop him on the bed, I'll ask one of the hellborn to check if he's died later..."

Fizzzy wriggled down Ozzy to pull the sheets back as the Sin slipped Alastor onto the bed, and then pulled them back up. "Is he alright like that? the bowtie snd suspenders and shoes?"

"Hmmm? Oh, I think he won't mind if I snap them off while he's under the covers and his virtue is intact or whatever..." It took less than a half second's thought, and the items including the coat were tucked away neatly.

Ozzie grinned. "And you said he isn't a friend..."

"He isn't. He acts like we're divorced dads seeking custody of our adult daughter, and I have no idea how to handle it without getting pissed off every five minutes. I'd kiss him just to see if that's what he's angling for, because it wouldn't be the first time a sinner tried to climb the ranks by trying to climb me before, but I think he'd claw his face off in horror. I don't think he's interested in any of that. And like I said, I'm all about consent... except for emergency healing. That's different and I stand by it."

Ozzie narrowed his eyes at the deer, and his aura changed colours to a rather recognisable flag for a split-second, then faded back to blue. "You're right, he's not interested... but he definitely cares for Charlotte. I might be the muted form of love, but I can still taste the different flavours from sinners and hellborn when I really focus. So don't worry on that account, its genuine... I just don't think he realises how strong it is... that's either going to be hilarious or heartbreaking when he figures this out."

Lucifer frowns. "Huh."

"Alright, show us to your room... you got a nest ready to go or you wanna build one with us?"

The door shuts to Alastor's room as the king starts frantically teleporting the piles of rubber ducks from his room whilst engaging in pleasant conversation. Can't let them see the mental illness. Must hide the ducks. Remain calm.

------

Unfortunately for Alastor, when he next wakes, he finds that he's about two feet below a veritable sea of the bloody things. And his furious shout shakes the nestled, nested trio of Asmodeus, Lucifer and Fizzerolli awake halfway across the palace.

Lucifer frog blinks, and realises. His grin could rival Alastor's in that moment. "Oh yeah... oops."

"Not friends, my voluptuous ass..." Ozzie murmurs and turns over. "You go fight, I want five more minutes. Wait, where's Fizzy gone?"

The answer, of course, was riding on Alastor's gargantuan shoulder as he crashed through the wall seeking vengeance.

"Oh for fucks-... I JUST gave you that energy and you're using it for a tanrtum, AND you fucked my wall. Can you just settle down?"

Fizzy swung off an antler, seemingly not bothering the overlord at all. "Burger time. Burger time. Burger time!"

"For breakfast? I mean... I've had weirder... " Lucifer concedes and magics some up. "Bambi... catch!"

The sight several hellborn staff came upon later that day was truly fascinating, and very hard to explain. But at least the King had managed to get Mr Radio Demon to eat someone... if only there weren't so many burger pieces strewn about the carpeted floor.

That was going to be a bugger to clean.

And then, the Devil sent an angel unto them...