Results of last blog post's poll seem to indicate a preference for Sunday updates, so Sunday updates, it is! This will be the last update going live on a Monday before making that switch. So ... see you back here in 6 days for chapter seven!
I've finally created an actual landing page for this story (you can find that here). It includes the full list of chapter titles as well as a little summary. I may (especially if this is requested) add a list of triggers/tropes.
There are no drawings in this update, either. As an apology, you can watch me draw Alastor! Magnifying glass may be required. Or, y'know... a monocle. 🧐
If you saw the drawing video I posted on Reddit, this is the same drawing but with better editing and captions. And yes, with the same disclaimer that I stand by.
Recommended Listening
Now that Alastor had challenged Grace about her avoidance, she couldn’t evade him any longer—not as long as she didn’t want to prove him right, which of course she didn’t.
Thus far, creepiness factor aside, Grace had not witnessed anything firsthand to align with the stories everyone told of him. He seemed all bark and no bite, inflated ego and nothing to support it. Unquestionably, he was cunning. Obviously up to something. But until he made his move, he was nothing more than an antiquated blowhard.
And that brought Grace an odd comfort since she had ample experience with men just like him; he was nothing remarkable.
Weeks went by.
During that stretch of time, she hung out at the hotel frequently with Cherri, Angel Dust, and Kofax. They spent enough time together that she even added their numbers to her phone contacts.
Kofax was especially chatty through text, which seemed in keeping with her character. She was never without some form of technology—her cell, a tablet, laptop, e-reader, extremely smart watch, bluetooth headphones, augmented reality glasses. If it had some technological component, Kofax used it.
And whenever Alastor was present, Grace worked on building her endurance of being in his presence. So far, he did nothing to follow up on that “arrangement” of which he’d previously threatened they could reach.
Although she pried—when she was brave enough—Alastor revealed nothing of his past. Nothing personal about himself. For that matter, he said nothing about anyone else.
Getting any information directly from him was akin to talking to a brick wall. A brick wall who, at times, could actually be quite funny when the mood struck him.
All she really had to go off about the Radio Demon was the hearsay from some bitch named Mimzy.
The day Grace gave up on figuring Alastor out was the day he sat down at the bar beside her and greeted her with, “If I were to ask you a favor, would you do it?”
All this time, he’d been biding his time. Grace looked around in desperation; nobody else was nearby. Husk, wherever he was, was decidedly not at his post at the bar for once.
Alastor cocked his head to the side in her silence. “Grace, my dear?”
She bristled but answered, “Like what? And probably more importantly—” Her eyes narrowed on his. “Why?”
Alastor dropped her gaze and at that, she damn near toppled out of her seat.
He dropped my gaze. I won? I won!
No. No this can’t be as good as I think it is. That was way too easy.
“Everyone always uses me.” He slid the empty glass someone had left on the bar toward himself and toyed with it, running a red-tipped talon along its rim.
Grace was oddly captivated by the gesture but said nothing; his admission was bait and she knew it.
She couldn’t tear her gaze from that talon slowly, methodically tracing the glass rim.
“Everyone thought I'd died protecting the hotel during the last extermination and yet did nothing in my memory when rebuilding it.”
Grace frowned but remained silent. There was a punchline here. There had to be.
“Sir Pentious died and got his painting on the wall.” Alastor pivoted in his seat and gestured to the massive oil painting overlooking the common area. “Dazzle died and they put a statue of him out front.”
These things were true—at least the painting and the statue did, indeed, exist. Whether the rest of what Alastor said was true remained to be seen. But Grace was well aware she shouldn’t trust him any further than she could throw him.
“Me?” He went back to tracing the rim of the empty glass with one of his claws, the radio filter off his voice. “Nothing. I just thought …” Alastor shrugged. “It would be nice if, just for once, someone did something for me.”
What an absolute load of bullshit. An actor, Alastor was not. But Grace had a weakness: curiosity. “What?” she finally asked through clenched teeth.
The filter back on, Alastor told her, “I need someone to see what Vox has been up to.”
There it is: the ‘long con.’ The reason for ‘the lure.’ He dragged me here to be his fucking spy.
Seriously? That seems like an awful lot of effort for such little reward.
Grace pursed her lips before replying, “You think he won't realize I'm spying for you?” She didn’t know much of the VoxTek CEO but imagined one did not gain such influence being foolish.
Alastor’s perpetual grin turned wicked. “That, sweetheart, is why you're not going to see him.”
Vee Tower was a soaring, round edifice encrusted with gaudy, pink-tinted windows on each floor, a VoxTek satellite dish perched atop the building like a jaunty, high-tech hat.
Red, glowing lights surrounded the top floor along with a symbol that resembled 3 Vs. Although Grace had never made it her business to meddle in such things, she could guess—judging by colors and prominence—that the left V represented Valentino, the middle and largest V, Vox, and the right V, Velvette.
It was nothing more than branding but Grace thought it smacked of ego, likely undeserved.
But who here in Hell didn’t possess an undeserved ego? Probably Alastor was the worst of them.
Why am I doing this again? She felt like she hadn’t been in full possession of her faculties when she’d agreed to this fool’s errand. In retrospect, she couldn’t find any sense in consenting to go along with this insanity. How did he convince me? She could barely recall the conversation to begin with and it had only been a few days past.
Grace entered the building against her better judgment; the inside of the first floor lobby made her think this was the ridiculous counterpart to the Hazbin Hotel’s opulence.
The main lobby hallways had various advertisements for all of the Vees. Velvette’s fashion shows. Valentino’s pornos. Vox, Vox, and if that wasn’t enough, even more Vox.
She noticed cameras all over; there wasn’t anything not closely monitored here.
BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, she thought unironically with a small shudder. It was eerie how closely George Orwell had described actual Hell without experiencing it, firsthand.
this was the party’s headquarters.
the two aims of the vees are to conquer hell and to extinguish once and for all the possibility of independent thought.
Vox is infallible and all-powerful. you must love Vox. it is not enough to obey him: you must love him.
The parallels Grace thought between the Vees and 1984 made her shudder.
But on the bright side, she remembered all that from 9th grade literature class. On the less bright side, she wished she could forget it; moreover that she was not experiencing something eerily reminiscent of it.
“Hello! I’m Kitty. May I be of assistance?” A robot demon dressed like a jester greeted Grace.
Her pale blue arms glowed, likely with some amount of neon. Dark eyelashes jutted out above her red eyes and she sported long, black heeled boots over asymmetric tights; her left leg had red with black stripes and the right was pink with red stripes. Whatever job this robot had, she was every bit as excessive as the rest of Vee Tower.
Do this, Grace goaded herself. Get it over with. The sooner you start, the sooner it ends.
It will end.
She didn’t mean to panic herself but it was a bit late for that.
“I’m here to see Velvette.” Despite how much she’d rehearsed it, Grace asked rather than said, “I’d like to apply for a job?”
Kitty nodded, flashing her a wide, blue, fanged grin. “Name?”
Around a hard swallow, she replied, “Grace. Bedgood.” And, once again in recent months, instantly regretted giving her real name.
Kitty placed a brief call on the front desk’s phone.
Either Grace’s ears were ringing, or she could actually hear the electrical buzzing from all the surveillance equipment surrounding her. It was absolute sensory overload. She hadn’t heard Kitty’s side of the conversation but Kitty hung up and said, simply, “Follow.”
She wordlessly escorted Grace to the elevators. When the door slid open on an upper floor—Grace didn’t have the equanimity to see what button Kitty had pushed when they walked in—it revealed a dark blue room with floor-to-ceiling glass walls.
This conference room was surrounded by a shark tank with giant, cybernetic predatory fish swimming around on the other side of the glass. At the center of the room was a long table with several black office chairs flanking its sides, and a bigger dark blue chair at the head.
Monsteras with demonic eyes populated the corners of the room. Probably those eyes were nothing more than cameras; Grace couldn’t decide if that was more or less unnerving than thinking they were actual, seeing eyes. That these plants were somehow sentient. In that case, what awfulness had they been silent witness to?
“Velvette will be right with you, Miss Bedgood.” With a slight bow, Kitty excused herself back into the elevator.
Grace cringed at how Kitty addressed her.
Still, anything is better than Little Fawn. At the mere thought of it, her cheeks heated up. Fucking Alastor.
Attempting to redirect her thoughts, Grace looked around the conference room, contemplating whether she should sit, and if so, where?
Wouldn’t it be funny if I sat in what’s obviously Vox’s seat? she thought, eyeing that bigger, dark blue chair at the head of the conference table. She bit her lip to avoid smiling.
Rather than following through on that intrusive thought, she lapped the conference room, keeping pace with one of the cybernetic hammerheads as it leisurely swam a circuit.
After several laps, the elevator to the conference room slid open and in swept an imposingly tall sinner; he must have had a good four or maybe even five feet on Grace’s height.
Oh, fuck. Too tall. Too tall! Grace had always had a weird phobia of the extremely tall, which was maybe why she preferred her men to be her height or less. This one’s stature was well into her triggering range; she took several giant steps backward while taking him in.
He was a slender yet broad-shouldered moth demon whose skin was similar in color to Grace’s. Behind heart-shaped sunglasses, his pupil-less pink eyes appraised her from toes to horns. His face split into a grin revealing sharp teeth with one golden canine.
“Preciosa bombón,” he greeted her with a voice that positively oozed sex. “What a delightful little surprise I’ve found myself!”
She retreated another tiny step, and judging by his chuckle, he noticed.
The monstrous moth dressed like an androgynous pimp: a red top hat with a wide, asymmetrical zebra-printed band. Beneath a red velvet coat trimmed with zebra-print fur, he had on a chest-exposing dark grey shirt. The whole procurer ensemble pulled together with a gold, heart-shaped belt buckle at his waist.
He approached with arm outstretched. “And who might this delightful little beauty be?”
At the rate this little salsa of theirs was going, Grace was dangerously close to having nowhere left to flee. “I’m here to see V-Velvette,” she whispered, curling her hands into fists.
“And do you have a name to go along with that kinky little stutter of yours?”
Grace spat, “Not that you can have!” Finally she learned to keep it to herself. Unfortunately, he’d literally cornered her in the Vee Tower conference room.
“Forget Velvette,” he said with a lascivious smile. “Come work for me.”
“You must be Valentino,” Grace said, craning her neck to meet his gaze as if asserting the dominance she most certainly lacked.
He plucked her left fist from her side, swiping his long cerise tongue along her forearm and leaving an impressive trail of red drool glistening on it. “My reputation always precedes me.”
Grace’s stomach lurched.
He inhaled deeply, eyes widening and then narrowing on her as he exhaled a single, hard huff.
Oh, did Grace dislike that look he was giving her. Nothing good came from looks like that.
And just like that, his smarmy smile returned. “Mi chiquitita!” he crooned. “You could be the next Tiffany Titfucker.”
“—who?” She didn’t recognize the name but it didn’t take a stretch of the imagination to know what Tiffany did or what Valentino was implying for Grace.
He replied with a throaty laugh. “You’re built for sex with a body like that.”
Arguably everyone with a body was built for sex but now wasn’t the time nor the place to say such things. Good girl. Don’t engage. You’re here for Velvette.
“Star in my movies. I’ll take good care of you.”
Something in the way he said that made Grace think Valentino would do anything but.
“You’ll never want for anything again.”
No. No! Finally, she could articulate it aloud: “No!”
Valentino’s appraising gaze focused on Grace’s body as if she hadn’t just declined his offer. “What a waist!” His expression then soured. “What a waste.”
Although he finally backed away, Grace continued to hold her breath. She’d probably never actually breathe again.
“My offer stands should you come to your senses.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t!” It took every ounce of willpower not to smack herself in the forehead. “Now for the last time,” she snapped, as frustrated with Valentino as she was with herself, “I’m here to see Velvette!”
Valentino scowled as he swept away and stalked to the elevator. “Then maybe you shouldn’t have come here reeking of venison.”
Grace had no clue what he was talking about; she’d showered just before she left the hotel and knew she smelled quite pleasant, in fact. Fucking lunatic.
Once Valentino left the conference room, Grace collapsed into the nearest chair, struggling to catch her breath. Everything in Hell was so damn exhausting. Maybe she would have been better off allowing herself to succumb to her Angelic Steel wound.
Time past. How long Grace waited, she had no clue. There were no clocks in this nightmarish conference room, nor did she wear a watch on her wrist. She’d left her phone at the hotel in what was quite possibly the stupidest decision she’d made recently.
She started spinning herself in the chair, using the toe of her right shoe to push against the floor.
Her back was to the elevator when it dinged again and the door slid open.
“You’re in my chair.”
Grace’s blood froze and she stomped her foot down to stop the chair from making another rotation.
She didn’t need to turn to know who’d just entered the conference room, nor did she need to look down to realize she’d inadvertently chosen the big, dark blue chair in which to collapse.
After a moment, she forced herself to spin the rest of the way around and meet Vox’s gaze. Yet, shockingly enough, Grace felt no need to apologize. She hadn’t asked to be sat in this room and forced to wait for someone who still hadn’t deigned to bless Grace with her presence. Someone who maybe never would.
Despite everything, Vox’s face literally lit up at the sight of her. “Grace Bedgood! How very expected.”
Ohhhhh, shit.
She made to stand but Vox motioned for her to remain sitting. “There’s no need to get up on my account.”
Grace frowned; his demeanor confused her more than Alastor’s did. “What do you mean ‘how very expected?’”
Vox tucked his arms behind his back and casually strolled over to her. “I knew after our chance encounter in the streets outside the Porn District that it was only a matter of time before you’d find your way back to me.” He paused just in front of her, leaning his thigh against the edge of the conference room table. “Though I admit, it took you longer than I thought it might.”
Chance encounter, my ass. “I’m here to see Velvette.” She felt like a playlist stuck on repeat.
“She knows you’re here,” Vox assured Grace. “I figured you might like some company while you wait.”
I would rather slit my wrist. There was something about Vox that brought to mind Joe Isuzu. Kenneth Copeland. Annie Wilkes. Gary Busey. Christian Grey. Her high school band instructor who loved watching the color guard girls practice in their skimpy little outfits at the height of the sweltering Southern California summers.
You flat-faced slime bucket.
“You’re wasting your time on me. I have nothing you want.” And once more, for good measure, she asserted, “I’m here for Velvette.”
“Hmm. I didn’t take you for a lesbian. But I suppose … what woman in Hell isn’t?”
Grace didn’t bother dignifying that assumption with a remark—confirmation or otherwise. Her sexual orientation was of no consequence to anyone here.
“And you’re wrong, Grace. You do have something Valentino and I are both quite interested in.” Vox swung out the nearest empty seat and lowered himself into it.
“If you think I have anything of value to anybody, you’re delusional!”
His left cyan pupil snapped into an attenuator symbol, the rest of his sclera a moving spiral of red and black. He held her gaze against her will. “What did you do when your throat was slit with an Angelic Steel knife?”
The words came out without resistance: “I healed myself.”
“And what did you do to that other sinner you found in the street who’d been stabbed by the same Angelic Steel knife?”
Again, she replied without hesitation, “I healed him.”
“Do you know what a rare talent you have?”
“No. I don’t have any discernible talents worth anybody’s interest.”
“Hmm. You really do believe that, don't you? Sad.” Vox was silent a few moments before he continued, “You came here from the Hazbin Hotel, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Did the Radio Demon survive the last extermination?”
“Yes.”
“And he sent you here, didn’t he?” Vox scowled.
“Yes. To seek employment with Velvette. I want to be one of her models.”
Vox tilted his head, his left eye continuing its spiral while he studied her. He leaned forward with a grin, pulling a switchblade from his pocket and flicking it open. His left eye returned to normal.
She sat back with a start, her heart then skipping beats at the sight of the blade in his hands. Grace recognized that metal.
And now Vox knew Alastor had sent her here.
“You want to work for the Vees?”
She struggled to swallow before answering, “Please.”
“Then prove your loyalty to us.” He pressed the handle of the switchblade into Grace’s palm.
Panic welled in her chest. Oh, no. Oh, shit! He wants me to go kill Alastor? I couldn’t—I can’t! The thought of following such orders caused her airway to constrict. She fought a losing battle against the tears spilling down her cheeks.
What the fuck? Stop crying!
It’s not like I give a damn about that asshole.
In fact, if I could spear him through the heart with this thing, my afterlife would be immeasurably more pleasant.
So why was this making her feel like she’d been stabbed in her heart all over again?
“Oh, come now, there’s no reason for the theatrics.” Vox chuckled wickedly, gesturing to her tear-stained cheeks. “You know better than I do that you recover from Angelic Steel wounds. This will be a piece of cake for you!” He drew a single cyan talon down the length of the inside of her left arm—from the crook of her elbow to her wrist. “And I want you to do this one little thing for me before I send Velvette in.”
Stay sane, deer friends!
Vox is the worst