Helluva Time 10

Where: [s]Happy[/s] Hazbin Hotel, Pentagram City, Pride Ring, Hell

When: 215 days to next Purge

Who: Charlotte “Charlie” Mange

I hummed to myself as I made my way to the front doors as there’s a series of knocks. Opening the door, I smiled as I saw the antlered lupine features of Alastor’s nephew.

“Hi Jacques,” I greeted as I held the door open for the odd Sinner. I was surprised when Via’s Voxgram account showed that they’d started dating, not the least of which because she mentioned them meeting at Loo Loo Land in the Greed Ring. Maybe I’d be able to ask him about that today?

“Hello Miss Mange, thank you,” Jacques said as he walked in.

“Please, call me Charlie. Thanks for coming by! Oh, before I forget, how’s Octavia?”

“Very well. You politely asked and I do not dislike you, so why wouldn’t I? The last time I spoke to her she seemed well.”

I smiled at Jacques as I led him to one of the meeting rooms in the hotel. Vaggie was still sleeping off our last session, Angel Dust was at work, Alastor was… somewhere, Nifty was cleaning, and Husk was raiding the liquor cabinet that Alastor had recently stocked for him. So it was just me with him. I was so happy he agreed to come and talk! Trying to talk to Angel about his problems hadn’t worked, maybe Jacques would be more open?

Holding open the door for Jacques, I grabbed a notebook and a pencil before sitting across from him at the table. Opening to a fresh page, I looked up at Jacques as he sat down and laced his fingers together.

“How’s things been?” I asked, deciding to start simple. I could work up to the big questions later, better to get a groundwork first.

“Well enough. Our most recent job resulted in a bonus for the entire staff, while I received another bonus for my actions taken when my boss’s ex-girlfriend attempted to steal the company parking spot,” he answered, and I resisted the urge to frown. His job made getting him out of Hell and into Heaven a lot harder on himself.

“What actions were those?” I asked, deciding to hold off addressing the whole killing people means staying in Hell thing.

“That was the company parking spot. It is the sole parking space of I.M.P. Therefore, when my attempt at diplomatically addressing the issue failed, I forcefully relocated Miss Mayday’s conveyance into an appropriate trash receptacle and placed the company conveyance in its proper location.”

I blinked, “You put Verosika Mayday’s car in a dumpster?”

“Yes.”

How to say this without making him angry? “Jacques… you do realize that things like that are what get people sent down here in the first place, right?”

“Yes. Though as my committing multiple murders were what determined my post-life destination, I fail to see the reason for stating such.”

“You know the purpose of this hotel right? What I’m trying to do here?”

“I assumed this was a normal hotel and you are naturally a friendly and jovial individual.”

“No, well, I am, but I’m trying to rehabilitate Sinners, to have them redeem themselves and go to Heaven. If I can do that, then the annual Cleanse won’t be necessary and people won’t be dying en mass every year.”

Jacques blinked, “You are attempting to convince me to actively pursue redemption, so as to ascend to Heaven?”

“A bit more formal than I’d put it, but… yes?”

“Why would I desire that?”

“What do you mean? It’s Hell, the very definition of ‘bad place to be.’”

“Being assigned to Hell as my post-life destination was the best thing to happen to me.”

That made me pause, before looking at him in confusion, “What do you mean? From everything I’ve heard, Hell’s worse than Earth in pretty much every way, the only thing Sinners universally have better than humans is their durability.”

“For the first time, I have individuals I can call friends, a job that does not make me desire to eviscerate and decapitate my coworkers, family members that actively present an approximation of familial affection, and I am dating a beautiful, wonderful girl. In every aspect of my post-life, it is better than any point of my life. Despite what others may claim, Hell has been Heaven for me,” Jacques calmly stated. I… didn’t know how to respond to that. It went against everything I’d come to expect about Sinners thoughts on being in Hell.

“Additionally, the function of the Cleanse as being solely for population control makes little sense,” Jacques continued, snapping me out of my thoughts.

“What do you mean? Why doesn’t it make sense?” I asked. Why else would Heaven send the Exorcists to Hell every year?

“The purpose of Hell is to be a place of eternal suffering for those that did not meet the requirements to be admitted into Heaven upon death. Overpopulation would increase suffering. Ergo, by massacring a significant number of Sinners every year in a highly ineffective method Heaven is reducing the level of suffering in Hell, an act counterproductive to the stated purpose of Hell. Therefore, there needs to be some other reason.”

“You think Heaven’s lying about why they commit the Cleanse?” I asked, scribbling down what he’d just said in the notebook. This… if Jacques was right then this was a big deal!

“Inconclusive. Was Heaven the one to state that overpopulation was the reason for the Cleanse? I have found no conclusive evidence for or against Heaven being the one responsible for initially stating this fact. There is also the fact that despite claims that Hell is at capacity, more souls are assigned to Hell as their post-life destination each year than the previous, yet each Cleanse results in similar levels of deceased Pride Ring denizens.”

I blinked and looked down at my notes, trying to put together the pieces he’d laid before me. I’d have to check his data, but if he was right… something else was going on and the annual Cleanse was a cover for it. My forehead itched as I felt my horns under the surface, my anger surging at my subjects being slaughtered as a distraction.

I wracked my brain, trying to come up with a reason for the Cleanse, assuming their stated purpose wasn’t the actual one. The first thought I had was a technical truth, in that they were intended to curb the population of Hell. Not because of overpopulation, but to deny Hell potential soldiers for the Day of Revelation.

I’d have to talk to Dad. This… I don’t know if that was the reason, I only know that I don’t know enough, I need more information.

Where: Office of I.M.P., Imp City, Pride Ring, Hell

When: 215 days to next Purge

Who: Loona

I glanced up from my hellphone as Jacques returned, “Where’d ya go?”

“Miss Mange asked that I visit her hotel every so often. I learned that she has a very optimistic outlook despite growing up in Hell,” Jacques answered as he got himself a glass of water.

“Probably more sheltered than optimistic, first I heard about her was when she announced her hotel and got in a fight with Killjoy,” I said, turning back to my phone.

After a few minutes, Jacques spoke up again, “Where are the rest of the crew?”

“Blitzø got a booty call while the lovebirds went on a date at some performance over in Pentagram City. Knowing him, probably some sort of boring opera thing.”

“Thank you.”

Things were quiet for a bit, my browsing Voxgram, Jacques doing whatever, before I glanced up. Something I’d been wondering… “Hey Jacques?”

“Yes?”

“You don’t have to answer, but… how’d you end up with a lupine form? I get the antlers are from your family, what with your uncle being a deer demon, but where’d the wolf stuff come from?”

“It isn’t lupine, it is canine. I killed a few gang members who refused to modulate their vocal pitch, and in retaliation the gang had me kidnapped and stuck me in a ring with several of the dogs they used in fights.”

I winced in sympathy, that couldn’t have been pleasant, “So you died from being ripped apart by a bunch of dogs? Brutal.”

“The gangster that orchestrated my kidnapping and death boasted about not feeding the dogs for a week prior to leaving me with them. Though I am curious if my managing to kill a rather large daniff got her in trouble with her superiors.”

I winced again, before blinking, “Wait, what’s a daniff? I don’t think I’ve heard of those.”

“Single word descriptor of a mixed breed between mastiff and great dane. There were three in the group of dogs that killed me. After I killed the first, the gangster had all the fighting dogs sent in at once, at which point I was swiftly overwhelmed by numbers.”