GIANT, HUMONGOUS, GARGANTUAN SPOILER ALERT. IF YOU READ ANY FURTHER AND HAVE NOT PLAYED THE SECOND AND THIRD GAMES, IT IS TOTALLY AND COMPLETELY NOT. MY. FAULT. OKAY? I'LL GIVE YOU A LITTLE TIME TO READ THIS WARNING AND MAKE A PERSONAL JUDGEMENT ON WHETHER OR NOT YOU'D LIKE TO READ FURTHER.

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s p o i l e r j u d g e m e n t t i m e

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OKAY. NOW, FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVE PLAYED THE SECOND AND THIRD GAMES, CONTINUE ON TO THE BASIC FANFICTION INFO-Y STUFF.

THAT IS ALL. (caps-lock is now off.)

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Still.
Pairing: Matt Engarde/Dahlia Hawthorne. (what? they're both freaking crazy evil. They're perfect for each other.)
Spoilers: Yes. If the display above wasn't enough for you, YES THERE ARE SPOILERS.
Rating: Rated T. Swearing and psychopaths.

A/N: Short little drabble-esque thing. It was the other tale floating around in my head around the same time as "Any Colour You Like" and I had some free time so I figured I'd sweep it on out and whatever. It's actually the last idea I really have, so if anyone's got anything they'd like to throw at me for inspiration, that'd be great.

He wasn't sentenced to Hell directly after dying. This wasn't an excruciatingly satirical game of Monopoly, where God says, "Go directly to Hades, do not pass Go, do not collect perpetual bliss."

It turns out, you have to sit around a while first, really think about the sins you've committed and the things you've done, like it's some sort of last-ditch chance to feel sorry about it and maybe, just maybe, not get thrown into the fiery pits of eternal damnation.

Or maybe it was just the beginning, like the Fates or Powers or whatever the ones who ran the universe were called, like they were trying to make a person sit around and feel guilty… as if they wanted the guilt to eat away at wrong-doers, slowly, painfully, until they're finally in a Hell of their own making, inside their own head and completely unable to escape.

If that was the case, he was completely in the clear both ways because, frankly, he just didn't give a damn. He was a sociopath, after all. It was his nature to Just Not Give a Damn.

Anyways, the Purgatory place wasn't so bad, if a little grey. There were people milling about, quite a few of them doing the whole guilt-trip thing and going batshit crazy at random moments, and there was a pretty-looking park with park benches along the side that he couldn't go anywhere near without having the strong desire to turn back away. He figured that the park was a guise for Heaven, in which case that would mean the Starbucks across from it was a guise for Hell… When he really thought about it, his theory was perfectly understandable.

And then there was the girl.

She had long, flowing orange-auburn hair and the most angelic look, completely innocent and lovely upon the first glance, but once a person were to swing their oculars over for a second look they could see that there was something else lurking under that Disney Princess appearance.

Her eyes were cold and calculating, with a spark of suppressed hatred glittering inside them... But they were also the most fantastic shade of silver-blue, like the sky on a stormy day or… Alright, he'd never been much for poetry, but they were quite poetic.

When he walked up to her, saw her up close for the first time, he nearly fell over. Her skin was flawless, her hair was perfectly braided with not a strand out of place, and her eyes, those wonderful eyes, were still ice-cold and burning hot simultaneously. When they turned on him they dazzled with an untrusting, menacing glare that, despite their severity, did nothing to hinder the beauty of her features.

Hell, he'd admit it. She was almost as pretty as he was.

"I'm Matt. Matt Engarde," he said, because back in Life it'd usually been enough to make the girls swoon, even the holier-than-thou drop-dead gorgeous ones.

She smirked cheekily and fluttered her lashes, a perfectly charming, perfectly deceptive little snake of a girl ready to hypnotize her prey and squeeze every last breath from its lungs.

Good thing Matt had no breath left.

"I'm Dahlia," she said. "I've killed about four people and I'm gonna find my way back for more."

"Oh, really?" He replied and smiled conspiratorially, making it clear that, as usual, he just didn't care. "Maybe you should stick around for a little while, first. We can get to know each other."

He gave her is best grin, and she returned it, flipping her hair behind her and giggling quietly. The blazing lust for revenge was subdued a little and her eyes just sparkled with a general, underlying evil that Matt found spectacularly attractive.

"I've got a little time," Dahlia said quietly, her voice dripping with flirtatious charm.

Hey, maybe this whole afterlife thing wasn't going to be so bad.

So long as he stayed away from that ominous coffeehouse.