Leslie thanked Baby Jesus for the thudding music below; it concealed the loud tearing noises from her own room. It let her work, with her bare hands and claws, to pull down Rosie's hateful messages. Even so, it took most of the night. When the wall was stripped clean, she hid the paper shreds under her bed. Safe. Out of sight.
Then she collapsed.
Next day, the astronauts came to visit and saw the bare wall - at least, Leslie was pretty sure they did. "What the fuck," the female groaned.
"Hallucinations again," the male explained. "No accounting for their behavior. You know, I'd really like to keep her under my personal observation. Get to know the disease!"
"Under your… No! She's not a lab rat!"
Leslie nodded. "Lab rabbit, " she said, "labbit… I hope it's fatal. What planet are you guys from?"
No response… but they carried out a second examination. Her restlessness had ceased (so long, marching millipedes!), but a new symptom replaced it. Leslie was changing color. This time, the fur came in pink, to match her eyes. At least she might leave a fashionable corpse.
For the remaining days of her fever, Alastor returned, dragging her back to the moonlit swamp. Dark was the night, cold and muddy was the ground, and he restrained and bit her struggling frame, reducing it to carrion with his bladed teeth. She never saw his demon form. That was the sole saving grace.
Sometimes, Shadow Man paced her bedroom in predatory silence: not hungry, per se, but waiting, waiting for the shift change. Sometimes it was Alastor's cane. She was sick of all three.
Night after night of it. Pain. Dreadful pain.
And at the tail-end of the sickness, mental reruns of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. She had to laugh.
o - o - o - o - o
By the penultimate evening of November, Leslie was in her right mind. Not fully well, but better. About 80%.
She saw the room as it was. Her poor bedsheets, rumpled and covered in dried sweat and gravy. The single wall, basically destroyed. The armchair she'd toppled in her attempt to get near the ceiling. Torn, red-striped scraps of wallpaper lay beneath the bed, still covered in scratchy ink. So it was real.
It took twenty minutes to rearrange them all, like jigsaw pieces. When she did, the writing was a puzzle in itself. Sure, Alastor was a flesh-eating bastard, but what made him lucky, exactly? Was Leslie both the harlot and the thief? And what was up with the cross-eyed dolly?
In any case, she flung the scraps back where they belonged, so nobody would see. She stripped the bed, then righted her armchair and sat in it, to let the mattress breathe.
She checked her phone. Two missed calls: one from Alastor, one from an unknown number. There was also a log of fifteen attempts to call Karlton, which she couldn't remember. That was a bit embarrassing, but understandable. Being so terrified during the fever, she might want to… well, talk to an old friend. Someone who knew her best.
But of course, Karl's living-world number hadn't worked. She should erase it from her contacts, and get his new number the next time they met.
While she was at it, Leslie deleted the Alastor playlist, and all of the songs it contained. She had no need for them anymore. In a few days, she'd simply let their contract expire. Then she'd make a plan to get far away from Alastor. Maybe she could rent a place with Angel Dust, if he was willing.
Or maybe…
No, the number didn't work. She wouldn't even get an answering machine.
She pictured Karl cooped up in his own room… probably making a stress-nest, the way he did sometimes. If he had headphones, they'd become a permanent fixture on his topsy-turvy head, blasting Chris Cornell or whatever lyrical psychedelia he could immerse himself in. He'd been good so far about keeping his distance. What was the harm, she wondered, in visiting him again? Just temporarily, for comfort's sake, until this thing was over.
A new email notification from the founders caught her eye.
everyone, (URGENT)
This Tuesday, guests are NOT to leave the hotel. We want everyone in the Reception Hall by 12:00 noon. This is to assure everyone is present before protective measures can be taken. If you've had the abyssavirus, please wait in your room Tuesday morning. Someone will be with you to mark your attendance, and test to see if you're contagious. If so, obviously you can stay put, just DO NOT leave the building.
Thank you! -Management xx
God, it was really happening. It was her last contracted day with Alastor, too. Part of Leslie hoped she'd be healthy enough to stand before him and say no. No to his games, no to biting, no to being his dinner.
Yes… a little dignity would be nice.
o - o - o - o - o
"OK, aaaaand just-! There! Super duper."
Baxter released his end of the thermometer, and Leslie held it between her lips. Really, they were going through the motions. Leslie had recovered. She'd been up, washed and dressed for two hours; her phone was charged, and in a final act of dumping the very idea of Alastor, she'd flung that emerald-green dress out the window, where it fluttered and fell to the dirty cobblestones below.
"C'mon," she urged him, "whad's by demb'radure?"
With a self-important flourish, he removed the thermometer. "98.1°," he said. "You're fine."
Leslie exhaled. "Super duper."
"You never told me why you wanted to be sick," Baxter mentioned, packing up his medical bag. "Do I get to know the reason?"
"No," she told him, "but thank you all the same."
They went downstairs, and Leslie heard the first strains of demonic chattering. A few guests clustered in the corridor outside the main hall. She felt them looking, and was suddenly conscious of her new color. It'd be alright, though, as soon as she found-
There!
"Angel!"
Leaving Baxter behind, she ran to her friend, all seven-foot-ten of him, and they hugged in the double doorway. No doubt they were blocking the natural flow of traffic - but she didn't care. It was good to see him. It was so wonderful to feel the weight of someone's limbs around her, and know they were real, and harmless!
"Ayyyy, it's the fuckin' invalid!" Angel said, ruffling her tuft of hair. "Where were ya? Ya missed out on… ha, prob'ly the last bitta fun we'll see in a while."
Leslie let him go. "Fun?"
"Yeah, had a li'l disco in your absence! Did the conga an' everythin'. Right, we'd betta…"
Taking her hand, Angel led her into the hall. Today it was back to cobalt-blue, and apparently standing-room only. Several hundred guests in irregular bunches, and the staff made rounds, offering solemn guidance to each bunch. Leslie scanned the sea of faces, looking for her friends. There - Charlie! A little bell rang in Leslie's head at the sight of her. Ginny! Ding-ding-ding... pink-feathered and walking in anxious circles.
Alastor had to be here somewhere, but his bell wouldn't tinkle. It would toll.
"Guess it'll be your firs' yearly massacre, huh Les?" Angel said. Something was off about him: that gladsome voice didn't match his face, pulled tight at the corners. "Ehh, not much ta get the hang of. Everyone jus' stays in, an' hopes the door'll hold, y'know? No big deal." He led them to Husk, skulking near a brocaded drape. Ding-ding-ding!
"How do, motherfukkers," Husk said, then swigged from a hip-flask.
Angel continued to squeeze Leslie's hand as he made conversation, and she didn't complain or let go. There was something like static electricity in the air - fleeting, yet heavy - quite unlike the drastic scenarios she'd known before. She felt it reverb tenaciously between the guests and ricochet off the walls and ceiling. There was going to be a lot of death today - a lot of death.
And there was so much Leslie didn't know… what did an exterminator look like? How were they chosen? And was it painful to be killed by one?
"You had all better be here," called a horribly familiar voice, "because the exterminators do not wait!"
Leslie turned. Everyone did, for there on the stage was Alastor, impossibly projecting his voice. Normally, she would have clocked him the moment he climbed the steps; regular Alastor stuck out in this room like a rhubarb stalk in a sack of blueberries. Not today, though: he was wearing a deep black suit, including the shirt. Gray chalk-stripes ran vertically down the jacket, and his gloves were fingerless, showing off his claws. She glared at him.
The brief, pin-drop silence was filled by Charlie bustling from one end of the hall to the other, to join him.
"I want you all to know," Alastor warmly proclaimed, "how deeply disappointing you've been!"
"Al! You promised-"
"Never fear, darling, I'll be quick," he said, winking at Charlie, then addressed the crowd once more. "Clearly," Alastor said, " no-one has been redeemed! Not a single soul, in spite of Ms. Magne's best efforts! I put that down to serious flaws in your collective character; a lack of conviction; low moral fiber, etc. Not to mention, most of you are far too ugly to be angels-!"
"Al! Enough!" Charlie cried. She had reached him now, horns out and blonde hair floating overhead. Before she could take any meaningful action, Alastor responded with a wave of the hand. The double doors blasted off their hinges and flew into the corridor, hitting a wall. Smack! Everyone shut up smartly - with the exception of one poor sucker who'd just been doored in the face. "Owww!"
"Whoops! Sorry, Niffty!" Alastor said. He spun theatrically to the co-founders. "This is really no time for games. Do you still want my assistance?"
"Fine! Yes! Do something, just… let me take a rollcall!"
The crowd noisily convened towards the stage, as Vaggie called names from a clipboard. "AMSCRAY!"
"Here!"
"ANGEL DUST!"
"Yo!"
Leslie peered into the hallway and saw Niffty. Ding-ding-ding! Another friend safe: even after the door accident, she seemed OK. "Right then," Leslie distractedly murmured to her friends, peering around, "I'll, uh… be back in a minute."
"Where ya goin'? Need a piss?"
"No, I…" she sighed. "Don't judge me, I'm checking on Decider."
Angel gave a mild, try-not-to-judge frown, but Husk's frown was deeper, more confused. "Uhh, Les?" he said, "That guy checked out three weeks ago."
She froze. "What? No he didn't."
"Yeah he did. I processed it up front."
"BAXTER!"
"Here!"
No, Leslie thought. No, it wasn't… It didn't make sense. Her hands made fists as she stupidly tried to argue with Husk. "You don't understand; he promised to get straightened out. 'Even if it takes years', he said! Karl wouldn't leave without telling me. Why didn't you tell me?"
"Sorry, Les. Some people-"
The guests all stumbled and yelped at once, as a force met the exterior of the hotel. It happened again. Then five more times. The hall began to quake. There was a rumbling beneath them and around them, getting louder, and when Leslie checked, Alastor was suspended a few inches off the floorboards, as glowing dark-red symbols orbited his torso. Behind the drapes, something black oozed over the window. A tentacle, like the ones she'd seen attacking Vox.
"Not yet! Let me do rollcall, for the love of God!" Vaggie bellowed to no avail.
Almost immediately, Leslie knew what was happening. Alastor was going to protect the hotel from exterminators, alright: by dragging it below the ground.
"Wait," she said, then fled the hall before she really knew what she was doing. Looking down the foyer, she saw the stained glass windows by the entrance, already dark. Outside, the awning broke free and stayed on the ground, scraping almost flush with the window-tops.
She'd have to be quick. She'd have to run so fucking fast.
Leslie sprinted the other way and took the stairs two at a time, her heart thudding. There were a lot of floors to clear, and she'd need to do it faster than Alastor was sinking them. It might not be possible, not when she'd been bedridden for a fortnight. Her muscles were weaker than usual.
Just do it. Do it, bitch. Come on.
Leslie cleared the first staircase and ran for the next. Then the next. The noise was horrendous: scraping stone and metal, and almighty crashes as the architecture failed to sink neatly. Square peg, round hole. On the fourth floor, Leslie screamed as a window shattered, right as she passed it.
Now she was running aerobically; her breathing grew heavy and rhythmic, like when she jogged. Six floors. Eight floors. Yes, she might be keeping up! Her heart was thrumming in her eyeballs. Go, bitch, go. Outside, the old shipwreck broke loose from the hotel's side, and fell, the metal roaring like a whale. Alastor was going to bring the whole place down.
Her muscles screamed. All those months of pain had prepared her for this. She ran through it.
Eleven floors. She prayed the roof was still unlocked. It had to be! No-one had any reason to go up there. Leslie ran and ran, and almost collapsed against that metal door, and mercifully it gave. Now exhausted, she had to crawl the final set of steps. The air on the roof was foul and fetid. When she staggered to the edge and looked, the tentacles were there, still dragging the place down. It was like being at the stern of the sinking Titanic… if there was a giant squid thrown into the mix.
The cobbled pathway from the entrance was coming closer. Staring at it, she waited for the ground to come to her, for the rumbling to slow sufficiently. Then, when it was safe, Leslie lowered herself, avoiding the tentacles, and dropped, maybe six feet. THUD.
She lay there, groaning through a horrific leg cramp, and gulped in air, and gaped at the Hazbin Hotel sign.
Hazbin, Hazbin, Hazbin.
Then it was time to move again.