The sounds of metallic creaking and rough scraping were the only disturbance in the monotone landscape, as a lone figure dragged behind them on a makeshift sled a sizeable pile of materials. One of the perks of being the only non spectral entity in this place, was that no one could stop them from claiming all the remnants of the war for themselves. But what use were such things when again they were the only physical being present, what purpose would they serve beyond decoration or scrap? Only this figure and the ruler of the circle Abaddon knew, for if the devil did not permit what they planned then they wouldn't be putting in this effort.
Yet remarkably this wasn't a strenuous task for them, though moving slowly they did so out of their own desire, for while there was work to be done they had all the time to get it finished. However they had been walking for some time, and as they marched onward soon in the far distance a faint light could be seen. As they approached it progressively got bigger, until eventually it could be seen in its entirety along with its source. An opening much like a cave had risen from the ground at some point, the only unique disturbance in the flat terrain of the circle.
From inside a light seeming to be a fire or something similar glowed, illuminating a long set of carved stairs in addition to the area that surrounded the opening. Of course its size was big enough to allow the figure and their haul to enter without issue, for while the haul was about the size of a tractor the opening was comparable to a building. This applied to the connected corridor that led deeper into the ground itself, so they wouldn't need to make adjustments to their pile for it to fit.
However, as they eventually reached their destination and thus descended down the stairs the opening closed behind them and returned to its normal state, making it seem like both were never there.
"Ugh, I hate how every single day he keeps getting peppier..." Katie groaned as she turned off the television.
In what had become routine for them the founders of Slayer Studios gathered to share a breakfast with each other. Not only that but the building itself had become a home for most of them, with the only exception being Stolas, Blitzo, Loona, and Octavia as they had the owl demon's noble residence to live in. But they made sure never to have a meal before arriving, as said residence was one of the many structures that needed repairs when the invasion was repelled, so for a good while they did need to stay here. And during that period they had all grown really close, even Angel Dust, Vox, and Velvet had fully made amends and buried the hatchet.
So as weird as it may sound they had become a sort of family, though certain members such as Katie, Loona, Octavia, and Vox would NEVER admit to this. Anyways, as for where in Slayer Studios they held their breakfast it was actually in Angel's office, which also served as their meeting room, his living space, and several other things. How that was possible was thanks to some renovation work they had on the building as a whole during the repairs, personal courtesy of the Khan and Vega both.
"Oh come on Katie, does seeing Tom so happy really upset you?" Millie asked as the other set down the remote on the table.
"It's not his happiness that annoys me..." She answered while slumping in her seat, "It's the fact that every FUCKING morning he acts like he just got fifty caffeine patches all slapped onto his body..." She explained.
"Language please." Stolas requested as he cut his food. "Bite me." She replied.
"Geez Katie, did something crawl into bed and bite you on the ass to get you up this morning?" Angel Dust asked jokingly.
"Nope, honestly I'd rather something bit me and force me to take the day off, that way we wouldn't have to go to the hotel..." She answered.
"Aaaaah so that's what it is." Cherri said with a smile as she twirled her fork between her fingers, "Let me guess, you're still working on the whole not killing people who piss you off part of the program right?" She asked.
"Why don't you come over here and I'll show you?" Katie suggested.
"So that's a yes then?" She asked her playfully, before then having to catch the knife Katie had thrown at her with her free hand, which she did with relative ease.
"I don't know why you're still stuck on that, me and Millie managed to get through it pretty quickly and we used to be assassins." Moxxie said.
"OH, GOOD FOR YOU!" She exclaimed with a clap of her hands, "I'm SO glad that I'm somehow more murder happy than former professional killers!" She added with an abundance of sarcasm.
"I feel like you're mocking me." He replied.
"Doesn't take much..." Loona said quietly before taking a bite of her meal. "I was just about to say that!" Blitzo exclaimed in genuine disappointment.
"Oh come now Blitzy, there's no need to be so cruel to him." Stolas said sticking up for Moxxie.
"Aw come on he's used to it, in fact not too long ago he tried to stab me with a fork!" He replied with a weirdly proud smile on his face.
"Yeah, because you ate my sandwich." Moxxie told him. "And it was delicious!" He replied.
"Still, I don't think we should be aggravating each other like this during breakfast, this is the time when we all can be together and enjoy each other's company before we start our work." Stolas said.
"I second that." Vox spoke while holding up two fingers, "I cannot tell you how much I've come to appreciate these breakfasts lately." He admitted.
"Oh? The game still giving you trouble?" Angel Dust asked.
"I do not exaggerate when I say that it has become my own personal Hell, no pun intended." He answered.
"What do you mean? We've been having so much fun!" Velvet exclaimed with zest, her stutter having faded as the months went on.
"That's easy for YOU to say, you get to design all the enemies and environments, whilst I have do the programing and the animating by myself..." He argued.
"I thought you hired a bunch of people though to help out?" Millie questioned.
"Yes, all IDIOTS..." He replied with a sigh, "Plus they have all these so called ideas that they keep trying to shoehorn in there, like oh what if there's a crafting system? Or maybe some kind of stamina bar? I swear if Velvet wasn't there to keep me calm I'd stretch out all of their fucking necks and tie them together to make a fucking demon jump rope!" He shouted in exasperation.
"Language please." Stolas repeated before taking a bite.
"...You do know you're only the parent of ONE of us here correct?" Vox asked as he pointed to Octavia.
"Hey, don't bring me into this." She said having been glad to not be noticed until now. "Excuse you he is the parent of TWO people!" Blitzo corrected.
"Him calling you daddy does not count." Angel Dust argued.
"OH MY FUCKING GOD." Both Loona and Octavia said in unison before gagging. "LANGUAGE." Stolas insisted though louder this time.
"I wasn't referring to me dipshit I was referring to Loony." Blitzo replied while pointing to his daughter with his thumb.
"What? But you two aren't married...unless..." Cherri said as a grin came to her face. "No, no, let's NOT go there PLEASE..." Octavia requested.
"Oh? Why not? Do you not want Blitzy to be your new daddy and Loony to be your new sister?" She teased.
"First off you are not allowed to call me that." Loona told her while crossing her arms, "Secondly they're just dating right now, which is all they can do until Stolas's divorce is final." She explained.
"Which cannot come soon enough..." Octavia muttered.
Finding it weird that she'd say that instead of Stolas, before the conversation could continue the owl noble's phone began to ring.
"Oh, pardon me." He said as he pulled it out and answered, "Hello? Oh it's you Charles." He greeted before covering the receiver with his hand, "The head of my security." He whispered to the others before returning to the call, "Charles I'm in the middle of breakfast with everyone can it...what?...no...SHE DID WHAT?!" He suddenly shouted causing them all to jump in their seats.
"Speak of thy devil thou shalt appear..." Katie muttered as they could all guess who "she" was.
"Was anyone hurt at all? No? Good, did she manage to get away? Oh you tackled her? Fantastic work Charles!" He praised as he rose from his seat, "Yes yes I'll be there momentarily, again good work and make sure you watch her beak, she's very fond of trying to bite a person's eyes out." He warned before hanging up the phone.
"Trouble in paradise?" Angel Dust asked.
"On the contrary, it appears my soon to be ex wife let her emotions get the better of her as usual, she showed up to the estate demanding to speak to me about the divorce and when my guards
denied her entry, she thought the next best thing to do would be to break down the gates with a car." He explained.
"Holy shit! What a crazy ass bitch!" Cherri exclaimed as Blitzo got up from his seat. "Where're you going sir?" Moxxie asked as he went over to Stolas's side.
"You kidding? There's no WAY I'm gonna miss out on seeing his ex being pinned down or tied up!" He answered before looking to the noble, "That is ya know, if you want me there." He said.
"But of course Blitzy! If she is going to get it through that thick head of hers that she's no longer a noble, then I can think of no better way than you ridiculing her in her lowest moment." Stolas replied.
"Fuck yeah that's what I'm talking about!" He exclaimed while looking to their daughters, "Hey girls wanna get in on this?" He asked.
"As much as I would love to see this we've unfortunately got a lot of work to do today." Loona answered causing all of their eyes to widen.
"Wait, you WANT to work? Am I having a stroke?" Moxxie questioned.
"Yeah, believe it or not when I'm not a fucking receptionist just sitting at a desk all day but am actually doing something I enjoy, I'm really fucking productive." She replied.
"Oh that's right, Vega finally managed to send you..." Millie stopped midway through her sentence, falling quiet as did everyone else.
Silence came over the room as all of them had a saddened expression adorn their faces, for what she was going to say was that Vega had finished rerecording all of the music the Slayer had composed. As for how he could do this when the Fortress of Doom was destroyed, do you really expect the creator to NOT have an amazing memory?
"...Sorry everyone..." She apologized after a few seconds, "Let my mouth run while my head was still walking..." She added.
"Hey, you've got nothing to be sorry for." Angel Dust assured her, "Truth is it's been half a year since...well ya know...by now a lot of people would be saying we should get over it..." He told them.
"Fuck those dumbasses." Cherri said firmly as she clenched her fists, "It's easy for them to say cause they didn't lose someone close to them." She argued.
"Yeah, I'm surprised you're the one saying that Angel." Katie admitted.
"It's only because I know what it's like to have people you care about leave your life, only difference now is that it wasn't because he thought I was a disappointment or a whore..." He explained.
"I hope you don't think of me as an ass when I say this." Vox spoke up to get their attention, "Even though it isn't a replacement for him as nothing could ever be, when our first game is complete at the very least you'll be able to experience his past through his eyes, at least the beginning portion of it." He said.
"Heh, I guess that's something we can look forward to then." Angel Dust replied with a chuckle and
brief smirk.
Another quiet moment passed by as they all did their best to put their sadness back in its box, something that unfortunately just kept getting harder as time went on, instead of easier like all those bullshit "I'm sorry for your loss" cards say.
"Forgive me." Stolas spoke this time being the first to do so, "But I mustn't keep my staff waiting." He explained.
"No of course, not your fault we're all a bunch of emotional wrecks." Angel Dust replied while flicking his hand towards them, "Go on shoo, deal with that bitch of an ex." He told him.
Nodding in response he and Blitzo then took their leave, though no one resumed their breakfast as they had lot their appetite.
"Well, guess we should all get the day started now." Vox said as he and Velvet rose from their seats, "Hopefully those imbeciles haven't undone all my hard work thus far." He added as they walked away.
"If they did you know you can just smack them." Velvet reminded.
"True, that is the one joy I have working with such idiots, you excluded of course." He replied.
"Let's go Via." Loona said to the owl who sat next to her, their relationship already having reached the point where they were so familiar with each other.
"Right behind you." She replied as they both took their leave as well.
"We should probably clean up first before we head to the hotel." Moxxie said while pointing to the table.
"Ugh, another reason why I hate these days..." Katie groaned earning her a light nudging in her side from Cherri's elbow.
"Come on this isn't so bad, do you KNOW how hard it is to get entrails out of your clothes after you've blown someone up?" She asked.
"RIGHT?!" Millie shouted in agreement, having had that same issue before.
As they all stood and began to clean up the meal, Angel Dust while doing the same couldn't keep from looking out a nearby window.
"Hope you're holding up big guy..." He thought before focusing on the chore at hand.
Round, after round, after round were shaped projectiles of holy energy fired from a chain gun, as no matter how many were expelled the demons known as Barons kept coming. Their heavy hooted feet marched effortlessly through the marshland, though what wetted down the soil and vegetation was anything but water. All manner of bodily fluids, bile, and secretions from corpses and other such rancid things made the polluted toxic sludge of the swamp, which boiled and bubbled due to the heat these giants gave off. And as they conjured the green flames that burned behind their red tinted flesh, throwing them at their target with as much hatred as they could, when making contact with this muck it caused a violent explosion, showing that one of its properties was being highly volatile.
All of these things whether separate or combined as they were now posed no concern to their attacker, who stood firm on one of the few bits of land that stood above the grime's surface. He didn't know how long he'd been here at this point, for when their realm had been severed from Hell a myriad of properties changed, one of which was the passage of time. Though it wasn't like it mattered whether or not he could keep track of it, all that mattered was fighting every single beast sent his way, as that was all there was to do now. Which as strange as it may sound caused an unexpected reaction within him, one that he hadn't felt in a very long time.
Behind the helmet that hid his face a grin stretched from ear to ear, though this wasn't one of pleasure or joy necessarily. When he first encountered these creatures he allowed the madness of it all to take him, to be lost in the endless bloodshed and carnage that resulted in their presence. He grew to savor their pain filled cries as he tore them down piece by piece, relishing the sight of a once living breathing creature being reduced to mush. For then he needed to focus only on survival, even if it meant losing his sanity or what made him a person he was willing to do it, just so he could live long enough to see these demons fall lifelessly to the ground.
But now as there was nothing left but this, no worries of others' lives or the chance at something better, he found that same madness from before creeping its way out from inside his soul, accompanied by the sadistic sensations it brought. So now, as he watched these Barons be stripped of their skin turning them into skeletal monsters with green fire animating their movements, he had but only one thing play again and again in his mind like a song on repeat.
Rip And Tear RIP AND TEAR RIP AND TEAR