Four imps sitting at a table, the ranch house absolutely boiling inside. No air conditioning, no electricity, wooden floors and wallpaper torn and slowly rotting as a result of the unstoppable march of time. A large pitcher of iced tea, along with some heavy-duty glasses near the imps, was the centerpiece of the room as of now. Moxxie certainly wasn't used to it, beads of sweat forming on his brow. "…well, the freelance thing hasn't really been… going well since the festival. You met Blitz, right? We don't know where he is, so he's not paying us, we're not able to pay rent… not sure how long we can last."
Joe tapped his fingers against the table, eyebrow raised, taking a swig of iced tea. "What is this? Are ya askin' for a handout or what?"
Moxxie moved to speak, but Millie interrupted him. "Oh, no, nothin' like that! It's just that… if things don't pick up, we might be on the streets unless… unless I move back in."
Lin gave off a slight nod. "Oh Mills, don't worry about that. We'd never leave our sugarcheeks out in the cold." She went to squeeze her daughter's face once again.
Joe stared at Moxxie. "…I'm not sure about him."
Lin let out a polite, slight laugh, her hand landing on top of his. "It's okay, hun… we need more hands for the farm, remember? We're getting' too old to do that stuff, and Striker's been outta commission for… gosh, about a month now?"
Both of the younger imps practically turned white at the mention of the tan imp. The murderer of Goetia. The man who killed the unkillable. Moxxie gulped down. "…did you just say Striker?"
The parents looked at the other imps. Joe was about to say something snarky about how much weaker Moxxie seemed in comparison to Striker, but their expressions took him aback. "…uh, yeah, y'all, he's our farmhand. Why, somethin' the matter?"
Millie could feel her blood run cold in the arid heat. She put her tea glass down on the rotting table, looking down at it before making eye contact with the two. "…where is he?"
Joe yelled out. "Striker! Hey, Striker! Could ya come down here?" Silence. "HEY! Shucks, I'll get him." He stood up, hurriedly scooting the chair into the table, and the two younger imps followed. Lin, worried, stood up too, trailing the others. "STRIKER! You alright in there?" Joe's booming, masculine voice echoed through the main stairwell.
Moxxie was practically shivering. "Sir… sir, this is… this is serious, you can't just-"
A loud sound could be heard several feet away from the front of the house. It was a combination between a bang, a boom, and a crack, reverberating through the vast emptiness of the desert. Everyone looked towards the source of the sound, then practically sprinted out the door.
A tan imp with a peculiar gait, his back as stiff as a board. A smoking revolver in his hand, a long briefcase in another. The door to the van was opened and he climbed inside, slammed the door, and floored the accelerator. The tires spun out as the four imps ran as fast as they could to catch the van, but it was too late. The van sped away into the great expanse, faster and faster, until no imp could possibly catch it on foot.
And on the driveway, gurgling from a wound in her chest, was a hellhound.
A chunk of red flesh is slammed onto the scale. "…203 grams." Scribbling, typing, observing. Humans in labcoats carefully recording the weight of everything they had collected. Red skin. White skin. Muscle, horns, nails. The morbid, bloodied results of a butchering. "We got a lot of samples… I thought this was just supposed to be skin."
His partner responded. "They figured they might as well take as much as they could. See what works, what doesn't. The subject's alive regardless."
The meat was shoved into a plastic bag, which was then roughly labeled with sharpie. 'RED SKIN + MUSCLE (203g)'. Blood ran freely within the bag. "We're checking for infections and such, yeah? That thing's no good to us dead."
A nod in the affirmative. "We're good."
"How much of this stuff do we actually need anyway? Do we have any idea?"
A sigh, half exhaustion, half frustration. "We'll run everything through the machine, see how much we get out of it. We might have to take more. Depending on what the expedition brings back too… maybe a lot more."
"Are they prepared?"
"About as prepared as they'll ever be. If this truly is Hell… I'm sure they're going to have a rough time."
Pain. Constant, sharp. Stitches littered the imp's body, some large, some small, but every single one straining against the flesh, feeling as if they were about to break with even the slightest movement. He was barely afforded the dignity of clothing anymore, wearing nothing but a ratty pair of shorts, the remnants of a baggy prison uniform. The constant administration of tranquilisers, anaesthesia, and the amnestics mixed in with them have completely destroyed his sense of time. How long was he in here? Days, months, years? All he knew was the darkness of his cell and the slow destruction of his body.
The door was tossed open. Blindingly bright light, his senses overloaded with the sudden stimulation. His eyes practically closed before the humans marched into the room. A man with a rifle. Humans in labcoats. Footsteps blazingly loud compared to the ambient of the cell. Blitzo scurried across the room. "Hey! HEY! Stay back!" It wasn't any use. The humans pinned him down as he thrashed and protested. They were looking at his ravaged flesh, wantonly staring at it, before a sponge ran down one of his stitches. The imp kicked and grit his teeth. Burning. So much burning. Swab after swab, stitch after stitch, his skin bathed with the yellow of betadine. Tears welling in his eyes.
He was finally let go after what seemed like an eternity. The humans stepped back, soullessly closed the door behind him, and left him in the dark.
Four humans looked at each other. They were dressed in the best gear money could buy, with fatigues, helmets, night vision goggles, plate carriers, magazines with ammunition shoved into them. They were inside the room that the incantation had been spoken in, silently looking at the closed doorway. It was clear from their mannerisms that they had been in this gear before, checking their assault rifles, fingers off the trigger, pointing them down at the ground. One of them spoke up. They were only marked by a capital A on the patch embroidered on their arm. "…hurry up and wait, huh?"
They laughed. Despite not knowing each other's real names, they connected through that line. An invisible line to a military background. Another spoke up, marked with a B. "Hey, I prefer this to literally goin' to Hell."
"Oh yeah? Then why'd you sign up?" That wasn't an English letter, but it was uppercase. Γ. Gamma.
Beta spoke up, shrugging his shoulders momentarily. "Beats rottin' away at home. Hey, maybe the gas prices'll be lower down there!" Another hearty laugh.
The last member of the group, quiet, was marked with Δ. Delta. "…how bad are the prices now?"
Gamma looked over to Delta. "Pff, dude, you don't gotta be so… shit, like, lighten up."
A quick glance through his goggles to the squadmate. "Just a question."
Beta cleared his throat. "Last I checked… about ten dollars a gallon. Doesn't seem to be getting any cheaper."
Alpha looked over to the group. "Don't share that info. Gas prices are different state to state."
Beta slapped the stock of his gun. "Oh yeah? And who's gonna hear?"
The leader of the squad pointed towards a window. The observation room, with several scientists walking around, talking amongst each other, bringing in bags of… something. Pouring them into a receptacle, red juice and all. "Them."
One of the scientists turned on a microphone, speaking through it. His voice echoed through the loudspeakers in the room. "Portal opening in five!"
Nobody knew what to expect, but this squad would make history regardless. They are to be the first living humans to step into Hell.
Many would wish they hadn't.
