She could feel the harsh, glassy shards of sand poking against her belly. The putrid smell of sewage and ammonia filled the air. This was all too familiar to her. This was what she experienced, the first time she was sent here.

Belladonna awoke from her sudden black out. Her mind was a haze. She looked around to see that she was finally back at the shores of Hell, where all new denizens arrive after being cast down from the Heavens. The sea was toxic and filled with caustic chemicals that could slowly burn your skin off. Most of them were produced from the factories that dumped waste and slag into the sea. She was lucky to not have been cast into it randomly, as some new arrivals are unfortunate enough to experience.

She tried to get up on all fours, but felt a strange sense of exhaustion. All her muscles twitched with pain. She fell down back into the beach of broken glass, wincing as the shards penetrated her skin. A tear dripped down her face from the sudden pain. She racked her brain to figure out what had just happened. After a few moments, it came back to her.

The pain.

The never ending pain.

Immediately her body froze as she remembered the scarring moment she had experienced, trapped inside that infernal room. She went back into shock. Fear and anxiety swept over her, her stomach freezing over. Her eyes stared off towards the endless sky, a look of true horror crossing her face. Then she remembered Red's cackling laugh as she was plunged into the lava. Her shock quickly turned into anger and resentment. That monster. Sure, it was to be expected from someone like Red, but she couldn't fathom Red doing this to her despite all her efforts and accomplishments.

She wasn't sure she could ever live this down. Not only was she rejected by Heaven and Earth, but also Hell itself. What power could she possibly gain now? She was left broken, with those scarring memories of being burned alive for what seemed like years. She couldn't even keep track of how much time she was in there. At this point, she didn't care. Just being in there for an instant, was enough to break her.

She realized her wings were missing, which meant she couldn't fly. She tried to cast a spell to turn her back into a wraith so that she could float away, but she soon realized that the dark powers she was gifted with had vanished. She was back to being a normal, useless lap dog.

She lied there for a long time, presumably days, just staring off into the distance and contemplating everything she had just experienced. Eventually however, she finally got the strength to stand up back on all fours. The shock had slowly resided, and she was ready to go out and figure out what to do next. The only problem was, she didn't know what to do.

Should she try to get back at Red? No, he's too powerful. Everybody in Hell wants to get back at Red. Nobody ever succeeded. She couldn't get back in power with Red, even if she wanted to. That goose was cooked. She could take her anger out on the other tortured souls, like she always used to do back during her first few moments in Hell. But for some reason, she didn't feel like it.

Despite her anger, she for some reason had no interest in torturing anybody. Maybe it was because she wanted nothing more to do with torture, considering what she had just went through. Perhaps she just wanted to be at peace. Maybe she should find somewhere to lay down and rest somewhere comfortable. But that was foolhardy, this was Hell. In Hell, nobody rests.

This feeling of not knowing what to do, only angered her further.

"Argh.. what is wrong with me?!" Belladonna yelled out loud. "Come on, man up! Don't go soft on me!"

The purple canine barred her teeth, trying to turn her anger into a desire to hurt, as she always used to do. Eventually, she snapped out of it and got back her strength. She was back in action.

Just then, she heard a noise from behind. Before she could turn around, she found herself being stabbed by a pitchfork in the back. She yelped and jumped forwards from the sudden attack. Luckilly it wasn't strong enough to puncture her skin. She turned around and growled at the cackling demon behind her.

"Hey, I am your commander! I command you to stop!" Belladonna demanded.

The demon merely cackled even more, holding hit's pitchfork towards her in a defensive stance. It was clear to her now. The demons were already made aware of her demotion. They no longer took orders like they used to. Belladonna lunged at the demon, dodging the pitchfork and biting it in the neck. She shook it like a rag doll, biting as hard as she could. The demon let out a growl of supposed pain as it then burst into a puff of black smoke. She killed it.

The death would have satisfied her, if it weren't for the fact that demons themselves weren't conscious. They were merely images, created by pure darkness. But then after the spiel, she realized what she had to do next. Maybe she couldn't truly get back at Red for causing her so much pain, but she could at least be a thorn in his side. Perhaps she could devote her eternity hunting demons. She would become stronger and stronger, until perhaps she could eventually overtake Red.

But then she remembered her lack of powers. Unfortunately, brute strength alone was not enough to face the most powerful of demons, who rely on dark magic to petrify and disintegrate any who cross them. Only Red could grant people powers, and there was no way he would give her any after all that has happened. Still, any satisfaction she could get out of it would be worth it. It was all she could do.

She wandered through the broken glass shoreline, careful not to cause any more cuts on her already shredded paws as she tread carefully. Eventually, she made it back to the badlands. This was where most demons tend to linger. Unfortunately because of the smoke, it was hard to see far in the distance. Since demons had no scent she couldn't rely on her nose, a major advantage for demons seeing as this was a Hell for dogs, but she could still hear them.

She could hear cries for help in the distance to her left. It sounded female. She could also hear about 2-3 demons cackling madly. Clearly someone was being tortured. She saw this as a perfect opportunity to test her skills. She crept slowly towards the sounds, hoping to land a pre-emptive attack. As she made her way through the dense smoke, she saw them. A young blue collie was being whipped by three demons surrounding her. Trails of blood could be seen coming from the poor canine. She bore a look of horror and helplessness.

After seeing this dog in so much pain, she was then reminded of what she had been through recently. The thoughts came back, and she froze into place. The memories of excruciating pain came back to her, and she was back in shock. After standing there for about a minute, the collie finally looked up to see Belladonna herself, just staring back at her with a look of worry.

The collie yelled out to her. "Please! Make it stop! Command them to stop!"

It was clear that the collie knew of Belladonna. Almost all residents of Hell knew of her. However, she was clearly unaware of her relief of duties. The demons turned around to see Belladonna standing behind them. Her chance of a pre-emptive strike was gone.

The demons growled and stormed towards her, their eyes glowing red with fury. Belladonna snapped out of her stupor, and noticed she was being attacked. A demon swung its whip towards the violet canine, but she quickly managed to dodge, jumping over the whip and landing next to it. Belladonna grabbed the whip with her teeth and tried to tug it out of the demon's hand. The demon pulled hard, and Belladonna wasn't sure if she would win this tug of war. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see another demon lunge at her from the side.

She let go of the whip, causing the demon to fall backwards on the third one that was trailing behind. As the lunging demon fell over after Belladonna's next dodge, it dropped the whip it was holding. Belladonna grabbed the whip and swung it as hard as she could. She made a loud crack on the demon's head, causing it's skull to shatter into pieces. The demon then turned into a black cloud of smoke, as they usually did. Unfortunately, the whip also disappeared along with the demon, leaving her defenseless. The other two demons got up and ran towards Belladonna.

She lunged at one of them, preparing to bite their neck like she did before. However, the demon manages to catch her in mid-lunge, and then tosses her into a stalactite. She gets up slowly, bruised badly from the impact. The demon lunges at her again, but before the demon can grab her, she kicks back at it with her hind legs. This causes the demon to flip over and land on the stalactite behind her. Impaled, the demon fizzles into a cloud of smoke. There was just one left.

As Belladonna struggled to finally get up, the third demon prepared to swing its whip. Belladonna was about to roll over to dodge the attack, but the pain from the bruising started to affect her. It once again brought back those painful memories. She once again froze. The demon started whipping Belladonna profusely. She winced from the pain, unable to speak or call for help in her current state. Her body was already soaking in blood from the lashes. She was hoping it would kill her already, so that she would just re-spawn back at the shores with all her wounds healed. The demon howled furiously as it built up it's strength to land a finishing blow.

But before the demon could swing it's whip, the blue collie grabbed it from behind, preventing the demon from swinging. Instead, the demon accidentally pulled the collie up onto the demon's shoulders. The demon, confused and angry, tried to grab the collie and throw her off, but she was persistent, and would always slip it's grasp. She bit hard into the demon's neck. The demon roared angrily as it disintegrated into a smokey cloud of dust.

The fight was over.

Both Belladonna and the collie lied down on the rocky ground a few feet away from each other. Belladonna lied on her back still against the stalactite, whilst the collie lied on her side. Both of them were bleeding like crazy. After a few minutes of catching their breath, the collie finally spoke.

"W-why...?" The collie whimpered.

"Why.. what?" Belladonna tilted her head.

"Why'd you save me?"

Belladonna chuckled a bit. "I didn't do this for you, ya know."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm doing it to get back at Red. Also because I have nothing better to do."

The collie paused for a moment, still confused by the whole ordeal. "Why would you want to get back at Red? Isn't he.."

"Nope, not anymore. The bastard dumped me out on the shores. My commanding privileges have been revoked. I'm surprised you hadn't heard the news."

"I don't think anybody has. It's not like we have our own newspaper."

"We are in Hell. Conveniences like newspapers are beyond us, even for relieving ourselves."

The collie smirked a little at the attempt at humor. "My name's Crystal by the way."

"Uhuh.. nice to meet you I guess."

"Yep.. hehe..."

The collie was struggling to contemplate the fact that the second most evil being in Hell was sitting right across from her, and that she had saved her life. This was indeed a very awkward situation. She struggled to come up with things to say. She wondered if she should even say anything at all. Perhaps she should try to slink away in case the creature changes her mind and tries to torture her, like she always used to do with the other denizens.

Before she could make any decision, the violet canine spoke. "Do you have a knife or something?"

"What..?" The collie tilted her head in shock.

"I think we should kill ourselves, so that we can re-spawn without having to wait for these wounds to heal."

"No.. sorry, no knife."

"Psh.." Belladonna looked to the side, clearly disappointed.

Another long awkward pause ensued.

The collie built up the courage to look at Belladonna right in the eyes as she finally spoke. "I-I know you really didn't do this for me but.. thank you."

Belladonna was about to protest, but something was stopping her. She looked down to the side, unsure of how to respond. This is the first time in years that she was ever thanked for anything. She began to feel conflicted, not knowing how to feel about it. The strange sensation annoyed her, and she crossed her arms.

"Tsk, yeah whatever," She replied.

The two dogs sat there for a while, waiting for their wounds to heal enough so that they could finally be on their way. Belladonna still had a lot of work to do if she really wanted to tick off Red. Thinking that she needed that collie's help for getting rid of that last demon was a stab in the gut. She wasn't strong enough. She needed to become stronger.


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