Door Three
"Within this room are the people who used their power for evil…" her voice trailing off the girl gently pushes the door inward and walks into the room which radiates with heat. "In their lives these people were powerful, but they did things with those powers that should not have been done, they hurt those who were less powerful then they were, for their own personal gain and had no qualms about their actions." She finishes as the door swings shut behind them with a soft bang.
" What are they doing? If they did such things why are they not as I saw them before? 'As they stole in their lives and worked by hidden ways, [why are] they [not] stolen from sight and hidden in the great flames which are their own guilty consciences?'i" Dante asks looking about the room in which the occupants were all crawling around on the floor.
"These men and women who in life were cruel masters now become the beaten slaves. They are cleaning up the mess of the world with their bare hands and their own tears." Answers the girl walking over to the crawling figures and pulls one up. "This is Cleopatra, one of the queens of Ancient Egypt. She employed her power as a queen, and as a woman to manipulate powerful men and their governments to serve her every whim." When she finishes speaking the girl releases Cleopatra who grovels at their feet until the girl guides Dante some ways off. "Over there is George W. Bush, to your left is Hitler, and to your right is Nero…"
She is cut off by Dante who replies with pity, "And they all are reduced to this?"
"Yes. But you should not feel pity for these or any other occupants of Hell. Come, we must keep moving." The girl replies leading Dante out of a plain wooden door on the opposite wall, several of Hell's occupants following at their heels groveling.
The hallway they enter into is in the middle of a flight of marble stairs. The girl leads Dante towards the downward flight without a word.
i Alighieri, Dante. The Inferno, Signet Classic, NYNY c.1982 P.220