Hellraiser: Beyond the Gates of Hell

Disclaimer: Well, well, well... My first Hellraiser fic. Look at that. It's about time I did one of these. Remember this, readers: I take CONSTRUCTIVE criticism, but not flamers. So kindly step away if you feel such an urge. This story is going to be written for the fun in it, but I have done as much research as one can. Clive Barker owns all things flesh and blood in Hellraiser, but I own the plot and the few characters he DIDN'T make. Well, since I got the okay, I want to dedicate this fic to laura 101 and Blue Kitsune. They're real hardcore Hellraiser romance fans! Gotta love that!

"The flesh endures the storms of the present alone, the mind those of the past and future as well as the present."

-Epicurus

"Do not bite at the bait of pleasure, till you know there is no hook beneath it."

-Thomas Jefferson

By: VampireQueenAkasha

We have such sights to show you...

Chapter One: Dark Days

"Alice?"

"Alice."

"ALICE!"

The nineteen year old Alice Cotton was lying with her head on the desk of her house office, sleeping soundly.

The large and spacious room suggested that even if this was a woman who was dissatisfied with her job, she was at least being paid enough to make it a bearable one. The room was very ordered and very neat with small, strange trinkets here and there. A few walls were taken up by a huge shelf unit packed with books, videos, and CDs. Alice Cotton was a born pack rat, but one who maintained cleanliness and order.

In some eerie way, she resembled her mother; the dark brown hair and young, almost innocent features. Her complexion was so translucently pale that it bespoke only the most rare and grudging familiarity with daylight. The only difference was in the eyes as she slowly awoke from her slumber. Instead of her mother's brown eyes, she had an almost dark, ocean blue. But there was something else there, too. Perpetual sadness.

"Alice, get up!"

Alice grumbled and lifted her head slowly and with much effort, looking up dazedly to her best friend and fellow co-worker Katie Daniels. She was 21 years old, beautiful and outgoing. Her hair was short, blonde and her eyes a pretty shade of green.

"What?" Alice grumbled, sleepily.

"Your going to be late!" Katie cried, "You're going to be late for the reading of your mom's will! Get up. NOW!"

Alice looked over at a hanging wall clock that read: 7:58 A.M. She gritted her teeth angrily and smacked her palms loudly on the desk. "Goddammit, I'm LATE!" she shouted, jumping to her feet and rushing out through the front door.

Katie grabbed the keys on the desk that Alice had forgotten and quickly followed her. "Alice! Keys!"

The younger woman stood on the driver's side of her Mustang Convertible and she caught them as Katie tossed them at her.

O

The two women rode down the streets into the city of Detroit and during the entire time, Katie was helping Alice by brushing her hair as she drove, applied makeup and straightened up her shirt so that she would look somewhat presentable. Alice sighed angrily at the traffic blockade and honked her horn a few times.

"I don't need this," she snapped, "I DON'T NEED THIS!"

"Calm down, Alice," Katie encouraged, "We'll get there."

Unfortunately, it took over a half of an hour to get through the traffic block and to the law office building. Both women had to run into the elevators where they ran to find Alice's lawyer. She ignored the unhappy looks of those behind desks; little office cubicles scattered around a converted loft space. She clearly had quite a bit of practice at ignoring disapproving stares from others. They were pointing and whispering as the two women walked by.

They walked into the office of Barry H. Miller.

He was a no - nonsense guy of 34 years with diminishing black hair and hard, brown eyes. As he studied the two women sitting in front of his desk, he removed a folder from his desk and a lock box containing what Alice could guess were a few items.

"You know, Miss Cotton, I normally don't condone tardiness of any kind, but you caught me at a good day." he told her.

The two woman glanced skeptically at one another. They caught him on a good day? They really didn't want to see bad then. Barry regarded Alice with dismay and even criticism. Katie knew that he was going to say something to piss Alice off.

"Your mother took her will seriously. You don't seem to." he said.

Alice glared at him. "Eat me, Barry."

He scoffed and shook his head. "It's exactly that lack of respect for authority that got you fired from your past 5 jobs," he snapped, "Now, I am going to read what your mother left you. So please try and control your tongue until I am finished so I won't have to look at you again."

Alice smiled tartly in reply. The feeling was sure as hell mutual between them both. How her mother put up with an asshole like Barry Miller was beyond her. "Good."

Barry arched his brows at her and murmured with displeasure before he opened the folder and began to read from Kirsty's will. "'I, Kirsty Cotton do leave my entire estate to my daughter, Alice Jane Cotton. She is to have unfettered access to all assets in the amount of 500,000 dollars."

Alice's brows went up with surprise and Katie patted her shoulder. "Hey! Congratulations!"

Barry handed Alice the lock box as well as the keys to it. "This belongs to you as well."

Alice ran her fingers over the cool metal and frowned thoughtfully. There were a few dents and imperfections in it, including some smudges. Alice couldn't resist her curiosity, but at the same time, the familiar feeling of bitterness came back. Why would her mother leave her even this?

When she returned home, Alice spent almost five minutes in her living room just staring at the lock box. Katie was on her edge with curiosity and she stared at her friend anxiously with a broad grin on her face. "Aren't you going to open it, Alice?"

Alice nodded. "Gimme a minute."

Katie groaned good - naturedly and took the keys from the table, handing them to her. "Come on!" she urged, "You wanna open it. You know you do!"

Alice smiled at her friend and took the keys. "Alright, alright," she said, chuckling as she unlocked the small padlock, "Good God, you're so anxious. It's probably nothing anyway. Maybe a pack of cigarettes and a stick of gum."

She opened the box and frowned.

"What is it?" Katie asked.

Alice removed several small items from the lock box, a DVD disk, a few photos and book clippings, and a golden puzzle box. The Lament Configuration. Katie picked it up and studied it with fascination, running her fingers along its aged edges.

"Whoa, what is this?" she asked, amazed.

Alice took it from her hands almost immediately. "It's garbage, that's what." She walked toward a window, opened it and Katie started to protest as her friend reared back and prepared to throw the puzzle box out the window.

"Alice, come on!" she insisted, "Don't do - Oh, you did ... "

Alice took a spot down on the sofa chair and switched her television on. "My mother practically obsessed over that goddamn box and she leaves it for me?" she groused, "Christ, she never ceases to piss me off, even in death!"

Katie sighed with pity and took a spot on the adjacent chair. "Alice, you know perfectly well that she didn't hate you."

Alice smiled sarcastically and even though she tried to sound like it didn't matter, it really hurt her more than she wanted people to believe. "Nah. She didn't hate me, Katie," she sneered, flipping channels with her universal remote, "Hate takes effort, you know. Mom was too busy obsessing over demons, witchcraft and all that other bullshit. She could have at least called me or showed up for my college graduation, but her excuse was," she raised her voice in a crude falsetto, "'Sorry, honey, I was booked up at the library'!"

Katie smiled at her and shrugged one shoulder. "Well, come on, she left you all that money ... "

"Probably as a guilt card ... " Alice muttered. She found a channel; a movie. It looked like a crime flick.

Outside, the puzzle box rested in the grass of the sidewalk. A man walked on by, whistling a casual tune to himself. He was young and quite handsome in appearance, the eye catcher that every woman wanted. From his attire, he appeared to be very wealthy as well. He was wearing a pair of Barker Blacks, an unbuttoned suit and shirt, a Bogart style hat and a thin brown jacket. He was a walking and talking big spender with a bit of a rugged mean streak to him.

Most of his associates knew him as Leonard "Leo" Belasco.

Once he noticed the box lying there, he stopped and cocked his head, bending down to pick it up. He studied it in his hands for a few moments before glancing up at the house where it had fallen from. After a moment of pondering, he smiled with pleasure at his find and strolled away.

Leo arrived at the Motorcity Grand Hotel, home of the casino, drug users, and prostitutes of every size and shape. This was just Leo's little piece of paradise, the tower of sin. He didn't mind dealing with the cops about it either; after all, he payed them to stay off of his tail.

Two burly men at the front doors greeted him.

"Good evening, Mr. Belasco."

Leo smiled at them before making his way casually down the rows of gamblers, machines and tables full of smoking, eager individuals bargaining their very souls away. He approached a smoky, overdecorated table where a few women and more sharply - dressed hoods were, in the middle of playing a friendly game of poker, smoking cigarettes and drinking from bottles of whiskey. Several of the women smiled at Leo when he took a spot at the table with them.

"Leo," one of the hoods said, chuckling between his cigarette, "You look beautiful tonight, my friend. Welcome home."

"How was the prowl there, tiger?" another hood asked. He was much older, possibly in his late 50's.

Leo shrugged his shoulder. "Ah, I came up short tonight."

The first hood who had spoken grinned and gestured to two of the woman underneath his arm. "You won't in a few hours, buddy," he told him, "I've been tellin' these ladies about ya'. About how you're into the real freaky shit."

Leo smiled at the two women, who grinned seductively at him. They seemed intrigued by the idea of this "bad boy" being somewhat freaky with them.

"Do you girls like that kind of thing?" he asked them.

"Oh yes ... " one of them whispered, slyly. She was slightly tanned and dressed in a skimpy black dress and blouse. She had long, red boots and a thick, red belt.

"My sister and I are good for anything you want us to do." This one was somewhat smaller than her companion, dressed in a red, spaghetti-strap dress that was cut so high, you could see her black-lace thong. She wore long, high - heeled black boots and massive pearl earrings.

They seemed to wear exact opposite colors when it came to their clothing. It was an odd trait to see in two women.

Leo's brows went up and his mouth turned upwards in a cheeky smirk. He couldn't believe his good luck. Now that he looked at them hard enough, there was a noticeable similarity between the two women sitting there. "Sisters? You're sisters?"

"That's right."

The hoods around the table laughed with glee at their boss' fortune and soon-to-be relaxation. "Have fun, Leo!" one of them called as Leo disappeared down the hallways with the ladies in his arms. He looked back at them, winking once before he turned a corner.

O

Leo's private room was precisely the size for a guy of his ego and it appeared to be a very expensive suite. His room looked like an annex to his casino- colorful walls, a few personal solitaire machines, artworks of elegant cruelty and even beauty. And in the very center of the room was Leo's grand bed where the two women were naked, lying beside him like two contented lioness. Leo was smiling with pride and he took out a cigarette from a wooden case beside the bed and the Lament Configuration rested there with various alcohol bottles surrounding it.

"You ladies certainly know how to have fun." he told them.

Despite being a murderer, an asshole and a rick jerk, Leo was the kind of guy who enjoyed the women and did what he could to make them happy, even if they were with him for a short time. He even went out of his way to learn their names, which were Candice and Mabel. Candice being the tanned lady and Mabel the other. They were clever and somewhat masochistic in their work. Leo enjoyed it because not many women in the city were in to that kind of thing.

"How much should I give you gals tonight?" he asked.

Candice grinned and rubbed his chest with one hand. "Whatever you feel we deserve."

Mabel's eyes landed on the puzzle box and she carefully picked it up. "What's this, Leo?" she asked.

He chuckled as he took the box and sat up, the two women joining him. "Not too sure, but I found it on one of my walks," he told her, "It's kind of weird, but hey, it looks old. Might fetch me a decent penny on the market downtown. There's a lot of people in this city who pay big bucks for old shit."

"Does it do anything?" Candice asked him, taking the box and rubbing her fingers along the edges.

Suddenly, as she toyed with it, the box made a clicking sound. She smiled and looked at the other two. Leo looked somewhat impressed and fascinated while Mabel watched in pleasure as Candice slid a small part of the box open. There was a gentle twinkling tune and a few of the trinkets in the room seemed to move on their own, but the three did not notice such a sight. Candice had opened more of the box. The tune within sounded much more complex now. Somewhere a bell had started to ring as she worked the final mechanism of the box.

Leo laughed and took it, placing it at the side of the bed. "Ahh, stop playing with that thing," he encouraged, with a sly fox-like grin that told of his coming arousal, "There's no use in wasting valuable time. We have all night, you know."

The two women forgot all about the box and giggled. As they began to fool around, the box slowly rolled away from the bed and into the bathroom where it began to unfurl and click on its own. Sparks of light flickered from it and shadows emerged from the darkness. All of this went by unnoticed by the lovers in the other room.

At the window of the suite, a raven - like head appeared, leering over at them. Mabel noticed it and she grinned. "Hey, hey, look at that!" she gasped, "There's a bird over there!"

Leo and Candice glanced over at the window and laughed at the sight of it. Their inhibitions were slightly off due to the alcohol, so they did not see what the creature TRULY was; a woman bearing the head of a raven, crouched down out on the fire escape with long, metal blades jutting out of her knuckles and the flesh of her back was split ope, stretched into the form of wings with wire and metal. The outfit she was wearing was different from that of most Cenobites as well, being still forged from leather and resembled Pinhead's leather suit mixed with the outfit that could be worn by a pole dancer. Her fish-net stockings were not fish nets at all, rather razor wire that resembled it.

Leo smirked at the bird. "Go on, bird!" he told the creature, as it tilted its head to one side, "Get out of here! This ain't no peep show!"

"I think that it most certainly is ... "

The voice came from the bathroom where Pinhead emerged. Along his side stood Butterball, Nikoletta and the Raven Cenobite slowly joined them. The sight of the demons standing there caused the three lovers to jolt in their bed, startled. Pinhead surveyed the room, the scene before him and the terrified and awe- struck group looking back at him, his eyes catching sight of the objects of pleasure; the cattle prod, the leather straps... He almost smiled at the childishness of their methods for pleasure. Petty, simple and not much in the ways of pain.

"Jesus Christ!" Leo gasped.

Pinhead laughed softly at the commonly used exclamation from his prey. Ah, that line never got old with him. "Not even close."

Candice and Mabel started to jump for their clothes, but several hooked chains flew out from the shadows and yanked them from their goal, wrapping around their bodies and holding them tightly to the walls. They cried out in horror and pain, struggling for all that they could. Pinhead gave them a cold, pitiless smirk. Ah, young flesh. Young, supple flesh.

"Tell me, ladies," he told the women, "Do you ... enjoy pain? Enjoy inflicting it perhaps? Even more so, enjoy receiving it?"

The two bound women looked at each other. They didn't know how to speak to this powerful, awesome being of hell. The question was almost loaded somehow, they just knew it. He was going to hurt them and they had a feeling that it would be much worse than anything that they had ever experienced.

Pinhead's grin broadened. "Then you are going to enjoy this."

Just as they opened their mouths to scream, two deadly hooks lashed out and sliced into their tongues, preventing them from uttering a single sound. Nikoletta smiled at the noises they made and Butterball licked his lips hungrily.

Leo made a dive for his drawer and pulled out a custom 9mm Handgun, leveling it at the demons. "Get the fuck out of here!" he spat, "I don't know what the hell you are, but I suggest you let them go, get outta here before things get real messy!"

Pinhead showed no particular interest with the man's less - than - intimidating threats. "I suggest that you curb your tongue, human."

Leo blinked in disbelief and two more chains flew out from the shadows, hooking both sides of his mouth and stretching them away from each other, holding him to the bed with his back bowed forward in a painful position. Blood gushed from the hooked flesh and the two women along his side whimpered with agony. Their cheeks were flush with tears and pain, the hooks in their tongues nearly ripping the flesh in two.

"You have friends waiting for you in hell, Leonard," Pinhead told the groaning man. He smiled as the man visibly choked and wavered at the knowledge that the creature knew. "Oh yes...I understand. When there is something we desire so strongly, we must take it by any means necessary, no matter who is hurt in the process. Oh but you...you made absolutely sure that you escaped so freely from your sins. You paid countless authorities to keep them quiet, to keep the truth from slipping out, but in the end, it always comes back to haunt you, Leonard. Always."

Leo groaned in agony and when he tried to reach up to take the hooks from his face, two more chains lashed out and stabbed into his palms, holding them to the bed as he uttered as much of a scream as he could.

"P'ase ... P'ase ... 'et 'e go!" he begged.

Pinhead smiled at him. "I will ... dear boy," he said, "I will."

And the Dark Prince of Pain's idea of 'letting him go' was simply allowing for the chains to pull him apart in various different directions, his scream of mortal pain silenced and followed up by the wet, sticky sounds of blood and flesh flying and hitting the walls. The watching women uttered muffled screams of horror and despair at the sight of their lover being torn to pieces. Pinhead turned to them and they immediately hushed themselves as he practically towered over them, a dark and blood - thirsty shadow. He gave them a smile before glancing over at Butterball. It had been some time since his lesser subordinate enjoyed female meat and he had done quite well in their past mission. Besides, Pinhead had his attention focused on other matter than indulging merely in trivial pleasures.

"Finish them." he commanded.

Butterball seemed absolutely delighted with the 'gift' and uttered a low grunt before looming over the women. He seemed to snicker dryly at them before removing a meat cleaver from his belt. Their eyes grew wide with muffled shrieks.

Pinhead had turned his gaze out the window and Nikoletta stared up at him curiously, tuning out the sounds of sliced flesh and death screams. "My lord, what is your command?"

"Find Alice Cotton," Pinhead told her, his black gaze searching the city before him, "She is out there. We will find her."

Suddenly, there came a swift knock at the door and the Cenobites turned toward it. "MR. BELASCO! I have the fish that you ordered!"

Ah, room service.

Pinhead spoke in a perfect imitation of Leo's voice. "Come in and leave it on the bed!"

After a brief pause, the doors opened and a man dressed in a black suit and tie walked in wheeling in a cart with a covered dish. He was young, attractive and handsome, but a rather timid fellow who did whatever he was told.

"Mr. Belasco, I hope you like it," he said, in the darkness of the room, "The chef's made it special."

"Thank you," came Pinhead's response from the bathroom, "I like it quite a lot."

Just as the man whirled to see who it was, a hook came flying at him before he could scream.

After hours of nothing but silence, the man stepped out of the suite once more, smiling and in no harm at all. But there was something different about him this time. His eyes were as hard as stone, his features grim and powerful. He cracked his neck and a demonic gruff sound escaped his lips. After popping his fingers into place, Pinhead's voice emerged from his lips and he sounded absolutely cunning this time.

"A little skin will take me a long way ... " he murmured, chuckling cruelly before walking down the hallways as if nothing was wrong.

O

Note-Oh my, what is going to happen next? Stay tuned and review for meh! ^^