And we're back with more Overdrive wherein things and stuff happen.

Overdrive Chapter 16: Thermopylae

Flyte's hooves scored glowing, molten channels into the debris-riddled ground, streaking through the ruins at blistering speed, darting around wreckage and leaping over shelled out buildings, looking to the outside like a jinking and jibing red-orange streak. At these speeds, the occupants would have been buffeted by hurricane winds were it not for the glowing bow-wave of hellfire emanating from the infernal steed's head and mane.

The four of them were squished together on the back of the immense hellhorse, their meager supplies jostling in saddlebags. JoJo reluctantly clung to Catwalk's waist as Kashmir did the same to him with one hand, his other keeping his grandfather's checkerboard top-hat on his head. Bhavana's slender body was partially sandwiched between them, her bony rump not even touching Flyte's back, her arms looped around JoJo's bullish neck.

JoJo glanced around at the ruins as they sped by, his brow furrowed deeply. What had happened back there? What was that sigil and why did it scare Catwalk badly enough to send them sprinting into an active warzone?

Abaddon… JoJo knew the name, of course. The apocryphal Angel of the Abyss, the Destroyer, one of the various agents of the Apocalypse. He'd taken all he knew with a grain of salt, of course, since much of what religions in the Mortal Realm preached were either incomplete or misinterpreted views of the Big Picture. Could this Abaddon character be real, or just a misunderstanding of another, less ominous entity?

"May as well ask…" JoJo muttered, leaning over the smaller demon's shoulder. "Hey! Catwalk! What was all that back there? Who is Ab–"

"Don't," he said, tersely. "Don't say its name. Try not to even think about it. For that to be in one of our safehouses… it's an ill portend."

"Well, we can't really plan and prepare around something if we don't know what it is!" Kashmir called out from the back. "I understand that you're nervous about invoking a malign entity, but if our mission is codified by prophecy or some such, then so was that encounter!"

"Yeah!" JoJo agreed. "So c'mon, spill the beans!"

Catwalk said nothing, deftly and silently guiding Flyte through the battlefield. JoJo glanced back to Kashmir and shrugged. The falcon-demon scoffed quietly, shaking his head. JoJo sighed and turned back to Catwalk. "Can you at least tell us where we're going? An active warzone is an odd place to keep a safehouse!"

"I was hoping to avoid this until we were better situated, but between our pursuers and… that, I fear that the safest place for us is out here," said Catwalk, tension singing in his voice. "I have allies out here who have recently taken some ground. If we can meet up with them, we ought to be safe."

"Ought to be?"

"Considering our situation, 'safe' is a relative term."

"Relative how?"

Catwalk turned to face him, a tight grim smirk on his checkered face. "Relative to our current situation 'safe' would come to mean 'merely in mortal danger' as opposed to 'as good as dead'."

JoJo stared at the demon for a moment before patting him on the shoulder. "…Hey, can this horse go any faster? I have a sudden need for speed."

The hellhorse skidded to a stop in a clearing at the base of an immense structure, its bare framework extending high into the sky like the skeleton of a long-dead colossus. In form it resembled an arcane pastiche of the Eiffel Tower, albeit much, much larger, tapering upwards before terminating in a bulbous mushroom-cap structure. JoJo was shaken from his quiet marvel at its architectural acumen by the realization that it was, indeed, built to resemble a giant cock.

'Gustave Eiffel is spinning in his grave…' JoJo thought, sourly. 'Or maybe he'd love it? The French flag is the only one to have a staff 1000 feet tall, after all. Freud would have a field-day.'

"We'll camp here for the night," said Catwalk, dismounting. "I'll establish a perimeter and see if I can scavenge anything from the surrounding area. The rest of you set up camp. Be on your guard and don't go anywhere alone."

"There's three of us," said Kashmir. "Even if we pair up, we'd be leaving someone behind alone."

"Then don't," said Catwalk, pulling out one of his angelic wrecking balls and heading out for the wasteland. "Stay put until I come back."

"What if we have to pinch a loaf?" JoJo called after him. "I can't go if someone's watching!"

Catwalk said nothing, disappearing into a bank of smoke and dust as it rolled by, carried on the winds of distant flames.

"Man…" JoJo muttered, sighing. "Whatever crawled up his ass has teeth!"

"That symbol…" Kashmir mused grimly. "To shake a demon like Signor Catwalk, it can't be good."

A small squeak sounded between them, a slender hand frantically batting at JoJo's rippling shoulder. They looked to see Bhavana, who had slid down between them, currently crushed between Kashmir's belly and JoJo's broad, muscular back.

"Whoops!" JoJo said, scooching forward on the saddle. "You okay back there, Fluff?"

"Jeez!" Bhavana exclaimed, gasping for air. "Like being stuffed between two beef sides!"

"And here I thought you liked meat…" Kashmir said, wryly.

"I didn't say it was a bad thing," Bhavana retorted, smirking wryly before looking around. "Where are we?"

"Somewhere they build literally monumental dicks, apparently," said JoJo, hopping off of Flyte and pointing to Eiffel Schlong. "Ring any bells?"

"Ooh!" Bhavana cooed, a huge grin spreading across her face. "Asmodeus Boulevard! Oh, I hear some of the best restaurants in all of PC Central are here!" She looked around at the blasted ruins, the warzone an unending gray waste of burning vehicles and the shattered remains of buildings, long since smashed to pieces by artillery and airstrikes. "Er… 'were'."

"There, let's set up camp," said Kashmir, pointing to an only partially shelled out building, its facing wall staved in, but the roof appeared more or less intact. "It's sheltered and will make it harder for anyone to sneak up on us."

"Ain't no ritz, but it'll do," said JoJo, shouldering the saddlebags and carrying them over.

After getting situated in the ruin, they started a fire in the main room of what was apparently a cafe. Bhavana had scavenged coffee grounds and breakfast sandwiches, brewing them all a steaming cup of joe as she warmed the sandwiches next to the fire.

"And for a little flavor…" She murmured, pulling a slice of demon-flesh from her recently replenished cache of 'personal meat', skewering it on a long splinter of 2x4 and set it to cook over the flames. "This is almost cozy!"

"Cozy, she says…" Kashmir muttered, looking out at the bombed out neighborhood. "What are we doing in this literally Godforsaken place?"

"Catwalk has contacts out here, apparently," said JoJo, sipping his steaming-yet-lukewarm coffee, grimacing. "…I hate this place."

"But why come here?" Kashmir said, an inexplicable sense of unease building within him as he stared out at the ruins. "What was in that room that made Catwalk drag us into an active warzone?"

"Not sure, he refused to talk about it," said JoJo, turning to Bhavana. "Hey. You're a local. What was all that back there?"

Bhavana jumped at the question, eyes wide. She curled up in front of the fire, hugging her knees to her chest. She reached down to the dirt and, slowly and obviously painfully as smoke trailed from her fingertip, traced an ॐ into the dirt. JoJo recognized it as the 'om' symbol, a Sanskrit sigil used in Hindu practices to, among other things, protect against evil. For a demon to cast such a thing…

"Bhavana!" Kashmir exclaimed, running over and kneeling next to her, examining her burnt finger. "Why? What was that thing back there? What do you know!?"

"Those letters, the ones around the symbol," said JoJo, leaning forward. "They spelled–"

Bhavana shook her head, her lips a tight line, ears vanishing into her wool as they pressed flat. "No. Don't say His name. Don't think it. Anyone could be listening."

"Oh, what the fuck is going on now?" JoJo groaned, clapping his palm against his forehead. "As if we weren't dealing with enough bullshit…"

All three jumped as JoJo and Kashmir's phones buzzed in their pockets. JoJo pulled it out and activated it, the alarmed holographic face of Dee-Dee appearing in the air above it. "I believe I can be of some assistance, Joseph."

"What the Hell is that?!" Bhavana squawked, pointing at the hologram.

"I'm none of your business, missy!" Dee-Dee said, eyes lighting up as her voice dropped any and all notion of warmth.

Bhavana went stiff, her mouth snapping shut as she turned her wide, staring eyes back to the fire, heedless of the piece of flesh blackening over it.

"And to think I'd actually forgotten you existed," said Kashmir, acidly. "My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined."

"Awfully catty for a bird," JoJo sniped, turning back to the Sinai. "Well? Give us the deets, Dee-Dee. What is all this bugaboo about?"

"That symbol back in the safehouse was the callsign of the Destroyer, The Angel of the Abyss, the King of Locusts: Abaddon," said Dee-Dee, gravely. "The actual existence of this entity is… controversial, even in Heaven. Should Abaddon actually dwell within the Abyss, the realm of destructive nothingness upon which Hell floats, it would mean that they had been placed there long before the Fall, possibly before the creation of Mortals. Rumor has it that this entity was placed there by the Almighty prior to the commencement of the Mortal Experiment as a sort of 'factory reset' asset."

"'Factory reset asset'? That's a funny thing to call an Agent of the Apocalypse…" JoJo grumbled, rolling his eyes.

"Wait," said Kashmir, gesturing for a 'time-out'. "Rumor has it? You mean you don't know? All religions have a doomsday prophecy or some such nonsense, how can you not know?!"

"The term 'prophecy' has been… misapplied," said Dee-Dee. "Just like a gun may have a trigger, or a computer a reset function, the eventuality of its use is hardly guaranteed. Many mystics and precognitives responsible for the various 'end of days' prophecies saw this possibility and, through catastrophe-bias, presumed it was inevitable. The Destroyer is a contingency, not necessarily part of The Plan. As such, specifics regarding its exact nature, location, and other such details are strictly need-to-know. Sinai's such as myself and, indeed, much of the Celestial Host do not need to know. Therefore we don't."

"The more I listen to you Celestial types, the more I understand that Heaven is run like a Midwest department store," JoJo groaned, shaking his head. "A really shitty, understaffed one."

"I'd warn you against blasphemy, Joseph," said Dee-Dee, her hologram looping about, taking in their surroundings. "But at this juncture it's kind of a moot point. It is not our place to know what Father chooses not to share with us. It's that simple."

"Like Hell it's that simple!" Kashmir snapped, gesturing broadly at Hell. "We're here on a mission of the utmost gravity! We should have every piece of relevant information available! Now, if this Abaddon is in any way involved with this plot–"

"Oh, don't be silly, Caesar~" Dee-Dee tittered, waving him off. "Abaddon, if he or she or they exist at all, is in the Abyss! No matter the incantations or rituals these fetid Souls employ, there is no conceivable way to summon or even contact anything within it. No, Mr. Catwalk's reaction was just a case of him, er, 'going native'."

"What do you mean?" JoJo asked, looking at Bhavana, who was sitting perfectly still, staring into nothingness within the fire. "Why's everyone so bent out of shape about this whole Abby biz?"

"You see, Adabbon holds a special place in the hearts of subversive elements in Hell," said Dee-Dee. "As an agent of the Apocalypse, it is logical to assume that Abaddon is more powerful than even Lucifer. Needless to say, the regime takes a supremely dim view of the practices of any organization that even questions Lucifer's position as 'He With Might Above All Under God', and as such persecutes such elements with, well…"

"Extreme prejudice?" JoJo offered.

"Great vengeance and furious anger?" Kashmir scoffed.

"Immense abhorrence," murmured Bhavana. "Whole neighborhoods have been culled under suspicion of housing Abaddonites. There's no better way to get Lucifer's attention than to allege a sect is active in an area. Ever since the war started, there's been a crazy uptick in cult activity. Either they've been getting displaced or… or something's going on."

"Doubtless that is why Signor Catwalk reacted so strongly," mused Kashmir. "We're already being pursued by powerful parties, no sense in courting the direct attention of Lucifer himself."

"Exactly," said Dee-Dee, nodding. "No need to concern yourself with the quaint rituals of misled Sinners, beyond the surrounding controversy and its consequences, that is."

"Maybe…" Bhavana murmured, setting the well-roasted meat on her warm sandwich. "But anything that agitates Lucifer enough for him to act out… maybe there's something to it?"

"In any case," said Kashmir, sipping his coffee. "Whether this being exists or not, let's steer right clear of that hornet's nest. We have quite enough on our plate already without Hell's version of Satanists bringing the Inner Circle down on our heads. Catwalk was right to vacate the premises."

"Yeah…" JoJo muttered, pondering the flames. "Say, where is ol' Checker-Face? I know he was doing perimeter duty, but shouldn't he be back by now?"

A dull 'thud' sounded from behind them. They turned to see Catwalk's Seraphim Steel wrecking ball rolling towards them on the rubble-strewn floor. Catwalk groaned as he approached, illuminated by the light from the fire, his feet a solid foot off the ground. An immense, gray scaly figure came into view, its taloned hand clasped firmly around Catwalk's neck and shoulders, a huge-bore blessed autocannon pointed at the checkered demon's face. The demon grinned, displaying a signature golden fang. Two armed demons strode from the darkness, dressed in some obscene mock-up of battle armor and pimp-wear, tattered and singed from heavy combat.

"Oh no…" Bhavana muttered hoarsely. "Vees…"

"How sweet…" The huge Sinner crooned, casting the semi-conscious Catwalk to the floor before them, leveling his weapon at the group along with the rest of his gang. "Fresh meat."

Pentagram City Central

Hellenes District

Thermopylae Pass

The Thermopylae Pass, formerly one of the main arteries both to and from PC Central, leading all the way to the center, to Perdition, the throne-city of Lucifer himself. Before that fateful day, its name was a rueful moniker for the interminable traffic jams that inevitably ensued when multiple superhighways merged together. Now, however, the name had become grimly apropos. As a main junction of countless highways leading in and out of PC Central, Thermopylae would be a vital lifeline to any warlord who took it, allowing them to quickly advance deeper into the valuable center while ensuring a steady stream of plunder to return, a feature that had not gone unnoticed. Since the start of the war, no one faction had held the Pass for more than a week, with each attempt at conquest more brutal and vicious than the last.

The rich, bustling neighborhoods and boroughs that had sprung up about the highway like grass on a shallow grave were now charred ruins. The bombed out shambles broken up by vast tracts of scorched rubble, laid waste by the increasingly savage fighting of ambitious Overlords seeking to control the chokepoint. Brutal urban warfare had given way to indiscriminate bombardment and razing as the warring demons sought to break the stalemate around the vital asset, while the artery itself was kept as pristine as possible. Tiny figures scurried about the well-lit highway, patching potholes and assessing the condition of the immense road's supports across its many overpasses. The current owners of the pass, after a fearsome battle, had wasted no time setting up fortifications across the road, celebrating their hard-won victory while maintaining a healthily patrolled perimeter, ever-wary of any who dared approach the most recent prize of the upstart group of Overlords, the brutal and effective Il Nove.

A short, sharply dressed rodent-demon strolled through the fort as it was rapidly assembled around him. His trim, muscular body was covered in a glossy layer of gunmetal gray fur save for the ruddy patch of curly hair atop his head, carefully cut into neatly cropped style with a pronounced widow's peak. He wore black tall-heeled wingtip shoes and a red vest, both made from nigh-impenetrable Wrath Mustang leather. The shoes were capped with glinting metal tips, the vest peppered with shining metal studs, all made from precious Seraphim Steel. His black custom fitted pants and silver undershirt were made of Gluttony silk, enchanted to harden in response to trauma, becoming stronger than ten times their weight in Wrath steel plate. Overlord Willin' continued his inspection of the operation, idly puffing on a cigarette.

"Lord Willin'!" A voice called out. "The perimeter walls are complete and being armed as we speak."

Willin' turned to see a trio of identical creatures approach him, differentiated only by the metal pauldrons on their right shoulders, two silver, one gold, signifiers of the quality of their 'breeding' and therefore rank. The demonic homunculi, or 'Juniors' as they were known, were the product of a member of Il Nove, the dreaded Overlord Playlist. Through a revoltingly invasive procedure, carefully selected hosts were implanted with eggs that, upon hatching, would rapidly and graphically erupt, consuming their hosts before pupating into what stood before him. Willin' himself was no fan of the process by which his compatriot selected his 'proud parents', nor the unhinged glee with which he carried out his duties, but fully conceded as to the usefulness of the monstrous things. They were immensely strong, blisteringly fast, and – depending on their breeding – surprisingly intelligent. To the mouse-demon they were annoyingly tall, though not especially so by Hell's standards, at about seven feet. Their blue-gray bodies were harsh, angular, resembling a cross between an insect and a machine. Besides their rank-indicating pauldrons, they wore little else besides bandoliers of ammunition and grenades, though given their ability to manipulate matter, even these were superfluous.

Willin' looked about at the walls as Juniors scurried about them like ants, breaking down matter into cubes and reforming it into a variety of machine guns, grenade launchers, and various other instruments of dissuasive violence. It was only four meters tall by two thick, with machicolations capped with razor wire, every thirty meters was a ravelin complete with framework sentry tower, creating overlapping killzones for anyone ballsy enough to approach.

"Those walls aren't very tall," said Willin', turning back to the lead Junior, the one wearing a Gold pauldron, as opposed to the Silvers flanking him. "Towers look flimsy."

"Yes, My Lord," Gold Shoulder said, bowing. "Our engineers tell us we can't take much more matter from the Pass without compromising its structural integrity."

"It can't be helped…" Willin' sighed, shrugging and reaching into one of the many pockets in his vest, producing a cigarette case. "Here. We'll give it some extra teeth in the meantime." He opened the case, revealing a dozen tiny semi-trucks. He tapped one with the single oversized talon extending from his index finger, sheathed in obsidian-sharp Seraphim Steel Carmine-blessed cladding. He picked up the cigarette-sized semi and tossed it casually, the truck returning to full-size an instant later. "Blessing-tipped 20mm rotary cannons, mortars, and grenade launchers. That'll make just about anyone think twice. If you have men to spare, arrange some sorties to head out into the ruins for building material. I want those walls twice as high and twice as thick by dinnertime, you understand?"

"Yes, My Lord!" Gold Shoulder said, bowing. He whistled and pointed to the truck. "Unload the cargo and set 'em up. Cannons in the towers, 'nades on the wall, mortars in the courtyard! Move! Move! Move! You, Silver! Gather up some Bronzes and whip up a dump truck, you're on quarry duty! Hup!"

Willin' smirked and strolled through across the courtyard and towards the officer's building at the center of the fort. He entered the reinforced building, an old, fat, ugly imp woman approached him with a dossier. Willin' thumbed through it, skimming over the various reports and requests from their forward forces. He signed off on the forms and handed the dossier off to the Hellborn assistant. She nodded and waddled off to wherever she was needed next. Willin' idly watched the dumpy creature go. Such a shame they couldn't have some nicer-looking wares walking about, but restraint wasn't Playlist's strong suit at the best of times and looks were his first criteria when it came to choosing his 'parents'. How many maids, butlers, and secretaries had they gone through before they figured that one out? Enough that Il Nove had been blacklisted by most of the service agencies in Hell.

He strode into the sparsely-appointed common area, with little more than a couch set before a widescreen TV, a folding table, and a smattering of chairs. On the couch was a handsome, well-dressed corvid-demon, the mirror-master Overlord Thriller. He sank into the couch, looking as bored as demonically possible as his couchmate, a short slender imp, prattled on about whatever it was they were watching.

"Inspired!" The imp practically swooned. "See that? While we engaged the Vees from the east, the Brigadier led his ground forces through the urban tangle from the south while his airforce approached from the west!"

Willin' stepped around to see what was on the screen. Tom Trench was chattering excitedly in front of a blackboard featuring various arrows, insignias, and the like. Willin' spotted right away it was a basic rendition of their victory in securing Thermopylae not three days ago.

"Uh-huh," Thriller grunted. "Why'd he do that, Moxx?"

Moxxie grinned, adopting a scholarly mein. "Well, you see, classic military doctrine is to have air support accompany ground forces. So when the Vees saw they were about to be caught in a pincer, they sent their reserves to face them and give the rest time to retreat north. You see, they assumed that no one could move a significant force through the rubble and narrow streets to their south, so imagine their surprise when Brigadier Heidelberg appeared on their flank with a full armored division! Then, when we pressed our attack to the east, both forces came down on them, all after the Vees had diverted their back-up!"

"And by the time they knew what's what, the Kraut's airsupport arrived," said Willin', nodding. "Pretty clever."

"I dunno," said Thriller, crossing his arms. "I still feel weird about accepting help from fucking Nazis."

"Not Nazis!" A voice barked out from across the room. "Bundeswehr!"

Standing at the table, poring over maps and charts with little tokens representing forces, was a tallish demon. In form he resembled a futuristic space-suit mixed with a cat, his carapace dazzling white with glacial-blue stripes, his face was glass-smooth, rounded with the slightest implication of a snout, a pair of twitching triangular ears atop his head. He turned to them, his face a roiling mass of cryogenic gas behind a transparent faceplate, a pair of ruby-red eyes floating above a franged grimace. The Cryogenic Killer, Entropy on Legs, the Heat Death of the Universe, the aggressively pedantic second-in-command of Il Nove, Overlord Blackbird.

Thriller rolled his eyes. "What's the difference?"

"The difference," Blackbird hissed. "Is–"

"The Bundeswehr is the official armed forces of the Republic of Germany," interjected Moxxie. "Established in 1955, the Bundeswehr sought to differentiate itself from the Reichsmacht and Wehrmacht by basing their military doctrine on the tenets of military thinkers Claus von Clausewitz, Gerhard von Scharnhorst, and August Neidhardt von Gneisenau, as well as establishing their own military tradition since their founding."

"Yes," said Blackbird, gesturing to the imp. "Thank you, Moxxie. The Black Stars soundly reject the tenets of National Socialism. Implying otherwise could offend our allies, so please refrain from referring to them as such."

Thriller grinned mischievously. "Do you think if I ask real nice, Ol' Heidelberg will give me an N-word pass?"

"DON'T TRY IT!" Blackbird snapped. "WE FOUGHT HARD FOR THIS GLORIFIED STREET, THRILLER! IF YOU MAKE US FIGHT FOR IT AGAIN, I WILL–"

"Ooh! Ooh!" Moxxie cried, pointing to the screen. "There he is! Brigadier General Heidelberg!"

On the screen was drone footage of the battlefield, one of them zipping around the proud raptorial form of the leader of the now-infamous mercenary group as he stood atop a roaring Tiger-1, its mighty treads kicking up dust and debris as it tore through the rubble. Another drone revealed their target, a fleeing Vees convoy of IFVs, APCs, at the center of which was Valentino's armored stretch Rezvani Vengeance. The eagle demon smirked and bellowed an order, the tank's 88mm cannon roared, belching smoke and fire. The armor-piercing round streaked towards the Vengeance, smashing through its side-plating. The demons manning its turrets were ejected from their posts on pillars of fire, the windows bursting outwards as ammunition cooked off within the sturdy frame. The blazing Vengeance swerved off the rubble strewn road, smashing into a bombed out shell of a car, launching off its wheels and tumbling side over side before grinding to a halt. The defending Vees vehicles braked, turning to engage Heidelberg's tank when dozens of shells tore into their midst as the rest of Heidelberg's forces burst from the side streets and walls of bombed out buildings. One after another, the lightly armored vehicles blew apart as high-caliber shells tore through them.

The door of the flaming Vengeance buckled outward before being kicked off its hinges entirely. Clambering out a pillar of flame and black smoke was a tattered, singed, and very angry Valentino. The Overlord snarled into the camera-drone, swatting it aside, his eyes blazing pits behind his shattered heart-shaped shades. The huge moth-demon snarled a string of unspeakably foul curses, his normally smooth, oily croon now a gnashing garble of growling vitriol. He reached into his scorched, shattered battle-tunic, producing a 6-round missile stack, hefting to his shoulder and taking aim. With a wrathful bellow, he fired off all six rounds in quick succession. The 127mm missile roared as they streaked over the battlefield towards the lead tank, Heidelberg's Tiger-I. The General smirked and leapt from the turret, his legs and hands rotating at impossible angles too fast to see, producing immense blasts of high-pressure air.

"Wait," said Thriller, pointing at the screen as the eagle-demon streaked through the air on tiny tornadoes, shredding the incoming missiles with blasts of hypersonic air. "How's he doing that? I thought his demon-power was stashing weapons and shit in his body?"

"Hammerspace is indeed his demonic ability. We're seeing now would be Seelenerste," said Blackbird, returning to his maps, not bothering to watch the screen. "It's a secret martial art practiced by the Black Stars. They're cagey about the details, but evidently it gives Sinners absolute control over their bodies and demonic essence. What he's doing is creating air-control channels in his flesh and bone and spinning his limbs at turbine speeds, producing thrust and an apparently destructive windshear. This martial art can manifest various different abilities, even in Hellborn."

"Fascinating!" Moxxie exclaimed, pointing at the screen as Heidelberg streaked towards the demon Overlord. "I'd heard Overlord Valentino was badly injured in this fight, but I never found out how! Damned Vox covered the whole thing up as 'Kraut misinformation'!"

"Strap in, Moxx," said Willin', chuckling. "This ain't gonna go how you think."

The Brigadier set a foot on the last missile, using it as a springboard as he leapt high into the air, the vortex streaming from his feet pulverizing the roaring ordinance. Valentino snarled, tossing away the missile-launcher and pulling out his battle-cane, the enchanted weapon morphing into a modified Bofors 40mm. The autocannon roared, tracers streaking through the air as he sent a deadly stream of 1kg shells towards the falling demon. Heidelberg smirked and drew a glinting angelic rapier seemingly from nowhere. The blade swished and slashed, light catching on the mirror-blade like starbursts as it sliced and swatted the shells out of the air. The raptor-demon set down on the other end of the burnt-out Vengeance, standing opposite the immense, seething moth-demon. Valentino's mouthparts fleered back from his yellowed fangs in a contemptuous snarl, raising the Bofors and pulling the trigger.

'Click'.

"He's not actually going to get in a knife fight with Valentino?" Thriller asked, incredulously. "That pimp's twice his size and has four arms! He's a fuckin' fool-thresher!"

"Watch, watch," said Willin', amused. "This shit's really funny."

Valentino hissed in disgust and tossed the weapon aside, pulling out four Seraphim Steel kukris, spinning them in his hands, a savage grin splitting his face. The immense Overlord stomped over to the comparatively small Brigadier, four knives glinting. The raptor demon pointed the rapier at the encroaching insect before folding his left arm behind his back, raising the sword up over his head and pointing the tip down to his hip.

"That's a classic Mensur pose!" Moxxie said, giddily. "It was a traditional form of fencing practiced by Bavarian Nobility dating back to the 17th Century! It differs from regular fencing in many fascinating–"

"Shh-shut up," grunted Thriller, leaning forward on the couch. "They're talking."

"Yer pretty ballsy for a merc, Kraut, I'll give ya that," said Valentino, his twelve-foot frame towering over the General, kukris glinting blood red in the surrounding flames. "But ya can't f'real think a nobody the likes of ya can step to me in a proper cut-up!"

"Too right, degenerate," said Heidelberg, raising his blade over his right shoulder. "You'd cut me to pieces."

Valentino paused, cocking an eyebrow, gesturing at the rapier. "So what's all this bullshit about?"

"Oh, this?" Heidelberg said, amused, wagging the blade, its mirror-finish catching the light in bright flashes. "This is just an elaborate preamble to beguile an egregiously attired waffelmampfen schwachsinn prior to deflagration."

Valentino rolled his eyes, scoffing. "In Hellish, G*rm."

"Translation…" Heidelberg grinned, eyes glinting, bringing the glinting blade down in a slow, authoritative arc. "Open fire."

Valentino blinked in realization, looking up to see two dozen tanks, scattered among the destroyed wrecks of his escorts, the bores of their cannons trained on him. He snapped back down to Heidelberg as the General hopped through one of the blown out windows of the Vengeance, smiling cheerily. "Schöen tag~!"

The assembled cannons roared in perfect unison, twenty-four high-explosive shells converging on the huge Overlord. Valentino vanished in an immense explosion, the tumbling, tattered form of the Vee sent hurtling high into the air, trailing smoke and fire. Heidelberg leapt up from the wreck, aiming his already spinning hand at the figure.

"AUUUUF!" Heidelberg bellowed, a manic grin on his face. "WIEDERSEHEEEN!"

A jet of hypersonic air blasted out from the General's rotating arm, demonic essence bursting from his veins and compressing in the high-pressure vortexes, igniting into brilliant green hellfire. The blazing vortex roared up at the blasted Overlord, engulfing him entirely in a shredding, burning maelstrom. Heidelberg reigned in the blast and looked up, smirking as he saw a rapidly shrinking point of green light as Valentino was sent arcing through the air, wreathed in Hellfire. The flickering green dot soared into the horizon, vanishing among the distant rubble.

Heidelberg chuckled, running his finger across the brim of the visor of his peak cap as he turned back to his forces. "Though, when I see you again, filth, it will be too soon."

"YEET!" Thriller cheered, pumping his arms in the air. "Damn, that was slick!"

"The subterfuge! The misdirection! The flair!" Moxxie said, almost swooning. "Such artful theater, perfectly executed to punt that degenerate sexpest–" Moxxie's gushing was interrupted by the shrill buzzing of his Hellphone. He pulled out the device and sneered flatly at the call display: Blitzo. "Speaking of degenerate sexpests… Hey, Thriller."

"Huh?" The crow-demon said, looking over just as the imp unceremoniously tossed his phone into his hands. "Whoa, hey! What am I supposed to do with this?"

"Answer it," grumbled Moxxie, speedwalking out of the common room. "I'm gonna go on patrol."

Thriller glanced at the buzzing phone and then at Willin'. "What was that about?"

Willin' chuckled, shaking his head. "Above my paygrade."

"Interpersonal squabbles are best left off the battlefield," sneered Blackbird. "It's unprofessional."

"Can't be helped…" Willin' sighed, hopping over the couch and searching for the remote. "Thriller, answer that, will you? I Loathe Lucy is coming on and I want to see if Lillith'll be wearing that skimpy number again."

"Why do I gotta–" Thriller grumbled before sighing dramatically and answering, adopting a surprisingly close approximation of Moxxie's shrill, high-pitched voice. "Nnnhello~?"

"Moxx!" Blitzo cried out, frantic relief clear in his voice. "Finally! Look, I know things have been a liiittle tense between the three of us since that night, but please just let me–"

"Whoa okay fuck this," interrupted Thriller, pinching his beak between his eyes. "Not Moxxie."

"Thriller?" Blitzo replied. "What're you–Where's Moxxie?"

"Out on patrol. I was gonna fuck with you a bit and pretend to be Moxx, but forget this domestic shit," said Thriller, looking uncomfortable. "Where you at, Blitzkrieg?"

"With them?" Blitzo sighed deeply. "Man, I am numero fuckin' uno on their shitlist!"

"No, I meant–"

"Or am I on the bottom of their shitlist? Whatever's worse, I'm it."

"Or just talk over me y'know whatever…" Thriller sighed, reclining on the couch and fixing the ceiling tiles with a flat glare. "Do go on, please."

"It's like, I didn't know-know, right?" Blitzo continued. "Okay, well, maybe I did. B-but not before we got down to it, y'know?"

"If I say 'yes' will you stop talking?"

Blitzo didn't seem to hear. "It's like–look, if you got picked by Duke Sallos to play the worst game of 20 Questions ever and saw your reflection wink at you, you'd assume that either your mirror-hopping pal had your back, or that you were going absolutely fuck-a-ducky, right?"

"Right," Thriller grunted.

"Yeah! I mean, I didn't know you guys were there until after we spent a nine-hour Vacay In Bonetown!"

Thriller sighed. "Kay."

"Agh!" Blitzo growled, audibly slapping his forehead. "Bringing up my ex's song when talking about plowing my employees/found family is fucking weird, isn't it?"

"Ah-huh." Thriller blinked, cocking an eyebrow. "Wait, 'found family'?"

"And now they know that I knew and they won't talk to me!" Blitzo wailed despairingly.

"Back up," said Thriller, sitting up on the couch. "This is so stupid it's looped back around to being interesting. What happened, exactly?"

"Right, so," said Blitzo, inhaling deeply. "When we got grabbed by Sallos and thought we were gonna die we kinda had a nightlong threeway but I kinda-sorta-maybe knew you guys were there to save us and I didn't get around to telling them until last week when we were getting weird with our Stands and Moxxie put his on me so he could look like me when we doubleteamed Millie and I guess he kinda used it to look at my memories and he saw that I knew whole time and now they're really really pissed at me!"

Thriller paused, digesting the information. "…Let me see if I got this straight. They thought they were gonna die and roped you into a bucket-list spritroast?"

Willin' blinked in surprise and turned to Thriller. "The fuck're you two talking about?!"

Thriller shushed him and held up an urgent 'one sec' finger. "That right?"

"Yeah, pretty much," Blitzo replied.

"But you knew me and the boys were there to bail you dipshits out?"

"It–!"

"What are you idiots babbling about?" Blackbird snapped. "THAT HAD BETTER BE A SECURE CHANNEL!"

"Shaddup!" Thriller hissed, setting a thumb over the receiver as Willin' turned down the volume and scooched closer. "Sorry about that. Turning down the TV. Continue."

"It's not like I knew!" Blitzo exclaimed. "I just kinda, maybe… sorta rolled the dice on it being that or me going crazy."

"Going crazy, he says…" Thriller said to Willin', sotto voce. "And up until a week ago, they didn't know that you knew?"

"Yes! Fuck! As if I didn't explain all this shit five seconds ago!"

"So you, what, didn't tell them because they might not want to play Chinese finger-cuffs with you anymore if they knew?"

"Wait," Blackbird said as quietly as was possible for him, leaning in, morbidly fascinated. "He what."

"I, uh, well, y'see… basically?" Blitzo squirmed, pausing a moment before asking: "Am I the asshole here?"

Willin' groaned in exacerbation, rolling his eyes, as Blackbird stood there, shocked, before throwing his hands in the air. Thriller paused, incredulous, before rallying. "Whuh–YES! Yes, you are the asshole, Blitzo!"

"Yeah, man…" said Willin', somewhat apologetically. "Kinda fucked up."

"Willin'?" Blitzo said, shocked. "Oh for–Am I on speaker?!"

"One sec," said Thriller, snickering as he tapped the screen. "Now you are."

"As always, your conduct is an affront both to the profession and common decency!" Blackbird said, acidly. "How, exactly, you continue to acquire associates to alienate is a matter of debate among Hell's top intelligence agencies!"

"Yeah, sorry bud," said Willin', sternly. "I'm with M&M on this one. That was a beaucoup Richard-relocation on your part."

"I know…" Blitzo sighed, defeated. "What should I do? I just want to apologize, but not even Millie's willing to hear me out!"

Thriller scoffed, shaking his head. "At this point, Blitzkrieg, your options are giving 'em time and space or inventing time-travel."

"Maybe wait for them to have a kid and then save its life?" Willin' offered, shrugging. "That might do it?"

Blackbird crossed his arms, turning up his nonexistent nose. "I advise ritual self-immolation."

"Big help. Thanks guys…" Blitzo grumbled. "Whatever. I'm going back to picket duty."

"Indeed," said Blackbird. "This inane diversion has compromised unit cohesion quite enough as it is. Blitzo, some of our scouts spotted a small band of Vee stragglers in sector A-6, can you confirm?"

"A-6?" Blitzo said. "Where th'fuck is that?"

"Our system is a simple grid with each square representing one hectare," said Blackbird, his tone scholarly. "The X-axis stretches east-west and consists of alphanumeric symbols, with the Y-axis running north-south, consisting of–"

"Near the dick-shaped Eiffel Tower!" Thriller interrupted.

"Oh yeah! Ah, Paris…" Blitzo said, sighing wistfully. "That's what me and M&M called it when Moxxie and I double high-fived while we–"

Thriller hung up and set the phone down, rubbing his temples. "We owe our lives to that guy…"

"Que sera, sera…" Willin' said, shrugging and getting to his feet. "Welp. I'm gonna go drink away that mental image. Any requests?"

"Beer me," said Thriller, reclining on the couch.

"Ethanol and Everclear," said Blackbird, turning back to the wargames table. "Double."

The hoverbike thrummed as it streaked through the air some two meters off the ground, kicking up dust as it did. Blitzo sighed as he bobbed and weaved around obstacles, lost in thought. A year ago, had someone told him he'd be rubbing shoulders with Overlords in a literally Hell-shaking turf-war, zipping about on a hoverbike as he smeared Sinners with his own superpowers, he'd have blown them on the spot! But now, the glory, the prestige, the heady rush of combat, all was ashes in his mouth.

IMP, his business, his pride, his joy… his family… was a shambles. He'd had it all, everything he could have wanted and, once again, torpedoed his own shot at happiness. Why? Why hadn't he told them sooner? Why did he let the lie live? But he knew. He knew exactly why. Because of this exact outcome. If they had known, would they have still brought him into their bed, shared their intimacy? Continue to let him sponge off their perfect love like some kind of loathsome emotional tapeworm? How could they? Why would they? What Moxxie and Millie shared was something a parasite like him could only dream of. Dream? Ha! The only way he'd imagine such a life for himself would be where he'd have it all only to lose it.

A nightmare…

He shook his head, letting the wind lash away the hot tears brimming in his eyes. Now was not the time to wallow in self-loathing. That would come later, when he was alone in his bunk. There were apparently Vees still in the area, and he'd be damned if those smug pimped-out meat-packers scraped his dirt without being fed their own teeth!

The hoverbike approached the dick-shaped Eiffel Tower, whirring to an idle as Blitzo hopped off. The air around the imp shimmered and he vanished in a flash of arcing static electricity, reappearing an instant later atop a radio antenna tower jutting out of one of the more intact buildings, hundreds of feet overhead. Blitzo set his feet against the structure, his tail wrapped around the tip as he leaned out, scanning the surrounding area. He stopped when he saw a flicker of light in the floor-level of a bombed out cafe some two kilometers; the shaky orange glow danced about like a fire. A campfire.

"Bingo-ringo…" Blitzo muttered, snapping his fingers. "[Mustang Sally], zoom and enhance."

A ghostly figure materialized behind him, in form it was largely mechanical, with a smooth, rounded chassis, articulated limbs of shining chrome and dull steel gray. At the center of its chest was a large stopwatch with five smaller dials arrayed within the main face. In dress, it resembled a cowboy, with tasseled leather chaps and jacket, atop its head a wide-brimmed Stetson. [Mustang Sally] leaned over, angling its yellow circular striated eyes, its enhanced perception allowing Blitzo to see clear into the ruined cafe as though he were standing there, seeing the characteristically dressed pimp-gangsters traipse about the campfire, running their mouths as they menaced the quartet of demons bound and gagged in the corner, helping themselves to their food and coffee. Locals? Refugees? Didn't matter. Those demons in there were obviously no friends of the Vees, which made them alright in Blitzo's book. Besides, that bird-boy… apparently had a mouth on him, because even though he wore a gag, one of the Vees snarled, raising his hand over his shoulder in an obvious incipient pimpsmack.

"Alrighty then," said Blitzo, his tail letting go of the tower. "Maximum effort."

The imp plummeted to the ground, wind shrieking around him as he fell. Casually, he rolled in the air, the ground streaking up at him. [Mustang Sally]'s form shimmered over his, encasing him, its feet crumpling a burnt-out car carcass like a tin can. The arms of the clock in the Stand's chest moved, the second and minute hands spinning as the hour hand thudded forward one increment. The third dial flared and the timer was set: for the next hour from his perspective, he would be able to move at and experience time 1000 times that of normal. He wasn't sure if he was just moving faster, or if time was slowing down for everyone else, but he was quite sure that he didn't care. It just worked.

Blitzo hopped off the truck, long flickering streamers of static electricity popping and crackling in the air around him, trailing off his horns, shoulders, and arms as the air was stirred and agitated by his Stand. He strolled through the ruins, his pace brisk but not unhurried, the debris kicked up by his feet freezing in the air as he walked by. He looked about at his surroundings, whistling as his Stand scooped up some rocks and hurled them at a nearby stop sign with some fraction of its full strength, the rocks streaking forward before slowing to a near-total stop. To anyone else, the stones would have cut through the air at speeds comparable to a .45 ACP, but to him they appeared as though they were dropping through cold honey. His leisurely walking pace easily outstripped them, the imp turning the corner before they impacted their target, the metal rippled like jelly as the rocks smashed ragged holes in the thin metal.

After a pleasant stroll, Blizto walked up to the café, carefully stepping over the rubble so as not to break his points of contact with the ground. For whatever stupid reason, [Mustang Sally] needed two points of unbroken contact with the ground to do its thing. And while that meant no running or jumping or anything like that, Blitzo was proud of the fact that he'd since become Hell's premier powerwalker. In the time it took for him to get from his hoverbike to this café, not enough time had passed for the demon-pimp to backhand the defiant bird, though his heavily ringed knuckles were coming perilously close to spoiling the lad's flawless looks.

This would not do.

Blitzo strolled up to the Vee, noticing the demon very, very slowly registering his presence, almost enough to blink and turn his eye. Blitzo was sure to flip the demon both birds before having [Mustang Sally] unleash a single, full-powered punch to the Sinner's face, its modest strength enhanced by the relative velocity both he and it were currently moving at. The Vee, some manner of scaly, ashen-gray creature in a Dick Tracy zootsuit, jerked away at registerable speed in the slowed time, his cheek cratering like dough as the shockwaves rippled out through his body, his eye popping out of its socket as tooth-fragments exited the opposite cheek in a spray of black blood.

Blitzo turned around to see the other Vees begin to react, their high-bore weapons training on what must have seemed like a blur to them. One of the dickless morons actually began firing before he'd taken aim, his four eyes wide and panicked. Blitzo strolled forward into the spray-n-pray, the much faster – but not nearly fast enough – .50cal BMGs streaking towards him. [Mustang Sally] swept the bullets aside like it was pushing through a series of bead curtains, sending them tumbling away on scattered trajectories. Blitzo slid up behind the trigger-happy Vee and, with a flourish, reached down and grabbed him by the band of his underwear, yanking up with all the strength his Stand could muster. The Vee was wrenched into the air before slowing once more, slowly lifting off his feet towards the ceiling.

The imp strutted over to the third Vee, this one had a hint of restraint, actually aiming his submachine gun at where the distortion had been, to him, milliseconds prior. Blitzo carefully extricated the blessing-tipped machine-pistol from his grasp, turning it around and resettling his fingers around the handle so that his thumb would pull the trigger when his trigger-finger squeezed.

"One, two, three…" Blitzo exhaled, as he either slowed down or time resumed normally. "Blammo."

The first Vee's head snapped to the side, a fan of blood and other things spraying from his mouth and face as he streaked across the room, smashing a hole in the far wall. The second Vee grunted a stream of blood from his mouth, nose, and eyes as his pelvis telescoped into his torso. He streaked upwards, smashing through the ceiling until only his boots remained visible. Vee number three pulled the trigger, the top half of his head vanishing in a bloody cloud as it attempted to occupy the same space as a dozen high-velocity armor piercing rounds.

"Yeaaap…" Blitzo sniffed, thumbing his nose before turning to the restrained demons. "Neighborhood's gone to shit since those dipshits moved in. Don't worry, my buddies and I are gonna class this joint up a bit. Gentrify the fuck outta those fuckin' pimps and their holes!" The restrained demons looked at him with shocked stares, cloth gags firmly in their mouths, blessed shackles on their wrists and ankles. "Oh! Pssh! Sorry!"

A sizzle of static electricity and the gags and shackles lay on the floor as Blitzo helped them to their feet.

"So, what? You guys locals or something?" Blitzo said, hands on his hips, grinning. "If so, I'm one of the, I dunno, new rulers or whatever of this neighborhood. Pleased to meetcha, you may refer to me as 'Your Greatness', 'His Bestness', 'The Stallion that Mounts the World', or 'Blitzkrieg'. Sound good?"

"Hey…" said the tall, fabulously well-built ram-demon, something like shock and recognition in his eyes. "Don't I know you?"

"Probably," said Blitzo, polishing his talons on his lapel. "Kinda a big deal."

"Excuse me, sir," said the falcon demon, looking at the remains of the demons around them. "You are an imp, are you not?"

"More imp than you can handle, hot stuff!" Blitzo crooned, zapping over to the Sinner, waggling his eyebrows. "Though I'd be happy to be proven wrong~"

"No offense…" said the willowy female lamb-sinner, nervousness and perplexment equal on her adorable face. "Since when can imps do… all that?"

"Ah-bup-bup!" Blitzo said, slashing the air. "A professional never reveals his secrets! I've trained long, long years, studied under ancient mystics and hellborn mages to–"

"He has a Stand," said the ram-demon, his hands curling into fists, blue-green eyes narrowing. "Seems like you've upped your game since the Vault."

Blitzo blinked, his eyes narrowing. "Hey… wait a millisecond…"

The imp vanished in a squelch of electricity before appearing a millisecond later, his brow furrowing as his lips fleered back from his fangs. "I'd recognize that callipygian booty anywhere! Been a while hasn't it?"

"Not long enough…" JoJo said, smirking at the compliment despite himself.

"No shit-talkin' schoolboy here to save you this time…" Blitzo growled, smiling ferociously. "…Joseph Joestar."

"No need for one, either," JoJo said, pulling out a fidget spinner, setting it into motion with a flick. "Blitzo."

Imagine having a Stand that lets you slow down time/speed yourself up. If I had something like that, I might be able to win a debate for once... I doubt it though.

Oh, and Blitzo did a boo-boo~