Chapter 13
"Why don't we step into my office?"
The footage on the screen rewound again. The screen's audio was filled with the sounds of traffic and yelling voices before centering in on the facade of Carmine Inc.
"-ime is precious, Miss Ong, so let's skip the formalities…"
Vox's red eyes focused on the black-haired Sinner and the Imp.
It just doesn't make any sense. How in the everloving fuck did this bitch manage to outwit Val?!
...Pftt, who was he kidding. A wall-eyed queef could outsmart Val. And had. For money.
But still: this woman was far too brazen for her own good. Was she seriously negotiating with an Overlord on the fucking street? Out in the open? Not one Sinner in this city with half a brain would do something this stupid. Surely Carmine herself wasn't that stupid; she was well aware of Vox's capabilities – and that's not just counting the drones.
And yet, there she was...talking to this skelly-looking cunt on the sidewalk.
With Alastor.
Which meant that not only was she still poking around his business, but she had also gotten the Princess involved as well. And that was after she'd made him look stupid.
On top of all that: Wackford still hadn't returned his calls.
He ground his digital teeth. Small sparks started to fly off of his head.
He reached up to his face and tapped the screen. The display switched over to a hellphone app screen. He scrolled through his contacts before tapping again. He then flicked the signal from his face to the screen in front of him as the other line rang.
The line picked up as Velvette's face appeared.
"Yeah?"
"You still at the meeting?"
"Yes, we're currently having a lovely conversation on when we're breaking for tea – what the fuck do you think?!"
"No go, huh?"
"Zeezi's pig-headedness is as big as her fat scaly arse. So no, it's a no go for the cross-promotion."
"Someone sound's jealous."
"My bum is fat enough for the three of us already, thank you very much. That's what my entire Summer line was centered around. Now, remind me again why you're pestering me?"
"Thar red fucker is outside of the building."
"And?"
"Remember how Val was bitching at us about having to actually pay someone for work? Said individual is with him."
"It's become something of a blur. Remind me."
"Two of his employees disappeared. He hired someone to track them down. Said 'someone' rescued one and killed the other."
"Mhmm."
"The one they saved fled to the Happy Hotel where Angel Dust is."
"Mhmm?"
"She was one of the girls he failed to give a contract to."
"Get to the point."
"Said 'someone' is now inside the building with Alastor. Talking to Carmine."
"…Repeat what you just said back to me. Slowly."
Vox growled.
"Alastor, and that bitch Chay Ong, are talking to Carmine. Right now."
Velvette's image looked at Vox through the screen, one of her eyebrows on her cedar-colored face raised with confusion.
Then she burst out laughing.
"Holy shit, that slag that broke Val's hand is here? Bloody Hell, I think I need to go get her autograph."
Vox's hands slapped against his screen. "For fuck's sake, Vel. Do I need to remind you what she's been up to over the last two weeks? Do I need to remind you what that spells for all of us if she digs too deep?"
There was a brief moment of pregnant silence.
"Ugh, fine. What do you want me to do?"
"That's better. Now, I need you to go downstairs to Carmine's showroom and see if you can find where they are. If she's down there, I need you to try and pry any info out of her that you can."
"Are you fucking with me right now?"
"Look, you were the one who was able to suss out that Carmine killed that Exorcist last year. Ong shouldn't be any more difficult to manipulate. For fuck's sake, Vel, she doesn't even realize we've been spying on her!"
"Whatever. Anything else?"
"Yeah: If Zestial is still there, make sure he doesn't catch on."
"It's Carmilla's building, Vox. Of course Zestial is still here."
"Awesome. Love you!"
"Aww, love you to! Ciao!"
The screen winked off, returning to the array of spy footage.
"Alright, one crisis diverted for the time being…"
He touched his face again and scrolled through his contacts.
"...And that fucker still hasn't called me back. Fuck my afterlife."
His head knocked back against his chair as he took a giant, irritable breath.
A soft knock came from his office door.
"What?!", he yelled.
The door slid open to reveal one of the interns: a short, bespectacled shark-like Sinner with blue hair.
"Um, sir?", the intern said nervously. "The people down at R n' D just reported a breach."
Vox slowly turned to look at the Sinner, angry sparks flying off of him.
"What kind of breach?", he asked as calmly as he could fake.
"Umm…", the intern furtively flipped through his clipboard. "It says here in the incident description: 'Oh fuck oh fuck we are so dead It's gotten out it's in the wild Vox is going to feed us to his boyfriend I can't take another anal fissure'...and it ends there."
Vox took a slow, deep breath.
"Fuck it. I'm calling Bodfish."
Stolas Goetia towered over every other person in the Hotel, even without his true demonic form. He was also incredibly intimidating, especially when compared to Sinners. His signature top hat made him seem all the taller.
He was also very, very upset.
"Hiiii, Uncle Stolas!", a nervously sweating Charlie said as cordially as she could. "Long time no see…"
The Goetian snorted smoke from his beak.
"Don't you 'long time no see' me, missy. Where is she?"
Charlie and Vaggie (spear in hand) traded furtive glances.
"Why, she's…", Charlie looked around the lounge in a panic before her eyes fell on the bar. "Oh! She's right over there!"
Vaggie looked at Charlie incredulously. 'The fuck?' She mouthed.
"I'm sorry, I panicked.", Charlie whispered back.
The tall Owl-demon's gaze swept over the lounge before finally resting on the bar, where Octavia and others were seated, frozen in place.
"Um...hi dadmmmmfff!"
Her voice was drowned out by her father's embrace.
"Via, darling! You're OK!" Stolas's voice was wracked with sobs. "I've been so worried…"
She peeked up over her father's chest feathers, barely able to see the tears pouring out of his enormous red eyes.
"My precious little starfire...I thought I'd lost you...I couldn't live with myself if-"
"Dad, please!"
Charlie, Vaggie, and everyone else in the room simply stood back and let the scene play out. They knew better than to interrupt a member of demon royalty. Especially when family was involved.
Eventually, Stolas's sobs quieted. Via reached up to gently hug her father, a relieved smile crawling up her beak.
"...Dad. I'm...I'm sorry. I know I should have-"
"Two weeks."
The smile suddenly faltered. "What?"
"You've been gone for two weeks."
She looked back up at her father again. The tears were all gone.
They were replaced with anger.
"You haven't called. You haven't written. You haven't so much as sent a single signal to me. You simply disappeared, running off to who knows where, gallivanting all over Hell without any security whatsoever, and where do I end up finding you? In a hotel in Pentagram City!"
She slowly lowered her arms, trying to back away.
Stolas wouldn't let her go. He only embraced her tighter.
"Why did you do this? What could have possibly inspired you to pull a stunt like this?
"Dad, I-"
"Wasn't that day in Los Angeles already enough to teach you how dangerous it is? And that was the human world!"
"-But da-"
"And how do I find out about your little joyride? From your mother, calling me from her chateau informing me that you had just tried to break into her vault!"
"I didn't break in! It was already-"
"I mean by everything that is unholy, Via, I'd have thought that you'd have better taste than whatever that shrew pampers her gilded toilets with!"
And there it was. It always lead back to this.
Octavia shoved her father away, her eyes screwed up with angry tears.
"This, dad. This is the reason."
She gestured wildly towards him, trying to gesticulate out words that she couldn't properly express.
"This is why I did all of this incognito, dad. This is why I was willing to risk mum's anger instead of coming to you."
Stolas's beak drooped open. He seemed to want to speak, but much like his daugther, he seemed to have trouble properly expressing himself.
"Because I knew that if I got you involved...if I got between you two...it would only result in more screaming."
She hugged herself tightly, trying to fight back sobs.
"I can't take the screaming anymore, dad. I can't take it. It makes me so stressed out and afraid every time it happens."
Her hands dropped down to her sides.
"This...is the reason I moved out."
Whatever angry glow that had been in Stolas's eyes had long since softened into sad embers. They were replaced with a look of hurt. And guilt.
His daughter had wounded him...and the worst part is that he knew he deserved it.
"Via, darling…"
The Prince sighed deeply.
"You're right, love. You're absolutely right."
He walked tentatively towards his daughter, halting his steps whenever she flinched from him.
"I...I can get too wrapped up in these things. In this...conflict. It's not your fault. It was never your fault. And I forget sometimes that there's more to this world than just me and your mother trying to hurt each other more."
He stopped a few feet from Via, his eyes downcast.
"...And sometimes, I forget that you're not a hatchling any longer. I was so happy to see you back with me at the house. I thought we could start anew...but I just started repeating all of the same mistakes that drove you away in the first place."
A pained smirk crawled up his beak. "It's no wonder you'd go to Her Highness for solace. The King's family seems to treat you better than me or your mum have."
Via shook her head. "Dad, I wasn't trying to run away from home. I was just trying to get someone to find the moon rock."
"Moon rock?", Stolas asked her with his head cocked. "Darling, I already had Blitzy looking for that thing!"
Via spread out her arms. "And did he find it?"
Stolas started to respond, but once again found himself unable to say anything.
"...Touche", he finally responded.
"...You've been gone for two weeks."
The real time surveillance footage played out on Baxter's lab computer screen.
"He appears to be upset.", Lester commented.
Baxter sipped his coffee. "Quite a bit, it seems." His chair swiveled around to look at the squat Sinner. "So...there a reason you're in my lab?"
Lester's cloak unfolded to show his hellphone gripped in his paw. "This technology. You have knowledge of its workings?"
"In a matter of speaking."
"I believe my sister is attempting to contact me through it. Chay is currently indisposed, and I cannot rely on her at the moment. You can help?"
Baxter sighed. "I can only do so much, Lenny. I can trace the call, but that's the most I can do."
Lester peered up at the screen again, where the tall bird was now clutching his hands to his chest.
"Do it.", he said.
The fish Sinner shrugged his shoulders and took Lester's hellphone from his grasp. He set it down on a nearby desk and opened up one of his drawers.
"Let's see...here we go!"
He pulled out an HDMI cable and connected it to his computer. He then attached a makeshift adapter to the other end and stuck it into the phone, taking care to insert it carefully without breaking. Vox's phones had a tendency to brick or self-destruct if they sensed unauthorized devices.
"Alright, let's connect it to the console…"
He then inserted the other end of the cable into one of the ports on his computer.
"Now then, who are we looking for?"
Lester stepped into the glow of the computer screen. "My sister. She used the name SOL686."
Baxter's gloved hands scrolled through the phone until he found the conversation.
"Yep, I see it here. Looks kind of...suspect, Lenny."
"Please."
The fish Sinner sighed. "Fine, let's see if we can't trace it."
He placed the phone on his desk as he moved his mouse cursor over the screen.
"Starting the trace now….huh, that was fast."
Baster adjusted his glasses as he looked at the screen. "Hmmm...that's odd. Exceedingly odd."
"I do not understand.", Lenny responded.
"Well, I managed to trace the signal to Voxtek HQ. But the thing is that it's not in one particular place. Look..."
Baxter pointed to the image on the screen. It was a map of Pentagram City, with the Hotel and other locations labeled. The Vee tower was in the corner.
"Normally, when you trace a call, it goes to a single source. That source is labeled with a dot. But this…"
Lester looked closer at the Vee Tower location. It did not have a dot.
It had several.
"It's...distributed. All over the area..."
THOOM
The room suddenly went dark, only lit by the dull red glow of emergency lights.
"Oh fuck.", Baxter cursed.
The screen on the computer glitched out, bending and tearing into binary codes and color test bars.
Then it went dark.
Only to be replaced with a blue screen.
Two red eyes opened up, along with a grin.
"Uh uh uh!", Vox chided. "Daddy spank!"
CHAPTER 13 END
