Author's Note: Good morning, day, and night to all the readers who have tuned in for the twentieth installment of Drifters! I know the last few chapters have been on the shorter end, and while I'm glad the musical section seemed to be well received, I'm happy to announce that the reward for getting through the song is an update on the longer side.
And as a cherry on top, you also get to read what has hands down been my favorite chapter to write… so far ;)
Alright, with the intro out of the way, onto the reviews (Added empathizes on the plural 'S' this week for sure!)
Johncfull: Thank you so much for the comment! And yeah, the musical element of the show being an integral part to how Hell functions is definitely a fun aspect to explore!
And while me putting off a song for so long was definitely due to my inability to write one… it was rather fun getting to see how the delay only added to Nester's mental breakdown in finding out a main feature of Hell is its ability to basically turn into a Broadway performance at a moment's notice.
JCINNABAR: Oh man, I'm sorry about your laptop dude. But I am happy to hear the bird flew away alright (I say not having a bias for avians whatsoever XD).
Les Mis is an awesome soundtrack, and definitely a good choice to read too! So from one random person on the internet to another, thank you for the compliments and comments!
P.S. Thank you for the Nopal advice as well! Definitely might try adding them to some of my meals to spice up breakfast and lunch!
Arashi Uzukaze (You know funnily enough, I just decided to start watching Naruto Shippuden the day before your review XD): Thank you so much for the review man! Unfortunately for Nester, Husk isn't very good at talk-no-jutstu. Nor is he one to pull his punches when addressing somebody's fault.
Which… kind of makes for a fun dynamic between the two for me to write. With Husk being somewhat nice in trying to get Nester to figure out his own flaw, but also being too lazy to go through the effort of just telling him what it is to actually help him through it XD
Gamer of Action44D: As always thank you for the comments man! If nothing else, the song was original XD Describing a rhythm and beat to the flow of the writing is currently a skill I lack… Though I have a feeling Charlie and the crew are going to make me write out a few more scores by the time this is over XD.
Phew, love the long response section I got to do this week! But now, without further adieu, besides my traditional apology revolving around any grammatical mistakes that may pop up along the way, I welcome you back too….
Drifters
A Hazbin Hotel Fanfic
Chapter 20
Jurassic Blitz
If time flies when you're having fun then Vaggie couldn't comprehend how the past couple of months had flown by.
The Hotel was doing well, and Charlie and her clients had even been making progress in the program.
And while that fact was something to be celebrated, the joy it produced hardly compared to the terror Vaggie felt in the pit of her stomach when each day brought them closer to the Extermination.
And Extermination she feared would come whether a path to redemption was possible or not.
Charlie obviously disagreed with her. Hell, at this very moment she was watching her girlfriend happily wave in half their clientele as they came back from work. No doubt eagerly formulating what kind of new self discovery awaited for them all this evening.
How could she convince such an optimistic person that all her hard work could be for not?
Vaggie closed her eyes and took in a deep breath.
She supposed her problem lay less with how she could prove that to Charlie, and more so the cost it would take to do so.
"Hell to Vag's!" Angel's voice was raised on the previous set of statements she had failed to hear.
She shook her head, and almost had to do so again, not believing the concerned look the actor had on his face.
"What's up?" she questioned, as if the answer wasn't the spider.
"My room." the furred Sinner crossed his arms and leaned back.
Her eyebrow rose for a moment, before the mirrors beneath Angel's showcased her being more of a wall than a guard.
"O-oh… sorry." Vaggie stepped out of the actor's path.
"Head in the clouds and apologizing?" the spider questioned as he passed, "You sure you're our Vaggie?"
The security guard hid her rolled eyes behind Angel's turned back. Although as he disappeared upstairs, she had to acknowledge the point he left behind.
"Hey," soft words echoed a touch to her shoulder. Yet both sent a jolt through her system, "you feeling alright?"
She turned, and unfortunately having been snuck up by her own girlfriend only added to the evidence of her being out of it.
"Yeah…" Vaggie sighed her lie, "Just, trying to get ready for tonight."
"Vaggie." Charlie frowned a concerned smile.
The white haired woman cursed herself for even attempting the fib. Her partner could see through her on a good day, trying to hide something from Charlie on a bad one was the definition of a fool's errand.
"It's nothing to worry about, seriously…"
Vaggie trailed off, but Charlie's warm eyes dragged the truth out a moth to a flame.
"Just anxious about… everything I guess."
"Do you want to talk about it in private?" Charlie squeezed the suggestion into her shoulder.
"It's really not that big of a deal," Vaggie shrugged both off, "Honestly, focusing on the programs the best thing for me right now."
"What do you mean?" Charlie cocked her head.
The gray hued woman tried to bite her tongue. Unfortunately, it only had the strength to hold back one truth at a time
"Everybodies doing so well right now, and I really mean that Charlie." Vaggie turned. Lowering her head with her voice so nothing would echo down into the lobby, "But… how do we know when it has worked?"
"When we start making their Redemption diplomas!" Charlie's smile quickly flattened when Vaggie's eyes drooped, "If we still want to go that route for their graduation."
The security officer closed her eyes, and tried her best to make the breath she took a calm one.
"Charlie, the moment you think a person's earned redemption is the minute I believe it." she leaned forward and put her hand in the blonde's, "But will Heaven?"
The owner's mouth didn't even pretend to open for a response. And for as much as Vaggie knew her girlfriend liked planning ahead, she had a bad feeling Charlie's original answer still hadn't accepted the Adam sized hole in it.
"By their own rules, they have to let all worthy souls in."
"… Charlie," it was now Vaggie's turn to softly call her girlfriend's name. When the blonde's head began to shift downward. "Do we know that for a fact?"
Vaggie frowned. Given how Charlie stared at her, the woman may as well have just asked the heiress if the sky above them was red.
"Of course we do!" Charlie nodded her own innocent acceptance into place, "I may have never been to Earth Vaggie, but I'm still part human."
"…" Vaggie remained quiet, and locked her corrections behind titanium teeth.
"I know for us, the universe can only be seen through shades of gray. And I appreciate that mindset just as much as the next bipedal ape."
Charlie forced her comforting tone onto Vaggie with all the grace of an old man proving he was hip. She honestly didn't know if she should cringe at her girlfriend's behavior. Smile at how cute it was. Or question the logic of Charlie being a product of evolution when her mom came from dust.
"But Angels see things as black and white, Adam said so himself." Charlie's voice dipped. And in a brief moment of anger, Vaggie had no problem believing all the other humans had evolved, given the discount gorilla that had been their source, "Once the goodness in our guests finally comes to light, it'll be impossible for Heaven not to see it."
'If that's true, then you'd have been let in ages ago.' Vaggie thought.
Looking down, she had to find another way to voice the logical fallacy.
"But we don't even know what the Angels' version of 'good' is."
Once again Vaggie was met with a silence Charlie had the heart, but not the words, to fill.
"Why not just ask the one here?" and in its place came static.
Alastor eased himself into the conversation. And if Vaggie had been beating herself up for not noticing Angel's and Charlie approach, then her head was practically exploding in self deprivation letting this sadist sneak up on her girlfriend.
"Don't know if you noticed," The guard shifted herself between the radio and her partner, "but down here, Angels tend to answer things with their swords."
"Or patronizing rock operas."
Vaggie could have sworn Charlie had just huffed out a mumble.
'Maybe I am going crazy' she thought, but shook her head back into place.
The time to question whether Charlie was even capable of a sneer or not wasn't something to ponder when an Overlord was smiling literal daggers at them.
"Not the one closest to you~" Alastor leaned his words over Vaggie and straight into Charlie.
For a moment the gray hued woman's mind froze in fear of what the radio meant, or worse what he could know.
"I don't know if I'd use the word close, I only talked to Adam the one time," Charlie trailed off the direction she thought Alastor was going.
"I don't mean him." Alastor's eyes twitched.
Vaggie wasn't sure if she should feel terrified that Alastor could still mean her. Or relieved that he was in fact not referring to her old boss. After all, she couldn't imagine an Angel she would want less involved in Charlie's life than him.
"Oh…" the blonde's confusion bobbed her head to the side, "Well, the Exorcist with him seemed to like me less…"
The owner rubbed her arm.
"And by that I mean she went out of her way to purposely demean me… and brag about how many people she had just slaughtered." Charlie's eyes blinked in some form of realization, "Looking back on it, I think Lute actually concerns me more than Adam."
'The Lieutenant?!' Vaggie's mind nearly crashed. Charlie never mentioned one of her sisters being at the meeting, let alone Lute.
"I don't mean her either."
'Thank God!' the security guard was all but choking on her trapped hyperventilation.
"Oh… well… they're the only Angels I've ever talked to."
"That's not true~" Alastor hummed.
Vaggie didn't think her heart could take anymore revelations tonight.
"I'm pretty sure it is." Charlie cautiously replied.
"Oh Charlie, I know he's never around, but has your father truly become absent in your memory as well?"
"You mean Lucifer." Vaggie sigh of relief shot its way into existence before Charlie's response.
"I guess, technology speaking, my dad is an Angel." Charlie's voice went quiet. "Maybe I could… give him a call to see what the rules for getting into Heaven are."
Vaggie took in a few gallons of air, and didn't know she had an audience watch her do so until she was inflated enough to see Charlie looking to her for support.
"Don't think that's a good idea?" Charlie asked her. Almost as if she wanted Vaggie to nod.
"Of course not!" Alastor answered for her, and before Vaggie could raise an eyebrow as to why he was shooting down his own suggestion, he continued, "Such a personal question can't be done over the phone. A broadcast baron I may be, but even I know some things are best communicated in person."
"I haven't seen my dad in years though! I can't just-" Charlie's eyes began to dart around the hotel. Vaggie's rollercoaster of hidden emotions could now add shock to the list. For she couldn't remember the last time she saw her girlfriend so willingly to avoid somebody, "It would be weird if I showed up at his door."
"Did he- Did he kick you out Charlie?" Vaggie asked. With how much she avoided telling her partner of her own past, the spear-wielder only just now understood how little she knew of her girlfriend's.
"No!" The blonde was as frantic in her response as her waving hands, "It's just- Things have been complicated between us since mom left."
"How very human of you." the radio cracked Charlie's point against her, "But as an Angel, his position must be black and white. If he knows the requirements it takes for a person to pass through the pearly gates, then the only person keeping your guests from salvation,"
The wendigo twirled his cane then prodded the microphone into Charlie's chest.
"is you~"
"Oh fuck off Alastor." Vaggie finally regained enough of a hold on the situation to call the Overlord out, "You know it's not that simple."
"It is though…" Charlie whispered, or more so huffed, out.
Vaggie looked back, and her dismissal for the blonde's self doubt was soon drowned by its presence. Her girlfriend stared blankly ahead, her body frozen in disbelief that slowly thawed to a shiver of guilt.
"My dad is the reason Hell exists in the first place. How could I have never thought to ask him about the rules?"
Vaggie frowned, and she motioned a hand to her partner's shoulder. But Charlie had moved out of reach. And now looked out over the railing to the Sinners wrapping up their day.
"If…" the blonde took a deep breath, as the duality of Vaggie's look of concern had to contend with Alastor's ever present smile of triumph, "If my dad knows what it takes to get into Heaven, then I owe it to them to ask."
Vaggie watched as Charlie turned her stuttered breath into an off brand form of courage.
"I know you don't like to leave this place unguarded, but do you mind coming with me Vaggie?"
The white haired woman would always be sharp enough to answer such a question.
"Tonight's lesson will be a study hall. I'll tell Husk and Nester to spread the word."
"Thanks." Charlie gave out a nervous, yet thankful smile.
Before she turned to confront Alastor's.
"While we're gone, do you mind keeping an eye on things?"
"Do you even have to ask," the pinstriped man's grin bowed his head, "as if I'd ever allow anybody but me to have fun here."
It was far from the answer Vaggie wanted to hear. But Charlie nodded at it nonetheless.
The humanoid deer always did things for a reason. And given he was the one to bring up Lucifer, and was so hellbent on Charlie seeing him in person, the security guard supposed her partner was doing the right thing by making sure Al stayed put. Less the Wendigo commandeer their visit to the King of Hell.
XxxxxxX
Nester's gaze fell across a lobby filled with students. Yet for the first time since he had arrived, there was no teacher here for the class.
And with no lesson planned, no supervisor to guide them through it, and no security guard to enforce them away from their own vices, the guests were free.
Which made the silence state they existed in all the stranger.
"… oh my God," Angel rasped in realization from the couch, as the nothingness of inaction washed over the atrium, "is this place… is this place actually boring without Charlie?"
"The last thing I want to admit is that you're right," Husk grumbled, "but I think you're fucking right."
The cat was currently cleaning off the counter of the bar for the fourteenth time. Velvette and Niffty were seated on the stools, or in the latters case stood atop it, but hadn't actually ordered a drink.
And without Charlie's advice, to either take in or ignore, even Sir Pentious and his eggs coiled in place. His schedule thrown out of whack, the serpent's eyes simply scanned the room confused on what he should do.
"Is no one else capable of substituting for Charlie and Vaggie?" Odette gazed around the occupants with a raised brow. Too new to understand why this was such an anomaly.
"If we were 'capable' of teaching a class on redemption,"
Nester watched Odette's pupils narrow in on Velvette's indifferent air quotes.
"then we wouldn't be part of the program now would we."
"Are you not just doing it for publicity?"
The Vee's mouth opened, but even her quick response seemed to have been dulled by boredom.
"… fuck you."
As was her wit.
'Our afternoons really do revolve around the activities.' Nester thought. His boredom from work having seamlessly transitioned into his time off.
It was kind of funny really. At some point every Sinner in this room had either thought or told Charlie her lessons were a waste of time. Yet here they were without one, and all they were doing was wasting time.
"If there isss no pre established command ssstructure in place, then obviously we ssshall grant leadership over to the person most qualified." Sir Pentious decreed, his voice all but a giant manifested arrow pointing towards himself.
"All right, so that rules you out." Angel deadpanned.
"What?!" the serpent reeled back, "Who else here hasss experience leading men into battle?!"
"Pretty sure providing Hell with a mountain of scramble eggs every week doesn't count as good leadership." Angel lazily retorted, "Besides, I don't think being a General gives you the social skills Charlie's church plays require."
"Oh, and I sssuppose the filth you make doesss?" Sir Pentious crossed his arms to the tune of Angel's laughter.
"Hell no." the actor choked on the comedy the snake hadn't meant to state, "By default the person in charge should be…"
The furred Sinner's chuckles died down, as his gaze drifted around the room. Finding no answer to the question he had set himself up to solve.
"Huh… that's pretty depressing." Angel's laughter reincarnated as a snort when his surveillance around the lobby triggered a wave of eyebrows, "I don't think anybody here would be qualified to lead for their own fucked up reason."
Based on that statement, the actor doubled down on taking himself out of the running. Although, as Nester gave it some thought, he couldn't help but admit Angel was probably right.
While Odette seemed to be making efforts to subscribe to Charlie's program, Nester simply didn't know enough about her to decide if she was teaching material or not. As far as the others, including himself, went…
Needless to say, silent, sadistic, and simpleton weren't exactly common keywords employers looked for in an educator.
"Says a lot about our character doesn't it?" Husk shrugged.
"Hmph," Velvette snorted, "I for one disagree."
"Listen, we tolerate you now doll face." Angel rolled back a sloth on the futon, "But you're smart enough to know you're the last person we'd make de facto leader of the hotel."
"Who said I was talking about me?" the Vee lazily flipped off the spider, "Besides having the motivation levels of a crushed snail, I think Puss in Boots could make for a passable Charlie."
"You trying to insult me?" Husk grumbled.
Cocking his head between the cat and the influencer, Nester thought her toying with the gambler was more like it.
"Do you really think I'd tell such a pathetic joke?" Her indifferent shrug proved the bird and bartender's theory wrong, "You give out life tips all the time, it's in the nature of your job. And just like your cocktails, sometimes the shit you say is pretty decent."
"Pointing out all your guys' faults doesn't make me a good person," Husk grumbled, "just an observant dick."
The cat gave a dead stare across the room. Only to find most of the eyes that were sent his way did so upon the silence of not being able to tell him or Velvette they were wrong.
"But I guess that also makes me the most honest person in the room," the cat sighed in acceptance. Before piercing the idea with a pointed claw, "Don't think for a second I'm going to take Charlie and Vag's place tonight because of it. As far as I'm concerned, they told us to take the night off when they left."
His low tone hung in the air for a few seconds. And with Nester not wanting to annoy the bartender by filling it, he was contempt letting it trail into awkwardness.
"That seems like a rather," the ever analytical Odette was not, "inefficient interpretation of things."
"Maybe…" Angel wafted a slow interjection. One that traveled at the same speed as his raised smirk, "but who are we to question the new boss."
Nester sucked his lips, less the laugh he held back attracted Husk's deadpan stare.
"If that's true, then here's my lesson plan for tonight," the bartender began with the enthusiasm of somebody ending a conversation, "everybody can go fuck off to their room, and silently think about ways to avoid pissing me off."
Angel and Velvette's snort would have masked any chuckle that could have escaped Nester's lips.
"Very well."
The laughter that followed in response to Odette's crisp nod, and her leave for the stairs to take Husk words at face value, would have deafened it.
"God," Velvette wiped back a hopeful tear that threatened to stain her cheek, "it really is a race to the bottom here for all of us."
The Vee followed the Carmine to the staircase. Evidently deciding that getting things done alone was better than accomplishing nothing in a group.
Nester didn't have the courage to voice a disagreement. And frankly, he didn't have the evidence to argue against it to begin with.
A sentiment shared by most of the others.
As Niffty's eye had long since drifted from the conversation in favor of scanning the lobby for a future crime scene, Angel had all but claimed the sofa as a bed throughout the course of the banter, and Sir Pentious was stretching his arms set to hit his actual one early.
"If itsss all the sssame with our commanding officer," the snake hissed, "I ssshall make for my room post haste asss well."
"Do you want permission to wipe your ass too?" Husk pinched the bridge of his nose.
Unfortunately, the snake cocking his head only proved he hadn't been commanded to understand sarcasm. Which prompted the feline to drag his claws down his own face.
"I'm not in charge Pentious, and I'm not giving anymore orders tonight-"
BOOM!
At least the loud crack of bone into wood didn't care for what the cat had to say.
As the explosive knock from the entrance sent a shockwave through the atrium. That shuffled Nester's feather and turned all retreating heads around.
"…Nester," Husk broke the oncoming silence just as the echoes of its cause faded, "go grab the door."
The bird nodded. And he made for the entrance rather than join the other heads that turned into mirrors for Husk's hypocrisy.
The avian didn't have much time to wonder who was at the door. Grabbing his hat atop the stool next to it, he gulped. With his first and only guess being that Vaggie's knuckles were the ones that had rammed against the wood.
'I hope Charlie and her don't think I was slacking off.' the employee's cheeks already paled in shame. His face typing as much guilt into it as he could as he pulled the handle back.
"Sorry guys I-" only for the entire paragraph on his cheeks to delete in an instance. Leaving his eyes filled with nothing but question marks.
On the welcome mat was the broken remains of-
Well, it would take a few more minutes for the pile of flesh to lump itself back into place for him to tell.
"…ummmmm."
Or maybe even longer. As remarkably, with reptilian skin and avian quills mixing together, more clues were actually making the three dimensional game of pictionary harder.
"Everything alright Feather's?" Angel's question lazily rose itself off the couch.
"I-I think that depends." The Doorman watched in disturbed curiosity as a pair of wings hammered themselves into place. With three nails pounded out claws at the tip.
"On what?" Husk sighed in annoyance.
"D-does Hell have demonic pigeons? Because if it does, one just crashed into our door."
"… what the fuck are you taking about?"
Nester turned to see Velvette's indifferent eyebrow raised twice as high on the stairs. And in doing so, watched it free fall in confusion when he provided a line of sight for all the Sinners to see.
"I do not believe that is an animal." Odette offered her observation from higher up, "Or rather its primordial chimera appearance signals it is too many to be one sent here from Earth."
Nester blinked, having understood none of the reasoning the Carmine presented as fact. And given the snap of bones and the crunch of a reset beak was the only response the blonde received, it was a confusion shared by all the other occupants of the lobby.
"If I had to make an educated guess," the scientist sighed, "I would say that creature is a fellow Sinner."
"Really?" Angel's question gave voice to Nester's thought. As the waist height raptor breached through the foam of its bubbling muscular system.
"Given the new evidence being acquired each passing second," the scientist pushed up her glasses, "most certainly. Are you all surprised this hotel built for Sinners would have one show up?"
"Is that a rhetorical question?" Husk deadpanned.
"… is yours?" the blonde furrowed her brow trying to process the sarcasm.
"Honestly, I think the better question is if we're being punked." Angel sat himself up to get a better view of the flesh pile that was inflated into shape by reforged lungs, "Cause I'm pretty sure somebody just egged our house with a dinosaur."
A shocked gasp echoed out from beneath Sir Pentious' hat.
Nester didn't have time to confirm the look of horror in the henchmen's face though. As popped eyes full of shock refilled the mysterious person's sockets.
"… Hell has dinosaurs?" Nester asked. But with the mutated velociraptor rising to its feet, the bird was quickly given an answer.
"Enough for an Overlord to create a theme with them-" Velvette's judgmental scoff cut itself off abruptly. As Nester watched realization widen the Vee's pupils.
"But I thought all of Zeezi's citizen were under a lockdown order?" The blonde's question only caused the Vee's orbs to inflate further.
The sight of which blinded the bird from the sharp hiss of consciousness he heard behind him.
"Close the door Nester." Husk's voice came through… well, to add to the Doorman's confusion, it came through a sharp order.
"O-okay, but why-"
"You?!"
A shattered screech erupted from behind Nester.
And before the bird could shut the door, he turned to face the angered glare of the knife clawed dino.
"You fucking bastard!"
Nester's fear overrode his confusion. And whatever questions he had for why this strange creature was so mad at him, could come after his terror slammed the door close.
Two bodies acted upon their emotions before their brains could process it.
In a furious rage the raptor leapt forward, daggers outstretched to pierce through the evolved avian's chest.
At the same time, the terrified bird man swung the door into a shield to guard his organs.
When the two reactions clashed, it was the barrier's hinges that surrendered first. As the little Sinner, if not able to shatter the oaken frame, hit it with enough force to have the lumber crash into Nester a full body slap.
"Holy shit!"
Dazed and confused, Nester wasn't sure if that shout had come from him or Angel. But when the stars orbiting his head were pierced by three organic knives that slammed through his wooden blanket, he decided it wasn't a question to dwell on.
Adrenaline shooting through him, the avian's wings shot out a lever. One that turned his body into a spring that launched the door, and the assailant stuck in it, away.
Nester didn't care to see the flight path he sent the dinosaur on. Scampering towards the bar, as if it was a bunker, seemed like a far better use of his time.
"You little fucking piece of shit!" The shriek came moments before the loud thud that caused it, "I'll teach you to get the drop on me!"
Reflected in Husk's wide eyes, the brunette saw the raptor had turned its landing pad into wood chips. And was quick to point the buzz saws used to make them back at Nester.
"What the fuck did you do to this guy Feather's?!"
The brunette jumped behind Husk's words a second before the raptor leapt to cut the throat his response was in.
"I-I don't know! I swear to God I've never met him before!"
The bird crashed behind the bartender. And, tumbling over the counter, crashed back first into the far wall upside down. The miniature earthquake he caused resulted in a downpour of whisky onto his face.
Rather than react to the burning sensation assaulting his eyes, the bird quickly tensed up in fear at the six blurry darts flying towards him.
"I'll scramble your brain into an omelet bird shit-"
The dino was cut off. As a wave of bullets exploded into the creature's chest. And knocked it down towards the staircase a clay pigeon.
"Well he obviously thinks you have!" Angel yelled.
Husk dragged Nester back to his feet, and his eyes onto the Tommy guns in the actors hands that had saved him.
"You limped dicked assholes!" The murder chicken words panged off the bullets falling from his body. "Don't act like you didn't blind side me!"
If nothing else, Nester's yelp turned into a gulp when the assailant addressed the room as a whole.
"We didn't do shit to you!" Husk growled.
The cat's out stretched an arm in front of Nester. And when the bird looked down, he saw a playing card nestled in the gambler's claws.
The raptor held a low stance. Yet when his impulsive nature scanned the room, and found that two of the six targets had weapons trained on him, his breath seemed to anchor him in place.
And when the logic of the situation began to weigh down the claws in the raptor's hands, a, beyond relative, level of calmness began to enter the room. One that Nester started to accept only when Husk's arm began to lower his ace in the hole.
"So let's just all calm the fuck-"
The bartender chopped away his own words. A red checkered streak darted upwards towards the railing.
Before Nester could even question why Husk cut off his own peace treaty, the card struck a crimson stick of dynamite that burst the short lived accords to smithereens.
An explosion rained down into the lobby it had meant to crater. With the shockwave having knocked Odette and Velvette back down the stairs, and shook the bar's foundation as Nester ducked beneath the counter when the blast reached his shore.
"Don't listen to their bullshit!" a low snarl pierced through the ringing in Nester's ears.
Raising up his dazed head, the bird saw a crocodile snouted man atop the staircase. Decked head to toe with sticks of dynamite that stuck out his command straps like scales.
Well, his rattled brain actually saw multiple spec ops dinosaurs lining the railway. And each time his astonished blinks proved his vision hadn't doubled, Nester's pupils shrank to nothingness.
"Oh…" Husk mumbled, reaching into his pocket as the raptor that started it all looked upon the army at his back with a different form of shock, "Fuck."
One that snapped around towards the hotel's as proof his murderous intent had been justified.
"You…" the Jurrasic Sinner began, his fellow reptiles backed up his sharp words with the scythes, swords, and sidearms they unsheathed, "You fuckers are going to rule the day you messed with Zeezi-"
A silver needle threaded through the air and stitched the creature's and the room's collective throat closed.
And in silence, all eyes trailed backwards along the dagger path to the one that had thrown it.
"I do not," Niffty's eye narrowed in absolute fury, "MAKE MESSES!"
Yet, to the tune of her war cry, Nester witnessed the biggest one he's ever seen break out in an instance.
As the intruders rained downed a hail of bullets the second their comrades' blood dripped from his neck.
"You've got to be fucking kidding me!"
Deciding not to fight a riptide with a water pistol, Angel ran towards the cover of the bar rather than return fire.
The actor picked up Niffty along the way. Intercepting her before she met the horde of projectiles she ran towards.
Who in such a blind rage, pulled out a second dagger to stab the air even as the white furred demon hurdled the two of them into the pub.
"Out of all the nights for Vaggie to take off!"
"The irony isn't lost on any of us!" Husk shouted over the chaos.
Dice, chips, and a full house of cards were whipped from his hand. Each ante into the pot exploding a pink smoke that, if not able to stop the bullets coming through, blocked the line of sight they traveled upon.
And the cover the cat created proved well enough that Nester had to scramble on his hands and knees across the bar's floor. As a flying snake, a rag doll, and an atomic scientist slammed down into the crowded bunker.
"Forget the cum haired bitch!" Velvette wrenched a Tommy gun from Angel's hand, "Where's the fucks the deranged deer when you need him?!"
Nester saw Angel about to throw his free hand up, as if to silently declare 'how the Hell should he know' to the world. Unfortunately, as Niffty continued to try and wiggle her way out of his arms and into her suicide blitz, the actor found himself having to dedicate more and more of his appendages to holding her back.
"Instead of asking where they are," Odette braced her back into the counter and huddled for safety next to Nester, "perhaps now would be a good time to call them, and let them know where they should be."
The blonde slammed her hands over her ears. And for a moment, as Nester's skull rang to Velvette shooting a Thompson above his head, he saw the Carmine eyes glued close. Her hand clutching a pocket on her chest in what seemed like genuine fear.
An emotion he knew all too well at the moment.
"You've got a phone and an Overlord for a mom don't you!" the doll grunted. Her spray and pray began to thud against the broad side of an organic barn.
Between that, Husk's ever accelerating string of profanities catching up to the spin rate of his arm, and the roars of pin cushioned Sinners getting closer, Nester had a bad feeling the battle would soon devolve into the type Niffty craved.
"Yesss!" Sir Pentious hissed out from his prone position on the ground. One hand clutching his top hat down as if it was a construction helmet, and the other catapulting shattered bottles over the rampart. The improvised ammo fed by an egg boiz' operated conveyor belt, "Call you mother and tell her I need to place a weaponsss order at once-"
"Shut up Pentious!" Husk's voice snapped, along with the spinal cord of a triceps he dealt a hand to at point blank range, "We literally can't afford your stupidity right now!"
With the wave of Sinners now reaching the banks of their trench, Nester felt like they couldn't afford a lot of things right now. A sentiment evidently shared by Angel, who decided the combat was close enough to release the dogs of war.
The moment he let go of Niffty, the maid was off. A deranged shriek erupting from her feet as she launched herself fangs first over the counter.
For a brief moment, Nester almost traded his concern for himself to the cyclops… until a splash, a stab, and a screech shattered that thought into a million pieces.
Hell, given Niffty's demeanor, Nester almost felt it would be more morally correct to feel bad for the flocks of raptors she slaughtered.
Angel rose to join Velvette in the firing line. And as the actor waved his gun around like a scythe to mow the lawn, Nester realized not even his fear could justify him doing nothing.
"I'm gonna call Vaggie for help!" Nester turned to Odette, and hoped to whatever God would listen that his words were close enough to ricochet through her shut ears, "If you're mom's like Alastor, then you should try her."
For a moment, only the chaos around him could be heard. And fumbling for his phone, he was afraid it had masked his plea to the blonde.
Luckily, just as his hands fumbled into his pocket, the Carmine slowly lowered hers down.
"Alright." Odette shakily whispered her agreement.
Nester nodded just as his fingers finally found his cell.
Pulling out the device, it twitched in his hands everytime blood and curses sputtered across the counter.
'Come on, come on!' Nester thoughts may as well have been silent screams. As the scroll to the end of his contacts list gave him a newfound hatred for the alphabet.
Given Oddette's silence, it seemed she was having her own struggle sending out an SOS in a war zone.
"Shit-" Angel blew off his own sentence along with the brain cavity of the duck bill that had climbed onto the counter.
Luckily, Nester had jammed his thumb into Vaggie's name just before a rain of gray matter squashed onto it.
And before he could worry if the slimy organ had damaged his phone, it jiggled like jello atop an outgoing call.
"Yes!" Nester exhaled in panicked optimism. And as he watched Odette's shaky hand telegraph across her own screen, the terror he had even evolved into a cautious hope, "Yes-"
A high speed whistle suppressed Nester's growing emotion. As within the blink of an eye, he witnessed another flightless dino crash into his vicinity a rocket.
Instead of hearing a velociraptor impact itself into a puddle against the door though, this time he watched a mace tailed iguana missile itself through Odette's phone.
The device being obliterated into more pieces than his hope proved false.
"Woah!" Angel turned his gun towards the reptilian intruder, "Where the fuck did he come from-"
The actor's aim was wrenched into his throat. As a long necked reptile snaked its vertebrae into a whip, bit down upon the Thompson, then fought with Angel as he tried to drag the weapon and its wielder from their cover.
Of course, as Nester's phone dropped from his hand to shake silently in his lap, the two shocked radio operators were more concerned with the live artillery shell that landed two feet from them.
A shell that hadn't exploded. And instead shook its own shock away faster than the blonde and the brunette, as it beat its mace-like tail into the ground.
"Fuck, what the Hell hit me?" the creature balanced itself onto its hind legs.
Whatever daze it had fell away as it cocked its head around. And before Nester could think why a creature would be confused about a war it ran into, he froze. When the reptile's perplexed eyes narrowed into a scope at the two assumptions before it.
"You?! Are you two bastards the ones who did this to me?!" the creature scowl made Nester pretty sure the reptile had already made up their decision on the matter, "Oh, you are so fucking dead-"
A bottle crashed down upon the iguanas head. With a bipedal egg having landed atop its spine holding the top half of the glass as if it was the handle of a sword.
"I got him boss!"
Sir Pentious peaked an eye out from his cover. His cowardness was raised when he looked up and saw what his soldier accomplished.
"Ha, good job minion!" the snake decreed.
Nester blinked in disbelief at the egg's victory… then did so again when he saw the iguana shiver the broken shrapnel off its intact skull.
One that shook with rage filled breaths that it pointed towards the inventor.
"… curse you minion!" Pentious decree turned into a sob of defeat.
"You son of a bitch!" the reptile rolled the egg off its spine, then flicked the shell into the air with their mace, "You'll fucking pay for that!"
Nester saw Pentious open up his mouth. But whatever words he had come up with, were lost beneath a metallic crack. And the hard boil fast ball that broke into the serpent's, now very broken, jaw.
And Nester nearly dislocated his own when the iguana went over and began repeatedly slamming its tail into the snake.
With each thunderous echo, the corner of Nester's eye lost more and more hope.
Around him he saw Velvette and Husk frantically fire projectiles into an overwhelming horde of melee attacks, Angel's arms wrestle off more and more grapples, and Odette doing the same nothing he did as they watched their last line of defense get hammered into paste.
Beneath a tidal wave of despair and dread, all the bird could produce was a pale face, shallow breaths, and molted feathers.
"Help…" he whispered, "Somebody please help me."
Nester didn't know why he was pleading, after all, unlike most of the people here who were fighting, who was he to cry for help.
Yet he couldn't stop himself.
On loop he stated his plea, and his pity grew to the point that the other coward tilted her own fear away. Her eyes were shaking, as if they were hit by his panic wave. One that sank her hand towards her lab pocket.
Not that whatever she could do could save them. Once the iguana wised up, or the other dinosaurs jumped in, they'd be-
"Everything alright Nester-" a static voice broke the train of thought it addressed, before it was interrupted by the explosions that would have cut off his response, "What the fuck was that?!"
Nester looked down at the start of a call that had gone through.
"Vaggie?" The bird almost questioned her name as if it was too good to be true.
"Oh you fucks!" and as the iguana turned their head to the distress beacon, it very much was, "Don't think I forgot about you!"
"Vaggie!" Nester flight response backhanded the freeze one away, and all but sailed his sound waves into the phone, "The Hotel's under attack!-"
A scale hand grasped Nester's cry by the throat, and lifted him skyward. Fear and terror poured out of the bird's very soul when the reptile brought him up towards its snarled fangs.
"Nester? Nester?! Shit! Charlie!" the phone slid Vaggie's frantic confusion to the floor.
"Help… please…" Nester's vision tunneled. And pounding at the arm dragging him up in vain, his begs followed suit as he turned it to the Carmine, "Help me."
Odette's mouth wobbled along with his consciousness and the hand she struggled into her coat.
"Just hold on-" Vaggie was cut off when the lizard's tail smashed the mute button.
"Yeah, that's not happening!" the beast snorted, "Hope you like shit and piss, because you're gonna reform in my toilet!"
The reptile cracked its lips into an open smile, one that grew wider and wider as Nester's head was brought closer and closer to it.
'Oh my God! Oh my fucking God !' Nester didn't care that he wouldn't actually die, he pleaded to the universe a scared child. He didn't want this fear he couldn't handle. He needed something, anything, to save him-
Before the first of the iguana's white fangs went to pierce Nester's neck, a silver nail wedged itself into the creature's temple.
For a moment, time stood still. As the metal locked the creature muscles in place nearly as well as the pale thin arm that had jammed it into the thing's brain.
But as Nester watched the life fade from the reptile's eyes, the grip on his windpipe was the first thing to go. And he fell to the floor. Where he produced the first silent thud in an ear shattering battle.
And being one of two people to bear witness to it, the Doorman watched as the mace tailed lizard head fell back, and slumped its way off the dagger.
Unlike the assailant, the silver steel remained unmoving in the air, as if sheathed in a broken scabbard.
Following the blade's grip to its handle, Nester wordlessly breathed out a sigh of relief seeing Odette had been the unexpected hero wielding the knife.
"Oh thank God." the bird breathed out his nervous smile, "Thanks for that."
"…" the woman gave no response, as only the slow twitch of her lungs proved time moves forward.
Nester lips trailed down, confused as to what the issue was. But given she had been braver than him in the previous moment, who was he to question how she acted now.
"V-Vaggie should be on her way so-" Nester tried to sound reassuring. Only to be cut off by an emotionless fear that echoed far past the confines of this room.
"W-what have I done?" the woman shuttered, and Nester's eyes narrowed even more perplexed.
He opened his mouth to answer.
Unfortunately, another one dawned on him and the room before he could speak. As an orchestra of shadows crept across the lobby turned battlefield like vines. All the static of their movement produced by their source.
"Why my dear girl~" a sinister tune came on the air, "You've just saved the day~"
XxxxxxX
Alastor's dominos falling into place, dinosaurs on the western front, and Angelic weapons being fired from the trenches! To find out what this all means and what gears are turning in the background, I invite you to tune in next week for another exciting installment of Drifters!
In all seriousness though, thank you to all those who have read through the twentieth chapter of Drifters!
I will try my best to upload a chapter every Friday. But until next week, please feel free to leave a comment! Criticism is always welcomed, so long as there's an attempt for it to be constructive.
As of this moment I am still looking for a beta reader, so to anyone interested please feel free to shoot me a PM.