IN GLUTTONY...
Tex still carried Balin in his beefy arms as the two arrived back at Gluttony from the elevator station.
With his free hand, Tex whistled for a taxi and waited 10 seconds before one eventually pulled up for them, missing a tire on one of its wheels.
As the cab drove along the yellow brick road, Balin was bouncing up and down on his seat from the bumps, even with his seatbelt wrapped tightly around him. Tex just remained seated due to his muscle strength, but still held the boy down with one of his paws.
"Is this better now, Balin?" he asked in a chuckle.
"Uh-huh. Thank you Tex."
"No probs." the male hellhound ruffled his hair. "Now just to let you know, this is me and Bee's first time watching over... someone, for the day, but Bee's not exactly experienced in babysitting. Yet. But I promise, we'll both take as much good care of you as we can."
"OK." smiled Balin.
"Not that I'm saying we won't do a great job, but Bee probably won't have enough time to help out with your homework." Tex continued.
"I understand." replied Balin again. "Who does homework on a Saturday anyway?"
"Hahahaha, people who go back to school." laughed Tex as he patted his shoulders. "It's just part of the blues. You'll get used to them."
"Okay..." Balin resiliently gave in.
...
A few moments later...
The two arrived at Bee's mansion, and as Tex paid the cab driver, Balin was about to knock on the door excitedly, before remembering his previous party experience and standing a few feet back from it, just to play it safe.
"Balin, you okay?" asked Tex, walking up to him.
"Yeah. Just waiting for the cotton candy to flood the stairs. Or any other hellhounds to not go feral on me." replied Balin.
"Don't worry, lil' man." Tex assured him with a gentle head rub. "I'm sure that won't happen this time."
Soon, the door burst open with a flood of cotton candy streaming down the stairs, before Balin looked up at Tex.
"Okay, I'll make sure that happened." he chuckled in response to his neutral look.
Just then, Bee peered her head through the cotton candy mess like a dog or a submarine.
"Holy shit, Vortex!" she exclaimed, squeezing him a hug by the neck as she buzzed out of the flood. "Now isn't it ironic you'd be home from work early?"
"Just like I said I'd be, babe." replied Tex.
"Well, the place could use a little... TLC, again. If you know what I mean."
"And... I brought some help." Tex then moved his leg out of the way to reveal Balin.
"Awww, hello Balin!" Bee knelt down to him and gave him a soft hug with all four arms, with an even softer kiss on his forehead. "It's so good to see you again, cutie-pie."
"I'm so excited to be back here as well, Bee." Balin replied with his usual kind smile.
"Well, what brings you back here so fast after last night?" she asked him, rubbing his cheek affectionately.
"Lunes is just out on a little mission with her... colleague-guys." Tex replied for the kid. "And his usual sitter's out for the day, so..."
"Holy shit. She wants US to babysit today?" she gasped in a whisper.
"Mm-hmm." nodded Tex.
Bee started prancing about around Balin & Tex on all fours and flapping her wings like she was a bucking fairy, before picking Balin up in her arms.
"Ohh, thanks so much for having us as your sitters, baby!" she cooed. "Now I'M excited too!"
Balin just giggled and nuzzled into her golden fuzzy-haired fur.
"What made you wanna choose me to look after your cute little face today, huh?" she asked him.
"Tex was walking by and he heard us talk about choosing another babysitter with his incredible doggy hearing." Balin said, using his hands as hound ears. "Didn't you, Tex?"
"Well, you know me, babe. Anything for my friend Lunes." chuckled Tex. "And her kooky co-friends, I guess."
Bee's lips then pressed up against's Vortex's cheek in awe.
"And that's why I fucking love you." she softly whispered before kissing the lips under his muzzle.
"By the way... Loona told me to give you this before we left."
Tex then licked his 'bird' claw and traced it along Bee's forehead as a sign of initiation.
"She hereby dubs thee, Queen Beelzebub of Gluttony, to now be a babysitter!" he declared. "As well as party animal!"
"Yay!" Balin clapped for her, making the two hounds giggle at his innocence.
Bee then booped his nose with a little purr to make him laugh too. "Please, do come on in." she smiled, carrying him in her arms.
The three then walked into the mansion to find that it'd been even more than a cotton candy and beezlejuice flood from last night's party. As usual, there were a ton of hounds from the party that remained in the party room, hungover on the couch or awake and not ready to leave yet.
"Yo, yo, bitches! We have an adorable special guest back with us today!" Bee announced playfully. "For those of you who's been to my last soiree, y'all remember the little Balin Johnson, right?"
"Hi..." Balin mumbled nervously hiding in Bee's furry shoulder. "Remember me?"
The hounds couldn't really hear him that much, despite their amazing hearing ability, but at least the frozen kid wasn't saying in his head:
*Please don't eat me, please don't eat me, please don't eat me.*
After a few seconds, most of the guests smiled and greeted him politely as they went back to socialising, playing on their phone, and perhaps drinking once more.
Balin then let out a sigh of relief, knowing how fun he was at the last party.
"See, kiddo?" Tex smiled. "Told you that cotton candy was the only thing to fear."
Balin giggled hearing that, before hearing a familiar song on the loud speakers and widening his mouth, knowing it was the Hi5 song from last night.
"You played my song?" he said to her with stars in his eyes.
"Surprise!" Bee sang.
She soon felt the boy hugging her tight in excitement this time. "Thank you so much, Queen Bee!" he softly exclaimed.
"Awww. Anything, honey." she swayed him and patted his back in an aunty-like manner.
Soon, the boy heard another familiar voice calling out for him.
"Yo, little dude!"
That someone was the Dalmatian hound he met at the last party, Ruffette.
"You remember me, little bro?" she walked up to the boy in Bee's arms and asked him.
"Yeah. You're... the Great Dane?" he guessed.
"What? No, silly!" she laughed. "I'm like, a Dalmatian."
"Oh yeah." the boy remembered. "I dressed up as a Dalmatian the morning after Loona brought me to Hell."
"Did you now?" Bee replied with an intrigued giggle.
"Yeah, he actually did." said Tex, showing her the photo. "And he looked stunning in that!"
The human boy couldn't help but blush over that moment.
"I'm sorry. The ears just make you look like a Great Dane." Balin pointed to Ruffette's long blanket-like ears.
"I guess you're..." she then put a teasing look on her face, getting an idea. "Hey... I heard humans love to scratch behind them. You wanna give 'em one?"
Ruffette twitched her ears, making Balin show a little wide-eyed 'yeah?' expression on his face at the offer. So as he scratched behind her ears, the Dalmatian started shaking her foot up and down relaxed by the touch, making Tex snicker a little.
Just then, he and Bee heard a low growling noise that sounded like a tiger.
They looked in the party room to see Vikki awake from the couch, so wasted from last night yet able to pick up Balin's scent, having tried to eat him at the last party.
But today, she actually looked more clean, other than the bitchy attitude still inside her.
"W'sup, lil' human?" she flatly greeted him.
"Vikki?" Tex asked Bee.
"Vikki." his girlfriend replied.
Balin then got into Ruffette's arms and hid behind one of her ears as she rubbed his back in comfort.
"Still alive, eh?" she remarked. "Finally wanted someone with class to maul you good?"
"Who said you had class?!" Bee sounded a lot more protective, almost getting into her full bee-demon mode.
"I suggest you walk away before you choose the hard way, Vikki." added Tex.
"Oh, I will... right after I EAT THAT LITTLE TWERP!" roared Vikki, as she charged straight for Balin.
Luckily, her former BFF evaded her just in time for her to slip over the spilt beezlejuice and slide down the stairs outside of Bee's mansion.
With the boy still in her arms, Bee and Tex quickly shut the door.
"Remind me to ban her from any Balin-invited parties." panted Bee to her boyfriend.
"I reckon Loona would love that." he replied.
"Other than that..." the queen continued. "One chore done, almost... bleventeen to go." she groaned at the state of the rest of the mansion.
"Sorry bud. Looks like you'll be sitting on a bed of cotton candy, doing some pretty soggy homework." said Tex.
"No, it's okay." said Balin with resilience. "It's like you said. This big house could use some cleaning-up. And music."
Hearing that made the passed-out DJ awake from his coma and immediately pick out a catchy song on his laptop.
The song was: "I'm So Excited!" by Clay Aiken and Ruben Studdard.
MONTAGE:
Balin started tapping to the beat as he swept up the cotton candy with a broom and mopped up the beezlejuice.
Bee, Tex, and Ruffette started tapping their hind paws to the beat too, as everyone else joined in on the clean-up fun.
With a confident nod to her two friends, Bee flew high up into the air and got started cleaning up the balcony railings.
Tex took a bunch of cleaning supplies from the closet and handed them to each hound that stayed after the party, and very soon, they all got to work.
Just as Balin was getting into the groove and having fun with his sweeping and mopping, Ruffette had an idea of her own. She showed a cheeky grin at him with some slow wags of her tail.
"You better run...!" she sang with her nails out ready to pounce.
...
Bee flew up and cleaned the hive-like lights on the ceiling, Tex cleaned the pool with the skating skills of his double-dew claws, and Balin played a chasing game with Ruffette, where they efficiently cleaned up the beezlejuice using his mop and her tail.
As Balin threw a lot of cotton candy at her muzzle to slow her down, she soon got close and scooped him in her arms once again, licking her maw.
"Time to eat." she playfully smirked, before licking his face again to make him laugh.
"Dalmatian! Th-That tickles!" he laughed out loud.
"You taste even better today." said Ruffette as she continued.
Bee and Tex watched this affection as they passed each other by and smiled.
PAUSE!
When everyone was done with the cleaning, the other hellhounds, including Ruffette who kissed Balin's forehead, said their goodbyes to Bee just as she said hers.
After they left, Tex shut and locked the door. Now the real babysitting experience could begin.
BACK to MONTAGE:
With the house now spic and span, Bee and Tex decided to show Balin around the mansion, starting from the kitchen where her party food chefs worked during the weekdays. Along with the bedrooms with slides, plasma TVs, and lots of lava-lamps like her tummy and tail.
...
Next, they took him out the back to show him their petting zoo, literally full of party animals. Demonic yet colourful beasts in the shapes of corn-dogs and balloons, and decorated in party decorations, even candy. These animals included cats, ponies, bears, birds, tigers, and actual puppies.
Balin held his hand out to any one of them gently, before amazingly, one of the party tigers crawled up to him, sniffed his hand, then nuzzled into it and his backsides like a house-cat before the other animals did the same thing.
No wonder he won Loona and Via over so well. He was a real animal person.
...
Straight after the petting zoo, Tex and Bee finally showed Balin a state-of-the-art VR phone, which looked like a VR golf course, where he could FaceTime with anyone from Hell, or Earth, even Heaven.
Soon, Balin called I.M.P and briefed them in on the mission plan for the next few minutes.
"I gotta say this to you kid. You really know your ideas better than me." said Blitzø. "And I've the best ideas ever!"
"Sure he does, kiddo." Loona interrupted the call after snatching HER phone from Blitzø. "Now we'll call you later when we have everything all sorted out. So just have some more fun. And Bee..."
"Yes, honey. By Hell's oath, I will take care of the cutie and protect him while you're gone." replied Bee.
"Alright, take care." Loona ended the call.
Afterwards, Balin was blown away by the amazing technology he just saw and used.
"How did you guys make all of this?" he asked. "Did YOU, Bee?"
"No, no, not just me. But my other deadly sins too." replied the queen. "We were building this house together, just the seven of us, and I decided to add this little game for fun."
"Cool...!" the little boy awed.
"Okay, little man, we have some spare time, so how 'bout some homework?" Tex started speaking. "What you got?"
"Well, I have Maths, English, science... Oh! I know! How about drama?" suggested Balin. "I'm currently studying Shakespeare and I have to translate these plays' lines in English too." he grabbed out his folder and showed them the papers.
Bee then got an idea in her head and nudged over to Tex, before she nudged to the VR phone next.
The idea she had in mind may have sounded freaky at first, especially for the kid, but he agreed.
...
A few more moments later...
As Tex waited at the door for someone, namely a tutor Bee had hired, she sat with Balin at the couch as he did some of his Math equations, such as times-tables and divisions.
"Hey, Bee?"
"Yeah, baby?"
"I don't want to sound weird, but, your tail is very beautiful" said the boy. "It looks like one of these lava lamps."
As Bee looked at her glowing tail, she couldn't help but blush at him calling her beautiful again. So she wrapped it around his body as a way of saying thank you and let him stroke it for a bit. He melted into the extra warmth it radiated onto his body, like an oven.
Soon, Tex heard a car pull up at the curb outside the door.
"OK girl, he's here." he said.
"Coolio!" said Bee. Then she spoke to Balin.. "Now Balin, I'd like to introduce to you a friend of ours who's gladly said yes to being your Drama work tutor. You may freak out, a little, but don't worry. He's very harmless."
Tex then opened the door upon hearing and revealing the tutor, which made Balin change his smiling face very quickly.
"Sweetie, this is Zestial." she introduced him.
Zestial was one of the most powerful overlords in Hell. He was like an old spider-like demon that culminated the characteristics of Jack Skellington and Doctor Facilier, known for his work with his business partner, Carmilla Carmine.
Who, speaking of which... stood far from the car outside the mansion and took a couple of steps closer to it.
A/N: See y'all in the next chapter.