Hell en Pointe | Alastor ✓

chapter 19

The strange man turned around in his swivel chair behind the beaten and cracked wooden front desk, riddled with graffiti and vandalism. He wore a broad smile with sharp canine teeth, and he had slim, calculating grey eyes, a sharp nose, and a strong jaw, yet skinny face. His black hair was neatly combed and slicked back. He wore a tuxedo with a sleek blue tie.

You froze. Why did you recognize him? He seemed so... familiar. Alastor stopped beside you also, you able to hear his movement halt completely in shared surprise.

"You know, Alastor, when I first got here, I was shocked," the man said with an evil grin. "Me and Val landed here, of all places, in New Orleans. Right smack dab in the center of an explosion of media in the modern-day Overworld. It was interesting, you know, to see how technology had advanced even since when I died over a decade ago." The man leaned back casually in the chair. "Did you know artificial intelligence is a thing now? I have no idea why we haven't got it in Hell yet, but I'll be sure to make it a new format for VoxTech."

Your breath hitched and suddenly everything went cold. Vox. One of the fucking Vees was sitting in front of you right here in the Overworld. You couldn't believe your eyes. Why was he here? Was he trying to stop Alastor? No... You couldn't let him. If Alastor didn't get what he wanted, you'd never get your soul back.

"Vox, what an unpleasant surprise!" Alastor exclaimed rather unhappily. "You look rather..."

"Handsome?" Vox finished for him, standing up and walking past the front desk to approach the two of you. He held a shiny grey thing in his hand, twisting it around in his fingers. "I know. And you, Alastor," Vox broke into obnoxious laughter, "you just look old-timey as shit. I mean come on, you're telling me nobody pointed you out on the street and accused you of playing dress up?"

"I'm going to assume this is Rosie's doing," Alastor said, contempt laced in his voice. His fists were clenched by his sides, but he tried his best to maintain his typical grin of superiority.

"Oh, don't blame the old hag, baby cakes," said a new, melodic voice. Out of the left hallway came an extremely tall and lanky man with dyed, highlighted dirty blonde hair cascading down his face and neck. "She said she was doing it for your own good."

His facial features were feminine, yet very masculine (adrodynous, you guess you could say), and he had a seductive look to him like he was ready to pounce on you at any moment. He smoked a cigarette and walked with a strut of confidence. He appeared of Hispanic descent and spoke with a small accent.

He wore a pair of tight jeans and a fashionable tiger-print silk button down, a pair of black rhinestone sunglasses atop his head. His style looked slightly outdated, reminding you of the early 2000s — was this Valentino, one of the other Vees?

"For my own good, you say?" Alastor said, looking back and forth between the two men. You couldn't help but stare at them in awe — it was incredibly strange to see a walking television screen and a ten-foot gay moth man human and normal-looking.

"That's what your old friend Rosie said," said Vox smugly.

"For your own good," Alastor said, folding his hands behind his back, at last regaining his steady composure once the shock of seeing his arch-nemesis dissipated, "you'd better go back to Hell where you came from. My personal affairs do not involve you."

"Oh, but they do," said Vox. "We know you're trying to kill us. We know the Vees are the first target on your sadistic fucking hit list, and once you get the power you need from this junk—" Vox held up the shiny grey thing in his hand, and you soon recognized it to be a vintage microphone, Alastor's microphone, "—you'll be able to wipe all of us out. That's what that stupid cannibal bitch said, anyway."