Archive of Our Own

The crackle of electricity raced up Alastor’s arms, making his hair stand on end. The static was all around them, unstable fissures cracking through the hard ground surrounding that garish canon of Vox’s that had nearly sent Alastor packing for good. The skin of his chest, exposed through his ripped shirt—battle was truly not helping his wardrobe these days—throbbed from the heat of that airborn blast. Were it not for the young seraph currently stumbling into Charlie’s side as the two of them faced down the malfunctioning weapon, he would’ve surely been little more than a spatter of red on Hell’s crusty surface.

Irritating indeed.

It wasn’t just Charlie and the now-five-winged angel trying to blast Vox’s infernal toy to dust and save all of Pentagram City, but their entire merry crew of misfits. Vaggie, Husker, Niffty, Angel and his raucous friend were all there. Not so surprising. What did get his eyebrows raising was the sight of the other overlords stepping up to join them by their sides. Carmilla, Zestial and…the others. Even Vox’s surprisingly delightful colleagues had joined the fray, much to the clear displeasure of their leader, who was still sprawled out on the ground, rubbing at his cracked screen, courtesy of a stiletto to the face. All of them were lifting their hands and firing raw energy at the huge bomb of angelic power waiting to blow. A spitting, hissing powder keg that was ready to blast them all to kingdom come.

Alastor, couldn’t decide if it was appropriate for him to feel smug in the face of his certain demise. Probably not.

Vox happened to glance over and catch his gaze, his face vanishing in a brief fuzz of static before snapping back into place, a deep scowl etched into his pixels.

“You,” he hissed, pointing a shaking finger Alastor’s way. “This is all your—hrrk!—fucking fault!”

Alastor, who had been in the process of pulling himself up onto hands and knees and dashingly slinking away, paused. He blinked at that finger, pointed at him from a dozen feet away, and scoffed. “Me? I’m not the one who destroyed half the city and is about to kill us all over a little temper tantrum. Quite the show! You’ve truly outdone yourself this time, Vox. Bravo!”

“If you’d just stood there and died like you were supposed to, I’d be up in Heaven right now! Sipping on ambrosia and yucking it up with fucking Jesus or some shit!” Vox yelled, stamping his feet against the ground and kicking up a cloud of dirt.

Alastor wrinkled his nose in distaste, but paused just shy of spitting out a scathing reply to tip his head to the side and echo, “Jesus?”

“Or some shit!” Vox repeated, electricity crackling down his arms but fizzling out with a pathetic wheeze before it could branch from his skin.

All out of power, it would seem. A dead battery. Their fight, as well as the aforementioned stiletto to the face, really had taken it out of him.

“Well, boo hoo for you,” Alastor mocked, wiping an invisible tear from his eye. “You’re just going to have to lie here and die like the rest of us. Thank you so much for that, by the way.”

Facing that bubbling ball of death left Alastor feeling strangely hollow. He’d never envisioned death as a part of his future, even when he’d been human. He’d always pictured existence as a long, endless tunnel with no stopping point in sight, a horizon forever out of his reach. To think that he’d one day stop existing had never crossed his mind. It simply didn’t compute with his ontology of the world. A universe without Alastor? How could such a thing be?

And yet, here it was, staring him down in the form of an unstable, crackling ball of Lucifer’s angelic power, ready to pop, thanks to Vox. To think he was about to be undone by the two biggest banes of his existence.

Ugh. How annoying.

“God damn it,” Vox spat, Alastor’s ear twitching before he turned to see Vox had somehow crawled his way over to him without him noticing. He supposed staring one’s own demise down was a rather effective form of distraction. “If I’d known this would be it, I would’ve crossed way more stuff off my bucket list.”

“As would I,” Alastor said through gritted teeth, his eyebrows drawing together as some of the blood oozing from Vox’s wounds dripped onto his hand. He curled his fingers into a fist and pulled his arm back. Vox really was too close. “So many opportunities to slander you on the air again, forever gone!”

The answering throaty laugh Vox let out lanced through Alastor’s gut like a volt of his electricity. Vox’s screen had gone strangely dark as he angled his head up, though his eyes remained stark as ever.

“I was thinking,” Vox went on, every word making the hairs along the nape of Alastor’s neck stand up, “I should’ve taken the opportunity to fuck you when I had the chance.”

A ripple of feedback hissed through Alastor’s teeth. He shot to his feet on unsteady legs, ignoring the pain in his abdomen that rippled through his body. He staggered back a step as Vox followed, rising to his feet.

“That,” Alastor growled, lips curling back from his gums, “definitely wasn’t part of our deal.”

“I would’ve worn you down eventually,” Vox shrugged, his grimace morphing into a sly smirk. “I’ve been told I’m…rather persuasive.”

“Delusional, more like,” Alastor snapped back, his blood roaring in his veins as Vox swept his eyes up and down the length of him.

Lecherous eyes, like he wanted to eat Alastor alive, and not even in a way that would make use of the protein of his body. Such a waste.

“Is it though?” Vox pressed, some of that mania that had been visibly consuming him before his pint-sized partner had dealt a soaring kick to his face eking back into his tone. His words became briefly garbled as static fuzzed over his screen before his grin came back into focus. “Wouldn’t it be nice to go out with a bang?”

“I knew you were pathetic but I didn’t know you were this pathetic,” Alastor muttered, crossing his twisted cane over his body if only to put another barrier between him and Vox. “Clearly, that hit to the head damaged you more than I thought. Nothing less than ending the apocalypse could compel me to sully myself with the likes of you.”

If Vox was put off by the reds of his eyes bleeding into black as he spat up the words, he didn’t show it. He merely grinned and curled his hand over Alastor’s on his cane.

“I like those odds,” Vox said, his voice low.

Then something happened that surprised Alastor.

This was no small feat, as Alastor had been alive (and dead) for over a century, seeing many sights and slitting many throats during that time. He’d begun to think, after his fourth or fifth decade in Hell, that he’d in fact seen it all. That he’d tasted all the sweet fruits life (and death) had to offer. This meant when something did manage to surprise him, he delighted in it.

Watching Charlie Morningstar cause an upheaval in Heaven? Such fun! Getting out of his deal with a bit of trickery and double-dealing? What a gas!

Seeing his and Vox’s hands light up with an eery, green glow? Not on his checklist for the day.

Alastor and Vox both stared in a shared mute stupor at their touching, glowing hands before the light faded away to nothing. Then they blinked at each other.

An instant later, Alastor’s mind caught up with him and he snatched his hand back, his hackles rising along with several inky tentacles from his back.

“What did you do?” he demanded, his voice coming out heavily distorted.

Vox threw his palms up, looking just as baffled as Alastor felt. “Nothing! I don’t even know what-“

A pop of air had the two of them glancing over to see Rosie appearing out of puff of golden smoke, proving Alastor’s theory that the universe was out to get him. He watched as she approached the two of them, holding her skirts up with dainty hands as she picked her way over fallen debris. The closer she drew, the clearer her cross expression became until she was stood only feet away, hands on hips and glaring at Alastor from beneath the brim of her hat.

“Rosie?” Alastor blinked.

“You just can’t seem to help yourself, can you?” Rosie huffed, tapping her foot. “Soon as you get outta one deal, you hop right into another! So, what is it this time, huh? Power? Strategy? Some bamboozle of an escape plan to some place I don’t know about?”

“Rosie,” Alastor repeated, a ringing in his ears making his head throb painfully. “I really don’t know what you’re talking about, and as you can see-“ He gestured behind him where Charlie and the others were still doing their utmost to contain the giant, sparking ball of angelic energy. “-We’re rather tied up at the moment. So, can this wait?”

“Rosie!” Charlie called out in relief, glancing over her shoulder without breaking her hands away from where they were pointed at the weapon. “Thank fuck. Are you here to help us save the day with the power of friendship?”

Rosie waved a dismissive hand at her, not taking her miffed eyes off Alastor. “Maybe in a minute, dear. First, I have to deal with this one.” That annoyed gaze then slid over to Vox, making him startle. “And this one too, I’d wager.”

“Are you really going to make my last moments in this world spent reeling in confusion?” Alastor asked, ignoring the way the whipping winds all around them were thoroughly mussing up his hair. “Or are you going to explain just what you’re doing here?”

In all honesty, Alastor had been rather looking forward to his next meeting with Rosie now that he no longer felt the ever-present weight of her phantom leash around his neck. Though he liked her against his better judgement and respected her prowess as an overlord, it was rather a difficult thing to get past in a friendship when one party held the other’s soul in the palm of their hand. The idea that he could finally face her as an equal—and perhaps engage in some tasteful smug teasing—was downright enticing.

This, however, was not how he’d imagined things going and he found he wasn’t really in the mood for anymore curveballs.

Rosie, never one to beat around the bush, snapped her fingers. “You made a deal, my friend. I felt it.”

“What?” Alastor said, truly flabbergasted. “But that’s simply not true! I-“

Alastor’s words died in his throat. Vox’s hand closing over his on his cane. The spark of green lightning where they had touched. The feeling of something shifting inside him.

Without turning his body, Alastor swung his head around to leer at Vox, who stared, wide-eyed, back at him. A moment later, Alastor’s shoulders snapped into place, spinning to face Vox, who took a cautious step back. Alastor didn’t blame him. He thought his body may have been getting away from him, distorting ever so slightly as he growled in the back of his throat.

“You,” he hissed. “You foisted a deal on me? Poor form, Vox.”

“What’re you talking about?” Vox stammered, his pupils bouncing back and forth between Alastor and Rosie. “That- That thing before? That didn’t count! It was a misfire!”

Rosie held up a staying hand between them, peering at Vox with that shrewd gaze of hers. In a slow, deliberate tone, she said, “Tell me exactly what you said.”

Alastor did just that, parsing through both his and Vox’s words just as they had been spoken, cringing as he had to repeat Vox’s crass dialogue. Rosie listened to it all with pursed lips, stroking her chin in consideration, impervious to the impending doomsday unfolding a dozen feet to their left. When Alastor was done, she nodded slowly, humming behind her fingers.

“Mhmm. I see.” Rosie clapped her hands once and said with a genial smile, “Sounds like a binding deal to me. Alastor, honey, good news! You get the chance to save us all, yourself included.”

Alastor and Vox looked at each other, then at Rosie, who smiled cheerily back at them.

“Huh?” they said in unison.

“Think about it,” Rosie went on, tapping the side of her head. “You said you’d only let Vox show ya a good time if the apocalypse was on the line, and, well, I don’t know if you’ve taken a look around lately-“ She spread out her arms, indicating the swirling maelstrom all about them. Her skirts billowed in the breeze, the feathers of her hat whipping about in every direction, though the accessory remained miraculously in place. “But this is as end a’ the world as it gets.”

Alastor was vaguely aware of Charlie’s merry gang of fools and the other overlords yelling at the lot of them, but he couldn’t hear them over the roaring wind and the sound of his own blood pulsing through his veins.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Vox said, holding his hands up. His screen had suddenly become brighter, that manic energy leaking back into his tone as he continued, “You’re saying we can save Hell…by having sex?”

“That’s what I’m saying, yes,” Rosie confirmed with a nod.

Alastor didn’t often have nightmares but he was fairly certain this was what they were like. How else could he explain the sense of impending doom that burrowed under his skin when Vox looked at him with a ravenous glint in his eye? Alastor put a stop to that by raising a wall of shadows between them and stuffing them against Vox’s screen, muffling his sounds of protest and keeping his flailing arms at bay.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Alastor argued, hands balling up into fists. “There was no intention to make a deal on either of our parts! And how could an unrelated action like that have any effect on that thing?”

He threw a hand out at the malfunctioning weapon, still sparking and glitching, still being held back by the combined efforts of the most powerful demons in Hell—and one injured angel—and still not blowing up.

“Whatever fuckin’ pissin’ contest you bozos are havin’-!” Husk yelled over his shoulder, glaring at Alastor from behind the curve of his wing, “could you wrap it up? Or are we gonna be stuck blastin’ this thing with koombayah forever?”

“Not now, Husker!” Alastor called out, not taking his eyes off Rosie. “The grown-ups are talking.”

Apocalypse be damned, he had bigger fish to fry.

“I’ll admit, it’s a strange one,” Rosie said with a shrug. How nice that she could afford to be carefree about all this. “But the will of the universe has been known to bend to stranger things, my dear.”

Alastor’s headache wasn’t getting any better. He groaned as he ran a hand through his hair, still doing his best to ignore Vox and his flailing several feet away. “There’s no guarantee this will even work.”

“But there’s no guarantee it won’t work either,” Rosie replied chipperly. When all Alastor did was glare at her, she pouted. “Oh, don’t gimme that look! All I ever did was try to keep ya on the straight and narrow, and look how you’ve repaid me. Tossed aside, after all these years. Why, it’s enough to make a woman weep.”

She dabbed at her dry eyes with a silk hanky she produced from her sleeve.

Alastor, meanwhile, was in turmoil. He’d heard of some truly outrageous things happening as the result of a soul-binding deal, and had even been involved in some himself—he’d evaded that drug cartel thanks to a strategically planned tornado—but he’d never heard of something like this. Sinking to Vox’s level and allowing himself to be sullied and pawed at after all this time? His nose wrinkled just thinking of it.

“Alastor!”

Husk’s voice pierced the cloud of gloom hanging over Alastor’s head and he looked over his shoulder to see Husk already glaring in his direction, still firing his energy beam to keep the weapon at bay.

“What’re you standin’ around for?” Husk demanded. “Fulfil the deal and save our asses already!”

Alastor’s mood dipped further. So, Husk had heard all of that then? Damn him and his perceptive ears. They were nearly as good as Alastor’s own.

“This doesn’t involve you, Husker,” Alastor sang in response, playing it cool. “I’m in the middle of something.”

“Oh, would you look at that?” Husk screeched, his voice cracking in time with the angelic static zapping off of the malfunctioning canon. “So are we!”

“Alastor!” Charlie joined in, her voice coming out strained. “I don’t know what’s going on but if you have some way to stop this thing from exploding, I’d really fucking appreciate it if you’d do it, like, right now!”

“Seriously!” Vaggie agreed.

“It’d be kinda sweet if we didn’t all die right here,” Angel added.

“Please!” Niffty squeaked.

Alastor sighed, his shoulders drooping with the motion. “Ugh, but I really don’t want to.”

“Alastor!” they all chorused and he held his hands up in surrender.

“Fine, fine,” he groused, straightening up his lapels. “I suppose I can be everyone’s saviour for today.”

At the very least, he could rub it in Lucifer’s face later.

Oh, your Highness! You might not have heard on account of your being foolishly captured by the enemy but I saved the day! Yes, everyone’s lives are owed to me, and not you. Who’s Mr. Useless now?

A smirk tugged at the corners of his mouth just thinking about it. It swelled his mood enough to let him face Vox, who was still being smothered by his shadows. With a fleeting thought, his tentacles retracted and Vox reared back, straightening up as he dragged in breath after wheezing breath. Alastor, meanwhile, put on a lofty air and busied himself with examining his nails.

“Well, Vox,” he began primly, “it looks like it’s your lucky day. We get the chance to undo your fuck up. How nice!”

Alastor jerked as his hand was seized, discontented radio static hissing from between his teeth as Vox peered up at him. The feral look plastered across his screen, interrupted by a series of glitches brought Alastor up short. He paused as Vox let out a low, distorted chuckle.

“I heard,” he said, twin lines of red dripping from the corner of his mouth to the frame of his monitor. Taking a step forward, he brought his face close enough to Alastor’s to make his hair lift from the static radiating off of him. “Don’t worry, Alastor. I’ll take care of you.”

Alastor eyed him doubtfully as Rosie gave him an encouraging pat on the back.

“Good decision, dearie,” she chimed. “And here. A lil’ somethin’ to help see ya through.”

She pressed a small bag into Alastor’s hand and he curled his claws around it without thinking. He’d take any assistance he could get in that moment.

A moment later, Vox’s fingers squeezed around his hand and the world turned white-hot. Alastor had a brief second to glance the silhouettes of the others, still surrounding the machine with their arms raised, before he was spirited away, his body dissolving into an incorporeal mess of crackling static. In the next blink he was flesh and blood again, his backside hitting a plush mattress as he was laid out on his back, blinking up at a dark ceiling.

A survey of the space with a blip of his magic informed him that he hadn’t gone far. The unstable power of the weapon registered as close by. Alastor supposed this made sense. If Vox had been able to zap himself away to a safe distance, surely he would’ve done it the second it became apparent that his whole plan was about to blow up in his face. No, most likely they were inside the abandoned V tower.

Alastor wrinkled his nose at the silky bedsheets. He only hoped Vox hadn’t dumped them into one of Valentino’s film sets. That might’ve tipped his will to save Hell a little too far over the edge.

The idiot himself suddenly appeared over Alastor, caging him in as he straddled his waist and planted his hands either side of Alastor’s head on the mattress. That same feral grin was stretched across his screen, the brightness of his face making Alastor squint. He remained still as Vox chuckled, hot breath brushing Alastor’s face, the crackling static sparking off of Vox’s antennae making his hair stand on end. Despite the stab of something that shot through Alastor at their close proximity, he kept his expression trained in something pleasant and impassive.

“You know, I’ve gotta say, Alastor,” Vox began, voice low and gravelly as his claws pierced the sheets and dug into the mattress beneath, “I didn’t expect you to fold so easily.”

“Oh, please,” Alastor shot back with a roll of his eyes. “Unlike some of us, I’m not a total idiot. If I have to suffer through two minutes of you slobbering all over me to see another delightfully hellish day, then so be it.”

That made Vox’s grin falter, his eye twitching. “Two minutes?”

“That’s what I said,” Alastor replied airily, examining his nails. “Don’t tell me that kick to the head damaged your hearing? I’ll have an even harder time getting through this if I have to yell all my instructions to you.”

In truth, Alastor wasn’t sure what instructions he could give. While he was hardly a shy daisy, he wasn’t exactly brimming with experience when it came to matters of the bedroom. Sleep was decidedly boring and only to be suffered when absolutely necessary, but sex was entirely optional, so he did that even less. The last time he’d engaged in anything of the kind had been nearly a decade ago, when he’d been part of a group hunt with a few of Rosie’s cannibals. It had been a vigorous, all-day affair by the time the last weeping sinner was squirrelled out and ripped apart. Alastor had been high off the kill, sharing the feed with a strapping young fellow, the two of them laughing in delight with sweet blood gushing from their mouths. They’d both bitten into their prey’s pancreas at the same time, then one thing had led to another and…Well…

It had been a memorable summer’s day, that was for certain.

However, whilst Alastor felt the rush of bloodlust quiet often, he couldn’t say the same for regular, old lust. An impressive physique and honeyed words were hardly enough to get him in an appropriately amorous state. Even he couldn’t say what the ticket the get him in the mood to shed his clothes was but it was something more than just the desire to roll around for the sake of it.

He supposed having the key to escape his imminent death was a good enough reason though.

“Instructions won’t be necessary,” Vox groused, sitting back on his haunches to shed the tattered remains of his coat. His shirt was quick to follow, leaving the smooth contours of his torso, lined with glowing stripes of bright blue, on display. “You remember who you’re talking to, old man! I’ve probably fucked more people than you’ve killed.”

“I highly doubt that,” Alastor said thinly as Vox grasped one of his legs, attempting to rest the shoe off. He planted said shoe against Vox’s bare chest, grinding the heel along his sternum as he licked his lips, the phantom taste of blood still clinging there. “My body count would have to be in the hundreds after all this time. And that’s just a modest estimation.”

“Oh, really?” Vox’s eyes flashed as he caught Alastor’s ankle, pulling his leg away, the thin cotton of his sock the only barrier between their hot flesh. With a grunt, Vox wrenched his shoe off, sending it flying across the room where it thumped against the wall. Alastor hoped it left a dent. “Because I’ve lost count of the amount of people I’ve had in this bed before you.”

He accompanied his words with a press of his thumb into the arch of Alastor’s foot, stopping when his touch met the hard keratin of his hoof through his sock. Alastor resisted the urge to lash out, smashing the hoof in question straight through Vox’s screen. He’d never done well with people touching his hooves, being rather ticklish in that area. On one occasion he’d reflexively kicked Niffty out of his open, two-storey window when she’d tried trimming them. Naturally, Niffty had been a good sport about the whole thing, sporting a swollen eye as she’d tottered back into the house, grinning madly.

Vox, however, Alastor was less inclined to believe would take kindly to being kicked in the face. Despite how fun Alastor found the prospect.

“Weeell,” he sang, curling his foot in Vox’s hand and flicking his antennae with the point of his clothed hoof. It bobbled comically above Vox’s heavy scowl. “I’ve always been a believer in quantity over quality, myself. Only the very best for my broadcasts.”

“I’ll show you quality,” Vox growled, sharply tugging Alastor’s leg down, away from his monitor, and pushing his thigh down against the mattress.

As Vox set about ripping Alastor’s coat open and attacking the buttons of his shirt, Alastor lied back against the sheets and pondered how he ought to tackle this whole salacious situation. Part of him was tempted to simply flop against the bed the entire time, limp as a ragdoll and play at disinterest. He could just picture Vox’s cries of frustration at finally getting his hands on the delectable carrot that was Alastor’s body only to have his fantasies dashed against the ground like a shattered egg. Egg that would very much be on his face. Why, just the thought of frustrated tears prickling the edge of Vox’s eyes as he rutted away to Alastor yawning into the back of his hand had Alastor’s lips curling in a sadistic smile.

However, as delicious as that daydream was, it was becoming quickly apparent that such a thing would be impossible.

Alastor’s brow furrowed as Vox pulled his shirt open and lowered his screen to Alastor’s bare chest. He nuzzled at the thatch of fluff lining his sternum before kissing his way down his stomach, the static radiating from Vox’s antennae making Alastor’s hair stand on end. Vox was making pleased noises as he laved Alastor’s naval with his tongue, running his hands greedily up and down Alastor’s sides. His clawed fingers fit neatly into the divots of Alastor’s ribs, heat radiating through his smooth palms. Alastor had thought he’d be equally amused and displeased at Vox’s touch, but the little sparks his hands were leaving across his skin, the way he seemed to be drinking in every point of contact between them was…not awful.

In fact, it was leaving Alastor feeling rather light-headed. He chewed at the inside of his cheek as Vox made quick work of his belt and fly, tugging his pants down to reveal his black drawers.

Vox must have noticed the way Alastor had seized up, as he was suddenly grinning up at him from his crotch. “You got quiet all of a sudden.”

“My apologies!” Alastor replied breezily, picking his hat of showmanship up as quickly as he’d dropped it, aiming a blinding smile down at Vox. “I didn’t realise you wanted running commentary the whole time. Please, allow me to make up for my ignorance.” He cleared his throat with a flourish then started in, narrating as though he were live on the air. “Welcome, welcome, listeners! If you’re just tuning in now, we here at the studio would like to extend a formal apology for the lack of entertainment in store today! Nothing but lacklustre linens here on this fine end-of-the-world!”

Vox glared at him, pausing with his fingers curled into Alastor’s waistband. “Would you quit it?”

“Our daring adventurer has halted in his baseless pawing! Perhaps he’s misplaced his direction manual on the task at hand?”

“I’m serious-“

“He’s seriously having trouble removing a pair of pants, that’s for sure!”

“You’re pissing me off-!”

“Apparently, yelling at one’s lover is the in-vogue route of seduction now. Who knew?”

“UGH!” Vox grunted in frustration, eyes falling shut as he gracelessly tore Alastor’s pants from his legs, tossing them aside. “Why do you have to be so annoying?”

Alastor snickered, rolling onto his front as the movement made the mattress bob. He threaded his fingers together beneath his chin and crossed his legs at the ankles as he watched Vox huff and puff.

“You just can’t let me have my moment, can you?” Vox went on, furiously grabbing at the package Rosie had pushed into Alastor’s hand that had somehow made its way onto the bedside table. “Even now, when your ass is mine, you still have to be such a brat.”

“It’s not my fault you’re easier to play than a third-grade fiddle,” Alastor replied in a sing-song voice, kicking his feet behind him. “Your ability to get so worked up over so little has always been your best quality, Vox.”

Vox glared at him, less so spitting venom now than staring at him with a deadpanned expression. It was nearly as fun as his roaring rage. Wordlessly, Vox unwrapped the parcel to reveal a clear bottle of lubricant labelled with a heart. Alastor supposed he ought to have been grateful that Rosie had been looking out for his health in such a way, but all it did was irk him.

“I was wondering what was in there,” Vox commented as he popped the cap. “Guess Rosie thought I’d just stick it in dry.”

“How vulgar,” Alastor muttered, a shadowy tentacle sprouting from his back and swiping the bottle from Vox’s hand. More slim tendrils joined the first, Alastor upending the bottle and squirting some of the clear liquid onto the tip of one, scrunching his nose up at the wet, squelching sound. “No one’s sticking anything in anywhere dry. Certainly not those claws of yours.”

Vox’s expression morphed from one of annoyance to reverence as Alastor rose up onto his knees and hooked his thumbs into the waistband of his drawers.

“You mean you…You’re gonna prep yourself?”

“Yes,” Alastor replied as primly as he could while pulling his underwear down and baring himself to Vox’s wide eyes. “As I said, I don’t trust you to do it with those ridiculous nails.”

Vox flexed said nails by his side as Alastor tugged his drawers free from his ankles and deposited them over the side of the bed. He then laid himself back on his stomach, chin propped up on his crossed forearms as he brought the slick tip of his tentacle around to his rear. It had been a while since he’d done anything like this—even longer than his romp with the cannibal lad—so he made himself go slow. He was keenly aware of Vox’s eyes on him, watching his every move with the utmost intensity.

Alastor had always preferred listeners over viewers.

“Can’t say I was expecting you to put on a show,” Vox commented, the grin evident in his tone, though Alastor refused to look, keeping his gaze either turned towards the sheets or the roof in a blasé fashion. “Not that I’m complaining. This is hot.”

Alastor narrowed his eyes at his own fuzzy forearms as the tip of his tentacle breached his hole, slowly pushing inside. He growled at the intrusion and the intake of breath he heard from Vox. A few moments later, the sound of a zipper being dragged down and the rustle of clothing let him know that Vox had ridden himself of his own pants. The following breathy sighs and fleshy swipes of skin-on-skin told him that Vox was touching himself.

Alastor couldn’t help the gnawing sense of dissatisfaction that came chewing at his stomach. While he wouldn’t deny a certain amount of smugness that came with knowing Vox was pleasuring himself at the mere sight of him, the whole thing felt far too pedestrian. How could it be that not twenty minutes ago the two of them had been duking it out in an epic fight to the death, trading blows as they swiped at each other’s throats and pelted one another across the city? Alastor could still taste the delicious adrenaline that had flowed through him as he tore into Vox’s guts, pulling out fistfuls of wires through Vox’s cries of pain and his own giddy laughter that bubbled from his throat like he’d swallowed a bottle of pop.

That had been exhilarating. That had gotten his blood pumping hot and fast, just as it had that day of the hunt in the woods. How could a simple roll in the sheets compare to literal life and death? The soul-scorching exaltation of fighting for every moment?

The let down of it all was almost enough to distract him from the stretching pain in his ass as he pushed the tentacle deeper, letting it expand inside him.

Eck. It really had been a while.

“Alastor, come on already,” Vox hissed, the fleshy thwacks increasing in speed and volume. Alastor finally glanced up at him from beneath the red fringe of his hair to see Vox was vigorously jerking himself off, his fist pumping up and down the length of his hard, naked cock. His gaze had that crazed sheen back again as he stared down at Alastor. “This is sexy as fuck as everything but I just—hnf!—need to fuck you already.”

Alastor took care to mask his wince as he gently retracted the tentacle from his tender hole. “What’s the rush, my dear? Not as though there’s anywhere either of us need to be!”

Charlie wheezed from the effort of keeping herself upright. Every breath burned her lungs, every blink stinging her dry eyes, every second an eternity of staying standing on her wobbling legs. Her hands shook before her as she kept them pointed at the buzzing Voxtek canon in front of her, the crackling energy of her own dad’s power kept at bay seemingly by a dream and luck that she felt had to run dry eventually. She knew that everyone around her had to be feeling similarly, their own fatigue showing on their haggard faces as they continued to shoot beams of raw power at the angelic bomb.

No one had said anything since Alastor and Vox had disappeared in a zap of electricity, apparently off to do something to save them all. Now, though, as the minutes ticked by, she could feel everyone’s impatience mounting, building like falling snow in the air above them.

It was Velvette who broke the tense silence first.

“What the fuck are those two tossers doing?” she demanded to no one in particular, her voice blaring over the whipping wind.

Charlie ignored the urge to throw her hands up and agree with Velvette, instead forcing on a smile of false cheer—she hoped Alastor would be proud—and said, “I’m sure Alastor and Vox are doing whatever it is they need to do to stop this thing.”

Emily and Vaggie on either side of her didn’t look convinced.

A few demons down, Husk groaned, his wings drooping. “Well, whatever it is, could they hurry up and fuckin’ do it already before we’re all squeezed dry!”

Matching grunts and sighs of agreement went up from the gathered hotel members and overlords. Charlie winced and turned beseechingly to Rosie positioned next to Emily.

“They are gonna do something and save us, right Rosie?” she squeaked.

Rosie, who was blasting the canon with her own beam of power, broke from the unimpressed glare she’d been aiming into space for the past ten minutes and grinned at Charlie. “Of course, dearie! Nothin’ to worry about!” Her smile dropped as quickly as it had formed as she added under her breath, “They better if they know what’s good for ‘em.”

Charlie faced the unstable weapon once more, her muscles crying out at this whole shit show of a day. While she wanted nothing more than to collapse into the fetal position and cry for ten hours, she kept her stance steady and her power flowing. She told herself she just had to hold on a little bit longer.

Come on, Alastor, she silently prayed. Whatever it is you’re doing, take one for the team!

“Now, this is what I’ve been waiting for,” Vox growled around a laugh, his claws digging into Alastor’s hips as he shuffled up behind him. “You on your knees in front of me, waiting to take it.”

Alastor’s ear flicked in displeasure at the remark. It had been a toss up what position to put himself in for Vox to finally put it in. All presented unique challenges. If he lied on his back, he’d be made to look at Vox’s deranged, ravenous expression. If he got on top, he’d have to actively steer the whole experience and respond to Vox’s pleas and demands for him to do this and that. Being on hands and knees with Vox taking him from behind had sounded degrading at first, but at least this way Vox couldn’t see his face and he could just lie back and think of Hell.

So, he winced as Vox’s sharp nails dug into the thin skin of his hipbones, the blunt head of his cock dragging between his asscheeks.

“Waiting being the key word here,” Alastor called out, a shiver running up his spine as Vox dragged his thumb along the underside of his tail. “Now, would you hurry it up so we can save the world before dinner?”

“Someone’s eager,” Vox snickered, his cock bumping against Alastor’s exposed hole.

“Eager to get this over with,” Alastor amended, ignoring his hot brow and the crackling heat in the air of this bedroom that had probably housed any number of degenerate acts.

“You need to work on your begging a little more,” Vox commented, but did at last begin pushing in.

Alastor scrunched his nose up against the intrusion, the toes of his hooves wiggling against the sheets as Vox’s cock stretched him out past what his tentacles had done. It was as Vox’s sighs of pleasure filled the room and his hips met Alastor’s ass that Alastor wondered when the parameters of the deal would be met. Would they be saved now that Vox was inside him? Or did they need to see this thing through to completion? Questions perhaps better asked at the beginning of this whole ordeal, not when he was already on hands and knees, being fucked by his nemesis.

Not that the nebulous force of the universe that oversaw soul deals would have bothered to answer him.

Oh well. He was here now and Alastor was not a man who did anything by halves.

Though he did feel like he was being split in half as Vox started thrusting, sawing his dick in and out of him. The slow roll of his hips quickly became fast, bucking pistons, the rapid drag of Vox’s cock inside him making Alastor groan. His head dropped between his shoulders, his claws slicing clean through the fancy silk as his fisted his hands in the sheets. If Vox had plans to try and draw this out, break Alastor down and make him beg for release, his own impatience and pleasure seemed to quickly overtake that desire. His grip was hard and his pace punishing as he pounded into him, Alastor’s tail curled back and taught as a bowstring.

“Oh, fuck,” Vox said, his voice low and gravelly, his breaths coming out in ragged pants. “Now this—hrrg—I could get used to this.”

“Fulfilling some long-held fantasy, are we?” Alastor managed to say between his own laboured breathing. He threw a glance at Vox over his shoulder, forcing a sly grin onto his face. “Tell me, Vox. Just how—mm!—long have you been dreaming about this? About me?”

Vox scowled, his screen fuzzing over for a flicker of a moment. His thrusting faltered before he quickly regained his rhythm. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

“Well, I can hardly help it when you went through so much effort to get my attention,” Alastor crowed, grunting as Vox nudged his leg, spreading his knees wider.

“Do you ever shut up?” Vox demanded, his mouth twitching downwards.

The answer was an unequivocal no. Alastor had always been a talker—couldn’t not talk given the chance—and that part of him didn’t simply fade away in the bedroom. He couldn’t help but perform for an audience, his mouth running away from him to chronicle every little thought in his head in a way that made his own frustrations and annoyances entertaining. In that way, he wasn’t Alastor, the man being made to spread his legs for his ex-something that had tried to kill him to save the world. Instead, he was the witty protagonist of a series of hare-brained hijinks, sure to get the listeners at home slapping their knees and rooting for him all the while. And all thanks to the power of words and presence.

Words were the greatest power, after all, so Alastor threw them out like chump change from his bulging pockets. He who spoke the most smoked the competition.

“Do you ever quit?” Alastor shot back, trying to keep a hold of his thoughts even as his senses were honed into where he and Vox were connected. It was surprisingly difficult to keep one’s head in order when they had someone else’s dick ramming into them.

Who knew?

“Because you haven’t these last sixty years or so!” Alastor went on. “What did I tell you, Vox? You’re insatiable. You almost had it but you threw it away just for a moment of bragging rights. Was it all—mm—so you could look good in front of me?” He laid his cheek on the sheets, turning so he could flutter his eyelashes at Vox. “I must say, I’m flattered.”

And though he said it to rile Vox up—a feat he was accomplishing if the way Vox gritted his teeth in a vicious snarl was any indication—it wasn’t a lie. He was flattered. That Vox would get such pleasure out of thinking he’d bested him, would go so far as to sabotage his own success purely for the sake of lauding it all in Alastor’s face was nothing short of romantic. Endangering their entire realm by starting a war with Heaven was worth more to Alastor than any amount of flowers or chocolates, and he’d certainly take someone debasing themselves for power over writing him a sonnet any day.

“You,” Vox spat, releasing Alastor’s hips to grab his tail in one hand and fist the other in his hair, “are such a fucking self-important brat! How can you be so full of yourself when you’re—hnng!—literally taking it from me right now? I should’ve put you in your place a long time ago, you fucking-“

But Vox’s words dissolved into a senseless, staticky mess as he picked up the pace, hammering into Alastor hard enough to bruise. He shoved Alastor’s face into the mattress and used his grip on his tail to hoist Alastor’s ass back against his thrusts.

Alastor winced at the pain prickling along his scalp and the pressure building in his gut. Still, despite the tears stinging the corners of his eyes, he laughed in delight. His laughter spilled from his throat, muffled against the sheets and riddled with radio static as Vox continued to pound against him and cuss him out. The ripples of electricity shocking Alastor between thrusts told him Vox’s control was slipping, each flare of pain making his grin stretch wider.

That was Alastor doing that to him, Alastor making Vox lose it just as he had when he’d hooked himself up to his holy canon, ready to blow the entire Pride Ring to kingdom come, just to get back at him. To know he occupied so much space in Vox’s mind, that Vox still thought so highly of him that only Alastor could lead him to such ruin, was exhilarating.

“You always do this to me,” Vox accused, his voice breaking in the middle of the sentence.

What it was that Alastor did to him, he didn’t say, and Alastor didn’t care to know. All he cared about was that Vox’s movements were becoming more erratic, his grip on Alastor’s hair tightening to the point of ripping strands out, the electricity zapping at his flesh intensifying.

“Yeees,” Alastor moaned, arching his back against Vox’s movements, meeting his thrusts by rocking his hips back.

This was what he’d been missing. This desperation, this neediness that only Vox could give him. Alastor had been in Hell a long time and had encountered many a desperate soul who would tear themselves to pieces just to avoid his wrath, but Vox was the only one who had kept his attention all that time. He was the only one who had bent and changed—literally beheaded himself—all for the sole purpose of trying to live up to Alastor’s idealised standards.

To be good enough for him. To be better than him.

Only Vox. He was reliable like that. The one constant source Alastor could always ensure the presence of to fall back on.

And now, here Vox was, on the day that he had lost it all because of Alastor, focussed solely on fucking Alastor into oblivion, because what else did he have now but that same desire to eclipse him? It scrambled Alastor’s brain and made his blood sing.

Yes, Alastor silently encouraged as his body was jostled against Vox’s thrusts, the mattress squeaking and the headboard slapping against the wall. Yes, keep going. Don’t stop. Don’t ever stop-

Vox’s hips stuttered as he let out a strangled cry then grew still. The wetness Alastor felt pumping inside him was his cue to reach beneath his front to finally grasp his own leaking cock and work himself to his own release. He bit down on his lip as he came with a muffled groan, adding to the doubtless disgusting array of fluids that had been collected on this bed over the years until the waves of pleasure coursing through him stopped.

Vox heaved above him, claws still locked in place and softening cock still buried in his ass until Alastor pushed himself up onto hands and knees and shrugged out of his hold. The sensation of Vox slipping out of him made him shudder, as did the sticky come dripping from his hole and down his thighs. He did away with the worst of it with a snap of his fingers, his magic wiping him down and replacing his clothes on his aching body.

“Damn,” Vox muttered as Alastor turned around to face him. “Couldn’t have let me enjoy the view a little longer?”

His subdued tone and lax posture, rocked back on his haunches with his soft cock hanging between his legs, had Alastor’s cheeks warming. Now that the tension in the room had snapped and his mind was no longer in the blender, he had room to feel slightly bashful about what they’d just done. While Alastor didn’t put the same stock into sex that most others did, he still recognised the action as something that couldn’t be taken back. They had crossed a line that could now not be uncrossed. Vox would forever more be a man who would know what it was to feel Alastor’s insides gripping his dick.

He shivered at the thought.

“You had plenty of time to get an eyeful,” Alastor rebuffed him, buttoning up his coat. “It’s not my fault if you—oof!”

Alastor was tackled to the bed, his back hitting the pillow and an antler scraping the bedhead. Vox’s arms locked around his middle and for a wild moment, Alastor thought he was being attacked. Had Vox decided to fulfill his earlier threats now that they’d fulfilled the terms of their deal and saved the city? Black magic danced up Alastor’s arms as he prepared to blast Vox to smithereens, but instead of frying Alastor with volts of energy, Vox pressed his screen to his hair and melted against him. Alastor went still, his mind a surprised flatline as Vox inhaled deeply.

“Just a minute,” Vox mumbled, tightening his grip on Alastor’s sides.

Alastor didn’t reply but he didn’t push Vox away either. He simply stayed there in Vox’s embrace, allowing himself to be held and breathed in. The drumming of his heart suddenly seemed too strong and he was sure that Vox would feel it and make some inane comment that would have Alastor reconsidering his decision not to kill him, but Vox merely sighed.

“I still hate you.”

That got a smile out of Alastor. He chuckled as he wound his arms around Vox’s back, stroking his claws along soft skin.

“I’d expect nothing less, darling.”

Just when Charlie thought she was genuinely going to pass out standing up, the bubble of collective power she and the others had been blasting at Vox’s bomb for what felt like hours closed around the canon with a dull blip! All at once, the power flowed through her more freely, the canon lifting into the air with ease.

She gasped in delight, Vaggie’s hand squeezing her shoulder in answer, and she stepped forward, advancing with the others. They kept walking towards the centre of the clearing, the canon lifting higher into the air as the blend of magic encasing it began to ripple and morph.

“It’s working!” Charlie yelled out in glee over the whipping winds. “Guys! It’s really working!”

She could feel her own mounting excitement mirrored in those around her, everyone’s expressions shifting from dejected exhaustion to elation in the blink of an eye. A moment later, the canon exploded within the barrier in a burst of iridescent colour. When they all dropped their arms, their beams of magic finally ceasing, the remnants of the weapon rained down on them in a cascade of shimmery glitter.

The ring of hotel residents, overlords (and Emily) all threw their fists in the air in victory, crying out in relief and exaltation. Charlie herself dropped to her knees and probably would have passed out, had Vaggie not sunk down with her, an arm curled around her to keep her upright.

“Charlie, you guys did it!” she gasped, happy tears welling in her eyes.

Charlie grinned, tearing up herself as she hugged Vaggie tight. “Oh my god. Alastor must have done it! …Whatever it was!”

A swish of fabric drew Charlie’s attention to the side. She drew her gaze up from long skirts to see Rosie smiling at the dark exterior of the Vees’ tower with an unreadable look in her eyes.

“Oh, yes, he did,” she chuckled, drumming her painted nails against her bicep. “That little snake.”

Charlie stared at her in confusion for a moment before Emily was flinging herself at her, causing Charlie to promptly drop it. As she squeezed Emily back, sharing in her tearful joy, she sent a silent prayer of thanks Alastor’s way.

Thanks, Al! Whatever you did really saved the fucking day.