Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It was dark but cold, there was barely wind that was blowing around or any at all. There were sounds but they weren’t natural ones as there were hisses and growls of creatures that didn’t belong to any animals. It was odd but it felt like the world had changed. At the time, a young man named “Vincent” woke up from his sleep as he felt like his head was going to explode by whatever impact that he was feeling.

As Vincent’s eyes snapped open to a sky the color of old television snow. His skull rang like a cathedral bell struck off-key as there was each pulse of pain that was carrying a high-pitched whine that belonged inside a cathode-ray tube rather than a human head. Vincent sat up too fast and the world tilted as there was asphalt scraping his palms and yet the sting felt distant, as it was wrapped in cotton.

“What in the—” The sentence cracked. His voice was there, but underneath it something else crackled, an audible snap of static, as though every word had to fight through a broken speaker.

He pressed the heel of his hand to his temple and tried to remember. The last thing that he remembered was that he was at The Gala for the anniversary of the Studio and their own success. The Newsfront Theatre on 47th, 1952. Klieg lights were popping flashbulbs and the network’s golden logo spinning on a velvet curtain. He had been out front in white tie, microphone in one gloved hand, and he was grinning the grin they paid him for. Then the rigging groan, the sudden shadow, the television set—one of the giant demonstration consoles—toppling from the catwalk like a drunk angel. After that: a white-blue flash, the smell of ozone and burning hair, and the sensation of every bone turning to antenna.

There was panic that surged through his body as it was making him frantic over what happened. He’d yanked at the box that he believed was still on his head. Vincent was still frantic over what happened at The Gala. His nails were scratching uselessly across glass and veneer while the crowd’s screams funneled away into a single long carrier wave. Now, Vincent was breathing hard on an unfamiliar curb, he realized the weight was still there—no longer on his head, but in it, behind the eyes, humming for him to hear.

In the state of panic, Vincent looked over just to see that there was a clean puddle that was right beside him. Vincent crawled over, on his knees, towards the puddle. Hoping that whatever happened to him wasn’t that bad and if it could be fixed. But, the moment he looked at his reflection in the puddle, he was stunned at what he was looking at. All that Vincent saw was what he believed was him. Vincent still had blood on where the TV landed on him but that wasn’t all he was seeing. Vincent saw that his head was covered by the TV that was stuck on him.

Vincent tried to pull the TV out of his head as he was forcing himself to count: one Mississippi, two Mississippi, three— The headache ebbed enough for finer details to arrive as he realized that the TV wasn’t coming off his head. It was like it became a part of him as it fused with his skin that was attaching the TV onto his body. But that wasn’t all that Vincent noticed about his body. Vincent’s fingers…weren’t his own anymore. Where pink skin should have been as there was metal that was plating glinted as they were slender talons of brushed aluminum tapering to television-antenna points. Vincent turned them over; inside the joints, tiny vacuum tubes glowed like ember eyes.

A gasp tore out of him as he was confused about what was happening to his body. Vincent scrambled to the nearest reflection—a rain puddle pooled against the curb—and looked. The face staring back was his, yes: slick black hair, sharp cheekbones, the birthmark at the left temple. But it was trapped inside a screen, boxed by a bezel that grew from his own collarbones. The glass was not glass; it was him. As there was light that rolled across it the way the picture rolls when vertical hold slips. His pupils jittered as he was tearing sideways into brief bars of monochrome.

Vincent screamed, yelling at the top of his lungs. Or maybe, he thought, that he still had lungs. The sound came out in two channels—one human, one an electronic squeal that blew the puddle into concentric rings. “Pull it together, Vincent,” he hissed, though the plea warbled like a mistuned dial. Vincent stood up on his feet and swept the dirt that was on his clothes. Knees of chrome and Bakelite clicked into place. A power cord, thick as a serpent, dragged from the base of his spine, its plug clattering against the pavement. He bundled it against himself like an obscenity and stumbled into the street.

Where the hell was he now?

Vincent wasn’t in Manhattan anymore but he was somewhere that he had never seen before in his life. The buildings were right—art-deco bones, fire escapes zig-zagging like black lightning—but every billboard advertised products in languages that hurt to read as there were letters that were twisted into test patterns, slogans that scrolled vertical blinds. The air smelled of overheated transformers. There were even many eyes that seemed to stare in different directions and they were freaking Vincent out inside his core just by looking at them. Even one eye was staring directly into Vincent’s eyes, he had to turn around just to avoid eye contact with the giant red eye.

Desperate to get help from somebody, Vincent limped forward as he clawed feet scraping sparks. “Help! Somebody! I don’t know where I’m at. I don’t even know what happened to me.” Vincent was holding his arms closely to his chest as he kept walking to anywhere that had people that could help him.

A figure rounded the corner—hat brim low, coat flapping. Vincent lurched toward him.  

“Please, I—I had an accident. I need a hospital, or—” Vincent bumped into somebody that was in front of him.

Vincent tripped onto the floor and landed on his side. Vincent rubbed his head as he lifted up his head and was rubbing his side temples. That was when the stranger lifted his face as they were staring down at Vincent. Where eyes should be, twin CRTs bulged as there were screens that were full of snow. His mouth was a speaker grille; when it opened, a voiceover baritone spilled out, devoid of warmth. “Late-night programming is over, friend. Go home.”

Vincent recoiled at the man’s words. Seeing the man’s hands were rabbit-ear antennas gesturing lazily. “Wait—just tell me where—”

But the stranger’s screens blinked to color bars, and he walked on, static fizzing with each step. Vincent turned to see his new surroundings that he was shockily looking at. Others filled the street now: a woman whose head was a rotary dial spinning endlessly; a child with a film-reel torso with his frames clacking as he breathed. Every one of them carried some piece of machinery the way ordinary people carried wallets—sewn in, bolted on, humming.

Monsters.

No—viewers. 

And he was the broadcast that was playing. His chest tightened until the power cord thrashed like a tail. Breath came shallow as it was syncing to a flicker rate he couldn’t control. While there were spots that danced in the corners of his vision—test dots while they were counting down to nothing. All that Vincent could do at that moment was run, nothing else. As there were alley mouths that yawned and vomiting neon; he plunged into the darkest, collapsing behind garbage cans that looked suspiciously like old cathedral radios. There he hugged his knees and there were claws that were scraping porcelain flecks from the brick.

Think. Think.  

That was when Vincent got a reminder that popped in his head. After the Gala, Vincent was supposed to leave to go to an All Night Diner—he remembered checking his watch “9:17 p.m." that he was supposed to be there or at least leave the Gala. Remembering where he was going, Vincent was due at Mel’s Diner on 53rd by ten. A corner booth, mustard bottles lined like soldiers. Someone would be waiting: freckles, shy smile, the kind of eyes that made Vincent forget the studio lights. They had planned it for weeks before the date of the Gala was given to Vincent and that first public hour together outside the smoke of after-parties and hush-hush phone calls.

“After the show,” Vincent whispered to the alley, voice glitching. “I promised.”

But the screen that was now his face showed only rolling thunder—memory as interference.  

He pictured the contract back in his dressing room: twenty pages of morality clauses, the clause that said *performer shall not conduct himself in any manner which may bring the Network into disrepute.* A single line underlined in red. He’d signed because the money meant escape from tenement drafts, from a father who called him a fairy loud enough for the neighbors to hear. He’d signed when he remembered how harshly the father always spoke to him and he postponed everything else—postponed “him.”

Now the postponement was a lifetime. Vincent tilted his head until the alley wall scraped the edge of his bezel. “Which matters more?” he asked the dark. “The future they let me have, or the one I was too scared to take?”

The alley did not answer for Vincent to listen too. Only the low sixty-cycle hum inside his chassis, the heartbeat of a television left on overnight. Somewhere beyond brick and static, a clock tower tolled ten times. Mel’s booth was empty tonight; he felt the vacancy like an unspooled ribbon. Yet the thought of that boy—Oliver—waiting, maybe worrying, maybe walking home alone as it stung worse than the electricity still coursing beneath his plating.

Realizing some details on what Vincent unfolded for himself. Seeing the cord dragging that was attached to his body, Vincent stepped toward the mouth of the alley. The city’s neon bled across his screen-face in horizontal bars—red, green, sickly cyan—painting the face of a man who had become the very medium that once sold him. “I don’t know how to fix this,” he said aloud, the words scrolling like a news ticker at the bottom of his vision. “But I know where I should have been.”

Vincent turned in the direction the clock tower had chimed and the palm of his hands were clicking on wet pavement. Monsters or no, audience or none, he would find that diner, that corner booth. If Oliver was still there, Vincent would sit across from him—screen, claws, cord and all—and finally let the picture settle into focus. Behind him, the alley’s shadows rearranged themselves into a test pattern.  

He did not look back.

Vincent didn’t know what to think. Vincent did not mean to sleep but to go back to where he knows best. Back home, in his apartment where he and Oliver have been living together since they became a couple. Vincent remembered the day that they first meant. It was the day that Oliver changed his life. Oliver was the reason why Vincent never grew jealous or resentful towards anybody that was Higher Rank than him when Vincent was a Weather Man. Seeing the tattoo on Oliver’s back where there was a little mark of Angel Wings and a Halo that had a little TV mark in the middle always made Vincent smile. 

‘Oh how I wish I was there more just like how you were always there for me when I needed you.’ Vincent thought to himself.

As time went by, there was one moment he was counting the flicker-rate of a sputtering neon sign—thirty cycles, thirty-one—trying to match it to the throb behind his glass-eyes; the next, the alley tilted and the world went to snow. Vincent dreamed of test patterns that folded into Oliver’s smile, of diner mustard bottles pouring static instead of mustard, of a contract page that kept growing longer the more he signed.

Then—tap, tap, tap.

A gentle rhythm against the metal casing of his arm. “Ollie?” he mumbled, half-dreaming, because the face swimming above him had freckles and eyes that caught streetlights like quarters dropped in a jukebox. Vincent’s claws reached automatically as he was wanting the warmth of a hand that had never once flinched from him.

The face sharpened the more they got closer to Vincent. The freckles became spots of rust; the eyes were twin dial knobs that were showing chrome catching dawn’s first sodium glow. The smile stayed, but it was stapled on as there was a ventriloquist’s curve cut into plastic. “Sleepin’ rough, friend?” the creature asked. Its voice hissed through a grille set where a mouth should be—an old car radio searching for a station. “You’re broadcasting on public property. Not allowed.”

Vincent recoiled so hard his cord tail rattled trash lids. “I—I thought—”  The dream-ashes of Oliver’s name still burned on his tongue.

“Hey buddy, it’s okay. I’m here to help you. Name’s Wurl,” the thing said, tipping a hat that was literally a waffle-iron. “And by the looks of it, you’re new here. So, you're technically late. New meat’s supposed to report to the Golden City before first fade-out.”

Vincent blinked snow from his screen. “Golden City?”

Wurl was already hauling him upright as his claws were surprisingly gentle under the elbow. “Where the Contract Demons clock in. They all have to report there in order to get a spot to live in. You got the look—fresh kill, still got your antennae up.” He tapped Vincent’s forehead; the glass rang like a bulb. “The door's right here. Can’t miss it.”

They had walked only three paces when Wurl stopped beside a dumpster Vincent could have sworn hadn’t been there moments ago. He pressed one waffle-iron finger to the brick wall—and the bricks melted to gilt. A doorway unfolded as there were edges that showed a blazing white-blue like a picture tube overdriven with voltage. Revealing the hieroglyphs of channel numbers and fine-print clauses crawled across the lintel.

“Through you go,” Wurl said. “Answers, benefits, orientation film—whole shebang. Try not to linger in the reception; Hell hates that.”

“Wait, I don’t—” Vincent’s voice glitched. “Did you say Hell?”

Wurl’s smile knobs spun. “You think you get a dressing room like that—” he flicked the TV frame fused to Vincent’s shoulders, “—upstairs?” And with a courteous bow that would have been at home in any midtown doorman, he shoved.

There was no drop, no lurch—just a snap of static so loud it folded into silence. Then light, revealing a champagne-gold, retina-white, and the blue of sky you only see on calibrated sets. Vincent stumbled onto a boulevard paved with film-stripes. As there were spools that were unwound beneath his feet and there was each frame a moment Vincent didn’t remember living like this or didn’t want to be in the spot that he got himself stuck in. Vincent wanted to go back home to where he belongs but knowing that he needed to keep going. What choice did he have so he kept walking to where he was told to go.

Around him, beings queued in perfect lines like they were waiting for something to call them. They weren’t human—antennae, dials, projector reels for ribcages—but they wore pressed suits or neat skirts and there were name-tags that clipped like press badges. Overhead, loudspeakers murmured easy-listening big-band as there was every trumpet note rounded off in treble-dial warmth.

A clock tower—its face a gigantic watch-dial—read 8:00 a.m. sharp. The air smelled of ozone and fresh mimeograph ink. “Excuse me.” A voice like an intercom. A guard in a brass-button coat stood beside Vincent; his head was a cathode-ray tube wearing a cap. Badge: RECEPTION SECURITY – LEVEL 1. “Identification?”

Vincent lifted his claws. “I—I don’t have any. I just got here. I was… pushed through a door and ended up here.”

The guard’s screen-face flickered to a quick horizontal roll—annoyance. “New arrival. Line Four-B. Follow me. Don’t get lost.”

Vincent sighed. “I’m already lost…”

They passed queues that snaked around velvet stanchions. Seeing ahead of him was a woman with a ribbon of magnetic tape for hair that argued with a clerk about a missing comma in her severance clause. As there was also a man whose mouth was a film gate pleaded for extra footage. No one stared at Vincent; in a place where faces were literally screens and a shattered television head that rated barely a shrug.

At Line 4-B the guard stopped. “Wait here. When your number flashes, enter. Someone inside will brief you on departmental placement, housing, energy rations, and residual rights.” He paused, taking in the dried blood crusted on Vincent’s white tuxedo collar where the TV had bitten bone. “The first day’s always rough. Try not to glitch on the carpet.”

Then the guard marched off in his heels, hearing the clicking sprocket holes into the film-strip boulevard. Vincent stood, tail-coat torn, bowtie skewed, and his screen cracked at the corner like someone had tried to change the channel with a hatchet. The blood—his blood—had oxidized to a rust color that matched the rust of his false memory of Oliver’s freckles. People—if they still counted as people—shuffled forward every few minutes, numbers lighting above the bronze doors.

A127, A128…

Vincent was now at A140 as it was flashing in front of him. Vincent’s digit glowed red in the corner of his vision, an embedded channel bug. Ahead, the Department of Contracts rose in Art-Deco splendor, all gold leaf and marble. Engraved across the portico: OBLIGATIONS ARE FOREVER—TERMS MAY APPLY. Sunlight (or studio light—he couldn’t tell) ricocheted off the façade and into his screen, filling it with blooming white that nearly wiped his reflection.

The more he moved closer in the line, the more Vincent saw himself anyway: a man turned appliance, gala finery soaked in trauma, and waiting in line to be told what Hell intended to do with the leftovers of Vincent Whiteman. The line moved closer to where Vincent needed to be at. Passing by A129 as the air was getting thicker for Vincent to breath. Vincent doesn’t know how he could be breathing but he was. Vincent shuffled forward as his newfound claws were tucked close so no one would notice them trembling. Every step crunched the film-strip as there were frames of strangers’ final moments popping like bubble-wrap beneath his shoes.

A130. 

Vincent wondered if Oliver was still waiting for Vincent to come to the diner or maybe Oliver was somewhere else. Wondering where Vincent is at. Vincent wondered if Oliver was scanning the morning papers for a small item: “Local TV Host Killed By A Freak Accident.” Vincent wondered if anyone would mourn longer than a news cycle. Knowing his family, his dad won’t care and his mother never showed concern so he knows they won’t even show up to his funeral. If there was going to be a funeral for Vincent.

A131.  

Vincent wondered if there could be a chance to go back to Earth and be with Oliver again. To be with the only person that ever cared for him. The one person that came at the right time when Vincent was feeling down about himself as a Weather Host and Man in general. Since men aren’t supposed to like the same gender as them. It was like Oliver was dropped down from Heaven to show Vincent the light. But, that was when Vincent’s number flashed, he would be offered a pen, a contract, and maybe there was another chance to sign his name in exchange for forgetting. Vincent even wondered if he’d be weak enough to take it.

A132.  

As the doors yawned open for Vincent to look inside. There was an exhalation of refrigerated air that was blowing at Vincent and he could feel the chill going through his body. Vincent wasn’t sure how he could feel cold especially when his head was basically a TV now. Inside, chandeliers of bare bulbs flickered in perfect synchronization—one dark frame, two bright, and there was a secret message in the refresh rate.

It was time for Vincent to go and see what’s going to happen next. So, Vincent straightened his bowtie that he was still wearing around his neck as best he could with talons and he lifted his chin, if he could still have a chin to recall by, so the cracks in the glass caught the light. The guard had said someone in there would answer everything. Vincent had to try and act that he was fine. Vincent had some questions to ask that he hopes that there are answers for him to know about.

But, Vincent also had one answer already as he was beating inside the cage of vacuum tubes that were all around him. Making Vincent spin in questions that were messing with his mind. But all that Vincent could think about is Oliver and if Hell wanted another bargain from him that Vincent would have to face when he gets to the location that he's supposed to go for. It would have to tune in to a different channel. Vincent was done selling pixels of himself and he had to face whatever he was going to be looking at.

A133.  

That was when the line moved, and Vincent Vox moved with it. Vincent’s newfound screen cracked a little the more he felt powerful emotions occurring. There was the cord that was dragging from his new form body. Lastly, showing the blood that was still drying on his Gala clothes, but Vincent’s eyes forward as he was waiting for the door to call his number and the next reel to roll.

Chapter Text

“Number A-one-forty—step forward, please.”

There was the voice that came from a speaker grille shaped that was like a bright red rose bloom and perched on the marble counter of Booth 9. Vincent obeyed at the speaker as his claws were clicking across the polished floor until he stood beneath a chandelier of naked light bulbs that flickered in slow as it was like hypnotic pulses that were going across the large room. Vincent walked over, going into the unknown of whatever is going to be said to him. Vincent was even crossing his fingers that something good happens that doesn't lead him into a deeper hole than Hell can provide. 

Behind the counter sat a woman—if woman was still the word—whose skin looked sewn from white silk thread. She had eight jointed arms that moved in perfect and independent rhythms as one was scribbling on carbon paper while the other one was juggling a candle-stick phone. There were also two more that were clattering over a typewriter and another wiping smudges from the glass partition, yet another buffing her own nametag: “MISS ARACHNE – RECEPTION & ROUTING.” Every motion left faint after-images, as though each limb were broadcast at a slightly different frame rate that it was showing. 

“Name,” she said, not looking up.

“Um… Vincent Whiteman.” His voice crackled; the chandelier dimmed in sympathy.

Once hearing his full name out loud, all of her fingers, from each arm, froze mid-air. She slowly lifted up her head and gave eye-to-eye contact with Vincent, staring at him like there was a giant bug crawling up his screen face. At the time, the typewriter carriage dinged as it became silent between them. Slowly, all eight eyes—round, black, television-screen dark—lifted to look both at her phone and the computer screen. Like she was ready to type in the name to clarify if it was really Vincent that was at her front desk. Vincent even felt like a celebrity that was caught red-handed to a crime that he committed. 

“You’re certain?” Silk rustled as every arm lowered.

Vincent nodded. “Pretty sure it’s still mine.”

Miss Arachne turned to a Rolodex the size of a wagon wheel as she was typing really fast on her computer and swiping across her phone. When she flicked it with a blur of wrists, she saw the image of Vincent when he was human and his documents of when he was alive back on Earth. There was even the image of the contract that he signed and she nodded, knowing that it was Vincent that she was looking at. So, she yanked one card and held it to the light. The card shivered as she was projecting a miniature newsreel: Vincent onstage at the Galla, the falling TV, the blue-white flash. The reel ended in static. She whistled—a sound like a modem dialing down.

“Line holds,” she muttered into the phone that had somehow already nestled against her cheek. “Yes… the name matches… Mmhmm, top floor.” She slammed the receiver down. “Mr. Whiteman, you’re re-routed. Elevator bank C, express to Penthouse. Keep this.” A slip of gold paper, warm as skin as she pressed into his taloned palm. TICKET – AUDIENCE WITH THE QUEEN. “Show it to the Seraph Guards. They’ll wave you through to talk to the Queen of Hell about your contract.”

Vincent’s throat rasterized. “Queen? I never signed anything with—”

“Special contract,” Arachne cut in, already beckoning the next soul. “She wears many faces up there. You met one. Move along—line’s backing up.”

Vox tried to explain to her but already, there were people glaring at him for him to move to the side and let them take their turn. Let the line keep going since they wanted to get their share on what they needed while living Hell. So, Voc had no choice to step aside and dazed, as a man made of reel-to-reel tape shuffled forward and arms were spooling anxiously. As the eight silk arms resumed their ballet.

Vox walked over towards the Elevator bank C as stood at the end of a corridor lined with filing cabinets that stretched beyond perspective. Each drawer was labeled in fine print: “Breaches, Season Two; Petty Grudges, Colorized; Applause, Forced”. The golden ticket pulsed in Vincent’s grip like a heartbeat he no longer possessed. Vincent became nervous, he never gets like this. The only time that he gets these feelings was when he first started out on Television and that was when he was a Weather Man years ago. 

But now, it is different and he has to face it.

Like it or not…

He must face what he signed himself into.

Inside that elevator, Vincent waited until he got to the floor where he’ll be talking to the Queen herself. He doesn’t know who the Queen of Hell is but he signed a contract with her. Even though he has no idea who and how that happened, he must face her in order to know what’s going on around here. While the elevator was going up, there was a memory that slipped between the fluorescent flickers—

———At Home: 5:30 p.m.———

Vincent was fixing his tie until Oliver came in and helped Vincent with it. “Vincent, you really need to learn how to fix your own tie. I have been gesturing it all this time since we've been together and you haven’t gotten it right.”

Vincent blushed. “Well, you do it better Ollie.”

Oliver rolled his eyes and fixed Vincent’s tie. Oliver sighed, sitting on the battered chair while his own fingers were worrying the brim of a diner-issue cap. Oliver looked around as Vincent saw the look that Oliver had on his face. Looking at himself in the mirror while he adjusted his tie a little more before he turned away from the mirror and looked forward at Oliver. Noticing that Oliver was avoiding the reflection that Vincent was in.

“You’ll be out by nine, right?” Oliver asked.

“Ollie, you know those events take longer than nine. I’ll try to leave at ten. Knowing how big crowds can get.” Vincent’s grin felt laminated. “But, if it makes you feel better. I’ll sprint to the diner.”

Oliver stood. “Okay, I guess that’s better.”

Seeing something on Oliver’s face made Vincent question what was on his mind. “Are you okay? What’s on your mind?”

Oliver sighed. “Then let’s tell them tonight.”

Vincent’s hands fumbled the tie. “Tell who?”

“Everyone. Your mother, your father. the papers, whoever’s listening.” Oliver’s voice cracked like an old record. “I’m tired of being a footnote in your life, Vin. We can move. California, maybe. Start clean.”

Vincent stared at the mirror. A studio light buzzed overhead as there was a threat of burn out. “You know what the Network clause says. Morality. Public image. I’m finally—”

“Finally what? Famous enough to lose yourself?” Oliver stepped closer. “Say it, Vin. Say we matter.”

Silence stretched as it was elastic and cruel around the surroundings. Vincent walked towards the door, looking at the clock that he needed to get to the gala. “I love you,” Oliver whispered.

Vincent’s mouth opened, but shame jammed the signal and he didn’t say it back to Oliver. Vincent didn’t turn to look at Oliver. In the matter of time, Vincent grabbed his tuxedo jacket and walked out of the room and was going down the stairs to head to the front door. Vincent leaves the words unsent as he was echoing in the dead air that left both of them quiet and neither of them never said anything else after that until Vincent was fully gone from the building and heading to the gala.

———Memory ends———

The noise from the elevator caught Vincent out of the train of thought as the dinged noise broke him out of it. Seeing the brass doors parting with a sigh of cool air. Inside, paneled walls displayed a progress bar of glowing filaments: LOBBY… 10… 40… 90. Vincent stepped aboard; the doors sealed as it was cutting the filing-cabinet corridor to a slit, then nothing else happened but just open to what was in front of Vincent.

Acceleration tugged at his chassis as there were tubes around the walls and ceiling. They were  glowing red as they were beaming brighter as floor numbers climbed. There was calming and smooth music that played—easy-listening strings, the same station his father left on all night to drown out arguments. It almost sounded creepy the more Vincent listened to it. Vincent stared at his reflection in the polished wall as there was cracked glass and dried blood that was mapping constellations across white shirt-front and his antennae were drooping like wilted lilies. Vincent tried to say “I love you” now, just to hear how it sounded, but static ate the vowels that were louder than the words that he tried to say out loud.

There it was, Vincent was in front of the doors of the Penthouse. The place that was told to go to in order to talk to the Queen of Hell herself. Vincent still didn’t know who she was but knowing that this is the Queen of Hell, she wasn’t a good person or whatever she was since nobody in Hell isn’t human looking no more or never was. That was when the doors slid apart to reveal a hallway of blinding alabaster. As there were old leaves crawled along cornices like circuitry; the air smelled of ozone and lilacs. Two guards waited—towering figures in ivory armor shaped like cathode-ray tubes. Their wings, folded tight, were arrays of feather-thin receptors. When they spoke, it was in perfect stereo that came out.

“Present ticket.”

Vincent raised the golden slip that was given to him to show to the guards when he got to the top of the mountain. One guard scanned it with eyes that displayed color bars; the other stepped aside. There were twin doors that opened up—ten feet tall, inlaid with quartz screens showing looping footage of blooming roses—swung inward without a sound. Vincent crossed the threshold as his own heart was racing in horizontal lines, and the doors closed behind him with the soft finality of a set going dark.

Coming inside the room, Vincent saw that he entered the office beyond stretched farther than any floorplan allowed. As there was light that came from everywhere and nowhere, as though the room itself were a picture still loading. At the far end, upon a dais of old television sets stacked like throne cushions as they sat a figure he could not yet parse while the image was  resolution that was refusing to settle down at the end of the room.

Seeing this figure just brought chills up Vincent’s spine and the more he got closer, the more he felt that he was going to faint and never wake up from a coma. A coma that he hoped that he would wake up from and end up at the hospital and Oliver would be sitting right next to him and it was all a bad nightmare. That he was just hurt from the accident and he was alive. That Vincent could have the chance to tell Oliver that he loved him. But sensing the room, he knew that it wasn’t a nightmare that he was dreaming but it was reality. Even though he still denied the situation that he was in, he still knew that deep down inside that none of this wasn’t a nightmare that he was having.

When Vincent was in front of the desk of where the figure was sitting at. The figure smiled, showing a wide smirk that Vincent could see from where he was standing. That was when the figure brought up their hand and referred to Vincent to walk forward to the front of the desk. Vincent gulped, with each footstep echoing like a dial tone. Somewhere inside the brilliance, a voice—feminine, familiar as late-night test cards—called his name.

“Oh goodie! Vincent Whiteman. At last. Come closer baby… we have a signal to correct that we need to talk about.”

Vincent started to shake in fear. Vincent obeyed to what the figure told him to do. Vincent had no choice to do whatever the figure commanded him to do. Vincent’t screen-face was flickering. Trying to contain his fear. Vincent didn’t want the figure to see that he was afraid, knowing that he shows that he is fearful towards it. Vincent wanted to bring himself away from what he was looking at. So, Vincent brought himself to the moment when he had the chance to say the words  that were unsaid “I love you” in his head that were looping in his circuitry like a tape that would not burn out.

But, that was when the lights came up like a studio room as there was soft amber light that was beaming onto the figure. At first, Vincent thought he was going to see a horrible looking creature but then the hard white key that erased every shadow. Vincent’s screen-face auto-adjusted as there was the brightness that was flickering until the after-image cleared and there was a change of the mode in the room they were in.

On a throne of stacked television sets sat a young woman in a pink blazer while her horns were pointing up as they were like antique rabbit ears and her hooves were dangling inches above the floor. A prop crown—circuit-board gold—tilted in her white curls. When she smiled, test-color bars flashed in her pupils. “ Hello Vincent Whiteman! Knew you’d pull through.” Her voice sparkled with laugh-track warmth. “I’m Charlie Morningstar—CEO upstairs, you know “Earth” not Heaven. Like that would ever happen. ‘She chuckled. “But, I’m the Queen down here. In Hell. You’ve been rated gold, darling.”

Vincent’s knees locked. “No, it can’t be.”

She smirked again. “Oh but it is…” Putting both of her hands under her chin and lifting it up just to gleefully glare at Vincent with her glowing red eyes.

Vincent gulped. “You… you ran the Network that I worked at.”

“Still do. Different broadcast towers. I’m a busy woman, you know. I own radio shows, television stations, companies, and etc” She hopped down as her hooves were clacking CRT glass. “Sit, sit. You look like scrambled input.” A snap of her fingers—sound effect of a dial turning—and his blood-stiff tux dissolved into a clean charcoal suit, silk tie the exact shade of Oliver’s favorite diner booth. “Better. Blood reads terribly on camera.”

She gestured to a coffee table that hadn’t existed seconds ago as there were chrome legs and top a single flatscreen looping a fireplace. There was a large bowl of popcorn. There were three different kinds of popcorn. There was one that was caramel. The other one was cheddar power. Lastly, the other flavor was just regular popcorn. As each kernel was shaped like tiny televisions—sat beside two glass bottles of cola labeled “HELL-ATION”.

“Help yourself. Low-calorie, high-residual.” She plopped cross-legged on the opposite couch while her long tail was swishing and the heart shape in the middle at the edge of her tail was reflecting back at Vincent to see. “So—death by falling TV. Classic irony. Writers upstairs are cackling about it.”

Vincent didn’t touch the snacks. “The front desk lady said somebody about… demons and contracts. What does that mean? I don’t remember—”

Charlie’s smile thinned. “Sign anything? Oh yes you did. You just don’t know what type of contract you sighed when you were alive.” Seeing the brightness up ten percent. She produced a manila folder from thin air, tossed it; pages fanned across the coffee table like channel surf. There it was—his signature, fountain-pen thick, dated the night he’d been called to the “upstairs” office.

———Memory rolled in, showing Office Above the Clouds, Two Years Earlier———

It was the time when the clouds were coming in even though the sun was still out, there was going to be a strom as there was something coming that nobody didn’t know about. By the Broadcast Building, inside the office, there was a woman across the desk as she wore a black and red suit. Revealing the details of a human form that a demon was inside. Wearing a brunette, glasses, and a nameplate that said “Ms. Sharlie Morning” on it. Those were the days that the ratings were great and the graphs were wallpapered all over the room. They were all in bold just for people to see clearly.

“Oh Vincent, darling, you’re trending all over the newspapers. You’re the next big thing!” She slid a single sheet forward. “Rapid-climb clause. If anchors exit—voluntarily or otherwise—you auto-ascend. No ceiling.”

Vincent smiled. “That sounds like an honor. A dream that I always wanted since I was a kid.”

She chuckled. ‘Well I guess dreams do come true. This is an opportunity that you can’t drop now.” She takes out a contact and shows Vincent. “Sign you and your dreams will come true! It’ll just fall on your lap without you doing any of the hard work to get it.” She gives Vincent a pen and lays the contact on the table, moving it towards him.

Vincent smiled as he grabbed the pen but he hesitated on signing it. Before Vincent was going to sign the contract, he kept hearing Oliver’s voice in his head that was warning Vincent. ‘She smells like fine print, Vin. Don’t trust anything that she says. She’ll end up using you in the end like a tool for her personal needs.’

But that was when Vincent’s father's voice was louder than Oliver’s voice. It overlapped with each other until eventually it took over Vincent’s mind. “You little fairy. Good for nothing failure. You’ll always be weak like your mother.”—and the pen felt heavy with destiny that Vincent could grab for himself without fighting competitors who want the spot that he truly deserves. 

So… He signed.

Seeing the contract has been signed, Ms. Morning’s hand extended out towards Vincent with a wicked smile. It appeared that her eyes were turning completely red and her smile became the same color. But since Vincent didn’t see the evil from his boss, he didn’t notice what type of face that she was making. At that time, her fingers were flickering for a millisecond—cloven, white-furred, eyes glowing slot-machine red. 

He’d blamed the fluorescents.

———Memory ends—signal drop———

Vincent stared at the sigil now embossed in hell-red over his name: PROPERTY OF MORNINGSTAR BROADCASTING & ETERNAL SOULS LTD.

“I was… good,” he whispered. “I didn’t kill anybody, I didn’t—”

“Good is a demographic,” Charlie said, already bored. “You wanted to reach higher measures so I gave it to you. I provided you towers and fame among your fans.” She leaned closer, voice syrupy. “Terms are eternal, sweetheart. The contract ends only when I pull the plug. Which—” she mimed a remote click, “—could be mid-season or series finale. Depends on numbers.” She chuckled softly.

Cold static crawled under his glass. “But… What about the people I love—”

“Off-limits for visitation. Different syndication zones. Besides, you don’t have anyone that loves you. Only that Oliver boy but nobody else.” She conjured a hand-mirror frame carved from antennae. “But we offer closed-circuit. Spyglass brand. Say hello to grief, Vincent.”

She shoved it into his claws. “Picture who you want and you get to see how they’re doing. At this very moment. She patted on Vincent’s right shoulder.”

Vincent looked at her before he turned to look at the mirror before speaking again. “Oliver,” Vincent breathed.

The glass rippled when Vincent called out for Oliver’s name.. There was an image that sharpened. It was showing Oliver’s bedroom, sunrise slicing through half-shut blinds. Oliver on the floor, knuckles bleeding from punching drywall, and the photo strips scattered—Vincent and Oliver at Coney Island, snow in their hair, foreheads pressed together. A newscast murmured in the background: …tragic accident at the Newsfront Gala…

Oliver screamed—a sound Vincent’s mirror couldn’t fully carry as there was Oliver’s voice that was breaking into raw carrier waves and brought shockwaves that even Vincent was taken aback when he heard it. Seeing Oliver in the corner as he clutched their first-date photo while he was rocking in a ball and curled up as he was whispering at the picture of Vincent to come back until the picture bent in half.

Seeing Oliver breaking down the way he did was a shock for Vincent since Oliver was always the calm and positive one. But Oliver in this state broke Vincent’s heart. But, that was when the mirror blinked to black. Vincent’s screen flickered horizontal hold—tears made of scanlines. “Let me talk to him. Just once. Please—”

“Against policy. Emotional bandwidth costs.” Charlie stood, suddenly twelve feet tall, crown sparking. “You’ll adjust. Hell’s got craft services, premiere parties, perpetual pilot season. You even get a multi-level loft—four floors, staircases that spiral like ratings graphs. Keys, maps, new job title: Host, Eternal Late Shift.” A folder materialized under his arm, thick as old TV guides. “Read on the tram. Orientation’s at six.” She snapped her fingers as reality pixelated; Vincent felt himself compressed into a single point of light—commercial break—and ejected.

He landed on cobblestones outside an apartment block that hadn’t been there before. Showing the neon sign read TUBE-ROSE TOWERS – LUXURY FOR THE LOUD AND FOREVER. Four staircases corkscrewed upward, each labeled: DRAMA, COMEDY, TRAGEDY, VARIETY. His key-ring bore a tiny tag: PENTHOUSE – VARIETY. Whatever the Queen of Hell did, she snapped him out of her office and he was at the place that she gave him to live. But Vincent didn’t care, all he cared about was his home and his boyfriend.

Inside, the unit sprawled—mid-century modern meets control room. As there were wall-to-wall monitors that displayed snow; a kitchenette sparkled with chrome; a bed big enough for two, though one was missing. Vincent ignored it all. Vincent kicked open the nearest door as he collapsed on satin sheets, and yanked the mirror from his pocket.

“Oliver.”

Once more, the glass obeyed what Vincent told it to do. It revealed the same bedroom that Vincent saw but it was hours later since Vincent saw the clock and the time of the day was. Vincent saw Oliver lay curled on the carpet as he was picture frame clenched to chest and his eyes swollen shut from all the crying that he did. There was snow  that was outside the window—early November, first of the season. The photo they held showed two boys laughing as there was a breath that was fogging the lens of the camera that they used on that day of their trip.

Vincent pressed his cracked glass forehead to the mirror. “I love you,” he whispered, voice modulation dropping to midnight DJ hush. “I was scared to tell you because I’m admitting to everything that my father called me. I’m still scared. But I love you. I love you so much.” Vincent teared up as he started to cry.

Oliver couldn’t hear what Vincent was telling him. Since they were in different realms and different frequencies of worlds that they lived in. Yet for a moment snow on both sides of the glass fell in sync—tiny white pixels buffering between worlds. Vincent cried more as the tears kept rolling down a screen that was never meant for water and it was shorting tiny diodes until patches of the picture fizzed black. Vincent cried until the mirror auto-dimmed and he was politely suggesting 

“Viewer discretion: excessive emotion.”

Vincent clutched it anyway as his arms were around cold glass and he was hugging an image that could never hug back. They could never hug each other ever again. Vincent was in Hell with a mirror so that he could see his boyfriend on the other end. While Oliver was back on Earth, suffering with the grief and death of Vincent “his boyfriend” as he was having a mental breakdown after finding out what happened. 

Outside, Hell’s perpetual sign-off tone played—one long sixty-cycle hum. Somewhere downstairs, a new show was being green-lit. Somewhere upstairs, a boy kept sleeping with a broken photograph of his boyfriend that will never come back to him ever again. And Vincent Vox—contract demon, late-shift host, ratings commodity—lay in his borrowed bed as he was whispering “I love you” into static that never answered, while snow continued to fall on two different screens, both forever out of reach.

Chapter Text

As the days went on, Vincent barely went out of his new apartment that was given to him. It’s been Seven days of Hell that Vincent stayed in his new place and never went anywhere else but just drank and looked at the TV that was provided. Vincent felt like seven seasons of a show no one had cancelled—only paused, forever, on the same frame. Those seven days have been the most miserable time that he's ever spent and it might be worse than the days that he had to spend time with his father when he was drinking on a Saturday night.

But after all that time, Vincent had left the apartment only twice: once to find the tram stop, once to come back. The refrigerator restocked itself with bottles whose labels read BOOZE – NOW WITH 20 % MORE EXISTENTIAL DREAD. Vincent drank it anyway and he didn’t care. The liquid hit the back of his glass throat as it fizzed into pixels, and reassembled as a warm while there was an analog buzz that was somewhere behind the tuner dial he now called a heart.

This morning—if mornings existed where the sun was a klieg light on a timer within Hell—he stood before the bathroom mirror as he was staring at his new form that he has now. Vincent wasn't a man with black hair with gray streaks along with his Heterochromia color eyes. Vincent was different now, like he was reborn into a body that he didn't feel somewhat ready to be in yet. Seeing the full-length of his height, cracked at the corner, edged with ghost-images of old broadcasts. Vincenf had been avoiding the reflection for a while but it was the day that he needed to see himself and face what reality he was living in now.

Vincent looked down at the floor. “All right,” he muttered. “I have to face this. This is my life now… But, I don't feel ready.” 

Vincent looked in the mirror, seeing that he was a nine feet demon that filled the mirror. Vincent's new torso was a cinema-scope V-taper as it was a charcoal hide laced with silver circuitry that pulsed when he breathed. Vincent also saw his shoulders spiked with antennae fins as there were biceps that were traced by vacuum-tube veins that glowed amber at full flex. The claws—he’d gotten used to—were titanium talons, three per hand, and retractable like cat-steel.

But the head… A 60-inch CRT crowned his neck as it was bezel and cracked from the impact that killed him. The glass screen front projected a flicker of how his face used to be—Vincent’s human face—but warped back to the face he has now. Revealing the colors that were bleeding at the edges and showing his new face on the TV screen that he has. When Vincent turned, the image lagged a frame as it was a horror-movie jump-cut. Inside the collar, there were thick cables burrowed into the collarbone and showing how his skin was merging with insulation like scar tissue.

Looking at his lower body, there were twin slits fluttering along his ribs—they looked like gills with the matte black as they were opening and closing with hydraulic sighs and breaths that he was taking. They appeared to be shark gills. Which made Vincent's eyes widened with a spark of excitement. Since Vincent loved sharks, ever since he was a boy, he loved sharks. It was a way for him to feel strong and in control of himself and others around. Vincent will always love sharks as a kid; now he shares their breathing apparatus. Every inhale tasted of copper and ozone.

Vincent flexed at the gills as they flared up and down the more he breathed. That was when the screen-face flickered. “Monster gets nine out of ten viewers for this,” he mumbled. “One that died in a ridiculous way.”

Vincent left the mirror, walking over to the kitchen. Vincent grabbed a bottle and took out a cup from the cabinet. Vincent poured another drink for himself to drink. The bottle glugged like a sound effect. Vincent carried it to the couch as he was looking at the mirror that was beside him. Vincent dug the Spyglass mirror from between cushions as he tapped the glass and was thinking if he should see what Oliver is doing right now. At this moment, Vincent wants to see how his boyfriend was dealing with his death. 

So, with one name that Vincent called. “Oliver.” He knew that he’ll see what's happening right now. 

That was when the mirror gave a resolved picture that revealed a grey sky and a green tent that had rows of folding chairs. It was back on Earth. There was a priest who read last rites; a closed casket sat above a rectangular mouth in the ground. No family—Vincent’s father had refused to come to Vincent’s funeral (“burial’s for decent folk”)—but Oliver stood front row, suit too big, eyes hollowed out like he'd been crying all week. Behind him, there were co-workers and fans that held umbrellas that were printed with tiny television icons. It was a free promo, even at the grave.

After the funeral, with mourning the loss of Vincent the service had ended as everybody was leaving a sad tune behind them. As the legacy of Vincent Whiteman was gone and nobody to carry it on. After everybody was leaving, Oliver was still in front of the grave of his late boyfriend as he was staring down at the stone of where Vincent’s name was at. That was when Oliver’s mother tried to guide him away. “Please honey, it’s time to go." You need rest.” But Oliver shrugged her off as he kneeled and pressed fingers to the coffin lid like he could still feel a pulse beneath.

Oliver walked away from his mother as she watched him leave, feeling helpless that she can’t help her son. She was the only one who knew his secret. How much Vincent meant to Oliver and since his death, there’s going to be so much that is going to happen to Oliver since he never dealt with grief before. That was when it cut to the parking lot where Oliver was alone in his ‘49 Plymouth as his hands were clenched on the wheel. After silence for a few moments, Oliver watched from a distance until he screamed—no sound in the mirror, just the violent shake of shoulders—then collapsed forward, forehead to horn ring. As Oliver’s lips formed the same sentence again and again. 

“It should’ve been me.”

Oliver cried once more, looking for a certain photo that he needed to look at. That was when he found it, it was the photo that he took with Vincent on one of their first trips as a couple. Oliver cried over the photo as he kissed the photograph—Vincent recognized the snow-date snapshot—threw the car into gear as the tires were spitting gravel toward the city, toward the bar where they first drank illegal beer at nineteen.

The mirror dimmed, polite. Vincent’s screen-face shorted as there were tears that became glitch bars. “I love you, Ollie. I’m right here—”

A synthetic chime sliced the air—DING! The apartment’s wall-phone, rotary dial painted like a candy cane, lifted itself off the hook and floated toward him. “Whiteman,” it said in Charlie’s sing-song. “Weekly ratings meeting at forty-five. Studio 9, Pandemonium Square. Non-appearance equals breach. Breach equals… well, you’ve seen the cancellation process.” Click.

The phone dropped into his lap. He stared at it, then at the bottle, then at the gills still fluttering with leftover sobs. Hell had schedules; Hell did not accept sick days for heartache.

“I didn’t even get ready. I didn’t even have an interview…. You know what fine,” he growled. “Encore performance because I signed myself into this mess.”

Vincent stood—nine feet of reluctant nightmare—shrugged into the Network-issued blazer that hung by the door as there was crimson with brass buttons shaped like play-buttons. There was a name-tag already embedded: VOX – LATE-SHIFT HOST. Vincent smoothed the tie as he clipped the Spyglass mirror inside the breast pocket and he closed to where a heart should beat at.

One last glance at the living room as there were empty bottles that were glinting like dead bulbs and the couch cushions were sagging under invisible weight. Vincent swallowed static as he opened the door, and ducked into the corridor. The tram bell clanged outside, a cheerful, tinny theme song. Vincent stepped aboard as there were claws that were sparking against chrome railing. As the doors shut, he caught his reflection in the window—giant, glowing, impossible—and looked away.

“Next stop, Studio 9,” the loudspeaker chirped. “Please keep all limbs, tails, and power cords inside the car.”

The tram lurched into motion as it was ferrying him toward lights that never dimmed and the cameras that never slept, and an audience that applauded every time a heart broke on air. In his pocket the mirror stayed warm as he pressed against the suit like a secret transmitter. Somewhere above, Oliver would keep driving, keep hurting, keep living without Vincent by his side to talk to him on how his day was at the Studio. And Vincent would keep moving, because Hell, like television, abhorred dead air.

Back with Vincent, he walked by Hell buses, which he never thought they would have but here he was, but none that wanted a nine-foot television-headed demon squeezing into the seats. So. Vincent stalked the neon sidewalks as there were power cords that were dragging like a leash behind him and there were sparks that were writing like broken Morse on the asphalt.

At Channel News 666, it was occupied by a ziggurat of stacked cathode cubes at the corner of Pandemonium and Static. A marquee ran headlines in twitching LEDs: WELCOME TO HELL—YOUR MISERY SCHEDULED SHORTLY. Vincent stepped through spinning glass doors into chaos. Vincent saw Demon crew scrambled as there were interns with reel-to-reel spools for torsos sprinted scripts as they were putting makeup and the imps airbrushed anchors with liquefied shame. At the foyer fountain—flowing ink instead of water—a panther-woman in a pencil dress adjusted her headset. She spotted him as there was her tail-tip that was twitching really fast.

“You the new co-anchor?” she asked, voice smooth as late-night jazz.

“I… guess?” Vincent responded back. 

“Name’s Valoura Voxworth—no relation.” She extended a paw, claws retracted. “We’re up at five. Follow.”

Before Vincent could protest, there was a china-doll demon seamstress clicked up on porcelain legs as there were pins that were sticking from rosebud lips. “Hold still, darling.” She tacked a Channel 666 lapel mic to his blazer—tiny screen reading ON AIR that lit crimson when pinned.

“But I don’t know the rundown—”

“Improv,” Valoura called, already power-walking. “Hell’s audience has the attention span of a flicker. Keep it loud, keep it lying, and keep it moving. That’s show business.”

Vincent commented. “But… That’s now how it works.”

Valoura rolled her eyes as she snapped her neck and lowered herself to glare at Vincent in the eyes as she was tapping on his screen face. “Listen here, buddy. This is Hell, I don’t give a fuck about what works or not. All I care about is looking pretty and telling the stupid viewers bullshit. And yes, you have to change your name. It won’t work for you. It sounds like a dork’s name. Maybe you should change it to ‘Vox,’ that sounds pretty neat. So now, get ready because we’re going to be on in a few.” She walked off as she was going to her desk.

Vincent was going to give some comments about what she said but it was cut off when there was a ringing from bells. Informing everybody that they only had a few minutes to get everything together. Studio A yawned—black drapes, cameras mounted on stilts of bone, and there was a desk shaped like a coffin lid. 

Red tally lights blinked: LIVE.

The floor manager brought the camera to the front, a cyclops with a clapperboard head as he slammed shut: “WE’RE ROLLING!”

There was a theme of music that blared as there was the fuzzy big-band drowned in distortion. At the side, Valoura slid behind the desk with a wide smile on her face while her eyes were glinting at the camera that she was staring at; Vincent mirrored her as her knees were banging wood. “Good everlasting evening, damned viewers!” she chirped. “I’m Valoura Voxworth.” She looked forward to Vincent as her neck snapped like a crack.

“And I’m… Vin— uh—Vox.” He nearly said Vincent; the teleprompter flashed bold: USE SINGLE NAME ONLY—BRANDING.

“Our top stories: River Styx rises three inches—sinners blame climate hoax! And revolution stirs among contract demons—details after this!”

Vox rolled his eyes as he kept his cool and he was getting himself ready to speak when it’s his turn. But, it took so long that he didn’t talk due to how conceited his panther was. Eventually, they went into a commercial break which only lasted half a second—just enough for a demonic jingle: Channel 666, where the news is always bad!

Then they were off again after talking about fake weather and fake deaths  but what was real is the despair that Vincent was feeling the more he heard the news. At the time, Vincent read copy about infernal stock prices (souls up, hope down), about a celebrity exorcism gone wrong, about a new line of torture tech IPO-ing at dawn. Words spilled faster than he could process; every sentence ended in a cymbal crash from the band pit.

It felt like he was stuck in the studio for days but it was only three hours and eventually it became six that he was dealing with. Overtime crawled to ten which Vincent was already from all the news that they were reporting and it was messing with his hearing since there were times that he thought he misheard some information but with the stupid stuff that they were saying were true and he was hearing them correctly. When the tally died, Vincent’s screen-face displayed color-bar exhaustion.

Valoura stretched. “Not bad for a debut. Get some sleep—graveyard shift starts in eight hours.”

Vincent nodded to Valoura as he was walking off to the door and going outside to catch the bus back home. Vincent trudged to the bus stop as he caught the 13th Street Wailer and it was clattered home through neon canyons. Inside Tube-Rose Towers he kicked off shoes and it was poured a bottle of BOOZE down his throat and he let it fizz behind the glass. Vincent just hopes that hopefully in time, it’ll get better for him.

20 Years Later

After years went by, Vincent ended up being wrong that things could get better. The cycle had calcified to wake, tram, lie on air, tram, drink, spy on Earth, sleep four flickering hours. Pay was astronomical—currency in Agony Aether—but bought only more bottles, bigger TVs, and it was louder than the silence that he was always surrounded by. Vincent felt more alone than he was before. Vincent never thought he would be in a spot like this again but it happened again.

Vincent always remembered those days when he was alone at home while his mother was out shopping and his father was working. Vincent always sat at home with nobody to talk to. Vincent always sat in his room while studying his schoolwork since he had nothing else to do. Vincent barely got any attention from kids at his school so there was no difference between trying to play with them or even talking to him. Vincent always craved the spotlight and he always wanted the good side of it but he never got it until he got older but it was with a cost of his life of getting what he desired the most. 

To cover himself from going insane, Vincent checked the mirror nightly. Just to see what Oliver was doing. So far, Vincent has seen Oliver move to a new apartment. It was smaller and darker unlike the apartment before. There were bottles that collected as there were cigarettes that burned to filters; strangers’ shoes lined the bedroom floor. Some mornings Oliver stared at the ceiling, whispering “Oh how I wish I could hear you again. Even if it was the last time. I don’t even remember your voice anymore.” Those words cracked Vincent worse than any hammer Hell could swing.

One Thursday (or maybe a Tuesday—days were reruns) Vincent arrived to find the studio buzzing. There was a memo flapped on every cork-board: CONTRACT REVOLT – COVER LIVE AT SIX. During the rundown meeting the director and there was a slug in a beret as he slapped Vincent’s shoulder. “You’re front and center. Spin it as entitled millennials wanting participation trophies.”

On air he read the prompter: “…dissident demons claim contracts are unfair and they demand early termination. Queen Charlie’s office calls the movement ‘baseless, treasonous, and bad for ratings.’ More at eleven!”

At Break time, Vincent wandered to craft services for synthetic coffee that could be strong enough to keep him awake throughout the day until he went back home. But, that was when Vincent saw something that caught his eye. Vincent hid in the corner and kept his eyes on a black-and-white cat that mopped the floor. It looked normal, he was just the janitor, but it was when he moved over to the Record Room where the Studio keeps their information that is given by Queen Charlie. 

Seeing this cat move into the Record Room and looking into boxes to find certain files. Vincent moved closer as he was seeing the cat man put his paw on records of certain cases about Queen Charlie using Contact Demons as a source for a weapon that she’s creating. The more Vincent watched, the more Vincent was pushing himself into the room and eventually he was inside the Record Room. The one place that he wasn’t supposed to go inside. 

Spotting the bucket that smelled of toner and the cat’s eyes darted as Vincent, appearing to be nervous when he saw Vincent. “Um hey… That looks like strange news, huh?” Vincent murmured.

The cat froze when Vincent was in front of him. “Um hey… Just cleaning. Nothing too odd about that.” He chuckled nervously.

As curiosity appeared more—an old human reflex—tugged Vincent after. Vincent is closer to the cat. “Really cleaning? It looks like you need help. Do you need help?”

Seeing all the papers scattered. The cat shifted—momentarily taller and his ears were folding into a fedora and his face was flattening to a gruff as he whiskered the man-cat. “Okay! Beat it, screen-head. I need to clean before I get fired.”

“Relax. I’m… like you or I think I am.” Vincent tapped his own chest, tubes glowing. “Contract demon. My name's Vincent but they call me Vox around here.”

The cat’s eye twitched. “Husk. Janitor—officially.” He stuffed papers inside a vest. “You didn’t see anything. Just normal cleaning here… Nothing else.”

“I saw revolution leaflets. I've been keeping track of the revolution and since you were roaming in the Record Room. It’s a dead giveaway that you’re a part of it mostly since you’re looking at records that involve plans of the Queen.” Vincent’s voice dropped. “But, I won’t turn you in since I know you’ll get punished if exposed. So instead, I want in.”

Husk studied him, tail thumping. “Why?”

“Because, I have been here for 20 years and I want to go back to Earth— even if it’s just for ten minutes, five—long enough to tell my boyfriend I’m alive-ish. That I love him. That it’s not his fault why I died. I never meant to hurt him in any way. He must be 55 years old now. He was 35 when I died. Since I was in my 40s.”

Something in Husk’s face softened—an old scar of lost love that Husk never resolved when he was alive. Husk sighed as he fished a matchbook from the vest and he scribbled inside of it as fast as he could before giving it to Vincent at the palm of his hand. Back gate, after sign-off. Bring the mirror.

Husk shoved it into Vincent’s paw. “Don’t be late. And don’t tell your boss what you work for.” Husk’s tail flicked as he was mop-and-cat again while he was sloshing away.

That was when the sign-off cymbal crashed. Vincent shrugged into coat as he tucked the matchbook next to the Spyglass mirror that he had with him and he slipped out past security cameras that blinked lazy red. Vincent always keeps the mirror with him at all times. Now, this time, he also has a note from Husk.

As the night air smelled of brimstone and burnt film. At the rear gate Husk waited under a broken exit sign and his tail was curling from the smoke like there was an unlit cigarette that Husk was smoking. Husk was waiting patiently at the corner for Vincent to come where he was at. That way they can talk about the next step and what Vincent mentioned about his old lover, who was still back on Earth.

“You got the glass?” Husk asked.

Vincent patted pocket. “I always have it.”

Husk looked up and down at Vincent as he gave him eye contact. “You know that’s not safe.”

Vincent nodded. “I know, but it’s the only thing that gives me comfort when I’m on my break. That way, I can keep a close eye on my boyfriend all the time.”

“Yeah,I guess that makes sense. Anyways, we should move before anybody spots us here. We’re breaking broadcast regulations and if the Queen finds out, she’ll have both of our heads on her platter."

They strode into shadow—one demon shaped like static, one like sin-striped feline—footfalls syncing to the distant hum of Channel 666’s overnight infomercials. Somewhere above, Oliver drank himself to sleep; somewhere ahead, a loophole might open. Vincent clutched the mirror and its surface was flickering with unsent apologies. For the first time in months, the snow in his head felt less like an ending as it was more like a transition that might be happening anytime soon.

Chapter Text

In a large tower, it was the kingdom of the Queen of Hell. In the middle of a room, where the meeting throne room was at. Around a table where the Queen of Hell was sitting along with Hellborn Royalty and Rich by her side. They were all quiet as the Queen of Hell was in complete silence which made everybody in the room nervous. They didn’t know what she was thinking and how she was going to react to them when she finally did open her mouth and she spoke to them. 

Nobody was brave enough to speak since they were all scared to say a single word. Even the Prince of Hell of the Goetia was tapping his fingers on his thighs while his wife was looking down at her dress. That was when a single voice broke through the silence as it was “Seviathan Von Eldritch” himself that spoke. He was the main head of the Von Eldritch since he was the male among the family mostly since his family was killed by Contract Demons as they were caught in the middle of a Crossfiring.

“My Queen, aren’t you going to say anything about the Revolution that is still going on? It’s been ongoing for basically 100 years and it’s only gotten worse.”

Everybody turned their heads, looking at him like he ripped somebody's head off from their body. Queen Charlie turned her head as she smiled before she flew in the air and landed on the table as she blasted towards him with flames coming out of her dress and she was in front of him as she was glaring at him before she yelled in anger. Her hair was flowing like water while her flames were sparking and transformed into her demon form. 

“You talk to me like I have any control over my Contract Demons. Well, apparently I don’t and I have been trying to focus on my project but these nasty Human-thing demons are running everything. Especially that Deer freak and the stupid dumb bitch that makes angelic weapons that keep killing my Hellborns and the Sin Lords aren’t happy about it. I don’t blame them! So maybe, stop making comments and start helping me to kill them!”

Seviathan Von Eldritch didn’t say anything but he just smirked. The others were relieved that he didn’t say anything else since they didn’t want the queen to scream any longer since her voice echos and the ground shakes when she gets angry. Queen Charlie walks away from him and she goes back to her seat as she floats down to her chair and makes herself comfortable. She turned to the others as she spoke. 

“We need to talk to the Sin Lords in order to gather forces and make more weapons. But even with weapons and more guards, it’ll be all useless since they have angelic weapons that can harm and kill us. So, we need to find their hideouts and locations. Even find the Contact Demons who joined this little revolution. I can’t let them ruin my plans. They’ll see me as… Weak especially “her.””

Seviathan Von Eldritch smirked as he crossed his legs. “And who is this “Her” that you keep talking about? You always refer to a “her” but never give us any context. I’m curious who this mysterious person is that is giving her tools to create your weapon. Which, you barely give me any information about.”

Queen Charlie sighed. “Because it’s none of your business. That business is only me and “her” only. And regarding my weapon, I’ll reveal that information to you once it’s ready or has made great progress and that’s all you need to know. Nothing else… Got it.” She glared at him before she looked at the others for them to give their answer too. 

They saw her expression, nodding with her before she smiled wide and clapped her hands together as she stood up from her chair and smoothing out her dress. “Well, that will be all for today. You’re all dismissed.” They nodded, getting up and leaving the room. 

Seviathan Von Eldritch was the only one that stayed in the room when everybody left. He walked over to her. “My Queen… Can we-” He was cut off when she raised up her hand as a way for him to keep quiet. 

Queen Charlie snarked. “I said dismiss. You shall go.” She said coldly.

Seviathan Von Eldritch huffed before turning away and heading towards the door, leaving the room without saying another word to Queen Charlie. After everybody left the Meeting Room, Queen Charlie went over to the window and she stared down at her garden. Seeing her Gardeners cutting weeds before she saw a beautiful young lady that had long gray hair and a X on her eye. The lady turned to look at Queen Charlie and smiled, waving back at her. Queen Charlie smiled, waving back at her wife. The only person that she loves and if anything bad happens to her, she’ll go insane and burn all of Hell for her. Her one and only… Vaggie.

Back At The Tube-Rose Towers, 3:12 a.m.  

Back at Vincent’s apartment, Vincent opened the door and both of them went inside. Before Vincent could give Husk a drink or something to eat. Husk went off to lock the door with a paw that briefly grew fingers long enough to twist the bolt, then re-furred. “Mirrors are her favorite peepholes,” he muttered, drawing mustard-yellow drapes across every pane. “The Queen's got a thousand eyes in reflective surfaces. We play this quietly, or we don’t play at all.”  

Vincent’s apartment—already dim—became a cave of muffled neon. He handed over the Spyglass mirror; Husk turned it face-down on the coffee table, tail flicking glyphs in the air. “One-hour round-trip,” the cat-demon said. “Human-world air corrodes sinners and contract demons. After sixty you’ll start to artifact—glitches, freezes, then poof, back to the tower whether you like it or not.”  

Vincent nodded, claws clenched to stop the tremor. Husk exhaled smoke that smelled of old film stock, then pressed both paws to the mirror’s back. Runes crawled outward—white tracking lines, countdown leaders, color bars. The glass ballooned, widening until it lay like a liquid window on the rug. Through it: a dim Brooklyn bedroom, blinds cracked, and the city sodium painting stripes across a mattress on the floor. 

Oliver.  

Oliver slept half-curled as there was one arm hugging a bottle and the other was clutching a crumpled photograph—Vincent in a diner booth mid-laugh. As there were discarded clothes, foil squares, and a handwritten note lay nearby. After 20 years, Oliver was still mourning his boyfriend. So Vincent’s screen-face flickered with grief just by seeing this sight of his own boyfriend.  

“Say the name,” Husk whispered. “Lock the destination.”  

“Oliver James Wright,” Vincent rasped.  

The portal solidified—glass became membrane as there was a surface that showed tension humming like a CRT left on too long. “The clock starts when you cross. I’ll keep watch.” Husk offered a half-smile, fang glinting. “Bring back a souvenir if you can—proof you were there. Might help the cause.”  

Vincent nodded. “I’ll try.” Before Vincent stepped through the portal. There was no falling—just a sudden drop in temperature as the smell of cheap pizza and human sweat. Vincent landed on warped floorboards with a thud that rattled the bed. Oliver stirred from his bed while he mumbled under his breath but he didn’t wake.  

Vincent straightened slowly, nine feet of demon in a seven-foot room. The bed creaked under his shadow; he had to hunch like a kid in a blanket fort. Vincent took inventory as there were ashtrays overflowed; take-out boxes molded; and the pill bottles that marched across the nightstand like soldiers on leave. The note beside Oliver’s head read: Had fun, but I’m not him. Don’t call.

Vincent tore it as the pills were skittering. Vincent knelt down on his knees  while they were popping Bakelite. “Ollie,” he said softly—voice still layered with that analog crackle. “Hey, day-breaker. Wake up.”  

Oliver’s eyelids fluttered. Pupils blown wide, irises the color of old coffee. He smiled, unfocused. “H-hey, ghost.” He tapped his temple. “Knew you’d show. I guess that Backalley guy was telling the truth. These are really good drugs.”

He reached up, fingers brushing Vincent’s screen. Static jumped; Oliver laughed, then winced—bruises bloomed along his jaw, fingerprints on his throat. Vincent’s gills flared, tasting the sour chemical air. “You gotta stop this, baby.”  

Oliver’s head lolled. “You never said it,” he slurred. “Not once. I kept count.” He was speaking to the room, to the hallucination, to the empty side of the bed—third person, past tense. “Vin probably never loved me back. Too bright for that. Too… important with his business in the Entertainment field. I failed him.”

Vincent swallowed hard; the gesture produced an audible pop. “Listen—”  

“Shh.” Oliver placed a finger to invisible lips. “He’s talking. My Vincent. See?” He gestured vaguely at the demon’s towering silhouette. “Big, shiny head. Like the TV that fell. That’s the joke, right? That’s what they all joked about. For 20 years, they never stopped talking about it even after all that time. They still joke about his death. Well… Joke’s on me.” 

Tears pixelated across Vincent’s screen, glitching the image of his own face. He carefully scooped Oliver up—thin, lighter than memory—and sat on the bed. Frame groaned but held.  

Oliver nestled into a scaled chest, too drugged to question physics. “Tell him,” he murmured. “If you see him—tell him I kept the picture. Tell him I—” A hiccup. “—I forgive him. For leaving.” 

Vincent’s voice dropped to the late-night timbre that once lulled a city to sleep. “He’s sorry, Ollie. He was scared. Too scared to tell you three simple words. But he loves you. Has since the first diner milk-shake. Always will.”  

Oliver’s eyes closed, tears slipping. “Sounds nice. Wanna stay here forever?”  

“I can’t. Different channels.” He stroked matted hair. “But you gotta keep going. Eat. Sleep. Quit the pills. For him.”  

Oliver nodded against static-charged glass. “Okay, ghost. One more day.”  

As time went by, Vincent kept looking down at Oliver. Admiring every feature that wasn’t touched by booze, drugs, and abuse. Vincent even shed tears as he was stroking Oliver’s hair back. Just like how he used to when he was alive. A tingling started in Vincent’s claws—artifacting. Tiny squares of transparency flickered over his frame. Husk’s voice echoed distantly, as if through a headphone left on the floor: “Time’s up, big guy!”  

Vincent pressed his forehead screen to Oliver’s. “I love you,” he whispered—direct, first person, no audience. “I always—”  

As there was a pixel crawl raced up his arms; the bedroom blurred. Vincent clung another second, enough to feel Oliver’s heartbeat thump against glass, then let the mirror yank him backward like a tape rewinding. Vincent landed in his apartment as his knees were denting the rug. The portal shrank to hand-mirror size as there was the surface that was clouding around the surroundings.

Husk exhaled cigarette smoke shaped like a countdown leader. “You artifacted early—air’s thinner up there every trip.” He offered a paw. “But you got your proof.”  

Vincent opened his fist. The photograph—snow-date, two boys hugging—now sat in his palm, damp with real-world tears. He clutched it to his chest, screen flickering between color bars and raw, unfiltered grief. “One hour,” he breathed. “Next time we make it two.”  

Husk’s ears flattened. “There won’t be a next time if we don’t break the contract first. Welcome to the revolution, Vox.”

Queen’s Tower – High Noon, Hell Standard Time

Charlie Morningstar reclined on her throne of stacked cathode cubes as her hooves propped up and they were conducting an invisible orchestra. "La-da-dee, contracts and fees, souls on a string, tra-la-la—"

There were the double doors that slammed open. Vaggie marched in, alabaster wings twitching and there was a clipboard that was glowing crimson with urgent memos. “Babe, we’ve got insurgency reports stacking higher than that Alastor’s body count.” She thrust the board forward. “Contract demons meeting in cellars, printing pamphlets, and stealing portal shards. And your favorite DJ—”  

“—is broadcasting coded rally cries again,” Charlie finished, sighing. “I know.”  

Vaggie’s single eye narrowed. “You can’t keep humming show tunes while the network burns. They’re quoting rights and termination clauses. Next they’ll want unions.”  

Charlie rose, tail flicking. “Then we rewrite the script.” She cupped Vaggie’s cheek, thumb brushing a scar. “Together. Like always.”  

They kissed—soft, then fierce, promise and strategy mingling. When they parted, Charlie’s smile held steel. “Round up department heads. We launch counter-programming tonight.” Vaggie saluted with her clipboard, already barking orders into a headset.  

Studio 666 – One Month Later

Vincent—now answering to Vox among conspirators—stood in a bombed-out soundstage beneath the main lot. Concrete pillars were painted with graffiti: Break the Antenna – Break the Chain! A makeshift armory lined the walls: rifles carved from antennae, grenades of packed holy-water capsules, a bazooka that fired subpoenas.  

Husk paced before a chalkboard. “Intel from Sector Five: Queen’s opening a new portal farm in Jersey. Shopping mall, food court, free-wifi bait. We snag the coordinates, we snag evidence.”  

Vincent raised a newly slimmed hand—flat-screen head now a 4:3 tablet, lighter on his neck. “And the Jersey mirror?”  

“Installed last week,” replied a spider-demon techie. “You’ll transmit data, we’ll pirate her frequency.”  

Vincent turned away as he nodded. “Perfect.” That was when the training followed as it was disassembly of soul-counters and it was forging royal sigils along with the small-arms practice. Vincent’s talons learned triggers; his screen displayed trajectories like an HUD. Evenings he returned to Tube-Rose Towers exhausted, but the revolution gave the exhaustion purpose—something the newsroom never had.  

Night 37 – 2:07 a.m.

Rain of ink against the window that was dripping down. Vincent hung his blazer as it poured a half-shot he couldn’t taste, and pulled the Spyglass from its hiding spot beneath floorboards. Vincent missed Oliver with an ache worse than electrocution. One hour last visit—never enough. Husk’s not here to stop me, he reasoned. I’ll keep it short. 

He set the mirror on the kitchen tiles, mimicked the paw-gesture Husk used: two claws drawing an infinity symbol. Glass ballooned, surface rippling midnight. “Oliver James Wright,” he whispered.  

Image resolved: dim Brooklyn living-room, couch blankets pooled like surrendered clouds. Oliver sat center, knees up, face buried, and his own shoulders were hitching with silent sobs. No bottles in frame—just a crumpled photo and a pharmacy bag untouched. Vincent’s chest tubes tightened. Vincent stepped through the portal as he was ready for whatever was going to happen on the other side.  

Earth – 2:12 a.m.

The portal sealed behind with a hush. As the city traffic murmured outside; with the radiator clanked. Vincent’s hooves creaked floorboards; the ceiling brushed his antennae. The moment he saw Oliver, sleeping on the couch, Vincent smiled as he walked over to him and Vincent knelt slowly as he was setting the photo upright—snowy first date, edges frayed from handling. “Ollie,” he said softly. “Hey, day-breaker.”  

Oliver stirred in his sleep as he was feeling a hand on him shake and calling him by his nickname. Oliver opened his eyes as his head snapped up. Oliver’s eyes were red, cheeks blotched, and his pupils became clear—sober terror. A strangled sound escaped. Oliver scrambled backward as he was knocking the coffee table. “W-what the hell—”  Oliver went to the corner as he was shaking and barely containing himself to keep standing on his feet.

“Wait, wait, wait no Oliver, it’s me. It’s Vincent.” He raised palms, claws retracted best they could. “I know I look—”  

“STAY BACK!” Oliver seized a metal flashlight from the side table, clicking it on like a baton. “I-I’ll swing, I swear—” 

“Ollie no please! It’s me, it’s really me. Don’t swing that at me.” 

Oliver swung as he was trying to hit Vincent anywhere. “I don’t know what you are but you better leave before I hit you really hard.” Oliver nervously said.

“Ollie please, it’s me Vincent!” 

“Why do you keep calling me that? The only person that called me was my boyfriend and he died!” Oliver cried out with tears appearing around his eyes. 

Vincent didn’t know what to say and how to convince Oliver that it’s him. So, the only thing he could think of is to prove that it’s really him. “Remember the snow trip?” Vincent rushed, voice modulating calm. “Coney Island, January ‘1947. You wore my scarf ’cause yours had a hole. We shared a hot chocolate, one cup, two straws. You said if we ever got rich we’d buy a beach house, paint it yellow—”  

Oliver’s breath came ragged. He brandished the flashlight higher. “Demon tricks. You read my mind—”  

“You kissed me by the carousel. The music was Bicycle Built for Two. You tasted like marshmallow and sea salt. I was so nervous I called you Olive by accident—”  

Oliver’s arm wavered. Tears spilled. “Nobody knew that. Nobody—”  

“I’m sorry I never said it back. I love you. I loved you then, I love you now, I love you every second between.” Vincent’s screen flickered, human face appearing earnest, unfiltered. “I didn’t die, Ollie. I got… transferred to this.” Vincent brought out his arms and referred to his new body that he has.

The flashlight clattered in his hands. Oliver sank to his knees as his own arms were wrapping himself. “Vincent?”

“Yeah.”  

Oliver lunged—not to strike, but to embrace. As they were hugging each other at that moment. As their arms were barely circled half the demon torso; he sobbed into warm glass. Vincent folded carefully as his claws were trailing harmless static through brown hair. Oliver cried. “I never thought I would hug you again. It almost feels like a dream.” 

That was when Oliver’s legs buckled as he was closing his eyes and fainted in pure pressure.  Vincent reacted fast as he scooped him into his arms and he carried him to the couch—furniture groaning under nine feet of demon weight. Vincent smiled. “It’s nice to hug you again. After all these years, I get to embrace you.” Vincent whispered to Oliver as he was stroking his hair once more. 

As Vincent draped a blanket on Oliver. Making sure that he was warm on the couch with the blanket that he gave him. That was when Vincent knew that Oliver would need something to wake him up so Vincent vanished to the kitchen and returned holding a mug of actual coffee as it brewed by pressing grounds with a claw and the water that heated via mild electric surge from his chassis.

Vincent placed the coffee on the side table as he waited until Oliver woke up from his sleep. After a while, Oliver woke up as he thought it was a dream that he was experiencing but when he turned to see that it was Vincent in the form that he showed up in. Oliver sighed, getting himself up and he accepted the coffee that Vincent gave him. Oliver held the cup with shaking hands. “Is this… this is real?”  

“Real as I can manage.” Vincent sat on the opposite side from the couch. “I only have one hour. Then I glitch back to where I ended up.”

Oliver’s gaze roamed to see Vincent’s gills fluttering as his screen-face was cycling subtle hues along with the antennae that were drooping with worry. “Does it hurt?”  

“Not as much as watching you destroy yourself.”  

Oliver flinched, set coffee down. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Oliver tried to act like he didn’t know anything. 

Vincent squinted his eyes at Oliver. “Oh come on Ollie, I know what you've been doing. I've been watching what you've been doing to yourself.”

Oliver spat out his coffee back into his cup. “Okay… Like that’s not creepy enough.”

Vincent sighed as he chuckled nervously. “It’s a long story. I know about the pills and the drinks you've been consuming for 20 years.”

Oliver’s eyes widened. “I thought I hallucinated you that first night. The pills made the pain quiet and you louder. So I kept… taking more. I needed to see you again.”

Vincent’s tubes hissed sorrow. “You don’t need chemicals. I’m here—imperfect, late, but I’m here now.”

A weak laugh. “You’re nine feet tall and made of television.”  

“And you’re still the cutest thing on any channel.”  

Color rose in Oliver’s cheeks—first healthy pink in months. He reached, fingertips brushing glass. Vincent projected a faint spark that didn’t burn—just warm. “How?” Oliver asked. “How do I keep you?”  

“You live. Eat. Sleep. Quit the pills. Say I love you to yourself in the mirror until you believe it. I’ll find gaps in the signal, and come back. We’ll piece together minutes until we have a lifetime.”

Oliver exhaled shakily. “I can try.”  

“That’s all I ever needed.”  

They talked—fast, overlapping, desperate to cram months into minutes: Oliver’s new job at the library, Vincent’s revolution training, and the beach house that was still funded was left untouched in a savings account. As there was laughter that surfaced between tears—old rhythm returning like a favorite song replayed after a power outage.  

At 3:05 a.m. artifacting began—Vincent’s edges pixelated as he was flickering squares and he was drifting off like burning film. “I have to go,” Vincent said as he was standing tall without hitting the ceiling.

Oliver rose too. “Next time?”  

“Soon as I can.”  

They met halfway—kiss cautiously, then certain. Oliver tasted coffee and ozone; Vincent tasted salt and healing. When they parted, static clung between lips like promise. Vincent stepped backward; the mirror yawned open behind. “One day we’ll make this permanent. Believe that.”  

Oliver nodded, wrapping arms around himself to hold the warmth. “I love you, Vincent Whiteman.”  

Vincent’s screen brightened to sunrise hues. “I love you, Oliver James Wright.”  

Vincent let the portal pull him as there were fragments that were swirling into darkness. The mirror shrank as it clattered to the floor and an ordinary reflective pane once more. Oliver stood alone—but upright, shoulders square, eyes clearer than they’d been in a year. Oliver picked up the photo as it smoothed edges and whispered to the quiet room, “See you soon.”  

Back in Hell, Vincent tumbled onto kitchen tiles as his chest was heaving from his encounter with Oliver. Vincent smiled, finally got to see Oliver and talking to him was a blessing in disguise. Vincent twirled as he was holding his arms close and he was in a daydream that he and Oliver might have a chance with his boyfriend.

Without Vincent noticing, there was somebody hiding in the darkness as they were sitting at the table and staring at Vincent with tense eyes. It was Husk that waited on the counter as his tail was flicking ash. “You’re late,” the cat grumbled. “Artifacting started early, didn't you? Without me noticing that you left this world without my supervision.” Husk lit off his cigarette as he was smoking it for a couple of puffs.

Vincent gasped as he turned around to see it was Husk that was waiting for him within the darkness. But without getting scared, Vincent grinned—cracks in glass, but genuine. “Worth every glitch to see him.” Vincent held up a souvenir in his hands. Vincent was holding the coffee mug, still warm, as it was bearing Oliver’s thumbprint.  

Husk studied it along with his cat ears twitching. “Impressing… I thought you would give excuses. Seeing that you have evidence of contact is at least progress with us Contract Demons. Even though Queen Charlie could damn us if found out, this is a step for her to at least travel without being stuck in the Pride Ring forever.”  

“Yeah, you’re right. Or inspire us to win faster in this Revolution," Vincent countered. Vincent set the mug on the windowsill like a beacon. “Next mission, I’m in double. Let’s tear the antenna off this whole network.”  

Husk smirked at Vincent as he flicked the cigarette that he was smoking and up it into the sink. “Then sharpen your claws, Vox. War just went prime-time for all of us.”

Chapter Text

With the revolution’s calendar blurred—there were meetings in sound-proof vaults and the midnight raids on Charlie’s parade-float warehouses as there were whispered codes over stolen radio bands. Vincent learned to shoulder an antenna-rifle, to splice soul-counter wires into looped infomercials and to smile for Channel 666 while hiding behind the leaflets in his coat lining.  

Throughout the news, there was a figure that has been popular among the Revolution and Overlords that have been taking over the Pride Ring. His name was Alastor, the name drifted through like vintage thunder as there was his grin that was wide as a broadcast tower and his voice was crackling 1930’s swing. Alastor has never spoke directly to Vincent, only through radios that Alastor uses to communicate with other demons, as if the younger demon were an open mic: “Keep your levels high, Mr. Vox. The Queen hates dead air.”  

Knowing everyday, Vincent is taking a risk in this Revolution and knowing that he could get killed because of working with them. But in order to be free, Vincent had to do it for himself and for Oliver. So Vincent saluted with a rifle-barrel along with his heart doing horizontal hold. But every operation ended the same—tram home, lock door, pull curtains, check mirrors covered, and open the Spyglass. Oliver was his oxygen; revolution merely kept his lungs busy.  

It has been a month since he hasn’t seen Oliver. The last time he saw Oliver was when he visited Oliver the second time and they got to talk to each other. Vincent has been busy with the Revolution and his job in the Studio, he didn’t have the chance to go visit Oliver and see how his doing. Vincent barely has checked on the mirror to see what Oliver was doing. But, this time, Vincent is going to make time to see Oliver and talk to him again. 

Earth – 11:47 p.m. 

There was the portal that spilled him into a living-room unchanged yet emptier and the blinds were drawn as the television was flickering silent static and the ashtrays balanced on arms of a couch that smelled of stale beer and wet wool. Oliver lay sprawled, bottle cradled like a stuffed animal. There were no pill bottles, they were gone—Vincent had watched him flush them weeks ago—but nicotine stained fingertips, whiskey ringed every coaster.  

The fireplace held a mound of ash as there were little rectangles of paper—phone numbers, bar napkins, and the one that was a half-burned condom wrapper. Oliver had torched his vices in increments as he kept only the legal poisons. Vincent clicked off the TV—picture collapsed to a dot—and knelt. “Ollie. Hell Sunrise.”

Oliver’s eyelids peeled back as they were blood-shot widening to demon scale. For a second Oliver froze—then smile broke, lopsided but genuine. “You’re late, ghost.” Oliver reached out while the palms were meeting Vincent’s glass cheek. “Thought the channel went off-air and I thought I wasn’t going to watch it again.”

Vincent leaned into the touch. “Signal’s stubborn.” He took the bottle, set it out of reach. “How many did you have today?”

“Two smokes, three drinks. Better than four and seven.” Oliver’s laugh rattled. “Clean compared to last month, huh?”  

Vincent surveyed the wreckage as there were dishes that were piled up and the dust thick enough to write ‘HELP ME’ with a claw. The man who once alphabetized spice racks now lived in a nest of blankets and regret. “Talk to me,” Vincent urged as he was shifting to sit. As his frame protested; he wedged a diagonal along with his antennas that were skimming the ceiling.

Oliver rubbed temples. “Talking’s all I do—at walls, at your picture, at talk-show hosts who can’t answer back.” He nodded toward the dark television. “Left it on static. Looks like you.”  

Vincent’s screen flickered embarrassed. “I’m here now. Real-time, you don’t need to talk to the TV.”

Oliver’s face crumpled, tears welling. “But… For how long? An hour? Two? Then poof—signal lost. I count seconds between visits like a kid counting days to Christmas that never comes.” Oliver stood up from where he was sitting and he swayed by Vincent as he caught himself on the mantle. “I can’t do Earth without you, Vin. I’m done.”  

Wind sucked from the room. Vincent rose slowly, ceiling light fixture scraping his antennae. “Define done.”

There was silence after Vincent asked, Oliver walked to the window as he was looking down at the city that he was living in. The city was bleeding neon across his profile. “Vincent, I have nobody here. My mom died of cancer 19 years ago. Right after you died, the only person who truly loved and accepted me after finding out I was in a Love Relationship with you. My dad just tolerates me but doesn’t really accept me. As for my brothers and sisters, they have their own lives so they don’t pay attention to me. I feel like I don’t belong here. I never did in the first place. My mom told me that I was surprised that she could never have any more children but here I am. The miracle child but in reality I’m nothing here. My job put me on ‘sympathy leave.’ Even my co-workers pray over the phone when they check-up on me. Yeah right, like any of them care about me. We just work together and that’s all. Strangers’ numbers are ash. Your grave grows weeds.” Oliver turned to Vincent as his eyes became fierce despite alcohol. “Take me with you.”  

The words hit like a commercial break—loud, unavoidable. “What no? Hell isn’t a relocation,” Vincent said as his own voice was modulating softer. “It’s punishment, contract, and static. It’s not a place that you want to be in.”

“I don’t care.” Oliver stepped closer. “You described revolution—souls down in Hell are fighting for freedom down there. Put me in a uniform and aim me at the tyrant. At least we’d share the same battlefield together."  

Vincent remembered another Oliver—summer picnics, budgeting spreadsheets, and the man who coaxed him off a hotel roof years ago with gentle logic. That Oliver saved lives; this one begged to leave him. Vincent grasped Oliver’s wrists—bruised as he was trembling. “You once stopped me from ending things. Remember? When I thought that I wasn’t going to rise up the ranks. You stopped me from going into the deep end. You saved me. Let me save you.”

Oliver’s lip quivered. “That was different. You were sick. I’m… empty.”  

“Empty is still alive. Fill the space with living, not leaving.”  

Tears fell freely. “Easy for the immortal demon to preach.”  

Vincent’s screen glitched. “Immortal doesn’t mean unbreakable. Watching you die by inches breaks me daily.” Vincent pulled Oliver into a careful embrace—alcohol and grief, warm under demon chin. “Give me time. Let the revolution finish. Then we’ll talk forever—together, on the same side of the glass.”  

Oliver fisted the blazer fabric. “Promise?”  

“I swear on every frame I’ve got left.”  

They stood entwined until artifacting sparked—tiny pixels peeling from Vincent’s shoulders. “I have to go,” Vincent murmured.  

Oliver inhaled shakily, stepped back. “Then go fight. But know this—” He jabbed a finger at the demon chest. “If the door to Hell opens for real, I’m walking through. Next time ask me to stay before you leave.”

Vincent cupped Oliver’s face as he kissed his forehead, his eyelids, finally mouth—static mingling with whiskey breath. “I love you, Ollie. Please keep breathing for me. Don’t give up on life.”

Oliver forced a smile on his face. “I’ll try… I’ll put a smile on my face for you.”

Vincent released as he strode to the mirror. The portal behind him shimmered. One foot through, he paused. “Not just for me but for you. And eat something green tomorrow. Demons or not, we both need you strong.”  

Oliver managed a watery laugh. “Yes, sir, Mr. Late-Shift.”  

Vincent saluted two fingers to brow as he stepped backward into swirling glass. As the portal sealed behind him and the room went dim as the television’s static dot re-appeared and it was flickering like a heartbeat. Oliver sank to the couch as he touched lips still tingling ozone, and—for the first time in months—turned off the TV instead of watching snow. 

“One more day,” he whispered to the dark. “Then maybe forever.”

Vincent’s apartment – minutes after returning from Earth

The door hadn’t clicked shut before Husk unfolded from shadow and his tail was curling while he had his cigarette in his hand as he was smoking into it as there were perfect puffs while listening to the broadcast bars. “Portal-jump again?” Husk asked Vincent with his voice very low.

Vincent set the snow-damp photo of Oliver on the counter. “I needed proof that I could still feel that Oliver’s safe.”

Husk’s ears flattened. “Feelings are breadcrumbs, kid. The queen’s birds are always hungry for any type of power.” Husk tapped the window as there were neon lights that were outside strobed like a warning test pattern. “Every visit etches a trail. She’ll use him to reel you—then gut you both.”  

Vincent’s screen flickered storm-static. “I can’t ghost him. I did that once already.”

“Kid, it’s not ghosting but you have to put up your guard from a distance. That way Oliver survives, or the revolution dies with your heart.”  

Between them, they stood in their sections. Neither of them spoke to each other but stared into each other’s eyes. With the argument that hung, it was unresolved what they could do next after that. They parted for the night as the curtains were drawn and the mirrors were triple-checked by both Vincent and Husk. Vincent knew that Queen Charlie was watching but at least Vincent was trying to hold his Heart and his Duty.  

Still In Hell – Following Weeks

After weeks of working at the Studio and making plans with some Revolution groups, Vincent threw himself into insurgency: decrypting soul-ledgers and he was running night-raids on parade-float depots as they were broadcasting pirate messages across Hell’s emergency band. With the power that only grew like signal strength—each act of defiance tuned him louder.  

One dawn his reflection split: a second, thinner scan-line clone stepped out, bowed, and dissolved. After all this time, Vincent managed to rise up to the rank of Overlord as it was a high tier among Sinners and Contract Demons to unlock from their time in Hell. Vincent never thought he would reach that level so fast but he did it. With the revolution still happening, Vincent whispered his other name that he's been using and might change it to his official Overlord name “Vox” as it was like a new reverence title that he can use for himself.  

While Vincent was laying in his bed, his phone rang and he grabbed it. His phone was on the side table as he held it in his hand and unlocked it just to see who was calling him. When he saw that it was Husk’s number, he answered it. Before Vincent could say anything like a “Hello” it was Husk that spoke first before Vince could get any words out of his phone. 

“Kid, you have to come to the main base. Alastor and Rosie want to have a talk with you about your rank.” Husk informed Vincent before hanging up.

Vincent had his mouth opened just to see that Husk already hung up. Vincent stared at the phone before getting up from his bed and stood up while putting his phone inside his pocket. Vincent got himself ready as he walked over to the door and was ready to leave his apartment. Vincent wasn’t sure what Alastor, the one person that he looked up to, wanted to talk about his rank. Even Rosie was going to be there at the meeting which was already concerning for him but he had to go to see what was going to happen. So, Vincent opened the door and left his apartment. 

Sub-basement beneath Pandemonium Arena – secret council

The moment Vincent stepped inside the Meeting Room, the first thing he saw was a stone table that had microphones of bone attached tk them. But that wasn't all that Vincent saw, there was Alastor, who lounged in a tall, large chair and his head was lying on the pillow part of it. Vincent also saw the vintage dial that was glowing between his antlers. On the opposite side sat Rosie—a delicate woman that had sharp teeth whose smile could curdle hope as there was patting a hand-bag stitched from former competitors.  

Seeing both Alastor and Rosie in the same room was already stressful enough, but Vincent didn’t know why they called him in. Whatever was the reason, Vincent had to enter so he went inside the meeting room and the door closed by itself. Vincent walked forward as his boots were sparking. The room was very quiet and it was making Vincent nervous by that but he had to keep it together without showing fear in front of them.

After a long time of silence, Alastor broke the quietness as his grin widened. “Ahhh, our rising star is here! Hear that, dear listeners? Static never sounded so ambitious.”  

Vincent tilted his head. “Listoners?”

Without Vincent seeing what was behind him, there were little shadows that were chuckling as they appeared to have green glowing eyes that were piercing at Vincent as they disappeared the moment he turned around and tried to see what was laughing at him. When Vincent turned back around to look at Alastor and Rosie, they were already ready to have their conversation with Vincent.

Rosie extended lace-gloved fingers. “Darling Vox, do sit. We’re simply dying to hear your… frequencies.”  

Vincent slid a dossier across the table—coordinates of Queen Charlie’s newest portal farm, guard rotations, and the soul-tally projections. “Well I… We could hit her during tomorrow’s Victory Parade, the day that she celebrates her victory of achieving 45,000 souls in Hell. There’s going to be floats that are going to be hollow—it’ll be perfect for smuggling charges. This will detonate the soul-counters along with her contracts that are going to be void mid-broadcast. That’s when chaos will cover our extraction.”

Alastor tapped the plan, needle skipping on an invisible record. “Deliciously disruptive. But we’ll need a signal jammer—your department, yes?”  

Vincent nodded. “I’ll personally flood her bandwidth. She’ll see snow while some souls, that were bonded with chains to their contracts, walk free from her chains.”  

Rosie clapped politely. “A man who ruins a woman’s close-up. Very charming.”

Alastor rose up from his chair as he offered a hand crackling broadcast juice. “That all sounds impressive. Welcome to the big leagues, Mr. Vox. Break a leg—and perhaps an antenna.”  

Vincent shook in his boots, looking down at Alastor’s hand. Vincent was shocked to see this offer be handed to him. In Vincent’s current state, he was coursed through metal claws while he was sealing the alliance with Alastor. For the first time since death back on Earth, Vincent felt seen—not as a product, but as a peer. Vincent didn’t cheat or kill to get on the top but he did this all on his own and it was all because of Oliver. 

Nothing bad could happen from there. 

Earth – same night, Brooklyn

Months had passed topside, the night was quiet. To Quiet for Oliver’s likings. It was like there was something hidden that was waiting until it could come out. As Oliver kept the promises that Vincent made with him. Oliver went out to get groceries as he filled the fridge and he was running shoes by the door. Even the pill bottles were absent. Oliver spoke to Vincent’s photo each sunrise as he was telling the day’s plans like a prayer.  

Yet loneliness still clung onto Oliver as he always tried to keep the tears in and never cry since he knew that would make Vincent sad. Oliver knew that he was right but it was hard to do. There was an ache that no amount of health could heal. Oliver returned from a late shift at the library while he was toeing off shoes as he was flipping on the lights from his apartment but that was when he froze in place on what he saw.  

What Oliver saw were candles as they were all lined in a single file line in the living-room and they were all flame-light as they were waltzing across the walls. What appeared to be a dinner that was steamed on the coffee table as there was truffle pasta, two settings, and a bottle of 1946 Bordeaux breathing in a crystal decanter.  

On his couch sat a young woman, showing signs of being overworked and full of stress that gave her wrinkles around her eyes. Oliver recognized from gala after-parties—Ms. Sharlie Morning, Vincent’s former “upstairs” boss, now sans glasses as her horns were peeking through white curls and she had a smile that was gentle as poisoned honey. It made Oliver sick to his stomach that he could barely contain from screaming at her. Since, she’s the reason why Vincent is dead and his torment for 20 years. But, Oliver kept himself cool and was aware of what could happen next.

“Good evening, Oliver.” She poured wine. “I’ve taken the liberty of seasoning al dente. Shall we?”  

Oliver’s pulse spiked. “How’d you get in?”  

“Doors open for those who listen.” She gestured opposite. “Sit. Eat. Let’s discuss it.”

“I’m calling the cops—”  

“And tell them the Queen of Hell brought dinner?” She tilted head as the candlelight was still flashing at the goat pupils that she had. “You want Vincent. I want conversation. Symbiosis, not intrusion.”  

The name hooked his heart. Oliver approached slowly as he sat down without touching any of the utensils. Charlie clasped hands. “You love him. I… basically manage him… Or so I thought. Our interests align.”  

She slid a parchment across cloth—elegant stationary, faint smell of brimstone. “Contract: Guest Residency Clause. Sign, and you may visit Hell alive, body and soul intact, for renewable seventy-two-hour periods. No harm, no obligations beyond a non-disclosure. You and Vincent together—dinners, dates, even joint battle if you fancy.”  

Oliver’s throat dried. “What’s the cost?”  

“Merely your signature. Consider it backstage pass to the afterlife.” She sipped wine as her eyes were glowing ratings-red. “Refuse, and portals close forever. Vincent continues risking clandestine trips—eventually caught. Punishment? The eternal loop of your death replayed before his eyes. You wish that on him?”  

Oliver recoiled at what she said as there were images of Vincent screaming while Oliver died repeatedly cycled behind his eyes. Charlie leaned closer as her own voice was velvet. “Sign, you spare him pain and gain access. Think, Oliver. Be rational—your specialty, yes?” 

Fork trembled in his grip. He set it down. “I… need a moment.”  

“Of course.” She produced a quill from air—raven feather, tip glowing. “Decide by dessert.” She raised a glass. “To love transcending realms.”  

He didn’t drink.  

Hell – moments later

Vincent just came back from the meeting that he had with Rosie and Alastor. Vincent was happy on how he got up the ranks without being lowered down. Vincent came into his apartment as he trudged up the light to lit up the room. When that happened, Vincent saw Husk, in the corner,  trailing his smoke in Vincent’s apartment. 

Vincent backed away. “AHGH!!! What the hell are you doing here? In the dark… Again.”

Husk smirked. “Just a habit that I like doing when you’re around.” 

Vincent rolled his eyes at Husk as he sat down on a chair. Even after being scared by Husk, Vincent could still hear the revolution buzz that filled his head—until he opened the door and felt it as if there was candle-wax scent that was bleeding through dimensional seams that Vincent could sense all around him.

Vincent sat there, thinking about if he should check on Oliver or not. Seeing the spyglass mirror on the table already displaying his living-room, Vincent smiled as he grabbed it and said Oliver’s name in it. Vincent was looking forward to seeing how Oliver has been doing but instead of seeing him doing good in his life. Vincent sees Oliver seated across a horned woman in pink that looked too familiar that Vincent knew too well.

Vincent’s screen blanched snow-white. “No…”  

Husk smoked a puff. “What?”

Vincent stood up from his chair as he kept looking at the reflection of the mirror. “She’s there!”

Husk hissed. “It’s a trap. She’s baiting you.”

But Vincent was through the portal before Husk finished sentence as there was a rifle-claw that was sparking. “Is it a trap for me or a trap for Oliver?”

Brooklyn – simultaneous  

While Oliver and Charlie were having their dinner, Charlie took out the contract as she was showing Oliver a glimpse at it. Charlie smiled. “Here’s the contract Oliver. Do you want to keep Vincent safe or him die with no memories of you? Leaving you with the grief and guilt that you caused his death for the second time.”

Oliver tilted his head as his eyes widened like he was confused even though there was guilt that appeared on his face expression. “What do you mean?”

Charlie chuckled. “Do you really want me to explain it to you? If you never were around, Vincent would’ve been a different person. Maybe worse off while you well, that’s a little spoiler that I can’t reveal. It’s a law among Up There.” Charlie points at as she was referring to something or somewhere but she couldn’t quite tell Oliver.

Oliver was left between the contract and himself with a Queen that was staring at him with a wide smile that showed her fangs and her red glowing eyes that were piercing through the candle light that was still lit. As Oliver was going to grab the pen, that magically appeared, the air cracked like broken glass. A nine-foot demon erupted between candles and the flat-screen face was reflecting through the flames of the candles.  

“GET AWAY FROM HIM!” Vincent roared, audio booming studio-reverb.  

Charlie didn’t flinch—smiled wider. “Ah, star talent arrives. Join us, Vincent. Wine?”  

Oliver shot up, chair toppling. “Vincent! She—she said—”  

“I know what she said.” Vincent leveled claws between Queen and lover, protective bulk shielding Oliver. “You okay?”  

Oliver nodded against Vincent’s back, hands trembling on demon shoulders. Charlie stood, smoothing blazer. “My offer stands, Oliver. Objective: coexistence. No tricks—read the fine print.”  

Vincent snatched parchment as there were scanner eyes that were scrolling clauses—renewable visits, non-transferable, subject to behavioural review… Final line glowed red: At management’s discretion, contract may be revoked—termination of subject mandatory. He crumpled it, static crackling. “Over my shattered screen.”  

Charlie’s cheer chilled. “Temper, Mr. Vox. You are contracted. Oliver is not—yet. Persuade him wisely.” She addressed the human. “You wish for shared eternity, or watch him suffer for your refusal?”  

Oliver’s voice broke. “I—I don’t want anyone hurt.”  

“Then sign.” She extended quill.  

“NO!” Vincent slapped the quill aside; it dissolved into sparks.  

Charlie’s pupils became slot-machine sevens. “Defiance noted. You have Twenty-four hours, Oliver. Accept—or portals seal, and I repossess Vincent’s memories of you as a penalty for the crimes he committed. He’ll recall nothing—blank snow. Choose.”  

Queen Charlie tipped an imaginary hat as she stepped backward and she was vanishing into candle-flame that sucked inward as it was extinguishing. With the wax instantly cooled as there was scent that was around. It was gone as the room didn’t have the wax smell anymore. There was only silence that rang.

Oliver collapsed on the couch as he was rocking back and forth. “I—I didn’t agree to this but… Should I? I wanted to see you, not—”  

Vinvent knelt, screen frantic with color bars. “Look at me.” He lifted Oliver’s chin. “She lies. We’ll find another way. There’s always another way.”  

Tears streamed. “But if she erases me from your mind—”  

“Won’t happen.” Vincent clutched Oliver’s hands to a glass chest. “I love you outside her bandwidth. Memory or miracle, I’ll fight for it.”  

Oliver searched the flickering face—there was a hint of fear but also protection for Vincent “But, is that true. Will we do this together or you’re just saying that just to comfort me of the ugly truth that could and can happen in the future?”

Vincent pressed forehead to his—glass warm against skin. “I’m not lying to you. I’m telling you the truth. Trust me… We’ll do this together.”

Outside, there was thunder that  rolled—Hell’s signal jamming Earth’s sky. The candle smoke re-formed briefly into Charlie’s smile, then scattered on wind. There was only twenty-four hours ticked in Vincent’s circuits like a countdown leader. War had come home—and the next broadcast would be live, uncensored, and it’ll be double-screened.

Chapter Text

The night still went on as the silence only grew louder since the presence of Queen Charlie coming out of nowhere just to visit Oliver by talking about making a Contract for him to go to both worlds and be with Vincent, the person that he cares so much about. They held each other in the candle-smelling dark, Oliver’s face pressed to Vincent’s cold glass and the television-skull flickering late-night blues across the walls.  

“You say together but I messed up,” Oliver whispered. “She just—appeared. I thought I could handle it.”  

Vincent’s claws trembled on the man’s back. “Yes Oliver, we’ll handle it together. No deals. No signatures.”  

Oliver’s eyes slid to the crumpled parchment on the rug. “But if I agree, you keep your memories, your revolution, your life—”  

“Life without you in it isn’t a life I want saved,” Vincent cut in, voice distorting. “She’ll own you. Forever. I won’t trade your freedom for my past.”  

Oliver stepped out of the embrace, jaw setting. “Then I’ll lose you either way. At least this way you remember me.”  

“NO.” Vincent’s screen flared white. “We fight this. We’ll find another door for me to see you. Please Oliver….

”  

“There isn’t one!” Oliver shouted. “She holds the keys, the tower, the whole damn broadcast! I’m one guy with a library card and a liver halfway to Shutdown. Let me do this, Vin. For us.”  

Vincent grabbed his shoulders. “For us is refusing. We’ve survived distance, death, dimensions—we’ll survive her.”  

Oliver yanked free. “You’re not listening! I won’t watch you forget my face. That’s a hell worse than Hell.” He snatched his coat from the hook. “I’m going to her. Twenty-four hours starts now.”  

Vincent lunged, talons scraping wood. “OLIVER, STOP—” 

But Oliver was already through the front door as his boots were hammering down the stairs. Oliver was gone from Vincent’s sight as he was already outside which Vincent looked out when he saw Oliver walking out. Vincent pursued—nine feet of demon squeezing into a narrow stairwell—just as the portal-back-home yanked like a leash.  

Reality pixelated; Vincent clawed at banister, metal squealing. “Wait! WAIT—” Ink-black swirl swallowed him mid-stride.  

Tube-Rose Towers – seconds later

In the matter of seconds, Vincent crashed across his coffee table as he was splintering onto the wood. Vincent groaned, slowly getting up from the table as he felt the pain that was coursing throughout his body but he managed to get himself up without any wood going through his skin. But, the Spyglass mirror slammed shut as there was the surface of a spider-webbing that he spotted.  

Husk stood over him, cigarette a single red tally light in the dark. “Saw the whole feed through the mirror portal. You okay, big guy?”  

Vincent hurled the cracked mirror; it embedded wall-first, glass raining. “No! I’m not okay. She’s going to own him and it’ll be all my fault! I have to go back—now!”  

Husk blocked the door. “Portal needs 24 hours to recharge. You blast through early, you’ll scatter yourself across frequencies. No good to anybody as confetti.”  

Vincent’s gills flared, sparking arcs. “Then I’ll walk! Drive! Hitch-hike through the rings!”  

“Listen.” Husk dropped voice. “There is another way—off-grid, untraceable for Contract and Sinner Demons. But it means leaving the Pride Ring and crossing into the Lust Ring.”

Vincent went still when Husk told him this. No demon, both Sinner and Contract Demons can’t go to other Rings but the Pride Ring. Besides, this is the Lust Ring that they’re talking about. The Ring that is full of Lust, demons that require and need, even want sex from pleasure that is both passion and disgust. It’s a place where demons get forced into activities that they don’t want. If they want it or not, they’ll be used as a sex doll that will destroy them into pure nothingness. 

“I’ll go,” he said instantly. “Whatever it takes.”  

Husk exhaled a smoky question mark. “Road’s one-way. We get caught, we’re deserters—executed on air as Saturday morning cartoons. You sure?”  

Vincent looked at the shattered mirror, reflection fracturing his face into a hundred Olivers. “I’m done letting him sign his life for mine. We leave tonight.”  

Husk ground the cigarette out on his paw, unfazed. “Then pack light, Overlord. We’re about to become pirates in no-man’s-land.”  

Outside, thunder rolled—Hell’s warning tone before emergency broadcast. A digital billboard across the street flashed: 24 HOURS REMAIN – SPECIAL CONTRACT SIGNING – STAY TUNED. Vincent’s screen hardened to battle-brightness. He loaded a duffel: spare blazer, antenna-rifle, the unburnt half of Oliver’s snow-photo.  

Husk opened the window; neon pollution poured in. “Once we drop off the grid, there’s no calling for help. You and me, static to static.”  

Vincent slung the bag as his claws were clacking resolve. “Then let’s make some noise she can’t censor.”  

They stepped into the corridor as the door was locking behind them as it was like a final commercial break. Somewhere above, the clocks ticked toward Charlie’s deadline and somewhere below as the road to The Lust Ring waited—untamed, unlit, but open for them to walk through.

And Vincent walked through the door as there was every footfall a vow that Vincent was making to himself. “I will reach him before the ink dries. Even if I have to tear the antenna from the sky.”

Earth – 2 a.m., Brooklyn sidewalks

The night was getting more cold, Oliver walked until the city blurred as there were neon lights that were flashing onto Oliver. Just for him to turn his head and see there were images that were streaking like corrupted film. Oliver’s own thoughts ran a single loop as it kept repeating in his head as he was looking at it with his eyes widened:  

Sign → lose myself → don’t sign → lose Vincent.

Both ended in absence which left Oliver depressed. Oliver had not many emotions and thoughts that were clouding his head. Oliver needed anchors for him to go and deal with his feelings. Oliver was thinking about the places where memory felt tactile. First stop: “Mel’s Diner”, the chrome palace where a teenage busboy once spilled coffee on a cocky young host and he was sparking ten years of inside jokes, shared milkshakes, and quiet hand-holds beneath Formica. 

The building appeared like a postcard from another life as there was a neon sign half-dead, “MEL’S” flickering “EL’S”. Inside, the vinyl booths were empty but one. Oliver slid across familiar cracked red seats as his own palms became flat on the speckled table that he sat by as he was waiting for a waiter or a waitress to come over and take his order. Oliver barely wanted anything but he was thinking of some things just for him to keep his mind busy.

Oliver sat there, looking down at his hands as he was tapping onto the table as he was struggling with what to do with the mess that he ended up in without even knowing that Hell and Demons were going to be on his doorstep within the 20 years that he had been mourning for Vincent. But, while he was lost in his thoughts, there was a tired waitress filling up a coffee for him without asking him. Oliver stared at the twin straws in the glass holder—Vincent’s habit, two always, “one for each corner of our mouth.” Tears spotted the laminate.  

Oliver whispered to no one, “Last stop, then decision.” Oliver sat there as he took sips from his coffee. 

Hell – Pride Ring, Sub-basement transit tunnels

Back in Hell, Vincent and Husk moved through maintenance shafts only contract-demons knew: steam corridors writhing with loose cables as there was graffiti that was reading BREAK THE ANTENNA in dried coolant. On the side, Husk checked a stolen map. “Lust Ring border’s ahead. We cross beneath the railway—no ticket booths, no CCTV. Keep cloaked.”  

While walking to where they need to go, Vincent’s new Overlord aura hummed; Vincent dialed output down as he was wrapping himself in static that mimicked lesser-demon signatures. They walked single file along with their boots splashing on the condensation of water that made Vincent flinch every time he heard it.  

Hours later the tunnel slanted up, there were terminus glowing magenta. As there was a sign that was flashing: YOU ARE ENTERING THE LUST RING – PLEASE ENJOY ALL THE HOLES.

Vincent tilted his head as he turned to Husk. “What does that mean?”

Husk sighed. “You know what, you don’t want to know.”

Husk and Vincent kept walking as they were staying hidden from any Succubis and Incubis, who are from The Lust Ring. Since it’s their home that they came from. As they surfaced in an alley perfumed with perfume and ozone. There were many billboards that displayed a looped desire—someone’s fantasy resetting every thirty seconds. There were even Imp barkers that were handed out neon flyers.  

Husk tugged Vincent’s sleeve. “Ozzie’s club, three blocks away. Stick to the shadows if you don’t want to get caught. All Hellborns are loyal to Queen Charlie. Even though she doesn’t rule the Rings that they live in, she does keep the other Sin Lords in line and treat the citizens of Hell better than how they were treated when her father was in ruling.”  

Vincent asked. “You know, after 20 years, I don’t know what happened to the original King of Hell. Where is he now?”

Husk sighed. “Oh you reporters always want the scoop. But to tell you the truth kid, I don’t know. Nobody does. All I know is that Heaven had something to do with his disappearance but it was never looked into especially when Charlie took over and hid the truth from everybody. There’s rumors that he's under the soil of Hell, locked up in Heaven chains due to him killing the original Sinner and trying to make an uprising against Heaven.”

“You mean Cain?” Vincent asked. 

Husk shook his head. “No. Not Cain. He came later.”

Vincent answered again. “Was it Eve?”

Husk thought for a moment before answering again. “Aww no… She isn’t. Who was the very first woman that was made for Adam?”

Vincent thought about it for a while. “Lilith?”

Husk nodded. “Bingo!”

“But why? Why would Lucifer kill Lilith? Especially after being kicked out of Heaven and The Fall. Even the Revolution he started.” Vincent had a lot of questions.

Husk sighed again. “Kid, I don’t know. Nobody knows. So stop asking questions that I can’t answer.”

That left Vincent with more questions than answers, wondering what happened to the Original King and why he killed the Original Sinner. All that Vincent knows is that Lucifer couldn’t kill Sinners since he tempted basically three humans. He brainwashed Lilith, tempted Eve, and made her to tempt Adam and that was because some insighters researched it, even though they disappeared after the discovery. But it didn’t matter right now, all that Vincent cared about is getting to Oliver before it’s too late.

So, they slipped through throngs of incubi, succubi, and even tourists from other Rings. There was music that throbbed like a visible pulse. At the strip’s apex rose “Ozzie’s”, a tower of undulating pink glass and there was even a line that was curling around the block. It was so long, it would take Husk and Vincent a while to get in without getting noticed especially since Sinners and Contract Demons can’t go outside the Pride Ring. 

So, they had to find another way to get in without any other demon seeing them getting in. “Back entrance,” Husk muttered, leading Vincent down a service ramp. A single imp guard snoozed; they stepped over him into a corridor smelling of glitter glue and sweat.  

Inside – backstage maze 

Inside the Strip Club, it was so lit up with different shades of blue and purple. The walls shimmered with mirrors; Vincent averted his screen-face while he was following Husk’s flicking tail. They passed dressing rooms where performers stretched latex limbs as there were tech booths where imps adjusted light rigs.  

Finally, there was a green door that was tagged FIZZAROLLI – PROP MASTER / SPECIALTY ARMS DEALER. Within, there were two imps that were conversed near the front door. There was one scarlet as it had extendable limbs coiled like party streamers—”Fizzarolli”, juggling glow sticks as his tail was spinning fire. Everybody was cheering just to see him do tricks like this. But on the opposite side, there was a white-faced imp with a black diamond eyepatch that was holding a wanted flyer covered in red X’s—”Blitzo”, an imp assassin extraordinaire that has been seen by Queen Charlie as the best among Hellborns.  

After Fizzarolli was done with his tricks for the people, Blitzo laughed as he was slapping Fizz’s back. “—and that’s why Contract Demons make the loudest pops when they burst!”  

Fizzarolli rolled his eyes as he chuckled. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. You win the bet.”

Blitzo laughed harder. “Oh yeah! I told you so!”

Seeing these two, Vincent’s gills tightened at the sight of them. Right next to Vincent, Husk used his magic trick to take a piece of paper from his hand and he took out a pen from his ear. Vincent's eyes sparkled when he saw the magic tricks that Husk was using. With no time to waste, Husk scribbled on a betting slip as he folded it twice, and—head down—slid it into Fizz’s gloved hand as he passed it without any notice.

Fizz kept laughing with Blitzo until he noticed a piece of paper in his hand. Fix unfolded the paper as he read it. ‘Need off-world crystal. Cash up front. Meet us prop closet – 5 min.’ 

Fizz sighed as he gave a tiny nod, Fizz turned back to Blitzo. “Hey, Blitz, gotta check the inventory. Don’t sell my tail while I’m gone.”  

Blitzo grinned. “No promises, jester boy.”  

Prop closet – ten minutes later

There were crates of dildo-shaped missiles, both used in War and to insert through a different type of hole, as there were bins of moaning mannequins. Fizz shut the door as he was dimming the lights to a sultry purple. “Well, well, casino cat; never thought I would see you here in the Lust Ring. I thought you don’t like this side of the Ring.”

Husk chuckled. “Well, I’m surprised. You already knew that.”

Fizz smirked before turning to look at Vincent. “Oh… And this is TV titan.” He extended a hand that unfolded three feet to shake Vincent’s, retracted. “Crystal’s hot item—Queen’s been cracking down. The price tripled.” 

Husk produced a fat roll of Hell-notes—revolution fund. Fizz weighed it, tails wagging. “AIs this acceptable?" From a safe he withdrew a thumb-sized prism as it was swirling with bright galaxy colors.  

“Yep! This looks good.” Fizz was counting the money as he was listing what the crystal could do for them. “The upgrade shard has more benefits than normal crystals especially since these crystals were made by rich folks that I can’t name since it’ll be exposing them. As when the crystal blinks, you’ll go to Earth as it’ll keep your body intact for a day. With the recharge here, it’ll only take 30 minutes. It charges faster than regular crystals. Also, this is very important and I want you to hear me clearly. DON’T get caught—Charlie’s offering a full season pickup for imps to have for health benefits and we need it. So, don’t ruin it for my people. You keep your revolution heads with her, not my people.”  

Vincent palmed the shard; it pulsed like Oliver’s heartbeat remembered. “We’ll be ghosts.” 

Fizz opened the door. “Pleasure doing shady business with you. Now scram—Blitzy smells profit like blood.”  

They exited the corridor. Behind them, Fizzarolli pulled phone, hit speed-dial #1. “Yeah, boss? It’s me. Just sold off-world tech to Husk and the TV-head. Thought you’d want the ratings to spike for the Queen to know about.”

There was a small chuckle from the other side of the phone. “Perfect.”  On the other end, the laugh crackled louder through receiver—sweet, victorious.  

Alley behind Ozzie’s

As the night air felt colder now. Vincent and Husk were out of the stripclub. They made it out without anybody noticing them coming in or out. That was a good sign for them to see the outcome. But, Vincent held the shard high in his hands as the moonlight refracted and it was painting different types of colors of portal runes on brick walls, showing them the reflection of Earth. Which made Vincent’s eyes glow and sparkle the moment he saw Earth again, it’s been so long that he hasn’t been on Earth for a long period of time without a mirror pulling him back to Hell.  

But, Husk broke the moment when he lit another cigarette and he was smoking it as there were puffs blowing in the air. Husk’s tail was twitching with nerves that he was secretly eager to go and stop the kid from doing anything stupid. “We’ve got maybe ten minutes before her goons triangulate and prevent us from making a Contract Deal with Oliver. Pick your Earth spot—public, crowded, harder to snatch you.”  

Vincent nodded, turning to the portal as he was focusing his hardest to get the portal to shift to where Vincent thinks that Oliver could be at. The more Vincent thought about it, the more he was certain on where Oliver could be at. Vincent had a feeling that maybe Oliver was at Mel’s Diner— the first place that they meant each other. So, it was a neutral ground for them that was full of soft memories. Vincent carved the address in air; shard responded, and the crystal was blooming.  

Through it: empty 24-hour coffee shop as there were neon lights from both the crystal and the sign from the diner, humming in front of Vincent's face. Vincent looked at Husk. “You coming?”  

“Someone’s gotta watch your six. Go—find him before he finds trouble.”  Husk smiled widely at Vincent.

Vincent clasped the cat’s shoulder. “We have a day to stop Oliver. I won’t let that bitch take him. No matter what it costs me in the end.”

“Just bring back your boyfriend and your head.”  

Vincent stepped through—glass sealing behind like a curtain falling on act one. Somewhere above rings, Queen Charlie closed her planner, and there was a smile that was sharpening. “Let the season finale begin.”