Verse 4

[This is part of an ongoing tandem writing experiment. To read the full story, click here.]

Karl wheeled awkwardly toward the conference table.

"W-what's going on?" he stuttered.

Lucifer ignored him for a moment. Spinning on his heel to face the others, he pronounced: "Gentlemen -- and lady," he said, with a wink toward Betty Bathory, "I give you the new Lieutenant General of Hell's Army: Mr. Karl Christian Rove."

He swooped behind Karl, extending a demonstrative hand in front of him. For a moment, there was dazed silence. Then all at once, as if on cue, the group erupted in protests. Lucifer cringed, unable to discern anything above the din of complaints and galumphing.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen!" he howled. "GENTLEMEN, ONE AT A TIME!"

Somewhere, a homeless kitten got pancreatic cancer with a very poor prognosis. Its mother's teats dried up, rendering her unable to nurse the youngling. Hunger and invasive disease began playing a game for its short life.

"But how can zis be?" shouted Hitler's sound guy, pounding his fist on the table. "He is small and pudgy -- hardly ze heroic archetype necessary to lead our warriors into battle! He cannot serve ze post with dignity!"

"Indeed!" barked Jackson. "This isn't to say that all of us haven't been impressed with Mr. Rove's work at one time or another. But," he said gesturing toward a shadowy figure in the corner, "Attila's been waiting for that job for going on two millennia. How is that fair?"

The shadowy figure glowered, but said nothing.

"This is hardly the time to dwell on fairness," Lucifer shot back, taking a seat next to Karl, who was at this point weeping tears of joy and stammering incomprehensibly. "This is the time for action. Now sit. All of you."

---

Back in the kitchen, Ikey, the Devil's least favorite minion, sprinted into the room. Augoostus glanced over expectantly but did not break from the large cauldron he was stirring. He idly wiped a hand across his "Kiss Me, I'm Infernal" apron.

Ikey doubled over, clasping his hands to his knees, panting desperately for breath.

"Have you guys heard?" he croaked.

"Heawd wha'?" Stanley said, setting aside the fried intestine sandwich he had just bitten into. Blood bubbled out of his mouth and down his chin.

"There's a -- there's a -- there's a new council member, and they say the Big L's getting ready to do something drastic," Ikey said, loping over toward Stanley and scooping a handful of thick, green goo from Augoostus's cauldron as he went. The chef arced a horny brow and rapped him on the head with his spoon made of human bone, sinew, etc.

"Oh yeah?" asked Stanley, gaining interest. "What's up?"

"I dunno. I think it has to do with the souls. This morning, there weren't enough of them to fuel the furnace."

A stray intestine slid from Stanley's gaping jaw to the floor. It landed with a sploosh at Ikey's feet.

"What's happening?"

"I-I don't know," Ikey bustled. He licked the goo furiously from his fingers, salivating more with each lap of his forked tongue. "But there's whisperings among the imps that he's going to open the Door That Really Shouldn't Be Fiddled With Under Any Circumstances And That Means Now Too."

"The DTRSBFWUACATMNT -- oh, dear," said Stanley and Augoostus in tandem.

---

Back in Lucifer's throne room, the board was bickering about what should be done. The souls were disappearing, yes, and taking action was imperative -- but beyond that, no two members could agree on what should happen.

"I don't even know why I'm here," John Denver whimpered amid the clamor, clasping the neck of his guitar.

"Two words: 'Thank God I'm a Country Boy,' puss," snarled Leonard Smalls from the far end of the conversation.

The debate continued like this for some six hours, during which Lucifer gradually slunk back in his seat with a headache that increasingly hampered his senses. Finally, he spoke up. When he did, he used a tone reserved for only the most severe circumstances -- the most recent being the birth of a certain carpenter's son in Bethlehem.

"Quiet."

The board fell silent, every pair of eyes focusing on the slouching figure at the end of the table.

"Friedrick," he called. A cowering figure emerged from behind his chair.

"Yes, my most Deliciously Malignant Master?"

Satan sighed heavily.

"Fetch the Daylighter."

A sudden hush resounded through all the hallways of Hell at that moment, as if propelled by a force of nature. Had the Devil's legions of minions any hearts within their empty chest cavities, they would have begun beating wildly all at once.

Fear gripped the Underworld, but Lucifer only repeated the simple order.

"Go get the Daylighter."