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Chapter 1: Assessment

Can anyone change their fate? The destiny to which they were born? For some, the answer would be a defiant roar to the heavens that they're no character written by a hack author! That fate is a four letter word that rivals a select few in foulness. Such people strive and fight! They chafe against the 'nays' and 'naughts' of the world and blaze their own trail. Welcoming hardship and savoring victory. Whether they're righteous or damned, such people will never be idle or mundane.
And then there are the others. When asked of changing fate and destiny they shrug and sigh. Might as well try and stop your fingernails from growing…

A man torn to pieces.

A girl stands triumphant, her back turned.

"Where are they taking me?!" He manages to say.

"Beats me," she replies, not a hint of relish in her voice, her satisfaction is cold and joyless. "All I know is that it'll be someplace without any sort of peace."

He snapped out of his reminiscence and looked down at his hands.

Claws.

He had claws now.

Near on twenty years in this pit and there were still times when he'd look down at his hand and expect to see flesh. Expect to see his long concert pianist fingers and fine, trimmed nails. But no. Claws. Claws and fur and other things. If pressed he could find some pride in his new cat-like countenance. One could could even deem it apropos, as he always fancied himself a lithe graceful hunter. Conscientious, careful, and above all, clean. At least he was, when he wasn't shedding all over everything! Not to mention, the contrast between his pink fur and blonde hair was more than a little bothersome. He'd changed, coming here had changed him like everyone else. Not that he stood out in a crowd. The rest of the population of this abyssal plane were all some manner of twisted monstrosity. Ironic reflections of their damned souls.

…Maybe?

To be honest, no one seemed to have the first clue to why they looked the way they did, but that they did and c'est la vie.

Or, rather, c'est la mort.

Hell, he was in Hell, yet another horror amongst horrors, lost in the sea of horns and scales and fangs and wings. There was no uniformity, no rhyme or reason, a flurry of nauseating inhuman mishmash. That alone had taken some time to adjust to. The sheer nonconformity of everyone and everything. To a man whom prided himself on clenliness and routine, this Hell was rather on-the-nose in its irony.

Kira, he called himself. Yoshikage Kira, age 53. He'd been the sole remaining heir to a long-defunct samurai clan, now extinct. Without getting into too many embarrassing details, he had died at the age of 33 some twenty years ago. He was a simple man, a quiet man, not a man one would suspect of dozens upon dozens of homicides. Suffice it to say he had an odd hobby. One that he strove to keep in check with his one true goal: to live a peaceful life, a goal that was now next to impossible. But still, he tried.
He walked down the street, homeward bound after a long day's work. Hell still needed middle management, so he was in luck. The streets were chaos as usual. Demons scurried to-and-fro, stealing and fighting and fornicating. The reddish tint of the city lent a foul, greasy quality to every reflective surface it disgraced. It was as though a thin film of filth covered everything, it was inescapable. He wanted to get home to his sanctuary and decompress. To wash his hands, to try and cope with this day past and the day yet to come. If he could just get back home without–

"Don't move," a curdled voice said from behind, accompanied by a sharp prick in his back. "Or I'll stick ya."

God dammit.

Shiv to his back, he walked into an alley and pressed himself against a wall. Busy hands set about checking all his pockets, finding nothing. "Turn 'round."
Kira complied, now able to see his assailant; thin, short, somewhat rat-like in form. His bloodshot eyes and tremens that of a druggie desperate for a fix. Lucky for this would-be thief there were precious few things in Hell that could kill demons. Otherwise he'd likely be dead of an overdose by now, among other things. Unlucky for him was his present choice of targets, one of those precious few.

Kira's hand moved with a deliberate slowness, reaching into his jacket. The druggie noticed and brandished his weapon. It was a crude handle and affixed to it was with a shining sliver of something that very nearly resembled a shard of an Exterminator's spear. The notion that this degenerate could have such a weapon was ridiculous. Odds were it was a mere mirror shard, sharpened and polished to look like one. Not that anyone would take those odds. Death was unpleasant enough the first time around, and no one was in a hurry to repeat the experience.

"Wachit, man! I gotta 'Sterminater bit right here, man! Y-you better not try nothin'!"

Kira did not flinch, instead he pulled his jacket open, revealing his breast pocket. He tapped his wallet with his finger. "Is this what you were looking for?"

The rat's eyes shot to his wallet, he brandished the shiv in a trembling hand and reached for it. He cracked it open, saw the ten hundred-dollar bills inside, and smiled a yellowed, rotten smile.

"Heh! Ha! Thanks, man! You not as stupid as y'look!" The druggie said, eyes wide and wet as though he were about to cry.

"Don't mention it," Kira said, his tone flat, cocking his right thumb up in what appeared to be a friendly gesture. "You have fun, now."

"Oh, man will I ever! I'm gonna–"

Kira's thumb pressed into his index finger with an audible 'click'. The druggie grunted and froze, his eyes bugged out with terror. His body bloated and contorted as bursts of light and smoke poured from cracks in his flesh. He didn't let out so much as a squeak as he blew apart from the inside out, consumed in fire and flame. Flame dissipated to smoke, then to ash, and then into nothing at all.

Kira sighed, content, smoothing back his hair. There was something indefinable yet gratifying about a clean set-up and a perfect pay-off. He knelt down to gather his wallet and noticed a small silver shard amidst the garbage. He picked it up with care, holding it on the flat between his fingers as he pressed a leathery pad against its tip. It should have followed its owner into nothingness. A brief moment of pain and a small wisp of smoke confirmed his suspicions: it was a shard of an Exterminator's spear.

"Hm." He stuck his finger-pad in his mouth to stanch the bleeding. "Interesting."

He made it home without further incident. He carded into the smallish slum apartment that served as his home. Kira strode through the hallways, avoiding garbage. He stepped over druggies and vagrants, acknowledging any neighbors that greeted him. In the corner of the hall, a hellhound thrust away. A succubus writhed beneath his heaving furry body, gasping and squawking. Their clothing, or whatever tatters that qualified, lay scattered hither-thither on the floor. He passed by without so much as a glance, not wanting to gratify them in the slightest with his attention.

"Eeeey Pink Panther!" One of the demon sluts crooned. She leaned over and hooked a finger into her shirt collar, exposing her cleavage. "You one sexy cat! Why don't you come on over and show me whatcha got?"

His red eyes darted over to her. She was some manner of fanged cycloptic gorgon, slimey purple eels writhed atop her head. Her clammy, jaundiced bosom on display like they were some sort of selling feature. But what drew his attention were her hands, or what passed for hands. Grotesque, angular, a hag's paw crested with talons and covered in scales. Utterly repulsive. He could not help himself, his muzzle fleered back in a disgusted grimace.

"Fuck you, man!" The hooker marched over to him, leaning in and staring up at him with her single eye blazing. "You think you're better than me?!"

Kira resisted the urge to turn her necklace into a bomb and blow her head off her shoulders "No, no. Just gay."

"Oh," she said, round face breaking into a crescent of yellow teeth. "Well, yeah. You do you."

"Have a good night, miss," Kira said, turning the corner.

She waved after him. "Yeah! Hey, let's grab a coffee later! Swap girl stories!"

Kira turned the corner and found his room, tapping his card against the lock. A thump, a click, and a jolt and he was in. Back into his room. He sighed with relief and slumped against the wall. Back home, where things make sense.

His apartment was tidy and austere, two decades in Hell had taught him the importance of living light. When it came to get-going a heavy suitcase was only an encumbrance. His furniture was cheap and tacky but discarded with ease. Decorations were non-existent and the appointments were basic. He was not the type to entertain guests, after all. All he needed was some proper suits and the appropriate kitchenware to feel at ease. So long as he could dress as he wished and eat to his standards, he could call his life bearable. Or, that's what he told himself.

Kira doffed his jacket and set it to hang on his folding garment rack. he thumbed off his tie and bundled it at the base of his bed, a pull-out closet mattress. He made his way to the 'kitchen' and opened his half-size fridge. He pulled out some eggs, old rice, and various this'n'thats from the week's leftovers. What he would have given for a well-made gas-top stove and a proper cooking-space. Still, he made do with what he had.

He ate alone in his room, watching the news. Some harridan grimaced at the camera opposite a thing that appeared to be wearing a gas-mask. Katie Killjoy and Tom Trench. Their mutual disdain notwithstanding, there was little in the way of compelling content. The gang wars in the west side of Pentagram City had worsened. The 'Dipshit Duet', as an old acquaintance had dubbed them, engaged in all out war over purged territory. Kira thanked himself for cutting ties with the wretched display that passed for the Hellscape crime scene nowadays. He grimaced, the less time spent reminiscing on those days the better.

Kira was scraping up the last of his 'weekend omelette' when a knock sounded at his door. "Hey! Neighborhood meeting! Twenty minutes in the common area, if you're not there it's 50 bucks put onto your rent!"

"Hmm."

The 'neighborhood meeting' was about as degenerate one might expect. Whores and pimps and druggies aplenty. Fifty in all, the meeting had been something of a clusterfuck, with everyone cawing over everyone else. The reasons for the meeting was to announce a 3% raise in rent. Then the installation of a blood fountain for the hemophages on the second floor. And finally something about an intervention. Kira sort of tuned it all out. With the meeting over, everyone began to file out. This left only him in the rec-room along with about twenty or so other demons, all from his floor.

Kira poured himself a cup from the coffee urn, and sipped it without relish. It was an alright brew, but lukewarm regardless of the steam wafting off of its surface. Despite this, Kira knew if he were to spill it on himself it would be as hot as though fresh-brewed. Hell was like that, he found, the coffee was cold on the tongue but hot on the lap. Little things that helped to make existence unbearable. This Hell was nothing so crass as fire and torment. Rather, the suffering was in continued, tedious existence rife with inconveniences and nonsense. A Hell made all the worse when populated with the absolute worst humanity had to offer.

"Hey, Yoshi!" A voice called, a hand setting on his shoulder.

Kira's eye twitched at his nickname, a moniker he loathed almost as much as its coiner. He turned to see the hideous grinning face of one of his more gregarious neighbors. He was some manner of lizard-thing, with three red eyes and a snuggle of long sharp black teeth. Kira nodded his acknowledgement. "Blacktooth."

"So, what did you think of that meeting, huh?" Blacktooth said. "Funny about the fountain. Hot blood on tap!"

"Mmm," Kira replied, sipping his coffee. "Suppose the rent hike is related to that?"

"Yeah, probably…"

Kira waited for him to leave. When he didn't he looked back over, now aware that all his neighbors were standing around him, looking at him. "Is there…a problem?"

"Yeah," Blacktooth said. "This is an intervention."

"An intervention," said Kira, confused. "For me?"

"Yeah man, we can't take it anymore. You're creeping us out!" Blacktooth gestured at the other neighbors, who nodded in agreement. "All you do is go to work, pay your rent, cook, and clean. You don't do any drugs, you don't drink, you don't steal or fight; just Mr. Normal all the time! It's freaky!"

Kira blinked, his ears flattening. "What."

Blacktooth looped his arm around Kira's shoulders. "Look. I'm not sure if you noticed, but you're in Hell. It's over, Bad End, there's no point in pretending to be a good person or play by the rules or any of that shit! Game over! You're here because you did something evil, so fucking act like it! You're just acting like you're still on earth is rubbing us all the wrong way, yeah? Still using your human name and dressing like your human self! Like you think you're better'n us! Or maybe you're just hiding like you were up there. Either way, we're letting you know how we feel, so unstraighten a bit and sin it up! Otherwise, we're going to have to ask you to leave."

Kira looked around at them, all their eyes on him, he could stares. His hand shot to his mouth as he began to gnaw on his claws. How could this have happened? His lifestyle, his treasured peaceful lifestyle, was making him…stand out? Making him noticeable? What to do? What to do? All these neighbors, all these witnesses, people who knew his name and now had reason to suspect him. The quiet existence he had built for himself was coming down around his ears. It wouldn't be long before they found out, before his secret was revealed. It would be back to the old days, the stressful days, back to the endless passionless killing and violence.

"Hey now Yoshi, don't be like that!" Blacktooth said, clapping him in the shoulder. "We just wanted to give you a bit of a reality check! If you wanna live in Hell, y'gotta be in Hell, y'gotta own it! 'Cause it's not like you're goin' anywhere."

"Or you can check into the Happy Hotel and go to heaven," one of the other neighbors, Shiv, said, laughing out loud.

The rest of the group joined in, their laughter mocking and derisive. It echoed in Kira's pointed triangular ears. His brow furrowed, his pupils contracted to slivers, his hackles rose. He could feel his claws as they pushed their way out of his fingertips. The urge to kill screamed at him from within. A roaring beast that was bare moments from blasting Blacktooth's jaw clean off his ugly face. To reach out for his neighbors and show them his true nature, his true self, to rip and tear and–

Wait. Heaven?

"The what-hotel?"

Blacktooth's laughter trailed off. "Huh? Oh, Lucy's daughter opened up some stupid hotel to rehabilitate sinners or some shit. You know, make 'em better so they move on to heaven, yeah? Stupid bitch actually thinks that'll fix the population problem!"

"Hm," Kira tapped his finger to his chin. Fate had sided with him, after all. Redemption? Heaven? Could he get of this awful place once and for all? Could he yet live a peaceful life?

"Hey, you're not actually considering going there, are ya Yoshi?" Blacktooth said, grinning. "Ha! I never took you for a sucker! You'd have to be some kind of–"

"This intervention is over." Kira tossed his coffee over his shoulder.

The scalding liquid splashing Blacktooth square in the snout. Blacktooth screamed and clutched his steaming face, staggering backwards. Kira made his way to the door, leaning back into the room. "Thank you for your time, everyone. Goodbye."

"Where the fuck do you think you're going?!" Blacktooth bellowed. "I'm gonna–"

A blue shape streaked through air and smashed into his face with a wet grisly crunch. Blood and brain sprayed out at the surrounding neighbors, who were silent with shock. Crawling around in the crater of blood and gore that used to be Blacktooth's face was a blue, skeletal turtle. It looked up at the gathered demons with black, eyeless sockets. "Hey. Look over here."

Kira closed the door behind him and set off a small bomb in the lock, fusing it and sealing off the door. Not a moment too soon, as the handle jittered and the door shook on its hinges as bodies piled against it. Screaming voices overlapped and mingled, threats and pleas for mercy merged together pleasingly. Kira allowed himself a moment to savor their fear, the delightful build-up to a slaughter. He stepped back and walked off down the hall. A massive explosion blew the door off its hinges and sent it crashing into the opposite wall. Kira sighed, smiling to himself.

He had some packing to do.

Charlie hummed to herself as she cleaned. The hotel was a mansion in years long past, and an exorbitant one at that. As such it required full-time staff to be kept in a presentable state. Charlie didn't have a full-time staff, she didn't have any staff, to be honest. All she had were friends and a dream. Razzle and Dazzle helped, of course, and Vaggie was tireless. But they all had other duties on top of their full-time jobs, so the bulk of the cleaning fell to her while Nifty, their eccentric, effervescent maid, was on a week-long paid vacation while the Noise Marines were touring the city. Charlie didn't mind. Anything she could do to help the hotel and her dream was a reward in and of itself.

Well, most of the time.

Their first and only customer presented some…unique challenges. Angel Dust was a difficult person at the best of times, and worse still when going through withdrawal. He tended to act out, to vent on things…and people.

Charlie jumped at the sound of automatic weapons-fire. The heavy crack of .45 APC rounds peppering the walls at 1500RPM. "Yeee-AAAH! Fuckin' cockroach! Eat demonic lead, ya fuckin' crunchy spawn of a hellhound's sweaty ballsack!"

Charlie sprinted down the hall to his room. She threw herself to the floor to avoid a 3-second burst as it sawed through the door. She waited on the floor, calm and patient, listening for her cue. The roar of Angel's quartet of Tommy-guns cut off into a series of clicks.

"Ah! Shit!"

Charlie hopped to her feet and slowly opened the door, peering into the room. Angel had his 'hangover shutters' drawn, which were essentially heavy switch-activated steel slabs that shut out every last flicker of light for when he was feeling 'sensitive'. Charlie flicked the switch and shutters retracted with loud 'thunk', the room awash with the soft light of 40 watt luxury bulbs. The furniture, walls, floor and ceiling, all riddled with bullet holes. Long meandering strings of pockmarks crisscrossed and scattered hither-thither. Angel was in the middle of the room, panting and hissing a long unbroken string of foul curse-words. His Tommy-guns still clutched in his shaking hands.

"Angel…?" Charlie said, entering the room. "Something wrong?"

"Is somethin' wrong?" He muttered, glowering at her. His eyes were bloodshot and ringed deep with exhaustion and withdrawal. "Is somethin' wrong?! Only the biggest hairiest roachiest cockroach to ever wriggle out of your dad's asshole! He's hauntin' me! Always watchin', always waitin', scurryin' away when I turn on the light like, what, ya too good for me ya fuckin' bug?!"

Charlie looked out at the tatters of the room. "A…cockroach?"

Angel sighed, the Tommy guns clattered to the ground. "Yeah, he was all…roachy…man, has it always been so stuffy in here?"

"That's probably the gunpowder." Charlie swept the guns away from him with the broom. "I should open a window."

Angel shuffled over to the bed and collapsed, shivering. "I feel like I'm turnin' inside out! Like I gotta shed or somethin'!"

Charlie opened the window and sighed, the air outside wasn't much better, but it was different. "What did you do before, when you couldn't get drugs?"

"I did drugs!" Angel said. "All the drugs! If I couldn't get one kind I grabbed another."

"Angel…" said Charlie, turning to him. "I can only help you if you let me!"

Angel Dust groaned and rolled onto his back. "Booze? Got any booze?"

She picked the guns up off the floor and headed for the door. "I can get you a big jug of water, some Tylenol, and some immodium for the…bathroom."

"Whadaya mean the bathro–" An ominous grumble sounded from Angel's belly. His eyes snapped open in horror. "Aw fuck."

Angel scrambled for the adjoining bathroom. Charlie smiled and headed out the door, she needed to find him a hobby.

She walked into the main foyer and dropped the guns down the main garbage chute.

"What the fuck was that?" Vaggie said, bursting into the room. "Was he shooting inside the hotel?!"

"There was a cockroach, apparently," said Charlie, dusting off her hands. "It's no problem, Razzle and Dazzle will patch up the holes in the wall and the room will be good as new. He's up and walking around, so it seems like he's over the hump."

"He better be!" Vaggie grumbled. "Otherwise we'll be down a customer."

"Our only customer…" Charlie drummed her fingers together. "But hey! If we can redeem someone like him, well, there's no one we can't help!"

A knock sounded at the door.

Charlie's face fell for a moment, the people who liked to vandalize the hotel rarely knocked. The only person to knock thus far was…

Vaggie looked over at her, drawing her Exterminator's spear from its usual hiding spot. She locked her eyes on Charlie's, glancing over to the door, brandishing the spear.

Charlie swallowed and started down the hall. The knock sounded again, slow, prim, deliberate. It was hardly the 'shave-and-a-haircut' of their unnerving 'benefactor'.

"Coming!" She called. "Be right there!"

She took a deep breath and centered herself, she opened the door with a theatrical flourish. "Welcome to the Happy Hotel! Where sinners come in and the redeemed depart!"

Standing on the steps was a trim, tallish cat demon with light pink fur and coiffed blonde hair. His suit, a purple Valentino, was impeccable, cleaned and pressed by a careful hand. He bowed respectfully, the ghost of a smile on his well-proportioned face. "Ma'am. My name is Yoshikage Kira. I would like to humbly submit myself to your care in the hopes that I may be redeemed. Will you accept this sinner into your fine establishment?"

Charlie's smile widened, her face alight with joy; a second customer! "Oh, of course! Of course! Please, Mr. Kira, come on in!"

Mr. Kira nodded and followed after her. She led him down the hall and to main foyer where Vaggie was waiting, spear at the ready. Charlie did a little pirouette and framed Kira to her friend, grinning like a goon. "Vaggie! Look! A customer!"

"I can see that, Charlie," Vaggie said, lowering the spear. "He got a name?"

"Yosh–"

"Yoshikage Kira!" Charlie said, grabbing his arm. "Look at him! So dapper!"

Vaggie grabbed Charlie by the wrist, looking up at Kira, something like a concerned smile on her face. "Just a second, please."

"Of course," he replied, checking his watch. "Take your time."

Vaggie pulled Charlie halfway across the room and whispered. "What are you doing?"

"He's a–"

Vaggie shushed her. "He's some rando off the street! You're just gonna let in anyone who knocks on that door?"

Charlie swatted Vaggie's hand out of her face, annoyed. "We did with Angel!"

"That's different! We know who he is, he's famous. Who's this guy? What's his deal?"

"That doesn't matter!" Charlie pointed over at the panther-demon. "He said he came here because he needs help, because he wants to be better. That's good enough for me!"

"Charlie–"

"Bup!" She broke away and returned to he new acquaintance, who was admiring the pictures on the wall. "Mr. Kira? Sorry about that. Here, allow me to introduce you to the hotel staff. This is Vaggie, she's the hotel administrator."

"Hey," Vaggie said, flatly.

"Pleased to meet you."

"And these two," Charlie said, gesturing at two winged goat-creatures. One was carrying a ladder and the other a bag of plaster mix and a trowel. "Are Razzle and Dazzle. They're the groundskeepers, cooks, handymen, and musical accompaniment."

"Musical–?"

She spun around and beamed at him, hand shooting out in front of her. "And I'm Charlie Magne, primary rehabilitation officer…and janitor."

Mr. Kira froze, his red cat-eyes wide, locked on her hand. His nostrils flared for a moment as he appeared to tense up all over. Charlie paused, clearing her throat, not sure what to make of his sudden tension. "Uhm…Mr. Kira?"

He rallied in an instant, bowing deep, almost genuflecting, as he took her hand in his. He turned her hand palm-down and kissed the air above her knuckle. "Apologies, Your Highness. I just this moment remembered that I was in the presence of royalty."

Charlie blushed and giggled, tapping him on the shoulder. "O-oh! My! What a gentleman. Please, Mr. Kira, it's just Charlie around here. I'm no more a princess than you!"

"Still, pleased to make your acquaintance." He kissed the air above her knuckles again. The points of his claws pushed out from his fingers.

She giggled and grabbed one of his suitcases. "C'mon! Let's get you feeling right at home!"

Charlie set off up the staircase with Kira following close behind. Vaggie watched them as they did, her eye narrowing. There was something…off about this guy.