Hellraiser: In Nomine Liwyathan

Disclaimer: Alright! Here's the sequel to my HR fanfiction, Beyond the Gates of Hell. I had spent quite a while planning this sequel, and yet, to full comprehend the ideas was a challenge unto itself for me. I hope you guys enjoy it.

"In these four things, opinion of ghosts, ignorance of second causes, devotions towards what men fear, and taking of things casual for prognostics, consisteth the natural seed of religion; which by reason of the different fancies, judgements, and passions of several men, hath grown up into ceremonies so different, that those which are used by one man, are for the most part rediculous to another."

-Thomas Hobbes

"A limbo large and broad, since call'd The Paradise of Fools to few unknown."

-John Milton

No tears, please. It's a waste of good suffering.

Part One

Hell.

In what way could one describe such a place? Hell was simply a term used by the damned and the tormented who were taken to "suffer" imaginations far over the reaches of experiences; but to those who dwelt within, it was paradise in flesh, blood and endless suffering beyond impossibility.

But even such pleasures became tedious for some. Some like Xilonen.

She had spent over a century or so in hell and she was still learning the proper ways of the Cenobite. Pinhead was to teach her everything he knew about the knife and the hook, so to speak. He had told her that every Cenobite was different in their own way. They each had a different skill that set them apart from the rest. Xilonen had yet to discover hers. It was frustrating to a certain extent because she HADN'T discovered it.

"You will in time," Pinhead told her, standing over a cold metal table where a man was lying, his mouth wrapped in latex and his arms stretched so far from the straps that held him down.

Xilonen shut her eyes as Pinhead sliced into the man's naked back, drawing a shrill scream from his lips. It wasn't the sight of the suffering soul before her that caused such a reaction, it was the lack of one from him. She opened them and stared at her lover with dismay. "But when can I expect for this to happen, Xipe?" she protested, "I have certainly been here a long time, haven't I? Doesn't it ... click into place eventually?"

Pinhead glanced up at her skeptically, an amusing gesture that seemed more human than Cenobite. "24 human years does not constitute a long time here, I'm afraid."

Xilonen uttered a frustrated grumble and turned around, her hair fluttering against her pale cheeks. She seemed ashamed by her assumed powerlessness. What could she gain or hope to gain if she remained in such a condition?

"And. .. " Pinhead continued, watching her as he slipped a hook inside the man's trembling right cheek, pulling it taut to the tearing point, "You have yet to pay your dues to Leviathan. Not a single soul has been taken here by your hand."

Xilonen whirled on him angrily. "You said that didn't matter until I was ready!"

"I said that it would matter once you knew that you were ready," Pinhead corrected, giving her a small chiding glance, "I cannot tell you when you are ready to take the final flight. You alone must decide that." He placed a bloody set of pliers onto a smaller table.

Xilonen scowled angrily at him, frustration and irritation in her voice. "This is useless!" she snapped, "I'm going for a walk!"

Pinhead glanced back as she brushed passed him and disappeared from the torture chambers. "Ahh ... what do you say to her behavior, my friend?" he asked the straining, moaning soul at his table, "Certainly she requires more time that I cannot give."

The man whimpered and struggled to speak beneath his bonds. Pinhead chuckled dryly and nodded. "It's always good to share with others, isn't it?"

As the screaming of Pinhead's victim faded beyond stone wall and memory, imbued in the texts of the Labyrinth as every damned soul here often was, Xilonen strolled down a corridor to do some serious thinking on her own. Xipe had always been around when she needed him, but lately she was feeling lonely; he always chose his mission above all else and took pride in being Leviathan's favorite son of choice. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but Xilonen had never had real time with him the past few years.

Cutting away from those thoughts, Xilonen noticed that she had never ventured down this pathway before. There was strange laughter in the air, psychotic perhaps, but certainly not threatening. Xilonen was intrigued and she continued down her designated path where the stone had changed. The walls were decorated with peculiar instruments of torture and even child's play; like a circus from hell itself. There were strange clown faces melted into what no longer looked like stone but a thin reddish leathery ooze.

Xilonen paused and at the end of the corridor stood another Cenobite she had never met before. He looked strangely similar to a clown with two faces; one was a classical smiling clown with pale skin and bright colored makeup, but his second face underneath was that of a sad old man with yellowish eyes and bright green hair. He also had a shaved head with hooked chains stretching his forehead completely to the straining point, his mouth had been molded into a permanent grin, he had rather blank, tired looking eyes and numerous cuts along his chest and stomach. He was wearing a classical Cenobite's leather bound suit.

"Who are you?" Xilonen asked.

"Wooareyooowoooaryooo?" the Cenobite hissed, in a bone - chilling high voice; when he spoke, his lips seemed to strain to move with his words in a painful way, "Why does it ask who I am when it doesn't even know who it is?"

Xilonen glanced over her shoulder briefly before she frowned at the strange creature. "How should I respond to that?" she asked. "I am Xilonen, second to the Gash of ... "

"That is the name of what they call you," the Cenobite answered, slowly beginning to pace back and forth in a lazy, casual stride, watching her carefully, "I just want to know ... who you are, fellow Cenobite. Who are you?" He exhaled, as if the answer had been heard so many times, it bored him. "You don't know who you are? What a shame ... "

Xilonen wasn't quite sure where he was going at with this, but nonetheless, she stood straight, posing herself as the bride of the leader of hell's army. "Just what are you trying to prove here, friend?" she asked, her voice dripping with almost human sarcasm, "I am in no mood to play your silly little clown games."

The Cenobite laughed softly and clasped his hands together, as if the concept amused him. "Clown games!" he gushed, his high voice making his words sound more eerie than before, "I love that!" He beckoned for her to follow. "Come! Come and see what I mean! Come!" When she didn't move, he beckoned even more this time, fervor in his voice. "Come on!"

Xilonen would have refused any other time, but she wasn't in the greatest of moods and maybe, just maybe his games would cheer her up to an extent. So she followed him down his path and they entered a chamber that looked like the inside of a circus tent surrounded by various props and gizmos. There was an amphitheater filled with rows upon rows of children. Children dressed in black robes that looked to be too big for them with every inch of their heads shaved.

Xilonen looked stunned by the audience. She had never expected to see children in the Labyrinth. "Children?" she said, "Here? How can this be possible?"

"They are Too - Innocent - to - be - Truly - Damned," the Cenobite responded, leading Xilonen to one of the seats, "The innocent children that managed to solve one of Hell's puzzles were placed under my care for all eternity. Leviathan didn't wish for them to cause such disorderly chaos here, so I must entertain them." His high voice began to lower and lower until Xilonen could hear true misery in his words. "Such a waste ... "

Xilonen looked around the chambers of true human horrors; a woman pinned to a rotating table surrounded by knives and hatchets, a man dangling from a rope and belching flames. His body was wrapped tightly with barbed wire, a fleshless monkey playing an accordion made entirely of ribcage and intestines.

There was a sign that hung from the center stage that read in bright gold letters: MR WINKY DINK SHOW OF HORRORS!

So that was his given name, huh? What a strange name it was. She watched as he entered the stage with a smaller version of himself - a midget - who was pushing several boxes and tools of every shape and size onto the stage.

"Hello boys and ghouls!" Winky Dink announced, "Welcome to the Winky Dink show! I'm your host, with the most, Mr. Winky Dink!" He paused as the children cheered and laughed. "I will be with you until the end! We have many tricks in store for you all today!"

Another round of cheers.

"Before we begin, I'd like to introduce our special guest, Princess Xilonen!" A small beam of light seemed to reflect down onto the female Cenobite from above the chambers and he laughed. "She has graced us with her presence today, let's not disappoint her!"

Xilonen wearily waved at the cheering audience members as they clapped for her.

"And now, for our first trick ... " Winky Dink announced, dramatically, "I will pull a rabbit out of a hat!"

A rabbit from a hat? Wow. Not very creative. But nonetheless, Xilonen sat at attention. She watched as Winky Dink's assistant walked up with a black felt hat and placed it in front of him. With a few dramatic gestures, Winky Dink reached into the hat and yanked out a ... rabbit?

It was a rabbit, that much was certain, but its flesh had been completely rotted away into a squealing, decayed mess. The crowd gasped with shock and amazement. Xilonen rolled her eyes with a groan of disinterest. What a particularly weak trick of child's play.

"But wait, there's more to this trick than just mere child's play!" Winky Dink announced, as if he had read her mind. He walked up to the woman bound onto the table and placed the screaming thing onto her face. She groaned weakly, her body so physically drained that it became impossible to think until she noticed the creature on her face. Her eyes went wide and she screamed, just as the rabbit slithered down her open mouth.

The watchers gasped with amazement as the woman twitched and jerked like a seizure patient before her belly button started to swell like a balloon before the flesh peeled back like fleshy, oozing flower pedals blossoming. The woman wailed in agony as her innards fell to the floor with sick, slippery sounds. The crowd cheered while Xilonen frowned and looked around at the children, bewildered by their delight.

How could children be happy with such things? Xilonen may still have had some lingering mortal feelings and they told her that children shouldn't even be here in this world. Not human children, anyway. Why were they even here?

After the show, Xilonen met up with Winky Dink to talk about what he was trying to tell her through his visual display. She was surprised to hear that he had no real agenda in his presentation and he had merely wanted to meet her.

"I know you have had trouble with ... fitting in here," Winky Dink said, leading her to his chambers; they were the same as the stage.

Xilonen fingered with a teddy bear that had the stitching falling out. It had no stuffing, but was filled with many tiny glass shards. "If you haven't met me, how did you know about that?" she asked him, frowning.

Winky Dink laughed softly. "Are you kidding me, child?" he said, "News is no object of secrecy here in the Labyrinth. Everyone knows everything. I was wondering, however, when you would travel here to my domain. I was hoping to have met you so that we could speak."

Xilonen took a spot in one of the stone chairs and crossed her legs. "I'm at odds with everything," she told the Cenobite, "Not as much as I had a few years ago, but I always have been. I feel as if I am missing something. Something vital."

"That is the very spirit and youth of your age," Winky Dink said, taking a spot across from her, "The heart of it. What's fascinating is ... you are so much like myself in a way." He leaned back when she squinted at him skeptically. "I meant regarding reflection. The others. They are decadent ... utterly useless. They cannot reflect anything of the past or the future. But ... you do. You reflect ... your humanity in a sense the way I do. You reflect its broken heart."

Xilonen frowned at that, unsure of whether or not to chastise him for his opinion. What if he was right about that? She did think of the human world every once in a while. Could that be helped? Didn't everyone here do that at least once?

Winky Dink chuckled bitterly, as if what he said to her reflected what he was at the same time. "Only you are free. You are a Cenobite with a human soul still intact. An immortal with a mortal's passion. Such a strange, yet beautiful combination of beings into one."

Xilonen was surprised by the words from the clown. When she had first laid her eyes on this being, she figured that he was just a petty joker with no real views or mentality. But he was actually sad to be here, sad to be a Cenobite, but he was too weak to defy anyone, including himself. It was interesting to meet one like that because Xilonen knew that no Cenobite ever recalled their pasts save for herself to a much lesser degree.

"What about the children?" she asked him, "Why are they here?"

"They solved the puzzle ... long, long ago," Winky Dink answered, grimly, "Leviathan decreed that they were too innocent to truly suffer in hell, so he charged me with guarding over them, to prevent them from running rampant."

Xilonen nodded with a humorless chuckle. "I see."

"Forgive me, child, but I must go," Winky Dink told her, rising, "I have a next session to perform in 14 hours. Must plan ... "

She stood up as well, watching the Cenobite exit his chambers with a sort of slouch to his pace. As soon as he had departed, Mahes paced his way through the massive doorways toward Xilonen. He stretched his body out and gave a low, chattering yawn. She reached down and stroked his damp, muscular spine with one hand. The animal made a soft, rattling purr and rubbed his head against her arm, pressing insistently against it.

She wasn't sure why she still felt like this. It took the words of a clown to tell her that she still felt out of place in this world. She had to find her place, find what would make her happy. Maybe there was a way that Leviathan could help her with that. After all, she still had to pay her dues. What better way than to ask for help from her God?

O

"You seem upset, my princess..."

Xilonen had taken a long walk to Xipe's torture chambers where a man was hanging by chains and hooks with his lower torso missing entirely. He was suffering the worst kind of pain imaginable, but it didn't seem to bother him at all. Xipe had dragged this man-well, he practically walked into hell on his own-here from a mental institution. Supposedly, he had been a psychiatrist who had killed many people after his wife had left him. It drew him into a bizarre and disturbing psychosis.

But he acted perfectly calm and normal.

He called himself Dr. Happy, but his name was Robert Holloway.

"Robert, I fear that my husband has lost interest with me," she told him.

Robert furrowed his sliced, blood - soaked brow with dismay. "Aww, now that isn't true, princess," he assured, "Xipe has always concerned himself with his work ethic to please the God of this world and of the next, you know that."

Xilonen hated being charged with torturing this man only because he enjoyed it too much and she would usually become bore with it in minutes. But a job was a job until she was truly able to venture out into the human world with Xipe and the others. She picked up a whip filled with glass shards before stepping behind Robert and readying it. He just grinned back at her with delight, eager to receive his suffering.

"So what should I do, doctor?" she asked, skeptically. She drew the whip back and brought it hard against his back with a wet smacking sound. He didn't utter a sound save for a slight widening of his eyes and a sharp inhale.

"Perhaps you should speak to him about this," Robert answered, "Remind him that Leviathan's word is law, but you need him just as much."

Xilonen smiled thoughtfully, winding the whip up into a tight bundle. "Hmm ... maybe you're right, I will talk with him when he returns from his trip." She whistled into the darkness and two bizarre - looking shapes emerged, squealing like infants. They resembled tiny mouths with wiggling stumpy legs that quivered like jelly. They had no eyes, rather fleshy, stretched skin. Xilonen watched as they began to nibble hungrily on Robert's exposed entrails. "Goodnight, Robert."

He called back to her with a smile. "Goodnight!"

Upon returning from their summons, Pinhead, Chatterer and Nikoletta announced to Leviathan their recent acquisitions; two young female souls. Twins even. Such a rare find these days to have twin souls with a chance at the same suffering. As the Cenobites later went their separate ways, Xilonen caught up with Nikoletta.

"Hello, can I have a word?" she asked.

"Certainly," Nikoletta answered, "Is this about the new souls we've collected?"

Xilonen looked over the Cenobite woman's head to catch sight of anyone else before she grimaced. "Not... entirely."

Nikoletta tilted her head curiously before she began to understand. "Ah, I see, It is about Xipe then."

"Yes and no." Xilonen admitted, "He hasn't shown much affection lately and I am concerned that he has lost interest in me."

"That's no surprise."

The cold, cruel voice of Angelique turned both Cenobite's heads. She was standing there in her human flesh, leaning against the wall with one hand. Xilonen and Nikoletta glared at her while she casually studied her perfect nails.

"What do you want?" Xilonen asked, harshly, making no attempt to hide her irritation.

Angelique shrugged a single shoulder. "Nothing. I was just bored and thought I'd go for a little stroll," she replied, calmly, "I didn't know I'd find our poor little princess going through domestic problems with Xipe." Her voice dripped with cunning. "I shouldn't have missed it all, but you know me."

Xilonen took a step forward, but Nikoletta's hand on her shoulder stopped her. "Back of, Angelique," Xilonen warned, "You have no idea what I can do."

Angelique laughed at the threat and raised two hands in a mocking display of submission to her. "Oh no, you're absolutely right about that, Xilonen!" she sneered, "In fact, I don't know what you can do...and neither do anyone else."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

A derisive scoff. "I think you know what it means."

Nikoletta gave Xilonen's shoulder a slight push. "Don't listen to her," she told her, gently.

"No, she's right," Xilonen said, quietly, "I have been unable to prove much these days."

Angelique laughed cruelly and brushed roughly passed them, her shoulder shoving into Nikoletta's and nearly knocking her over in the process. "Give it a few more days and Xipe will throw you away like a piece of trash that you are!"

"She has some nerve calling someone used trash ... " Xilonen snapped, shaking her head with dismay.

Nikoletta looked at her with a glimmer of worry. "What will you do?" she asked, sensing that Xilonen was just itching to start a fight with the other demon. "Surely you realize that fighting amongst one another is forbidden without just cause."

"I'll find some 'just cause'." Xilonen promised, her voice dripping with menace.

Nikoletta let out a low sigh of weariness that she was famous for. Only instead of her usual boredom, she seemed more concerned for Xilonen's safety. Angelique may have been a pest, a nuisance to every Cenobite here, but she was also not one to be trifled with. She exceeded Xilonen in age and even more so experience. Not to mention that Angelique was also very cunning. She had a tendency to play dirty when it came to her methods of soul acquisition.

It would be a terrible thing for her to meet an end to Angelique.

"Just be cautious," Nikoletta told her, gently.

Little did she know how much she'd eat those words.

O

Note-So...what do you think so far?