Who: George, Satan Where: Hell When: Part of the Evil!Patrick Saga What: Retrieving Patrick's soul
George came down in the circle of Wrath.
All things considered, it seemed appropriate.
"This'll bring you down in whatever Circle's most appropriate for you," said the demon, a shifty-looking fellow who only looked shiftier the longer George glared at him. "Which probably won't be Sloth, I'm guessing."
"Explain the layout of Hell."
The demon squirmed. "You might as well ask me to explain the layout of New York City."
"I just might. Talk."
"I can just leave."
"No," George said, smiling unpleasantly, "you can't."
The demon stared at him for a few seconds. "Fine. Fine. Um, it's laid out like a funnel? There are circles where different people are punished, but it's not as cut and dried as Dante wrote. It's all muddled. But you can find their throne room at the bottom of it all. Just keep going down and you'll get there. The same goes for getting out, really. Just keep going up."
The Circle of Wrath, as it turned out, was blood red, blisteringly hot, and full of furious souls that immediately started trying to tear him apart. George found it strangely comforting, even as he was hacking his way through them and scraping their fluids off his armor. This had actually been his vision of Hell, more or less. He was waist deep in a river of boiling hot blood, stabbing people in the face, and he felt comforted.
The possibility of him being insane seemed more and more likely.
By the time he got out of Wrath, he was covered from head to toe in blood. It obscured the equally red cross on the front of his armor. He took a few seconds to catch his breath, wiping his sword off on the rocks around him. It glowed slightly, just as he did, being the only things for miles still in contact with God.
A few seconds was all he had before he leapt into the next circle, a splash of holy water announcing his presence. He fell into a familiar, violent trance, his entire world reduced to movement and planning. Turn, stab, retreat. Turn, duck, punch, stab. It was like a dance, one that he knew all the steps to, one that was as familiar to him as breathing.
The trance of combat took him further and further downward, past flayed corpses that were somehow still moving and crying out. Past people who were actively being turned inside out. Past people who were clawing out their own eyes. And demons, so many demons, all of which fell beneath his sword.
He cut a path through Hell, and he had no idea if he was doing it in the name of God, or revenge, or just because he needed to hurt something after so much pain.
What had to be Satan's little citadel loomed before him, carved from some kind of black stone and bending at angles that shouldn't have been possible. Words like non-Euclidean flitted through George's mind, along with some thoughts about eldritch abominations. The entire place seemed to bend inwards and outwards at the same time, to grow and shrink like it was breathing. George lunged for it anyway, demons on his heels, and practically fell through a door that he was sure hadn't been there three seconds ago.
George emerged in what looked for all the world like a conference room, Satan's sarcastic applause ringing in his ears.
"That was a very impressive show, little knight," Satan said, lounging back in one of the chairs with his feet propped on the table. "Is there a saint of hacking everything you meet into bloody chunks? Because I do believe you just earned the position."
"This is your throne room?" George said, voice emerging as a growl. His throat was burning, he realized, parched from breathing too-hot air and no water. He reached down to the container at his waist and took a long swig of holy water.
"Oh, no, this is just what you're allowed to see," Satan said. "There are rules about these sorts of things."
"You're going to give me Patrick's soul," George growled, pointing his sword at Satan.
"Yes," Satan said, nodding amicably, "I am."
"Just like that?"
"There are rules-"
"Shut the fuck up about the rules, I think you're just making those up." This was an absurd conversation. Why was he having it?
"No," Satan said, looking serious for once. Though it was hard to tell, considering that his eyes were distinctly snake-like. "You fought your way through Hell. You reached the bottom. For a damned soul, that means you can leave. For a non-damned soul, that means you can take someone with you. You're just the first person to have managed to do it."
"I'm cutting your head off."
"I swear to God."
That brought George up short.
"So settle down, Rambo." There was no flash of light or loud sound, but suddenly there was a small Mason jar sitting on the table in between them. It seemed to be full of pure light, eye-wateringly bright and beautiful. On the jar, in what appeared to be Sharpie marker, was drawn a penis and a leprechaun. "Here it is."
"You..." George felt badly off balance. "You're keeping my brother's soul in a jar?"
"Yes," Satan said, smiling. "I think he likes it there, anyway." He picked up the jar and tossed it to George, who caught it more on reflex than anything else. "Certainly more than he's going to like remembering everything he's done. I didn't know you had this sort of cruelty in you."
"I'm a Crusader," George said, still a rasp as he carefully put the jar into the small bag he'd brought with him for this. It was fastened tightly across his back to keep from jostling.. "I'm capable of unimaginable cruelty in the name of the greater good."
"There's the George I love so much. Cynical and mean."
"If I see you again, I'm going to kill you," George said flatly.
"First you'll have to fight your way back out of Hell, so I'm not terribly worried," Satan said, tongue flicking out, long and serpentine. "I don't envy your odds. And it's a much harder fight when you're going uphill."