Chapter Text
Alastor sank down on the other man’s leaking cock and the resulting moan was nothing like what one would expect from an Overlord Alpha, but instead so obscenely whorish that it rivalled any Omega’s in the throes of heat.
But Vox had always been pathetic like that.
“Well? What do you say, old pal?”, the Radio Demon cooed as he bottomed out, his tentacles constricting around the TV demon’s arms and legs to hold him in place when the Alpha instinctively tried to grab his waist.
“God, A-Alastor …!”
The Omega chuckled darkly, tilting his head as his crimson eyes roamed the sight of Vox’s shivering body bound to the bed under him.
“Flattery will get you nowhere, I’m afraid.”
He ground his hips against the Alpha’s dark blue and smooth-skinned pelvis and felt the cock twitch inside him, eliciting another moan from the TV Overlord.
“Missed me?”
“Please, Al, let me touch you …!”
The desperation in Vox’s voice was delectable, and they had only just begun! This negotiation wouldn’t take much time – with the way the man’s hips jerked with pure need to get in even deeper, there was no way the media mogul would last long. Hells, Alastor would have to make sure to edge him on long enough to come to an agreement!
He hummed in fake contemplation. “I think you’ve touched me enough while I was your captive, don’t you think? I’d much prefer it if you would keep your hands to yourself for once!”
His tentacles constricted even further where they bound the Alpha’s hands behind his back.
“Although … perhaps if you’re a good boy, I’ll reward you with a little more skin contact”, he teased while he lifted himself up until only the tip of Vox’s cock remained inside of him.
Then he slid down again, slowly, savouring the sight of that TV head glitching from the friction of the stiff length against his tight walls.
Alastor leaned down and rolled his hips with the new angle, coaxing a whine out of the demon he’d speared himself on.
Alphas were always too easy, really. All one needed was a cunt and some pheromones paired with a level-headed mind and the world lay at your feet, like prey bleeding out and thanking you for it!
Especially this Alpha …
“Oh fuck!”, Vox panted, writhing in search for more friction, more movement. “Let me at least look at – nnghh!”
“And what do I get for that, pray tell?”, the Radio Demon crooned, lifting himself up again. “You still haven’t answered my question, old chum!” He sank down once more, pressing himself firmly down to prevent Vox’s hips from bucking into him freely. “What of my proposal, hm?”
“Dammit, Al, I – ah! – I can’t … I can’t do that! – Ohh! – That would ruin my – God! – my reputation …!”
… Rising …
… Sinking …
“Your reputation is in shambles anyways, my dear!”, the Omega mocked, grinding down while rolling his hips. “If you approach this the right way, you might even spin this to get your ratings up again!”
… Rising …
… Sinking …
“Why would y-you – nngh! – even do that f-for – fuuuck! – for that dumb bitch of a princess – ah! A-Alastor!”
Because I’m not done clawing my way to the top, you moron!
“Ah-ah-ah! A gentleman never tells!”
… Rising …
Vox managed to swallow a moan to scoff at his words. “Bullshit! Just admit that you were drawn back to me after I gave you a taste of real pow–“
… Slamming down!
“Oh, fuck! Alas–!”
Vox’s outcry ended abruptly in a gurgle when red tipped claws closed around the TV Demon’s throat.
Charlie didn’t exactly approach him at the bar – he was simply already there, nursing a glass of his favourite rye, when she let herself fall onto a bar stool. Not the one directly next to him, thank the stars, but one over.
“Ugh, they’re doing it again!”, she groaned, letting her face fall flat on the counter with a thud.
“Who’s doing what again, Princess?”, Husk asked what Alastor wondered as well, instantly doing exactly what the Radio Demon had placed him here for – gathering intel.
“The Vees! I’d thought they’d learned their lesson, but they’re already twisting the truth again! We just watched the news and it’s … ugh, it just didn’t happen this way! And they don’t show how Emily helped or how Abel stopped Lute!”
“Looks like the Vees aren’t the only ones who didn’t learn their lesson!”, Alastor quipped, taking a sip.
The Princess regarded him with a look somewhere between ruefulness and hope.
“I did learn my lesson … I’m not gonna try and talk them out of lying again just so they can spin every word I say! Which is … why I hoped that … maybe you could … do that?”
Her voice grew smaller and quieter under the glare the Overlord pinned her down with.
“And why, pray tell, should I indulge your request? Because you suddenly NOW remember that the Radio Demon is well versed in media, too?”
The way she bit her bottom lip spoke of uncertainty and guilt, and yet the sparkle of hope in her eyes only grew.
“Because you came back …? That means that you care about all of this?”
The deer demon chuckled and turned towards her fully now, clapping his hands in a slow and mocking applause.
“Bravo, my dear – you’re growing! At first I thought you were a hopeless little thing, far too naïve for this world. But look at you, learning how to take advantage of people! Unfortunately, I’m not as easy a prey as Angel Dust was!”
“What?! I didn’t – … I would never –“
“– ask a victim of torture and humiliation to go back to their abuser? Oh, right, in poor Angel’s case, you INVITED them right in!”
Charlie’s eyes had gone wide with horror, distress wafting off her in an acrid smell not even the suppressants she used could block completely. It did nothing to make him back down, however. Quite the contrary – only the scent of blood would have stirred a stronger urge to sink his teeth in further, literally or metaphorically!
He was somewhat aware of the hush that had fallen over the lobby, of the dozens of eyes staring in their direction, and how his passive aura of distortion burned through camera lenses and phone screens, but Alastor didn’t let his focus leave Charlie for even the briefest of moments.
“I admit, I didn’t wish for anyone to come to my aid when I was held captive, but I was a little surprised that YOU, dear Charlotte, didn’t even try! Especially after all your promises of making guests feel like family … but then again, I DO appreciate a clever wording, and staff really are no guests, am I right?”
Her eyes had gone misty now, tears glinting in the lights of the bar.
“NO! That wasn’t a deception, I was worried about you, please Al, I’m sorry, I –”
“Spare me your false apologies and your false care, Princess!”
He slipped from his stool now to stand tall, looming over the Devil’s daughter.
“This is Hell, after all, there are no friends, only allies! And allies need to be appeased – so, allow me to teach you another lesson to further your growth as Hell’s Princess, yes?”
The Radio Demon leaned forward and brought their eyes to the same level, then offered a hand.
“I’ll help you with this PR nightmare of yours for the small price of one favour – but this time, there will be no stipulations. A true favour, at the time of my choosing, whatever it may be. What do say, Charlie Morningstar? Do we have a deal?”
She could turn the offer down and deal with her media problems on her own, be he knew that she wouldn’t. She just didn’t have it in her to just ignore the slander or misrepresentation – in that regard, she had inherited too much of her father’s angelic side. The constant dishonesty and its ripple effects within Hell’s population would continue to drive her crazy, and they both knew it.
Plus, Alastor was rather sure that he had successfully guilt-tripped her into accepting already. She felt like she owed him, even if that wasn’t quite the case, all things considered.
“Hey, what’s going on here?”, Vaggie could be heard, having left her station at the reception desk, and making her way through the mob of sinners wanting to check in. “Charlie?!”
Time was running out. Alastor’s grin widened.
“Deal.”
The Princess took his hand, and power erupted around them.
“You think you’ve given me a taste of power? Oh, your ego truly doesn’t fit your screen, does it now … Vincent?”
A shudder ran across the constrained body, and the R adio Demon felt the cock inside him throb at the use of the other demon’s human name. Alastor loosened the pressure on Vox’s throat just enough to allow for a few gasps of air and speech.
“Damn, Al, please – ah! – I wanna make – nngh! – you c-come!”
Aww, Vox could beg so sweetly if he threw his dignity to the wind, but what he was asking for now was too much to grant.
Alastor rarely ever reached a climax, which was fine since he didn’t particularly care for it. But that also made the rare occasions where it did happen rather special and therefore valuable in a way, and Vox knew that.
The Radio Demon wouldn’t grant him the satisfaction, though – he never had, and he wouldn’t start now, especially if he was negotiating a deal for someone else’s benefit instead of his own. Frankly, no one had ever earned the privilege of making the Radio Demon unravel, and the red sinner would prefer to keep it that way, leaving the experience of an orgasm to his annual heat paired with his own efforts.
“Oh Vox, you really think you could tip me over the edge?”, he scoffed, relishing the sight of the other man flinching at his words. “Such a bold claim for someone who fucks a professional manwhore on a daily basis!”
The brightly glowing blush that coloured the TV Overlord’s entire face wasn’t one of arousal, but of humiliation, and wasn’t that just a sight to behold! He would never get enough of that view!
But then Vox’s embarrassed expression turned into a smirk. “Oh, I know exactly what gets you off, old pal!”, he sneered, and the prickling of the rising charge in the air was the only warning the deer demon got.
Electricity surged through him the next moment, making his muscles lock and his back arch. It tore a strangled sound from his throat, something between a pained groan and a moan, while his inner walls clenched and fluttered hard around the cock buried deep inside him, and a sudden heat coiled in his abdomen.
Oh no, NO! Absolutely NOT!
Alastor growled, radio dial eyes meeting the Alpha’s smug grin. That bastard!
“Stop that!”, he hissed, lifting himself up while putting all the strain of his own body weight on the other’s throat, and then slamming down so quickly that now the TV Demon was the one to jerk and arch in his restraints at the sensation. “Do that again and I’ll leave our little business unfinished!”
“No!”, Vox whined before he could stop himself, but despite this little victory, the Radio Demon was well aware that he had to bring their encounter to an end sooner rather than later.
He leaned down again, further this time, pressing his whole torso against Vox’s trembling body. The other Overlord gasped when the Omega’s scent flooded his senses, making the deer demon’s next words so much more powerful.
“If you agree to the terms”, Alastor whispered, low and raspy in that special way he knew for certain made the Alpha crazy with want, “I’ll allow you to knot me …”
For a fleeting moment, he thought that the other man might have come right then and there.
“Oh fuck, Alastor!”, Vox moaned, already trying to bully the swell at the base of his cock into the red sinner’s cunt despite the restraints allowing for barely any movement on his part.
“Aww, you poor, pathetic thing! So needy!”, Alastor sing-songed, grinding himself on that knot he’d offered to take. “But I need an answer first, darling!”
That was enough to do the TV Overlord in at last. “Yes! God, yes, it’s a deal!”
Not that Alastor had expected a different outcome once he’d offered what the Alpha wanted so desperately.
Power erupted around them, black and green voodoo sigils appearing on every surface while blue arcs of electricity surged between them like lightning in a storm cloud. Feedback screeched from the various media devices mounted on the walls and scattered throughout the room until the speakers popped and the screens glitched and died with crackling white noise.
The Radio Demon finally took his claws from that dark blue throat, only to dig them into the other demon’s waist to steady himself while he started to ride the TV Overlord in earnest. He was done with teasing now and therefore set a brutal pace that drew an almost continuous moan from the man beneath him, rendering the Alpha breathless while Alastor’s own breathing grew shallow and fast.
The lack of arousal on his part always led to his body producing a bare minimum of fluids to help the glide, resulting in a rough stretch and a feeling akin to rawness with every pass of the Alpha’s cock that verged on painful but never quite reached that point. Vox loved how tight the lack of slick made his insides feel, he knew, while the deer demon simply preferred that it made for less of a mess.
It was bad enough that his insides would be filled with cum as soon as that knot finally slipped past his swollen lips down there – he really didn’t need his own fluids to add to that disgusting wetness between his thighs …
The Omega’s movements got more and more erratic as he chased Vox’s release instead of his own, wishing to reach the end of this encounter sooner rather than later. He pressed down harder and harder on the Alpha’s swollen knot with each slam of his hips, until the bulging mass finally pushed inside.
Some instinctual voice in the back of his mind that was Omega-coded screamed in triumph, but was instantly banished by the very real scream that signalled Vox’s climax and the feeling of gushing wetness against his inner walls that was the Alpha’s seed.
The room fell silent afterwards with only their exhausted panting to fill the quiet.
“Fucking Heavens … I had almost forgotten how fucking incredible you feel, Al …”, the other Overlord rasped, and Alastor’s teeth ached at the sight of utter contentment on the flat screen that was Vox’s face.
The red sinner wanted nothing more than to shove his claws right through that smiling TV head, and one day he would, but not today. Metaphorically tearing the other man’s heart out would have to do for now.
That would never cease to be enjoyable, at least!
“Unfortunately, I can’t really say the same, old pal”, he shot back snidely, watching with satisfaction as hurt flickered over Vox’s expression.
Trying to downplay the hit to his ego, the TV demon scoffed. “I don’t believe you. Sure, you’re getting a kick out of playing ‘Mr. No Feelings’ but there can’t be nothing, not when –“
The Radio Demon’s claw closed around the other man’s throat again with an iron grip, cutting off words as well as air supply.
“Don’t you dare say it!”, he snarled, red radio dial eyes ticking angrily in void black eyes while his teeth grew too long for his mouth and his antlers creaked from branching additional tines.
Vox’s bared his teeth in a defiant snarl of his own but ultimately was the first to break eye contact, and Alastor let go of him, pulling his powers back with the exception of the tentacles that still pinned the other demon to the bed. He silently commanded his shadow to hand him his coat instead, retrieving a small glass vial with a clear liquid from one of the inner pockets. The Alpha watched him down the vial’s contents with a pained expression.
“You still keep doing that …”, he commented while trying to hide the way he swallowed a lump in his throat, but the deer demon noticed regardless.
“Of course I do! I won’t ever entertain the idea of carrying some Alpha’s whelp – especially not yours!”
An Omega was much less likely to conceive outside of their heats but it wasn’t unheard of, and the red sinner wouldn’t take any chances. Of course, in the unlikely event that something did take despite all odds, there was always the option of tearing his own womb out to get rid of the unwanted spawn …
Vox’s screen glitched. “Fuck you, Alastor!”
“I’ll have to decline the offer, I’m afraid. You’ll have to watch a replay.”
“I’m goddamn serious! You should be fucking glad you ended up with me instead of some lowly shmuck Alpha from the street! We’re a perfect match! We –“
“– are NOT mates!”, The Radio Demon growled. “We NEVER will be!”
Once again Alastor was glad that he had insisted on a deal when he’d decided to allow the Alpha to stick around him all those decades ago. They would only ever have intercourse when the Omega offered the act, and always on the Radio Demon’s terms. Otherwise, Vox would have forced a mating at some point in their long history, of that he was sure.
It was the only safety measure with regards to his person he’d relied on when he had offered himself as captive. Torture and humiliation he could endure, but that …
“But we should be, and you know it! You and I, Al, we are fa–“
“Ṡ̵̫̙͚̗̤̈̅͑ͅI̴̡̫̒̊Ḷ̷̛͚̹̳̰̗̀̀̾̚Ę̵̢͎̫̰͓̀̆̂Ņ̸̢̰̖̝̈́̒̅C̷̺̭̊E̴̩̿͐̂̈́̊!”
His shout manifested in the room in a booming sound wave that shattered the windows. The stench of the city – although highly diluted at this height – flooded the suite, as well as the cacophony of a city that never slept, its citizens constantly fighting and killing each other, or worse.
Vox obeyed with gritted teeth, but Alastor knew that it wouldn’t take long for the Alpha to recover. However amenable the other demon’s post-coital brain might have been, it was quickly being overwritten by anger.
“My, you haven’t changed at all, have you? I still find it astonishing how seamlessly you’re able to switch from being a sentimental fool to thinking that you’re somehow entitled to my person just because of some annoying patch of discolouration on my skin, and it’s just as disgusting now as it was seventy years ago!”
Vox’s screen glitched heavily, flickering between emotions too fast to discern them all. The deer demon could feel the air grow charged with electricity and quickly decided that he was done here.
He’d gotten the deal and fulfilled his part – no need to stay any longer.
The TV demon’s knot had just barely started to deflate but luckily that was no hindrance for a demon like Alastor. He let his shadow grab the rest of his discarded clothes and then vanished into a puddle of darkness, leaving the infuriated Alpha behind.
.
…
.
Alastor didn’t stop in the lobby when he arrived at the hotel in his shadow form, making a beeline for his tower instead. He needed to clean – no, cleanse – himself from what remained of his encounter with Vox, and an extensive, scalding hot shower and fresh clothes were the bare minimum.
The red sinner scrubbed every inch of his body with an excessive amount of scentless soap, skin and fur, and didn’t even spare his ears. Getting all the water out afterwards would be a personal kind of Hell even the masochistic demon usually took great care to avoid, but he knew that if he left them out of the procedure, his mind would plague him with constant reminders of that oversight.
The Omega also downed another dose of Anti-Spawn – including the glass vial – despite the odds of getting side effects from the overdose like retching his guts out later, being all but in his favour. The many shards cut the inside of his throat open when he swallowed, followed by a sharp and hot burn when he gulped down four fingers of rye immediately after.
The pain sent a shiver down his spine while the alcohol made warmth bloom in his stomach and the demon let out a growled sigh at the contrasting sensation. The taste of copper from his own blood kept ghosting against the base of his tongue even after the wounds had already healed a few moments later.
Now he felt better. More like himself.
More in control of his body and his mind.
Now all that was left was to finish what he had started and tell Charlie that her little promotional problem had been dealt with.
Not by her dear daddy, but him! And their deal was truly in place now, without so much as an inch of wiggling room!
Since she wasn’t present in her office when he stopped by, he concluded that the Princess was busy with a one-on-one therapy session, thus Alastor decided to pass the time at the bar down in the lobby. She would surely make an appearance there sooner or later for one reason or another.
Husker began pouring him a drink the moment he saw the Radio Demon approach, sliding the glass of neat rye over once Alastor sat down.
“Something wrong, boss?”, the cat demon asked after taking a few moments to study the Overlord, and Alastor raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
“What makes you say that, old cat?”, he inquired instead of answering.
“Well, you’re usually not drinkin’ this early in the day, is all.”
The Radio Demon hummed. That much was true, and there was no point in denying it
“Just a bit of negotiations between Overlords”, he responded vaguely.
“Ah.”
Alastor really didn’t like how much understanding and insight that simple sound conveyed, but before he could utter a warning to Husker to mind his place, Niffty scurried up to them. She inhaled deeply, her one eye going wide with her pupil narrowing to a terrifying degree, before suddenly summoning a strongly smelling cloth.
“You stink of HIM!”, she accused the Radio Demon, starting to climb over his body and swiping the surface of his clothes.
“Niff, stop it, I already showered and changed!”, the Overlord objected, grabbing the tiny cyclops and holding her at arm’s length while she wriggled in his hold.
“NO! You stink of Alpha, you stink of HIM! Must clean you, must clean!”
That … was a strong response, even for the little Alpha maid. She had always reacted strongly to the Radio Demon being even near Alphas for any length of time, which was rarely avoidable due to most Overlords being Alphas. But a reaction like that tended to only occur when he was close to – …
No, that couldn’t be!
“Niffty, this is uncalled for! I –“
“Uhm, boss?”
Alastor’s gaze flicked to the bartender, and he was pleased to notice the cat demon flinch under his stare.
“What?!”
“You, uhm … Did you check your calendar …?”
Ruby and red eyes turned into crimson radio dials.
“I do know perfectly well what time of the year it is! I have two more weeks!”
Husker’s whole body went tense with concern for his own wellbeing. Still, he seemingly felt compelled to speak his mind.
“Are you sure, though? Your scent is … well, a little off …”
The Omega Overlord glared at his owned soul … and then lifted his free hand to his mouth, pulling the fabric of his sleeves down with his teeth and licking the scent gland on his wrist.
He tasted nuances of swamp water and peaty rye and … strawberries.
Alastor froze for a moment, ears drawing back.
The taste – and therefore the scent – wasn’t pronounced yet, but far from the faint fruity sweetness it should have been.
“Fuck.”
He didn’t know whether it had been the knot or the fact that it had been Vox of all demons, but the encounter had clearly triggered his oncoming heat early, and now he was already entering pre-heat.
No wonder Niffty was rather frantic about him having the smell of an Alpha attached to him, faint as it may be after the extensive cleaning he’d put himself through …
Alastor groaned in defeat – his annual cycle was the one thing he could do nothing about to remain in total control of himself, and he loathed the fact.
“Husker, I shall prepare for seclusion immediately. If I don’t catch the Princess today, tell her that Vox and his crew are bound to report truthfully about the war-that-wasn’t for the remainder of the month, and that VoxTek is compelled to either portray the hotel truthfully or not at all till the end of the year, starting this instant. On a personal note, I shall be unavailable for the next seven days … well, make it ten, just to be sure.”
“Understood, boss.”
“Good man! Here, take care of Niffty for me, will you?”
“Sure …”
“Nooo, must clean, must remove the stink from you!”
And with that, the Radio Demon downed the rest of his rye and left the bar, painfully aware of the trail of pheromone-laced sweet scent he left in his tracks.
Chapter Text
Lucifer usually didn’t take the stairs. Teleportation and portals came easy to a being as powerful as him, and had the extra built-in bonus of limiting contact with random sinners to a bare minimum.
He had promised Charlie to socialize more when he had moved into her hotel – to try and get to know them. At least the ones truly interested in redemption, and those could hardly be the bottom of the barrel, right?
And he did try, truly! Remembering names was just hard in general, and even harder for a being that had been created with a purpose instead of a name. Every other angel had been ‘sibling’ back then, long before the distinction between ‘brother’ and ‘sister’ was even so much as a thought, and names had come even later.
Those had been invented for humans.
The prospect of using the stairs was especially dreadful now with so many sinners flocking to the hotel after having seen the very first redeemed sinner on screen, proving that there was indeed a way out of this, well, hellhole. But using his magic in a way that affected his body tended to reopen his still healing wounds from that blasted energy-draining machine he’d been stuck in, and the last thing he wanted was for Charlie to find him somewhere panting from the pain and with golden stains soaking through his clothes. Injuries caused by angelic steel really were a bitch to heal.
He had assured his daughter that he was fine, after all. And he would be – it just took a little longer this time around, totally normal considering the circumstances …
Stepping out of his suite was the easy part. There were only two rooms on the top floor of the hotel, and Alastor’s lay on the opposite end of the hallway, so it was relatively unlikely to run into the annoying bellhop right now. Still, Lucifer made sure not to linger too long and headed straight for the stairs. The elevator would have been a preferable option, but with so many guests now occupying the building, chances were high that he’d have to wait longer for the cabin to arrive than he liked. The last thing he wanted was for the red sinner to pop out of the shadows and mock him for being a lazy ass, ugh.
A small creature scurried up the stairs and darted into Alastor’s side of the hallway. It looked like a caricature plushie of a demon, black and white and stitched together with green thread. Red pupilless eyes ignored the King as the wannabe voodoo doll skittered towards the Overlord’s door with a sack over its shoulder, and the fallen angel gawked in the surprise when the black sigils warding the door glowed with a sickly green light and then opened for the creature. The little minion slipped inside through the small gap, and then the door fell shut again.
Weird.
Two more of the little puppet minions passed him on his way downstairs, both of them carrying sacks with who-knows-what inside, and none of them paid him any mind.
What was going on?
When he got down to the lobby, things got even stranger. For one, there was a tension in the air unlike anything the King had ever felt in the hotel, not even at the hight of what had apparently been a slander campaign against his daughter and her hotel prior to the almost-war. Secondly, he noticed the smell – a concoction of unsuppressed Alpha pheromones that hung heavily in the air like cigarette smoke in a bar.
That in itself wasn’t really surprising – the hotel required for guests to use scent blockers as well as heat or rut suppressants, and while most Omegas were already on medication to hide their designation for their own safety, the same couldn’t be said for Alphas. Why would they choose to hide a status that put them above the other secondary genders by default? Why would they deprive themselves of pheromones that served to intimidate weaker Alphas and Betas in general, and could force Omegas into outright submission?
Heck, Lucifer usually shifted into being an Alpha for those very reasons, since an overpowering scent was one of the very few ways he could truly enforce his status as King of Hell towards the mortal souls he was doomed to rule, especially now that his inability to use direct violence against sinners had been laid bare.
Stupid TV head … If that motherfucker hadn’t already known back then that the Devi’s threats were all smoke and mirrors as he was crashing the sinner’s public event, the guy probably wouldn’t have been able to withstand the scent cloud Lucifer had bombarded him with while circling the Overlord …
Box, or whatever his name was, had been prepared. Maybe he’d been drugged to the nines with whatever new shit people came up with nowadays, who could say, the fallen angel had never been interested in keeping up with the ways sinners made each other’s lives even more miserable than they already were.
Which was exactly the reason why Alphas didn’t even dream of pretending to be something other than what they were, let alone act on it. Cutting themselves off from an advantage in Hell was equivalent to pulling a predator’s teeth and claws out, and no sinner trying to survive – let alone thrive – in this unforgiving environment would even consider making this decision.
Unless they wanted to try for redemption, that was. Most Alphas that entered the hotel for the first time usually left without checking in once they got informed of the requirement for self-medication, but a few had signed in. Either way, that meant that the lobby was the area where pheromone-induced scents were the strongest and tended to accumulate, and it had only gotten worse since Charlie had proven that the hotel worked and redemption was possible.
But today seemed particularly bad, though. Lucifer flicked his tongue to probe the many intermingling flavours, instantly regretting how the thick smell felt like a film coating his tongue.
Ew!
The most prominent smell was classic Alpha musk, with notes of leather, coal, cedar, tar, damp earth, and black pepper – but underneath these scents lay a sweet fragrance that sent a shockwave through the Devil’s system: the strawberry-coded scent of an Omega nearing their heat.
Oh.
Oh fuck.
Lucifer immediately aborted his idea to go to the kitchen to fetch some breakfast and made a beeline towards the front desk. He needed to speak to Charlie about this, but first he had to find out where she was right now. There were so many different therapy sessions available to the guests and almost all were run by the Princess herself, so it was hard to get a hold of her sometimes, but if anybody knew where his daughter currently was, it would be her girlfriend.
Only that said girlfriend wasn’t manning the reception desk, as the bold lettered sign “BACK IN 5 MIN” indicated.
Damn.
The King pulled out his phone and opened his daughter’s contact.
>>Hi – <<
“Duckling! Listen, there is a –“
>> – there! I’m currently conducting a therapy session and can’t answer your call, but if you leave me a message, I’ll contact you asap! Speak to you later, bye!<<
Oh. Double damn.
Well, he could wait five minutes, no problem.
Or he could see if that grumpy bartender knew where Charlie was …
“Hey there, uhm … friend!”, he greeted, earning him a raised eyebrow and a polite nod. “Do you know where I can find my lovely daughter? There seems to be an Omega with a little bit of heat problem running around, so, you know, we gotta handle that before some people get ideas, if ya know what I mean …”
“Yeah, but don’t worry, your Majesty, it’s already being dealt with.”
“Oh? Oh, good! Thank Father, I was worried there for a sec, I mean can you imagine –“
The door of therapy room 102 suddenly burst open and off its hinges when a tiger-striped crocodile demon was catapulted out of the room. The sinner crashed through the golden railing lining the first-floor gallery and down into the middle of the lobby, where they landed with a chorus of sickening and definitely bone-breaking cracking sounds.
“Ah shit, here we go”, commented the cat demon with a sigh.
Charlie came running out of the therapy room, looking down to where the unfortunate soul – oh, hu, an Alpha no less – was slowly trying to rearrange their limbs. “Oh gosh, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?”, she yelled, her voice equal parts hopeful and horrified.
She then hurled around. “That was totally unnecessary, Al!”
Wait, the bellhop?!
Said annoyance of a demon stepped through the busted-out doorway, straightening the lapels of his coat with his eternal smile turned into a snarl of absolute disgust.
“I asked him to take his hands off me!”
“But you didn’t even give him a second to comply! Besides, he was clearly driven by instinct –“
“Which is no excuse, my dear!”
“I know! This is exactly why we have the A/O-Suppression Medication Program for all guests, so that these things don’t happen!”
Alastor’s snarl turned into a dismissive sneer. “Precisely, my dear, that’s a rule for guests to adhere to! Allow me to remind you that I’m neither a guest nor do I seek redemption. We had this discussion already – don’t make me repeat myself, Princess!”
The Overlord turned and started to walk away from Charlie, and Lucifer felt his horns and tail sprout at the blatant disrespect this Omega dared show the King of Hell’s daughter! He should teach this unruly deer a lesson in how to behave around his better, he should –
Shit, he should get fresh air, all these Alpha pheromones clouding the lobby were starting to get to him, urging him to exert his inert dominance over anyone who dared to challenge him or his beloved offspring. He needed to protect her, he needed to –
He needed to let her fight her own battles, fuuuck, coming down here had been a mistake!
Meanwhile on the gallery, Charlie hurried after the red sinner. “Al, listen, please! This is about the safety of our guests! Any Omega living under our roof must be able to feel safe, including you –”
The Radio Demon spun around with a shrill whine of feedback, making the Princess flinch back. “I don’t need your protection, Charlotte Morningstar! Don’t you dare tell me how to handle my own body!”
The thread of self-control that had restraint the bubbling Alpha aggression in the Devil’s consciousness snapped.
His wings emerged from his back and with a single sharp snap of all six of them simultaneously, the fallen angel propelled himself up to the first floor. He landed on the railing, wings spreading wide in a threat display while the King released wave of pheromones meant to force the sinner in front of him into submission.
“Know your place, Omega!”, he growled, flames licking between his bared teeth.
Alastor stumbled backwards until his back hit the wall. His ears dropped to the sides, his smile pulled into a surprised grimace while his pupils blew wide, almost swallowing the ruby of his irises completely.
Lucifer’s lips curled upwards into a triumphant smirk – until he was hit by the cloud of pheromones the other man had instinctively released, and it swept over the Devil’s mind like a tidal wave, turning the aggression boiling in his blood into a possessive hunger that rooted itself deep into his groin. He felt his cock fill and harden while his olfactory sense was flooded with the scent of strawberries, sweet and ripe, with underlying notes of water and rotting greenery and rye, which shouldn’t have blended together at all, and yet it filled the King’s mind with a sense of wildness that was strangely alluring.
Holy shit, Alastor was the Omega approaching their heat?!
The Overlord suddenly surged forward, and the fallen angel found himself grabbed by the lapels of his coat and pulled down a little, and oh fucking Hell, the red sinner was so close, almost nuzzling against the crook of Lucifer’s neck but without making actual skin contact, sniffing him like a bloodhound taking in the trail of game, and that totally didn’t sent a shiver down his spine, nope, wasn’t happening!
And then the Overlord let go of the fallen angel just as quickly, shoving the Devil away with a push that almost sent the King to topple backwards over the railing. The stag’s pupils had narrowed into slits now, the snarl was back in place, only his ears were drawn back defensively.
“Alpha.” The word wasn’t simply spoken – it was spat with the same disdain Heaven had regarded sinners with prior to the snake guy’s – what was his name again? – ascension. “What do you want?”
It sounded like an accusation, and Lucifer was suddenly left for words.
“I – … I mean, you – …”
“Me?” The Radio Demon’s expression turned from condescending to sly, and his ears perked up. “My, did his Majesty come here to proposition me for my heat?”
Charlie gasped, and the Devil felt a burning warmth creep up his neck and face – and the worst thing about that was his inability to tell whether that scorching sensation was caused by mortification or arousal.
A red tipped claw tilted his chin up despite the King’s already elevated position due to him standing on the railing, and although he was therefore literally forced to lower his gaze to even hold eye contact with the Overlord, he’d rarely ever felt more like the one being looked down upon.
“I usually don’t sell my heats out, but I might be persuaded to make an exception …”, the Radio Demon continued in a low, sultry voice. His pupils were dilating again and it made desire coil tightly in the fallen angel’s guts, Father help him, shifting into an Alpha had been a decision he was already deeply regretting. “For the right price, of course!”
“Alastor!”, Charlie shrieked. “That’s my dad!”
Alastor turned his head to look at her, but didn’t take his hand from Lucifer’s chin, who remained frozen in place like a goddamn puppy grabbed by the scruff of its neck. “I’m aware, my dear, hence the exception!”
“He’s married!”
“Oh?” The stag’s gaze returned to the fallen angel. “Did you finally check? Bond’s still holding?”, he quipped with a dark chuckle.
Anger flared in Lucifer, finally breaking whatever spell he’d been under. He swatted that damned hand away from his face.
“You better mind your tongue, bellhop!”
“Or what?”, the red sinner snapped. “You’ll smite me? Ha!”
The deer demon then turned his back on the King and Princess of Hell, and Lucifer’s Alpha pride howled at the wordless insult.
“Hey, we’re not done here!” He jumped from the railing, grabbing the taller man’s arm.
“DON’T TOUCH ME!”, Alastor bellowed as he whipped around once more, pulling his arm free while his body elongated with the movement, eyes turning into spinning radio dials and his antlers branching into a multi-pronged rack –
CLACK!
One of the antlers suddenly dropped from the red sinner’s head, and they all froze. Lucifer stared at the blackened piece of bone in open disbelief, and when he finally looked up again, Alastor’s expression was one of utter loathing towards the misbehaving half of his rack. Then his hand came up to the other half, gripping the main beam and pulling. The antler came loose with sickeningly wet Crack!, leaving behind a bloody stump that was quickly obscured by red hair.
“There!”, the Radio Demon growled, shoving the antler piece into Lucifer’s arms while a tentacle picked up the other half from the ground and dropped it into Charlie’s. “Have a trophy, both of you, since one could argue that this is all your fucking fault!”
Alastor didn’t leave them enough time to recover, let alone respond – his shadows surged to engulf him, and then he was gone.
Father and daughter stood there for a moment, dumbfounded or shocked or both.
“What the Hell did just happen?”, Lucifer asked no one particular and Creation in general.
“I … I don’t know?”, Charlie said, her voice thin and uncertain. She gripped the antler as if she was seeking comfort in the presence of the black bone. “He came looking for me during art therapy to tell me that he’d fulfilled his part of the deal, but that his heat was coming on earlier than expected, and –“
“Wait, hold on, apple pie – what deal?”
“Oh, I, uhm …” His daughter gave him a crooked and apologetic smile. “So … I kinda asked him if he could talk to the Vees and convince them to stop twisting the truth about what happened …” She trailed off.
Lucifer blinked. The heat inside him turned into a fire that had nothing to do with lust.
“And he asked for a deal?!”
“Yes”, Charlie nodded, and then grabbed his arm when the flame between his horns blazed with fury. “But it’s okay, dad, I was really asking a lot of him there considering what they did to him, so it was only fair that he was requesting something in return!”
“What did he ask of you?”, the King demanded to know, stifle the urge to growl at his beloved daughter. And what did those Vees do to Alastor?
“Just a favour, dad, nothing more!”
“A favour? An unspecified favour?!”
She bit her bottom lip.
Oh, that red fucker!
“Please, dad, it’s okay! He won’t ask anything bad of me, I’m sure!”
Lucifer’s lips twitched. His sweet daughter, always hoping for the best in sinners, even if they were manipulative, scheming, tall and slender and delicious smelling –
No, stop, bad Alpha brain! Heavens above, the effect the Omega had just had on him was unfair, really, to the point of making him consider taking the bastard up on his offer at least a teeny-tiny bit …
… which had nothing to do with the fact that his mating bond with Lilith had been weakening for decades and now he could barely feel it anymore, which in turn did not add to his depression and loneliness, and feeling inadequate and unworthy and … broken …
Ugh, he needed to switch out of this damned Alpha gender! It only made his spirals of feeling inferior worse, especially if he couldn’t even assert his dominance over one damned Omega, Overlord or not, who was supposed to submit and stay that way, and not blink out of it with a look of –
Oh.
Oh.
Right … Alastor had been affected by Lucifer’s pheromones just like the Devil had been by the demon’s, and once the sinner’s heat was in full swing, the stag – or rather doe now, ha! – would have an even harder time to resist the call of a proper Alpha!
All Lucifer had to do was to make the bellhop relinquish the deal with Charlie in exchange for a good dicking down, knot and all, to ease his heat! And afterwards, the pompous Overlord wouldn’t even be able to look at him without being reminded of who the Big Boss of Hell truly was! Two birds with one stone!
He’d invited the Devil in, after all, hadn’t he?
Charlie looked at him with worry marring her pretty face, right, he should assure her that all was well, because it soon would be!
“Alright, duckling”, he said, patting her hand. “You’re right, it’s gonna be fine!”
He would make sure of it! Best dad in all of Creation!
His plan was infallible, after all!