Chapter Text
The bedroom was thick with satisfaction and smoke. Vox stretched languidly across the sheets, a blanket draped carelessly over his lower half as he stared at the ceiling with half-lidded eyes. His screen face flickered with contentment.
"Oh! Ah! Today was perfect. Right, Val?" he sighed, folding his arms behind his head.
Valentino sat beside him on the bed, similarly undressed, his arms bound decoratively above him. He took a long drag from his cigarette, glass in hand. "Uh-huh, sure, babe," he murmured, distracted.
Next to the bed, still bound to that damned chair, Alastor sat in rigid silence. The mask remained fixed to his face, and Vox's discarded clothing lay in a mocking heap at the Radio Demon's feet. Static crackled in the air like suppressed rage.
"Hmm? And what do you think, Alastor?" Vox asked, turning his screen toward his captive.
Alastor's head jerked away. The radio static intensified.
"Oh, why the long face?" Vox laughed, rolling out of bed with fluid grace. He hummed as one of his wires retrieved Valentino's glasses while another plucked the cigarette from the moth demon's fingers. Vox took a leisurely drag, then moved toward Alastor, yanking down the mask and blowing smoke directly into the demon's face.
More static. More fury.
"Mh-hmm. Mm. Isn't this nice?" Vox purred.
With a flick of his wires, he dragged Alastor—chair and all—across the floor as he dressed himself. Soon enough, they stood before the massive crimson window overlooking Pentagram City, Vox in his sharp suit and Alastor still bound and bristling.
"Look at all this," Vox gestured grandly at the sprawling hellscape below. "I know you feel it too. And to THINK you could have had this all and without the public humiliation."
Screens materialized behind him, displaying their recent encounters for Alastor's viewing displeasure. Vox laughed. "Yeah, this calls for a celebration!"
"Hmm, yes, not like you haven't been doing that all day..." Alastor muttered darkly.
Another wire-assisted pull brought Alastor to a chair opposite Vox's desk. The television demon settled into his own seat with predatory ease.
"Whiskey? Gin? I could call up and get you a Sazerac?" Vox offered mockingly.
Alastor remained silent, his hair falling across his eyes like a crimson curtain.
Vox sipped his drink, savoring both the liquor and the moment. "You know I've waited for this moment for almost seventy years. I'm curious. What makes the princess and her crappy little hotel so great that the RADIO DEMON gives up what little dignity he had left to help out with it?" He lifted his foot, placing his heel beneath Alastor's chin, forcing the deer demon to look up. "Or, how a guy from the thirties landed in Hell and somehow became one of the most powerful Overlords?"
Static filled the air like a brewing storm.
"Tell me how," Vox demanded, his voice dropping to something menacing.
"Mm, nope. Our deal is for me to be your captive. I don't have to tell you anything."
Alastor turned his head away sharply. Vox readjusted, feet on the desk.
"Seriously? You usually love to run your mouth. But I guess being a BRAT is kind of your THING, isn't it?" As he spoke, Vox's wires turned Alastor forcibly back around.
Alastor laughed—a bitter, cutting sound. "You'd be nothing without those two."
"Excuse me?"
"You really haven't changed, have you?" Alastor's voice was soft, almost pitying. "Still so reliant on all those around you."
His face darkened. His eyes began to glow with eldritch light as shadows writhed and coiled around his body, responding to his rising anger.
"Always seeking someone to put up with your incessant—"
Wires snapped around Alastor's mouth, cutting him off mid-sentence.
"You know, I think I prefer the silence," Vox said coldly.
But Alastor's voice emanated from a speaker anyway, distorted and crackling. "What? Don't want to be reminded of how desperate you were for attention? Back then, you and I were as close to equals as I'd imagined down here."
His smile was closed but glowing as the words poured out. He leaned back against the chair with false casualness.
"You had your decent ideas, you were growing your power, and it was almost impressive." A pause. "And I respected you."
Vox's claws dug into the desk, splintering the wood. His eyes widened, electricity crackling across his screen.
"And then you went and ruined it," Alastor continued, each word a carefully placed knife. "I thought you found me... what was it? 'Inspiring'?"
The word hung in the air like a curse.
Vox's screen glitched violently, his expression going pale. The present dissolved, giving way to memory—
Decades Earlier
They sat at a bar together, two Overlords in their element. Alastor wore his pilot outfit, drink in hand, while Vox leaned forward with earnest enthusiasm.
"You're inspiring! Really! And when you think about it, modern entertainment actually started with radio."
Alastor set his glass down with a soft clink, humming noncommittally.
"Ah, am I boring you with my compliments?" Vox asked, a nervous edge creeping in.
"Perhaps."
Vox's screen flushed with color—a blush, unmistakable. "Well, look, I'll just get to the point. We've been close for a few years now, right? I mean, people know us, they love us. And with new Overlords popping up every day, and before you hit me with a—" He affected a poor impression of Alastor's voice, "—'Well, you're pretty new yourself.' I know, okay, but I'm much more forward-thinking, so it's in your best interest to hear me out."
"I'm listening, pal." Alastor gestured to the bartender. "Barkeep, another whiskey."
Vox smiled, looking away as electricity danced between his antennae. The bartender slid the drink over, and Alastor tossed a coin in return.
"So, I've been thinking, Alastor." Vox's voice dropped, became more intimate. "With your incredible power and my massive influence, we would be unstoppable. Radio AND video. Me and you—we could rule Hell, together, as partners."
He extended his hand for a handshake.
Alastor began to chuckle. Then the chuckle became a laugh. Then the laugh became something uncontrollable, wild and vicious.
"Oh, that's— Oh, you're serious?" Alastor buried his head in his arms, shoulders shaking. "Ah-ha-ha, come now, Vox! I knew you could be pathetic at times, but I didn't realize you were so WEAK."
"What?" Vox's laugh was hollow, uncertain.
"Oh, fuck!" Alastor hit the table, wiping at his eyes. "You need me to join your team. And here I thought you might actually be approaching my level, but asking for assistance? A partnership? I am quite disappointed in you."
Vox looked down. His vision blurred at the edges, going hazy and dark. His hands trembled.
"I— I just thought, you know, since we're friends—"
"FRIENDS?!" The word exploded from Alastor like a gunshot. "There ARE no friends in Hell, Vincent! I thought that was something you understood. How embarrassing."
The words landed like physical blows. Vox's screen flickered erratically. His hand—still extended for that handshake that would never come—slowly lowered to the bar.
And beneath the humiliation, beneath the rejection, something else stirred. A secret he'd been carrying, a truth he'd been building the courage to share alongside his proposal. The words had been on the tip of his tongue: Alastor, there's something else. I'm pregnant.
But now those words died, unspoken and bitter, choking him from the inside.
Alastor stood, adjusting his coat with theatrical flourish, completely unaware of what he'd just destroyed—what he'd never know existed at all.
"Do take care, old friend," he said with mock pleasantry, the endearment now a twisted joke.
Vox sat frozen at that bar, his extended hand slowly curling into a fist, the secret growing heavier with each passing second. He would never tell him now. Never.
Some doors, once slammed shut, could never be opened again.
Present Day
Vox's screen flickered back to the present, the memory still raw after seventy years. His jaw clenched as he stared at Alastor, bound and bitter in that chair.
All this time. All these decades. And Alastor never knew what else he'd rejected that night—never knew about the life Vox had carried alone, the choice he'd had to make without his so-called "friend."
”You think your little mockery is gonna make me cry?~♪ That I'm bawling ‘bout the past that could've been?… ♪”
The penthouse was finally quiet. Valentino had left hours ago, and Alastor had been returned to whatever hole Vox had decided to keep him in. The television demon sat alone in his office, staring at the city lights below, a half-empty glass of whiskey in his hand.
His screen flickered as he replayed the confrontation in his mind. Seventy years, and the wound still felt fresh. Seventy years, and Alastor still didn't know. Still didn't—
Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt.
Vox's attention snapped to his phone. The caller ID made his screen brighten immediately: AVA🩵 with a little heart emoji next to it. His entire demeanor shifted in an instant. This wasn't a call he could miss. This wasn't a call he would miss.
He swiped to answer, and his screen transitioned to video chat mode.
"Ava, sweetheart!" His voice was warm, genuine—so different from the cruel mockery he'd used with Alastor just hours before.
The screen filled with the face of a young girl, no more than eight years old in appearance. She had rich brown skin and long, flowing brown hair with distinctive streaks—pinkish-red on the left, cyan blue on the right. But it was her eyes that were unmistakable: Vox's eyes, hypnotic and sharp, though organic rather than digital. When she grinned at the camera, her teeth were cyan and pointed.
"Dad!" she squealed, her whole face lighting up. "I've been waiting all day! You said six o'clock!"
Vox glanced at the time display in his peripheral vision. 6:03 PM. "I know, I know, I'm sorry, princess. I got... held up with work. You know how it is."
"Mmm-hmm." Ava flopped back on what appeared to be a dorm room bed, holding her phone above her face. "Overlord stuff?"
"Something like that." Vox set down his whiskey and leaned back in his chair, getting comfortable. "How was your week? How are classes?"
Ava launched into an enthusiastic recap of her week at the Arcadia Academy, the most expensive, most exclusive, and most secure boarding school in the Greed Ring. She talked about her mathematics class ("boring but easy"), her demonic arts lessons ("I made Miss Grimshaw's hair catch on fire, but it was an ACCIDENT"), and the drama with some kid named Dustin who thought he was so cool just because his dad owned three casinos.
Vox listened to every word, his screen displaying little reactive expressions—raised eyebrows, amused smirks, exaggerated shock at the appropriate moments. This was his favorite hour of the week, bar none.
"Everything else okay? No one giving you trouble?"
Ava's expression flickered—just for a second. "Well..."
Vox's screen sharpened. "Well, what?"
"It's nothing really. Just... some of the older kids were asking why I don't look like them. She gestured vaguely at her organic features. “Like an imp or a succubus or even a hellhound.”
Vox's jaw tightened. This wasn't the first time. "What did you tell them?"
"What you told me to say. That not all demons look alike.”
“And how did they react?”
“They laughed at me. Saying I look a human.” Ava said.
Vox could agree. She did resemble a human. More than anyone would have guessed. She didn’t have obvious demonic parts like a tail or sharp nails. If her eyes and teeth were demonic, she could easily pass as a human. But perhaps when two sinners make a kid together, their kid looks like their parents back when they were human.
"Kids always think everything's weird," Vox said gently. "You know why we keep things private, right?"
"Because Hell is dangerous and you have enemies and if they knew about me they might try to hurt me to get to you," Ava recited dutifully. “That's why I'm here in Greed where it's safer."
"That's my smart girl." Vox's voice was soft. "I know it's not ideal. I know you'd probably rather be closer, where I could visit more often. But—"
"But you can't travel between rings 'cause you're a Sinner, and I can 'cause I'm Hellborn, so this is the best we can do." Ava smiled, though it was a little sad. "I know. And it's okay. Really. We still get to talk every week."
"Every week," Vox confirmed. "No matter what. That's a promise."
They talked for another forty minutes. Ava showed him a drawing she'd made in art class—a surprisingly good rendering of the Pentagram City skyline as seen from above. Vox told her about a new show VoxTek was producing (the age-appropriate details, anyway). She asked if Valentino and Velvette said hi (they didn't, but Vox said they did). He asked if she was keeping up with her training (she was, mostly).
Finally, Ava yawned, covering her mouth with her hand—those cyan teeth flashing.
"Tired?" Vox asked.
"A little. We had training today and Professor Moros made us do like a hundred laps."
"Then you should get some sleep, princess."
"Okay." Ava hugged her phone to her chest. "Love you, Dad."
Something in Vox's chest—his digital, electrical heart—constricted. "Love you too, Ava. More than anything."
"Even more than being on top of the Overlord food chain?"
"Especially more than that."
Ava giggled. "That's really sappy."
"Yeah, well, you bring it out in me. Now go to sleep."
"Fine, fine. Same time next week?"
"Same time next week. I promise."
"'Kay. Night, Dad."
"Goodnight, sweetheart."
The call ended. Vox's screen returned to normal, and he sat in the sudden silence of his office. He looked down at his hand—the same hand he'd extended to Alastor seventy years ago, the same hand that had been rejected.
That night at the bar, he'd had two things to tell Alastor. The first was the partnership proposal. The second... the second had been much more important.
I'm pregnant. I'm going to have a baby. Our baby, if you want to be part of this.
But Alastor had laughed in his face before he could say the words. Had called him weak, pathetic, embarrassing. Had made it crystal clear there was no "friendship" between them, let alone anything more.
So Vox had walked out of that bar, hand pressed protectively over his stomach, and made a decision. He would do this alone. He would keep Ava safe, keep her secret, keep her away from the chaos of Pride and the cruelty of Overlords who would use a child as leverage.
Alastor had never known. Would never know.
And after today, after everything that had happened between them, Vox was more certain than ever that it needed to stay that way.
He picked up his glass of whiskey and finished it in one long swallow.
"To secrets," he muttered to the empty room, his screen flickering. "And to the things we protect."
Somewhere in the Greed Ring, a little girl with mismatched hair streaks and cyan teeth drifted off to sleep, unaware that the Radio Demon—bound and bitter in a distant tower—had no idea she even existed.