Ch.15

At the next extermination meeting, Lucifer didn't attend. His daughter Charlie showed up as a representative.

Adam laughed bitterly. Wow. Now Lucifer even doesn't meet me on the hologram. Awesome. That's the answer, huh?

So Adam laughed at the princess, taunted, found fault with no reason, and put the extermination day forward.

He kicked her out and slammed the door. As the hologram meeting was over, he giggled maniacally.

"Fucking hilarious, haha! Did you see her face?" He jerked at where Charlie had been standing.

Lute narrowed her eyes in a subtle expression. "Are you sure about this, sir?"

"I'm not sure about any fucking things. I just do, whatever appeals to me, whenever I feel like doing it! Fuck yeah, This is the rock spirit!"

And Adam strummed his electric guitar again. Lute raised a brow. Adam definitely had an impulsive nature. But he was not the kind of man who could become a rebel. He had kept away from getting on heaven's nerves.

But lately, he... looked like he let himself go. As if he had given up on everything, waiting for whatever to happen.

But Adam drew a line between himself and other angels too. Lute knew he would never tell her why. She knew Adam wouldn't unlock the door of his mind, no matter how long she had hovered around. So she just sighed and left the room to give him his time.

A few months later, the first court for sinners was held in heaven at Lucifer's request. Charlie defended Angel Dust, claiming that he was an example of redeemable souls in hell. Scary angels surrounded her and Vaggie. Even though it was natural that Adam was on heaven's side, he was fidgety as if he were the object of being reproached.

"It's not fair, Sera."

Adam laughed to hide his nervousness. He felt like butterflies were in his stomach. In a bad way. A man's life is once. Case closed! Adam raised his voice to shut up the inner voices.

He exaggeratedly threatened the two demons to decorate his fear into a bluff. Then he lost his temper and ended up revealing the secret of the event by accident. He felt awful but forced laughter. As he saw the judge's expression, he just flew out of the room saying he was sorry in a damp voice.

Adam picked up his electric guitar as usual in his room. That's what he did when he needed mental recovery. He tended to do it until he could stop thinking.

This time, he seemed to play it all night.

Adam insanely played his guitar. He came out of his room and crisscrossed the palace while playing. The finale was performed in the largest hall. When he enthusiastically twanged the last note, it was almost 4:30 am. No one cared about it. He was alone there.

His panting echoed throughout the place. Adam looked around, soaked with sweat. As soon as the crazy rock music stopped, the silence came back. No sound was willing to fill the hollowness for Adam. There were only him and his echoes.

He threw away his guitar on the floor. It cried once from the impact but soon became part of the quiet. He took off his mask and threw it too. It didn't even make a sound. He lay on the floor in a sprawl.

He huffed, looking up at the ceiling.Fuck. I give up, he thought.I'm sick of everything.Every effort, searching for the reason for the endless emptiness. Sick of trying to fill it with crazy tunes or whatever, but it never worked, struggling his ass off to get credit from others, but only realizing he couldn't belong anywhere.

He was sick of living. He was sick of thinking. It wasn't even the grand thought of the end of his life or something. He just wanted to stop questioning. He wanted to stop existing, so that he wouldn't feel this shit anymore.

Now Adam knew the old and sticky dummy of emotions wasn't anger. It was close to sorrow. Or loneliness, missing what he had lost, frustration.Hopelessness.Residue of what was once called happiness.

"...Fuck! Fuck my life! Aaagh!! FUCK YOU!!"

He busted shouting with all of his strength, swinging his fist in the air like a lunatic. His yelling reverberated around the huge hall. It bounced off several times, gradually fading away.

He put his hand on his forehead like hitting and roughly rubbed his face. "Shit, you win, whoa."

How could life be shit like this? Okay, I lost. I surrender. Now I'm feeling it freaking phenomenal.

Now I know humans never dared to handle the inner void. Even more than ten thousand years couldn't beat a human's loneliness. A human could be drowned from longing.

Adam breathed deeply. He closed his eyes. Wishing to scatter into dust and disappear.

I just... wanted to know what those things were. What on earth they were, that the emptiness they left could be so big like this. How big they were that had been filling me.

How it felt when I was with them. I just wanted to feel it once more. Just once more.

It's not much I'm asking... The thing I lost and I couldn't find anymore. Just wanting to know the name of it. So in the end, I couldn't find it.In my life and even my afterlife.In earth, heaven, and hell.

The inner voice has gotten bigger and clearer, Adam even hears them whispering in his ears. He wished that if he couldn't find the answer outside, he would rather find it inside.

But it wouldn't. The voice only repeated the same word like a broken doll.

It was saying sorry again and again in Lucifer's voice.

-A day before the last extermination day-

Lucifer hadn't gone to the hotel since the first visit. Even if he was a bit shocked at the individualities at first -unholy stuff, a bunch of losers to be honest-, he ended up realizing how important it was to his daughter.

It reminded him of his old dream that people would have goodwill so that they could decide their lives on their own. People would fly freely up, drawing their own path, loving who they loved, correcting their mistakes caused by freedom, trying to be better, and doing all of this together. Not alone.

The corner of Lucifer's mouth raised slightly. He thought of who had dreamed this too long ago. Charlie was a little bit like Adam in the past. She had a hot temper but was pure, a young mind but having a strong will. If Adam hadn't lost his memory, they would have been good friends with each other.

The flow of consciousness ran to Adam now again. After Adam came to his castle, Lucifer had been thinking about him every day.

Lucifer had made rubber ducks twice as much as usual. He turned the polkas up very loud. He sang alone. He looked through the reviews on Yelp. Of course, none of them were helpful for not thinking of Adam.

This strange fate. Karma. Why are we going round and round, and coming back around each other? You found me on the apple tree. And you forgot me for good. But now you've been finding me again for more than ten thousand years.

I was with you and deserted you. But I could neither leave you entirely nor throw away our memories, so I hovered around you until now, I got found by you in the end.

What should I have done with this destiny? What should we do?

Lucifer took a deep breath. The air he inhaled touched the scars in his heart. He started to whisper the song that used to relieve the pain, in a low voice even if he knew nobody could hear.

"Twinkle twinkle little star..."

A long long time ago there was a man and an angel. One of them sang, and the other played the strings. They found each other whenever they heard the other's melody. Whenever he was alone, or in danger, or missed the other.

Now the man couldn't hear nor remember each other. Lucifer wondered what Adam was doing now. He wondered if Adam sang too when he missed someone.

On the corner of the extermination day, Sera came into the empty court of law where Emily had been disappointed by Sera's duplicity.

Sera hung her head. As one of the elders of Seraphim on duty, the blame was the fair she deserved.

A piece of paper on the floor caught her eyes. It was what Adam had written at the court.

1) Act selfless2) Don't steal3) Stick it to the man

'Sure got me here, didn't it? Right, Sera?' Adam had said to her with an anxious smirk. Guilt stung her heart.

Not long ago, Adam had snuck out of heaven. Perhaps Emily had given him a hint. Sera could imagine how easily Emily leaked about the schedule.

Sera had known him going to meet Lucifer, but she didn't get in his way.

Heaven had stopped them from meeting together for thousands of years. By a strange quirk of fate, they had been drawn to each other, like the cycle of nature.

When Adam was running away in the night, Sera had been watching him through the window, thinking about a story of the raindrop and dust.

Once upon a time, there was a raindrop falling on a fistful of dust. The drop watered the dust and turned it into soil to bloom a flower. They met just once but that was it. The dust was stuck in the ground, while the raindrop had to flow down.

The drop of rain became part of streams, rivers, and oceans. And it evaporated into the air to become a cloud. The dust sank under the sea for a long period of time, became hard rock, with the pressure and pain, and was dissolved into lava and exploded out to become part of a mountain again. They just flowed through their life cycles.

But someday, maybe, if the rain cloud passed over the mountain again, what was the probability that the same drop of rain would fall on the same dust? What if after eons, they could meet again by accident? It would be something beyond what could be called coincidence. If that miracle happened, nobody on earth could know it. Never. But only the two would truly understand the meaning of destiny.

Sera burned Adam's memo into dust. She closed her eyes, thinking about everything that had happened in the end. She thought about what hadn't been apart even ever since the world divided sky and basement.

-Eighteen hours before the last extermination day, in Hazbin Hotel-

The war is imminent. The crews are preparing for the great battle. Nonetheless, Nifty was holding a broom and Alastor was just sipping his tea, they were doing their job in their own ways.

Husk, Angel, Sir Pentious, and Vaggie took each weapon they preferred. The angels could only die from the same weapons that kill demons. What an irony. What was different between their and our lives?

They made lame jokes to reduce the tension. They laughed and chatted together as much as they could before going to bed. Because when tomorrow night fell, some or all of them might not be able to be here anymore.

...

The preparation for the party was done in heaven.

Lute checked their forces for the last time. There was no one missing apart from the first man. Their boss, Adam.

"I'll go get him. Go to your positions," she commanded the last of them on his behalf. She had an idea of where he was.

She headed to the deserted hill not far from the palace. The chapel in the middle of the field was abandoned long ago. She passed by thick grasses and pushed the old wooden doors open, and they creaked.

She could see Adam sitting in the front row of the pew. She walked up to him. Adam used to come here whenever he had crucial events ahead. Because he didn't like to show his nervousness, only Lute knew he did this.

She thought he was praying alone again.But he wasn't hanging his head down. He was just vacantly looking forward.

"Did you finish praying, sir?" He seemed to know she was behind him, so she opened her mouth.

"Yeah," Adam answered simply.

Lute scanned his face. There was a lack of light in the place, but Lute could see dark circles under his eyes. He looked tired. But he didn't look anxious. Rather, he looked calm.

"God would be upset, if he found out who you prayed to.""Haha! Nah, I bet he doesn't even care.""... So, your guardian star or whatever, did it answer your prayer this time?"

Adam smiled faintly. There was no wave or shaking in his eyes as usual. But his eyes didn't seem like a quiet lake, either.

"Lute."

They were just empty. Nothing was in his eyes. Lute was unfamiliar with his low voice.

"If I die tonight, will you take my halo?"

Lute frowned in confusion. "Why... are you saying that? You won't."

Adam didn't answer. He looked at her with a subtle smile. Lute said again, a bit firmer."You won't! You should stay with me, sir."

Adam put on his mask without saying a word. And he stood up slowly to leave. Lute got upset. "You better do so, Adam!"

"... well, I've gotta go. The hero can't be late for his fucking party. Haha!"

He just passed by her and walked up to the door. Lute was just standing there, just watching him leave.

"You got it? Adam!" She shouted at his back in vain. "If you die tonight, I'm gonna kill you!"

He only laughed, waving a hand without looking back. Then he walked far away out of her sight.

Every preparation was over. The war was about to start.On the night of the judgment, in their own way, the souls on the clouds prayed to the starry sky and the souls underground to the empty sky.

But the night sky was calm as always. Only stars are listening to them, hidden beyond.

-Two hours before the last extermination day-