When I awoke in the morning, at seven sharp, as I always do, the bedroom I and my wife took such pride in simply reeked of blood. I could almost see the foul odor, wafting about the room much like a red mist, localized entirely within my bedroom. Yes. And I knew who the culprit was. Underneath the bed, I could hear the lightest of snores, a soft breathing, every exhale adding to the already obnoxiously thick mist of blood. Without even checking in on how the demon now residing underneath my bed was doing, I got out of bed, energized and ready for the day, as I always am, went to the window, and thrust the shutters open, allowing the red mist to escape outside and flee with the wind.

The light snores from underneath the bed stopped the very second I could smell something other than blood, and without skipping a single beat, Arthur rolled out from beneath the bed, swivelled to his feet, and blinked with one eye like a frog, in less than a second. He’s not a demon for nothing, I suppose. He was mostly naked, apart from some black boxers that mad eme glad he wasn’t a complete beast. Bending my back a bit, I noticed his oddly professional suit, folded neatly by the foot of the bed, with the bowler hat on top. Arthur himself, well…

His hair was all fuzzy, and seemed to be slightly longer than it was yesterday. His horns also seemed a little bit longer, but it may just have been the light. But that wasn’t really the part that stood out. Almost his entire face and upper body, plus his hands and arms, were covered in blood. Well, dried blood, thank God. It seems he had quite the feast yesterday. I can’t say I’m much surprised, but… it’s still wierd, seeing such a cheerfull and innocent kid covered in blood from head to toe.

Our eyes met. I had no expression on my face. He didn’t seem to recognize me, furrowing his brows instead of smiling as he always seem to do whenever he saw, well, anyone. He’s a real smiler. “Good morning,” I said to him, noticing my wife squirming a bit under her covers, extremely unwilling to get up in the mornings. But she usually did, after a while. “Hey, Arthur, I need you to get out of here,” I told Arthur sternly shooting a gaze and a nodd at my wife meaningly. His brows furrowed further, before he took a look back, noticed her, looked back at me, and seemed to realize something. His eyes opened wide and he gave me a lackadaisical smile. “Oh! Right! Good awakening, yes!” he half-shouted, finally returning to being, well, Arthur. “Not so loud, to the kitchen. Now,” I said, guiding him to the kitchen with a hand half on his bare back. He was very warm. Around 50 celcius, I’d say.

“I’ll go to the kitchen and eat breakfast,” I told Josey as I exited the bedroom. She grunted in resignation. I carefully guided the groggy demon from hell to the little table, got him to sit down, and grabbed my usuall breakfast. Yogurt, an apple, and a glass of cold water. Excellent. Arthur had a rather long face. “What’s the matter,” I asked him, not looking up from my excellent breakfast at all. “Well, I’m not hungry at all, that meal yesterday left me quite full, but… what exactly are you eating?...” he asked, clearly being unable to hide his disgust in the least.

“What do you think it is?” I asked curiously. I’m not sure what exactly exists in Hell, it is quite the mythical place, and I’m not too much of a catholic, but… from what this guy eats, I don’t think there’s too much cattle or the like. Arthur was silent for a moment, most likely in deep thought. “I’m guessing that white goop is bile or semen, that green thing must be a heart or a kidney, although is looks really weird, and that clear liquid must be the fabled “water”,” he said with a straight face, forehead wrinkled in thought. Hm. No, that’s not what I’m eating. The water was right, but that’s about it.

“This is yoghurt, this is an apple, and this is water,” I said, pointing to each of the items in order. Arthur followed my finger with his gaze, apparently trying to make sense of it all. He was just about to say something, when out of the corner of my eye, I could see a door slam open, and a little girl burst into the room. Patty. She looked at me, calmly eating my yoghurt as if it hadn’t just been called bile, and then to the other end of the table, where Arthur sat, staring at her in extreme confusion(his most regular emotion, I’ve found), Arthur being not only a demon with tiny wings, a tail and horns, but also entirely covered in blood. All and all, he made quite the stunning visage. Had I been quite right in the head, I’d probably have had exactly the expression of fear, disbelief, surprise and morbid curiosity that my young daughter was currently displaying quite well.

She gave one yelp, and ran right back to from whence she had came. Interesting. I looked at Arthur. Arthur looked at me. “Go hide,” I told him as I put another spoon-full of yoghurt in my mouth. Arthur stood up, looked around, and ran towards any nearby door, which just so happened to be the door to the cellar.

Arthur ran like the wind. That little girl had really looked terrified. Had he done something bad?... Nah, can’t be. Maybe it’s because he’s only in his boxers?... Yup, let’s say that. Arthur ripped the door open, fled inside, and shut it behind him. He was immediately met with darkness. Thankfully, since demons live in perpetual darkness, Arthur had absolutely no problem noticing the stone stairs descending before him. Arthur could hear a commotion brewing behind him and decided to make a run for it.

“There she goes at it again. First, she says I kill girls and butcher them, and now, she says I’ve made a deal with the devil, and just so happen to do this by the kitchen table, both of us dressed only in boxers?” I told Josey. Patty was hiding behind Josey, clutching tightly to the brim of her nightgown, looking at me extremely accusingly. Patty was no lier, that I knew. In fact, everything she said about everybody was the objective truth. But since she said such outrageous things about me, well… in short, she’s a liar with no redeeming qualities.

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Josey looked at Patty, and then looked at me. She had a complex expression on her face. She hated punishing just about anyone, but how else would you handle a liar like Patty? “Patty! What have I told you about lying?!” Josey shouted, turning around to face Patty. “B-, but I rewy saw it! He hawd howns and a taiw and wigws!!” Patty defended herself, despite her eyes tearing up at suddenly losing her one defence against her serial-killing satan-praising demon-worshipping father.

There was a loud rumble in the stairs of someone coming downstairs. I already knew it was Seth. Within seconds, his pimple-covered, snow-white face popped out from behind the wall, his normally tired eyes, with heavy black bags beneath them, looked unusually energetic as he proved that he had been listening in on the whole exchange. “What’s all this about a demon?” he said, trying his hardest not to smile as he said this. Seth was the one real satanic in the house. Better make sure he never meets Arthur, all his dreams would be crushed.

“Patty is accusing me of treating a demon to breakfast,” I told him in order to put down any hopes he may have. He took it like you usually do. “Oh,” he said, turned around, and went back to sleep. Frankly, it was quite the surprise that he could get up at this hour at all. As for Patty… well, she’s usually running about at any hour. She’s a light sleeper. “You can just go right back to bed, Josey, I’ve gotta eat this and get to work soon,” I said, trying to disarm the whole situation. Josey seemed to accept it well enough, nodding quietly as she carried Patty back to her room.

Arthur decided pretty quickly that it would be dangerous to touch anything since it might be a bomb or something, so he just sat in a corner of the damn wine-cellar, waiting out the conversation going on above. After a little while, everything got quiet. There was a knock on the cellar door. Arthur gulped. “Wh-, who’s there?...” Arthur cautiously asked. The door opened with a creak, and a sliver or light slithered down the stairs. Then it creaked back closed again, and Arthur was left again in the darkness and silence. He slowly climbed the stairs on all fours, and at the very top, right by the door, he found his clothes. And on top, he saw a little note, saying “Get cleaned, being covered in human blood is hardly a flattering look here.” Arthur could somewhat understand. He grabbed the coat, removed the voider, and stuck it right on his boxers. He hoped to the good Lord below that this would work.

Tap tap. He tried opening the door. He could not. Great! He soundlessly slid right through the door, and was right back where he had come in. It was bright. His eyes had to adjust, but soon enough, he could easily navigate through the room and to wherever he was going. He was in the kitchen. Steve was still sitting by the table, slurping his yoghurt. Arthur sneaked up behind him, something he was very, very good at. “Where do I clean myself?” Arthur whispered into Steve’s ear. Steve shuttered at this, but otherwise made no visual remark of the sudden question. He didn’t even bother remarking to himself that a demon was literally whispering in his ear. “Up the stairs, right on the left,” Steve whispered back before immediately taking a sip of his water. Arthur nodded, thanked, and went on his little trip about the house to find A. the stairs, and B. the bathroom.

The kitchen was the heart of the house. Over there was the cellar, that way the bedroom, and that way was outside. There was only one door left that could possibly lead to his destination. Arthur didn’t even bother testing if he could open it or not. Only extremely powerful spirits could move material things without, and Arthur probably wasn’t one of those. He slid through the door, and was met with a hall. It went to the left and right. To the left was a single door, and to the right he could see, well, nothing, but if he looked straight ahead, he could see parts of the stairs, so he went right, and sure as hell, there it was. Arthur patted himself on the back for his amazing detective work.

Arthur went up the stairs, and was met with another little hall. There were four doors in total, two on the left, two on the right. Right on the left. Right or left. Hm. Arthur decided to just check all the doors just to be sure. He popped his head into the first door on the right and was immidietly hit by the unmistakable smell of human (teenage) sweat. The entire room was black, the walls were covered in a myriad of posters, some having that star the voider was shaped like, some having strange demons that looked like they came straight from the 6’th or 7’th circle, and some with humans and big sketchy-looking words Arthur could barely read. The floor was covered in a black mat, but this was extremely hard to notice, since it was also covered in clothes, and strange square things(records) and a variety of other, unidentifiable things. To the left was a desk absolutely covered in things, and to the right, there was a very soft looking bed, from which Arthur could hear loud snoring. This was probably not the right room.

Arthur popped his head back out. Never again. He tried the first door on the left next. It was very, very white. The floor was shiny, and the walls were shiny, really everything was shiny. It reminded Arthur of big, square scales, the kind only the strongest of humans and demons had. To think humans had access to these kinds of materials… Arthur was quite stunned. But what really grabbed his attention was a little sign on the right of the room, right by a metallic sheet so polished he could see the whole room(but not himself, for some reason(probably because he was just a spirit at this moment)), that said “cleanliness is a virtue”, which made Arthur think that this probably was the place. Arthur entered.

On the right there was a strange altar that seemed to have religious use, which was connected to the metallic sheet and the sign. On the left, there was a large white tub-looking thing. Under the metallic sheet, there was a little handle, and underneath the handle there was another little white tub. Curious. Arthur was very curious. He turned the lever to the left. Nothing happened. To the right. Nothing. But then, he tried to turn it up, and that fabled water started flowing out of it! Whoa!! Arthur turned off his voider before holding his hand under it, despite the fear that it may be lethal. The blood he was covered in simply dissolved and went away. Arthur gasped. I see!

Arthur spent the next quarter or so cleaning himself up, getting bloody water all over the floor. When he was done, he happily turned the voider back on, made his way downstairs and back to the cellar, got dressed, and stood proudly in the kitchen, hoping Steve would come along soon.