@thedemonconstantine - from HERE
“You do know that they’d really toss you out and then you’d have to come back in again to take another queue number. That’s part of the gag,” Tim said the obvious just to get it out of the way. He pried Yoyo off his shoulder to fit the owl into the front of his hoodie. The cosier the bird got, the less irate it would be at John.
Smelly Smoke Man die…
Timmy warm and cosy Timmy.
Cosy and warm Timmy…
“Yes, Yoyo, now be good and stay there whilst we figure out how to move this along. Why actually…” “S67003426B to Counter 5,” Said the speaker overhead.
A simple prestidigitation spell should do the trick. Tim swapped their ticket with the one demon who was making his way towards Counter 5, took John’s arm and dragged the man along.
“Ahem,” Said Tim who waved the swapped ticket at the imp seated at Counter 5, having cut in front of the demon. The poor creature blinked and squinted at the ticket in his claws and groaned, threw both hands in the air and shuffled back to wait with the rest.
“I believe it’s our turn to be escorted to Dahak’s offices?”
“State your name and business,” The imp leered over his scrolls and books and tried his very best to look important.
“I’ll have to announce you, you know.”
The dirty look John shot Tim was perhaps a bit unwarranted, but by now the magician was past caring about fairness. Besides, the Nines were supposed to bring out the worst of you, so, for how he saw it, his being rude more than justified.
If something, it was almost required in the land they were dwelling in.
"Aye, aye, I bloody know tha'. I've been 'round dis block already, lots o' times, even if yeh keep actin' like 'm some fuckin' green'orn," he grumbled under his breath, but that was the extent of his show of displeasure.
After all, the teen had placated the stupid angry bird and spared him an ugly encounter with Yoyo's too sharp claws, and that alone demanded some gratitude.
When he was suddenly grabbed and dragged towards the counters once again, though, that awareness didn't stop him from wishing that he hadn't been so lenient. It was a desire purely born out of pettiness, because Tim had performed a clever, obvious trick John himself felt like he should have come up with himself.
Again, that was the nature of Hell, bringing out a person's worst. In this case, the childish resentment of a man too absorbed in his trouble to tap into his own smartness, unfairly directed towards a friendly third party.
Still, he allowed himself to be manhandled, without opposing much resistance. His inner displeasure aside, he wasn't stupid enough to stand in the way of something that brought him closer to his goal.
The Imp behind Counter 5, an unlucky sod who was just trying to do his job with some self-respect, seemed the best scapegoat for Constantine's repressed frustrations.
"Are yeh for bleedin' real? Yeh know who we are, e'ery insect in th' whole bloody Nines know!" He hissed, stabbing the glass between them and the clerk with his index. "And our fuckin' business is ours alone, th' bloke we're seein' knows woh we're 'ere for."
Despite his open hostility, he was well aware that this kind of attitude would have led him nowhere. And, especially, the last thing he wanted was to give Tim another pretext to lecture him about how he should have conducted himself.
Not to mention that the scowl on the clerk's face promised a scene he knew he couldn't afford.
"John Constantine n' Timothy Hunter, 'ere to see Dahak," he added in a quieter tone, through gritted teeth. "We gots an appointment. N' tha's all 'm sayin' 'bout me business."
The Imp offered them a withering glare in return, but then he puffed his chest out, conveying more dignity than he could ever hope to have in his existence.
"Not so hard, was it?" He asked in a patronising tone, his eyes smirking while his mouth remained in a flat line. "Follow me. You are expected."
"...Gobshite," John muttered under his breath, but he fell in step with the demon as the latter walked out from behind the counter, escorting them towards one of the many doors that led to the main offices.
The corridors the travelled through are crowded with low-ranked devils, scurrying around to fulfil their tasks, no matter how trivial they were. Getting a coffee order wrong could mean demotion at best and endless torture at worst, so they knew better than to screw it up.
In a way, it was like being back in the Limbo once more, with too many people ready to bump into you without the slightest care.
Dahak's office was, as it turned out, on the ninth floor and, for some senseless reason, there was no elevator to bring them up there. Constantine could have sworn that he had seen plenty of lifts, all working and ready to be taken, but then again, this was Hell. The only easy way a damned soul could know was the one who had led it into the Pit. From then on, everything else was supposed to be fatally difficult.
So, up the endless staircases they went, up and up and up, until they finally reached their destination...and John was coughing out a lung yet again.
So much for his recent, heartfelt oath of never going through such a hardship again.
