Chapter Text
The Radio Demon did not fall in love. Love was a weakness he could ill afford. One that could be exploited by other overlords against him. It was a lesson he had learned once in life and he would not forget it in death.
He did not fall in love.
It was all a game.
Or at least— that had been the plan.
Where had it all gone wrong?
As a rule, Alastor was not accustomed to his plans failing. He was, after all, a master strategist, a chess player of the highest caliber who was always planning ten moves ahead.
Every action was calculated.
One did not simply fall to Hell an all-powerful overlord who toppled other overlords by not calculating the risks involved. Sure there was the all-encompassing hunger, but his eating habits were carefully considered. He had learned, after a few decades or so, even to make friendly acquaintances amongst other overlords. Zestial was a particular favorite. The arachnid overlord was brilliant as he was, and far older and that alone made him a powerful acquaintance should Alastor need it. Then there was his dear friend Rosie, leader of the Cannibal Colony. He had even managed to be one of the few overlords with a direct connection with Lucifer himself.
But love was not even a consideration for the overlord.
Alastor had always been partial to the brilliance and beauty of spiders, it only made sense he would be caught in one of their webs sooner or later.
* * * 6 weeks earlier * * *
Vox! That meddlesome, vexing, thorn in Alastor’s eternal side had annoyed him for the last time. His latest little stunt of a fit had been the final straw. The television overlord had been desperate to find himself in Alastor's good graces since the moment he Fell in the '50s and the man had been an insufferable terror ever since. He did not take No well enough for an answer.
But what to do about it? Alastor considered this option carefully. He had already knocked Vox off the air for the time being and that alone was delicious enough retribution but it hardly seemed to quite make the impact that he wanted. No, Alastor had promised that he would make the other overlord wish he had stayed gone, and so he would.
An opportunity presented itself almost immediately as Alastor returned to the hotel lobby from his radio tower and caught sight of Angel sitting at the bar, enjoying a cocktail and bugging Husker. Alastor’s grin widened as an idea formulated in his mind.
A wonderfully, terribly, awful idea.
If Vox insisted on pestering him, then Alastor would simply have to pester him right back.
Angel was Valentino’s best employee, and Valentino being Vox’s—lover? Boyfriend? Business associate? meant that Vox would have front-row seats whenever the insufferable moth threw a tantrum. If Angel was kept away from his boss, well then Vox would simply have to deal with Valentino unfettered and utterly unhinged. Alastor had heard the rumors of the fights between the two overlords. A smashed screen for Vox was not an unheard-of occasion. It was almost too delicious, he thought gleefully as he snuck up to the bar in his shadow.
“Ah, Angel, my good fellow. Just the spider I was searching for.”
“Since when?” Angel asked dubiously.
Alastor merely laughed, “Such a card, I’ve always said. Husker, why don’t you get Angel here a real drink?" he said, then turning to Angel added, "I’m certain one with a discerning palette such as yourself could appreciate the subtle differences in top-shelf alcohol compared to the swill you’ve been served in the past.”
“Eh, a drink’s a drink, so long as it gets me shitfaced I’m happy.”
Alastor tsked, “This just won’t do.”
Husker eyed him suspiciously but grabbed the alcohol from the top shelf and poured Angel a proper drink, whiskey neat, as per Alastor’s exacting standards. Angel took the cocktail, eyeing it suspiciously as if he expected it to be poisoned. Wouldn't be the first time.
“I’m usually more of a Cosmo gal myself but eh, it’s free,” he shrugged knocking it back. Alastor eyed him, shaking his head.
“Angel, my dear fellow, it is customary to sip such a drink.”
“It may be customary, but this gets the job done fasta. If ya tryin’ to help me get plastered you gotta let me do it my way.”
Alastor shrugged but decided not to intervene as he gestured for Husk to pour another for Angel. Husk kept eying him, but he kept pouring drink after drink, as Alastor kept up with just his one. Once Angel was decidedly drunk, Alastor covertly waved a hand behind the spider, an electromagnetic field washing over him; nothing big that would cause harm, just a little something to fry the circuitry of his damnable phone. He grinned delightedly to himself and finished off the last of his drink.
Assuming that Angel realized his phone was broken and had a new one overnighted, Alastor could theoretically keep this up indefinitely. More importantly, if either overlord dared approach the hotel, Charlie had given him a not-so-implicit carte blanche to do what he deemed necessary to protect the hotel. He had done so when Sir Pentious had attacked and he would do so if Valentino or Vox tried anything. It was a deliciously devious plan if he did say so himself, and more importantly there was very little consequence for it. Either Valentino or Vox would attempt to take Angel away by force and find themselves eliminated as a result, or they would simply grow weary of the endeavor of sending him phones that would find themselves mysteriously broken by the time they arrived and give up. Why with the help of his shadows, Alastor could ensure that they never left Vox’s warehouse without already being in tatters.
It was tempting to get greedy in this game of cat and mouse with Vox, to knock out a whole cellphone tower in an effort to keep his game up with barely a flick of his wrist. After all, hell phones worked on a bastardized form of the same electromagnetic signal that made radio possible. It would take very little effort to knock down Vox's entire network for the foreseeable future. Some part of him, the part that was coherent enough to realize that inciting a turf war with the flat-faced moron would be ill-advised, decided to table the idea, (for now). There was always time for drawing him out if needs must later. Once Charlie had removed the short leash she insisted on attempting to keep him on.
“You’re looking rather exhausted, my dear, perhaps it’s time for bed?” Alastor suggested, using his best comforting radio announcer voice.
Angel yawned and nodded. “Ya know when ya right, ya right Smiles. Thanks, fa tha first class hooch.”
“Any time my dear,” Alastor said watching discreetly as Angel unfolded himself from the bar and made his way towards the stairs. This action however was not lost on Husk, however subtle he was attempting to be.
“You’re plotting something,” Husk said without any hint of fear at calling out his boss.
Alastor turned to face him, eyebrow raised. “What makes you think that?”
“One, you hate Angel and you would never do anything nice for him.”
“Incorrect, moving on.”
Husk eyed him seriously. “You expect me to believe that?”
“I expect you not to question me, my good fellow,” Alastor replied, allowing only a trace of radio static to enter his voice. Enough to send a clear warning that the cat was on thin ice and his patience was wearing thin.
“Sure, whatever," Husk rolled his eyes. "I'll pretend I give a shit enough to believe you."
“Your second point?” Alastor asked, still curious enough to let him continue.
“I saw you wave some freaky voodoo shit in his direction which means you probably did something either to him or something on him.”
Alastor smirked, “What an imaginative mind you have. Really, Husker you should put it to more good use. Pen a novel someday about your flights of fancy.”
“Don’t bullshit me,” Husk hissed. “Just look—whatever the fuck you’re doing, just don’t let him get hurt in the process.”
Alastor eyed him for a long moment, “Your care is touching, I’m sure he’d be delighted to know.”
“Fuck you. I can care about a person without it being a whole big thing.”
“Can you?”
“I care about you, asshole, somehow.”
“I’m flattered,” Alastor said with a genuine smile.
“I care about Niffty too.”
“Of that, I had no doubt,” Alastor replied. “Not that she can’t handle herself as we’ve seen.” Husk shuddered and Alastor merely beamed like a proud father. “In any case, your concern is unfounded, my intention is not to harm dear Angel Dust,” Alastor was surprised by how much he meant that statement. He had only known him for a short time, and in that time Angel had proven infuriating in more than a few ways, and yet— there was something fascinating about his lack of fear where Alastor was concerned. So few people could manage such a thing. Even the Princess of Hell herself had been terrified of him at first. Husk and Niffty were not afraid of him now but that had taken decades together to earn—but Angel had been brazen right away. A lesser demon would have cowered before him. Then again, a lesser demon who had not amused Alastor so would have found himself flayed on the spot for making such a forward advance on his person. He was not certain he could say he liked the spider as such. More that he found him interesting, and he did not actively wish any harm to come to him, and that was enough of a ringing endorsement as few could hope to receive from the Radio Demon.
* * *
It had taken Angel all of three days to realize that something was off with his phone. To be fair, Alastor had not messed with the main components itself, so the phone could still turn on just fine, and use most of its usual apps. He had simply shorted the internal mechanism that allowed the phone to receive texts and phone calls. The spider could, apparently still get on the internet thanks to something he had once explained was called Wi-Fi. Another thing that Alastor would have to short circuit in time, lest texts come through that instead.
Delightfully, there was no easy fix to such an issue, and so even after Angel had realized that something was wrong with his phone, he could not ascertain what. Voxtek like human corporations before it had opted to make their phones proprietary and not user upgradable, meaning that one would have to go to a Voxtek store directly to get their phone fixed. Or in the case of a certain spider, to Vox directly.
This presented the first major challenge that Alastor had not accounted for in his initial decision making. How to ensure that Angel would not end up in Vox’s clutches to secure a new phone. Angel hardly needed to go to a store when one had the owner of the company on speed dial. The hotel still hadn’t gotten around to getting a proper phone of its own yet, which meant that Angel could not simply call the other overlord and announce that his hell phone had broken.
Oh, raspberries! and it had all been going so well up until this point, he thought. Alastor nearly frowned. Never one to be foisted by his own petard, Alastor knew of course that Angel liked Vox about as much as he himself did, he would never willingly go to see him, especially when casually reminded how dreadfully boorish the television overlord could be. He waited until Angel brought it up in casual conversation.
“I can’t figure out what’s wrong with this damn phone,” he complained at breakfast. “Nobody can get through to me and I can’t seem to make a call or text.”
Alastor barely resisted the urge to let his grin grow decidedly bigger. “Perhaps it’s a problem with your cellular device’s reception band,” he suggested casually, taking a sip of tea.
“How tha fuck do you know about that?” Angel asked, pointing his phone still in his hand accusingly at Alastor.
“I make it my business to know all things related to radio. Your cellular contraption uses a form of electromagnetic frequencies that is not dissimilar to radio waves.”
Angel stared at him for a long moment. “That mean you can fix it Smiles?”
Alastor eyed him, “Perhaps, but I wouldn’t be caught dead touching anything produced by that insufferable idiot box.”
Angel groaned, “Please Al? I’m not above beggin’ here. You don’t know what Val will do ta me if he can’t get aholda me.”
Alastor felt a frown pulling at the edges of his lips. He had not considered that. “Oh very well,” he said with a huff. “I would hate for Charlie to think that I am unwilling to keep our patrons out of trouble in my efforts to protect this hotel,” he said.
Of course, what Alastor had not accounted for was that in his tipsy-hazed desire to pull one over on Vox he had not merely fried the components but had overloaded it to such a degree that the only hope would be a new phone. A fact which he was loathe to admit. Still, he was the Radio Demon, and his powers far exceeded that of the average sinner. Perhaps there was hope for his plan yet. He could simply magic a new phone for Angel, one which would allow him to send his messages, but which would route any calls from Vox or Valentino directly to the Radio Demon himself.
With a snap, Alastor materialized a phone of his own devising and handed it to Angel with a flourish and bow. Angel stared at it for a long moment.
"This got all my same shit from before?"
Alastor snapped his fingers, "It does now," he replied.
"Whateva," Angel said turning around his nose buried in the phone as it so-often was. It was, in Alastor’s estimation, a far better plan than he had previously thought possible.