Chapter Text
It was all gone, all of it. The hotel was in ruins, her friends were either long dead or now in Heavens Custody, along with her. Charlie still remembers the battlefield from her final moments before being transported to Heaven’s temporary prison until the trial.
The hotel was in ruins, the foundations themselves collapsed to dust from Adam’s heaven-beam, or whatever it was. So many dead, with severed limbs spilled over the ground, all coming from the citizens of Cannibal Town. Charlie was among them, fortunately with all four limbs, but her throat was hoarse and dry, her vision going blurry, her head pounding from her head bleeding like a cracked egg, Charlie could barely crawl herself from the rubble, weapon slipping from her hand. But all she could see were all the exorcists either flying around or standing behind Adam and Lute, as they laughed at their defeat.
Charlie tried to get up, but she couldn’t, her legs felt feeble and her body as a whole felt sore. Though it didn’t even matter, as Lute kicked her back down as Adam said, “Stay down. We’ll be back for you bitches later.” Before flying off deeper into Pentagram City.
Charlie reached her arm out, trident gripped tightly in hand, in a pathetic attempt to stop them, trying to get up. But couldn’t and could only watch as they tore Pentagram City to shreds. Even with Cannibal Town’s valiant residents and Carmilla Carmine’s weapons, they were no match.
”I failed...” She said, And what could tell her the opposite? Nothing.
And that was the same statement she could think of, as the chaos continued, and as the exorcists came back and took anybody who was left alive, including Charlie, and took them back to Heaven, telling them that they’ll await their trial, and then, her world went dark.
She didn’t wake up two days later, and by then, she was alone in her own isolated cell. She found out by a few of the details later on, saying that as the leader of the battle, she would be kept isolated from her comrades but would see them again in the trial. Where she would be heading now.
No longer was she wearing her simple red dress from the battle but now an orange jumpsuit, Charlie’s head wasn’t bleeding anymore, now being wrapped with bandages that covered her right eye as well; she hoped she hadn’t gone blind there at least. There were many more bandages where that came from though, almost adding an extra pound of woven cotton and rayon fabric to her arms, legs, torso, neck, and chest. And just like any other prisoner, Charlie had a pair of shackles used on her when they moved her around the facility, hands and feet chained together, making it harder to move. Even in her cell, she had shackles on her wrist - despite the bandages, it still bruised her - condemning her to the wall. Moreover, her hair was no longer tied-up or neat but was now a tattered mess with knots everywhere and the dirt and dust in the cell didn’t help either.
Charlie didn’t sleep, where when she rarely did, she would dream of the death of her people, Adam choking her until she could barely wheeze, and the destruction of her hotel; she would wake up in terror, screaming and in a cold sweat, before crying for hours on end until her eyes went dry into an old, stale, scrappy pillow. They were so vivid, so real that Charlie resorted to not sleeping at all; Charlie would play her own little, tedious game where she would imagine that her friends were all playing along, too, where they had to see who could stay up the longest.
Charlie barely ate or drank, demanding to see her friends or to at least hear some news that they were okay. At first, the guards would sometimes withhold meals, saying that many of their friends were killed in that battle. But they stopped once they saw the effects, but it was too late, she would barely eat and would tear her already damaged vocal cords to shreds as she called out, begging for information about her companions, to the point where they had to restrain her to get her to eat so she didn’t starve before her trial officially began; the guards even had to either sedate her or tape her mouth shut and shackled her hands so she wouldn’t take it off.
Until the day finally came, where her trail would begin. Charlie had been huddled up into the corner of the dimly lit cell, where the only light came from the window. Things until then, had been eerily quiet, with only the soft, low breathes she would let out and the distant sound of water dripping and free birds chirping; ironically, the one thing she wasn’t, the one thing she wouldn’t be for a long time, but somehow, it was the one last thing that kept her going.
Then a new sound came: footsteps. At first, Charlie thought it was the guards bringing her food, so she got up, despite the cold, hard floor feeling so raspy against her bare, bandaged feet, ready to tear her yell and beg at the top of her lungs the guards to tell them something about her friends, anything. Once eight shadows appeared from the corridor, however, before she could let out a single letter, she noticed something, how each exorcist was in full gear, with one spear in hand and the other ready to grab a dagger, knife, or any other weapon from some obscure pocket.
Of course, Charlie wasn’t completely surprised by this, the guards always came fully geared when delivering her food or retraining her, she was kind and sometimes even gullible, but she wasn’t naive, and despite how she wasn’t always proud of the power it came with, she was the Princes of Hell, she had a colossal amount of power over possibly most of the inhabitants of Heaven. And, in spite of her reputation for being naive, gullible, childish, and stupid in Hell, it would be foolish to just let her out on nylon ropes, which she could easily burn in mere seconds.
But what set these guards apart from the others, was not only the amount of guards present but the keys that opened her cell door.
“What is this?” She asked, her voice sounding croaked.
But then, her eyes widened slightly, her mouth went up, and she brightened up a bit. “Wait, how are my friends? Are they okay? Will I get to see them?” She asked, but it seemed as though they had all collectively ignored her.
“Charlotte Morningstar, your trial has begun.” Said the guard just an inch outside the door. The guard moving his hands up, chains in hand. Charlie got the message.