Fanfic / Revelation (Hellaverse)

Revelation is a Hellaverse fanfic by steveguyhi1243. It’s hosted on Archive of Our Own.

Everyone thought that Alastor was helping Charlie with the Happy Hotel out of nothing but his own amusement at seeing sinners try and fail to redeem themselves. Little did anyone guess that his ambitions went way beyond that.

A month after offering his assistance, he manages to kill Lucifer and usurps the throne, arresting Charlie and her associates and ruling Hell with an iron fist. Two years later, Hell has changed from a chaotic Crapsack World to a somehow even worse totalitarian fascist regime where All Crimes Are Equal. Anybody who commits any crime or even so much as says a negative word about the regime gets the Crimson Guard sic’d on them and sent to the Pit Of Fire to be punished and/or executed.

Still, for I.M.P, life mostly goes on as normal, aside from the increased surveillance; They just lay their heads low and go about their assassination business. That is, until one day, when they’re invited to do a live interview on TV... An interview that goes horribly awry when a nervous Moxxie, after being grilled and pressured by Katie Killjoy, accidentally blurts out the word ”brutal” when describing the Crimson Guard. Before long, the assassins, alongside Stolas and his daughter Octavia, find themselves arrested for treason and set to be sent to prison. In an attempt to escape, Blitzo, Millie and Stolas are all apprehended, but Moxxie and Octavia manage to get away and Loona evades capture by virtue of being out of town for a supply run.

The weapons specialist and the Goetian princess find themselves on the run as wanted fugitives while Loona joins up with a resistance group led by Cherri Bomb, all of them hoping to be able to save their loved ones. It’s a race against time as they’re all set to be executed... but as bad as things are, it appears that Moxxie’s small act of accidental rebellion has sparked a bit of hope in the denizens of Hell...

Some unmarked spoilers ahead!

Revelation contains examples of:

• 11th-Hour Superpower: During the Final Battle, Octavia suddenly gains a huge power boost due to her magic awakening and goes ham on Alastor with them. She's still not strong enough to actually defeat him, especially since he's gone full One-Winged Angel, and almost dies for her trouble, but she does manage to injure him pretty badly and buy Charlie enough time to heal herself and gather enough power to deal the final blow.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul:
  • Downplayed. In the series proper, Charlie and Vaggie are girlfriends. Here, they’ve gotten married.
  • In canon, Vox and Valentino both hate Alastor, especially the former, who sees him as his Arch-Enemy due to their different media preferences. Here, both Vox and Valentino not only willingly join Alastor's regime without hesitation, but are claimed to have assisted his slaying of Overlords back when he first arrived in Hell.
• Adaptational Villainy: Make no mistake, Alastor is still a monstrous individual and cannibal in canon. (He is in Hell, after all) But he does have some standards and morals however warped they may be, and while he is The Dreaded and one of the most dangerous demons in all of Hell, he moreso behaves like an unpredictable Troll who does whatever he wants for his own amusement. In this story, though, he’s a power-hungry psychopath who’s had his sights on the throne all along, and once he becomes the ruler of Hell, he becomes a bloodthirsty dictator who wants anybody who might even consider criticizing him put to death to Make an Example of Them.
• Adapted Out: While Vox and Valentino act as Alastor's Co-Dragons, Velvette, their third cohort, isn't even mentioned.
• Age Lift: In canon, Vox and Valentino are relatively new Overlords, having died in the 1950s and 1970s respectively. Here, they must be much older than that, as they apparently assisted Alastor in killing Overlords shortly after he first arrived in Hell, which was in the 1930s.
• Agony Beam: When Alastor captures Moxxie and Octavia, he binds them with magic that also causes them excruciating pain, though there’s no indication that the magic used leaves any physical injuries.
• All Crimes Are Equal: Under Alastor’s regime, anybody can get sent to the Pit Of Fire for breaking any type of rule or law, even if it's just something small like ”disturbing the peace.” In the beginning of the story, Moxxie worries that a guard is going to arrest him for making noise when Blitzo accidentally sets fire to the toaster in the middle of the night.
• An Arm and a Leg: Alastor's Cold-Blooded Torture of Moxxie involves ripping his arms off at the shoulder as easily as if they were made of tissue paper and then healing him so he can do it all over again.
• Asshole Victim: Vox and Valentino are killed when the Pit of Fire is destroyed. Given that both of them immediately went Quisling for Alastor at the start of his regime and Val is still guilty of sexually abusing Angel, nobody ends up missing them.
• Better to Die than Be Killed: Discussed. While watching over the almost tortured-to-death Octavia, Moxxie muses about the number of times he’s considered putting a bullet in his head while on the run, and the thought of finding some way of killing himself before Alastor tortures him as well does cross his mind. But then he remembers that not just Via, Millie and Blitzo, but all of Hell is counting on him, so he decides against it.
• Big Brother Is Watching: As can be expected from a totalitarian fascist regime, Hell under Alastor is under constant heavy surveillance with Crimson Guard soldiers patrolling basically every inhabited area in Hell.
• Big Damn Heroes: When the remaining 11 prisoners (I.M.P, Stolas and Octavia, Charlie and her associates as well as Katie Killjoy and Tom Trench) set to be executed find themselves cornered on the edge of the Pit Of Fire by a royally pissed-off Alastor for trying to stage a coup, a hand grenade flies past them and explodes at his feet, revealing that Loona, Cherri and Maya's resistance group has arrived to save them.
• Big Damn Reunion: After everything they've been through, Moxxie and Octavia finally get to reunite with their loved ones in chapter 40.
• Bittersweet Ending: With more emphasis on the "sweet" than the "bitter"; Alastor is finally defeated for good, freeing Hell from his rule, Charlie takes her rightful place as Hell's ruler and all of the heroes are rewarded for their actions. But Edrich is dead, there are still people out there who preferred Alastor's rule, and Moxxie ends up a Shell-Shocked Veteran who wonders if he can ever return to the life he used to live.
• Blind Obedience: Edrich is a prison guard who has spent his entire life simply following orders. It doesn't matter what the order is or how conflicted he feels about it - If he's given an order, he’ll follow it, no questions asked. This absolute obedience makes him Alastor's favorite guard, and he’s assigned to guard the most notorious prisoners in the Pit Of Fire. However, Moxxie ”speaking out” against Alastor and Millie mouthing off to the dictator when she’s imprisoned does cause him to start questioning his actions, and he ultimately decides to help the captured heroes from the inside.
• Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: Downplayed. Even after Octavia activates her Super Mode and attacks a One-Winged Angel-form Alastor during the Final Battle, while she does manage to do a number on him, she's ultimately not strong enough to take him out and is injured so badly in retaliation that she almost dies.
• Brought Down to Normal: Alastor makes sure to strip all of his magic-using prisoners of their powers in order to prevent them from using it to oppose him; This is how he’s managed to keep Charlie under his thumb despite her normally being more powerful than him. When Octavia and Moxxie are captured, he tries to steal the Goetian princess’s powers as well, only to discover that they haven't been activated yet.
• Catch a Falling Star: Invoked. As La Résistance storms the prison in chapter 44, Moxxie and Octavia end up jumping from the prison's roof in order to get down and thus to the radio tower faster, forcing Loona to catch them before they hit the ground. The other prisoners soon follow suit.
• Chekhov's Gun: Octavia's Goetian magic is mentioned a couple of times to not have awakened yet. Her magic powers finally activate just as Alastor is about to execute Moxxie, which allows her to get the drop on him (if only temporarily). In turn, this gives the rest of the prisoners a chance to attack the guards and get some weapons for themselves, allowing them to actually fight back.
• Claustrophobia: Octavia makes it clear that she doesn't like dark, cramped spaces, both when she and Moxxie first hide in a pipe to get some shut-eye after their harrowing first day on the run and later when they hide the trunk of a bus travelling to the Pit Of Fire. The bulky Crimson Guard armor they use for a disguise in the latter scenario doesn't help, either; She almost has a panic attack until Moxxie throws out some of the baggage stored in there to make more space. Alastor uses this when he tortures her in chapter 35, having the room shrink until it almost crushes or suffocates her to death.
• Cliffhanger: Chapter 34 ends with Octavia being taken in to Alastor for questioning, fully prepared to experience Cold-Blooded Torture at his hands.
  • Chapter 36 ends similarly, except this time, it's Moxxie who’s taken in for a torture session. Since he’s the catalyst for everything that’s happened, he doesn’t expect to get out of it alive.
• Co-Dragons: Vox and Valentino act as this to Alastor during his regime. Alastor ultimately leaves them to die when they cease to be useful to him.
• Cold-Blooded Torture:
  • After apprehending the remaining members of I.M.P, Alastor brings Millie in for questioning to learn where her husband might've gone. He jumps straight to sending blasts of fire at her, heating up the room to unbearable temperatures, and almost throws her into the pit of fire when he’s interrupted by Edrich. Oh, and he broadcasts this to all of Hell in the hopes of breaking Moxxie’s spirit and getting him to turn himself in. It succeeds in almost pushing the poor man past the Despair Event Horizon, but Octavia snaps him out of it.
  • Stolas is later put through this treatment, as well, with some psychological torture mixed in as well with an illusion of Octavia being tortured to death. And just like with Millie, Alastor broadcasts it to get Octavia to turn herself in.
  • And in chapter 35, it's Octavia’s turn. Alastor suspects that she and Moxxie are planning something, so he takes her in to get answers out of her by shrinking the room until the princess is almost crushed to death or suffocates, taking it up a notch by also heating the walls up so that she gets burned. And considering that she’s claustrophobic already, the proceedings terrify her even more, and for a brief moment, she finds herself begging for mercy. Despite this, she manages to pull herself together and not only get out of the ordeal alive, but without caving in to his demands or ”giving him a show”, though she's left so badly injured that she has to be carried back to her cell afterwards and is left on the brink of death.
  • Chapter 37 sees Moxxie on the chopping block. Alastor's chosen method of torture for him is to repeatedly rip off his arms and give him a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown, only to then heal him and start the process over again, and Alastor also threatens to put Blitzo, Millie and Stolas through the same treatment. And after Moxxie encourages the rebels directly to continue fighting instead of telling them to stand down, Alastor decides to roast him over a fire and throw him through a window for good measure. But just like Octavia, he manages to keep his composure and refuses to give in, beg for mercy or get tempted by any of Alastor's offers.
• Collapsing Lair: Downplayed in that it was already collapsing during the Final Battle due to the damage done to it, but after Charlie finally manages to kill Alastor for good, the radio tower that they were fighting on top of finally breaks and falls to the ground with all of the remaining heroes still on it. The only reason none of the Hellborn heroes die from the fall is because Moxxie holds the orb housing all of Alastor's prisoners' magic powers, which ends up absorbing the impact of the tower hitting the ground, but everyone (except for Charlie, and even she doesn't come out of it totally unscathed) is still left badly injured in the end.
• Darkest Hour: Chapter 29 sees Moxxie and Octavia finally captured and tortured by Alastor, who broadcasts their imprisonment in chapter 30 in order to snuff out any hope anyone could’ve had that they’d be able to succeed with a rebellion. Moxxie and Octavia almost cross the Despair Event Horizon, and even Millie almost gives up hope. Fortunately, not all hope is lost; Via pulls herself together and decides to still go down swinging, the resistance are even more determined to push through when they realize that Moxxie and Octavia managed to break into the radio tower and start to set their plans on causing a Prison Break in motion, and Edrich is assigned to guard Moxxie and Octavia and plans to use it to grant them an audience with Charlie and let them in on their escape plan.
• Death by Adaptation:
  • Happens to Stella and Lucifer. In both series proper, both of them are alive. In this story, both of them have been dead for years; Lucifer was killed by Alastor unexpectedly two years prior to the start of the story, and Stella tried to start a rebellion against Alastor's rule and got executed for it. Octavia despises Alastor for having gotten her mother killed even if she wasn’t particularly close with her.
  • Vox and Valentino are alive in Hazbin Hotel proper, but here, they're unceremoniously killed by the rebels when the prison is destroyed, Alastor gladly abandoning them to their fates since they're no longer of use to him.
• Defiant to the End:
  • Moxxie demonstrates this multiple times:
    • At the start of the story, I.M.P, Stolas and Octavia have been arrested because of Moxxie’s Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment, and Alastor has arrived to see their incarceration personally and broadcast it while he’s at it. After hearing the order that Imp City is to be razed to the ground even after he's surrendered himself, Moxxie, who realizes that he’s in deep shit anyway and thus has nothing left to lose, suddenly head-butts the guard holding him in a fit of anger, grabs their gun and shoots the guards holding his friends and implores them to make a mad dash to escape. Unfortunately, only he and Octavia make it out.
    • A standout example can be found in chapter 37 as Alastor interrogates him. He's been offered a place in the Crimson Guard if he reveals his and Octavia's plans. He's been beaten up and repeatedly had his arms ripped off and then healed so Alastor can do it all over again. He's even been offered his and his associates' freedom if he just tells La Résistance to surrender. Moxxie weighs his options and responds by turning to the green glow that broadcasts his torture session and directly telling the rebels to not listen to Alastor and to continue fighting, knowing that Alastor is an untrustworthy jackass who'd probably have them all executed anyway. This earns him even more of Alastor's ire, who then roasts the poor imp over a fire and throws him through a window in a fit of rage.
    • As he's about to be tossed into the pit of fire to burn to death in chapter 43, his response to Alastor asking if he has any last words is to flip him off.
  • Octavia herself decides to go down swinging when she and Moxxie are finally imprisoned, as she thinks back on everything the two has managed to achieve when it comes to the damage they've done to Alastor’s regime. It's motivating enough to pull her away from the Despair Event Horizon and later power through the Cold-Blooded Torture that Alastor puts her through, refusing to give him a show or even a hint of an escape plan.
    • She finally gets to show her defiance in chapter 41; After Alastor teleports into their cell for one last session of torment before their execution, she throws herself in front of Moxxie in a (futile) attempt to keep him away from Alastor, mouths off to the tyrant and calls him out on how much of a psycho he is, and even as he begins to torture her with magic, she continues to sass and disrespect him.
  • Unlike the rest of the prisoners, who had little choice but to simply obey, Charlie and Vaggie have to literally be dragged kicking and screaming out of their cell as they're lead to their execution in chapter 43. Charlie even takes a moment to mouth off to Alastor.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: Octavia starts out pretty hostile towards Moxxie, which is rather understandable considering his role in getting her father sent to the Pit Of Fire even if it was an accident. But as the two travel together, she starts taking a liking to the imp due to him constantly putting his life on the line to ensure her safety and being patient and kind with her. By the time they're captured, she finds herself unable to hate or blame him for the things that happened; After all, it's not his fault that Alastor is an insane, murderous dictator who took one accidental comment and blew it out of proportion and who would've looked for any excuse to imprison and kill just about anyone anyway.
• Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?:
  • When I.M.P and Stolas have arrived at the Pit Of Fire, Millie spits out that she's glad that her husband called Alastor out for being a tyrant and dictator on live TV, telling the tyrant this to his face. Considering that he can have her thrown into the pit of fire to be cooked to death on a moment's notice, such a blatant display of defiance is incredibly brave. And, in fact, it inspires the guard Edrich to start questioning his Blind Obedience.
  • Almost literally in Octavia's case; When she and Moxxie are captured and dragged to their cell, she musters up the energy to flip Alastor the bird. The tyrant merely warns her that such an attitude is what got her mother executed.
  • In chapter 41, Octavia repeatedly sasses and calls out Alastor on his tyranny and sadism even as he prepares to torture her. And not to be outdone, Millie literally flips him off when he prepares to do the same thing to her.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Two years prior to the story, Alastor managed to kill Lucifer by catching him off-guard at a press conference outside of the Happy Hotel, using the Devil's arrogance and nonchalance against him to take him down with one attack. Everyone present was shocked at how a mere sinner, no matter how dangerous, managed to accumulate such power.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Well, it’s a totalitarian fascist regime where All Crimes Are Equal, so this is the name of the game with Alastor. Not only are I.M.P, Stolas and Octavia arrested for treason, all of Imp City is ordered to be razed to the ground and Alastor even contemplates committing genocide on all imps... all because Moxxie accidentally called the Crimson Guard ”brutal” on a televised interview and then resisted arrest.
• Dressing as the Enemy: After finding some dead members of the Crimson Guard, Moxxie and Octavia take their armor for protection. This not only shields them from gunfire, but also lets them blend in as patrolling guards in a different city as they make their way to the Pit Of Fire.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: All of the protagonists, but Moxxie and Octavia in particular, have to go through absolute Hell over the course of the story, constantly getting severely injured and almost dying. In the end, though, Alastor is finally defeated and killed off for good, and Charlie ends up reclaiming her rightful title as Hell's ruler. And since this is Charlie we're talking about, she promises to bring about an era of peace for all of Hell's citizens.
• Elevator Failure: While infiltrating the Pit of Fire's radio tower, Moxxie and Octavia enter the elevator to get to the top, only for it to malfunction due to the cables being severed. The two manage to exit the elevator cab just before it drops, forcing them to climb the cables in the shaft the rest of the way. Alastor later fixes it with magic when escorting the captured fugitive pair to the prison.
• Everyone Has Standards: After the dust settles and the Final Battle is over, Katie implores Tom to abandon all of the injured and dead citizens in favor of coming with her with the footage they got in order to strike it rich. Tom, while hardly a pillar of morality, is absolutely appalled at her heartlessness and cuts all ties with her in favor of staying behind and helping, leading to her storming off in a huff. The epilogue reveals that the rest of 666 News apparently felt the same way, as she's mentioned to either have been demoted or outright fired for her actions while Tom receives a medal from Queen Charlie herself for his.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: While giving Moxxie his We Can Rule Together speech, Alastor tries to convince the imp that Octavia has lied to him about how the Crimson Guard operates, calling her a "scheming, evil woman" and telling Moxxie to "not fall for her tricks." He believes that he'll be able to turn Moxxie over to his side like this because he thinks that there's still animosity between the two due to Moxxie's role in getting her father arrested - That they would've grown to genuinely like and care for each other during their days on the run is apparently not a possibility that crosses his mind. Unsurprisingly, Moxxie refuses to see Octavia as an enemy.
• Evil Is Petty: Perhaps as a remnant of his trollish demeanor, Alastor is noted to mess with his prisoners both to break their spirits and just to be an asshole, and thus nobody who's been imprisoned should accept or fall for any perceived ”luxuries.” When he drags the captured Moxxie and Octavia to their cell, he deliberately does it in such a way that they continuously hit their heads on the floor and stairs to further injure them. And when Octavia approaches the sink in her and Moxxie's cell just to wash her hands and face, the water turns green and causes a burning sensation that leaves her almost paralyzed with pain until it wears off; She notes afterwards that she’s glad that neither of them thought to actually drink the water.
• Fantastic Racism: Part of what infuriates Alastor so much regarding Moxxie is the fact that an imp, the lowest caste in Hell, would dare to criticize him in any way. He even contemplates wiping the whole imp species out just because of it, and when he realizes that Moxxe and Octavia have genuinely become friends, he's disgusted at the notion of demon royalty willingly befriending or even associating with an imp.
• Faux Affably Evil: Whereas he’s genuinely Affably Evil in the series proper, Alastor here demonstrates a plastered-on fake demeanor of politeness whenever he talks to anyone, be they a prisoner or even one of his own men. And the more pissed he is at someone, the more the mask slips.
  Alastor: *To Octavia while he's putting her through Cold-Blooded Torture* You wouldn’t lie to your old pal Alastor, would you?
• Fire-Forged Friends: Moxxie and Octavia start out on the wrong foot due to Moxxie's accidental role in getting her father arrested and the two of them labeled as fugitives. But after the days of literal Hell they go through to try and save their loved ones and keep each other safe, they become steadfast allies and close friends; After Alastor imprisons them, Octavia even notes that she's come to trust and value Moxxie so much that she'd rather spend her final days with him than on her own and is disgusted with herself for ever blaming him for how everything turned out.
• Foreshadowing: It's noted that one of Alastor's favorite ways of messing with his prisoners is to lull them into a false sense of security, and thus one should be wary of any "luxuries" offered. In hindsight, this would also obviously apply to the notion that the security cameras would ever be turned off.
• Going for the Big Scoop: When Katie and Tom realize that I.M.P, Stolas, Octavia, Charlie and her associates are going to storm the radio tower during the Final Battle in order for Charlie to get her magic powers back, the reporters decide to follow them and get everything on tape despite the danger; After all, what would sell better than up close and personal footage of a dictator getting toppled?
• Go Through Me: When Alastor gets into Moxxie and Octavia's cell with the intention of torturing them again in chapter 41, he glances at the still-sleeping Moxxie and tells Octavia that it'd be a shame if something were to happen to her friend. Octavia responds with immediately throwing herself between Alastor and Moxxie to try and protect the imp. Not that it does either of them much good in the end since Alastor is more powerful than them and just proceeds to torture both of them again anyway.
  Octavia: Don't you lay a fucking hand on him! You've done enough to him!
• Guilt by Association: The reason Stolas and Octavia are arrested is simply because they decided to check in on I.M.P after the interview and see if they could help them in some way. It doesn't matter that they didn't do anything else and have otherwise followed Alastor's orders to the letter - The fact that they associate with ”traitors” is enough to get them labeled traitors, as well. In fact, this seems to be the standard procedure, as everyone at the TV studio are disposed of simply for broadcasting the disastrous interview or just being in the building when it happened.
• Heel–Face Turn: Edrich, the guard assigned to watch over Blitzo, Millie and Stolas, has lived his entire life simply following orders without question, even ones he doesn't agree with, which has made him Alastor's favorite prison guard. But hearing Moxxie speak out against the dictator on live TV (if only accidentally) and seeing Millie’s audacity in the face of her own possible death causes him to question his own actions. The end result is that he saves Millie from her Cold-Blooded Torture and starts arranging to help the imprisoned heroes from the inside, starting with letting Millie see Charlie to start formulating an escape plan.
• Hellhole Prison: The Pit Of Fire is a maximum-security prison where anybody who commits a crime is sent. The worst of the ”criminals” can expect daily torture and interrogations as they await their execution: Being thrown into the namesake pit of fire to be slowly burned to death over the course of a couple of hours to several days.
• "Hell, Yes!" Moment: Charlie getting her magic back is presented as a triumphant moment, and understandably so; As Lucifer's daughter, she's the most powerful being in Hell and the only one who could hope to defeat Alastor.
• Heroic BSoD: Moxxie slips into these a couple of times:
  • He enters a bad one after his Open Mouth, Insert Foot comment, and it gets even worse after he and Octavia manage to escape from Imp City by hiding in a train cart while all their loved ones got captured. He manages to snap out of it once the two have to flee again, though.
  • He enters another one when Millie's Cold-Blooded Torture is broadcasted to all of Hell to get him to turn himself in. He would’ve crossed the Despair Event Horizon if not for Octavia being there to snap him out of it.
  • His third one occurs in chapter 21, when Alastor announces that Millie, Blitzo and Stolas are set to be executed in seven days time. Once again, he almost loses all hope, but he pulls himself together and decides to do whatever he can to save them regardless of whether he lives or dies.
• Heroic Sacrifice: When the Crimson Guard and Alastor arrive at the I.M.P offices and demand that Moxxie surrenders himself under threat of razing Imp City to the ground, the imp decides to comply in order to keep his loved ones safe and innocent people from getting killed. Millie stops him before he can leave, though, citing that she's not going to let him go out there and face possible death all alone, to Blitzo and Stolas's agreement.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: After razing Qaburn to the ground, the Crimson Guard places out landmines all over the ruins in case the two fugitives return, and in any case to ensure that anybody left alive in the village is killed, too. Later, Moxxie takes out the troops sent to capture him and Octavia by shooting one of these landmines, causing it to explode. (Though he and Octavia are also knocked out by the ensuing blast for their trouble)
• Hope Bringer: Moxxie turns into one by complete accident; His Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment causes several rebel groups to appear across Hell who use him as the face of their movement. Octavia also becomes one by virtue of accompanying him, and the damage they manage to do to Alastor's regime while on the run further fuels the rebel groups. Alastor is aware of this and wishes to capture the pair not just because he considers them criminals, but also so that he can snuff that hope out in the rest of the denizens of Hell and discourage more rebels by making an example of them.
• Hope Spot: In chapter 28, Moxxie and Octavia have successfully infiltrated the Pit Of Fire and slaughtered their way to the top of the radio tower, finding the orb that houses all of the trapped Overlords' and royals' powers… only for Alastor to teleport to the top of the tower and capture them with ease.
  • In chapter 43, Edrich tries to convince Alastor to stick to the schedule instead of moving the execution date up one day. Alastor, for a moment, seems to consider it... before revealing that he's known about Edrich switching sides and the planned escape attempt all along, and poor Edrich is promptly killed for his trouble.
• Icon of Rebellion: Moxxie himself becomes one after he accidentally criticizes the Crimson Guard; The various resistance groups that spring up in the wake of the interview chant his name and wield signs with his face and the word ”Brutal” on it.
• If We Get Through This…: Moxxie and Octavia have a heart-to-heart after Octavia has been patched up and saved from bleeding to death from Alastor’s Cold-Blooded Torture of her. As they're eating some rations, they start talking about cooking and how it's a skill Octavia never had to learn due to being a princess, and Moxxie ends up promising her that he'll cook her a meal if they manage to overthrow Alastor.... A promise he ends up keeping in the epilogue by bringing her a stir-fry after she wakes up from her coma.
• I Lied: This is Alastor's bread and butter as a bloodthirsty tyrant:
  • After Stella was imprisoned for trying to start a rebellion, Stolas and Octavia paid Alastor a hefty fine in order to keep her from getting executed. Alastor then proceeded to execute her anyway, and on the day she was scheduled to be released, no less.
  • He does it again after Moxxie has surrendered himself; After threatening to raze Imp City to the ground if he didn't comply, Alastor calls for the city to be destroyed anyway.
• It's All My Fault: Moxxie has no illusions regarding just how badly his Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment has screwed him, everyone he cares for, anyone who's associated with him in any way and even people who just so happened to live in the same city as him or be in his general vicinity over. When Blitzo chews him out and Octavia lashes out at him, both while they’re getting arrested the first time and while they’re hiding on the train, he notably makes absolutely zero effort to defend himself. And when he and Octavia are finally imprisoned, he tearfully apologizes to the princess for getting everyone into the whole mess, but Octavia reassures him that she doesn't blame him anymore, having come to really value him as a friend and ally and realized that Alastor would've just done something heinous to somebody else for any reason anyway.
• It's Quiet… Too Quiet: As Moxxie and Octavia leave the hospital in Qaburn to find a place to drink water, the two agree that the village is eerily quiet and lacking in activity or Crimson Guard soldiers. And sure enough, they turn out to be right to be suspicious.
• Join or Die: This was Alastor’s ultimatum for all of the more powerful demons and their families at the start of his reign - They’d either comply with all of his demands, such as letting the Crimson Guard use their facilities whenever they want or need and aiding him in seeking out ”criminals”, or they’d be considered traitors and sent to the Pit Of Fire for execution. Stolas complied with the demands in order to keep Octavia safe, having already witnessed Stella get arrested and executed for trying to spark a rebellion, and both he and Octavia forcefully got tattoos of Alastor’s symbol on their right arm and forehead to show their ”allegiance” to him. Octavia considers hers a Mark of Shame and a constant reminder of how much she hates Alastor for what he’s done.
• Kick the Dog: Unsurprisingly, Alastor loves to commit petty, gratuitous acts of evil towards his prisoners just to be a sadstic asshole:
  • Alastor's interrogation session with Stolas starts with the Radio Demon cheerfully asking the Goetian prince where the "missus" is and that it's a shame that she's not present... when he's the one who had Stella killed two years prior.
  • Chapter 41 has Alastor teleporting into the cells of Moxxie, Octavia, Blitzo, Millie and Stolas just to torture them some more before their execution. He does this for no reason other than to see their terrified reactions and Kick Them While They Are Down. He even insults Moxxie and Octavia's friendship directly to their faces and taunts Millie and Stolas with his torture of the former two just to rile his prisoners up some more.
  • After Charlie calls Alastor out on killing her father in chapter 43, Alastor merely responds by calling her pathetic and telling her that it's no wonder that Lucifer wanted nothing to do with her. This gets to Charlie so badly that she immediately stops resisting him and slumps in defeat and despair.
• Kill It with Fire: This is how the Pit Of Fire got its name - Prisoners are executed by getting tossed into a fire pit where they slowly and painfully roast to death. The process takes a few hours… if the poor bastard that got tossed in there is lucky. If not? It can take days.
• Kill the God: Alastor somehow managed to make himself powerful enough to kill the Devil himself.
• La Résistance: Loona runs into an unnamed resistance group led by Cherri Bomb and a bird-like demon named Maya and ends up helping them with the supplies she was sent to get, which makes her an important member almost immediately. Aside from them, Moxxie’s Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment also inspires other resistance groups to rise up across Hell and use him as the face of their movements. (Though it’s mentioned that most of them are killed for their trouble)
• Late to the Tragedy: Loona avoids getting caught in the crossfire of the interview gone awry and the aftermath of it because she was out of town to get supplies, thus keeping her under Alastor's radar when it comes to her connection with I.M.P. Once she finds out what's going on, though, she joins a resistance group that she runs into and quickly becomes one of its leaders.
• Line-of-Sight Alias: After Octavia wakes up from her surgery, the surgeons ask for her name. Since she’s a wanted fugitive, she can’t use her own name lest she be turned over to the Crimson Guard, so she settles for ”Charlotte Fern” after seeing a fern in the corner of the room.
• Make an Example of Them: Alastor killed Stella and her associates for planning a rebellion, broadcasting it to all of Hell to show what happens to ”traitors” and anybody who thinks of opposing him. He’s aiming to do the same thing to Moxxie and Octavia.
• Mark of Shame: Octavia considers her tattoos of Alastor’s symbol (Something she was forced to get, mind you) to be this, as in her eyes, it's a symbol for how the Goetia family effectively sold their souls to the tyrant in order to keep themselves alive.
• Mass "Oh, Crap!": Everyone at the TV studio reacts with horror when Moxxie blurts out that he finds the Crimson Guard ”brutal”, as them broadcasting it live or, frankly, just being there when it happened means that they'll be arrested for treason, as well.
  • Blitzo, Moxxie and Millie, once they've returned to the I.M.P headquarters, react with horror when they see that the interview has been broadcasted to all of Hell.
  • There's also I.M.P’s, Stolas's and Octavia's reaction in chapter 6 when they realize that the Crimson Guard has arrived to arrest them... with Alastor in tow.
  • Blitzo, Millie and Stolas's reaction in chapter 21, when Alastor reveals to all of Hell that they've been scheduled to be executed for treason.
  • The reactions of all members of I.M.P and the Goetia when Alastor teleports into their cells to torture them some more before they're executed.
  • Twofer in chapter 43: This is the heroes' reactions when Alastor shows up in their cells and reveals that he moved the execution date ahead one day, meaning that he's shown up to escort them to their deaths, and then again when he reveals that he's known about their plans and Edrich's Heel–Face Turn the whole time.
• Medals for Everyone: The final chapter sees I.M.P, Charlie's associates, Maya and Tom Trench all receiving medals for their courage and help in toppling Alastor's regime. Charlie names the award "The Gehennah Medal" in memory of Edrich.
• Meteor-Summoning Attack: In chapter 43, Octavia, once her magic powers have finally awakened, manages to get the drop on Alastor, Vox and Valentino by summoning a small comet and sending it crashing into them. The result is the three Overlords being knocked down one floor, Val and Vox both dying and a huge hole in the prison roof.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Poor Moxxie is hit hard with the consequences of his accidental critique of Alastor's regime when he sees the unrest and deaths it’s caused, his loved ones arrested to be tortured and killed and that all of Imp City is to be destroyed in order to Make an Example of Them.
  • After throwing coal at Moxxie and blaming him for the situation they’ve found themselves in while hiding in a train cart, Octavia almost immediately feels bad about it and apologizes when she notices the poor man's distress.
  • Octavia reacts quite badly when she accidentally shoots Moxxie in the leg while they're attacked by the Crimson Guard in Qaburn. Though the imp doesn't hold it against her in the slightest, it still traumatizes her badly enough that she's left frozen with inaction when they're attacked while trying to enter the radio tower at the Pit Of Fire.
• Never My Fault:
  • After the disastrous interview, Katie viciously attacks Moxxie and accuses him of dooming them all for daring to criticize Alastor's regime on live TV... which a) was an accident, and b) something he wouldn't have said at all if she and Tom Trench didn't decide to bring up the Crimson Guard in the first place, despite having no good reason to do so, and her continuously pressuring and stressing out the already nervous imp in order to make better TV. Both Tom and Blitzo point this out to her, to no avail.
  • Alastor also gets in on this when interrogating Octavia, telling her that she and Moxxie have gotten hundreds of soldiers killed and an innocent village razed to the ground while on the run… except that they became fugitives over a small accidental comment, the soldiers were killed in self-defense and Qaburn was wiped out just because they'd been there previously; They'd managed to escape the Guard by the time the order came, so he didn’t actually have to do that, but did it anyway. Suffice to say, Octavia refuses to take the bait.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The whole plot is kicked off because Moxxie accidentally calls the Crimson Guard ”brutal” on live TV, which gets not just him, but all of I.M.P as well as Stolas and Octavia for associating with them labeled as traitors and set to be arrested and executed.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: In chapter 29, Alastor has successfully managed to imprison Moxxie and Octavia. He schedules for them to be executed alongside their loved ones, revealing this on a live broadcast to crush people's hopes in chapter 30... and freely mentions that he caught them at the top of the radio tower near the Pit Of Fire. Loona picks up on this and realizes that the two must've been able to infiltrate the prison and break into the radio tower, something no one else has ever been able to do due to how heavily guarded it is. The fact that two lone demons succeeded with such a difficult task while she's backed by a thousand fuels the hellhound's hopes of being able to break into the prison and motivates her and the rest of La Résistance to push through with their plans.
• Nightmare Sequence: Chapter 19 starts with one, with Moxxie having a nightmare about him, Millie and Octavia burning to death.
• No One Gets Left Behind:
  • As Moxxie prepares to turn himself in to keep Alastor from killing his friends and destroying Imp City, Millie stops the elevator just before the doors close and firmly tells him that I.M.P will not just leave him like that. Blitzo, Stolas and Octavia agree, albeit reluctantly:
  Moxxie: What the hell are you doing?! You guys are going to get yourselves killed!
  *A moment of heavy silence*
  Blitzo: *sighs* Moxxie, we're not going to just abandon you. Even though... things are probably going to happen out there. It's either this shit... or the entire city gets blown up harder than Stolas in a strip club.
  • After Blitzo's possibly last phone call with her, Loona decides to return to Imp City despite the risk because she's not one to just abandon her colleagues and father to die.
  • Moxxie, who intends to effectively go on a Suicide Mission after hearing about their loved ones' scheduled execution, implores Octavia to save herself. The princess bluntly refuses and reminds him that they haven't come this far just to roll over and surrender, that she's not leaving him and that her Dad's life, the only remaining family she has, is also on the line.
• Not Quite Saved Enough: Octavia's magic finally awakens in chapter 43 just as Alastor is about to toss Moxxie into the pit of fire. She fires a blast of magic at him, which makes him lose his concentration... and his grip on Moxxie, who was being dangled over the pit. The prisoners all react with horror as Moxxie disappears below the edge, with Octavia and Millie screaming his name in despair. Thankfully, he's revealed to have survived by gripping a metal ledge just below the platform, which allows Octavia and Millie to pull him up.
• Odd Friendship: Over the course of the story, one forms between skittish, gunslinging Hitman with a Heart Moxxie and snarky, moody Troubled Teen princess Octavia. This also counts as a downplayed Intergenerational Friendship as Moxxie is in his mid-to-late twenties while Octavia is nineteen in this story.
• Oh, Crap!: Several moments of horrifying realization are a given, considering the setting;
  • Loona reacts with utter horror when Blitzo calls her and tells her about the disastrous interview in chapter 4.
  • Moxxie in chapter 6, when he sees the sheer number of Guards that have arrived in Imp City after his surrender and realizes that Alastor was going to wipe out Imp City regardless of whether or not he'd comply with the orders.
    • Also in chapter 6, when Moxxie sees blood pooling out from under Octavia, revealing that she'd been shot when she tried to enter the train cart.
  • Moxxie and Octavia in chapter 7, when they see Wanted posters of themselves merely hours after they managed to escape from Imp City.
    • Another one from chapter 7 is Octavia's reaction when a train worker notices her blood in the train cart that she and Moxxie are hiding in.
  • Loona in chapter 9, several times: First when she sees the destruction of Imp City, then when she sees the arrival of the thousands of Crimson Guard soldiers approaching her and the other travelers shortly after and then when her car is sent careening off a bridge after ramming a Crimson Guard car.
  • Moxxie and Octavia in chapter 11, when they see that the train bridge has been blown up, with the train they’re hiding on plummeting down into a river below.
  • Moxxie and Octavia in chapter 13, when they’re caught while trying to buy some water at a bar in Qaburn, realizing that one of the drivers they’d passed by outside must’ve been a Crimson Guard soldier in a civilian disguise.
  • After Moxxie and Octavia return to a razed to the ground Qaburn in chapter 16, they discover that the ruins are littered with land mines after a surviving inhabitant tries to attack them and steps on one by accident. Cue horrified reactions.
  • Moxxie in chapter 19, when he finds himself cornered and almost captured by a Crimson Guard soldier in the seemingly pristine-ish abandoned house, revealing it to be a trap.
  • The pair also react like this in chapter 28 when they’ve managed to reach the top of the radio tower at the prison, only to find Alastor already waiting for them there.
  • While both are scared at the reveal that Octavia is to be brought to Alastor for interrogation in chapter 34, Moxxie is noted to have the worse reaction of the two, the reveal leaving him so shocked and horrified that he almost blue-screens again. To say nothing of his reaction when he's called in for interrogation only a couple of hours later in chapter 36, because he's well-aware that he might only leave that room in a body bag as the accidental instigator of everything.
  • Octavia in chapter 35, when she realizes that the interrogation room’s walls are closing in on her.
• One-Man Army: Or, two-man army, rather. Moxxie was one already due to his job as a gunslinging Professional Killer and weapons specialist, and considering that Octavia is a teenager with no previous experience in using guns and they’re up against Alastor’s elite army, the body count the two of them rack up is quite impressive. Octavia realizes this when she and Moxxie have been imprisoned - Their efforts haven't been completely in vain, as the damage they’ve done to Alastor’s regime and army have inspired more rebels to rise up and would make the two martyrs even if they’re executed. This just barely manages to keep her from crossing the Despair Event Horizon.
• One-Winged Angel: When Alastor realizes that the heroes have almost reached the top of the radio tower during the Final Battle, he ends up demonstrating his true power in a Villainous Breakdown by transforming into a huge, more monstrous form to take the battle directly to them.
• Open Mouth, Insert Foot: Played for Drama. During the TV interview, Katie Killjoy targets Moxxie specifically with difficult and provocative questions because she notices his anxiety and believes it'll make for better ratings. The already nervous imp starts panicking when she starts asking him why he hasn't joined the Crimson Guard considering his skill in using firearms and high body count for I.M.P, and her repeated questioning of his answers being in the negative causes him to accidentally blurt out that he finds the Crimson Guard brutal. This ends up having disastrous consequences.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Moxxie and Octavia end up stealing some jackets to cover their heads and disguise themselves in order to get Octavia to a hospital to treat her bullet wound. While they somehow manage to get out of the hospital without being exposed, it ultimately doesn't keep them from getting found out when they enter a bar for some water later.
• Psychic Strangle: Alastor tortures Octavia this way in chapter 41.
• Ramming Always Works: As a Crimson Guard car tries to pull Loona over when she decides to flee instead of complying with their orders, she rams her car into theirs, sending the guards off the car and crushing them underneath her wheels. She doesn't get much time to celebrate, though, as the maneuver sends her car careening over a bridge.
• Rebel Leader: Cherri Bomb has turned into the leader of a resistance group alongside a bird demon named Maya. After Loona joins them, she also becomes one of the leaders.
• Recap Episode: Chapter 40 kind of serves as one, as the end of the chapter has Moxxie and Octavia tell their loved ones everything that's happened to them while on the run.
• Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Upon escorting the prisoners to the execution platform in chapter 43, Edrich, having been caught off-guard by the execution date being moved up one day, tries to stall by telling Alastor to stick to the schedule. Alastor muses on Edrich being so orderly and how he can respect that... before lifting him into the air with magic and killing him by breaking every bone in his body at once, revealing that he's known about Edrich's Heel–Face Turn all along.
• The Scapegoat: Octavia comes to realize that she was treating Moxxie like one and regrets it badly. Sure, he had the Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment that got him, I.M.P, Stolas and Octavia all labeled as traitors to be hunted down, but Alastor is an insane tyrant who thinks All Crimes Are Equal and took what was clearly an accidental comment and blew it out of proportion, and that's hardly Moxxie's fault. Octavia concludes that she just wanted somebody to blame, and blaming an innocent man for an honest mistake was easier than blaming the tyrant who wants them killed over it.
• Schmuck Bait: After mowing down the Crimson Guard in the ruins of Qaburn, Moxxie and Octavia find a strangely untouched house amidst the ruins of a different town. It has air conditioning, leftover food in the fridge and water. Since they're exhausted, hot, starving and parched, (and thus pretty desperate) they decide to go inside to cool off, eat and restock on supplies. Sure enough, it turns out to be yet another trap by the Crimson Guard as Moxxie is almost captured when going upstairs to investigate the building further; He even laments how obvious it was as the soldier grabs him. Luckily, Octavia saves him at the last minute.
  • The notion that the security cameras in the Pit Of Fire would ever be turned off is revealed to be this in chapter 43. It turns out that they were, in fact, always on regardless of whether the red light was on or not, meaning that Alastor has known about the heroes' escape plans all along. He lampshades this as he prepares to kill Edrich for his treachery:
  Did you really think I would ever turn my cameras off?
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
  • Husk managed to evade capture by Alastor by getting the hell out of dodge when Charlie and her other associates were imprisoned. He then proceeded to spend his time underground for the following two years to avoid being found.
  • Katie Killjoy's last appearance in the fic has her storming off the battlefield in an indignant huff to an unknown location after a disgusted Tom Trench refuses to abandon the injured and dead to their fates once the Final Battle has concluded.
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: Moxxie is established in the epilogue to have some major psychological trauma after everything he's been trough; He can't even walk past a sports stadium because the cheering crowds remind him of the screams of people burning to death in the Pit Of Fire, and he ends up wondering if he'll ever be able to return to his job as a Professional Killer again since every gunshot reminds him of the shootout back in Quaburn. It's not mentioned if anyone else is as affected by the events of the story as he is.
• So Proud of You: Blitzo and Stolas express this towards Moxxie and Octavia respectively when they reunite in chapter 40. Blitzo, in his usual rude and vulgar fashion, flat-out says that Moxxie is a better assassin all by himself than all of the rest of I.M.P together for all of the things he's accomplished while on the run. Stolas, meanwhile, calls his daughter "the bravest demon he's ever known" and that she's brought more respect to the Goetia family name than any of her predecessors ever could hope to.
• Spark of the Rebellion: Downplayed. It's implied that the resistance group that Loona runs into has been around for some time considering the number of members they’ve amassed, but the thing that causes more rebels to rise up all across Hell is Moxxie's accidental critique of Alastor’s regime on live TV. For this reason, he effectively becomes an Icon of Rebellion.
• Spiteful Spit: Octavia ends up spitting at Alastor's face after he shows up in their cell to taunt and torture them just before their execution. While he was going to cause them pain anyway, this show of defiance combined with her mouthing off to him previously is enough to get him to start his torture session with her.
• Stay with Me Until I Die: When Octavia is returned to her and Moxxie's cell after Alastor has tortured her to near-death, she’s left bleeding out on the floor. She begs Moxxie to stay by her side and talks in a way that makes it clear that she's well-aware that she's probably not going to make it. Fortunately, Edrich appears just in time with medical supplies so that he and Moxxie can save her life. (Though he had to kill a nurse and Make It Look Like A Suicide to pull it off)
• Storming the Castle: The climax of the story features I.M.P, the Goetias, Charlie and the other Happy Hotel associates storming the Pit Of Fire's radio tower in order to reach the magic orb and let Charlie regain her magic, which would allow her to finally take down Alastor once and for all.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: The end of chapter 6 has Octavia shot in the leg while escaping the Guard and her injury averts Just a Flesh Wound. Her wound is severe enough that she would've bled out or died of an infection had Moxxie not managed to get her to a hospital for treatment.
• Tempting Fate: After returning to the I.M.P headquarters, Moxxie tries to tell himself that perhaps the fallout won't be so bad; After all, he's just an imp, and maybe not that many people, including Alastor, saw the interview, right? Well, as he's swiftly made aware, he's wrong. Very, very wrong.
• This Is Gonna Suck:
  • Loona reacts like this in chapter 9 after seeing Alastor broadcast I.M.P's incarceration and calling for Moxxie and Octavia’s surrender or arrest.
  This was going to be a long fucking day.
  • Scared as she is, Octavia's only reaction before she's forced into an interrogation room for a session of Cold-Blooded Torture in chapter 34 is a rather resigned ”Ah, shit. Here we go.”
• Tired of Running: Husk, being the only one of the Happy Hotel inhabitants who managed to evade capture, has spent the past two years underground and off Alastor's radar, mostly spending his time drowning his sorrows. But when he picks up on Moxxie's broadcasted Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment and the snowball effect it has caused, he decides that enough is enough and that Alastor needs to be stopped. So he goes out of hiding to seek out Maya, Cherri and Loona's resistance group in order to aid them.
• Title Drop: In chapter 6, as Alastor is intimidating Moxxie while the Crimson Guard destroys and slaughters everyone in the city block, an enraged Moxxie hears Alastor order Imp City’s destruction despite Moxxie having already surrendered himself:
  The next words that Alastor spoke awoke something deep within Moxxie that he wasn’t aware existed. A feeling of anger, hatred and determination. A revelation.
• Track Trouble: While hiding in a train wagon, Moxxie and Octavia notice, to their horror, that the bridge they're about to cross has been blown up by the Crimson Guard. They have no time or opportunity to escape, leaving them no choice but to remain in the wagon as the train plunges into the river below.
• Train Escape: The ”jump into train” variation is used in chapter 6: After managing to escape from Imp City, Moxxie and Octavia race towards some train tracks and manage to jump into a coal wagon on a moving train. Octavia almost doesn't make it and is left clinging to the door for a moment (And gets shot in the leg for her trouble by the soldiers chasing them, to boot), but Moxxie gets a hold of her and pulls her to (relative and temporary) safety.
• Treachery Is a Special Kind of Evil: In Alastor's eyes, at least, saying anything negative about him, the Crimson Guard or his regime is considered treachery and a crime so heinous that it'll basically get you scheduled for execution immediately. Exactly this happens to Moxxie and anybody who has associated with him just for calling the Crimson Guard ”brutal” by accident, and it also happened to Stella in the backstory because she tried to start a rebellion at the start of Alastor's reign, which just further fuels Octavia's hatred for the tyrant.
• Tyrant Takes the Helm: Alastor's ascension to the throne results in Hell turning from one type of Crapsack World to another: Instead of the kingdom of sin, chaos and hedonism that it was under the uncaring, apathetic Lucifer, it becomes a totalitarian dictatorship where anyone can get imprisoned and executed for any reason.
• Underestimating Badassery: As usual where Moxxie is concerned, anybody not named Millie generally doesn't hold him in high regard due to his anxious personality and small stature. Cue people's surprise when he manages to keep himself from crossing the Despair Event Horizon repeatedly (Though with some help from Octavia) and pushing through with nothing but grits, wits and weapon skills, truly proving himself to be a One-Man Army. Octavia even mentally refers to him as a fighter at one point and acknowledges that she never would’ve gotten as far as she did without him.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom:
  • At the start of the story, Blitzo enters Moxxie and Millie’s home in the middle of the night to excitedly tell them about I.M.P getting an invitation to an interview on live TV in Pentagram City, with him accepting the offer in the hopes of drumming up more business for them. He couldn't possibly have known that this would be the start of so much misery for everyone involved.
  • Katie Killjoy and Tom Trench are also examples. Tom is the one who decides to bring up the Crimson Guard in regards to Moxxie's killing prowess, and Katie is the one who keeps pushing the issue and stresses Moxxie out, both to be an asshole and in the hopes of making better TV. But that he'd blurt out a word with negative connotations when describing the Crimson Guard wasn't something either of them expected to happen, not that Katie takes any responsibility for it happening.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Alastor’s Affably Evil (Or, Faux Affably Evil in this story) nature actually made him quite popular when he seized the throne, and several people thought that Hell would be a better place under his rule. This, alongside a big heaping of propaganda, has resulted in him still having some genuine supporters despite his tyranny. At the bar in Qaburn, Moxxie overhears a man saying that Alastor ”knows what he's doing” and that it'd be better if Moxxie and Octavia just turned themselves in to ”make it easier” for those who follow the law.
  • Ultimately, however, the trope is averted. Most of the denizens of Hell despise and fear Alastor for being a tyrant. Alastor eventually realizes that his sway over Hell is fading and that his critics outnumber his supporters, and Moxxie and Octavia also realize that this is the reason why he was willing to try to sway Moxxie to his side: It was a desperate attempt to invoke this trope once more, because in his mind, getting the Icon of Rebellion to join him would make the rebels and the rest of Hell back down.
• The Walls Are Closing In: Alastor's chosen method of Cold-Blooded Torture for Octavia is to have the interrogation room shrink in size until she almost gets crushed to death. (Alastor himself escapes it by taking on an incorporeal form) And as an extra cruel twist, he also heats the metal walls so that she gets burned. She doesn't die (Not in the interrogation room, at least, but she does almost bleed out after she's taken from there) because Alastor calls it off after she’s passed out from pain and oxygen deprivation, but she's left so injured and exhausted that she can't stand up or walk on her own afterwards. Though she notes that she should’ve been even worse off, all things considered, so she concludes that Alastor must've healed her somewhat after he stopped the torture session.
• "Wanted!" Poster: Only hours after Moxxie and Octavia’s escape, they spot Wanted posters of themselves, promising a reward of 10 000 souls for whoever manages to capture them alive.
• We Can Rule Together: During Moxxie's interrogation in chapter 37, Alastor starts it by offering him a top spot in the Crimson Guard, having seen for himself just how proficient Moxxie is with firearms, if he just spills the beans on what he and Octavia are planning. The Radio Demon goes on to try and convince Moxxie that he's just been "misinformed" about the Guard by the people around him, including Octavia, and he even points out Moxxie's status as I.M.P's Butt-Monkey and No-Respect Guy to further strengthen his argument. Moxxie is a bit taken aback by this, conceding to himself that Alastor is absolutely correct in his assessment of Moxxie's workplace experience and how tiring it's been to work so hard and receive little to no recognition for it. But he's come to miss that life, seen for himself just how heartless Alastor and the Guard is and utterly refuses to turn against Octavia, not to mention his suspicion that the offer is a trap. So he sticks by his guns... At which point Alastor starts torturing him for real.
• Wham Line:
  • Chapter 42 ends on the reveal that Alastor has moved the scheduled execution ahead one day.
  • In chapter 43, Alastor reveals that he's known about the escape plan and Edrich's Heel–Face Turn all along with this line:
  You'd know that, wouldn't you? In fact, you had your own little plans for tonight, didn't you?
• Wham Shot: Blood pooling out from under Octavia's leg in chapter 6, signifying that she’s been shot and might risk bleeding out.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • Moxxie gets royally chewed out by Blitzo after they make it back to the I.M.P offices for his Open Mouth, Insert Foot moment on live TV, with the taller imp even slapping him in the face over it.
  • Octavia also gets in on the act in chapter 6, first when the group has been arrested and later when Alastor broadcasts I.M.P's and Stolas's arrest while she and Moxxie are hiding in a train cart; In a fit of rage, she throws coal at the imp and screams that the whole situation is his fault, though she regrets it when she sees just how devastated he is and that he's perfectly aware of how badly he's fucked up.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are:
  • As Moxxie carries a severely injured Octavia towards a nearby village, she berates herself for having to be carried by an imp half her size because of her being ”weak”. Moxxie shuts her down pretty quickly:
  Octavia: If we survive this, we’re going to leave this part out of the story, okay? Last thing I need are the people of Hell thinking I’m weak. I have a reputation to maintain.
  Moxxie: Of course. And… if it helps at all, I don’t think you’re weak at all.
  Octavia: Really? Do you have eyes?
  Moxxie: Yes, I do. And you’re not ”weak.”
  Octavia: Don’t pity me. I fucking hate it when people do that.
  Moxxie: I’m not doing that. You were shot in the leg while trying to escape the most brutal and authoritarian regime that Hell has ever seen. You survived a train crash, a gunshot wound and the rapids. I don’t think a ”weak” person would be able to survive something like that, do you?
  • He gives her another speech like this in chapter 19 when the stress starts to get to her after she accidentally shot him in the leg previously:
  Moxxie: It's alright. And I want you to stick around, do you hear me? You're pulling a lot more weight here than you're giving yourself credit for. Look at us. We killed those soldiers like they were nothing, and we lived to tell the tale. How many other demons can say that they've done something like that?
  Octavia: *sniffles* Sure… but still…
  Moxxie: No ”but still”, we did it. And I'm sure we'll be able to pull it off again. We'll be able to get [Blitzo, Millie and Stolas] back. I promise.
• You Are in Command Now: After Maya is grievously injured after an ambush by the Crimson Guard, Husk is assigned as one of the new rebel leaders once he catches up to the front of the pack because he's the one who knows Alastor the best and thus might be able to predict his behavior.
• You Are Not Alone: As the heroes are led to their execution in chapter 43, Moxxie realizes that Blitzo is the only one of them who doesn't have a family member present since Loona is with La Résistance. So he wordlessly beckons his boss to come closer to let him know that I.M.P will stick together to the very end.
• You Cannot Kill An Idea: Evidently, executing Stella and her associates for planning a rebellion didn't stop a resistance group from forming anyway. And after Moxxie's accidental critique of Alastor's regime, more rebels spring up even if it results in their deaths. The imp even becomes the new symbol for the various resistance groups that pop up, all of them using signs with his face on them and the word ”Brutal” when going up against the Guard.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Alastor abandons Vox and Valentino to their deaths as the Pit of Fire goes up in flames, no longer seeing a reason to keep them around.