"So, now that we're all alone and the kid has been sent to his room, maybe we can-"
"No," Andras huffed, a cloud of smoke escaping his beak. "I'm here to fetch you. Can't you hear it?"
"Hear what?" was all Zac could say before he actually tried listening.
A deep thrumming was vibrating the floorboards, a rhythmic pulse that he could feel in his teeth. Zac looked up, his eyes widening. "Is that March howling for me? Does the Wolf Daddy need me?!"
Zac jumped to his feet and rushed into the hallway, his leopard-print tail streaming behind him.
Andras followed, sighing heavily. "It's not the mutt howling. Use your ears."
"I don't have owl ears," Zac muttered before closing his eyes.
He concentrated. It was faint, muffled by the thick stone walls, but it was definitely music. A heavy, rhythmic beat drifting up from somewhere below.
Zac's eyes snapped open. "Is that... a boombox? Is March holding it up at the bottom of the stairs to get my attention?!"
Andras tried to protest, but Zac was already running.
"I GET SO LOST SOMETIMES! IN YOUR EYES!" Zac shouted, sprinting down the corridor, lost in a rom-com melodramatic fervor. "WITHOUT MY PRIDE I REACH OUT FROM THE INSIDE! MARCH!"
"What? Wait!" Andras shouted, chasing after the human.
"THE GRAND FACADE SO SOON WILL BURN!" Zac sang at the top of his lungs as he bounded down the stairs two at a time with a demon serial killer hot on his heels. "A THOUSAND CHURCHES IN YOUR EYESSSSSS!"
Zac followed the sound of the music until he found himself in front of a familiar pair of doors: the War Room. He could feel the bass now, thumping against the wood.
"Sa bet chi lamp, chi tangaay, sa bet maangi ci biir!" Zac belted, butchering the lyrics with passion.
"HAVE YOU BEEN POSSESSED?! DID YOU LEARN A NEW LANGUAGE?!" Andras hooted, grabbing at the back of Zac's onesie. "Don't go in there! I was supposed to keep you from-"
Zac kicked open the doors.
A sudden, physical wave of music poured out from the room, hitting Zac like a wall of sound and knocking him backward into Andras's arms.
Zac brought his hands up to his ears, squinting against the sonic assault. Inside, chaos reigned. An anthropomorphic unicorn man, dressed in a glamorous outfit of rainbow feathers and glittering sequins, was dancing on the tactical map table. He was playing a trumpet, but the sound coming out of it was a shredding electric guitar solo, accompanied by an invisible, booming orchestra.
Marchosias, Skarg, and Nock were chasing after the one-man band, lunging and grabbing at him as the newcomer twirled and hammed it up on his own imaginary stage. Zac looked over to see Bune in the corner, nodding along to the beat and tapping a clawed foot.
The unicorn pirouetted, dodging a tackle from Skarg and a sword swing from Nock with effortless grace.
"So this is the summons
Stop kissing your cousins
Demons dancing in dozens of new ways!
It's hot as the ovens
Your legions and covens
It's not up for discussions, in a few days
The Goetia Ball is near!
So hear me as I tell you so clearly
It is merely our yearly
Demonic parade!
There will be murder and fervor
Mischief, yes this stuff
Would make a Christian fade!
There will be-"
"WE ARE NOT THAT KIND OF DEMON!" Marchosias yelled, blasting at the dancing unicorn man with his silver annihilation breath. "WE DO NOT SING OUR FEELINGS! STOP IT!"
The blast of fire washed over the table, evaporating the unicorn's trumpet mid-note. The music stopped with the jarring twang of a violin string snapping.
"You murdered Satchmo!" the flamboyant unicorn shrieked, clutching his chest. "My beloved!" He swooned, collapsing onto the map in a dramatic faint.
"Oh, you drama queen," Nock hissed, straightening his mane. "Who the hell names their horn?"
Zac walked into the room now that the deafening music had stopped. He thought it was rich for Nock to be calling anyone else a drama queen, but the unicorn man was clearly... ugh, a musicals guy.
"I've heard of guys giving their horns nicknames," Zac said, his voice echoing in the sudden silence. "But it's usually something like 'Mr. Big' or 'The Hammer' or 'Anaconda.'"
All the demons in the room turned to look at Zac.
Zac yawned, stretching his leopard-print arms high overhead. "Morning y'all."
"Oh my dear Ose!" the unicorn man suddenly trilled before the others could react to the diabolically horny human. "You're finally back, and just in time for the ball!"
The unicorn man rolled off the table and spun over to Zac, a blur of feathers and glitter.
"WAIT RIGHT THERE!" Marchosias howled as he ran forward. "Andras, why did you bring, uh, Ose down here?! Bring him back upstairs so he can, uhm, get dressed! You know how I hate nudity!"
"HEY!" Skarg bellowed. "FUCK YOU!"
"He came down on his own," Andras said, waving a hand and walking past the others to sit at the table. "This human is literally more evil than the rest of you combined. But not me. I'm super evil."
The unicorn man stopped dead in his tracks as he heard Andras call the leopard-spotted figure in front of him a human. He leaned in, sniffing delicately.
"You... you're an Avatar?" he questioned, his eyes widening. "Oh, but of course! You are so teeny tiny! How wonderful! How spectacular! How absolutely morbid!"
Ahem.
The unicorn man waved his hands like a conductor. Another trumpet phased into existence with the sound of an orchestra vamping. "Me-me-me-me-meeee," the unicorn sang, finding his key.
"Uhm, I'd rather you play with your other horn," Zac said.
The unicorn laughed, quickly bringing his hand up to the spiraling horn on his forehead. "This one is only for disemboweling! Now let me serenade you! It's been so long since I've gotten to get someone's first impression on my art!"
"That's not the horn I was-"
Zac was cut off as the unicorn began to bellow a new song, a ghostly band striking up behind him with a crash of cymbals.
"Welcome to the afterlife!
You got what you deserved!
Welcome to the afterlife!
You're dead now, isn't that absurd?
Thinking you followed the word
Thinking you hid among the herd
But your feathers are different than the other birds
Spurred you along with the threat of swords!"
"ENOUGH!" Marchosias howled.
He grabbed the trumpet out of the singing demon's hand and tossed it on the floor. In a moment of rare unity, Nock, Skarg, and March all began stomping on it with a rhythmic, vengeful fury.
Oh wow, I'm not the only musical hater here, Zac thought.
"NO! Satchmo!" The unicorn man dramatically collapsed onto Zac, clutching at his onesie. "Look at what they are doing to my boy! Oh, the horror!"
Zac took a step back, letting the unicorn demon fall face-first onto the stone floor. "Stranger danger! Please help me, Bune!"