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hiemaldesirae · 3 months

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The Hazbin Graduate's Guide to Homicide (2)

Student Report: Alastor Hartfelt Supervising Staff: Vice-Dean Lilith Morningstar Sponsor: [REDACTED] To the esteemed and generous sponsor of one Mister Alastor Hartfelt, The following enclosed letter is a partial recount of Mister Alastor's first week during his term here at our esteemed institution. Please dispose of this report as soon as you are finished reading it for privacy insurance. We at the Hazbin Institution for Homicide Practictioners thank you for your continued interest and patronage. Sincerely, Vice-Dean Lilith Morningstar.

(Enclosed is also a photo of your charge with our current star student, Vox Vanhal. Please note that Mr. Vanhal's file is not yet open for your private purposes, but Dean Lucifer is working on it.)

[more murder academy radiostatic content] <- read the first for context! ^^

"Does this radio only have one station?" Alastor frowns at the contraption.

Having arrived at Pride House late into the semester (according to Dean Morningstar, anyway- he hadn't wanted to come here in the first place, so he doesn't see why he should be given the blame), Alastor had been stiffly informed by the receptionist- one Mrs. Mayberry- that he would have to be sharing a joint bathroom with a young woman named Charlie as a result of no other rooms being available. He'd been tempted to ask about the peculiar young man who he'd met that afternoon and how he'd assumed they might be roommates, but after one sour look from the receptionist that reminded him far too much of his late grandmother, he'd simply kept his mouth shut and taken the key.

The room he was assigned honestly wasn't half bad, if he could push out the questioning in his hindbrain of why he was given a room with a bathroom to share with someone of the fairer sex. Light from the setting sun streamed in from the open curtains, and through the window, an elevated view of the small Dutch-themed town square was easy to see. If Alastor squinted, he could see the glittering waters of the oddly named Lake Pandemonium, and past that, a thick covering of colourful flowering trees he had never once seen before in his life.

The room itself reminds Alastor a little of hotel rooms: somewhat sterile in its professionalism, and altogether unattached from any sense of home. Though he supposes it's better this way: he would rather a completely sterile and unlived in room than one bearing marks of another's absence.

Anyway. Back to the radio.

Alastor fiddles with the knobs a little, but still, the tunes of the blues persist on, with not even the slightest bit of variety.

It was ironic now, thinking of how he used to dance to songs just like these in Mimzy's company, and now he was complaining for no reason. He'd expected much less kind treatment when he'd been brought to Hazbin, after all, but after not even a day of staying here, it seemed to him that their service alongside their accomodations had been top notch. Excluding the presence of the Dean, Alastor found himself thinking that he may even end up liking this place.

That line of thought would soon be tested the very next morning, when Alastor made his way out of his rooming quarters and down to the building that housed the institution's dining hall.

Though the dean had been careful to point it out to him during the tour, he hadn't realized just the sheer size of the place: its high-sloped ceilings and massive polished columns of oak wood and obsidian enlays made for a stunning, if intimidating layout.

"Ah, Mister Hartfelt- Alastor, right?"

A voice catches his attention and before he even turns, Alastor knows who the soft hand on his shoulder is from. Lo and behold, the man with the mismatched eyes offers him a smile, one that Alastor returns after a beat of silence.

"Since you're new, do you want to come sit with me?"

"I don't see why not," Alastor responds simply. There's no harm in it, exactly- he's not quite sure what exactly he's supposed to be doing at mealtimes (see once more: coming in to the start of the term 'late') and, besides. He's been curious about the man with the gemstone eyes since they met the day prior, so the chance to sit and eat with him... well, it was quite the unexpected boon.

"Right, you'll have to get a plate for yourself, but you can always just take one from someone who hasn't woken up yet," Vox says as they make their way to the table where he was sitting. "Just be careful that the one you're taking isn't from someone really protective of their property."

"Why not?"

"They've probably already laced the plates with some kind of poison." Vox shrugs. "Most have antidotes on hand for that kind of thing, but only for their own poisons. So we try not to get the plates mixed up."

"Ah," Alastor says succinctly. "My apologies, remind me how long you've been here for again?"

"Two weeks," Vox says. He laughs a little at the face that Alastor makes, "I mean, well, you tend to learn these kinds of things pretty quick. If not cause of the upperclassman, usually staff are around to tell you what not to do... and if they're not there either, there's always the medical personnel who can help you after you've done the deed and gone belly up, so to say."

"I'm quite sure I'd rather not have to resort to said medical personnel, but to each their own," Alastor says.

This gets a laugh from Vox again, one that provokes that deep sort of familiarity inside of Alastor, and once again he asks himself where do I know this man from? It was certainly never from any radio program he'd ever heard, but he couldn't quite rule out the possibility of it being from a foreign program either, given the soft influence of german notes in the other man's speech.

He's drawn out of his thoughts when Vox pushes a plate towards him, already laden with food. "Here. Snatched this one from my former roommate a week back and he never questioned it. Guy didn't even show up to breakfast half the time."

Alastor takes it without asking any further questions, though he does look at the meal to check for any sort of poisons he should watch for. Not that he has enough faith in Vox to think that the other would be able to murder him, but, this was a school for murder, and in the current moment, he was outclassed (even if it wasn't by much.) However, there was a question he wanted to ask unrelated to the food.

"Former roommate?"

"Mm, he graduated- well, went to complete his thesis, which is basically the same thing but shorter because if you don't complete your thesis you may as well say your goodbyes- and that was three days before you arrived," Vox clarifies. "Or, well. I s'pose I shouldn't say that. I'm pretty sure he graduated. The guy was an upperclassman, and the terms here are pretty unpredictable- there's no limits on the time you spend here unless your funds are limited, and he was definitely not one of the people who have to scrape their savings together to afford a single year here. I didn't know anything about his academic career though, so it's definitely a possibility he didn't graduate."

"If he didn't graduate, then-"

"If he didn't graduate then he's dead, simple as pie," Vox clarifies once more. Alastor squints his eyes at the other man, who huffs and bites into his toast before saying anything else. "Well, hey, I mean I know I don't seem like the best roommate right now, but look, all right, I'm not gonna be looking into the disappearance of the guy who kept wrecking my bathroom setup for two weeks! Besides, when Dean Morningstar introduced you the other day, I thought that we'd be rooming together- especially since I already had the vacancy, and it'd make sense to just, you know, lump us together, right? Since I've got the room, and you need it?"

"Yes, it'd seem that way," Alastor says. He picks at his own food for a moment longer, debating between telling Vox of his actual room arrangements and keeping his mouth shut before deciding that whatever information he could get out of the man would be worth the potential embarrassment and questioning. "But instead, I was assigned to share a room with a woman."

Vox spits out his food onto the table, hacking and coughing as Alastor reaches over the table and pats him on the back firmly, shaking his head when some other members start making their ways towards him. "You- they made you room with a woman? What?"

"Well, it's certainly not as bad as you're making it sound-"

"I mean, sharing a bathroom, whatever, I know how rooming works in the Pride House so, all right, not that bad considering you'd have the double locked doors and as long as neither of you forget to lock the doors everything's all right, but, seriously, what?" Vox sounds puzzled, almost as if he himself can't work out what the staff are getting at, and in fairness, Alastor himself can't really puzzle it out himself. "Couldn't you file like, a report against that or something?"

"I'm here on a sponsorship," Alastor reminds the other man, who seems to shrink back into his chair at the reminder that he hadn't been the one to put himself into this facility. "I'd rather not risk their ire, if only for the sake of my sponsor."

That was a lie, of course. The truth was, as amiable and sociable as the man before him was- and as much as Alastor had a personal sort of curiosity towards him, he still didn't wish to room beside a man, even if it was Vox specifically who he was sharing a bathroom with.

Whatever it was that the Dean and whoever had arranged their rooms had been planning, Alastor felt free to turn a blind eye to the proceedings, at least until it affected him negatively.

"Makes sense," Vox says after a beat of silence. "Well... even if we aren't roommates, are you up to being friends, perhaps?"

"Sure," Alastor says. The other man's face brightens, and with it, his eyes too, sparkling like the gemstones he'd been silently comparing them to. "As long as you don't kill me."

"Hey, I wouldn't do that," Vox rolls his eyes. "If you wanna meet someone who'll kill you after becoming friends then you can go ahead and talk to Miss Rosetta Levi. She's taking... Mariticide as a major if I remember correctly? Oh, don't call her Rosetta, though, I hear she prefers Rosie."

"I'll keep her in mind, dear pal," Alastor chuckles. With that, he begins to once more dig into his breakfast, before a final question occurs to him. "Oh, right. I wanted to ask- if it's not too personal- what is it that you're here for?"

"Huh?" Vox blinks at him, spoonful of food raised to his mouth as he waits for Alastor to clarify.

"Your target. Because there's one for everyone here, right?" Alastor says simply. "They make you write it on the application, don't they? Whether it's your mother, your father, the organization who wronged you..."

The other man sets the spoon down gently before grabbing his glass of orange juice and taking a swig of it like a day drinker. "They do."

Alastor waits for a moment, but there's nothing else. "Well, all right then. I'm not quite sure what mine was listed as when the application from my sponsor came in- the Dean refuses to let me see more than I absolutely have to when it comes to my own paperwork- but I'm quite certain my father's name is on the list there somewhere."

He's not saying all this solely in an attempt to get Vox to open up, though that is part of it. Still, it's nice to let someone know of his own things (if only because he's a bit of a fiend for attention). "Anyway, it's all right if you don't want to say. I figure it's personal."

"It is," Vox says simply before he sighs. "Sorry. It's... well, it's a bit of a touchy subject for me. Not exactly something I'd like to spill at breakfast twenty-four hours after our first meeting."

"I understand," Alastor responds, though in his head he's already beating himself over the head for his lack of tact and how much he'd said. "I'm sure not many would."

"Eh," Vox waves his hand. The easy flow of conversation has returned now, as Vox continues, "I met a guy my first week here called Arackniss and he proceeded to tell me every single gory detail about how he planned to do away with his stepfather for the sake of his cartel's future. Lot more mob people than I'd expected."

"It's because of Prohibition." Alastor says absentmindedly, not expecting anything to come of his throwaway comment. Then he looks over at Vox, who's staring at him.

"You're that old?"

"What?" Alastor squinted. "The year is 1948, right? I'm not crazy? I'm 32, this isn't-"

"You're- no, sorry, I-" Vox laughs, hand flying up to his mouth to cover it. "Sorry, I just- you look so young."

"I am young," Alastor says. He sighs even as Vox continues laughing, pressing a hand to his temple to quell the coming headache.

"Sorry! Sorry. Different age standards, you know. It's a Hollywood thing," Vox smiles, mirth twinkling in his eyes, and suddenly, Alastor knows where he recognizes the other from.

"You-"

At that moment, a loud ringing echoes through the halls nine times.

"Ah, that'll be the morning bell. I've got Aesthetics and Disguise with Professor Asmodeus next," Vox says. He scarfs down the remaining food on his plate in record time and gets up, readjusting the uniform shirt and jacket he wears before grinning at Alastor. "I'll see you at lunch, then!"

"Right. I'll see you there."

#sorry guys they're not roomies BUT ITS FOR PLOT REASONS ITS FOR PLOT REASONS #the hazbin institution for homicide practitioners #chai writes #ran rambles #hazbin hotel #radiostatic #🌗 art tag #hazbin vox #vox hazbin hotel #hazbin alastor #alastor hazbin hotel

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