Chapter Text
King Dice entered the throne room, humming a tune as he looked to the throne expecting to see his Boss. Strangely, the demon was nowhere to be found. At this time just about every day, the King of the underworld could usually be found in his throne, sipping at tea and reading the morning paper. Dice supposed this was one of those different mornings. As much as the man respected that the demon had his own life outside of sitting on his throne, he wouldn’t lie that he looked forward to having their chats every morning. He knew all too well that the Devil probably didn’t feel the same. To him, Dice was only just another pawn for him to step on.
Turning to head back into the Hellevator, King’s attention was caught by a small noise, followed by distant talking. He listened closely, but judging by the tone Dice deduced that it was in fact his Boss’ voice.
Smiling, King Dice adjusted his tie and followed the sound, going down a corridor that he didn’t recognize. The underworld was a vast place, however, he was sure there were many places he’d never been. Down the dark corridor, there was a single door open, a sliver of light illuminating the hallway partially. At this point, Dice could tell that the Demon seemed to be talking to himself, listing off things. That, and Dice didn’t hear Henchman’s voice accompanying the other.
At least they’d be left alone to talk, even if it was in a different room.
Sticking his head through the door, Dice blinked at the demon looking over what seemed to be a large cauldron, a book opened on a stand and he seemed to be telling himself the ingredients as he went on.
Opening the door wider, King flinched at the loud creak the hinges let out and froze when the Devil turned to face him. He’d obviously startled the demon as he jumped, pouring in just a little too much in whatever ingredient he had been working on.
“Dice! What are you doing here?!” The Devil snarled, seemingly not noticing that he’d added the extra ingredient. “Don’t you know not to bother me while I’m working?!”
“Well, yeah… But I was just looking for you. I was only worried, Boss.”
“Congratulations, you found me. Now go away.”
“What are you cooking up there, Dev?” King Dice approached the cauldron, immediately getting pulled back before he could see in it.
“DON’T TOUCH THAT!” The Devil thundered, keeping a firm and frankly harsh hold on the man’s wrist.
“I wasn’t gonna touch it, Boss!” Dice quickly protested, putting his free hand up. “I was only curious.”
“If you must know,” The Devil snarled, letting go of Dice’s wrist. “I’m making a potion that will allow me to peer into the minds of whoever I want.” He smiled wickedly to himself as he loomed over cauldron.
“Oh boy…” Dice frowned, his face flustered.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing! Nothing! Please, continue.”
The Devil kept an eye on him, raising a suspicious eyebrow, but to Dice’s relief, he didn’t pry.
“This will allow me to always know what those rotten cups are doing and where they’re going at all times. Which means I can snatch that little brat’s soul anytime I want!” The demon went on, laughing sinisterly. “It’s absolutely genius, isn’t it?”
“So… You got a mind reading potion?”
“Yes?”
“It can read anyone’s mind?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re going to use it to spy on those snobby cups that beat you— ?”
“Watch it, Dice.”
“Right, sorry— So… You’re just gonna use it for that?” Dice asked.
“Maybe on Stickler too, as a prank, but other than that, nothing else.” The demon shrugged.
“Oh— Yeah! That’s brilliant, Boss.”
“Why thank you, Dice! You’re too kind.” He chuckled.
Turning back to the book, the demon mumbled to himself, going to a rather dusty cabinet and looking through the old bottles of ingredients. Finding the right one, he smiled to himself and took it from its shelf.
“Just a teaspoon of ‘fragments of a dream’.” He mumbled to himself, just loud enough for Dice to hear.
“Hey, Boss?”
“Yes, Dice?” Annoyance tugged at the demon’s voice.
“Since when can you make potions, if ya don’t mind me askin?”
“It’s always been a hobby of mine. I just don’t do it much.” The Devil explained, concentrating on pouring the glowing, silverish liquid in a teaspoon.
“Huh, I guess I just never thought of it.” Dice spoke mainly to himself.
“Dice, would you kindly shut the hell up for a minute?” The demon snapped, Dice rolling his eyes.
“You could’ve just asked, you don’t need to be rude about it.” Dice snapped back.
“Dice, if you couldn’t tell, I’m very busy, and you’re asinine voice is not helping.”
“Oh, so now my voice is asinine? Fine. I’ll stop talking.”
“Thank you! For my sake, it’s not hard to just follow simple instructions!” The Devil turned to face him for a moment, still pouring the liquid, clearly much more than he should have.
“Uhm… Boss?”
“Don’t you interrupt me! And I told you to shut it!”
“But Boss! It’s important!”
“Dice, that’s enough, you shouldn’t even be back here, and yet here you are! King Dice, the king of worming his way in and out of situations!— “
Before the Devil could continue, the cauldron suddenly started boiling, glowing a bright green light. The demon backed away from it a few steps, staring at it with confusion and a slight tinge of fear. Without thinking, Dice ran to him, took him by the arm and tugged him back.
“No! Dice! Get out of here!”
“I don’t care how dangerous this stuff is, I’m not gonna leave you here!”
“Dice, you don’t understand! You can’t— “
Before he could finish, there was an explosion of light, Dice was quick to place himself in front of his Boss. In the flash of light, there were spurs of color and flashing lights, making Dice’s head spin and ache. It felt as if his mind was going a million miles a minute, as if his mind was leaving its own body— But that was ridiculous.
And as fast as the flash came, everything went black.
***
The first thing King noticed when he woke up was a weight on his head. He groaned, not wanting to deal with a migraine on top of already dealing with an angry boss.
“Dice?” A familiar voice and tone that don’t exactly go together pierced through his groggy sleep on the cold ground.
Dice furrows his eyebrows and groaned nonsense in reply, not wanting to be disturbed from his sleep.
“Wake up, Dice.” The voice snapped. “That’s an order.”
He knew that tone from anywhere; but why was his Boss talking like that?
Dice felt a twitch from somewhere in his body and something tap against his leg. Furrowing his eyebrows, he kept his eyes closed, still barely awake as he felt around, eventually finding something long and serpentine; a forked tail that when he tugged on it, realized was connected to his body. Dice’s eyes shot open— He didn’t have a tail! Why did he have a tail?! What on earth happened before he fell asleep? Or passed out? It’s a little fuzzy to be honest, and his head ache made it impossible to rack his brain on what had happened beforehand.
A hand grabbed him by the shoulder, flipping him over without so much as a warning. His eyes still open, his vision was fuzzy for a moment before it focused on a face. His own face to be precise.
“Dice, I want you to listen to me very carefully; don’t freak out— “
Unfortunately, Dice had barely comprehended what had been said before he yelped, sitting up and trying to back away.
“Wh— What kinda spell is this?! How is— How did— Wh— How is there two of me?!” His voice stammered and cracked, though it was different then he was used to; slightly deeper, a hint of an accent, a little gravel he didn’t recognize but thought he knew from somewhere.
“Dice, you idiot, it’s me! I told you not to freak out!” His own voice growled, his face warping into a surly expression he only recognized from one other person.
“Buh— Boss?” Dice blinked. “B— But how is… How are you— Wha— What happened?”
“Your guess is as good as mine. I suppose the spell I was using backfired. Or maybe… I used too much of ‘fragments of a dream’— I don’t know, you were distracting me.”
“I wasn’t distractin’ ya Boss.”
“You absolutely were!” The Devil in King Dice’s body snapped. “And stop talking like that in my body.”
“Your body— “
Dice looked down to his own body, expecting to see his signature purple suit and instead seeing that he was covered head to toe in black fur. Bringing his hands up to see them, his breath gasped in his throat as he panicked and saw every little nail come to a sharp, pointed talon. Dice felt the tail once again tap against his leg— Apparently he didn’t have much control over it. Feeling his hands around his head, he felt the base of two large horns and pointed ears.
The realization made him let out a terrified scream, his mouth quickly getting covered by a gloved hand.
“I told you not to freak out!” The Devil snapped through gritted at him, lowering his hand. “That means don’t scream, you’ll only attract unwanted attention.”
“B— But— How did… Wh— What— “
“Stop stammering you look like an moron.”
“Can… Can you undo it?”
“What do I look like, an idiot? Of course I can undo it!”
“O— Okay… How do we— “
“There’s just one, teeny, tiny problem… I’m out of some of the ingredients.” The Devil admitted, scratching the back of his neck.
“WHAT?!”
“SHHHHH!” The Devil clapped a hand over Dice’s mouth again, leaning in closer. “Stop screaming, you moron, or I’ll rip your soul out.”
King Dice raised an eyebrow, unsure if his Boss could even do that still in his current state.
“You know what I mean.” The Devil snapped. “Now listen very closely, we can order the ingredients but they will take some time to get here. Not long, shouldn’t be more than a week. Can you manage that?”
King Dice nodded, his mouth still covered.
“Now I need you to listen very, very carefully, because you can’t screw this up. I need you to ask Henchman to order ‘fragments of a dream’, ‘eye of a deadman’ and ‘tail of a newt’.”
Dice grimaced back but didn’t say anything.
“What? This is Hell, were you expecting cinnamon, sugar and vanilla?” The Devil snapped at his disgust. “Now can you do that for me?”
King Dice nodded.
“D’uhm… Boss?”
The two of them froze, turning their attention to Henchman who had entered the room without either noticing.
“Is… Is everything ok?”
“Yeah, why wouldn’t it be?” The Devil answered, momentarily forgetting that he was in King Dice’s body.
“Well I just heard the Boss scream and I wasn’t sure… I didn’t mean to uhm… Interrupt anything…”
The Devil opened his mouth to argue, his eyes falling on his own body in front of him, a confused looked across his face. Right. He was King Dice right now. Not the Devil.
Removing his hand from over Dice’s mouth, he backed away from him, ultimately keeping his mouth shut.
King Dice looked between him and Henchman, the Devil gesturing for him to answer.
“Oh— Oh, right uhm…” He cleared his throat at the warning look the Devil wearing his own face gave him. “I’m— I’m fine. Just… Just saw a spider. It’s not a big deal.”
King went to stand up, surprised to find Henchman hurrying over and taking him by his hands to help him up. The Devil scoffed, standing by himself, wincing at a few cracks coming from his back.
“Must’ve been a big spider to scare you.” Henchman helped dust himself off.
“Oh— Oh yeah, it was a real big spider, but the Bo— I mean… Uh Dice, helped me.”
“Yeah, huge spider.” The Devil commented, sarcasm tugging at his voice. “Boss, didn’t you have something to ask Henchman?”
“Huh?”
“Something important?” The Devil hinted again, getting annoyed with the other.
“Oh?— Oh yeah! Henchman, could you please order some ingredients for my spells?”
“Sure, I can put in an order. What all do ya need?”
“What all do I need?” Dive looked to himself, the Devil giving him another annoyed look. “Oh yeah! Uh— Fragment of a dream… Uhm… Eye of a… Deadman… Tail of… Lizard? Newt! Not lizard…” He chuckled half heartedly.
“Uhm, ok, yeah I can get that in for you. Would you like some tea, Boss?”
“I don’t really like— OW!” He rubbed his ribs where the Devil had elbowed him, the pain subsiding as fast as it came. “I mean, yeah, that sounds good. Thank you, Henchman.”
The purple imp nodded, leaving the room, the Devil turning to face him as soon as the door clicked shut.
“Smooth.”
“Sorry! I panicked!”
“No kidding. Really? A spider? Everyone knows that I’m not afraid of spiders!”
“I’m sorry!”
“Stop apologizing!” The Devil growled, dragging his hands down his face in ire. “For someone with a massive ego, you sure don’t seem confident in yourself right about now.”
“Well I’ve never been the King of Hell before, so I’d appreciate some help, Boss.”
“Don’t you be getting a swelled head just because you have limitless power.”
“I’M NOT— “
“Hell will survive a week with an idiot in charge, just don’t mess this up.” The Devil quickly changed the subject, Dice letting his anger subside just for now. “And under no circumstances are you tell anyone what happened.”
“Not even Henchman?” Dice creased his brow.
“Especially Henchman.”
“Don’t you trust him?”
“Of course I— “ The Devil stopped and growled again. “Henchman is… Nice… But he also has a big mouth. And there’s a lot of power-hungry demons that would gladly take advantage of the situation. Understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Just sit on my— Your— Throne and pretend you know what you’re doing. Just act as if nothing is wrong and my— Your— Demons will work as they usually do.” The Devil went on, King nodding. “I know how to play all the Casino games so being you should be easy enough.”
“I also have that performance this Saturday.”
“I’ll just cancel, nothing faking a little cold can’t solve.”
“No, you can’t do that. The public demands it!”
The Devil opened his mouth to argue, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Had King Dice really never taken a sick day? Did he even get sick? He was so prim and proper that the Devil didn’t notice. Though as he thought about it, he closed his mouth. Of course Dice took a sick day. It must’ve been too close to the show night to cancel, which was fair.
“Let’s just hope we can get this resolved before then.” He decided to say instead. “Get to my— Your— Office and get some paperwork done.”
“Wait, I have to do your paperwork?” Dice’s golden eyes widened.
“It can’t go a week without being worked on, trust me I’ve tried.”
“But— Wh— What do I do? What if I do something wrong?! What if— “
“You’re panicking again, Dice. All you have to do is just sign the papers.” The Devil said as nicely as he could, even then it could be perceived as mean.
Dice still looked unsure, his jagged top teeth biting his lip as he looked to the floor, his ears and tail drooping.
“Just do your best. I’m— I’m not expecting perfection right now. Let’s just… Get this week over with.” The Devil tried again, seeming to put Dice’s nerves at ease just slightly. Walking to the Hellevator, Dice followed, the two of them looking at each other before heading up to the Casino.