Hellish Company

how did we get here?

Hermie stumbles down the initial entrance of hell, which just so happens to be a flight of stairs. The teens thought it'd be a good idea to try and get into heaven and while everyone else made it back to not-earth safely, he fell down to hell and landed flat on his face. They take a moment to figure out what just happened, They're in hell now not fun, hot. They then realise that the worst part is that even if the teens open a portal in a second, it'll be hours for them and if they're to go off their previous experiences it'd take them hours to remember them. So they take a deep breath and sit up in favour of lying splayed out on the floor. He'd get up but he heavily doubts anyone in hell is polite enough to help him up and he can't really do it himself, Burn scars are not very pliable, especially when they never once got taken care of.

Unable to think of anything else to do they wonder what they would be doing if they never plotted against normal, and just stayed in Chaparral High School. Maybe he would be the lead in the play, maybe he'd gotten kicked out for cheating, he doesn't know anymore. He wishes he could've just been a normal kid or hell, he'd settle for being raised by one of his biological fathers. Sure he hates both of them and he's planning on how to kill them but maybe if he was raised by them it'd be a different story.

Hermie is hot with a strange smell, the smell of aerial silks, why would he be smelling aerial silks of all things? Their thoughts are interrupted by a voice"Are you just gonna sit there and sulk all day?" They half jump and look behind them. He could recognize the man as Nick, Taylor's dad... technically his half-brother, but he doesn't mean that. The only reason he counts Taylor as his nephew is because they're friends. They haven't even spoken to Nick once in the brief time they were together. "I would get up but I can't" They explain, looking up at Nicholas who was smirking a bit too widely for his liking. "You can't get up on your own?" He asks, looking around confused, seemingly looking for an explanation. He shrugs it off and offers his hand to Hermie. Hermie takes it and pulls himself up, with some effort. "Burn scars are very annoying" They explain, dusting themselves off.

"Those are real? I'd kinda expect you to have fire immunity, I mean, Taylor has it for Christmas' sake," he jokes, looking at Hermie's scars, skeptically. Hermie frowns for a second, did Nick just say Christmas in stead of hell? "They're real, yes. I keep them because I like the two-face look, also it takes enough energy to have a consistent form, I'm not going to exert more energy just to cover them up" Hermie explains with a shrug. "A huh form?" Nick asks, clearly more confused than before.

Hermie sighs. They hate explaining this, it's embarrassing. "You remember the doodler? How they were always shifting between multiple people?" Hermie asks. Nick responds simply by nodding. "So it's that except, more physiologically scarring, I have to use energy to not look like that" they explain, making a few vague hand gestures, trying their best to explain this in the most dumbed down way they can. "And this is the form that uses the least energy?" Nick asks Hermie isn't sure why they're asking so many questions, it's slightly annoying. "No, it's the form that looks the most normal and takes the least energy" They reply, getting fed up with the questions. "Hey, when you're in hell, you can just take whatever form you want, I mean, the people down here might even deserve some physiological scarring" Nick says, gesturing to the people around them, who all seem to be fighting somehow.

"Why do you care so much? Last time we were in the vicinity of each other you didn't talk to me once" Hermie sneers, just wanting to be left alone. "Well, that was before I had to listen to Jodan ramble about you for, Uhm, 2 hours. I'm not kidding that's not counting the time he was crying, that was 20 minutes on its own" Nick says with a laugh. Hermie raises an eyebrow, Jodie talked about him? And he cried? Was he making fun of him? Was he going off about how much of a disappointment he is? About how he's happy he was abandoned?