The Adventures of Stagger Li

Chapter Nineteen

Vincent

Stagger Li had become lost from love, at least in the usual conventional understanding of love.
None, other than Zelda, had seen into the depths of his soul, and while their fusing in the Pic &
Run had, by earth time standards, been only the time it took for Horace to drive up in his police
car, get out, come in, and eat a doughnut, the joining of their souls was eternal. And now she was
gone.

Love is right relationship and Stagger Li expressed love through right relationship with evil. He
did not merely fight it; he sliced it and diced it. He withstood its tortures with a humor that evil
could not comprehend. He drove its representatives mad with frustration. They could harm him
but could not make him fear.

Vincent and Stagger Li had clashed long before Vincent's promotion from a Lower Hell minion
to one of Hell's gatekeepers. Vincent had wound up on the ground with Stagger Li's boot on his
throat and the Vorpal blade carving a smiley face on Vincent's forehead. The stupid grinning face
still burned its way into his fiendish soul but had long since been cauterized from any external
display.

There was one thing you could count on about Vincent. He was honest in his dishonesty. You
always knew which side he was on. He kept the faith of no faith with no waiver and no waver.

As one of Hell’s gate keepers, Vincent had worked his way up through the ranks. He knew all of
Dante’s and Virgil’s friends in the lower and middle hells. He despised Beatrice. “That snooty
dame,” he called her. Vincent likes his desk job, but one should make no mistake, not be fooled
by his bureaucratic manner. Vincent has fangs and claw and knows the drawing of blood as
readily as he knows his computer files.

"You shouldn't have performed that testicular operation on my guards, Stagger! You made the
children suffer."

"YOU made the children suffer. You slime balls are the ones holding them hostage."

"Avoid responsibility all you want. Any violent move you make causes them instant pain."

"How about if I come over there and kiss you on your smiley face?"

Vincent blanched and involuntarily touched his forehead.

Stagger Li felt the children laugh within their cell in deepest Hell. They looked into each other's
eyes with newfound hope.