The Terrible Secret of Hell


In times long gone past, Daniel and Hutriel were two angels charged with the word of Final Justice. Each one is responsible for preventing the souls of mortals who do not belong in the Fiery Fires(tm) from going in by sheer Administrivia Futz, in which recently deceased mortal souls are misaddressed and sent to the wrong afterlife (a phenomenon known in Heavenly circles as 'Pulling a Sircam'). As Heaven is ostensibly perfect (or at least slightly better run than Hell, even though people do seem to steal the pencils from the desks all the time...), this sort of a mix up doesn't tend to happen too often, allowing Daniel and Hutriel to establish a sort of patter with the various souls of the damned -- you wouldn't know it from published material, but Hutriel can do a mean groucho -- to help pass the time. For instance, they've been recently seen to deliver the following monologue:

Yes, at times they can be bastards, but they're fun bastards. Of course, just recently, Orc decided to do a Great Thing. He decided hey... what the heck... as a present for everyone he'd Network all of Heaven's Soul Heaven/Inferno Tracking system (which even allows you to trace where your soul is, right over the web!). This was a wonderful idea indeed... except that when shopping for software to use for his project, he rolled quadruple '6's (yes, somehow he rolled an extra die, don't ask) and wound up picking FileMaker Pro to use for connecting all of Providence.
As you might expect, all of Heaven experienced what's known amongst we geeks as 'downtime'. Slashiel, Angel of the First Post, immediately remarked upon it. And meanwhile, down at the Gates of Hell, Daniel and Huttiel were suddenly working harder than a FedEx employee under Tom Hanks. Needless to say, they had no suitable coping mechanism in place, and Divine Prozac had yet to be invented at this point... so both of them went mildly dissonant.
You see, in addition to being rubber rapier wits, both Angels tended to be perfectionists, which was just fine when they had too much time on their hands... but throw a bazillion souls an hour at them and they start to perceive flaws in their work. Or, sadly, in one another's work. And in their methodology. And in their purpose entirely...
Both of the Angels decided, almost in tandem, that being sent to Hell was far worse than not existing at all. Further, that if most human souls were being diverted towards Hell, they should take Steps in which to protect them. Thusly, both have created their own, very different, entirely dissimilar Attunements by which to protect human souls from the Terrible Secret of Hell:

Daniel's Attunement: Push


Effect: Can only be used at the top of the Staircase of Souls, a visual reconfiguration of the path down to the Gates of Hades which makes the path there look like... well... stairs. By delivering the somatic component (a push to the back of the back of the deceased soul), the ex-human will tumble down the staircase and never be seen again. Nobody knows where they go.

Hutriel's Attunement: Shove


Effect: Can only be used at the top of the Staircase of Souls, a visual reconfiguration of the path down to the Gates of Hades which makes the path there look like... well... stairs. By delivering the somatic component (a shove to the back of the back of the deceased soul), the ex-human will tumble down the staircase and never be seen again. Nobody knows where they go, but we suspect that they're very well-protected.

Unfortunately, right now neither Daniel nor Hutriel trust one another. They have a new routine, which arguably is not quite as fun as their old...
Calling Dr Bombaiel! Calling Dr Bombaiel! We need you fast to save some dissonant Angel!

So what does this have to do with Zero Wing? Well, the Laziest Men On Mars originally brought us the Zero Wing music video... and now they've released The Terrible Secret Of Space, right here. Check it out. And keep... watching... the skies.

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