The Cells of Notre Dame

By Beth McCoy

**Flaming
Feather**

Now, as everyone knows, a Hellsworn Soldier tends to go to Hell when killed, even if he (or she) hasn't already reached his fate (yet?). This does bother some people -- Mercurians, Servitors of Destiny, the odd Cherub or Malakite...

Not to mention that sometimes it's just not a good idea to kill a Hellsworn (it might tip off your plans early), and once you've captured the damned sod alive, well...

So, between Hellsworn who some angel thinks can be turned, and the ones you get just because killing them is tactically unsound, you need a place to keep them.

Ordinary Tethers are all well and good, but few of them have the room for long-term storage of captive mortals. However, Notre Dame has (it's well established somewhere or other) catacombs which only celestials know of. Vaulted, underground rooms and halls, without windows, shadowed...

And little rooms.

Lots of little rooms, really. Most of them look like windowless Motel 6 chambers, with a bed, a table or two, maybe a chair, and a bathroom. Some, for the more suicidal prisoners, are less well-appointed, of course. Don't want some Hellsworn getting to Hell and babbling the secrets that he knows, right?* Poor deluded things.

Food is delivered through a slot in the door for some, via Heaven-sworn Soldier for others, or angel for others. (It can be the first view of a non-blessed soul for new angels, especially those of the Sword, and is therefore educational as well as useful to have these cells around.) Exercise is in underground gyms, if deemed necessary and not dangerous. Some Elohite and Mercurian (and human) psychologists have sessions with those Hellsworn who might be redeemable, trying to convince the poor damned souls to let an Archangel strip the infernal Force from them. For most of the captive Soldiers of Hell, that's the only real contact with another sapient being that they get. Tends to soften them up for the psychologists, no?

There are books, of course. If you're not one of the troublesome ones, at least, you can get a list of books to read. Destiny is big on reading books, of course. Some Creationers will sneak in art supplies, too.

What's that, you say? They still have to sleep. True enough. That's why the cells are linked to little niches in the ethereal side of Blandine's Tower, which holds the captive dreamscapes of the prisoners. One of Blandine's Vassels is on constant watch there, of course, its Distinction ability carefully linked into the artifact-cells to ensure that all the prisoners have good dreams. The very best. (It's no wonder that a lot of them tend to sleep. Of course, the counselors who go to talk to them don't have to talk to them corporeally. Sometimes, a dream is an even better venue for analysis and persuasion.)

*Well, yes, some of them have information that should never get to Hell. Useful, the Songs of Entropy, no? Some of the Hellsworn there have been there a long time. With TVs? Why would Heaven's servants let elements of the Media get into Notre Dame? They've got books and some art supplies. Why should they get TV as well? Though it's a common enough threat from Lightning Servitors to junior Jeanites, to make them do "tech support" for the prisoners. Not that they have a real link out of the place either, though -- no reason for one.

Does the Sword approve? Why, whose new-to-Earth angels do you think do the brunt of the guard duty...?

**Flaming
Feather**

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