Traffic [Valduggery, Skulduggery Pleasant Fanfiction]

God

Valkyrie winced. "I, uh, forget to set the alarm."

Skulduggery looked at her.

Valkyrie held up her hands. "In my defense, it was late."

Skulduggery looked back at the creepy man. "How did you get past the guard dog?"

Valkyrie closed her eyes. "I gave Xena the week off. Alice was visiting a city, or something, and she said there are dog parks and dog boutiques and..." Valkyrie pursed her lips. "Sorry."

"For the last time, I'm God!" the man on the floor yelled.

Skulduggery nodded slowly. "Which God? One of the Faceless One's worshippers? Or a Darquesse worshipper—the god to the goddess, so to speak. A Druid god? A Teletubbie's God? Frankly, you can pick any god, because I don't really care which God you are. I'm more interested as to why you were harassing my partner."

God raised his hand again. "I can prove it."

Skulduggery tutted. "You seem to be missing the point, delusional man. I really don't care."

"No," the man said loudly, "I swear—"

Valkyrie sighed. "Gosh, what is it with dudes and breaking into my room?"

"Skulduggery, you love Zootopia!" the man yelled again.

Valkyrie laughed.

Skulduggery did not.

Skulduggery stood. "He is God."

Valkyrie frowned. "What?"

Skulduggery carefully smoothed his shirt down. "You are currently standing on God's face."

"No, not that—you love Zootopia?" Valkyrie grinned. "I knew you related to Nick. You did, didn't you? And how can you not love Judy?"

Skulduggery looked at her for one long second. "I suggest you stop standing on God's face before he decides to smite you."

Valkyrie opened her mouth.

"And to stop talking about Zootopia before I smite you."

Valkyrie removed her foot from God's face.

God slowly picked himself up. He fixed his hair and glasses. He took a moment to compose himself.

Skulduggery finally broke. "Valkyrie, stop grinning at me."

God held out his hand. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you both."

Valkyrie—as a rule—didn't shake hands of men who broke into her room. Skulduggery hunched his shoulders.

"I don't," Skulduggery said, "shake the hands of men who reveal my biggest secrets."

God's fingers practically withered into his hands. He didn't let this deter him.

"Well," God said, clapping his hands together, "I have a question I want to ask you both. Now, I've traveled a long way to ask you both—"

"Can we get on with it?" Skulduggery interrupted.

Valkyrie shook her head. "See? You've made him angry. You couldn't pick something a little better, like, his greatest fear or something? The last meal he ate? His hair color?"

God was distressed. "How would you two like to save the world again? Go on more adventures?"

A chill ran down Valkyrie's spine. "We go on plenty of adventures. Just last week, I punched at least five people."

"Six," Skulduggery corrected.

God waved their words away. "Can you imagine? Another boo—another year or month or week of action and adventure?! The Earth, on the brink of collapsing, when you—"

Valkyrie's throat tightened. Her hands were shaking, and she stilled them. "Another war?"

Skulduggery nodded. "Maybe kill a few more of our friends?"

God wilted. "But you two like adventure!"

"We like solving mysteries," Skulduggery said, voice still sharp. "It's been nice. We've saved up some money, tidied up after the last war, protected people. It's been busy and not horrifically trauma inducing. We save the world because we have to, because we put the pieces together."

Valkyrie closed her eyes. "Because we're the ones who were about to destroy it."

God coughed. "It will be better this time," he said lamely.

When Valkyrie opened her eyes, God was gone.