Author Note: This idea came to me a while ago, as I was posting an hilarious 'when you accidentally open the front camera' meme with a screenshot of Pinhead in an extreme close up from Bloodline to my HR/Pinhead fanpage on Facebook. It occurred to me that he would have to deal with this technologically-minded generation, and the widespread obsession with selfies. A sudden thought of Pinny's curiosity of a new summoner's iPhone getting the best of him popped into my head, and...yeah. This is the result. XD Rest assured, our favourite Prince of Pain is completely in-character. I just had to get this plot bunny out, one I've had since January, and have been writing for a couple of months. I really hope you all enjoy it. It's just a bit of harmless fun, and something I hope gets a chuckle out of you all. Also, this happens to be my present for Nikette, also known as ArtGem ondeviantArt, whose birthday it is today. Happy Birthday, buddy! :D Now, onward we go. PS - My humblest apologies for the lame-ass title. It was the only one I could think of. :/ - Laura

Selfie-Obsessed

Xipe Totec's lip curled upwards slightly as he observed his latest handiwork; remnants of what was once a young man reduced to nothing more than viscera and bone lay in bloody chunks before him.

The Cenobite gazed upon the mess with an apathetic air, before he gave a sigh of boredom and moved slowly forward. With his task completed, he could now return to his realm. The hem of his floor length cassock brushed the dust-coated wooden flooring as he languidly and gracefully manoeuvred amongst the scraps of torn flesh and limbs in order to retrieve the Lament Configuration. The item in question was set where the supplicant had once knelt, almost as if in wait for its master, miraculously unstained by the human's shed blood, and nor tainted by his grease-coated hands.

Though his newest supplicant did not put up much of a fight, none of the usual pleas of clemency or bartering, it was...a rather unusual summoning, that was certain.

As he slowly leaned forward, his hand reaching for the configured box, his attention was piqued by something other than the key to his realm; it was something that Xipe could not have missed, as it was emitting a shrill and repetitive tone.

A device lay on the opposing side of the bloodied remains, and Xipe recognised it as belonging to the boy he'd torn apart. He remembered, strangely, how the youth had held it up before him and pointed it in the Cenobite's direction. Why? He wouldn't know. His reaction to the Prince of Pain's presence and his subsequent behaviour was as puzzling as some of the humans he'd reaped over the centuries.

Soon, the shrill ended, and it lay in silence. In spite of himself, the Prince reached for the item, and grasped a hold of it. He turned it over in his hand and studied it closely.

Then, it occurred to him just what this...thing was.

It was a device created in this modern era for its modern and technologically-minded citizens. Whenever summoned to earth, Xipe had heard whispers of this piece of human machinery amongst the mortals. Many of them, regardless of social status, held ownership of these things, and there had been various models over the years.

It was rather frivolously referred to as an iPhone. Something, he understood, was the ultimate tool in gratification, and which combined many functions other than being a telephone.

He was more than aware the earth realm was in its eighteenth year of the new millennium, so naturally with the advancing age came advanced technology.

He gave a soft displeased rumble as he stared to the item that was seemingly consuming most of humanity with obsession. It was a wonder the humans were still seeking out the LeMarchand's box at all. The box, some of the newer in his Order had argued, was dated and obsolete. His younger brethren believed it to be a product of its time, old and too feeble for the newer, jaded generation whose desires needed to be indulged with digital machinery.

It had even been suggested to him by a certain few of the lesser Cenobites that they should revamp the configuration entirely, with Leviathan's riddle posing as an 'app' throughout these gadgets worldwide. It was certainly conceivable.

Surely, they argued, it would work just as well as this old-fashioned musical toy...

But Xipe would beg to differ.

Technology may have advanced significantly in recent years, but the Prince was aware desire remained essentially the same as it always had been since the doorway between both realms was unsealed centuries before. Nothing of this advancing age, no matter how engrossing they were to the humans, or how gratifying, could ever steal the unconscious attention of the curious, the bored, and the weary from the path to ultimate sensation, and knowledge. The box still did its bidding as well now as it ever had. This young lad he had just enlightened was a testament to that.

These so-called iPhones paled in comparison to kind of gratification he and his cohorts could provide for them.

Casually and without a second thought, the leather of his thumb ran across the screen, and it flickered to life, illuminating both the room and his astonished face. Staring back at him from the device's screen...was him, his black liquid eyes widened in surprise and pins glinted in the brightness like a halo.

He held the phone at arm's length in confusion and consternation, still able to view his own countenance glaring back from such a fair distance.

Eventually, he brought the device a tad closer and his forefinger tentatively prodded the screen, where soon the blood-stained tip brushed ever-so gently along the white circular panel displayed beneath his image. Then...

The Prince was startled by a sudden mechanical-type noise emanating from the device, and he stared to his squinting features- now frozen- plastered across the screen.

"What is this...?"

Bemusement was not something he usually felt, and it was so unbecoming of him. Yet here he was, stood in utter bewilderment and gazing at the piece of mortal technology that now beheld a frozen image of his own face...until it disappeared, the device saving the image to one of its many folders.

Xipe's hairless brow lifted minutely as he regarded the object of his incertitude, which was still held within his hand. There had been occasions in the past where situations had left him flummoxed, and even dumbfounded...but this? Never before had something so trivial and small in his eyes had disconcerted him like this piece of human gadgetry.

Yet, there was something quite...appealing about it. Something that stirred the fragment of the human within him. He couldn't help but feel intrigued by it, no matter how inconsequential it seemed.

A sudden crackle of energy emitting from the box reminded him that the veil between the realms was closing, and that he needed to return to his dimension, and also broke his train of thought. And the curiosity for the gadget that accompanied it.

He squinted at this so-named iPhone, and cursed himself for being temporarily enticed by such banality, before he tossed it aside, turned on his heel and slowly ambled back to whence he came.

The Lament Configuration, left in its master's wake, twisted its segments and slid immaculately into its default shape with an audible click, and its surroundings fell into normalcy...with only a lone iPhone as what remained of its owner, and the insanity that proceeded, resting beside it.

The End...

Afterword - Well, I sure hope you enjoyed this. It wasn't as funny as I envisioned it in my mind, but in the end I deliberately went for half-humorous, half-serious approach. And this very brief scenario; what if the box became obsolete, thanks to modern tech? This was something very briefly touched upon in the newest (so-called) Hellraiser film, but it was poorly followed though with how 'Pinhead' and co got around acquiring new souls. But don't get me started on that. :/ In the end, this is supposed to be just a small, for fun flash fiction type of story, and something I wrote for a friend's birthday. I did struggle to get this written, as I suffer with terrible brain fog lately which stifles my imagination and clear thought. Nevertheless I was determined to get this finished, regardless of how difficult it was. I'm also pleased by the fact this was freshly written from a blank canvas, and not an older story I've recycled. It's been a while since I did that. XD Anyway, Happy Birthday again to my dear friend. :D And thanks for reading. :)