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Vaggie had never stopped to properly think about what they were doing in the first place. She never questioned how she came to be, never disobeyed an order, never did so much as even consider talking back to Adam, no matter how much he deserved it.
Vaggie trained, excelled in battle and, although she disagreed with some habits of the angels, she was a proper soldier. She woke up everyday, grabbed her lance and did her best leading up to the Extermination Day, when all of their joint efforts would prove themselves useful.
But it wasn't exactly like that, was it? It was hardly fair to say they put their training to use against souls... demons whose fighting experience consisted of street brawls or whatever fucked up thing they did in their human lives... even if some of them were amazing fighters, they were unarmed, confined to the streets of the Pride Ring, running around like headless chickens, waiting for the final blow of an angelic weapon.
It was, at the very least, unfair, and Vaggie hated herself for thinking that. Nobody else seemed to bat an eye at Adam's crass speeches or how they kept the Extermination a secret from all other angels. How could they put on their masks, cheer at the death of souls who, sure, weren't innocent, but hardly had any chance against them? For fuck’s sake—pardon her language—they were angels. Those souls couldn’t even hurt them! Lute’s little tirade never—
Alright, maybe it was a lie saying that Vaggie never thought about what they were doing. She doubted, quietly, inside her heart, where none of them could reproach her for asking too many questions. Vaggie knew that she'd never receive an answer, and that was fine. She was fine .
Until that day. Vaggie had been feeling herself approach a breaking point for years now. Regardless of how much time she spent convincing herself that Lute was right and those souls were not like the ones they had in heaven, that they deserved what was coming to them, that extermination was actually a mercy on their fucked up beings, Vaggie couldn't help but feel the anguish expanding in her chest.
And, then, she saw herself facing a little kid.
Surely, it was a kid that deserved being there, wasn't it? After all, there was no mistake in the divine judgment of souls, whoever got to Hell deserved to be stuck in that blood-curdling pit. Angels made no mistakes, Heaven made no mistakes, Extermination was just.
She raised her lance and saw terror in that kid's pitch-black eyes. He was scared and defenseless. How could she… Vaggie couldn't do it. She towered over him and urged him to run. There was no time for her to react when Lute got to her. Vaggie could barely hear what was being said, she could only feel an excruciating pain.
Pain wasn't something completely alien to her. Sometimes, she pushed herself too far while training with other angels, but the sore feeling of her muscles after a good spar felt nothing like that. There was blood everywhere and her eye... Then, it was her wings. Ripped out like an animal being slaughtered. Vaggie heard a distant laugh and nothing else.
The world felt like it had gone silent. The screams of demons lasted for what could have been minutes or hours, she didn’t know. Vaggie herself could have stayed in that alley for hours or days. But, at some point, she got up, found the clothing of a slain demon and dressed it. She was in Hell and she was still alive. Why? Couldn’t she have died? If she gave up, what would happen?
Faintly, Vaggie thought that, no matter the answer to her questions, it wouldn’t be good to be strolling around covered in her blood—angel blood, so she threw her clothing out and stumbled her way into another alley, hand weakly clutching her lance. Exhaustion and throbbing pain due to her untreated injuries made her knees weak and she couldn't walk anymore. Succumbing to her own body, Vaggie closed her eyes and wondered if there was an end to all of this.
At some point, she heard steps and wondered what kind of demon was approaching her. They wouldn’t know she was an angel, right? Would that even matter in Hell? They fought each other all the time, the fact that she was an angel could make things worse but being a demon probably wouldn’t stop anything from happening. Vaggie wondered, then, what that ‘anything’ looked like. She probably wouldn't die, and their weapons couldn't hurt her... though she had thought the same of the angelic steel Lute had used to injure her. Could she fight them off? What would they think of someone wielding an angelic spear? Questions, questions, questions—
A soft voice. Not like the voice of a demon. The voice of an... Vaggie opened her eye and saw bright red eyes, then her sight focused and, maybe I did die .
Vaggie never stopped to think whether angels could die, and if they could, what kind of place would they go to. Her bet was placed in the disappearance of their entire being, but maybe... just maybe, there was something else. If there was, and it looked like the person right before her, then, Vaggie was fine with that.
But this wasn't the post-life, a dream or even a pain-induced hallucination. There was a blonde woman with red eyes looking at her… Was that worry Vaggie saw? Giving the angel no time to think, the woman wrapped bandages around Vaggie’s missing eye and smiled. Was Vaggie smiling too? What… What was happening?
Turns out that she was fine with that not knowing.
The woman introduced herself much later, after asking if she could walk and bringing Vaggie to a clean and decorated apartment (in Hell?). Hues of red and white invaded her senses and, contrary to the putrid smell of the streets, it smelled like… a home? It was… cozy. A word Vaggie never thought she’d use to describe a place in hell.
"Charlie, that’s my name," she said, pulling Vaggie out of her thoughts with the brightest smile she had ever seen. Her voice was prim and proper, it was the voice of a princess, Vaggie thought, much before finding out she was leaning on the shoulder of the actual daughter of Lucifer.
Vaggie was surprised, rightfully so, but hid it well when Charlie kept talking as if that bit of information was commonplace in Hell. Vaggie thought it should be and… oh no .
Charlie definitely thought Vaggie was a demon, didn't she? Lies were something the soldier detested. Honesty was a virtue she saw lacking in the Extermination Army and very much hated, so Vaggie was disgusted with herself when she found herself hiding her true origins.
She should have said something right at the beginning. She wanted to do it so badly. But Charlie's wonderful smile, her careful touch, her dreams... it was all so very new, confusing and good. Charlie was good. Vaggie had met good souls in Heaven, she truly believed in them, but never had she found someone so eager and filled with the desire to help others like Charlie. Heaven was almost… stagnant, like a clear lake filled with the well-intentioned. It didn’t compare to the almost overwhelming energy Charlie put out, her dreams of making things better were more like a waterfall in the middle of a wasteland. Impossible and, oh, so beautiful.
If Vaggie told Charlie what she was… had been, would Charlie hate her? Probably, right? Or maybe not. It had been just a few days, but Vaggie didn’t think Charlie had an ounce of hatred on her… Even so. Vaggie had taken an active part in the slaughter of her people. There was no way Charlie would take that in stride. Even if she didn’t come to hate Vaggie, she would surely leave, right?
Vaggie didn’t want that. She had been stripped of her purpose before, now she was overcome by the desire to protect Charlie and she couldn’t do it from afar. Vaggie was aware that wasn’t the healthiest of thoughts, but how could she make herself care about healthy in that situation? All she could care about was Charlie.
When Charlie cleaned her wounds and asked if it was hurting a lot, when Charlie apologized for waking her up in the middle of the night scribbling cute drawings while talking to herself about the beginnings of a surreal plan, when Charlie smiled, catching Vaggie staring at her dumbfounded and then blushed, looking away for some inexplicable reason. When—whenever Charlie did anything, Vaggie could feel her heart swelling with... oh, fuck.
"Vaggie?" A melodic, concerned voice called her, and Vaggie could only think that she hated being the source of that worry. "Are you OK?"
Finally realizing she had been spacing out in the middle of dinner (made by Charlie because Vaggie still could barely stand up longer than five minutes), she swallowed all of those feelings before saying, "Yeah. Sorry, did you say something?"
"No, don't apologize! I was just... are you hurting anywhere? Do you need something? I know I'm not the best at medical care, but the best Ring for that would be Sloth, and sinners can't go there..." As if her spear was drilling into her chest, Vaggie flinched. Charlie withered, mistaking that for something other than Vaggie recoiling at the misconception of her being a sinner and not an angel. "I'm very sorry, I wish I could no more."
"You're doing more than enough," Vaggie hurriedly whispered, feeling crushed by guilt and the overwhelming need to put an smile on Charlie's face. "I can't thank you enough, Charlie."
"Oh, psh," the princess rolled her eyes, but the corners of her mouth quirked up. God, she was so fucking pretty. "I just want you to recover well. This last extermination was... bad. Not that any of them are good. But. You know."
Vaggie closed her eyes for a second. There it was once again, the guilt stabbing her right in her heart.
Charlie took a deep breath, a determined expression illuminating her face. "It'll be fine, eventually. I'm going to fix everything and one day my people won't have to ever suffer like this again." She nodded to herself and stuffed her mouth with food.
Vaggie, who had been so full of fake certainties in her life, was left looking at Charlie eat.
The Princess of Hell spoke like she had no doubt she'd succeed at a plan Vaggie thought was doomed from the start. She had heard the pitch—in song format—and her first reaction was that it would never happen. Have souls be redeemed and enter Heaven? Nonsense.
But, the more she saw Charlie jump around the apartment, come up with ways to help those wayward demons, perfecting something she had no idea would work with such enthusiasm, Vaggie couldn't help but be endeared and, somewhat, convinced.
It was an inevitable fall, she realized it later.
Though, Vaggie didn't mind this one that much.