Work Text:
Act 6: Judgement
The room was bright and open, nearly blinding like being in a snowstorm. Peridot tried not to show how intimidated she was, but her wings trembled in trepidation. She was the only figure around but she knew she wasn't alone.
“You have broken our rules.” Came a booming voice from all around her and Peridot couldn't stop from flinching.
“You took a lover knowing full well that it was forbidden. Distraction to a guardian can be fatal for their charge. Repent, denounce her, and all will be forgiven.”
“I,” Peridot choked, “I don't think it's fair.”
“Fair is a word used by the selfish when not given the thing they desire. Cast off these mortal needs and dedicate yourself to your duty.”
“How can I give up my heart?!” Peridot cried out in passion, “I will love her forever, no one can compare to my Lapis Lazuli!”
”You tread dangerous waters, sacrifice is demanded and rewarded.”
“Rewarded by what? A job well done? We have something real and tangible, comfort and love the likes of which I've never known. How can I give that up?”
”Love is selfish and this is why it is forbidden. You cannot love one and protect many. Cast aside this feeling or be cast into flame.”
Peridot shook her head, “I… I can't. I can't stop loving her, I can't give it up and I can't be in a place where I can't love freely! Cast me out! Throw me away! I won’t deny myself or her.”
”Be certain of your words, because there is no path back once you start forward.”
“I’m sure. I’ll wait for her to join me.”
And then the white room was replaced by red.
Act 7: Confrontation
“Lapis.”
“...”
“Lapis, please.”
“...”
“Lapis, dammit!”
A fist impacted the wall with a meaty thud, the demon losing her patience.
Lapis whirled around to confront her ex lover, wings flaring wide in defense, “What do you want me to say? You did this! You choose this! You could have stayed a guardian, kept your wings-”
“Lost you.”
“You already lost me! As if it wasn’t hard enough to be together before, now we’re enemies!” Lapis slumped, sadness weighing on her shoulders, “If you’d stayed, we could have at least seen each other.”
Anger coursed through Peridot, stronger than it had ever been, unnatural in its need to take over her. She hadn’t known what it would be like, hadn’t realized that she was just trading rules for shackles. She struggled for a moment, fighting against the need to resort to violence, “I thought...”
“You thought that I would join you? Why would I ever become a demon? You and I have both seen first hand how they hurt people and now you’re expected to as well. If us being together means that people get hurt, it’s not worth it. I mean, we already had a few close calls, but it was nothing like this.”
“I just wanted to be free.” Peridot whispered, head hanging.
“Do you regret it? I hope so, I hope you always regret it so that you don’t become consumed down there. Even if you regret, you can’t come back. You made your choice.” Lapis’s words are like acid and Peridot can’t stop herself from surging forward and pinning Lapis’s wrists to the wall.
“I could take what I want.” She hisses, eyes turning red, fangs growing and turning monstrous, “I can do what I want now.”
Lapis is calm, eyes sad, “But you won’t. You love me, you won’t hurt me.” She says it with such conviction and trust that Peridot immediately pulls back, face returning to her normal countenance. “This,” Lapis gestures to Peridot’s green skin, horns, claws, tail, “Isn’t who you are. This isn’t the Peridot that loves me or that I fell in love with, but I know that she still exists.”
It takes a long moment for Peridot to respond and when she does, her voice is thick with tears that can’t fall, “This is who I will be. Regret and choice and no path backwards.”
Lapis watches her with eyes that struggle to have sympathy for bad choices. “Then move forward. Without me.”
Interlude III
An angel becomes a demon in more than just name, covering heartache with death and chaos. Somewhere along the way, excuses stop being used and pain gives way to revelry.
She stops regretting.
Always, blue resides in her mind and her heart, but it’s tinged with bitterness until the demon is alone and tired and thinks of a beautiful smile with fondness instead of anger.
Years pass.
Act 8: A New Assignment
When one is asked by a demonic boss if they can handle a new task, the appropriate response is always in the affirmative.
For eternal beings, the human passage of time is nearly meaningless. Decades might as well be days.
Seeing her ex lover’s face staring back at her from the cover of her next job, Peridot found these two facts warring within her. She could not say no to this or to her boss, but her heart ached at the sight in front of her, much less the thought of what she would have to do. Eventually a demon’s natural inclination towards chaos urges her into a near frenzy.
“I’ll destroy her.”
First, she needs to get close.
Lapis Lazuli, age 21, takes night classes at a local college. It is simple to arrange to share the course with her. Peridot takes a seat next to the girl with light brown hair and strikes up a conversation before class. Her demonic features are masked while she’s above ground, her naturally timid appearance making it easy to blend in.
She also knows everything there is to know about her target, both from her file and from personal experience. She knows Lapis will be hard to get on friendly terms with at first, because she was even as an angel. She knows that Lapis appreciates bad jokes and worse puns and that she always found Peridot’s enthusiasm endearing.
Peridot has had time to perfect her approach towards humans, she knows when to push and when to back off, how to make them trust her, how to make them love her, how to pretend to be whatever they want.
Lapis had always wanted Peridot at her most genuine.
She finds she doesn’t need to lie to get what she wants. Lapis responds to her advancements in the same way she always had.
Lapis falls in love with Peridot.
Peridot learns she never fell out of love with Lapis.
Being on the surface tempers the bursts of violence and chaos that the flames ignite and Peridot remembers being human.
Thoughts of her mission fall away. She encourages Lapis into healthier habits, instead of trying to corrupt her into bad ones. When Lapis almost gets hooked on speed trying to manage her busy schedule, Peridot helps her quit. When Lapis has bad days, Peridot comforts her. She tries to ease as many burdens as she can.
Her boss is furious.
A deadline is presented; Lapis dies in three months time or Peridot spends eternity in a pit of agony.
Peridot decides to make those three months the best of Lapis’s life.
Then she is gone.
Act 9: Eternal Suffering
Everyone suffers in different ways.
Physical pain can be endured for some, but mental anguish is hard to protect against.
Peridot is cursed to watch Lapis lose her mind
After disappearing without a trace, another demon comes to take Peridot’s place. Jasper is huge and intimidating, but she can put on a gentle face that makes her seem like she can protect you. She approaches Lapis through one of her two jobs and makes friends with the girl. Peridot roasts in jealousy and rage as Jasper plucks every heartstring as she worms into Lapis’s life.
It’s not love, Peridot takes great comfort in that fact, but it’s somehow worse.
Lapis gives herself to Jasper as a means to forget and it makes her vulnerable to vice. Drugs, alcohol, sex, crime. Peridot has to watch it all; her Lapis, the woman that would give up their love because it was the right thing to do, falls.
The spiral is sharp, steep, and terrifying.
Peridot resorts to begging, Hell and Heaven, angel and demon, she barters, and threatens, and cries.
Save her, save her, save her.
She watches Jasper help Lapis inject the needle, not knowing which one will be her last.
Act 10: Hope
The flames are always chaos, so Peridot thinks nothing of the screaming until a white robed figure with large wings settles in front of her.
“You want to save her.” It’s not a question.
“More than anything.” Peridot answers anyway and suddenly her restraints are gone.
“Then run.”
Peridot does.
Jasper is gone, but Lapis is not, laying on the floor, breathing shallow, needle in her arm. Peridot grabs her and uses every ounce of her power to get to the hospital before time runs out.
She prays and just having faith is painful.
The doctors rush Lapis back and Peridot is left alone, unsure but desperate. She decides that if bargaining worked once, perhaps it can again. She follows signs to a small chapel, takes a breath, and steps inside.
It’s agony, the holy place sapping her strength and making her feel like her body is on fire, but she kneels at the altar anyway and prays.
“I’ll do anything, just save her. Take me instead, I’ll give my soul for her.”
On and on for what feels like hours until she opens her eyes and realizes that she’s standing in a room so bright and open it’s like being in a snowstorm. Her tail trembles and she looks down to find that her human disguise has melted away.
“Can you save her?” She begs, knowing she’d being heard.
”You know our powers.” A booming voice points out.
“They want her because she used to be a guardian.” Peridot says accusingly, “She should have been protected.”
”You know that we can’t protect everyone.”
“You mean she wasn’t important enough.”
”Everyone is important in their own ways.”
“Will you give her a guardian now?” When the silence stretches too long, Peridot drops to her knees, “Please, I’ll do anything to protect her. She doesn’t deserve this.”
”I cannot give her a guardian. You cannot come back, you made your choice.”
“And now I’m making another! Me for her! Please!”
”She never got over you. She was so heartbroken that she could no longer do her duty. We had to send her back to start over.”
There is a pause that Peridot is desperate to break, but before she can, a sharp pain passed through her eyes and she doubles over, clutching her face, then screaming when her hands begin to burn as well.
”You can no longer be a guardian, but you can watch over her all the same. You will be granted the abilities you need to protect against demonic threats, but you will no longer be one yourself. Your eyes will see everyone for what they truly are, your touch will deter any threats. Beware, child, because you are no longer as resilient as you once were, nor as long lived. Start over and be free together, but never forget your desperation here today.
Peridot was back in the chapel, lying on the floor, shoulder being touched by someone she didn’t know. Looking up, her eyes widened as she saw huge, white wings stretching from the back of a man with a lab coat on. A guardian, but she could see through his guise.
She could see what he truly was.
“You came in with Lapis Lazuli, right?” He asked once Peridot had assured him she’d simply fallen asleep. “She’s awake and was asking to see the person that brought her in.”
Peridot allowed the guardian to lead her to Lapis’s room, then entered timidly. Lapis gaped at her in shock.
“You’re here.” Lapis’s voice was small and breathy, “I thought I’d never seen you again. I thought you left me.”
“No, no, not by choice, never by choice.” Peridot hastened to the bedside and wrapped her arms around her lover, “Never again.” She promised and they hugged and hugged and Peridot tried to think of a good way to explain the entire situation to Lapis without sounding crazy and ended up telling half truths.
It wasn’t perfect, maybe it never was or would be, but they were together and they had a second chance and that was important.
Intermission
Life continues. Because the story never really ends.