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“That all went a bit pear-shaped, didn’t it? Then again, I rather like pears, so perhaps that isn’t the best idiom to use.”
The angel snapped his gaze to the left, where in the place of the bat he had noticed in the corner of his eye, there now stood a demon.
The angel had heard that demons had dark, cold eyes, and while this demon did have eyes black as night, they were anything but cold. They sparkled in such a way that the angel found himself wondering if someone had put the stars he loved oh so much directly into the demon’s eyes.
Being caught off guard, the angel brilliantly decided to reply with, “Er, I do believe it was an apple, actually.”
Those bright eyes narrowed into points before blowing wide and round once more as a realization must have hit him.
“Oh dear, I am so sorry! I didn’t realize you were an angel…” He trailed off, as if realizing he didn’t have the angel’s name. Said angel didn’t really want to give his real name to a demon, for obvious reasons.
“Anthony will do just fine,” he informed the demon.
“Anthony,” he repeated, “I truly am sorry about the mix-up. It’s just…well, you look rather demon-y from behind.” He indicated Anthony’s black wings and wild, fiery locks. The angel scowled and crossed his arms defensively.
“Well, you don’t exactly look all that demon-y yourself,” Anthony grumbled. The demon’s white wings ruffled, clearly offended despite it being true. If it weren’t for the singed hair, all-black eyes, and little fangs poking past his top lip, he would have looked like the ideal angel stock. The kind of loyal goody two shoes that Gabriel or Michael would love to boss about. It made him wonder about this one’s particular fall.
He shook the question from his head. Anthony had always been a bit too curious for his own good, a fact that he imagined would have caused him a great deal more trouble if he hadn’t been isolated in space making new stars, and planets, and nebulae, and-
-and okay, maybe he was still a bit salty about being pulled away. He knew he was getting rather far from the earth with his creations, but there wasn’t enough room nearby! And being put on apple tree duty of all things. Needless to say, the reason he looked all ‘demon-y’ s it were was because the black and the red and the gold reminded him of the night sky. If he couldn’t live in space, at least he could wear it, right?
Silence had fallen upon the pair, and after a bit of deliberation, he finally gave into his possibly deadly curiosity.
“So, what brings you up here? Aside from you thinking I’m another demon,” asked Anthony. The demon twiddled his thumbs and bit his bottom lip in an almost bashful manner.
“Well, I just- I worry. What if I did the right thing back there, helping the humans learn the difference between right and wrong?” Fretted the demon. Anthony…had honestly never thought of it that way.
“You’re a demon, I’m not sure you can do the right thing,” Anthony said, trying to reassure himself just as much as the demon.
“Oh, you think so? Why, thank you, that makes me feel better. A demon can get in a lot of trouble for doing the right thing you kn- is that a flaming sword?”
Anthony, who had just started to relax, tensed up again suddenly. He watched helplessly as the demon’s gaze swept from Adam defending his wife with the aforementioned weapon, to the angel with an identical sword at the Western gate, to Anthony’s lack of, and finally back to Adam. Then, a wild grin spread across his face, lighting him up like one of Anthony’s brightest suns.
“You didn’t-”
“She- I- look,” stammered Anthony, jumping to defend himself, “there are vicious animals out there! And- and it’s going to get cold, and she’s expecting, and-”
The demon had started laughing, wings fluttering with his glee. Anthony trailed off to watch. This creature of hell was somehow radiating more joy than Anthony had ever felt in heaven.
“I- I apologize, dear boy, but wouldn’t it be a bit funny,” he wheezed, “if you did the wrong thing, and I did the right one? Perhaps we should switch jobs.
And oh, okay. Anthony liked this one, he couldn’t help it! He began to laugh as well.
"I suppose so,” he chuckled. Their laughter only cut off when a distant rumble sounded and the first rain began to fall. The demon instinctively flinched, and Anthony raised a dark wing to shield him. The stardust that perpetually clung to his feathers showered into the demon’s curls and Anthony winced.
“Sorry,” he said, but the demon simply shrugged.
“Don’t be. I-” he looked around conspiratorially before finishing, “-I appreciate the gesture, truly.”
“Yeah, well, don’t get used to it, fiend,” Anthony teased. The demon beamed at him playfully and replied,
“The name is Az, actually.”