Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"Vaggie, can I talk to ya about something?" Angel asked, wringing his hands together and looking far more nervous than she had ever seen him.

"Of course,” she nodded, doing a terrible job of hiding the worry that spiked at the request.

He grimaced, but added a hopeful, "Maybe in my room?"

She followed him silently, nerves growing with every step, but obligingly waited until they were inside his surprisingly inviting room, with the door shut, before turning her expectant gaze to him.

"Well,” he said, fidgeting nervously and biting his lip, looking incredibly unsure despite the fact that he had prompted the conversation. "If I tell you something, can you promise not to tell Charlie?"

"No,” her answer was firm and immediate. "I am not blindly promising to keep secrets from my partner, but I can promise to hear you out before I make a decision, and to tell you if I do plan to tell her."

He pursed his lips, visibly debating the option before he finally, hesitantly, nodded an agreement.

"Well, uh, I… I got a problem, but I can't tell Charlie, and I also can't just do nothin',” he rambled before clamping his mouth shut, taking a deep breath, and starting again. "You remember when Charlie went to my work?"

He asked the question meekly, peering at her from under his fluffy hair, and his blatantly scared shame was the only thing that kept her from making a barbed comment that it would be hard to forget the afternoon and evening her girlfriend spent sobbing into her shoulder.

"I do,” she said blandly, though Angel winced as if she had slapped him.

"For the record, I'm sorry I made her cry,” he told her, a tad desperate, and she forced herself not to demand to know why he could apologize to her but not Charlie.

"I -," Angel bit his lip again, eyes dropping to his lap as he sat heavily on the bed, looking small and lost. "I didn't know what to do, I still don't know what to do, but… but I think I need help."

He swallowed hard, glancing up at her, and she sent him a bracing smile and an encouraging nod, surprised by how proud of him she was for the admission.

His lips twitched with a weak return of the grin but fell into biting them again as his worry reasserted itself.

"My… my boss is evil,” he whispered, looking at her with enormous eyes that made him look remarkably young. "Like, he's evil, Vaggie. And he -, it doesn't matter, I got myself into the mess, I need to live with it, but the thing is, he… he's threatening Charlie."

Vaggie's blood ran cold at the words, doing her best not to shake the spider to try to get an answer out of him sooner.

"He got… he got so pissed when she came to the studio," Angel admitted. "He thought I told her to come and get me out of work because she's the princess. He, uh, didn't take it all that well. If I didn't get her out of the studio, he was going to hurt her, or maybe even kill her, he doesn't care she's the princess, he doesn't think Lucifer would notice if something happened to her."

Vaggie almost couldn't breathe around her horror that her direction for Charlie to go to the studio had almost gotten her girlfriend killed.

Angel didn't seem to notice her self-recrimination, his words flowing out faster, as though desperate to make his case to her.

"I didn't mean to make her cry, I swear I didn't, but I panicked,” he pleaded. "I didn't know how to make her leave, and I had convinced him to let me get rid of her instead of him hurting her, but he was getting impatient, and when Val is impatient it… it ain't pretty. He told me when I left the shoot that if he saw her around work again, he'd kill her slowly and painfully."

"Fuck," Vaggie whispered, and he nodded an adamant agreement.

"I wanted to apologize for screamin' at her, but I don't know how without telling her why I did it, and I'm afraid if I tell her why she'll go storming back to the studio to tell him where he can shove it," Angel told her, more open and vulnerable than she had ever seen him. "That and.. and I don't know how else to keep her away from the studio except for thinking I'd be furious about it. If I just try to order her not to go she might pull a screw you and go anyway, I know I would if someone just tried to tell me what to do without a reason. But if she thinks I'd be mad… maybe she won't go around him again?"

Vaggie's chest physically ached at the words, and the heart wrenching look on his face did not help the feeling.

"I don't know what to do,” he whispered, "but I was… I was hopin’ that maybe if she ever did decide to go back for some reason you'd at least make sure you went with her to help protect her?"

"Yes, of course,” she promised without having to think about it. "I won't let her go alone, and I'll be ready with my spear."

He breathed a sigh of relief, and she felt a surge of affection well in her chest for the absurdly endearing spider.

"Thank you,” he told her with an overwhelming gratitude, tears in his eyes that he didn't let fall.

"No, thank you, Angel,” she countered. "Thank you for telling me and thank you for protecting her."

He blinked, looking shy and pleased, but before she could appreciate the surprisingly adorable sight she realized there was something off about his face. She cocked her head, studying him, and he stared back, confused. He had flushed red across most of his forehead, and a small patch of one cheek, but not the rest of his face, and she had never seen a blush only appear in spots before.

"Somethin’ wrong?” he asked as she contemplated the possibility of spider's having bizarre blushing patterns before the more obvious answer hit her.

"Are you wearing makeup, Angel?” she asked, and he froze, staring at her with wide eyes as though he had been caught in a trap, but shook it off and pulled up a shaky smile that was a weak parody of his usual persona.

"Sure am, toots, what of it?” he asked, tension under his airy tone, and she narrowed her eye at him. If not for how odd he'd been, she would have thought nothing of it, of course he wore make up, he was a movie star, it was rather expected he would. What wasn't expected was that he would panic about it being noticed.

"Why?” she asked, watching him closely. He hid it well, but when she was looking for it, she could see the brief flash of panic flicker in his eyes.

"What do you mean, why?” he asked doing a convincing rendition of nonchalantly curious, but she couldn't help but hold onto the feeling that the detail was odd.

"You just showered, you're staying around the hotel for the night and not going out,” she observed, cocking an eyebrow at him. "You're telling me that you went through the effort of putting on makeup that gives you the natural look just to talk to me?"

"Hey, you're worth dressing up for,” he refuted, voice slipping higher with a hint of defensiveness.

"Angel,” she said, tone turning reprimanding, "why are you wearing makeup?"

He bit his lip, studied her face, and then eventually slumped with a sigh.

Without a word he got up and trudged to his bathroom, and she followed in his wake, not sure what to make of the response.

He wet a small washcloth by the sink and unceremoniously scrubbed his face with it, wiping for several long seconds before he let it drop to the sink and turned back to her with hunched shoulders and all four of his extended arms wrapped around himself in a hug. He couldn't meet her gaze, staring pointedly to the side and looking incredibly uncomfortable, but she couldn't stop herself from gaping in open mouthed horror.

The makeup had been hiding a myriad of bruises, Angel's face mottled with blues, purples, and healing yellows. When she looked closer, she realized she could see swelling in some areas, covered from first glance by the fluff of his fur evening it out and making the inflammation less noticeable.

"Angel,” she breathed, unable to summon more words through her sudden concern, and he hunched further in on himself.

"Like I said,” he shrugged, still unable to look at her, "Val wasn't pleased."

Oh, shit.

Vaggie fervently wished she could go back in time and stop her past self from sparking the events that had led them there, but Angel seemed to take her silent self-recrimination as something accusatory.

"I'm not asking for sympathy,” he told her, shoulders tight with tension and tone pointedly casual, "and I don't expect it, neither. I know I'm an idiot that got myself into this mess. You got your answer, let's just go back to the important part."

With a small part of her brain, Vaggie wondered just how many times Angel was going to break her heart in one night, but the rest was focused on the moment, trying to decide how to convince him how wrong his statement was.

"I think there are a couple of important parts to this conversation," Vaggie informed him, more bluntly than she had meant to. "You're right, I do think strategizing how best to protect Charlie is important, but you are also important to me, Angel."

He stared at her in a crushing mixture of hope and awe, and she tried not to cry at the sight.

"I'm not good at showing it,” she admitted. "I'm actually pretty terrible at showing it, but you matter to me, Angel, and it kills me to see you hurt like this."

He opened his mouth, shut it, and tried again, still with wide eyes that looked shocked and amazed.

"It's... it's fine, Vaggie,” he assured, though he sounded utterly baffled to have to. "This kind of thing isn't new, it's just a little worse with the temper tantrum Val threw about Charlie."

"Angel,” she refuted, audibly pained, "that really doesn't make the situation better."

"Sure it does,” he brushed off with a slightly overplayed casualness, "it means that it's nothing I can't handle, toots. The only part that actually needs fixing is the whole Charlie thing."

"How about we talk about it later,” she compromised, going on before he could protest. "As far as the Charlie issue, I think you should tell her."

"I can't,” he shot back immediately, sounding scared and looking terrified, shrinking into himself with enormous eyes. "What if she gets hurt and it's my fault? You don’t understand, Vaggie, Valentino is evil, and he will hurt her. He’s smart enough to know horrible ways to torture people, and stupid enough to do them without thinking through the consequences. I’m not saying that Charlie can’t defend herself, but she’s so nice, and Val is good at pretending he’s nice until he has you where he wants you, and she wouldn’t know in time to defend herself, and she could get hurt. I can't be the reason she gets hurt, I can't, Vaggie, I just can't -, I -, I-,"

His breath hitched, coming in panting gasps that were becoming more harsh by the second, and she felt her own heartrate pick up as she watched him spiraling into a panic attack.

“Take a breath, breathe for me, Angel,” she coached, doing a horrible job of masking her own rising desperation. “You can do it, breathe in with me.”

She tried her best to patiently wait as he visibly tried to follow her instructions, eventually managing to draw in a reedy sounding gasp.

“Good,” she praised the success, however slight it may be, “great job, now hold it for a beat or two, and then let it out. Good. In and out, just like this,” she sucked an exaggerated breath in and then loudly let it out, and slowly but surely he was able to follow her lead, eventually regulating his breathing to something more regular.

“Sorry,” he muttered, sounding somewhere between embarrassed and moments away from bursting into tears.

“Don’t be stupid,” she shook her head, wishing she was better at handling emotions or had anything that could even approach being called tact. “Don’t apologize, Angel, just keep breathing for me.”

He wrapped both sets of arms tightly around himself, but did follow direction and continue breathing, though he was also trembling from head to toe.

“Do you get panic attacks often?” Vaggie asked, partially to stall for time while she tried to think of what to do, and partially because she hoped he’d have some idea of what she needed to do to make him feel better, but he only shrugged noncommittally and didn’t answer.

“Uh, ok,” her gaze flicked around his room, hoping for a savior, “is there anything that makes you feel better afterward?”

“Hugging Nuggs,” he muttered, and she barely stopped herself from letting out a sigh of relief. Of course, of course the answer was Angel’s criminally adorable piglet.

“Alright,” she agreed easily, pulling the fluffy pink bedspread off the mattress and draping it over Angel’s shoulders like a cape before slinging an arm over Angel’s shoulders and dragging him into her side, “let’s go find that pet of yours.”

Angel huffed a breath and sent her a grateful smile as he pulled the blanket tighter around himself and burrowed further it even as he pressed more firmly into side but didn’t verbally respond.

They walked out into the hallway in search of the wayward pig, and Vaggie was thankful to see that Angel’s shaking died down, disappearing almost completely by the time they found the little piglet playing with Razzle and Dazzle in the upstairs lounge.

Angel huffed a fond breath but paused in the doorway to watch as his pet squealed happily while darting away from the two little dragons playfully chasing after him, leading them in a chase all around the room. Vaggie watched, incredibly endeared by the sight until Fat Nuggets ran too close to an end table that held a vase that had been a gift for Charlie from her mother.

Her eye widened, but before she could try to dart across the room to stop the dragons from barreling after the pig Angel’s voice cracked through the air.

“Nuggs, Razzle, Dazzle, halt!” Angel barked, his tone full of far more authority than she had ever heard from him before. Thankfully for Vaggie’s visions of Charlie sobbing over the broken shards of one of the last gifts she had received from her mother, they did not become reality. Instead, all three animals immediately froze, giving Angel their full attention.

"Come on, babies,” he chided affectionately, warming his voice considerably, and they all relaxed at the realization they weren’t truly in trouble. “You all know better than that. Come here."

The three of them obeyed, trotting forward to receive pets from his many hands, chirping and trilling happily under the barrage of attention, and Vaggie gaped at how well behaved the little hellions were acting when she had always been under the impression that they were unfathomably adorable, but more than a tad feral.

“How the fuck did you do that?” Vaggie asked, finally moving closer and staring down at Angel in amazement.

“What?” Angel glanced up, brow furrowed until he understood what she meant, and then the confusion was replaced with a nostalgic smile. “I’ve always liked training animals. I’ve been teaching them some basics since I moved in.”

“You just know how to train animals?” Vaggie felt oddly flummoxed by the revelation. “Where in the world did you learn that?”

“When I was alive, I was the son of a mob boss,” Angel offered with a blunt tone and casual shrug. He huffed a laugh at the way her mouth fell open in surprise but nonchalantly continued his tale.

“We lived in New York City, of course, but we also had this fancy-ass place upstate. My father insisted on having hunting dogs even though we only went to the estate for the summers, and we had three dozen dogs, a kennel-master, acres and acres of land, the whole shebang.”

He trailed off, glancing back down at the animals he was petting for a few long seconds before he continued.

“My dad and I didn’t get along,” he admitted. “I was… I was nothing of what a boss’s son was supposed to be, and despite how busy he always was, he usually found time to hit me about it.”

Vaggie’s chest clenched with an overwhelming mixture of heartbreak for Angel and visceral rage for his father, but he hurried to go on before she could express anything about her reaction.

“I did my very best to stay out of the house and out of his way,” Angel went on. “There weren’t a lot of excuses to stay outside, but the kennel master took pity on me one and let me work with her to train the new puppies. After a summer or two I got pretty good at it.”

Dazzle fell onto her side, snorting happily when he shifted to rubbing her belly and let out content little smoke rings that abruptly reminded Vaggie of the fact that the dragons were able to breathe fire.

“Angel,” she said, her tone full of epiphany, “I think I have an answer to our problem.”

Chapter Text

 "Where are you going?" Vaggie heard Husk interrogating Angel as she walked in with the leashes, huffing as she clipped the leads to each of the little dragon's new collars.

"Out to take Razzle and Dazzle for a walk?" Angel asked more than answered. "We're working on training them to walk on a leash, remember? I told you about this."

"Yep," Vaggie agreed, handing one of the leashes to Angel and waving at Husk and Charlie as they made their way to the front door.

"Have fun!" Charlie called after them, thrilled by the sudden alliance of Vaggie and Angel, and Vaggie turned to blow her girlfriend a kiss before she unlocked the front door.

"You don't think it's weird they're hanging out so much?" Vaggie heard Husk demand in what he clearly thought was a hushed tone.

"Honestly, I'm just glad they're getting along now," Charlie answered just before they slipped out the door, and Vaggie snorted her amusement, shaking her head as she shifted the leash to let Razzle sniff at the bush he inspected every single time he walked by it.

"I don't know why Husk is suddenly up my ass about this," Angel grumbled, propping against a nearby lamppost while they waited for Razzle to finish. "He's watched me train them for months, it's not like this is new."

"The part that's new is that you're training them outside of the hotel where he can't follow while Alastor has him working the bar," Vaggie told him, bemused by the fact he hadn't already figured out the reasoning behind Husk's deteriorating mood over the past days.

"What?" Angel asked, genuinely perplexed, and she huffed a breath, wondering -not for the first time- how someone so smart could be so stupid.

"He's jealous, Angel,” she told him bluntly. "Suddenly you and I are friends and are hanging out where he can't follow. Surely, you've noticed how much he always wants your attention?"

"What?" Angel asked again, sounding just as baffled, following along when she started to walk by automatic habit. "Husk doesn't like me, Vaggie. He thinks I'm annoying, and slutty, and fake. He likes Pen way more than me, but since Pen is on that visit to friends for the week that totally isn't a turf war I'm all he's got for the moment."

"Oh, Angel,” she sighed, rolling her eye dramatically and then fixing him with an unimpressed look. "I thought with all those eyes you have you'd actually be able to see."

"What -, I-, I can see! What is that supposed to mean?” he spluttered indignantly, making her laugh rather than apologize as he obviously wanted her to do.

"Oh, Angel,” she repeated, just to be frustrating. "He hasn't disliked hanging out with you since you two went out and had your little night on the town drama. Surely, you've noticed?"

"I -, I -, I mean, sure, we're friends now," Angel eventually found his response, "but just because he doesn't actively hate me anymore doesn't mean he wouldn't be grateful he doesn't have to put up with my shenanigans for the day."

"Shenanigans?” she echoed, arching a judgmental brow, and he momentarily pushed away his confusion to nod with a smirk and confirm, "Sin-anigans," which made her groan while he preened at her reaction.

"You're an idiot,” she informed him, receiving a self-satisfied grin before she refocused them. "Anyway, he likes you, dumbass, and he doesn't appreciate feeling like he's not in on it while we have bonding moments because he wants your attention."

"... That can't possibly be right," Angel eventually managed making her laugh again.

"Well, regardless, it won't matter for long, because we've made insane progress in just a few days. As soon as we can figure out how to test the protect commands in a real-life scenario, you can tell her, and the whole thing will work itself out."

She huffed a fond breath as the dragons both perked up at the word 'protect' but after they scanned the area and found no danger they continued their meandering explanation of every street sign and lamp post they passed.

"Yeah, hopefully it will be fine," Angel agreed, biting his lip and wringing the set of hands not holding Dazzles leash anxiously.

"Keep breathing, Angel,” she coached. "It is going to be fine. As soon as we get the dragons trained up, we'll have something that none of the what if scenarios you come up with will be able to take on. She will be ok. I know it's scary, but we did agree that you'd tell when they were trained."

"I know," Angel nodded, eyes huge. "You're right, I know that, I just.... I don't want her to get hurt."

"I know,” she reassured, lightly bumping his shoulder with hers. "You know I wouldn't be pushing for something that would get her hurt. It'll be ok, Angel."

He nodded, clearly doing his best to believe her, so she aimed for distraction instead of only reassurance and tried, “My ideal way to resolve the situation would be to just defenestrate him.”

She said it so seriously that there was a beat of silence before his face twisted, his brain visibly replaying what she said to listen to it again.

“Defenestrate?” he asked, amusement growing. “Isn’t that throwing someone out a window?”

“Someone or something out a window,” she half confirmed, half corrected, making him laugh and send her an exasperated look.

“He’s a fuckin’ moth, Vags, he’s got wings,” he informed her, his tone overflowing with a fond judgement, and she scoffed and haughtily tossed her hair over her shoulder.

“Well, I’d pluck his wings off, first, obviously,” she informed him with a faux pretentiousness, and he blinked at her for another second and then burst into laughter. That was much better, mission accomplished.

She grinned to herself, waiting until he had fully calmed -almost a block later- and then launched into a description of her next ridiculous scheme, which was followed by increasingly convoluted and ridiculous ways they could murder Angel’s nightmare, interspersed by side splitting laughter at their suggestions.

The unexpectedly amazing time they were having was interrupted by a voice ten minutes later while they cut through a side alley and emerged onto a new street.

“Ah, if it isn’t my darling little Angel-cakes,” a moth announced, something in his tone sending a cold chill down Vaggie’s spine, instantly sobering her as she turned to face the tall stranger.

“Hey, Val,” Angel tried to force his voice into something approaching light and friendly, but failed miserably as his fear clearly shot through his wary expression.

The moth spared him a long look before turning to survey Vaggie.

“Ah, if it isn’t -, what are you, exactly? The princessa’s little arm candy?” the disgusting moth drawled, leering down at her.

“What I am to the princess is none of your business,” she drawled back coolly, holding his gaze squarely, which he seemed taken aback by for a moment before his face hardened into something more threatening.

“I believe you become my business when threatening to kill me,” he informed her, a pointed edge to his tone.

Vaggie blinked at him, baffled as to how he could have known that, but Angel gasped, shoving Dazzle’s leash into Vaggie’s hand and shrinking back with a wide-eyed fear.

“Vox,” he whispered, horrified, and Valentino’s face broke into a smile that was anything but friendly as he confirmed, “Vox,” in a deadly tone.

“Oh, fuck,” Angel breathed, swallowing hard and looking seconds away from passing out.

Valentino took a prowling step forward and Angel shrank back, visibly terrified, and Vaggie tried to run through all of her options for what would cause Angel the least amount of blow-back.  A crowd was growing, a news crew springing up from seemingly nowhere, and whatever the next step was, it would be public. They could turn and run, but the damage was done, and Angel would have a whole new level of hell waiting for him in his next shift. That wasn’t an option.

She could try to brush it off by just making a general statement to the growing crowd, but she knew full well she couldn’t lie for shit and that she had been entirely too specific to get away with convincing Valentino Vox was mistaken, making it a non-option as well.

The only way she could see out was through, and she squared her shoulders, deciding that intimidation was the only true card she had in her hand.

“And why do you think I’d be threatening to kill you?” Vaggie asked, arching an unimpressed eyebrow, her tone full of judgement.

“My darling little Voxxy informed me that you and my puta, here, were discussing that very topic for the past ten minutes,” he told them, further confirming to her that she wouldn’t be able to convince him that their conversation had merely been misconstrued.

“Oh, he must be mistaken, then,” she told him, a saccharine sweetness dripping over her deadly intent that was still more than audible. “I said that I would end anyone who threatened the princess. That wouldn’t happen to apply to you, would it, Valentino?”

“Of course not,” he mirrored her tone. “I have nothing but respect for the princesa del reino.”

“Ah, good,” she nodded, taking a step forward to square up to him instead of backing down. “See, because I sure would hate it if I had to eviscerate someone right here in the street for, say, licking her arm as a way of greeting and then offering her a role as a porn star. I sure would hate it if I found out that someone had threatened my princess, if someone had gone on and on about ways he would hurt her before finally attempting to end her life.”

Valentino grit his teeth, expression wavering between rage and a mask of politeness before he visibly decided to hold onto his temper, at least for the moment, casting one sharp, dangerous look at Angel before turning back to Vaggie with a look that was obviously aiming for placidly unconcerned.

“That would be rather unfortunate,” he commented noncommittally.

“Let’s cut the shit, Valentino,” she snapped, mind searching for a way to strike enough of a fear of consequence into him that he wouldn’t take the confrontation out on Angel the next time he showed up for work. “I am fully aware that you not only threatened to hurt the princess in a myriad of depraved and disgusting ways, you also threatened to kill her. Understand this, your meager power means nothing to me. You do not scare me because you are not a real threat to me, no matter what delusions of grandeur you have convinced yourself of when you hide behind the other two Vees. The only reason I have not taken care of the annoyance you pose yet is because we have more important things to take care of than you and your pathetic attempt at intimidation.”

She prowled closer, taking a risk and letting just a smidgeon of her angelic power crackle out of her, not enough to be visible or distinctly noticeable, but enough to give herself an intimidating aura that would hopefully be enough to make him fold. She may have lost her wings and her eye in the fall, but she still felt her small spark of angelic powers deep inside, and she knew her move had -at least- partially worked when the crowd around them shrank back and Valentino momentarily curled defensively into himself before he caught the movement and straightened.

“As I mentioned, I have more important things to deal with than the likes of you,” she told him, doing absolutely nothing to hide her disgust, “so how about this? How about you make the smart choice and decide you’re not going to even consider harming the princess or any of the hotel’s residents, and I won’t have to reprioritize my schedule to end your miserable fucking life slowly and excruciatingly. How does that sound?

“It sounds to me like my darling little Angel Dust has been spreading lies again,” he told her, a simmering rage lurking under the mask of calm.  “I don’t know what horrific slander he has been filling your ears with, but I would never dream of threatening hell’s darling princesa.”

“Uh huh,” Vaggie scoffed, staring him down. “If that was even the slightest bit true, I’d tell you to keep it that way.”

“How about this,” Valentino echoed her previous words. “How about you take your little lizards back to that princesa of yours, and I will have a discussion with my lovely Angel-cakes.”

Angel backed away, eyes enormous, shaking his head in a silent protest, too terrified to speak, but it didn’t stop Valentino from stalking forward, though Vaggie dropped the dragons’ leashes and side stepped to cut off his path.

“I think one of my toys here has forgotten what his mouth is for," Valentino snarled in what would've been a light, conversational tone if not for the lethal edge underneath. "Not to worry, I know exactly how to take care of this problem.”

From one blink to another a red collar appeared around Angel’s neck with heavy foreboding chains that stretched back to Valentino's hands, and his eyes went impossibly wider. "Now," Valentino hissed, jerking the makeshift leash to send Angel stumbling past Vaggie to stand before the moth before she could stop him, "I guess you have just volunteered to be a public example of what happens to my toys that spread rumors about their owner."

He slowly made a fist in the air, magically tightening the band around Angel’s neck until he was gasping soundlessly and clearly choking.

Vaggie felt her heart rate spike with panic. The collar and chain were soul binds, not physical and the way she could fight, even if she had her spear on her. She could try to attack Valentino himself, but Angel was between them, and in the perfect position to be used as a living shield. She looked around for some way to stop him, her eyes catching on the way the crowd was gaping in a terrified horror at something up above her head, and she swung around to see if it was something she could use to her advantage before she too felt her own mouth open surprise.

The little, adorable dragons had grown taller than the nearby buildings in the time she had looked away, their enormous bulk intimidating in its own right, even if they had not been glaring a deadly warning while snorting plumes of smoke into the air.

"Razzle, Dazzle, protect!” she called desperately, and they needed no further prompting.

Everyone stared, wide eyed and petrified, but the dragons suffered from no such issue, both of them lunging forward to clamp their jaws into an end of Valentino, and then jerking their heads in opposite directions, splitting him in half in a gory spray of blood and guts.

Once separated, they dropped the pieces back to the street and in almost perfect sync sent controlled columns of fire at them, incinerating the corpse to nothing but two blackened spots on the street within seconds.

Angel stood in the middle of the destruction, unharmed, but staring in wide eyed shock, and the other people in the street looked the same, with a tinge more open terror in the expressions.

Razzle and Dazzle growled, curls of smoke curling up from their nostrils as they blatantly assessed the rest of the crowd for threats, making them all shrink back in obvious fear.

"Well done, babies!" Vaggie congratulated them in a pointedly audible voice when she corralled her surprise back under control. "I knew you'd make good guard dragons for the princess. All that training we’ve been doing has paid off. That was exactly right, good babies."

Their menacing threat disappeared to be replaced with a gleeful excitement, shrinking back down to their previous size and then bounding over to her with wagging tails in search of a treat.

She laughed as she fished a small handful of treats out of her dress’s pocket, giving them each half of the bounty and turning to grin at Angel.

“You weren’t kidding when you said you could train animals,” she told him, her tone making it obvious how impressive she found his work. “It didn’t even take a week for you to teach them the new commands.”

Angel shook himself out of his daze, a slow smile growing on his lips, sending her a sincere, “Thanks, Vaggie,” and meandered over, dropping to a knee to lavish them with pets from his many hands.

"Oh, good girl, good boy,” he praised them, and Vaggie froze when he glanced up at her, and then beamed as what she saw connected in her mind.

"Your eye isn't black anymore,” she told him ecstatically. "Looks like we were right about death by dragon being permanent. You're free!"

He stared at her for a long second as he visibly comprehended her words and then turned an impossibly wider smile on the dragons, redoubling his efforts.

She huffed a fond breath and let him spoil them rotten for several more long seconds before tapping his knee with her foot and prompting, “We should get going, don’t you think?”

Angel gave them each one more enthusiastic pet before he stood and accepted Dazzle’s leash back, a distinctive pep in his step when they walked together away from the gaping crowd.

“Breaking news!” Katie Killjoy’s bold voice caught their attention only a block and a half from the hotel, and they paused to watch the television in the window. “The princess may not be as pathetic as previously believed! Shock to end all shocks, pornstar Angel Dust and the princess’s very own royal slattern used the dragons of her royal prissiness to kill the up-and-coming porn overlord, Valentino, today in the doomsday district for threatening her majesty. Here, take a look.”

There was one more beat where Katie’s eager, malicious smile could be seen before the clip replaced her image, beginning as Vaggie went on the offensive to attempt to bluff their way through the encounter.

The focus stayed on herself, Angel, and Valentino all the way up until the camera person clearly got distracted from the brewing fight just before Valentino summoned Angel’s chain by the two little dragons growing and broadening, becoming hulking figures that were barely restraining themselves until, off-screen, Vaggie’s voice called, “Razzle, Dazzle, attack!” and they burst into motion. The camera was close enough to spare no details of Valentino’s gruesome end, and Vaggie did not feel even a spark of pity for the horrible demon that received the horrible demise he deserved.

The clip faded out as Angel accepted her praise over his training prowess and walked over to pet them, his no-longer-black eye just visible before the scene cut back to Katie, who began her spiel on how shocking she found it that Charlie had pets capable of such violence considering what a pansy the princess of hell had always come across as, and Vaggie scowled, wanting to punch through the window to break the television screen, but stomping away instead.

“Yeah, she’s full of shit,” Angel responded to her nonverbal grumblings, “but I have to say, the reminder that Valentino is dead forever and can’t hurt Charlie anymore was an awesome reminder, even though it’s only been ten minutes since it happened.”

His tone was serious under the lilting humor, and she snorted, her good mood returning while she bumped his shoulder and sent him a warm grin.

“Or you,” she reminded him. “He can’t hurt you or any of his other workers anymore, either. You’re free.”

“Yeah,” he smiled, his smile brighter than the sun, “I’m free.”

Chapter Text

Angel unclipped Dazzle's leash and hung it on the hook just inside the door, stepping to the side to allow Vaggie to do the same with Razzle's and shot a grin at the bar where he knew Husk would be stationed.

He froze at the sight he was met with, though, expression sliding off his face as he took in the stony look Husk was leveling at him and the bizarre sight of Charlie staring at them without a smile, standing with her arms crossed by the couch they did exercises on.

Angel exchanged a look with Vaggie, unsure of what he had done to earn Charlie's displeasure, but immediately ashamed and apologetic, even without understanding the cause.

"Hi, babe," Vaggie tried, and Angel was even more alarmed to find that Vaggie was apparently also in trouble as he was met with the sight of Charlie transferring her glare to Vaggie, which Angel hadn't previously thought was possible. Angel wasn't proud of it, but he had frustrated Charlie to the point of a scolding once or twice over the six months he had lived in the hotel, but he had never seen the princess look at her girlfriend with anything short of adoration since he had met the pair.

Vaggie seemed just as upset as Angel felt, freezing in place under the look, leaving Husk and Charlie standing on one side of the abrupt rift that had opened between all of them with Vaggie and Angel standing shoulder to shoulder several paces away.

"What -," Vaggie flicked a nervous look to Husk as well before refocusing on her girlfriend, "What happened?"

"A lot, apparently," Charlie said, audibly hurt, "not that either of you felt the need to share."

With a dawning horror, Angel's eyes skittered to the side where the television set was still silently playing the news, an image of the enormous Razzle and Dazzle frozen behind Katie Killjoy and Tom Trench while the banner scrolled through a rambling proclamation of how naïve and incapable they had believed the princess to be.

"Thanks for letting me know someone was threatening me,” she said sarcastically, recapturing Angel's full attention. "Oh, wait, you didn't. Tell me, was it because you thought my naïve optimism couldn't handle the news, or you just didn't think it concerned me?"

Beside him, Vaggie flinched as if she had been physically struck, and Angel panicked as he scrambled for a way to fix the situation.

"Don't be mad at Vaggie,” he pleaded, wide eyed and more than a little desperate. "She told me from day one I needed to tell you. She was trying to let me have a redemption accomplishment or whatever by telling you myself, but she's been telling me to tell you since the first second I told her. Please don't be mad at her."

"And were you ever going to tell me yourself?" Charlie asked, sounding hurt, and it sent a bolt of pain through him.

"Yeah,” he said, voice meeker than he meant it to be. "Vaggie made me a deal. We could train Razzle and Dazzle to be more protection, but as soon as they were trained, I had to tell you."

She nodded that she had heard, but only said, "I need to go for a walk. I'll be back in a few minutes."

She couldn't meet his eyes as she strode out of the room and down the hallway that led to the kitchen, Vaggie exchanging a lost look with Angel and then scurrying after her, leaving Angel and Husk alone in an oppressive silence.

Angel's shoulders slumped, feeling the weight of Charlie's disappointment more vividly than ever before. Probably because when she had been angry with him before he hadn't cared what she thought of him beyond ensuring she wasn't so angry she kicked him out, whereas in the recent weeks he had begun to truly, deeply, and viscerally care what Charlie and the others thought of him. He had been trying and he had still ended up being crushed under the fact he had disappointed her yet again

"I get why you felt like you couldn't tell Charlie if you were waiting until you trained her guard dragons," Husk said, breaking the stillness between them, and Angel could hear the note of hurt the cat was trying to cover, "but why didn't you tell me?"

"It's not that I didn't trust you," Angel rushed to assure, "I just didn't want to put you in the position of taking the fall for it. I know Alastor has a weird thing going on with the vees, I hear all about it from their end. I didn't know if you'd be in trouble for getting involved in something that might kill one of them because it might implicate Alastor if you were involved or he might be mad because he wanted to kill him himself."

"I appreciate the thought, Angel, but I would have appreciated it more if you had respected me enough to let me make my own decisions and talked to me about it."

Angel ducked his head, trying not to burst into tears at the shame that lit in his stomach, but nodded that he understood the words.

"Hey, legs," Husk's voice was warmer and more bracing and Angel swallowed hard and hunched inward further, arms wrapping around himself in a vain attempt at self-comfort.

Husk's paw was suddenly in his field of vision, slowly reaching out to him, eventually making contact and gently tugging him forward into a hug that made Angel jolt with an aborted sob.

"I'm not mad at you, legs," Husk soothed, curling one hand into Angel's hair while the other ran up and down his back. "I'm just trying to let you know for next time something like this happens, I'd prefer if you talked to me and let me decide. Don't make choices for me thinking you're protecting me, ok?"

Angel nodded a little frantically, swallowing down more tears with a sniffle before he whispered a wet, but heartfelt, "I'm sorry, Husk."

"You're forgiven, Angel,” he assured, resting his cheek in Angel's hair, and Angel slumped into him, surprised at the tidal wave of relief he felt.

"I can see how you thought you were protecting me," Husk continued. "Some people might appreciate that approach, but I'd rather make those decisions for myself... hold onto what pieces of control of my life I have left, you know?"

“Yeah,” he rasped, shame flooding his chest again, and his contriteness was almost tangible as he confirmed, “Yeah, Husk, I understand.”

“I know you do,” Husk assured, hitching him in even tighter, and Angel was more than a little convinced he would have crumpled to the ground in relief if Husk weren’t holding him up.

Husk let him stay huddled in his chest, hiding from the world, for several long minutes before Angel finally convinced himself to ease back. When he finally disconnected, he peered up through his hair to find Husk watching him in open worry, but Charlie and Vaggie reentering the room distracted either of them from commenting.

“Why wouldn’t you tell me that Valentino was threatening me?” Charlie asked, calmer, but a desperate emotion Angel couldn’t quite identify was still blatant in her eyes. “Why would you tell Vaggie, but not even mention it to me? Why make her promise to lie to me by omission? Why would you literally train my dragons before talking to me?”

She paused, studying his face with an anguished intensity.

“What did I do to make you think I am so inadequate?” she asked, her quiet voice sounding deafening in the quiet room.

“You’re not!” he promised, making an aborted motion to hold one of her hands before he drew back again. “You’re not inadequate, Charlie. I'm not saying I don't think you can defend yourself or handle knowing you’re being threatened, because you're a powerhouse, Charlie, you really are. I'm just... I just... Valentino is good at pretending to be harmless and friendly until he has you where he wants you and it’s too late, and I was so scared you'd get hurt or killed and it would be my fault for not being able to keep my shit together, and if you got hurt I don't know what I would do."

He clenched his jaw shut, struggling to push his rising tears down, and floundered for how to further explain.

Vaggie moved to the bar, momentarily distracting everyone as she picked something up and ran it under water in the small sink. She wrung the cloth out, walked around the bar to stand next to the group again, and offered it to Angel.

"Show them,” she instructed gently, handing him a damp wash cloth.

"Why would that matter?” he asked, shoulders shooting up in a tense defensiveness that he couldn't stop from asserting itself.

"It would help them understand," Vaggie patiently explained, ignoring the bewildered looks from the other two and focusing on Angel.

"I don't want their pity, and I don't want their forgiveness either if they only forgive me because they think I'm so pathetic they have to let it go,” he tried to calm his spitting outrage and didn't quite succeed.

Vaggie wasn't offended, though, just watched him with a bracing expression.

"It won't be pity,” she promised, "and it will help them understand why you were scared enough to panic and make decisions for other people. They don't know him like you do, what you see he is capable of is not what everyone sees. If you show them, it will make more sense that you weren't trying to belittle or disrespect them by taking choices from them, you were scared of the threat you know far too well."

On one hand, he was well aware that he had gotten himself into his situation, and he didn't want their pity or their judgement, but on the other of his many hands, it was killing him to see the wounded expressions on Charlie and Husk's faces and know that he was the one who had hurt them.

Angel bit his lip but hesitantly took the washcloth. He glanced at the other two, shrinking into himself, but finally decided the humiliation of showing them would be worth it to convince them that he really had been trying to earnestly protect them.

With slow, unsure movements he brought the cloth up to his face, obscuring his vision as he wiped off the layers of makeup he had put on, his bruising coming to life in a myriad of aches and pains.

He glanced at Vaggie in lieu of a mirror to check he had removed it all, and she nodded with a small, proud smile on her lips, and it did help him breathe through the rising humiliation trying to suffocate him. He dropped his eyes to studiously watch the washcloth steadily wipe away the cover on his arms as well, revealing the rope burn and fingerprints that littered his wrists.

He knew he looked like an absolute mess, he had seen it in far too much detail as he applied the makeup in the bathroom mirror. His entire face was a mottled yellow and greenish-brown of healing bruises that was dotted with swelling that was only just starting to truly fade.

He finished with his last arm and ran out of tasks to distract himself with, flinching as he registered the almost deafening silence that had stretched since he had first wiped off his face, and his arms moved to wrap around himself in a hug as he struggled not to let himself run from the room, or try to curl into a ball so small he became invisible.

"He really wasn't trying to make decisions for you because he thought he knew better than you both," Vaggie said, voice jarring as it broke the tense quiet. "If it had been some asshole reason I would have forced him to tell you or told you myself. He wasn't trying to control you, and he doesn't think you both aren't capable, he was just scared."

She paused for a beat, obviously letting her point sink in, and Angel wanted to die. He couldn't bring himself to look up, but the ongoing silence couldn't mean anything good, and he hoped he hadn't pushed the other two into anger and outrage at trying to use the physical proof of his own bad decisions to get out of the consequences of his actions.

"He was scared, and with good reason," Vaggie continued, "but instead of running away he told me first, so I would be there with my spear if you decided to go back, and then worked on training Razzle and Dazzle so he could tell you without having a panic attack you would die confronting Valentino. I know your dad can't see how competent you are, and the rest of hell can't see how amazingly capable you are, babe, but this isn't that, I promise. He was just scared because he gets hurt every day and he didn't want us to get hurt."

Angel felt another hot flare of shame unfurl in his stomach as he remembered the way the light in Charlie's eyes had visibly dimmed when her father had not been the slightest bit interested in hearing about her hotel when he called her, only to send her on an errand to a meeting he didn’t want to attend.

Charlie didn’t talk about her father often, but as the group had grown closer, she had once admitted just how much it hurt that he didn’t believe in her and was sure she didn’t have the competence or ability to actually achieve her goals. Angel hadn't meant to be another voice on top of all of hell that told Charlie she wasn't capable of being anything except a naïve child.

"Oh, Angel,” she breathed, her voice wet and not full of the frustration he had expected. It was enough to make him peek up from under his hair at her. He had one moment to see that Husk was watching with a devastated look on his face while Charlie had tears streaming down hers before he was engulfed in a hug that was just barely short of a tackle as Charlie flung herself toward him.

"I'm sorry, Cha,” he whispered into her front, sniffling around the tears that slipped out of his eyes. "I don't think you're incompetent or -, or -, or not capable, or any of that, I promise. I just…,” he swallowed hard, voice barely audible as he finished, "I couldn't stand it if you got hurt for me."

"Oh, Angel,” she repeated, sounding no less affected as she clutched him tighter. “If I got hurt because I was protecting you, I wouldn’t have been your fault, it would have been the fault of the disgusting, mean, horrible moth that is now a pile of ashes.”

“I promise I think you’re amazing, and capable, and competent, and shit,” Angel’s breath hitched, tears momentarily clogging his throat before he went on. “I -, I just -, I know you’re a badass, I promise.”

“Thank you, Angel, I really appreciate that,” she told him sincerely, laying her cheek in his hair. “How about we say that we're all going to agree to do our best not to make decisions for other people in the future and tomorrow in lessons we'll talk about the circumstances and brainstorm things that we all could have done differently so we know what to do if we're ever in a situation like this again, but for now, I want you to know that I forgive you."

"Thank you, Charlie," Angel slumped in a boneless relief, more held up by Charlie's firm hold than his own legs, a little shocked at just how much he had needed Charlie's forgiveness.

He shifted a little so he could send Vaggie a grateful smile for helping him through his apology, but the expression fell into puzzled as he watched her open her mouth, freeze for a long second, and then snap her mouth shut looking… scared? She looked scared, though Angel couldn't fathom why.

"Vaggie?” he asked, redirecting everyone's attention to the woman whose eye went wide under their undivided focus.

"Oh, uh,” she started, more flustered than Angel had ever seen her, "I had just thought it might be a good time to say, but, but it has been a long day, and everyone's tired, and I didn't want to -, "

"Vaggie?" Charlie asked, her voice concerned, and gentle. "Was there something you wanted to tell us?"

If possible, Vaggie looked even more trapped, and Angel watched her worriedly.

"You can tell us,” he promised, hoping it came out as reassuring as he had tried to make it. "It'll be ok, Vaggie."

"It's just,” she stammered, and Angel couldn't deny that seeing her look so frightened made his own heart rate spike.

"It's just that I also had something I've been scared to tell Charlie, well, all of you, and it seems like it might be the time, but maybe it would be too much for today,"

"We love you, Vaggie," Angel told her, surprised at how easily the sincere words of affection fell out of his mouth when he normally felt an almost uncontrollable urge to cover all legitimate caring with banter. "You can tell us."

Vaggie swallowed hard, her eye flooding with tears, and Angel’s concern turned to panic.

"I, I've wanted to tell you all, especially you, Charlie, but I didn't know how to bring it up," Vaggie tried to explain. "I wasn't trying to keep it a secret, at first I just didn't really think you'd stick around, Charlie, but then you did, and then I was dating you, and then I didn't know how to tell you ..."

Charlie was looking more and more concerned by the second, but she only offered a gentle, "What is it, Vaggie?"

"I -," Vaggie took a bracing breath and visibly steeled herself. "I'm a fallen angel."

The silence was absolutely deafening as they all stared at her in shock, and her eye flicked between the trio staring at her, seeming to grow more and more afraid of their reaction by the second.

"What?" Charlie whispered, viscerally shocked, and Vaggie winced hard.

"I was... I was an exterminator,” she said, and her quiet confession was somehow the loudest thing Angel had ever heard. "I worked for Adam, I believed it when he told us that it had to be done. When you found me I had just fallen. I cornered a sinner, and they looked so small and scared, I let them go. I questioned what the fuck we were doing, and didn't go after any more. My commander saw me do it, and she personally cut off my wings and gouged out my eye. We were given strict instructions to never question why we were doing it, and never to let a sinner escape our blade, and I made the mistake of doing both."

There was another long, echoing silence as they stared at her, Angel struggling to make his mind connect what that meant, even as the words made perfect sense. Of course Vaggie had such extreme issues relating to the sinners of the hotel in the beginning, she had never been one. Of course she and Charlie seemed like a perfect match, Charlie was practically an angel despite being born and raised in hell. Of course Vaggie thrummed with an indescribable, but incredibly intimidating, fierceness, she was more than capable of ending any sinner she so chose.

She carried an angelic weapon –and had an x over her eye, just like the exterminator masks– and Angel was suddenly baffled as to how he hadn't guessed it himself.

He opened his mouth to tell her that he still loved her but, "So, you've always been as flat as a board, you didn't lose your chest in the fall, too?" was what popped out. Angel couldn't bring himself to fully regret his own stupidity, though, as it surprised laughs out of the other three, and the room as a whole seem to breathe again.

"Nope," Vaggie told him with a bemused quirk of her lips, "just the back of me that got shaved down."

Angel snorted at her deadpan delivery, and more of the tension in the room eased away.

"Yeah, well, we love you anyway,” he told her, playing up the put-upon act, and her smile widened, shoulders slumping slightly in relief.

“Thanks, Angel,” she whispered wetly, eye filling with tears that she didn’t let fall.

“You know,” Husk said, eyebrows raised as he stared at her, “that makes so many things about you make so much sense. I guess it’s not hypocritical of you to yell at Pentious for buying weapons from Carmine after all, you got yours directly from the source.”

“Yeah,” Vaggie huffed an uncomfortable laugh that trailed off far too quickly, obviously still worried about where she stood with him.

“Alright,” he shrugged with a teasing grin, “well, it makes you marginally less annoying if you’re just a caustic control freak rather than a hypocritical, caustic control freak. You're moving up in my book."

She snorted a surprised laugh, shaking her head at him, but her shoulders did relax a bit at the sign he wouldn’t hold her past against her.

She took a bracing breath and then dragged her eyes to her girlfriend, looking small and scared while she waited for judgement.

“I don’t think I’ve told you this, but I’ve been thinking it for a while,” Charlie told her, holding her gaze with a gentle smile on her face. “Vaggie, I love you.”

Vaggie’s eye went wide in shock, and then she was hurling herself forward, and Angel only had just enough time to slide backwards out of the way before Vaggie swept Charlie into a tight hug, burying her face in Charlie’s neck and holding her close.

“I love you so much, Charlie Morningstar,” Vaggie whispered adamantly without lifting her head, and Angel watched them with a fond defeat, wondering how either of them could have had the slightest doubt the other loved them with all her heart, he had never seen a couple as in love as Charlie and Vaggie were with each other.

“I didn’t want to lie to you, but by the time I realized what we had was real it felt like it was too late,” Vaggie explained, a little desperately. “It’s been eating me up inside, but I’m so afraid of losing you, and I love you so much, and I -, I -, I can’t believe you’re not furious with me.”

Charlie shook her head fondly and hitched Vaggie in impossibly tighter.

“I think I would have been mad about it if I had just found out about it,” she admitted, “but you made the choice to tell me, and I can understand that you wouldn’t want to start with that in an introduction, and our relationship did turn serious far quicker than I think either of us was expecting.”

Vaggie’s shoulders shook with an aborted sob that had Charlie dragging her backwards a few steps to curl up on the couch with Vaggie still clinging to her front and refusing to be separated, making Charlie huff a fond breath.

“Thank you for telling me. I love you, Vaggie,” Charlie told her, quiet, but sincere, receiving an equally as earnest, “I love you so much, Charlie,” in return.

Angel gave them a long minute to soak in their moment before he grabbed Husk’s hand to tug him closer to the couch, Husk cramming himself into the free corner of the couch while Angel planted his butt in the one small sliver of empty space and kicked his legs into Husk’s lap and draped his torso over the other two, making all three of them laugh at his antics.

Charlie and Vaggie shifted, one of Charlie’s arms wrapping around his shoulders while Vaggie’s legs became a support for Angel’s back to keep him close, and he burrowed into the warm safety, so relieved at how unfathomably well the problem he had been losing sleep over had been resolved.

"Does anyone else have some shocking bombshell of a secret they would like to share with us?" Charlie asked with a teasing sarcasm, and Angel shook his head without lifting it, grateful he hadn't been trying to keep more secrets than the one that had been eating him alive from the inside out.

"… I was an overlord before I sold my soul to Alastor," Husk announced bluntly, and there was a beat of absolute silence before both Vaggie and Charlie demanded a confounded, "What?" in perfect sync.

Angel giggled into Charlie's front, sinking into the warm hold even further as the others began to pester Husk with questions, knowing that against all odds, everything had turned out alright.