#asktheprinceofhell

{{Once in a blue moon, can it be a fanfic version of a character, and Athena has to help them while being scandalized at how out of character they are?}}

Beelzebub’s lips twitched as he only half-heartedly held back the gloating smirk that came at the sight of Metatron lying on the muddy ground with a black arrow sprouting from his stomach.

The demon’s figure cast a long shadow in the dying light of day as he swept across the battlefield, stepping over and around the metal-clad soldiers that lay rotting in the heat. The smirk finally broke free as, drawing nearer, he saw that the angel was wearing no armor himself, and was unarmed to boot. Beelzebub figured he had gone into the battle without it, forgetting that human bodies were still susceptible to permanent injury even if the souls inhabiting them weren’t.

Metatron’s expression, which had been that of someone attempting stoicism in the face of sheer agony, had changed to one of utter annoyance, as though the seraph had forgotten his pain momentarily in light of being approached by an enemy while in such a compromising position.

“Come to gloat, have you?” he spat, the venom in his voice surprisingly stinging for a being of his nature.

Still smirking, Beelzebub crouched down and took a moment to fully absorb the image that was Metatron. The seraph was filthy, between the blood splattered on him to the mud that was tangled in his hair and caked on the rest of his body, especially his arms and legs. A piece of cloth that had likely once been a tunic now clung to him, completely shredded. The skin that showed from beneath the cloth was an ugly patchwork of blacks and blues and putrid yellows and sickly greens. One of his legs was bent at an awkward angle from where a spooked horse had trod on it, and the arrow that had brought him down protruded from his body as a flag of malicious victory.

“Of course,” he responded finally with a low laugh. “You’re an idiot, Metatron. What made you think you could go into battle without so much as a sword or a breastplate?”

Metatron deliberately avoided looking at him as he answered through gritted teeth, “I wasn’t intending to actually fight. I came to tell the emperor that our side would help him win so long as he used one of our symbols, but I got caught up in the battle.”

“And you didn’t think to just fly off? It’s not as though they didn’t know you were an angel.”

“Tried that,” the angel hissed. “Got shot down.”

Beelzebub had to laugh again at that. Here was Metatron, the Voice of God, the highest ranking angel in the Host, brought down by human hands. It was too good of an opportunity to pass up.

And yet, Beelzebub found that after the first few, initial taunts, he wasn’t in the mood to gloat; the angel was going to die, after all, at least physically, and the demon knew very well that it was never pleasant. The thought made an old scar over his heart ache noticeably.

He was mildly concerned.

He pushed the thought away in time to notice that Metatron’s eyes were now closed, and that his breathing had become shallower. He’d be gone soon, Beelzebub knew, and it would be who knew how long before he’d be back.

“Hey,” he said softly. When Metatron gave him a grunt in response, he continued with, “This isn’t your first time being discorporated, is it?”

“Uh-uh,” the seraph answered briefly, too weak to shake his head. “Second.”

“What happened the first time?”

“Blew myself up.”

Beelzebub blinked, genuinely surprised. “You…blew yourself up?”

“Mm,” Metatron replied, his eyes fluttering frantically beneath their lids. He was slipping fast now. “Wasn’t as bad as now. ‘Twas quick.”

Beelzebub remained silent as he watched the angel begin to glow slightly as his soul prepared to return to Heaven; it wasn’t that he had no words, no, he had plenty of things he could have said. It was that he wasn’t sure how to say them.

The seraph’s last words, however, did leave him truly speechless.