#shiningmoth

Blue AU s1 Finale Lore Reveal

I've been calling Bluespear doomed yuri since the beginning since they mirror my favorite doomed straights, Adam and Lute. So it really shouldn't be a shock that one of them is gonna die.

I actually debated for a while on who it would be, and this particular post cinched it for me that it would be Vaggi.

In the finale, Vaggi sacrifices herself to save Charlie's life after Cain and Abel tag team to destroy her wings. Sensing his daughter's near death experience, Lucifer forces the entire Exorcist army, including Charlie, to retreat. They take Vaggi and the other dead Exorcists back with them.

Lute and Abel survive but not without significant casualties on their own side, and the destruction of their home.

So how is Charlie doing after all this? Abysmal!

Charlie gets grounded by her dad after losing the battle, and as a punishment he takes most of her magic away (hence why she's missing a diamond on her halo). She can barely summon enough magic to cut her own hair, let alone go to hell and take vengeance for Vaggi. She is also grounded quite literally due her injuries requiring the removal of two of her wings.

I have no idea what happens in s2 (or in most of s1 for that matter), but I'm sure I'll make it up eventually.

This post is a bit jumbled and disorganized because this AU is jumbled and disorganized.

Main summary:

Charlie is an "archangel" raised by Adam and the seraphim, Vaggie is a sinner/moth demon working for Carmilla Carmine as a bodyguard. Their paths cross shortly after Charlie learns some hard truths about the exterminations and vows to make it right. It’s kind of a role reversal, kind of an Anastasia/Tangled AU, and a LITTLE bit of a Star Wars AU. 

Some Lore Drops

1 Charlie's chains / "jewelry"

Charlie's cuffs and chains are part of a spell to seal away her demonic traits/powers put on her after an incident when she first arrived to Heaven as a newborn. This has been a foundational part of the AU since Day 1.

Part of the spell "locks" her in this shape when she is meant to be able to shapeshift (have a "demon form" and fully retract her wings and tail) like Lucifer and canon Charlie. She doesn't like people touching or messing with the chains so of course Adam (and later Lute) will do it to annoy her.

At some point towards the end of the story, one cuff gets broken in a battle with Adam, unlocking some of her latent powers (like the black arm from canon).

The bell on her tail is specifically so people know she's coming and can keep an eye on her. Unbeknownst to everyone else, she knows how to silence the bell but chooses not to never thinks to do so.

None of her "jewelry" can come off through any conventional means, and Charlie doesn't know exactly what the spell does. She thinks she wears them for a health reason related to why her parents left her, but mostly doesn't think about it since they've always been "part" of her. Learning the true purpose of the spell is part of her motivation to run away.

Part of the loose plot I imagine for the story is Charlie and Vaggi searching for ways to break the spell once she gets to Hell.

After the first cuff breaks they can temporarily re-seal it so she's not walking around with the black hand all the time, but with the spell out of balance comes host of other issues that I haven't fully figured out.

Charlie's whole arc in the AU would center on being an angel/demon hybrid as well as the heir to a kingdom she doesn't understand. She wants to learn more about who/what she is and find her parents who've all but vanished from Hell. Meanwhile several people in Hell look to exploit her potential power and influence for their own gains. Everyone has big ideas and preconceptions of who/what Charlie is "supposed" to be, and only Vaggi sees her for who she really is :D

2 Vaggi's Wings

(in the AU, Adam is not part of Vaggi 's lore at all. She has no reason to have any shitty name he'd come up with. For a while I kicked around having her AU name be "Van" (originally "Evangeline"). Charlie's implied canonical genuine love for the name "Vaggi" is so adorable I'm just gonna keep her name as Vaggi, logic be damned)

Vaggi was a human who died young and spawned in as a moth demon. Vaggi lost her original moth wings to Lute, and was rescued from the brink of death by Carmilla and her daughters. Her current wings are magic/prosthetic made of shadows and steel. As an untested experimental weapon system combining magic and technology, they require constant upkeep. They are removable but it is extremely difficult and painful. Carmilla's daughters are basically her pit crew.

Vaggi works for Carmilla as a bodyguard. Vaggi sees their relationship as a knight and her lord, while Carmilla and her daughters consider her another member of the family.

Neither Charlie nor Vaggi can properly fly. The spell chains limit Charlie's movements, and Vaggi's new wings make flying too difficult to be worth it except in dire situations.

Vaggi's arc in the AU would have something to do with growing past her "moth to a flame" nature. She would grow to look past Charlie as the one and only savior for hell and find strength in herself as a leader of the people (still in support of Charlie but slightly more independent).

Vaggi is one of the first sinners to successfully survive a fight with an Exorcist. She uses her experience to puzzle out the secret of angelic steel. She tells her discovery to Carmilla, who contracts her soul with the promise to restore her wings in exchange for loyalty and service. With Vaggi on her staff Carmilla continues her research into angelic steel and weaponry. Vaggi is banned by her soul contract from spreading the word about it to others, thus preventing an all out war. Carmilla tries to keep Vaggi close under the guise of bodyguard work, but she manages to loophole her way out and rescues the few people she can.

Adam takes notice of the demon who attacked and injured his soldiers, and the Exorcists take their very first prisoner the next year. This is where she meets Charlie.

(Not exactly this, but it is like this ^^)

3 Heavenly Metal

Heavenly metal burns demon skin on contact (also see in this video), so Charlie and Vaggi can't hold hands as easily. To solve this, Angel Dust lends her some oven mitts, and she wears long sleeves at home. Vaggi forgets this problem a lot and tries to take her hand or touch her arm without thinking. The metal burns fade but Vaggi quickly masses a collection of small burns on her hands until she smartens up and gets her own hand and arm guards.

After one cuff breaks off, the first good discovery they make about it is that Vaggi can grab her unchained hands without hurting herself.

(A lot of the art for this AU was drawn before I made this canon so if Vaggi is touching the chains at any moment in older art, we have two options: 1) Ignore it, or 2) decide it is burning her but she's not mentioning it.)

4 Emily and Lute are Here Too

Charlie and Emily are around the same age and grew up as best friends in Heaven. (They're technically aunt and niece, since I headcanon the Seraphim are all siblings including Lucifer.) Emily doesn't know about Charlie's parents or the exterminations, and sees her as just another Heaven citizen. They spend most of their time together. Emily has one cuff, chain, and rings set in silver that does nothing magical to her and was made specifically match Charlie's.

Emily develops a little crush on Lute. Charlie does not support this--she spends a lot of time around the Exorcists and rightfully clocks Lute as a sadistic bully--but pretends she does to be nice.

Sometime after Charlie runs away, Emily and Lute go on a mission to hell to "rescue" Charlie. Emily takes the mission very seriously and thinks they need disguises to blend in with the sinners. Meanwhile Adam tells Lute to come back with Charlie (and Emily) or not at all. Emily and Lute become close on this mission, as it requires them to spend nearly a week in enemy territory. They are unsuccessful in "rescuing" Charlie, and Emily defends Lute from Adam's wrath at their failure.

Lute and Emily might or might not have a deeper relationship, but after their mission together Emily becomes very taken with Charlie's ideas to fix Hell. Lute obviously hates this.

Archangel AU Lute might be the least accurate to canon Lute because she does not have a crazed rivalry with Vaggi consuming her every waking moment. She doesn't think of Vaggi as anything but another sinner she killed and enjoyed hurting -- until Vaggi and Charlie publicly defeat her on the "rescue" mission. After that she will obviously hate Vaggi's guts and want to finish what she started, but it's not the same since they didn't grow up together and have crazy history like I assume in canon.

In a way their usual dynamic is reversed, in that Vaggi is the one who wants revenge on Lute, and Lute doesn't remember her.

Vaggi is the first sinner to survive a fight with an exorcist, and Lute is the first exorcist to be visibly wounded by a sinner. (Scar placement not final but it is on her face)

Lute is more confused than anything when she gets wounded which is how Vaggi manages to escape. All Exorcists are taught they are invincible, especially in Hell, and have a magical healing factor higher than the average angel. However wounds from angelic steel don't heal like wounds from normal weaponry, as the magic metal affects the soul as well as the body. Lute's wound will go away eventually but she picks at it on the rare occasions when she takes off her helmet. Lute and Adam seldom take off their helmets around the troops so most Exorcists don't know both of them have gnarly facial scars. Lute likes to romanticize that she and Adam are the only people who've seen each others' true faces, but she is 100% wrong.

Archangel AU Lute also needs glasses but won't admit it, so another reason she wears the helmet all the time is to compensate for her shit vision with the targeting system.

5 Charlie's Custody Situation

Charlie is Lucifer and Lilith's daughter but Adam's responsibility. Man never wanted more kids but somehow he got stuck raising the kid of his ex and the guy she left him for. Absolutely brutal. He tended to pawn off supervising Charlie duty on Abel when she was a kid.

Charlie knows who her parents are and thinks they left her behind are coming back for her one day. Nobody is really sure why they gave her up. Adam and Lute make a lot of jokes about Charlie's dad getting lost on the way back with the milk.

Charlie knows Adam is the commander of Heaven's Exorcist Army but doesn't know what it's being used for. She sees how he and Lute (after she rises up the ranks) treat the Exorcists and tries to advocate for them but they don't want her pity and typically tell her off.

Adam and Charlie's relationship is complicated but they care about each other somewhere deep down.

6 The Shirt

In universe, Charlie and Vaggi are often drawn in Bethany Ghostf**ker t-shirts, but it is the same shirt they share custody of. This is simply because I am obsessed with Bethany Ghostf**ker and love the idea of them sharing clothes.

AU playlist (just songs that pass the vibe check for now) on YouTube here

If you got this far, thanks for your time! I genuinely treasure you and any tags/comments about the AU I see.

AU Art is under the Archangel AU tag here!