This one-shot is based on the prompt above ^
I found it on Pinterest and immediately thought Yep, this is Skeppy and Bad. Just to be clear, I didn't create the prompt, lol.
Here's the prompt if you can't see the image:
'EVERY DEMON IS ASSIGNED A GUARDIAN ANGEL IN HOPES THAT THEY'LL GROW KIND ENOUGH TO GO TO HEAVEN. YOU'RE AN ANGEL, AND YOU'RE ASSIGNED TO A DEMON THAT'S THE SWEETEST THING YOU'VE EVER SEEN.'
So Skeppy is the Angel and Bad is the Demon. Enjoy!
(P.S. This was supposed to be mainly Skephalo but there ended up being a lot of Karlnap. It kind of just worked as I wrote more. You'll see! <3)
Skeppy's P.O.V.
I approach the place where my demon is located and do a double-take. The other angels told me to expect some dark alleyway or firey pit or something like that, or maybe even inside of Hell itself.
No.
This abnormally tall demon is sitting in a freaking flower field. Surrounded by butterflies and sunshine and bees. As I'm watching him, a hummingbird comes down from the sky and perches on his finger for a second before flying a bit away and sipping nectar from a lily nearby. The demon looks closer at the hummingbird, his eyes widening slightly.
"Uhm, hello?" I call down to him. He looks up at me and I notice he's wearing a flower crown that drapes down behind his horns.
He smiles.
"Hello! I'm BadBoyHalo but I'm also called Darryl." I shudder. The name 'BadBoyHalo' doesn't seem like a promising factor. But honestly, I couldn't be less worried, seeing what he spends his time on. "Who are you?"
"I'm your guardian angel. My name doesn't really matter but you can call me Skeppy if you must. I'm here to make sure you end up going to Heaven." I say warily, flexing my platinum wings slightly.
"Oh." He utters as if contemplating what I said. "Why? I mean, I'm sure it's great, but what have I done wrong?"
I narrow my eyes at him. Is he being serious right now? 'What has he done'? He's a demon, he's obviously done something.
"Well...You tell me. Did you murder someone?"
"What!? Absolutely not!" He looks surprised and scared and frantically shakes his head.
"Commit theft or threaten someone's life?"
"Definitely not."
"Commit arson?"
"No!!!"
"Sexual abuse or harassment? Animal abuse??"
He shudders. "I don't know why someone would do something so obviously wrong..." He sounds truthful and confused, which puzzles me even more.
"Have you even committed a crime??"
He looks at me uncomprehensively. "No, I would never..."
"We'll see about that," I mutter and watch him lay back down in the meadow and pick some flowers from where I'm hovering.
~~ Time Skip - 3 Days ~~
"C'monnnn, just do a crime! It's easier for me!" I whine as he picks up another 'pretty rock' for his collection.
He looks at me with a pout. "But this is so much better. And easier. And fun." He looks up at the tall redwood trees in the area. "And nature is so pretty and interesting."
"What the hell am I even doing here..." I mutter. He looks at me, scandalized. "Language, you muffinhead!" He yelps. "You can't say that!"
At this point, I'm barely surprised anymore. "You're telling me that you don't...swear?"
"Nnnnnnnope." He replies with a small grin on his face. "Er, what were you saying, 'it's easier for me'? What does that mean?"
I wasn't about to let him know that the whole thing was rigged... "Nothing, it's my business." At this point I know that if I tell him to stay out of it, he'll respect me.
He shrugs and stands up. i make sure not to touch him, because according to the stories, if an angel touches a demon then their light will be stripped away. Unless the demon truly doesn't want to hurt them...Which almost never happens. Bad starts trotting away.
"Wait, where are you going?" I ask him as he makes his way towards the road. "The store. I need food too, y'know." I follow him onto the street .
As we enter the store that is almost deserted, he immediately makes a beeline to the fruit section, grabbing raspberries, green grapes and a few apples. I hear some people talking and coming our way, and Bad sidles behind a chocolate display. A few girls that look to be in their mid-twenties walk by him and stop when they see me. They stare, I stare back at them uncomprehensively.
They eventually leave and Bad steps out of his hiding place. "Why did you hide?" I ask him, curious as to why he would need to hide from people.
He rubs the back of his neck. "When people see me, they get scared and run away. They usually also drop some stuff. It's easier for them that they don't see me."
I shake my head. This demon really is something else. I casually glance at him as I follow him to the snack section and notice that he's using his abnormal height to glance over the shelves, as if he's trying to spot someone. Odd.
A few minutes later, I follow him to the check-out area. A woman with light blue hair waves us over. Bad looks at the register a few feet away sadly. More specifically, at the light-brown-haired man wearing a color-block sweatshirt with a spiral on the front. He's helping another customer. I do a double-take as I notice he's a guardian angel, I can easily tell by his light purple wings that he's folded behind his back. But where's his demon?
The lady puts all of our things in bags and Bad and I head towards the exit. I walk out first and suddenly hear an alarm when Bad tries to follow me.
I whip around, pointing at him accusingly. "You. You stole something!" He frowns at me. "No. I didn't."
I'm taken aback. "The alarm is clearly ringing, you obviously have something!" Just then, I see the light brown haired man running towards us.
"Bad?" He asks, surprised.
Bad whirls around."Karl!!" He cheers before hugging the shorter angel. I suck in a gasp but then realize that nothing is happening to the man apparently called Karl.
"What...?"I mumble, watching them. "Who are you?" He gives me a friendly grin before responding. "Karl. I'm Karl. Who are you?"
Bad interrupts. "Sorry, that was really rude of me. This is Skeppy, he's my guardian angel." My head swims after hearing him say my name for the first time. It's...weird. Not bad-weird, though. I don't know how to explain it.
Karl scoffs. "Bad, you are literally the polar opposite of a demon. Why the hell-" "LANGUAGE!" "Sorry, heck do you need a guardian angel?" Bad just shrugs. "I don't know. He's pretty cool though. Other than being totally suspicious of me."
I interrupt him, a bit shocked. "Okay, wait a minute, Karl, where's your demon? And why aren't you back in Heaven if you don't have one?"
Bad and Karl share a look. "It's complicated." Karl says. "I've still never heard the whole story, only bits and pieces." Bad chimes in. "I'll call him over." Karl continues. He leaves for a minute to go back inside the store. Bad and I stand there awkwardly.
"So, what happened when you set the alarm off?" I finally ask him. He grins sheepishly. "I was looking for Karl and wasn't watching where I was going. I bonked my head on the doorframe and the alarm went off." He rubs his forehead.
I'm taken aback. "Oh...Sorry...?"
He's about to say something when Karl walks back out of the store, followed by someone who doesn't look like a demon at all. He looks completely normal, like a human. He's wearing a long-sleeved black undershirt and a white tee on top. The t-shirt has a little flame on it, and his eyes are covered by a red bandana. But there's nothing about him that would strike me as 'demonic'.
Karl is leading him over by his hand with an expression that I could only describe as ecstatic. And the human-demon(?) looked mildly surprised. "Take off the blindfold!" Karl exclaimed to him. He did so, and did a double-take when he saw Bad. "Bad? Is that really you?? It's been so long!" And he just ran over and hugged Bad like he had known him forever. Maybe he had, in fact.
"So, who's your angel?" the human-demon said, looking at me before taking Karl's hand again...Uhm, what?! Bad responded to him, again apologizing profusely. Apparently, the man's name was Sapnap, and Skeppy got to hear Bad say his name again. Wait, that's not a good thing. No. I'm not supposed to be talking to him this much, just steering him in the right direction.
Not that he needs me for that.
"So, what's the story between you two?" I ask Karl and Sapnap to take my mind off of...stuff.
Karl looks at Sapnap with a sad expression and begins telling the story. "Well...About fifty years ago I was assigned to the craziest demon I had ever seen. Let me tell you he was a massive pyromaniac. He had about three other guardian angels who quit before me and most of the angels were beginning to lose hope." Sapnap looked uncomfortable as he listened, but something on his face made me feel as if he had heard this several times before.
Karl continued. "When I found him, sometime around dusk, he was standing in an alleyway, lighting a dumpster on fire. His face was illuminated by the growing flames. Tears were running down his cheeks, but a determined look in his eyes. I didn't approach him yet."
The story kept going. "I watched him return to his home if you could call it that. Concrete ruins with scorch marks littering the walls. A small compartment for food and money, and a charred table in the middle of the room with a chair next to it. No sink, but a working spigot a few feet away from the ruins. I didn't want to talk to him yet. I was scared."
I found myself being pulled into the story. Bad looked nervous. I wonder why, is he okay...? Um. What. Yes, he's fine. Not that it matters to me. He'll be fine and I don't care...At all. He's a job, not a friend...
Our feet traveled without meaning, taking the four of us to a bench in a park. We sat down as the story stretched on.
"I left something. A single marigold. Right on his doorstep. And then I left. I figured he was going to burn it, or at least discard it. I came back the next day. The flower was gone." I sucked in a breath. Karl kept speaking. "I thought I was right, that he had burned it. I looked in his window and almost broke my cover. The flower was sitting in a water-filled vase on the lonely table, in a patch of sun. He was sitting across from it with his back facing me. I wanted to act on it, so I put a violet on the windowsill and tossed a rock onto the room. Then I left. The violet had joined the marigold in the vase the next time I checked, about an hour later. I noticed he was zoned out staring at them, so I left the sunflower I got on his doorstep instead of the windowsill."
Who's he talking about? Did he have a demon before Sapnap? Because Sapnap seems like a demon-human, not a demon. I only know he's a demon because Karl said so, he's so...different. but so is Bad...
Karl's breath shook as he continued. "The next day, I arrived and there was a planter box outside of his house. He had put the sunflower inside of it and watered it. This time I left a bundle of daisies on the doorstep and peeked in the window. What surprised me was the scent. No smoke smell anywhere. No new burns. When I looked at the demon he had his head in his hands and was muttering 'I'm going crazy. I'm going crazy. It was a coincidence.' It wasn't."
Karl smiled as he continued.
"He got up and I ducked out of frame. I heard the door open and heard him say 'It's not a coincidence. They're real...' He picked them up and I saw a tear form in his eye before he shut himself in his house. Fast-forward a few days, I began to get used to seeing him sitting on his doorstep for nearly the entire day. I didn't send flowers every day since the daisies, only one more over the four days that he sat outside. It was a poppy that I placed on his windowsill, he saw it almost immediately. For the other days, he sat outside with a hopeful look on his face but nobody came by and dropped off a flower. He cried most of the days. it was heart-wrenching to watch."
Bad, being the emotional demon he is, starts to mildly tear up. I guess this is the full version then, the one he hasn't heard. Or maybe he's just a bigger sap than I realized.
"The last day it was cloudy. He sat outside again, and I noticed the lighter sticking out of his pocket. I had brought a flower that day, with a note attached. It had said 'Don't Worry' with a heart next to the words. I don't know why I added the heart that day, but it felt right. However, I panicked when I saw him with that lighter. I couldn't go down there and give him the flower without being seen, but if he didn't get one, he might start burning again. I watched from through the clouds and he rested his hand on his chin with a familiar look in his eyes. A look like I had seen him with on the first day when he was burning something. The flower slipped from my grasp and fell through the cloud layer and the sky, landing next to him."
My hand slipped out from under my chin as I listened to the story and I mildly zoned out looking at my demon while I imagined what it would be like if that's how I approached Bad instead of what happened. Too late, I noticed Karl had kept speaking.
"-pink camellia flower from the forest nearby. He looked into the cloudy sky wildly. I panicked. I left. I didn't come back for almost a week. I worried every day. When I finally decided to come back, the house was silent. Too silent. I slowly entered with a bundle of marigolds, violets and lilies in my arms. The house was deserted, or so I thought. After putting the flowers on the table I went to turn around, and there he was, standing there. In the doorway. He looked a bit surprised but also sad, and...angry. And then he spoke to me. It hurt my heart.
'It was you. You left me. Why?'
"My voice crackled with the suspense and the amount of sadness and accusation in his voice. He looked tense like he was expecting a fight. 'It was me,' I had told him. His face went a little softer as he heard me admit it but didn't move off of accusatory. he repeated himself. 'Why. Did. You. Leave?' I stepped backward, slightly threatened. 'I panicked.' I confessed. 'I got...scared. I felt like...What is that on your arm?!'"
Karl chuckles sadly as he retells the moment where he panicked.
"I stepped forward swiftly and pressed him down into the chair before grabbing his arm tenderly to inspect it. Burns. So many burns and scars. Most of them were old and rough but a few of them were new. Fresh. I dug around in my bag for healing medicine and pulled some burn cream and scar-healing paste out. He looked bewildered as he watched me but still upset. He was silent as I applied the medicine to his skin. Silent as I stood up from kneeling down and brushed the soot off of his shoulder. He stood up but stayed mute, even as I hugged him gently, but quivered and sat down again. Silent until I exited the house after throwing a small 'I'll be back' over my shoulder. I was walking away from the house when I heard a small 'Wait.'"
Karl's eyes water as I watch his face go back fifty years, back to when he was with that demon. Did Karl love him? Did he...die?? Is that even possible?!
"I heard his voice break. 'Don't leave me here.' He said. 'I won't, I'll be back.' I responded. He avoided what I said. 'I'm a mess.' 'You're my mess now.' I had responded without thinking, but I sure did think after I said it. That really came out wrong...Or did it come out just how I meant it to? I remember his shell-shocked face. He tentatively took a step closer to me. Not a lot, considering our distance of several meters. He spoke again. 'Don't. Go. Please...' It was a plea for help and a wish for safety. I didn't go."
Karl smiled. "I changed him. He never lit things on fire anymore. We built his house up from the ruins. And somewhere along that freaky pathway of years and years I realized I loved him. But, like in any good story, something has to get in the way. And something did. He did change, he did. And I submitted his form back to heaven, for him to enter and live happily, with me, forever."
I watch Karl's hands shake and watch Sapnap take one of them in both of his, squeezing it gently. Karl takes a deep breath before resuming. "It got denied. I tried again. Declined. They didn't believe he could change so they told me to give up and come back to heaven. They sent me the form to come back. I sent it to them with one word written in big red letters. Denied. And he was so happy." Sapnap butts in, smiling triumphantly. "Yes, I was."
They're expecting a reaction from me, and they sure gave them one. I start to choke on air and almost fall off the bench. Karl thumps me on the back. "You good?"
"Yeah..." I rasp. "Please, do continue."
"Sapnap thought there would be another way for us both to go back. So he did the boldest thing I'd ever seen. He willingly gave up demonism, to try and be with me. I was shocked when I came home one day and saw someone unfamiliar in the house. He told me what he'd done and I cried. That night, we submitted the form one last time."
DENIED.
"We both cried. I got mad...Really mad. I swore to never set foot into heaven again unless Sapnap was by my side. But I was too scared to revoke my angel side. Not like him. So now we're living together, and I couldn't be happier. Oh, and somewhere in there we met Bad. He was kind of an anchor for us because we were struggling mentally at the time."
My mind whirled as I thought of the story. How...What...I don't know what to think. Maybe...stuff like that isn't just for silly storybooks. Maybe something like that could happen to me...?
The small voice in the back of my mind telling me this idea was dangerous died. I left with Bad in a haze, only speaking to bid Sapnap and Karl goodbye. We kept walking, farther into places I didn't know. Or perhaps I just didn't remember, because we ended up right where we started. The flower field.
Bad sat down again. Just like when I had first seen him, he lazily watched the butterflies and picked flowers. I sat down under the one tree that swayed in the light breeze. I closed my eyes.
———————————
Bad shook me awake several hours later.
"Skeppy?" There it was, the odd feeling. He said my name again. Maybe I'm just delusional from lack of sleep. Yeah.
"I think so." He replied to my thought. Wait. Did I say that out loud? "Yes." He replied. "I think you're sleep-deprived."
I opened my eyes and saw him with his hands on my shoulders. I panicked and shrunk down onto the floor. He removed his hands, but I didn't feel like I was withering away. I felt like something was missing. What is happening to me...
"Wait." I had a realization. "You...touched me. And I'm fine." He looked at me shyly. "Yeah. I don't want to hurt you." I then realized the dainty crown of blue baby's breath and chrysanthemums winding over my ears and on the top of my head. It felt soft and special, like something I would find after losing many years prior.
He pulled me up from where I was on the ground, touching a strand of the flower crown that hung down from my slightly messy hair. His finger skimmed over my cheek, but was it an accident?
I stepped backward and looked up and the demon who was more than two feet taller than me. I feel a tear form in the corner of my eye and close them, too proud to let anything overwhelm me. I was backed up against the tree with my wings spread mostly open. I heard the grass shift as he walked up to me. I let the tears fall slowly as he wrapped his arms around me. It felt right.
"I want what they have," I mutter. "Karl and Sapnap. They're so happy together and nothing's going wrong. Too bad I'll never have the chance." Bad sat down, gently pulling me with him. He put an arm over my shoulders gently and laid my head down on his lap so that I was looking up at his face. "Look at me." He whispered. "How do you feel?"
"Weird," I responded. "You make me feel weird."
"Good weird or bad?"
"Good. Definitely good."
He brought his head down to my forehead and lightly pressed his lips to it.
——————————
I awoke with my eyes closed. It was all a dream. I opened my eyes slightly and realized where I was. It certainly was a good place to wake up. I was sitting up but resting my head against Bad's chest and his legs were on either side of my body. There was a flower crown on my head. My hand was-
Oh goodness.
My right hand was lightly resting in the palm of his. I moved slightly and he spoke to himself.
"He'll wake up soon. I should go. He still doesn't trust me. It'll make everything...worse." He began to stand up. I interlocked our fingers, preventing him from leaving. I heard him sigh and stop trying to get up. "He's clingy when he's asleep."
Or when I'm not, ha.
That dream isn't too much to handle right now, and the meaning is pretty clear. Bad moved his other hand up to the base of my neck, then away as if he was scared he'd wake me up. Too late. I felt a hand in my hair and stifled a gasp as he lightly moved his hand around tenderly. I decided to lean into him more and he removed his hand in surprise. I heard him take a breath and hesitantly speak. "I love you..."
I took action. I lifted my head upwards and stared him in the eyes. He blinked in surprise and then his face changed to regret. "I'm sorry," he apologized. "That was terrible of me." "Don't be," I muttered to him. He didn't relinquish his grip on my hand.
"Aren't you mad?"
"Why would I be?"
"I-You-But...-What-?!" He said.
"It's cute when you're flustered," I whispered.
He just stared at me in shock.
"Bad, you make me feel weird. In a good way. And I never know what to think around you."
"I'm glad I'm not the only one. I can't explain you, but you make me feel different, Skeppy."
"Maybe that's not a bad thing like I thought it was," I breathed as I sat up, turned around, and leaned closer. I heard his breath hitch and he reclaimed my hand in his. We both leaned in and our lips touched. His hand reached up and ran through my hair.
And I was happy.
I was finally happy.
And nothing was going to stop me from staying here with him forever.
I broke away and smiled at him, tears threatening to fall. I was crying a bit more lately, I guess. But they weren't sad tears, not this time.
He put his arm back over my shoulders and I leaned into him.
"And to think," He mumbled, "You entirely distrusted me when we met!" He said it in a light tone and his fingers found their way to my hair.
I chuckled. "Well, you are a demon after all."
"What, and you're some amazing, all-powerful, all-knowing angel?" He joked.
"Hey!"
He laughed and my heart shone. At that moment, I just knew that everything would be alright.
Omg
That was a REALLY long chapter.
4,140 words <3
Anyway, does anyone want me to make a separate book about the story of Karl and Sapnap? Pls tell me if so :)
ANYWAY BYE IMMA GET SOME SLEEP.