(Part 19)

Time passed, and still the peaceful silence descended over them. Rather, the peace was permeated by a solid atmosphere of grief as they all knelt, shedding silent and unseen tears. The men refused to show their weakness outwardly, but Leah didn't care. She didn't care that the guys weren't crying, because she had genuinely loved the woman who now laid limp in her father's arms.

At least Eva had finally returned to her lover's embrace. It was the only sort of consolation that Leah could tell herself, as she cried her cheeks wet. All the troubles getting into Hell, being forced in a mad rush since getting the threat from Azazel... nothing mattered to her anymore as she held on to her mother's limp hands, crying her eyeballs out.

Sparda himself spoke no words at all, simply holding tightly to his wife's body. He cradled her as if she were merely in a deep sleep, and knelt reverently with his lips pressed against her forehead. He never should have met her... he never should have answered to his heart and loved this poor woman. Sparda knew from the start that courtship with a woman only meant heartbreak. It would only happen to their family sooner or later.

And now, it had happened. The fact that they were angel and demon had made no difference in the fact that they could no longer be together.

The knowledge that they were separated in the years had passed hadn't struck Sparda down so hard as they did at the moment. Sparda knew that he might never be able to see his wife alive again when he went charging down in Hell to protect his children from Mundus. But back then, he had the promise that Eva would be turned into an angel after she passed on, which settled his worries. Eva, even after she died as a human, would be resurrected into a beautiful angel.

Sparda had acknowledged that it meant that he would never be able to be with his wife in holy matrimony ever again. But the fact that Eva was now killed as an angel...

It spoke for the utter loss Sparda had to go through. There was no more assurance that his wife was doing well, safe and guarded. There was no more knowing that Eva was enjoying herself, being a pure angel -the very trait that Sparda was attracted to in the first place.

It was his eldest son -the most mature of his children -that finally spoke up to break the sorrowful silence. Sparda didn't say it, but he was utterly proud of his children, particularly in Vergil.

Even locked in Hell, Sparda had heard rumours. How Vergil had struggled through his life, trying to accept the fact that he was forever labelled as a Traitor's spawn. Sparda had remembered fretting about Vergil's apparent thirst for power, and had almost been disgusted and horrified when he heard about Vergil stabbing his younger brother. But the rumours eventually changed, and Sparda heard stories of Vergil ending up living with Dante, killing demons together. And then Vergil had met Leah, and realized about Lily... It had been a long journey for his sons, and yet the road was not coming to an end for them.

"We should give her proper burial, and leave her where she belongs." Vergil interrupted the silence with his soft voice, a hint of sadness that only his fiancée could detect. "It is the very least that we, as her family, should do."

"Fuck this." Dante exploded quickly, jumping to his feet and wiping the tears that had gathered at his eyes. His death-grip over the hilt of his sword was enough evidence to every one of his intentions. "I'm going to kill the son-of-a-bitch who did this. Where did that coward angel go?"

"Dante," Sparda finally spoke up, slowly looking up at his angered son. While he had been utterly worried about Vergil's journey in life, Sparda would also agree that Dante had caused him a great deal of stress. Dante never seemed to truly take anything seriously, and it had been utterly worrying when Sparda heard Dante being a good-for-nothing. Sons of Sparda were meant for so many more things, and yet his son was fulfilling such little of his destiny.

"If you're not going to do something about this, Pops, then I am. I'm sick of being kicked around like some stupid pawn on the chessboard. If you still want to laze around in this cell being all beat up and moaning about protecting us, then grow up. I've gone on for years without parents. It's not going to start today, but I'm going to finally do something about this fucked up angel that has been ruining not only my life, but Vergil's, Leah's and Max's." Dante raged, turning his back on the scene.

And that was when he realized something. Something that had missed him entirely in the preciously minutes that they had spent in silence grieving over his dead mother.

Max was gone. Like the angel, Max had gone missing.

"Where is Max?" Dante spun around once more, forgetting the burning hatred for the shortest of moment as he met the eyes of shocked family members. The abrupt topic change had surprised them, but he had no time for such pesky emotion. Max could be in trouble. A human here in Hell had to be in trouble wherever she went. "Did anyone see where the hell Max went?"

"Pardon me for being an unfeeling bastard, Dante, but I was busy grieving over Mother to care for a mere human." Vergil's hard voice was defensive, almost in disbelief that his twin brother could get over the death of their loving mother so quickly. He knew Dante was quick to drop his feelings when he wanted to, but Vergil had never imagined that it would happen to their mother -the one woman who had loved them so much and watched over them even when they thought she wasn't around anymore.

"A mere human," Dante shot back with a hard, defensive edge in his voice, "who happened to bring you here. A human, who braved everything for a family that was in no relation to her."

"It was her choice." Vergil brushed away. "It was her misinformed choice to come running to Hell with the naïve intention of thanking Father. She must have known coming to Hell means a guaranteed death for her."

Dante's reaction was lightning quick -the typical expected movement of an angry half-demon who was in utter disbelief of his twin's indifference towards the one human who had been crucial in the entire mission. If it had not been for Max, could they have opened so many doors to reach Sparda? If it had not been for the amazing Angel, could Vergil and Leah have gotten so far without aid?

"This human gave up everything she had and came rushing here to Hell to save our father in the span of a few weeks. Where were you? Busy romancing your sister that you had to leave me alone for more than five years. You left without a word, Vergil. You left me thinking that you would come back one day, happy and with Leah by your side. But no, you left me waiting, thinking and stupidly believing that I had a brother who once cared." Dante demanded, hauling his brother up by the lapels of his coat.

"Don't begin to start about that, Dante," Vergil warned, swiping his brother's hand away roughly, "Because if you want to start comparing how much we have achieved in the years I was gone, you would lose shamefully."

"At least I still think about my family!" Dante exploded back, obviously losing his mind both from worry and grief. The strong emotions that boiled within him were being channelled outwards as rage, and it was pure unfortunate luck for Vergil to be around, providing ammo. "At least I dreamt about you, and hoped you enjoyed your life with Leah! At least I remembered a brother, a father and a mother!"

"And you are an utter idiot if you think I did not suffer the same fate." Vergil's reply was utterly cold, as if he could not bear to inject anymore emotions. "You are a complete idiot if you believe that I didn't worry over your useless life while I was in another world."

"Enough!" Leah jumped in between the men, a hand on each of their chests and keeping them apart while their father watched numbly. It was the emotions running amok -she knew. Vergil normally would never say such words to the brother that he cared so much for. Leah had been around her fiancé to know that much. But Vergil was deep in grief, and now was channelling it all as rage, playing the blame game with someone who was doing the same thing back in reply.

"Stay out of this, Leah." Vergil warned.

"Yeah, stay out of this. I wouldn't want be lowered in the ground beside Mother in a coffin because I was rude to my sister." Dante added with as much acid as he could make, and it was the breaking point for both men.

It was as if they hadn't grown up. They began lunging at each other, trying to catch each other's throats to squeeze the apologies out of each other. All the while, Leah struggled between the two stronger sons of Sparda, pleading and begging them to break up the fight and see what was important.

Dante swung a punch towards his brother's face, but Vergil's reaction was no slack. A hand shot out, and slapped Dante's fist out of the way. The momentum of the force behind the punch could not be stopped on time, and flew sideways.

Leah cried out, flew a bit, and fell on the floor. She clutched at her abdomen, the tears of pain springing forth from her eyes as she crouched over, the pain radiating from more than just the simple misguided punch. The fight froze for a moment as the men stared in guilt at the result of their violence.

Sparda froze, his blood running cold for a moment as Leah remained curled, in pain.

It couldn't be...

"Leah!" He laid his wife's body carefully down on the floor, before appearing beside his daughter in lightning speed. Her expression was still one of pain that she did her best to tide over, but the trembling of her hands spoke volumes. Carrying a demonic child always made a woman weak. Sparda knew that from watching Eva carry Dante and Vergil in her womb. A little bump could send Eva into waves of pain. That punch had been hard and right on the abdomen...

"Are you okay? Answer me, Leah." Sparda urged, holding tightly to his daughter's shoulders. If Leah lost the child, then it would be a double blow to the family. Sparda wasn't sure if he or Vergil could take the blows one after another.

"I..." Leah ground her teeth together. "It's hurts, Daddy..."

"Look, I'm sorry..." Dante said weakly, the anger drained out and replaced by worry and guilt. But it was too late, because it had been his punch. Still, he hadn't expected for his sister to be so weak. Leah was supposed to be a half-demon as well, right? Surely she could withstand a punch from him?

The weak apology was ignoring as Sparda watched his daughter carefully.

"Breathe, Leah. Breathe carefully and tide through the pain. It's going to be fine." Sparda advised, and for the first time since she was carried into this life, Leah listened to her (real) father's words of love and care.

"I don't want to lose her, Daddy..." Leah cried as she did her best to breathe properly. "I'm scared..."

"I know." Sparda assured, taking a wrist and carefully measuring Leah's pulse. As a demon, he might not know much, but he was still a father who had watched his wife suffer from carrying half-demonic babies in her womb. He was a man who had watched his wife suffer so much carrying a full-blooded demon Lily in her womb, and had been unable to do anything for her. Sparda couldn't do anything for Eva, but he could damn well be there for his daughter. "I know you're scared. But it's okay. It's going to be fine. I'm here. Daddy's here."

"It's going to be fine..." A breathy voice interrupted the pants of pain that emanated from Leah as she did her best to deal with the pain. The men in the room froze, but Leah remained focusing on the pain, doing her best to get past it. She was so caught up in the pain that she didn't hear the voice.

Until it came again, closer.

An impossibly white arm reached forth and grabbed Leah's hand around her abdomen. The strength was there. The strength of a mother.

Leah's eyes snapped up, startled at the intrusion.

Eva, though weak, smiled up at her daughter. She held on tightly to Leah's hand in both of hers and placed a kiss there.

"My dear, it will be fine. Vergil will love her the same way your father loves you." Eva assured.

Leah stared at her mother for a moment longer, the pain temporarily gone from her mind.

Then she fell limp, no longer feeling any pain.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Congratulations, Angel Cartwright.

What the hell?

You have been chosen to inherit Eva's wings. From now onwards, you are an angel. Azazel will guide you along the way of being a Warrior. When you are ready, you will become a guardian angel and receive your ward.

Wait, wait. What the heck was going on? Who was this talking to me inside my mind? In fact, what exactly happened? The last thing I knew was Azazel holding on to me, and forcing my cry for help down my throat. And then everything had went black, and then this disembodied voice was suddenly speaking to me in my head?

My trusted aid, Azazel, will explain things to you. But first and foremost, your first Task at hand will be to confront Mundus together with Azazel. Negotiate for the freedom of the Sparda family.

Azazel? Someone trusted Azazel? That backstabbing angel who murdered the angel who had been nothing but kind, loving and caring? I was expected to trust that traitorous bastard?

He was merely carrying out my orders. Azazel is my most trust aide.

Well, somebody had some trust problems around here if he trusted Azazel with his orders. He'd better be lucky if Azazel didn't turn around to stab him in the back or something.

Unfortunately, he cannot. Should he even begin to have those thoughts, I will eradicate all of it before it can take root.

Convenient, huh?

Let's not waste each other's time. Once more, congratulations in joining my holy force. Angel Cartwright, you are blessed.

It would mean so much if I understood what anything meant. I got the idea that I should be happy or grateful, but it was an emotion that I couldn't exactly come up with when I had no idea what I was supposed to do, or what it all meant.

It turns out that I didn't have long to guess, because the next thing I knew was someone shaking my shoulders lightly. And even though my eyelids were heavy as lead, I forced them to open slowly, feeling something strange. It felt like something was strapped on my back, a new weight. Strangely, it felt like another pair of arms on my back, but no fingers that I could control.

"Welcome back to reality." Azazel's face hovered over me, against the background of a surprising bright light. Everything came in with sharp focus -even better than my usual vision. My contact lenses have never been so strong, and I wondered if someone had somehow changed my degree or something.

"What happened?" I asked, surprised to find my voice totally smooth. I had expected some croaky voice, considering I had been knocked-out for god-knew-how-long. "Where am I?"

"We're at your new home, where all of us were made." Azazel -scarily -smiled at my alertness as he moved backwards a little to give me a view of where exactly we had turned out. I blinked when I realized that most things around us were white -particularly the floor. But what surprised me was that we appeared to be in a room, with walls painted in a colour that I would best describe as the colour of Dante's eyes.

"Where the hell is this?" I demanded again, sitting up, not sure if I was in for something bad. A place that looked so peaceful and soothing couldn't possibly be the place that Azazel was going to murder me in, right? Then again, Azazel could murder Eva in cold blood, which meant that things could happen anywhere, anytime.

"It would be best if you removed such words from your vocabulary. It makes you appear less... pure as you were supposed to be." Azazel's tone of voice was surprisingly mild, and I spun around to look at the angel in shock. Normally, this would be the moment where he would balk against me, and say something with his haughty tone. Somehow, that tone of voice was gone, as if he were finally treating me as an equal -grudgingly or not.

"Pure?" I repeated, laughing a little. "What makes you think that I was ever pure? For gods' sake, I was dealing with demons since young. I've been coloured red from top to toe with demons blood for more times than I can count."

"You were pure enough to be chosen and turned. It is not the purity of your actions, Angel. It is the purity of your heart." Azazel reasoned back, still sitting beside me calmly. His wings were all out, and against the blue-green background, they seemed almost threatening.

"You know, if you explained everything to me, I would understand why the heck I'm so 'pure'." I pointed out. The damned angel was probably enjoying this, wasn't he?

Cue the mind-talk that Azazel always did when I thought something bad about him.

I waited for a moment, then was surprised when he didn't invade my mind to give me his admonishment. I was so used to it now, that it felt weird that he didn't do it. In fact, it felt so weird that I had to open my mouth about it, ignoring the previous topic of conversation.

"Are you not bothering to read my mind? I expected some sort of snarky reply to my thoughts." I pointed out, but Azazel only let the corner of his lips quirk in a sly smirk, as if he enjoyed the memory of making 'snarky replies to my thoughts'. See what I mean by this guy being a bastard?

"The problem is, Angel, that I cannot." Azazel answered. "I cannot read another angel's mind."

"What are you talking about?" His explanation wasn't very helpful at all. "What do you mean by another angel?"

He sighed in a way as if he couldn't believe that I was so dense. It was a familiar action from him -considering how he had always belittled me when we met. Finally, it was something that made me confirm that this guy in front of me was the same Azazel I met previously.

"Do me a favour and turn your head around. Look behind you." He sighed, and I obeyed, because there was really nothing else I could do while I was at the mercy of the angel of Death.

What I saw shocked the wits out of me, even though I guess I should have asked about that weird weight on my back the moment I sat up and felt it dragging me down. Still, I never expected to see them so beautiful, so up close.

"What the fu-"

"Like I said, do try to remove such words out of your vocabulary. Your role as an angel is slightly less dignified if you insist on speaking like Dante." Azazel interrupted before I could complete my expletive, but I was past caring about my vocabulary now as I admired the wings.

My wings, to be accurate.

"So what? I'm an angel now? How the hell did that happen?" I wasted no time demanding the answers from Azazel now. Maybe that explained why I felt so energetic, so powerful even though I don't remember doing anything. I felt like I could run a thousand miles, kill a million demons, and still be as energetic as I was now.

"I killed you, and put Eva's wings on you." Azazel's bland explanation made me blink blankly for a few moments, before the words processed in my mind.

"You killed me?" My voice cracked a little, but give a girl a break -I had just realized that I was now a dead person.

"There was no way to make an angel unless the person has died. It would be too late to wait for your death, and thus there was only one way to go about it. It was painless, wasn't it?"

"You stupid, idiotic angel!" I burst out, unbelieving at how nonchalant he was at this. "Are angels even supposed to kill innocent humans like me? What about Eva?"

Azazel only shrugged. "I expect it was as painless for Eva as it was for you. Besides, it was the orders from my master."

"So you just go around killing people as and when you like it, and call it the order from your master?"

"You wouldn't be made an angel if my master didn't want you." Azazel balked, finally the familiar defensive tone come back. "Besides, you should begin calling him our master. As an angel now, you are tied to the words and orders of our master."

"Right, and be a killing machine." I replied in my most sarcastic tone. "I'm sorry, buddy, but I'm not going to listen to shit like that."

For some reason, Azazel didn't even bother with trying to protect his master's reputation. I only realized afterwards that our arguments didn't even make a difference, because it was a fact that I was made into an angel. And all angels obeyed the master, even if I disagreed to the orders.

But back them, I knew nothing about it, so I argued with Azazel about it. I didn't understand why, but Azazel only engaged in the argument with a placating tone and expression, as if he were dealing with a child who wanted to believe that the earth was flat. But at least the argument put me at ease, because I knew I would have freaked out about my new wings if I didn't argue. Things put simply: arguing with Azazel returned me with some normalcy of my human life that calmed me down.

Eventually, though, I ran out of arguments, and could only sulk in my defeat before Azazel seemed to decide that we had wasted enough time. He picked himself to his feet, and looked down at me with the usual haughty expression once again.

"Come on, we need to go back to Hell."

"What for?" I asked with curiosity, willing to forgive the 'I-am-still-better-than-you' look if he explained things to me.

"We need to talk to Mundus. I expect he would finally have found out about the break-in by Sparda's children." Azazel began to walk, opening a door closest to him, and leading out... to an empty white plain. Still, I followed him, because I saw no one else around in the silent piece of Heaven, and I didn't want to be left alone.

"What kind of a demon king is he if he didn't know about the break-in long ago? I thought you said they were running out of time when you left the cell?"

Azazel continued walking, but turned back and looked down at me. Turning angel hadn't improved on my height deficiency, apparently.

"Mundus was busy with my angel brethren. Why else do you think he took so long to realize that the doors to Sparda's cell were open?"

"Then what are we doing now?"

"Going to negotiate with him."

"Why bring me along? It's not like I've met him before. Besides, I'm an angel now and he's a demon. Are we not supposed to end up fighting?"

"Let's try our best to be diplomatic, then." Azazel answered, as if my questions meant little to him, and he couldn't be bother to register them in his mind.

'But what if he doesn't want to be diplomatic? I'm still not used to this angel mojo!"

"You'll pick it up along the way." Azazel continued walking, this time not even bothering to look at me while answering.

"No one gave me a 'How to be angel 101' manual!" I protested, feeling like a child trying to convince her father to get her favourite teddy bear.

"You'll learn." Azazel finally stopped in the middle of nowhere, and turned around to face me. I blinked, and stopped in surprise. We were not going to Hell? It seemed as if we had stopped in the middle of the white plane of Heaven.

"But if you really want instructions, then I'll give you your first ones as an angel." Azazel finally caved, but I was terribly suspicious of the sly grin tugging at the corner of his lips. He was definitely planning something...

"Open your wings and fly." He said.

"Well, that wasn't very helpful, was it -WHATTHEHELLAHHHHHHH!" My reply was cut off by my own exclamation when I spied Azazel's black wing flying through the air. One moment later, I was hit in the chest and was falling through the clouds. The whiteness of the skies cleared, and I looked down in horror to see the familiar plane of red-black Hell.

"Open your wings and fly!" Azazel's voice shouted against the roaring wind, and I managed to stop screaming in time to see him gliding downwards beside me.

"I don't know how to, you idiot!" I screamed back at him, desperate. What happened to angels that crash-landed in the middle of Hell? Was I going to die in my first act (or non-act) as an angel?

"Think about spreading your arms!" He replied, looking as if he were thoroughly enjoying my utter terror of falling splat on the ground.

"That's not very helpful!" I cried back, but did my best to obey. Stupid, how was spreading my arms going to work when it was my wings that needed the work? Stupid Azazel... how I wished I could instantly learn to fly, chase him and chew his ass out.

"There, you're flying. I told you; you'd learn." I was surprised when I heard his voice beside me clearly, and realized that the wind wasn't roaring against my ears anymore. Opening my squeezed-shut eyes, I blinked to see that the son-of-a-bitch was floating beside me... and that we were stationary in the sky.

"You're a motherfu-"

"Vocabulary, Angel." He reminded once more in the tone of a tired old mother.

"Well, suck it up. If you're going to be such a bitch, then I'm going to be such a vulgar angel." I retorted. "Now how the hell do I fly anywhere? All we're doing is floating."

Azazel shrugged with a grin that betrayed his utter enjoyment at my suffering. I swear, once I knew all the things I needed to know as an angel, I was sooo going to tear him limb from limb -starting with his wings.

"I don't know. Why don't you figure it out by yourself? I'm a bitch, after all. Bitches don't teach vulgar angels like you how to fly." He replied in a tone of utter nonchalance, and turned towards the black star hanging in the sky, flying off like he hadn't brought a companion along.

"Hey!" I protested. Even though I didn't like him around, I was probably going to be utterly lost if I didn't have Azazel. "How can you leave a newly-made angel like this? Our master will fry your butt for abandoning me!"

"Deal with it, Angel." He stopped a distance away, enjoying my helpless suffering.

"My name is Max!" I don't know why, but the protest came quick to my lips.

"Not anymore." He grinned, and turned off without me.

What a bitch. Well, who needed Azazel anyway? I just had to figure out how things work, so that I could catch up with that bastard, and maybe overshoot him, and let him kiss my ass.

Yeah, he could make me into an angel and leave me alone floating above Hell.

But this was one angel that couldn't be abandoned so easily like that. If he wanted to leave me alone, then I was going to cling to him and annoy the Heavens out of him.

I wasn't any other angel, after all.

I was the Angel.

I was Angel, Angel 'Max' Cartwright.