Work Text:
Maybe I should've worked harder. Maybe I should've found her way sooner, started the training when she was still younger. Maybe things wouldn't get so bad to the point where so many beings were concerned.
If you lived in Hell long enough or heard of me, you may know me as Princess Delilah Morningstar. The, ridiculously, younger twin sister of Charlie, and, once again, ridiculously, not the heir to the throne.
Why is it ridiculous that I'm the younger sister and that I'm not the heir? Well if you ask me...it doesn't make sense.
Those who knew me and my sister very well would find the notion ridiculous as well. My sister and I were polar opposites.
I was cold, collected, and authoritative. I was extremely powerful, and I made sure to let the sinners know that, which is how I got the respect of those who were around before I eventually left Hell.
I wasn't exactly cruel. I just knew how to put my foot down if I needed too. After all, as a powerful figure of authority, you always need to be strict and let your people know that you won't take disrespect laying down.
My sister? Like I said, she was the opposite. Super friendly, and way less authoritative. Sometimes, I feel a little embarrassed by her, mostly because she acts like an immature child and she thinks the world is all sunshine and rainbows.
I, myself, actually behaved like a grown adult and knew what the world is deep down really like. So....I was more queen-material than my own sister.
But that's not the point. This story isn't about me. It's about a girl named Caliste. A goetian demon with bright feathers and gorgeous red eyes. Wearing nothing but a pink shirt with blue overalls.
Yeah...and she also bears the power of my family, the Morningstars. How? I gave them to her....before she hatched.
You see, seventeen years ago, I returned to Hell after so long, and found out it hasn't changed at all. Aside from the yearly exterminations, one of the things that disgusted me....were imps and hellhounds being mistreated. Looked down like they were nothing but animals to the upper class.
I was furious. Dad didn't care about them, and Charlie only cared about the sinners to even bother. They weren't doing anything to cease the mistreatment.
Now...like always, I had to do everything myself. I couldn't do it because I'd be spending too much time away from my home on Earth.
Throughout the past 100 years, I have found thousands and thousands of humans, and I put them under contracts that rendered them immortal in order to protect them from damnation.
At first, I let them do whatever they wanted, and the humans sinned as much as they desired. Heaven noticed and started sending angels down to nullify the contracts. I couldn't let that happen.
When the contracts become nullified, the humans start to rapidly age, and if they've lived past their life span, they wither out and die.
So, if I left to tend to the hellborn, the humans under my contract would be sitting ducks. So, I held a meeting about this problem and one of the sinners reached out.
She told me that Stella and Stolas just had two eggs, and that I should give one of my powers to them. I liked it better than just giving them to a full grown adult or an irresponsible young kid.
There were a lot less risks, the child would be born with the powers, and I would be able to train them to use the powers responsibly.
However, I didn't account for Bill Cipher to come and snatch the child up, and I certainly didn't account that the child would return ten years later. Said child was Caliste, who just recently got adopted by an imp family that was running a ranch.
And what I certainly didn't account for was how chaotic Caliste was.
Ever since I started her training, there's been an awful lot of disasters that went out of hand, so many I had trouble counting.
Like the time spell. I remembered her mother telling me that Caliste had found something, and when she and the rest of the family came out, there was a giant mammoth sitting next to her. One time, she even brought home a dinosaur.
And there's the clone incident. Where she figured out how to duplicate herself. And duplicated too much. To the point where Wrath was infested with too many clones. I had to, well, make them disappear. Pretty sure I killed them, but at least there's just one Caliste.
Then the sinners frenzy. What'd she do? Well, I guess someone, either a kid or her family members, told her about how the whole 'sinners being confined to Pride', so Caliste, being a young naive child, opened up several portals to Pride.
Since there were no force fields in the portals, the sinners were able to walk through. And once they did, most of them caused a lot of chaos. So, being the responsible princess I was, I sent them all back.
I most certainly did not want any of the Deadly Sins' attention drawn to Caliste, since I was pretty much worried that she'd be in a lot of trouble if she did.
Anyways, along with a bunch of other crazy stuff, Caliste may have brought home a dinosaur and a mammoth, and infested Wrath with both clones and sinners... don't even get me started on this other incident.
The Heaven Fiasco.
I remembered when Caliste disappeared for a few hours. I was the most worried, because I thought she was gonna cause another disaster. Then someone said something about Heaven...
I remembered how furious I was, because at the time, I thought Sera suddenly had the bright idea to send an angel after Caliste....but I learned that she wondered with an angel that was about her age.
And caused a lot of chaos and panic in Hell.
So, training Caliste turned out to be more difficult than I thought or planned. But this is not where this story ends. No...
....
One day, I took Caliste outside at night to see the stars in the now darker orange sky. Beautiful and bright.
I chuckled a bit as Caliste stared, awestruck. "Did you know people often make wishes at the stars?"
Caliste turned around, staring at me with wide eyes. "Really? Do they come true?"
I nodded. Even though it's not actually true, Caliste was still a kid. I was gonna let her be until she felt ready to grow up.
She happily stood up from my lap, and looked at what I thought was the brightest and most beautiful of stars. "I wish....for a new friend."
Afterwards, Caliste looked to see the star moving, looking like it was moving closely to her. "Huh?"
I immediately reacted out of worry, grabbing Caliste, and keeping her close, retracting all six of my purple wings and wrapping them around her as a shield.
I waited until the star landed deep into the ground, then retracted my wings, moving them away and letting Caliste go.
In front of us was instead some round ball, with a spiky tuft of hair at the top. Glowing, the creature uncurled and levitated itself into the air. Revealing itself to actually be a small cute dragon.
"Hello!" It greeted. "I'm Fwench Fwy!"
Caliste grinned widely, while I stared in shock. While I wasn't showing it, I felt somewhat angry...for some reason, I could sense angelic energy coming from that dragon.
....
That wasn't the last time we saw Fwench Fwy. For the past few weeks, we both saw the dragon a lot more often.
They did a lot more than just chat. Apparently, Fwench Fwy must've thought they were Caliste's mentor. Because for the past few weeks I've seen them, they've basically been teaching Caliste how to use her powers.
The same things she already knew. They didn't teach her new tricks. I started to realize that Fwench Fwy wasn't actually training Caliste to use her powers.
In reality, they were teaching her HOW to use them. In less chaotic and non destructive ways. Which, I'll admit it was nice.
But then there were....the life lessons. What to do and not to do. Treat people the way you wanted to be treated. Things like sympathy.
I'll admit...those were good, responsible things to teach a child. The thing is, I started to feel worried...because I started thinking of my sister.
How she was kind and sweet, but at the same time, she was also a pushover. She can't even lift a goddamn pitchfork.
Fwench Fwy wasn't trying to soften Caliste up, right?
I can't have that. What if Caliste becomes a big pushover? By the time she's an adult, she'll be too scared to even stand up to the royal demons. I don't want that.
That would beat the purpose of why I gave her powers to begin with.
Unfortunately, Fwench Fwy wasn't the only one who decided to "steal my responsibilities".
After four weeks, someone else showed up. I was watching Caliste frolic in one of the flower gardens that belonged to a family friend when we heard a somewhat familiar voice.
"Hi! I'm Iscream!"
Both of us have turned around to see some white cute rabbit galloping towards us. I was mainly flabbergasted while Caliste was simply awestruck, happy to have another friend.
....
So, Iscream basically turned out to be another teacher. Though, this time....their methods were far different.
While I was relieved that they weren't teaching Caliste to be more soft, I was a little worried about their teaching methods.
Iscream mentored Caliste for over three weeks, and I recently discovered that they were not some ordinary bunny, but actually some demon, which made me glad that Caliste wasn't being influenced by another angelic being.
Iscream was a bit unhinged, though. They were teaching Caliste to be more demon. Basically how to not take garbage from anyone, and how to be more... assertive...more willing to pick up a fight.
And it worries me. Sure, Caliste would likely be willing to stand up to royal demons. But the thing I was worried about....is that she may become too violent, even cruel if she ends up like anything like the royal demons.
The point of my powers was to make Caliste stronger, and put the lives of the hellborn first. If she's too aggressive and cruel, she might become too power hungry and probably not even care about the imps. If she's too nice, she'll become a pushover and just let the upper class get away with the mistreatment (just like my stupid sister always did).
And surprisingly, Iscream and Fwench Fwy aren't even working together. Most of the time I've seen them together, they're always arguing constantly. Sometimes it's just childish bickering. Other times, it's about which way Caliste should be using her powers for.
I think I've seen Fwench Fwy torment Iscream sometimes....
I feel like there's a reason why they decided to meddle in my apprentice's training.
....
"We need to talk, Fwench Fwy."
One day, I had enough. I decided to talk to them, and I needed answers. I decided to ask Fwench Fwy first since she came along before Iscream. They did seem like the reasonable one after all.
"What do you mean?" The dragon looked at me with confusion.
I rolled my eyes. "Don't act coy. Ever since you came here, you did far more than just be 'friendly'. You do realize that I'm Caliste's real mentor?"
"I do know that, Delilah," Fwench Fwy frowned.
"Then why are you trying to soften her up?" I glared intensely into their eyes.
Fwench Fwy looked taken back by my words. "Soften her up? Delilah, I'm only trying to help. Like, maybe you do need help."
"And what gives you that idea?"
Fwench Fwy sighed. "Delilah, I genuinely understand why you gave Caliste her powers to begin with. I completely get it. The royal demons' mistreatment of your people, not to mention the whole execution Satan had broadcasted.....it gotten out of hand."
I scoffed. "Yeah...and like always before I left, I have to do everything. My dad and my pathetic sister can't even do their jobs right!"
"First of all, that's kinda harsh," Fwench Fwy pointed out. "Second, ever since Caliste came back. Ever since you started her training, her powers got out of hand. First, she went back in time and brought home a mammoth and a dinosaur, then infested Wrath with sinners and clone, and bad enough, she made her way to Heaven and caused panic and chaos."
I gritted my teeth, annoyed at the reminders. "Don't remind me."
"The point is, Caliste's powers have been destructive and gotten out of hand," Fwench Fwy explained. "She needs to use them in non destructive ways, that way people won't get hurt and she'll draw less attention."
"I have no problem with her using her powers carefully," I told them. "I have a problem being softened up by your lessons."
Fwench Fwy raised a brow. "Delilah, kids need to be good. They need to care, to sympathize."
"I have no problem with her being nice," I said. "I have a problem with her being TOO nice. I have a problem with her being...... a second Charlie."
Fwench Fwy simply looked at me with shock. "Hold up....what?"
"If you knew my sister, you'd understand," I scoffed. "She's kind and sweet, but is she powerful? No, she's a pathetic weakling. She thinks the world is all sunshine and rainbows when everyone else knows that's not how the world works. It's no wonder she can't even get the sinners to respect her."
I then added. "If Caliste turns out to be anything like Charlie in the future, she is just gonna let the higher ups get away with their bullshit."
Fwench Fwy frowned. "Delilah, kindness isn't weakness. You can be strong and kind at the same time...just give me a chance...I can assure you that you won't regret my teachings."
They then added. "Besides, if you ask me, Iscream is the one that shouldn't be teaching Caliste at all."
.....
"Why are you really here?"
After my talk with Fwench Fwy, I decided to have a chat with Iscream, who was writing some sigils on the walls at the ranch while Caliste's family was working.
"What are you talking about?"
I rolled my eyes. "It's about the way you teach Caliste."
"Oh, that, wait a minute..." The rabbit faced her. "Had she transformed into her full demon yet? If so, I'm a pro at that."
"Iscream," I sighed. "I'm a little concerned about your methods."
"What? I thought I was a good teacher," Iscream said, looking offended. "I mean, I taught her a lot of demon ritual and how to do them. I taught her a few tricks to use whenever someone spoke trash to her face!"
"Iscream, I never said you were a bad teacher, I'm more worried about what you're teaching Caliste," I pointed out. "I think you're teaching her to be a little too aggressive."
"Aren't her powers meant to put royal demons in their places?" Iscream smirked. "Like, isn't she supposed to be powerful?"
"She's not supposed to overdo it," I corrected. "I don't want her to become some powerful, edgy overlord when she grows up."
"Come on, loads and loads of demons will respect her by then," Iscream insisted. "Compared to that pushover sister of yours."
I glared at them. "Only I'm allowed to make fun of Charlie."
"Second, I don't want her to become too aggressive," I added. "I want the hellborns to become her top priority in the future. And I don't know if that will happen if she's far too aggressive and violent."
"She'll still be powerful and be fine," Iscream assured, then added. "Besides, if you ask me, it's better than being softened up by Fwench Fwy into some killjoy pansy."
....
I was out in the living world, in my human form since I was in a completely new town at this point. My husband, Pooky, was with me at the moment. Due to Annabelle's contract, Pooky could choose whenever he wanted to be visible or not, along with the ability to choose who could see him.
So, he was invisible to any human passing by, and visible to his not-so-happy wife. "Maybe you should give Fwench Fwy and Iscream a chance," Pooky suggested. "Maybe they know what they're doing."
"I was fine training Caliste by myself," I said.
"Caliste's powers were getting out of hand, and she was drawing out attention," Pooky tried to tell me. "If this went on, both the eyes of Heaven and the Deadly Sins would be onto her, and it could put her at risk."
"Well, if Fwench Fwy wasn't trying to soften Caliste up and Iscream trying to turn her into some overlord, maybe I wouldn't be so concerned," I vented.
"I don't want Caliste to turn into a second Charlie, and I don't want her to be anything like the higher ups."
"Maybe that won't happen," Pooky insisted. "Just....wait a little bit. Caliste can perhaps, be kind and strong. Have a little faith."
As we were walking, I stopped when I saw some sort of poster hanging on the wall.
I ripped it from the nail that was hanging it up and got a better look. It was a missing poster. Of some girl that looked to be seven years old.
That was when I started thinking to myself for a moment. Pooky had just told me that Caliste can be both kind and strong. I thought further. What if she used both of those things somehow?
That was when it suddenly hit me.