"Would you...die for me?"
"Yeah."
The instant answer, delivered without so much as a missed beat, was surprising enough to one Yuuma Amano - or rather, the Fallen Angel Raynare - that it stopped her in her tracks before she could even start her transformation into her true form, much less summon her spear of light.
"Wait, what?" Had she heard him right? Had he heard her right?
"Look, I know." Issei sighed, slumping his head to look at the ground. "I'm dumb, but I'm not a complete moron. There's only a few reasons a girl like you would ask a creep loser like me out, and none of them are because you really wanted a date. But you've gone through the trouble of at least pretending to give me a chance, and that means a lot more to me than you could possibly imagine...So yeah, I'll die for you. What is it? Some drug lord yakuza boss chasing you and you need a meatshield? Serial killer looking for a thrill? Practical joke your friends wanted you to play?"
Brown met owlishly blinking violet.
Say what you would about Raynare - she was a Fallen Angel for a reason. She had been asked to observe this boy and make sure he never became a threat, and honestly the easiest and most surefire way to do that that she could think of was just killing him outright.
But she had still been an Angel at one point, and hearing such a bewildering lack of self-preservation from her intended victim was more than enough to halt her plan to murder him in its tracks.
"Issei…?" She asked carefully, stepping forward towards him. And only then did she realize that he was shaking - his whole body shuddering in terror. But if he was so terrified of the thought of death, then why was he saying…?
"Is it bad that the last option is the only one I'm actually scared of?" He blurted out. "Really, I would actually rather die than have someone toy with me for a laugh. I know. Pathetic. Even my parents are disgusted with me so I should be used to rejection by now…"
Brown eyes clenched shut and he took deep breaths, trying to control those shivers, and against her better judgment Raynare found herself stepping closer towards him.
"I wish I had an angel, for one moment of love…"
And then he started singing.
And at that point, a Fallen Angel fell all over again.
"Wish granted." She declared, and before she even realized what she was doing, instinct and desire had already run their course - black wings bursting from her back.
He barely had time to raise a startled expression in her direction before her arms and wings wrapped around him, hauling him into a crushing kiss.
Damn it, Raynare. What are you doing?
This had to be a dream.
Or a trick.
That was the only thing Issei could think, standing stock still as he was in the arms of a winged woman. An actual angel.
One that was kissing him.
His eyes screwed shut while he waited.
Waited for the other shoe to drop.
One would think that a proud member of Kuoh Academy's perverted trio would be in lech heaven, given his current circumstances. What with the ample bosom of a pretty girl crushed against his chest as the girl in question swapped spit with him.
But for the most part, all that perversion was an act. Yes, he was a pervert. Yes, he was lewd. But he also played it up. Threw himself into all of that.
Because it was all just fantasies.
Fantasies that distracted him from his own insecurities. From his own doubt.
Fantasies that showed him a dream of a better future.
Harem King? Yeah, it was his dream.
A dream he knew would never happen.
It was just a fantasy.
A fantasy where he was surrounded by people who loved him despite his faults.
Or perhaps a fantasy where he'd overcome those faults and become someone that could be loved.
But never something serious. It was something he wanted more than anything, but how could he expect it to happen when it required him to fix so many faults?
And even if he could fix those faults - which he hard a time believing to be possible in the first place - what would be left in the end? Faults were all he was.
How was he supposed to keep a girl interested, and make them happy despite his faults… When he knew that without those faults he was so unbelievably boring?
So this had to be a dream. A wonderful date that he had enjoyed - with a gorgeous girl, who had been the one to ask him out-?
Even his dreams didn't dare to be so bold, most of the time.
His first thought would have been that it was a trick...but she had wings.
No way this was real.
His fear had spiked so high that she could actually feel it. Which, granted...wasn't particularly hard. The poor boy was stock still against her form, and she could feel his heart racing against her breasts. She could feel the goosebumps that flared to life over his flesh. The cold sweat that broke out and glistened his skin.
He was paralyzed with fear.
Raynare had lived for a long time.
In her many centuries of life, she had never felt so incredibly ashamed of what she had become than she did right now, in this very moment.
Once upon a time, she had been an Angel.
Her job had been to protect people. To guide them. To wash their fears away.
And now she had become something that preyed on them.
She broke the kiss, and pulled his head down against her chest, running fingers through his hair while she looked up at the sky and tried to fight away the sudden onset of tears.
"Next question...Would you live for me?" It was the only thing she could think of to say.
The only thing that had a hope of undoing the damage caused by her first question.
"W-what are you?" Issei stammered, and Raynare didn't need to be looking down at him to know that he was staring at her wings.
"I used to be an Angel." She whispered, closing her eyes in an attempt to hold the line against those tears - tears that made a charge as she spoke those very words.
"Used to…?" She felt, more than heard the gulp as he swallowed the lump in his throat.
Damn it all, Raynare. Why did you have to find out you still had a heart tonight?
"I'm not any more. I'm...something else. Something much darker." She admitted, still stroking fingers through his hair.
She felt him look down and slump against her, all the tension of his alert body fading away...and not because he was relaxing in comfort.
He had slumped in defeat.
"You really are going to kill me, aren't you?"
For a moment, she wondered if he had already unlocked his Sacred Gear.
Because she could have sworn he just stabbed her in the heart with her own Spear of Light.
There was a moment of silence before a humorless chuckle bubbled up through his throat.
This was...insane.
Angels weren't real.
Yet, here one was.
His mind had come up with a new level of crazy to torment him with, if this really was a dream.
"Answer the question, Issei." Yuuma - was that even her real name? - Prodded him, using a hand to nudge his face up to look at hers.
The fact that there seemed to be tears pooled in her eyes was even more cruel.
He couldn't even make a murderer smile in his own nightmares.
"Issei!" She hissed, jostling his head to try and get his attention.
He didn't wake up.
Shouldn't he be waking up right now?
"Who cares?" He asked, trying to rip his gaze away from hers.
"Right now? I care."
That sent a twinge of pain through his chest.
"Yeah, for right now." His mouth moved faster than his mind could stop it.
"Answer the fucking question!" Yuuma insisted, shoving his face back in her direction and locking eyes with him.
"I DON'T KNOW OKAY!?" He finally snapped, and sent a his head forward against her collarbone, trying - and failing - not to sob.
"What do you want? A plaything? A pet?" He asked, and he felt his hands fist in the sides of her outfit. His fingernails dig little half moons into the flesh of her waist before he caught himself and yanked his hands away.
Look, but never ever touch.
"I don't know what living means."
"Then how can I kill you?" Raynare asked, maneuvering them over to sit on the fountain in the center of the park, using her hand to brush hair - and tears - out of his eyes. "You can't kill something that isn't alive."
Raynare, seriously, what the fuck are you doing?
She had no idea.
She didn't care anymore, either.
"Why do you care?" The muffled voice came from her shoulder, reinforcing the steel she was already adding to her resolve.
She was an Angel, damned though she may be.
"Because you wished for an Angel."
Yet again, she used her hands to drag his face back to hers, to force his eyes to meet hers.
"My real name is Raynare. I'll be your Angel tonight. And tomorrow. And the day after that. Until you tell me to go away."
This time, when he pushed his head into her chest and cried, she didn't stop him.
She just wrapped her wings tighter around them both and held him.
And for the first time in centuries, she actually felt like she was doing something right.