The newest Axia angel spent most of his time thinking about Dagiel, but the squeezing feeling at his heart every time the omega male jumped through the waves, or even swam by, he couldn’t take it sometimes. Mumbling the commandments under his breath he closed his eyes tightly and pushed his growing affection for Dagiel away. Hani knew that Dagiels own ten-year long mission would be starting soon. 

He instantly went to seek him. He called out to the traveling merangel as he settled down to sit on the rocks next to the ocean. He sighed, reaching up to pet his Feathercom who as always was sleeping in his hair. Haniel was calm, content in his place inside God’s plan which he thought about every day, almost as much as he thought about Dagiel. “Dagiel! Don’t be too hard on those otter pups, they don’t have their mother to teach them.” He said this jokingly as he watched the other push an otter headfirst into the water, the merangels feathercom swimming in circles. 

 “Nonsense Han! These pups are tough, and I’ll see that they survive! Their otter mother may be gone, a shark saw to that, but I’m their merangel mother and I’ll be as tough on them as I want.” Dagiel, who rarely ever even looked as if something had made him happy, was smiling brightly at Haniel. 

This made the unawakened angel's heart leap, he reluctantly laughed alongside him as an otter pup squeaked and climbed into Dagiels head. Twenty years ago the two had spent every waking moment together when they weren’t working. Haniel had desperately tried to get put on Dagiels team, the most he could do was design the rock formations and the cliffs around his beloved oceans. Haniel was also put in charge of the beaches above the waves, he found everything he could to be next to Dagiel and the two always had wonderful times together.

 The new feather was a bit afraid of telling the merangel they had been called away at the same time, but he swallowed his nervousness and waved at him again. “Dag, I have to go on a ten-year long mission to the deepest parts of the ocean. I tried to see if I could get you to come, but the page boy declared that you had your own mission in that time frame and while I know that I just…” he then trailed off. 

Why am I talking so much? His mind was spinning as he thought to himself, he had so much he wanted to tell Dagiel, but it would have to wait. Dagiel smiled and grew legs, he walked onto the rocks to wrap an arm around the shoulders of the other angel. However when Haniel attempted to do the same, Dagiel quickly pulled away, the newer angel did not catch the strained look on the merangel's face. “Don’t worry about it too much ok? The ten years will be up in no time and then me and Salsa, you and the otters can have a lot more fun together. You are the best feather in my wing after all Haniel, and Salsa is my best wing"

He tapped Haniel in the cheek affectionately which the other attempted to reciprocate by tapping him on the forehead but Dagiel grabbed his hand and pushed it away. Haniel frowned and sighed after pulling himself out of his self-doubt, though hearing Salsa’s name made him frown slightly harder but he quickly covered it up. 

Haniel had visibly relaxed when Dagiel had replied to his worries, he leaned into him for a moment, even as Dagiel leaned back to get away from the intimate gesture before Haniel finally stood up. “Thanks a lot, I guess, I will see you in ten years?” he said this as he moved a hand through his own short hair. 

Dagiel nodded solemnly and moved his head away when Haniel’s finger attempted to trace his jawline with a small frown. “Yea...see ya.”

 “See ya.” With that the merangel turned and dove into the sea and the angel watched this happen with a slight frown of his own. He was called by Salsa who came over dragging Raziel by the arm. 

“Come one Haniel, let's go!” The seemingly ever bubbly merangel, Salsa said while grabbing him and pulling him away. “Dag will be ok! My sea star is a resilient one” Salsa said this with a smile, a far off look in his eyes. Haniel’s own eyes never left the crashing waves, he tried to ignore the words Salsa was speaking, he watched until Dag had vanished beneath the ocean’s embrace. 

___

Dagiel

___

Dagiel watched them from under the water with a sad look in his eyes. His ocean green-blue gaze, like the swirling tides in its sadness, his eyes followed them until they were out of sight. 

He missed Salsa already.

___

Samael

___

On the other side of the camp, Samael was pacing back and forth, his eyes drifted from the trees to the ground in rapid succession. He figured if his plans were to come about, he had to have help, with that in mind, the angel spread his wings and flew off. The male would gather around him followers who would help in his goals, help him achieve what he was setting out for, Azrael and the others were the perfect candidates.

 Samael worked alone for God mainly, so, seeing the things he’d seen transpire between Haniel and the merangels, their love triangle that looked to be more complicated than it seemed, it angered him. It was something he would not stop until he destroyed, adding in the fact he knew God had a divine plan for him; Samael was confident that he would make everything fall into place with ease.

____

UNDERDARK

___

In the ten years past, life had only grown harder, all this Haniel observed first hand, from beneath the waves. 

He was outfitted with a special set of temporary merangel gills that allowed him to breathe under water. He kept up to date about land activity thanks to the merangels who frequently brought reports with the few remaining Feathercoms. 

He slept fitfully that night, he had just learned that older angels were assigned to beating those who did not work fast or hard enough, despite all of this the angels kept working. Lucifer kept up moral and helped those angels whose hair had begun to change, signaling they were beginning to develop their own personalities.

Haniel closed his eyes under the water and tried to sleep once more, after waking up for the millionth time. He finally gave up and poked Raziel. In the end, life would carry forward no matter what happened. However, this was but a small comfort to the angelic beings in the end, for when God brought down it’s wrath, they would all suffer the consequences. “Raz, you awake?”

They were camped in an underwater cave and Raziel opened his eyes “I am now, we should really find a cave not filled with water somewhere and work on some fish.” Raziel sat up and rubbed his eyes, he looked at the other with a smile.

“Lets do that then” Salsa said this while sitting up himself, tail swaying. “I know a spot, Dagiel and I go there all the time” he got up fully and swam out of the underwater cave.

They followed, having been given temporary merangel tails, they used their wings for balance. “Alright, sounds good” on the inside Haniel was screaming. He had always been jealous of Salsa and Dagiel’s relationship.

The next night, after Salsa was dead and gone, after ten long grueling years, the assignment had come to an end. Haniel’s hand shot out of the ocean waves. He rose from the water silently, face vacant of emotion. On the inside, the things that had happened under the waves had brought him a sense of peace, cruelty was not something he knew the concept of. Unlike most of the other angels, he was out during the day. 

The rest of the Axia were passed out asleep in their tents from so much partying in the night. Partying every few moons for nights at a time the last ten years he was gone. 

His head turned at the sound of coughing. The other angel that had gone with him, Raziel was covered in ocean water, his long multicolored hair soaked and dripping. The only reason they were not burning in the sun was due to the water acting as a temporary protection. They shared a sad look between them, the merangel that had escorted them nowhere in sight. Haniel shook himself off and looked around, he waved goodbye to Raziel.

 “See you later Rai.” He felt a poke to the side of his head, a sign of their close friendship over the ten years they spent underground. Raziel smiled, only his closest friends could call him Rai instead of Raz. Haniel walked off on his own, eager to get through the day and into the night. He’d left a dear friend and brother behind when he’d gone on the journey underground. It had been a year since his mer's own mission and he knew Dagiel was back by now.

He walked out of the waves with a light pep in his step. They waited until nightfall as Raziel walked off into the darkness. He thought back to when he first left....

He walked with Raziel and the merangel, Salsa. Walking with them down to the beach he stared at the water as Salsa jumped in, his blond tail reflective of his uniform cropped blond hair.

 Salsa held out oddly colored shimmering blue berries. “Come on! God gave me these, eat them they will give you gills and a tail, power to breathe under the water!” Salsa was a cheery, happy kind of fellow, regardless of how much Haniel didn’t really like him because of Dagiel’s obsession with the other merangel. Haniel could tell Salsa was faking it. It was all a lie, that underhanded bastard.

 He also handed them both two strange sponge like red balls. “Two are for gills and two are for tails!” Salsa clarified as they looked at him.

 Quickly eating his, Haniel took one last look at the vast ocean, thinking of Dagiel.

“I really don’t want to go…” he said this as he walked into the water with Raziel. His eyes closed when they dove into the water, swimming down to reach the underwater cave that would lead them to the deepest parts of the ocean. This was where even merangels could not tread without special gifts from God.

“Cheer up Hani! We will be back in ten years and then you can smooch all over Dag like you know you want to!” Salsa giggled, but the giggle didn't quite sound genuine, it didn't sound real at all, Haniel noticed a pink streak in his blond hair, he then realized that was why the angel was so giddy and filled with such strange expression of his emotions; he was developing an individuality, the same way Lucifer had… 

He didn’t want to think about what had happened ten years before this. His blank eyes felt heavy, looking into the blackness of the underwater as if the next ten years of his life were stretched out right before him, the blankness of the water and his hatred of Salsa mingling into one. He was perfectly happy being his same God-fearing self, he knew Salsa was a devout follower of God’s laws. 

For the most part. But he also knew the merangel was one to spend his time curled up near where an attractive look proto-man made his camp on the beach. Most of the Proto-Men were ugly, with massive beards and large bulbous noses, but this one was young, beardless and sported a head of shoulder length curls. 

Haniel chuckled, “like you wanna do to that proto-man you keep stalking?” he joked back, Salsa laughed and quickly swam away. 

“Shut up Hani!” he defended as he swam through the winding underwater vent tunnel. The cave they had entered was narrow and dark, a merangel’s fin large enough to break through it however. The two land angels had to use their claws, endowed with a special silver attachment, long and deadly, it could cut flesh if they were not careful. The claws were silver and had grooves on either side of them to help make digging easier to break up the rock. They were clearing away the rocks and the undersea dirt, creating the things that lived inside the water beneath the earth. 

The ocean was a calm place this deep, a calm and terrifying place. Creatures with millions of eyes and many legs swam past them as they worked. Both of the land angels was trying hard not to shake in fear as long tendrils drifted across their backs and lights atop the heads of monsterous fish floated by in search of prey. 

Haniel felt a shiver run up his spine, it coiled around it like a sickly pair of fingers and held it close in a sticky grasp that refused to let go. The feeling got worse with every strange creature that he spotted in the water. They worked and toiled for ten long years, every night stopping to rest, though day and night blended together after a while, for no light ever reached the very bottom of the ocean. They dug deep into the earth, four years in, sifting through sand and rock to build corals and reefs and other creatures that lived but did not move.  

Raziel was silent the entire time one day, as they were creating a new series of corals. “Raziel, what’s wrong with you?” Haniel asked this as he swam over to the other angel, who was sitting in the sand, playing with a seashell.  

“Nothing Haniel. I love getting to spend so much time with Salsa, we don’t get to see each other very much because of our jobs, he makes me really happy.” Raziel smiled and Haniel could only imagine he was thinking about Salsa. “But I just miss the surface, it’s been four years of this already, why God didn’t assign more merangels?” Raziel said this as he frowned while looking at the shorter angel. 

“Well, you do know that merangels are even rarer than regular angels, Salsa was the last one God made before she stopped making them. So many have died, only Dag, Salsa, Veriiel and Lariel are left. That’s not enough merangels to do the underground AND work on the different seas and oceans.” He stopped talking and watched the expression on Raziel’s face change. Raziel smiled brightly as he watched Salsa swim with a group of fishing penguins farther up in the ocean.

 “Rai! Hey Rai look!!” Salsa called down to them as he played with the penguins. Haniel cleared his throat and Raziel looked startled as he looked back at him. 

“Cute, anyway, not to mention the rivers lakes and ponds!” Haniel sighed as he watched Raziel’s shoulders slump, face falling from happy to miserable in a matter of seconds. “Look, it will be ok, the ten years will fly by and then we can go back to flying around up top! Now come on, cheer up.” Salsa called out to the two after penguins had left, shouting about a really big boulder he’d hit while digging.

 “Come on Raz, Salsa needs help breaking a big boulder he found that’s stopping us from going deeper.” Reluctantly Raziel got up to help and together they broke down the giant rock into smaller pieces, carrying on their excavation of the deep darkness underground. It went on this way for many long hours, time began to blur and Haniel was unsure how much more of it he could take. 

He’d been panicking on the inside during that time, Haniel waved as Apollo flew across the sky, the other angel waving back; walking through the forest he’d headed toward the beach. The angel found peace here and it wasn’t just because of the crashing of the waves or the flying beasts in the air. Their shrill cries cutting through the night like a joyous choir.