Hi, can I just say I really like your body swap AU, say how does Vaggie react to being Niffty?
Before I get into it, I want to mention that the bodyswap AU isn’t mine/it’s not something I came up with/I take no credit (credit due where credit’s due and all that).
Also I feel like I answered this in an odd/unusual manner (in the sense that I feel like I answered this in a “physical things Vaggi has to adapt to” kind of way rather than like how she would react emotionally, her desire/compulsion(?) to clean), but this is what came to mind. I hope you enjoy it!
How Vaggi reacting to being Niffty depends partially on headcanons and how they interact with the AU. For example, a popular headcanon is that Niffty was lobotomised and that it still affects her in Hell. Would that affect Vaggi while she’s Niffty? (This was actually discussed in the comments of one of the original posts, if I recall correctly). If we go with “Vaggi temporarily has it while she’s Niffty”, regardless of what “it” refers to (e.g., lobotomy, disorganised thoughts/speech, mania, whether she has to follow requests and orders regardless of her desires), then I imagine that she’s going to be reacting to that first (potentially. There’s also the manner of insight/awareness).
Ignoring the above, I imagine that Vaggi would initially be focused on Fixing The Problem/Problem Solving if we’re going with “Charlie accidentally did it because of grief” (and trying to help Charlie when she reveals that she is not having a fun time in Alastor’s body). Then things would start to come up that she would struggle with.
Like I have glasses that mess up my depth perception and my migraines can cause mild Alice in Wonderland Syndrome. Even though both are mild, both individually can have a major impact when navigating the world (e.g., I try to avoid stairs because of the number of times I’ve almost fallen due to my depth perception being funky). Vaggi as Niffty would suddenly be much, much shorter than she usually is and that’s something she’d have to adapt to. That can be frustrating and, considering the situation, I imagine it would at the very least irritate her until she got used to it. She also might struggle with Niffty’s depth perception and sight! As Niffty, her vision would be centred. Depending on how (originally) having one eye versus two in the universe, her depth perception might be affected as Niffty and she’d have to adapt to that as well (like she would have when she lost her eye). I imagine her reaction would be similar to mine when I was dealing with (mild) Alice in Wonderland Syndrome for an extended period of time: the first time you almost fall down the stairs is scary. The fifteenth time? You start to get pissed off.
There would also be a lot of stress and worry.
Niffty and Vaggi have different fighting styles— if Vaggi still has her spear, it’s going to be much, much harder to use. If she doesn’t, she’ll have whatever Niffty had available and not necessarily a lot of experience with it— and I can see her initially going to her default spear-style fighting, being panicked and frustrated before remembering her interaction/lesson with Carmilla Carmine and then adapting.
Also Niffty is implied to, at the very least, have Overlord/Overlord-level powers. That’s something Vaggi (and potentially others) might discover and suddenly she needs to learn a whole new set of abilities that she would have no clue how to deal with. That’s very easily going to cause a lot of stress (especially true if she used to having a fairly easy time learning things).
There would also be stress and worry about Charlie in Alastor’s body— and it would probably be jarring to see her girlfriend going from grieving to being in very high levels of pain, suffering from an injury caused by Adam, being scarred (and potentially being unable to express it like she usually would) and potentially struggling with Alastor’s powers the next time she interacts Charlie. Because, regardless of whether or not she was still in her own body or Niffty’s, there isn’t much she could do (although I imagine she’d try regardless and her focus would shift to Charlie).
It gets worse for her (emotionally) because she’d probably also feel guilty because she feels like she’s failing— until she adapts her fighting style, she’s going to struggle to protect the hotel. She can’t do much to help Charlie because magic/this kind of magic is out of her scope. She can’t carry her while she’s Niffty and Charlie’s Alastor (tangent: I headcanon that Niffty could easily carry Alastor. Vaggi wouldn’t think to try because of height differences). She can give medical aid for the chest wound and see if the hotel has any medication (assuming they do)…but they might to have anything strong enough (and/or Alastor might be like me and OTC pains meds never do anything).
Depending on how long it takes those around her to know/realise what’s going on (and, maybe in Lucifer’s case, accept it), she’s also going to have to deal with the frustration of being treated like was Niffty— like going from being seen as one of the most competent people in the hotel to being infantilised is going to be a whiplash (I imagine the difference might be such a stark contrast that, the first time it happens, she freezes because her mind is struggling to process what happened in the moment).
Also not having wings again, even if temporary and she knows this, would definitely bother her regardless of whether or not she’d admit it. In season 2, we see her using her wings more often (so presumably she’s using them more often post-season 1 and pre-season 2). I can imagine Vaggi instinctively trying to use her wings and…Niffty doesn’t have wings. Even if the reason is temporary and very different and she knows this, I imagine it would still be very triggering to lose her wings again— like I can easily see her having some form of flashback at some point and potentially even phantom pains.
None of this even touches on the potential weirdness she might experience when it comes to things like skills. Like imagine you know how to ride a bike and have been riding a bike for years now. Suddenly, you can’t anymore— sure, you know how to do it cognitively and you know how it works, but it’s like you’ve never actually ridden a bike in your life and have to relearn. I can imagine Vaggi as Niffty (and everyone else who swapped) struggling with this and the potential mindfuckery (and potential frustration and fear) it causes.
Or to put it much more succinctly: Initially she’d be in Problem Solving Mode. The moment she sees Charlie struggling and in pain and scarred, Vaggi’s going to become stressed and worried. Eventually the differences between being Vaggi and Niffty will start to affect her in various way as well (e.g., the lack of wings being triggering, frustration while adapting and being infantilised).