People are crazy and times are strange [ open ]

[inequal]

WHO: Liam (Owen) [inequal] and ANYONE.
WHAT: Somebody else got struck by the memory rehab bug, thinks his name is something else. Now Liam's trying to deal with the idea that he might have his head screwed on wrong without being able to tell.
WHERE: All around the Cave, notably: the Bar; the Supply Depot; near the Living Quarters; a secluded corner.
WHEN: April 10th (Tuesday) through April 12th (Thursday).
NOTES: What the hell is consistent narrative name, do not even get me started on trying to figure out which one to use. IT'S JUST "HE" AND "HIM" OKAY.

His Tuesday started out simply enough, some murky memory (or was it a dream?) floating up to remind him of a white room and then... nothing, really. Probably just made it up. No, his day really started with a buzz in his head and a request for his husband to turn off the bloody overhead light, if you please, George.

That was his first sign that something was wrong. It didn't feel wrong, but the sheer comfort with which he identified as Owen Bates (not... Liam McNally or whatever name it was that George—Ken?—said it should be) gave him a shudder if he stopped to think about it for too long. Exactly why he immediately sought out Arthur Stieber at the Supply Depot and was told to swing by later that night after work.

Fine, whatever. He could wait another few hours. So he went with his spouse to the Bar and spent the next few hours ignoring the twitch in his foot and fingers. Scaring off the customers would not do, even if the only exchange he cared about tended to be the conversational sort and nothing to do with money.

He was out like a bolt by closing time and off to retrieve the pack of cigarettes as Arthur had promised. Horrible habit to get back into when he was still not physically addicted, but the psychological effects were already ingrained deeply enough. It wasn't until Wednesday that he had the chance to secret himself into an underdeveloped crevice on the west side of the Cave and finally light up. Hopefully the smoke would dissipate before anyone else caught wind of it, because despite popular belief, he did not try to bury himself in as much trouble as possible at all times. George Ken George would likely be worried and that kept him from lighting a second despite the urge.

The rest of Wednesday proceeded as normal... what accounted for normal in this place, anyway. Some exploration in the day and work in the afternoon, all the way to After Hours. Thursday found him escaping to the crevice once again, lighter and cigarette clutched in hand, then off to the Depot again with George to retrieve more rations.

It was perhaps the least exciting lifestyle he had indulged in for nearly sixty years. Nevertheless, Owen could not stop the dread coiling in his gut that the other shoe was primed just perfectly to drop any day now.

Comments

Wednesday

[tartanisstylish]

Once again, Aziraphale was walking. He seemed to be doing nothing else these days, and although ordinarily he did enjoy a stroll, this was not the nicest scenery, and also he had been a lot in the last day. He was not one to sulk, but honestly, his feet hurt. Which was in itself a new experience.

All around him he saw people with anxiety etched in their faces, a few with deep frowns of confusion. He was becoming more and more displeased with what he saw, although he knew better than to question it, for the moment at least. He'd do more good once he got to the blasted City.

But there was something within him that could not help reaching out to those who (he, at least, felt) needed assistance, and so it was that on the second day he smelt smoke and stopped in his tracks. It's none of your business, he scolded himself, but he was a busybody and he well knew it, so he wasn't entirely surprised to find himself peering into a crevice in the Cave's wall.

His heart sank. He hated seeing people look so distressed.

"Are you all right?" he asked kindly, unable to avoid breathing in the smoke. It sank and settled heavily at the back of his throat.

[inequal]

He coughed. Someone finding him in the crevice had been the last thing Owen expected, and the startle was enough for him to choke on the heated smoke, sending him into a small fit. The coughs themselves weren't bad, but the triggering memory—lack of breath, horrible pain in his side, the smell of blood and dirt and gunfire—caught him off-guard and he continued to gasp even after the smoke had been expelled.

For what it was worth, he tried to wave Aziraphale off as if it were nothing. Go back to your routine, nothing to see here, just a man trying to remember how lungs worked and not recall the instant of his own death. Completely normal happenstance!

[tartanisstylish]

"Oh!" Aziraphale waved his hands with a typical amount of ineffectuality when the man started coughing, then pulled himself together and slapped him on the back. He had never actually slapped someone on the back before, never having had this close of personal contact with people who actually breathed, but he felt he did an acceptable job.

"I'm really very sorry," he muttered over and over again as he whacked Owen on the back. "Really, truly sorry."

[inequal]

The slap forced him to reach out and balance himself against the wall, but the physical jolt at least helped snap him out of the rising pool of panic. Owen closed his eyes momentarily, then forced himself to look Aziraphale in the eye, spare hand going out to snatch the other man's.

"Quite all right, mate," he assured. It wasn't, nothing was, but that wasn't this poor sap's fault. "Just got me off guard."

[tartanisstylish]

Aziraphale ducked down a bit, trying to get a better look at the man. "Are you sure? You're all red in the face." He smiled wryly. "I really was trying to make sure you were all right, you know, not trying to kill you."

As he spoke, he briefly considered what that must have been like. He was still getting used to the idea of breathing. Last night he had briefly forgotten he was doing it, only to find that his body had entirely taken over. It was automatic. So when it went wrong it had to be truly terrifying.

[inequal]

His lips twisted wryly. Even he couldn't tell if it was in amusement or distaste at the comment. Instead of replying, Owen (Liam? Should he be trying to think of himself that way now? It was far too confusing, wondering over what name he should use, the one he remembered or the one his husband said was his) simple took the time to take in a few breaths of cool cavern air.

"It'll pass," he replied after a moment. "See? Right as rain." His cigarette was dwindling down, burning without giving him any of the benefit, and so he drew it back to his lips while carefully taking a drag. The need for comfort temporarily overrode his usual attempt at manners.

[tartanisstylish]

"Right," Aziraphale said doubtfully. "It's just you looked a bit - well." Peaky. Troubled. Awful. Perhaps it would be better to leave it alone. "Never mind."

He glanced out of the crevice at the Cave. Somehow it seemed worse out there than in here, suddenly, despite this man and his cigarette and his sadness. He wanted to stay and ask questions and above all else wanted to say his own name aloud. But that would be tremendously stupid, and besides, he had intruded.

He pressed clasped hands to his lips for just a moment, as if praying, although he generally didn't, anymore.

"Sorry again," he said. "I'll just be going. Ah - if you do end up needing - anything - " Aziraphale hesitated for a long moment, weighing his options. "John Gates. At the Library. Or, well, I'll be around."

Pausing at the mouth of the crevice, he turned. "Oh, and you are?"

[inequal]

"You don't have to, you know," said Owen softly. He glanced to the cigarette in his hand and offered a grimace. "Unless you don't like the smoke, in which case — by all means."

John Gates. The hesitation there earned a sardonic smile from Owen (Liam, whatever) and he held out a hand as if to shake. "Owen Bates, work at the Bar. Supposedly, anyway." His chest fluttered, leftover nerves mixing themselves with uncertainty. His name wasn't his name and apparently names were a big deal here, so using the one he knew naturally inspired a fair deal of nervousness.

[tartanisstylish]

Aziraphale smiled, a big smile, and slipped back into the crevice. "No, of course I don't mind. It smells good, actually."

His eyes lit up a bit when Owen mentioned the Bar. "Pleasure - is it any good? The Bar, I mean." He laughed self-deprecatingly at his own eagerness. "It's been a while since I've had anything decent, and I've needed it lately." His handshake was a bit lackluster - he still hadn't gotten used to body language entirely - but tightened halfway through. He was still smiling, as well.

[inequal]

He offered a laugh at the question, drawing his hand back after the shake. "Looks like we've got all the staples, along with a few I don't entirely recognize." Owen tilted his hand in an easygoing not-quite-a-shrug.

"As for quality, I must say it's not the cheap stuff. Tell you what, though, John: why don't you come down later today, see what you think?" It was impossible to begrudge a man needing some good alcohol in their current situation.

[tartanisstylish]

"That would be lovely," Aziraphale said brightly, "although I don't know that I was ever one for bars, before." This sort of language was, he felt, ambiguous enough that if he were caught in it he could say he was talking about the time before the Disaster. John Gates appeared to have been something of a recluse as well, funnily enough.

"I don't suppose you have anything along the lines of a Châteauneuf-du-Pape," he continued, before quickly correcting, "or a dry red, I suppose there's not really such a thing as the Rhône here. I dreamt all that wine!" he muttered under his breath, tapping his lip.

[inequal]

"You were missing out," Owen commented idly. John didn't really look the type, no, but people had surprised him before and the atmosphere in the right kind of pub was not to be underestimated.

He turned to give the other man a grin. "Probably do have something close enough. I'll take a quick peek just for you when we open up." Another drag, another thoughtful exhalation. "Don't buy it, personally." Quietly, as if musing to himself more than Aziraphale — maybe he was. He didn't buy it... but he had no other explanation to give for how he was somehow alive again.

[tartanisstylish]

"Do you think so? I've never been one for crowds, but there's a first time for everything. That's what life's about, or so I'm told." An angel in a pub . . . or whatever he was now. Aziraphale in a pub, more to the point. What would he do with himself? Dither his way into oblivion, probably.

"Don't trouble yourself, I'm sure you'll have something wonderful. I trust you." Although he did cast a brief side-eye at the 'don't buy it' statement. Nor did he, of course, but it seemed a bit reckless. "Well, I know who I am," he said carefully. "I should think everyone does, ultimately. In their souls."

[inequal]

Owen bobbed his head in agreement. "Absolutely. Gotta give everything a try before you know you like it, and one pub's never the same as the next."

There was the rub. "You would think," he huffed with an irritated roll of his wrist. He wasn't exactly sure on that at the moment, though everything outside of the name thing seemed to line up with what his husband recalled. Maybe there was something else that neither of them thought to check yet. Wasn't that a lovely thought?

[tartanisstylish]

Aziraphale gave Owen a kind smile. "It is frustrating, isn't it?" he said, and patted Owen's hand earnestly. "But you will find the answer in the end. I have every confidence. You seem stronger than most." And kinder, he managed not to say. Kindness did take one farther in life than cruelty, although sometimes it seemed he was the only one to think so.

[inequal]

All right, that earned Aziraphale and honest and bright smile. "Well, I do have an excellent support helping keep me from falling, so I can't say it's all my own doing," he replied easily. Without his husband, he would be long dead and gone by now; there was no way he could deny it, nor did he have any desire to do so.

His head tilted in teasing consideration of the man in front of him. "You don't seem to be doing too badly yourself, either."

[tartanisstylish]

His smile faltered - just a bit, for just a moment, and then he pulled it back up. He felt a stab of very unangelic jealousy. Why was it that he was alone and this man was not? Not that he begrudged him the company, as it was clearly someone he cared for very deeply, but - why him? "Oh, well, I'm sure you had more to do with it than you think," he said, for something to say, while at the same time thinking, Fall. What an apt choice of words. Is that what will happen? Or has it already happened?

"Well," Aziraphale added, straightening his collar under the sudden scrutiny, "I have the benefit of age to keep me certain of who I am. Enough years make for very stubborn . . . dreams."

[inequal]

Brow furrowed, Owen cast his gaze more critically over Aziraphale before allowing that one to pass. He could understand the feeling of loneliness — he did indeed have George, but their daughter was lost to them. Perhaps for the better, even if it didn't help the ache.

"You don't look that old," he observed instead, a teasing remark. Of all people, he knew that appearance meant very little when it came to one's age. Here he was, eighty-one years old and looking not even yet to thirty if he was a day.

[tartanisstylish]

Grateful that his shift in expression had gone unnoticed, Aziraphale shrugged slightly. "I don't look that young either," he commented tartly. "But really, what do looks mean in the end? They can be altered, one way or another. I'm old enough, believe you me."

[inequal]

It hadn't entirely gone unnoticed, so much as it wasn't commented on. Normally, the rudeness wouldn't have stopped Owen from trying to nose in and talk about what was wrong... but this whole day was anything but normal.

Owen chuckled. "That makes two of us. Not sure age is going to be enough on its own, though," he mused after a moment. He took another inhale of the smoke, then sighed and dropped the spent cigarette in order to grind it out.

[tartanisstylish]

"Well." Aziraphale shrugged. "Wisdom, perhaps?" He felt himself a fairly good judge of wisdom. He used to be able to sense it on people, just a bit, like a faint perfume. Not anymore, of course. "Open-mindedness?" he hazarded. "Or perseverance. All useful qualities in confusing situations, I would imagine."

Sighing, he glanced out of the crevice into the Cave. "What I wouldn't give for some good, honest weather right now," he muttered. "Snow. Rain. Hail, even, I'd take hail." It just didn't feel quite real as it was.

[inequal]

"If what they say is true, we'll have our chance for weather soon enough." Owen leaned his shoulder against the wall and made do with the poor view it gave him to the rest of the Cave. "Right now I'd just like to find anybody else who agrees this is crazy."

Not saying that it wasn't true, though certainly skirting the very edges. He just wasn't satisfied that they were supposed to take what they were told with nothing to truly help support it. The picture and video... Well, he was trying not to lean too far, either way.

His head tilted to the side, and he continued, "Open-mindedness, if you'd like."

[tartanisstylish]

"I'd take it," he said. "All those dreams gave me a taste for rain."

Smiling, not at anything in particular, he added, "Yes, let's say open-mindedness and allow for the unpredictability of human nature, and I'm sure everything will turn out as it should. Or if not, then interestingly." He mimicked Owen's posture, head tapping back onto the stone.

[inequal]

"It'd be nice to feel some rain," agreed Owen, after giving it a moment of genuine consideration. It had been way too long since he'd properly felt the effects of nature.

He returned the smile with a grin of his own. "Glass half full kinda guy, eh? I like that." Speaking of unpredictability, that was another thing... "They say herding cats is impossible, but I have to wonder if they don't realize herding people can be even worse."

[tartanisstylish]

"I try to be, yes. It makes things easier."

Aziraphale shook his head. "Can't be done. That's the beauty of free will. Everyone goes off in an entirely different direction and soon it's not a herd, it's a diaspora. Always been difficult to manage, you - us."

He bit the inside corner of his mouth. He'd met Dr. Freud briefly. Not quite a Freudian slip, but not entirely unintentional. How he did hate being guarded - but hopefully Owen wouldn't notice.