caveofsapphires | suddenly my eyes are open [open]

Entry tags:

suddenly my eyes are open [open]

WHO: Gabriel (Sylvester Wilton) and [OPEN]
WHAT: Gabriel got taken in for a memory-modification. Now he's a little bit weirded out.
WHERE: Sleeping quarters, Bakery, Bar, Temple, streets in-between.
WHEN: Tuesday 10 to Saturday 21 April 2012.

This was one Hell of an elaborate prank. Except that Gabriel was starting to doubt that it was a prank, exactly. Dad wouldn't have thrown him into a place where the inhabitants drilled into his skull. Or experimented on him. Or ... did something Gabriel wasn't quite aware of but which must have happened, because going off to the clinic and then waking up in his quarters without knowing the in-between kind of indicated something happened in the in-between. All at once he remembered the 'dancing alien' prank he'd pulled and wondered if this was in any way similar. Maybe Lucifer had done it, except that Gabriel was fairly sure even Lucifer had no idea where archangels went after they died or how to capture them before they went there.

Maybe this was some kind of archangel's afterlife. If so, Gabriel's only hope was that Luci's turned out worse in the end.

With a groan Gabriel rubbed his temples, trying to wish away the ... it wasn't a throb, exactly. More like a hollow ache. He'd tried to snap it away, naturally, but that had only made the headache worse, so he'd stopped.

"Note to self," he told his reflection in the mirror. "This ain't a game anymore, and pushing the line results in ... in ... something. Just because you've already died apparently doesn't mean it can't happen again. I mean, look at the Winchesters."

With that pep-talk, he staggered to his feet and out the door.

The next five days were, in a word, weird. He still had no idea how to bake, but when he walked into the bakery on Tuesday he found himself automatically pulling out the ingredients for icing and had finished making a multi-tier wedding cake before he realised what he was doing. (Of course, then he had get rid of the excess icing. The cake wasn't actually saleable either, but Gabriel figured he deserved a reward for actually doing some baking and not having it completely burn.)

Tuesday night and Wednesday morning he discovered that powerless archangels in human bodies could, indeed, get sick from eating too much sugar. He made it to work--for a little while--he just didn't get much work done. (Instead he spent most of it looking green and slumped on a chair near the cash-register, with neither the appetite for sweets nor the energy to bake.)

On Thursday after work he went to the bar. If he could get sick, maybe he could get drunk too, and then he could get rid of this niggling uneasiness (fear) that Something Was Wrong. He succeeded in getting drunk quite well, and for a happily oblivious night completely forgot what the hell he was meant to be uneasy about, if anything.

He just didn't make it to work on Friday and spent the day in bed, groaning over the hangover, yelling at anyone who made too much noise and then going back to bed to groan some more.

On Saturday he found the Temple, a tiny little hole in the wall whose only two seats were cut into stone and whose altar sported a couple of thick candles. There was another worshipper, but he left when Gabriel told him to skedaddle, and then the archangel had a very unproductive one-sided conversation with the candles. Anyone passing by might have heard the final rather frustrated and faintly echoing refrain of, "Dad, if you can hear me, get me out of here!"

By Sunday morning something had settled in his mind and he finally became aware that he, in fact, had an extra memory that had been hiding by pretending it belonged there. A memory of baking a multi-tier wedding cake, colour-coordinated with the wedding party, with the mother-in-law hovering over his shoulder. The realisation it was there made him shiver.

He imagined it lurking and giggling, and named it Marie.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The small smile that had come to his face at Gabriel's joke drained away very quickly indeed. He hadn't enough practice lying. He wasn't good at putting walls back up once they'd been taken down, which, tonight, he'd allowed. And yet he couldn't tell Gabriel the truth. In the event that Crowley was here, somewhere, it could compromise his safety. No matter the differences between the Gabriel he'd known and the Gabriel sitting in front of him, the man was still an archangel, and telling the truth was simply too dangerous for everyone concerned.

Now if only he had a decent cover story, and knew how to lie without giving himself away.

"I associated with humans," he said, as the waiter returned with their drinks. "Human. He knew who I was. He - helped, at the end of the world. He helped me, in general." For a moment he felt fragile and uncomfortable, because it was true, except for the human part. "He was my friend."

The tumbler of scotch was solid in his hand as he raised it to his lips and drank. When he lowered it to the table again, it made a subdued thunk, and brought him back to himself just enough for him to add, "But it's probably better that he's not here, all things considered."

Now it was just a matter of hoping Gabriel believed him. Aziraphale glanced away into the crowd, looking again for that odd glimmer of sick familiarity to be found in Famine's presence, and, on not seeing him, turned back to Gabriel and the table and his scotch with a sigh.

There was something there. Something off. Gabriel hadn't made any secret that he liked humanity so much, so why would Aziraphale want to hide that unless it was a cover for something else? But the archangel couldn't peg what, exactly, it was a cover for. (The idea of a demon didn't occur to him, simply because ... well, it just didn't. Demons were demons. The only angels who associated with them were the truly Fallen, which Aziraphale wasn't.) So Gabriel let it go. Maybe he'd look into it later, when things were less raw.

Which wasn't now.

"You had a soft spot," the archangel said with a twisted smile that said he understood completely. Two thousand years on Earth? There had been one or two humans in Gabriel's time. He'd always said 'never again' afterward--after they died or discovered he was supernatural and inevitably tried to kill him--and never been able to stick with the vow. Somehow he just always wound up with some idiot chucklehead who triggered whatever protective instincts he had left and channelled into revenge.

Which was why he hadn't approved of Castiel getting too involved with the Winchesters. Gabriel's last had been a hunter too, had been too recent, by angelic standards, and had blown up badly. The archangel could only wonder how the Castiel-Winchester parade was going to end.

A soft spot. Wasn't that such an understatement. Still, Aziraphale crooked his lips in a tired smile and nodded. "I suppose you could say that." Really, though, he had never articulated, or even tried to articulate, to another being the importance of Crowley's presence, the comfort in knowing that he was nearby or at least on the same physical plane. Crowley had, in an odd way, been a physical manifestation of hope, a snidely optimistic, occasionally tiresome, secretly kind creature that Aziraphale had never understood the way he thought he might understand a human, but without whom he was, he had to admit, drifting a bit.

Still. He'd heard of it happening, with humans, and from Gabriel's expression he had personal experience, so that was the story he would stick to for the moment.

"They have a bad habit of doing that," Gabriel told him sardonically, then shrugged and took a gulp of his drink. "Dad, we got depressing. Tell me something, Azzy: first thing you did when you got to Earth which you didn't understand jack shit about, but your idiot insisted you had to try."

Aziraphale laughed under his breath. What had it been? Crowley'd tried tempting him to bigger things, back when they first knew each other, before the Arrangement, but the first thing that had been successful . . .

He pushed his tumbler forward about an inch, raised an eyebrow, then pulled it back and drank. "Did you honestly think I took to drink of my own volition?" he asked, grinning a bit, and let it fall back to the table with a clunk.

Gabriel snorted. "Oh, so you've been working on this vice for that long? Me, it was--" He stopped, hesitated, because his had been the plants he'd been smoking when the philosophers got lost, and then segued sort-of smoothly into something else. "Sex." He leered a little, leaning back in his chair, arm propped up, glass raised. "What can I say? I was curious. And a voyeur."

"It's a . . . vice that deserves a lot of attention," he allows, and then poorly conceals his reaction to the sex thing, which was just going to keep coming up, no matter what he did, wasn't it? To his credit, he did not flush, or at least not any more than could be blamed on the liquor.

He tried out various responses in his head and finally settled on, "Oh," which, he was quite sure, was not the right one. At least he hadn't spilled his drink this time. He was improving? Sort of?

It really wasn't the right one. But for him, not for Gabriel. The archangel's grin broadened and became genuine. "'Oh'? Why, Azzy, don't tell me that's a vice you've never indulged in before."

He tutted. "Your idiot needs to work harder, obviously."

"My idiot - no," the angel stuttered, sitting back in his seat and glaring righteously at Gabriel. "No, he very much doesn't. That's not - no. And it's none of your business whether - oh, and that's answered your question."

He huffed and looked away. It would just keep happening no matter what. This was absurd. Why everyone was so fixated on their genitals he absolutely couldn't fathom.

That hadn't actually been what Gabriel meant, but at Aziraphale's reaction the archangel threw back his head and laughed and laughed.

"Thanks, bro, I needed that. I was actually thinking he should introduce you to some strippers or something, but, hey, if that's what works for you why the Hell not?" He grinned and winked, and lifted his glass to drain it.

Oh Somebody, this was horrifying.

"Well, I'm glad I've provided you with some comic relief!" Aziraphale said sharply, and took a breath, finished his scotch, and waved over a server again impatiently. Politeness was all well and good, but he hadn't had nearly enough to drink for this stupid conversation.

"Do you always badger people about their sexual histories?" he said. "Or am I just very special?"

He would not dignify the bit about the - young ladies with any sort of response. It didn't deserve it.

"Nope, not always," Gabriel said innocently, and then added with so much lasciviousness it was a surprise there was any left for anyone else: "Usually I'm the one to contribute my history."

He ordered another bourbon when the server arrived and then pointed sharply at Aziraphale. "But since we're already on yours, please tell me you've at least seen a strip-show. I mean, come on. You've been to Caligula's parties. You've gotta have seen something."

"I've seen enough," Aziraphale said, words pulled from between gritted teeth - because 'enough' was a subjective measure so perhaps he could get away with it - "but there's a major difference between seeing and deriving any sort of - enjoyment from it. And my time with Caligula was not recreational, believe you me." He shuddered delicately. "I was trying to save lives. Thwart evil, and things. Sometimes work took me less than savory places."

There had been a few times, a few people with the Lord in their souls, whom he'd attempted to help (in the most bumbling and accidentally judgmental way possible) get out of the trade. Generally they hadn't been receptive. Then again, he never really had any money to offer and the job market in Caligula's time in particular had been grim. Obviously. Still, he'd tried. While studiously avoiding eye contact. It really wasn't his place, it was a human thing.

Cognitive dissonance being what it was, he had temporarily forgotten that he was human now, and would likely continue to have selective amnesia on that front.

"If you haven't hit the point of deriving enjoyment, you haven't seen nearly enough, bro," Gabriel told him, still with a broad grin and not even trying to hide his enjoyment of the other angel's discomfort. "What's the point in getting a meatsuit if you can't roadtest it once in a while?" He did a little, suggestive wriggle in his seat.

Aziraphale sighed. "Your definition of 'roadtest' is remarkably specific," he managed, and refused to look directly at Gabriel. He wished the archangel would sit still. Also stop talking, ideally, but of course that wasn't going to happen.

Rubbing his temple as the server approached, he took his refreshed scotch and held it close like a child or a lifeline, then swallowed half of it in one gulp. He still wouldn't look at Gabriel as he said, "I've never seen the appeal, honestly. It just seems - messy. Unnecessary. Base. Not really a tempting prospect."

Edited 2012-05-13 22:27 (UTC)

"It's a remarkably good roadtest," Gabriel said with the perfect equanimity of an Englishman that Aziraphale was struggling for and utterly failing to achieve.

The archangel snorted, snatching up his new glass and taking a gulp. He was beginning to feel that nice, warm stage of relaxation. "Well, of course you think that from the outside. I thought that. And then I gave it a try. It's kind of like ..." His hands motioned in the air, keeping his bourbon from spilling with practised skill, while he tried to think of something equally messy but fun which Aziraphale would approve of and wouldn't hurt Gabriel's reputation any more than he already had.

"It's like going mud-wrestling," he decided. Everyone had done that when they first got their meatsuits, right? It was like training. But in the mud. The very first experience of actual tactile contact with something, of having something on your skin that stayed. "You can forget about being all prim and proper and being a good boy and just have a bit of fun, and don't have to give a shit how dirty you're getting for once."

... How did the conversation turn back in that direction, anyway?

"Don't mock me," he said mildly, though of course he was used to it, and he wasn't surprised. That didn't mean he'd put up with it.

He focused on the table while Gabriel spoke, allowing himself a few measured sips as he considered the archangel's words. Aside from this conversation being one of the most embarrassing of his existence, Aziraphale had to admit that his time as a pagan god had given Gabriel time to perfect persuasion. It didn't sound patently unpleasant, at the very least, although part of this might have been because Gabriel was not being particularly graphic.

Still, there was something about what the archangel was describing that seemed incomplete - and certainly not worth it. (That and the comparison to mud wrestling was not well-received. He'd had enough of mud for all time by the sixth century and had been thankful when humans invented the shower.) He shrugged and glanced up at Gabriel for the first time in several minutes with a gentle smile. "I suppose I'll have to take your word for it."

Edited 2012-05-14 03:57 (UTC)

There were other things Gabriel could mention. The way it could let you be close to another soul other than your host's, assuming your host's soul was still present. There was something about sex which enabled souls to touch in a way Gabriel hadn't even known was possible until he'd tried it himself, and then he'd been so startled and unnerved that he hadn't tried it again for a century.

Not always, of course. Sometimes it was just purely physical, and that wasn't really conducive to a proper connection. But sometimes ...

And there was the way it could make you feel alive. It was sort of like how training did it for some of the warriors, the physical exercise, except this was more intense. It went back to that connection, but didn't rely on it.

But talking about these things was treading far too close to admitting things Gabriel had felt, things he was still too used to denying to admit he felt, and would have made things way too serious. So he didn't.

"You should," Gabriel just told the other angel amiably. "You should and I'll mock you until you do, so if you want me to stop, you should really fix that. Just consider it a matter of expanding your horizons!" The last line declaration was accompanied by a wave of his hand (the one with the bourbon in it, which still managed not to spill).

Had Gabriel mentioned those other things, Aziraphale might have paused and stopped thinking for a moment and considered the possibility, the validity of that kind of connection. After all, what else were they here for if not to create connections, to become, in their own ways, human? He could at least have used it as an excuse. He would at least have thought about it; the idea would have niggled at the edge of his mind.

Instead he dismissed it. Hedonism was not his cup of tea, or so he liked to tell himself, and as such he refused to think about this topic any longer.

"I'll take the mockery, then," he said, with a firm but friendly smile. "You can corrupt me any way you like but that one. It simply won't work."

"Tricky customer, eh?" Gabriel grinned at him, a slow, wicked grin. "So you're going to be a challenge. Excellent! I like challenges." He tipped his glass slightly in Aziraphale's direction. "Just means I need to find a suitable subject. So, what's your knucklehead look like, eh? May as well start there."

Maybe he could find an appropriate analogue among the Sleepers. Sure, he'd need to get them piss drunk first, but hey, he could work with that. Or something else, once he had something to start with.

Aziraphale grimaced briefly and was tempted to tell Gabriel exactly what Crowley looked like, snake-y attributes included, if only to shut him up for longer than five seconds. He didn't, of course, but it would have been so satisfying, and it would probably have gotten them onto a different (albeit more dangerous) conversation topic.

"I did tell you it wouldn't work," he said. "Why do you think I'd give you tools to trick me into it if I don't want to do it?"

His glass was solid in his hand and the scotch burned slightly on the way down, although less than it had been doing earlier. It was so odd not to be able to control this. Still, it was a distraction, which was welcome, given the melancholy that was beginning to slip over him. He did not want to talk about Crowley any longer. He really didn't.

A few months ago he would have pushed. A few months ago he would have seen the flicker in Aziraphale's composure, marked it as a weakness, and taken every advantage. In fact he opened his mouth to do just that and then paused.

Gabriel had opened up, unintentionally, and Aziraphale hadn't pushed. And something about the expression made his stomach flipflop unpleasantly. So instead the archangel said with a crooked smile, "I'll work on that. So tell me: how'd you keep yourself sane in London all those years? Don't tell me it was just the booze, or I'll have to book you for extra lessons in not being boring."

Sitting back slightly, Aziraphale gave Gabriel a warm, if slightly unfocused, smile. The change in topic was noted and appreciated, although he kept his mouth shut about it. He was already getting the sense that drawing attention to Gabriel's more gracious impulses would only make him defensive.

With his fingers still curled around the outside of his glass, he tapped perfect nails against the etched designs, then let his hand fall flat on the table. There was nothing to hide, really.

"I stayed away from the major fires - " Except for the one that had burnt his shop to a crisp, of course, but that was only major to him. " - and had very little to do with kings. Other than that, I kept to myself." He smiled again. "It's a really fascinating place. Lots of history. Of course, I watched it all happen, so perhaps history is the wrong word."

"History's boring," Gabriel claimed, lifting his finger, with just a little too much enthusiasm to not be tipsy. Or maybe he was just trying to work on that 'getting away from serious topics' thing. "Because of exactly that. It doesn't count as history if you damn well lived it. Then it's just your past, and who wants one of those?"

He shrugged, flapping his hand. "Should've just burned the whole lot down and rebuilt it, if y'ask me." In fact, he might have been ... indirectly ... responsible for some of those fires for that reason.

"Pasts are interesting things," Aziraphale said neutrally. He had mixed feelings about his, for lack of a better word, life. There'd been a lot of missed opportunities, some time wasted, but also a good deal of certainty that he had to admit he sometimes missed nowadays. Of course, he was also certain of new things now. Companionship, protection, "the morning sun of heaven" - on Earth, but near enough and lovely enough to be the same thing. Continued existence. Contentment.

He shook his head slightly. He was being sentimental.

"History is important to people, though," he added, shaking his head more vigorously at Gabriel's last comment. "I think it might be hard to know who you are without it, if you're - not us."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

i see those feels gabe.

you're seeing things, duh.

no subject