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zalrb · 4 years

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What were your favourite childhood movies? I was rewatching the karate kid movies and the newest version is nowhere as good as the old one.

This list is kind of all over the place, haha, because some movies are movies I grew up with meant for my age group at the time and a lot of them aren’t because I was exposed to a lot of media as a kid, haha. I’m also jumping around in time

Lion King --- I had Just Can’t Wait To Be King on repeat, I’d rewind it again and again and just sing it until I had to go to my room because my mother had enough

Aladdin --- apparently I just went around going, “I’m not a prize to be won!”

Land Before Time --- this movie is so fucking depressing but I really liked Ducky --- like to the point that the reason why I go “yepyep” is because Ducky goes “yepyepyep” and I remember when I realized that, I was like holy shit is that why all these years I go “yep yep” and my family was like, lol yes. But then as an adult I found out what happened to that child actress and that just made the movie all the more depressing

The Breakfast Club --- I explained this yesterday I believe

Grease --- so my mother loved/loves Grease, she knows all the songs, can play most of them on the piano and we used to live across the street from this movie theatre that played old movies and Grease was a regular so we watched it a lot

Sixteen Candles --- I remember thinking this was so romantic as a kid. Super problematic movie tho

Titanic - ah yes, Titanic, Leonardo DiCaprio, my first celebrity love. Oh, I can’t stand this movie now, lmao

Lord of the Rings trilogy --- lmao so when the first movie came out, I was obsessed with the elves and Rivendell and I used to write my homework with swirly letters to look like elvish and my teachers complained so I had to get a talking to about it

Love and Basketball --- first Black love story I ever saw.

Back To The Future 1 and 2, lmao as John Mulaney pointed out, the first movie anyway is actually REALLY weird when you think about it

Bad Boys --- I mean Martin Lawrence and Will Smith were the shit back then so I just liked watching them in a movie together

The Best Man --- THIS is funny so the 90s and early 00s saw a lot of African American movies and my mother was all about getting me to see Black people onscreen as much as I could so she took me to these movies even if it wasn’t exactly kid appropriate, she would just make sure to have a conversation with me about the movie when it ended, anyway, so when I was a kid, I didn’t really get a lot of the nuances of The Best Man but when it came out on VHS and when the soundtrack came out we got it so we watched it a lot and there’s a song by The Roots that I really like and one day I was like, I don’t know why I like this song so much and my mom was like because they play that song when you see Morris Chestnut for the first time and I think you went through puberty in the theatre when you saw him and I just diiiiiiiiiiiiiiied

As an adult, The Best Man is fucked up and I would’ve kicked Harper’s ass as well but only because what he did as a writer was a fucking dick move.

Pretty Woman --- it took me a while to realize that she was a sex worker

You’ve Got Mail --- I remember watching this in the theatre with my mom and being SO FRUSTRATED because I just didn’t understand why Tom Hanks couldn’t tell Meg Ryan the truth.

Liar Liar --- I related to having an absentee dad who never made good on his promises but I also liked Jim Carey’s exaggerative facial expressions but I remember there’s this joke, so the whole premise is that Jim Carey didn’t show up to his son’s birthday when he said he would (relatable!) and his son was so tired of him breaking promises, he wishes that his father will never lie again but Jim Carey is a lawyer so that causes issues, lmfao, but anyway so Jim Carey can’t lie and he has sex with I think it’s his boss, I forget, but he has sex with someone and she’s like how was it? and he goes “I’ve had better” and every time that joke came on my family would CRACK UP so I kept being like “better what? GUYS WHAT DID HE HAVE BETTER OF? I DON’T GET IT” then my mom and I had a conversation, lmfao.

Goodfellas --- I remember my cousins watching this movie in the living room and I saw the scene of the gif I posted below and was like OH WHAT’S THIS and then they told me to go into the bedroom because it was too grown but it’s like they forgot there was a TV in the bedroom and I just turned it to the channel and watched it there. And the movie came on a lot on TV so I just watched it a lot by myself, lmfao.

Twin Warriors aka Tai Chi Master --- probably my favourite martial arts movie. I know there are better ones but I really resonated with this as a kid. Jet Li was a legend with my cousins.

Fist of Legend

Once Upon A Time in China

Romeo Must Die --- omg I played this movie ALL. THE. TIME.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

Boyz N The Hood --- a really important movie in my household to the point that I was excited to be able to write a paper on it in the same Popular Cinema from the 70s to the Present class I did my Breakfast Club paper for

same with Do The Right Thing

Jumanji -- I fucking love how mean-spirited this movie is and I did appreciate it as a child too although it freaked me the fuck out

Clueless

Home Alone - god, Kevin’s family was terrible

Home Alone 2 --- ah the movie/scene that changed my life

House Party --- to this day I haven’t been to a house party as live as this one

Malcolm X --- another extremely important movie in my household

Hook --- ooooh I still love this movie so much!

Scream --- I remember when this movie was THE. SHIT. Scared the fuck out of me.

Hero --- this movie was so gorgeous

Rush Hour --- I would probably hate Rush Hour now tbh but whenever I hear “Fantasy” by Mariah Carey I think of the opening scene because I was Soo Young belting to Mariah Carey in the car, it was the best part of the movie for me as a kid because I was like I DO THAT TOO but then she gets kidnapped, so....

The Mummy --- CLASSIC

Gremlins

Hercules - DUH

The Godfather --- I rarely talk about my dad but he was very much into mob movies because he liked the way they dressed and carriedt themselves in these movies, especially in The Godfather so whenever I was with him, The Godfather was on a lot

He was also very much into comics, particularly Batman, so even though I don’t really care for DCU/MCU or comics, I’m more likely to go to a theatre (well pre-Covid) and pay to watch a Batman movie over any other comic movie - except Black Panther which is a huge exception because these Batman movies were a pat of my childhood

yes, even Batman and Robin, I even had the soundtrack, listening to Bone Thugs N Harmony on my bunk bed and shit.

Space Jam --- I recently watched the Movie Pitch for this and it had me hollering

Lean On Me --- I have complicated feelings about this movie now but I grew up watching it and I really liked it and the older I got the more I understood what the movie was actually about

Practical Magic --- I wanted to live in that house

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone --- because it was real finally!

Armageddon -- I still love this horrible, nonsensical, illogical, terrible movie because it’s utterly fantastic and hilarious. As a child I didn’t understand this moment and why it was such a huge ask, as an adult I’m like YES. IF I SURVIVE SAVING THE WORLD I’M NOT DOING THIS, THE FUCK I LOOK LIKE?

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ijustwant2write · 5 years

Text

Demons and Dragons-Crowley x Reader x Aziraphale (Platonic)

(GIF credit to @sherlxdestiel)

Saw a post by @darkshadow3942 and I had to write it! Also this is my first Good Omens post, and I can’t express how much I love this show!!!!

Summary: Imagine being the supposed dragon that was supposedly slain by Saint George. In reality, you’re a simple demon that posed as a dragon after Crowley dared you into it. He still gets a kick out of it to this day every time you two go out for a drink.

Characters: Crowley x Reader (platonic), Aziraphale x Reader (platonic)

Meanings: (Y/N)=Your name

Warnings: Slight swearing, drinking

(A/N: I just had to include Aziraphale in this and you’ll see why)

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

“(Y/N)! What the devil are you doing here?” I heard Crowley exclaim as he spotted me.

I was casually leaning against a lamppost, hands in my coat pockets as I watched him emerge from the bookshop his angel friend owned. He sauntered across the road, not bothering to check for cars as a grin beamed across his face.

I smiled back at him.“It’s been quite some time. Needed to get away from everyone down below, you know? Be with someone I can tolerate.”

“Tolerate? So I’ve moved up in the ranks.”

“When someone told me that you were hanging out in a bookshop, I had to come and see it for myself. How come you’re here?”

“Well, you know, anti-Christ, end of the world, usual business.”

I nodded, sensing the sarcasm.“Oh yes, heard about that too.”

“Listen, we should talk about this over a glass of wine!”

“Just a glass?”

Over Crowley’s shoulder, I saw movement coming from the bookshop, a man dressed in variations of whites spotted us, twiddling his thumbs together. Crowley noticed that I wasn’t paying attention to him anymore, spinning around before quickly turning back to me.

“Right, are we going? I know a great place where-”

“Invite the angel.”

His lips were pursed as he went to speak, but he hesitated.“W-what?”

“We can’t leave him by himself! That would just be plain rude.”

“Demons don’t care about manners.”

A slow smirk grew on my face, Crowley’s eyes reflecting worry as he saw; his footsteps were frantic as I made a beeline for the angel, liking the horrified look he was trying to hide.

“Hello, we haven’t met.” I started.“I’m (Y/N), an old friend of Crowley’s, though I suppose you’re a much older friend than I am.”

“We’re not friends.” they simultaneously said, though neither held much conviction in their tone.

My eyes darted between them, before giggling at them.“We were wondering if you would care to join us for a drink?”

“Drinking with demons? I couldn’t possibly fathom-”

“What’s your name?”

“I-it’s Aziraphale.”

“Aziraphale, have you ever heard the term, ‘keep your friends close and your enemies closer’?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I think that’s what’s going on here. Come on, I’m parched. Where’s a good place to drink round here?”

Leaning back in my chair, I clumsily placed the wine glass down on the table, chuckling quietly to myself as it almost tipped over. Yet again it was empty, though Crowley was quick to fill it back up again. We clinked our glasses, raising them towards each other before necking the wine back again. Poor Aziraphale sat with his own drink, and though he too had drank quite a few, he wasn’t letting loose as much as we were.

Everyone knew (or had suspicions of) these two. They definitely were friends, even if they didn’t want to label it that way. Demons and Angels despised each other, it was a well known fact, even amongst the humans. Good Vs Bad, God’s army against Satan’s. But these two seemed to break the mold. I had been around for just about the same time as them, yet I had never seen another friendship like it. They were able to find loopholes, break the system somehow without even alerting anyone. Yes, people knew, but they didn’t actually know what they were doing together.

“May I ask,” Aziraphale suddenly spoke up,“as to why you are here (Y/N)?”

I cleared my throat, crossing one leg over the other as I swirled my wine around in my glass.“To be completely honest with you, I was bored.”

“Bored?”

“Yes, bored. All anyone went on about down there was the anti-Christ and how many days it was until Armageddon. I mean, doesn’t anyone have anything better to do?”

“I mean, it is the end of the world they’re discussing. Seems like a big thing to me.”

“Yes, but I’m not interested. Everything turned so serious, where’s all the fun nowadays? We used to be able to do anything we liked!”

“Oh!” Crowley raised a finger, falling into hysterics as he tried to speak.“Do...do you....d-do...oh, I’m sorry, just hold on a minute.”

We waited as he continued laughing, the alcohol not helping him recover. He took a deep breath though ended up laughing again. Once he was calm, wiping away the tears in his eyes, he regained his posture, able to speak properly again.

“Do you remember St George?”

I cracked up with laughter too as soon as the name popped up. As we bent over giggling, throwing our heads back when snorting, Aziraphale once again remained silent, watching the two idiot demons lose it.

“St George? Why should she remember him?” Aziraphale asked, looking back and forth between us.

“Because, dear angel,” I spread open my arms in a proud fashion,“I was that dragon that was slain by the saint himself.”

Aziraphale sat up even straighter.“I beg your pardon?”

“Well, dragons are seen as evil beings right? Or used to be anyway. Obviously someone needed to do the job. Crowley was supposed to, but as usual, he found a loophole.”

“Now hang on a second,” Crowley rushed out after drinking from his glass,“we were both bored, and neither of us had an assignment, as you like to call them, like this in years!”

“Alright, if you say so.”

“Plus I don’t like morphing into animals, or mystical beings. It tires me too much.”

“Anyway, Crowley told me the details and insisted that I accept defeat from George.”

“You did?” Aziraphale raised an eyebrow, a small smile starting to form on his face.

“I don’t remember saying that.” Crowley protested.

“How would a simple man defeat a dragon? And if you know me so well, you would know that I wouldn’t accept defeat.”

“Yes, alright, but it was so much more interesting to watch than participate!”

“Hold on for just one moment!” Aziraphale exclaimed.“What happened after George slayed the dragon? Well, to you.”

“He slayed no dragon that day.” I started.“That man froze as soon as he saw me, almost shit his breeches. Before I could swallow him whole, Crowley stopped me. Somehow he convinced me to not eat the Saint-”

“But the dragon wanted human sacrifices, it kidnapped a princess!”

“Yeah, well, you know what our boss is like, a bit over dramatic a times, I’ll admit. When he got bored of that, he got Crowley in to sort out the mess he left behind, who then brought me in. I had no idea about the princess being there, she was annoying. Then George came along, I felt bad for the guy, pretended to be killed....that’s it really.”

“But the chivalry, the bravery-”

“He had none of that, and you made him a Saint.”

Aziraphale sighed.“Oh dear, if upstairs heard of this-”

I interrupted him once again.“They won’t though! It was centuries ago. Everyone was happy. I got to mess around with a good guy, Crowley got his bit of entertainment, and you did your job.”

I raised my glass in a happy fashion, chugging back the Prosecco like it was water. Aziraphale rolled his eyes, tutting at me, though not in a rude way; he was trying to process everything, the poor being. I knew that he would play by the books, he seemed to be the only angel that did nowadays. Crowley hadn’t stopped smirking throughout the story. He leaned back in his chair, one arm hooked around the back of it as he began speaking.

“Sorry I couldn’t tell you. But (Y/N) here is a sore loser.”

I scoffed.“I didn’t lose, I played dead so that some mere mortal would have a chance of living, because you begged me to.”

“See what I mean?”

“Although I am quite displeased by the fact that George didn’t do a good deed in ‘defeating evil’ as it were, I am grateful for what you did (Y/N).” Aziraphale finally smiled.

My face scrunched up at his words, pausing before saying,“What?”

“I put it down to good showmanship. I can imagine you put on quite a show.”

“A total drama queen.” Crowley added.

“Yes, well, I can admit it was a rather riveting performance.” I looked at my nails, distracting myself from the holy forgiveness being bestowed upon me.“Gave me something to do for a while.”

“Come on, admit it,” Crowley nudged me,“you loved it.”

“You know what gentlemen, we should do this more often. There are many stories I could tell you both.”

“Both?”

“Not all of them concern you Crowley.”

“I suppose you’re not that bad really. Why we could make this a daily thing-wait...Oh dear! Crowley, we must get going!”

“Whatever for?” Crowley slurred.

“Armageddon!”

The demon sighed, moaning like a child as he stood.“Yes alright. (Y/N), you need to pop by soon, tell me those stories. Pop by the bookshop anytime.” He slung his jacket over his shoulder, waltzing away as Aziraphale spluttered over his words.

“No! Well I don’t mean to be rude but, you see it’s my bookshop and-”

“Aziraphale, I think you might want to run after him. You do have a world to save.” I grinned.

He nodded, nimbly running after his demon friend. As the opposite pair quickly left, I gazed over the various alcohols left on the table. Crowley had drank almost all of his, though there was still enough left for me, whereas Aziraphale wasn’t as near finished.

I giggled to myself, pulling the beverages closer.“Seems a shame to let this all go to waste. What to start with first?”

#good omens #good omens imagine #good omens imagines #good omens one shot #good omens x reader #crowley #good omens crowley #crowley good omens #crowley imagine #crowley imagines #crowley one shot #crowley x reader #aziraphale #good omens aziraphale #aziraphale good omens #aziraphale imagine #aziraphale imagines #aziraphale one shot #aziraphale x reader

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thisbitchinthecorner · 5 years

Text

Roughly 7 minutes after the End of the World That Wasn’t

“We’re fucked”

There before them stood the Archangel

Gabriel and Beelzebub, Prince of Hell. Gabriel, his face twisted in an sadistic smile, began unfurling his wings, one after another; each one more terrifying than the other. Beelzebub, surrounded by flies, unleashed his monstrous wings and brandished his bow and arrow, poisoned with the fires of hell. Both prepared to unleash their wrath upon the angel and demon standing between them and the antichrist.

Crowley, holding nothing more than a spent tire iron from his once glorious, yet now demolished, 1926 black Bentley that had not a scratch upon it until the hellfire that ignited the M25. The demon turned his gaze towards the brilliant light standing beside him. Aziraphale, despite his soft and genial appearance, stood, flaming sword in hand, poised to fight against the horror before them. Crowley’s heart soared at the sight of the angel, a desperate wave of fierce love came over him. “We stand together.” He whispered to himself, trying to steady his confidence against the rage of both Heaven and Hell. Suddenly, the world shifted, and he found himself alone, encompassed in darkness.

“Anthony J Crowley.” A voice boomed from above as time seems to stop. He was now upon the precipice of a brilliantly lit hallway. He walked down the corridor, towards the voice that called to him.

“Anthony J Crowley!” The voice bellowed once more.

“G...god? Is that you?” He sputtered in disbelief.

“Yes, my child.” God’s harmonious voice replied. “It seems things have gotten, well, rather complicated.”

He scratches his head and tried to come up with something witty to say, yet no words came.

God continued. “Crowley, my sweet child, what are you going to do about this situation?”

He sighed, “Well, I just thought I would...you know, fix it.”

“How did you plan on preventing armageddon?” God asked curiously.

“I don’t know.” He gestured wildly, trying not to show how utterly defeated he felt. “It’s a mess. I don’t know how to fix it.”

“Oh Crowley, how you suffer.” God’s voice soothed. “My fallen angel, your pain displeases me.”

“Your pain?” Crowley suddenly snarled, in a such an angry tone that it surprised even him. “I was forsaken by you. You cast me out. You made me to suffer.” Crowley, forgetting himself completely, lashed out in anger.

“I know. Banishing you caused me pain beyond pain. For you see, my child, of all my creations, I love you and one other, above all.” God’s voice fell upon him like a thousand flaming arrows, setting his heart ablaze.

“You- you love me?” Crowley’s voice broke. Words failed him again as he tears filled his eyes.

“My dearest child,” God continued. “I love you in ways that even I cannot comprehend.”

“But why? Why would you banish me? Cast me out like garbage! That’s not love! It’s cruelty! How could you? Why? Tell me!” He screamed to the heavens, clenching his fists.

“My sweet Crowley, when I created you, there was nothing that could match the love I had for you. You were perfect. My Favorite.” God’s voice echoed thought the vastness. “Then I made another creature, one who was just as perfect and for whom my love was equal. Yet, this creature, one so gentle and pure, needed attention and protection. And that creature, my child, became your eternal purpose.”

Crowley pondered for a moment. Still God continued to speak. “I made the most difficult decision I’ve ever had to make, I needed you to watch over this creature. None other were worthy. For only you could be so mindful and attentive. Only you could be trusted to perform such a task. So I had to cast you out. Knowing that one day, you would fulfill your glorious mission.”

Crowley paused, filled with confusion. “What are you saying?”

“You have done brilliantly protecting my beloved child over the centuries. Keeping him from harm, guarding and watching over him. After all this time, do you think that I have not noticed?” God said plainly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Crowley denied.

“You do, my sweet child. I see your heart, and I know your greatest desire.” As God spoke, Aziraphale appeared beside him; frozen in time, flaming sword in hand, eyes filled with determination as he prepared for battle. He felt his heart skip a beat.

“Crowley, my sweet, you have fought so valiantly, yet even you must see, that this world is meant to burn to ash. But your efforts are not in vain. I will prove my love for you; I offer you a gift.”

Crowley, still fixated on Aziraphale, asked, “A gift?”

“Yes, my child. For your suffering, I offer you the stars. You will have galaxies and nebulas at your whim. But I know that is not enough for you. To prove my love, I offer you my beloved Aziraphale, my most cherished angel, to join you among the stars as your reward. Neither Heaven nor Hell will come for you. You will be together, and free, and my beloved Crowley, you will be happy.” As God spoke, Crowley’s golden eyes changed; they darkened and filled with stars as he was entranced by God’s promise.

“Crowley, my tired child, I offer you happiness. Just say the word, and it will be done.”

Stars danced in his eyes. “Together.” He murmured. “And I will be happy....” His eyes grew wider as visions of eternity with Aziraphale flashed before him. “I will be happy...” He closed his eyes, before opening them again slowly, methodically, as he did, the stars within them began to dim and fade, and were once more the vibrant yellow they had been for many millennia. “But Aziraphale will not be happy.” He paused. “I can be happy in the stars with him, but he cannot. Aziraphale loves his bookshop, and fine wine, and sushi. He loves fancy clothes and crepes and brioche and more than anything, he loves humans and their pursuit of knowledge. How could he be happy without any of those things?”

“I could make him happy. I can make him forget all Earthly pleasures. He will be yours, and yours alone.” God cooed. “Alpha Centuri and Aziraphale will be all for you. Just say yes, you know you want to.”

“It is true,” Crowley began. “That I love Aziraphale more than anything. That he has held my heart for 6000 years, and that I want nothing more than to be at his side for eternity. But spending eternity in the stars with an Aziraphale who has forgotten his earthly delights, is a cheap alternative. I love him because of his affections for earth.”

“Crowley, my brightest star, this earth is over. If you refuse me, then you, and Aziraphale, will perish.” God proclaimed. “But if you accept, then I promise you that Aziraphale will love you as obediently as he loves Heaven. He will be blissfully happy because I will make it so. How can you refuse?”

Crowley pondered for a moment, his eyes fixed upon Aziraphale’s frozen face. He wanted to reach out, to touch his cheek, to feel his warmth, yet thought better. He sighed before speaking. “God, almighty one, while your offer gives me everything I could ever hope for, it is ultimately a selfish desire. I do not want Aziraphale to love me because you command him to, I want him to love me because he choose so. He may never choose to love me, as he is, after all, unfailingly good, but I can accept that.” Crowley swallowed hard. “If we are to die, then we will die side by side. My choice and his choice.”

“Are you certain, my beloved?” God pressed.

“Yes.” He answered sincerely. “I am sure.”

God fell silent for a moment.

“You are, and always will be, loved beyond measure.” God answered. Crowley closed his eyes, tears streaking down his face as he felt God’s love to wash over him.

The light began to dim, but not before God asked one final question.

“My cherished child, I must know, what does the J stand for?” God asked curiously.

“Oh! Um, it’s just a J really.” He stifled a laugh. “Haven’t given it much thought.”

“I like it.” God replied. “But might I make a suggestion?”

“What’s that?” Crowley asked with wonder.

“How about Jed?” God proposed.

“Jed?” Crowley laughed. “Jed.” He said again with interest. “Hmmm. Anthony Jed Crowley does have a nice ring to it.”

“It does indeed.” God’s voice echoed through the endless chasm. The glowering faced begins to fade, and the brutal reality of the present comes glaringly into focus. Crowley, lowering his tire iron, turns to face the heavenly body beside him.

“Aziraphale,” he murmured. “There is something I have to tell you.”

“I know.” Aziraphale says, as he lowers his sword while turning towards the demon. “There is something I must tell you too. And I’m afraid it cannot wait.”

......

Part 2

“We’re fucked!”

Aziraphale turns to look back at the group of children clustered together, Pepper, Brian and Wensleydale watch, eyes wide with fear, as the Archangel and Prince of Hell transform into their celestial forms. Adam Young, The Antichrist, stands right behind him and Crowley, the young boy quietly absorbing all that is unfolding around him, but his only concern seems to the be supposed Hell Hound trembling at his feet. Do something Crowley! He thinks to himself. He closes his eyes and as he opens them, he feels an intense light shining down from Heaven, one he has not felt for 6000 years.

“Aziraphale, Guardian of the Eastern Gate, I see you found the sword I gave you.” God’s voice broke upon him like the crescendo of a symphony; leaving him shaking with both joy and despair.

“Oh! Well, yes.” He stumbled over his words. “But that’s not important. You got my message! Thank the Lor...I mean, thank you!”

“Aziraphale, what is it that you want me to do?” God asked plainly.

“What I want you to do? Right! What I want you do is to stop this! The world doesn’t need to end!” He waved his arms erratically. “That boy is The Antichrist, and by some miracle, he refuses to start the apocalypse. But Gabriel is convinced that this war must happen, and now he and Beelzebub will stop at nothing to see that Heaven and Hell have their way. But you can stop this, all of it!” He pleads with desperation coursing through his voice.

“Aziraphale, what if this is the Great Plan, the Ineffable Plan, and all of this is meant to happen?” God asked calmly.

“I cannot believe that you would destroy humanity just to settle a proverbial score.” He argued, his voice shaking. “They do not deserve to die. Humans are inherently good and filled with wonder. They have created so many beautiful things; music, art, language, food and books, so many wonderful stories they have told over the centuries! They are curious and constantly seeking understanding and knowledge, and that has given them grace and their lives meaning. How can you destroy so many miracles made from their own hands?”

“Aziraphale, you, more than anyone, must know how much the humans mean to me.” God’s voice offered him some measure of comfort.

“So...you will stop all of this then?” He asked hopefully.

“Yes, Aziraphale. I will stop this and set things right.” God soothed.

He let out a shriek of joy; his hands clasped together and a brilliant smile flashed across his face. “Oh thank you my Lord! You truly are merciful!”

“I will return the world to the way it was yesterday. What has been done will be undone. I will return the angels to Heaven, with one exception, and banish the demons back to Hell.” God declared triumphantly.

He paused for a moment. “All...all the demons will be sent back to Hell?”

“Yes,” God replied. “All of them.”

“But what about Crowley? Surely you do not intend to banish him to Hell.” The very thought made him ill.

“He is a demon, he belongs in Hell, Aziraphale.” God stated coolly.

“Crowley doesn’t belong in Hell! I mean, he is a demon, but he’s not...he’s not like the rest of them.” He protested.

“Aziraphale, are you saying that he belongs in Heaven?” God’s voice raised in tone ever so slightly.

“Oh goodness no!” He nearly laughed at the idea of Crowley strolling into Heaven with his ridiculously tight pants, low cut shirt and flashy watch, asking Michael for a high-five and languishing seductively over a plush chaise he miracles into existence. “No, he belongs on earth, he’s been living among humans for well, for as long as I have.”

“He has,” God began. “And he’s been corrupting them for as long as he’s been on earth. You remember it was Crowley who tempted Eve to eat the apple. It was him who set all of this into motion. So, in reality, everything that is happening now is directly his doing.”

“In his defense, you did put the forbidden tree in the very center of Eden. Seems to me they would have succumbed to temptation even without Crowley’s influence.” He daringly argued.

“Aziraphale, Crowley is a demon, he is Fallen, and despite what you believe, he deserves to be in Hell.” God reasoned.

“But Hell is angry with him over this business over the mixup with The Antichrist. They will not be pleased with the canceling of the apocalypse.” A shudder went down his spine as he considered what Hell would do to Crowley as a result of his betrayal.

“Aziraphale, I fail to see how that is a concern to you.” God remarked. “What Hell chooses to do with one of their own shouldn’t concern you.”

“Except it does, in fact, concern me. Greatly.” He could hardly conceal his growing anger. “They will destroy him for what he has done for humanity. For what he has done for me.”

“And what has he done for you?” God asked.

“Crowley has been there every time I needed help. He’s saved me more times that I can even count.” His memories go back to the little village decimated by the Black Plague where he nearly discooporated due to illness, to The Bastille where he was nearly beheaded, to Nazi occupied London where he was nearly shot, to a dark alley in the late 1980’s where he was nearly beaten to death; every single one of those moments could have been his last, had it not been for the miraculous appearance of a certain demon. “He’s been there for me. He’s always been there for me.” The words kept coming, and he could scarcely stop himself from speaking. “It was Crowley who came to my rescue time and time again. Crowley who convinced me to try to stop the apocalypse. Crowley who was there for me when Heaven turned their backs on me.”

“Aziraphale, it sounds as if you have affection for him.” God questioned, and he could feel God’s judgement upon him. But he would not be diminished, not anymore.

“If it sounds that way, it’s because I do.” He snapped. “I have more affection for a demon than I do for my own kind. When was the last time an angel offered me any kindness? Heaven treats me like a joke; they belittle and mock me.”

“I am not altering my decision on this, Aziraphale. If you want to save the earth, then Crowley must be sent to Hell. With demon influence, this same scenario will continue to occur, time and time again.”

“You’re asking me to sacrifice Crowley, to damn him to utter destruction at the hands of Hell to save the world?” He clenched his fists and nearly drew blood from biting his lip so hard.

“I am. But for that sacrifice, you will have the earth and all its splendors. You will have it’s music, art, language, food and books. You will be free from Heaven’s scorn and free to enjoy yourself. Be thankful that I am giving you this opportunity, thankful that I have not cast you out for your indiscretions. I am giving you this reward for your many years of loyal service to making humanity inherently good. Choose carefully, Aziraphale.”

“Then my answer is no. I won’t sacrifice Crowley. I won’t abandon him! You might not care what happens to him, but I most certainly do.” He is filled with defiance now, filled with an anger that he had never experienced before, but now that he had unleashed it, there was no stopping him.

“Not even to save all of mankind? How can one demon be worth all of this?” God’s voice roared back.

“Look at him right now! Just look! Crowley is going to fight Gabriel and Beelzebub with nothing more than some busted car part, and you have the nerve to say he is the cause of humanity’s downfall? He is their savior and protector! He and I, we are the only ones fighting for the earth. We’re the only ones fighting for what is right!” He gestured to the frozen scene playing out before him: Gabriel about to unfurl his final wings, The Prince of Hell raising his cursed bow and Crowley, still in human form, brandishing a bent piece of metal with as much menace as he could muster.

“Surely you know you cannot win against them. But if you somehow make it out of this alive, Gabriel will see you punished for siding with a demon, and he will not show mercy.” God said with a knowing arrogance.

“I would rather face Heaven’s judgement and die a traitor’s death than betray Crowley!” He spat bitterly.

“Why would you choose to die for this demon?” God roared angrily.

“Because I love him!” He screamed as loudly as he could, and he immediately gasped at the boldness of his own words. He repeated them quietly to himself. “Because I love him.” He looked at Crowley, frozen in time, standing beside him in triumphant glory; poised to defend him and everything he holds dear. He studied the sharp angles of his face, the cascade of fiery red hair that seemed almost ablaze in the evening sunlight, the intensity in his eyes visible even under his dark sunglasses, the trail of freckles that formed over centuries of sunshine that traced along his cheek, spilling onto his neck and down his clavicle. He sighed, drew in a breath and steadied himself before continuing. “I know who I am and I know where I belong. I was afraid before, afraid of what Heaven would think, about what you would think, but I’m not afraid anymore. I love Crowley, and I have loved him for so long that I cannot remember a time when he did not hold my heart. Where he is is where I belong. For you see, I am not only the Guardian of the Eastern Gate, I am the Principality Aziraphale, and along with Demon Anthony J. Crowley, we are the Protectors of humanity, and we will stand together to defend the earth against anyone or anything that threatens our home. Because that is who we are, and earth is where we belong, and we belong together. Me and him. I would rather die fighting by his side, than live in a world without him. For we are together; we are on our own side. I don’t care what Gabriel thinks, he can lick my ass if he doesn’t like it!” He thought for a moment, or was it kiss?

“That is your decision then, Aziraphale?” God asked flatly.

“Yes. That is my decision.” He stood proudly, chest heaving as his hand still firmly gripped the sword. “Furthermore, if you’re going to damn me and cast me out, could you kindly wait until all of this is finished, because I’m in the middle of something important. I cannot simply die without telling Crowley that I love him.”

“Very well.” God’s voice softened. “And Aziraphale, it’s about time, don’t you think?”

“Oh?” He fumbled for words, unsure how to respond. Just as he attempted to process God’s final words, he felt a wave of intense love wash upon him; sending him reeling and filling his eyes with tears. “Thank you, my Lord.” He whispers quietly and as soon as it began, the bright light radiating from the clouds dimmed, and time began again.

He turns his attention away from the terrors before him, and shifted his gaze towards the slender figure beside him.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley began. “There is something I must tell you.”

“I know.” He says, as he lowers his sword while turning towards the demon. “There is something I must tell you too. And I’m afraid it cannot wait.” He swallows hard before continuing. “I’m sorry, my dear, I’m sorry for being a complete fool and for making you wait. I love you. More specifically, I am in love with you, and I have been for a very long time. I was afraid of what Hell would do to you and what Heaven would do to me. But none of that matters anymore. All that matters to me right now is you.”

Crowley smiles as he removes his sunglasses, revealing his golden eyes. “Took you long enough.” Crowley laughs while reaching out his hand toward him. “Angel, you are, and always have been, the love of my life.”

He reaches towards the demon-his demon and gently threads his fingers between Crowley’s, giving his hand a gentle squeeze.

“Time to finish this?” He asks with a smile.

“I believe it is, my angel.” Crowley says as he raises his tire iron and points it towards the wrathful creatures in front of them. “Ready to die?”

“I am now.” He nods as he grips Crowley’s hand tighter. “By your side.”

......

#ineffable husbands #crowley #aziraphale #good omens #justenoughofabastardtobeworthknowing

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honestandsincere · 5 years

Text

when the party’s over pt.2

“But the thing is, he’s like objectively gorgeous. He’s not even hot, he’s beautiful.” “I get it.” “I’ve spoken to like four different girls across campus and all of them think he’s perfect.” “That’s interesting.” “I think I might be in love. That’s not even an exaggeration, it’s- y/n? Are you listening?”

Y/n looks up from her bowl of now soggy cereal and gives her friend a tight-lipped smile, “Sorry, Cass. I am paying attention. Promise.” Cassie tucks a strand of auburn hair behind her pierced ear and crosses her arms against the table, the way she does whenever she feels inclined to stage an intervention, “You’re not, you’ve been infatuated with your cornflakes for the past twenty minutes. You’re not good.” “I’m fine.” “And I’m going to get a first in my degree. Stop lying, y/n! You’ve been a hermit for the past week. Talk to me.”

Y/n sighs and runs a hand through her hair. Cassie is annoyingly astute. It’s a Thursday morning and they’ve got the apartment to themselves. Ethan has an early morning lecture and Grayson is on the other side of town at lacrosse training.

“I don’t know what to say.” she shrugs. “Is it something I’ve done?” Cassie asks, her eyebrows furrowed in deep concern. “Jesus, of course not, Cass!” “Oh thank God!” she laughs in relief, placing her hand over y/n’s that’s cradling her spoon, “The last thing I want to do is fall out with you.” “I know me too.” y/n smiles. “So what’s up?” Y/n grimaces and Cassie notices the way her eyes drift upwards to wander around the kitchen and avoid contact with hers, “I haven’t been sleeping well recently.”

The penny drops for Cassandra Young as she finally puts two and two together. She fights the pleased smirk that dances across her lips. She’s hit the jackpot. Cassie is acutely aware of Grayson’s little habit of accumulating female companions and then sending them home after maybe half an hour of sitting next to each other on his bed. She’d stumbled into a girl who was leaving their apartment as she was walking in, alcohol’s effects wearing off and her eye makeup smeared halfway down her cheeks. This girl, Lauren if Cassie can remember correctly, had explained that Grayson had brought her home but had decided he was too tired for anything more than talking about what football team they each support. Cassie was baffled, to say the least when she’d met Lauren, not expecting to see anyone awake at four thirty in the morning. She was even more taken aback by the concept of Grayson Dolan bringing girls back to their apartment. Cassie is not ignorant or deluded or oblivious, she knows the way Grayson feels about y/n based on what she would deem empirical evidence. This notion of him trying to prove some kind of point makes her want to knock some sense into him. It’s a typical boy thing really, the whole jealousy card.

“Let me guess, it’s because of Gray.” “Well, yeah that’s partly to blame.” y/n flushes, not expecting Cassie to be so observant, “You’ve noticed it too?” “Noticed what?” “The girls, Cass. Every single weekend he’s got someone new in his bed, and not that there’s anything wrong with that, I just wish they weren’t so loud!” she’s getting more worked up by the second and Cassie has to hide her amusement. “Oh my God, you’ve heard them doing it?” she knows full well that there’s no way y/n could’ve heard something that wasn’t actually going on, but Cassie can’t wait until her friend finally admits that this is irritating her. “No! I’ve always fallen asleep by then or I’ve got a podcast playing or something.” Y/n doesn’t want to admit that Grayson having female company irks her beyond her own belief, because admitting it aloud would make it that much more real. Suppressed feelings are dangerous enough as it is, having an external source acknowledging the emotions is essentially a recipe for emotional armageddon. She can sense that maybe Cassie has an inkling because Cassie can read people the way a middle-aged woman devours the horoscope page of a trashy magazine; with intense analysis. But simply stating that you’re jealous of the girls your best friend brings home is laughably harder than it sounds. So y/n consciously changes conversation topic back to Cassie’s beautiful stranger in her Economics seminar, reveling in the way her best friend’s eyes widen with excitement. They’re stood at the sink when Cassie’s mouth works faster than her mind and decides to drop the bombshell, “You do know that he doesn’t actually sleep with them, right?” Y/n, having forced her mind to stray far away from Grayson Dolan, doesn’t quite understand, “What?” Cassie dries her sudsy hands on the back of her jeans and turns to look at y/n who’s leaning on the kitchen counter, “Grayson hasn’t had sex with any of the girls he’s brought home. He doesn’t sleep with them at all. They all end up leaving after like an hour of him being all awkward because he doesn’t know how to tell them he’s not into it.”

This revelation hangs in the air above the girls, like flecks of dust that haven’t yet settled. Y/n is processing what Cassie has said, the words all making perfect sense yet being completely incomprehensible. Grayson Dolan has sex, he must do. She can’t fathom a universe in which the boy wouldn’t get any. She’s heard him talking to girls in his bed. She knows they must do stuff. Cassie watches as incredulity washes over y/n’s blushing features. Bingo. “Where did you get that idea from?” she stammers. “I’ve bumped into some of them leaving, they’re all super sweet. I’ve heard them too, I’ll be going to the kitchen to get water or something and he’s talking about getting them an Uber.” “Oh.” Cassie breaks into laughter, the soft chuckles telling y/n that she’s been so blind. It’s blatantly obvious, as cliche as it may sound, that she’s the last person to know. She knows that the connection y/n and Grayson have may be strong, but it’s also deep. It’s fragile in its strength, both them incredibly insecure in their own forged bond. It’s as if their closeness is a given, that regardless of their romantic circumstances, Grayson and y/n will always be Grayson and y/n. Through disjointing themselves into a relationship in which they consider their friendship absolute, they’re setting themselves up for heartbreak.

Luckily, y/n has a painfully busy day. She’s occupied with the tribulations of a tutorial and then an excessively profound study session with her Literature research group in the library. Y/n doesn’t think about Grayson. She desperately wants to, even if it’s just for a split second, but she knows that thinking about him will only lead to her conjuring theoretical scenarios in which she always gets let down. A wave of relief comes in the form of Ethan Dolan when he meets her outside of the student theatre at six in the evening. His eyes light up when he sees her coming his way, her tote bag filled with notebooks slung over her shoulder. “Hey there, kiddo.” he jokes, pulling her into a hug, “How’ve you been?” “Swamped,” she mumbles into his t-shirt, inhaling a familiar scent of gum and cologne, “Super excited for this though.” “Yeah me too, the reviews it’s had are all very complimentary.” Ethan leads her into the ugly concrete building that was probably recognized as architectural genius last century. “Guess we’ll have to see for ourselves!” y/n smiles, reaching for the programme he had in his hand. The show is underwhelming, to say the least; a load of students rolling around in fake blood screaming in iambic pentameter. Ethan and y/n sit catatonically, in sheer shock until the interval arrives. As the lights come up they turn to look at one another, pale-faced and slightly panicked and burst into a fit of childish giggles. “Jesus,” he breathes, “What is this?” “I don’t even know, I’ve never hated Macbeth more.” “I’m sorry I dragged you along to this,” he grimaces, unable to fathom what they’ve just watched. “Don’t be, it’s all very interesting.”

Ethan sighs loudly, like you do after you’ve been laughing for a while and suddenly remember that life seems to advance without giving you time to tap out. “Cass said you two had a talk this morning,” he says. Y/n feels her face get considerably warmer, “She did?” “Yeah, something about Gray keeping you awake at night.” Ethan spreads his legs a little wider, trying to get comfortable in the weirdly malleable velvet chair. He turns to gauge her expression. “Only on Saturdays,” y/n cringes, “It’s not that big of a deal.” “Just know he’s not having sex like five centimeters from you, yeah? Gray wouldn’t do that to you.”

He has to bite his tongue to keep himself from telling her more than his brother would want her to hear. Ethan loves y/n, they’ve been friends since they’d started college. But this was Grayson’s business and he didn’t want to intervene, as much as it frustrated him. Watching y/n shuffle into the kitchen on a Sunday morning, her hair slipping from the scrunchie she’d tied it in the night before and a fake smile adorning her slightly chapped lips when she saw Grayson, is painful in itself. Knowing that she thinks Grayson is the type of person to say one thing and completely refute his own morals is irritating. Living in an apartment with two human beings who refuse to accept that maybe there’s a possibility that they might be in love with each other is wickedly bothersome.

Y/n doesn’t know how she’s supposed to deal with this information. When returning from the theatre with Ethan that evening she heads straight to her room, avoiding any interaction with her housemates. She strips herself of her jeans and blouse and pulls on some sweatpants and the softest hoodie she owns, before curling up on her bed with her laptop in front of her. Being a recluse is quite enjoyable. Her phone vibrates on the bedside table, causing her to look up from the Netflix show playing in front of her. Y/n feels her heart begin to pound markedly faster when she sees who the text is from. SMS messages from your best friend aren’t supposed to make your palms damp. breakfast tomorrow?

She replies with the excuse that she has an essay to write. She hopes he’ll believe her, but she knows deep down that he’ll see right through the lie. Y/n hasn’t seen Grayson since Tuesday when he’d knocked on her door asking her if their Wi-Fi had cut out or if it was just his computer messing around. She doesn’t think she’s going to be able to face him again. Everything about him hurts her, and the worst part is that she knows it’s not intentional. Grayson can’t help how adorable he is when he laughs at one of his own jokes. He’s utterly oblivious to the way he makes her feel when he makes direct eye contact with her and asks her for her opinion because he really values it. Grayson Dolan doesn’t know that all he is is damn near perfect. There’s nothing he can do to make this better, she can’t risk losing their friendship over her emotional confusion. She wishes she could blame the whole scenario on someone else. But sadly, when you’re in love with your best friend, there’s not much you can do other than wallow in your own misfortune. Y/n curses whoever decided that unrequited emotions should be a fixture of human existence.

When she should be sharing pancakes and maple syrup with Grayson, y/n’s in the library. Her copy of Wuthering Heights is fanned out in front of her and her legs are tucked underneath her on one of the semi-comfortable chairs. Academia serves its purpose as a distraction, recently her motivation levels have been unwaveringly high. Someone moves to sit in front of her and instinctively she looks up to see who’s been unlucky in finding their own table. Y/n’s greeted by the blinding grin of Nat, his hair as tousled and as soft looking as it has always been and his adorable tortoise-shell glasses perched on his news. “Hi!” she whispers with a smile, fiddling with her pastel highlighter. “Hey, how are you?” he unzips his Kanken and takes out a hefty looking book. “I’m good, still studying. You?” “You’re incredibly motivated this term, aren’t you? I’m just trying to get in some reading before a lecture.” “How conscientious of you.”

Nat laughs, causing a few heads in the quiet space to turn their way. Y/n isn’t embarrassed to be seen with Nat. If anything, she’s quite proud. He’s popular across campus; vice-president of the student union, on the lacrosse team and well-known amongst faculty staff. People don’t mind that he’s a little loud, his vivaciousness is admirable. The pair get to work in their comfortable silence. He’s got his head rested on his hand as he flicks through the browned pages of his novel and she’s taking notes as she reads the assigned extract of her book. Y/n can’t help but sneak a few glances at him, so enthralled by his studiousness and his effortless ability to look cool. She’s halfway through quoting Heathcliff when she hears a whisper of her name. Nat watches her intently as she looks towards him, taking in the adorable sweater she’s wearing and the way pieces of her hair fall into her face every few minutes, forcing her to swipe them behind her ears. “There’s a party at mine tomorrow night, just a few of us seniors getting together. I’d really like you to come,” he says quietly. Y/n’s a little startled by the invitation. She’s never been directly invited to a party before, let alone a senior’s.

“I think I’m around,” she says abashed. “Awesome! I was kinda worried you wouldn’t wanna come.” Nat runs his tongue over his bottom lip and pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose, “I don’t see you at many parties anymore.” “I haven’t been up to go out recently,” “I always see the Dolans at frat events, but never you.” “I guess I just haven’t been invited to a party I actually want to attend,” she lies, Nat’s not going to know about her situation so there’s no point feeling guilty. “Sounds like you’ve got high standards,” he laughs. “The highest.”

“You’re an actual saint, Grayson! Thank you so much!” Cassie cheers as she slams the back door of his Bronco. “Yeah thanks, bro.” Ethan chimes in, giving his brother a firm pat on the shoulder before clambering out of the car. “Don’t mention it.”

Grayson watches as Ethan shuts his door and begins to walk towards Alpha Sigma Pi’s house. He’s just about to drive off when Cassie runs back to the passenger side of the vehicle and pounds her tiny fist against the window. Grayson winds it down, looking at her in bewilderment. “Jesus, Cass! What’s wrong?” “If you’re planning on talking to y/n tonight, she’s not home.” “Oh, ok.” “She’s gone to this senior’s house to talk about Descartes with other clever people and she’ll probably wind up having sex with one of them because they all look cool as fu-” “When is she coming back?” Grayson asks, his mind teeming with scenarios in which something awful happens to y/n. “She never said, I’m sorry G.” Ethan’s noticed that Cassie hasn’t been following him, so he turns back towards the car. Grayson wants to question why he’s in need of Cassie’s sympathy but doesn’t want to have his entire emotional turmoil relayed to him through the eyes of his housemate. He runs a hand through his hair, tugging on it slightly as he realizes his entire plan for the night has been foiled. “What’s going on?” Ethan asks as he reaches the Bronco, his arm wrapping around Cassie so he can stick his head in through the window too. “I told him that y/n’s not in tonight.” “Yeah she’s gone to Nat’s, y’know the guy on the lacrosse team,” Ethan tells his twin, “Looks like you’ve got the apartment to yourself tonight, Gray.”

Cassie can practically feel the tension radiating off Grayson. She notices the way he’s refusing to look at them, his hazel eyes fixated on the empty road in front of him. His jaw clenches and relaxes a few times and he exhales loudly. “She’s safe, it’s not like this guy’s a creep or anything, and she hasn’t been out in ages.” she reasons. “I know,” Grayson mumbles, “I’m just gonna head home, get some sleep. You’re sure you don’t mind getting an Uber?” “No, you go ahead. You haven’t had a quiet weekend in ages.” Ethan says, giving the Bronco a little tap before lifting his weight off it. Cassie flashes Grayson a look of uncertainty to which he returns a tight-lipped smile. She steps away from the car and Grayson rolls up the window. The pair on the sidewalk watch as he drives off down the street. Cassie looks to Ethan, “Do you think it’s ever going to happen?” The broad floppy-haired boy shrugs, “I mean, I’ll be surprised if it doesn’t.”

Y/n has never felt so out of place in her entire college life. She’s stood in Nat’s kitchen alone, pouring herself a glass of something strong. Around her are a few seniors, collectively looking like an Urban Outfitters campaign, chatting animatedly amongst themselves. This kind of affair was a lot more understated than she was expecting; there’s no pounding bass blasting through speakers and there isn't a keg in sight. Y/n recognizes a few of the girls there, one red-head making an effort to approach her and ask if Professor Stevens was grading harshly this year. She’s received some compliments on her dress and a guy told her that her earrings were ‘actually awesome’, yet y/n feels so uncomfortable. She wonders if everyone that’s acknowledged her presence knows that she’s not a third year and doesn’t really belong here. She doesn’t even know why she decided to come.

Nat stumbles into the kitchen, notably tipsy and cheers at the sight of all his guests. He makes his way around each small cluster of people, giving hugs to the girls and weird bro-hugs that y/n will never fully understand to the guys. When he finally reaches her, his flushed face is adorned with a megawatt smile. “Y/n! I’m so glad you made it! How are you?” he shouts. “I’m good thank you, Nat. I see you’re having a nice time.” “We were playing Ring of Fire,” he guffaws, leaning on the counter opposite her for balance, “And as you can probably tell, the odds were not in my favor.” Y/n takes a sip of her drink, wincing at the burn it leaves in her throat, before taking another. She listens to him ramble about various drinking games as he gesticulates fiercely. Nat, despite being rather drunk, notices that y/n isn’t her usual relaxed self. He pushes up his glasses that have slipped hilariously far down his nose and shoves his hands into the pocket of his patterned dress pants. “You’re not drunk enough.” Y/n chuckles mid-sip of her drink, “You’re very right.” “Come play some games with us, it’ll get you pissed in no time.” Y/n gladly follows him into the living room and ends up squashed on a couch in between Nat and a very friendly girl called Sarah.

Grayson Dolan is pissed off. Not at anybody, unless if being angry towards yourself counts. He’s finally decided that he can’t go on avoiding y/n and she can’t go on avoiding him. Granted, it’s taken him far longer than it should have to come to the conclusion that there’s no point dancing around the term friendship if they’re not exactly friends right now. Grayson doesn’t know how he intended on telling her that he thinks he might have feelings for her. Before he’d found out that she wasn't in their apartment, he’d assumed that he might just walk in and profess his love for her on one knee. Y/n likes romantic literature, so she probably would have liked that. Nonetheless, Grayson is acutely aware that he does live in a reality in which everyone can break into song and somehow all know the choreography to an improvised number. As rom-com-like as this whole ordeal may feel, it’s still very much a brutal situation in which someone inevitably gets hurt. Not every male is a loveable, bumbling and British with the ability to somehow win the emotional lottery. Take that Hugh Grant.

He’s lying in his bed, the curtains drawn and the lights out, with the hood of his sweatshirt blocking out the rest of the world. He wants y/n. He wants her so much it hurts. He hates himself for ever blindly believing that it would take another girl to fill the weird void he has in his life. Grayson thought perhaps having someone else would ease the pain, maybe even dull it down a little until he could watch y/n smile at him and not have a rapid increase in heart rate.

Falling for your best friend is excessively romanticized and Grayson has come to realize this now. He didn’t wake up one morning realizing he loves y/n, nor did it come to him in an inexplicable flash of affection. It all sort of happened in stages. One minute he was admiring how charmingly funny she is, the next he’s noticing how pretty her eyes are and eventually he decides that she’s the best thing since sliced bread. It wasn’t a mutual epiphany, more of a staggered process in which the ‘f word’ transforms from something fricative and blasphemous to friend.

He doesn’t notice his phone’s vibrating at first, he’s far too immersed in his thoughts to be tugged away from them. But as Grayson rolls over onto his side, he notices his bedside table is shaking. His large hand fumbles along the surface, knocking over a tube of zit cream on his quest for his device. His eyes widen at her name across the screen and in panic, he accepts the call. “Y/n?” “Grayson?” he notices the way the first syllable of his name slurs into the second. “I’m here, is everything ok?” “Gray, I miss you. The party’s finished. I just wanted to call you.”

Part two! Here it is! I hope you guys liked it! It’s been a bit of a struggle trying to write all my ideas down in a way that’s somewhat cohesive and readable. This is definitely the longest piece I’ve written on Tumblr to date! I think it’s because this little story thingy is told from both characters’ perspectives, and usually I tend to like to stick to one narrative, if that makes sense? Anywho, please let me know what you thought because your feedback means the most! Have a lovely day / night - K x

{ p.s. here’s the lil tag list shenanigans I promised I’d try and sort out for you gorgeous people! @the-evolution-of-stupidity @skurtdolans @graydolan12 @thedarkrozeofnight @yslbailey thank you so much for all the love! }

#grayson dolan #grayson dolan imagine #grayson dolan fanfic #grayson dolan one shot #grayson dolan x reader #ethan dolan #ethan dolan imagine #ethan dolan fanfic #ethan dolan one shot #ethan x reader #dolan twins #dolan twins oneshot #dolan twins imagine #dolan twins fanfic #dolan twins blurb #part two

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luckyspike · 5 years

Text

The Ol’ Switcheroo - A Good Omens fanfiction

everybody else has written it but i wanted to write The Night At Crowley’s Place

where our two supernatural buddies switch bodies

and aziraphale says the fuck word

everybody stays completely dressed the entire time by the way sorry to disappoint but i do love my ace avengers

link to AO3 if you prefer to read it there

They go to Crowley’s flat, after Armageddon. It wasn’t Aziraphale’s first choice, however as his first choice was, as far as he knew, currently sitting in a soggy pile of char and cinders, it was the only other sensible option. He sighed as they went through the front door, Crowley first and Aziraphale after him, the demon swinging the door shut behind the angel and wordlessly gliding past him, toward the office.

“Euch,” he said, from around the corner. Aziraphale followed.

“Euch,” he echoed, when he arrived. “Who, er … was that … ?”

Crowley looked glum, sunglasses fixed on the puddle. “Ligur. Result of your security policy, angel. Thanks.” He breathed out through his nose, long and meditative. “Saved my life, probably.”

“Then it was my pleasure.” They stood, staring at the puddle, shoulder-to-shoulder. After a few minutes, Aziraphale snapped, and the goo dematerialized in a blinding holy glow. Crowley winced and looked away. “Much better,” Aziraphale risked, weakly.

“Yuh.”

They stared at the floor a bit longer. Truthfully, neither was sure what to do next.

Crowley was the first to speak, after a while, hands in his pockets, still staring at the floor. “They’re going to come after us.”

“Indubitably.”

“So we’re still going to die,” he lamented, glum and bordering on whining. “They were going to torture me for eternity anyway, and that was before I coached an eleven-year-old into telling my boss to piss off.” He scuffed a foot over where Ligur’s remains had been. “I suppose I can beg for forgiveness - choose my face or whatever. They’ll still drown me in Holy Water. Dissolve me. Whatever.” He swallowed hard. “An eye for an eye. So, uh. Nice, er. Nice working with you. Glad we saved the world, anyway.”

Aziraphale looked to him, brow creased with upset and worry. “Crowley.”

“I mean they probably won’t kill you,” Crowley went on. “Angels aren’t usually like that, anyway, right? Especially if you apologize.” He considered it for a minute. “I mean, you’re definitely going to Fall at least, but I guess my last actions on Earth can be to tell you how that’sgoing to go. The trick is not to fall asleep while you’re taking the dive - I did that, got bored I guess, and I couldn’t slow down fast enough to -”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale cut in, sharp and firm. Crowley paused. Took a breath. Aziraphale softened. Then,

“No, you know what, you’re right, they’re definitely going to kill you. Probably hellfire. Did you see Gabriel back there? Itching for a bloody fight, and he’s just the paper-pusher. I can’t imagine how Michael feels right now, glad I’m not Up There anymore I’ll tell you that. At least you don’t have to worry about Falling, though. You think we’ll see God for once if we die?” He bit his lip, scowling. “Got a few choice words for Her, after all this.”

“Argh!” Aziraphale threw his hands up. “Crowley! Listen to me!”

“What?” Crowley snarled. “I’ve had a very trying day, Aziraphale, excuse me if I’m trying to come to grips with the death I didn’t think was going to come after a quick 6,000 years. I’m in my prime! Still plenty of good years left in me! And I stopped the bloody Apocalypse, very not-Hellish but you’re welcome, anyway, but that’s life for you, I guess. But I’m trying to make you feel better about it too, you absolute twat.”

Aziraphale, quite unconsciously, started twisting his fingers into his hair. “How is talking about our inevitable executions supposed to make me feel better?”

“Trying to make you laugh, innit?” He spread his arms. “We saved the world! Congratulations, traitors, enjoy the sweet embrace of death!”

Aziraphale stared at him for a beat. The demon laughed, and it ended up sounding a little bit like a sob. Aziraphale took his hand, and started dragging him through the office, past the houseplants* and into the bedroom, which he knew about only because he’d been there once in the late 80s, when Crowley had taken one of his shorter fourteen-month naps. He shoved Crowley onto the bed and stood over him, arms crossed, glaring down imperiously.

[* Which were rather surprised to see their Infernal Master hiccuping and making the odd squeaking noise that might have, from any other sentient being, been crying.]

“Stop crying,” he said with all the authority of a Principality, echoes of the universe just under the tone of his voice. Crowley gulped and made a valiant effort. “I have a plan.”

Crowley watched him. His glasses slid down his nose, and he stared, wide-eyed, slit pupils unmoving, before he muttered, “A Great Plan?” And then he started laugh-crying again, falling backwards onto the bed, pulling at his hair. Aziraphale sighed and leaned over him, hands on his hips.

“Crowley, this really is - oof.” He grunted as the wind was knocked out of him. Crowley had kicked him. Actually kicked him! Right in the waistcoat, and there was a bootprint and everything! Aziraphale glared at the bootprint, eyes narrow, while Crowley carried on with his dramatics on the bed. The angel frowned deeper as he tried to brush the stain off, and found it was truly ground in. It was the work of a quick snap to make it disappear and then, his face like stone, he grabbed Crowley around the ankle and jerked him off the bed. The demon’s back hit the hard stone floor and he gasped, the wind briefly knocked out of him, as Aziraphale stepped over him, one foot on either side of his skinny torso, and propped his hands on his hips. “Would you listen?” Aziraphale demanded.

Crowley blinked. “Okay.”

“I have a plan, not a great plan and probably not even a very good plan, but I have hope that it will be an effective plan, which is much better and involves neither of us dying.”

“Okay.”

He pulled a slip of paper from his waistcoat, and brandished it at Crowley. “Agnes Nutter’s prophecy, I don’t think, means pretending to be sorry.” When he saw Crowley starting to squint at the page, he sighed, and turned it around to read it aloud, instead. “When all is fated and done, ye must choose your faces wisely, for soon enough ye will be playing with fire.”

Crowley’s face screwed up with concentration. “So what the bloody fuck does it mean, then?”

Aziraphale steadied himself. If he were feeling more charitable, or if Crowley had been less ridiculous earlier, he might have encouraged the demon to sit down on the bed. He might have broken his theory more diplomatically. But he was tired, actually tired, and he was afraid, even if he refused to show it, and Crowley was being a child about this, and so instead of being kind and gentle and tactful he said, “She wants us to bloody well switch bodies, doesn’t she?”

“She what?”

“Switch bodies! I dress my holy essence up in your body, you throw my form over your infernal nonsense, and we fool them both! Literally choose our faces!” He let his arms fall to his sides. “Crowley, listen, you’re right: both sides are going to be furious. Someone’s going to have to take the blame for this, and you’re spot-on that it will most definitely be us. You’re probably even right about the executions, although we can’t know that for certain. Still, it’s … likely.” Crowley looked dangerously close to laugh-sobbing again. “But if we switch bodies, Crowley,” he said slowly, leaning in closer, “then they can’t use all the Holy Water and hellfire they want, and it will never work.”

Crowley’s mouth was open. “You can’t know … How do you know for sure that that’s what -”

“It makes the most sense, dear boy. You said it yourself: an eye for an eye. We made them look like fools and destroyed their plans, their only logical recourse is to destroy us.” He offered his hands to Crowley. “But if we switch bodies, or physical shapes at least …?” He raised his eyebrows, lips pursed. “Let me help you up, Crowley.”

The demon’s hands slid into his own. “Okay.” With a grunt, Aziraphale gripped his hands and raised him from the floor, only for Crowley to sway for a minute and then collapse into a sitting position on the bed. This time, Aziraphale sat next to him, calm, watching his face the entire time.

Crowley thought it over for the better part of an hour. Occasionally, he would move his mouth, as if he were going to say something, but then he would stop, and be quiet for a while longer. There were long stretches when all Aziraphale could hear was the quiet ticking of the demon’s watch, or the occasional traffic sound from the street outside. Big Ben chimed. Finally, Crowley’s shoulders relaxed a little. He hadn’t said anything, but Aziraphale was so familiar with his body language that he didn’t need to. Cautious, the angel extended his hand for a handshake. “You’re in agreement?”

“And we won’t explode?” Crowley asked, hand halfway to the angel’s.

“I have no way of knowing that. We’re dead either way, though.”

“True.” He swallowed, and his arm inched forward, before he snatched it back, eyes wide. “Hang on, we’re going to have to fully pretend to be each other, then.”

“Yes. That would be rather important.”

“You’re going to have to act like me.”

“Correct.” He frowned at the demon’s dubious expression. “I have known you for the entirety of human existence, Crowley. I think I’d be rather familiar with your mannerisms by now.” He might have said something of Crowley’s impression of him, but truthfully he wasn’t worried. He’d seen Crowley mock him many times in the past, and although it was childish and petty and sometimes hurtful, Aziraphale was also humble enough to recognize that under the layer of vicious mockery, Crowley was usually dead on. He sighed. “We can practice, if it makes you feel better.”

“Going to have to,” Crowley affirmed. “Definitely.” His mouth twitched into a frown, just for a second, before he whispered, “And you really think this is the way out, hm?”

Aziraphale patted his knee. “The only one I can see, dear boy. Trust me, if there were something less absolutely reckless I would have suggested it already.”

“Yeah.” Crowley stared at his navel for a minute, lost in thought, and then looked back to the angel, sitting up as straight as he ever did, and squaring his shoulders. “Right. Right, okay. You’re right. And I’m in. But before you put on this body you ought to know a few things.” He snorted, and Aziraphale hesitated, as if his friend might burst into hysterical sobbing again. Crowley didn’t, though, and instead crossed his legs, his hand on his knee, tapping out each point as he made it. “One: I’m a snake so there’s that. We’ll have to practice transforming, just in case.”

“Just in case,” Aziraphale muttered, thoughtful but not disagreeable. “Yes, yes, just in case.”

“Two: snakes have terrible vision and I’m sorry but you’re not going to be able to see anything really aside from a bunch of blurry smudges and some infra-red if it’s dark.” He smirked. “You’ll get used to it.”

“That explains your driving,” he replied, with a soft chuckle. To his enormous relief, Crowley joined him in it.

“Does, I suppose. Anyway, Hell’s dark so you’ll be fine with the infra-red. Right, next, three: Everything tastes like ash, so unless you want your favorite food to be ruined forever, don’t eat anything.”

Aziraphale’s mouth fell open. “Is that why you don’t eat?” he asked, after a minute, a wave of pity washing over him. Crowley frowned and then laughed, waving a hand.

“No, angel. I mean, it doesn’t help, but no, I do eat, about once every two or three weeks - you had to have noticed** - but any more than that and I just have to nap so much it’s hardly practical. But the point stands: if you don’t want to associate your favorite food with the taste of ash and brimstone, don’t eat while you’re me.”

[** He had, and he always suggested Crowley’s favorite restaurants for lunch dates around those times.]

“Noted.”

“Great. Four: snakes don’t actually have limbs, not sure you ever noticed, so the arms and legs are sort of, uh, fabricated and they’re fairly numb unless you stumble across consecrated ground, so just be careful how you go.”

Aziraphale nodded. “This is honestly explaining so much about you, Crowley. Is that why -”

“I walk like that for reasons of personal aesthetic, angel. It’s a learned skill. You’re going to need to demonstrate before tomorrow morning.”

“Ah.”

“Right.” He looked thoughtful. “Okay, got the snake thing, the vision - oh, if you get stuck you can taste the air, that’s got me out of a few spots over the years - the limbs, the eating thing. Er.” He drummed his fingers on his knee. “Can’t fly, you knew that one …” He thought it over, idly scratching his knee, and then, “Oh! I’m probably going into shed next week, so everything itches. Ignore it; I’ll deal with that if we live.” He stuck out his hand. “That’s it. Ready?”

Now it was Aziraphale’s turn to hesitate. “I’m not sure.” He put his hand out, hesitant. “I mean, I do want to live, absolutely, but if I’m going to have to remember all of this then I’m a bit concerned.”

“It’s not that bad. Like I said: you get used to it. The body’s not going to magically do anything else. Well, it’ll turn into a snake if you’re not careful, but we’ll iron that out.”

“Do you want instructions on this body?”

“Anything special I should know?”

“... Not really. No. Pretty standard, honestly.”

Crowley raised an eyebrow. “You know, if we pull this off, and don’t die, and switch back, and still don’t die, you’ll be the only angel in history to have a trial run of being a demon.” He barked a half-laugh, one time. “Lucky you.”

“Lucky me,” Aziraphale agreed, grimly. And then he nodded, Crowley returned the gesture, and they gripped hands. Neither of them had actually changed bodies before, but they’d inhabited them, possessed them, and re-corporated them, and although it was disconcerting, like using someone else’s shower and not quite knowing what all the knobs did, it was still at the base a body, and the change went as smoothly as they could have hoped. They sat still for a breath afterwards, Crowley-as-Aziraphale looking wildly around the room, eyes wide, fingers twisting into the bedsheets, and Aziraphale-as-Crowley squinting at him, trying to make anything out.

“I’ll never make fun of you for books on tape again,” Aziraphale concluded, in Crowley’s voice. Crowley-as-Aziraphale, in response, shoved a pair of sunglasses onto him.

“You look like a bloody prat.”

“You mean you look like a bloody prat.”

“No, you-being-me look like a bloody prat with that Mister Magoo horseshit. Stop squinting, it doesn’t help.” He licked his lips, and looked perplexed. “I want a Cornetto.” He stood, cautiously at first, and then took a few experimental steps, before turning and holding up a finger to Aziraphale, not that he could have seen it anyway. “Wait there, we’ll practice the walk, but I need ice cream.” He strode from the room, confident and even and steady (albeit with more swagger than Aziraphale ever attempted), and returned minutes later with a Cornetto in hand, biting into the top of it. “Oh, it’s so sweet.” He made a face. “How do you eat this?”

“I like them.”

“I mean, I’m not complaining, it’s the first normal thing I’ve tasted since I Fell that wasn’t charcoal or blood, but you have to eat some vegetables or something to balance this out.” He took another bite. “Mf, it’s good though.” He savored the ice cream for another minute, while Aziraphale experimentally stuck out Crowley’s legs and tried to study his feet. They were, as promised, mostly numb. Except for the itching, which he was resolutely ignoring and which was, possibly, slowly driving him insane.

“Right,” Aziraphale heard his voice say, around a mouthful of ice cream, “off you go, then.”

Aziraphale had to think about it. Hard enough being in a different body - his center of gravity was off, and unlike when he was possessing the lovely Madame Tracy he didn’t have another person that was used to the body along for the ride to help - but add in numb feet and not being able to clearly see the floor and he was more than a little disconcerted. Still, he managed to lever himself standing, feet spread wide and arms out. He swayed a little. He heard himself - his voice - whimper.

“Oh, we’re definitely dead.”

He frowned. “Don’t be so pessimistic, it’s just my balance is off. Give me a minute. You’re too tall and skinny, you damnable demon.” He pretended not to hear himself laughing in the background. “Right. Okay, so you always lean back a bit, kind of off to the left -” He straightened up, and then leaned, just as he’d said. “So far?” He risked a look over his shoulder - Crowley’s shoulder? - and saw Crowley-as-himself sitting with his face in his hands, watching with trepidation through a crack in his fingers.

“Better, anyway.” There was a beat. “Hang on - you … you changed the collar of my jacket. Angel, is that tartan?”

Aziraphale ignored him. “And then hands in pockets!” he said with forced cheer. “Always! These are very small pockets, Crowley!”

“Yes, they’re women’s jeans. The pockets are completely useless: it’s one of my finer pieces of work.”

Aziraphale shook his head. “Of course. Anyway, so you slouch to the left, and then there’s the way you swing your right hip.” He took an experimental step, and then another. And then grabbed a statue because he lost his balance, and nearly wiped out. “Oh, bother.”

“Alright, first of all, too much. Second of all, I would never say ‘oh, bother’.” Crowley stood and Aziraphale became aware of how warm he felt to Crowley, when he took the outstretched hand to help pull him back to his feet. “Alright, try again, but less Jack Sparrow on it.”

“Who?”

“Never mind.” He watched, appraising, as Aziraphale gave it another try. “Better.”

“I still feel like I’m going to fall over.”

“Means you’re doing it alright.” He put his head to the side - studious - and watched as Aziraphale took another wobbly step in his body. “Less sway. Think of it as an upright slither. Not big movements but you go side-to-side as well as forward.”

“I don’t have much experience with slithering, I’m afraid.” He tried once more. “Better?”

“Eh.” He saw the smudges of his body’s shoulders shrug. “Yes. But a bit stilted. But you know, it’ll fool them. It’s close enough.” He stepped aside. “Do a couple of laps. Really, angel, it’s all in the hips. Right. Better.” He did a few laps, as requested, Crowley watching appraisingly through his own blue eyes, hands in his pockets. “Yeah, yeah there you go. It’s all in the attitude, angel.”

“Attitude, right.” He paused, and then continued, announcing as he did, “Move, I’m better than all of you!” He smirked as Crowley laughed. “Get out of the way, I have to go climb a telephone pole and cut all the lines.”

“Yes! Yes, attitude!” He fell into step next to Aziraphale, walking backwards. “Let the hate flow through you.”

Aziraphale paused. “What?” He watched his own face fall.

“Right, forgot you haven’t seen Star Wars. It’s from a film, angel. Anyway, attitude. I’m better looking, I’m smarter, I’m infernally evil, I’m who every edgelord teenager wished they could be, I’m the ultimate being of temptation.”

It was unsettling, Crowley thought, how Aziraphale’s presence in his body could warp his facial expressions like that. He wouldn’t have ever considered that he could smile with such … affection. “Certainly,” Aziraphale told him. “Oh, certainly. Very evil. Not a single kind bone in your entire body.”

“Nope. Infernal. Forged in the fires of Hell.” He poked his body in the chest. “Literally bad to the bone.”

Aziraphale remembered himself, and resumed slouching. “If you have bones. I’m not convinced.”

“Hah, right.”

Aziraphale clapped his hands and stood up straighter, settling into typical Aziraphale posture in spite of being in Crowley’s body. “Tip-top. Now, you do me.”

“Angel, I’m sure I can manage.”

“Well, I had to prove I could, only fair for you to do the same. Stand up straighter.” Crowley rolled his eyes and obliged. “And get into character -”

“Of course you would say that. Hang on.” He looked thoughtful, and then clasped his hands in front of himself, smiling in a way that was probably meant to look warm and inviting but instead looked rather deranged. “Pip pip old boy, here we are all … uh … oh, Oscar Wilde! First edition! Tickety-boo and get a wiggle on! Buy one of my books and I’ll fucking murder you!”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale tried to admonish, but it was a lost cause. He’d started snorting somewhere around ‘wiggle on’ and outright laughing at the last part. “Dear boy, I don’t generally say, er, the uh -”

“Oh, you’re me now, you have to say it.” Crowley prodded him. “I wasn’t sure this mouth would even be able to do it. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuckery fuck. You do it.”

“The fuck word,” Aziraphale concluded, while simultaneously resolving to never tell Crowley about the Shadwell incident. They stared at each other for a minute, before they both, as one, started laughing, low and hesitant at first, and then harder, more genuine, until there were tears streaming from Aziraphale’s eyes and they were both forced to sit on Crowley’s bed before they fell over, leaning into one another. Crowley’s body seemed unconsciously drawn to Aziraphale’s natural body heat, leaning in a little closer than maybe necessary. When Aziraphale realized, he acted nonchalant, laid back on the bed, and distracted himself by pushing the sunglasses back up Crowley’s nose.

“This is absolutely bonkers,” Crowley sighed, likewise laying back, hands folded on his stomach. “It shouldn’t work, but it’s so daft that it might.”

Aziraphale sobered a little. “Yes, rather. Best chance we’ve got, though.”

“Million-to-one odds, I bet.”

Aziraphale hummed in agreement. “Probably. But, you know, remember when I was learning magic?”

“I have done my best to forget, but yes, I recall.”

“The magician I was learning from - lovely chap, really knew his stuff, could always make the tricks look so easy - was talking about theory one day, and said that some of the tricks seem to work like that. Million-to-one. Like the lady in the box of swords***, yes? It’s a million-to-one chance that the assistant makes it out without injury. And yet, they do.” He held up a finger, making his point and made an attempt to imitate the voice of his mentor, though it was worse than usual due to using unfamiliar vocal chords. “Million-to-one chances, Ezra, will come through for you nine times out of ten.”

[*** Aziraphale had never attempted the sword box trick. He did love magic, and fancied himself fairly good at basic tricks, but he knew his limitations. He also, on a deep level that he would never, ever confess to Crowley, knew he was fairly rubbish at magic and he didn’t think any lovely assistants deserved to be subjected to his attempts to learn the sword trick.]

“Hah. Hope so.” Crowley sighed, and grabbed his body’s wrist, looking at the watch there. “Sun’s going to be up in a few hours.” He dropped his arm back to the bed, and Aziraphale let it fall. “I should go. I don’t think they’ll wait long.”

“No, they probably won’t,” Aziraphale agreed. He pushed the sunglasses up, the better to rub his current body’s eyes. “We should have a plan.”

“Yeah.” Crowley closed his eyes - a part of him was loath to do it, it was so nice to be able to see - and sighed, scrubbing the strangely familiar face with his hands. “Alright. So the energies - they’re less likely to notice the mix of energies if we’re together when they come for us. They’ll think we’ve just contaminated one another. They’re not wrong, but that can be to our advantage overall.”

“Good plan.”

“But,” Crowley went on, thinking aloud, following the strand of thought as it went, “if they don’t see us meet they might suspect something.”

“What makes you think they’ll come for us at the same time?” Aziraphale sounded thoughtful, staring up at the ceiling. “Do you think if you wore glasses you’d be able to see better?”

“They don’t work, and they give me a headache. Focus, angel. They’ll definitely come for us together - we won’t be able to chase each other if they do. They’ll expect that.”

“Are we that predictable?”

Crowley frowned. “I think we might be.”

“Inevitable, I suppose. Alright, so we meet up somewhere. They’ll take the opportunity.”

“St. James’,” Crowley said, without hesitation. “Out in the open. They won’t be as suspicious if we’re out in the open.”

“No, they wouldn’t be. My people certainly won’t be, anyway.”

“And mine’ll just think I’ve finally tripped up badly enough to give them a clear shot.” He ignored the pitying look Aziraphale was giving him. “Natural state of demons, Aziraphale - they really are all out to get you.”

A chill came over Aziraphale suddenly, and a heavy silence settled over him. There was a curious ringing in his ears, quite unrelated to the curious vibratory sensations he’d been trying to reconcile since suiting up in Crowley’s corporation. “Crowley?”

“Hm?”

“I’m going to have to go to Hell.” He swallowed and looked over to Crowley, who was watching him out of his own blue eyes. They lay like that for a minute, looking at one another. Even in Aziraphale’s body, Crowley wasn’t much of one for facial expressions, but there was something there - pity, Aziraphale thought. It was unfamiliar, seeing it on his own face, but he’d seen it on Crowley’s before, and it wasn’t so different. “I’ve never been,” he murmured. “I’m not sure what to expect.”

“It’s … probably not what you’re thinking.” Crowley sat up, leaning on stiff arms, staring at the ceiling. “Not the part they’ll take you to, anyway. Not if they’re going to execute you - they’ll do that publicly. It won’t be in the Pit.” He shook his head. “Too much risk of you escaping into the Hellfire in the Pit.”

“So you don’t think I’ll have to see … him?”

“Who, Lucifer?” Crowley waved a hand. “Nah, only the Dark Council ever sees him these days. And I’m not even sure they see him all that much. He’s been ... quiet.” He shrugged a shoulder. “After the Antichrist was born, I figured that’s why he hasn’t been around. But then you’d think with Armageddon looming we’d start hearing from him more, you know? But we didn’t. I still can’t believe he showed up at the airfield. The only one that’s seen him for ages has been Beelzebub and maybe some other Dark Council members. And his head torturer.” Crowley made a face. “Mazikeen. Nasty piece of work. Lilim.” He shook his head. “Nah, you won’t see him. Or Mazikeen. I’m too small potatoes. It’ll be Beelzebub and Dagon and Hastur, probably, working on the Council’s orders. Maybe Verrier, but I doubt it.”

“Hastur? I know the others, I suppose, but who’s Hastur? Have you talked about him before?”

“Duke of Hell, I’ve mentioned him.” He sighed. “He’s my supervisor. I hate him. And not in like, the demon way where we say we hate someone because we actually like them. Legitimately hate him. He’d have killed me ages ago, if he’d had the chance, but until recently I’ve still been coasting on original sin and the Spanish Inquisition. Verrier is a big fan of original sin.”

“Which you didn’t do. The Spanish Inquisition, that is. You definitely did original sin.”

“They’ll never know,” he scoffed. “And anyway, isn’t original sin enough? Can’t have literally every other sin without it.” He shook his head. “Anyway, never mind. You’re just going to see ol’ Beelz, probably. And Dagon. And definitely Hastur - he won’t miss it.” He frowned. “Bet they’ll have an audience. It’d be their style. Make an example out of the traitor.” He growled. “You know, and it’s bloody hypocritical, isn’t it? I’m meant to rebel and go against the powers that be. That’s all I did! It’s - argh - it’s fucking Falling all over again!” He twisted a hand into the sheets. “Follow these rules, got it, oh, but there’s a whole list of secret rules that we won’t tell you, but don’t violate those, Crowley, you scoundrel, those are the really bad ones and -” He stopped when he felt a hand wrap around his wrist, insistent and gentle. He looked over to his own body - Aziraphale, though, that openness of expression was all Aziraphale - who was frowning at him.

“They wanted a war, Crowley. Both sides. The rules went out the window the minute they decided they were going to fight.” He squeezed Crowley a little, the demon’s body’s skin cold and dry against the warmth of Aziraphale’s body’s hand. “You knew, right away. I should have listened. I’d hoped … But you were right.” He took a breath. Crowley looked away, staring at the floor, Aziraphale’s shoes, the bed. Anywhere but his own body. “If it’s any consolation, they probably won’t have an audience for you. That would be too exhibitionist for Gabriel. And Michael, well. If anything goes wrong, Michael won’t want anybody else to see. No, it’ll just be the four of them: Gabriel, Michael, Uriel, and Sandalphon. That way they can spin the story however they want when it’s all done.”

“Typical,” Crowley grumbled.

“Oh.” Aziraphale sat up suddenly. “Crowley! Heaven!”

“Yes?”

He looked to Crowley-as-Aziraphale, who was staring fixedly at his shoes. “They’re going to take you back to Heaven.”

“Oh, goody,” he said, with all the enthusiasm of a man who, while considering things probably couldn’t get much worse, had just discovered everything had gotten worse. “Probably going to burn like … well, like that church in ‘41, but all over. At least your body will be alright. I can take it.”

“It won’t, though. It’s not consecrated.” He shook his head. “Hasn’t been since Yeshua. It’s been too long since She was there, and Gabriel has never bothered to re-bless it. It’s just … it’s just an office. A big, empty office.” He looked down, face falling. “No love left there at all.” He swallowed. “You’ll be fine.” Crowley was watching him, eyes wide with disbelief. “Things haven’t been the same for a long time, Crowley.”

“You never said.”

“I hoped it would change. I hoped it would … go back to the way it was before. It never did, though.” He shook his head. “It’s why I finally settled in the bookshop. If there wasn’t going to be love in Heaven, then I was going to make sure there was some somewhere in the world. For all sorts, not just the divine.” He forced a chuckle. “I’m soft, Crowley.”

Crowley patted his hand and they shared a look. “Your bookshop’s always been fine for me, angel,” he said softly.

“Yes. Yes, it has.” He took a deep breath. “All gone, now. It’s … I’ll recover. Find something else to do.” A thought occurred to him, suddenly, and his eyes widened. “Crowley?”

“Hm?”

“You said, when you came to Tadfield, that the M25 was on fire.” He looked over, and blinked. “The M25 wasn’t on fire when we came back.”

“No, of course it wasn - Oh. Oh.” He raised a hand to his forehead, twisting fingers into Aziraphale’s soft curls. “He couldn’t have. It had to - no. No, he can’t have - Ngk.” He grabbed his own body’s bony wrist again, and dragged Aziraphale off of the bed, toward the office. “He couldn’t have put it all back.”

“He must have,” Aziraphale breathed, using full advantage of Crowley’s long legs to keep pace as Crowley practically ran to the office. They got stuck, briefly, when they tried to force their way through the door at the same time, but Aziraphale slithered out and was already waving the TV on as he rounded the corner into the office, Crowley hot on his heels.

The news snapped on. “ - though the same research vessel was later found intact, with no injuries or fatalities reported among the crewmembers. This is similar to the incident earlier today on the M25 where there were documented reports of fire and death, however no evidence exists that this actually occurred. At this time, NHS is investigating, but mass hallucinations are believed to be the source of the majority of these reports. We have in the studio to discuss this further the doctor who -” Aziraphale waved the TV back off. They weren’t watching it, anyway, instead staring fixedly at one another, wide-eyed and deathly still.

“He put it back,” Crowley whispered. “He put it all back.”

“But Ligur -” Aziraphale shook his head, not allowing himself to hope, although twinges of a light feeling, of love, were stirring inside him. Crowley’s stomach roiled and growled in response. “He didn’t put it all back.”

“He’s eleven, surely you can forgive a mistake or two.” Crowley grabbed his shoulders, and Aziraphale fought the urge to lean into the warmth of his hands. “I’m going, angel. Meet me at St. James at one. By the usual spot.” He nodded. “If we survive, I’ll meet you after at rendezvous eight.”

Aziraphale frowned, groaned. “Crowley, you know I can never remember -”

“Bench in Tavistock. Angel, he put it back. I bet he put it back.” He started backing away, tripping a little over unfamiliar feet in his excitement. “One o’clock, St. James’! Bring the Bentley!”

There was a slam as the door shut behind Crowley-as-Aziraphale, and the pounding of wingtips on the stone floor. Aziraphale blinked - it didn’t help the vision - and then paused, because the running sound was no longer getting farther away. It was … he was coming back. The door banged back open.

“Don’t be nice to my plants while I’m gone!” Another slam, the sound of running, and this time it faded away entirely, punctuated by the clang of the fire escape door slamming shut. Aziraphale stood, hands clasped behind his back, and tried to ignore how Crowley’s body objected to good posture. “He never told me how to turn into a snake,” he said, at length, slightly disappointed. After a time, he shrugged, and started stalking around the office, looking at the chair (gaudy), the desk (huge but utterly devoid of anything useful), the books (books?), and the art. There was the da Vinci sketch, he’d always liked that, the uncomfortable wrestling statue, he’d never liked that, and … the eagle from the church in ‘41. He paused in front of it, smiling, and traced his fingers over the arch of the eagle’s wings. “When did you go back for this?” he murmured, tapping the bird on the beak. He sighed, happy, smiling so widely that Crowley’s face ached with the unfamiliar movement, and then, only because he knew he was alone and would never be heard, “Oh, Crowley. You old softie.” He tapped the beak once more, chuckled, and turned away. He’d ask about it later.

The plant room stood ahead, green and verdant, the early-morning sunlight trying weakly to slip through the clouds and skylight. “Well,” he murmured, walking toward the greenery, his hands brushing the leaves as he drew even with them, quieting their trembling, “aren’t you all just gorgeous?”

#good omens #good omens fanfiction #aziraphale #crowley #i wish i didn't enjoy fanfiction so much

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familyavengers · 6 years

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Avengers Parent Preference #1: How you met and age

Trigger Warning: Abuse mention

Tony Stark: You were given up for adoption by her birth parents seeing she was a product of a drunken night, bouncing around from home to home since age 4. You’ve become self-reliant and started getting interested in building seeing how her power worked. Tony was forced to visit a school to show the public he cared for the safety of their kids and he was drawn to a sassy little girl stealing computer chips and metal to make her robot (Beta BeeMi) which is why she ended up with the nickname 'Sticky' for her sticky fingers. It didn't take long for him to figure out your power since you couldn't have build a robot with the resources you had so, he decided to take you in just to see what you were capable of. The two of you grew close as time went on and both felt awkward to leave one another so, he adopted you at age 6.

Steve Rogers: You lived in Saint Aphrodisius Orphanage for most of your life. While you don't know the reasoning of your parents abandoning you, you’ve always kept to yourself. Your powers began to show when you were a toddler and that made the kids either fear you or push to see how far your abilities can go. After one demonstration caused part of the building to collapse on staff and children, you were banned from using them again and scarred you to thinking that your powers were not a gift but evil. Steve along with Sharon made a trip to St. Aphrodisius Orphanage to read to the orphans when he found himself staring at a shy child, moving away fearfully. Almost immediately, he felt this weird urge to protect you, being so small, seemingly scared of their own shadow. Despite all the workers warnings, he all but demanded to adopt you that day. Who could say no to Captain America? You were 3 when Cap took you as his daughter.

Thor Odinson: Thor has met some odd people in his lifetime, powerful people who could level entire planets, bring Armageddon, or do extraordinary things but nothing beat a baby, probably around a year old unintentionally wreaking havoc in New York City. The Avengers were more than confused as the pure angelic baby caused so much mayhem. “It’s a child…did we really get called out for a person who still craps their pants?” Tony landed and pulled his helmet off. “We can’t be less cautious…” Steve warned but Thor disregarded it. “My comrades we have nothing to fear, this is just a Midgardian newborn!” He walked over and bet down to your height. “Now my infantile companion, let us find your guardians!” He held his finger out and you took it. “Yeah, nothing that we needed to come for.” Tony stopped seeing you slam Thor on the concrete from side to side before tossing him into a building. “Oh my God…” Thor blinked and jumped back to you. “Child…” He growled but soon picked you up in happiness. “What a kid you are! Not many can defeat an Asgardian in battle, especially one of your age! Brother Tony, we must take this child in as our own!” He held you closely as you giggled and clapped your hands.

Bruce Banner: Doctor Banner was always lonely man. He had to since, the Big Guy wasn’t as emotionally stable. He was afraid of hurting someone while Hulking out. That changed when he met you. He woke up, sitting on the ground. In front of him was a small damaged table with a chipped tea set with one of the cups in his hand. In front of him, was you. A small dirty child no more than 6 years old, staring back at him with the same amount of confusion on your face. “W-What happened, where am I?” He spoke causing you to frown. ‘I liked you better when you were big and green.’ He blinked, he heard you…but your mouth didn’t move. “Did…did you just talk…?”

‘Yes, and I said I liked you better when you were big and green.’ He nodded slowly. He needed answers and you had to provide them. ‘You want answers huh? Well, I guess I can tell you some stuff but, I want something in return.’ He looked at you confusingly. ‘I don’t like it here, I don’t have a family so wherever you go, I wanna go wherever you go. Deal? Oh, and before you bring up the Big Guy, we’ve already met. He’s cool, he played tea party with me.’ He blinked before sighing. He really didn’t have much of a choice.

Natasha Romanoff: Nothing pissed her off than people using children for their personal gain. This almost made her breach the mission, to hell with those documents. Working undercover as a scientist, she saw something truly horrifying. A 4-year old child, hooked up to tubes and machines as their breaths were slow and heavy, tired from whatever substance they were pumping into them. “Ah, I see you’ve taken interest in my child.” Natasha’s head whipped as the woman walked over. “Your child? Like, your biological child?”

“They’re still in need of augmentations but soon, they’ll be the ultimate weapon. Killing perfection.” She smiled before looking at the woman’s confused and furious look. “Sacrifices needs to be made, for the sake of science and the perfection of a new generation. Silly things such as emotions have no spot in the workplace.” She left, leaving the woman and the child alone. Natasha bit her lip and walked over to the child, gently petting them as they practically purred in delight. “You’re…not…afraid…?” She shook her head. “I’m going to get you out of here…I promise.” The child looked up. “Let…me out…and I’ll show you…what you need….”

Clint Barton: “So, this adorable little bundle of joy is my mission?” He asked, as Coulson handed the child over. They were bigger than your average toddler, in size and height but, Coulson said that they were 3 years. “Yeah…poor thing was found in the Amazon Rainforest. All abandoned and alone…we were originally going to give them to Agent Romanoff but, she already had a kid she was watching.” He nodded. The kid looked at him nervously. The minute she was put down, she ran behind Coulson’s legs and peeked out, studying the new man. “Hey kid, I’m going to take care of you from now on. I’m Clint Barton. You got a name?” He bent down to their height, smiling lightly when they shook their head. “Alright then, how about…Avery?” They scrunched their nose up in disdain. “Riley.” A headshake. “Okay, okay. How about (Name), that suit your fancy?”

“(Name)…” They repeated. “(Name), (Name)…(Name)!” They smiled and nodded. It had a nice ring to it. “Now we’re in business! Wanna come with me?” They ran from behind Coulson’s leg and into the man’s awaiting arms, looking up with a bright smile. “Aw, there we go! Come on then.” He stood up, bringing the kid with him, talking to them lightly.

Sam Wilson: Sam feared you. “RAAAAUGH!!” Make that you terrified him. Then again, seeing a demonic child, fighting tooth and nail, trying to break out of the cage Fury had you. Your eyes were pure red, your teeth and nails were razor sharp, your head darted from side to side, snapping at anyone who dared get close. “Alright Wilson, I’m going to need you to slowly approach her, try not to seem like a threat.” Sam looked at him incredulously. “I’m not getting close to that.” Fury urged him. “Damn, damn, damn…” He inched closer to your cage. “What the fuck, did this little girl growl at me?” Your growl sounded like a wild animal. He stood in front of your cage as you leaped closer, you seemed to calm significantly as your eyes turned back to a normal form. You sniffed the man, fear. He feared you but, his smell was calming. Sam watched as your teeth and nails turned to normal as you nudged your head again the cage. “Good job Wilson,” Fury commended as they opened the cage. You hopped out and circled Sam, looking at him curiously. You were kinda cute, like a dog mixed with a 10-year-old. He smiled and rubbed your head.

“So, I’m going to need some information on this one.” The older man shrugged. “We found her in a HYDRA lab. Poor girl looked like she was going through hell and back but when we got close, that happened. Ripped a couple of our agents pretty good. They survived but…” He shuddered. “The results ain’t pretty. She seems to like you, why don’t you take her?” He suggested. “Oh, I’m that replaceable huh?” Fury looked at you, who looked like a happy puppy dog, snuggling at his legs and begging to be pet again. “Something gives me the feeling you won’t have that problem. Seems you got a new guard kid.”

Bucky Barnes: You were Winter’s child. No one would take you away from him. No one dared to. The minute his eyes laid on yours, he became your shadow, your protector. This interested the scientists in HYDRA, seeing how fiercely protective the Winter Soldier has become over this child. The child seemed to be just as attached to the man. Your days whenever you weren’t in experimentation and training was spent in Winter Soldiers arms. He barely put you down and the scientists studied how he was around you. He was the only person you willingly showed your abilities to. Winter heard something that finally pushed him over the edge, he snapped. They talked about putting you under cryogenic sleep, to turn you into another Winter Soldier if something happened to him. When you were 5, he took you away. He woke you up in the dead of night, told you to get dressed and to follow him. You remembered the rain hitting the facility so hard that it rang in your ears, and that contrasts with the sounds of the guns being shot. “Keep your eyes closed.” He constantly reminded you. You covered your eyes with one hand and held onto his belt loop with the other.

You guys made it out of the facility as you watched the man pant. It wasn’t out of exhaustion but out of rage and adrenaline. “Daddy…?” He turned to you and his eyes softened. Dropping to his knees, he brought you into a tight hug. “No one will take you away from me…” You were glad. You didn’t want to be away from Winter. “What do we do now?” You asked. He smiled. “Well first, we get out of the rain but, we’ll figure something out.” He stood up and grabbed your hand. “I hope it involves food…I’m hungry.” He chuckled as you two moved to the nearest town.

Pietro Maximoff: “Where the hell did they go?!” Pietro cursed as he, Vision, and Wanda ran into the alleyway. When they were walking, Pietro was knocked over by a man but then he was pick-pocketed. They followed the man here but, all that was trash can and two children, you and your sister. “Hey, did you see a man come here?” you nodded and pointed down another path in the alley. The twins nodded and thanked them as Vision disappeared. You began to laugh, tossing the man’s wallet into the air. “What a joke, I did real good huh sis?” Your sister only shook her head. “Oh, come on, don’t tell me you felt bad. It’s not like life’s given us a choice! Because we’re different, we’re bad. Plus, that idiot and the two freaks had 500$ on them!” That got her attention, neither of you could resist after how loudly your stomachs growled. “Find a good restaurant, we can stay the night at a hotel and get some clothes!” She nodded happily. You watched as her eyes glowed and you made yourself busy by kicking a can. Oh man, what a catch! You kind of felt bad for stealing but, you and your sister had to live.

She was all you had and vice versa. Due to your abilities, you two worked like a well-oiled machine. You can look like anyone or thing and she saw the possible outcomes. She was the brain to your brawn. It didn’t help that she was always the weaker one of the two. “Oh, I never tried a Chinese hot pot before! Can we big sis?” You smirked, tossing the wallet into the air. “Anything for you!” You blinked feeling a rush of air only to see the idiot from before holding the wallet. “As clever as your trick was, stealing is not good little girls.” You growled. “Hey, give that back! She needs it more than you!” You lunged only to find him on the other side of the alley. You were so busy with the man, you didn’t notice the other two near your sister. “Get away from her!” You shouted. Turning into a jaguar, you pounced to your sister and growled at the other two, making them back away. “Relax…they’re here to help…” You looked at her before turning back. “How?”

Wanda Maximoff: After your run in with the three, they took you and your sister out to a restaurant. It wasn’t the Chinese hot pot but, that didn’t make the food any less delicious. The woman watched you curiously as you stared back with the same curiosity. Meanwhile your sister and the man she dubbed “Idiot” was chowing down. “What are you two?” She asked. “That’s something we’ve been asking for the past 6 years. Whatever we are, it isn’t too different than you all.” The woman scoffed at first. “I highly doubt that.” “Because your abilities were born in a lab than us having it since birth? Miss Wanda, Mr. Pietro, Mr. Vision?” The three looked at you incredulously. “How do you know that?” You smiled and pointed at your eyes. “They can see all, and they saw you. Well, you and your brother. We’re sorry that we pickpocketed you. We only do it because of our situation.” You apologized. “I’m not.” “Keep eating sis.” Without looking, you forced a chicken leg into your sister’s mouth. “Believe us, we understand…”

“We’re not too far apart ability-wise either, it’s nice to meet someone like you.” She smiled. “Yes, it seems we’re all two sides of the same coin.” At that moment, you both understood what had to be done. Your sister and Pietro looked at you two curiously. “Hey, I don’t have your powers, wanna tell me what’s going down?” You turned to your sister. “Well…at least we’ll have a home.” “No.” “Sis, you and I both know we don’t have a choice in the matter. Whatever my eyes tell me, goes.” She growled as you hugged her. You were both six years old when Wanda and Pietro took you both in.

-Mod America

#mcu #marvel #marvel cinematic universe #avengers #marvel imagine #avenger imagines #parent preference #steve rogers #tony stark #bruce banner #thor odinson #natasha romanoff #natasha romanov #natalia romanova #clint barton #sam wilson #bucky barnes #pietro maximoff #wanda maximoff

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charred-angelwings · 3 years

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Unfortunately I can't help feeling this way, but I know it's probably all in my head. Aww you're such a sweetheart! I'm glad you feel that way and I appreciate your kind words. I don't think very highly of myself so it made my day. 🥰

I can't believe it's been a week. I hope the hospital is nice at least. I'm so sorry to hear things aren't looking all that good, but I'll be keeping you both in my thoughts. I can't imagine how hard this has been on him. I probably wouldn't want to eat either in that situation, but hopefully you can convince him otherwise and he's able to keep something down.

Oh wow he's one smart kid! That's good he's got lots of way to communicate. Aww poor baby must be so tired of being there. I really hope y'all get to leave sooner than. later.

Oh I know the feeling hun. It's a shame people don't understand our interests sometimes, but at least we have this place. So much great Dean/Jensen content to keep us precouppied for a long time. 😊

You are very welcome dear. It's so nice talking to someone as sweet as you and bonus who shares things in common with me. I hope your day hasn't been too crazy. Hang in there hun! ❤❤❤

-Anxious Anon :)

Today was actually the best day we’ve yet, I actually think they might let us leave tomorrow! Zeke ate a ton of food, drank a whole box of juices and didn’t vomit once 🙌🙌🙌 I can’t wait to be out of here and I know zeke is dying to leave. I really feel that’s why he cooperated and tried to eat.

And I totally get it, anxiety is crippling and when people say “don’t think that” or “don’t feel like that” it’s almost like oh wow thank you, I just won’t feel like that, new concept, never thought of trying to just not have anxiety, sweet poof it’s gone. Lol like it doesn’t work like that. For example, this whole time at the hospital, I kept asking the nurses if I was in their way, like, constantly. When they asked me if I needed anything, every single time I would say “ I’m so sorry I hate to ask but could I get some ice water for the night I’m sorry I know your busy” even though they were asking me. And in my mind I know I’m being irrational (maybe even annoying 👀😬) but I can’t help it, I hate to bother anyone and I always feel like I’m bothering ughhh lol im working on it. I’m at the first stage, like, where you acknowledge you have a problem lol

Hey I understand if you don’t feel that great about yourself, i am the same. I was raised in a religion that made sure you knew that your only purpose in life was to be a servant to god and anything else was just “worldly”self indulgence that you will most certainly be destroyed for if you don’t repent and dedicate your life to knocking on door and preaching (they’ve switched it up, use to be about paradise but now it’s) about Armageddon and the end of the world. Which I guess they are super excited about. Wow! I got off topic, I’m sorry. I guess my point is, I started trying to figure out where when or why I started feeling like this and maybe find answers that won’t change the way I feel or act but explain it and maybe one day I can over come it. (I don’t have medical insurance so I am my own psychologist 😅)

Anywaaaaayss

Thank you for the love and I love YOU and hang in there and always come talk to me whenever you want or if you’re feeling a way. I’m an open door and open book, obviously I gave you my whole life story that you didn’t ask for 😅😅😂

❤️❤️

#anon ask #i love asks #just so you know I will fight someone for you #just point them out

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renegadesrpg · 3 years

Text

Dark Angels: Creation Part 30, Crossover with Rekindled. Honesty #RRPG. Zav, Truely, Adrian, Celia

Adrian: *I'd stayed invisible as I followed Zav and Truely to her apartment over the bakery and stationed myself on the small porch landing outside the door. I didn't like this set up much. Unless there was an interior door that led to the bakery, there was only one way in and one way out. And if there /was/ an inside door I doubt it was fortified appropriately. The human wouldn’t understand the need. Sounds of laughter echo through the door and as I start to mentally shake my head in amusement white light flares in my brain and a blinding pain nearly drives me to my knees. And I see it. We've been followed. They’re coming. The pain fades as I reach out to Celia. 'Rogues. They're coming. Get the humans out.' Simultaneously I bang on the door and shout*

ZAV! We're about to have company in the shop!

Zav: *This day had been all I could have hoped for so far. Truely had felt our souls connect and was as into me as I was to her. We'd spent time talking and time doing ....smiling at the recent memory... "other" things and had begun making plans for our future. If I hadn't fully opened up yet as to just exactly /what/ I was, I was beginning to have real hope that might not be as big an obstacle as I'd thought it might be. Just as I grasp Truely's hand to go meet her friend Frederick and have a mid-afternoon lunch a banging on the door starts and Adrian bellows at me. Looking sharply at the door as I drop Truely's hand and manifest my angel's short sword in it, I tell her*

There's trouble. Stay here. Please. And, *grabbing one of the two medallions I wear around my neck, and handing it to her.* Wear this. I lost you once. I won't again.

Truly: *I was having such a magical time with Zav. He was more than I could have ever asked for and I couldn't wait for our next chapter. I almost hated to breathe for fear I'd find out he wasn't real.* Who is that? *Suddenly there was a loud pounding on my door and Zav dropped my hand, his look of panic evident. Next thing I know he has a sword in hand and he's asking me to wear a pendant that was around his neck.*

Zav, who is at the door? What's going on? Are you in danger? Are Celia and my shop? *I was rambling. Whatever was happening was out of my realm of knowledge but I did hear Zav ask me to wait here though.* Fine, I'll stay. *I’m confused but I’m trusting Zav. So, I touch the pendant and just wait...for now.*

Celia: *I'd just finished taking out another tray of cookies when Adrian's voice invaded my headspace in full force. Neither shifters, nor ghosts are naturally telepathic, but Sean and Sin had always managed to maintain a link with us. I hadn't expected Adrian to be able to do the same. Communication wasn't generally his gift. I stagger under the mental assault but manage to get the tray on the table without dropping them, then call out to Truely's assistant*

#Lucy, I need you back here for a second. *She hurries through the door to the kitchen...'What is it Celia? I just had two customers walk in the door.' *Dammit, I think just as loudly as I can in hopes Adrian hears, They're here!*

#Lucy, *I begin, forcing calm into my voice,* I'm out of vanilla and I don't know this town. Can you run to the supermarket and get some? I'll cover the counter while you're gone. *Lucy frowns and looks at me questioningly, because she probably knows damn well Truely has this place stocked to last through Armageddon, but she doesn't argue, just grabs her purse and starts back out the door to the front. I grab her arm, and turn her...*

Go out the back door. I'm sure it's closer to your car.

*She frowns at me but only answers 'Sure.' But I can see she's making mental notes to have a word with Truely about me. And that's just fine, assuming we make it through this. As the back door slams, Adrian mists in beside me, sword drawn and ready to fight. I hike up my sweater in and pull my .38 with its "kill anything that moves" bullets out of the holster at the small of my back.*

Was just too good to be true, huh?

Adrian: We'd hoped they wouldn't find her but I think they must have been trailing us. I'm not sure how, but this isn't a coincidence.

*I can hear them out in front now, moving around and banging on that damned little counter bell for service. At that moment Zav materializes on the other side of Celia*

I think we might have led them to her Zav. I don't know how, but we need to figure it out.

Zav: I'll be back. Keep the pendant on.

*Drawing her to me, I drop a quick hard kiss on her mouth and then I'm out the door. As soon as I'm out of her sight, I hone in on Adrian and mist to his side.*

Later. We'll figure it out once they're dead. Celia, stay back in the doorway and cover us. But don't hit us. Those bullets will kill us too, feel me? *She gives me an indignant look but just nods. As the sound of an insistent bell turns into glass breaking I cringe. Dammit, Truely is going to be upset.*

Truly: *I'm standing here holding the pendant Zav gave me and I'm so confused. He gave me a quick kiss then left me.*

What the ever-loving hell is going on? *

As I absent-mindedly put on the pendant I hear a crash come from below.* What's going on in my shop? *I hear a couple more crashes and bangs and I realize I can't stand here twiddling my thumbs anymore. The man I love is in trouble, his friends could be too, and my shop, my livelihood is being destroyed.*

Nope, sorry my Star but I'm not going to stand here listening to my world get destroyed, just not happening. *I open my door, carefully look out in both directions, then run down my steps and around to my shop's back door. The scene I come on is one of nightmares. Creepy, smelly things fighting with Zav and Celia, and the blonde man. I see swords, fists, and bullets flying. My shop is in ruins and my temper boils over.*

Oh fuck no. *I whisper yell as I grab the first heavy thing I can find...my cast iron skillet. *I quietly move through my kitchen and get up behind one of the ugly beings. I raise the skillet and scream* NOOOO!* as I slam it on his head.*

You will not hurt my family. No! No! No! *with each yell I hit the being, fury that I've never felt taking over. I didn't recognize myself but I would rather die than have Zav hurt. Unfortunately, my energy isn't long lasting and now I don't know what to do. So, I lift the skillet and wait, my breath still heaving with effort...anger, fear, and frustration filling me.*

Celia: *I watch in a combination of mixed horror and admiration as the human woman attacks a reaper with a skillet. Cast iron. That sucker has to be heavy. Adrian has one almost cornered between the oven and walk-in fridge and Zav...dammit, he dropped his guard when he heard Truely>and missed it when two more misted in. I shouted....* ZAV! *and swung up from behind the table I'd crouched behind, unloading my .38 into one, the volley of reaper-killing bullets opening up a center mass wound as he falls to the ground.

Adrian: *I'd fought my foe into the corner. Celia had had to be careful not to hit me but she'd managed to place a well-aimed bullet into his weapon arm, which slowed him down considerably. I blocked and parried but he was tiring. The sounds of a cast iron skillet knocking against a skull hadn't really caught my attention, but when Celia yelled Zav's name I decided enough was enough and gutted the bastard, a mortal wound, dying, but not yet dead. He falls as I turn just in time to see ...well... I'm not sure what I'm seeing.

Zav is starring at Truely... TRUELY? with a stunned look on his face as she stands there, in front of him, chest heaving from the exertion of swinging a frigging massive cast iron skillet. The reaper he'd been fighting was groaning, laying on the floor. There had only been two rogue reapers in my vision but now there were four. Two more had just misted in. The originals must have called for reinforcements before they'd fallen. One goes down, its chest exploding into a bloody mess from Celia's bullets, but the other one is headed straight for Truely. If it touches her....*

Gods dammit Zav, GET HER OUT!!!

Zav: *Gods… Truly…. One minute I was fighting and the next minute I was staring into her flushed face with a reaper groaning on the floor in front of me. My eyes locked on hers in stunned admiration, and yeah, not a little fear for her, just as Adrian called out. Another reaper, a new one, had misted in and was making for what he assumed was the easiest target in the room, my woman. Time seems to slow down. I note the sound of Celia ejecting and reloading a new clip into her gun. Adrian is throwing himself at the new attacker. In the blink of an eye I leap over the prone rogue on the floor and grab Truely, misting her away from the attack, to just outside the back door. As I hear shots ring out I’m torn between going back and staying to protect her but I hear Celia’s glee as she shouts out ‘And another one bites the dust!’. Heaving a breath of relief, I turn Truely’s face up to mine and frantically scan her eyes.*

Are you all right? Did it touch you? Are you hurt?

Truly: *I'm huffing, puffing, and staring at mayhem in my shop and then the next thing I know, I’m outside and Zav asked how I am.*

I'm pissed. I'm stunned. I'm confused. What the hell Zav? What... *I lean over to catch my breath and that's when tears start falling and I just plop myself down on the ground. The realization that my shop is ruined, my man has a secret that turned deadly, and he could've died all hit at once.* Talk Zav, please. Am I losing my mind here?

Celia: As the Zav misted out with Truely I shouted*

DOWN

*and opened fire hoping Adrian wouldn't get in the way. Of course, he was already on the move but he heard me and turned to mist, allowing the bullets to pass through harmlessly and embed in the chest of the last standing rogue. Slowly lowering my gun I look around at the carnage just in time to see the bad guy Truely ... damn, I have a lot more admiration for her now... Truely tried to pound into sand start to struggle to his feet and I raise my gun and put my last bullet between its eyes. The rogue fell to the ground, its physical body disappearing as it died and its untethered soul shimmering beside where it had fallen.*

We're going to need something to do with these souls so where Truely is doesn't get back to the Horseman and his boys.

Adrian: *Looking around as a 2nd rogue followed suit*

Bryn used a Dybbuk box for the last crew. I'll reach out to her and have her send one. Meanwhile, *grabbing the disembodied souls each with one hand*

You two are with me.*

*Mentally I call to Bryn with my request and in seconds a box materializes in front of me as she conveys instructions on how to use it and where to take it when I'm done. Death Valley, with the other one. Of course. She's always had a gallows sense of humor.*

In you go...*softly chanting the spell Bryn had given me, watching the two souls being sucked into it. As the last two expired, their souls too were sucked into the box and I had the distinct feeling it was still hungry. Hastily I say the words that lock the box and pick it up, handing it to Celia.*

Put this somewhere safe and out of the way while I take care of this mess.

*Looking around at the rubble, I inhale and dematerialize it all, sending it to Brazil to be burned outside the safehouse.*

Zav: *She's pissed. She's got a right to be but the cats out of the bag now and she's got a right to the truth. More, I want to tell her. As she sits down on the ground, I sink down cross-legged with her. I've fought with Adrian long enough to know he's already doing damage control in there. Now I have to do it out here.*

No, baby, no. You aren't crazy. I'm so sorry this followed us here. It's what I was trying to keep from happening to begin with. But everyone is all right and we're going to fix this, I promise. Just please, listen with an open heart. Because I can promise, whatever you're thinking right now? That's not what this was.

Truely: *What I'm thinking? What I'm thinking is the Twilight Zone is being filmed again or Candid Camera, a really bad version of it. I'm thinking you could've been killed. I'm thinking my shop is destroyed, and...*

HOLY SHIT! Lucy! Where's Lucy? Is she ok, oh my god how could I have forgotten her. *I stop myself and take a deep breathe reaching out to touch Zav.* Ok, first...where is Lucy? Then explain so I don't go overboard in my thinking cuz right now...*deep breath* What I DO know is that I love you and trust you. What I don't know is why the secret, why the chaos. Please explain.

Celia: *As I stand there holding the box in both hands I watch Adrian make a clean sweep of the place. Walking to the door to the front, I check to be sure it’s all gone too.*

Good job. It could pass a Health Department inspection. Now, since you're already in my head how about you materialize what needs to be replaced here. Yeah, yeah, *I dismiss as he opens his mouth to protest* I know you can't make it out of thin air like the Boss can, but I know what she had and where it came from. Pick my brain. Literally. This is a small operation and I doubt she can afford to replace all this. I'm pretty sure her insurance doesn't cover damage from the Reaper Wars. Zav will see the funds get into the right accounts to cover it. He's picky about that stuff.

*Leaving him frowning as he invades my brain again, I turn and walk out the back door, still carrying the box, just in time to hear Truely freak out over Lucy.*

Lucy's fine. I got an advance heads up from Adrian...

*jerking my head back into the doorway* Tall, blonde and deadly in there.... and I sent her to the store. I told her you were out of vanilla.

Adrian: *I frown as I rummage through Celia's brain and select the equipment needed replace what had been damaged. She might be a bossy ghost, but her thoughts were well organized and she provided me not only with the items, but brands as well. I materialized them from their manufacturer's warehouses and set them into their proper places, being sure to get the front of the shop covered, too, then follow Celia out the back door. Taking the Dybbuk box from her, I begin*

I've got the souls Zav. Bryn sent a Dybbuk box to hold them like she did the ones from Layla's place. She told me where to leave them. I'm going to stow them and I'll be back to watch your six shortly, so try to stay out of trouble until I get back. Oh, and Celia, the place is put back together to your specifications. *smirking at her raised eyebrow* What, you thought that would take time? You've lived with reapers long enough to know we're efficient.

But, Zav, you might be thinking up a story in case someone called in the gunfire. Something harmless like Celia was teaching Truely how to use a gun and it went off or something. Cops can't hold you but they could make life uncomfortable for your lady.

*Nodding, I dissolve into a fine black mist, to take care of this errand.

Zav: I nod at Adrian as he goes. His method of leaving is going to cause more questions, but she needs to hear it all. Running my hands through my long hair and pushing it back from my face, I take a deep breath.*

Celia, I think Adrian's story will hold up since he repaired the damage. Can you go man the fort while Truely and I talk? We'll be right here if you need us.

*Celia nods and shoots me a quick look of sympathy. She's aware this won't be an easy discussion and I stand to lose everything if it doesn't go well.*

Truely...*licking my lips and sighing* I love you. And everything I've told you has been the truth. It just...the details are going to be hard for you to believe. But this won't happen again. I'll take steps to see you're protected. *sighing*

Humans had a great poet and playwright who once wrote "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” Well he was right. There are more things in heaven and earth and the worlds beyond than humans comprehend. And I... and Adrian and Celia... are some of them.

Truly: Shakespeare, Hamlet right? Ok, so what are you and what were those icky creatures that were trying to kill you? I want to understand this all, I really do. Please tell me everything Zav...everything.

Zav: It might be easier to show you some of it. *Materializing a slim dagger, I hold out my forearm and make a fist, running the sharp blade across it. But what flows out isn't red blood. It's blue.*

That's grace. Not blood. It's the first part of what I am. An angel. *With a thought I allow my wings- enormous and capable of lifting my weight, and much more, in flight to materialize. The deep navy blue of them fades down into a pale blue at the bottom, the gloss of them catching the sunlight.*

And I'm more. *With another thought I dematerialize myself into a black mist and then reform.*

I'm also a reaper, a powerful being who collects mortal souls and helps them move on. *sighing* Once, long, long ago I and angels like me were sent to earth to teach humans. Some of us fell in love with them. But the white god...not the Creator, but one whom most humans believe is...he was jealous and afraid. The children we created with our human wives held great power. They had both soul and grace. So he had us all killed before they could grow up. Now, what happens to angels when they die is different that it is for humans or other mortal species. Most mortal souls move on to other lives. A few, when they are ready, ascend to a new plane of existence. But not angels. We go into the Long Sleep. So my wife and I could never be reunited. Not in new lives, not in ascension. But the reaper who came for me had been a friend once and he offered me the opportunity to join his corps. And to look for the soul of the wife that the white god...El Shaddai... had taken from me. And so... here I am.

Truly: *I let out a squeak as I watch him materialize a knife. That squeak became a gasp when I see him cut himself. Then before I can say anything out runs blue blood. I watch it flow then stop. THEN the most beautiful set of wings appear... WINGS! I'm looking at actual angel wings. Then he's talking about angels and reapers and his dead wife.*

Wait. So you were an angel living among humans? Teach humans what though? Then you died or just your wife? *I shake my head*You are now a reaper? Or an angel? And you are not only taking dead people's souls to, their final resting place? But also searching for your dead wife? But if she's dead, why look on Earth? And where does this leave me if you are wanting her?

Zav: *smiling in relief at how she's taking all this. Quietly I demat my wings. No point in keeping them exposed in case we do get a visit from other humans*

I taught them art, music...how to govern and care for a people, how to grow things. The Creator wanted humans to prosper. When I died I didn't lose my angel's grace or power. It would have gone into the Long Sleep with me. When a being surrenders his soul to Death to become a reaper, he brings with him all that he was in life. I have grace instead of a soul, which is a different kind of power than a soul has, but an immense one. So I am both angel and reaper now. Just not one who serves the Creator anymore.

*Pausing for a moment and inhaling before I continue. This was going to be the hardest of all.*

Her soul was human and it was not ready to ascend. It had more lives to live, more lessons to learn and grow from. If I had lived... and angels will live forever if they are not killed...my grace would have kept Kalare young and alive for as long as I was. Love is that strong.

But I don't have to look for her anymore. *looking deeply into her eyes* I've found her.

Truely: *I stare into your eyes as you speak. I see and feel the truth but it's still overwhelming.* So, you are still an angel but also a reaper. And you said your grace could keep Kalare alive for as long as you...how? Like, she fed on it like a vampire? *damn do vampires exist too? Ok, not asking that right now. I just want to understand this man, his history, and how I fit into his present.* So, waaaaaaiiit.... *something he said just processed through my stuffed brain* You found her soul? Her reborn soul? *I squeak that last part out, then whisper...* me? You're saying I'm your dead wife reborn?

Zav: *laughs softly and takes both her hands into mine* There are other ways of passing grace than drinking it. Humans don't have the teeth for it. My grace passed to her every time we made love. As it will pass to you. And yes, I have searched for her soul for 35,000 years. It has grown. Learned much. Been tempered by the experiences of the lives it has lived. Truely, the soul she bore in her mortal body now lives in yours. But you are not Kalare. You are Truely. And I am very aware of it. And grateful for how her soul has grown and who it has become. How it has become you.

Truely: *I'm...stunned*. 35,000 years? You searched that long to find her soul? But, but how can you know her soul is in me? *I touch my chest* And how *I shake my head trying to gather my thoughts* how are you sure its ME you love and not the idea of her soul being found? What, what do I do with this information Zav? *I stare into your eyes and absent-mindedly brush your hair out of your face as tears fall.* Is this why our connection was strong and fast? Is her essence like going to take over or how does that work?

Zav: *taking her face in my hands I wipe away her tears with my thumbs. Kissing her gently,* I would have searched through eternity for it. It /is/ why we both felt such an instant connection, but I was not sure until I looked at your soul. *smiles* Yes, it is something reapers can do that angels can't. But the connection....*shaking my head and smiling a little* It was so instantaneous that I just knew it had to be from the moment you walked into my shop. But "she" doesn't take you over. You are her and she is you. There is no difference in the essence of your soul. What it's learned in each life, it brought to this one and made you who you are. The qualities that made her who she was then are still there now, and help make you who you are. I love you because you are Truely. Not because of who you were, but because of who /you/are.

Truely: *I smile the tears drying up as I feel the truth and love in his words.* You said you had children. Does that mean their souls are out there too? And, um, can we have kids?

Zav: *The smile fades from my face at this* Angels can. Reapers...cannot. I'm a mix. I still have my grace, but to be totally honest with you, I just don't know. Death is powerful.

Truely: So, it’s one of those questions that has no answer ‘til we try. Right, then. What now Zav? What happens next and what about my shop?

Zav: That's been taken care of. Reapers have the ability to materialize and dematerialize objects. Only our captain can reform molecules into other items, but we can all take it from one place to another. From what Adrian and Celia said, I can promise you your shop has been cleaned up, repaired and the equipment replaced. I'll see that the proper companies are paid for it. No one will lose by it. As for what happens now... *smile fading* I have to go to war.

The creatures that attacked us were rogue reapers. There's a struggle going on for the soul of the worlds. The Horseman of Death, whom I supposedly owe allegiance to, is in league with Lucifer and seeks to overthrow the Creator and rule the worlds with death. A group of us have broken away.

Our Captain is a very, very powerful being. As strong as the Horseman himself. And I owe him everything. I owe him finding you, as he was the one who offered me the Reaper Corps instead of The Long Sleep. He blocks The Horseman's hold on us. The rogues were souls that were corrupt before they died. So corrupt they were doomed for their respective Hell planes. Instead, The Horseman used them to create a fourth column of corruption in the corps, to help him alter the Fates’ decisions and let him take souls before their time to consume rather than let live and then move on to their new lives when it was time. *shaking my head* We fight for all the worlds, all universes.

Celia, I will leave here with you to protect you. She is not a reaper. She's a ghost and in life was a wolf shifter. She brought that ability over with her but her shooting is something she learned from Adrian. Her mate serves with us. I'll ward the shop and your home so this doesn't happen again. But go nowhere without her. Please.

Truely: So, this Horseman is rebelling against his boss, siding with the devil, all for power and greed? Sounds kinda human. He should be ashamed to stoop to our level. And, um, you and your friends are going to stop him from taking souls that don't belong to him yet, if at all. Do I have it right? And Celia is a ghost who can bake and kick ass and you want me to hang with her 'til you come back to me?

Zav: *laughs at her succinct summation* I love you. *shaking my head, then kissing her.* I really do.

We're going to do more than stop the Horseman. We're going to overthrow him, purge the ranks of his corruption and set the worlds back on their paths. But yes. Celia is all of that. And one of the other lieutenants is in constant contact with her mentally, so if there's trouble we'll know right away. *Pausing,* There is one more thing. *reaching out and taking the medallion by one finger.* Wear this. It contains a bit of my grace as well as some personal warding. It will make you harder for our enemies to focus in on and the grace will act as a homing beacon if anything should happen. Never take it off.

Truely: *Returning the kiss* Ok, so you are going to go kick his ass, overthrow him, kill him and his lackeys, or all of the above. And this necklace will keep me safe from them. Right? Will Celia need one too or does being a ghost make it unnecessary? And lastly...when do you leave?

Zav: She has one. It will /help/ keep you safe. And other things I will do before I leave will prevent both reapers and demons that do not possess a similar medal from entering. As for when I leave....I'm afraid this attempt on you means we are being more closely watched than we had hoped. Once I've warded everything I'll need to go and make a personal report to our Captain. I'm pretty sure it's going to speed up our timetable.

Truely: Alright. So in a few minutes then or does this warding take longer than that?

Zav: *Standing and drawing her to her feet* I'm afraid so. *huffing a sigh* I didn't want to tell you all this in quite this way, but I /was/ going to tell you. I never lied to you, but I didn't tell you everything. I promise, that will never happen again.

Truely: *wrapping my arms around you I look into your face.* I'm going to hold you to that promise. I want our relationship based on truth and trust not just love. Can I help with the warding or what should I do now?

Zav: *Lowering my lips to hers, I kiss her deeply, putting all my love into it. Finally breaking the kiss, I rest my chin on your head* I'm sorry I brought this to your door. And in the spirit of honesty *Looking down at you* I have to tell you there will always be enemies to guard against. I want you to know that going in. But I also want you to know that I'd die again to protect you. I won't let myself ever be caught unawares. *Not again. Not like the first time* And I think that I can teach you some of the warding so if you need to refresh it and I'm away you can. It's not hard, just some simple symbols in a certain order. The key is what you draw them with. Mortals /can/ do it with blood. It's more effective than paint, but like paint, blood will show and we don't want it to show. *smiles and chucks you under the chin* It would scare away the customers. So we're going to do it with my grace.

Truely: *laughs* Yes it would. Ok, thank you for being honest. It’s a little scary to think about but I know you will protect me and I can learn to protect myself I'm sure. *leans up and kisses you letting you feel my love*

Alright, let’s do this and then, Zav...no weepy goodbye. Just smile and go, ok? I want to watch you go with us both standing strong. *knowing I'll fold later into a pile of mush but if he can be strong, so can I.*

Zav: *materializing a small jar, I take the same slim dagger I'd used before and re-open the vein on my arm, letting silvery blue grace flow into it. When it's about three-quarters full, I materialize a gauze pad and place over it* I do heal fast, but not that fast, *I smile.* Next I need you to trust me. We are going to put these symbols on the inside of your shop but we are going to paint them in the half-world. It's where I am invisible to this world but it's visible to me. It's also where we fold time and space to walk the different worlds. *Shrugging my shoulders* It's complicated. But when we're done it won't be visible to the mortals. If you have to do it and I'm not here you'll have to do it where it can be seen but I've seen our resident reaper-witch do it so looks like decorations.

So to do this, I'll need you to grab hold of my belt and not let go. If you do, you'll just fall back into this reality, so it's nothing to fear, but to learn you need to be with me.

Truely: Ok. This won’t be seen but if I have to use my blood to redo then make it look decorative. Got it. *I grin up at you.* I'm ready for the next step Zav. *I grab your belt tight as we shift into this, what I assume, is this half world you mentioned.*

Zav: *I mist into the interior of the bakery with Truely at my side and then reform, keeping us in the half-world*

So, *Materializing a thick artists brush* we're going to paint symbols on the windows about 2 feet apart all around the outside walls of this room. If I needed to I could even paint it on the half-world air itself and it would just float there. I just did that for an area in New York state. But that takes a level of power you won't have on your own so we'll do it this way. There are four symbols we are going to use. This one *Drawing the first* is the equivalent of Gandalf the Gray facing down the Balrog and shouting "You Cannot Pass". And this one *drawing a new one* is for reapers. And this one *moving along the window and dipping my brush in the grace again* is for demons. And this one is for angels. Because not all angels are your friend. And then you start all over again. When we get to the wall that separates the kitchen we want to be right up against it and then start up with the next one right up against it on the other side. The wall itself won't impede the magic. Want to try?

Truely: Yes! I like painting and these aren't overly complicated. I need to do this. *I dip the paint brush in the "grace" paint and mimic the symbols on the walls as he directed. When I finished the last one I turn to face you.* How was that? Did I do it right?

Zav: *Grins and pats my chest* I feel like a proud papa. You did great. We'll just continue this around and then mist upstairs to do it. *Working quickly, we finish the downstairs and move up to Truely's apartment.*

Truely: *I can't help but sneak glances at Zav as we work to protect my apartment. I know our time, for now, is just about to end and it's breaking my heart but I have to stay strong, I will stay strong.* Is that it then, we done?

Zav: *Smiling down at her* Almost. *Reforming in her dimension, I take the dagger and slice the other forearm to refill the small jar with grace, then bandaging it to match the other arm.*

If you have to do this where people can see it mix some of this with your blood. It will be almost as powerful as grace alone because of our connection. And combined it will kill the scent of blood make a nice purple shimmery color that will be easier to explain as decor. *When the jar is full I cap it tightly and hold my hand over it murmuring ag dúnadh go docht* When you need to open it say “oscailte” and then twist. *sitting it on the table and sighing* You don't know how much I really do not want to leave you. *drawing you into my arms again, I just hold you, memorizing the feel of you in my arms*

Truely: *I tighten my hold on you not wanting to release you but knowing I have to. I inhale your scent, I absorb your heat, and I kiss your shoulder tasting your skin.* Ok my Star. You have to go, so you can come back. And you WILL come back or I'll go find you...no matter where or what rules I have to break. Take my love with you and let it be your shield. *I step back a step and smile holding back the tears I feel forming*

Zav: *Fuck, how can I leave her, but how can I not? If Sin loses this fight all the worlds are screwed including this one. And they know about her now. They'll find her. I have to go. I have to fight, now more than ever. Reluctantly, I let her step away from me, letting my hands drop.*

It will be. It's my reason to survive this. *taking her hands and kissing her knuckles* I promise I /will/ come back. You are my heart and my soul. I will be back. *Stepping back, I mist away, calling to Celia to let her know I've gone and bidding her to guard my heart as I will guard hers. And now to find Sin.*

#TBC #Renegades #RRPG #DarkAngels #Creation #Rekindled #BDBAU #Reapers #Angels #Vampires #Wolven

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automatismoateo · 3 years

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15 arguments that PROVE Santa exists and DESTROY Santa deniers via /r/atheism

Submitted December 18, 2020 at 01:17PM by Phenenas (Via reddit https://ift.tt/2Kgr7bk) 15 arguments that PROVE Santa exists and DESTROY Santa deniers

1. Argument from Design

Every Christmas, a bunch of presents appear under my Christmas tree. I looked up pictures of the PS5 I might be getting if I’m nice, and it looks so beautiful that it can’t possibly have been made in a factory. No, the design is so complex and intricate that it must have been made by elves in Santa’s workshop. Therefore, Santa exists.

2. Argument from First Cause

Presents don’t just appear out of nowhere. You can’t just have a bunch of neatly wrapped gifts coming out of nothing. Every present must have a cause, and Santa is the only rational explanation I’ve heard that makes sense. Therefore, the first cause is Santa Claus.

3. Pascal’s Wager

Let’s say you’re a Santa denier, and it turns out you’re wrong. That means you’re in a world where grown-ups have to spend hundreds of dollars every Christmas, going through all kinds of stress, just to please their spoiled, thankless children. What kind of horrible world is that? Now let’s say you’re a Santa believer, and it turns out you’re wrong. That means you live in a wonderful world where a jolly man flies around and delivers free toys to all the boys and girls every year. I think it’s safer to bet on that option. Therefore, Santa exists.

4. Ontological Argument

Let us assume that Santa is a maximally jolly being, the most jolly creature possible. Just imagine his cherry-red nose, his twinkling eyes, his belly shaking like a bowl full of jelly. There’s nothing more jolly than that, right? Let us also assume that it’s theoretically possible for a maximally jolly being to exist. And thirdly, let us assume that it’s better to be jolly and spread joy as a real being in the real world rather than as a made-up fictional character. Would that not be a property of a maximally jolly being? Therefore, Santa exists.

5. Moral Argument

Every year, Santa keeps two lists containing all the children of the world: one for “nice” children, one for “naughty” children. This incentivizes children to be on their best behavior, so they don’t get a lump of coal in their stocking this Christmas. But if Santa doesn’t exist and people stop believing in him, what happens then? Then we have no universal standard of morality! If there is no standard for what is naughty or nice, all is permitted! There’ll be rioting in the streets! Ax murderers breaking down your doors! Maniacs poisoning the water tower! Nuclear armageddon! OH GOD WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE! Therefore, Santa exists.

6. Argument from Prayer

Last year, I got a Lego Star Wars X-Wing building kit. I asked for that in a letter specifically addressed to Santa Claus. I even wrote “The North Pole” on the envelope and my dad helped me put it in the mailbox. How could my request have been granted unless Santa exists?

7. Argument from Scripture

Okay, Santa denier, if Santa doesn’t exist, then who are all the elves working for in their workshop up at the North Pole? Who does Mrs. Claus bake cookies for all year? Who said “Rudolph, with your nose so bright, won’t you guide my sleigh tonight” to Rudolph? Dasher, Comet, Cupid, and the rest have all given personal testimonies that Santa exists. Therefore, he does.

8. Argument from Fine Tuning

Did you know that Santa’s body is so fat that it keeps the Earth weighted just enough that it stays in its proper orbit? If he didn’t exist, the Earth would either crash into the Sun or go careening off into space and freeze into a snowball. Thanks to Santa, we’re staying in the exact right spot where we can live and be happy and stuff. No, I won’t give sources.

9. Argument from Incredulity

Are you SERIOUSLY asking me to believe that EVERY SINGLE PARENT on the ENTIRE PLANET just HAPPENS to spend a fat wad of cash on toys EVERY December, and then they just HAPPEN to give it to their kids on the EXACT SAME DAY, EVERY SINGLE YEAR? I simply find that to be too much of a COINCIDENCE to believe. Therefore, Santa exists.

10. Lewis Trilemma

With regards to the story of Santa Claus, you can believe one of three things. One, that Santa is lying, and that he made up the whole story about himself. But what motivation does he have to do that? Two, that he’s a lunatic, some bearded madman who raves about magical floating reindeer. But if he is crazy, then why does he seem so happy and nice in all the cartoons? That leaves us with only one option left: that Santa is being truthful about what he’s saying, and truly brings us presents every year. Yep, there’s no possible fourth option here.

11. Jordan Peterson’s Argument

Do I believe in Santa Claus? Well, it depends what you mean by “believe”. If we examine the metaphysical architecture of belief as a function of Jungian analysis, then we can identify something resembling a Falstaffian archetype as a product of the collective subconscious of various hierarchies. And we must also define what it means to “exist”. If a product of traditional wisdom is so thoroughly intertwined with the hierarchies of pre-Dostoevsky Western society, and this patriarchal archetype functions in bestowing numinous meaning upon the individual and helping to combat the pathological shadow-dragon that lies within the superego, then who are these postmodern neo-Marxists to push an ideology which contends that Santa does not “exist” within these hierarchies? It also depends what you mean by “Santa”...

12. Argument from Conspiracy

It’s all a big cover-up! The government doesn’t want you to see it, but in Area 51, they’re hiding photos of Santa in his sleigh, half-eaten cookies with his DNA on it, even one of Rudolph’s turds! You brainwashed sheeple just go about your life with no idea that the deep state has been hiding Santa’s existence from you. The Illuminati has been sending secret UFOs to spy on your house and spray your Christmas trees with chemicals that will turn you into a soyboy! And the ringleader behind the whole thing?...the half-Reptilian half-cyborg known as BILL GATES!

13. Argument from Personal Experience

I sat on Santa’s lap in the mall once! Well...I know that wasn’t really him. But the real Santa talked to me one time...well, it was while I was high on ayahuasca. But okay, one time I felt really scared, and I just kinda felt like Santa was there. No, I didn’t see anything. Or hear anything. And nothing in particular really changed about my life, but I just kinda felt a little something, y’know?...Are you converted yet?

14. Ad Hominem

You know what? I’m tired of you arrogant Santa-deniers with your “science” that says a reindeer can’t fly. You all just believe this because there’s something wrong with YOU, and you just can’t stand the sight of Christmas cheer or joy. You all just hate the world, and you know what, I hate YOU! I HATE you all so much! You’re all just having a toxic circlejerk! Santa denialism is a religion! That Christmas song you quoted was out of context! You’re all just servants of the Grinch! YOU’RE ALL NAUGHTY AND YOU’LL GET A LUMP OF COAL THIS CHRISTMAS! YOU HEAR ME? COAL! I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

15. Argument from Honesty

My parents told me Santa exists, and I like them. If anyone tells me Santa doesn’t exist, I don’t like them. Therefore, Santa exists.

Happy holidays, Santa deniers!

#reddit

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joannalannister · 7 years

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The Dead Ladies Club

“Ladies die in childbed. No one sings songs about them.”

The Dead Ladies Club is a term I invented** circa 2012 to describe the pantheon of undeveloped female characters in ASOIAF from the generation or so before the story began.

It is a term that carries with it inherent criticisms of ASOIAF, which this post will address, in an essay in nine parts. The first, second, and third parts of this essay define the term in detail. Subsequent sections examine how these women were written and why this aspect of ASOIAF merits criticism, exploring the pervasiveness of the dead mothers trope in fiction, the excessive use of sexual violence in writing these women, and the differences in GRRM’s portrayals of male sacrifice versus female sacrifice in the narrative.

To conclude, I assert that the manner in which these women were written undermines GRRM’s thesis, and ASOIAF -- a series I consider to be one of the greatest works of modern fantasy -- is poorer because of it.

*~*~*~*~

PART I: WHAT IS THE DEAD LADIES CLUB?

Below is a list of women I personally include in the Dead Ladies Club. This list is flexible, but this is generally who people are talking about when they’re talking about the DLC:

Lyanna Stark

Elia Martell

Ashara Dayne

Rhaella Targaryen

Joanna Lannister

Cassana Estermont

Tysha

Lyarra Stark

the Unnamed Princess of Dorne (mother to Doran, Elia, and Oberyn)

Brienne’s Unnamed Mother

Minisa Whent-Tully

Bethany Ryswell-Bolton

EDIT - The Miller’s Wife - GRRM never named her, but she was raped by Roose Bolton and she gave birth to Ramsay

I might be forgetting someone

Most of the DLC are mothers, dead before the series began. I deliberately use the word “pantheon” when describing the DLC because, like the gods of ancient mythology, these women typically loom large over the lives of our current POVs, and it is their deification that is largely the problem. The women of the Dead Ladies Club tend to be either heavily romanticized or heavily villainized by the text, either up on a pedestal or down on their knees, to paraphrase Margaret Attwood. The DLC are written by GRRM as little more than male fantasies and tired tropes, defined almost exclusively by their beauty and desirability (or lack thereof). They have no voices of their own. Too often they are nameless. They are frequently the victims of sexual violence. They are presented with few or no choices in their stories, something I consider to be a particularly egregious oversight when GRRM says it is our choices which define us.

The space in the narrative given over to their humanity and their interiority (their inner lives, their thoughts and feelings, their existence as individuals) is minimal or nonexistent, which is quite a shame in a series that is meant to celebrate our common humanity. How can I have faith in the thesis of ASOIAF, that people’s “lives have meaning, not their deaths,” when GRRM created a coterie of women whose main if not sole purpose was to die?

I restrict the Dead Ladies Club to women one or two generations back because the Lady in question must have some immediate connection to a POV character or a second-tier character. These women tend to be of immediate importance to a POV character (mothers, grandmothers, etc), or at most they’re one character removed from a POV character in the main story (AGOT - ADWD+).

Example #1: Dany (POV) --> Rhaella Targaryen

Example #2: Davos (POV) --> Stannis --> Cassana Estermont

*~*~*~*~

PART II: "NOW SAY HER NAME.”

Lyanna Stark, “beautiful, willful, and dead before her time.” We know little about Lyanna other than how much men desired her. A Helen of Troy type figure, an entire continent of men fought and died because “Rhaegar loved his Lady Lyanna”. He loved her enough to lock her in a tower, where she gave birth and died. But who was she? How did she feel about any of these events? What did she want? What were her hopes, her dreams? On these, GRRM remains silent.

Elia Martell, “kind and clever, with a gentle heart and a sweet wit.” Presented in the narrative as a dead mother, a dead sister, a deficient wife who could bare no more children, she is defined solely by her relationships with various men, with no story of her own outside of her rape and murder.

Ashara Dayne, the maiden in the tower, the mother of a stillborn daughter, the beautiful suicide, we get no details of her personality, only that she was desired by Barristan the Bold and either (or perhaps both) Brandon or Ned Stark.

Rhaella Targaryen, a Queen of the Seven Kingdoms for more than 20 years. We know that Aerys abused and raped her to conceive Daenerys. We know that she suffered many miscarriages. But what do we know about her? What did she think of Aerys’s desire to make the Dornish deserts bloom? What did she spend 20 years doing when she wasn’t being abused? How did she feel when Aerys moved the court to Casterly Rock for almost a year? We don’t have answers to any of these questions. Yandel wrote a whole history book for ASOIAF giving us lots and lots of information on the personalities and quirks and fears and desires of men like Aerys and Tywin and Rhaegar, so I know who these men are in a way that I don’t know the women in canon. I don’t think it’s reasonable that GRRM left Rhaella’s humanity virtually blank when he had all of TWOIAF to elaborate on pre-series characters, and he could have easily made a little sidebar on Queen Rhaella. We have a lot of dairies and letters and stuff about the thoughts and feelings of real medieval queens, so why didn’t Yandel (and GRRM) give us a little more about the last Targaryen queen in the Seven Kingdoms? Why didn’t we even get a picture of Rhaella in TWOIAF?

Joanna Lannister, desired by both a King and a King’s Hand and made to suffer for it, she died giving birth to Tyrion. We know there was “love between” Tywin and Joanna, but details about her are few and far between. With many of these women, the scant lines in the text about them often leave the reader asking, “well, what does that mean exactly?” What does it mean exactly that Lyanna was willful? What does it mean exactly that Rhaella was mindful of her duty? Joanna is no exception, with GRRM’s teasing yet frustratingly vague remark that Joanna “ruled” Tywin at home. Joanna is merely the roughest sketch in the text, seen through a glass darkly.

Cassana Estermont. Honestly I tried to recall a quote about Cassana and I realized that there wasn’t one. She is the drowned lover, the dead wife, the dead mother, and we know nothing else.

Tysha, a teenage girl who was saved from rapers, only to be gang-raped on Tywin Lannister’s orders. Her whereabouts become something of a talisman for Tyrion in ADWD, as if finding her will free him from his dead father’s long, black shadow, but aside from the sexual violence she suffered, we know nothing else about this lowborn girl except that she loved a boy deemed by Westerosi society to be unloveable.

For Lyarra, Minisa, Bethany, and the rest, we know little more than their names, their pregnancies, and their deaths, and for some we don’t even have names.

I often include Lynesse Hightower and Alannys Greyjoy as honorary members, even though they’re obviously not dead.

I said above that the DLC are either up on a pedestal or down on their knees. Lynesse Hightower is both, introduced to us by Jorah as a love story out of the songs, and villainized as the woman who left Jorah to be a concubine in Lys. In Jorah’s words, he hates Lynesse, almost as much as he loves her. Lynesse’s story is defined by a lot of tired tropes; she is the “Stunningly Beautiful” “Uptown Girl” / “Rich Bitch” “Distracted by the Luxury” until she realizes Jorah is “Unable to support a wife”. (All of these are explained on tv tropes if you would like to read more.) Lynesse is basically an embodiment of the gold digger trope without any depth, without any subversion, without really delving into Lynesse as a person. Even though she’s still alive, even though lots of people still alive know her and would be able to tell us about her as a person, they don’t.

Alannys Greyjoy I personally include in the Dead Ladies Club because her character boils down to a “Mother’s Madness” with little else to her, even tho, again, she’s not dead.

When I include Lynesse and Alannys, every region in GRRM’s Seven Kingdoms has at least one of the DLC. That was something that stood out to me when I was first reading - how widespread GRRM’s dead mothers and cast off women are. It’s not just one mother, it’s not just one House, it’s everywhere in GRRM’s writing.

And when I say “everywhere in GRRM’s writing,” I mean everywhere. Mothers killed off-screen (typically in childbirth) before the story begins is a trope GRRM uses throughout his career, in Fevre Dream and Dreamsongs and Armageddon Rag and in his tv scripts. It’s unimaginative and lazy, to say the least.

*~*~*~*~

PART III: WHO ARE THEY NOT?

Long dead, historical women like Visenya Targaryen are not included in the Dead Ladies Club. Why, you ask?

If you go up to the average American on the street, they’ll probably be able to tell you something about their mother, or their grandmother, or their aunt, or some other woman in their lives who is important to them, and you can get an idea about who these women were/are as people. But the average American probably won’t be able to tell you a whole lot about Martha Washington, who lived centuries ago. (If you’re not American, substitute “Martha Washington” with the name of the mother of an important political figure who lived 300 years ago. I’m American, so this is the example I’m using. Also, I can already hear the history nerds piping up - sit down, you’re distinctly above average.)

In this same fashion, the average Westerosi should (misogyny aside) usually be able to tell you something about the important women in their lives. In real life history, kings and lords and other noblemen shared or preserved information about their wives or mothers or sisters or w/e, in spite of the extremely misogynistic medieval societies they lived in.

So this isn’t “OMG a woman died, be outraged!!1!” kind of thing. This isn’t that.

I generally limit the DLC to women who have died relatively recently in Westerosi history and who are denied their humanity in a way that their male contemporaries are not.

*~*~*~*~

PART IV: WHY DOES IT MATTER?

The Dead Ladies Club are the women of the previous one or two generations that we should know more about, but we don’t. We know little more about them than that they had children and they died. I don’t know these women, except through transformative fandom. I know a lot about the pre-series male characters in the text, but canon gives me almost nothing about these women.

To copy from another post of mine on this issue, it’s like the Dead Ladies exist in GRRM’s narrative solely to be abused, raped, give birth, and die, later to have their immutable likenesses cast in stone and put up on pedestals to be idealized. The women of the Dead Ladies Club aren’t afforded the same characterization and growth as pre-series male characters.

Think about Jaime, who, while not a pre-series character, is a great example of how GRRM can use characterization to play with his readers. We start off seeing Jaime as an asshole who pushes kids out of windows, and don’t get me wrong, he’s still an asshole who pushes kids out of windows, but he’s also so much more than that. Our perception as readers shifts and we understand that Jaime is so complex and multi-layered and grey.

With dead pre-series male characters, GRRM still manages to do interesting things with their stories, and to convey their desires, and to play with reader perceptions. Rhaegar is a prime example. Readers go from Robert’s version of the story that Rhaegar was a sadistic supervillain, to the idea that whatever happened between Rhaegar and Lyanna wasn’t as simple as Robert believed, and some fans even progress further to this idea that Rhaegar was highly motivated by prophecy.

But we don’t get that kind of character development with the Dead Ladies. For example, Elia exists in the narrative to be raped and to die, and to motivate Doran’s desires for justice and revenge, a symbol of the Dornish cause, a reminder by the narrative that it is the innocents who suffer most in the game of thrones. But we don’t know who she is as a person. We don’t know what she wanted in life, how she felt, what she dreamed of.

We don’t get characterization of the DLC, we don’t get shifts in perception, we barely get anything at all when it comes to these women. GRRM does not write pre-series female characters the same way he writes pre-series male characters. These women are not given space in the narrative the same way their male contemporaries are.

Consider the Unnamed Princess of Dorne, mother to Doran, Elia, and Oberyn. She was the only female ruler of a kingdom while the Robert’s Rebellion generation was coming up, and she is also the only leader of a Great House during that time period that we don’t have a name for.

The North? Ruled by Rickard Stark. The Riverlands? Ruled by Hoster Tully. The Iron Islands? Ruled by Quellon Greyjoy. The Vale? Ruled by Jon Arryn. The Westerlands? Ruled by Tywin Lannister. The Stormlands? Steffon, and then Robert Baratheon. The Reach? Mace Tyrell. But Dorne? Just some woman with no name, oops, who the hell cares, who even cares, why bother with a name, who needs one, it’s not like names matter in ASOIAF, amirite? //sarcasm//

We didn’t even get her name in TWOIAF, even though the Unnamed Princess was mentioned there. And this lack of a name is so very limiting - it is so hard to discuss a ruler’s policy and evaluate her decisions when the ruler doesn’t even have a name.

To speak more on the namelessness of women... Tysha didn’t get a name until ACOK. Although they were named in the appendices in book 1, neither Joanna nor Rhaella were named within the story until ASOS. Ned Stark’s mother wasn’t named until the family tree in the appendix of TWOIAF. And when will the Unnamed Princess of Dorne get a name? When?

As I think about this, I cannot help but think of this quote: “She hated the namelessness of women in stories, as if they lived and died so that men could have metaphysical insights.” Too often these women exist to further the male characters, in a way that doesn’t apply to men like Rhaegar or Aerys.

I don’t think that GRRM is leaving out or delaying these names on purpose. I don’t think GRRM is doing any of this deliberately. The Dead Ladies Club, imo, is the result of indifference, not malevolence.

But these kinds of oversights like the Princess of Dorne not having a name are, in my opinion, indicative of a much larger trend -- GRRM refuses these dead women space in the narrative while affording significant space to the dead/pre-series male characters. This issue, imo, is relevant to feminist spatial theory, or the ways in which women inhabit or occupy space (or are prevented from doing so). Some feminist scholars argue that even conceptual “places” or “spaces” (like a narrative or a story) have an influence on people’s political power, culture, and social experience. Such a discussion is probably beyond the scope of this post, but basically it’s argued that women/girls are socialized to take up less space than men in their surroundings. So when GRRM refuses narrative space to pre-series women in a way that he does not do to pre-series men, I feel like he is playing into misogynistic tropes and tendencies rather than subverting them.

*~*~*~*~

PART V: THE DEATH OF THE MOTHER

Given that many of the DLC (although not all) were mothers, and that many died in childbirth, I want to examine this phenomenon in more detail, and discuss what it means for the Dead Ladies Club.

Popular culture has a tendency to prioritize fatherhood by marginalizing motherhood. (Look at Disney’s long history of dead or absent mothers, storytelling which is merely a continuation a much older fairytale tradition of the “symbolic annihilation” of the mother figure.) Audiences are socialized to view mothers as “expendable,” while fathers are “irreplaceable”:

This is achieved by not only removing the mother from the narrative and undermining her motherwork, but also by obsessively showing her death, again and again. […] The death of the mother is instead invoked repeatedly as a romantic necessity […] there appears to be a reflex in mainstream popular visual culture to kill off the mother. [x]

For me, the existence of the Dead Ladies Club is perpetuating the tendency to devalue motherhood, and unlike so much else about ASOIAF, it’s not original, it’s not subversive, and it’s not great writing.

Consider Lyarra Stark. In GRRM’s own words, when asked who Ned Stark’s mother was and how she died, he tells us laconically, “Lady Stark. She died.” We know nothing of Lyarra Stark, other than that she married her cousin Rickard, gave birth to four children, and died during or after Benjen’s birth. It’s another example of GRRM’s casual indifference toward and disregard for these women, and it’s very disappointing coming from an author who is otherwise so amazing. If GRRM can imagine a world as rich and varied as Westeros, why is it so often the case that when it comes to the female relatives of his characters, all GRRM can imagine is that they suffer and die?

Now, you might be saying, “dying in childbirth is just something that happens to women, so what’s the big deal?” Sure, women died in childbirth in the Middle Ages at an alarming rate. Let’s assume that Westerosi medicine closely approximates medieval medicine - even if we make that assumption, the rate at which these women are dying in childbirth in Westeros is inordinately high compared to the real Middle Ages, statistically speaking. But here’s the kicker: Westerosi medicine is not medieval. Westerosi medicine is better than medieval medicine. To paraphrase my friend @alamutjones, Westeros has better than medieval medicine, but worse than medieval outcomes when it comes to women. GRRM is putting his finger down on the scales here. And it’s lazy.

Childbirth, by definition, is a very gendered death. And it’s how GRRM defines these women - they gave birth, and they died, and nothing else about them matters to him. (“Lady Stark. She died.”) Sure, there’s some bits of minutia we can gather about these women if we squint. Lyanna was said to be willful, and she had some sort of relationship with Rhaegar Targaryen that the jury is still out on, but her consent was dubious at best. Joanna was happily married, and she was desired by Aerys Targaryen, and she may or may not have been raped. Rhaella was definitely raped to conceive Daenerys, who she died giving birth to.

Why are these women treated in such a gendered manner? Why did so many mothers die in childbirth in ASOIAF? Fathers don’t tend to die gendered deaths in Westeros, so why isn’t the cause of death more varied for women?

And why are so many women in ASOIAF defined by their absence, as black holes, as negative space in the narrative?

The same cannot be said of so many fathers in ASOIAF. Consider Cersei, Jaime, and Tyrion, but whose father is a godlike-figure in their lives, both before and after his death. Even dead, Tywin still rules his children’s lives.

It’s the relationship between child and father (Randyll Tarly, Selwyn Tarth, Rickard Stark, Hoster Tully, etc) that GRRM gives so much weight to relative to the mother’s relationship, with notable exceptions found in Catelyn Stark and Cersei Lannister. (Though with Cersei, I think it could be argued that GRRM isn’t subverting anything -- he’s playing into the dark side of motherhood, and the idea that mothers damage their children with their presence -- which is basically the flip side of the dead mother trope -- but this post is already a ridiculous length and I’m not gonna get into this here.)

*~*~*~*~

PART VI: THE DLC AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE

Despite his claims to historical verisimilitude, GRRM made Westeros more misogynistic than the real Middle Ages. Considering that the details of their sexual violence is the primary information we have about the DLC, why is so much sexual violence necessary?

I discuss this issue in depth in my tag for #rape culture in Westeros, but I think it deserves to be touched on here, at least briefly.

Girls like Tysha are defined by the sexual violence they experienced. We know about Tysha’s gang rape in book 1, but we don’t even learn her name until book 2. So many of the DLC are victims of sexual violence, with little or no attention given to how this violence affected them personally. More attention is given to how the sexual violence affected the men in their lives. With each new sexual harassment Joanna suffered because of Aerys, we know per TWOIAF that Tywin cracked a little more, but how did Joanna feel? We know that Rhaella had been abused to the point that it appeared that a beast had savaged her, and we know that Jaime felt extremely conflicted about this because of his Kingsguard oaths, but how did Rhaella feel, when her abuser was her brother-husband? We know more about the abuse these women suffered than we do about the women themselves. The narrative objectifies rather than humanizes the DLC.

Why did GRRM’s messianic characters have to be conceived through rape? The mother figure being raped and sacrificed for the messiah/hero is an old and tired fantasy trope, and GRRM does it not once, but two (or possibly even three) times. Really, GRRM? Really? GRRM doesn’t need to rely on raped dead mothers as part of his store-bought tragic backstory. GRRM can do better than that, and he should do better. (Further discussion in my tag for #gender in ASOIAF.)

*~*~*~*~

PART VII: MALE SACRIFICE, FEMALE SACRIFICE, AND CHOICE

Now, you might be asking, “It’s normal for male characters to sacrifice themselves, so why can’t women sacrifice themselves for the messiah? Isn’t female sacrifice subversive?”

Male sacrifice and female sacrifice are often not the same in popular culture. To boil it down - men sacrifice, while women are sacrificed.

Women dying in childbirth to give birth to the messiah isn’t the same thing as male characters making some grand last stand with guns blazing to give the Messianic Hero the chance to Do The Thing. The male characters who get to go out guns blazing choose that fate; it’s the end result of their characterization to do so. Think of Syrio Forel. He chooses to sacrifice himself to save one of our protagonists.

But women like Lyanna and Rhaella and Joanna they didn’t get a choice, were afforded no grand moment of existential victory that was the culmination of their characters; they just died. They bled out, they got sick, they were murdered -- they-just-died. There was no grand choice to sacrifice themselves in favor of saving the world, there was no option to refuse the sacrifice, there wasn’t any choice at all.

And that’s key. That’s what lies at the heart of all of GRRM’s stories: choice. As I said here,

“Choice […]. That’s the difference between good and evil, you said. Now it looks like I’m the one got to make a choice” (Fevre Dream). In GRRM’s own words, “That’s something that’s very much in my books: I believe in great characters. We’re all capable of doing great things, and of doing bad things. We have the angels and the demons inside of us, and our lives are a succession of choices.” It’s the the choices that hurt, the choices where good and evil hang in the balance – these are the choices in which “the human heart [is] in conflict with itself,” which GRRM considers to be “the only thing worth writing about”.

Men like Aerys and Rhaegar and Tywin make choices in ASOIAF; women like Rhaella don’t have any choices at all in the narrative.

Does GRRM not find the stories of the Dead Ladies Club worth writing about? Was there no moment in GRRM’s mind when Rhaella or Elia or Ashara felt conflicted in their hearts, no moment they felt their loyalties divided? How did Lynesse feel choosing concubinage? What of Tysha, who loved a Lannister boy, but was gang-raped at the hands of House Lannister? How did she feel?

It would be very different if we were told about the choices that Lyanna and Rhaella and Elia made. (Fandom often speculates about whether, for example, Lyanna chose to go with Rhaegar, but the text remains silent on this issue as of ADWD. GRRM remains silent on these women’s choices.)

It would be different if GRRM explored their hearts in conflict, but we’re not told anything about that. It would be subversive if these women actively chose to sacrifice themselves, but they didn’t.

Dany is probably being set up as a woman who actively chooses to sacrifice herself to save the world, and I think that’s subversive, a valiant and commendable effort on GRRM’s part to tackle this dichotomy between male sacrifice and female sacrifice. But I don’t think it makes up for all of these dead women sacrificed in childbirth with no choice.

*~*~*~*~

PART VIII: CONCLUSIONS

I hope this post serves as a working definition of the Dead Ladies Club, a term which, at least for me, carries a lot of criticism of the way GRRM handles these female characters. The term encompasses the voicelessness of these women, the excessive and highly gendered abuse they suffered, and their lack of characterization and agency.

GRRM calls his characters his children. I feel like these dead women -- the mothers, the wives, the sisters -- I feel like these women were GRRM’s stillborn children, with nothing left of them but a name on a birth certificate, and a lot of lost potential, and a hole where the heart once was in someone else’s story. From my earliest days on tumblr, I wanted to give voice to these voiceless women. Too often they were forgotten, and I didn’t want them to be.

Because if they were forgotten -- if all they were meant to do was die -- how could I believe in ASOIAF?

How can I believe that “men’s lives have meaning, not their deaths” if GRRM created this group of women merely to be sacrificed? Sacrificed for prophecy, or for someone else’s pain, or simply for the tragedy of it all?

How can I believe in all the things ASOIAF stands for? I know that GRRM does a great job with Sansa and Arya and Dany and all the other female POVs, and I admire him for it.

But when ASOIAF asks, “what is the life of one bastard boy against a kingdom?" What is one life worth, when measured against so much? And Davos answers, softly, “Everything” ... When ASOIAF says that ... when ASOIAF says that one life is worth everything, how can people tell me that these women don’t matter?

How can I believe in ASOIAF as a celebration of humanity, when GRRM dehumanizes and objectifies these women?

The treatment of these women undermines ASOIAF’s central thesis, and it didn’t need to be like this. GRRM is better than this. He can do better.

I want to be wrong about all this. I want GRRM to tell us in TWOW all about Lyanna’s choices, and I want to learn the name of the Unnamed Princess, and I want to know that three women weren’t raped to fulfill GRRM’s prophecy. I want GRRM to breathe life into them, because I consider him to be the best fantasy writer alive.

But I don’t know that he will do that. The best I can say is, I want to believe.

*~*~*~*~

“Ladies die in childbed. No one sings songs about them.”

But I sing of them. I do. Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story...

*~*~*~*~

PART IX: FOOTNOTES AND MISCELLANEOUS

**I am 90% certain that I am the person who invented the term “Dead Ladies Club”, but I am not 100% certain. It sounds like a name I would make up, but a lot of my friends who I would talk to about this on their blogs in 2011 and 2012 have long since deleted, so I can’t find the first time I used the term, and I can’t remember anymore. Some things that should not have been forgotten were lost, history became legend, legend became myth, y'all know the drill.

To give you a little more about the origins of this term, I created my sideblog @pre-gameofthrones because I wanted a place for the history of ASOIAF, but mostly I wanted a place where these women could be brought to life. During my early days in fandom, so many people around here were writing great fanfiction featuring these women, fleshing out these women’s thoughts and feelings, bringing them to life and giving them the humanity that GRRM denied them. I wasn’t very interested in transformative works before ASOIAF, but suddenly I needed a place to preserve all of these fanfics about these women. Perhaps it sounds silly, but I didn’t want these women to suffer a second “death” and to be forgotten a second time with people deleting their blogs and posts getting lost in tumblr’s terrible organization system.

Over the years, so many other people have talked about and celebrated the Dead Ladies Club: @poorshadowspaintedqueens, @cosmonauthill, @lyannas, @rhaellas, @ayllriadayne, @poorquentyn, @goodqueenaly, @arielno, @gulbaharsultan, @racefortheironthrone and so many others, but these were the people I remembered off the top of my head, and I wanted to list them here because they all have such great things to say about this, so check them out, go through their archives, ask them stuff, because they’re wonderful!

#asoiaf meta #the dead ladies club #rhaella targaryen #elia martell #lyanna stark #joanna lannister #asoiaf #feminist spatial theory #lynesse hightower #lannister thoughts #gender in asoiaf #ashara dayne #cassana estermont #tysha #the princess of dorne #the unnamed princess of dorne

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idontlikethisaccount · 5 years

Text

Her.

Based on the writing prompt, "Every 100,00 years, God restarts the universe, including mankind. Last time, God started with Adam and Eve. This time, God starts with two new people. The problem, however, is that you've somehow managed to survive the reset, and keep all your memories. Additionally, it appears that you've stopped aging entirely."

~~~

From behind a tree of what I had quickly learned was the garden of Aiden, I watched the couple meet. There were some similarities. The trees were still filled with apples, only they were pink. There were flowers that seemed like prehistoric lilacs, next to vibrant teal ones with no name. The world seemed more saturated, more colorful, slightly more square. But the biggest change was from the two people only a couple meters away. Their leaves didn't need to be on their chests. One was muscular, the other thin and scrawny. Their tails swung gently under them. One of them glanced in my direction, and I hid away. The feeling of being watched didn't leave as he looked away. As I realized just what having two men in the garden meant, a shrieky voice rang out. "ALPHA ADAM AND BETA STEVE, SONS OF GOD." The voice declared. "THOU SHALL BRING UPON THE NEW WORLD. UWU." I clamped my hand over my mouth, trying not to scream. "UwU." They said back. I had to hear them say that. I had to watch Li'l Cider get Steve to bite into the apples, which turned out to be the most primal form of drug. The world hated me. It sounded like God was a 13-year old girl. I wanted to die. But as the years went on, I found I simply couldn't.

~~~

The good thing about being immortal was that I couldn't die. If I broke through skin, there was something like a barrier underneath. During my darkest times, I sat and watched that translucent barrier shimmer in the night before my skin quickly regenerated. The bad thing about being immortal was that I couldn't die. It was so lonely. I couldn't get on Noah's arc - one family per species, he said. I watched the unicorns pile in in my place. Instead, I had a rickety little boat. Halfway through the purge, a wave pushed me off. I breathed in water on purpose. It was agony, but only for a bit. The world looked so pretty under the waves. I stayed down there for a couple weeks.

~~~

I watched Jesus cry on the giant cross, a capitalized T this time around. The guard look at the sun, sweat dripping into his prismarine armor. A man glanced at me, and I tightened the shawl around me head. I nervously scratched at my aching binder. I had to pass, or else they'd find out. I had already become an outcast for not having a tail, or the right ears. But if they knew I was the only girl in a literal world of men . . . I don't know what would happen then. I watched the guard check the sun again, declare it had been 30 minutes, then take Jesus out of his timeout. I wanted to go home so badly I shook a little.

~~~

I didn't breathe anymore. I didn't have to. I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was John, my friend for this century. "Michael," he started, obviously nervous. "You are a being shrouded with mystery. You share no tales, you hint no clues. And yet here you stand, with no tail nor role to your name, yet ageless beauty. And though I am paralyzed, I must speak the truth. I wish to love you, Michael."

I looked out, gazing across the indigo ocean from the S.S.South. It was not my first confession, nor would it be my last. I always ended up doing the same thing.

"You mortals are fascinating. You live so slow, yet so fast. Your love is quick, yet eternal. Your deaths are sudden, and they have no purpose. You make meaning out of nothing. Amazing."

Yes. I pull some vampire romance bs out of my butt while giving a grim smile.

Luckily, John let out a nervous laugh. Hopefully he was having second thoughts. "S-surely you jest?"

I laughed too, and grabbed my buckled hat out of instinct. "Perhaps. My world is one of fantasy. But I cannot accept your confession. There is only one person whose love I must gain. I don't know if I shall ever find her."

"Her?"

"Yes, her." I hesitated. You'd think that after being alive for thousands of years, I'd remember some words didn't exist anymore. "it's an . . . Ancient word. From my hometown. It means "the one I love". I apologise, but you are not her."

He nodded, big ears drooping, and turned away. I didn't move for a second, but saw a man glanced at me and quickly looked back out into the ocean. I had definitely thought about having a purpose. But with the literal child of the Justice clothing store and furry fanfiction running the town (did I mention the boat was pink?), It seemed pretty slim that that was the case. Especially since there was no such thing as "her." Still, it was nice to think about.

~~~

I denied being a witch. I knew no matter how much skin they scorched off, I'd be fine. But I wanted to see how far they would go. I fought the special red-and-white striped rope bonds a little, grinning. I had reverted back to an edgy way of living, just in time for the warlock trials. Even better, in this timeline, it was universal, and I was actually pretty sure warlocks were real. Maybe I was a warlock - well, a witch, - and I just hadn't realized my powers yet. I heard whispers and shouts as I passed by.

"I heard Cider himself cut off his tail!"

"What are those things on his head?"

"Neither alpha not beta . . . "

"Always an outcast, always a warlock!"

I stepped up onto the wood, smiling. A hundred or more eyes stared up at me as I was bound to a pole. I smiled; I hadn't had this many eyes on me since before the first Armageddon. They lit the match. And then there was screaming. From them, from me. I felt every lick of flame. It was only when I felt something near my chest snap that faintly I realized my mistake through the mind-numbing pain. My badly made binder had broken. If they saw through the flames, they would be able to see that I'm wronger than they ever thought. I struggled through my rope ties, surely scaring everyone around me. The second I felt them loosen, I ran.

~~~

When someone is so utterly suicidal that they would gladly jump into extraordinarily deadly situations just because it felt nice, war seemed like the perfect choice. I took bullets like they were little spitballs being thrown my way. I treated myself like little more than a fleshy punching bag. I made excuses as to why I was still alive, why it took me so long to realize we were retreating, why I seemed to have a death wish. I was able to laugh it off. I kept fabric over my ears, a homemade binder on my chest, and a hole in my heart at all times. As I ran in front of someone to feel pain spread from my arm, I never wished more for that dumb kid in the sky to kill me.

~~~

I sat in my room, drunkenly looking at the small pile of pages in front of me. When I first came to this world, I had grabbed a bit of charcoal and tree bark, and I wrote down as much as I could remember. As the centuries passed on, they were written and rewritten, edited constantly to make more of a story than a documentary. Constantly getting longer and longer as I quickly realized just how much a person's mind wasn't supposed to handle so much memory. And there they were. I thought about my bad job. I thought about my broken, dinky little apartment. I thought about me. And I grabbed my age-old computer and started to write.

~~~

I was at a book signing, my fears about being found out stuck in the back of my head. I called my ears a mutation, my lack of tail a birth defect. I questioned my sanity, wondering if they were really just that. I wrote the hole in my heart into pages of writing, and came out with a "fantasy" where the world was slightly different, and they all looked like me. I wrote a series on that topic. I wrote stories about aliens and existentialism, and the people loved it. I called up the next in line.

"You're Her."

"Hmm? Yes, that's my pen name."

"No. You're Her. It means the one I love."

My face blanched. I hadn't written that in my books.

I signed three more guys, and then went for lunch with him.. His name was Jackson, and he told me he had seen paintings of us together. He had read his great-something grandfather John's diary. He read about Her. He didn't think I was real. I said I wasn't sure if I was either. We laughed and talked a bit more. After listening to me for a bit, he told me whether I had been alive for hundreds of years or not, I should get a therapist. I agreed. We never spoke again.

~~~

I kept nervously checking my phone. Today was the day. After thousands of years of contact, it was finally the same day everyone died. I don't know why I kept track of the date, but I was pretty sure today was the Armageddon day. I chose a nice spot in the park, being as close to nature as one could get in the city. And I waited. And waited. People walked past. A dog sniffed at me. The warmth of the sun made me tired, and I started drifting away.

The sound of someone sitting down startled me awake. It was a guy with shaggy hair and a big sunhat, watching the pond in front of us with a little grin on his face. A little strange, but seeing as I existed, it wasn't too bad.

"Lovely afternoon, isn't it?"

"I Guess."

"I love to come watch the sunsets, though it hasn't started yet."

I gave him a look. "Uh-huh."

"Wish I had brought a book with me, or some birdseed, but-"

I held up a hand. "Look, did you need anything? I'm in the middle of being stood up by the universe."

He stopped his chattering and looked at me, confused. "What were you waiting for?"

"Armageddon."

"Ah." Surprisingly, he just nodded and looked back towards the pond. I left soon after.

Armageddon didn't happen.

~~~

I came back the next week. He was there.

"I feel like I've seen before. On a boat or something."

I laughed at that. "You haven't. It's been ages since I was on a boat."

"It's been ages for me too."

"I've been off longer. Promise."

~~~

I jumped as the man tapped my hand. I yanked it away as fast as physically possible.

"Don't touch me."

The man raised his hands apologetically. "Sorry! I just wanted to ask you something."

I rubbed my arm, my skin screaming. Touch starvation was real, kiddos. "Well you can do it without touching me?"

"Why are you so angry?"

I paused, then sighed a little. Time for more vampire novels. ". . . I know it doesn't look like it, but I've been alive for a very long time. And I haven't been treated nicely during that time." I hesitated. That was probably too much information. "Nothing too bad, but still. At this point I think I'm just lonely." I looked over, faking a little grin. "Plus, I was really hoping for that Armageddon thing."

The man let out a barely-there chuckle. It didn't seem genuine, though. "What about you?" I asked.

He looked startled, but smiled after a moment. "Well, I'm not really angry, but I'm kind of sad. I've been alive longer than you, and it's been . . . tiring. Too many things have happened to too many people. It's too easy to lose faith in humanity." It got quiet.

Time for a mood change. "You haven't lived longer than me."

He sighed. "Believe me, I have."

Yeah, right. "Try me. Age?"

"Uh, e-eighty seven!" I gave him a look, then burst out laughing.

"No you're not! You look like your 20-something!"

He huffed, but started to grin." Well then, what about you, junior?"

"Oh, you wanna fight? I've been alive since the beginning of time!"

"Hah! As if!"

"I have! I was in the Garden of Aiden, I saw the two holy losers we call our ultimate grandparents!"

"Uh-huh. Sure."

I threw up my hands "I have!"

"Well, if you've really lived for thousands of years, then it must get lonely. How about a friend?" I must've had a look, because he quickly continued. "Or at least a name? I can't keep calling you 'random guy' in my head."

Screw it. He could be this century's friend. For however long it lasts. I held out a hand. ". . . Um, sure. For both. I'm Michael. Just Michael."

He shook it happily. "Sarah Worth."

"Weird name."

"Yeah, it's a family name."

"Cool." I wondered where he came from. I had never heard of a name that feminine before.

~~~

It became a trend. I threw out some birdseed. "Here's a fun fact: Michael's actually a cover name. I got it back during the creation of America. It's been so long since I've heard my actual name that I've forgotten what I used to be called."

Sarah looked at me, impressed. "Wow. You have a lot of stories, don't you?"

"As I've said. I've lived a long time."

A look crossed his face for a second. "Um. Do you have a number? I'd love to hear more over some coffee." Oh no.

"I . . . I don't know."

"You don't have a phone?"

"No, I . . . I know it's weird that I keep saying I've lived forever and stuff, but it's true enough. And I haven't ever hooked up with someone, because I don't want to watch them die. I've always left friends after a couple of years so I didn't have to watch them die. I don't want to watch you die." It got quiet.

He almost grabbed my hand, but stopped and set it on the bench instead. "It doesn't have to be forever. It'll be a long, long time before I, or any other friends you have die. And I . . . I- it doesn't have to be a date. Just . . . A scenery change. Okay?"

I stared Sarah down, thinking. Then I nodded. "You know what? Sure."

~~~

I decided, after a while, that Sarah was Her. I decided after it became official, after hundreds of dates, after she moved in with me. Even a century later she was still Her.

"Hey, I'm gonna start calling you Shelly cause you need a girl name." She mumbled in her sleep once.

"Oh my God I love you."

~~~

There was fire. Screaming. The very familiar sense of boiling hot, creamy pain as the world was cast into the sun. And then . . .

~~~

They called it the Empire this time, despite it still being a garden. They weren't apples this time, either, but some weird, lumpy purple things, like if grapes and strawberries had a child. It seemed as though I would really live forever. I was crushed at first. And then I wasn't.

"Do you think there'll be more?" I asked Sarah from up on the wall barrier.

"Maybe. Probably. I mean, I was here a world before you."

"Let's try to find them."

We watched two figures step into partial view. It was hard to see, but I was pretty sure I saw a vague outline of a woman. And a tail. Good enough for me.

There was a flash of red in one of the back corners, but when my head snapped over, it was gone. Probably nothing. I nudged Sarah.

"Hey, you think I could try to shapeshift into something? Like- like a snake?"

She gave me the Look. "Are you really gonna try at being a devil?"

"Hey, we're immortal. Maybe we're more than that. Just let me try. Please babe. Please."

She glared at my puppy eyes, then groaned "You are insufferable."

I kissed her cheek and stood up giddily. "Love ya too, babe."

I jumped off the wall excitedly, trying to think really hard about how much I wanted to be a snake. I hoped my girlfriend thought it was amusing. And as I heard the deep voice of the new God of the world, I decided that wherever we were, whatever was happening, it was good enough for me.

#this took me a week #gay #lesbians #immortal #writing prompt #sad lesbian #help her #she gets helped

0 notes

noahpoligy · 5 years

Text

An entire “album”, written on 9/13/2019

So I got super inspired in the bathroom to “write an album” whatever that means. So, I sat down, and forced to write a ton of lyrics all in one sitting. The most I’ve ever written has been 2-3 songs at once, and well, here’s 10. I started grasping at straws towards the ends, whatever was coming to mind honestly. I was listening to “Rape Me” by Nirvana in the shower and I thought to myself “Why not change that to “Hate me”, because I personally feel like I have a fair share of haters, but none of them hate me as much as I hate certain aspects about myself, ya know? Anywho, I might fuck around and see if I can find demo versions of songs w/o lyrics or whatever and see if I can produce any of these into actual listenable songs. We’ll see. Sadly, my motivation goes away with as I sleep. It took me 3 hours to write all of this, and honestly I think I should mention that it’s a bit funny comparing the second thing I wrote to the last.

So I guess this is a “light” concept album. I think the one present theme that all these share is self perception and belief in one’s emotions and beliefs. I’m pretty tired as I right this, I can’t think of the word for that, if there is one. I’ll probably rewrite aspects of tracks 1, 4, 6, and 7. 1 looks too much like Rape Me, 4 needs “more”, I’d honestly like a rap section in there, 6 I’m just unhappy with some of the lines, it comes off as corny to me. 7 needs a chorus and the ending I just randomly threw in, so that needs to be fixed too.

Track 1: Hate Me

I hate me

You hate me, and my friends

hate me

I’m not the only one

I hate me

I’ll say it again and again

You’re a waste to me

You hate me and my friends

I’m not the only one

Every time I do anything it’s for the worst

A kiss would tag you as a whore

I appreciate your concern

I’d like you to die so you can burn

I hate me

You hate me my friend

Hate me

Hate me and my friends

I’m not the only one

I hate me

hate me

It sates me

========================================================

Track 2: Something More

She waits at windows

She daydreams all day

And sleeps away her frowns, for now

She just waits around wishing she

Could meet that single another

At night in a parking lot wearing that new dress she bought

Only for her to go back home, she’s let down easy

She goes out to buy a drink

I noticed the one Friday she didn’t, she was locked up high

There’s something about her innocence

That makes her chafe for love

And she’s down to explain what she’s looking for

She says she wants me and will help me become someone more

Dead leaves, the sky desolate of summer

I’m underage so I’ll stand outside while you get the drinks

Tomorrow you can smoke me out, and we can hang around the cemetery

Do we need each other?

We’re two discount lives without any numbers in our bank accounts

Do you think that if I wait around that maybe she

Might go back to her room and say it was all a lie?

She’ll tell her parents that she doesn’t know my name and I’ll sigh

Get out of my head demon, you’re dismissed

I will change for love

And she explained how long she’s waited for

Something more

Come, Goodbye, I might just see you another night, and if you don’t I understand if you can’t find that definite reason why you should stay. I’ll watch you walk away

She says that she will change for love

And she explains how long she’s waited for something more

And as these days go by, it ends that track of how long we’ve waited for

In love there’s more

In love there’s something more.

============================================================

Track 3: Self-Faith

Wrap me up in my true skin

Drag me in front of my mother’s eyes

My innocence is tragic

My innocence is damned

And in a sense I’m gifted because of it all

I can breathe underwater

I can fly high in the sky

I can burrow deep inside my chest

and stab another with my teeth

and I live underground

If you spend your love around me

You’ll know fantasies beyond your wildest dreams

And before you know it, your love is gone

Cause there’s nothing as awkward as what I see

And in your fear, you’ll disappear.

You saw my dreams, you saw death.

I believe in no one

I believe in another way

But my beliefs are not noticed

My beliefs are all held of faith

Faith in me, and that’s why I must escape

And in this ring our wedding will be true

And with this wring I will separate us in two

And with this ring you’ll see what’s in my head

And inside you’ll find the truth

Now let me tell you, if you spend your love around

We’ll enact our fantasies so they’re no longer dreams

You’ll find that your love is hard

And that it’s exactly what it seems

And no one will disappear

Even during the darkest hour

To the revelations

To the fresh baked victims

To the weak that have succumbed

They hate me

So speak your peace

While the drum drowns you out

You’re not wasting

A single breath at all

Because strength is your weakness

Your weakness is your hate

And it’s something you just can’t explain

You’re sniffing on some roses

They’re so beautiful

You’re getting so lost inside their smell

The others have come, to make you dumb

The others have come, to hold you down

The others have come, to hold, you, down

========================================================

Track 4: Run Away

Monkey see monkey do, run away

Fuck around and follow you, run away

I don’t like you, I’ll keep it in, run away

Another fool with pencilled skin, run away

There he is, take him out, run away

He never laughs he never smiles, run away

He can’t run he’s a cripple, run away

Let’s beat his ass, it’s good fun, run away

Run away Run Away

Run Away

Monkey see monkey do, run away

Fuck around and follow you, run away

Cut him up but keep it in, run away

Another fool with poisoned skin, run away

Run Away Runaway

Run Away

Run Away Runaway

Run Away

Away, Runaway

Run Away

Don’t Stay

Run Away

Don’t Stay

Get Away

Rat-a-tat-tat.

========================================================

Track 5: Who the Fuck Are You?

You say I’m gonna fall

Well I can’t wait to let you down

You say I’m gonna fail

We all know you’re a fucking joke

Get out.

You’ve lost equality.

Get out.

You’re below a fail.

Can anyone anywhere believe that you’re true?

Does anyone anywhere wanna be you?

You say I’m a faggot

Well at least I’m not a bigot, kid

You say I’m lucky

It takes knowledge to play the cards

Get out.

You’re a waste of sperm.

Anyone anywhere can beat you

Does anyone anywhere actually wanna face you?

Who’d wanna bother with you?

I guess I’d like to, bring it fucker.

Lousy, you’re knocked out sky high

You’re flat out dead in the head

Does anyone wanna support you?

Does anyone anywhere actually believe in you?

Does anyone anywhere wanna be you?

Do you wanna be you?

=========================================================

Track 6: Family Crest

I bathe in silence

I want you to notice

I’ve got a god complex

I already know I’m gonna pass the test

I’m on fire

I’d hold on their hearts from the inside

And squirm myself inside and take control

I want everything they have and I want it now

I’ll find a way

Today I can waste away

I once flew away

Far away, from all of this, and I nearly died

Miserable dust and homeless mutts

Hating my face and wanting to wither away without a trace

I didn’t hate anything else but my own and me.

I’m gonna bleed

To make me believe

That my hearts still there

But is it really? I need a fucking shovel

I’ll clean off the dust, our faces will meet

I disconnected by cutting the string

Anytime that you’d try to talk to me

I bathe in silence

I want you to notice

I’ve got a god complex

I already know I’m gonna pass the test

I’m on fire

I’ll hold onto their brains from the inside

I’ve got their heads believing in me

It’s not enough I want fucking more

I wanna bleed

To make them believe

Someone hurt me

So then maybe I’ll feel something

===========================================================

Track 7: Horribly Ever After

Let out the stampeding horses

Suffer in your suburban houses

Withdraw from the taste of the devil and God’s affair falling from the sky

Scream all you want you’re in a silent movie

Kiss up each other while your lives go tick tock

Beached by the groupies that are sick of your stuck-up hinds

Vacant is your deposition

Dead is your fleet of propogandic sources

Your sister is actually your aunt your father had an incestual affair

You scoffed away the very true sources

You chose to go to war against another’s imaginary friend

Blood is the key to eternal life and that’s why Earth wants more death

It’s about time

It’s about, concluding you

Black skies bring fears

Unleash armageddon, tute yourself and say one final prayer

it’ll be one last moment before you’re off where you belong my dear

Lust for a reality that is like the movies

A life where you survive the locusts

It all goes away when a angels voice says you’re damned for eternity for being a stupid sheep, you need to be fucking sheered.

It’s about time. Maybe now you can see

Too bad you suck

Too bad you’re dumb

You looked directly at the sun and now you can’t see

This is the final message

Soon you’ll be stabbed by the ancient armies

Death by thousands of roses

It’ll take years but that’s what you deserve

You’ll be raped by the soldiers

They’ll embroider their band on your skull

You’ll probably enjoy it, it’s like your inverted cross tattoo

I guess you got what you desired, your spot in hell.

Black skies bring blood

Black skies bring flood

Black skies bring you

Black lies bring truth

==========================================================

Track 8: Hysteria

I woke up to a message of love

Though I don’t think we’ve ever spoke on the phone

I’m obsessed with the poison of us

I wonder why I can’t seem to find one to trust

Is there even a soul living inside of ya?

Oh yeah oh no, there’s nothing in that stereo baby

I’d try to bridge on over and see what’s up but it’d crack under your pressure

You need a miracle

And I’m no miracle

You’re honestly hysterical

What the fuck is going on inside of ya?

I’m unimpressed with my presence at best

I get depressed from the needles of sunlight that bleed through the blinds

I make shit up so I think I’m the best

Honestly though, there’s no one I can trust

There’s no one living inside this universe

You can call me No Paranoia Noah baby

I’m the last motherfucker that’s not hysterical

I’m not one to crack under any amount of pressure

If you’re looking for a miracle it’s me

Now now, come on, get your broken soul out of bed baby

What’s so funny? I’m at least trying and you’re staying a degenerate

You’re lying in your bed about a broken phoney bone

Come on I see a spark of something in ya

Skip the jokes, escape living in hysteria

=======================================================

Track 9: It Will Become

The doorbell has rung, it’s coming true

The silence and the dread, it ends here

You’ve waited and now it’s time

Come into the utopia of....

The future of earth will become

There is a past yes, it’s clear.

You better take this face and choose your race and face the race for the constant search for anything

You’ve waited and now it’s time

Come into the the utopia of....

The future of your life will become

=========================================================

Track 10: Falling Apart

I’ve got no legs

Fuck the shadows are in me too

These thoughts they won’t leave my head

Wait.... Why are my legs on the other side of the room

I was your everything

You were the one last thing I’d ever think of doing anything wrong to

Yet you’re right next to me with blood and blades all around you

I was yours and you were my one true love

And now arms are stuffed with lace

And my you’re chewing on one of my eyes

My tongue is stapled to my nose

And my legs, oh god, you’re eating my toes

I was yours and I guess now I’m yours

Why did you cut me into this

We were best friends

And now I’m just meat

-------------

Oh, hey, good morning!

=========================================================

0 notes

sjohnson24 · 5 years

Text

The Magic and Mystery of Tyrannosaurus Rex

Vulnerable Gods

Armageddon Shatter time Fragile glass Left behind Broken bones Names unknown Heaven beckons Us back home

A Brief History The tyrannosaurus rex means “king of the tyrant lizards.” The spirit of the tyrannosaurus is known to be aggressive, beautiful and powerful. The dinosaur is considered to have the strongest bite of any ever known today. There are many species of this creature, yet all are ancient rulers of a distant time and land, which will not be forgotten.

They are thought to have originated in Asia, as a sort of invasive species, overcoming all other beings with its reign of terror. The first tyrannosaurus developed over 170 million years ago, during the jurassic period. The gene began as a more advanced and intelligent dinosaur, with outstanding sensory ability and instinctual perceptions. Soon, they evolved into the tyrannosauruses of our nightmares, as a vicious carnivorous rising empire, hell bent on murder and expansion. This began a monarch over our ancient lands and ended, nearly 65 million years ago, during a mass death, known as the K-T extinction event, thought to be brought on by an asteroid.

The physical characteristics of this creature vary between each species and its evolution. In the start, they were smaller and slowly advanced into larger and hungrier versions of itself. Starting at about the size of a horse and slowly advancing to that of a tall building. It is thought by some, the dinosaur did not always feast on meat but, instead plants and insects, until it developed slowly into a killer, which could only be overtaken by the cosmos itself. The T-rex is said, at its strongest point, to be able to consume 500 pounds of meat, in one bite.

The creature is known to have a lizard tale, large mouth, and two small hands, whose use is still unknown and uncertain. The largest t-rex fossils found to date, place the length of this most powerful creature, at over forty feet long.

The mystery of the dinosaurs is still being researched and it is not considered to be a thoroughly developed subject at this time, as much speculation and misinformation exists. The study of this creature is an ongoing process, which with time, will be solved. Bones and fossils are discovered frequently, leading to more testing and information to be brought forward. The important thing about mystery is that, there is a quest for knowledge that is invaluable, priceless and can help us to protect our species and ecosystem, in the future.

Mass Domination & Alien Interference The mass domination of this species suggests that the extinction event must have occurred at an ideal time for the planet. Although, for the t-rex, it may have seemed like a paradise, for the rest of the species on Earth, it is a hell. Could there have been interference from an extraterrestrial source to stop the overwhelming reproduction of this dinosaur? After all, the kiss of death came from outer space. It is not unlikely that there was a divine hand in this prehistoric Armageddon.

Although, we would like to believe that we have acquired all the wisdom of the world, there is only so much that our species has recorded; it is only a blip on the radar of Earth. Nothing is set in stone and if it is, even stone becomes broken, lost and transformed.

Anything is possible.

Soul of the Dinosaur Despite the fact that the land of the dinosaur was transformed into a fiery, unbreathable, and unlivable landscape, these creatures live on, in other realms. These realms are such like; art, dreams, fantasy, history and recreation. The energy is real and it affects our subconscious in many ways.

You can imagine a tyrannosaurus as your soul animal, when you are trying to overcome large obstacles. Imagine that you are a conqueror, unafraid of your enemies. Spirit animals are a creation of energy manifestation, which can actually help us to creatively process through difficult emotions, and begin our healing.

Some of these manifestations have come through dreams. It is thought that if you dream of this animal, it signifies anger issues. When we have anger issues, we cannot focus on those around us, only ourselves, and catastrophic events may occur. To be healed spiritually, our anger is a great focus of importance and understanding.

A tyrannosaurus also holds a lot of prehistoric magic in its energy. The t-rex is thought to be very good at mastering its instincts, as it is a vicious killer, to survive. It is even thought that some t-rex ate each other. It is known that the t-rex has amazing sensory abilities, such as hearing and perception. Perhaps we can listen to the world around us to find what we are looking for and to the voice inside of us, that helps us to survive.

The t-rex is a great spirit to have as your companion and should be treated with respect, as this native land was once where they roamed before we ever existed. Should they have survived without outstanding cosmic events, the planet would be much different. Perhaps that one exists in an alternate reality.

Below, I want to share with you some of my dreams that I have had; concerning this fascinating soul. If you are interested in reading more of my live, updated dream journal, please visit my blog site at; www.shootingstarbaby3.bravejournal.com

Where you can also comment, or contact me if you feel a connection, or need someone to talk to about a paranormal manner.

The Dreams

Saturday, July 2nd 2016 Eating a t-rex

I am in my kitchen, which has cinnamon colored wood floors and a dinner table. There is a chair pushed up against the wall, into the table.

I notice Paul was eating something standing up. I looked at what there is to eat on the table. He told me that he was eating a t-rex. On his plate was a slice of meat and his dog is by his right side, sitting up, looking content.

Tuesday, June 14th 2016 T. rex in a treehouse

I am in a treehouse that does not have polished walls or floors. The tree has very large floors & is a pine wood color. The outside is covered with pinecones on the ground and the background is a forest.

I am with a white man with black hair and dark, deep, earth brown eyes.

He is living in the treehouse with another male with brown hair. There is an obnoxious lime green folding couch in the living area. The guy with the brown hair throws out the couch. The guy that’s with me, with the black hair, is upset about the incident, but, not mad because the other guy simply tells him it was ugly and he was tired of looking at it.

I get a telepathic message all of a sudden to watch out. A tyrannosaurus rex is inside of the treehouse, he just comes through a portal in the walls and he fits nice because there are high ceilings.

He leans down to the guy with the black hair, as if he was going to be whispering that he is here and all of a sudden a glow comes out of him, on his mouth, into the guy’s ear.

I’m just on the sidelines watching this happening as the tyrannosaurus leans back, looks towards me and disappears.

Tuesday, February 16th 2016 T-rex stalking

I am in my house and I am trying to protect my little black and white dog, Hannah. I have all the windows closed up and locked.

Outside, it is dark and dreary and I am afraid. Hannah is nervous and we keep hearing growling noises. She is in my arms.

There is a skylight and we look up and see a T-rex dinosaur looking in on us. He has a green, metallic golden, red and brown face with dark and yellow lizard eyes that blink and watch us in hunger and fascination.

Inside, I have all the lights on. There is more clutter in the house than usual and I keep packing my backpack with supplies because I think that I am going to have to leave with Hannah, once it figures out how to get inside.

Then, the rest of the dream is me in fear, confusion and anxiety in this manner.

T-rex Calling The magic and mystery of the t-rex is extraordinary. The fact that its energy is still going strong on our minds, from millions of years ago, is incredible. The sheer force of its ghost over our hearts, captivates us and transforms us. The bones buried in this ancient home, filled still with the essence, the dirt of our Earth remains, in an inconceivably vast manner.

Great energy remains from this powerful period of time and we are still waiting to harness it for the future. The t-rex is a divine force, with intelligence and vitality, deep within the soul. The love for our universe is one thing but, there is more to know, more to come from where this great realm exists.

The t-rex spirit is calling out to us from the ancient Earth; will you listen to the message it is sending you?

Deanna Jaxine Stinson, HPI Esoteric Detective aka The Rose Goddess Halo Paranormal Investigations (HPI International) https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/HPIinternational/

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