Thinking about the weird camaraderie that exists between demons but not angels in GO.
Have we ever seen two angels who are actually friends? Or even friendly to one another? We have met angels with a capacity to be friendly in general, but I think the closest we've come to two angels actually getting along would be Gabriel making a point to laugh at Sandalphon's terrible "can't have a war without War" line in S1.
Most scenes between the angels actually seem to have an undercurrent of absolute hostility. Teeth-clenched teamwork. No wonder it took them so long to notice that Aziraphale wasn't on the same page as the rest of them! The rest of them are barely on the same page as one another, either! When Gabriel goes against the majority vote, no one bats an eye at demoting him and wiping his memory. Michael and Uriel immediately begin vying for his job. The only times we've seen angels team up is when they're working together to bully someone else, like when they're trying to intimidate Aziraphale in S1 or going to the aftermath of the bookshop raid in S2.
Saraqael's overall neutrality towards Muriel is the closest we get to two angels in Heaven getting along, and it's more a lack of hostility than any kind of friendliness. At least until Gabriel loses his memories and Muriel shows up to spy on Aziraphale, and Aziraphale decides to be kind to both of them.
Demons, on the other hand, actually seem to form alliances and even friendships among one another. Hastur and Ligur are awful, but Hastur seems genuinely distraught over Ligur's death, not just fearful of suffering the same fate. Shax and Furfur conspire together and even though the 1940's investigation into Crowley's fraternizing doesn't work out for Furfur, it's not due to any double-crossing on Shax's part. Unlike the angels, who stick almost exclusively to making threats until the Metatron decides to try dangling a carrot at the end of the season, demons actually offer rewards to other demons when trying to work together. Beelzebub offers Crowley a promotion if he can bring them Gabriel, Furfur offers to back Shax up politically if she goes for the Duke position opening, and Crowley successfully stalls Hastur in S1 by pretending everything was a test and he's going to be put in charge of a legion as a reward for passing. They're still not great at socializing, but they're significantly ahead of the angels.
Of course, it's a fact that demons are awful to one another (Eric's treatment is really bad, they throw that random demon into holy water just to test it, "it'd be a funny world if demons went around trusting one another", etc) but they still seem more capable of forming friendships than the angels do.
I think that's because Hell cramps and crowds everyone together to try and increase their suffering and hostility, whereas Heaven isolates angels to decrease the odds of questioning or rebellion. Hell's methods are unpleasant, but it still ends up putting demons together, and some of those demons inevitably forge alliances and make friendships. Because as Crowley and Beelzebub demonstrate, demons are still social creatures with the capacity for love and affection, even if it's strongly discouraged and buried under nine million layers of trauma and a cultural mandate against kindness.
Angels are the same, but isolation makes is harder to form connections than overcrowding. Muriel and Jimbriel are both so eager to make friends, but Muriel's spent the past millennia shut in an empty office, and Gabriel has been distanced from his peers both through his position and also through Heaven's culture of fear and surveillance. He only breaks away from it when he finds something that's stronger than "choosing sides" (stronger than the fear of being rejected by Heaven and Falling, in fact strong enough that Falling seems worth it if he gets to be with someone he loves). Both Muriel and Gabriel are only able to start forming connections when they're away from Heaven.
I just think it's interesting that demons, despite being supposedly devoid of love, have an advantage in forming relationships compared to angels. Angels are supposed to love, but have far fewer opportunities to actually do so. Demons aren't supposed to love, but they make connections anyway.
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Emmetstyle and their ways of showing love
Emmet is very big on dishing out his affection for others. He hasn't had anyone in his life care enough to stick around for long, so he's going to be the first one in his and Lucy's relationship to say 'I love you' to her.
Compared to Lucy, he's a very open person, finding it easy to show his appreciation and love for his friends through his words, actions, and gifts. So obviously he would have no problem showering his special best friend cough girlfriend cough with all the love he has.
He's going to tell her he loves her whenever he can. She helps him with the chores? Love gushing out of him. They go out on a 'best friend' excursion? Hugs everywhere. He is constantly wiggling with happiness when he's around Lucy.
Lucy on the other hand tends to deny her affection for others if she thinks it'll make her look weak and less tough (She was fine showing her 'affection to Batman because he's a super cool and tough superhero), therefore ruining the persona she's built herself around.
Though she does soften up around Emmet whenever they're alone. It takes her a long time to finally say the 'L' word to Emmet. Other than ruining her reputation, Lucy is also scared to admit her love for Emmet, because the last time she loved something with a passion and dedicated her life to it, it was warped into a cruel method to brainwash people.
After the second movie, seeing how hateful Rex became because he believed that his friends never loved him, Lucy became more determined to show her special best friend how much she really loves him.
During the rebuilding after armageddon, she does a lot of seemingly little things (but are monumental to Emmet) to show her love. She starts to hold hands with Emmet in public, defends him fiercely against hateful comments, and starts to gift him small things that she think's he'll like.
Even after all this, She still doesn't think it's enough. Because there's a difference between knowing someone loves you and knowing they love you. So, Lucy gets the others to help her come up with a plan to show their appreciation for Emmet (Since I like to think he's one of the people working overtime to fix all the destruction (Y'know... out of guilt and all)), and it ends up as this giant party with everyone to celebrate the rebuilding efforts.
Towards the end, she has this whole speech (I'm not going to go too in detail), and she ends it with finally saying the three magic words that she could never bring herself to say.
If we go over to dangerstyle in Rex's timeline, then it's going to be flipped. They swapped roles in the way they show affection.
Lucy is a lot more vocal than she used to be when she shows her love. This is mostly born out of her fear that the people she loves might end up disappearing and dying without ever truly knowing how much she cares about them .
In her eyes, she never fully reciprocated Emmets love before he disappeared. She never got the chance to finally tell him the three words that always got stuck in her throat.
Emmet died trying to save someone that Lucy believes never treasured him as much as she should have. And that guilt weighs down on her every single day.
Going onto reunion AUs where there's the big 'happy' reunion and reconciliation, have no doubt, Lucy is 100% going to try and drown Rex with the love she never showed when he was Emmet.
She doesn't do it immediately because they can all tell that Rex needs to adjust a bit. But after he's a bit more okay with being around them, he's going to get slapped in the face with all the care they're treating him with.
Lucy does say it as a way to thank him for things like how he used to do for her, but she also does it whenever he's going through one of those bad days. Where the memories become overwhelming and he just needs that little bit of reassurance that they do actually care.
Rex is a lot more reluctant to share his affection with others compared to his past self. Or at least, he does it more privately and can come off as a bit of an asshole. The reason is basically the same as how Lucy didn't want to ruin her tough persona.
He's one of those characters that at first glance seems like a jackass- and he is, there's no doubt about that. But after a while the closer you get, you can't help but become fond of him. He's sweet in like a loveable asshole kind of way.
There's also the fact that his whole personality is built upon the trauma he endured in Undar, so any shred of Emmet that he has is buried really deep down.
Occasionally, if he's comfortable enough, Rex will end up slipping back into Emmet's habits in front of people. But whenever he does, he just ends up freezing up and backtracking, pulling away and avoiding everyone for the rest of the day as he goes to hide and sulk.
When it comes to actually saying 'I love you' again, well... it's gonna take a really long time for him to feel safe or confident enough to do it again. Rex is going to need to get so much therapy and validation from Lucy and the others.
Compared to when Lucy finally says the three big words, the way Rex finally does it again isn't dramatic, it isn't one big planned-out party with all their friends together and celebrating.
The way he finally says them again is early in the morning, with both of them wrapped in blankets, cuddling on the sofa, the TV playing some show in the background. Lucy will slowly detach herself from the arms firmly wrapped around her, careful to not wake up the dozing raptor trainer. But Rex still feels the slow change in environment so he whines softly, trying to preserve the warmth that's moving away from him.
It's in this moment when Lucy softly draws him back to sleep that he mutters a small 'love you' before falling into unconsciousness again.
(She cries in the kitchen)
(Rex doesn't even know he said that)
MMMMMMM, parallels
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