#if anyone wants to suggest ideas for Noah for how some of his content could fit

[shywhumpauthor]

Hi whump community

Hot oil really fucking hurts

Even tiny drops

And it splashes

A lot

So

Go force your domestic Whumpee to deep fry something, and have your Whumper accidentally bump into them at the worst times

[the-hopeless-haze]

Somebody Sit in My Chair and Ruin My Sleep (Being Alive Ch 15)

A/N: Idk how I feel about this chapter but here u go I guess lol

Previous Chapter

content warnings: implied smut

WC: 1.9k

Rafael didn’t have any idea what he was walking into on Monday morning, but Jesus Christ, the fact that you let the squad know what happened - down to the very last detail, it seemed - was a horror show. Amanda avoids him in some show of female solidarity, Nick shoots him sympathetic looks, and Sonny - fucking Sonny asks Rafael how he is and won’t stop asking how you were, if he’d heard from you.

But why should he expect mercy from the woman who turned down his proposal?

And maybe he deserved it. Maybe he should’ve tried to read the room instead of just pushing forward. You had been right - that night certainly wasn’t the prime time for a proposal in the slightest. Hindsight is always 20/20, and he keeps remembering moments where you were slipping away inch by inch like sand past his fingertips, and he can’t believe how stupid he was that he chose to swallow it down and chalk it up as nothing instead of sitting down and actually talking to you.

Still, communication is a two way street, and instead of sending him vague signals that he was too obtuse to decipher, you could’ve sat down and talked to him too.

It’s so much easier to assign blame than take it, isn’t it?

Ultimately, though, he just couldn’t believe you weren’t on the same page as him. Didn’t you always say you wanted all these things? Weren’t you happy that Rafael finally felt he was ready, too? Perhaps though, in the midst of all his internal turmoil he truly forgot to assess your feelings on the matter. Yes, you said you wanted children, yes, your parents constantly threw comments his way about settling down with you, and yes, you’d told him on multiple occasions he wasn’t too old to get married if that’s truly what he wanted.

But where was your actual opinion on marrying him in any of this? It was lost in between the need you no doubt felt to constantly comfort Rafael about his current misgivings and past misfortunes and your parents’ well-meaning but busy-bodied comments. It was clouded by Rafael’s own mother’s opinions, and hell, even Sonny’s - everyone was so afraid Rafael was going to lose you that they pressured him into offering you a ring and a promise of forever - but little did anyone know that by doing just that... he had in fact lost you anyway.

His mother was devastated, weeping about how you would’ve made such a lovely bride, how she was already looking at suits for Rafael and venues for the wedding... he couldn’t handle it and left her apartment after ten minutes of her lamentation. He should’ve never told her, he should’ve never been so sure of what was going on in your head, because now he realizes he never had any idea. No one did.

So now, he snaps at Sonny, because Sonny is guilty by way of telling him “oh sure, she’ll say yes” like anyone knew what the fuck you would do when the question was finally asked. Maybe you didn’t even know until he was down on one knee. Still, Rafael can’t help wondering if things would be different if the car accident never happened - deep down, he knows there were signs you were pulling away after Thanksgiving, but it’s so much easier to blame Sonny for it. You wouldn’t have sunk so low in a deep depression if you could’ve worked, if you weren’t immobilized by your injury... but would you have loved Rafael enough anyway?

“Will you shut the fuck up?” Rafael hisses at the younger detective. “You’ve been talking my ear off all morning.”

“Whoa, Barba, wake up on the wrong side of the bed today or what? I was just getting you up to speed on the case—“

“I’ve read the file. You don’t need to.”

“Fine. Liv’s in her office but I suggest cooling the attitude, because she’s not in a good mood either. Noah was sick and kept her up all night.”

“Lovely.”

And then, by some sick twist of fate, you walk through the door, and Rafael’s stomach turns. Never did you look so gorgeous, so beautiful, so fucking untouchable than you did now. It’s the first time in weeks he’s seen you in a blazer and slacks, the first time he’s seen you look like you gave a shit in months. And maybe that’s unfair - you were struggling, per your own admission - but it almost feels like all you had to do was lose the weight of Rafael and all his baggage that came with being in a relationship with him, and you were good as new.

He wonders how many of his exes could tell a similar story to yours, if that were truly the case.

You meet his eyes for a split second and he wants to drop dead. You give him a haughty smirk and head over to Amanda’s desk, turning your back to him.

Why couldn’t you just fucking leave like you’d said you would? It’d be so much easier if you did just go back home but like everything else that came out of your mouth that was merely a half baked promise you had no intention of making good on.

And maybe Rafael should’ve called you this weekend, but he couldn’t swallow his pride and come back to you with his tail between his legs after you rejected the proposal he’d worked all his life to be able to give. You never called him either, but if this was going to go anywhere, someone would have to talk first.

But shouldn’t it have to be you? You’re the one who asked for space. He’s giving it. What the fuck else was he supposed to do?

But now that you’re not living with him, now that you’re not even with him at all, you’re completely unpredictable. Never in his wildest dreams did he think you’d come over to him and Sonny, flash him your best sardonic lipglossed smile, and ask to borrow Sonny for a moment.

Rafael can’t even think straight, he can barely breathe, the rage coming up like bile and tightening his throat. How could you stand there and act like nothing was different now?

“Sure,” he snaps.

“Whoa, no need for the attitude, Rafael,” you say sweetly. “We can all play nice, right?”

Rafael doesn’t say anything, can’t say anything… he just shakes his head and walks to Olivia’s office. How could you compartmentalize like that, he’d love to know. Wasn’t this killing you, too?

The rest of the day proves to go by smoother, thankfully, albeit minor annoyances that come up like a snippy altercation with Olivia due to both of their bad moods and a taxi driver haggling him about the fare. Rafael still cannot wait to come back to his office and savor his fourth cup of coffee today after running around the city all morning, put his feet up and do some paperwork…

But you’re there, in his chair, with your feet up on his desk.

“Get out,” Rafael says before you can utter a word.

“I want to talk,” you say innocently.

“I don’t. Get out. Who the hell let you in here?”

“Carmen, duh. She still thinks we’re together, apparently.”

“Do I have to call security?”

You stare at him blankly. “You’d really call security?”

Rafael rolls his eyes, throws his briefcase on a nearby chair. “What the hell do you want?”

“Where do we go from here?”

“Nowhere. You ended it.”

“Okay, no, I just said I needed space. I didn’t end it--”

“Right. I need to work.”

“Okay. We’ll meet later then,” you nod, standing up.

“I didn’t agree--”

“I’ll be back in a few hours. I got to head back to the precinct in fifteen minutes anyway.”

Rafael hates doing this, showing a moment of vulnerability, but he has to ask, “Are you staying? In New York, I mean.”

“For now,” you say, softening too. “Obviously. I talked to Liv for a long time, talked to my dad.. And… I don’t know if being back home is the best course for me either. I’m just trying to get back to some semblance of normal, you know?”

“Right.”

“I’ll see you,” you say, walking past him and leaving his office.

How many years would it be before he did figure you out?

------

The two of you don’t really talk much at first when you reunite later on that evening. Rafael draws the shades in his office, and it’s all pulling at clothes, at skin, at hair and you’re not proud of it but you also don’t really regret that you let it get that far. You missed him, in an annoyingly cloying way, and what was better than makeup sex when the two of you were still pissed off at each other?

“You need…. You need to go to therapy,” Rafael pants after coming down from his high.

You have to laugh at that. Maybe that was only the 7th most offensive thing someone had said to you after sex. And, annoyingly, he was right, even if his delivery and timing could’ve been light years better.

“Mm. I know,” you tell him, pulling him in to kiss him again, his sweaty chest sticking to your back as you pull off him to lay, or rather squeeze next to him on the couch.

“You need to--”

“Let’s not get into the shit I need to do right now, okay? I know I have things to sort out. So do you.”

“Right. I’m sorry. I’m trying to help, and I’m trying to understand, but--”

“Right now… don’t. Just fuck me like that again.”

Rafael chuckles - damn, it was only two days and you missed his laugh that much? It just tugs on your heartstrings in the worst way, but you suppose it proves how much you love him, how you couldn’t just put this down. You hated being the first to let your guard down, to bring yourself to his office not once but twice… but you couldn’t bear to lose him, either, and you’d hurt him where no one else had. It had to be you who offered a new start.

“I need to eat, mujer. And as tempting as that sounds… we need a change in location anyway.”

You nod in assent. “Fine.”

Neither of you get much sleep that night, as you split a bottle of wine and a pizza and talk, cry, fuck, whatever… but it’s a long sleepless night you wouldn’t have traded for the world. Things are different between you two, naturally, but something has to be shed to grow, and maybe you left some good things behind along with the bad things, but it’s how these things go. You can’t expect a relationship to be standing firm after a rejected proposal. For the moment, you’re just happy the two of you found a way to get back up.

As you curl into Rafael’s arms at four in the morning, you don’t feel at peace - lord knows you still have so many things to worry about - but you do feel better, and if that’s all you can get right now, you had to be okay with that.

Taglist (ask if you wanted to be added!) @stormtrooperofficerbrowneyes​ @thatesqcrush​ @law-nerd105​ @blackeyedangel9805​ @moon-river-drifter​ @the-baby-bookworm​ @dianilaws​ @xecq​ @lv7867​ @teddybluesclues​ @averyhotchner​ @houseofthirst​ @stardust-fray​

[wordsintimeandspace]

Sleepless Nights

Aziraphale has spent thousands of nights not sleeping. It’s nothing special. Except there are nights - usually spent watching over a certain demon - that are more memorable than others.

Or: five times Aziraphale didn’t sleep, and one time he did.

Aziraphale/Crowley, rated T. Read on AO3!

The rain has already started, big fat drops falling from the dark sky, and Crowley is still standing by the railing. Frowning, he looks out over the soon to be flooded lands. Aziraphale watches him for a moment, but when Crowley still doesn’t move while the rain soaks his robe and hair, he steps closer with a huff.

“What are you doing, Cra- Crowley?” he asks, feigning annoyance even as he raises his wings to shield them both from the storm. “Come inside. It’s not particularly comfortable, but at least it’s dry.”

“Just watching how far they’ve gotten,” Crowley says, nodding towards the horizon.

Aziraphale blinks. For a moment he can’t see anything in the dark of the approaching storm, but then he spots it: a group of humans, barely visible in the distance, marching away from the Ark.

“Where are they going?”

“Told them to make a run for it,” Crowley says with a shrug. “They might make it to the mountains in time.”

For a moment, Aziraphale is at a loss of words. “That was very kind of you,” he eventually says.

“I’m not kind,” Crowley snarls. “I’m thwarting you, obviously. If God wants to kill all the humans, best I can do is help them get to safety.”

Aziraphale hesitates. When he finally speaks, his voice is barely more than a whisper. “It might be too late.” No, actually that’s not true - he knows it’s too late, but he can’t get the words over his lips.

Crowley finally looks at him, his eyes hard. “Then I suppose your lot wins this round, angel.”

Aziraphale winces. It doesn’t feel like a win. It feels like anything but that. But it is God’s plan, and he can’t argue with that. He can’t question it, he can’t even have doubts. It’s not his place.

Crowley turns without waiting for a reply. With one last glance at the humans moving towards the horizon, and one quick prayer for their safety, Aziraphale follows him below deck.

They’ve set up camp earlier in a cramped storage room, hidden behind crates and barrels from Noah and his family, anyone who might object to their presence on the Ark. Aziraphale meant it when he said it wasn’t comfortable, but there’s at least an oil lamp for light and enough hay to make sitting on the hard wooden floor somewhat bearable.

With a snap of his fingers, Crowley dries his robe and hair. He paces the small space while Aziraphale sits down, his back against the wall, unsure how to break the tension.

Eventually, Crowley flops down onto the haybed. “I’m going to sleep,” he announces before Aziraphale can figure out what to say.

Confused, he stares at the demon. “What?”

“Sleep, angel. That thing that humans do at night. Don’t tell me you’ve never seen them do that.”

“Of course I have,” Aziraphale says, exasperated. “But why do you sleep? We don’t need it.”

“It’s nice. Being unconscious for a whole eight hours! Not having to deal with any of this!” Crowley gestures wildly around the room, and Aziraphale is unsure if he means the storm raging outside or present company. Maybe he should be insulted, but he’s still too perplexed that Crowley would suggest such a thing. “You should give it a go,” Crowley continues, oblivious to Aziraphale’s confusion.

Aziraphale thinks about it for a second, thinks about the loss of control, the helplessness, that comes with sleep. He shudders. “I think not.”

“Suit yourself,” Crowley says with a shrug.

And with that, he closes his eyes. He continues moving for a while, shifting on the hay, but eventually he goes still. Fascinated, Aziraphale watches how his breath turns slow and even and how the tension fades from his face. The furrow between his brows smoothes until he looks calm and relaxed.

It’s startling, somehow, to see Crowley like that. All open and vulnerable. As if he isn’t sleeping right next to his enemy. As if he trusts Aziraphale.

This realization knocks the air out of Aziraphale’s lungs. It feels utterly undeserved, this trust.

Eyes burning, Aziraphale averts his gaze. He can’t help but feel like a failure. He’s supposed to be a guardian, a protector of humanity, and now the lands are flooding around them and he can’t do anything to stop it. But despite all that, Crowley still trusts him enough to sleep right beside him.

Even if he’d been tempted to sleep before, Aziraphale doesn’t think he’d be able to close his eyes for just a second. This is the least he can do - sit in the dark while Crowley sleeps, watching over him. Keeping him safe when he can’t save anyone else. He’d do anything to be worthy of Crowley’s trust.

And so he sits next to the sleeping demon through the night, listening to the rain pouring onto the deck above, and desperately tries not to let the doubt set in.

~~~

Crowley lets out a groan as Aziraphale gently lowers him onto his bed. The demon rolls onto his back, blearily blinking up at Aziraphale as if he isn’t quite sure how he got from the dingy tavern into a bed that is as comfortable as it gets in the 11th century.

“Huh,” Crowley slurs after a moment, lips curling into a smirk. “Pretty sure that wasn’t part of the arrangement.”

“Oh, you- foul fiend!” Aziraphale splutters as Crowley lets out a snicker. “You know I have as little desire to engage in that sort of thing as you do. I simply didn’t want you to fend for yourself after drinking several bottles of wine.”

Crowley snuggles deeper into the blanket, letting out a content hum. “I know. Appreciate it, angel.”

“Yes, well. Perhaps you’d like to sober up before you’re going to be horribly hungover tomorrow morning.”

Grimacing, Crowley complies. It takes him a few seconds, but when he’s done he immediately looks more alert. He lets his gaze wander through the room, taking in his surroundings for the first time since Aziraphale carried him up the stairs. It’s a rented room in an inn, so there’s not much - just a desk covered in books and scrolls and, as Crowley now seems to realize, one single bed.

“You alright with me taking up your bed, angel?” he asks with a frown.

“Of course. You know I don’t sleep.”

“Still haven’t tried it? Not even a short nap?”

Aziraphale shakes his head. “No. I couldn’t really.”

Genuinely confused, Crowley blinks up at him. “Why not?”

“It wouldn’t be proper.”

Crowley snorts. “You have a demon in your bed, Aziraphale. Pretty sure that isn’t proper either.”

“Yes, well.” Aziraphale fidgets with the hem of his shirt. That’s not something he wants to examine too closely. “Are you going to sleep or not?”

“Yeah.” Crowley lets out a yawn. “What are you gonna do all night?”

“Plenty to read for me. Don’t you worry, my dear.”

Crowley looks over to the desk, and back at Aziraphale. “That chair doesn’t look very comfortable.”

“It’s fine, Crowley.”

“I know, it’s just...” He shuffles to the side, pressing his back against the wall, and pats the free space next to him. “Enough room in here.”

Aziraphale hesitates. Oh, he shouldn’t. He really, really shouldn’t, but… Crowley is right, he supposes. The bed is quite large. Possibly, miraculously, even a little larger than it was just moments ago. Before he can change his mind, he grabs a book from the desk and sits on the bed, his back against the headboard.

“There,” he says with a huff, trying to ignore the pleased smile on Crowley’s lips. “Happy now?”

“Perfectly,” Crowley grins. “Good night, angel.”

As usual, it doesn’t take him long to fall asleep. Aziraphale tries to keep his gaze fixed on his book, but he can’t help but glance over to Crowley from time to time. He takes in his face, so calm and relaxed in his sleep, and can’t stop the fond smile on his lips.

In theory, he knows he shouldn’t feel like that for a demon. Shouldn’t like him, shouldn’t be his friend. Shouldn’t have formed the arrangement with him. And definitely shouldn’t enjoy watching him sleep.

But he does.

Sometimes, the guilt is so strong and vicious Aziraphale doesn’t quite know how to deal with it. But now, as Crowley shifts in his sleep and presses his shoulder against Aziraphale’s thigh, it’s so very easy to forget about that.

~~~

Walking away from Crowley, leaving him in the Bentley with the tartan thermos flask that might contain the demon’s destruction, is possibly the hardest thing Aziraphale has ever done. He feels numb as he wanders through Soho back to his shop, passing people on a night out and lit up storefronts without really taking any of it in. In some ways, he relishes the numbness. He’s sure the alternative would be worse.

The bookshop feels too quiet, too dark, when he finally steps through the door. He’d never been bothered by the quiet too much, but now it feels deafening. All he wants is to fill it with Crowley’s carefree laughter, but he can’t. Oh, he knows he could call Crowley and ask him to come over, and Crowley would comply in a heartbeat. But he can’t, not until he comes to terms with what he has just done.

All he ever wanted was to keep Crowley safe, from the very first moment they met on that wall in Eden and he shielded the demon from the upcoming rain. No matter how hard he tries to tell himself that giving Crowley the holy water is a form of protection, he can’t shake the dread that he might be responsible for Crowley’s destruction if the holy water isn’t handled carefully, whether deliberately or not.

He knows he should be concerned about other things - about how this is the ultimate betrayal to Heaven, giving his enemy a weapon so powerful. About how much trouble he’d be in if any of the other angels ever find out. But it all pales in comparison to how terrified he is for Crowley’s life.

Aziraphale shakes his head, letting out an unsteady breath. He can’t stand any of these thoughts. He needs to get away, he needs to-

Abruptly, he stops pacing around the shop. He has an idea. Something he never really considered before, but he supposes there’s a first time for everything.

Slowly, he ascends the stairs into the flat above the book shop. At the end of the hallway is a bedroom. It’s filled with books, editions so precious to him that he doesn’t want any customers to lay an eye on them. But despite the stuffed shelves, Aziraphale has always made sure to keep the bed free. He’s never used it, but he always hoped that Crowley would, someday. He just never had the guts to offer it to him before, whenever Crowley was about to doze off on the couch downstairs.

Now, Aziraphale fluffs up the blanket that is still as fresh and clean as the day he miracled it there so many years ago. He lies down, pulling the blanket over himself. Somehow, it feels awkward. Whenever Crowley curls up in a bed, it looks so natural, so relaxing. Aziraphale is only painfully aware of how stiff he is. He doesn’t quite know how to sleep, but he’s sure that relaxing is one important step.

But he still wants to try. Being alone with his thoughts all night long seems unbearable. He’d wondered so often why Crowley liked to sleep, and maybe this was it. The reason why he slept on the Ark, the reason why he slept for nearly a century after he’d first asked for holy water. Sometimes the world is just too much, and sleep the only escape.

Aziraphale closes his eyes, tries to slow down his breathing. He’s exhausted, emotionally if not physically, but still sleep doesn’t come. He lies there in the dark, not sleeping, until the morning comes.

Midnight has long come and gone, and Crowley and Aziraphale are still drinking in the backroom of the bookshop. Their conversation has slowed down in the last hour or so, after they fleshed out their plan to cancel out each other’s influence on the antichrist, in the desperate hope that he grows up into an ordinary human. There’s lots of things to work on, but for tonight everything has been said and done. Still, Aziraphale is reluctant to part from Crowley. Apparently Crowley feels the same. He hasn’t shown the slightest inclination to move from where he slouches on the couch, despite clearly being exhausted.

They’ve been silent for a while, and Aziraphale watches Crowley over the rim of his glass. Crowley’s head lolls to the side, his eyes slipping shut, and Aziraphale nearly thinks the demon will get some well deserved sleep. But Crowley jerks his head up after just a moment, blinking against the exhaustion that is threatening to take over.

“My dear boy, you look tired,” Aziraphale says, his voice quiet. “Why don’t you lie down for a nap?”

Crowley suddenly sits up straighter, shaking his head as if that might chase away the fatigue. “No,” he finally gets out. “Best not. Eleven years is not a lot of time, angel. I don’t think we can afford to waste any time on things like sleeping.”

Aziraphale knows it’s an excuse - they finished their scheming hours ago before returning to the wine - but he also doesn’t protest. He just purses his lips, watching Crowley in concern. He knows that Crowley gets nightmares sometimes, vicious and terrifying things, and he can’t really blame him for not wanting to close his eyes after just delivering the antichrist. He doesn’t want to imagine what he might see.

“All right, then,” he finally says. Crowley relaxes slightly, obviously relieved he doesn’t have to argue. His head lolls back against the back of the couch, although this time his eyes stay alert. The tension doesn’t fade from his face.

That night, neither of them sleeps. They pass the bottle back and forth, talking about everything and nothing. Secretly, Aziraphale wishes the night would never end, that they could exist forever in the sanctuary that is the backroom of his bookshop. But eventually, the world awakes around them. The spell of the night is broken. Crowley says his goodbyes, stiff and formal, and it takes all of Aziraphale’s willpower to not hold him back. He knows he can’t, no matter how much he wants to.

They have a world to save.

~~~

Crowley is half asleep by the time they make it back to London and step into his flat. With all he’s done today, Aziraphale is surprised he held out that long. But no matter how tired he must be, how much he sways on his feet, his grip on Aziraphale’s hand is still firm. He hasn’t let go since they boarded the bus, and Aziraphale is more than grateful for it. It’s been an impossibly long day, but Crowley’s touch grounds him more than anything else in the world.

“There we go,” Aziraphale says, his voice low, as he shuts the door behind him. “Let’s get you to bed, darling.”

Crowley doesn’t protest as Aziraphale steers him toward the bedroom. He all but collapses onto the black sheets as soon as they make it to the bed, shoes and sunglasses still on.

Aziraphale peels off his boots for him, and then nudges Crowley’s shoulder until the demon rolls onto his back with a grumble.

“You can go to sleep in a moment, dear, but I don’t think these are very comfortable,” Aziraphale says, tapping a finger against the rim of Crowley’s glasses. “Can I take these off?”

Crowley is quiet for so long that Aziraphale begins to suspect he’s already fallen asleep. But then Crowley moves so fast it nearly makes Aziraphale jump. He knocks Aziraphale’s hand aside, rips the glasses off his face himself and flings them onto the nightstand.

“Sorry,” Crowley mutters, not meeting Aziraphale’s eyes. “It’s just… Hastur took them off earlier, in the car.”

“Don’t you dare apologize for that,” Aziraphale protests. A bit hesitant, he reaches out to Crowley again, letting out a breath of relief when Crowley presses his cheek against his palm. An invitation to touch. “I’m so sorry he did that to you,” Aziraphale continues, quieter this time, as he brushes his thumb over Crowley’s cheek. Crowley lets out a hum in the back of his throat, his eyes slipping shut.

“You should get some sleep.”

Suddenly, Crowley’s eyes open again, wide and panicked. “The prophecy,” he gasps, struggling to sit up.

“What about it?”

“We still have to figure it out.”

“You need rest, Crowley. Let me take care of that.”

“But-”

“No buts,” Aziraphale insists, gripping Crowley’s shoulder to prevent him from jumping out of bed. “My dear, you have done so much today to keep us and all of humanity safe. I can take over for a while.”

Crowley looks like he’s about to argue some more, but eventually sags back down. “Fine,” he grumbles, running a hand over his face. “But at least get into the bed, angel.”

Aziraphale smiles. “Of course. I’m not planning to go anywhere.”

Crowley shuffles to the side, making enough room for Aziraphale to sit comfortably right next to him. They have done this dozens of nights before, but somehow, it feels different tonight. There’s no guilt, there’s no doubt. For once, Aziraphale is sure that this is exactly where he’s supposed to be. More than that, exactly where he wants to be. Right next to Crowley, watching over him as he sleeps. He’s made his choice.

As soon as Crowley is curled up on his side and Aziraphale has settled against the headboard, he reaches out to take Crowley’s hand. Crowley smiles, his eyes already closed, as he slips his fingers through Aziraphale’s. Tonight was the first time they’ve held hands, properly, intentionally, instead of just a fleeting brush of fingers. It already feels more natural than breathing.

Exhaustion finally catching up with him, Crowley only takes minutes to fall asleep. He shuffles a little closer to Aziraphale and finally goes still, their hands still entwined.

During the night, Aziraphale sits, and thinks, soothes Crowley when his nightmares hit, and thinks some more. Early in the morning, when the first rays of sunshine creep over the horizon and Crowley blinks his eyes open, Aziraphale is still right next to him to greet him with a plan.

~~~

It’s over.

They’ve won.

They’ve tricked both Heaven and Hell, and they’re finally free to do whatever they’d like to do.

Aziraphale knows all this, but he still can’t shake the dread creeping up on him once they’re back from the Ritz. His hands tremble as he pours their tea, and he actually has to take a few minutes to calm his breathing before he steps back into the backroom where Crowley is lounging on the couch.

Crowley looks utterly relaxed, his sunglasses discarded on the coffee table, his head propped up on the armrest and one leg spread out on the couch. For a second Aziraphale is startled by the stark contrast to how anxious he feels, but he makes sure to put on a smile before Crowley looks at him. It wouldn’t do to worry the demon, not after what they’ve been through in the last few days.

“Here you are,” Aziraphale says, setting the tea down on the coffee table before sitting on the opposite end on the couch.

There’s something - maybe the waver in his voice, or the quiver of his lip - that gives him away. Crowley sits up a little straighter, regarding him with a careful look.

“You alright, angel?” he asks quietly.

“Of course. Fine. Tip-top!” Aziraphale gets out in a hurry, but his voice is breaking.

Crowley frowns at him, eyebrows drawn together in worry. “Out with it. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Aziraphale says miserably, and he means it. There is nothing wrong, and he can’t explain why he still feels like the world is going to end. He jumps up from the couch, desperate to escape Crowley’s concerned gaze, but of course the demon follows him.

“Aziraphale…” Crowley begins, carefully reaching out to him. It’s the impossible gentleness in his voice that finally makes Aziraphale’s tears spill over. Exhausted and overwhelmed, shaking so badly that Aziraphale is glad he’s not holding his teacup anymore, he does the only thing that seems sensible: he throws himself into Crowley’s arms.

They’ve never hugged before, but Crowley doesn’t hesitate to wrap his arms around Aziraphale, holding him so tight until it feels like he’s the only thing keeping him from falling apart.

“What’s wrong?” Crowley asks again, right into his ear, rubbing his hands along Aziraphale’s spine.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Aziraphale sobs into his neck, clinging a little tighter. “I don’t know why I feel like this. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Crowley lets out an understanding hum. “It’s alright. Sometimes things just catch up with you. It happens.”

“Well, I’d like it to stop.”

Crowley’s chest rumbles as he lets out a short laugh, and Aziraphale marvels in the fact that he can actually feel it. He’s suddenly painfully aware how close they are, bodies pressed together from head to toe. It’s simultaneously the most terrifying and exhilarating thing, and he can’t imagine ever letting go.

“Come on,” Crowley says, oh so gently. “Let’s lie down for a second.”

He moves them towards the couch, but Aziraphale stops him. “Bed,” he croaks.

“What?”

“Bed. I have a bed upstairs.”

“Okay,” Crowley breathes out, guiding Aziraphale upstairs without ever easing his grip around his shoulders. Aziraphale clings to him when Crowley urges him to lie down, and so they find themselves in bed together, still entwined. Crowley keeps holding him close, and as Aziraphale hides his face in the crook of his neck, his tears slowly subside.

Crowley presses a feather-light kiss to the top of his head. “I know it’s not your thing, but maybe you should sleep,” he says quietly.

Aziraphale sniffles. “I don’t know how,” he admits. He doesn’t want to think about that one night when he tried and failed to sleep.

“I’ll show you how. Close your eyes.”

“They are already closed.”

“Great, good job, gold star for you,” Crowley grins. “Now you’ve just got to relax.”

Aziraphale tries, but gives up after a few seconds. “I don’t know how to do that either.”

“Don’t worry, you’re doing okay on that so far. Let me help.” Crowley slips one leg between Aziraphale’s, bringing him impossibly closer. He still has one arm wrapped around his shoulder, his fingers drawing circles onto his back, and moves the other one higher to stroke his fingertips along Aziraphale’s neck. He massages away the tension in Aziraphale’s muscles, and when his fingers eventually slip into Aziraphale’s hair, he’s already boneless in Crowley’s arms.

“There you go,” Crowley whispers. “Sleep, angel. I’ve got you.”

Aziraphale lets the exhaustion wash over him, making his limbs heavy. He remembers how he always thought falling asleep would be terrifying - the vulnerability, the helplessness of it. But now, wrapped into Crowley’s arms, without fear of repercussion from Heaven or Hell, Aziraphale only feels safe. He knows Crowley would never let any harm come to him. He smiles into Crowley’s neck, and before he can comprehend what’s happening the soft touches and quiet whispers lull him to sleep.

~~~

Waking up is a little disorienting at first. Aziraphale comes back to consciousness only gradually. The first thing he becomes aware of is a firm body pressed against his own and arms wrapped tightly around his shoulders. He nearly panics in the one second it takes him to recognize the familiar scent. Letting out a breath, he allows himself to relax again, sagging against the body holding him close. It’s Crowley. Of course it is.

“Good morning, angel,” comes the familiar voice of the demon, low and rumbling. Aziraphale can’t help but smile.

“Good morning, my dear,” he says as he blinks open his eyes, moving away from the crook of Crowley’s neck just enough to see his face. Golden eyes greet him, loving and tender.

“Sleep okay?” Crowley asks.

Aziraphale takes a moment to ponder that question. He can’t remember anything from the night, no dreams or nightmares. But he feels rested, impossibly so, relaxed and content in a way he hadn’t felt in ages. “Yes, I believe so,” he eventually says.

“Good.” Crowley grins. “You slept a whole ten hours. Not bad for your first try.”

“Oh, dear. I hadn’t intended for it to be that long.”

Crowley only shrugs. “Looks like you needed it. You probably had some catching up to do.”

“Did you get some sleep as well?”

“Nah. Told you I’d watch over you, didn’t I?”

Aziraphale blinks at him, perplexed. He’d expected Crowley to need a good night’s sleep as well, after the trials. He did get to sleep the night before, of course, but...

“You’re not tired?” Aziraphale asks, searching the demon’s face.

“I’m fine,” Crowley insists, but he does let out a yawn as Aziraphale narrows his eyes at him. “Maybe a nap this afternoon on your couch, if you don’t mind.”

Smiling, Aziraphale reaches out to brush a lock of red hair out of Crowley’s face. “You’re more than welcome to do that. I will watch over you this time.”

Crowley is quiet for a moment. “You don’t have to, you know,” he finally says.

“What?”

“Watch over me. They’ll leave us alone, angel. No need to stand watch at all times anymore. We could even sleep at the same time, now.”

The idea stuns Aziraphale for a moment. He thinks he might need some time until he’s comfortable with that, but then… oh, it’s the most tempting thing. He allows himself to imagine it - falling asleep in Crowley’s arms again, like he did last night but with Crowley relaxed and sleepy as well. Holding Crowley through the night, his nose buried in his red hair. Waking up together - either like today, or with Crowley still asleep, so he gets to see the marvel that is the first smile on Crowley’s lips as soon as he blinks open his eyes. So many possibilities, and Aziraphale wants to experience them all. Wants to spend all his nights like this, for as long as the universe allows.

He smiles, beaming and wide, and Crowley answers with a blinding smile on his own. “That, my dear,” Aziraphale starts, “sounds simply marvelous.”

[mego42]

207 Discussion Q’s

shout out and thank you to @pynkhues for putting these together even though she wasn’t gonna be here this week

1. What was your favourite scene of the episode? Tell us why!

obvs the dubby but underrated fav is Ruby and Jane in the closet, idk exactly why but I am starved for the families interacting with each other content (screw the timeline, the most unrealistic aspect of this show is that they aren’t constantly in and out of each other’s houses with ben and sara continually being called on to babysit) so this little snippet makes me levitate

2. Was there any scene that missed the mark for you? And if so, how?

the annie and noah scenes for sure. I mostly feel betrayed bc I really liked them the first time I watched (i have a lot of built in affection for sam huntington let me live) and now I’m like BEGONE FOUL BETRAYER and feel pre-emptive fatigue over annie’s taste in men and how that’s not going to get better any time soon

3. I know time does not exist in the Good Girls universe (or in reality anymore), but let’s start with a timeline question! The implication of the opening montage is that a bit of time has past since Beth strongarmed the partnership with Rio at the end of 2.06. How long do you think it’s been? And more importantly, what do you think these early days of their partnership looked like?

I tend to lean towards at least 2 months, maybe more based on:

the number of shoeboxes and how many times Beth’s shown making a closet deposit

how lived in their annoyance over Beth’s dividing her time and Rio pushing back feels

the implication (at least how i read it) that Rio’s annoyance stems from having to track Beth down which presumably implies they’d grumbled their way into a semi-functional working relationship prior (supported by their ease with each other in 208) and if the montage has only been a month, that would be a maximum of 4 meetings and I don’t particularly think that’s enough time for them to get over being extremely prickly with each other

the fact that Beth goes to Rio for help when Jane’s missing (again, to me implies a longer period of time to get over some of their antagonism than a max of 4 meets)

I imagine their initial partnership went something like Beth being a smug brat about forcing her way in, Rio being deliberately unhelpful and trying to force her to admit she’s in over her head (while still keeping enough of an eye on things that his money isn’t jeopardized), Beth stubbornly refusing to and finding ways to rise to the occasion, Rio being grudgingly impressed, Beth being annoyed with herself for how pleased she is over that. Lather, rinse, repeat until they’ve worn a cantankerous but bizarrely comfortable groove into each other.

meanwhile, Mick, Annie and Ruby are absolutely disgusted by everything happening in front of their eyes.

4. The first scene between Ruby and Turner in this episode is a really dynamic one! It’s pretty clear that Ruby’s afraid of Turner, but what do you think Turner thinks of Ruby?

I think he sees a big cartoon canister labeled "Beth Boland Bait"

5. Taking the kids to the drop was a pretty big mistake! What do you think Beth should’ve done in this instance? Do you think saying no again to Rio was an option?

CALLED BEN OR SARA FOR A BABYSITTING ASSIST. For fucks’ sake.

And yeah, I think she could’ve said no to Rio but he would’ve kept her cut of that drop and, even worse, would’ve been able to hold the fact that she didn’t deliver that one time over her head forever more.

6. The krav maga teacher offers some sage advice telling Dean to not order the hit and instead just divorce his wife, haha. Do you think that he thought the baby hitmen would come through for Dean? Or do you think he was deliberately setting Dean up to get robbed?

I choose to believe the krav maga teacher knew exactly what kind of an idiot Dean was and set him up because the dude clearly had at least two brain cells to rub together and anyone with two brain cells to rub together would never get tangled up in a murder plot with Dean standing on the street corner telling random bystanders in detail how he wants to kill the guy that fucked his wife what do you mean established means and motive Boland.

7. During Ben and Annie’s tense conversation, Ben tells Annie that she’s hard to keep track of - she’s parent mom, cool mom, sketchy mom. In a lot of ways, this feels like a parallel to Ruby talking to Beth in the last episode and calling her ‘drug Beth, gun Beth, human trafficking Beth’. What do you make of this? And how do you think it relates to the show’s themes?

I defer to @foxmagpie’s answer because I like it a lot. 

8. The scene with the girls in the house! Tell me all your thoughts please!!!

I love this scene a lot

Beth’s channeling Rio in general but also specifically in 201 you will never ever change my mind

Sometimes I lie awake at night wishing Rio had seen it

Prayer circle that he sees a version of it in s4

Can you imagine the nightmare level of boner he would get? The sheer narcissism!!

Ruby’s obvious wish for new friends is The Most Valid

I really love the main drug den guy, I love Blake Shields’s energy, it makes the scene crackle, and I wish they’d bring him back purely bc he’s gr9

9. Annie meets Noah in this episode! What do you think of their introduction to one another? And how would you rate Noah on the scale of ‘Garbage Annie Love Interests’?

at least he’s not her therapist I guess

10. Beth has two pivotal and emotionally revealing fights this episode - one with Dean and the other with Rio. How do these fights compare? And what do you think they tell us about her respective relationship with them?

UUUNNNNNFFFFFFFF

I L O V E how hard the show goes on Dean’s obsession with Beth and Rio as the primary source of his angst

the fact that he’s trying to rope Stan into murder while looking for Jane who isn’t even MISSING but Dean had NO IDEA bc instead of giving a shit he went straight to HOW CAN THIS BE THAT GUY’S FAULT

I love how clearly they delineate that it isn’t about Beth but specifically about someone else ~*~taking~*~ Beth from him and how emasculated that makes him feel (something something something the storyline opens with the krav maga guy choking him out and then telling him to divorce her and Dean being like I reject your rational and logical solution bc it doesn’t punish the man who touched my property, idk i have a half baked thought there but i can’t pull it out of my brain)

and then it’s all underscored how little Dean’s worried about Beth and her safety by him bringing her work up specifically as a gotcha (which, unless I’m forgetting something, is p much the only context Dean ever brings it up in besides maybe the sit down fight but that’s again, about Beth acting out vs genuine concern)

Meanwhile, this is contrasted with:

Beth flipping tf out at the mere suggestion Rio would ever hurt her children, showing how deeply and instinctively she trusts him in regards to her children aka what’s been established as her Most Important Priority over and over (in the same breath that she rips into Dean for losing Jane in the first place)

which is doubled down on her immediately going to Rio for help

and he is FURIOUS at her, but the thing he leans hard on isn’t how she could have jeopardized the business deal (aka his money, what’s been established as his Most Important Priority over and over) but how she jeopardized herself and how badly she can fuck up if she doesn’t take this seriously

putting himself in a vulnerable position (presumably burning a connect, letting on that Beth means something to him beyond business) to look out for Beth’s emotional well-being

And then, just to drive it home a little further, @sothischickshe pointed out the Beth and Rio fight over Beth’s self preservation is directly paralleled with Stan freaking out at Ruby over the IA stuff because he’s worried about her and I had to go and stare at a blank wall for a few minutes to calm down.

anyway, draw your own conclusions.

11. Ruby takes Jane being missing as an opportunity to try and find evidence on Beth for Turner and, in the process, finds Jane too. How do you think this scene captures Ruby’s moral dilemma? And do you think it’s a satisfying turning point in the Ruby-Turner arc?

I struggle a lot with the Turner and Ruby plot specifically because I HATE that Turner’s ruthlessly leaning on Ruby as the weak link but I’m also ferociously attracted to him so I’m less bothered by it than I feel like I should be so mostly I just try not to think about any of it.

Idk, I see it in some ways as a continuation of Ruby’s fight with Beth and Annie in s1 where Annie said she isn’t blood. They put Ruby on the outside but when push comes to shove, Ruby still puts the two of them above her own family. As far as I’m concerned, Annie still owes Ruby a massive apology for that. Beth I let off the hook a little because by the end of the season she’s ready to turn herself in to make it all go away for all of them (I think, unless I’m misremembering, which is entirely possible bc I don’t think I’ve ever rewatched all of 213)

12. RIO GETS BETH THE DUBBY!! That’s it, that’s the question. Please discuss.

I think a lot about how the gesture is so baldly honest neither one of them can face it either at all (Rio) or without taking a shot first (Beth) which, now that I’ve typed it out, is also an interesting flip of their general MO bc under normal circumstances I’d put Rio down as the one that, of the two of them, is more willing to face stuff whereas Beth’s the one that hides from it.

[goodproofingwater]

A Gentleman | Noah Centineo x Reader

Word count: 2417 Warnings: NSFW content, mentions of an abusive relationship Requested by: @cxxl-gall​ (literally almost a year ago i am so sorry)

The memories of the man before swim in your mind as you wait in line for your morning cappuccino, the strong smell of arabica wafting through months of what you once thought was normality until you started talking to your friends. Words which had been designed to bow you into submission had been dressed in such pretty packaging that you hadn’t even noticed what they were, and you were thankful for having such a supportive group around you to help you remove yourself from the situation.

It was around three weeks after everything had died down that you started filming for your new movie, and although you had originally thought it best that you pass on the role due to the nature of the film being so based on relationships and your horrible experience, your friends were once again there to push you. You had been trying for ages to break into something more than the commercials that you had been stuck with, and you weren’t about to let your ex ruin this for you. He had already done enough.

The first day was apprehensive, scary and exciting, and for the first time in ages, you were thinking about something other than your past. And so you leaned into it, allowed yourself to become obsessed with your craft once more, spent days immersing yourself into your character, the nights re-reading lines and researching aspects of your characters' interests that you would never have done before. Before long, you felt like you knew your character better than you knew yourself, and you felt like you were starting to heal.

And then you met him.

Noah was every inch as handsome as the images you had seen, and every bit as charming as the interviews would have you believe, and although the scenes that you had with him were predictably romantic, his kindness made them easier to swallow.

Even with your research and the depth that you went into to ensure that your character was as multi-faceted as possible (while also distracting yourself) the scenes toward the end of the script in which you were fully in a relationship with Noah’s character were much harder to adapt to.

By the time you had started reading the script aloud in your trailer to prepare for the scenes that would be filmed the following week, it had been a month and a half since the break-up, and although you were much more comfortable with the idea, actually being so close, acting out things which had become so tainted… it was a whole other story.

“I’ve never met anyone like you before.. I can’t believe you’re even real..” You read to the empty trailer, trying to enforce love and passion into your voice but you could feel it shaking, could feel the goosebumps erupting on your skin at the thought of someone touching you, the thought of the words that were so similar o the ones which had fallen unscripted from your lips months ago and how they had been used to trap you.

You were so engrossed in trying to focus that you didn’t hear the knock on the door, and you barely heard the door open. It was only when his calloused fingers grazed your bicep that you spun, so fast that you had to steady yourself against him, wide eyes expecting pain either physical or otherwise.

“Woah.. are you alright?” Concern washed through his features, the mask that he used so often while he was acting stripped away completely to reveal how much he genuinely cared about your wellbeing, and it was then that you realised that you couldn’t remember the last time a man looked at you this way. Each time your ex had looked at you it had been with disgust, with expectation of something that he hadn’t even told you he wanted, and even after nights where you had thought that you had given him everything he wanted there was nothing but cold emptiness behind icy blue orbs.

This was different.

Even though you hadn’t known him long, the warmth of his expression made you feel more validated than any time your ex had attempted to understand your feelings.

“I--” You started before clearing your throat and forcing a smile on your face which didn’t quite fit there, “Sorry I was just really into the scene.”

Curls dropped as he looked down at your shaking hands, and he cupped them in his own, shaking his head. He looked like he wanted to say something, to ask why you were so hurt and what had cause you to have such a reaction to someone grazing your arm, but instead he continued with your charade.

“Well lets practice together. It’s better that we build up our familiarity as much as we can right?” He smiled, and it was a kindness that no one had ever afforded you. Even when your friends had been helping you through hell, none of them had given a thought to how you wanted to deal with it, only how they thought was best. Focussing on work and powering through was perfect, and you knew you would have to find a way to than Noah without letting him know just how much he had helped.

You practised over and over, and it wasn’t long before you were even more comfortable with him. All thought of who he was and the level of this for your career left your mind, he was just your friend who was helping you get through something horrible by immersing you in something that you loved doing, and even improving your talent by teaching you different techniques.

By the time the scene came around you were no longer nervous, you were excited to do this on camera, the words becoming commonplace and any connotations that you had been worried about completely gone.

And so, you stood in the middle of the set which was supposed to be his room, his hands on your waist as you swayed softly to a song that you knew would be replaced in the final cut, words falling with ease, taking on an entirely new meaning now that he was looking at you as his character rather than you off-camera.

“I- I can’t believe you’re real..” You spoke, your bottom lip quivering, his eyes darting down to catch the sight before he spoke

“I’m not special..” He started, looking directly into your eyes and you felt like he was talking directly to your soul, “You just deserve the world” and although that was where his lines ended, he continued, “and I can’t believe that anyone ever made you feel any other way. You’re incredible, perfect really, and I’m so lucky that I get to be here with you..”

He swallowed thickly as you scanned his expression, unable to tell if the improvisation came from his characters' desire for yours or because of how close you had gotten over the last couple of weeks.

“I’m the lucky one... You’re perfect..” You whispered, leaning in and running your nose along with his and biting your lip before the director called cut.

There was a moment where you stayed still, where you both allowed the magic to continue before you were forced to pretend that the scene was normal.

“Excellent!” The director spoke, “Fantastic take guys, give us a few minutes and we’ll move on to the next scene in this room.”

You could feel Noah’s eyes on you for a moment, and you looked over at him with a small smile, “Want to grab a cup of coffee before we go ahead with the next scene?” you suggested, and he nodded, licking his lips and throwing caution to the wind.

His fingers slipped softly into your own, and while you were scared of being so close to another man you felt safe with him, felt like no matter what happened he could look after you, even if it was just for the duration of filming this movie.

--

It was three weeks later that he took you for a drink and you told him everything. Something about him made you feel more comfortable than you had ever been with anyone, so open and honest about everything that had happened and how it had made you feel. He had wasted no time in telling you how much of a prick your ex was, and he bought another bottle of wine for you to share over some food.

Light glinted off of the rim of his wine glass as he spoke so passionately about his life and his career, and you could tell then that there was no inch of this man who even had the capacity to hurt you. He was kind, loving and wonderful, and although even three weeks on you were still not sure if his improvisation was him getting caught up in his characters feelings or him sharing his own, it didn’t stop you taking a leap as he walked you to the door of the hotel room the production crew had put you up in for the entirety of filming.

“Probably shouldn’t have drunk so much wine with us having to get up at 6am tomorrow huh?” You grinned, and he laughed as he watched you slip the key into the door of your hotel room and turn to face him,

“Ahh but this is the best lesson of all,” He grinned, licking his lips in such a way that you had to focus on his words to stop your mind from betraying itself, “work-life balance.” His wink made your knees weak, and you licked your own lips before throwing caution to the wind,

“If that’s the case then I’m not sure you’ve taught me that lesson all too well… perhaps.. Perhaps you could join me for a nightcap on my balcony?” You offered, and his eyes immediately darkened, his body moving from where it had been leaning against the opposite wall toward you and it took everything in you to push the door open rather than let him push you against it.

Pouring glasses of vodka and cranberry, you did everything you could to not read his hand ghosting along your waist, his long fingers stilling your own hands as his lips moved slowly along your shoulder.

“Tell me if this is too much” He whispered, “I don’t want to do anything which makes you uncomfortable.”

You thought that your guide would be straight up, that you would be pushing him away, but instead, it melted into him, your head resting back against his shoulder as he kissed your neck and undid the buttons of your shirt from behind.

“I want to show you how incredible you are, I want to worship every inch of you, I want you to feel how worthy of love you are.” The words could have fallen straight from his characters lips, and you would have stopped him for fear of him feeding you lines if you couldn’t feel him hardening beneath you, if he hadn’t been so consistently wonderful and you hadn’t felt so instantly trusting of him, something which had been difficult even during your relationship with your ex.

Instead of answering you turned to face him, kissing him softly, running your nose gently along his as you undid the buttons on his own shirt, your breath bated as you were desperate to feel a man again after so long, and a man who you knew you could trust.

“I bet you say that to all the girls” You tried, your insecurities falling from your lips in the form of a joke and he laughed, shaking his head. He pulled back from you, holding both sides of your face to ensure you were listening and you could understand how genuine he was being

“I think you’re amazing, and you haven’t been treated the way you should be. And.. don’t feel like you have to, but I would really like to show you how you deserve to be treated. How someone who likes you, who respects you, someone.. Someone who thinks you’re incredible and funny and interesting and fucking beautiful will treat you.”

You don’t even had the words to accept and so you close the gap between you, kissing him in a way that you had never imagined you would kiss again. Full of passion. Full of lust. Full of trust.

Strong hands wrapped around each of your thighs as he picked you up, lips never parting, and placed you softly on the bed. Clothes peeled off of shaking bodies, lips and tongues dancing together in lust and desperation until you lay bare for each other, one arm holding him up as your legs wrapped around him and he sank deep into you.

“Fucking hell..” He whispered against your lips as you gasped at the size of him, tight from months of nothing but being intimate with your own fingers.

He moved slowly at first, holding you tight against him. When his lips were not desperately pressed against your own he was looking into your eyes, sweet nothings rolling off of his tongue as he sped up until the sound of slapping filled the room and you were writhing in pleasure.

“I want you to cum for me baby,” He whispered, kissing softly up your neck as your head fell back at the sheer pleasure which washed through you, and it wasn’t long before you gave in to his request and he came with you, leaving you both panting from an incredible mutual orgasm.

Minutes passed in silence as you came down from your high, and you couldn’t keep the smile off of your face even as he pulled out and lay next to you, pulling you into him.

“So..” You spoke first, tension palatable in the air, “What now?”

His soft laughter filled the room before he placed a soft kiss on your forehead and he spoke, “Well I would like to take you for a proper dinner sometime this week if that’s alright with you? I meant what I said about you deserving to be treated like a princess.”

“You didn’t say princess…” You grinned and he mirrored your smile, nodding and he’s like, “well whatever you want to call it, I’d like for this not to be a one-time thing... If that’s okay?”

You answered by kissing him deeply and nodding, finding comfort that you had never expected in just his presence.

[clotpolesonly]

Laura/Stiles?

Coffee shop AU: Who is the barista, and who frequents the coffee shop?

Stiles works way too many hours and honestly is not very good at his job, but he has so far managed to not spill hot coffee on anyone so he figures he’s doing okay. his beautiful lady who comes breezing in and out twice a month makes him especially nervous and fumbly, though, which is probably justified considering she owns the cafe. luckily, Laura thinks he’s adorable.

Highschool/College AU: Who is the straight-A student, and who’s the backrow slacker?

Laura is top of the class because of course she is. she’s the quintessential overachiever, if maybe a little bit of a workaholic, if you can call a high schooler a workaholic. Stiles certainly would. he’s of the mind that deadlines or more like suggestions, really, and what do grades even matter when there are real life mysteries out there to be solving?? he may or may not have gotten detention for bringing crime scene photos with him to school and examining them during class. and Laura may or may not have looked over his shoulder, spotted a crucial clue that he’d overlooked, and officially put herself on Stiles’ radar.

Rivals to loves AU: Who takes their rivalry seriously, and who is half in it just to push the other’s buttons?

Stiles is hella competitive and also hella annoyed at these werewolves with their freaky good senses and reflexes and strength and literally everything else. he wants to WIN, but there’s no damn way he ever could win in the areas he keeps challenging Laura in. Laura thinks it’s hilarious that Stiles is so determined to beat her in an arm wrestle, or ping pong, etc etc. he gets so riled up, all pink in the face, eyes flashing, it kinda makes her wanna kiss him but she’s pretty sure it would make him rageflip a table XD

Enemies to lovers AU: Which one switches sides?

i could go in for some hunter!Stiles. or maybe something along the lines of a werewolf vs magic user conflict, that could be fun. would probably end with them meeting in the middle though, rather than just one defecting to the other’s side. 

Soulmate AU: Who is eager to meet their soulmate? Who absolutely does not want to meet their soulmate?

Laura’s parents were soulmates and she’s always wanted to have that same kind of deeply fulfilling contentment in her life.

Stiles’ parents were soulmates too, and he’s absolutely terrified of being so connected to someone that their death devastates him like his mom’s death did his dad.

Single parent AU: Which one is the single parent? (Alt. if they’re both single parents: Which one is open to starting a new relationship from the start? Which one is never planning on finding love again… Until they meet the other and are instantly smitten?)

Laura is determined to raise her kid and have a career, just like her mom managed to do. it’s a lot harder than she thought it would be, though. as much as she wants to prove that she’s as capable as Talia was, she eventually has to accept that she’s stretched too thin and has to hire a nanny. Stiles is great with the kids, which helps ease her mind a bit. he’s also cute enough that Laura is preeeetty sure she’s gonna end up a cliche when she sleeps with her son’s babysitter.

Doctor AU: Which one is the longsuffering doctor? Which one is the patient?

Doctor Hale has no idea how Stiles manages to injure himself in such creative ways, it’s honestly astounding. Stiles insists that he is not doing it on purpose just so he can see the pretty doctor. (he’s like 80% not lying.)

Bodyguard AU: Who is the bodyguard? Who are they protecting? Which one is secretly pining for the other?

i can’t decide why Stiles is important, but he’s definitely the one being guarded. maybe his dad’s the president, yeeaah let’s go with First Son Stiles, that’s always fun. Laura is the head of his protective detail and honestly, Noah should’ve known better than to assign a beautiful witty badass woman to follow Stiles around all day when he is well aware of Stiles’ Type(TM) and his competency kink!!!

Pirate AU: Who is the pirate? Who is the member of the royal family who did not sign up for this?

Stiles is the pirate captain and Laura is the princess that he accidentally kidnapped. i say accidentally because really, she is not who they were intending to snatch. he told his crew to take one of the minor nobles, okay, someone they could ransom for a few hundred gold pieces and then be on their way to the next port. not the crown fucking princess, jfc his crew is full of MORONS and what is he supposed to do with her now???

Childhood best friends AU: Which one was super obviously in love with the other the whole time? Who was oblivious until they were older?

Stiles grew up thinking Laura was the literal best most amazing prettiest lady on the whole entire planet and he was gonna marry her!!! he was very insistent on that, which Laura thought was precious coming from a 6 year old. she really thought that crush went away in the intervening years, which she was actually pretty bummed about cuz Stiles came back from college looking like a damn snack. but luck is on her side because, after four years of steadily growing closer again, 26 year old Stiles asks her to marry him again. and this time she says yes.

send me ships

[the-unconquered-queen]

Please I wanna know more about your thoughts on Dan x mc relationship. I know its been age since ILITW ended but this is a hill I will die on. Like, I didn't romance anyone else on this book. If I couldn't have him then I didn't want anybody else, 🤧

oKAY, we’re going for it

This is the first time I’ve ever put an answer to an ask under a read more. That should really tell you something about me and about what you’re about to be subjected to.

I would like to start this off by saying that I couldn’t care less about when it ended because it is ALWAYS It Lives hours on my blog and that’s never gonna change. But let’s get into this:

I completely understand why Dan wasn’t an LI. It’s not the same case as with, say, Noah, who’s such a prominent character in the book they could’ve easily added him. Even though Dan’s influence is strong in the series - seeing how his absence brought the group together when they worked to save him - the actual Dan was in a coma for a sizable portion of the book, which would’ve frustrated his romancers to no end. This is why if you look up fan made Dan x MC content, most of it takes place after the events of the book (not including the epilogue), not during them, because at that point, there wasn’t much to go on.

I think that if ILitW had had a sequel that wasn’t an anthology, so a second book with the same MC focused on the same group (which obviously can’t happen because of all the possible combinations of deceased/survivors in book 1), Dan could’ve been made an actual LI in that second book, or maybe players would’ve gotten the first romantic dialogue at the end of book 1 if PB knew they were gonna commit to giving him a route in the sequel. The seeds are all there in the first book, from how close they were in their backstory to how that closeness seemed to linger ten years later even though they’d barely spoken during that time. Dan admitted to never talking to people about his struggles because he was worried people would think differently of him, but with a little bit of encouragement from MC, he opened up to them, which shows a very strong bond between them, which could easily turn romantic in his hypothetical route. I mean, he’d known Stacy for as long as he’d known MC, had interacted more with her since she was the only one who kept in touch with him out of the group and was concerned about his well-being, and yet it was MC he trusted with his feelings.

Also, like I said earlier, the way he spoke of them when they were kids in his scene suggests (to me, at least) that, after Jane, Dan was the one MC was closest to out of everyone in the group. And when, after not speaking to MC for ages, they show up at the orientation he’s attending and tell him they went solely because they knew he’d be there and they missed him, he thought they were joking, but was genuinely happy when they told him they were serious because he felt the same way, which shows that even though they had a falling out that lasted a decade, they easily fell back into a familiar friendly rhythm after just a minute together. Now, as much as I love this ship, I’m not really entirely sold on the idea of Dan having had a crush on MC since they were eight and having it last well into their senior year of high school, but I believe that their easy bond would’ve been a major factor in him developing that crush, and maybe it would’ve already existed by the time the orientation scene took place, only strengthening when they got to actually spend time together when they properly reunited.

But giving it some thought, I doubt he and MC would be a couple right away. I mean, Dan’s been through a lot, and he probably wouldn’t be in the right place to be in a relationship as soon as everything ended, even if he started healing after what happened in the cave. It’s possible that he and MC would’ve mutually acknowledged their feelings to each other so they’d know they were reciprocated but not actually acting on them for a while, just until Dan feels like he’s in a better place to do the relationship and get it right, because I can’t imagine him disregarding that just because he wants to be with MC so bad and then the relationship falling apart because it was too soon, too hasty, and MC would for sure understand that they’d need to take their time to make it work out. 

I feel like even before they got together, MC would be good at reading Dan’s moods when he has off days, knowing when he needs company or someone to talk to and when he just needs space, and they don’t take offense to Dan not being in the mood to talk sometimes because they’d understand that even though Redfield is gone, that doesn’t mean that he’d just go back to what he was like before the PTSD and everything else happened. Dan does the same in return, since he knows MC went through more than their fair share of bad stuff, but he’d also have to learn to navigate that, like I said in my other ask, there would be times when MC might wake up from a nightmare and he’d try to comfort them and find that MC somehow looks even more freaked out and then it dawns on him that MC might be having a flashback of when a dirt monster wore his face in their room and he’d have to talk them down and tell them it’s him.

Moving AWAY FROM THE ANSGT, an established, dating Dan and MC would be such a cute couple. If it happened in-game, the “define the relationship” talk would end with them kissing while the overhead achievement banner reads “Dynamic Duo” (guess why). I feel like it would be a chill relationship in the sense that they didn’t go straight from acquaintances to lovers, since they had a lot of history together being friends for a long time before dating, so they’d be so at ease with each other’s presence and so used to it that they wouldn’t need to be like some of the couples in their high school who’d need to always have their hands all over each other or constantly making out for you to tell they’re in love, because they could do the most low-key stuff and still be happy together.

They’re probably actual relationship goals. Dan would make such a caring boyfriend, always making small gestures that make MC smile, a real Pinterest-type boyfriend. You ever see those pictures of football players running to kiss their partners on the stands? Yeah, that’d be him, because you know MC would show up to every single game and be his personal cheerleader.

MC would probably get along well with Dan’s parents, too, since I bet his mom would be really grateful that Dan’s got someone close to him he can open up to and who makes him so happy. He and MC would probably have stay-in dates where they just cuddle up close and watch Star Trek while Dan’s cat is curled up and purring between them, and Dan’s mom probably makes them mac and cheese because MC missed her cooking from when they would all go to the Pierces’ for lunch. And when they do their stay-in dates at MC’s place instead, MC always pretends to get upset when their cat wants to be on Dan’s lap instead of theirs, but really they love it because, hello, cute boy being cute with animals? They fall deeper in love with him every time. Also, imagine some time later, MC and Dan’s cats having kittens and then they’re trying to co-parent a couple of furry little babies. No, seriously, imagine Dan sitting on the floor while a bunch of tiny kittens try to climb all over him. Get that mental image in there.

At this point I have written a lot about how much I love Dan and I am fully aware that I’m rambling BUT I JUST THOUGHT OF MORE. Okay, you know the iconic Dan x MC Captain Incredible team up? Imagine Dan and MC slaying every single couples’ costume contest ever. They coordinate that stuff so well that they just own Halloween and nobody stands a chance. I mean, I did say they were goals, didn’t I?

And then of course there’s MC being so completely supportive of him when he starts seriously thinking about pursuing psychology as a career to help people cope with trauma. I mean, they know how complicated his own journey was and they are so proud of him for choosing to dedicate his life to that, since his caring nature is one of their favorite things about him. They probably help him prepare for his exams by setting up study dates to keep him motivated and working so he can make his career happen, and he’s just as supportive when it comes to whatever MC chooses to do.

Oookay, not that I don’t have lots of feelings about this, you know, ‘cause I really just went on and on about how I feel about Dan off the top of my head without any organization whatsoever, but I deadass thought “hey, this is a very long response” and put it through a word count and it is, no joke, over 1.4k words, so I really should stop talking now because people are gonna forget that my brand was supposed to be stanning Andy x MC, but the gist of it is Dan x MC is an amazing pairing, even it It Lives in the Woods didn’t explore the romantic potential there.

[b-creativ3-archive]

A summary of my SMPLive AU so far

I have an idea for an SMPLive urban fantasy AU that I want to share here. Feel free to use/add more content!

Concept: All/most of the SMPLive creators are various magical humanoids/people who have magical powers. Most of Earth doesn’t know magic exists but there is a magical community and hidden cities where everyone knows that stuff exists (sort of like how diagon alley from Harry Potter is), SMPLive probably all end up living in one big city.

Characters:

Wilbur Soot

��Witch

•Based on how he makes potions on SMPLive and how he sometimes cheats items in on his challenge videos lol

•Has a fish familiar named New Milo, after a childhood fish he had (he knows it’s an unconventional choice of familiar, he doesn’t care)

JSchlatt (I will not be posting AU content of Schlatt for now, as people have said he doesn’t like being treated as a character. I am leaving him in this post for clarity’s sake so that people don’t ask me where Jschlatt is in this AU. Description redacted.)

Traves

•Werewolf

•Because his avatar is a dog and in magic terms that translates to werewolf babeyyy

Cscoop

•Merman (but can also have legs when out of water bc magic)

•Based on fish avatar (obv)

Hugbox

•Honestly I was sort of thinking he’s just a regular human who happens to know a bunch of monsters to play off the ‘Noah looks like a generic white guy’ joke

•But if anyone has any better ideas tell me bc I honestly don’t know that much about him

CallMeCarson (I am currently not making AU content involving Carson for the same reason as Schlatt, description redacted)

JunkyJanker

•Werecat

•Bc he’s the Gumball voice actor

•Ppl have nickednamed his cat form Gumball

Ted Nivison

•Vampire

•Because I could sort of see the milk thing translating to a blood thing? Also I’ve seen vampire!ted before and I feel like I need a vampire in this AU soooo

Slimecicle

•Slime creature

•I think it’s obvious why

•He was probably created by a spell going wrong in a swamp or smthn

Joko

•He’s whatever his little avatar thing is? Can someone tell me what that is bc I don’t really watch him

Beefstew

•Probably has something to do with plants bc of the melon thing but that’s all I’ve got

•Ideas appreciated

Sneegsnag

•Current idea is that he’s a regular human but Boomer is a magical dog, he finds out about magic bc of Boomer

•Tell me if that’s a shit idea lol

Krinios

•Half-cyclops (has some cyclops traits but not all e.g. he’s not a giant)

•Bc of his character, obviously

Additional Information

•This AU is set in modern times

•I know I missed some people and others I don’t have a solid idea for, so feel free to give me suggestions if you have any

•At some point I’m going to make individual posts about each of them that go into more detail, but the AU isn’t fleshed out enough for that yet

•This isn’t meant to be a sad AU, so don’t expect that (at least not from me anyway)

•Feel free to make content for this AU, and tag me so I see it!

[smkkbert]

Time for a story - Welcoming Ceremony

“What if we don’t find anything to talk about?”

Felicity started pacing up and down in the kitchen nervously. She could almost see what it looked like if that happened. They would sit around the table, eating in awkward silence. They would keep their gazes lowered to their plates, only lifting them briefly to check if everyone was feeling as awkward about that too. As soon as their gazes met, they would look away.

“Or what if one of the kids gets nauseated from all the sweets you fed them this afternoon and throws up across the table?”

She could almost see Millie holding her stomach and rocking herself back and forth to hide how badly her stomach was hurting. Before she could warn about it, would suddenly throw up. That would certainly kill the mood as nobody liked to see kid’s puke on the table. Felicity was a mother of five which meant that in the last years she had probably seen more puke than other people saw in all their life, and even she had never gotten used to it. How would someone who didn’t have any kids react to-

When another thought of what could possibly go wrong crossed her mind, she came to a sudden stop and turned around to Oliver. She looked at him with wide eyes.

“What if my mom comes at him with a knife?”

The corners of Oliver’s lips twitched as he was doing his best to hide his smile. She wanted to tell him that there was absolutely nothing funny about the idea that her mother might kill Dominic, but she couldn’t say a single word. Her throat felt like it was swollen shut just from the bare thought of this possibility.

Her mother could be quite feisty. When you had spent years serving drinks in a casino, you had to act on your emotions sometimes. At least that was something her mother had always told her when she had been a kid. She would have sat down on her bedside, make sure the blanket was wrapped around her safely and tell her to always do what her heart and her stomach told her to do without thinking about it too much.

“At least that last worry I can take from you,” Oliver said, gesturing towards the pot he was stirring in, “because I chose to cook a lasagna soup. There won’t be any knives involved, and I don’t think a spoon will cause much harm.”

Felicity frowned at him angrily and put her hands to her hips. “You are not taking me seriously.”

Oliver chuckled. He turned off the stove and pushed the pot off the hotplate. Dropping the dishtowel that had been resting on his shoulder to the countertop, he crossed the distance towards her. He put his hands to her cheeks, framing her face ever so gently. He angled her head back a little, so she was unable to look at anything but his face.

As nervous as Felicity still was, the expression in Oliver’s eyes made her calm down. A wave of warmth went through her, allowing her to take in the first deep breath for hours. Her heart that had been racing in her chest for quite some time now calmed down a little.

Felicity lifted her hands, taking hold of Oliver’s wrists. Her fingers brushed over his pulse, and she let them rest there. Her own heartbeat started adapting to his pulse in an almost magical way, and Felicity leaned her face more into his touch in response.

“It’s going to be okay,” he told her with quiet voice, stroking his fingers over her cheekbones, “This evening is going to be great.”

Felicity sighed. She wanted to believe Oliver, but she really wasn’t sure that it was that easy. It didn’t matter how long her parents had been separated now and how long Donna had been happy with Quentin. There were wounds that had never properly healed for her mother. The wound Noah had caused when he had left them overnight without as much as a single dollar to make sure that they got through the first time was one of those. Getting to know Dominic, the son he had had before they had been together that he had never told her about could feel like rubbing it back in. That Dominic had the same eyes as Noah didn’t help either.

Since Dominic had come back into her life two weeks ago, he had kept his distance to the rest of the family. Felicity had meat him a couple of times, helping him to get used to living here in Starling. She had respected his need to settle in here first before he wanted to get to know anyone else, including her kids and Donna.

Those two weeks had been enough for Felicity to know that she really liked Dominic. He might not be exactly talkative, and he certainly came with a lot of baggage. Still, she cared about him. That was why she wanted him to feel comfortable around her and around her family. She wanted him to become a real part of it.

“I’m nervous.”

Oliver leaned in and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. With a low sigh, Felicity leaned against his chest. Olive wrapped his arms around her shoulders and rested his chin on the crown of her head. His body embraced her, wrapping her into warmth and the scent that was all him.

Felicity could stay like this forever because she felt comfortable and protected like this. As long as she was in Oliver’s arms, her world was whole. Nothing bad could ever happen to her as long as Oliver was just holding her like this.

“I am sure Dominic is going to be nervous too.”

Without moving the slightest bit away from Oliver, Felicity nodded her head. He had been the one to suggest getting to know her family now. His face had shown nervousness and hesitation. He hadn’t been entirely sure of his reaction.

“It was a good decision to only invite Lyla and John aside from my mom and Quentin,” Felicity almost whispered, “that will make it easier for him.”

Actually, it would make it easier for all of them. Getting to know her mother and their five kids would already be a lot for Dominic. If they had invited Laurel, Tommy, Thea and Roy to come here too, there would have just been too many people. For someone like Dominic, who had lived most of the last years all on his own, it had to feel almost new to spend time with people, especially strangers.

With John and Lyla, it was different. Dominic – or Nick as he liked to be called – had already met John and Lyla. They had served together in Afghanistan, and at least John had met him once more in Gotham. They would hopefully add some normality and make the situation less stressful for all of them.

“He’s going to get a lot of new people. Loud and crazy people,” Oliver added when loud laughter, mixed with joyful screeches sounded from the living room, “so having Lyla and John here will definitely make it easier.”

Felicity took in some deep breaths, letting Oliver hold her. She felt his presence relaxing her more and more. Only Oliver could have this effect on her. If she could stay here like this forever, she would certainly do it.

The moment the doorbell rang, Felicity felt all relaxation disappearing immediately. She jumped out of Oliver’s arms feeling her heartbeat quickening once more. Her fingers moved through her hair nervously although she doubted that it would do any good. It probably only added to the way her hair was tousled already from all the times she had torn it today.

“Okay, you go to the door,” she said quickly, “and I will- No, I will go to the door, and you- Or maybe-“

Again, the doorbell rang.

“Maybe you should just go before he thinks that you were just fooling around with the dinner.”

Felicity wanted to reply, but she figured that Oliver was right. It didn’t matter who opened the door, but somebody should. Otherwise, Nick might indeed think that she had just fooled him with the dinner. Siblings did teach each other like that, right?

When she turned towards the door, Oliver quickly stepped behind her. His hands came to rest on her shoulders, and he leaned his lips against the shell of her ear.

“Breathe.”

Closing her eyes, Felicity took in a deep breath before she released it slowly. She put her hand over Oliver’s and finally left towards the door, leaving Olive alone in the kitchen.

When Felicity opened the door, she could see that she wasn’t the only one who was terribly nervous about this date. Dominic might look somewhat relaxed with the way he was standing there, four bottles of wine in his arms. His face showed pure panic though. Felicity guessed he had thought about canceling as many times as she had thought about it today.

“Hi,” she said, smiling at him gently. “I’m glad you have come.”

“I wasn’t sure I would,” Nick admitted, “I thought the wine would help all of us to sit through this dinner.”

“I hope they are all for me.”

Nick chuckled. “I can offer two. I think I need the other two.”

Felicity smiled. “I can live with that.”

Stepping aside, Felicity opened the door further and nodded for Nick to come in. She bit down on her tongue hard, doing her best not to babble. When she was nervous, she just had trouble to keep hold on her tongue. She was almost sure that a long ramble would drive her newly found brother away rather quickly though.

While Felicity was leading Dominic towards the living room where everyone was already waiting for him, she reminded herself of everything Oliver had told her to help her relax. It didn’t take long for Felicity to realize that those words didn’t relax her as much as they had relaxed her when Oliver had said them. It wasn’t the words itself that had been so relaxing. It had been Oliver.

As soon as they had stepped into the living room, all conversations fell quiet, and all eyes turned towards them. It was awkward and oppressive.

Hawk was the only one to react the way he always reacted when he met people he liked. He approached Nick, jumping like a goat on crack. Since the dog hadn’t been delivered with breaks, he jumped right into Nick’s legs.

“Hawk!”

Hawk, who was still like a giant puppy in a lot of ways, didn’t care about Felicity’s exclaim. He already snuggled around Nick’s legs like a cat and released those sounds of content that made him sound like he tried to become a dinosaur. He allowed Nick to move his fingers through his fur and rubbed his head against his jeans.

At least one family member seemed to miss the awkwardness that came with this dinner, Felicity thought to herself and felt her stress easing a little.

When Addie rustled with the bonbon bag Connor held out for her, Hawk turned his ears forward. He left Nick’s side quickly and hurried towards the two youngest kids in the room. Sitting by their side, he watched them eating the bonbons. Just every now and then, he moved his head closer toward the bag, trying to steal a bonbon or two. A single glare of Connor or Addie was enough to make him lie down.

“Let me help you with this.”

John took the bottles of wine from Nick after he had squeezed his shoulder in a gesture of backup. He put the bottles away. Meanwhile, Lyla stepped in front of him.

“It’s good to see you again, Dominic.”

“Lyla,” he replied almost with a little surprise although he knew about John and Lyla’s wedding already, “it’s good to see you two.”

The two ex-militaries hugged each other. Even when they pulled apart, they stayed close, holding each other’s hands. The intense gaze they shared was almost intimate. Felicity guessed that seeing each other again on somewhat normal ground when you had worked together on the battlefield meant a lot to both of them. Felicity guessed that you didn’t ever think of meeting those people again, at least not alive and well.

“Mama, look!”

When Lyla turned around to look at Connor who was calling for his mother’s attention. He showed her how he only had to point at his cheek for Hawk to lick it.

“He kisses you.” Lyla smiled at the two of them for a moment longer before she turned back to Nick. “Connor is Johnny’s and my son, and that’s Sara, our daughter.”

Sara, who was sitting on the couch with Emmy and Tommy, waved at Nick briefly. She smiled sweetly, but quickly turned her gaze back to the book she and Emmy were reading in for Tommy.

“And the rest of the kids are yours, right?”

In the back of her mind, Felicity knew that Nick already had the answer to his question. He had known that she existed, and he had known that she was married to Oliver. He had also known that he was the Green Arrow. She was sure that he had stumbled upon a picture of them in the media. They loved to show pictures of the entire Queen Family. They were Starling City’s Brangelina, just with more self-made kids and without the divorce.

Anyway, Felicity took Nick’s question as a way to keep the conversation going before another awkward silence would spread.

“Yes, they are,” Felicity replied. “William, our oldest, isn’t home tonight. He is studying for a test tomorrow.”

Felicity’s gaze caught side of her mother. Donna was sitting on her chair without moving. She had her legs crossed, her hands resting in her lap. Her shoulders seemed tense, and she seemed to be taking deep breaths like she was trying to relax herself.

Dominic nodded. “You have a nice family… and a nice home.”

While Felicity continued watching her mother, she listened with one ear what Oliver was telling her about how he had built the house for the family, how he had surprised Felicity with it and how they had needed to expand it when the numbers of kids had just outdone the number of bedrooms in the house.

Donna was the one person Felicity felt decided about how awkward this dinner would be. The kids loved if their family was expanded the way it had when Tommy had joined them. John and Lyla knew and respected Nick too.

With Oliver, it could have been difficult, but he had already taken kindly to Nick. Since he had saved Felicity’s life once, he couldn’t possibly dislike him. He might have held a little grudge against him when he had decided not to become a part of Felicity’s life, but he had forgiven him. He had made that mistake once upon a time too after all.

Donna was the one who would suffer most by seeing Dominic again and again. As little as it was Nick’s fault, his presence would always remind her of how dishonest her relationship and marriage with Noah had been from the start. He had kept a former relationship and a child from her for reasons they would never know.

“Speaking of jobs,” Quentin said and got up, squeezing Donna’s shoulder comfortingly, “Quentin Lance. Captain of the SCPD. Felicity told me that you have been working for the CCPD. I have talked to some of your former bosses and partners. If you are interested in getting back into the policework, all you have to do is ask.”

“Wow,” Nick said, obviously surprised, “I don’t know what to say.”

“I hope you say yes,” Quentin told him, shaking his hand, “I have heard many good things about you, and we could definitely need your help at the SCPD.”

“I heard the crime rate went down.”

Quentin nodded. “It did thanks to Team Arrow, but the really bad guys are hard to chase away. They just become more brutal and up their games to make sure that they are ready to fight in case they are being attacked by Team Arrow.”

Nick nodded his head. “We had the same problem with some gangs. They hated each other and attacked each other every now and them. Neither of them wanted to back down though. They just continued to recruit more and more members, so they could start a new attack.”

“Crime today is just not the same thing it used to be. I mean when I started working for the SCPD-“

“Quentin, please,” Donna suddenly said, got up and stepped next to Quentin, “I think we agreed months ago that family dinners won’t be used to talk about crimes.”

Quentin shot her a glance. He looked at her apologetically. Beneath it, Felicity could see an expression of encouragement and pride. They had certainly talked about this evening and just like Nick hadn’t been sure if he would come and Felicity hadn’t been sure if she wouldn’t cancel, Donna hadn’t been sure of her reaction to Dominic.

Taking in a deep breath, Donna turned towards Dominic. She smiled and held out her hand for him. It was shaking slightly, but Felicity doubted that many could see it.

“Donna Smoak. I’m Felicity’s mother. Welcome to the family, Dominic.”

Nick looked at her hand briefly before he hurried to reach out his hand and shake hers There was still hesitation in her eyes, but he smiled at her nonetheless.

“Thank you, Ms. Smoak. I-“

“Oh, nobody calls me Ms. Smoak.” She chuckled. “Never has. Just call me Donna please.”

“Thank you. Donna.”

Relief was spreading through Felicity’s body, and she had trouble to bite back a deep sigh. Maybe all her nervousness had been for nothing. Maybe everything was a lot easier than she had thought it would be.

The kids soon took Dominic hostage, so they could bombard them with their questions. Felicity overheard Tommy telling his new uncle that they loved to have the family expand because it usually meant they were getting more Christmas gifts. Oliver butted into the conversation, telling Nick that he wasn’t obligated to do anything and making Tommy apologize.

Watching them, Felicity stepped towards her mother. She put an arm around her waist, pulling her close to her side. Donna smiled at her, leaning against her daughter and resting her head against hers.

“Thank you,” Felicity whispered, so only Donna could hear, “for accepting him into this family so easily.”

“It’s not his fault that is father is as terrible as he is,” Donna told her with a sigh, “and he looks like he really needs a family.”

Felicity nodded her head. She was sure that it was true. Nick needed a family, and she hoped that this big and sometimes slightly messy combination of people she called her family was the family he needed too. She really hoped so. 

* * *

If you want to help me decide on what multi-chapter to write next (please, please, please!), you can do so here.

If you want to sign up for our Goodbye Olicity Online Gift Exchange (the more, the merrier) please read here.

* * *

@fannaz​ @promiseyoullbepatientwithme​ @bytemegeekette​ @felicity-said-just-in-case​ @phanseptiic​ @orangeisorange​ @mspotatohead14​ @whentheheavenfades​ @emmaamelia95​ @smoakingskye​ @seaolicity​ @ourwritinginvein​ @1022bridgetp​ @felicityqueenforever​ @leagueofolicity17​ @yryssss​ @myhauntedblacksoul​ @sherlock44​ @sinceriouslybea​ @olivyflavescentdeer​ @olicitys-castle​ @ofnothingcharming​ @vaelisamaza​ @smoakedandcharmed​ @alexisa1206​ @mysaudadespt2​ @florence-bubbles​ @addictiontelly​ @queens-of-arrows​ @memcjo​ @hysterical-for-joshifer-blog​ @oswinelevenforever​ @olicitylovemaking​ @bandanab310​ @mymusiclove101​ @lynslogic​ @scarletqueen23​ @olicityshipper19​ @alex-wesley​ @arrows-4ever​ @unabashedlynerdypatrol​ @louehmysoul​ @ligiapimenta​ @chattyyana​ @malafle​ @coal000​ @samcrowleys​ @ishippolivia​ @julianegomesqueen​ @malafle​ @miriam1779​ @charlinert​ @melaux​ @ontheolicityship​ @myshipperlife​ @wrightainsley​ @lexi9515​ @ladygreenwood​ @multi-fandom-crazy-fangirl​ @morinamel​ @mje-thomas​ @kebarry​ @canadianheartgirl​ @nannett2307​ @almondblossomme​ @kathrynelizabeth89​ @imdfabulous​ @mrt2501​ @arsipaci14​ @salasvia​ @brandis91​ @cainc3​ @morganmiguess​ @pr0fessi0nal-fangurl​ @iamisalima​ @nessafrancis-blog​ @jonhdiggle​ @niki-is-amazing​ @universed-posts​ @hopeful-warrior​ @senoritaswiftie​ @bellemmie​ @green-arrows-of-karamel​ @iheartarrow​ @olicityovereverything​ @oliverfel4​ @olicity-in-the-heart​ @fullychippedcreation​ @geemarie​ @everything-but-normal-cat​ @myarroworld​ @tjmartinez​ @pleasantfanandstudent​ @j69confessional2​ @scentedcolorpirate​ @icanica74​ @tjmartinez98​ @certainmentalityface​ @tatianadamaceno @ryelew​ @wildwillowzepplin​ @missafairy​ @letsplaymurde-r​ @lipizette​ @positivepiper​ @nuttymilkshakehologram​ @laksagirl​ @turnupthemusicandscream​ @pumpernickle93​ @onceuponanolicity​ @1106angel​ @jaspertown​ @fadinglands​ @morganashimi83​ @mochababychristy​ @omglovechrissie​ @mariejr88-blog​ @thetaufactor​ @onceuponanolicity​ @speakandseethetruth​ @bri206​ @aglasgo​ @geemarie​ @pineprincess​ @nerdgirljen​ @eternal-olicity14​ @allyouhadtodowas-stay-stay-stay​ @lovelycssefan​ @tsseract​ @flowerandsunshine​ @dcnmarvelgamergeek​ @blondeeoneexox​ @monetsmark​ @bb-olicity​ @mashamarty​ @rulerofsilence​ @erika-amber​ @nothingmorethanmyotps​ @kayleenyc​ @tonto16​ @olicityfluv​ @olicitea1990​ @haahaaa2408​ @pattid1​ @faegal04​ @24karatgem​ @wrldtravler​ @readerkas​ @olicity-beliver​ @greencoffeecups​

(If you want to be tagged or untagged, just let me know. :))

[centerofstupidity]

Noah Primeval Preface Snark

If you enjoy the content you are reading, please like and follow the Center of Stupidity blog.

Summary: The author claims that his stories are rooted in "the theological and spiritual intent of the Bible."  He also loves to scripture drop. The worst is yet to come. 

In case anyone wants to read the original author’s preface in order to form their own conclusions, you can read it here. 

In the event that this gets flagged, here is another place to read the chapter snark.

Inspired By True Events.

Keep this in mind, folks. 

Because...

The story you are about to read is the result of Biblical and historical research about Noah’s flood and the ancient Near Eastern (ANE) context of the book of Genesis. 

Translation: Because I did some research, it means that the novel is deep and elevated lit-ra-choor. 

While I engage in significant creative license and speculation, 

....

..................

......................................

That’s a verbose way of saying “I created a work of fiction.” 

all of it is rooted in an affirmation of what I believe is the theological and spiritual intent of the Bible. 

Even though there are countless Bible interpretations.

You found all of the "hidden truths"and know the "correct" way to read the Bible.

But silly me. 

This is the same person who spews vitriol at movies that don't conform to his beliefs and wrote a paper called Calvinism and the Bible. 

In the document, Godawa insists that "Calvinism is simply Biblical Christianity" and how the five points of Calvinism are “truly Biblical doctrines, then most of us western American Christians have been sold a bill of goods as to what the Gospel really is."

For those who are leery of such a “novel” approach,

Like some other writers, Godawa believes that he has a Wildean wit.

let them consider that the traditional Sunday school image of Noah as a little old white-bearded farmer

I gotta call bullshit.

The traditional Sunday school image depicted Noah as being a white man.

It didn't emphasize that he was an old farmer.

building the ark alone with his sons is itself a speculative cultural bias.

It's been a while since I've been to CCD…

But I don't remember them ever discussing at great length on how the ark was built.

They don't deal in the minutia.

Instead they focused on educating people about their faith.

And the whole "speculative cultural bias" comment is rich...

Coming from a man who preaches in his fiction and does evangelizing podcasts with his friends.

The Bible actually says very little about Noah.

Instead we get lengthy details about who begat who and what tribe they came from.

We don’t know what he did for a living before the Flood or even where he lived.  

Which is why the Midrash aggadah was written.

According to MJL, Midrash aggadah interprets biblical narrative, exploring questions of ethics or theology, or creating homilies and parables based on the text.

For instance, one of the best known midrashes is the story about Abraham.

It states while Abraham was a young child in Mesopotamia, he was smashing idols.

This story suggests that God didn't randomly pick Abraham.

Instead, God knew that Abraham would be receptive to His voice.

How do we know whether he was just a simple farmer or a tribal warrior?

The answer?

We will most likely never know for certain.

And secondly, who cares? It is minutiae.

Oh wait.

The author is going to bestow us the answer.

Genesis 9:2 says Noah “began to be a man of the soil” after the Flood, not before it.

Genesis 9:2 says this:

The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth, and on all the birds in the sky, on every creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea; they are given into your hands.

(This comes from the New International Version.)

And I checked two other translations: the King James Version [KJV] and the English Standard Version [ESV].

They are the same as the first.

The passage about Noah becoming a farmer comes from Genesis 9: 20

Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. [ESV]

Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard. [NIV]

And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard. [KJV]

So in conclusion:

If the world before the flood was full of wickedness and violence,

Because they would all fight evil physically.

It's not like righteous men would ever combat evil by using their words or practicing non violence.

Noah would not have been that different from Abraham,

Or…

He could have been a prophet whose words inspired others.

Nobody knows for certain what Noah did prior to the flood.

who farmed, did business and led his family and servants in war against kings.

Man, Godawa is obsessed with the idea of righteous warriors.

We know very little about primeval history,

There is a newfangled thing called archaeology.

but we do learn from archeological evidence that humanity was clearly tribal during the early ages when this story takes place.

Um…

The previous line belies the rest of the sentence.

Where's the editor?

Yet, nothing is written about Noah’s tribe in the Bible.

We also don't know anything about Jesus' childhood.

Your point being?

It would be modern individualistic prejudice to assume that Noah was a loner when everyone in that Biblical context was communal.

Who ever said that he was???

Is Godawa just making up arguments so he can tear them down?

Noah surely had a tribe.  

You already said that. Move along.

There is really no agreement as to the actual time and location of the event of the Flood.

And in other news…

Bears shit in the woods and the Pope is Catholic.

So B. Godawa lists some theories about when and where the Flood took place.

He thinks it is "Early Bronze Age Mesopotamian contexts" because of some passages in Genesis.

By the by... He doesn't mention any specific passages.

At some other time, I'll take a look at the appendix.

Because right now, I'm not in the mood to read an appendix that is about one hundred pages long.  

The Bible also says Noah built the ark.

And now for the following news bulletin:  

Adam and Eve lived in a place called the Garden of Eden.

Are we to believe that Noah built it all by himself?

Yes, if you take the Bible literally.

It doesn’t say. With his sons’ help? It doesn’t say.

But that very same book does say earlier that Cain “built a city” (some scholars believe it was Cain’s son Enoch).

Which scholars said that?

Because doing a quick Google search got me absolutely bupkis.

Instead, I got a bunch of websites that talked about Cain building a city and naming it after his son.

Are we to assume that he built an entire city by himself?

No lie… I had to check and see if Cain had a son named Enoch. (And he did).

Because after the bungling of a verse from Genesis, I wasn’t sure if this was another mistake.

As for Cain building an entire city single handedly?  I’m sure Christian fundamentalists would respond with “yes”.

My response would be “no” followed by:

Who helped Cain to build a city? A lot of golems? Some demons? Or did he hire a lot of people in the nearby area?

If Cain just hired a bunch of people, wouldn't the idea of God only creating two humans [a.k.a. Adam and Eve] be false?

How did Cain get the materials to build a city?

How would Cain know which materials would be good for building a city?

And why did Cain want to build a city in the first place?

Ridiculous.

Who knew that with one word, such disdain could drip from a person’s tongue? 

Cain or Enoch presided as a leader over the building of a city by a group of people,

Wait a tick…

Godawa previously said that it was Cain that built a city but some scholars believe it was Enoch.

And now he is stating that it could be Cain OR Enoch.

Does that mean that Godawa forgot what he wrote previously?

Or the man who sees himself as the Grand Poobah of Biblical Knowledge is finally admitting that he doesn’t have all the answers?

just as Noah probably did with his ark.  

So in other words, Noah just sat on his ass and barked orders at people.

Because as we all know, that is a great leadership style.

One of the only things Genesis says about Noah’s actual character is that he was “a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God” (Gen. 6:9).

Now a normal person would interpret this to mean that Noah was a good person who conversed with God.

But Noah Primeval turns Noah into a Gary Stu. (By the way, this will be revealed in future chapter snarks).

The New Testament clarifies this meaning by noting Noah as an “heir” and “herald” of righteousness by faith (Heb. 11:7; 2Pet. 2:5).

ESV [English Standard Version] said Noah as a “herald of righteousness” while NIV and KJV described Noah as a “preacher of righteousness” (2 Peter 2:5).

While ESV, NIV, and KJV all described how Noah “became an heir of righteousness.” (Hebrews 11:7).

You might be thinking to yourself: What’s your point?

If we are to take into account what the Bible said about Noah… It describes Noah spreading God’s message (like a herald or a preacher). But it also adds that because of Noah’s faith in God, he “became an heir of righteousness.”

This differs from the depiction in Noah Primeval where Noah is the Chosen One from an ancient prophecy.

And that makes him superior to all the other filthy mortals along with slightly less perfect than Jesus.

The popular interpretation of this notion of “righteousness” is to understand Noah as a virtually sinless man too holy for his time, and always communing with God in perfect obedience.

But is this really Biblical?

If you mean, some people acting like sanctimonious hypocritical assholes, then I would loudly shout “Hell yes!”

Would Noah have never sinned? Never had an argument with God?

Personally, my answers would be “no” for both questions.

But in this novel, when Noah isn't acting like a bratty teenager, he acts like a smug douchebag.

Yet the reader is supposed to see Noah as a paragon of virtue.

Never had to repent?

In order to repent, a person must have genuine remorse for their actions. It also requires accountability.

It doesn't entail a person rending their garments melodramatically until they are completely naked and then yelling at the top of their lungs. I'm looking at you, Noah Primeval.

As a matter of fact, the term “righteous” in the Old and New Testaments was not a mere description of a person who did good deeds and avoided bad deeds.

Maybe it is because the writers of the Old and New Testament know that good people are not perfect. They make mistakes and take ownership of their actions.

Righteousness was a Hebrew legal concept that meant, “right standing before God” as in a court of law.

What makes me so fucking disgusted is that Godawa has no qualms with cherry picking things from different mythologies and whatever doesn’t suit his narrative is either discarded or depicted as being malevolent lies.

It carried the picture of two positions in a lawsuit, one “not in the right,” and the other, “in the right”

You mean a lawsuit involves two sides:  the prosecution and the defense?

or “righteous” before God.

And this series doesn’t hesitate to jump on a soap box and shout at the top of their lungs.

It was primarily a relational term.

*Sigh*

What’s next?

Are we going to define the definition of is?

Not only that, but in both Testaments, the righteous man is the man who is said to “live by faith,” not by perfect good deeds (Hab. 2:4; Rom. 1:17).

So righteousness does not mean “moral perfection” but “being in the right with God because of faith.”

In other words, ice is cold and fire is hot.

….

This is leading up to rant filled with gratuitous Bible citations.

What’s more, being a man of faith doesn’t mean a life of perfect consistency either.

You mean good people aren't perfect??? Thanks for notifying me Brian Godawa!

Look at David, the “man after God’s own heart” (Acts 13:22), yet he was a murderer and adulterer and more than once avoided obeying God’s will. But that doesn’t stop him from being declared as “doing all God’s will” by the apostle Paul.

At risk of sounding like a broken record, good people are not perfect.

Which is why repeating the obvious makes a person look like a blithering moron.

Or consider Abraham, the father of the Faith, who along with Sarah believed that God would provide them with a son (Heb. 11:8-11).

What does this have to do with anything? Is Godawa trying to dazzle the reader with how many Bible verses he can quote?  

Yet, that Biblically honored faith was not perfect, as they both laughed in derision at God’s promise at first (Gen. 17:17; 18:12).

I guess Godawa never heard of a thing called context.

According to the Zohar, Sarah laughed because her son would have a feminine soul.

The Zohar also states that a soul from the "feminine world" cannot have children.

Sarah knew this and laughed because this contradicted God's promise to continue Abraham's bloodline.

God had to remind Sarah that He has the power to do anything. Which means He can turn a feminine soul into a masculine one.

And because Godawa loves to scripture drop, he cites additional examples from the Bible when people either argued or complained to God.

The very name Israel means “to struggle with God.”  

I normally don't split hairs but considering the fact that the author fancies himself to be a scholar…

The word Israel means "God contends".

An alternate translation is "He Retains God"or "God Is Upright".

All the heroes in the Hebrews Hall of Faith (Heb. 11) had sinful moments, lapses of obedience and even periods of running from God’s call or struggling with their Creator.

According to the NIV translation, it commended the people for having a strong faith in God and how that faith allowed them to do what it is just. It does not give blow-blow descriptions of their spiritual struggles or a detailed accounting of all of their sins.

Now that I'm thinking about it… I have a sneaking suspicion that this is leading up to Godawa justifying his depiction of Noah.

It would not be heresy to suggest that Noah may have had his own journey with God

Well, duh.

Noah's spiritual journey would have started with baby steps.

It is not like Noah would be chummy with God the very second he was born. A relationship with God is developed during a lifetime.

that began in fear and ended in faith.

That's assuming that every person that started a relationship with God that said relationship was founded on distrust (which is fueled by fear) or the case of Noah Primeval, built on a foundation that is a passive-aggressive hate boner for the Almighty.

For some individuals, their spiritual journey never originated from animosity or distain because they always had faith.

In fact, to say otherwise is to present a life inconsistent with the reality of every human being in history.

I'll say it again.

Every person's spiritual journey with God is different.

To insist that every person's relationship with God originated from negative emotions is not based in reality.

To say one is a righteous person of faith is to say that the completed picture of his life is one of finishing the race set before him, not of having a perfect run without injuries or failures.  

It is time for a writing exercise! Let’s take this wordy sentence and make it concise.

I'll go first.

The completed picture of a righteous person’s life is not a perfect run without injuries or failures but rather they finished the race set before them.

Now that I'm thinking about it …

This verbose sentence sounds like something that belongs in a fortune cookie.

Also, I find it odd that this little nugget of wisdom uses the gender neutral phrase “righteous person of faith” but then uses his | him pronouns.

Why am I getting the feeling that this is a subtle message that only a man can be a "righteous person of faith"?

Some scholars have even noted that the phrase “blameless in his generation” is an unusual one,

“They also think it is peculiar that the Flood lasted for forty days and nights. Why not eighteen or twenty-five? Is forty God’s favorite number or did He just pick it randomly?”

reserved for unblemished sacrifices in the temple.

Wait a minute.

So these scholars are stating that the phrase "blameless in his generation" is only used for animal sacrifices.  

Which means Noah is likened to an animal sacrifice…

Which is totally different from Noah Primeval's depiction of Noah as a macho and virile warrior who is the Chosen One.

Also, it is really dodgy when someone only gives some citations or doesn't provide any.

This physical purity

…

The words "physical purity" just sent shivers down my spine.

Because when words like that casually enter into a conversation, it is not long before an argument is made in favor of eugenics.

takes on new meaning when understood in the genetic context of the verses

"Genetic context"?

I didn't know that words had DNA.

Flippant comment aside, all this talk of "physical purity" and "genetic context" prompted me to do a quick Google search of the following:  Noah blameless in his generation animal and it  brought up a thread asking if Genesis 6:9 is referring to Noah's genetic purity.

before it that speak of “Sons of God” or bene ha elohim leaving their proper abode in heaven and violating the separation of angelic and human flesh (Gen. 6:1-4; Jude 5-7).

Um…

This is sort of correct.

Genesis 6:7-4 is about the Sons of God marrying beautiful human women and having children called Nephilim. Yet it also states that humans will live to be 120.

While Jude 5-7, the writer reminds the reader that God delivered his people out of Egypt and destroyed the non-believers. They also said that the angels who "did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their proper dwelling" along with the sinful people of Sodom and Gomorrah will be punished by "eternal fire."

Within church history,

The concept of the Grigori and Nephilim originated in Jewish folklore and legends.

At some point, early Christians either stumbled across an old scroll discussing these ideas or simply heard about it. They probably found the whole story to be fascinating and proceeded to write their own interpretations.

there is a venerable tradition of interpreting this strangest of Bible passages as referring to supernatural beings from God’s heavenly host who mate with humans resulting in the giant offspring called Nephilim.

The idea that some angels came down from Heaven to mate with humans doesn't sound bizarre to me.

Frankly, the Book of Revelation reads like John was on a big acid trip.

Other equally respectable theologians argue that these Sons of God were either humans from the “righteous” bloodline of Seth or a symbolic reference to human kings or judges of some kind.

Again, Christians didn't come with these alternate explanations. For instance, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai strongly opposed the idea that the "benei elokim" were angels.

I have weighed in on the supernatural interpretation

That is a weird way of saying "I have decided to write a novel that depicts the Grigori as angels."

According to the Collins dictionary,  the words "weighed in", means:

give an opinion or enter a discussion or argument

to measure how heavy someone is, esp. before a competition

It is important to note that The Free Dictionary  and the Oxford Learner's Dictionaries has these definitions but with slightly different wording.

In conclusion?

and have provided appendices at the end of the book that give the Biblical theological foundation for this interpretation. 

Only a filthy peasant has opinions.

An enlightened individual only believes in facts and since they are benevolent, they are imparting their wisdom to others.

This novel seeks to remain true to the sparse facts presented in Genesis (with admittedly significant embellishments)

“Admittedly significant embellishments”?

That’s putting it mildly.

More like “being preachy but insisting that you are only telling people facts.”

interwoven with theological images and metaphors come to life.

I’m sorry but I can’t take this statement seriously.

Because it reminds me of a scene in the movie The Ref when Gus is talking about how “a complex web of complications need to be weaved and woven into a quilt of some kind.”

Where I engage in flights of fancy,

That’s putting it mildly.

This story never put its feet on the ground.

such as a journey into Sheol,

Pray tell, what is Sheol?

An explanation would be nice because for all we know, Sheol is the name of a cave or a forest.

I seek to use figurative imagery from the Bible, such as “a bed of maggots and worms” (Isa. 14:11) and “the appetite of Sheol” (Isa. 5:14)  and bring them to life by literalizing them into the flesh-eating living-dead animated by maggots and worms.

Let’s break this down, shall we?

Isaiah 5:14 ESV says this:

Therefore Sheol has enlarged its appetite

   and opened its mouth beyond measure,

and the nobility of Jerusalem[h] and her multitude will go down,

Isaiah 5 is about the people of Israel who will be punished for their sins. This specific passage is discussing how the sinners are going to die. 

Isaiah 14:11 ESV says this:

Your pomp is brought down to Sheol,

   the sound of your harps;

maggots are laid as a bed beneath you,

   and worms are your covers.

Isaiah 14 discusses how Babylon will be destroyed by God.  This specific passage is about how the haughty King of Babylon will perish.

It still doesn’t answer the question of what Sheol is.

If we are still looking at the Bible for an explanation, the NIV translation of Isaiah 5:14 states:  

Therefore Death expands its jaws,  opening wide its mouth;

Also, the New International version of Isaiah 14 doesn’t use the word Sheol.

Instead,  it uses the words to the grave.

Based on these translations, one can make the assumption that Sheol is the word for death or grave.

However,  Sheol is a place where the souls of the dead reside.

Let's take a look at this line more closely:

bring them to life by literalizing them into the flesh-eating living-dead animated by maggots and worms.

The Bible having figurative imagery? That is not a groundbreaking revelation. Plenty of Bible scholars have written papers and or books analyzing this.

Figurative language is not supposed to be taken literally. It is used by a writer to convey an idea (example: time is a thief) or to paint a picture in a reader's mind (example: the flowers danced in the wind.)

To take something figurative and make it literal is asinine.

Also, "flesh-eating living-dead"?

I guess the word "zombie" is too plebeian.

Another player that shows up in the story is Leviathan.

“Another player”?

I bethink he is a pretentious rampallian who thinkest by using an antediluvian word maketh him intelligent and literary sir.        

“Player” is an old fashioned word for actor.

It DOES NOT mean character.

So in conclusion:

While I have provided another appendix explaining the theological motif of Leviathan

Translation?

“Behold my dizzying intellect!”

as a metaphor in the Bible for chaos and disorder, I have embodied the sea dragon in this story for the purpose of incarnating that chaos as well.

One word:

I have also literalized the Mesopotamian cosmology of a three-tiered universe with a solid vault in the heavens, and a flat disc earth supported on the pillars of the underworld, the realm of the dead.

Thanks to Brian Godawa, the words "metaphor" and "literalized" annoy me.

I'd hate to rain on your parade but Mesopotamian mythology isn't the only one who had a three-tiered universe.

Below is an image of the Hebrew cosmology:

It also has an universe that has three levels: heaven, earth, and the underworld. The earth is a flat disc floating on water with heaven above it and the underworld below it.

If one takes a second look at the picture, you will notice that there are pillars or the foundation of the earth.

In conclusion, Mesopotamian mythology isn't the only one to depict a universe as being composed of three levels.

This appears to be the model assumed by the Biblical writers in many locations (Phil. 2:10; Job 22:14; 37:18; Psa. 104:5; 148:4; Isa. 40:22),

Jewish people have their own culture. They would not be using Mesopotamian mythology as their yardstick.

so I thought it would be fascinating to tell that story within that worldview unknown to most modern westerners.

You mean a different concept or an idea can be interesting? What a mind boggling revelation!

If I didn't know any better, I’d believe Godawa when he said telling a story from another culture’s point of view would be “fascinating.”

Yet it is painfully obvious that if something doesn't conform to his beliefs, it must be a vile falsehood created by malevolent beings.

The purpose of the Bible is not to support scientific theories or models of the universe,

Actually, the Big Bang Theory does not conflict with the story of creation.

but to tell the story of God through ancient writers. Those writers were people of their times just as we are.  

Which is why the absence of Jewish culture is jarring.

Especially since all the "good" characters are Calvinists.

I have also woven together Sumerian and other Mesopotamian mythology in with the Biblical story,

It is randomly inserted  (ex: Pazuz) or the deities are evil fallen angels who are destroying Family Values™ and Corrupting the Children™.

but with this caveat:

"Anything that doesn't conform to my worldviews must be the lies devised by Satan."

Like C.S. Lewis,

Did he compare himself to C.S. Lewis?

….

……….

…………………….

It is like trying to compare M. Night Shyamalan to Alfred Hitchcock.

Even though one is a hack while the other one is a talented creator.

I believe the primary purpose of mythology is to embody the worldview and values of a culture.

Aside from helping people to understand the world around them and giving them answers to timeless questions such as: Is there life after death? Why does evil exist?

Mythology also provides a form of entertainment and ensures that certain traditions survive.

But all myths carry slivers of the truth and reflect some distorted vision of what really happened.

This reeks of ethnocentrism!

Sumer’s Noah was Ziusudra, Babylon’s Noah was Utnapishtim, and Akkad’s was Atrahasis. The Bible’s Noah is my standard.

I'll bring this up if anyone tries to claim that Noah Primeval isn't preachy and ethnocentric.

So my goal was to incorporate real examples of ANE history and myth in subjection to that standard in such a way that we see their “true origin.”

....

You know what?

If someone wrote a Wiccan based fantasy series that demonized Christianity, he would be outraged.

Godawa reiterates his "speculation" that the deities were fallen angels with superhuman abilities that once belonged to God's divine council.

See the appendix at the back for my defense of this interpretation from the Bible.

I'm not in the mood to read a lengthy appendix that reads like you giving yourself a giant pat on the back. Perhaps that will be a future snark.

Lastly, I have permitted myself to use extra-Biblical Jewish literature from the Second Temple period as additional reference material for my story.

In other words...

He gave himself permission to steal and vandalize a different culture. Isn't that charming?

I use these ancient Jewish sources

I bet many people wished you hadn't.

not because I consider them completely factual or on par with the Bible,

"They are complete heresy. Instead, believe in the teachings of John Calvin."

but simply in an attempt to incarnate the soul of the ancient Hebrew imagination in conversation with the text of Scripture

Like the Yeti, the Hebrew imagination has yet to be found.

rather than imposing my own modern western one upon the text.

...

............

............................

I am within the tradition of the Church on this since authors of the New Testament as well as early Church Fathers

Just "Church Fathers"?

Christianity also had Church Mothers.

To name a few: Mary Magdalene, Phoebe, Junia, Lydia, Eudia, Thecla, Syntyche, and Prisca.

and other orthodox theologians in church history respected some of these ancient manuscripts as well.

While the author did the opposite.

Many of these texts from the Second Temple Period, such as Jubilees, Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs or The Life of Adam and Eve, and others found in the Pseudepigrapha, were creative extrapolations of the Biblical text.

I guess the word of the day is "extrapolations".

Extrapolation is defined as "to predict by projecting past experience or known data" or " to infer from values within an already observed interval."

I find it rather disgusting to imply that the Midrash is a product of guesswork or estimates.

Which means whatever the author's personal beliefs are founded in facts.

These were not intended to deceive or overturn the Bible,

Notice the word "intended".

It infers that the writers weren't deliberately telling lies.

It just happens that they were spreading falsehoods.

but rather to retell Biblical stories with theological amplification and creative speculation

You see, humans are a curious species. We don't like unanswered questions.

Therefore, we come up with a possible answer or an explanation for a particular event.

The purpose of the Midrash is to provide explanations or to give a story details.

Ever wondered who was Cain's wife? According to Book of Jubilees, she was Cain's sister and her name is Awan.

while remaining true to their interpretation of the Scriptures.  

They weren't providing interpretations to Mesopotamian mythology.

In short, I am not writing Scripture.

Normally, I would believe this.

But subsequent interviews and podcasts along with the preachy messages written in the story belies this statement.

I am not even saying that I believe this is how the story might have actually happened.

Remember when I said to keep something in mind because it will be significant later on?

Well, now it is important.

This statement and the words "Inspired by True Events" are contradictory.

I am simply engaging in a time-honored tradition of the ancient Hebrew culture:

No, no, no!

Do not pass go. Do not collect $200!

I am retelling a Biblical story in a new way to underscore the theological truths within it.

Godawa only wants to associate with ancient Hebrew culture when it elevates him as a writer and  his stories.

From his remarks, it is obvious that he regards the Midrashes as being subpar bodies of work that will mislead undiscerning readers.

That being said, that won't stop him using such texts in order to receive praise for his "creativity" and be commended  in scholarly circles for using Jewish texts.

This mentality is similar to Rick Riordan's.

In case anyone doesn't know...

Rick Riordan is best known for writing the Percy Jackson series which retold Greek mythology. He then wrote a series based on Norse mythology called Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard.

Both series were a hit and he greatly profited from these stories.

After sometime, Riordan made the following statements:

“I didn’t realize some people still worship the old Viking gods. Very strange, and a little scary…In my opinion, the more you learn about the mythology, the more impossible it is to take it seriously as a religion… after you’ve met Odin and Thor in the stories, who in their right mind would ever want to worship them?”

" I love Greek myths, but why anyone would want to worship the Greek pantheon is beyond me. "

"It’s strange to think anyone would still worship the Olympians seriously."

Early in the book, the character Chiron draws a clear distinction between God, capital-G, the creator of the universe, and the Greek gods (lower-case g). Chiron says he does not wish to delve into the metaphysical issue of God, but he has no qualms about discussing the Olympians because they are a “much smaller matter.”

Unsurprisingly, this offended many polytheists.

You might be wondering: what's my point?

To put it simply? Both writers profited from incorporating different mythologies into their stories.

One writer made disparaging remarks about individuals who believe in these deities after becoming a best selling author.

While the other barely concealed their disdain for the source material they used that garnered their popularity and praise from critics.

In conclusion?

Don't build your career on writing stories using different mythologies and deride the believers of said mythos or the very thing that puts money in your bank account.

Then wonder why some people think you are a horse's ass.

The Biblical theology that this story is founded upon is provided in several appendixes at the back of the book for those who are interested in going deeper.  

First of all..

Stop peddling your friggin' appendixes.

We get it.

It has citations.

Which means it is supposed to be scholarly...

Therefore... It is deep and elevated literature.

The beauty of fiction

Um, no.

It is not all beautiful.

It can also be bland or terrible.

And in some cases, it is deeply disturbing.

is that we can make assumptions regarding uncertain theological and historical information

Yes, you can.

Up to a point.

The moment when you insist theses assumptions or personal beliefs are based in fact...

Writers like Philippa Gregory and Brian Godawa are born.

without having to prove them one way or another.

You know what also doesn't require proof?

Faith.

The story requires only that we establish continuity within the made up world,

It is called the suspension of disbelief.

and accepting those assumptions for the sake of the story does not imply theological agreement.

Normally, yes.

But this series makes it abundantly clear that if you don't agree with the political and theological beliefs...

At best, you are country pumpkin. (Yes, he does equate them to being stupider than Ana Steele.)

At worst, you are not only a moron but a depraved degenerate as well.

So, sit back and

Reach for the booze because you are going to need it. Also, make sure that the vomit bucket is in front of you.

let your imagination explore the contours of this re-imagined journey

And before long, wishing that you never did and longing to depart for the Undying Lands.

of one of the most celebrated religious heroes across all times and cultures.

And by the end, you want:

To repeatedly punch the "good" characters in the throat and stab them in the groin. Especially Noah.

The villains to shut up and fuck off. Because they are what a thirteen years old boy would think is edgy.  Especially if said boy was also a Bible thumper.

[littleredroseonthevalley]

A Very Quirky Little Habit

Summary: After dating him for about six weeks, Emma came to find out that Mason has a very quirky little habit: buying every single thing his girlfriend might like. It was starting to become exhausting.

Rating: K+ - Suitable for more mature childen, 9 years and older, with minor action violence without serious injury. May contain mild coarse language. Should not contain any adult themes.

Words: 1375

Notes: I dated a lot of rich boys. Well, honestly, I date exclusively emotionally-stunted rich boys. I enjoy suffering. Anyways, none of them spoiled me because they were cheap bastards and I was too timid to ask for anything. Allow me to live my fantasy.

One of these days, I will post some Noah content. I swear I like him, too. I swear.

After dating him for about six weeks, she came to find out that Mason has a very quirky little habit.

Well, at least Emma judges it to be quirky, she had never come across anyone else with such a proclivity.

It was not something normal, like along the lines of rolling pens between his fingers whenever boredom strikes in class or whistling a bubble-gum pop song to himself when he thinks no one is listening.

It was no secret that Mason Jennings, her boyfriend and childhood friend, had more wealth than he could possibly need, but she did not think that his, well, profligate behaviour was so pronounced.

Mason has a habit, and that habit was to buy Emma every single thing he thinks she might like.

When she complained about it to her sister, Mackenzie, she laughed out loud.

"I really do wish I was kidding!" Says Emma, face completely deadpan as she stares at Mackenzie from across the table. "He buys me everything. We went to the mall together yesterday and he saw me very briefly glance at a box of chocolates at that expensive chocolaterie on the second floor. Next thing I know, he's dragging me to the cashier and buying not one—"

"I'm guessing not two." Her coloured hair sister says, finding the situation quite ridiculous.

"Not two! Not three either, because that boy has too much money on his hands!"

"Four?"

Emma presses a palm to her forehead, leaning on the stuffed armchair she was sitting. "Try five."

Mackenzie laughs loudly once more, falling back on the couch as she takes deep breaths to steady her voice and allows her to talk normally again. "You are living the dream of every girl in your cheerleading team."

“Don’t be judgy!” The older one berated. “They aren’t all vapid sugar babies.”

The younger girl raised an eyebrow.

“Fine, Lauren definitively is vapid and high-maintenance, but not all of them. Ava’s in the team, she dated Mason and they broke up.”

“Yeah, I wonder what that is all about.” Mackenzie responds, in a sarcastic tone.

“Well, my argument stands.” Emma counters.

"And mine does too. I know girls who would kill to have someone like Mason Jennings." The painter points out, matter-of-factly. "Rich, handsome, popular and absolutely whipped. I mean, I know the boy my whole life, and I can’t say a single good thing about him besides those four. That’s gotta be it."

The former cheerleader glared at her sister, who shrugged.

Emma sighs. "Look, it's not that I don't appreciate what he does for me, but sometimes..." She trails off, falling silent in search of the right word. "He's a bit..."

"Too much?" Mackenzie suggests. "Too rich for your liking? Too rich for human decency?"

"He spoils me too much." Emma mutters, and she does not know why, but saying it out loud has her cheeks flooding pink. "I don't really feel like I deserve it, and I don’t want him to think I’m with him because he buys me stuff."

Mackenzie gives her an unimpressed look. "Look, I might not care all that much for the Jennings. I might think you could do better. But I can see that boy adores you, sis. He would punch his plutocrat dad’s face for you if you asked him to."

Emma raises her eyebrows. "Would he?"

"Well… You might have to be a little insistent, and he had to have a bit of a death wish." Mackenzie shrugs. "Point is, he'd do anything for you. He'd obviously buy anything for you, as he has so kindly proved."

"Well, what if I don't want him to?" Wonders Emma, her voice a little desperate-sounding. "I haven't even finished half a box of the chocolates he bought me yesterday, and I still have unopened candy from last week, and that’s after I gave you half my stash."

The youngest gaped. “That was half?! Goddamnit, who is he? The witch from Hansel and Gretel?”

She nodded, emphatically. “See?! It’s too much!”

“Well, OK, I give you that, but have you considered telling him that?” She asked, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, and it really was.

Emma scoffed. "Have I?! No matter what I say to convince him that I don't need a designer dress that happened to catch my eye for two seconds, or a nice camera my gaze lingered on for a little too long, he never listens. He marches right up to the cashier and slaps a blasted credit card onto the counter and then suddenly it's all mine for the taking."

Mackenzie looks terribly amused. Leaning forward, she settles her elbows on the arms of the couch to approach her sister on the chair and drive her point home by shrugging a petulant shoulder.

"He's a man in love, Emma. In love and a little stupid." She says, a single brow arched. "If he wants to show how much he loves you by spoiling you rotten with things you don't even need, then let him. It's not like it's hurting anyone, it's certainly not hurting you."

Emma swallows. Indignantly, she says, "It's hurting his finances."

Mackenzie only scoffs. "Well, that’s his problem, and his dad’s problem, to solve. Think of it as wealth redistribution."

“Our dad’s a doctor, Mackenzie. I don’t think we qualify for that.” The oldest sister points out. “We might be in debt, but we’re hardly lining up in front of a soup kitchen.”

“The American economic system runs on reckless consumption, Emma. Think of all the families and small business that you could be helping by hinting you want a carbon fibre easel and an ink set from that store downtown.”

“But I don’t paint.” She points out.

“Well, I do, and if you’re done with the material consumption, I have a couple of things I want but can’t afford on my allowance.”

Emma hits her sister with a throw pillow.

“Ow!” She complains. “OK, got it, no art supplies. How about a puppy? We can call him Mason Jr.”

“Dad’s allergic. Mason Jr. would go straight to the pound.” Emma, with a tinge of regret, reminds her sister. “And don’t give him any ideas!”

Mackenzie rolls her eyes and points out the bay window with a wicked smirk on her face. "I don’t have to. Look, here he comes now. I wonder what he may have brought for our delight."

Sure enough, when Emma looks towards where Mack was pointing, Mason is walking across the front lawn towards their home with his hands tucked behind his back.

The doorbell rings, and Mackenzie shouts, running towards it: “I’ll take it! I’ll take it!”

The youngest sister opens the front door widely and, with a smile, greets her brother-in-law. “Hey, Jennings, what’s up?”

“Hey, Mack. I’m fine, how about you?” He responds, amicably.

“Oh, I’m hanging. See, I came with a business proposal. How would you like to invest on a budding local artist? I’m sure it would make my sister very happy…”

Emma throws her another pillow, that hits her sister straight on her head.

“Ow! Emma!” The youngest complained. “Damned shooting accuracy!”

“Stop trying to scam my boyfriend, Mackenzie!” She screamed from the living room.

“Ugh, fine!” The artist shouted back. “Emma’s in the back. I’ll be in my bedroom. If you need me, don’t call.”

The younger girl went up the stairs two steps at a time, and left Emma and Mason alone together. She flicks her eyebrows up at him and leans up when he stands in front of her to press a chaste kiss to his lips out of a greeting.

"What have we here?" She asks, trying to take a peek at what he holds behind him.

A prideful smile sneaks its way onto Mason's face. "Like the loving boyfriend that I am, I've bought you this."

And then he brings his arms to his front to show her what he has clutched in his hands: another bag from the blasted chocolaterie.

"More of the chocolate I bought you yesterday!" Announces Mason with excitement. "In case the ones I bought weren't enough."

Emma meets Mackenzie's gaze from upstairs.

"Whipped." Mackenzie mouths and pretends to hold a riding crop.

My Two First Loves Masterlist

[salmonthestoryteller]

All About Isobel

I’ll admit Isobel is my fav character.  I honestly didn’t expect that to happen.  She definitely wasn’t among my fav in the OG series, nor at the start of the book series. (Though, like RNM the book series version seems to be winning me over.)  Somewhere along the line, though, I was like - yah, nope, everybody else move a slot down, Isobel is claiming my top character spot.

If there’s one thing I love about Isobel it is how important Max and Michael are to her.  It seems to be why some people hate her.  To me, though, it’s one of the reasons I adore her character.  These are her brothers and if you hurt them she will end you.  The world can freakin’ burn, she is going to protect these two with all she has in her.

It isn’t surprising either, and I want to back up and look at her backstory first, especially with everything we learned in the last two episodes of the season.  So, yes, considering her plot involving both the Drifter and Noah, fair warning that some of the content may be triggering.

So there is at least two instances where Isobel is able to call out to Michael, one shared with Max, while completely unconscious.  We know Max and Isobel have their twin connection which Max describes as a “warm presence” with him all the time.  But the fact that she called to Michael twice shows that at some level she has to be telepathically connected to him as well.

They emerge from the pods at age seven, and are found by the highway.  From there they end up in a group home. Now, to my understanding a group home is not a foster family.  It is the modern day equivalent to an orphanage, with several adults looking after a group of children.  From there they are adopted by the Evans almost right away.  They still aren’t even speaking yet when they go with them. Max and their mother discuss the fact that it took them months to talk. And that when they did, they did so immediately with no trouble.  As if they’d been waiting to learn the whole language before speaking.

Michael, as we know, is left behind and doesn’t return to their lives until they are eleven.  However, Isobel probably could sense that he was missing the whole time.  She couldn’t say who was missing, because they hadn’t had words or names when they were separated.  She couldn’t say “Michael is missing” - she just knew someone was.  This is probably where Isobel’s fear of losing those she cares about first stems from.  An experience she couldn’t even fully explain at the time.

I have no doubt that when they found each other again at eleven, it was one of the best days of their lives to Isobel.  Because, to her, Michael is her brother. There’s no ifs in that to Isobel.  Michael says they aren’t family, Max tells Michael he isn’t his family in a moment of anger, but to Isobel the fact that Michael is her brother is indisputable. It’s plain fact.  It’s there in the way she treats him, in how she is willing to rely on him and trust him, and even how she speaks.  Not even the big statements like, “We’re a family.”  In small ways like how she refers to Max in 1x03 as “Our brother.”

Fast forward a few years.  (In 1x06 I thought it was their thirteenth birthday as it was 2004 and they are said to be 17 in 2008, but in 1x12 Max says Isobel was fourteen so I guess if their “birthday” was summer it's three years later?)  It seems like - compared to Max - Michael protected Isobel much more from the abuse he was suffering.  It doesn’t seem as if she has an understanding of just how bad things were.  The look on her face when he tells her the story of always going to Foster Homestead Ranch and his reasons why are further proof.  Isobel knew he wasn’t as lucky as them, but she was at a loss at how bad he truly had it.  How alone he truly felt.  Which I think was on purpose on Michael’s part.  It’s also why she’s probably closer to their mother than Max was.  She doesn’t seem to harbor the same resentment to their parents that Max felt for them not taking Michael in.  I think she’s closer to Ann because when she thinks she’s dying she tells Max, “We should call Mom.”  Not their parents. “Mom.”

However, Ann still says they both kept her at arms length to Max.  That they, not him but they, didn’t let her be a mom.  I don’t think this was true as much when they were younger.  I’m guessing the separation for Isobel and Ann occured when Isobel hit puberty.  Because - think about this for a moment - Isobel is an alien.  She knows this.  She knows she has powers others don’t.  That her biology isn’t quite the same. (Acetone, hello.)  And she had to go through puberty with not only no grown woman to talk to it about, but not even another girl her own age.  She couldn’t ask her mom if certain things happening were normal or not - because there was no way of knowing what was alien “normal.”  And if it turned out it wasn't human normal, and she brought it up she risked exposing them. Puberty is a pretty sucky thing already, and Isobel probably felt twice as isolated during it because she just damn didn’t know what was or wasn’t normal for their species.  In that Max and Michael at least had each other.  I doubt Isobel felt comfortable talking to her brothers about periods, cramps, etc.

And in the middle of this whole very isolating confusing time for her comes the Drifter.  It’s pretty clear what his intentions were when he grabbed her, though it is not made clear how far he got.  Isobel is still clothed, so I don’t think he raped her, but I have no doubt he touched her before Max and Michael got here.  And remember something else - Isobel is a telepath.  A telepath who they already knew could make others do things.  If she at all tried to touch the Drifter’s mind there’s no saying what was said in Mindspace to her.

Worse, this is when her telepathic scream brings her to Noah’s attention. Between the Drifter’s attack and witnessing Max kill him, Isobel shuts down.  The trauma is too much for her to handle, and she retreats inside her mind.  Noah takes the opportunity to connect to her that night, and he never lets go of that connection until his death.  Max said that she continued to have black outs after the attack, and Noah mentions how that allowed him to see through her eyes.  How soon he was able to start to use her body to move around is unclear.  And we are also unclear on what all influences Noah had on her otherwise.

Noah speaks of their connection several times.  We know he can control her actions when she is unconscious or withdrawn into her mind, but how deep did that connection run?  Max is concerned about Liz’s ability to consent when his mark is on her.  Noah has had his mind connected to Isobel’s since she was fourteen.  We cannot say how much that affected her - if she ever had complete autonomy after that night or if a part of her was always affected by Noah’s feelings and desires.

However, one thing is very much true - and that’s that after that night Isobel didn’t trust anyone who wasn’t Max or Michael for years.  There was never a time when the people around her weren’t listed as “potentially dangerous”.  We see that in how she reacts to everything, both in her teen years and even as an adult.  She kept everyone else at arms length.  Through barbs; through a mask of perfection.  The reason Isobel didn’t care about using her powers as a teen?

Because as long as other people were doing what she wanted she was safe.

This is someone who never feels safe.  Hasn’t been able to regain that feeling since that night in the desert.  The only place she felt remotely at ease was around Max and MIchael.  Isobel is clearly supposed to be the Queen Bee in high school, yet she goes to prom with her brothers.  Why?  Because Isobel didn't trust anyone else.  It’s why she kept withdrawing into herself and having blackouts as graduation approached.  If Max and Michael left - how was she ever going to feel safe? She had devoted her life to her brothers, because she knew she could trust them.  They would protect her, no matter what.  They’d already proven it.  Everybody else was suspect.

Only now her brother were becoming suspect.  If they were going to leave her to fend for herself, what did she have left? It’s clear from her lash out, “What am I supposed to do?” that Isobel had no plans right then for her future.  She doesn’t know what she’s going to do once Michael and Max leave - she never once mentions college herself.  And, actually, it seems her brothers have no idea either.  During the argument all Max says is “Live your life.”  There’s nothing there about anything Isobel might want or suggested she would do after graduation.  If Max and Michael had this argument, that line would have involved, “What are you talking about? You’re leaving for Albuquerque/You’re running off to Europe.”  For Isobel the best Max has to offer is “Live your life"?

This is actually where the fact that Roswell is supposed to be a small town probably plays a big part.  Because Isobel is the only girl among the three aliens.  It’s not surprising that in a small town Isobel’s lack of plans to go to college or pursue a career is never brought up.  The notion of girls staying home with the parents, working local jobs or simply getting married is still quite common.  From what we’ve seen, it’s actually what happens to Isobel after graduation, though that hasn’t completely been made clear yet.

One big thing did happen first, though. The murders.  Things change that night for Isobel in a very big way.  Until now Isobel has relied on her brother’s for protection.  After the cover up Isobel finds herself in a new role - One of protector.

To her, Michael may have killed Rosa, Jasmin, and Kate - but he is very much not to blame for it.  Think of the story Michael tells her.  He got into a fight and his hand was smashed.  He says he got drunk, but it's not like Michael could have gone to a hospital.  What is the only painkiller they have? Acetone.  To her, Michael was medicating himself because he had no way to receive the care he needed.  Then, drunk on the acetone, he ran into the other car and lost control of his powers.  He was drunk and in pain and alone and he lashed out to protect himself.  She may believe Michael killed them, but she doesn’t blame him.  If anything, she probably blames herself for blacking out and not being there when he needed her.

Then, a few days later, Max starts talking about telling Liz the truth.  Think about what this looks like from Isobel’s perspective.  Max is choosing some crush over Michael.  Michael, who buried the Drifter for him and kept his secret all these years.  He’s literally going to get Michael arrested, maybe even get them all killed if they find out what he is, because he cares about some girl more than their brother.  Is it any wonder she decides to go into Liz’s mind and tell her to stay away from Max?

However, I feel it's hinted at that Max kinda broke down after Liz left.  Isobel mentions something that sounds like a reference in a conversation with Michael in 1x02:

“Max is shutting me out. I thought maybe you could talk to him.  Something is wrong with him, Michael. And when that happened the last time, you were the only one he would open up to.”

I think seeing how using her powers on Liz affected Max really drove home what her powers were capable of to Isobel.  She’d never used her powers against her brothers in such a way.  I don’t think she ever used her powers to negatively affect those she cared about.  Others were free game, but anything that could hurt those she loved was off limits. And this is Max, her person as she calls him to Noah, and her using her powers has hurt him.  She tells Michael, “I don’t do that anymore.”   While it’s unclear when she stopped, my guess is that it was after she used them on Liz.

Then, while we can’t be certain how soon it happened, she met Noah.  She probably felt an instant trust in him because - hello - Noah was in her literal head.  She didn’t know why she felt safe with him, but he was the first person aside from Max and Michael who made her feel that way.  So she dated him, fell in love, got married.

All of this is disturbing enough, because essentially Noah has been grooming Isobel since she was fourteen and then he seeks her out physically and marries her once he gets out of the pod.  But what also bothers me is we don’t see any hint that Isobel is romantically with anyone else in the past.  She teases Max about Tess, Michael mentions dates limiting options, but Isobel is not shown with anyone.  The only feelings of desire Isobel experiences that we are shown is Noah’s for Rosa through her flashbacks, and her and Noah’s relationship.  There is literally nobody else that is even mentioned.  Every other character we get some mention of an ex or potential love interest, even Rosa.  But Isobel has only Noah.

Over the same time period, she witnessed Max and Michael’s friendship fall apart with no idea why.  She didn’t understand what was happening between them.  This was her family and now they were barely speaking.  She had her new position, though, and she wasn’t going to let them down.  She was going to be the one who was strong; the one who protected them and looked after them.  She devoted herself to that, and despite some bumps along the way, I don’t think she felt she failed at it.  She never knew Max was unhappy - he didn’t seem to show that to her after he got his act together.  She says as much to Noah in 1x03.  She thought Michael let his life fall apart because he’d killed three girls and couldn’t forget.  She tried to be there for him - she never cut him out of her life.  She had no idea how to make things better, but she made sure she was there if he needed her. We know this because Noah doesn’t just list Max when Isobel says she had something to take care of - he lists Michael too.

Then Liz comes back into town, and everything changes.  It’s little wonder she views Liz as a threat. Remember, Isobel never feels safe - everyone is a threat.  Liz most of all - Max almost turned on Michael and her for Liz once before.  Max was devastated after losing her the first time and now it's going to happen again. And while people like to say Isobel is overprotective and out of line for constantly lecturing Max about her - is she wrong?  Liz is using Max’s feelings because she’s searching for the truth, Liz does want revenge for Rosa. Liz's history doesn't look like someone she would trust with her brother's happiness. 

Isobel isn’t just using her powers for kicks.  She goes after Liz to protect her family.  She practices at Maria’s bar because she thinks she needs to strengthen her abilities.  If she fails - how will she ever keep Michael safe now that Liz knows an alien killed Rosa?  She isn’t thinking there’s some big secret to why Maria hates her - she probably thinks the reason is small and petty. She doesn’t know Maria.  Then everything becomes strange - because why did Rosa hate her?  Rosa was two years older than them - she was long gone from high school by the time Isobel would have been the head of Roswell High’s Mean Girls.  It makes no sense - she almost never  interacted with her.  Why would someone hate her she didn’t even know?

It’s no wonder the “truth” about the murders affects Isobel so deeply.  She’s spent ten years viewing the deaths as a terrible accident. Now they are murders - actual murders - that she herself committed.  And she doesn’t know why. She does know that for some reason Rosa hated her. But Rosa, Kate, and Jasmin weren't even a blip on her radar before the murders. Why would she suddenly kill them? She's spent her whole life afraid of others and now she can't even trust herself.

Then the flashbacks start after the cure. She has no reason to doubt them - they're her own memories. What's more is that they probably make sense to her.  There were probably days she was sick of the front she put on to keep others at a distance.  And here are these flashbacks saying she let down that guard with someone - with Rosa. And it seems like it was a wonderful thing - Rosa didn't let her down.  She was safe.  Maybe she even loved her? It's everything teen Isobel always wanted. She and Michael discuss it:

"I used to look in the sky when we were kids, and hope something up there would save me."

"I used to look around at the people of this town and hope for the same thing."

She feels invested in this now.  She had a close friend, the only truly close female friend she ever had as far as we see, maybe she even had a secret romance.  Then she finds out the horrifying truth that it was never her at all. She never had that friendship, and what's worse? Noah used her to attack an innocent girl. Just like she was attacked when she was fourteen. Only Rosa didn't have Max and Michael to save her.

Isobel's face off with Noah is painful because it truly is the worst betrayal imaginable.  Isobel doesn't let people close. Isobel doesn't trust. She did with Noah, when the truth is she never should have.  He was the one she should have been protecting herself from.

I am glad they gave us her final Mindscape conversation with Noah.  It may be a lie that she never loved him, but what truly mattered wasn't whether she loved him or not.  What mattered was facing him and letting him know he no longer had control of her.  She was done with him.

The season ends with Isobel exploding the picture frame with her mind. And while I'm excited to see her expand her powers, I am concerned for her in s2. The truth about Noah has already taken away one of her shelters. Losing Max? That is literally one of her greatest fears come to life.

In pursuit of feeling safe again - in protecting what she has left? There's really no saying what path Isobel might take.

[missmeikakuna]

Chad and the Incel Chapter 11

Rated: M

Fandom: Original Fiction (but inspired by the Virgin vs Chad meme)

Relationship type: Male/Male with a bit of Female/Female (the lesbians are adorable, btw) and unrequited Male/Female (in other words, the guys are bisexual).

Description: Chad is, well, a Chad, or at least he looks like one. He’s got his sights set on the cool nerd Becky and enlists the help of her shy incel ex-friend Noah, offering to help him get the gorgeous girl (Stacy) he desperately wants. Noah is reluctant to help, believing that he will be stuck in inceldom forever, but Chad’s interest in his life gives him hope. When their plans go awry, they start turning their romantic attention towards each other.

Content Warning: Given the subject matter, you can guess that this story has dark themes in it, such as suicide and self-harm (plus the mental health issues that often cause them), sexism, slut-shaming homophobia, biphobia and transphobia. There is also swearing and some mentions of sex but nothing too explicit (hence the M rating as opposed to an Explicit rating).

11th Post: I’m using a cope, sue me

Noah didn’t know what was worse, the obviously microwaved food, the uncomfortable bean bags or the creepy boy staring at him constantly from the other side of the room. He considered closing the curtain, but he wasn’t going to let that boy see him sweat. Not that it really mattered. Both he and this boy were there for the same reason.

It had been two weeks since Noah had been put in Silver Lining, and every day he cursed Chad’s name. However, after the first week, he had mixed his anger at Chad suggesting he go there with a flutter of anticipation. He told himself each night that he would see that stupid man soon if he put up with everything for just a few more days.

He was finally on his last day at the psychiatric hospital and his parents arrived to pick him up. His father spoke in hushed tones as if he was worried too much volume would shatter Noah like glass. His mother, on the other hand, complained about the hospital bills the entire trip home, interjecting her rants with questions to Noah about how he was feeling. Noah simply and without elaboration said that he was fine, each utterance of this answer more pointed in tone than the last.

When he went back to school, he held his breath. He had no idea who Chad had told about the suicide attempt, if anyone at all. 

No one looked his way, so he let go of his breath and searched the school for Chad, who smiled and waved before frowning and turning his head.

Chad repeated these motions in the classes they shared. And lunchtime. And after school. Noah felt his heart drop right to the ground like someone had tossed stones into it.

The next day rolled around and Noah walked up to Chad during lunch. He grabbed him by the arm and dragged him outside.

‘The fuck are you ignoring me for?’ he asked after getting him under the bleachers.

‘I wasn’t trying to ignore you!’ Chad exclaimed with his hands moving about. ‘I wanted to give you some space. I didn’t want a repeat of last time, what with me intruding on you and stuff.’

‘Wouldn’t refusing to talk to me at all make things worse?’

Chad blinked three times before silently making an O shape with his mouth. ‘Fair point,’ he said while rubbing his jaw and looking at the ground. Noah hitched his breath at the gesture, trying not to get too distracted. He put his hands in his pockets and sighed.

‘So, well, what exactly are we now?’

Chad let go of his jaw and grinned. ‘You still up for that? I started thinking you weren’t in the right frame of mind when you kissed me, so I was getting a little worried. Plus, I did a godawful job talking you out of suicide, so it’s a miracle it turned out okay. Oh, but you’ve still got more recovery to do, right? I should probably wait until-’

‘How long do you think that’s going to be?’ Noah yelled.

Chad flinched. ‘A few months?’

Noah groaned but lowered the volume of his voice. ‘It’s going to take me years and years. I don’t think I can wait that long. Hell, therapy might last my whole life.’

The O mouth returned to Chad’s face. ‘Okay, so, maybe we could, I dunno, take it slow?’

‘We’ve already done it. How slow could we possibly get?’

‘Well, um, we could just take it slow from now on. You know, go on a couple of dates every once in a while. No super big commitment.’

‘What, so you can go bang a bunch of foids?’ Noah blurted out before immediately covering his mouth. ‘Sorry,’ he said through the gaps in his fingers. ‘Just slipped out.’

Chad frowned for a moment before giving Noah a warm smile and placing his hand on his shoulder, massaging his neck with his thumb.

‘Slow and steady it is,’ he said. Noah moved his hands to the rest of his face and tittered, earning an even bigger smile from Chad. ‘So, secretive or not secretive? After what we’ve been through together, I don’t think I care what people think anymore.’

‘Maybe secretive for the first week.’

‘And then?’

‘And then I’ll have made up my mind. Maybe we’ll be open, maybe not.’

With a nod from Chad, the two grabbed each other’s hand and squeezed it before letting go and heading out from under the bleachers.

They passed Stacy crying as her friends berated her. Chad was about to try and rescue her when he saw Becky standing behind her with a hand massaging the crying girl’s shoulder.

Stacy wiped her tears away and told her now-ex friends in no uncertain terms, ‘Fuck off.’ When the girls left, she cried into Becky’s chest.

‘You’ll find some new friends,’ Becky said as she patted her girlfriend on the back. ‘I just know you will.’ She gave her a light kiss on the forehead and Stacy reciprocated with a kiss on the lips.

Upon seeing this display, Noah initially felt his hands clench into fists, but he then realised how close one of his hands was to Chad’s and grabbed it.

Chad beamed with the joy of a homeless person winning the lottery. ‘No secrets, then?’

Noah paused, then nodded. ‘I managed to get someone interested in me. Might as well show that off.’

Chad put a hand on his chest and feigned shock and horror. ‘I’m just a prize to you?’ He smirked and leaned down to Noah. ‘How much am I worth?’ Noah rolled his eyes but chuckled.

As they walked into the cafeteria, hand in hand, Tyrone started an oh so witty quip but remembered Chad’s treatment of him earlier and zipped out of the cafeteria.

During the weekend following two weeks, Noah watched Chad play football and then took him to his place. The laptop was back in its spot but the walls were still bare. The couple put all of Noah’s anime merchandise back in their original places along with the planes and the NFL poster. When Chad pulled out that poster, he rolled it and unrolled it multiple times as if expecting to see a different poster when he unrolled it. Noah laughed at this and Chad joined in.

While Chad sat on the bed waiting to watch anime with his boyfriend, Noah opened the laptop and went onto the incel forum. He moved his mouse over the delete account button and, following a deep breath, clicked it.

[whatadaze]

Some Kes and Liv content maybe?? 🧡

hm...interesting prompt! never really thought about writing about this duo but hopefully you like it! enjoy ;) 

******

Lucas is the one to suggest that Kes be the one to help Liv with her music. 

“He makes some sick beats and his lyrics aren’t too bad either.” 

At first, Liv simply laughs off his idea but then a few days later, Kes is knocking at the front door.

“Oh, Lucas isn’t here,” she tells him, glancing at the bag in his hand.

“I’m not here for him,” he says with a smile. “He said you could use some help with your music? I thought this equipment shouldn’t go to waste...it’s been collecting dust for a while.” 

Liv steps aside, or rather, Kes pushes his way through. The soft beat of her current project grows louder and louder as they approach her room and Kes turns around to face her, his dark brows raised high in surprise. 

“Damn,” he says, dropping his bag onto the floor. “You made that?” 

Liv nods and crosses her arms, suddenly feeling a bit shy. She hadn’t shown anyone her music, not even Noah, and she is surprised by how...naked she feels in this moment. 

“It’s a sick beat, Liv.”

She can make out the truthfulness in his tone and feels herself relax a bit as she takes a seat at her desk. 

“So I’m having a bit of trouble with the lyrics,” she explains with a tired sigh. “It just...it doesn’t fit. I like the beat and I like the lyrics but together? It just sounds wrong. And I don’t want to start all over because I have to finish this in two days but I can’t just submit a shit song and-”

“Okay,” Kes cuts in, resting a hand on her shoulder. “Breathe, yeah? Why don’t you show me what you have and we can go from there. Sometimes, a fresh pair of eyes and ears may help.” 

Liv nods, grabbing her journal from her desk and silently handing it to him.

She watches as Kes’ eyes scan the pages that she had poured her heart into.

[shellsan]

30 Day Writing Challenge

Day Ten: Dice

Fandom: D.Gray Man

Pairing: Poker Pair, Tyki Mikk/Allen Walker

Disclaimer: I do not own d.gray man

Dice

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

The first time that Tyki loses to Allen walker, he's shocked and amused. He knew that he'd been played, even if he didn't know how, and he was reluctantly impressed by the unexpected skill. It piqued his interest. But there was also another part of him that felt annoyed at the loss, determined to win should they ever meet again.

That time came when he spotted Allen working a small group at a casino, smiling innocently as he purposefully lost a hand.

“Mind if I join?” Tyki requested, sliding over to the poker playing table.

Allen's eyes narrowed for a moment before he shrugged. “Sure.” He agreed, the rest of the table having nodded in agreement. “Buy in is two hundred.”

Tyki didn't even blink as he placed the money on the table. “Sounds good.”

After that, the cards were dealt and he observed as Allen sat there innocently, small smile on his face belying none of the smug satisfaction that he'd gotten used to seeing.

When the cards went down, Tyki thought for sure he had it down.

“I win.” Allen exclaimed in false excitement. “That's only the second time tonight.”

Tyki frowned as he looked over at the boy's cards and noted that his four of a kind in Queens, did in fact beat the full house of Aces and Kings that he'd been sporting. Damn.

“Care for another round so we can win it back?” One of the older men asked, eye's narrowed at Allen. He'd put a lot of money in for that bet.

Allen shook his head. “I think I had better quit while I'm ahead. Luck's not been on my side up until now.”

As the boy left them, cash in hand (what was that, three hundred dollars?), he caught Allen's eye, smirking a little when he got a wink before he disappeared into the night.

Perhaps he could challenge the boy to something else then another time.

The second time he got his chance to corner Allen for a rematch was just after he'd finished working a case and promptly ruining the Earl's plans. But Tyki couldn't care less about that.

“How about a game of blackjack this time?” He suggested.

Allen jumped in surprise, swinging around from where he'd just shut the door to his room. “Oh it's just you. Don't scare me like that.”

Tyki frowned, huffing. “What do you mean 'just you'? Maybe I should try to kill you while I'm here instead if you're going to be like that.”

Rolling is eyes, Allen shook his head. “Do whatever you want. It's not like I'm about to stop you.” He scoffed.

Raising an eyebrow, Tyki smirked. “Whatever I want? Those are dangerous words, boy. You sure you're going to be able to live up to them?” He drawled, leering at the younger boy's body openly.

The white haired boy, to his credit, didn't so much as blush as he looked at Tyki. “Don't be an idiot. I'm not some cheap whore that you can aim for without so much as buying a drink first.” He informed, smirking forming at Tyki's reaction to those words.

Coughing a little, the Noah shook his head. “I never said you were. But regardless, I was honestly only here for a couple games of blackjack. Give me a chance to win my money back.”

For a moment he thought he'd have to try harder to convince Allen to play with him, but then the boy shrugged. “Sure. I doubt you'll be winning anything though.”

“I'll deal, I don't trust you.” Tyki informed, well aware that this was one of the few games that favours the player, but unwilling to let Allen have an easy way to cheat.

Allen didn't seem concerned though, shrugging in agreement. “Sure. You can even drop the drawing rule. You can stop at sixteen just like a normal player.” He offered.

Tyki narrowed his eyes. “You think I need a handicap, boy.”

Shrugging, the exorcist smirked back. “I don't know. Do you?”

“I'll play normally.”

“Suit yourself.”

Tyki huffed before pulling out a deck of card and beginning to deal, watching Allen carefully just like last time. He still couldn't find the moment that Allen cheated, but it definitely happened because there was no way that he'd get a blackjack otherwise. The noah had made sure of that.

“Well that's a shame.” Allen informed him, grabbing the money they'd bet on, twenty dollars each just to start with and giving Tyki a pitying look. “Better luck next time.”

The third time he demanded a rematch, it was so something he was positive Allen couldn't cheat at. Roulette.

“Gonna let me win this time?” Tyki asked, joining Allen at the table he was working.

Allen smirked in lieu of an answer, and for the first time, Tyki noted how dark it was, very far from the innocence that he usually portrayed.

(Part of his liked to think that he brought that out in Allen, and wasn't that a delicious thought?)

They played three rounds and every single time, Allen won.

There wasn't really disappointment this time, only the feeling of being vaguely amazed.

“Wow, I'm so lucky tonight.” Allen hummed, grinning innocently at the other participants.

It was so fake that Tyki had to fight not to laugh.

“I guess I'm calling it a night.” He decided, giving in. However Allen was doing it, he wasn't about to stick around and keep trying for a lost cause.

Allen pouted at him as he waved goodbye, clearly fighting the urge to smirk.

What an bastard.

By the fourth time, Tyki was feeling less determined to win, and more determined to figure out how the hell Allen was doing it. So when he spotted the white-haired boy entering an inn, he didn't think twice about following and invading his room again.

“We really need to stop meeting like this. People are going to get suspicious.” Allen informed, smirk tugging at his lips.

Tyki pouted. “Would that really be so bad? Or are you ashamed of me?” He shot back, feeling smug when it manages to startle a laugh out of the boy.

“Seriously though. What do you want, Tyki? Because that bed over there is looking really tempting so you better have a good reason to be keeping me from it.”

It occurs to him in that moment that Allen's lack of being scared of him should be less satisfying than it is, but he throws that thought away.

“A rematch. Backgammon this time. If you're sick of betting with money though, we can always bet something else.” He offered.

Allen rolled his eyes. “I have no problems wiping the floor with you every single time, but isn't your wallet starting to feel a little light?”

Tyki scoffed, “Don't be ridiculous. I have more money than I know what to do with.”

Shrugging, Allen took a seat. “Alright then, it's your money. I'm assuming you have a board.”

Producing the board, Tyki moved to sit across from Allen, setting things up quickly.

Then the game began. In the beginning the noah thought that maybe Allen had decided not to cheat at all. Everything was going rather mediocre, and he hadn't seen anything underhanded.

But then things quickly began going uphill for Allen and downhill for himself. Allen had to be cheating, even though he couldn't figure out how, for the life of him.

“Hand it over.” Allen singsonged when he made his final move and won.

Without complaint, Tyki handed over the twenty dollar note before disappearing.

The fifth time he challenges Allen to a game or baccarat and loses even worse than usual, Allen holding back with none of his usual nonchalance.

“In a bad mood are we, today?” Tyki teased.

Allen huffed, narrowing his eyes. “I'm fine.” He informs Tyki, before proceeding to beat him for the third time in a row.

The noah chuckles. “Whatever you say, boy.”

Frowning, Allen set everything up for another game. “This time I want to bet on something different for a change.” He informed.

Tyki blinked in surprise before shrugging. “What did you have in mind?”

“If I win, you stop calling me boy and use my real name.”

If the noah had been surprised before, he was definitely shocked now. But he was also amused. “Does it bother you that much, boy.”

“You're an asshole. Yes or no?”

“Sure. What do I get if I win though?”

Allen smirked at that. “You won't. But you can pick anything within reason.” He offered.

Tyki huffed at his likelihood of winning being proclaimed so openly. “There's no need to be rude. I'll choose when I win then.”

Allen shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

Neither of them were surprised when he didn't win that time either.

The next time they play together, Tyki isn't aiming to win, or to figure out how Allen was cheating in the first place.

“How hard would it be to convince you to play a game of strip poker with me?” He asked, announcing himself in Allen's room at a local inn.

The white-haired boy looked over at him with something akin to boredom. “Sick of betting with money?” He teased.

“Variety is the spice of life.”

Shrugging, Allen sat across from his easily. “Alright then. Strip poker it is.” He agreed.

It wasn't long before Tyki was sitting with only his boxers left. Allen, ruthless as ever, had refused to give the noah even a single round.

“How anyone could ever mistake you for innocent is beyond me. You're the devil.”'

Allen laughed. “Such a bad loser, Mikk. Are we playing another round, or are you content with being stripped to just your boxers?”

“I'm not a quitter, Walker. I'll play until the end.” He informed.

Shrugging, Allen waited as the cards were dealt again before winning with ease.

“Cough them up.” He joked.

Tyki smirked, moving to strip himself of his last item of clothing. “If you wanted me naked, you could have just asked.” He teased.

Allen scoffed. “Says the man who suggested it.”

Sitting down once more without any shame, the noah leered at Allen. “Another round?”

“You have nothing left to bet with.” Allen pointed out.

Tyki tilted his head. “I'm sure there's something else you could want from me.”

A smirk tugged at Allen's lips.

Bingo.

“I suppose I'm not against the idea. You won't win though, so I don't understand why you're bothering to try.”

Tyki shrugged. “Put it down to desperation instead of psychoanalysing me. All or nothing. If you win, I'll do anything that you want. If I win, you strip everything and lose the game.” He offered.

Allen smirked, and it was oh so dark. “You're on.”

Of course, Allen won.

“So what are you going to ask me for?” Tyki asked, curiosity clear.

Allen's smirk looked all the more dangerous. “You'll know soon.”

[not-a-space-alien]

Into the Unknown, Part 3:  Search Party

Prologue | Dramatis Personae | Part 1 | Part 2

Series masterpost

On AO3

Noah rubbed his temples.  On some days the crown felt heavier than others, and today was a heavy day.  He tented his hands, examining the human soul supplicating before him on the red carpet.  “Okay.  Go ahead, again.  You want to…?”

“Go up to Heaven.”

“You know as well as everyone in Hell that human souls are not allowed to leave Hell for any purpose.”

The dead human’s lip quavered, and he didn’t meet the king’s eyes.  “I know, my lord, but I was hoping you could make an exception.  You see, my…my wife died recently, and—”

“Have you filed a report with the Infernal Office of Family Location? It’s on the second layer.”

“Yes, Lord.  They informed me she was not down here.  I really need to see her.  I need to apologise…”

The dead human absolutely refused to leave until he was physically dragged out by one of the attendants.  Noah removed himself from the throne to confer with the court.

“I understand I said we needed to hear grievances,” he said in a low voice to Dagon, “but we can’t keep doing this with dead humans.  They all want the same thing, regardless of how much we’ve improved Hell.”

Dagon’s throat pouch expanded and contracted with an amphibian breath. “You know better than all of us humans are fickle creatures.  They get restless, sire, even in the absence of torture.”

From Noah’s other side, Beelzebub buzzed, “It’z only natural for them to get rezztlezz in Hell.  You can provide them with comfort, but it’z ztill a dingy cave.  They are inclined to be unhappy with it, though perzonally I cannot fathom why.”

“Right, you’re right,” said Noah.  “All right.  Something’s got to change.  We already decided human souls can’t go back up to Earth because that would upset things up there; I’m not going to change that.  But is there any reason why we couldn’t let them go up to Heaven?”

Behind Noah, Jezebel began to flip through some sheets she had on a clipboard.  “The sheer amount of work it would take to organise screening every human and approving their transportation, not to mention transporting them through the ethereal plane on Earth to reach the celestial plane…”

Noah frowned.

“Perhaps we could arrange to have free movement between Heaven and Hell?” croaked Dagon.  “We would only need to establish a tunnel of some sort.”

“I hardly think the Metatron would be amenable to zuch a zuggestion,” Beelzebub said.

Dagon’s eyes retracted back into his head and re-emerged with a blink. “The Metatron seems to take little interest in what is and isn’t allowed nowadays.  Victoria and Raphael seem to be more interested in such matters in the current standing, though it’s hardly proper.”

“Doesn’t have to be proper,” said Noah.  “Nothing we really do is proper.  My concern is that we have such a mixture down here in Hell.  We would want to allow humans such as our guest today, who was only here for adultery, to go apologise to his wife.  But we also have serial killers and rapists and things down here.  We shouldn’t treat them all the same.”

“Perhaps we could arrange them based on crime, and have certain restrictions for each group,” suggested Jezebel.

Noah massaged his temples again.  “Bloody Hell, that’s what the nine layers were for…We need to think of a way to do this without just making Hell exactly like it used to be.”

Jezebel, Dagon, and Beelzebub looked at each other among wringing hands, flipping paperwork, and lost mumbles of half-formed ideas.  Their new master was much kinder than their old, but he was hard to please in entirely new and different ways, and sometimes demanded creativity in their thinking they simply did not possess.  

“With all due respect, sire,” said Dagon, “Without the inherent cruelty this place used to have, under your rule Hell would never go back to the way it used to be.”

Noah smiled.  “You have no idea how reassuring that is.”  He sighed again.  “But I don’t know if anyone kept track of why everyone was down here, anyway…And some of them have been here so long they hardly remember what they were like when they were alive.  They might not even remember…  We need to have another meeting with the full court to discuss this.”

Dagon and Beelzebub looked at each other crestfallen.  Jezebel voiced their thoughts:  “Even Aziraphale and Crowley?”

“Yes, even Aziraphale and Crowley,” said Noah.  Aziraphale and Crowley were technically members of the advisory court, but they were in positions Noah had only been able to convince them to accept by promising their responsibilities would be absolutely minimal to the point of non-existence.  “I know getting them down here for anything other than a party is always an ordeal, but we need their expertise.”

Jezebel looked disheartened.  “I’ll start sending out the letters.  It always takes at least three before they start responding.”

“Send one to Beth first,” said Noah.  “She’ll make sure Maltha sees it, and Maltha will pressure Crowley to check his infernal mail for once.”

Jezebel bowed her head.  “Yes, sire.”

Noah sighed.  Things down in Hell would be a lot easier if the crew that stayed topside on Earth were here to help him run things on a regular basis, but it wouldn’t be right to expect that of them.  So he was stuck with the ones who wanted to hang out in Hell, which required…a certain personality.

….Still, the topside crew could be a little more cooperative about helping out when called upon.

Noah slouched in the throne, running his ring-laden hands up his face.  Full court sessions were a nightmare to coordinate. It was like wrangling cats.  No one behaved unless it was an emergency. But they were the only way things actually got done around here.

Noah was so deep in thought he didn’t even notice an imp scuttling up to the throne until he was bending down to whisper in the King’s ear.

Noah’s frown deepened upon hearing the message.  “I thought we were done with open invites.”

“You are, Lord, but Mammon insists this one was urgent.”

“All, right, then, bring them in.”

Noah sighed and arranged his crown and lordly regalements so he would look proper, and waited to see who could have convinced Mammon they were important enough to rearrange the king’s schedule.

The doors at the far end of the audience chamber boomed open, and a small demon sprinted in at top speed, looking absolutely panicked.  Noah stood in alarm.

Crowley skidded to a stop just in front of the throne, hands on his knees, panting.  Then, he seemed to catch himself and knelt briefly, then stood back up and looked Noah in the eyes.  “We have a problem.”

********************

The first thing Gabriel did upon finding himself inexplicably blessed once again with life and sentience was go to his office.  It was in complete disarray, exactly as he suspected it would be. It looked like nobody had been here in years.  A layer of dust had accumulated over all his important documents.

Muttering with disgust, he set about organising the contents of his desk, shaking out the occasional folder that was too heavily laden with dust to continue.  He found his list of targets he had been in the process of telling Kris to execute when the fighting had broken out.  That was the last thing he remembered.

Who knew how long ago that had been.  Upon taking back his position, Gabriel would first have to order an investigation into how exactly he was here.

Not that he was complaining.  But it might be prudent to make sure it, whatever it was, was permanent, lest he suddenly keel over when it wore off.  The Antichrist was the only one he could think of who might do something like this; Death very rarely made exceptions, and almost never for anyone other than humans.  But he found it hard to believe any antichrist would want him alive.

“Sir?”

He looked up to see Kris standing in the doorway, hand on his sword, looking just as confused as Gabriel felt.

“Good to see you,” said Gabriel.  “Do you know how you’re here?  You were dead, right?”

Kris gave a vague shrug.

“That’s what I thought,” said Gabriel.  “We’ll get to the bottom of this soon enough.  Where is the Metatron?”

“I don’t know, sir, I tried to find you first thing.”

“Good work.  We’ll find them…just as soon as I finish putting this in order.”

Kris sat in the chair opposite Gabriel’s desk for a solid half an hour, waiting patiently while the archangel fussed about everything within reach, organising it until it met whatever invisible rules of satisfaction he kept in his head.  “All right. You stay here, I’ll be right back.”

Metatron would be in the inner sanctum of Heaven, Gabriel knew.  You could build a house on the foundation that Uriel and Metatron both refused to leave the innermost layers of Heaven unless necessary.  Not even the sudden absence of God could change that.

He checked the Judgement Hall first—that’s where Uriel usually was, since that’s where the Book of Life was kept.  But it was empty.  Even the Book itself was gone, which was alarming.

He backtracked and made his way into the Hall of the Throne.

The antechamber also empty, but it looked like it had been torn apart in a great fight and never put back together.  Dust faintly layered broken decorations littering the floor, and the red carpet leading to the door was torn up.  Huge claw marks now adorned the walls.  Gabriel shuddered, having a very good guess at exactly what creature had left them.  The claws were the same ones that had torn him limb from limb on the steps of Heaven’s clerical division.

Gabriel tread carefully through the antechamber, approaching the Throne Room. It was open, revealing the Throne was painfully, obviously empty, and Gabriel’s heart sank.  The other archangels hadn’t been able to keep the secret about God’s absence while he was away?

Well, given the raiding party he had seen just before his death—it looked like they had made it much further than he expected—who knows what could have happened.

Gabriel heard a voice faintly echoing out from the Throne room and drew closer.

“I’ll throw you into the Pit, Metatron,” chimed the voice, and Gabriel recognised it as the voice of the Metatron itself.  “You’d better obey!  Are you sitting?  Sitting?  More hot irons!  This is better than Hell somehow, remember that!”

Gabriel peeked his head into the room and saw the Metatron sitting on the Throne, barely taking up even a portion of its huge, empty surface.  They were gesturing and shouting grandly, as though mimicking the Almighty.  

“Metatron,” said Gabriel.

Metatron was so startled that they slipped and fell off the Throne, tumbling to land gracelessly at the foot.  “Wh—Gabriel?!”

“Yes,” said Gabriel.  “I’m back. Somehow.”

Metatron dusted themselves off and peered at Gabriel disapprovingly. “Hmmmm.”

“Do you know how this is possible?”

“No, but I don’t like it one bit.  Is this what a nightmare is?”

Gabriel laughed.  Metatron smacked Gabriel with as much strength as they could muster, which was not a lot, really.

Gabriel took a step back.  “Get out of here!” said Metatron.  “I can’t stand your face!”

“What has gotten into you?” said Gabriel.  “What were you doing in here, on the Throne?  He may be gone, but that does not mean we can desecrate His holy—”

Gabriel broke off under a fresh assault of mildly threatening slaps from Metatron.  “We can do whatever we please, thank you very much!  We’ve been doing just fine without you around to boss everyone about!”

Gabriel tried to either extract information from, or talk some sense into the Metatron, but neither venture was successful.  He eventually settled on the idea of fleeing Metatron before they remembered how to actually inflict injuries, and finding Uriel instead.  Surely she would take his side in all this.

He investigated Heaven like a bloodhound and found that everything was in total disarray.  The human souls were wandering freely wherever they pleased.   Hardly any angels were around.  Those who recognised him were not happy to see him.

The most egregious breach of protocol was when he found a demon in one of the choir rooms, strumming a harp.  Gabriel managed to discorporate it, but it was able to get away before he could fully smite it.  The angel accompanying it seemed extremely distressed by this, but Gabriel wrung her out for allowing such a creature into the Heavenly Kingdom.  He got quite a lot of back-talk, which was absolutely unprecedented.*  He made note of the angel’s name and resolved to discipline her properly later, once order was restored again.

*Except for Aziraphale, but he didn’t count.

And he eventually discovered a surprising fact: Uriel was not in Heaven.  It seemed unlikely, but Gabriel could not avoid the conclusion for much longer.

Well, no matter.  After six-thousand years, the archangels had ways of finding each other, even in a place as big as Earth.  He was going to get to the bottom of this.

******************

“I wish we had gone with a search party instead.”

Maltha stopped scanning the horizon of St. James’ to look at Beth. “Hm?”

Beth kicked a pillar of the pavilion.  “This sucks.  I’m so worried about Aziraphale.  Anything could have happened to him.”

“We needn’t panic yet,” said Maltha.  She counted on her fingers.  “There’s only two resurrections we know about, Hastur and Kabata.  We don’t know that there are more.”

“There could be more.”

Maltha privately thought there probably were more, but she was trying her hand at being optimistic and was unfortunately finding herself not very good at it.  “With so many people looking, I’m sure we’ll find Aziraphale in no time.”

A figure with black wings rapidly increased in size in the sky. Victoria, and she had donned her armor. She folded her wings and trotted back towards Maltha, standing on a bench near where the party had been set up, the catering and decorations abandoned.

“Any word?” said Maltha.

“We’ve just finished a cursory sweep of London,” Victoria reported.  “No sign of him.  Crowley’s gone down to Hell to ask Noah for help.  The field agents are going to do a more thorough search of Great Britain, starting with the shop and working outwards.  He couldn’t have gotten too far.”

Beth wrung her hands.  “And can we—”

“I still think it’s best you and Maltha stay here in case Aziraphale shows up again.  Botis and Kyleth are at the shop.  We don’t know what’s happening, and with Mykas on his way down to Hell, it’s a good idea to keep an archdemon in London in case we need to deal with someone.”

Maltha lowered herself onto the bench, sitting on her hands.  “Right…”

“You really should get a cell phone,” said Beth.  “Angelo has one.”

Victoria gave her a dirty look.  “Sending a letter is perfectly fine and timely.”

“Sorry.”

“I’ll be in contact,” said Victoria, spreading her wings and taking off.

Maltha watched the archangel disappear into the city.  Beth sprawled out on the bench next to her.  “I feel so useless.”

Maltha was quiet.

“Everything okay?  You seem weird.”

“I haven’t fought in a long time,” said Maltha.  “It’s been years.”

“You afraid you forgot how?”

Maltha twiddled her thumbs.  “No. I’m just not very happy about the prospect of having to again.”

Beth squinted at another approaching figure beating its wings in the sky to approach.  “Better get ready, though.  Who’s that?”

“Seems to be an archangel,” said Maltha.  She stood and materialised her staff, giving it a few swings to loosen up.

Beth got her cell phone out in case she needed to call someone.

“Oh, it’s just Uriel,” said Maltha.

Uriel touched down and walked up the park trail.  She came over and sat down on the bench next to Beth without a word, shuffling her shoulder bag onto her lap.

“Any news?” said Beth.

Uriel’s hands disappeared into her bag and reappeared with her knitting needles a moment later.  “I heard something happened, so I wanted to come help.”

“Ah,” said Beth.  “I’m not really sure how you can help.  Maybe we should call Angelo?  He’s good at that kind of stuff.”

Maltha didn’t respond, doing some practice staff work in the air.

“You’re very good,” said Uriel, who had no idea how to use a staff and, consequently, to whom all staff work looked good.

“Thanks,” said Maltha.

“I’ll just stay here and help you with whatever you’re doing to help, Maltha,” said Uriel.  “What job did they assign you?”

“We’re supposed to wait in London in case we’re needed.  Everyone else is looking for Aziraphale.”

“Oh.”  Uriel arranged her knitting on her lap.  “I’ll help you wait, then.”  She propped open a book on how to knit against Beth’s thigh.

Beth sighed and put her phone away.  “What are you making now?”

“Another hat.”

“Oh.  How did the last turn out?”

“Not very good.”

“This one looks better, though.”

“Not really.”

“…Yeah.”  She leaned over to study the way Uriel’s fingers moved against the needles and cloth. “It seems like you’re getting a little better at the techniques, though.”

Uriel’s hands continued to work, and her tone was absolutely matter-of-fact. “I’m no better than I was when I started.”

Beth squinted at the knitting book, trying to superimpose the illustrations in the book over Uriel’s tools, determined to help somehow.  “It looks like you need to loop the left hook around the right one, here, like this.”

“That’s what I’m doing now.”

“Oh.”

Whoosh whoosh whoosh went Maltha’s staff.

“You’ll get better at it eventually, I’m sure.  You have all the time in the world.”

“I gave Crowley that last hat I made.”

“Yeah? What did he say?”

“He pretended to like it, which is more than I expected.  I hope I put him more at-ease.”

“I’m sure you did,” said Beth, patting Uriel’s hand.

Maltha’s hands froze mid-air.  Her eyes rolled up to look at the sky, where the Heavens had parted, indicating an arrival from the celestial sphere.

“Hmm,” said Maltha distastefully.

The archangel Gabriel fluttered down, landing on the pavilion and dislodging a few roof tiles.  The warrior angel Kris followed, drawing his sword.

Maltha pivoted to face them without changing her stance.

“Erm,” said Beth.  “Weren’t you dead?”  She turned to Maltha.  “That one was dead, right?”

“Uriel,” said Gabriel, beckoning with his hand.  “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Uriel furrowed her brow.  She did not even look up at Gabriel, still focussed on her knitting.  “Where are we going?”

Gabriel stared at her for a moment.  Maltha raised her staff up at him and shook it in a mildly threatening way.

“What are you doing?” said Gabriel.

“I’m knitting,” said Uriel.

Now Gabriel looked befuddled.  He spread his wings and leapt down, drifting to a stop in front of the bench where Uriel sat.  Kris followed, taking on a fighting stance and trying to menace Maltha, who turned to face him.

“Don’t think you can beat me,” said Maltha in a warning tone.

“Three against one?” said  Gabriel. “You’re fierce, Maltha, but I doubt you want to face down me, Uriel, and Kris just for the sake of keeping Uriel prisoner.”

Maltha’s gaze shifted from Kris to Gabriel then to Uriel.

“Now hold on a minute,” snapped Beth.  “Uriel’s not on your side.”

Gabriel scoffed at her.  “Humans. Uriel, come on, let’s get out of here while we can.”

Uriel finally stopped her knitting and looked at him.  “And go where?”

“Away from this archdemon.”

Maltha’s grip tightened on her staff.

“Where is it that’s so important to go right now, though?”

“What’s gotten into you?” said Gabriel.  “They’re holding you prisoner, aren’t they?  You want to go back to Heaven, don’t you?”

Uriel didn’t answer.

Gabriel leaned over Uriel, who shrunk back into the bench, and examined her needlework without comment.  Uriel met his eyes, as though waiting for him to say something.

“They’re making you…sew garments?” said Gabriel, sounding completely lost.  “The Queen of Hell takes the Keeper of the Divine Aura hostage and she makes her do manual labor?”

Uriel looked down at her lap, as though Gabriel’s comment completely upended her worldview.

“She’s been free to leave whenever she wants,” said Beth, sounding like she wanted to throw a fit.  “You absolute asshole.  Leave us alone.”

“Where’s the Book of Life?” Gabriel demanded.  “What’s going on?  How long was I away?”

“I hid the Book of Life,” said Uriel.  “I didn’t want anyone to mess with it while I wasn’t around.  It’s safe.”

Gabriel’s eyes swept her up and down like a hawk.  “And you moved the most holy relic and abandoned your post why?  To come down here and—?”

Uriel’s needles clacked against each other.  “I could make you a hat, if you want one, Gabriel.”

Gabriel swiped his hand and knocked Uriel’s work out of her hands, spilling the yarn on the ground.  “Stop that,” he shouted.  “It’s unbecoming of the most holy servant of God!”

Uriel looked down at her yarn in the dirt, then back up to Gabriel.

“You’ll come back up to Heaven with me, and we’ll have a little talk about what exactly is going on,” said Gabriel.  “Kris, hold this archdemon off and meet us in Heaven later.”

With one fluid motion, Maltha pushed Beth back, knocking her flat on her arse, and simultaneously brought her staff up to block Kris’s sword.

“I really would prefer not to kill you,” said Maltha sourly.  “Come on now, we can have a nice chat instead.”

Gabriel looked at Uriel, as though expecting outrage and support that failed to materialise.  Uriel busily retrieved her things from the ground, her knees in the dirt.

Gabriel reached down and roughly hauled Uriel to her feet.  “Are you seeing this?  Let’s go!”

Maltha watched this out of the corner of her eye, worrying, and hissed when Kris landed a blow on her left shoulder, slicing it open.  “Fine, then.”

“I’m very busy, Gabriel,” said Uriel.  “Please leave me alone.”

“Who do you think you are,” Maltha snarled.  “We brought the Heavenly Kingdom to its knees, and you think you can just walk in here and win with only a power to help you?”

Kris scowled at her.

“Your name was Kris, wasn’t it?”

Their weapons clashed.  “Yes.”

“Dead then, weren’t you?”

“Seems I was brought back for the purpose of engaging you in co—”

“It was decapitation last time, wasn’t it?”

Maltha lobbed her staff like a baseball bat and knocked Kris’s head clean off his body.

For the first time in the encounter, Gabriel’s anger melted to fear.  He pulled Uriel by the arm away from Maltha.

“Let go of me,” Uriel said, digging her heels in.

Gabriel turned back, as though he hadn’t expected resistance, panicked eyes going from Uriel to Maltha and back again.  “Let’s go!”

“I’m busy!”

“Busy with what?”

“Knitting!”

“Forget the bloody yarn!”

Uriel’s face finally snapped into that expression of rage every angel in Creation had learned to fear.  “I chose this, Gabriel.  I may not be good at it, but I chose it, and you won’t take that away from me.”

“They’ve done something to you,” said Gabriel.  “We’ll find out exactly what once we get out of here.  Let’s go.”

“I said let go of me!” Uriel shrieked, finally breaking Gabriel’s grasp and shoving him backwards.  “You have the audacity to try and tell me what to do after I’ve finally decided for myself?”

Gabriel stumbled backwards, fear evident on his face as Uriel’s wings flared out in a display usually only reserved for demons incurring her wrath.

“You try to take my free will away just as I’ve finally learned to make use of it?”

Gabriel held his hands out, and his mouth tried to form words, but nothing came out.

“Things have changed, Gabriel, and you’ll not put them back to the way they were.  Get out of my sight.”

Gabriel did not move.

“Fine, then.”

Uriel lifted her hands and swiped them outwards over Gabriel’s body. Gabriel gasped as his wings ripped out of his back, seemingly without his consent.

Uriel clenched her fists, and Gabriel’s wings went stiff.  His eyes widened.

“U-Uriel, wait,” said Beth, while Maltha said, “You’re not going to—”

Uriel jerked her hands outwards in a ripping motion, and simultaneously Gabriel’s wings severed from his body, spraying blood on the pavilion behind him. Gabriel let out a pained shriek as a huge chunk of his aura came off with the wings.

Gabriel’s sandy-brown wings were engulfed in holy fire by the time they hit the ground.  Uriel stood over them with her hands still out, reflection of the flames dancing wickedly in her eyes.

Gabriel turned and staggered away, tripping over himself, trailing red pools over the grass from the huge bloody streaks on his back.

The holy fire sizzled out, leaving two piles of ashes on the ground surrounded by blackened grass. Uriel lowered her hands and clasped them in front of her.  Maltha and Beth stood where they were, looking at her with newfound fear.

Uriel watched until Gabriel had disappeared further into the park, out of sight.  Then, she knelt, picked her yarn up off the ground and brushed the dirt off it.  She took her seat on the bench and resumed.  The needles clacking against each other was the only sound other than the sizzling of the feathers on the ground.

*********************

“There!  There, I saw him!”

The image in the scrying ball collapsed into static.  Crowley crowded up against it desperately.  “I saw him.”

Lyra roughly pulled him away from the table littered with magic tools. “Please give me room to work.”

Crowley kneaded at the tablecloth.  “Hurry, I saw him.”

“Lyra is working as fast as she can,” said Noah magnanimously.  “Be patient.”

Crowley rubbed his hands together and paced.

“He is somewhere in the fourth layer of Hell,” said Lyra, rubbing her hands over the scrying ball.  “But there is something very powerful blocking my magic and making it difficult to tell exactly where.”

“We’ve received word that Mykas and Angelo are coming down,” said Noah. “With Mykas’s nose, we should be able to sniff Aziraphale out right quick.  Hm?”

He hmed as he was handed a letter by an imp.  He ripped it open and scanned it.

“Ah,” said King Noah.  “It appears as though Gabriel and Kris are both back as well.”

Crowley went absolutely ballistic.  “Does Gabriel have Aziraphale?  Did Gabriel come down to Hell?  Is Gabriel working with Kabata?”

Noah put up a hand.  “Crowley. Calm yourself.  I’m sorry, but I have no idea as of yet.  I didn’t bring Duke Hastur or Kabata back to life, and I certainly didn’t bring Gabriel back to life.  We’ll find out soon, though, one way or the other.”

Crowley turned back to Lyra, who had covered the table where she was working in incense smoke, which wafted in a ghostly way around her hands.  “If Gabriel is loose, we have to find Aziraphale right away.”

“Don’t worry about Gabriel, if the contents of Maltha’s letter are anything to judge by.”

Crowley shifted from foot to foot, antsy.  “I saw him.  You’re close.”

“Do you have any more of Aziraphale’s feathers?” said Lyra.  “That would help me increase the power of the spell.”

Crowley and Aziraphale had a big jar of each other’s feathers at home; they had arranged this a while back as gifts to each other.  Crowley snapped his fingers to summon Aziraphale’s to himself, then handed it to her.  She dumped about three-quarters of it into the cauldron in front of her, stirring it with one hand and waving the other over the scrying ball.

The crystal ball cracked, belching black smoke, and the image therein disappeared.

“Damn it!” Crowley shouted.

Lyra steadied herself with one hand on either end of the table.

“What’s the verdict, Lyra?” said Noah.

“He is somewhere in the fourth layer,” she reported.  “That is all the information I can gather through the interference.”

“Then we’ll send out search parties to sweep the fourth layer,” said Noah.

The words had hardly left his mouth before Crowley dashed from the room.

“Crowley, wait here until Mykas arrives!” Noah called.

But Crowley did not listen.  He had no gods or masters any longer, and he did what he wanted without thought now.

Mammon, lounging in the antechamber of the ninth layer, gave a piggish low and trundled to follow him up and out.

“We should wait and go as a group,” said Mammon.

“We have no time to lose,” said Crowley, clambering out into the eighth layer.

A group of familiar demons which had been lounging around recognised his eagerness and followed him up to the fourth layer.

Crowley led the pack, his gaggle of followers fanning out behind him, half trying to convince him to wait, half poking in cracks and crevices to look for Aziraphale themselves.

Crowley kept the ring-box in his pocket, caressing it worriedly.  In the span of a few minutes it had turned from a gift into a desperate good luck charm.  He white-knuckled it like a rosary and scoured the fourth layer, straining his senses to the max for any sign of that familiar aura.

Crowley proceeded with the greatest speed and enthusiasm out of anyone in the group.  It was no great surprise, then, that Crowley was the first one to find Aziraphale. Crowley sprinted towards the source of aura, faint but distinct, but stopped when he heard voices, indistinct. They sounded familiar, but he couldn’t place them.

They seemed to be coming from behind a rocky outcropping near the entrance to the fourth layer, and they grew louder as he approached.

“I do not know, my Lord, though it goes without saying I am…overjoyed at seeing you again.  I had intended on bringing this angel down to the ninth layer…”

He crouched onto all fours and crept forward.  

“Of course,” said the second voice.  “I would expect no less from you.  Good work.  This pathetic creature was the one responsible....Well, we’ll make an example out of him, won’t we?”

Primal fear prickled his neck as Crowley finally recognised the second voice. It was the voice of his long-dead tormenter.

Crowley managed to override his instincts to bolt, instead peeking around the rock.

Satan was there, looking just as he had on that fateful day he had tortured Crowley and met his end for it, down to the bloodied tools hanging off his belt. He was facing the rock where Crowley was; in front of him, facing away from Crowley, was a woman with green hair, and he finally recognised her too: Agares, the archdemon who most fiercely contended for Satan’s throne before Maltha swooped in and stole it.  In her right hand was an orb covered with pulsing sigils and emanating magic static; that would have been the device trying to mask their location.  That made sense in a way—Agares had been the one to uncover the angel dust spell; she had always been a bit more into spellwork than Satan.

And Aziraphale was there, all right.  He was facedown on the ground in between them, alive but looking quite worse for the wear.

Electric fear surged through Crowley.  Even all these years later, he still remembered in vivid detail what Satan had done to him, and to everyone he got his sadistic hands on.  The smart thing to do would be to go back and get help. But he bent with revulsion at the thought of leaving Aziraphale, his angel, his angel, in the clutches of Satan to be subjected to the same torment he had been through for even a single minute.  

But help was so close by.  There had been about a dozen demons tailing him.  Mykas was coming down.  Mammon wasn’t far behind.  Surely, surely if he left for just a moment…

Aziraphale, face bloodied, slowly raised his head and met Crowley’s eyes. His face mirrored a desperation he had never seen on Aziraphale before.

He couldn’t.  He couldn’t leave and risk coming back to find them gone.  Crowley hadn’t felt fear like this in decades.  The world was supposed to be gentler now.

Well, he’d be twice-damned if he let it go back to the way it had been before.

Crowley darted out from behind the rock, hoping to slither as quietly as he could.  But of course Satan saw him; Crowley was directly in his line of sight.  Satan’s eyes swiveled to follow him, and Agares, sensing his shift in attention, pivoted and also locked onto Crowley.

“What’s this?” said Satan, almost genially.

Aziraphale reached a hand up as Crowley drew near; Crowley took it and hefted Aziraphale up.

Satan circled around like a shark.  “You were the one I was torturing right before I died.  That was the last thing I remember.”

Crowley, trembling, started to drag Aziraphale away.  

“You sure have grown bold,” said Satan.  “How long was I away?”

Agares stepped in front of Crowley to block his path.  “I’ll take care of this, lord.”  She hooked the magical orb onto her belt and cracked her knuckles, sneering at them.  “This should be fun.”

Satan held out a hand.  “No, no, allow me.”

Crowley’s shaking redoubled as Satan drew near, towering over him.  Memories of the last time they had seen each other grew in Crowley’s mind, overwhelming his thoughts like static.

“Kneel,” said Satan.  His hand sprouted a set of wicked, dragon-like talons as he spoke.

Crowley slowly lowered Aziraphale to the ground, hunching over him protectively.

“Maybe you’ve forgotten exactly who your master is,” said Satan.

“I have no master,” said Crowley.

Satan’s eyes flared on him.  “Is that so?”

Crowley stood back up, knees weak, and materialised his healing staff.  Both Satan and Agares let out hearty laughs.

“You think you’re like Maltha?” said Agares.  “You’re pathetic.  You intend to face us down yourself?”

Satan locked eyes with Crowley and leaned in.  Crowley felt that force demanding obedience down to his very bones, burning into him with that gaze, the same gaze that had the power to command the very sun itself to rise.

Crowley’s legs buckled out from under him.  He went down, but he did not look away.  He held his staff out to shield Aziraphale.

“No one else will save you,” said Satan.  “The only one who cares about you is right here with you.”

Crowley glanced down at Aziraphale, then back up at Satan.  That taunt, which at one point would have been so successful in utterly breaking him, snapped Crowley back into reality. And he smiled.

“That’s what you think.”

And he took a deep breath and yelled at the top of his lungs.  “Over here! I found him!”

Satan and Agares looked a little shocked and glanced at each other.

“Who do you think will come help you?” said Satan.  “You’re nobody.”

All the same, he waved Agares to go stand by the rocks from which Crowley had appeared.

Sweating, Crowley forced himself to his feet.  His hands shook on his staff, but he managed to keep the tremble out of his voice.  “Things have changed a lot since you’ve been gone.”

“Lord, I think someone’s coming,” said Agares, sounding a little alarmed.

Crowley smiled.  “And you’re in for a nasty shock if you think you can force it back to the way it was.”

Satan reached a hand out to grab Crowley, but Crowley forced his aura outwards, using his staff as a conduit, and struck like a scorpion.

Satan hissed in pain and drew his arm back, clutching it, looking outraged.

Agares assumed a fighting stance and materialised a sword.  “Lord!” she said, sounding on the verge of panic. When Crowley heard the clacking of clawed feet on stone, he understood why.

Mykas came barreling around the corner, snarling and growling.  Agares immediately realised she was massively outclassed, but not with enough reaction time to get out of the way.

“Is that—?” Satan gasped.  “No, it can’t be-”

Agares had been torn up and knocked to the floor in a matter of moments. Mykas raised his head to lock eyes with Satan, blood-soaked muzzle crunched in a snarl, still crushing Agares’s windpipe.

“Michael?” said Satan.

“Run,” Crowley whispered.  He didn’t know why he did so.  It probably wasn’t out of genuine compassion.

Satan stepped back from Mykas, then whirled around and fled.

That was why, Crowley decided.  He’d wanted to see Satan run from someone for a change.

Mykas bounded forward to give chase, but then he caught sight of Aziraphale lying injured on the ground and veered towards him instead.  “Are you both okay?”

“I’m all right,” said Aziraphale distantly into the dirt.

“You’re bloody not all right,” said Crowley, laughing tearfully.  “You look like shit.”

“Fortunately we have a healer close at hand, then,” said Mykas, prodding Crowley with his nose.

Crowley suddenly became aware of himself and turned Aziraphale over, resting his head on his lap.  He started pouring healing energy into the angel’s battered body.

“You bloody idiot,” said Crowley.

“You’re the one who sent me to the store to pick out wine for almost an hour,” said Aziraphale.

Neither of them said their words with any real malice.  They were both almost faint with relief.

Footsteps from behind the outcropping heralded the imminent arrival of the rest of the search party, and friendly faces poured in to crowd around them.

“Been a while since we’ve had to do this, hasn’t it, Crowley?” said Aziraphale, putting a hand on Crowley’s hand while it worked on Aziraphale’s injury.

“Yeah,” said Crowley.  The smile faded from his face.  “But it’s still too damn soon.”

But they were together, and they were safe.