(no subject)

[gabriel_tam]

It had been a relief to leave the hospital at last. Gabriel had argued bitterly with the doctors about the chair they'd insisted upon, and compromised far enough to allow himself to be wheeled as far as the door. There-- in full view of the media's uncompromising eye, the reporters watched even more carefully in turn by a grimly determined security team -- he'd pushed himself to his feet and walked the few steps to the vehicle, waving once to the cameras before settling into his seat behind the now-tinted, bulletproof windows.

No one but Regan had seen just how much strain it had put on him.

Still, it's good to be home, even if things in New Mayfair aren't exactly the same. Gabriel's study is upstairs, as are his and Regan's room and the guest chambers.

It had taken them all less than a day to realize how much of a problem this would be. As a result, Gabriel Tam has been settled temporarily in the downstairs den, which has been hastily converted into a combination sleeping room and makeshift office, appropriately fitted for a recovering patient.

He hates it. He hates all of this, but there are times when a man simply has to make do with what he's got, and this would seem to be one of them.

Comments

[gabriel_tam]

Everything about him stills.

"Did you."

It's not a question.

[aj_crawley]

"Mm." Noncommittal. "That's how I found out. Quite a font of information, that visit was."

[gabriel_tam]

"I expect that it might well have been."

His glance cuts to a book lying on a nearby table, one of the haphazard "desks."

Uncommon Grounds is printed along the spine, and there's a small unassuming square lying beside it.

[aj_crawley]

Crowley's noticed.

"'S the reason I'm here today, in point of fact, instead of this weekend, which was when I planned to drop by."


A long moment, during which Crowley removes his sunglasses, toying with an earpiece as his eyes play over the miscellany scattered about the room, returning again and again to that innocuous wooden square.


"You've met him, now," the demon resumes, abruptly. "He means you no more harm."

[gabriel_tam]

"If he'd meant me any more harm," Gabriel returns, "I wouldn't be having this conversation with you now."

[aj_crawley]

"Yes," Crowley says. "My point."

He turns his sunglasses over in his hands, twirling them by the nosepiece.

"So I was... I wanted to - "

[gabriel_tam]

"I'm glad you stopped by," Gabriel says, very simply.

"You'll stay for supper, of course?"

It's a sincere invitation; it's just as clearly an offer to allow Crowley to avoid discussing an uncomfortable subject, if he would prefer to do so.

[aj_crawley]

"That might depend," Crowley says, a little ruefully (but no less visibly grateful for the offer), "on what I wanted to ask you."


"I wondered," he begins, carefully and levelly, "if you might see fit to ask your newest bodyguard to stop trying to hunt Raguel down, presumably with intent to exterminate."

[gabriel_tam]

There's an awkward silence that stretches on for several seconds.

"I could ask," Gabriel says, finally. "Leaving aside the question of how much good it might do-- you are aware that ... Raguel..."

There's barely a hesitation on the name.

"-- intends to kill him?"

[aj_crawley]

Reaching into his pocket, Crowley opens his palm to reveal a single wooden tile, to match the one by Gabriel's book - this one engraved with a 'G'.

"Galadan is sending him these," Crowley says, yellow eyes glittering. "I. You've met Raguel. He can't... I can talk him down, I know I can. But not if Galadan keeps provoking him."

"Antagonized, he's more likely to be a threat to everyone."

[gabriel_tam]

There's something almost awkward about the hesitation before Gabriel speaks.

"I'm not denying that, actually."

[aj_crawley]

"He's..."

Crowley's hand fists uncertainly around the tile, and the angular lines of his face are set in a sharp and rare honesty.

"Like River. He's not always - in control. Now."

Gabriel's seen this... perhaps twice, three times before.

(This is the demon he saw cradling a scotch, late one evening, and barefoot and defenseless one evening later still.)

"I have to watch out for him."

[gabriel_tam]

This time the silence stretches out longer. After a swift look at Crowley-- the nakedness of his expression, the way his hand is clenched tightly on the lettered square -- Gabriel studies his own fingers with care, rather than watch the demon.

"I don't know if you are...were... aware," he starts, cautiously. "But I'd had something of an opportunity to become acquainted with him before."

A beat.

"It's quite a change."

[aj_crawley]

"Yes," Crowley says, with the simple certainty of experience. "The Fall does that to you."

[gabriel_tam]

"How long...?"

[aj_crawley]

"How long what?" Crowley asks. "How long before he... improves?"

He leans back against the shoulder of the chair, and shrugs gracelessly.

"I don't know. I don't really remember. It's... hard to tell when you feel like yourself again, when yourself is, you know, fundamentally altered."

[gabriel_tam]

Gabriel shakes his head, a little stiffly.

"That's not what I meant." A pause, and a careful breath.

"How long has it been? For you?"

[aj_crawley]

"Since...?" An awkward hand-gesture; Crowley knows what Gabriel is asking.

"It's sort of... time didn't really exist properly back then. Just things happening one after another. Call it six and a half thousand years, and then some."

[gabriel_tam]

"And you never wanted to--"

He waves one hand in the air, vaguely indicating the sky above.

"-- to change again? To go back?"

[aj_crawley]

"It's complicated," Crowley says finally, distantly.

[gabriel_tam]

"I don't mean to pry."

Which isn't to say that he's not going to; still, Gabriel looks very uncomfortable.

"I just... don't understand."

[aj_crawley]

"It's not like - " his hand sketches out the shape of his thoughts in the air. "It's not like changing careers."


"Think of it more like a chemical transformation, if it helps." A wry snort, and his mouth twists in the semblance of a self-deprecating grin. "The alchemy of the soul, if you want to be poetic about it. Dreams into nightmares, et cetera. Your, mmm, substance, your - the spaces between your molecules, and the way you scratch your nose - is made... not what it was. Violently."

As illustrations go, it fails quite spectacularly. But - how do you explain being made of light? The Presence in your breath? Being taken apart and put back together wrong, filled up with the fractured bits of before and moving to the grind of broken glass?

[gabriel_tam]

Silence, for quite some time, broken only by the quiet rasp of Gabriel's breathing and the occasional clink of ice in a glass.

"So you've no-- no choice, then."

What matters now is what you do next.

"No second chance."

[aj_crawley]

"Well."



"By and large, we tend to bring it upon ourselves. Whatever your interpretation of that might be."



"As for - the other. I assume that... if He were to wish it," the capital letter is audible, "it obviously wouldn't be beyond Him. But I've never heard of it happening."

"Besides, any club that wouldn't have us as members, we wouldn't want to be a part of anyway."

[gabriel_tam]

"I see." Absently, Gabriel rubs at the side of his face before he becomes aware of what he's doing and forces himself to stop.

"That explains some things."

A beat of silence.

"Xièxie nĭ; for answering."