I Thought of Angels, Choking On Their Halos [open]

[wentdowntogeorgia]

Lucifer falls.

This is old news for everyone involved. He fell from Grace, he fell from Heaven, and after the so long awaited confrontation in Stull Cemetery, he and his once-beloved brother and the promise of violence, he fell back into the Cage in the body of Sam Winchester.

Now, when he falls, he feels a shift around him like the universe cracking open at the seams; there is the smell of ozone and a lightning-snap that’s louder than even Sam’s fearful internal monologue, louder than the terror that pounds his frantic mortal heart at the sight of Perdition yawning wide beneath him. He is yanked sideways, sudden lateral movement that would be dizzying if he had a center of balance to upset, a rip-tide pulling him in and down and through the rabbit-hole, shadow-thin and darkling deep.

The body that is supposed to be his—that has had his name written over and across and around every fiber of its being since its conception—is suddenly far away, and he is wrapped in the old, familiar skin of a vessel he’d left dying in Detroit, flesh given freely rather than claimed by divine right. And then he is a streak in the sky that hits water and sinks like a stone.

Under the water, cold and getting colder from the seed crystal that is his freezing Grace in its mortal house, he can feel the vast emptiness where Heaven should be above him and isn’t; the universe is silent and it is deafening, a tinnitus ring where there should be angels’ voices. Lucifer grabs two fistfuls of space-time and pulls, moving himself from under the water to standing in the shallows at the bank, and behind him the lake’s surface is already frozen over thick like it’s the dead of winter. The water around his feet is sluggish and barely liquid, filmed over top with a thin frozen layer that breaks and flows around his ankles.

Someone approaches him with a towel, and there is no Hell below him and above him only sky, and he makes no reply; he banishes the water from his clothes with a thought before he puts his fist right through the man’s chest.

[[ooc: So this is going to be the hottest of messes; see mod comment for post instructions and fun stuff like that.]]

[[TW: gore, major character death.]]

Comments

[erratic_hematic]

Spike's eyes shift to where Sunshine is looking, but where she sees a blot in the scenery, he only sees a man walking steadily away from the lake. Spike barely takes in the fact that the lake has frozen over. All of his focus rests on the crumpled body lying behind the man's steady advance.

When Sunshine tugs at his arm, he pulls away. "You go. Get out. I can stop this." Before she can object, he runs forward to face this demon. Everyone else is running away, and what the bloody hell is going on with these birds? He has to swat some aside in order to get anywhere near the new arrival. When he gets close enough for a punch, he throws it, aiming for the face.

[wentdowntogeorgia]

Lucifer ignores the fleeing wildlife as he makes his advance away from the lake, searching for more people to work out his anger on. He hears the squawking before the next victim makes his way toward him-- it's much more convenient when they come to him, rather than making him chase them down-- and he does not even move to block or dodge the punch that comes at his face.

Punching the Devil is like punching a brick wall and accomplishes about as much; his head barely even moves from the impact.

He follows it up with a punch that's far more effective, shoving his fist straight through the chest cavity, soaking his arm in gore up past the elbow.

[erratic_hematic]

The punch is like hitting iron. Only he might have dented iron. Now he's sure that at least a couple bones in his hand are broken. Not so much for the demon's face. What the hell is this guy, a god?

He doesn't have time to dodge what comes next. He hears his own ribs cracking. He cringes and moans, because that bloody hurts, then turns his face back up to his attacker. "Fucking hell. What are you?"

[wentdowntogeorgia]

Lucifer twists his arm in the other man's chest, just for the pleasure of feeling his insides tear and bone give way.

"I," he says, gripping something soft in his body and digging his fingers in, "am an angel of the Lord."

And then he yanks his arm free, the spray making the front of his shirt hot and wet and red.

uhhhh gore tw for this and previous tags

[erratic_hematic]

Spike drops to the ground when he's no longer being held up, one hand braced against the ground and the other over the enormous hole in his chest. Fuck. fuck fuck fuck fuck. The hole goes all the way through and there's blood covering his hand, dripping down to the ground in amounts that would have him unconscious or dead if he were human.

The angel (an ANGEL?) walks away, and Spike doesn't move to follow. Whatever this thing is is way more than he can handle alone.

[wentdowntogeorgia]

Surprise, Spike: not all angels sit on their clouds being all nice and nonviolent. Especially not when that angel is the Devil, and he's pissed.

Lucifer steps past him, not even sparing a backwards glance to the person he has left on the ground, and continues on. Places to go, people to murder; you know how it is.

[rae_of_sun]

'Stop this'? Sunshine turns to gape at Spike in disbelief. Does he not understand how completely goddamn absurd he sounds, like he can just slap some duct tape over that godsbloodyawful thing out there - she can't even look at it, it's making her head pound - and call it a day? But before she can argue, a pigeon flies right into her face, shortly followed by another. And another.

She throws up her arms with a wordless cry of indignation, a sort of incredulous, "wuh?!" Feathery bodies pummel her forearms, like she's somehow stumbled into a carthaginian pigeon manufacturing plant and something's gone tragically wrong with the conveyor belt settings. What the hell is this?!

Finally, finally there's a break in the goddamn feathery bombardment, and she can see the thing striding along in the same direction it had been headed before. Steady, unstoppable, because of course it fucking is, she could have told Spike that if he'd given her a chance instead of running off to be a goddamn hero, and where is he?

And then she sees him on the ground, on all fours, and oh gods there's so much blood oh gods oh no no no no no.

She's halfway to him before the damage really registers, before she realizes all the blood is from a hole that goes right through him like something out of a cartoon, but it's horribly real. Her steps falter and she stumbles, but she doesn't go down completely and her momentum is enough to carry her the rest of the way to him.

She is afraid to touch him. If she touches him, she will feel nothing and she'll know he's gone. But then he moves - still alive(?!) - and she drops to her knees and reaches for him, one hand on the arm he's braced against the ground and the other around the back of his neck. Her affinity uncoils and hurls itself at him with such alacrity that she lurches forward with a little grunt, as if gut-punched. Is it even enough? She'd thought the sunlight was bad, but this, this is so much worse, and her hands feel too small for the--the volume of what needs to be done. Rocking forward, Sunshine presses her cheek against his, another crucial point of contact, and shuts her eyes.

If she breathes through her mouth, she can't smell the blood.

[erratic_hematic]

The next thing he knows, Sunshine is there. She's healing him. That's nice. He leans into the power, into her, and just lets it happen. Shame that he's getting blood all over that dress, though. His gaze is facing down, and all he sees is the fabric covering her knees slowly soaking up his blood. Maybe he's getting a little loopy, he thinks, because everything seems to be moving slower than it should.

It takes a few minutes, but the gaping wound in his chest closes, and he starts feeling the tissue and bone in his chest knitting themselves painfully back together. He groans and dips his head to rest his forehead on her shoulder. "...ow."

[rae_of_sun]

Gods, he's a such a mess. She could probably get a clear idea of the… specifics… if she tried, but she doesn't want to, and it doesn't seem necessary for her to know. Her affinity doesn't require detailed direction beyond her frantic desire to fix this, to fix him. Some distant part of her notes that she is putting a lot of herself into the effort, leaves falling from her tree in an autumnal rush, but she doesn't care, and she doesn't stop.

He's not breathing. She knows he doesn't need to, but that's never stopped him before. He has never been this still. Con-still, but he's never been Con, either.

--hands close around the furred length of her neck, and their bodies crash to the forest floor. She kicks out, because she must, once, then again, long legs stabbing at the undergrowth, sides heaving. But it has her fast, and she accepts, in that moment, that it is time to stop running--

Spike groans, and Sunshine slumps forward a little, leaning against him in turn, like a gory capital A. She thinks, a little deliriously: the Scarlet Letter. Ha. Oh gods, this is terrible. She absently rubs her thumb in a soothing arc along his neck and notes that she's crying - not sobbing, just a hot, steady stream of tears, unusual, for her. Atypical. What a frigging atypical day.

She keeps her eyes shut. "You idiot," she says, without malice.

[erratic_hematic]

"He said he was an angel." That's weird, right? Whatever that thing was, it wasn't the same sort of thing that he's been getting used to with Aziraphale. This guy is something else entirely. Not an angel from Aziraphale's universe, at least.

He takes a hesitant breath, and the action is painful, but isn't unbearable, so he returns to the habit. He needs to get himself together. They need to get up and warn people about what's happening. It'll definitely be effective...he can't think of a better deterrent than people walking towards them covered in blood. He feels lightheaded and the only thing he can smell is his own blood. Sunshine is still healing him, and he wonders how much she can do before she'll be worse off than him. "You can...stop. Stop that. I'm okay."

[rae_of_sun]

An angel? No. "That... thing... was no angel," she mutters, just in case its behavior hadn't made that patently obvious. "It…" Hell, how is she even supposed to describe it? She doesn't want to describe it. That would require thinking about it, and she would willingly knock back a shot of Delete right now if it meant forgetting the last five minutes and never having to think about it again. "I don't know," she concludes. "I've never seen anything that… bad." And she has seen some truly toxic top-shelf career evil, so that's saying something.

It's a relief when Spike finally pulls in a breath, because it means he can. He must be relatively intact, right? Gods. Much as she might privately criticize him for being a vampire lite, she's beginning to wonder if he can recover from frigging anything (provided a little help, of course). Still, she hesitates for a moment when he tells her to stop before removing her hand from the bare skin of his arm to the neutral territory of his shoulder. With that point of leverage, she pushes them both into something a bit closer to 'upright,' enough so that she can look at him properly as she reins her affinity back in. It's not easy - there's still work to be done - but she manages. Because he asked. And because she'd kind of like to be able to walk herself back to the apartment building rather than make him carry her. Or drag her, if he's not up to carrying.

"Can you stand?" Can she stand? Gods, if they can just get back to the apartment without another kali disaster, is that too much to ask?

[erratic_hematic]

"Yeah." He thinks he can stand, anyway. He hadn't been able to after the fist had been pulled out of his chest and he hasn't really thought about it as a possibility till now. But probably. He drops his hand from where it had until recently been covering the hole in his chest, then pushes himself up enough to get his feet under him. He stumbles a little when he looks back down at her, but he manages to stay standing. "Ugh." He does not feel well, but there are things to do.

He offers a hand down to help her up. "Come on, we've got to warn people away."

[rae_of_sun]

Sunshine tries to keep her gaze on Spike's face, because she's positive that she doesn't want to see what's on the ground just in front of her and she's pretty damn sure she doesn't want to see whatever other carnage that thing has left in its wake, either. She can't quite stop herself from glancing at the wet, ragged hole in his shirt, though at least the black fabric doesn't show much.

Nor can she entirely hide a wince when he talks about warning people. Okay, so it's a step up from trying to punch that thing into submission, she will give him that. But she doesn't want to be a carthaginian hero right now; she'd settle for saving just him and herself.

At least it's the relatively blood-free hand that he offers her. She takes it and lets him help her up. Gods, her everything is killing her; she feels like she's just run a marathon. Then she slips her arm around his waist in a manner that she hopes will be mutually supportive. She could sure use it - she's not at the end of her rope yet, but she's intimately familiar with the feeling and she knows she's pushing it - and he's had a damn fist through his chest.

"I don't suppose we could just warn anyone who happens to be between us and the apartment," she says in a strained attempt at humor.

[erratic_hematic]

He notices her difficulty getting up almost immediately, and wraps his arm around her in turn, hoping to support her as well. It's thanks to her that he's standing and thanks to him that shes wavering now so he'd like to get her back and resting as soon as possible, but he also needs to warn people out of the area.

"Soon," he answers as he looks around. He's definitely not going in the direction that...whatever that was had gone. Anyway, the birds seem to have had that covered. If that was a thing that really happened. He's assuming. Eventually, he picks out a direction only because he can see a couple people coming their way.

"Come on." He lurches in that direction, bringing her with him.

[rae_of_sun]

She makes a sort of strangled groan at that, because soon is not now, but she's not feeling exhausted enough or trollish enough to actually object to Spike wanting to help people. So she sticks with him (almost literally; she's trying very hard not to think about what a mess they both are until she's actually in a position to do something about it) as he aims them both toward some oncoming civilians.

It's a little too familiar, this staggering along in a vampire's company, acutely aware of how terrible they must look. The fat, curly ripples of her affinity moving through her are familiar, too, and she distantly thinks: whoops. She wasn't supposed to be healing him anymore, was she? She pulls it back again, but it's like trying to put a sleeping bag back in a stuff sack; it just doesn't want to go. It wants to keep healing him - finish what it started - and it wants to hold her together because something has to. She can keep it at bay if she concentrates, but it's so hard to concentrate when there are other things that require her attention, like putting one foot in front of the other, and it just keeps coming back until she gives in and lets it be. Fighting it is more exhausting than letting it do its thing.

The cobwebs that start to seep in around the edges of her vision are almost like old friends. How many people have they frightened off by this point? She's lost count. She's not even sure she can trust her vision; aside from the cobwebs, she could almost swear she saw a wolf a minute ago, and that can't be right. She leans heavily against Spike and starts to ask, "Are we done yet?" But she only gets two words out before there's some kind of - of carthaginian eruption from the local wildlife, a deafening clamor of birds and beasts and insects that stops them in their tracks. Sunshine looks around wildly, breath quickening, then starts towards Central Park West in a brief burst of strength, pulling Spike along with her.

"We're going," she insists in an undertone once the noise has died down, focus evenly divided between getting back to the building and wondering what in the fresh hell that was about. "We're going home now."

[erratic_hematic]

He can tell that she doesn't have a complete handle on her affinity, because whenever he gets a second wind, Sunshine seems to lag behind. When it seems to be working nonstop without her tamping it down, Spike starts thinking that they've warned enough people off.

She leans heavily against him and he tightens his grip on her just as a flurry of animals explode from what seems like everywhere. He barely has time to let out a confused shout before Sunshine is tugging him back and away. He wonders vaguely how she can still be moving so fast- he can feel her power working, even now.

"No arguments here." He doesn't see anymore people, and it seems like the mass exodus of animals will scare off anyone else even thinking of approaching.

[rae_of_sun]

She can't still be moving so fast, as it turns out. That burst of adrenaline gets her all of ten yards before she stumbles, and it's only Spike's arm around her that keeps her from going down like a sack of toxic FDA-disapproved potatoes. So much for dragging him all the way back - not that she needed to, since he's finally willing to get the hell out of Dodge, but still.

"Oh, damn," she says, foolishly, as she grabs Spike's shoulder for some additional support. She should have expected this. Stupid of her not to mention it earlier, probably, but she's just so tired, and there was other stuff going on. Now that her legs are giving out, though, it seems like the natural progression of things. First she uses up too much of herself keeping a vampire alive, and then she collapses. Typical. Classic frigging Sunshine. She'd be embarrassed if she wasn't too busy being a goddamn liability.

[erratic_hematic]

"Whoa there." As she falls against him, Spike pauses and adjusts to hold her up a little better. "You've got to stop that." He frowns down at her, considering his options. She needs help, so the only way they're getting back is by being in contact, but it seems like her power can't control itself long enough to realize that she's in danger of passing out. He needs to help, and they need to get back quick.

He adjust his arm higher and, in a move that's less fluid than it would normally be, he sweeps her up into his arms. "Hold on. And try not to touch any skin."

[rae_of_sun]

"It's not listening to me," she complains, as if talking about a particularly mulish toddler. She doesn't add that it's starting to feel necessary, as if she'll deflate without the familiar curls of her magic there to fill her out. Nor does she try to argue that if he's carrying her back, maybe it would be better if she could at least indirectly help with that.

Because he's right - she can't keep this up. She's never been faced with healing injuries so extensive before, so hey, she can forgive her affinity for being a bit… enthusiastic. Overly so, even. But getting Spike back to one-hundred-percent isn't worth her losing consciousness and becoming nothing but a senseless weight for him to deal with.

So, it's with a wince of mingled embarrassment and resignation that she allows herself to be picked up. She's in no position to object (though she is still lucid enough to appreciate how ridiculous it is that this is happening again). "Okay," she agrees with only a little reluctance, putting her arms around his neck in such a way that she's only touching fabric, not skin. Her affinity coils back on itself, the curly ripples thinning into something more noodle-y, but she doesn't crumple in on herself or drift apart into a haze of atoms. She just feels a bit smaller, and weaker, and in desperate need of a nap.

No. She has to do something practical or she'll never forgive herself. "I'll make sure that thing doesn't sneak up on us," she says. She can't see it at the moment, but she's pretty sure its toxic kali wrongness would stand out to her even at a hundred yards.

[erratic_hematic]

"Okay, Sunshine." Spike smiles to himself at her insistence at helping. As he starts walking. He thinks that he'd probably realize if whatever that thing was came back, but he won't begrudge her help.

There are definitely still some significant internal injuries going on that she hasn't managed to heal. Despite her healing powers, he's still moving slower that he might normally move. They definitely make an unusual sight making their way through the park. They're still inadvertently scaring people away as they move between here and the apartment building, but Spike isn't making any special effort to scare people off anymore. He's more worried about how long Sunshine is going to last with her powers still trying to heal him. Could something worse than her passing out happen? He needs to get her back and into the sun or lying down or something.

[rae_of_sun]

Okay, she's not in great shape, but she's not that far gone. She knows the verbal equivalent of a pat on the head when she hears it. "Don't patronize me, grandpa," she mutters - which, given her current position, ought to be more than loud enough for him to hear. "None of this would've happened if you'd listened to me in the first place." Lest he forget.

Being carried, little as she likes it, does seem to be helping. The cobwebs around the edge of her vision don't recede, but they don't get any worse, either. And she doesn't seem to be in imminent danger of passing out. As they finally exit the park, she gives his shoulder a little rub with her fingertips through the fabric of his shirt. No healing, just keeping tabs. "How're you holding up?"

[erratic_hematic]

"I'm surprised a book didn't fall on my head through all that." Maybe his power really doesn't have any rules to it, after all. "Maybe Gray's Anatomy, given how intimate he got with my internal organs. Everything's still..." He pauses short of using the word soupy as a way to describe the state of his internal organs. "...not quite intact. I think the bones healed." If they hadn't, holding her up like this would probably hurt a lot more than it does.

"I'll heal. I'm more worried about how we're going to stop that thing." Maybe he could go talk to Aziraphale about it, or try to conjure up some more magic books of his own, but someone that shaves their fist through people's chests for fun probably shouldn't be allowed to roam free.

[rae_of_sun]

"Could've come in handy if it had fallen on the thing, instead," she says, leaning her head against her arm. She frowns deeply as he describes the extent of his injuries, appalled that it's still that bad after all she's done. Gods, he only thinks the bones have healed? How in the hell is he carrying her at all?

She lifts her head a little so she can frown at him properly. "Seriously? You're not making it easy for me to keep my hands to myself," she informs him.

[erratic_hematic]

He snorts a laugh at her unintentional innuendo and smirks back down at her for a moment before lifting his gaze to the street again. Navigating a sidewalk like this isn't exactly easy.

"As much as I'd like that, I think it can wait till you're not in danger of passing out, hm?" He could comment on his injuries again, but it's easier for him to just not acknowledge them at the moment.

[rae_of_sun]

Well, at least he's capable of laughing. She'd be impressed if she wasn't too busy worrying about how messed up he still is.

"I'm not," she insists, transferring her frown over his shoulder towards the people they're passing. They're getting some quality Looks. Quick and furtive as they might be, she still catches them - no doubt because all she has to focus on right now is keeping her eyes open. She almost envies them. They have no idea how much worse it can get than just two bloodied people making their way down the sidewalk.

Still, it's a hell of a relief when they finally reach their building. Maybe it shouldn't be - she got the impression that that thing is going to go wherever the hell it wants, and there's no reason their wardless building is safer than any other (though what kind of ward would even keep that at bay, she can't imagine). But its stolid normalcy is so far removed from the chaos of the park that she can't help but feel they'll be okay as long as they just stay inside.

"Need me to get the door?" she asks, shifting a little so she can face forward (more or less). "Because I can." That sort of trick is easy as breathing, and she doesn't want to seem utterly useless, here.