diatu | Surf's up, School's out

Surf's up, School's out

Who: Crowley and OPEN - (Now with bonus August Adventure)
What: A demon getting used to school, meeting new people, going to class... what could go wrong?
Where: In and about the Academy (August Catchall)
When: First day of class
Warnings: Bit of cursing here and there

Room 666
The shades were drawn but only enough so that the light streamed into the room through a narrow slit, brightening the center of the room but leaving the corners rather dark and secluded. That car was still out there. He couldn't make out who was in the driver's seat... if indeed there was anyone in the driver's seat at all... but it had been following him. He thought it had been following him anyway. Maybe it was a mistake?
Maybe every one in this place drove silver DeLorean's. He was too suspicious to be that gullible!

Crowley stood near the window peering out past the curtains, glaring at the stalkers car, fully content to watch it as long as it took to find out who was following him... that is until there was a knock on his door which necessitated his sauntering over to answer it. Now whether the knock had been on purpose or accidental he leaned on the frame and looked over the person in the hall.

"If you are selling I have all the paper and quills I will ever need... Maybe if you try the next door down? And knock really loud," he added for just that extra touch of demonic mischief to incite the maximum level of disturbance to his new neighbor, "They are a bit hard of hearing."

First Class
Crowley came to class on that first day in typical style. He was late and wearing his stylish outfit from home instead of his assigned uniform. He made a grand production of taking a seat at the back of the classroom and propping up his feet on the back of the desk chair in front of him... very nearly on top of the head of the student sitting at that desk.

Intimations class. Crowley had no idea what that was, barely looked at the syllabus when one was passed around to him, and was more focused on constructing a few paper wads to fling at the other student in the next row over... until the instructor demonstrated one of the spells they would be learning in the class by reciting a prayer to the God of Love. Then his demonic outcry would be heard echoing throughout the school.

"NGK!!! What the Heaven... What kind of class is this?!"

With a prayer and a gesture by an irate instructor who had had enough Crowley would find himself unceremoniously magically teleported out of the classroom for being too much of a disturbance. He is bound to reappear; falling from the air, crashing into your dorm bed, splashing down in the middle of a pool... feel free to run into him anywhere.

Escape
He was outside in a flash, hopping down the cement steps and taking off across the lawn in long-legged gate.

"No, no, no, no, no! This is ridiculous! I can't be in that kind of class! Or have that kind of magic!"

Fear and uncertainty manifested itself as anger and he hissed to himself as he fled the school building.

"It has to be a mistake or..."

With a fierce glare he staggered back to snark at the sky.

"Some great big pissing joke!"

He knows you are up there God and just laughing your ass off about this! There would be no answer of course, there never was. There was only the interminable silence and the fear that this was all some how ineffable.

August Adventure - Panic At The Fresco

Renowned artist Brank Cee just finished his latest masterpiece -- only for a sudden Valhudor flash mob to erupt just as he hung it up to dry! Now he's over here, the piece is over there, and the lead actor has come within a hair's breadth of skewering it with his sword prop three different times in one duel alone! He can't get through the crowd to recover it, let alone the performance. Oh please, rescue his painting and he will reward you!

Lounging on a bench Crowley looked up at the panicked artist, then over to the flash mob, then laid right back down where he had been .

"Why not just walk over there and get it yourself? Yea, yea, yea... you are afraid of getting conscripted to the play."

It did seem like they were pulling people in from all over. Willing and not-so willing participants either joined in with the song and dance or sulked angrily in the background.

"I don't know why you think I want to get caught up in it either."

Besides, like a flicker of flame springing to life, he suddenly had a better idea one he sat bolt upright for.

"Why not leave the painting where it is? So it gets skewered! All you need is a crowd of people watching and you could make a bundle off those bits of painting fragments still hanging in the frame. Call it performance art! They will see you as a genius."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I wouldn't doubt it. And I wouldn't call it hopping, more been dragged without so much as a question from one place to another. I'm not even sure where I came from." Though that was a story for a different day.

On the other hand, maybe it didn't have to be.

"When you have so many lives, how do you figure out who you are?"

"That a riddle?"

Crowley considering it as his wine was delivered but didn't bother offering any sort of answer until he had drunk a cup full of the stuff.

"If humans are made up from their life experiences then you would be all of them."

"Thanks that clears it up." He turned his cup around and around, staring into the water. He didn't really expect good answers, but he'd hoped for them. Maybe there were no answers.

"What do you consider those other versions of you?"

Crowley had found that answers were always few and far between. You could ask a question until you were blue in the face but the answers were always, that dreaded word... ineffable.

"I never really thought of them at all until recently. Alternate universes with alternate Crowley's in them. it would be fun to get them all together, have a big 'come as Crowley' party."

"But they wouldn't be you." It was said as a statement, but meant as a question. He knew they wouldn't be him. Had never been him. The ones on the outside were the ones on the outside which meant that his cousin was effectively dead or written out of existence and that hit like a fist to the gut which he was furiously going to ignore.

He had left him -- or something like him-- mad and covered with blood. Maybe he was still there or maybe he had never been there at all.

"It doesn't matter. I think Fell would enjoy that too."

His wine glass was slammed on the table causing the liquid inside it to splash menacingly across the wood. It was a waste of a good wine but Alec had just done it again, said something that indicated he was already familiar with one or perhaps even both of them.

"What is that shit? Are you saying you met Aziraphale before? Is that what all this has been about, you met some version of me on one of these other worlds?"

"Something like that. We weren't friends. We didn't even associate really." It was a lie and one he hoped Fell didn't contradict. Hopefully Fell wouldn't try to interfere at all.

"But I know Fell cares about you a great deal, so it's important to look after you." A light shrug. "He's a friend. Sort of."

"I've never needed looking after."

Which wasn't true at all but Crowley at least felt this wasn't a lie. He looked out for himself.

"But if you and Aziraphale are friends..."

Then Crowley would look after Alec.

"Why not say so earlier? Aziraphale can have any sort of friends he wants."

"Who cares if you need it or not? It's important to him regardless. And we're only sort of friends. Sort of> I wouldn't even call us friends. More acquaintances. Half the reason he even noticed me to begin with is because of our...similarities. Anyway I didn't say because it's not important. Don't worry about it." He took a sip of water and wrinkled his nose.

"They added something to this."

"Maybe you are only friends on the weekends."

So they were both now looking out for each other because it was important to Aziraphale?That seemed a very clever angelic ploy to him! The sneaky bastard!

"Bubbles. Yeah, they surprised me the first time I tried it too back in 1767."

"I didn't want it carbonated. No one ever listens." He wrinkles his nose and decides to completely avoid the first statement by changing the topic of conversation.

"Do you still plan to stick around forever instead of going back to wherever it is you came from?"

"Earth."

Crowley returned to sipping his wine as only a demon could, by downing half of the glass.

"I don't have any solid plans. I might stick around, I might not. I haven't seen much of this place yet."

And there was always Alpha Centauri.

"Were you planning on sticking around or flying back to... wherever it is you came from? Venus?"

Alec wasn't sure which answer he'd have preferred Crowley to give, but maybe it was better this way. Things were always changing so he should never get too comfortable with one idea or another. If he was always prepared to lose, he'd never be surprised when he did.

"I'm not sure where I come from. I don't usually have much choice, it seems, where I go." So he had no answer to that question really. "I've just come to accept it." He was tempted to try a little wine but then that would not end well and there was enough going on.

"That's fatalistic."

Or defeatist. Crowley didn't particularly care for either really, not from a human. They were meant to be out there striving against the flow of things not just bobbing along with it.

"If you could have anything, no matter how unrealistic, what would it be?"

No shit it was, and what of it? It was the truth. He couldn't fight against this current even if he wanted to.

The question though caught him off guard.

"Justice. For all the kids that died that shouldn't can have a second chance, that the system would work the way it ought to without everything getting in the way, that kids could grow up safe with nothing to be afraid of. I want to know who the fuck I am and for once not to screw up everything in the process of trying to do some good in the world."

Well, he'd asked, and maybe Alec had said too much, but what the hell.

"Justice for kids?"

It was a more creative answer that the more often said, 'world peace', and it spoke to Crowley's secret fondness for children, but he had not been expecting it.

"I thought you would say better health, a new car... something for you."

"Don't need anything." Or he didn't deserve it which was much the same thing. He took another sip of water, forgetting and made a face before setting it down.

"You?"

He could have been as altruistic wishing that the humans of his Earth wouldn't be tested to their destruction... But Aziraphale said they had managed that. Crowley had no memory of it but he trusted Aziraphale wouldn't lie about something that important.

He could have been sappy and said he wanted to remain with Aziraphale, wherever he went, to which ever world he ended up on next, but the angel was already here and not likely to leave without Crowley.

So...

The demon took another good long sip from his wine.

"I'm really missing my car."

A faint chuckle.

"What kind of car was it?" Maybe he could make one. Who knew? It was magic after all.

"1926 Bentley."

You will have to hone your magical skills to make a car with as much character as that!

"Got it from new, right off the line, and I've kept it in mint condition ever since. I suppose... I do have a car here, one of those futuristic American things. But it doesn't have the same feel!"

Edited 2021-08-15 04:22 (UTC)

"Maybe it'll come to you. Or maybe you'll go to it. A fool and his money are soon parted, but I can't imagine anyone can keep an idiot and his car apart for too long." He, perhaps, smiled too fondly at that before remembering himself.

Anyway, Alec didn't really have a concept of a Bentley let alone one from a particular era. He could distinguish modern vehicles well enough to do his job-- to have done his job-- if he'd even done it... but beyond that...

The point was he had every confidence that Ant-- Crowley would eventually get what he wanted. He always did.

The idiot's head tilted to one side as he sported a very unimpressed expression. Calling him an idiot with a smile like that! Only Aziraphale ever had...

"What? Wine getting to you?" He tilted his head the other way to watch him. "Am I going to have to carry you back?"

A slight and some what terrified shake of the head.

"Don't do that. Don't ever try to carry me anywhere."

Alec would probably fall to bits and who would be left to pick up the pieces, him?

He didn't know how to take that but tried to shrug it off.

"Then don't give me a reason."

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