Chapter Text
Grief had an iron taste. Grief tasted like his own blood, long after he had stopped bleeding and into the hours of the dying firelight. It carried into the height of night. Heaven, bathed in blue. A childish notion asked if Heaven, too, was grieving, coloured as it was.
The unveiling of deception, too, had an effect on the senses. On ones memory. Gabriel was unable to look upon the halls with any form of warm familiarity. Those were not his halls anymore.
With the veneer of purpose worn, the place almost looked alien. It certainly felt it. Yet his feet knew the steps to the council-chambers all the same. Home but worn. A different light - dark now as the council-members uselessly fled from him - a new perspective.
Here, fledgling Angels had looked up to him. Imparting the affection of 'Seraph'. He had worked hard to keep well their thoughts of him. Now, he knew they were wrong. The Virtues had been relegated to hell. Not because of a plan, not one of The Father's at the very least, but one selfishness. Of ease for one at the sacrifice of another.
Another council-member fell. Gabriel didn't feel the white hot anger he had when he fought the Machine. It, too, had simmered to embers. In the remaining coals was a clarity of purpose. It was refreshing in it's simplicity, he thought, as another body fell.
The pleading of his Brother's did not fall on deaf ears, no. He had simply returned the kindness they had given. They would plead, try to talk his sword back into its sheath, and only succeeded in finally embodying splendour in the only way they could.
--
What else was there to do but return to Hell?
Gabriel followed the wake of The Machine. It felt fitting for him. Not a fall - truly he could have simply teleported. Merely a walk. It was only decent, he felt, to walk through the lands he had harrowed.
Stray husks, demons, other machines, made their way up to certain layers. Those that had somehow escaped the unending hunger of the machines further below. Gabriel did not raise his hand, only bowed his head when some retreated from him. If one struck out at him he would evade, but continue onward.
He did not feel further from The Father's light the further down he went. How could he be, really, when it wasn't there at all. In that was peace. It was a peace he had seen before in humans over the centuries. The calm before a known death. The security of an immutable plan.
Gunfire, too, held a peace. For similar and different reasons.
In an instant, Gabriel was taken back to that cathedral and to the pipe organs that reverberated through his very being. The very next instant he had thought he hallucinated the shape of The Machine leaping across some cavernous ravine.
He hadn't. A Mind-Flayer appeared behind it, struck out and altered The Machine's trajectory.
It had been a while since the necessary removal of The Council that Gabriel had felt Anger. He felt it then. White hot. Motivating.
Gabriel was on one side of the ravine, spear in hand, and the next he was on the other, snatching The Machine out of the air and putting himself before the Mind-Flayer. It looked indignant, but it didn't have long to do so. Where many things weren't, Gabriel's spear was familiar. Swinging it was instinct. The threat was gone.
Then it was just him, The Machine, and his spear in the air in the depths of hell.
The Machine themself didn't move in his grip. Likely shocked. He hoped it was shock.
When the weight of his weapon sunk in he let it go, let it evaporate and left his hand open. He stared at his hand. Only until The Machine attempted to move.
Shaken from his reverie, he drifted to the nearest platform and placed them down. Watched as they quickly righted themself. Their weapon never left their grip. Gabriel never quite lowered himself to the ground. He didn't speak, though he wondered several things. Chief among them was if The Machine wondered why he did that - he wondered that himself.
A thought with a little more electricity was if The Machine would strike, seeing him, quite understandably, as a threat.
They did not. Though they didn't lower their weapon.
Instead, their camera-like-face seemed to focus. Something in that yellow of their optics narrowed with the faintest sound of a whirr and a click. Were they assessing?
Gabriel decided to head it off at the pass, "My...apologies, Machine. This was not how I envisioned us meeting after our last encounter." And unlike their last encounter, Gabriel's voice was quiet and soft. Tentative.
Their fans picked up, the facsimile of wings splaying and settling. Was - were they communicating? Or simply idling?
A more prominent whirr and they lowered their weapon. To deny his surprise would make him a liar and he certainly didn't want to be that. He also didn't want to say thank you, because on some level, he wouldn't have forgone another bought with The Machine. But the motion was so novel he wasn't going to speak against it. The hand was simply lowered, not pausing to reach for another weapon.
It seemed lowering was as far as they would go, however. An understandable thing.
Two hands - one of their not-original ones in tandem with the right - began to work together, gesturing. That was new. That was -
"Are-" there was a rhythm to the movement, intention, "Oh! You're -" The Machine paused and Gabriel rose a hand to gesture in a way he didn't really understand beyond trying to encourage them to continue, "Please, repeat that, I was simply-" Surprised. A remarkably unsurprising turn of events, all things considered.
Why?
Well, it's more a 'For What Purpose?', but the general sentiment, he thinks, is a Why?
It was a good question. A fair one, "Ah - well," one he wasn't sure how to answer, "I had not been pursuing you, you will know when I am. But to see you being pursued, threatened - I would not see you bested by anything other than me."
Gabriel was in equal parts stunned by his answer and the edge to his tone, both equally involuntary. He was not surprised by the truth to it, however.
Another series of whirring sounds, clicking. Incredibly faint, but while Gabriel was old he was still an Angel. Much had faded but not his senses. And it didn't seem as though The Machine was offended. Not angered, at least. Weapons stayed down so he felt it was a fair assumption.
Hands moved again, making the shapes of the word. Appreciation - thanks. The Machine was giving its thanks to him.
Despite himself and whatever dregs of decorum that clung to him, Gabriel laughed. On some level he hoped it wouldn't offend The Machine. But he could scarcely help himself. Of course they would surprise him yet again.
"You are welcome."