[ John Mulaney has a bit about a horse being loose in a hospital. One of the defining sentiments of this bit is that nobody knows exactly what's going to happen, least of all the horse.
Being given to anxiety and typically worked up over something by default, the Aziraphale experience is very much in the same vein.
Thing is, he was definitely on an air base. World and life-ending evil, dangerous things were actively afoot. Imminent, even. Stakes and tensions? Higher than ever. Satan? Pissed off and taking the lift up to the top floor. And Aziraphale looked at Crowley and he said "come up with something, or I'll never talk to you again," and Crowley stood up in a way that said "I've come up with something and here goes."
To find himself in a stale, quiet room playing some sort of informational video, Crowley and other involved parties nowhere in sight, up to and including the entirety of the planet Earth? Hugely upsetting. Could not recommend it any less. It feels like Crowley is very much not anywhere at all. This has never happened before. What the fuck is happening? Like what the fuck.
He may or may not be emotionally going off the rails. Catch him at any of the following stages:
- trying to miracle himself back to Earth. Or, standing in the video room and snapping his fingers about 7 times while nothing happens. He does that twice. One of the plants is non-dead in here now because he panicked and needed a quick miracle test.
- leaning against a wall or the fountain looking pale and woozy, because he put a lot of work into those attempts and it's coming with some unprecedented costs. He is probably saying something like "oh bugger all."
- 100% literally trying to argue with the automated voice asking him to disrobe for decontamination. This coat! Is 180 years old! This outfit is all he has! He doesn't want to do this, no thanks, do not collect $200. He stops himself mid-sentence in trying to locate someone In Charge to talk to and get this all sorted, because looking back over recent experience, would the third time be the charm? Probably not.
- and last but not least, staring down at his network device with palpable dismay. At some point he digs around in his pockets and puts on a pair of reading glasses, which changes nothing about his eyesight or his dismay. But like, at least he can look nifty. ]
a2. no chill we wander around like animals.
[ The anxiety never ends, but the feet keep moving. There are not really other options except to flounder forever, bereft of any modicum of his long-running routine. Aziraphale finds very quickly that he doesn't have it in him to sit still.
So this is the general, less-wordy exploration option!
Aziraphale is going to be poking around various open levels and rooms and whatnot, trying to get a feel for things. He'll be inclined to stick to agricultural levels more at first, because nature can be sorta nice? It's more familiar to him than most of the technology and all that here. Like cool, still looks like trees are trees, time to eat a random fruit. The lounge with the rude tequila sunrise robo-bartender? Primo spot. Eh. Well. A spot.
Eventually he does figure out there's a library, and that's kind of the full story on that, because Aziraphale immediately reallocates 95% of his time to sitting in it. And in the first few days of coming to sit in the library, that definitely includes looking very much like he might cry. I'm sorry. He's having a really rough time right now and there are books. ]
a3. some kind of 'all creatures' pun.
[ He's not necessarily a fan of the journeying into the darkness angle of this endeavor. And yet, not at all surprised by how quickly it comes to that.
Aziraphale winds up venturing out to investigate, eventually. Cool thing about being abruptly untethered from everything familiar, your only actual friend, and general faith in the very root of your sense of driving purpose for existing, for-- oh, gosh, the second time in the span of a week? There are no cool things about it. But he hears that there are animals and they're unusual at that, and he's always on the hunt for a possibly pleasant distraction. So. He shows up once in a while.
There's genuine endearment (muted by his usual standards, meaning readily apparent and poorly concealed in these trying times) in his expression when he looks down to find any animal that wants to hang in his vicinity. It happens with some regularity. Never a big gaggle or flock or crowd, but a new friend or two as he primly goes about his business. The business is hanging out with animals. With all the sort of tunnel vision focus of a person for whom being eaten or mangled by big dangerous non-sentient creatures has never once been an active thought-slash-concern.
He is, at current, holding a ferret at arm's length to keep it from going after his bowtie. ]
Best not to get too attached, I'm afraid. Go on, you- you- little rapscallion. [ Haha take that loser ferret, you live on the ground now. ] You might still be able to find yourself a... lovely irradiated fish somewhere. If that's what you eat. You must eat something. Whatever it is you like best. Really now, I must insist--
[ Haha take that loser angel, the ferret lives on your sleeve again. You fool. The epic battle continues. It feels rude to punish them or send them off for being friendly. Friendly is good! A+ animals, great work, love the aesthetic. Still, though.
There are also more chill animal hangs. Throw a dart at a glowing animal dartboard, come play in the petting zoo. We got ducks. Big snakes. That thing that might be a weird dog? Insects that shouldn't be so big. Snails! Aziraphale finds the snails especially delightful. ]
b1. actually, fuck this.
[ Gotta get on the manifestation of fears game at least once per character-playing experience, frankly. To say Aziraphale is caught off-guard when it happens to him is a huge understatement. His brain goes in for the full backflip. He's minding his own business, trying to- to boldly explore and keep repressing his problems like he has every day of his life, when from the ether appears an archangel. He claps his hands in a real office team manager trying to hype up the gang way, one time. And he goes, "Aziraphale! How do you like the place?"
This is not ideal by any means. It's less that Gabriel himself, the individual, is Aziraphale's deepest fear personified, and more everything that's sort of... tied to him and Heaven and the whole bureaucracy of it, and maybe the fact that Aziraphale directly contributed to stalling a prophecied holy war to end all wars, and pretty much everything from the past several years to millennia in general. Gabriel's a good poster boy.
Aziraphale pops his hands behind his back, all the better to keep from fidgeting or shifting on his feet. He puts on the polite smile of someone who is clearly already desperate to not be having this encounter. He did not go full chaotic feral and nearly shoot an 11-year-old with a gun that could fire bricks so he could have this encounter. He does not care for the implications that being here is... deliberate. That might be the actual deep-seated terror frothing up here.
Something doesn't feel right. There's a difference between an actual angel and a fancy fear cloud. A lot of things haven't been feeling right in this place, though. Sometimes he doesn't know until he knows. So Aziraphale says: ]
It's always a pleasure, Gabriel. To what do I owe the, ah. The honor.
[ "Let's cut the crap. We both know what you did to land yourself here." The continued geniality is spot-on, though. Gotta give him that. "You didn't really think the two of you were gonna get away with it, right? Come on." ]
Well, I rather thought that the greater good-
[ And then Aziraphale does just sort of get punched in the face. He's on the ground to think about his life.
It's the first thing that's very definitively Off about this, because Gabriel doesn't get his hands dirty, personally. Pretty much ever. Aziraphale.exe has stopped processing for a few seconds. He's gotta consider his options, which he thinks mostly involve running.
Typical. He hates running.
On the other hand, maybe at some point he'll be able to hit a fake Gabriel with a folding chair or something, and that could be.......... terrible. Obviously. Just heinous. Goodness, he'd sure hate that and wouldn't do it out of anything but necessity. ]
b2. everybody gets one.
[ There are two distinct nightmare swarm flavors. Flavor one is what the narration would like to call Operation: Guardian Angel. So it will be doing that. That's the name. It's about as straightforward as it sounds. Aziraphale scrapes together enough dignity or functionality or whatever to consider that right, there are still people here, and he is still an angel who can and should do good things to protect and help said people, and that that means actually going and doing... that...
Helping is a core tenet of existence. No matter what else is complicated or lost, he does have angelic business to fall back on. Two birds with one stone, really. He gets a free lifeline and maybe things won't be so miserable for the others here. This is the exact brand of impulse that his brain cell has been inclined towards for 6000 years.
Isn't it convenient, miraculous even, that as someone is on the run, they get pulled flush against a wall or into a door off to the side by this random dude, and that there's a lighting fixture overhead that creates sort of an impressively crisp-lined barrier. It could look like any other ceiling-embedded light in the city. It could be really weird and anachronistic, because Aziraphale is still really fond of the 1800s and early 1900s. It might be just a tad too bright at the source to make out what it's coming from completely.
If and/or when the latest Monstrosity dissipates back into nothingness, Aziraphale has a legitimately relieved sigh to heave for each individual instance. He's just glad it's still working. Holy shit. ]
Lucky this was here. I'd hate to think what might have happened otherwise. It's been dreadful.
[ The later it is in the day, the more outright tired he starts to look. Miracles are turning into a whole Thing suddenly? But he can't just not do the thing. People need help. He's supposed to be the good guy, etc etc etc. Live fast, tire out, bad bitches do it well. ]
aziraphale | OTA
[ John Mulaney has a bit about a horse being loose in a hospital. One of the defining sentiments of this bit is that nobody knows exactly what's going to happen, least of all the horse.
Being given to anxiety and typically worked up over something by default, the Aziraphale experience is very much in the same vein.
Thing is, he was definitely on an air base. World and life-ending evil, dangerous things were actively afoot. Imminent, even. Stakes and tensions? Higher than ever. Satan? Pissed off and taking the lift up to the top floor. And Aziraphale looked at Crowley and he said "come up with something, or I'll never talk to you again," and Crowley stood up in a way that said "I've come up with something and here goes."
To find himself in a stale, quiet room playing some sort of informational video, Crowley and other involved parties nowhere in sight, up to and including the entirety of the planet Earth? Hugely upsetting. Could not recommend it any less. It feels like Crowley is very much not anywhere at all. This has never happened before. What the fuck is happening? Like what the fuck.
He may or may not be emotionally going off the rails. Catch him at any of the following stages:
- trying to miracle himself back to Earth. Or, standing in the video room and snapping his fingers about 7 times while nothing happens. He does that twice. One of the plants is non-dead in here now because he panicked and needed a quick miracle test.
- leaning against a wall or the fountain looking pale and woozy, because he put a lot of work into those attempts and it's coming with some unprecedented costs. He is probably saying something like "oh bugger all."
- 100% literally trying to argue with the automated voice asking him to disrobe for decontamination. This coat! Is 180 years old! This outfit is all he has! He doesn't want to do this, no thanks, do not collect $200. He stops himself mid-sentence in trying to locate someone In Charge to talk to and get this all sorted, because looking back over recent experience, would the third time be the charm? Probably not.
- and last but not least, staring down at his network device with palpable dismay. At some point he digs around in his pockets and puts on a pair of reading glasses, which changes nothing about his eyesight or his dismay. But like, at least he can look nifty. ]
a2. no chill we wander around like animals.
[ The anxiety never ends, but the feet keep moving. There are not really other options except to flounder forever, bereft of any modicum of his long-running routine. Aziraphale finds very quickly that he doesn't have it in him to sit still.
So this is the general, less-wordy exploration option!
Aziraphale is going to be poking around various open levels and rooms and whatnot, trying to get a feel for things. He'll be inclined to stick to agricultural levels more at first, because nature can be sorta nice? It's more familiar to him than most of the technology and all that here. Like cool, still looks like trees are trees, time to eat a random fruit. The lounge with the rude tequila sunrise robo-bartender? Primo spot. Eh. Well. A spot.
Eventually he does figure out there's a library, and that's kind of the full story on that, because Aziraphale immediately reallocates 95% of his time to sitting in it. And in the first few days of coming to sit in the library, that definitely includes looking very much like he might cry. I'm sorry. He's having a really rough time right now and there are books. ]
a3. some kind of 'all creatures' pun.
[ He's not necessarily a fan of the journeying into the darkness angle of this endeavor. And yet, not at all surprised by how quickly it comes to that.
Aziraphale winds up venturing out to investigate, eventually. Cool thing about being abruptly untethered from everything familiar, your only actual friend, and general faith in the very root of your sense of driving purpose for existing, for-- oh, gosh, the second time in the span of a week? There are no cool things about it. But he hears that there are animals and they're unusual at that, and he's always on the hunt for a possibly pleasant distraction. So. He shows up once in a while.
There's genuine endearment (muted by his usual standards, meaning readily apparent and poorly concealed in these trying times) in his expression when he looks down to find any animal that wants to hang in his vicinity. It happens with some regularity. Never a big gaggle or flock or crowd, but a new friend or two as he primly goes about his business. The business is hanging out with animals. With all the sort of tunnel vision focus of a person for whom being eaten or mangled by big dangerous non-sentient creatures has never once been an active thought-slash-concern.
He is, at current, holding a ferret at arm's length to keep it from going after his bowtie. ]
Best not to get too attached, I'm afraid. Go on, you- you- little rapscallion. [ Haha take that loser ferret, you live on the ground now. ] You might still be able to find yourself a... lovely irradiated fish somewhere. If that's what you eat. You must eat something. Whatever it is you like best. Really now, I must insist--
[ Haha take that loser angel, the ferret lives on your sleeve again. You fool. The epic battle continues. It feels rude to punish them or send them off for being friendly. Friendly is good! A+ animals, great work, love the aesthetic. Still, though.
There are also more chill animal hangs. Throw a dart at a glowing animal dartboard, come play in the petting zoo. We got ducks. Big snakes. That thing that might be a weird dog? Insects that shouldn't be so big. Snails! Aziraphale finds the snails especially delightful. ]
b1. actually, fuck this.
[ Gotta get on the manifestation of fears game at least once per character-playing experience, frankly. To say Aziraphale is caught off-guard when it happens to him is a huge understatement. His brain goes in for the full backflip. He's minding his own business, trying to- to boldly explore and keep repressing his problems like he has every day of his life, when from the ether appears an archangel. He claps his hands in a real office team manager trying to hype up the gang way, one time. And he goes, "Aziraphale! How do you like the place?"
This is not ideal by any means. It's less that Gabriel himself, the individual, is Aziraphale's deepest fear personified, and more everything that's sort of... tied to him and Heaven and the whole bureaucracy of it, and maybe the fact that Aziraphale directly contributed to stalling a prophecied holy war to end all wars, and pretty much everything from the past several years to millennia in general. Gabriel's a good poster boy.
Aziraphale pops his hands behind his back, all the better to keep from fidgeting or shifting on his feet. He puts on the polite smile of someone who is clearly already desperate to not be having this encounter. He did not go full chaotic feral and nearly shoot an 11-year-old with a gun that could fire bricks so he could have this encounter. He does not care for the implications that being here is... deliberate. That might be the actual deep-seated terror frothing up here.
Something doesn't feel right. There's a difference between an actual angel and a fancy fear cloud. A lot of things haven't been feeling right in this place, though. Sometimes he doesn't know until he knows. So Aziraphale says: ]
It's always a pleasure, Gabriel. To what do I owe the, ah. The honor.
[ "Let's cut the crap. We both know what you did to land yourself here." The continued geniality is spot-on, though. Gotta give him that. "You didn't really think the two of you were gonna get away with it, right? Come on." ]
Well, I rather thought that the greater good-
[ And then Aziraphale does just sort of get punched in the face. He's on the ground to think about his life.
It's the first thing that's very definitively Off about this, because Gabriel doesn't get his hands dirty, personally. Pretty much ever. Aziraphale.exe has stopped processing for a few seconds. He's gotta consider his options, which he thinks mostly involve running.
Typical. He hates running.
On the other hand, maybe at some point he'll be able to hit a fake Gabriel with a folding chair or something, and that could be.......... terrible. Obviously. Just heinous. Goodness, he'd sure hate that and wouldn't do it out of anything but necessity. ]
b2. everybody gets one.
[ There are two distinct nightmare swarm flavors. Flavor one is what the narration would like to call Operation: Guardian Angel. So it will be doing that. That's the name. It's about as straightforward as it sounds. Aziraphale scrapes together enough dignity or functionality or whatever to consider that right, there are still people here, and he is still an angel who can and should do good things to protect and help said people, and that that means actually going and doing... that...
Helping is a core tenet of existence. No matter what else is complicated or lost, he does have angelic business to fall back on. Two birds with one stone, really. He gets a free lifeline and maybe things won't be so miserable for the others here. This is the exact brand of impulse that his brain cell has been inclined towards for 6000 years.
So. You ran into a nightmare nanite cloud that manifested into a terrible fear and it's chasing you down dark corridors, trying to kill you. The near misses are getting nearer. Close calls, closer. The mood more dire.
Isn't it convenient, miraculous even, that as someone is on the run, they get pulled flush against a wall or into a door off to the side by this random dude, and that there's a lighting fixture overhead that creates sort of an impressively crisp-lined barrier. It could look like any other ceiling-embedded light in the city. It could be really weird and anachronistic, because Aziraphale is still really fond of the 1800s and early 1900s. It might be just a tad too bright at the source to make out what it's coming from completely.
If and/or when the latest Monstrosity dissipates back into nothingness, Aziraphale has a legitimately relieved sigh to heave for each individual instance. He's just glad it's still working. Holy shit. ]
Lucky this was here. I'd hate to think what might have happened otherwise. It's been dreadful.
[ The later it is in the day, the more outright tired he starts to look. Miracles are turning into a whole Thing suddenly? But he can't just not do the thing. People need help. He's supposed to be the good guy, etc etc etc. Live fast, tire out, bad bitches do it well. ]