warning, lazarus

“Bullshit.” The accusation poured from Gale’s lips absent of any sort of malice or indignation. There were no thoroughly unpleasant intentions that lay in wait on his tongue, no, but there was, perhaps, an undercurrent of frustration that settled in the pit of his stomach. It wasn’t that he was particularly frustrated with Wesley, per say, but there was something about the way the good doctor conducted himself, with a sort of resigned and inconceivably astute caution, that unsettled Gale. 

He didn’t so much mind the mystery of this man, for he’d encountered other humans with mysteries far more complex than Wesley Hudson’s; he did, however, mind that Wesley’s particular mystery made the man seem—untouchable, like there was nothing Gale or any other demon or angel or human could ever do to get under his skin. And Gale didn’t particularly want to get under Wesley’s skin, but he wasn’t overly fond of being powerless to do so if he was ever so inclined. ( Maybe what he minded most was that he recognized with indignant familiarity many of his own qualities—faithlessness, introspection, a love of solitude—in this human. And what would that mean? What would be the implications of discerning kinship and sameness with this human? ) 

“Bullshit,” he repeated. “You’re trapped in a playpen with a herd of lost lambs. You’re a man of science living in a world that science can’t explain. You’re at the mercy of creatures far more powerful than you.” His eyes narrowed on the doctor, pressing him with the demanding, unyielding scrutiny of someone well-studied in the art of truth-prying. “And you don’t have much to say?” 

He scoffed, the sound a thing of obvious skepticism. “I don’t buy it, Ten.” 

The good doctor nearly FLINCHED at the man's quick (and vulgar) response, his raised eyebrows betraying his surprise. It didn't shock him in the least that the man beside him — a detector of pain by trade, as he'd called himself — had called his bluff (whatever ungodly trade the Ice Prince practiced, he must've been DAMN good at it), but the raven-winged man's preoccupation with his SILENCE was as concerning as it was unexpected. Wesley had often been overlooked — both among his peers and within his own family — for being quiet, and though it had certainly made pleasing his father more difficult (one couldn't be proud of what he didn't even notice), he'd embraced the long shadows cast by those more outspoken than he (beginning with his brothers and continuing with certain classmates and colleagues) and learned to work in them.

His achievements — the things he’d been able to do in the peripheral — had garnered notice, but never the things he didn't say. It was unnerving, both because a demon (of all creatures) had taken an interest in him for it and because he suspected the man’s curiosity branched from something deeper, be it a sick desire of some sort or an acknowledgement that their natures — when it came to speaking, at least — didn't differ as much as their respective positions did.

He didn't buy it, and if Wesley been bolder — if he'd been more RECKLESS, the Louisiana man might've chuckled aloud at the irony of it all. He didn't buy it? Hudson was trapped in what was supposed to be the Devil's playpen with a meager group of survivors, and he didn't buy it? A man of science was conversing with a being whose existence science couldn't vouch for, and the demon didn't buy it? It was preposterous, LUDICROUS, but he was far too polite (and too wise, it could be argued) to react as someone cockier might have.

The man had a point; he was at his mercy.

His gaze was piercing, marked by disbelief, but Wesley held it, despite the nagging urge to look away; Abel's bloodied back was hardly a worthy escape, and even if it were, the thirty year-old was reluctant to stray from his morals, even now. "With all due respect, you don't exactly need to." Shifting his weight slightly, he hesitantly inquired, "What would you like me to say?"

Dominic grunted at the newly admitted information. He didn’t want to go back to the man’s house just to have his knuckles repaired, but what choice did he have? If he was being honest with himself, he didn’t really think past the whole hitting he door thing in terms of what exactly his knuckles would look like once he finished. The point of the whole thing was for his muscles to tear and for everything to come back stronger. If there was a way to get his knuckles back faster, why wouldn’t he take it?

After taking a few seconds to move his fingers, he nodded at the man. “This will probably be quicker than me saying no.” He waited for the man to begin walking. Dominic waited a few seconds behind him, working out a few plans in his mind to figure out what might happened if Wesley turned out to be working for a demon or something of that nature. Why would a man just walk around Paradise offering to help people? There had to be some sort of bigger picture, some angle that he was missing. 

“You always been a fan of helping people?” He asks the questions as he comes up beside him, falling in line with his steps. “Or were you just captivated by my eyes?”

He wasn't sure how quickly the man was able to say "no," and even if he had been, the doctor wouldn't have begged him to seek care for his hand; thus, he couldn't speak for which choice would be faster, but the wiser option was OBVIOUS. Wise or not, though, Ramsey didn't appear to be nursing any broken bones; he was able to wiggle his fingers without much (noticeable) consequence, which, luckily enough for the both of them, ruled out the need for anything more than a few stitches.

Wesley was nothing short of a veteran when it came to sewing wounds shut, and having gotten an early start in his high school years — both under his father's critical supervision and on his own — he'd gotten to be quite efficient at what he did. Dominic was probably more concerned with the principle of being helped than with the time it would take to be helped, but nevertheless, it wouldn't take long.

The doctor would finish in enough time to go to the diner as he'd initially intended to — though he wouldn't have been bothered if he didn't — and the other man would have ample time to do whatever he liked, assuming that didn't include busting his stitches. Wesley then turned on his heel and led the way, his blue eyes flitting upward when Ramsey posed his question. "Oh, a bit of both." It wasn't often that the doctor utilized sarcasm, but if the man in front of him could handle punching a door, he could certainly handle a bit of harmless banter. "But yes, I suppose I have."

The closer the two of them drew to the kitchen, the more dread seemed to create a shadow over her heart. No matter how positive she tried to be, she knew that this plan would most certainly land her behind bars again, and although she tried her best to come to terms with it, she had been given a two week reprieve that none of the others angels were offered (and in fact many of them had suffered for it), and she should just be grateful for that. Although logically she tried to reason with herself, it was her heart that seemed to pump denial through her body, and she could feel the soft thrum of it beneath her wrists a steady no, no, no, no.

Perhaps that was why she slowed her steps, preferring to linger in the hallway with the kind doctor. She nodded at his response, guessing he’d most likely gotten emergency calls well into the night before, though she did feel like she was partially responsible for Adelaide’s actions and thus was partly to blame for rousing such a commotion. Although a smile remained on her lips, the light in her eyes dulled slightly, her gaze glancing over the smooth line of Wesley’s smile. It may have been her imagination, or the shadow cast by the slowly rising sun, but his expression was clinical, well-practiced. Junia could not help it but think it was the same placating smile he would deliver before offering bad news to a patient.

Small wrinkles appeared between her brows and she inquired, more brazenly than she would have if the situation was different, “What do you really think of this?” Although they did not know each other well, had not had the opportunity to, with her having to remain hidden at all times, she instinctively felt that he would be the most honest, most direct person in this house. He must be used to pleading looks and wary eyes, and he must be used to speaking the truth, whether it would bring joy or sadness. In a smaller voice, echoing the her most potent fear, she added, “Do you think it’ll work?”

Even she herself didn’t know–at least that’s what she told herself as she refused to face the reality that it would not–but perhaps he would be able to offer some insight, a different way of looking at it. Perhaps there was a way they could all make it out and ensure the safety of the rest of the angels.

He hadn't expected an angel to imply that he'd say anything other than what he really felt about the situation, but she hadn't been wrong to assume that he wasn't apt to be brutally honest. It simply wasn't in his nature to deflate whatever hope might've lingered any more than what was necessary (they had to be realistic, after all), and when he did speak up, it was with purpose.

She'd practically asked him for a diagnosis of the situation, and while he could see from the look in her eyes that, deep down, she wanted to hear him say he had complete faith in the plan, they both knew that sugarcoating wouldn't do anyone much good; even angels needed to hear the truth (for even their God emphasized its importance). Pondering for a moment, he pushed his glasses a bit higher up the bridge of his nose before remarking, "It's a risk." One worth taking, perhaps, for the safety of a fellow human, but a risk still. "I'm not sure, miss. I wish I knew."

He'd found himself saying so much more often than he ever had when he'd been little more than a small town physician, but it was every bit as true now as it had been then. Uncertainty, especially where the wellbeing of others was concerned, was liable to drive a man like him mad.

"It could, though, and I hope it does." Anything could happen; the situation itself was a testament to that. He was conversing with an ANGEL, a creature whose existence he wouldn't have even begun to acknowledge if he hadn't ended up in Paradise, on the subject of whether or not a plan to liberate a woman (and possibly others) from the clutches of demons would be successful. He wouldn't be surprised if the plan failed, but the possibility of it working, though small, wasn't negligible.

Any good man of science knew that something being highly improbable didn't deem it IMPOSSIBLE.

"We just have to be careful, is all." Lest they make things immeasurably worse.

“Profession? I didn’t think people still clung onto that.” The world where they had been in possession of career aspirations and hopes of attending college was surely a long way away from this one, all normalcy stripped from the world, replaced by this barren nothing. All sense of their lives, who they had been, what they might have wanted as gone, nothing but empty memories and broken hearts left in their wake. Once, she had imagined herself to be an academic in the work, someone who would crack open a book hundreds of years old and learn the distant truths from them. Now, she would give anything just to be human. It was funny, how your perspective changed with the loss of the world. Thousands of years of potential, of history and culture, stripped away.

What did it even mean to be human anymore? Sooner or later, they would join the ranks of demons or angels alike - defined by their wings, or lack of them. She had always thought she would be destined for heaven, to join the ranks alongside her Father. Now, she often wondered what would happen. Was her fate bound to the demon? Would she fall to the depths of hell? Or would she have a chance of redemption - a chance to be happy. Such a concept seemed nearly impossible in this world. Another hopeless dream, something best not thought about. If you did, you would surely break your own heart - and where was the merit in that? 

“I’m Claire. The pleasure’s mine.” Clipped speech with a velvet tongue, the sound of her own voice never failed to send shivers down her spine, a stark reminder of who she was now - and who she could possibly never be again. How they had taken something so full of warmth, possibility and curiosity and turned it into ice, she would never know. Devoid of emotion, bound to serve and obey, their demon was a hopeless spirit, a soldier without independent thought. Still, his words were enough to ignite curiosity behind shadowed orbs, enough to make her wonder who he was - and whether he could help her.

Echoed thoughts spoken by them, they clocked her head, studying him with clear intent. “You’re logical. You think with your mind” And not with your heart. The insinuation lay as plain as day, perhaps only known to the two figures who occupied her mind. In this world, she wasn’t sure what was smarter - head or heart?

This woman — Claire, she'd called herself, though knowing her name did him no favors in terms of deciphering who she was — was right, and really, if he'd been anything else — a lawyer, an engineer, an architect — he probably would've let go of his profession. There was no court to be held in Paradise; the creatures that roamed the streets answered not to earthly judges, but to one unseen. There was nothing to be built, no chemicals to be created, and no books to be written — save, perhaps, for a record of the accounts (for surely no one would believe it if they hadn't seen it), but there were people to save.

And that was more than enough for Wesley Hudson, the youngest of a group of brothers bred for greatness who had taken up his father's craft not for the sizable salary — like the eldest, Will — but for the rewarding work itself. If, by chance, his brother had survived, the dark-haired doctor — though he'd never been a gambling man — would've been particularly reluctant to wager that he'd continue to practice; he'd never seemed to enjoy his work so much as he endured it. Making their father proud had always been his priority (Wesley would be lying if he claimed it hadn't also been one of his), and now that William Hudson had succumbed to the fate of the rest of humanity just as he had to the bottle, his firstborn had no one left to impress, no one left to please.

He'd always had a knack for soaking up their father's attention like a sponge, and once, his youngest brother had nearly envied him. Now, he almost pitied him.

But wherever he was — whether he was dead or alive, and whether the former option allowed for the consciousness observed here or not — he hoped he'd found peace.

Nowadays, it seemed to be in short supply.

"Most don't," the doctor ceded with a slight shrug of his shoulders. Save for Stella, Oliver (was being a religious man a career in and of itself?), and himself, he didn't know of many humans who'd retained their careers after the Fall, though that could've been due — at least in part — to some simply being starved of the opportunity.

A polite nod of his head acknowledged both her name and her observation that he erred on the side of logic. "I do." Hudson was undeniably left-brained, and it showed in the way he spoke and conducted himself. "My father did, as well." His heart, though it certainly had good intentions, was a tricky thing to work with. He'd learned when to let it have its head and when to rein it in over the years, and he'd found there was a time and place for each; everything in moderation. "And you? What do you think with?"

    It wasn’t that often that she was surprised – after all she was a strategic person; everything was written in the stars for others and the stars, in turn, were placed in position by her. She was a mover of the cosmos ( in her own eyes ) and every move she made was premeditated and meticulously analyzed so that even the unplanned aspects came as no surprise. Rowan was the puppeteer who gathered all the strings and tied them to her nimble fingers, whether they be heart strings or strings that tied her fingers to their limbs so as to make them dance and move at her desire. So why, then, did this one human surprise her? Was it because, for someone who seemed so learned,  he was so incredibly stupid and trusting? Or perhaps she was unfamiliar with this aspect of humanity – a humanity so pure so as to seem angelic? 

    Her footsteps were light and swift as she led Wesley away from where he was sure to be captured in a much less accommodating manner. Every so often she’d glance at him, bright, cold hues roaming over his much less confident persona. Were humans really so weak and fragile that their shoulders seemed to bow under the weight of unconfessed sins? Were they really so unsure that each step seemed to her like a gazelle about to bolt? Then again, this gazelle was walking next to a lion whose teeth were currently glistening with blood. Even when she had been as human as him, though, she had never been privy to such insecurity and discomfort. No, when she had been human she had only known the coldness of being superior and the hunger of wanting more. Someone as brilliant as him should know what that tasted like. 

    And so she would try to teach him that hunger, to let him know of that thirst. 

   A smile lit her features like the north star in the night sky – shining, constant, and unreachable. While she was not completely foreign to kindness shown to her ( she demanded it and took it when others tried to deprive it of her ) she was still taken aback by how readily he offered her assistance when it was glaringly obvious that she was a more or less a deity – and beings such as herself did not need the aid of mortal hands. It was amusing. Endearing. Adorable, really. 

    And the fact that his voice seemed to deepen the more uncomfortable she made him? That was adorable too. 

    “Well ,” she mused, her hand slipping from his wrist to intertwine their fingers in a much more intimate manner. It was a move that was draped in casualness but it was made to evoke a response. Did Athena ever open her lips etched with wisdom without warrant? No – and so Rowan did the same. She never opened her mouth, lifted a finger, or batted an eye without forethought. “The cuts along my cheek do sting rather sharply, every breath I take makes my ribs burn in pain, my wings are loathe to make any movement, and there are about a hundred new cuts that were not there before today.” There was a pause as she twirled a strand of her around her finger thoughtfully, trying to listen to the twinges and the aches of her body. They bloomed and they bemoaned the affliction that she had put them through, but at the same time they reveled in the victory that she had won. 

   Her eyes flickered to him once more as she slowed her steps. The threat of her own kind taking away her new toy was little to none at this point, since she was certain that most escapees and rebels had been rounded up. “Do you need to examine my wings more thoroughly? You’re free to touch them.” And without a second to let him consider, she turned around and placed his hand on the edges of her wings. 

Being looked at by Rowan was reminiscent of what he imagined it felt like to be examined beneath a microscope: invasive and a bit humbling, like being laid BARE for judgement. There was a certain distance in the way she regarded him, like he was the unusual specimen to be studied, to be discovered, and for the first time in his life, Wesley Hudson, a scientist in his own right, felt like the subject of an experiment far bigger than himself.

Humbling, indeed. Was this what it felt like to be a believer? If God had truly walked the Earth thousands of years prior, would He have looked upon him like that? Despite attending a Catholic school (sentimental or not, it was the best and only education his little hometown had to offer), he'd never read the Bible; he'd never blessed himself with the belief that he was doing anything more than wetting his forehead; and he'd never bowed his head out of anything more than RESPECT. Perhaps, if he'd treated what meager exposure to religion he'd had as more than a means to an end — something to be endured and tolerated until graduation day — he might know the answer. And perhaps he wouldn't.

The past was such a troubling concept — reassuring in that it was concrete and worrisome in that what could've been was not. Dwelling on it endangered the future, yet so did disregarding it. A man had to learn when to cut his losses and push on.

And so he did. He trailed behind her like the concerned doctor he was, his light eyes only dipping down to their hands when, like a girl — a mortal girl, a (probably) DEAD girl — he'd once known, she released her grip on his wrist in favor of tucking her delicate fingers into the vacant spaces between his and smiled. And if she hadn't spoken just then — if she hadn't taken inventory of her injuries just as he'd essentially asked her to, he might've been LOST, swept away by nostalgia he'd tried his hardest to suppress since the Fall. It was sacred — she was SACRED, the closest thing to God he'd ever known, and he'd be DAMNED before he let this place soil her memory.

But even dragging him (a poor choice of words, as he'd gone willingly) to Church hadn't been enough, and by God, if she hadn't turned a man of science into a man of faith, Wesley was surely convinced nothing could.

And then — "They're probably bruised." Realizing a heartbeat later that he hadn't clarified (her fingers tangled up in his were distracting in the way of something unexpected), he added, "Your ribs, I mean." Her ribs would need time and rest, things she may not have been willing to give them, and the gashes in the porcelain skin of her cheek would be (somewhat) easily remedied; he could see to that immediately, but her wings —

She'd fallen quiet, he noticed, and whatever he'd meant to say (if he'd known of anything at all to say) died on his lips just then, a moment of reverence for a DEITY he was reluctant to believe in. Her steps slowed (his stride dwarfed hers, so it was only a matter of shortening his) until they'd both come to a stop in the middle of a hallway that could've been anywhere in the prison (he hadn't been able to gauge which turns they'd taken, try as he might), but despite being something akin to lost in the labyrinth, the doctor didn't fret about finding his way out.

He might've had more faith than he was willing to admit, but in whom?

"I, uh —" Before he could even think — let alone speak — a coherent response, she'd disentangled their fingers and settled his hands on the corners of her wings, the soft feathers and tight, swollen tendons undeniably REAL beneath his gentle touch. Fingers softly tracing the outline of her bones, he lingered in the spots that seemed abnormal (he'd only ever dealt with birds, after all) and dared to press down, blue eyes reluctantly tearing away from the damn near unbelievable sight before him to search her likeness for a reaction. "Sprained," he exhaled, relieved that the right word (and not strange, for this certainly was) had escaped his lips.

Few things rendered the doctor truly speechless in a manner that wasn't by choice, but AWE held his tongue now. It was harder than he'd expected to lift his hands from the most magnificent, peculiar thing he'd ever seen and felt for himself, but somehow, the part of Wesley Hudson that didn't let himself get carried away by it all persevered — at least succeeding in getting his hands to fall to his sides. "I've only ever healed bird wings before," he admitted quietly, the image of a bird with a homemade splint burned into the back of his mind. Humble beginnings and not-so-good ideas. "But I can try. There's not much to do for a sprain, anyway, and everything else shouldn't be a problem."

As Josephine braced herself for his response, she was silently grateful that he was bothering giving her any information at all. Many had been keeping her in the dark, and she knew it was her own doing that they felt the need to do any of this. Her hesitance to join in on all of their plans must have been leaving sour tastes in their mouths, and yet she couldn’t stop that part of her. The part that refused to think about others instead of herself. Maybe she was reckless, too reckless, but that mostly stemmed from the lack of having a solid ground to fall back onto. She had Patrick, sure, and she knew that Wesley knew Patrick. But was Patrick enough to keep her feet on the ground? Jo wasn’t so sure he was.

Jo held her breath without realizing it, and before he started, she knew where it was going to end. Brown eyes fell, her hands immediately went up to her forehead, hastily brushing back any hair that had decided to make its way into her eyes. She was biting back tears, and that was more than enough to make her want to run in any direction. The list. She was on it. The red mark was just a indicator of something that others already knew. Doomed. 

“They’re going to kill me–us?–the people on the list?” Jo was breathing heavily, her chest moving up and down in a rapid fashion. Doomed. Doomed. Doomed. How could they choose her? She had done nothing wrong. She wasn’t the one orchestrating the plans. She was innocent. Nothing she had done had warranted termination. Nothing. Yet there she was, hearing news that seemed akin to learning you had cancer. She had become cancerous.

“Why me? Why?” 

Wesley had dealt with dying patients before, both as a doctor's son and a practicing physician, and while it was never particularly easy to navigate conversations with those who knew their lives were drawing to a close, he had found that a bit of empathy and gentle honesty went a long way. There was no be-all and end-all for communicating with the terminally ill, save for regarding them with the same care and dignity afforded to any other patient.

Years of speaking with those who'd developed cancer as a result of smoking or working in chemical plants had left him with quite a bit of experience on the matter of discussing imminent death, but the woman in front of him couldn't be sure that she was facing it, and therein lied the problem: he wanted to reassure her that she wasn't going to die, but he couldn't say with absolute certainty that it wasn't even a possibility.

"No, Miss — that's not — we don't know what they're going to do. It could be anything." The doctor paused to gather his bearings, briefly wondering if he'd made matters worse by telling her what he knew; she didn't deserve to be kept in the dark, but watching her hyperventilate was more than enough to make him question his decision. "Breathe, Josephine, there's no need to panic just yet." As for her question of why, he didn't know; after hours — days — of studying the list, he and Lydia had drawn nothing but blanks.They’d uncovered only a small piece of the puzzle, and the complete picture was far from distinguishable.

Lydia tilted her head, thoughtful. Wes was always making her think. It was never a dull discussion, even if the surface seemed more basic than that. The lines of her morality, of the choices she and others made, were constantly at the surface of her thoughts. “I thought so, too. But I’ve been trying to think of an explanation for… the good ones. The better ones, rather. Decent demons.” 

Her time in Paradise seemed to stretch into twice as long when measured in discussion between them. She learned at a seeming exponential pace, when faced with a one-to-one ratio rather than the confines of a classroom. Her brain seemed to sponge up information, calling on it at moments where she wasn’t quite sure herself if she’d retained it all. It was familiar to her, now, to pose questions without easy answers. They’d traded almost too many of them in their quest to learn more about this place, in between what he was showing her about being a doctor.

Wes’ answer came with no small sense of relief to her. He was usually right, about most things. Lydia waffled for a moment between giving her undivided attention to Abel and his plight, or focusing on what else she wanted to know. Ultimately, the latter won out, because it distracted Wes. Watching the torture was emotionally torturing in itself, and more than that, it let the demons win. She got sucked into it on her own, but with someone else, someone she cared to protect, it was easier to prioritize.

He echoed thoughts she’d had ages ago, about Adelaide, in fact. That maybe it would be easier just to stop, when the world was so bleak and they barely spoke without arguing and all her feelings were tangled up. But she’d soldiered on, determined that Adelaide would like her someday, that she could be useful, that she could forgive this person who’d nearly dragged her into hell. And she had. More than that, she’d stopped blaming her at all. It was more than that. It was so much more, and she’d been so blind not to see it.

No, if someone could be helped, she would do it. Whether they aided her or not. “It’s difficult for people who have always had to be independent to ask for help,” she countered. The flip side of the coin he’d tossed her way. “Not that it feels like it does much good, with them beating us down again every day.” 

Wesley was nothing if not observant, and in the time they'd spent together (his records read well over a month), he'd learned a few of his student's mannerisms. He'd come to recognize the gleam in her dark eyes when she learned a new skill, and he knew what she looked like when a yet-to-be asked question nearly burned a hole through her cheek. The expression on her face when a conversation took a turn for the deeper was one he'd discuss just about anything to see.

But for all the versions of Lydia he had seen — determined, triumphant, excited, focused — he'd rarely, if ever, seen her truly, completely satisfied. When it came to knowledge, she was RAVENOUS, and try as he might to sate that hunger, he couldn't seem to conquer it.

Then again, he wasn't sure he wanted to. Finding people like her — people who never wanted to stop learning, to stop giving — was like hunting for needles in a haystack, and perhaps more than anything, she CHALLENGED him, in both the literal and figurative sense. She comprehended things so quickly that finding new things to teach her was an uphill battle, and rather than passively agreeing with him when they discussed topics on which their opinions differed, she reasoned with him (or against him) and presented her perspective, one he might not have previously considered.

If Wesley Hudson ever prayed to God, he'd thank Him for Lydia Delgado.

His respect for her only grew with every word she spoke, from her acknowledgement that not all of the demons were evil incarnate (he shared this sentiment, though tentatively) to her defense of those who found it hard to ask for — or accept — help. Another surge of pride swelled up in his chest, not because he'd taught her those values, but because he hadn't needed to. "You're absolutely correct," Wesley murmured, memories of his father giving him pause. "But those people often need it most."

What would William Hudson say if he could see him now? Would his youngest son finally be enough? The doctor wasn't sure which stung worse: the realization that he'd never find out, or the thought that if he were to, he wouldn't like the answer.

ALASTAIR —