video; BACKDATED to Wednesday

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[Raphael, this time, looks less like the bleeding pile of shit she did last time and more like a meditative businesswoman with dry skin who hasn't slept in a while. She is seated Indian-style on the floor of what is obviously a run-down house; her normal illusions of nice drawing rooms and furnished libraries are gone. Forgotten, even. There's a

Comments

[expunger]

Raphael didn't have to look down to know that her finger was still injured, brilliant light pouring from the cut. No matter.

"Yes. It provides a distraction from the persistent pain of Hellfire." Depressingly, Raphael never would have been this honest if she had her memories and with them, her hang ups. She never would have told him the truth if she knew her brother. "You sneer because you do not know."

With that, she stepped forward and pressed her uninjured hand to his head, pushing into his mind the pain, the feel of Hellfire that Raphael was even in that very moment enduring: a constant, white-hot burn that never abated and was never any less intense than the first moment it seared her, for months on end without the slightest flicker of abatement. Her skin on fire, her being twisted, the lurching metaphysical nausea of being around him or Gabriel. Raphael let him see in a way that she knew another angel (if he could even said to be like her anymore- she couldn't really count herself as his kind or his species, regardless of family) could appreciate the time span and scope of, and stepped back. All told, she had her hand to his head for maybe two seconds, but she let him see it all.

[swordoffate]

Michael had been about to argue with her last statement, and to refute her previous one, but then she touched his forehead and suddenly all thoughts were gone, replaced by the incredible overwhelming destructive Hellfire, taking over his senses completely and drowning out everything that wasn't pain and wrongness and constant endless corruption.

When she removed her hand, he lurched forward from shock, catching himself instinctively by grabbing his sister's shoulders, eyes unfocused for a few second as he processed. She had been right; he hadn't understood. He'd tried, but he simply couldn't grasp what she was dealing with, until now.

And he didn't at all know what to do about it. Unlike his sister, he recognized the familial bond, it pained him greatly that one of his most loved siblings was suffering so much, but it wasn't as though he hadn't tried to help before. He wasn't holding back, and frustration and worry were quickly turning to anger. Not at Raphael, but at who had done this in the first place: Lucifer.

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Raphael gave no outward reaction to his hands on her or weight braced against hers. She made no move to catch or support him, as she would have normally, but stood gazing into his eyes impassively. This much was what she wanted.

But time was wasting, and even now his presence pressed at her. "Then you understand why I can not stay here."

[swordoffate]

He was still reeling, but he heard her words, and he understood them. And while this was going on, while Raphael barely knew him, maybe it was best; best to spare her the pain of his presence, best for her to be away from him and the anger threatening to take over and prompt a righteous rage.

"Yes. I do."

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There was no benefit of courtesy, no sentimental words, respectful ones, or even a single indication that he was anything to her but a speck on the wall. She was gone almost before the words left his lips.