Fic: A History of Heaven (Gabriel/Various Angels, PG-13 for this chapter) 47/59
For full notes and other chapters, please see the Masterpost.
Notes: Sammael = Lucifer
Chapter Rating: PG-13
Chapter word count: 2,292
Chapter Summary: A storm on the Sea of Galilee has Jesus performing a miracle, while a friendly tulpa has a chat with our Earth-bound Archangel.
CHAPTER 47:
The Tulpa and the Sea
Gabriel!
Jesus’ shout rang out clearly in Gabriel’s mind, which was good, because he certainly couldn’t hear much over the howling wind. He was holding on to the mast himself, his wings streaming behind him in the storm. He hated wind. It reminded him far too much of Raphael.
Gabriel, can’t you do something!? Jesus was within the ship, pretending to be asleep. He was very good at pretending to sleep. It fooled his somewhat-dimwitted disciples while giving him time to confer with his angelic protector. Gabriel had taught Jesus how to speak through his grace after a few people muttered suspiciously about the man who talked to the air.
Gabriel sighed to himself, shaking his head. He could barely feel the rain pouring down on him, but he knew it was there. Water all around, and not so much as a candle flame to bank his own spirit with. This voyage was horrible.
I’ll save you if the ship goes down, but I’m not the angel to call about the storm. That’s Raphael.
Will he answer my prayers?
Gabriel didn’t mean to laugh into Jesus’ head. It just sort of slipped out. Not likely. He hates humans, and from what I heard, he’s not too keen on the idea of a Son of God.
I can’t let these people die! Can’t you save them all?
Rules are rules, Gabriel answered. I can’t… Gabriel was here to protect Jesus and Jesus alone. Interfering to save an entire ship of people might be too much of a miracle for this day and age. It was one thing if Jesus did it himself, but Gabriel wasn’t supposed to intervene.
However, a potential loophole did come to mind. Barachiel. Pray to the angel Barachiel. Tell him exactly where you are, so he knows what storm to calm.
Can he help?
Unless Raphael is pissing on you directly, it’s actually one of Barach’s angels whipping this mess up. Technically, Gabriel could tell him to stop himself, but he was trying not to give orders from Earth. Cariel needed to have as much power as possible in Heaven to keep Raphael from trying to step in. If Gabriel started throwing out orders down here, he risked undermining Cariel’s temporary authority.
Jesus was silent, but Gabriel could feel his prayer. Barachiel knew who Jesus was, and Gabriel was confident his good-natured Seraph would answer the man’s prayers. Sure enough, when Jesus opened his eyes, he shouted at the wind and it immediately quieted. The rain stopped falling, and Gabriel shook his wings off, folding them neatly against his back. Congratulations, Jesus. You’ve performed another miracle.
This one wasn’t mine.
It impressed your followers. Go on, use this opportunity to teach them.
Gabriel didn’t bother listening as Jesus rebuked the men for lacking faith. He wiped his hands over his body and pulled a wing around front, grooming his feathers straight. He hated feeling wet.
Your face looks like a drowned cat’s. The water goes right through you, you know.
Gabriel glanced up in time to catch Jesus’ eye, pulling a face as the man grinned at him. Oh, shut up. Angel of Fire here. I hate water. The sooner we can land, the better.
Crowds tended to follow Jesus wherever he went. Some, Gabriel could see, were true believers, but most were just interested in the show. Wherever Jesus went, a spectacle was sure to follow. Even if Jesus himself didn’t do anything noteworthy (which in and of itself was noteworthy these days), at least one or two people in the crowd did.
Or rather, Gabriel made them make spectacles of themselves.
Life had become more bearable now that Jesus could see and speak with Gabriel. They often spoke during the day, and at night, Gabriel would slip into Jesus’ dreams to entertain the man with long theological discussions or just stories about Heaven. Jesus especially liked tales of Castiel, and he declared Joshua his favorite angel (or second favorite after Gabriel, so as not to be insulting).
Even with Jesus’ attention, Gabriel was still frequently bored. Most of Jesus’ daily energy went toward the people who crowded around him, and constantly explaining and re-explaining himself to his disciples was absolutely mentally exhausting. Gabriel was mostly left to his own devices while Jesus preached or healed.
Big miracles were out of the question, but nobody said Gabriel couldn’t remind humanity of the powers of an avenging angel.
As Jesus preached, Gabriel read the souls of the crowd, seeking out people who had done the truly evil sins. He wasn’t looking for big things, like murder or theft. Those tended to be dealt with fairly well by humans themselves. No, Gabriel looked for the sins that society overlooked. Things like being unnecessarily harsh to your slaves, or unfaithful to your wife. Gabriel compelled liars to confess and infected the groins of adulterers with fleas. In one instance, he wrapped a spell around the hand of a man who would beat his horses so that every time he picked up a whip, his hand cramped in excruciating pain even before he could strike the first blow.
“Not bad.” A short man with eyes the color of old honey was watching Gabriel. Not Jesus, Gabriel. He had his chin propped on one hand, the elbow of that arm resting in his other hand, and he was giving the angel an appreciative nod. “I was tempted to do something to him myself, but I probably would have chopped off the hand entirely.”
“It will also cramp if he touches himself with it,” Gabriel said, cocking his head to the side as he studied the man. No, not a man. He glowed with an inner power-this was a tulpa. A strong tulpa, with a solid body and a mind of his own. He was well on his way to godhood, if he hadn’t already reached that point.
The tulpa threw back his head and laughed, a rich, hearty sound. “Perfect! I love it!”
“I know you,” Gabriel realized, pointing a finger at the tulpa. “We’d run together, in the northern forests. You were more sparkly back then.”
“I’ve gotten a bit more refined over the years.” The tulpa tugged his shirt straight and grinned at the angel. “On the other hand, you’ve gotten more sparkly. What happened to the old man face?”
“Suros was just a vessel,” Gabriel explained. “This is my true form. I’m watching over him.” He nodded toward Jesus, standing on a small hill nearby to preach.
“I wondered why I could actually feel your weight in the world. I followed it here.”
“My weight?” Gabriel’s head tilted further to the side. “I don’t have a weight in this form. Without a vessel, I have no mass.”
“Tch!” The tulpa shook his head incredulously. “You can’t feel it? You’re bending the world around you. Like a rock dropped onto a sheet stretched taut. Your power, it’s just…” The tulpa tapped the side of his head. “I feel you in here. Just picked up my feet and let myself roll down the world until I found you.”
“Ah.” Angels tended not to stay on Earth without vessels for long. Gabriel had never experimented to see how his unvesseled presence was experienced on Earth. If this tulpa could feel him from the northern continents, then that was just one more reason why escaping Heaven was an impossible dream. If the tulpa could feel him, certainly Raphael would be able to. “Did I bend the world like this when I was in the old man?”
The tulpa shook his head. “Absolutely not. Didn’t even recognize the power as you at first, not until I got closer.”
Gabriel glanced up sharply at that. “So, in the human, my power was completely contained? If I have a vessel, I don’t weigh down the world?”
“Don’t seem to,” the tulpa said with a shrug. “Could’ve changed. Do you have a vessel you could try on now? Did that old man die?”
Gabriel nodded. “Suros has gone on to Heaven, where he is finding eternal peace. I can’t leave Jesus to find a new vessel.”
“Does it have to be a certain person? Can’t you just… pick?” The tulpa waved toward the crowd with a little frown.
“It doesn’t work like that,” Gabriel said. “They have to be of a certain bloodline, directly descended from the first man I took as my vessel, Vindonnus.”
“Seriously? You and Vindonnus?” The tulpa whistled lowly. “Now there’s a sparkly god!”
Gabriel smiled, glad to hear the tulpa that had been spawned by his repeated possession of the man was still alive. It was perhaps a little blasphemous to be so pleased with having created a god, but Vindonnus was hardly a threat to God. “Are you a god yet?”
“Not yet,” the tulpa sighed. “Don’t even have a name yet. Someday. Someday, I’ll have a name.”
“And that’s when you’ve made it?”
The tulpa shook his head. “Nah, just having a name’s not enough. I mean, yeah, to most of my brethren, once they get a godly name, they’re good. But I know better’n that.”
“Oh?” Gabriel was intrigued. Most of these strong tulpas strove for a name, and from the name became pagan gods. He didn’t know that they could even conceive of anything more to achieve. He wasn’t even sure what more a tulpa could achieve. Surely there was nothing greater than becoming a god!
“Immortality,” the tulpa said, a mischievous grin curving his lips. “True immortality. That’s what I want.”
“And what is true immortality?”
“Never being forgotten.” The tulpa punched a fist into his hand to emphasize each word. “I can be killed. All gods can be. They’ve all got some weakness or another… even the big ones, the old ones, like Kali or Osiris, or Zeus, they can all be killed. But,” he held up one finger and raised his eyebrows pointedly, “but, as long as they’re not forgotten, they can come back. As long as one person worships them, they can be reborn as a new god. Once you’re a god, the only way you can really die is to be forgotten.” He nodded emphatically. “I’m going to find a way to do that. I’d be willing to die if it meant I’d always be remembered.”
“Because death would only be temporary.” Gabriel studied the tulpa with new eyes. He looked like a man, but he radiated his own power. His body had to be stronger than a human’s, vulnerable only to what the humans believed for him. To humans, he could pass as a human, but an angel would immediately identify him as a tulpa. Once he was strong enough, he’d be seen as a pagan god and left alone, unless he was causing trouble.
“Exactly. I’d do anything to never be forgotten.”
“Would you give up your life?” Gabriel glanced over at Jesus. The man was still preaching. He cast out his grace but felt no close reply from a brother. No one was around to overhear.
“I just said I’d-”
“Not die,” Gabriel stressed, lowering his voice and stepping closer to the tulpa. “Would you give up your life? Hand your body over to another? They would see through your eyes, speak through your lips, move through your limbs. You’d… sleep. Forever. You’d only barely be aware of the passage of time, of the actions your body was doing without you. Would you give up your life if I promised you your name would never be forgotten?”
“Can you actually do that?” the tulpa breathed, his eyes glowing gold with his desire. “Can you actually give me that immortality?”
“I don’t know,” Gabriel answered honestly. “Hypothetically, if I could, would you give me your body to use as my own?”
“Yes.” The answer was immediate. “Make my name remembered forever, and my body is yours.”
The air around the tulpa shimmered, an all-too-familiar golden bridge jumping between his energy and Gabriel’s spirit. The angel gasped, jerking back in surprise. The tulpa jumped too, staring down at the link. “What is that!?”
“A conduit.” Gabriel reached up, hesitantly touching two fingers to the bridge. “You said yes. I can possess you. I can possess you!” He could feel the knowledge in his head, how he needed to fold his wings and pour his spirit to fill the tulpa. It was a loophole in God’s law. An angel needed a vessel on Earth.
A vessel did not need to be human.
Gabriel closed his hand into a fist and willed the link to break. He couldn’t leave. He couldn’t leave Cariel, he couldn’t leave his choir, and he couldn’t leave Heaven. Just because there was a way out didn’t make the dream any less impossible.
The tulpa rubbed his chest ruefully, frowning at Gabriel. “Was that a good thing?”
“In a purely hypothetical situation, yes.” Gabriel sighed, his wings drooping. “It’s a dream I can never make true. Too much rests on my shoulders.”
“Ah.” The tulpa rubbed his chest once more before giving a shrug. “Well, if you ever change your mind, feel free to track me down. I’d love to make our dreams into reality.”
“Thank you,” Gabriel said with a little smile for the tulpa. “I won’t forget you. But please, don’t tell anyone else about this.”
The tulpa laughed. “You think I want to share my chance at getting immortality with those other idiots? What if you find one of them more to your liking? Then I lose out! Oh no, I won’t even hint at your ability to possess me, oh Shining One.”
“Gabriel,” the angel said. “My name is Gabriel.”
Next...
Notes: Sammael = Lucifer
Chapter Rating: PG-13
Chapter word count: 2,292
Chapter Summary: A storm on the Sea of Galilee has Jesus performing a miracle, while a friendly tulpa has a chat with our Earth-bound Archangel.
CHAPTER 47:
The Tulpa and the Sea
Gabriel!
Jesus’ shout rang out clearly in Gabriel’s mind, which was good, because he certainly couldn’t hear much over the howling wind. He was holding on to the mast himself, his wings streaming behind him in the storm. He hated wind. It reminded him far too much of Raphael.
Gabriel, can’t you do something!? Jesus was within the ship, pretending to be asleep. He was very good at pretending to sleep. It fooled his somewhat-dimwitted disciples while giving him time to confer with his angelic protector. Gabriel had taught Jesus how to speak through his grace after a few people muttered suspiciously about the man who talked to the air.
Gabriel sighed to himself, shaking his head. He could barely feel the rain pouring down on him, but he knew it was there. Water all around, and not so much as a candle flame to bank his own spirit with. This voyage was horrible.
I’ll save you if the ship goes down, but I’m not the angel to call about the storm. That’s Raphael.
Will he answer my prayers?
Gabriel didn’t mean to laugh into Jesus’ head. It just sort of slipped out. Not likely. He hates humans, and from what I heard, he’s not too keen on the idea of a Son of God.
I can’t let these people die! Can’t you save them all?
Rules are rules, Gabriel answered. I can’t… Gabriel was here to protect Jesus and Jesus alone. Interfering to save an entire ship of people might be too much of a miracle for this day and age. It was one thing if Jesus did it himself, but Gabriel wasn’t supposed to intervene.
However, a potential loophole did come to mind. Barachiel. Pray to the angel Barachiel. Tell him exactly where you are, so he knows what storm to calm.
Can he help?
Unless Raphael is pissing on you directly, it’s actually one of Barach’s angels whipping this mess up. Technically, Gabriel could tell him to stop himself, but he was trying not to give orders from Earth. Cariel needed to have as much power as possible in Heaven to keep Raphael from trying to step in. If Gabriel started throwing out orders down here, he risked undermining Cariel’s temporary authority.
Jesus was silent, but Gabriel could feel his prayer. Barachiel knew who Jesus was, and Gabriel was confident his good-natured Seraph would answer the man’s prayers. Sure enough, when Jesus opened his eyes, he shouted at the wind and it immediately quieted. The rain stopped falling, and Gabriel shook his wings off, folding them neatly against his back. Congratulations, Jesus. You’ve performed another miracle.
This one wasn’t mine.
It impressed your followers. Go on, use this opportunity to teach them.
Gabriel didn’t bother listening as Jesus rebuked the men for lacking faith. He wiped his hands over his body and pulled a wing around front, grooming his feathers straight. He hated feeling wet.
Your face looks like a drowned cat’s. The water goes right through you, you know.
Gabriel glanced up in time to catch Jesus’ eye, pulling a face as the man grinned at him. Oh, shut up. Angel of Fire here. I hate water. The sooner we can land, the better.
Crowds tended to follow Jesus wherever he went. Some, Gabriel could see, were true believers, but most were just interested in the show. Wherever Jesus went, a spectacle was sure to follow. Even if Jesus himself didn’t do anything noteworthy (which in and of itself was noteworthy these days), at least one or two people in the crowd did.
Or rather, Gabriel made them make spectacles of themselves.
Life had become more bearable now that Jesus could see and speak with Gabriel. They often spoke during the day, and at night, Gabriel would slip into Jesus’ dreams to entertain the man with long theological discussions or just stories about Heaven. Jesus especially liked tales of Castiel, and he declared Joshua his favorite angel (or second favorite after Gabriel, so as not to be insulting).
Even with Jesus’ attention, Gabriel was still frequently bored. Most of Jesus’ daily energy went toward the people who crowded around him, and constantly explaining and re-explaining himself to his disciples was absolutely mentally exhausting. Gabriel was mostly left to his own devices while Jesus preached or healed.
Big miracles were out of the question, but nobody said Gabriel couldn’t remind humanity of the powers of an avenging angel.
As Jesus preached, Gabriel read the souls of the crowd, seeking out people who had done the truly evil sins. He wasn’t looking for big things, like murder or theft. Those tended to be dealt with fairly well by humans themselves. No, Gabriel looked for the sins that society overlooked. Things like being unnecessarily harsh to your slaves, or unfaithful to your wife. Gabriel compelled liars to confess and infected the groins of adulterers with fleas. In one instance, he wrapped a spell around the hand of a man who would beat his horses so that every time he picked up a whip, his hand cramped in excruciating pain even before he could strike the first blow.
“Not bad.” A short man with eyes the color of old honey was watching Gabriel. Not Jesus, Gabriel. He had his chin propped on one hand, the elbow of that arm resting in his other hand, and he was giving the angel an appreciative nod. “I was tempted to do something to him myself, but I probably would have chopped off the hand entirely.”
“It will also cramp if he touches himself with it,” Gabriel said, cocking his head to the side as he studied the man. No, not a man. He glowed with an inner power-this was a tulpa. A strong tulpa, with a solid body and a mind of his own. He was well on his way to godhood, if he hadn’t already reached that point.
The tulpa threw back his head and laughed, a rich, hearty sound. “Perfect! I love it!”
“I know you,” Gabriel realized, pointing a finger at the tulpa. “We’d run together, in the northern forests. You were more sparkly back then.”
“I’ve gotten a bit more refined over the years.” The tulpa tugged his shirt straight and grinned at the angel. “On the other hand, you’ve gotten more sparkly. What happened to the old man face?”
“Suros was just a vessel,” Gabriel explained. “This is my true form. I’m watching over him.” He nodded toward Jesus, standing on a small hill nearby to preach.
“I wondered why I could actually feel your weight in the world. I followed it here.”
“My weight?” Gabriel’s head tilted further to the side. “I don’t have a weight in this form. Without a vessel, I have no mass.”
“Tch!” The tulpa shook his head incredulously. “You can’t feel it? You’re bending the world around you. Like a rock dropped onto a sheet stretched taut. Your power, it’s just…” The tulpa tapped the side of his head. “I feel you in here. Just picked up my feet and let myself roll down the world until I found you.”
“Ah.” Angels tended not to stay on Earth without vessels for long. Gabriel had never experimented to see how his unvesseled presence was experienced on Earth. If this tulpa could feel him from the northern continents, then that was just one more reason why escaping Heaven was an impossible dream. If the tulpa could feel him, certainly Raphael would be able to. “Did I bend the world like this when I was in the old man?”
The tulpa shook his head. “Absolutely not. Didn’t even recognize the power as you at first, not until I got closer.”
Gabriel glanced up sharply at that. “So, in the human, my power was completely contained? If I have a vessel, I don’t weigh down the world?”
“Don’t seem to,” the tulpa said with a shrug. “Could’ve changed. Do you have a vessel you could try on now? Did that old man die?”
Gabriel nodded. “Suros has gone on to Heaven, where he is finding eternal peace. I can’t leave Jesus to find a new vessel.”
“Does it have to be a certain person? Can’t you just… pick?” The tulpa waved toward the crowd with a little frown.
“It doesn’t work like that,” Gabriel said. “They have to be of a certain bloodline, directly descended from the first man I took as my vessel, Vindonnus.”
“Seriously? You and Vindonnus?” The tulpa whistled lowly. “Now there’s a sparkly god!”
Gabriel smiled, glad to hear the tulpa that had been spawned by his repeated possession of the man was still alive. It was perhaps a little blasphemous to be so pleased with having created a god, but Vindonnus was hardly a threat to God. “Are you a god yet?”
“Not yet,” the tulpa sighed. “Don’t even have a name yet. Someday. Someday, I’ll have a name.”
“And that’s when you’ve made it?”
The tulpa shook his head. “Nah, just having a name’s not enough. I mean, yeah, to most of my brethren, once they get a godly name, they’re good. But I know better’n that.”
“Oh?” Gabriel was intrigued. Most of these strong tulpas strove for a name, and from the name became pagan gods. He didn’t know that they could even conceive of anything more to achieve. He wasn’t even sure what more a tulpa could achieve. Surely there was nothing greater than becoming a god!
“Immortality,” the tulpa said, a mischievous grin curving his lips. “True immortality. That’s what I want.”
“And what is true immortality?”
“Never being forgotten.” The tulpa punched a fist into his hand to emphasize each word. “I can be killed. All gods can be. They’ve all got some weakness or another… even the big ones, the old ones, like Kali or Osiris, or Zeus, they can all be killed. But,” he held up one finger and raised his eyebrows pointedly, “but, as long as they’re not forgotten, they can come back. As long as one person worships them, they can be reborn as a new god. Once you’re a god, the only way you can really die is to be forgotten.” He nodded emphatically. “I’m going to find a way to do that. I’d be willing to die if it meant I’d always be remembered.”
“Because death would only be temporary.” Gabriel studied the tulpa with new eyes. He looked like a man, but he radiated his own power. His body had to be stronger than a human’s, vulnerable only to what the humans believed for him. To humans, he could pass as a human, but an angel would immediately identify him as a tulpa. Once he was strong enough, he’d be seen as a pagan god and left alone, unless he was causing trouble.
“Exactly. I’d do anything to never be forgotten.”
“Would you give up your life?” Gabriel glanced over at Jesus. The man was still preaching. He cast out his grace but felt no close reply from a brother. No one was around to overhear.
“I just said I’d-”
“Not die,” Gabriel stressed, lowering his voice and stepping closer to the tulpa. “Would you give up your life? Hand your body over to another? They would see through your eyes, speak through your lips, move through your limbs. You’d… sleep. Forever. You’d only barely be aware of the passage of time, of the actions your body was doing without you. Would you give up your life if I promised you your name would never be forgotten?”
“Can you actually do that?” the tulpa breathed, his eyes glowing gold with his desire. “Can you actually give me that immortality?”
“I don’t know,” Gabriel answered honestly. “Hypothetically, if I could, would you give me your body to use as my own?”
“Yes.” The answer was immediate. “Make my name remembered forever, and my body is yours.”
The air around the tulpa shimmered, an all-too-familiar golden bridge jumping between his energy and Gabriel’s spirit. The angel gasped, jerking back in surprise. The tulpa jumped too, staring down at the link. “What is that!?”
“A conduit.” Gabriel reached up, hesitantly touching two fingers to the bridge. “You said yes. I can possess you. I can possess you!” He could feel the knowledge in his head, how he needed to fold his wings and pour his spirit to fill the tulpa. It was a loophole in God’s law. An angel needed a vessel on Earth.
A vessel did not need to be human.
Gabriel closed his hand into a fist and willed the link to break. He couldn’t leave. He couldn’t leave Cariel, he couldn’t leave his choir, and he couldn’t leave Heaven. Just because there was a way out didn’t make the dream any less impossible.
The tulpa rubbed his chest ruefully, frowning at Gabriel. “Was that a good thing?”
“In a purely hypothetical situation, yes.” Gabriel sighed, his wings drooping. “It’s a dream I can never make true. Too much rests on my shoulders.”
“Ah.” The tulpa rubbed his chest once more before giving a shrug. “Well, if you ever change your mind, feel free to track me down. I’d love to make our dreams into reality.”
“Thank you,” Gabriel said with a little smile for the tulpa. “I won’t forget you. But please, don’t tell anyone else about this.”
The tulpa laughed. “You think I want to share my chance at getting immortality with those other idiots? What if you find one of them more to your liking? Then I lose out! Oh no, I won’t even hint at your ability to possess me, oh Shining One.”
“Gabriel,” the angel said. “My name is Gabriel.”
Next...