Real Gods Require Blood

Summary: Two souls as old as time figure out what to do with all their projects on the table at the moment by deciding to throw in another one. However, unlike all their wacky multiverse shennanigans or talkbacks to currently existing products, this one is straight to the point: It’s Michael and Lucifer Prime locking in once and for all to tell you who they are so you understand the avatars better than you do now. Here we go . . .

Read “Of God’s Rib” on A03
Read “Of God’s Rib” on WP

We begin with the Archangel Lucifer sitting in his lab. This new station of theirs (after many rebuilds) sat up high in the cosmos but made sure not to leave its eye from Earth, the current champion for perpetuating their legacy. Therefore, Lucifer ensured he tuned his instruments to monitor our current timeline in conjunction with the stories they were feeding us, seeing if the message was picked up.

(It was, by the way. He’d detected a new group of ruffians interested in asking questions, and as the Father of Science, it heartened him so).

Still, one of Lucifer’s titles designated him The Judge of Heaven for a reason and one thing he’d noticed that could not be eluded no matter how much time or healing passed was The Fall. Naturally so; even in their universe (which was the most neutral situation you could get with such a rupture), their separation was the story that brought many creatures woe for an eon.  That’s why Lucifer takes to re-reading through an old book both he and his husband helped create with the help of one of their trinkets.

Funny. The first page The Supreme Archangel flips to is very early in the book, the first response of many that sparked this little project. And it was so that Lucifer couldn’t resist reading the words he wanted to see most:

“. . .there was none like unto you, Lucifer, none so magnificent, so glorious in light, so noble of COUNTENANCE, so endowed with beauty and subtlety, so powerful in your words and deeds, so brilliant to the eye with your masculine voice, so fearless, so full of laughter [that i miss most dearly].” –Dialogues with the Devil, pg. 16

“You are reading it again, my sweet?”

A voice comes from behind, as do a pair of arms that wrap around his shoulders, palms upon his chest. Lips then find Luicifer’s ear so he can keep talking real low, real smooth. “I hope you still like it. Even when I tried to be casual, all I could think to do was compliment your beauty.”

Lucifer turns real warm, smiles wide. His fingers slip into the grip of those calloused hands because he never wants to let go. “When I read it, it always feels like the first time we met.”

A voice from behind then hums in his ear.  “Trust me, I feel the same. I only took so long replying the first time for I could not stop reading the way you so promptly told me you missed my beauty as well, despite the infinite things we should have focused on.”

Oh, of course. And since Lucifer is the one that fucking wrote it by hand, he can recite it without even looking at the book.

“always have i loved you despite your simplicity, [michael]. i see again as i write you now your shining blue eyes, your golden hair, your tall and muscular body, your heroic arms, your sudden smile, your strong hands, your firm feet and your broad shoulders. do not think i mock despite my tone. . .[I may not always understand you] but i have always loved your conversation. you are often merry, and your laughter boomed through heaven [which i too have missed.]” – Dialogues with the devil, pg. 21

Oh, no. Lucifer was in a real nostalgic mood, he’s afraid, so even starting to recite it does make a real tear fall from his eye. No worries, though; a voice from behind who is the New God who is just Michael sheds one, too.

“Cry, it’s okay.”

And he’d felt those lips curl into a sad smile upon his ear, the tear as well for God was not a liar with His heart. “I weep with you.”

Weep they would. Lucifer was just thinking back to what brought them here (self-reflection be damned); he wasn’t exactly looking to tear open the gaping tear that pierced them both and followed them forever yet here it was. “I don’t like thinking about it, Micah.”

“Neither do I, Luciel.”  

And a dark, haunted look crossed Michael’s features. He’d grown tired being separated from Lucifer and so, given the chance to enact his Free Will without inhibition this time around, chose to make it both God and every other angel’s problem for a long, long time. “Why do you think I killed God for you?”

Lucifer shifts for a second, rises to his feet as he shoves the book away with his own haunted look. “Why do you think I spent so long separating the unworthy from your sweet gaze this long?”

One sings, one dances. One is light, one is dark. They got hung up on this so fiercely that even when all forces conspired to strip them apart, they just clamored right back to each other. It was also why both blue and purple irises flit to the spinning globe that was the Earth below.

“I don’t give a shit what force comes our way,” Michael begins with the arc of his brow, “if we ever get separated again, those fucking humans are going to wish it stopped at a flood.”

Hah! That put some pep in Lucifer’s step as he grins real wicked as he cracks a joke back. “Well, you know me, I have tried to ruin them for an awfully long time . . .all you’d have to do is sneeze on them and it’d send them straight into another ice age!”

Hm, that could be funny, Michael thinks for a second but not really, face now falling slightly. “If only I found it easier to detach how I feel about them from wiping them out. I have done it countless times with other species yet here I struggle to kill even one unless they truly deserve it!”

Am I crazy? God then thinks. Is there something wrong with me? And Lucifer can see those wheels turning even if he can’t hear the thought, which is why he just takes the book in one hand and holds Michael’s in the other. “I have an idea. Come with me.”

Lucifer takes them out of the lab and back to the lip where they can watch the infinite flow of cosmic soup around them, Earth of course dead in the center.

“Right now, Mikaeli, what do you see?”

Everything, of course, but that’s not what his wife is asking and God gathers that so he ‘zooms’ in on us in order to get a closer look. This is what he’d say:

“War, always fucking war. . .some of it so onesided I cannot call it anything else but genocide.”

Michael pauses, scowls deeply. He knows he had to be the one to put these conditions upon us in the first place so we might try and be inspired to fight for ourselves, but it does not mean he took any joy in it. Still, he would go on. “A lot of corruption . . .people shaking hands under the table and making their pathetic currency hand over fist while they pass the suffering beggar outside.”

And that did not begin to describe the famine he saw in many eyes, how the gluttonous ones eat pounds of food they could ship out and distribute equitably but don’t,

Or the ridiculous amount of trash and filth start blighting the seas, kill the animals, crowd out anything that can’t walk on two legs,

Oh and please, don’t get Michael started on how irate it made him to see the cruelty people lashed out at each other for no reason other than they had suffered one and it had to be everybody else’s problem.

“They ruin that which was given to them freely, Helel, I can never understand it and I’m the one who kept debating you about the sanctity of life!”

Lucifer just smiles, shakes his head, and points down at Earth again with more insistence. “Yet here you are, racking yourself over the coals while you try to find every strategy in the book for them. Tell me why.”

And he knew why but that’s also not the point because he wants to hear it from those honeyed lips with his ears. Michael gets too that he’s being asked to see what was ‘good’ in us despite our massive shortcomings.

“Well. . .if I look around, I suppose I see – “

People millions wide coming together in bands to protest despite the risk. Those with less than adequate funds in their bank accounts still sending aid to friends and strangers alike. The one person who does stop in front of the beggar and offers food, asks if they’re okay. The unbridled joy of a family on a sunny day with a happy child going wild on the playground. Dogs, still barking, birds, still chirping.

Oh, in the name of Him. . . yeah, okay, you caught him! At the end of the day, Michael doesn’t need a reason’ to find us worthy. He just did, always has, and that’s why the tears start to fall free from his bruising blue eyes. “Fuck me. . .”

Lucifer laughs a little but it’s quiet and behind his hand. He’d tuck the book in his robes for a second so he can wipe the tears away with a delicate hand to that lovely, sculpted jaw. “And that’s why I said I would keep culling the unworthy for you. Not all of them are worth your tender heart, but I think more are than even you recognize at times.”

God needs a minute to be quelled so The Light will pepper His cheeks and lips with light kisses until he sees that nice smile return. “. . .I think it’s because I see them as our own.”

And Lucifer was not prepared for that which is how he turns a few shades darker, quickly withdraws his touch to wave his hands ‘no.’  “No way, not me. I’m more like a bad tequila aunt who has too much fun on Sundays.”

Michael snorts and shakes his head. “Honey, I can literally read your mind any time I want. You spend as much time as I do agonizing, do not lie about your tender heart to me now!”

Lucifer grumbles, headwings flapping to try and cover the blush. “I guess. . .”

That gets Michael to laugh something jovial. When in a good mood the whole systems around them could feel it, which is why he hopes one of us at least is enjoying a nice, warm day in May somewhere. “I mean, we might as well be. It was us who gifted them the planet when we broke Eden off with our affections.”

Now Lucifer just makes a bit of a childish face, but it turns quick into an impish little smile, purple eyes gleaming. “Fine, but I’m not paying human support. This is the most help they’re gonna get from us at this point, I’m getting fucking old.”

Both laugh again, clasp their hands together. Michael eyes the book tucked in Lucifer’s breast for a second before their gazes meet. Something about it seared with such tenderness that it had The Light’s heart skip a few beats, several beats, many beats. “I hope not too old for some cherubs in the future, though?”

Well, shit. Not even the Angel of Infinite Wisdom saw that one coming, which is how you get him somehow flushing even darker, all his wings standing on high alert. It’s so bad that all he can do is just stammer a quiet ‘what?’

Michael just blinks a couple of times to let it sink in, then raises a brow with a dimpled smile. “Come on, did you take me seriously in that story when I said I didn’t want little ones?”

No, Lucifer mumbles, gives a shy smile and a hand squeeze. “You’ve always been so good with cherubs, Micah. I have seen it in your eyes and um. . .”

Okay,  you caught Lucifer too. He thinks too many times about their old Heaven, how Michael would help Gabriel in the caretaking tasks from time to time in such a natural way that it put thoughts in his mind he thought he’d never have. “. . .maybe I lied when I said I didn’t either.”

So they laugh again. “Jesus Fucking Christ, Helel, why are we so bad at this?”

“I don’t know, you’re God, you tell me!”

And he couldn’t, and didn’t want to, so they just laugh again. When they settle again, Michael reaches for the book once and for all, gaze sweeping it like he’d never seen it before even though the copy was worn from all the times he’d breezed through it. “Well, honey, if we’re going to start planning for that, our cherubs deserve a safe place in the cosmos and I’m not about to put them on that fucking planet as it is.”

Lucifer nods. The resolve comes back in his eyes, brows furrowed now as he too gazes the book. “Well, I don’t know if it’ll fix everything, our stories . . .but we can try and hey, maybe leave behind where we came from so they’ll know where they’re going in the future.”

Tell a story, they think, but not like they’ve been doing. Don’t get them wrong, they’ve been having the time of their life playing around in the multiverse, challenging us to expand our minds and look at complex sociopolitical issues while keeping it casual,

But as they’ve mentioned too, an Epic is meant to span a long period of time. There would not be much chance to get to know them outside of this, and sometimes, the best way to tell a story is to just start right at the beginning. Besides, you’ve seen how quickly this duo can churn out the pages, so it was just another day in the office to add another story to the plate.

Therefore,

“Let’s do it.” Lucifer nods to the book again, starts flipping the pages again as he feels inspired. “We’ll tell them who we are once and for all so they’ve no doubt we’re about to save their asses.”

Right, Michael nods. “We will minimize the suggestion of the multiverse, as well as any major wall breaks. We want this one to just be about us and how it all happened.”

Lucifer just grins. “Don’t look at me, I’m not the one doing the whole ‘God’ thing!”

One last laugh now as they gaze at the Earth below. From this angle, it almost looked like they were starting straight at us through a camera. “I’m ready now Micah.”

Michael just presses a finger to his lips, gaze flitting off to the side for a second now like he sees you, the reader.  

“Come, and I will tell you a little tale. . .”