Part Two

Can't Touch This?

The house had stood abandoned since its last owners had disappeared and left a large police investigation in their wake. Numerous others had come, each thinking the draping ivy, the sad frescoed walls and columns, the dreary nature of the building all created a romantic atmosphere. Even the statues wept, their hands to their eyes, tears running down their faces and wings drooping behind them; as though they grieved for the world. One room had seen more use in recent years, sparking a third, fourth or fifth investigation and the police by this stage had lost count of how many people had gone missing. Each time someone went there, cars were found hours later, engines still running and picnics barely touched. And always the Angels wept. The Weeping Angels, waiting for the next unlucky soul to arrive.

The First, the eldest Angel was the one to witness the arrival the Untouchable Man. His hair stuck up wildly, like a black birds nest and his eyes were the purest green, unmarked by glasses or traumatic events; they shone with enthusiasm and a will to live. His body was youthful yet the breadth of his shoulders and the strength of his hands marked him a man; and even better to the First's mind, the young man was completely and bewilderedly confused. The First approached the man and reached out to touch him, brimming with joy at the thought of feasting once more, when the Second and Third appeared. The Fourth was still in the basement, still locked into position as he stared forever into a glittering mirror. The Doctor may once have locked them in place, but an inspector had disrupted their circle, releasing them once more to terrorise the world. Free to feast at last with an enmity against the Eternal Man to last the ages.

"Bloody hell," Albus stared at the Angel statue, it had definitely moved and his father's warnings reverberated in his mind. He drew his wand.

The Second grasped the man's shoulder, making him spin around in shock. Albus' reaction was instantaneous.

"Bombarda!"

The First stared at the remains of his brother; his brother who had been unable to toss the man into the past, his brother who was the first of their race to die. The First was the eldest, the wisest, and so knew that the man was something new, something unheard of. The First had been around when the Universe had first been born. The Angels, borne of chaos and living dust, had been spun into existence by the fear that the sentient races had felt when faced with the dark and the loneliness of the first hundred years of the Universe's existence. The Third was not so old, not so wise, not so clever, and was very rash in comparison to the First. He made the same mistake as the Second.

"Reducto!"

Albus turned his wand on the only remaining Angel; knowing, or rather guessing that if two Angel statues had tried to kill him, the third was likely to as well.

'I will not hurt you, Untouchable.'

Albus blinked, the words had drifted into his mind as the Angel stared at him, "what the fuck?!" Albus gaped.

'I do not understand this word. What is 'fuck'?' The voice was dry and rather droll, Albus decided.

"Uh, well. Fuck is..." How was he supposed to explain this? He didn't want to corrupt the Angel with his bad language; Albus paused, searching for the simplest explanation, "a very bad word for a very bad situation."

There you go, as incorruptible as he could manage on short notice.

'I see.' The voice, which Albus was certain was actually the Angel, was very dry and dusty.

"So are you the Angel?" Albus asked, figuring it was better to clarify now rather than guess.

The Angel for all that it was immovable stone, gave off the impression that it was vastly amused. Albus blinked in surprise, how could living stone give of the impression that it was amused? How was that even possible?

'I am. I am the First Angel of the Eldest Coven.'

"You're a coven?" Albus yelped. "Like a vampire coven?" Albus blinked again, his eyes watering as dust filaments from the shattered angels drifted around him in spirals.

The Angel had somehow changed position once more its arms by its side and its face appeared to be genially smiling, if one discounted the rather unnerving fangs. 'I have never met a Vampire. Coven is the name of my Family; our true name is unpronounceable to your human tongue. You will learn other languages. I dislike the human tongues, they are very limiting.'

Albus stared at the Angel in mild surprise and no little amount of annoyance, "well that's not pushy at all, is it?"

'You will do as I say, because I will teach you. You will then repay me by destroying the Doctor the Last Time Lord.'

"I beg your pardon?" Albus gaped. "Who is the Doctor? What is a Time Lord?" What the hell?

The Angel smirked. 'You do not understand?'

"Damn right I don't understand. I'm not a killer either; I'm not killing anyone!" Albus felt particularly put out when ringing laughter echoed through his head. "You cannot make me, if you try I will blast you to bit like your mates!"

The Angel flared its wings as Albus blinked and slammed Albus into a nearby wall.

'I am the First! You will not threaten me!'

Albus extended his wand, blinking from the strain. The Angel flung itself from him and Albus gasped in air desperately. "Do not try that again!" Albus rasped, pointing his wand at the statue.

'I will not.' The words were dry and disappointed. 'You are Untouchable.'

Whatever that meant, Albus figured it had something to do with the infamous Potter Luck that he had inherited from his father, Harry Potter. His father's ability to get into and out of trouble was legendary and no small cause of his mother's increasingly grey hair.

"That's good to know." Albus muttered, turning his head to the side.

'Who are you?'

"Oh now you ask me!" Albus growled. "Not much of one for manners are you?" The Angel appeared only to be slightly repentant and Albus glared at it. "Albus Severus Potter, Asp to my friends." Albus finally said grudgingly after staring around the dank and dusty room for a while.

The Angel inclined its head in several stuttering fits and almost smiled, 'Asp suites you Untouchable.'

"Why do you keep calling me that?" Albus asked, irritated that the Angel had called him Asp. They were not friends, not yet; and probably never would be.

The Angel paused to gather its thoughts, which were long, dry and dusty, much like its life. 'We are the Lonely Assassins, the Weeping Angels; the first Immortal's of the Universe. Ever watching, never changing I have seen civilisations rise and fall. My Kind feeds on Time Energy; potential time lived, loved and experienced by the sentient races of the Universe.'

"You kill how, though? I mean, if you eat potential time, then surely you must kill somehow." Albus mused, for once caught up in the hows and whys. His Aunt Hermione would be so proud.

The Angel smiled again, a twitch of stone lips that occurred between each rapid blink of Albus' eyes. 'We kill by sending the sentient races backwards in time. Once that would send them into the Chaos time, but now simply results in their living outside of their true time.'

Albus didn't like how disappointed and aggravated the Angel sounded in that dry voice. It truly was a cruel and indifferent being. "So, you what tried doing the same to me?" Albus asked.

'Yes.'

Albus blinked. That was... unexpectedly short. No justification, no excuse; the Angel was definitely not human, or young. No, it had no need for excuses or justifications, it knew what it was. It was a killer. It hurt people, harmed them, even obliquely. And it felt no remorse or regret for the lives it destroyed or changed. It was a monster, Albus decided. But, thinking about the situation logically, he Albus rather enjoyed a nice thick steak, and the Angel was simply killing what it saw as steak. It wasn't as though the people actually died; after all, they still lived just not in their correct time period. It could have been a whole lot worse, to Albus' mind.

"So what now, what do you want from me?" Albus asked. "Because I'm not helping you kill this Doctor fellow. I don't do death and destruction."

The Angel appeared to pout. 'If I cannot feast, then may I-'

"I never said you couldn't eat," Albus said calmly, very aware that he was about to sanction murder. "But I myself will not kill."

The Angel seemed to think that over. 'I understand.'

"Agreed then," and Albus turned on his heels, reminded, quite forcefully that he was still in his boxer shorts, and exited the house. He hoped that he would be able to somehow pass himself off as vaguely normal and without needing to be sectioned in a muggle mental hospital. As the Angel tailed the unlikely human male from the house on West of Drum-lands, the faint sound of grinding gears could be heard...