Author's note: The hack writing this fan fiction has no legal claim to any of the characters within. In fact, they belong to DC Comics, and are being used without their express written permission. Hell, they probably don't even know I exist...which is probably a good thing in the long run!
I'd like to thank Chris Dee and Myklar Cure for all the inspiration their fics have brought me.
For Michelle. Even twenty years later, I still think of you every day. Rest in peace little sister.
It took Brian several tries, and eventually several francs, but he managed to get a pair of strapping young French lads to help him carry Jean Paul back to the apartment they were renting. Naturally, he was exceptionally worried over what he saw as a relapse in Jean Paul's condition. When they had first left the laboratory of the Grey Abbott in Africa, Jean Paul had been nearly catatonic. It took Brian and Lilhy almost two weeks to get him to speak even a syllable, and that was only after Lilhy took matters into her own hands and tried kissing him.
She had claimed it worked for Snow White, so why not Azrael? Brian had instantly regretted starting her education on the outside world with Disney movies. However, it had worked, and the shy, geeky, computer nerd that the "real" Jean Paul is responded about as expected to being kissed by a beautiful woman - he blushed, tried to run away, and finally developed a huge crush on her.
Still, dealing with teaching Lilhy to survive outside the Ice Cathedral with Jean Paul's help was much easier than doing it himself. Even if he did eventually have to explain to the young man that it would be impossible for Lilhy to return his feelings if he never actually said anything to her about it. And then dealing with the fall-out of her not even understanding...but that hadn't driven Jean Paul back into a catatonic state. In fact, he had thrown himself into trying to understand the "System" that had been hypnotically implanted in him. Brian had attempted to help, even suggesting as they walked along that perhaps Jean Paul should think of the "System" as something other than a computer program - maybe even as a true angel that shared his soul. And that is when Jean Paul screamed and fell to the sidewalk.
Brian went over and over it in his mind. He just couldn't grasp exactly what had happened, but it was apparent that the young man acted like he had heard a second voice. If only Brian could discern whose voice Jean Paul had heard!
Jean Paul found himself floating in a white, featureless plain. One part of him was sure that he had just been lying on a sidewalk in Paris, but the rest of him was absolutely sure that he wasn't there any more. He turned his head from side to side, but in all directions for as far as he could see was absolutely nothing. Yet still he had a sense that he was not alone...
"Hello? Is there anyone out there?"
Almost immediately the scene around him changed. Now he was standing in the Cathedral of Notre Dame, beside the altar, dressed in the finest robes he had ever seen. But he still felt as if someone else was with him, although he could see no other signs of life around him.
"This isn't funny, so just come out where I can see you!"
"As you wish, mortal." A luminous being appeared below the altar dressed in the uniform of Azrael. "Although I sincerely doubt that you will be happy to see me."
Jean Paul's heart leapt into his throat, as he looked down upon his own face, exactly as he must appear to everyone else while in costume. "Who are you?"
"I believe that you know me as the Angel Azrael, although I have been known by many names throughout the ages."
"But, I'm Azrael! How can you be me? This doesn't make any sense..."
"I assure you, Jean Paul du Valley, that I am who I claim to be. I also assure you that you are not, in fact, Azrael."
"I wish that were true, but the training I received from the Order of St. Dumas made me into their angelic enforcer, I was bred to be their assassin, the punisher of those who strayed from the Order's strict views. So how can you be Azrael? Unless...am I dead?"
"No mortal, you are very much alive. I will endeavor to explain this to you, but please be patient with me. It has been a very long time since one of your line has actually sensed my presence, and even longer since I could speak to them."
The apparition gained a more solid form, and moved up the stairs to stand next to Jean Paul. To his credit, Jean Paul neither shied away, nor spoke, but instead merely stared patiently at the supposed Angel as one stares at a teacher about to broach a favorite subject.
"In the year of our lord, fourteen hundred and twenty five, Louis Dumas beseeched the Lord God above to grant him a defender. He pleaded with our Lord to lend him an Angel, someone with whom he could defend his small band of men until such time as they would be truly free of the Teutonic Knights they had broken away from." The figure seemed to grow somewhat in stature at the memory. "Now, most mortals would simply have been ignored when they made such a grandiose demand, but Dumas had found a piece of the True Cross while sacking the Holy Lands. This small sliver of wood gave him access to the Lord in ways that no man had since Christ himself returned to Heaven."
"I hate to interrupt, but what does all this have to do with me?" Jean Paul asked, then sheepishly stared down at his feet.
"A fair question, I suppose. Hearing Dumas' plea, the Lord took pity upon his subject, and offered Dumas a compromise - He would not grant him an Angel outright, but would agree to combine one of his host with one of Dumas' men, creating a new being."
"Almost sounds like that Spectre guy in the J.S.A. that I read about in Batman's files..."
"Quiet, mortal. The Spectre, as you call him, did not come about for nearly four hundred years after I was bound." Azrael looked down at Jean Paul, having now risen several feet off the floor. "He, or more properly, they, are not important to this story! Now, where was I?"
Azrael floated back down beside Jean Paul. As he did so, the scene around them again changed. They were now on a mountainside in Turkey, on a clear fall day. Sheep could be seen gathered at a stream several hundred yards away from them, and a gentle breeze filled the air.
"Dumas was taken aback by the Lord's offer. He was not willing to volunteer one of his men himself, as he loved them all like brothers, and would not so severely change their lives without first asking their council. One man among them stood forward and volunteered for this wondrous duty, your ancestor, Jean Sebastian du Valley." Azrael turned and pointed to a spot several hundred yards away from them, to a small group of men dressed in the armor of medieval knights. One stood apart from the rest, obviously addressing them, and when he finished, one man jumped up and walked towards him.
"Is that my ancestor? What did you call him? Jean Sebastian?"
"Aye, mortal, what you see now is what I witnessed on that day. For, you see, the Lord had decided to grant Dumas a portion of his wrath, the Angel known as Azrael, to become Dumas' greatest defender. I was summoned the instant the Lord offered Dumas this bargain, and watched as the men deliberated. I was quite proud of the young mortal who stood ready to join with me unto eternity."
"You say 'unto eternity', but it sounds to me like 'forever.' Yet, if that was so, how could you be here with me? Wouldn't Jean Sebastian have been immortal, like you are?"
"I had thought this to be so. I shared Jean Sebastian's body, taking control whenever battle raged about him. I had thought we two would never be parted, but the Lord had other plans. Jean Sebastian du Valley aged just as a mortal man is meant to, and eventually grew old and died. At the moment of his death, the Lord God appeared to me, and asked me if I wished to continue in service to Dumas' infant church, or if I wished to return to the hosts with him. I had enjoyed my time in these men's company, and being curious about mortals, I chose to remain. So the Lord decreed that evermore, when the Valley who is my current partner dies, I shall pass to his eldest-born son, and begin protecting them all over again."
Jean Paul sat down on a fallen log, and tried to absorb what the Angel had just told him. Something bothered him, though, something just didn't fit in the story...
"Ok, I think I understand what you've said. But, if this is true, why haven't you spoken with any of us in so long?"
"Another fair question, mortal. I have great hopes for you. But that is not an answer, merely an observation. In truth, I am not fully sure why my link to your ancestors weakened as time went by. Was it that the du Valley blood in them had been diluted, or was the Church of St. Dumas falling that far from God's will?" Azrael surveyed Jean Paul, and then with a wave of his hand changed the scene yet again.
Now they were standing at the foot of a hill, knee deep in snow, staring up at a crumbling Cathedral. Jean Paul instantly recognized it as one of his own memories; this was where he watched the Order of St. Dumas fall.
"It appears that my second suspicion is more correct."
Before them, they watched the remains of the Ice Cathedral fall down the side of the mountain and crash into the river at its base. Jean Paul felt a pang of guilt as he watched it come tumbling down, but Azrael laid a hand upon his shoulder and turned him away from the sight.
"Do not feel sorry, mortal. It is obvious to me now that you did the right thing. Even with the years of brainwashing they subjected you to, you must know this to be true."
Jean Paul could only nod weakly. Azrael began to walk, the scenery around them morphing as they moved. They were now in downtown Gotham City, or rather, on the rooftops high above it. They stood in the center of a roof, and standing before them was what appeared to be a demon.
Then Jean Paul stared a little more closely. It was no demon standing there, looking down over Gotham City, but instead his version of Batman.
"Why have you brought me here?" He asked, again feeling shame bringing color to his cheeks.
"We must discuss this, mortal."