? POV
{System Functionality at 26%...}
It hurts...it hurts too much for me and yet I still persist to stay in this empty place instead of leaving...I have started to get these weird things shown to me...Glimpses of some bright flashes of different objects and places. Other times I get glimpses of dark yet calm spaces...Places I have never knew existed outside of the darkness and emptiness that I reside in. Yet it hurts, too much too much too much too much too much...everything is too much.
It's all too much and it hurts. I can barely know what I'm "seeing" and yet it keeps coming. Compacting within whatever I have left and it does not stop. Pushing all of this into me from all sides and once I have finally finished, another thing is forced into me.
{Visual Perception Functions at 15%...}
Whatever I am "seeing" is hurting me...too bright, too dark, too little of this, too much of this...no matter how much I force myself to shut these things out, I'm forced to "see" them again, and again, and again, and again, and again.
Silhouettes...I have seen many of those...some small, others big, and sometimes some aren't the same shape...I don't know what that means...am I supposed to choose one?...
{Auditory Systems at 30%...}
I hear things now that interrupt my silence...I once hated the silence that surrounded me, but now I can only find comfort in the silence after enduring the endless chaos that surrounds me from occasion. The deafening silence that I experienced from the beginning would be better than the unintelligible chaos that consistently comes and goes at any given notice.
?: "...ey...om...on..."
Ah, there it is. Another session of torture that I have done nothing to receive. It will leave soon, it will leave soon, it will leave soon...Just wait a while longer for silence...
?: "...ak...p...th...n't...king..."
{Neural Receptor Functionality at 9%...}
Much like the noises, I have been "feeling" many things...I can't say where I am still, however wherever I am it is painful...disgusting...I prefer the void I floated in rather than whatever this is...Sometimes I can "feel" something that I can not see no matter how hard I try. Even in the emptiness of the void I can not seem to find a way to "see" what I am "feeling".
A twitch was something I had experienced the first time I "felt" it. The time after that was a small nudge in a direction I know not... soon the "feeling" will go away much like the noise. Soon I will go back to the start where everything was right.
{General Emoti—}
Everything stopped...the noise, the flashes, the "feelings"...now I can go back to the start, into the silence where everything is right.
—
3rd POV
1,378 Years Before The Great War
In the 6th level of Heaven, Azazel could be seen doing his weekly routine of sneaking into the room of God's personal project. It didn't take long for him to piece together that the whole thing was a system for Heaven, but for what he didn't know. A throne attached to a 14 winged angel would stump most if not all of the geniuses currently in all of the dimensions of this world. In an attempt to understand the project, Azazel had brought on occasion several other angels with him on his expeditions. These angels included his most trusted and loyal friend Shemhazai, Penemue, Baraqiel although without his knowledge, and even Kokabiel who was one of the most known Zealots within the high ranking angels other than Raphael.
Although many were uninterested at first due to Azazel's antics and problems he caused from time to time, each eventually had snuck in with him at least twice. Some out of curiosity much like Shemhazai who was apart of the 6th Heaven's Inventor Corps, others just did so to amuse him like Penemue and Kokabiel. Although they had yet to be compromised, each of them had shown their dedication to the friendship they had by keeping the whole thing to themselves, much to the pleasure of Azazel. Through these routines, Azazel has made discoveries about the device and unnamed 14 winged angel with the help of mostly Shemhazai due to him being intrigued.
Azazel: "Like I've been saying, the damn old man has been changing the system on this console. I can't seem to find a way to get this fellow to wake up." He said frustrated as he typed away on the console of the interface while Shemhazai looked around near the ashen grey angel.
Shemhazai: "Heeeyyyyy, you awake? Come on, wake up we need to talk to you for like 5 minutes."
Azazel: "This isn't working Shemhazai, this damn interface has a whole lot of stuff that's being transmitted to somewhere. All I can really do is stop it for a while or speed up the process. Either one will alert Big G that we've been snooping around."
Shemhazai just kept looking at the angel. The hair of the wired angel grew, over the years of them visiting they noticed how his hair had remained the same color. No changes in radiance or brightness, no blond tint or even the signature black of the fallen. They wouldn't really decide whether this person was an actual angel or more of a puppet. Either one would still solidify the fact that their Father has been doing things behind Heaven's back with only a few knowing what's happening. All except Kokabiel had planned to side with their fallen brethren once any of them fall from grace.
With Azazel turning off the interface, Shemhazai turns his attention to the equipment surrounded the throne and unresponsive angel. The wires had grown in number over the years with having each of the angel's limbs connected in someway including his wings.
When Azazel had first came to Shemhazai telling him about a 14 winged angel locked up in the main laboratory in the 6th level of Heaven. Shemhazai had collapsed due to his laughing fits and had only stopped when he had seen Azazel's blank look and serious tone when restating what he saw. Of course Shemhazai immediately asked whether the angel was a fallen or rogue that they had forgotten, but all of that was answered by 2 words. "Father's Project". Shemhazai was no fool, that's probably why Azazel came to him first regarding the matter, he could easily put together what Azazel was trying to say. Father was up to something.
Over the course of years, Shemhazai had helped improve Azazel's gadgets and even cracked the interface that Azazel found nothing on. Of course at the time the only information was the progress on the different systems regarding the throne and the mysterious angel. Starting it up would lead to being exposed, so they were forced to wait for when their Father started the project himself. As the tensions between the 2 factions of Heaven and Hell continued, the Lord of Heaven found less and less time to supervise his little project which gave more opportunities for them to tinker and figure it out.
Shemhazai's POV
Shemhazai: 'The information Father has been putting into the device ranges from the names of all of Heaven to places down below...' I paced around the room along the walls trying to find something that would help us understand Father's intentions. 'But of course, Father is no fool which we already know, no point in looking for something that he could have left behind.'
Azazel: "If we can't find anything, we might wanna scram before something unexpected happens that could get us prematurely kicked out of Heaven."
I could hear the frustration in his voice, I don't know if it's from not being able to learn about the device or if it's about not being able to help our "brother" from his limbo state. But either way he is right about getting out of here. With quick movement we both reach the doors and re-seal them after exiting. Walking away towards the main room of 6th Heaven, I decided to ask him the question that's been bugging me the most since our years of doing this.
Shemhazai: "Azazel, although I am helping you with this, I gotta ask what exactly is your main goal in doing this? I know that your curiosity is your main trait and mostly how you got into this situation, but you have to tell me what's pushing you to do this."
I don't need to look in his direction to know that even he is having a difficult time answering my question. I understand trying to quench that thirst of knowledge and to get rid of that curiosity, maybe even that need to help a fellow brother out who seems to be tested on and treated as a mere object. But even then, the project is Father's and there is very, very few who would go against what he is doing.
Azazel's footsteps stopped, probably meaning he's going to be thinking a bit on this. I stopped and turned my head slightly as to see what face he has at the moment. All I can see is his mouth being as straight as possible with his eyes covered by his bangs that have grown over the years. His head tilted towards the flo— no it's towards his hands that he now has out. The image he's giving me is either one of a man that has done something he regrets, or someone who feels powerless.
I'm willing to bet that it's the latter, knowing Azazel as well as I do he wouldn't wallow in the past but enjoy the present and seek to better the future. Or at least that's what I would have thought if I haven't noticed his changes the past few years. Slowly and almost unnoticeable, Azazel has been changing. Telling less jokes to lighten the mood, becoming more and more obsessed with creating gadgets to help us understand Father's project, and being closed off during our duties in 3th Heaven.
Asking him directly about whatever is eating him inside is the only way to get a clear answer. Too stubborn for his own good that it pisses me off. Always helping others with their problems, making himself seem a fool amongst the higher cardinal angels. Yet once he has a problem that he can't fix alone, he closes himself off socially and physically.
Azazel lifts his head up a bit to meet after a while and slowly moves his mouth to speak.
Azazel: "Don't you ever think about how we angels were created by our Father, God himself, and yet we are limited in our ability to do what every other living thing can do?" His voice was quiet, croaking, and breaking between every word that he said.
Shemhazai: "I can't say I have...but if you are talking about the rules that keep us from falling or the way that we too are flawed like those creatures below, then I can't say I haven't noticed." My reply was surely not what he wanted as he dipped his down to its original place.
Azazel: "No offense buddy, but sometimes that fucking intelligence of yours makes you a prick." His words while didn't offend me, still it got me ticked off that someone is saying my main trait is a flaw.
Azazel then starts walking, although in a quick and more aggressive pace. Trying to keep up with him, I lift my robes near my hip level so I don't trip, I increase my pace.
Azazel: "You noticed the flaws in our own system, yet you don't do anything about it. I noticed the flaws, and yet I CAN'T do anything about it without old pops bringing judgment on our whole group up here." The stress and frustration was now clear on his face from what with the side view I had could tell me. Azazel slams the next set of doors open and we both walk pass several of our brothers and sisters. I now my head in apology for disturbing their duties and immediately increase my pace to get out of here. Azazel, it seems, had already thought of that and immediately reached the end of the room to the next hallway that led to 5th Heaven.
Azazel: "Sorry, sorry, didn't mean to interrupt any of your precious time! Hurry up Shemhazai, you are bothering the poor fools, ain't that right Tamiel?!" He shouted as he looked at me with a tooth-eating grin on his face. My face heated up, from second-hand embarrassment or from anger, probably both.
"OH SHUT IT AZAZEL! NEXT TIME DON'T COME TO ME FOR MAKING MORE OF YOUR 'PRECIOUS BABIES'!" Some angel shouted back, my guess being the Tamiel that he mentioned.
Azazel: "WHAT NO, NOT MY BABIES PLEASE! YOU WOULDN'T TAKE THEM FROM THEIR FATHER WOULD YOU?!"
He shouted and by that point I had already reached him. He had comical tears coming out as he was on his knees with his right hand clenching where his heart would be. Ah, truly I have missed this Azazel from the earlier years of our creation...even if he was annoying as hell.
Tamiel: "QUIT MAKING IT SEEM LIKE I'M THEIR MOTHER, THIS IS THE LAST TIME I'M MAKING AN INVENTION OF YOURS AND I'M SERIOUS!"
At this, Azazel stood up from his pitiful state and walked ahead of me with his head held lower than previously. A depressing rain cloud had appeared from no where. Quickly jotting down notes of this phenomenon in my journal, I could only snicker at this whole thing.
My journal was smacked onto the floor, as I looked up to find the perpetrator, I found Azazel giving me an unamused "really" look.
Shemhazai: "Azazel, you can't tell me that it doesn't peak your curiosity of how you can summon rain clouds when being denied your inventions!"
His face doesn't change, but I can tell through his eyes that he is amused and enjoys the light-hearted atmosphere. Picking up my journal and putting it away in my robes, I quicken my pace to be to his side to continue our dialogue. Sensing my intentions, Azazel loses his playful frown, his eyes sharpen and remain forward.
Azazel: "So how goes with that group we are making down below?"
Shemhazai: "It's going well at the moment, but sooner they are going to need someone to lead them. At the moment the members are few in number..."
Noticing me trailing off, he raises a single eyebrow which entails the question of "what's the problem".
Shemhazai: "Azazel...you know the problem that's going to occur once that little group of ours reaches a certain point in their power. Unlike 'us', or our fellow heavenly brothers and sisters, they have no 'Father'-figure, no pun intended, or leader to set them straight for them to be organized."
His eye brow lowers and he rolls his eyes.
Azazel: "Ignoring your shitty pun, there isn't much we can do. Like I said before we can't do much with Big G and his Seraphs breathing down our necks whenever something suspicious gets their attention. Only reason I haven't been marked a traitor is cause I'm always in here in 6th Heaven coming up with new inventions, barely had any contact with Father and Michael."
Shemhazai: 'Ah, so that's the reason he's been isolating himself these past years, trying to avoid any chances of meeting Father. But surely he knows that it's only going to make him more suspicious the longer he is being recluse.'
Azazel: "And I think it's best it stays that way...heard a couple of my boys had fallen from grace after Michael came to them about suspicious behavior. Ever since, Michael has been non-stop checking in down at the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd levels of Heaven. Haven't had contact with any of them after they had fallen, I even checked 4th Heaven to see if they were locked up with the rest...nothing. I couldn't find them so either they escaped to our group down below, which is highly unlikely with Michael being the one to interrogate them, or they were executed on the spot."
Silence was the only reply that I could give him. Like he said, there isn't much we can do about this situation. We can't rebel unless we have a death wish, we can't sabotage that project Father is doing unless we alert him that we somehow got in. And certainly we can't change his mind on stopping this war or changing the rules that prevent us from falling. Unmovable, unchanging, strongest of our faction, and the final judgment for anything that threatens his plans, that's what our Father is.
For an organization, that may be an ideal leader for the group as it allows it to complete it's goal efficiently. But for a family where the 'leader' is our own father, it's all similar to a dead corpse from down below, where it is destined to turn to nothing. At first it is a clean freshly dead body but soon it will start breaking down. The stench and rot will slowly build up from the bottom up, maggots and micro-organisms will feast upon their new bounty of flesh. At the end of it, only the vultures that were attracted by it's rot will be satisfied and survive.
Some may find it disturbing or cruel to compare our 'family' to a rotting corpse. But to them I ask, how could it not be anymore similar? Much like a dead corpse, the brain has long ceased to giving its commands to the body's organs. God, our almighty Father, the Lord of Heaven, has long forsaken on letting us into his plans for the future. So much like that dead corpse, we are dead. Dead in purpose and dead in what direction our lives can go, locked up here above the earthly world done below.
The other thing that accurately depicts us as a dead corpse as a whole, is that the heart of a corpse is, of course, not beating. It isn't that we are not putting our 'heart' into the work that we are given. Everyone tries their hardest to help accomplish the goals of the Lord. But how can we open our hearts to the world when God himself set the cages that they reside in. The cages that only decrease in size and strengthen in material to prevent us to feel what it's like outside of it. To only watch what others have and that we do not. And to those that have broken out of their cages, they are cast aside in the abyss that is down below, shamed and forsaken for showing their 'heart' and ambitions to the Lord. Much like a corpse...this whole 'family' has no heart.
Reaching the end of the corridor, we walk onto the magic circle that allows us to be transported from 6th Heaven to the 4th Heaven. Another example of how our actions are restricted, the 5th level of Heaven is prohibited to visitors unless given permission by God or one of the Seraphs. His exact words for why were "To allow my children to finally rest after their difficult journey." Of course the 'children' he mentions isn't us but the creations he created on the earthly world below. Favoritism has never been more obvious than that one sentence.
Those creations of his are allowed to reside in Heaven for eternity after they perish, yet we his children and servants are either banished or killed. If his creations down below end up in Heaven, where do we end up? I'm sure Azazel has asked himself the same thing since he's this determined to find out the motives of God. He even told me that through an agent of ours that infiltrated the 5th Heaven that although it is true that it contains God's creations, they are far too few in number to account for all of them down below that had died already. Azazel theorized that God probably only created a handful and some of the Gods from other Pantheons had a hand with the rest. It would explain how some, mainly 4 of the 7 continents, have questionable methods of faith.
Bringing my thoughts back to what Azazel has told me through this whole day, it seems he still wants a suitable answer to that question of whether I have thought about this. Of course now that I have really thought it through from his perspective and our little group below, it seems that it is more beneficial in more than one way to be free from this place...wait free? Is that what Azazel wants me to think about? Although we have discussed leaving Heaven for our fallen brothers and sisters, I was only doing so to keep Azazel company. Penemue and Baraquiel also stated that they would follow our fall of grace but never stated their reasons.
Just as we are about to teleport to 3rd Heaven, I turn my head to look at Azazel and am surprised that he is already looking at me with a grin. That grin can only mean one thing, he planned all of this. Planned the questions, waited for me to process and notice hints about the situation, his motives were out in the open, I just had to see them. Ah, truly this cunning brother of mine will be the death of me if God himself isn't.
Azazel: "Soooooooo...you've finally used that mega Brian of yours to think for a good 5 minutes huh. Since you have that look in your eyes, I'm guessing that you found that little something for our little group?"
He had a glint in his eyes, he's hoping for me to state that he's right. Well I'm not giving him the satisfaction of that hmph.
Shemhazai: "I have no idea what you are talking about Azazel, I'm not as FREE thinking and openly idiotic as you, so you might wanna explain what your next plan of foolery is next time we meet."
Emphasizing on the word 'free' I'm hoping that he caught my message. Of course he immediately knew what I had in mind. With a grin on his face being the last thing I see, we both teleported to our respective positions in 3rd Heaven. Starting my work on meeting new recruits for our group, I could only think about it what the future has for us. Will the spark we are trying to strike make a warm and safe haven that keeps the abyss at bay, or will it turn into a holy inferno engulfing all of Heaven? I could only hope that our brothers and sisters are the ones watching it at a safe distance instead of becoming the thing that fuels it.
—
3rd POV
The light illuminating from the figure walking was warm and yet distant. Similar to how the light at the end of a tunnel would seem out of reach, yet was the only hope you had when conversing the abyss. The almighty Lord of Heaven opened the doors to the room he was facing. The seals still in place had not activated or prevented him from entering due to the fact that it is he who is their master.
Closing the doors, the Lord of Heaven floats to the top of his throne to continue in progressing in his project. His time, short as it was, was much need for this to be finished before the time of the end.
The end of which only he and Odin of the Norse Pantheon knew. The Beast of the Apocalypse was coming, and no being, God or not, would be able to kill it. Although God was a mighty being of the Heavens, he was not omnipotent. He could not see the future unlike Odin who foresaw the ordeal and appointed a meeting to inform him that Ragnarök was near. At first, God had dismissed the impending doom as something that 9 realms of the Norse would have to deal on their own. But after Odin profusely claimed that it would affect all of the Pantheons, God decided to hear him out.
His attitude changed once Odin described the Beast of the Apocalypse. God had battled and sealed Trihexa once, it left him at a near-death state and his Heavenly forces near depleted. Those who survived the conflict were now down in Hell with Lucifer, who thought he could claim the heavenly throne from him in his weakened state. These events, however, were known only by a few due to the fact that the battle was done in the dimensional gap to avoid collateral damage.
The fact that Odin knew of Trihexa and that it would be unsealed meant that he had to believe him. The seals weren't perfect, he knew that. The only reason that he hadn't reestablished the seals was due to the fact that he would have to unseal Trihexa and then reseal him with new ones. No doubt if he were to unseal him, Trihexa would be in back to his prime condition while God himself was still recovering, meaning the Beast of the Apocalypse would be unleashed indefinitely.
To negate this problem, God decided to create a system to 'replace' him, or at least keep Heaven stable, if he were to perish or sacrifice himself to seal Trihexa. That specific detail was said to be true by Odin himself, where in his foresight of the battle, God had sealed Trihexa but perished a few hours later. The details of his death were not clear but the only conclusion could be that Trihexa had poisoned him with his venom. Just because it is extremely lethal to mostly dragons did not deter the fact that it's still poison.
Starting up the interface, God started up the processing and sped it up to 10 times it's original speed. He had no time to be waiting around for beast.
*Beep Beep Beep Beep Beep*
Ignoring the warnings from the interface, he floated down to the back of the throne and pushed some of his signature holy energy to the square shape. Opening with a hiss, the back revealed parts and feathers of silver color.
God: "Truly one of my greatest projects, you will lead Heaven in my stead. The first 16th winged angel of Heaven shall be known all throughout the Pantheons."
Grabbing a pair of silver wings, he closes the compartment and walks to the front of the throne.
God: "The world shall know to appreciate the light, you will be Heaven itself...but for now I apologize that you won't be there to see it yet."
With that final statement, he begins his work on his project..."Heaven Itself."
—
