(Someone please let me know if the links to the art work correctly. I hope you enjoy the end of the first story arc. More to come.)
I'm in the barren salt flats. Camping. There is no turmoil here, there are no people here. Crowley and I had split up looking for the demon, and I had split. It would cost me, but it meant I could enjoy fresh air for a bit...until the spell was completed. I had no doubts it would be, Crowley had too much experience dealing with these things. It was just a matter of time.
In the meantime I sit in a trailer at the salt flats, my fake flesh suit needing nothing, and paint. I hadn't painted in years. So many years. I hadn't drawn, or held a pencil to even write. I missed it so much. It was worth whatever torture I would endure once he found me. And he would. Despite the sigils I had Finally picked up along the way whose use would terminate my contract. Despite the fact that I had no contact with the outside world. Despite the fact that he didn't know I was missing.
I had taken $50,000 from a cash box Crowley had buried while I was with him...and bought a car, a trailer...and art supplies. Enough for years. It had taken some doing, and a shotgun, to brave the confused society, but I had what I needed. I had art supplies.
And when they ran out, it'd be time to go back.
They don't last 3 months.
I know he is there. I don't even turn around. I just keep painting.
"Hello Crowley."
"Hello Chew Toy."
"I see you found me."
"Did you Really doubt I would?"
"No, I was just hoping to use up some more art supplies before I went back."
"You were...planning on coming back? You missed our tete a tetes that much?" I sigh, and set my paint brush down. I turn and he is sitting there, in a chair, with a glass of grapefruit and gin.
"Crowley. I have no disillusionment about my situation. I'm fucked. For eternity. I will be fucked, by you, on a daily basis, for eternity. Or until you get bored."
"No, you're right. Eternity. Especially after what you've put me through. Most would say it's grounds for a divorce, but I miss my Chew Toy too much." I ignore the comment about missing me, I can't dwell on it. I'm not sure which would be worse, if it is true, or if it's a lie.
"Crowley, what you've put me through is grounds for homicide." He nods acknowledging the fact.
"Yes, well. It's time t-"
"Please. Just let me finish this painting?" He pauses, regarding me and my audacity, then stands and goes to look at what I am working on.
It is red, almost abstract. Swirls of shades of red forming a storm with clouds and white snow and wind buffeting about ...nothing. I hadn't painted it in yet. He looks at it a good minute, taking in the forms, then blinks in realization. He looks at me, incredulous.
"Really? Of all the things, in the entire world; the world you ran away from to escape its horrors… and you paint... Me?"
"You left quite an impression Mr. Crowley; and suffering… well it creates great art." He looks at the painting for a long time. He looks at the swirling reds, cascading, pushing, pulling, moving all over the canvas from the left...where they start as a simple cloud of smoke emerging from a mouth with no face. He looks at the hints of white, some like lightning, some like wind, some like dust, some like hinting at faces lost in the fury of the storm. He looks at the chains, taught, twisted, thrown about. Appearing and disappearing through the red smoke. Weaving, moving as part of the storm, not its container. He looks at the various faint faces, one vaguely familiar, most screaming in agony.
He looks at the blurry space to the right where it waited to be finished.
He looks for a long time. Then looks at me, and sits down in his chair that was now next to the easel, and says the kindest thing he has ever said to me.
"You have 3 hours."
He stands behind me, watching as I put the final touch in the bottom right hand corner. My signature.
"Very nice. You captured my eyes exactly." I snort and shake my head, his visage was barely visible, only if you squinted, and even then it is an approximation of how I know him. We both are still, looking at the finished piece, with the white circle with blue flames of ether. Nothing maring its surface. Whole. Away from everything, but trapped and enclosed. Perfectly white with blue fringes; except at the bottom, where a single link penetrates it, and the attached chain flows away until it turns into red smoke. Me.
I nod, washing off the brushes in turpentine.
"It's done."
"And you?"
"I don't really have a choice." I look at the open expanse for a moment more, I know what is coming.
The pain is immense but not surprising. The false body around me breaks down; I fall, I float, I am surrounded in red.
Then I'm 'home', imprisoned. Seeing through someone else's eyes. And I know, from that moment, I would not paint again. Not for a long, long, time. He will never let me go.
"Exactly darling. Now, I need to do some house work." He looks around, and for me, does one of the most impressive things I've ever seen. Of course, I have a bit of a skewed vision.
With a wave, the fresh oil painting in front of him, sets. Dry to the touch, ready to transport.
It takes days, sometimes weeks, for an oil painting to dry. Heat. Dryness. Light. Nothing really affects the time it takes, but he did.
If I had been alive then, I would have swooned.
"Darling. I'm blushing." He takes one more look around. The other paintings lean against the trailer. The sketches. The charcoal drawings. He looks sideways, out of the corner of his eye, half caring, and with a snap, they are gone. All except his. He pauses, and looking out over the salt flats, past my painting, at the view I had been taking in for months.
"How boring." How perfect for an artist. Nothing but memories to inspire. Fully able to free the emotions and put them on paper. "And you're going to tell me about each and every one before I burn them." He looks at his portrait. "Except this one. I like this one. After all, you didn't just paint it, you helped make it happen." I cringe as he snaps and it vanishes. "Right, just one more thing. I forgot to clear your room out." It's true, there is another there. An x-demon from one of the jars. They are numb, their soul silent and cold from solitude. I don't find it odd, I had had company before. They would fade.
"There's a new tenant tomorrow, this one needs to vacate." There's a snap, and as he walks into nothing, into his office, that cold soul beside me just...disintegrates. Instantly gone. Sucked into the red storm that I always seemed to be insulated from. I scream. Horrified. Not at the sudden absence of life but at what it meant Crowley had learned to do. What he could do. 200 contracts a year, one soul a year, ten years to vanish...none of that mattered. If he could do that...
"You have no idea what I can do now. I'll show you soon, but today? I've cleared my schedule after the meeting to announce ...well that I'm back...so we can have some quality time after. I missed my resilient Chew Toy. It needs to be broken in again." He walks the halls, uncaring of the other demons passing by. Most pause and bow, some freeze, a few whisper. None show open disrespect, not right now; not after he retaken Hell, again.
"You know rumors spread after I got back from the fight with Castiel...Words have passed around. Immortal, soul killer, storm of red smoke… I believe it's finally time to put them to rest...but first." There is a ripping feeling, one I'm familiar with, as a piece of me is broken off. He holds out his hand and it drifts out. From his pocket he takes out a very fancy pocket watch… which when opened reveals a clock...as normal. I was expecting more, am expecting more. He pushes the back and the clock face pops off to reveal...a large intricate diamond covered in sigils so small I can't read them. The crystal glows.
"Courtesy of mother. A phylactery. She's going to be at the meeting today." He pushes my bit of soul into the crystal and it flashes. I can feel the piece of my soul, the connection feels stronger, as if it's next to me... "Now, let's see if it works." He snaps. Nothing happens. He snaps again. Nothing.
"Artenu retrevia." He snaps again and this time the little bit of light emerges from the crystal. Satisfied Crowley pushes the spark of my soul back in, and closes the pocket watch. Crowley grabs the final jar from the cupboard and leaves his room.
We walk into nothing and appear in an already full courtroom.
"Mother." She is silent. She can't speak. He snaps his fingers and sigils glow for a second before smoke wafts off of her.
"Son. I suppose I finally have been let out of false Scotland because today is the day?"
"Today is the day." He holds up the jar and looks at the gathered demons. Many are his loyal followers, many more are ones who only returned to Hell from self imposed exile because Crowley's system failed. He looks out over the crowd.
"I believe many of you are here because you believe I failed. I did. I could not prevent the angel from cancelling the contracts. I cannot promise they won't try again, the tablets are indestructible. The demon one is in Hell, I have a third of the angel one as well. That should help...but very few things are foolproof. What I can promise is that I will always fix it. I already did. Most of you will have noticed contracts are working again. So, time to get back to work." There is a shuffling, as the audience stands, waiting for something more. Boy… are they going to get it.
"Now, rumors have been circulating, once again. Once again...I will confirm them." There are gasps, a few demons immediately turn tail towards the doors, a few try to teleport out. One succeeds before Crowley snaps his fingers and a sigil on the ceiling glows. Crowley looks to his right briefly. Three demons stand in the shadows, one with a chisel, one with paint, and one with a notepad.
"Say thank you to our architectural team. Now. Most of you don't believe these rumors, rightly so. They are impossible." As he talks he unscrews the lid to the jar. The soul floats lethargically in the air. "Well, mostly." He snaps and the soul...just funnels away into the red smoke leaking lazily from his meat suit's mouth. There is silence. For a moment.
"So? Half of us are sharing a meatsuit with a soul." Crowley nods at the comment.
"Well, I guess you can't really know...except." From his pocket Crowley withdraws a familiar gold object. The hyperbolic pulse generator. He holds it up and points it at the offending demon. There is a screech and pressure rises in the room, and the smoke from the demon flies through the air. "Hold my meatsuit and egg Chew Toy." He rushes from his body, leaving me behind in confusion as I suddenly am in control of one of Crowley's most precious possessions. In control of a male body that should be dead, but isn't.
I'm distracted from my confusion by the movement above. Crowley is chasing the other demon. He dwarfs him, at least 30 feet longer and 10 feet wider. Crowley soon catches up and circles him, surrounds him until he can't be seen. The smoke thrashes and flies around the room the titleonce, twice, three times, and it's apparent that the other demon is gone. Crowley had pulled an Amara. When the Fuck had he learned that? How? I look at Rowena, and she looks just as startled as I am.
The red smoke barrels towards me and I brace. It's never easy, the feather bed I once felt crushed with, is now a ten ton piece of brick. I'm shoved down, encircled, and Crowley sits up and orients himself. He looks out at the crowd and smiles.
"Questions? Comments? ...Offers for dessert?"
We head back to his room shortly after. Three more demons exterminated from reality.
"I really never cease to be amazed by how Stupid they are sometimes. Really, attack me? After that display? I feel like a peacock that gave it his best and half the females turned out to be colorblind!" I'm silent. I don't know how to react. If he had learned to do that to demons… What had really happened to that angel?
"Chew Toy. I'm not trying that forbidden fruit for another 100 years minimum. Probably feels like pond water with a side of acid. Now, ready for some quality time?" He waves and all of my art appears in his room, sketch upon sketch, drawings, paintings, poems, abstract doodles. Everything. Cold falls over me as I realize Crowley is making good on what I thought was a passing comment, an idle threat meant to scare. I should have known better.
That first day we go through five pieces of art and I am nearly catatonic for a week, I think a week. Time is skewed in Hell, further when you are being tortured. After that he spaces them out over a few months. I never know when we would suddenly be down in his room, playing therapist and art critic. He has me explain the story behind every piece. The emotion. The horror. The regret. Whatever the painting entailed, he drew it up and then rode my emotions to a high...and when he came down he burned it as promised. I am broken for days after each one, it was somehow worse being able to feel him experience the emotions I felt while I was creating, and see him discard the art like a syringe after. He destroyed every single one.
Except his portrait.
He saves it for last and doesn't say a word as he hangs it in his room. He doesn't need to. It is the last thing I ever painted, and it represents all the damage I caused. It is the result of my contract with Crowley, the King of Hell...but with what he had discovered from our contract...from our meetings, from my existence with him...He hadn't been just the King of Hell for some time. No one ever said the new title to his face; it was a name to be feared, not revered his others. Perhaps someone snuck into his room and saw the plaque, perhaps he let them. After all, that was the title of my painting. Prison of the Immortal Storm.
.
