I really did want to get this up last week, but the disjointed nature of this chapter was making me reconsider what I wanted to do with it. The issue I had was that the middle part was written first, than the last part, and the opening section was written last. So, it was written in a strange matter in the first place, and just kept its weird structure.
There was also an issue of a bag that shows up in the last chapter of this section. So, I had to figure out a way to actually introduce it.
Anyway, lira (or the plural, lire) was the name of the currency of Italy before the euro was introduced. Also, I have to say that we start to notice Remington's bitterness towards God in this chapter. It's not as bad as will be encountered later in the story, but it's there, and I don't mean to insult anyone with it. I just feel that Remington has not forgotten (or forgiven for that matter) the matter concerning Rosette and Chrono, and he never will.
I want to thank my sister for beta-ing this chapter for me, because she noticed things that I still missed even after reading this over five times. I also want to thank those of you who reviewed the last chapter (OtherCat1, squishy the jellyfish, and snekochan).
Disclaimer: I do not own Chrono Crusade. CC is the property by Daisuke Moriyama.
Chapter 5
Days passed into weeks, and soon three months had passed us by. I've already told you the routine I had slipped into, and other than parties, that's more or less what my life consisted of. On occasion Gabriel and I did go to Rome, and I learned to be like Aion and ignore people.
Or at least I tried to. There were too many instances where I handed out a few lire to the homeless. It seemed that I was still capable of guilt if nothing else.
"I don't get why you do it," Gabriel told me one day in early September as we walked through the streets. It was a chilly morning and I had already handed out a fair amount of cash. I figured they could go and get something warm to eat.
"Why I hand out the money?"
"Yeah. Most of these people are probably just pick pockets. There's no point in helping them."
"It's the least I can do."
"Does this have anything to do with your time on the streets?"
I shrugged. "I'd say so. There was always a part of me that wanted someone to help me out. Why shouldn't I do that now that I have the ability to?"
Gabriel smiled and laughed. "Hold on then. You just reminded me that I need to go get something."
"I'll be at Saint Peter's than."
The younger man just nodded and I walked towards the Vatican. We weren't far from the ancient square and basilica, and that was something else Gabriel didn't understand. I insisted that we go whenever we went to Rome. All he could do was shake his head and sigh whenever I said it. He generally didn't ask questions about why I wanted to go there, so he must have just thought that it was one of my quirks.
He didn't need to know that my life had more or less restarted at this point on that May day in 1981. He didn't need to know that I had spent countless hours slinking in the shadows, waiting to see if Aion would show his face one more time. It was a personal matter in the end, and he just went along with it.
He once asked if I came here to worship, and if that was the case, Ambrogino would be more than happy to take me to a Sunday Mass.
I told him rather bluntly that I didn't talk with God anymore, and I hadn't for a long time. He didn't ask about my religious preferences after that.
As I walked around the square, I took in the grand architecture. I don't know how many times I've seen the buildings, but they are inspiring. After all, who builds grand churches just to prove that you're loyal to a deity that you've never seen?
"Remington!" I looked over my shoulder and saw Gabriel coming towards me. He had a package tucked under his arm, and as usual, he seemed happy.
"Do you…never mind," he began, and I knew what he had been going to ask.
"It's alright. I just like looking at the Basilica. Over three hundred years old and still in good shape."
"I suppose so. I personally think it's a little too ornate. I mean, I don't think that God cares what the place you worship at looks like."
Well, you're right about that, I thought. He does like the tithes though.
"Could you tell me why you like coming here so much? You don't worship God, you've seen the Basilica enough to describe it in perfect detail, and…,"Gabriel began before I cut him off.
"You don't need to worry your pretty little head about it. This place just has special significance for me. That's all."
Gabriel looked at me, but there was a light in his eyes that I can't forget. I can't even describe it properly, though it must have been sorrow that I saw there, because his voice certainly sounded sad. He wasn't smiling either, which usually indicated that something was upsetting him.
"Ewan, I just wish that you were a little more open with me. I know that you haven't known me for that long, but I consider you to be one of my best friends. I'vehad to live with a lot of shadows and secrets and…fuck it: You don't have to worry about me telling Aion. Just…just open up a little bit."
I slung an arm around the younger man and walked him away from the square.
"I'm glad that you can trust me enough to call me one of your best friends, Gab, but just know that I can't open myself up. If I did, you'd probably get hurt, and I don't want that to happen to you."
"What, were you part of the Mafia or something like that?"
I laughed and shook my head. "I knew some pretty powerful people, yeah, but no one in the Mafia. At least, I don't think anyone was in the Mafia."
He lightened up after that and after a quick call to Ambrogino we returned to the estate.
That night he gave me the package he had had under his arm: It was an old leather pouch.
"So you have something to carry your gifts in," he said, and I thanked him. He was probably just being ironic, but I still had to appreciate it: an old leather bag for the man that could now afford just about any thing he wanted. What more could I ask for?
X X X
The library was like my other home. It was quiet, it was peaceful, and I was only ever bothered there by three people: the maid that told me when a meal was ready, Gab when he wanted to tell me something or just get me out of the mansion, and Aion. Aion usually just came to sit and read with me though. He never truly bothered me.
"You have to have a favorite passage," he asked one day.
I looked up from my reading of the good book and glanced at the Sinner. We never spoke to each other while we were in the library. Sure, there had been a few exceptions, but they were just that: exceptions. Silence ruled the large room, and that's how we both liked it. He read whatever he wanted to pull out that day, and I tended to either read his old Latin Bible or something else hypocritical. So, his asking what my favorite Biblical passage happened to be took me back for a few moments.
"And if I said that I didn't have one?"
"You'd be lying. See, I've read Paradise Lost a hundred times and I have my favorite parts. I do believe it to be impossible to not have a favorite part in something as epic as The Bible."
I frowned and thought about it for a while. Honestly, I had never thought about having a favorite passage. I just read the Holy Book because I enjoyed it. And because the copy he was letting me borrow was about as authentic as they came.
"If I had to pick a favorite….it would be the Temptation."
"Irony never sounded so sweet, Remington. Tell me, were you one of the angels that helped Christ after the 'Devil'," he smirked as he said that word, "finished tempting him?"
"Would it matter if I was?"
"As I said, Remington, 'irony never sounded so sweet.'"
"So says the demon that denounces God and then asks why he has been forsaken."
Aion smiled and shifted his tattered copy of The Prince onto his other knee. "I never did say that I was without a sense of the dramatic, did I?"
"You don't say a lot of things."
"Words just get in the way. I find actions to be of more importance. Unless, of course, one is being dramatic or one is doing business."
"You're dramatic quite often then, aren't you?"
He just smirked and went back to reading Machiavelli.
X X X
I often found myself being dragged to corporate parties and speaking with people with whom I had nothing in common. I tried to keep the rule of "just look pretty" always close to my mind, but sometimes that was impossible to do. They would ask me the most absurd things like: have I ever modeled, or was I in that fabulous new movie that just came out? I would always be polite and tell them the not-a-lie bits of my life, to which I always heard comments about how I should act or I should model.
It just went to prove that these people didn't actually listen to what was happening. They pretended that they did, and then they doled out their advice regardless of what had just been said to them (at least when Aion ignored you he was completely blunt about it. You knew that he wasn't listening). Hell, once I explicitly told a woman that I had never modeled and never intended to do so. She told me that she thought that I would make a fantastic poster-boy for her company's new ad campaign. I gave her a friendly smile before I went and had the bar tender pour me a large glass of scotch. I had really developed too much of a fondness for Single Malt Scotch. At least I never had to pay for it.
"Take it easy on the liquor, Remington. I know that it's not easy for us to get intoxicated, but at the rate that you're going, I'll have to drag you out of here before the night is over," Aion told me as he too took some scotch to fill his empty glass.
"Don't these people disgust you? They never listen to what's being said. They just appear to do so and then they go and spew their nonsense like it was their God given right!" I growled, already feeling the affects of the drinks I had consumed that night. I was going on ten and didn't think that I would be stopping any time soon.
"Isn't it though? God let Adam and Eve screw themselves over. So, humanity may have the ability to learn, but they also have the ability to be superb jackasses, just like the first two humans," the Sinner responded calmly before he smiled at the bar tender who was giving us awkward glances.
"I'm just trying to figure out how the hell you can put up with these bastards. I've noticed that you don't like them either," I muttered as he led me away.
"I put up with them because I can use them. Shaderalways told me I had a talent for the spoken language. My CEO seems to think the same thing. You know, he invites these people for the sole purpose of having me talk to them. I told you once before, but I compliment them, I tell them what they want to hear, and they buy it. Remember at our first party how I said my speakingwith them usually produced something for the company? I've gotten so many contracts out of simple idle chatter that you wouldn't believe it.
"You don't have to like people, Remington. You just have to know what they want to hear so that you can free them from the clutches of their false idols."
His last statement made me think, but I brushed it aside after a few seconds. After all, he couldn't mean anything like before. Aion wasn't that obsessed with destroying Heaven and God…was he?
I pounded back my drink. Of course he wasn't obsessed with usurping what he believed to be a corrupt religion and world. He only meant that in a metaphorical sense. After all, he did like to be dramatic.
I do admit to having a favorite line in this chapter, but that's just me. Um, since I have yet to completely read The Bible if anyone who reads this knows of some powerful quotes that relate to the content of the story, I would be more than appreciative to hear about them. The Bible is on my long list of classics that I need to read, and other than the ones people use to make their points in debate topics, I admit to not having much experience with it.
