Work Text:
Time is not experienced linearly. At best, it’s a strange spiral. Things half-remembered return, things seen at one angle look different in front or behind.
Time is a slippery thing, shifting like sand, unable to be held. Stretching and shrinking, depending on how it’s passed. The size of the creature experiencing time changes how time looks and feels.
An instant for a human is like several full minutes for a fly.
Linear time, and consensus time, are both shimmering mirages. Time is a circle-dance of birth, experience, and death. Isn’t what they’d spoken to Crowley about, high and happy, laying on a stone bench and watching the stars waltz through the ceiling of their orangery?
Beelzebub smiled to themself, crossing the center court to return to their kingdom of leather and plaid and spikes and studs. To think, that they would find him again. In Chez Mall, of all places.
The light in the Hot Topic hadn't reached his eyes. Surely, they would have recognized him if those eyes had lit up. Purple and beautiful, and so very distinctive.
Beelzebub wondered if he even remembered them.
They remembered him. The pretty blond Italian boy with the long name. And the purple eyes. He made them smile then, and he made them smile now.
What a strange feeling. Light. Buoyant. Smiling like a fool.
Beelzebub breezed past the front gate. Dagon caught them there, stepping into their path.
“Beloved?” they asked.
“Beelzebub,” Dagon said, her arms folded very tightly across her chest. “You’ve got a visitor.”
Beelzebub looked in the direction of Dagon’s glare. A man leaned against the glass countertop. He looked innocuous enough in jeans and a white button-down blouse. His long dark hair was sleeked back in a low ponytail, and his deep blue eyes held Beelzebub as they always did.
More like teeth than eyes.
Time seemed to slow, in anticipation of whatever misery that Raphael Masters decided to visit upon them. Beelzebub’s smile died.
“Anybody else in the store?”
Dagon shook her head.
“Good. Stay at the gate. Watch for Lucifer. He’ll be here in the next fifteen minutes or so. If you see him, stall him.” They paused. “Don’t come back into the store.”
“On the record, I don’t like leaving you alone with him.”
“He’s my fencing coach, and I’m a few weeks away from another handful of shiny medals. He’s not going to hurt me,” Beelzebub replied. “Besides, on the scale of weird friends that our parents have, Dr. Masters is not that bad.”
Dagon frowned her disapproval, but stepped aside, allowing Beelzebub to pass. Beelzebub heard her walk to the gate to keep watch.
Dr. Raphael Masters had been Beelzebub’s tutor since he was a first-year medical student and Beelzebub was a precocious two-year-old. Now that he'd handled their education through two PhDs, and taught them to play chess and to waltz and to fence (even coaching them to the Olympics and into international chess championships)--now, in addition to all of that, he had become Beelzebub’s personal physician. Their parents had (mostly) paid Dr. Masters' way through medical school, and he was a member (in very good standing) of their church.
It was assumed that he would do the best job.
Dr. Masters was capable and brilliant. Intense and passionate.
He was also creepy. Really, really creepy. His presence settled like a stone in Beelzebub’s stomach.
As the years danced, and it became apparent that the student was to surpass the master in almost every subject, he clung tighter to Beelzebub. It was worse, now that his clueless father and mother had given Dr. Masters nearly unfettered access to Beelzebub’s body. As their physician.
Circle dance. In the past, Dr. Masters was a giant--an adult who took Beelzebub very seriously and made them feel capable and competent. In the present, he was something dark and dangerous--and that danger had always been there. Just unrecognized as Dr. Masters tried to entangle himself in his young charge, under the auspice of care and concern. No, he'd longed for possession. Nothing less, and while little Remiel never saw it, older and wiser Beelzebub certainly did.
Dr. Masters’ continuing feud with his brother only made things more awkward, as it seemed like he NEEDED Beelzebub to pick a side, and refused to allow them to remain the neutral party that they were.
Time slip. Something about Dr. Masters always made Beelzebub feel about five years old. Nothing about them pleased him. Not even their premier at the 2000 Olympics and their frankly miraculous performance there.
Plus, he had no love for Crowley, Dagon, Hastur, Ligur, and every other person that Beelzebub cared for. Dr. Masters saw them as anchors, pulling Beelzebub down. Even Crowley, who matched them in steel, in chess, and in most every other thing.
Crowley, who was more precious to them than salt.
Jealousy rode in Dr. Masters’ eyes, and he often appeared to Beelzebub as a leering dragon, desperate to get his claws on them, in them. To drag them back to his hoard and to keep them, a treasure to be caged.
But now, knocking on the door of adulthood, Dr. Masters had become more annoying than frightening. He had changed as time swirled on, and Beelzebub was able to see him from other angles. He was less helpful tutor and more grasping vampire, desperate to cling to the thing that defined him. That made him important to church and community. His need for control was obvious and unwanted.
Especially here.
“Dr. Masters,” Beelzebub said. “What an unexpected pleasure.”
“Remiel,” Dr. Masters began. “I believe I told you to quit this job.”
“You did.”
“You’re still working here,” he continued.
“I am.”
“Explain yourself.”
“Nothing to explain,” Beelzebub said. They took a deep breath. “I’m not quitting.”
“Stubborn little creature,” he said, and he closed the distance quickly. Beelzebub fell back, and Dr. Masters advanced. Eventually, he had them cornered between himself and the glass counter. He leaned down, keeping a bare inch between their noses. Beelzebub could smell licorice on his breath. “I wonder sometimes why I even bother.”
“The money’s good, and I keep winning,” Beelzebub said, with a smirk. They shrugged. “At this point, I’d win with or without you. It pleases my father to keep you on--”
“Fuck your father--”
“Not with your cock.”
“Is everything alright in here?” a new voice asked.
Beelzebub looked past Raphael to see Shadwell’s new recruit. Dagon said that he was big and he was pretty. Beelzebub thought that he looked like a Rembrandt painting. All soft curls and eyelashes.
Crowley must be head-over-heels. Dagon hadn’t mentioned that.
But.
Beelzebub knew their cousin’s tastes. Big and sweet and a bit naïve.
That might just be a family trait, that particular taste in men.
And Beelzebub could feel the blood creep into their cheeks.
“Everything’s fine,” Beelzebub replied, cheerfully. “You must be Aziraphale DiAngelo, Shadwell’s new fellow.” They stepped lightly around Dr. Masters and extended a hand. “I’m Beelzebub DeVille. I’m the store manager. Dr. Masters was just leaving.”
“I was not.”
“Yes, you fucking were,” said another voice.
“I’m sorry, Bug! I tried!” Dagon cried out, clicking after a very furious Lucifer Masters.
“S’okay, Fishy,” Beelzebub replied, sotto.
“I told you before, stay the FUCK out of MY store and stop harassing MY employees,” Lucifer spat.
“Employee,” Dr. Masters corrected. “There’s only one person in this store worth my time.”
They were carbon-copies of one another. Same fine features, just different coloring. Lucifer’s green eyes flared behind the kohl that ringed them, and his golden hair shimmered in the weird light of the Hot Topic. His dark suit only made him blaze brighter.
Dr. Masters, older by five years, was shorter--but only barely. The brothers squared off a few inches apart, glaring at one another.
If looks could kill...
“Do I have to evict you from my store, Jazzy Jeff style? Again?”
“No, Lucifer, you do not. I’ll take my leave.” He turned to Beelzebub, and laid a hand on their shoulder. “Practice. Tomorrow.”
“I’m aware.”
“You have an appointment for your pre-screenings for the Olympics next week.”
“I know.”
“And you’re going to quit this job. Your father will hear of this,” he said, and squeezed Beelzebub’s shoulder just tightly enough to be painful. “Until tomorrow, Remiel. Good day, Lucifer. And...you two.”
He left as arrogantly as he must have swept in.
“Did he hurt you?” Lucifer asked, a gentle hand over the shoulder that Dr. Masters had squeezed. His eyes were beautiful and his tone gentle.
“No. He was just making a point.” Beelzebub replied.
“Who was that man?” asked the Rembrandt painting.
“My brother,” Lucifer said. “Hi, I’m Lucifer Masters, regional manager for Hot Topic. That sentient tumor was my big brother, Raphael.”
“My tutor and fencing coach.” Beelzebub explained.
“Fencing...? Why, you’re Remiel DeVille!” Aziraphale said, delighted. “My brother and I followed your bouts in the last Olympics! You’re absolutely phenomenal!”
“Did you?” Beelzebub asked, feeling their eyebrow quirk against their will. “Thanks for the encouragement. I mean it.”
“We’re fine here, angel,” Lucifer said. “I need a word with my employees, alright?”
“Yes, of course.” Aziraphale turned to leave and then turned back. “I’m going to pass by in a couple of hours, if that’s okay? I’d like to make certain that ruffian stays away.”
“I’ll see you then,” Beelzebub said.
The Rembrandt smiled, and his smile was bright enough to make skeptical Beelzebub wonder if angels, did indeed, dine at the Ritz. Aziraphale waved, made a little bow, and turned and left.
“That one’s strange, even by DiAngelo standards,” Lucifer said.
“How many of your exes are DiAngelos?” Beelzebub asked, dryly.
“All of ‘em,” Lucifer replied. “As you well know. Bunch of closet cases, and I’m not one to turn my nose up to low-hanging fruits.”
“You alright, Bug?” Dagon asked.
She would ask, now that the angelic interloper was gone. Now that they were safe.
“I’m fine.”
“You sent her to distract me.”
“He’s here to get me to quit--or to get me fired. Getting you fired would ice the cake,” Beelzebub said, laying a hand on Lucifer’s bicep. “I do as I do out of love, Lucifer.”
“Some things, you can’t handle alone, Bug,” Dagon said. “You shouldn’t. That man SCARES me.”
Things must be bad if she was reverting to nicknames. While Beelzebub was fast with the pet names, Dagon only used them when she was afraid.
Beelzebub went to her, wrapped their arms around her, and felt something break inside of her. Something that she had propped closed, hammered shut, held tight with every inch of her being. Something ugly that moved behind Dagon’s carefully constructed barriers, something that threatened to burst free--something dark and heavy that was born when Michael left her.
Beelzebub did not know what it was.
Grief, definitely. But some guilt festered there, blacker than the space around stars. Beelzebub held her as she started to sob.
“You have the store,” they said to Lucifer, as they led Dagon towards the backroom. “I just fed the kittens. They should be fine.”
“Great. Sure. Yeah. Kittens again, huh?” Lucifer went behind the register. “Take as long as you need.”
Beelzebub nodded, and led Dagon into the back. They did not like leaving Lucifer in charge. Counterwork was not his element. Not by half.
“Fishy...” they murmured, sitting on the bench seat of Ligur’s old Chrysler--pried out before he sent the old rustbucket to the dump--which lived in the backroom.
Dagon collapsed, pulling her headgear off and setting it on the spool beside their makeshift couch. She curled herself around Beelzebub, nuzzling their neck.
“He scares me,” she repeated.
“This isn’t about Raphael,” they said, plainly. “Just tell me.”
“I...”
“Michael saw us dancing...she saw something there.”
“No.”
They felt Dagon’s skin heat up against theirs. She started struggling, but Beelzebub held her tightly. Very tightly.
“Do not run from me,” Beelzebub said. “I’m faster.”
Dagon struggled a bit more, ineffectively. Then relaxed into Beelzebub as they began to stroke her dark red hair.
“We’ve known each other for a decade, I think,” Beelzebub said.
Dagon nodded. “About that long, yeah.”
“I know you very well. And I love you dearly. But...” They paused. “When you were with Michael, did you lead or follow?”
“I led,” Dagon said.
“Do you want to lead or to follow?”
Dagon was quiet for a while, and Beelzebub knew that she was thinking.
“What do you want?” Dagon asked. “To lead?”
“With the right partner,” Beelzebub said, “I think I’d do both, as the occasion warranted.”
“You...are you asking me...?”
Beelzebub let her go and handed her a handkerchief, and she wiped her face with it. Blew her nose.
“It wouldn’t work, Fishy,” they said. “You do not like dick. Never have. You’ve never seen mine, but I assure you it exists.”
“I dunno...” Dagon demurred. “I really don’t. And you’re way too young...”
That was it. The dark thing that stalked in Dagon’s mind.
“Age is not a factor, beloved. Not in my calculus.” Beelzebub laid an easy hand around her waist. “It’s just that I know that you would tolerate my cock, and I want someone who would...celebrate it.”
Dagon laughed, burying her face in Beelzebub’s handkerchief. Then in their shoulder.
“You have all of my dances, and all of my kindness, sweet Fishy. But you’re looking for a different mate.” They sighed. “I dearly wish that Michael could have gotten her shit together, but...”
“Fucking DiAngelos,” Dagon said, from Beelzebub’s shoulder. “Hey, um...Don’t make my mistake.”
“What?”
“I saw how you looked at Gabriel. Don’t. Just...they aren’t worth it.” Dagon paused. “Since when do you like boys?”
“I don’t like anybody,” they said. And they realized that those words were a lie as they passed through their lips. “Oh...oh, no! I do...I like someone...”
“Yeah, they have that effect. DiAngelos.”
“It’s new for me, alright?” Beelzebub said.
“Alright.”
And it was all right, because Dagon was holding them, and time spun. They were very small and Dagon came over to go swimming. Dagon taught them to open their eyes underwater, the most amazing thing for someone so small. Her hair caught the sun. She looked like a mermaid--not the Disney one, but a real one. Sharp teeth and fierce eyes. After that, wrapped in the same towel, they’d sat on a patio chair in her lap. Heavy-lidded and smelling of pool. Waiting for food from the grill. Dagon was holding them and telling them about the iguanas and exotic fish that her parents raised.
That was almost a decade ago. That was yesterday. It was a patio chair. It was the backseat of a 1975 Chrysler that Ligur sent to car Heaven last year.
Time stopped as they laced their fingers with hers.
“I still don’t like Raphael,” she said. “I’m serious about that.”
“Your feelings are mutual, if that makes you feel better,” they said. Kissed her head. “He hates everybody that I’m friends with.”
Dagon sat up and strapped her headgear back on. “Don’t get messed around with a DiAngelo. Seriously. They’ve got their duty, and that’s way more important to them than their hearts.”
“Michael should not have let you go. You are an absolute treasure, do you know that?”
Dagon blinked, and then smiled, showing off her lovely, sharp teeth. “Only because you keep telling me so.”
“Go refresh your coffee,” they said. “Hit up Crowley on the way back. Tell him that I saw the boy he’s mooning over, and he looks like a Rembrandt.”
“Oh, no! I didn’t say anything about...mooning!”
“You did not, but I know his type. His type is big, pretty, and naïve.” They chuckled. “We must have that in common.”
“Yours is...ah...different.”
“Psycho. The word that you’re looking for is 'psycho'.”
“That would be the word.” Dagon paused. “Where the fuck are Hastur and Ligur?”
“I don’t know. I’ll give them another half an hour and then I’m calling. If it was something foreseeable, they would have had the triplets cover for them,” Beelzebub said.
They stood up and offered Dagon a hand, which she took. “You want anything?”
“I’m fine, Fishy.”
“Okay.”
Dagon reapplied her mascara and her lipstick before she left the backroom. Beelzebub watched her go.
“What was that about?” Lucifer asked.
“Oh, the usual Hot Topic drama,” Beelzebub said. “She got wrecked by a DiAngelo.”
“Uriel finally asked her out?”
“Uriel? URIEL?” Beelzebub asked. “No, it was Michael. Messed Dagon right up. Since when has Uriel had a lady-boner for our Dagon? That’s news.”
They deftly reached into their pocket and withdrew another plastic bottle of eyedrops, and Lucifer paid them. He handed them his empty and pocketed the fresh one.
“According to my source--Uriel’s exceptionally...flexible...little brother--ages,” Lucifer said. “She pines from afar.”
“She ought to pine a little closer, but only if she’s willing to ditch the family.”
“I can tell Zachariel, the next time I see him.”
“Still seeing that one?”
“Well, as their mother Does Not Give a Fuck if her kids are gay--and the boy has a mouth like a Hoover...and eyelashes for days--yeah.” He touched Beelzebub on the top of the head, an affectionate gesture from when Beelzebub was tiny and Lucifer was a bitter almost-teenager living in his brother’s shadow. “I just dropped by. I’m headed to Baton Rouge. Standard issue store check-up.”
“We’re good here. I don’t think Raphael is going to show back up.”
“You’ve got a guardian angel, if he does.”
Beelzebub chuckled. “Oh, he is a bit star-struck, isn’t he?”
“He is. Pretty, too. Looks to be as gay as a treeful of monkeys on nitrous," Lucifer said. "Shame he's a few years short of legal. Well, I might help him sort some things out about himself in a few years. In the meantime, I’m out.”
And Lucifer was.
The meeping started a few minutes later.
"Already?" Beelzebub asked, as one meeper became three, became six.
Beelzebub sighed, pulled their silver finger-claws off, and pocketed them. They drew the bottle warmer up from under the register, along with the kitten bag and the tub of kittens.
The tub was actually two tubs, stacked. Beelzebub unstacked them, and set the full tub on the chair beside the counter. The empty tub went on top of the counter, and Beelzebub got to work.
They helped evacuate little bowels and bladders, cleaning the kittens with wet wipes, setting them to squealing before returning them to the warm embrace of terrycloth and thick black plastic.
After cleaning the kittens, they began to feed them. Empty bottles piled up.
They were feeding the last one, the little white one, when the Archangel returned to the store.
“Um, hi,” he said. He was nervous, and Beelzebub found that endearing. “Are you feeding a kitten?”
“Kittens wait for no man, Archangel,” they said.
Time compressed, became a trickle that they could step over. Gabriel seemed to shrink before them, and his hair turned gold. Linear time is a mirage, and beyond it, they saw the boy they'd stood next to in kindergarten.
“I know who you are now," they said. "Gabriel Lorenzo Lucius DiAngelo, tredicesimo. Tredici, for short. You speak Italian, Neapolitan, French, and you can read and write in Latin. And you have purple eyes.”
Gabriel blinked. “How?”
“You don’t forget an introduction like that,” Beelzebub replied. “Do you remember me?”
He looked at Beelzebub, really looked. Gazed, would be a better word. “You were at Holy Angels?”
“Briefly,” Beelzebub confirmed. “‘Hello, my name is Remiel DeVille. Something interesting about me? I don’t want to go to this school, and if my father insists that I stay here, I’m going to teach you every bad word that I know in seven different languages.’”
“That kid? You were that kid?” Gabriel’s whole face lit up, and it was a glorious thing to behold. “I remember you! You were a rockstar!” A shadow crossed his face. “Why didn’t you want to go to Holy Angels?”
“There was...a compelling argument made--just before my introduction, actually--to stay,” they said, looking the tall boy deep in the eyes until he looked away and blushed.
Sweet baby Satan, that was charming.
“But...I already had a high school diploma at that point, and Holy Angels seemed a bit of overkill," they continued. "My dad insisted it would be good for connections. My mother and I thought that I’d die of boredom.”
“High school diploma? Already?” Gabriel smiled again, in spite of himself. “That’s...wow. That’s amazing, actually.”
“I wondered about you, over the years, in passing,” Beelzebub said. “The others weren’t too keen on smart kids, and I wondered how you made out there.”
“Pretty good, actually,” he said. “Your fault. Honestly.”
“My fault? What did I do?”
“Half of my classmates--the bad half--started swearing to get out of class, and eventually school. I mean, they were so young, they didn’t understand that they’d just end up in public school. They thought that they’d end up home playing video games forever. So...” He looked down, and then up, a look so intense that Beelzebub’s stomach began to feel as if it were filled with helium. “So, they got kicked out and the kids that were left at Holy Angels were mostly my relatives, or just nice kids who wanted to go to school.”
“Glad I was able to clear out the riff-raff for you,” they said.
“Me too. What’s with the kittens?” he asked.
“I rescue kittens, puppies, some wildlife--raccoons and possums mostly. Want a kitten?” they asked. “They’ll be ready to go after they’re fixed. That’s another ten weeks.”
“They’re cute, but...Nona doesn’t like animals.”
“I remember that woman,” Beelzebub said. “She was...a character.”
“Still is,” Gabriel said. “Just got her hip replaced and is still trying to get up to cook.”
Beelzebub chuckled. Yes, they liked him. They liked him very much.
Did the DiAngelos just have one mistake for each of them to make, they wondered?
Best to figure out what he needed.
“I’ve enjoyed catching up, I really have,” Beelzebub said. “But did you come here for something in particular?”
“Uh...oh yeah! Do you have a hook? Ours is...missing.”
“Yes. Yes, I do. I guess you got visited by The Them.”
“The what?”
“The Them. Adam Young and his merry band of miscreants. Hold this for me,” they said, pressing the little white furball into Gabriel’s hands.
“I don’t...Beelzebub, I don’t know how to...oh, hi, kitten.”
“You’re fine,” Beelzebub said, giving his bicep a squeeze.
They went to the backroom and fetched a broom handle with a rack hook screwed into one end. A paper label, lettered by Crowley, named it “THE HOOK”.
The white kitten had curled up in Gabriel’s hands and snoozed, very nearly in a milk coma.
“See, you did fine,” they said.
“He’s adorable,” Gabriel said. “What’s his name?”
“I didn’t name this one yet.”
“Why not?”
“I give the kittens names of things that annoy me. The little black one is Pothole, for example.”
“Why do you give them awful names?”
“Those are kitten names,” Beelzebub explained. “They’ll be given real names by their forever homes. I give them names that I don’t like to discourage me from keeping them.”
“I see.”
“This one doesn’t have a name because he’s a white cat with blue eyes,” they said, drawing the sleepy kitten from Gabriel’s hands and laying him beside his siblings. “Male, too. Even worse.”
“What?”
“White cats with blue eyes, particularly males, tend to be deaf,” Beelzebub said. “He’s too young to tell, yet. I keep all of the disabled ones. So, if he’s deaf, I’ll name him after something I like.”
“How many...do you have?”
“Tons,” Beelzebub said. “Here’s your hook. Please tell me that Michael isn’t waiting with a customer for you to get back?”
“No, one of the top racks has a faulty clasp,” Gabriel said. “It fell open, and so those shirts are just kind of...hanging down. They need to be put back up.”
“I’m going to guess Neveah isn’t ever going to fix that,” Beelzebub said. “Could you find out if Michael wants me to send Hastur and Ligur over--if they ever show up? They can fix it.”
“I’ll ask. Yeah.” He took The Hook and his other hand went to the back of his head. “So...uh...catch you later?”
“Definitely,” they said.
“Alright, um, sure,” he said.
The eagerness in his voice was warming. Beelzebub felt themself flush, and they didn’t hate it.
“Boss?” Dagon asked. “Sorry to interrupt, but Anathema was at Center Court.”
“What’s up?”
“It’s Warlock. I think he’s in some real trouble this time.”
