Chapter Text
SCANNING TEXT…
Dear ███████,
It seems as if your duties have been completed. We request that you retire to ███ ███████ ███████ to tend the plants. You are no longer needed ████ ██ █████.
Thank you for your cooperation,
███ ███████ ██ ██████.
SCANNING TEXT…
Archangel Azrael, Apostle of Mankind.
Hanging Gardens Update: ██/██/██
All plants are growing smoothly. All tiles are polished. I miss mankind. I miss preaching. But plants will not grow all by themselves.
REMAINING TEXT: IRRELEVANT
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The distant, alien moonlight shone through the panelled glass windows, casting stark shadows on the vibrant green flora that appeared dull and lifeless in the darkness. A figure stood in the dark, halo and wings, letting out a soft, baby pink glow that clashed in the silhouetted shadow. All armour was removed, and he was draped with a woollen toga, long enough to cover the back of his knees. There were nights like these; there were many nights like these in Heaven.
The halls were filled with an eerie quiet unlike one ever heard before. The figure shuffled through the halls, followed by hushed whispers, whether it be from Heaven itself or the writhing plants that should’ve stayed lifeless. The figure did not hold a weapon; he did not seek violence.
“Heresy,” one voice whispered.
“Heresy,” another followed, until there was a choir of beings chanting and heckling, waving their viny limbs and gnashing their teardrop-shaped teeth. The figure made no sign of noticing and simply continued throughout the floral halls. The moon shook with anger from her place in the sky, and roars of botany and plant matter all screaming one word, clambering over one another like ravenous vultures fighting over scraps of flesh on a carcass.
“Heresy,” they all continued. “Heretic.”
The cries began to create static in the figure’s ears, like shushing waves. All manner of sound blurred together, a baptism of din that washed over everything, bathing it in a sickly, metallic red hue. The figure reached the end of the halls.
Standing at the far end of the blood-soaked marble chamber was another figure, bone-thin and clad in blue. They raised their head with the sound of metal against metal, their shiny yellow optic illuminating every drop of crimson liquid that stained every pristine gallery or foyer of Heaven. The figure reached out a hand to the gaunt azure silhouette, offering salvation to the beast of binary and blood. Simply, the machine responded with its gun raised, and the angel understood.
They bowed their head, and the roars ceased at once.
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Azrael awoke with a start. Moonlight drenched his body in a pale hue, a jaundiced and sickly light. The shabby structure that sheltered him creaked in the gales, but no anxiety thickened the already tense air. He rose to his feet, swaying gently like a brittle tree.
The night was quiet. No screech owls sang their deathly banshee call, and no nightingales bellowed so sweetly, none that Azrael could hear as he exited his house. The night was cold. A cold that bore its teeth deep into Azrael’s flesh as he descended the ladder back down to the ground. Worst of all, the night was lonely. A loneliness that settled itself like an unwelcome guest everywhere that Azrael stepped.
A distant light spilled from between the tall trees, and small animals flickered underfoot. Azrael remained unflinching as he made his way through the foliage, shivering with remembrance. He rubbed a bare, dark hand across the bark of an evergreen tree, and it groaned as the winds shook it violently.
The trees parted in a clearing, all surrounding one tall, glowing figure that towered over not just Azrael, but the whole forest. It glowed a soft, milky pink and hummed just quiet enough for Azrael to hear. It was a tree, taller than life itself, that shone so bright that the winds parted and the animals hid.
Azrael picked up a book tangled in the roots of the divine thing that creaked and groaned under its own weight.
“I understand you’re in pain,” The dreamer said. “There is nothing I can do to ease your ills,” He took a droplet of sap from the tree’s leaking bark, using the tip of his finger to create a new entry on a blank page.
Date Unknown. The entry began. I worry about this tree’s progress. I fear that I have made a treacherous mistake.
He took another dollop of sap.
I fear what will happen to humanity if I decide to let this continue, but if I chop the thing down, the gush of blood would be enough to drown the world. I also fear that it will grow back.
The tree groaned in a sad tone.
It wants to be put out of its misery. It’s grown too tall; its body can no longer support itself.
More sap.
I don’t want it to be in pain. Oh, Holy Father, give me strength. I cannot stand to see it in pain. I just hope I can ease its woes for a bit before it withers. I have been working hastily on a brace and supports to keep it standing. Hopefully, it will stop crying during the night.
Azrael dropped the book, and the tree’s roots wrapped tightly around it, wrinkling the paper and ripping it from its hinge. Azrael turned away.
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There is much that people forget to write about. Much of history has been destroyed, but even more has been lost in the sands of memory. I fear that if I forget everything, it will all come back to haunt me one night in a dream. I do not remember what was standing at the end of that hall, but I know that it wanted to harm me.
Dear Council,
Please forgive me.
Azrael.