lt_safe_house | Haniel arrives, shenanigans ensue

Date: March 28, 2003
Status: Private (Haniel, Aziraphale, Crowley)
Setting: The streets of London/a restaurant in Lower Tadfield
Summary: Haniel discusses business with Aziraphale. Or, y'know, not.

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As he wandered through Europe on what was technically a business trip but had turned out to have very little to do with business, Haniel decided that he liked the twenty-first century much better than he had the nineteenth. People seemed less wound up, at least in the ways they had been (and he felt rather disappointed that he'd missed the cultural revolutions in the 1960s, but no one was prouder of the humans for it than he). There was more acceptance, more openness—he hadn't seen a pair of men kissing in public since Greece, for Heaven's sake. That layer of grime that had always coated humans' perceptions of their bodies was still there, of course, sloughed off and replaced with something else, and he didn't like it...but, on the whole, he was enjoying himself immensely, basking in the general mood of humanity.

But he did still have an assignment to be sort of doing, and eventually he meandered into London. The Principality of Europe tended to station himself here (why, Haniel would never know, but then he'd never been much of a settle-down sort of angel), and Haniel hadn't spoken with him since the Industrial Revolution. Given how much the rest of the world seemed to have metamorphosized, he couldn't help but wonder if Aziraphale had gone along with it. His reports would just have to wait. He was curious. Mostly, he wanted to know how in God's name all of this...this had happened in two centuries.

Following Aziraphale's presence, Haniel wandered the streets, stopping at whatever happened to catch his interest and living up to his reputation among the Archangels as something of a magpie. Everything was so shiny these days.

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"I'm supposed to be on business," said Haniel, sitting down and leaning in a bit, "but, well, you know what I get like when They let me come down."

His smile was very nearly radiant, and only a last-minute dampening kept him from lighting the whole restaurant. "I feel so...out of step!" he continued. "The last time I came down everybody was wearing these absolutely ridiculous boned things that made it hard to breathe, and now they're hardly wearing anything! Honestly, Aziraphael, I don't know how you manage to keep up."

He looked around the room as he spoke, watching the humans going about their business (he gave an encouraging nod to a nervous-looking young girl in the corner with her date, and she set her jaw and laid her hand on his). "Things as usual Upstairs, of course, the Metatron's still got something up his arse, and poor Raguel's just losing his mind with all the paperwork he's having to do...I have a feeling that the Metatron doesn't like you very much, you know that? Of course, he can't do anything about it except complain, which I'm perfectly happy with, better complaining than smiting..."

It tended to be difficult to shut Haniel up once he got going.

Aziraphale nodded. It was really all he could do when Haniel got on one of his, er, excessive trains of thought. Not that Aziraphale minded all that much; it just meant less talking for him to do, and the less of that the better. In one meeting a thousand or so years ago Aziraphale had accidentally mentioned Crowley's name when he had gotten a chance to speak, and to this day Haniel always inquired after him.

Aziraphale shot Crowley a glance. He could tell Crowley was listening - the eye-roll had given him away - and wouldn't he be surprised when Haniel asked after Aziraphale and Crowley's love life?

"That's true, Metatron hasn't liked me for some time," Aziraphale admitted when he did get a chance to interject. "And worst of all it was even before that Incident with the Apocalypse that didn't happen, so I can't even imagine why..."

Haniel arrives, shenanigans ensue

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