[reverse darkest timeline AU: cellthread #2]

[stilljustandrew]

[Previously: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

What's worried Baby the most, over the past few days --

Well. What's upset her the most is Andrew's consistent refusal to speak to her mind-to-mind, or out loud beyond the few necessary words she might exchange with any other inmate, such as requests for food, fresh clothes, an extra blanket.

But what's worried her is that he hasn't asked for anything to pass the time. No tablet with games or videos on it, no pencil and paper, no baseball to bounce off the opposite wall.

No books.



In the cell, Andrew finishes his breakfast (cornflakes, with sliced banana), sets aside the bowl, and settles down leaning against the wall.

Comments

[hadyougoing]

"Because that's the side I was on."

Ava regards him with a sliver of bitter smile.

"The side that measures how strong you are by how many people you've screwed over. That likes to watch people bleed."

[stilljustandrew]

"Lot of sides are like that." Sullenly, now.

[hadyougoing]

Ava snorts.

"Oh, okay. That'd make Jenny Yi feel a lot better, I should've tried telling her that."

[stilljustandrew]

And for the first time, a spark of irritation.

"Or hey, what about that guy who got you before you got him? What side was he on?"

[hadyougoing]

Her eyebrows arch.

"Uh, Jake drank the Kool-Aid."

(As it were.)

[stilljustandrew]

"Right. That's 'cause your side wasn't a side. Cause Azazel was an asshole."

[hadyougoing]

"Oh my gosh, so Lucifer doesn't kill people? Or drive them crazy, or chase them with hellhounds or anything?"

[stilljustandrew]

"Lucifer doesn't make His people fight to the last man standing just to prove who's strongest. Because we're His."

[hadyougoing]

"Huh. That's not a no."

[stilljustandrew]

He makes a scoffing noise. "It's like you can't tell the difference between what someone does to their enemies and how they treat their people. Gosh, wonder why."

[hadyougoing]

"Nooo," she says, with exaggerated patience, "it's like I think even if they're not 'your people'--"

Air quote solo!

"It's still wrong to murder them. And Andrew, it's never just enemies and friends. You know that."

[stilljustandrew]

He looks away.

"Maybe I used to think that."

[hadyougoing]

"What about Brady?"

[stilljustandrew]

He gives her a slightly blank look, and for a moment the question forming in his mouth is who's Brady?

It changes on the way out: "What about him?"

[hadyougoing]

"He didn't have a side. He never would have found me, he didn't have to die--"

She shakes her head.

"And he was a really sweet guy. I know you never met him, but--he was. He was a good man. How does that fit into your whole thing? You gonna tell me Lucifer and his 'people' never hurt anyone who doesn't deserve it?"

[stilljustandrew]

He shakes his head. "That was Azazel. And he did it to hurt you. Just part of that whole stupid unnecessary mess."

A beat.

"I mean, you get it. You just said. He didn't have to die. Maybe if things were different he would've had to. Even if he didn't deserve to."

[hadyougoing]

"Andrew, nobody has to die who doesn't deserve to."

Her eyes have narrowed.

"And if your boss says different, then he's just as much a freaking game-playing sadist as the rest of them."

[stilljustandrew]

His chin comes up, and he inhales sharply.

"So you wanna maybe call out God along with the rest of them? Cause last I checked, a whole frakking lot of people die when they don't deserve to."

[hadyougoing]

"Uh, no." Her eyebrows climb. "I don't, because even if it wasn't a stupid cop-out, why would God being a jerk mean you get to work for a murderer? Or be one?"

[stilljustandrew]

He scoffs. "So like -- where's this imaginary better side I could be working for instead?"

[hadyougoing]

"You didn't answer my question.

Why does other people doing bad things mean you get to do them too?"

[stilljustandrew]

"Because I'm not doing them for me," he bursts out, spreading his hands. "None of this is about me, it's bigger than that."

[hadyougoing]

Ava decides to momentarily shelve her immediate response to that, which is: nope, that makes no sense.

"What is it about?" Tired. "What's the endgame this time?"

[stilljustandrew]

He shakes his head, and -- bizarrely -- he's smiling a little.

"It's not my endgame. It's His. I just serve Him."

[hadyougoing]

Dry, "Yeah, I get that."

In her head, like a Brady Bunch rerun: Satan Satan Satan!

"So what does he want?"