[ Nothing says "things are probably going to be fine" like waking up who-knows-where (nevermind the fact that he doesn't sleep), outdoors even though there are buildings well within range, and also there's extremely thick fog everywhere and it's filled with wandering ghosts. To say nothing for what he'd call a notable lack of the usual extent of his angelic power.
Aziraphale is quietly, tidily, weighing the pros and cons of losing his whole mind.
He was looking forward to opening his shop and hopefully not getting any customers, and certainly not selling anything if at all possible. Lunch with Crowley. That sort of thing. Home things. So this was already a less than ideal situation. And then there's... all the rest of this.
Aziraphale can't sense ghosts, per se. This is mostly to do with the fact that last he checked, ghosts weren't real. Souls, the spirit, absolutely. Angels, demons, yes, got a decent handle on picking up on those. Some certain entities, he saw the proof himself, very extant.
None of those descriptors apply.
Human-but-not. Here-but-gone. Very purgatorial. The first one that he encounters up close and personal instead of as a vague distant shape, it feels like getting punched. ]
Oh. Oh, you poor thing. [ He's required by law as a big sap to feel awful about it. There could not be more sympathy packed into his tone if he tried.
His next requirement by law is to feel guilty about the fact that he can't do anything to help them, after he probably spends more time than he should trying to do just that. ]
exploration.
[ Exploration is a bold word to use for "enters buildings out of necessity because the fog is starting to do a number on him physically, which he's never had happen in his life." Still, why not. It technically counts. He gets more familiar as he goes along, after all.
He doesn't tend to stick around places longer than it takes him to get his momentum back, mostly in the spirit of all the familiarizing he's trying to do. Clothing shop here, halfway house there, distillery that way, etc. The toy store, he actually takes more of a breather at despite the upped creepiness factor. The thing about very quaint, handmade items that speak of devotion to craft is that they tend to feel well-loved whether they're sold or not. That's always a vibe he's into.
Ultimately he settles himself in for a longer haul at Benedict Books, where he just plain feels the most comfortable. Doesn't even compare to his shop and collection, frankly, but he supposes he wasn't expecting it to. He's had the benefit of a very, very long time to put things together by comparison, surely.
And it isn't... it isn't completely awful, as long as he refuses to think about anything about it that may or may not be awful. Which out of every skill he's ever learned is probably the one he's best at.
Foreboding and vaguely supernatural, is all. He'll get used to it.
This is where he can mostly be found, for hours on end, basically puttering around looking at everything on the shelves. Maybe trying to clean up a bit, where he can.
Pretty much no matter where he's at on his dumbass walking holiday, Aziraphale is pretty given to polite greetings and amenable to conversation, if a little distracted. ]
to see and be seen.
[ Aziraphale is no stranger to the anxiety and paranoia that naturally go hand in hand with feeling watched. In fact, after 6,000 years of definitive authority to answer to, it might be safe to say that he knows those feelings better than he knows any others.
(There's love to consider, of course, seeing as he was very definitely made for that, but love often feels like less of a thing that he knows and more like a thing he happens to do.)
Even knowing he's officially been cut loose, as it were, and it's not something he would've had to necessarily worry about going forward, it's a very old habit to break. He hardly even notices. Until, you know. He does notice, while he's distractedly scanning over notecards and the map and whatnot, because it's not his usual self-generated Brand of watched-ness.
Sourcing it out takes a minute, despite the fact that he was literally looking at the board. Aziraphale looks up towards the ceiling for a long few moments first, then down at the floor, frowning. And that doesn't get him anywhere, obviously. It's practically an accident that he sees the whole "sigil painted in human blood" situation, which he notes with: an offended gasp.
The symbol's not familiar to him offhand. But his offense stands. ]
How lovely. [ Aziraphale mainly sounds dry and put out. The things he has to deal with without any forewarning, smh. He helped stop an apocalypse only to end up in this mess. Disastrous. ] The occult.
[ It's just uncalled for. Whatever happened to common decency? ]
aziraphale | good omens (tv)
[ Nothing says "things are probably going to be fine" like waking up who-knows-where (nevermind the fact that he doesn't sleep), outdoors even though there are buildings well within range, and also there's extremely thick fog everywhere and it's filled with wandering ghosts. To say nothing for what he'd call a notable lack of the usual extent of his angelic power.
Aziraphale is quietly, tidily, weighing the pros and cons of losing his whole mind.
He was looking forward to opening his shop and hopefully not getting any customers, and certainly not selling anything if at all possible. Lunch with Crowley. That sort of thing. Home things. So this was already a less than ideal situation. And then there's... all the rest of this.
Aziraphale can't sense ghosts, per se. This is mostly to do with the fact that last he checked, ghosts weren't real. Souls, the spirit, absolutely. Angels, demons, yes, got a decent handle on picking up on those. Some certain entities, he saw the proof himself, very extant.
None of those descriptors apply.
Human-but-not. Here-but-gone. Very purgatorial. The first one that he encounters up close and personal instead of as a vague distant shape, it feels like getting punched. ]
Oh. Oh, you poor thing. [ He's required by law as a big sap to feel awful about it. There could not be more sympathy packed into his tone if he tried.
His next requirement by law is to feel guilty about the fact that he can't do anything to help them, after he probably spends more time than he should trying to do just that. ]
exploration.
[ Exploration is a bold word to use for "enters buildings out of necessity because the fog is starting to do a number on him physically, which he's never had happen in his life." Still, why not. It technically counts. He gets more familiar as he goes along, after all.
He doesn't tend to stick around places longer than it takes him to get his momentum back, mostly in the spirit of all the familiarizing he's trying to do. Clothing shop here, halfway house there, distillery that way, etc. The toy store, he actually takes more of a breather at despite the upped creepiness factor. The thing about very quaint, handmade items that speak of devotion to craft is that they tend to feel well-loved whether they're sold or not. That's always a vibe he's into.
Ultimately he settles himself in for a longer haul at Benedict Books, where he just plain feels the most comfortable. Doesn't even compare to his shop and collection, frankly, but he supposes he wasn't expecting it to. He's had the benefit of a very, very long time to put things together by comparison, surely.
And it isn't... it isn't completely awful, as long as he refuses to think about anything about it that may or may not be awful. Which out of every skill he's ever learned is probably the one he's best at.
Foreboding and vaguely supernatural, is all. He'll get used to it.
This is where he can mostly be found, for hours on end, basically puttering around looking at everything on the shelves. Maybe trying to clean up a bit, where he can.
Pretty much no matter where he's at on his dumbass walking holiday, Aziraphale is pretty given to polite greetings and amenable to conversation, if a little distracted. ]
to see and be seen.
[ Aziraphale is no stranger to the anxiety and paranoia that naturally go hand in hand with feeling watched. In fact, after 6,000 years of definitive authority to answer to, it might be safe to say that he knows those feelings better than he knows any others.
(There's love to consider, of course, seeing as he was very definitely made for that, but love often feels like less of a thing that he knows and more like a thing he happens to do.)
Even knowing he's officially been cut loose, as it were, and it's not something he would've had to necessarily worry about going forward, it's a very old habit to break. He hardly even notices. Until, you know. He does notice, while he's distractedly scanning over notecards and the map and whatnot, because it's not his usual self-generated Brand of watched-ness.
Sourcing it out takes a minute, despite the fact that he was literally looking at the board. Aziraphale looks up towards the ceiling for a long few moments first, then down at the floor, frowning. And that doesn't get him anywhere, obviously. It's practically an accident that he sees the whole "sigil painted in human blood" situation, which he notes with: an offended gasp.
The symbol's not familiar to him offhand. But his offense stands. ]
How lovely. [ Aziraphale mainly sounds dry and put out. The things he has to deal with without any forewarning, smh. He helped stop an apocalypse only to end up in this mess. Disastrous. ] The occult.
[ It's just uncalled for. Whatever happened to common decency? ]