Post by AZAZEL on Jul 31, 2023 19:19:50 GMT
The yellow eyed demon’s nose wrinkled as he worked his way through the crowd towards the bar. If it wasn’t Crowley covering in a corner of this cesspit then it was another demon at the very least. It was a miracle he could smell it at all beneath the noxious waves of desperation, jealousy and lust that poured off of the crowds that swelled and constricted on the dance floor at his back. Its tidal pull threatened to draw him in. Once upon a time maybe he’d have let it, finding a single soul in that cesspit of humanity to twist around his little finger. Another fool to bargain with, another pawn on the chess board he’d been playing on for millennia. They fell one at a time, were added to the pile on his side before they reemerged onto the board twisted, unrecognisable from what they’d once been.
Human blue eyes squinted against the beams of light that swirled over the place, picking out arms thrust up out of the mass of people, highlighting the face of the bartender. ”A beer,” he growled, raising his voice and repeating himself when he just seemed to get a blank look in return. The man turned to start pouring second time around at least. Azazel planted his elbows on the bar, scanning along the length of it. Crowley wasn’t fool enough to be sitting front and centre. No ridiculous lurid drinks heading out in the hands of a server. If the former King was cowering here, then it was out of sight.
He flashed teeth in an approximation of a smile as the beer was set down in front of him. Azazel dipped a hand into the canvas pocket of the canvas jacket that had raised the eyebrows of the man mountain at the front door of the club, slipping a couple of bills across the bar. It wouldn’t take long for the noise in here to start grinding his patience down to dust. They were still keeping a low profile in this town, but eventually something would give on one side or another and the war that been threatening to begin ever since Rowena had dragged him out of the Empty would finally erupt.
Two beers eventually followed the first, each slowly drained as he studied the place. Others had come and gone around him – none skittering away with the sort of twitchiness that would’ve drawn his eye. He hadn’t been wrong about the scent, it still lingered there like perfume in the air, but without sniffing at every throat, he wasn’t sure he could trace it through this crowd without the sort of excitement that would have that war kicking off before Lucifer gave the nod. Azazel frowned down into his beer. Pointless. A waste of time that could’ve been spent more productively elsewhere.
The last beer was shoved away only half finished. He’d leave one of their trustworthy minions in his place. If Crowley scurried out from under a rock, he’d finally be spotted and this game of cat and fully unprepared mouse would be over and done with. Azazel slipped from his seat, slinking through the edges of the crowd again, letting his eyes flare golden just the once as a woman who barely looked able to stand curled her hands into the front of his jacket and refused to let go. She gawped up at him, then stumbled away, brows furrowed like the wheels in her mind were grinding, trying to figure out what she had seen.
Azazel hissed out a breath as he emerged into the darkness. The queue still stretched away from the doors, the desperate bouncing on their toes, like the movement would hurry their admission along. He turned away from them, heading into the gloom at the other side of the building, weaving his way away from the street to vanish in one of those pools of shadow. Footsteps scraped behind him, slowing the demon’s footsteps down until he paused in one of those shadows a moment later. Turning towards the figure illuminated behind him, he grinned slowly, all fatherly charm. ”Let me guess, I tipped a little too much back there? You came to give me my money back, or a little something else…” Eyes that glimmered with just a little flicker of gold amongst the blue narrowed. Azazel grinned faintly, approaching slow. Perhaps someone had spotted a demon in the club after all.
Tagged: Open Thread * Word Count: 742