Angelo and Marie-Ange. Coffee and Prophecies.

[x-tarot.livejournal.com]

Angelo brings the prophecy that has him so worried to Marie-Ange, who is not very reassuring, even if she tries her very best to be.



Angelo was sitting waiting in the little cafe at the agreed time, flash drive on the table in front of him next to his laptop. He was looking unusually twitchy, going between staring at the little drive and tapping his fingers on the table.

Marie-Ange was only a minute behind, and sat down at the table after removing scarf and hat and gloves. "Perhaps you should have the decaf today?" She said, with a small worried smile. "You look as if you do not need anything else to make you twitchy.."

"Maybe", he agreed, offering her a small smile in return. "Thanks for comin'. What kind of coffee d'you want today?"

Marie-Ange made as if to answer and then yawned, covering her mouth and looking sheepish. "Anything that will wake me up.." she said. "Doug and I were out late last night..."

After ordering, she motioned to Angelo and his laptop and his flash drive. "I am right if I guess that you have a copy of the prophecy?" Obviously whatever it was had Angelo very worried, and she thought they might as well get it over with. "Remind me to kick that woman in the shin if I ever meet her."

"Oh, yeah?" he asked with a flash of amusement. "Out late doin' what? An' yeah, I do, a scan of the original. Figure you should look at it before we talk about it." He pushed the flash drive towards her and turned the laptop to face her way, then got up to fetch their coffee.

"She meddles!" Marie-Ange said, as Angelo got up.

When he returned, she had the file open on the laptop and a notepad and pencil out, and a frown on her face. She didn't even look up as he handed her a coffee, and said 'Thank you" only after taking a sip, making a few notes and -then- realizing she had a coffee in her hand. "Humanity's God? What does that even mean? There are so many religions I could not even start to name them, and some of them have more then one god!"

"So maybe it's talkin' about one of the ones that's only got one", he suggested grimly, sitting down and drinking from his own cup. "It's how it ties in with the first part I don't like."

"I noticed that part. I was hoping you had not." Marie-Ange said wryly. "But then if you had not, I suppose you would not have brought it to me.." She shook her head, slowly. "This could mean nearly anything. She could be referring to a canvas or a tanned hide, and not a person."

"Forge said that. About the tanned hide. But when you put it all together, it doesn't really sound like it's that." His eyes were intent on her. "An' you don't think it is, do you."

Marie-Ange sighed. "I am not sure. I have not seen anything for you recently, good or bad. But this is almost direct that I cannot help but worry." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "This is why I hate that woman. If she was really concerned about people, she would say something instead of making us run around in circles. She just likes to meddle and she has her own agenda."

"I've never been part of it before", Angelo said quietly. "An' there was a lot of stuff in that book. If she really just saw this, an' it is about me... then I think it's tellin' me how I die."

"It does not say -when-, and it does not actually say death." Marie-Ange countered. "If this is about you, and while I am worried, please remember we cannot be certain, there is still a great deal we do not know." She took a long drink of her coffee. "If this is as direct as you think, then it mentions you by name. If it -that- direct, I would hope the rest would be the same." She was grasping at straws and knew it, but any kind of hope, even the kind you flailed at, was good right now.

"It doesn't say when", he agreed. "But it doesn't say my name, not really. It says my codename, maybe, or it might just be about my powers. Not that direct. But when you think about it... you know the Old Testament as well as I do. That verse says 'sacrifice' and it says whatever god it's for will be appeased."

"I very much hate that woman..." Marie-Ange muttered. "Visual prophecy is so much less frustrating when people are involved. You can see their faces!" She took another drink of coffee. "I can check.. well, everything I can check. I can see if I can talk to Tante as well. If this is true, it is serious and ... " She set her cup down. "It would affect Amanda, and Nathan and Doug and myself and I cannot cannot! imagine I would not see it coming!"

"Maybe it's just too far ahead", Angelo suggested grimly, draining his cup in one long swallow. "Yours is pretty short-range, right?"

"Most of the time." Marie-Ange conceded. "I can't think of anything I have gotten that was more then a year away." That sometimes she got almost no warning at all she didn't bother explaining. She was not going to give Angelo any more cause to develop an early ulcer then he already had. "Or maybe it had nothing at all to do with you, or it is something that we have already prevented from happening.."

"Maybe. But it sure sounds to me like it's about me, an' you said yourself you were worried." Sometimes it was hard to see past the worst possibility.

"I just do not also want to worry unduly." Marie-Ange explained. "I suppose technically if you worry yourself to death, this would not come true, but that is not quite the way I would like Irene Adler to be wrong, no?"

Angelo snorted. "Guess not. But I just keep thinkin'... look at all the shit I've survived, Angie. Twelve years in LA, then Moscow, an' I've been inside a bombed buildin', I've been in vacuum... what if none of that killed me 'cause it wasn't meant to? 'Cause this is?"

"That is not how these things work..." Marie-Ange explained. "At least, that is not how it works when I see something. This is not written in stone. Ask Forge about the cat in the box and about the electrons." She turned her notepad to a new piece of paper and drew a line with circles marked on it, and several arrows going in all different directions. "Let us suppose I saw this for next year. Which I did not! Even then, all of the other things you do between then and now could change it. Perhaps this was supposed to happen and then you went into the vacuum and almost died there and now it will not happen because something changed. It is not something anyone can be sure of. Every little thing you do can change the future as much as it can set you on one particular path."

"Or maybe every little thing I do can lead me straight there", he countered tiredly. "...I don't know, Angie. I brought it to you 'cause you're the only precog I still know, but... I don't know. I need a drink. Or six."

"Or it could mean something else and until and unless this happens, or I see something myself, we will not know." Marie-Ange said, almost sternly. "Have you talked to Nathan about this?"

"Not yet. Only found out about it myself yesterday. But his precog was different an' anyway, it's gone."

"That is not quite what I meant." Marie-Ange said. "I wish I had a more clear answer for you, but my precognition is often just as confusing as Irene Adler's." She just did not meddle. Quite so much. Or in such an irritating way. "Promise that if you find anything else, you will let me know? I think Doug may have copies as well, so I can see if we can find anything further.."

"If I find anythin' else, you'll be the first I tell." He was already planning to go through the diaries with a fine-tooth comb, very soon. "But now I'm gonna get a bus to Salem Center, go to Harry's, an' get those nice stiff drinks. Just tonight."