Title: The Twelve Commandments
Author: viridian_magpie
Pairing: gen
Fandom: Good Omens
Rating: G
Disclaimer: Good Omens belongs to the geniuses known as Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman.
AN: British measurement of weight: 1 stone = 6,35 kg = 14 pounds
Summary: Companion piece to "Good Water Omens" but can stand alone: Aziraphale apologises to Crowley. This, too, has an impact.***
Moses slowly trudged down the mountain, carrying the heavy stone slab with the Eleven Commandments (1).
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(1) It used to be twelve but God dictated rather fast and Moses wasn't that good at masonry, anyway. Still, eleven's better than none, right?
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He groaned under the weight, his back aching, and wondered idly if He (2) had not made it heavier than it already was (3).
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(2) or She
(3) Moses had the distinct impression he'd somehow offended the Lord (4). He wasn't entirely clear on the hows and whys but he'd bet anything that it had something to do with his admittedly itty bitty tiny bit blasphemous (though entirely justified, in his humble opinion) question earlier. Really, was it too much to ask to shorten the text a little? His hand really had hurt (5). And anyway, this only meant that he had had to leave one Commandment out because he hadn't been able to catch up.
(4) or Lady
(5) still did for that matter
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He lumbered on, stumbling every couple of steps. Dude, this really was ridiculous. He sat the slab down, then cursed because his foot was in the way, and finally settled down himself (6).
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(6) wishing for a reefer. Unfortunately, they had not been invented yet.
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Surely there had to be an easier way. His eyes were inadvertently drawn to the slab and he contemplated it for a while. The back side was rather smooth, wasn't it? He let his fingers trail over the surface. Hmm.
His gaze then strayed downwards to the foot of the mountain. It was quite steep. Well, he'd known that. It was hard to miss when you had to haul up several stone of, well, stone.
He pondered some more.
Okay, perhaps it was a bit sacrilegious but…oh the temptation! Yes, God saw everything but maybe He (7) wasn't really paying too much attention now. After all, the Commandments had been – painstakingly! – chiselled into stone and surely He (8) had other things to do two. And what could it hurt?
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(7) see (2)
(8) see (7)
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Moses rose and glanced around furtively. No one else seemed to be there. Tentatively, he put the slab on a small ledge, stepped onto it with his right, and kicked off with his left foot.
Three seconds later and he was lying flat on the ground, face pressed deep into the only puddle of mud on the whole mountain. He cursed, then stood up and tried again. It went slightly better. He glided down the mountain, wind in his hair and… forgetting that he didn't know exactly how to steer and thus how to avoid fiendish trees.
Grumbling under his breath and rubbing his sore behind, he glared at the offensive plant. It glared right back. Moses blinked, then shook his head, annoyed at himself. Plants couldn't glare (9).
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(9) Actually, they could but most humans were too stupid or too blind to realise the danger when they silently promised retribution. What? Did you really think that it's coincidence that the tree roots in your path just happen to lye so perfectly that you don't see them until it's too late and you've already tripped?
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He would not credit them with the possession of human emotion or intelligence. That would simply be a regression back to animism, which…- wait, where had that come from (10)? He snorted and banished it from his mind. It wasn't important (11).
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(10) from Freud and his followers. Moses had a knack for remembering the future even if he wasn't always aware of it.
(11) admittedly this thinking was mainly due to the fact that he hadn't even understood half of what he'd "remembered" (12).
(12) students of psychology often have the same problem
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Anyway, what did they say? Third time's the charm, right?. He would try one final time.
Two minutes later saw an ecstatic Moses rushing down Sinai on his board. It was working, it was working! Yes! He started humming a melody ("mhmhmhm surfing. Surfing Si-na-i. Oo-eee. Oo-eee-eee-eee-eee-eee…"), shifting his weight from time to time, staying clear of trees and bushes (13).
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(13) both Sr. and Jr.
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He could swear he heard the crashing of the waves, the roar of the ocean, giving voice to that one word –.
"Crowley!"
Moses twisted his head around and saw from the corner of his eye a young dark man being chased by a young blonde one. He gaped. The blonde one, he had, he had wings!
"Crowley, wait, please. I'm sorry. I mean, I'm grateful for the present. Really, I am." (14)
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(14) It wasn't quite a lie. He was grateful that Crowley had given him something. He just didn't much like the thing itself.
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"Pah!"
"Really, it's very…distinctive. All golden and, er, cow-y."
"Why'd you leave it down there, then?"
"I – I just don't have any room for it in my abode." (15)
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(15) Again, he was bending the truth a little but it was for the greater good. He didn't want to hurt Crowley's feelings. More than he already had, at least.
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"Pah!"
Moses heard no more of the exchange. His lack of attention to where he was going had, unfortunately, caused him to fall off a high ledge.
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It was evening when Moses finally returned to the Israelites, limping and cursing and generally looking worse for the wear. After this, this fiasco the only thing he wanted to do was drop into his bed and sleep, sleep, sleep. Forget about the bloody world. But he couldn't. Not yet, anyway. First he had to give the two stone slabs to his people. Two stone slabs with ten Commandments.
It wasn't his fault. Really, it wasn't. He'd tried to salvage what he could when had returned to consciousness finding the original slab broken next to him. Luckily, it had only split into two pieces but the Fourth Commandment could not be deciphered anymore since this was exactly the place where the thing had broken. Well, he'd polished the two pieces up a bit, erased the rest of the former Fourth Commandment ("You shall n-"), and carried the rest of God's Commandments down the mountain, all the while cursing young men and their stupid arguments about bloody golden cows.
When, at last, he arrived at the camp, there was a crowd ooh-ing and aah-ing at something he couldn't quite see from where he stood. No one was paying him any mind, so he pushed past several people and stopped dead.
No, it couldn't be. They would not, they could not possibly…
Moses first saw the cow – calf, God corrected him but Moses didn't notice – and then red.
"What in God's name (16) do you think you're doing!"
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(16) Obviously, in his present state of mind it really was too much to ask that he remember the Second Commandment. Even God understood.
***