#like he DOES want revenge on v1 but i think he needs to square it in his mind as something not so selfish

[muzzleroars]

What if during the Gabe and Micheal fight V1 was serveraly injured by Michael?

Like the fight originally wasn't Gabe vs. Michael but it was Micheal vs. V1

After all the shits that's happened in hell and the fall of his brother, he wants to avenge his brothers memory by killing the thing that made him fall.

In this action he's thinking "gabe is gonna hate me for this but he needs it"

Granted V1 could totally beat Michaels ass he probably just caught him off guard and when he was low on blood.

michael likely would give v1 a pretty good fight - i tend to think that gabriel is an equal match for it with many of their sparring sessions being his win, i just like to think that v1 is particularly troublesome when one has no experience as it learns EXTREMELY quickly (beat it in a minute or it'll never happen!!) and it has an instant blood-healing mechanism. in that sense, michael would equal it as well as he's pretty similar in strength and skill to gabriel, BUT he's got a couple advantages that help level the playing field despite this being a first encounter, chief among them how he engages it with little warning already enraged. complicating this is the fact that michael is naturally very adept at harnessing his wrath as an advantage in battle rather than a detriment, so i think enraging sends him into a radiant state...which isn't a great set-up for a machine that's likely just rooting around for some soul orbs.

thankfully for v1, it's extremely difficult to actually catch it fully off-guard - it's learning about michael from the first move he makes, knowing he's a supreme angel like gabe but instantly scrapping much of its data to start from a clean slate. because he doesn't fight like gabriel. gabriel has a serene elegance to his fighting style, a grace in his movements that treats battle like a dance, and he LOVES to talk (being god's messenger puts a lot of words in his mouth). michael is a sharp contrast to that, entirely silent as he moves in vicious, staccato movements that reek of a brutal efficiency and a single desire to end the battle. whereas gabriel delights in the fight itself, michael is clearly only concerned about the victory. v1 can appreciate it for its distinct, cutting brutality, but it becomes an increasing issue that michael is an entirely foreign combatant with a very unique strategy - every so often, he seems to entirely change his fighting style. v1 knows there are always patterns, idiosyncrasies that betray an individual, but michael's are incredibly difficult to pin down in the limited time it knows it has. and so he continually resets its learning, frustrating its ai in a way that's paradoxically thrilling for it, but it knows now isn't the time. it decides to follow mike's lead instead, attempting to end the battle as soon as it can, but another problem arises that finally trips its alarms - michael's blood doesn't seem to work very well. it does repair it in some capacity, but it's about half as effective as it should be, similar in many respects to the old blood that runs in rivers through hell. put all that together, and v1 could easily make a mistake that turns disastrous.

michael knows he's doing a terrible thing to gabriel, but he would do anything in service to his brothers, and he would fully believe that playing the villain now is necessary. to him this is sickness, perversion, to love an object that michael believes has no sentience and certainly has no soul, marks the full degradation of gabriel. again, it is his fault. gabriel's faith had always wavered, and being worked to death by a heretical council has completely decayed his morals, with v1 the object of that fall. there is something selfish in michael, a part of him knowing he does this because if he eliminates this idol, perhaps gabriel could repent. maybe he can use purgatory to heal him, to save him, to pull a fallen angel back from the depths of treachery and restore him to his former glory. it's an abominable thought, he knows it's wrong, but if he can gather gabriel back into the fold, back to heaven and to himself, maybe his life lingering on like this still has value. it pushes him ever forward in battle against a machine far more capable than he would have thought, but god tempered him to fight anything in hell, in merciless pursuit that burned through his own divine fire. his strength is similar to that of gabriel's, but it has been honed for a singular purpose.

v1 knows when a fight is lost, michael has learned much the way it does (cheater!!) and he sees what it protects, he begins quickly to tear into its exposed blood ports (bullshit prototype). v1 is forced to be defensive, something it's much less adept at, but again michael sees just how it curls in on itself - while he likely gets nails driven right into his face for it, he grabs hold and rips open its chest plate. v1's very mind. it screeches at him so loudly it's actually disorienting, but there is nothing it can do with damaged insulation even as the blast of absolute zero instantly freezes michael's dead hands. the temperature is immediately too high, the particles kept in stasis suddenly moving at unimaginable speed and instantly destroying v1's ability to move, to think, to exist. a split second of its hud flashing garbled nonsense in dire warning before it all cuts offline, but by then gabriel's virtues have fetched him, begging him to come help. and a fallen angel at full strength, now blindingly enraged, isn't going to go well for a michael that's just struggled against the scourge of hell, especially when the fight would need to be much more delicate considering he's done all of this to save gabriel. but he can't understand. not now. but gabe doesn't really give two shits when mike simply vanishes, because he's not the priority and in fact would just be a waste of time.

because v1 is bled out on the floor, its body torn open with its computer exposed as its refrigerator desperately blasts out frigid air on emergency power. without thinking, gabriel takes what's left of his wings, ripping out his tortured feathers in shocks of agony that should render him motionless, and packs them inside v1's computer in delicate urgency. deathly cold, burning his own hypothermic body but just right for v1's needs, before he's done enough and can quickly switch to clawing up his own arms for the blood it now needs. it's all quick fixes, enough to hopefully keep it sustained until he can get it somewhere safe and he can revive it. because it's still intact enough and he knows it can live (v2 proved how surprisingly hardy they can be) but BOY if this wouldn't piss him off to an extreme extent with michael. like gabriel would know, in a calm mind detached from his personal feelings, that michael was doing what he thought right...but what does that matter when he's so willing to hurt the undeserving (like the ferryman) or those he loves? tbh between something like this and the ferryman, if mike returned too soon afterward they could get into a fight they both REALLY regret.

#I'VE WANTED TO USE GABE STUFFING HIS FEATHERS INTO V1'S COMPUTER FOR SO LONG..... #they are the world's coldest but lightest ice pack....perfect for quantum computers ;o; #BUT YEA mike would likely attempt this if he wanted gabriel taken to purgatory #like he DOES want revenge on v1 but i think he needs to square it in his mind as something not so selfish #so it's about saving gabriel. that maybe he's not too late #besides he doesn't see v1 as alive and like. that thing IS legitimately a problem. right. #cake answers #v1 #michael #fallen gabriel