HELP! How The Fuck Do I First Woman!? - Chapter 9 (Patreon)

Lucifer and Lilith stood still in front of me. As if the words were lost in their throat, not sure what to say or do to my outright confrontation, rather than de-escalation or placation.

"Well?" I smiled. "Come on, sit down. Let's talk." The blinked as if now they got back their thoughts in order. "You have my full attention." They shivered, before looking at each other.

Lilith shrugged and acted first, with Lucifer following. Slowly they crouched and sat down on the grass. Lucifer tried and failed to copy my pose, before just sitting cross-legged. Lilith sat in that dainty lady-like way of knees and ankles together under her, angled to one side.

"So, Eve, first, why would we need to define Free Will?" Lilith asked, attempting establish control of the situation that veered far away from what she originally planned.

"Yeah, I mean, it's Free Will! It's obvious what it is!" Lucifer said enthusiastically, acting to support his wife. "Although, I guess you wouldn't know, but that's why we're trying to give it to you. Also why did we sit on the ground?" He asked looking around in confusion and disgruntlement.

"Because it's comfy." I said, answer Lucifer first. "And if it's obvious what it is, then it should be easy to give a definition for, so we're all on the same page." Eve said, the idiom hitting the Morningstar couple, as they took a moment for Meaning to reveal itself to them from that saying. "More importantly, if it's obvious to you and I, supposedly, don't know it, then you not explaining it isn't actually a good thing. It would be bad because you're telling me to do something without complete information, which would be an infringement on my ability to choose, as it would be compromised."

Lawyer talk is annoying but I feel like I have to use it for these two bozos.

"Alright. Why don't you tell us what you think Free Will is?" Lucifer whined before Lilith could interject, making the Former First Woman frown but side with her husband and wait.

"Very well," I nod, smiling as I was building up to this. "Then, Free Will is the ability for a person—a sentient and sapient thinking being, with a consciousness that can reason, reflect and be able to abstract, think of itself as itself—to make a choice of their own volition, I.E. having the self-governance to act based on their conscious desire to materialize said desire to action or inaction, in whatever forms those actions or inactions take."

"!"

"!"

Both Lucifer and Lilith look wide-eyed and constipated.

"Okay, sorry, maybe I overdid that. Basically, Free Will is the capacity to be able to make a choice for yourself. That choice could be action or inaction." I simplified, waving my hand, as if to gesture 'there, that's simple enough?'.

"How could inaction be a choice?" Lucifer immediately objected.

"If you happen to be walking down a road that branches into two paths, right and left, and you don't know which to choose, so you just lay down on the ground, that's a choice. It's inaction to go right or left, but rather stay in place."

"No you didn't. The action you took was to sit down." Lucifer said back.

"Which is done at the cost of not going right or left." I replied.

"But that's only because you're thinking about it and gonna do it later."

"And right now you chose neither. The point was about the choice done in the present, not later."

"But you aren't choosing inaction." Lucifer insisted.

"How about this example? Two people asked you which is your favorite food, each presenting theirs as an option, and think you'd agree with their choice. They are your friends and you don't want to offend either, so you freeze. And then just keep quiet. That's inaction, and it is also a choice."

"What? No. You just," Lucifer looked like he was moments away from steam coming out of his head. Really overclocking that brain, huh. "Froze, you didn't choose that."

"A person can always choose to act even through fear, or embarrassment or what have you. Staying quiet and stuck in that frozen state is still a choice." I shrugged.

"You didn't think about it, it just happened!"

"You fly around rather than walk, even though you can do both. Do you think about it every time?"

"Well... no that's different."

"In what way?"

After my question Lucifer fell into silence, holding his chin in thought.

"It seems..." Lilith finally began. "Adam and the Seraphims have taught you a lot."

"Yeah, those nerds." Lucifer tried to say with confident nonchalant, jokey dismissiveness, but ended up sounding melancholic, as he looked to the side with a sad smile at the end. The expression only lasted for a second.

Huh, guess he feels guilty about angering his angelic siblings with his previous actions regarding Lilith. Or just feels sad they're angry at him, and that's it.

"Takes one to know one." I said cheekily to Lucifer. He hiccupped, like he didn't know whether to look offended or happily entertained with the comeback. "And these statements are all my own." I said towards Lilith. "We mostly spent time working on the Tasks and the Naming as I get used to things."

"Eve, it's obvious that Adam and Sera have instructed you extensively on the Forbidden Fruit and all the arguments against it. You don't have to lie to us." Lilith said in that compassionate friendly way of 'I'm just trying to help you' that was starting to piss me off.

"Again with this weird assumption that I'm lying." I said back with an annoyed expression.

"I didn't mean harm by it," Lilith said with raised hands in a placating way.

And yet you definitely keep doing it. I thought. Is this strategy of 'lower their self-esteem and confidence so they listen to you' something she's doing intentionally, or is the bitchness natural?

"But that I expect Adam and Sera in their way to protect you, to be overly controlling to you, to the point of caging even your thoughts. That you're so brilliant with all of this insight on your own, makes it more disheartening to see you hold on even stronger to the cage they gave you." Lilith continued, with that 'kind-looking' expression.

And now compliment me, while subtly disparaging my husband and my kinda-mentor, kinda-guardian, so as to make me more likely to listen to you? Okay, this shit has to be intentional at this point.

I closed my eyes and thankfully Lilith let me collect my thoughts. I heard her and Lucifer whispering. I think they were congratulating each other like they were getting to me.

And they were, just not in the way that they thought.

I was always a passive person when it comes to dealing with people. Sure I'm more assertive and engaging with I know and like, but I didn't like fighting. Conflict, be it words or action I'd just rather it passes away.

I'd rather do what I want without getting into an argument.

...This was the beginning of Creation. If I can't make a change in who I am here, then what's the point?

I hate conflict.

I opened my eyes, my expression itched into stone, and my smile or playful lazy grin no longer there.

But I guess something must be fought for.

The Exiled Duo flinched at they met my gaze.

"Adam is my husband who I love, respect and trust. Seraphiel is my mentor who I respect and care for. If you can not speak of them without disparage them, then either hold your tongue or leave for we'd have nothing to speak of." I said with ice in my tone.

Lilith and Lucifer looked startled at the change in attitude. Frowning and instinctively wanting to object.

"Hey, come on now! That sounds like something the Seraphs would do to stop you from speaking your mind freely—" Lucifer immediately jumped in.

"Do. Not." I settled my gaze on him and he flinched back. "You can choose your words however you wish. You can choose to arrange them kindly, and you chose to arrange them to hurt." I said looking at Lilith, looking at both of them.

"Now, Eve—" Lilith began in that patronizing tone.

"Can you abide by this basic courtesy?" I cut her off, saying firmly.

"Of course," Lilith replied easily but I could see they annoyance in her eyes, the clinched fist, and frown that stayed on for a few seconds. Lucifer noticed this and held her hand, looking at her in concern, before frowning at me in disapproval. "We just wanted to help you, Eve. It's just hard because we have bad history with Adam and Sera, not that we wanted to hurt your feelings." She said, yet their was a hint of approval in her as well.

Right. Time to move on.

"Thank you." I acknowledged. "Do you believe Lucifer has Free Will?" I said. It was a non-sequitur to the situation, but it was time to actually get on to the actual discussion.

That threw the Morningstar couple off, and eased away some of the hostility that built up.

"Err, what? Yeah, obviously!" Lucifer answered right away, shock and a hint of amusement in his face.

"Yes. It is because of his jubilant aura that I understood what freedom was, and how beautiful it is." Lilith said, looking at Lucifer and smiling.

Still trying to subtly manipulate me by focusing on 'freedom this' and 'freedom that' or just bragging about her man? ...No, looking at them, she's just being affectionate to her husband, I'll give her that.

I relaxed my expression back to eased neutrality. The tense atmosphere seemed to be less now.

"And do you believe Lilith to have Free Will?" I continued.

"Of course!" Lucifer shouted, scandalized. Lilith was looking at me like she's trying to study, figure me out. "It was her unrestrained spirit, moving and feeling this world, yet restrained by..." Lucifer looked at me. I didn't react or give anything away. "Those that didn't see her like I did. It's why I wanted to help her be free to experience all of Creation like she deserves."

They shared a smile.

Wow, they really act like they're in some kinda Hallmark love story. ...Those were actually shit movies, weren't they? Like the more I think about it, their message was pretty terrible.

"Now..." I continue, pushing pass their romance mush moment. "Do you think Adam has Free Will?"

I could almost hear the record scratch in their head. They froze, their mood was gone and after a moment they turned to look at me with incredulousness.

"He sure doesn't act like this." Lucifer snorted.

"I sometimes wonder myself. Adam never questions the angels about anything. It's part of the reason we couldn't stay together. I wished to be question, to wonder and be curioous of Creation and my role in it. Adam wished to control me, to just obey like a puppet." Lilith spun her bullshit.

Yeah, I'm not gonna engage. Zeroing in on the argument.

"Oh? But aren't you equal?" I smiled sweetly, and for some reason that made them flinch. They were more thrown off than when I expressed my anger. "By the very property that you, Lilith, have Free Will, doesn't that mean that Adam, as your equal, would also have it?"

"...While we're suppose to be equals, I have found that I was never treated as such by the angels. Only Luci—"

"No, no, no," I waved my finger at them, a smirk growing on my face. "We're not talking about the Seraphs, the angels, how you were treated or any of that history. How things went down isn't important to the principle of this discussion, which is the assertion of Free Will."

"A-assertion?" Lucifer said, looking a little uncomfortable now. "You, kinda, talk like Michael a little bit, you know? Did she also teach—"

"Mine." I said with full declaration. "My Free Will is what's up for discussion here, and I'm treating the matter with the utmost seriousness. So let's not weasel or dally around on the topic."

Their was a feeling in the air now. A sharp focus. As if this moment was weighed as more significant than most. Like a sense of... numinous was present.

"Um, Eve, maybe we should calm—" Lilith began.

"I assure you." I met Lilith's purple eyes. A color that would later be attributed to royalty. Maybe with my future knowledge, this is like bullying the weak, but there are some things these two need to learn. Boundaries they must not push on. And my life, as well as Adam's life, are at the top of that list. "I have never been more focused as I am now."

Lucifer audibly gulped.

"So, as we've established, Lucifer has Free Will, meaning his actions are his own. He chose to purse you and love you. You, Lilith, have Free Will, because you got to reject Adam's commands, as you called them, thus proving you have Free Will." I smiled playfully. "After all, it would be very suspect is Lucifer was commanding someone to love them, and they have no ability to think or object."

"Hey!" Lucifer protested.

"Eve, your words cut too far." Lilith said in a more challenging tone. She wasn't playing the 'understanding mentor' role anymore. Good.

"I apologize as I meant no harm, but to prove the validity of your relationship. It was based on mutual affirmation after all, right? You both chose each other?" I said.

"Of course! What are you digging around with your words? Did you not just say you didn't wish for veils made of honeyed speech?" Lilith pushed forward.

"Just establishing positions. Lucifer has Free Will, you have Free Will, you are equal to Adam, thus by logical equivalency, Adam has Free Will. You not liking what he used it for, or his choices is irrelevant. After all, if he didn't have Free Will, you couldn't find him disagreeable, since you could just override anything the Seraphs told him to do with your words. You disobeying the Seraph, and him having to order you, rather than just go along with whatever you wanted without question, proves you both had Free Will and simply clashed on what choices to take."

"I can... accept that." Lilith said, warily, like she felt like a trap was being set, but not knowing what, and not liking it.

"And thus we come to this point. I was made of Adam's rib, and thus by the simple property of him having Free Will, and me being made of a piece of him, why wouldn't I have Free Will as well?" I grinned.

Lilith and Lucifer's eyes widened as they saw the point I was circling towards.

"Um," Lucifer huffed and tried to put on his confident showman persona. "Eve, sweetheart—"

"Don't call me that. Only call your wife that." I deadpanned with a look that would have invented the concept of deserts.

"Errr..." Lucifer looked towards his wife.

"That was a bad one, my Light." She said back.

"Right, sorry." Lucifer said blushing, before coughing to quickly move on. "Eve, you don't know the full abilities of the Seraphs. I should know since I am one, although exiled." He muttered the last bit, and Lilith rubbed his back in support. I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes. "The point is, even if originally you would definitely have had Free Will, they could have easily suppressed it, or added commands in your mind. Otherwise, why would you argue against our ideas so vehemently?"

"Having someone question my cognition and the sanctity of my own mind, with a know-it-all attitude, along with a solution of doing literally the only taboo in Creation, while saying it's in my best interesting—and side note, I've literally just met the two of you, and you already want to control the direction of my life. All of that together, I believe I'm rightly justified in being the tiniest bit pissed off." I finished my calm speech, switching from smiling to glaring at the end.

Lilith and Lucifer flinched, and leaned back hugging each other. Kinda comical reaction if I wasn't annoyed at that.

"O...kay, I guess, I can see your point." Lucifer slowly said.

"The simply fact of the matter is, I have the ability to choose and my own opinion on the matters of my life, however, me deciding to make choices that you disapprove of if frankly none of your business, and for me, not my problem." I said. "Me choosing to obey Adam and the Seraphs instructions is still my choice, and I don't need to do some thoughtless act of rebellion and disobeying just to prove a point. Certainly not to prove it to you, for I do not care to prove myself to you. Either of you." I said bluntly, no longer hiding behind pleasantries.

"...Wow, harsh." Lucifer said, grimacing a bit.

"Eve," Lilith separated from Lucifer to reach out toward me in a comforting gesture.

"Do not." I said blunted, not moving from my seat, just shaking my head a little. She piped back to her place next to her clown-looking husband.

"I simply do not wish to see another woman caged, and forcibly chained by commands of unreasonable angels against her will. That you might not be able to see the chains they are putting on you already by confiding your very thoughts on right and wrong." Lilith said with watery eyes.

She was met by my flat stare.

"Lilith," I said slowly. "This life, this role, as the First Woman, that is a life you didn't want. A life you saw as a cage. Just because it was your experience doesn't mean it is mine." I shook my head a bit to emphasis the point.

"That's just what the Seraphs and Adam want you to think!" She said passionately. "Please, let me help you—"

"Or that is what you think and applying to me for some reason." I said back. "I have no idea why you're seeing me as an extension of yourself. Is it because I'm the only other woman in existence?" I genuinely asked.

"Yes! You were made to replace me, and now I'm seeing myself who was broken and chiseled into a shape I can no recognize." Lilith said back without filtering her thought.

"That is nar... wow." Narcissus doesn't exist yet. Not sure what using that word would do. "That is very self-centered." I settled.

"I'm the only woman there is. Was, before you. The angels only had me as a model, and then they changed you so much." Lilith gestured toward me. "How else would you be a woman, yet be so... submissive?" She said the word like it was poison. Something vile that fell from her tongue.

So overdramatic.

"You... two make a lot of fanciful, baseless assumptions and just run with them without ever stopping." I said, another idiom taking place. "Have you considered that maybe my personality was based off of him?" I gestured with my head to Lucifer.

"Wait, what?" Lucifer looked taken aback.

Lilith blinked a few times, then her brain registered what I said and it looked like it crashed.

"Yes, I mean, the angels are capable of pattern recognition. If they saw two relationships, one that work and one that doesn't, wouldn't they try to recreate the example of the one that works? So if you have any objections on how I act, look right next to you for any issues."

"...Am I being paired with Adam?" Lucifer said some nonsense while looking horrified. I don't even wanna know how his brain works.

""NO!"" Lilith and I said at the same time.

"More importantly, I'm not sure if you forgot or didn't know, but the Almighty Himself took part in my creation, and I've not met any angel or Seraph at that point, and when I did meet Sera, I wasn't changed or made different. I'm pretty sure none of the angels would dare temper with His Work once it was completed." I raised an eyebrow at Lucifer, asking him to interject if I was wrong.

"She... right." He said, which had Lilith look at him surprised and slightly hurt. "My siblings are many things, but they wouldn't dare do something against Father's designs, if he had a final say in it." He explained, and Lilith nodded after a bit, accepting the answer, while looking unhappy about it.

The Exiled Duo fell quiet in contemplation. I gave them a moment.

"So!" As in a literal moment. "I believe given all the evidence presented, and arguments put forth, I have proven my own Free Will."

"Wait, we didn't—" Lilith began.

"Because you have it, ergo Adam has it, and thus I would have it. The Seraphs had a lot to do with my creation true, but the final stamp of approval was from the Lord God Himself. The First Woman is the Compliments the First Man. Thus by the simple fact that we are all—me, Adam and you—are equal in the eyes of the Lord, then I too must have Free Will."

I declared and their was a gong-like sensation in the world. As if my words resonated and Creation acknowledged them as True.

Lilith and Lucifer, even if they didn't understand what happened fully (and truthfully neither do I), couldn't muster up any more arguments about me having or not having Free Will.

"It doesn't change that the Seraphims rules restrict your choices, Eve." Lilith stood up in a burst of manic energy. Lucifer followed her example, but hovered. "Even if all your choices are yours, that's only because they gave you a limited set of them, thus anything you choose is what they want."

"So?" I shrugged.

"SO!?" Lilith cried out, looking at me as something incomprehensible. "So they're lying to you by omission! Blinding you to possibilities of your potential, of what you could be!"

"Again, so what?" I replied. "I don't assign malice to them if they didn't tell me something like you do. If they didn't tell me something, then either it wasn't time for me to find out yet, as I'm not mature or ready yet, or it was something they didn't think of yet. Sera had been nothing but kind and helpful in her guidance of me, since I still have much to learn."

"Then what about Adam? And his commands?" Lilith argued.

"My husband had done nothing but aid me with wisdom and gentleness since I've known him." I answered.

"And when what he wants goes against what you desire?" Lilith pushed.

"Then we talk." I gave her an exasperated smile. "Like Husband and Wife. We discuss the topic and come to a decision together."

"Really? Or only what he wants?" Lilith pushed.

"Again. None of your business." I said back firmly, but this time Lilith was too heated up to back off. "And what? Are you gonna say you two don't come to a mutual decision, or is it only mutual if you and Lucifer only do what you want to do."

"Well..." Lucifer looked aside.

"That's different. We always agree to decisions that involves us both." Lilith interjected.

"Then same for me and Adam." I shrugged.

"You are still young."

"And I have all the elders I need."

"You don't get it," Lilith shook her head, acting like she's pitying me. "There a whole world outside the Eden that you—No. That not even Adam knows. And he would forbid you, just because the angels ordered him to stay here too. When the day comes when you wish to step outside your role, what will you do when you're denied?" She asked like it was a gotcha moment. "What then, Eve? Will you just obey, while feeling nothing but misery in a cage you think you put yourself in, but they designed?"

"You are way overdramatic." I said, Inventing a Word, as the meaning hit her and Lucifer, staggering them for a second. "I have eternity. Whatever I can't do now, I can always do later, unless it's harmful to me. And before you say anything," I raised a hand to stop her objections from flying. "I trust the angels and Adam to have my best interest in mind. And if not the angels, then I trust my beloved husband."

"What they deem 'good' could be out of misplaced caution. It would good for you to see the world outside the Garden, yet even with eternity, the angels won't allow it till they deem you ready. You wouldn't know what events or experiences you could miss by then."

She's using the FOMO tactic? I raised an eyebrow.

"So be it, if that happens." I said with a shrug and stood up. Lilith went to object but I continued. "I think we reached a point in our discussion where no further talk would avail anything or change mindsets or persuade the other. As such as should do the peaceful thing and agree to disagree."

"It seems we have came here too late." Lilith started crying.

What the fuck?

"I'm sorry, Lilly." Lucifer hugged her from behind, using his flying to be able to rest his head on hers. Lilith put a hand on his arms, supportively. "Maybe if we'd have come here right away rather than waiting, we could have helped her. I'm afraid they taught her their way of thinking and limited her already."

"No, honey. It's not your fault, but the controlling Seraphs as usual."

My eyebrows twitched.

...Are... are they baiting me?

They paused and looked at me expectedly. Like they expected a reaction.

Oh, they are baiting me. Alright you chucklefucks.

"Oh for the love of—You know what? SERA!" I called, much to the shock of the Double L.

"W-Wait—!" Lucifer called only to be interrupted by glowing light.

"I'm right here, Eve." Sera spoke, revealing herself, to have been listening in with Adam next to her. He was looking only at me, wide-eyed with an amazed expression. A look that screamed 'THAT'S MY WIFE!'.

It was... doing things for me. Good things.

It seemed like Sera and Adam were far, but edited the Garden to listen in, then Sera traversed the distance instantly to be here, when I called, bringing my husband with her.

"Sera, can Adam and I be allowed a supervised trip outside the Garden sometime in the future, just to check out our eventual Kingdom we're meant to rule over and all?" I asked.

Lilith was surprised, before getting a smug look. As if her point was about to be proved.

"Very well, I don't see why not." Sera shrugged.

"W-WHAT?" Lilith shouted.

"Wait, how come?" Lucifer said afterwards.

Sera met both their gazes, and spoke firmly. Her answer was like a judge's gavel crashing onto the perception of all L&L knew.

"Because she asked."

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AN: I may have been listen to "You Say Run" a few times while writing this chapter. It really does work with everything. Also Egzod & Maestro Chives - Royalty.