may--hawk

[may--hawk]

"I went to monsieur rossignol's night classes in 1760."

Monsieur Rossignol, pour quoi tu ne chantes pas?

A group of the two of them here

Very inspired by art noveau :D thought process behind the art here

Couldnt decide which version I liked better so here are both

There's no way aziraphales wings would be well groomed in heaven

[may--hawk]

birds of england (ineffable remix)

Birds of England, take me high / atop this burning treeline / sending signals up in smoke / I’m never coming home

Sometime, oh, in the year or so after Armageddon, when all the world had felt like eternal springtime stretching on and on into forever, the Earth reborn, reprieved, an exhale of relief, Aziraphale would start each morning with the dawn coming down across the city. Each morning the bright swell of hope in his chest that this would be the day something would change between them, the day one of them would finally reach out to the other, and say - but of course they never did, each day following the same course as the day before it and the one to come after, stuck in the same old round, their predestined orbit. Each day, Aziraphale watched the morning skies for some great portent, some sort of sign. A certain color in the sunrise, a waver of cloud, a flock of crows on the rooftop across the way. A fortuitous crossword clue, a dark old car on the street. Anything to signify this particular day as different from the others, this the day where everything changed.

And then one particular day out of a hundred similar days Crowley called him up, the quick short ring coming down the line and Aziraphale already picking up, phone cradled between his cheek and shoulder as he carefully sewed a set of signatures back together. “Park, ten minutes,” said Crowley, and Aziraphale said “thirty,” automatically, his heart already fluttering faster in his chest, not that he needed the time, not that he even wanted it, but it was always like this with him and Crowley. A negotiation, a push and pull. A careful dance, a guard against ruin.

So he met Crowley at the park in twenty-eight minutes, and had to look away from the little curl to the edge of Crowley’s mouth that showed his pleasure, and when Crowley handed him a bag of frozen peas because Aziraphale had forgotten about them again their hands had brushed, Crowley’s fingers cold from the bag, and this was no different from the day before, would be no different from the day after. The bag of peas the same brand, the same spies around the pond, Crowley dunking the same mallard he dunked every time because he didn’t like way it looked at them. Nothing different. No sort of sign telling Aziraphale to act, and now. They fed the ducks, and talked about something they’d talked about a dozen times before, and when Crowley suggested lunch, that same little hopeful rise to his shoulders Aziraphale had seen for thousands of years, Aziraphale said yes. Yes, of course. They turned to go. At a sharp cry overhead, Aziraphale looked up, stopped walking. Crowley, hands shoved in his pockets, didn’t seem to notice. A long dark snake moving away from him, slinking through the park like oozing asphalt. Aziraphale put out a hand to Crowley’s arm to stop him, not quite touching him, just the faintest brush of fingertips on cloth. Crowley turned, his mouth parted, his eyes - visible through his glasses at this angle - fixed on Aziraphale’s hand, still between them. “Look,” Aziraphale said. He pointed up. A second, two, where Crowley just kept staring at him, as if waiting - finally he seemed to see Aziraphale’s hand. He stepped back, looked up. Another sharp cry from above, from the pair of falcons in the sky, circling around and around each other, crossing and swooping some great delicate dance where, despite feints and thermals and sharp cuts, they never once touched.

“What’re falcons, again?” said Crowley. “I never paid much attention to the oracles.”

“That’s because you were too busy drinking with Claudius,” Aziraphale said, and then admitted, “I don’t remember,” the weight of thousands of years of knowledge and memory and want pressing down on him, bearing him down to Earth. The falcons soared above them, cutting across the sun, just dark outlines from this far down. “Oh, just look at them,” Aziraphale said.

“Jealous, angel?”

“A bit.”

Crowley said, “We can, you know. Go flying. If.” He swallowed heavily. “If you want to.” Crowley’s thin chest heaved, as if he’d run a race, or gone for a fly, and Aziraphale didn’t understand it, he didn’t understand why -

(And Aziraphale had thought he would know when the perfect moment came: that the very air would still around them, the birds would cease to fly, the planet stop in its turning, even the stars faltering in their twinkling, that he would know the moment when he would finally turn to Crowley and lay a hand on his arm, and say, “Crowley, I-”)

Aziraphale crumpled up the pea bag and shoved it deep in his pocket, shoved it down, out of sight, and Crowley watched him, brow furrowed, watching the movement the whole way down, but he didn’t say anything, either. “We shouldn’t,” Aziraphale said, and tried a smile. “Someone might see. We’re much larger than falcons, you know.”

“Don’t have to be,” Crowley said, but his mouth was thin and flat, and in his dark glasses all Aziraphale could see was the reflection of the ground. His own pale and wavering self, and beyond, the empty sky.

So the days slipped on away from the end of the world and the right moment still didn’t come, because Aziraphale would know it. It would be something big and momentous and fitting, and if that wasn’t it, if there was no great epiphanic moment that Aziraphale was waiting for, then it meant he was just afraid -

So Aziraphale waited, and waited and waited, and nothing ever changed, a hundred times in the shop where Crowley’s eyes sparkled at him in the dim light, his chin propped up on his hand and the look on his face, Aziraphale’d only seen it on statues, only heard it in music, only seen it in the bright new glory of a star, and their hands were so close as Aziraphale reached forward and played another move or Crowley poured him another glass of wine, and once Aziraphale had been busy talking about something or other, he didn’t even know what, was just talking to fill the space between them, which was narrowing every year, it seemed, drawing them closer and closer together, and Crowley had cut him off, said, “Aziraphale.” Just a low murmur, really, and Aziraphale gasped a little, he couldn’t help it, his heart jerking abruptly like it’d caught a thermal, and he said, “Yes?” leaning forward a bit, and Crowley leaned forward too but didn’t speak, his lips moving wordlessly, his eyes bright, fixed on Aziraphale’s, and Aziraphale said again, “Yes, Crowley?” leaning forward in his chair, about to slide off, where he would fall on his knees in front of Crowley -

Then a noise on the street: a car door slam, a pair of loud human voices, raised in laughter. Crowley frowned and sat back very slightly, and so Aziraphale too, pulling himself up as if from the edge of a great cliff, pushing his shoulders against his chair to steady himself. They stared at each other. Crowley said, “Nothing, I - nothing.”

And then Aziraphale’s in the elevator, and this is it, it’s here, the second coming, and he will stop it or ruin himself trying, he already knows. It’s what he was made for. He will not see Crowley again, he thinks, not unless it is across the battlefield, because despite all his bark and bluster Crowley is too stubborn to run away, to save himself. Aziraphale can already feel the reach of Heaven coming down from above, the holy brightness settling over him like a hood over his eyes. He can barely see Earth, its rich golden sunlight. He can only make out Crowley because he’s so dark and still. Far above him, something catches his eye: a bird in the sky, just a dark blot, singular and high. Freedom, thinks Aziraphale suddenly, dredging deep in his thousands of years of memory. Falcons mean freedom. But he can’t tell if it’s a falcon he’s seeing now. He’s not sure what he’s seeing. From down here, Aziraphale thinks, half-blinded, it could be anything. Even a sign.

Read the rest of the mixtape on AO3.

[may--hawk]

Mistakes are being made....

[may--hawk]

[may--hawk]

Michael Sheen you have some explaining to do

(I don't think anyone understands how plain silly this makes me feel)

[may--hawk]

One of my favourite illustrators of Alice in Wonderland - Tove Jansson's style captures the strange fantasy world of Carroll perfectly!

[may--hawk]

The Tower of Babel (François de Nomé, 1630)

[may--hawk]

I had the pleasure to work with the most lovely sensiblesquirrels on this piece for the upcoming Hornz magazine from the @goodomensafterdark subreddit. She made the flow chart, I gave it the spooky look and made the icons.

Happy tempting!

[may--hawk]

Botanical illustrations taken from 'Naturgeschichte des Pflanzenreichs', Eßlingen, 1870 by Jakob Ferdinand Schreiber.

Scanprojekt Community Projektbudget 2012.

Wikimedia.

[may--hawk]

On the road to Season 3 - Day 274

The way Crowley looks at Aziraphale here 🥺🥰

[may--hawk]

Aziraphale + guilt

[may--hawk]

Nikolai Vorobyov • Tugarin Zmeyevich (detail)

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on the head of a pin🕺

[may--hawk]

ad vitam aeternam

Summary:

In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Aziraphale and Crowley converge on a monastery in northern England, each on an assignment as an undercover priest. Or, on the nature of miracles, love, and forgiveness. “Give it a try.” “What?” “Confess to me.” His voice was low and sweet. “What - I - confess what?” Aziraphale said, and laughed nervously. “I have nothing to confess. Certainly not to you.” “Well, how about drinking in the confessional? Start small.” “What - I - you tricked me into doing that!” “I thought angels couldn’t be tricked.” “Tempted,” Aziraphale said, absent-mindedly. “Angels can’t be tempted. Alright, fine. Yes, I confess to - to drinking in the confessional. Give me that,” he said, reaching over into Crowley’s side and wrenching the bottle out of his hand. He drank, and tucked the bottle between his thighs, daring Crowley to say something. “See?” Crowley said. “S’easy once you start. Go on then, what else?”

Rating: T

Word count: 25,831

Tags: Angst, hurt/comfort, angst with a happy ending, temporary character death

Notes: Inspired by @chlorine-and-daisies's fantastic line "what exactly is it that makes miracles work?” from their great Crowley POV story “and all i do is kiss you, through the bars of a rhyme (i’d do the stars with you anytime)”.

It was winter in England, far up in the still-wild north, and the roads were absolutely wretched. It was late by the time Aziraphale hopped off the back of the cart, gathering up his robes as he hurried down to the dock. “Hold that ferry!” he called to the completely stationary boat, which looked small against the wide river. The waters were dark and flat in the failing light. A more lonesome sight Aziraphale had not seen in some time, the only figures he could see - as he heard the slap of the reins, the slow creak of the cart pulling away - the ferryman on the dock and the boat’s single passenger. The man, clad in a traveling cloak, sat staring at the massive church on the far shore, the cathedral lit like flame by the wash of the setting sun.

“Sorry, sorry,” Aziraphale said, bustling onto the docks. “These roads.” The ferryman made no reply, holding his hand out for the fare. Dropping a coin into his hand, Aziraphale picked his way onto the boat, the vessel swaying under his weight. “Good evening, Father,” Aziraphale said to the other passenger, whose alb - dark and heavily embroidered in red - was just visible under his traveling cloak.

It was early December, darkening already in the late afternoon, and the sun was sinking quickly over the water. It would be dark by the time they landed. The blasted North. You know, just once, he’d like an assignment back in Rome, or Persia. Somewhere pleasant. As if reading his blasphemous thoughts, the priest looked up at him, hood falling back, and he saw - “Crowley!” he said, with real pleasure.

“That’s Father Crowley to you,” the demon said, looking Aziraphale up and down. “Father Fell. What the deuce are you doing here?” He had a strange little half-smile on his face, as if he was pleased at Aziraphale’s presence.

“Same thing as you, I imagine. I’m off to Wickham. There’s a miracle there I’m to verify.” Aziraphale threw a glance over his shoulder, but the ferryman seemed more focused on pushing them off from the dock than eavesdropping. Crowley raised his eyebrows, politely interested, as Aziraphale continued. “Not one of ours, I’m afraid. I’m sure it’s a hoax. They always are.” He sighed a little, and Crowley made a sympathetic noise.

“Haven’t had a really good miracle since - Galilee? Golgotha?”

“Flanders, sixth century,” said Aziraphale, absently. “The outline of Christ in a courgette. Don’t ask me why. One of Uriel’s little vagaries. Hold on, you’re not-”

“Nah. I’ve got to tempt a priest. I hate tempting priests. S’ so easy. They never put up a fight.” The setting sun cast a strange red, almost Hellish glow on Crowley’s face, reflecting sharply in his dark glasses.

“Yes, well,” said Aziraphale, looking at the long line of Crowley visible under his draped robe.

Continue reading on AO3.

[may--hawk]

This is my submission for this week's GOetry prompt hosted by @isiaiowin and @goodomensafterdark

Does it count as a concrete poem? Probably not. Did I follow the prompt? If you squint... but I had fun so I guess it's valid LOL

There's a crack in my home

A small fissure that keeps on w i d e n i n g

I don't know when it first began,

Nor the first nail to

pierce.

Was it when my hand longed for

Yours among the soot

Or when I cherished your

bright eyes

Instead of the stars?

There is a rift in my home,

An open wound

Where I bleed away from you.

Tag list (tell me if you wanna be added or removed 💛): @howmanyholesinswisscheese @captainblou @crowleys-hips @crowleys-bentley-and-plants @hello-ello-ello @patoslover @ficreader500 @marika-misc @ghostsparrow @ineffable-rohese @lickthecowhappy @starry-eyed-darling @fearandhatred @nimbusalba @celticseawych @wibbly-wobbly-blog

[may--hawk]

Don't interrupt date night. 😇🖤😈

[may--hawk]

I would not wish any companion in the world but you

William Shakespeare - The Tempest