#Erdnase

[fuckyeahgoodomens]

The words we have of Season 2 script! :)

15th word of the script: white

15th word dialogue: if

6th word, 6th line, 6th page: a

20th word, 22nd page: road

27th word, 27th page: Mr

28th word, 28th page: Bentley

69th word of the script: Something

7th word of the 12th line of the 7th page of the 4th script: the

Sandwich

Erdnase

[frederikschubert]

S.W. Erdnase Typospielwiese

[pissas29pissas]

Pls tell me someone here likes this shi / just some sketches ♣️♥️♠️♦️

[o-uncle-newt]

I do love that Aziraphale is willing to give away the Doctor Who annual but is only willing to lend the signed Erdnase. He'll never not be a magician at heart and he won't give that up.

On that note, I just found the post I did about Erdnase when Neil released the word from the script.

Turns out I threw just about every possible theory at the wall to see what stuck, and so my suggestion that Aziraphale owns a first edition with identifying info about the author ended up being correct, but also, obviously. I'd have been more surprised if Aziraphale, who owned the original Book of Revelations, did NOT own a signed first edition The Expert at the Card Table with clues to the author's identity.

(Also, I strongly disliked the joke about Jane Austen, but I'd have loved jokes about the true identity of SW Erdnase and his exploits.)

The thing I DO want to pat myself on the back for, though, is this:

Now, personally, having thought about it for the five minutes it took for me to get this far down in the reblog, my favorite way for Erdnase to be incorporated would be that, if I'm understanding the little tidbits of info that have come out, it seems very possible that Aziraphale and Crowley have lost some, if not all, of their angelic powers and connections. So could one, or both, of them be trying to recoup some skills by learning them out of a book- or possibly multiple books? Now that I type it out it doesn't SEEM likely but it would be cool.

BECAUSE I WAS RIGHT! It was in a minisode but I was STILL RIGHT! Aziraphale does use sleight of hand in a situation where he no longer has magical powers. It's not because he lost his magic in the present, and it's not related to Erdnase himself, but THAT STILL HAPPENED. And it was, and still is, my favorite of the theories that I had at the time. So that's pretty dang cool.

(That said, I do think that the "miracle blocking card" was a ridiculous plot device that makes no sense and seems far too convenient for them not to be used all the time. But it let my theory be accurate so I don't care for right now.)

[ermm-what-the-alpha-theta]

Kay,

Neil so far gave us i think 7 words from GOS2 script, which are: Road, a, Mr, Bentley, sandwich and, here it goes, ERDNASE. Specifically S.W. Erdnase, who is the author of ,,The expert at the Card Table'', a book about card magic tricks. My deduction is: more magician Zira is season 2 :D

[worrynoodle]

Crowley: pfft humans. You can't let yourself get too attached

Aziraphale: No, I suppose not.

How many humans did it take for them to feel this way? How many humans did they love and lose before they didn't allow themselves that attachment anymore?

Aziraphale keeps himself surrounded by books written by people he had met in person. Jane Austen, Oscar Wilde, S.W. Erdnase, and Prof Hoffman are all authors I know he keeps off the top of my head. His copies are signed personally

"To Mr. Fell, a wonderful student" Says his copy of Modern Magic.

And Crowley has a sketch from DaVinci. Imagine how personal their relationship had to have been for DaVinci to gift that to him.

What was their breaking point? Who did they lose that they said 'never again will I get attached to a human.' And instead, cling to one another.

[meatballlady]

Aziraphale was already one foot out the door by the beginning of episode 5

I know this is a crazy statement to make, but why else would he be giving his (most prized) books away? I mean really, what?

He gives away ("lend it to you" smh) an ORIGINAL ERDNASE. That book itself is TWO of my dude's special interests. TWO!

This is also compatible with the "the ball was really Aziraphale's big love confession all along" idea. This angel is patient AF. Did he need to do this now? Why the urgency? hmm?? Did he, maybe, know that he didn't have much TIME LEFT????

Also why is this mf walking around tempting fate, all "it will be a night to remember" and shit? He MUST know about its ties to the Titanic. HE KNOWS HE'S ON A SINKING SHIP. OR IS THIS ANOTHER MEMORY THING REFERENCE, AGAIN, LIKE ALL THE OTHER MEMORY REFERENCES THIS SEASON AUGH I AM LOSING MY FUCKING MIND HERE

[smugbarkart]

Finally finished this WIP I had of fanart of the protagonist of the amazing game Card shark🃏♦️. I always get lost in the rendering stage :')

me rambling about the game under the cut ˱ 𓈒 𓈊 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊 𓈒 ˲˱ 𓈒 𓈊 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊 𓈒 ˲˱ 𓈒 𓈊 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈉 ┈ 𓈒 ┈ 𓈊 𓈒 ˲˱ 𓈒

This is specifically of the protagonist crossdressing to get into an event undectected, which is very iconiccc ✨🪭 the whole dialogue the comte and eugene had was so funny to me Xd

Really loved this whole game & the protagonist a lot! The game was super fun and the diary entrys with the lil doodles eugene does are amazing??? love him sm :3 Made a whole bunch of doodels of him but idk if they are that intersting 2 see :') Also the whole plottwist in the end & the final mission? Amazing

Also loveeed Erdnase! queer icon tbh. Also did a doodle of him obvi XD

[indigovigilance]

How to Write Good Omens Meta

Someone left something in my ask box that intrigued me:

My Ask is for insight into the theory of clues and how S2 clues move and build S3. Is there a meta on this? (If not, would you consider it at some point?)

Well, I did consider it, and here’s my first shot at answering this really good question. It's more about the art of writing than of clue analysis, but I may do a second piece in this series, if it feels necessary. Anyway, here we go:

read on Ao3

Learn Something New

People want to read meta to learn something that they didn’t know before. This probably means you will have to learn something that you didn’t know before. Some meta-analysts arrive pre-loaded with a rich background in costuming, tarot, biblical canon, and the wide array of cultural references that appear in the show. We also seem to have a fair number of psychologists (formally trained or otherwise) representing. I (and others: see Chekhov's Contract by @ineffablyruined) happen to have a background in law and so I was able to make a unique contribution via my piece Sovereignty, Citizenship, and the Bookshop. But for other topics, I have to self-educate.

In my personal opinion, the work on direct canon analysis (that is, watching the show and reporting what you see) has largely been done and I don’t think there will be many more breakthroughs until some people go away and come back with a freshly informed perspective. Personally, I’m waiting for someone to go learn everything there is to know about S.W. Erdnase and tell us what they found, because that is a very specific reference that I haven’t seen fleshed out yet (link it in the reblogs if it already exists!).

Don’t Be Afraid of Outside Sources

For example, quite a few times I’ve gone away to read outside source material before writing a new meta. Good examples are: Honolulu Roast, The Lament of the Metatron, and The Hornet in the Beehive. These are topics where I had no particular advantage over anyone else, I just had a question and decided to keep digging until I had something that looked like an answer.

On choosing a topic: in each of these cases I began with an in-show piece of information that seemed both unambiguous in its directness and yet unexplained. Why is there a mysteriously appearing sign in the coffeeshop that says Honolulu Roast? Who is the Metatron? Why is there so much attention drawn to bees when Crowley goes up to Heaven? If I start with a solid question and then follow an investigative pathway, usually beginning with the Bible given the nature of this show but not always, I’ll usually find something.

There are also some Clues that we’re basically told to investigate. The books on the shelves. The movie playing in the background in The Resurrectionist Pub. These are unambiguous breadcrumbs but they’re a lot of labor. I’m not going to read all those books and watch all those movies. So pick one (1) and go read it, or watch it, and then tell us what you found, so I can read your 1,500 word piece to learn what I need to know about it. 

Sometimes you get enough information for a meta just by hanging around long enough and absorbing information. That’s how I put together my pieces on Terry Pratchett’s Death and Crowley’s Dream. The trick in this case is to be able to synthesize it, and for that, the very best way to learn how to do that is read other people’s meta.

Specializing

The asker asked the most important question of all: what’s the balance between trying to manage all the Clues or ignoring them entirely? Well, think of it this way (I’m borrowing an XKCD comic for brevity):

The takeaway here is, when you get a PhD, you become a hyperfocused expert in a very narrow topic and you’re relying on lots and lots and lots of other PhD students becoming highly specialized experts in other topics so that together you are expanding the diameter of human knowledge.

We (meta-analysts) are all getting PhDs in Good Omens, one way or another. Some people are doing their theses in color theory. I am doing mine on the concept of memory and identity permanence (though frequently dabbling in law). Yet others have flung themselves body and soul into the topic of Crowley’s gender and God bless them. Heck, there’s a team of people on Discord who are on any given day ripping the Bentley down to its studs and building it back up again. Feel free to explore while you seek out your passionate topic but don’t feel the need to tackle all of them. You’ll find the one that you fit best in. 

You do not have to solve the S3 plot puzzle by yourself. You have to find two pieces, put them together, and then go find a buddy that also has two pieces and see if your pair of pairs makes a quartet. Literally. That’s what we’re doing here guys. It’s a team effort or nothing at all.

Organize your ideas into digestible segments

Great, so you learned something new, you have a tantalizing hypothesis, and you’re ready to write! But what does a good meta look like?

Your abstract (which I recommend you write last) will go at the top, followed by evidence in a logically progressive order that finally culminates in your conclusion. If you’ve ever written a five paragraph essay, you have these tools in your toolbox. And yes, sometimes you will even need to rebut counterarguments (“but Neil said” is the bane of my existence) just like your teacher taught you. But it shouldn’t be formatted like a five-paragraph essay. This is not an 8.5”x11” sheet of paper with 1” margins: this is Tumblr.

Walls of text are great and all but reading handicaps come in all flavors and I for one benefit greatly from having section headers that help me navigate a meta. I’m much less likely to read it if all I have to find my place by is paragraph breaks.

Section headers should tell me what the next paragraph or two are about, and if I read just the section headers, I should have a pretty good idea of what evidence you’re pulling from where and what conclusion you’re going to support with that evidence.

Here’s my opinion on gifs: if I need to see Michael Sheen’s micro-expressions to really understand your point, include it. If I just need a reminder of where we are in the story, or what a costume looks like, a still is fine and less distracting. For a lot of things, though, images are unnecessary. You’ll find the right balance but don’t overburden your written work with images. I think there are quite a few people who only read my work on Ao3 because they simply don’t like the Tumblr, image-centric format.

Have a main takeaway

What does all your evidence point to? It may feel like stating the obvious, but state it anyway. Put a little ribbon on top of this gift you have given to the fandom. Label it. Tell them exactly what your conclusion is from all this information you gathered.

…but don’t feel a need to draw a firm conclusion

In my meta Continuity Errors, I conclude that Crowley stops time in order to move something that was hidden in the bookshop out of the bookshop. I do not speculate on what exactly that something is that he moved. I don’t need to. By leading others down this path, I am tapping the collective resources of the hive mind to think about what exactly was hidden with the bookshop’s protection. They may have some information I don’t because they’ve been looking other places. Not having a hypothesis for this shouldn’t (and didn’t) stop me from publishing my work.

Go back to the top and write your intro/abstract

Have you written your main takeaway? Did you support it with evidence? Good. Now take that and write a 20-30 word elevator pitch that you’re going to put at the top of the meta so that people know what it’s about before they commit to 1,000-2,000 words of being led down the garden path. I have a bad habit of burying the lead, and I’m trying to break it. For a moment people were worrying about putting big revelations below the cut so that we’re not interfering with Neil, but I don’t think Neil has ever seen my work and I doubt he ever will, and at this time my opinion is that playing “hide the lead” is more of a hindrance to the fandom than helpful to protecting the integrity of the IP. So be bold. Tell people exactly where you’re going with this and a short roadmap of how you’re going to get there. You don’t necessarily have to “give away the goods” but the theme should be obvious. An okay-ish example of an abstract is the intro to my first meta. My abstract for Continuity Errors is decidedly more tongue-in-cheek. You'll find your own style.

Cite and Tag

If you read someone’s post and it gave you a great idea, cite them as inspo! It’s a feel-good moment for them and it ties the fandom together. If you’re relying on your own prior work or someone else’s work to support a point, link the piece and tag the author. You will probably want to start copying links to metas that you like into a doc or spreadsheet to make this easier. Check out mine to get an idea of how you could organize a spreadsheet, or check out this doc to see an alternative approach to meta database management.

Speaking of which: @cobragardens, @aprilodite, @drconstellation, @vidavalor, and @irispurpurea, your work appears in this... whatever exactly this is idk.

Recruit a Mentor/beta

Various Tumblrites have published comments or posts that they are willing to beta other people’s work. Reach out to those people before you need them and ask if, whenever you’ve written your next piece, if they wouldn’t mind taking a look at it? Have an upfront discussion about turnaround time. Most of us work, and have other obligations, so it’s unlikely we can look at a thing the minute you send it to us, even if we’re active on Tumblr at that moment. Some people have set days off that they know they’ll have time to curl up with a cup of tea and read the first draft of your meta; you may find that having a weekly schedule with someone pushes you to produce and improve at a pace you wouldn’t achieve under your own steam. Writing is a skill; you get better by practicing and getting constructive feedback.

Anyways, I hope someone finds this helpful: maybe meta-analysis seems like an intimidating thing to get into, but it shouldn’t be! This is a welcoming community with room for all shapes, sizes and flavors of contributions. If you have any follow-up questions about this piece, please feel free to drop them in my ask box!

[vonlipvig]

I’m back, less diseased, WHAT HAPPENED WHEN YOU CHEATED FOR YOURSELF I MUST KNOW!

welcome back, hopefully in renewed spirits!

ok, so like, i couldn't decide whether to go with the comte's or erdnase's plans so i was like fuck it i'm nobody's pawn i'm gonna show them all what i'm capable of! but then you cheat for yourself and you get 5 aces in your hand, and the king is like get his ass, but the comte is like no it wasn't eugene, it was me (which is very nice actually, i could never hate him...), so he gets arrested instead. and then erdnase is like 'couldn't let you do that ;3' like.....cmon.

anyway, then the comte gets killed and you go back to run the tavern, and you get a scene with older!eugene serving some patrons and i think you can cheat and impress them, but i didn't get to do that cause i wen to pet the dog and suddenly the game ended AUGH.

which ending did you get?

[foxedthecards]

🍁 + "Do you have any favorite books or book genres, Jonas?" (Could also be directed towards Mr. Fox if you want hehe)

" Oh uhhh hm. I'm kinda not as uh...as big of a book reader as I used to be for some reason. Mostly non-fiction and biographies and a lot having to do with stage magic. Like I've got hmmm.. a copy of 'The Annotated Erdnase'...S.W. Erdnase that's the one who wrote 'The Expert At The Card Table'...fuck if I had a first edition of that book, man...and an old paperback edition of 'The Secrets Of Conjuring & Magic'. And 'Blackstone: A Magician's Life' But yeah. I like books like that. "

[fuckyeahgoodomens]

Hello Mr. Gaiman. It's not my birthday, but could tell us your favorite word from the GO2 script?

Hiya, I am not Mr. Gaiman :). Neil's page is here :). Anyway, the words we know from S2 are: a, road, Mr, Bentley, Sandwich, Erdnase, my favourite from them is Bentley :).

[most-normal-eccles-cake-ignorer]

Metatron used to be human maybe?? and related thoughts about Aziraphale's persuasiveness in S2E5

(using it/its for Metatron since apparently that's how it is narrated in the book, with the exception of Aziraphale using he/him for it)

From the wikipedia page for 'Metatron':

Genesis 5:23-24 :

Gonna try my first 'the rest is under the cut' here:

Interesting given the Metatron's offer to reinstate Crowley as an angel... Human -> angel isn't quite the same thing but it's still quite "unorthodox," to use its wording. I kind of figured that offer was just to fuck with Aziraphale (since Crowley would never) and I still think that; this Enoch/Metatron possibility just gives me more questions.

The way the Metatron chews the inside of its cheek (or maybe just clenches its jaw, either way) talking about "ingesting" things in the past makes me feel like it pains the Metatron somehow to say this/remember it? I've seen many people point out this was a clear attempt to be relatable to Aziraphale and make Heaven seem more tolerant/progressive than it is, but also if this Enoch thing is in the story, who better to deal with this mess than angelic conversion therapy darling, Enoch/Metatron?

I saw a post saying that line had the same energy as Stanley Tucci in Easy A going "I was gay once. For a while. We all do it. It's okay." and it has stayed with me

ALSO during my daily rewatch of the series a casual review of S2E5, I noticed Aziraphale acting a lot like the Metatron while inviting some of the traders and shopkeepers of Whickber Street to the dance meeting:

Mr. Arnold @ music shop: Refuses outright at first, but is coaxed into it by the promise of the 1965 Dr. Who Annual proof copy

Mutt @ magic shop: Cannot attend under any circumstances bc of anniversary plans with their spouse ... until S.W. Erdnase's annotated personal copy of Expert at the Card Table becomes available for loan

Nina: We get "perfectly ordinary invitation with no hidden agenda of any kind" and then he lies to her again that the Christmas lights will be discussed so she accepts

"He's discovered his civic obligations," if by civic obligations we mean 'ability to identify what people want most and offer it to them in return for obedience'.

The Metatron does the same with with Aziraphale: Comes in all friendly, makes the invitation, gets immediately refused, then sweetens the deal by offering what Aziraphale really wants (to be with Crowley and have Heaven's approval again so he doesn't have to deal with the cognitive dissonance anymore).

What does this mean? (i have no hecking idea) Does the Metatron (in addition to just wanting to split the dream team up) also see itself in Aziraphale a little bit? Or is the parallel more for us as viewers to see (even more) how Aziraphale still uses Heaven's tactics and thinks he knows what others need better than they do?

On the other hand, apparently Sandalphon is said to be the prophet Elijah raised to angelic status in a similar way and that didn't really seem to be a thing in S1 soooo who knows.

[shoemakerobstetrician]

We have Erdnase as one of the words Neil released from the S2 scripts. It’s a pseudonym used by the author of a book about card tricks, presumably written by a magician. It has never been revealed who Erdnase really was.

Maybe Aziraphale is revealed to be Erdnase in the script?!

[tonydaddingham]

✨ episode 5 - running commentary✨

- this episode better be the one to Alter My Brain Chemistry, I NEED AN explanation for the too fast for me scene pls

- THEY BETTER KISS I S2G

- right okay hi shax I hate you 😘 but Miranda is killing WAIT TEN THOUSAND WHAT THATA OVERKILL ITS ONE SILLY BILLY ANGEL AND A DUMB ASS DEMON

- "can I watch" crowley TONE IT DOWN KINKY BOY

- "there will be sandwiches" LOL IM IN BABES

- DOCTOR WHO lmao harpischord guy get fucking SERVED

- HES JUST TEMPTED SOMEONE AND GIVEN AWAY A BOOK??? my guy going through some ROUGH character development

- hell is literally so understaffed wtf

- MAGIC SHOP AGAIN YES

- ERDNASE REFERENCE ERDNASE REFERENCE

- Crowley is so proud of his husband BUT THAT FEZ NEEDS TO GOOOOO

- neil if you ever read this pls can we have aziraphale be a permanent party planner bc he does the mostest and pls ignore my criticism of ep1 and 2 I take it all back pls pls more aziraphale planning tf out of shit

- SHAX MOMMY YES💅💅💅 ALSO ERIC MY BELOVED My sweet baby boy

- FRENCH AZIRAPHALE YOU NEED TO STOP crowley is FED UP he looks like a kid whose mum got caught chatting at the supermarket

- aziraphale pls stop

- NINA KNOWS WHATS UP GAY SPOTS GAY

- no crowley don't make that face no why why why WHY YOU LOOKING LIKE THAT😭😭😭✨ he loves you CROWLEY YOU BLIND FUCKKNG IDIOT and you love HIM you emotionally stunTED APE

- the glasses and sideburns are still BUGGING ME someone explain did he go shOPPING OFF SCREEN????

- ERIC NO BYEBYE MY LOVERRRRR

- wow that was a long pre credit bit wtf

- DATE???? oh no crowley is pulling away no no no

- "SMUT?" fucking OKAY??? DO IT THEN YOU PUSSY ASS BITCH✨💓

- fuck they're about to have a Conversation aren't they and get drunk and it's about to get EMOTIONAL

- Crowley FUCK

- CROWLEY BOO

- "friend" ok lol

- he's about to throw mf HANDS but goob is so innocent NO WAIT CROWLEY NO DOMT DO THAT oh thank fuck

- matchbox ajamakajalam sns

- lmao the growth that Crowley just did in 30 seconds gave me WHIPLASH

- Muriel no pls don't do it bbygirl💓💓 OH GOD YOUVE GONE DONE IT NOW

- ah Jim's mug

- DECORATING MIRACLES YES BABY

- WAIT AND SEE ✨✨✨✨

- oh aziraphale I love u so MUCH 😭😭😭

- Mrs sandwich I LOVE HER no aziraphale don't ask pls bby

- CROWLEY WHAT U SNIFFIN HONEY UR LIKE A BLOODHOUND FOR TROUBLE WHAT A POWER

- GOOB YOU ARE FABULOUS DARLING I LOVE JT✨

- "you young people"

- F BOMB FUCK YES

- oh no Maggie no not you CROWLEY YOU HERO GOD BLESS tell em babes

- lmao are they even gonna get to dance this is so stressful

- Mrs sandwich just chill out honey you are a madam SEX WORK IS VALID REAL WORK I said what I said

- "have a vol au vent" SO MARRIED💓

- omg am i now liking Maggie and nina hmmmmmmm AZIRAPHALE'S FACE crowley you could have that IF YOU EVEN TRIED MY GUY

- I HAVE SUCH JACKET ENVY LMAOOOO goob you are the only valid character

- WHAT no stop goob stop

- fuck OFF THEY ACTUALLY SANCE FUXK KM SWEATINF NOOOOOOK💓💓💓💓💓💓💓💓💓💓

- AHHHHHHHHHHHHH BOYS PLEASE

- well fuck that's put a spanner in the works

- aziraphale go fucking NAILS GET THEIR ASS oh that's not good✨

- GOOBY NO BE QUIET SHHHHHH

- GOOB NO

- NO GOOB

- the mf coat is SPECTACULAR ✨✨✨✨ did they spend the whole budget on it???? HES SO FABULOUS AND FRUITY

- oh my god the miracle is working against them fuck

- the fact that the humans are just chilling lmaoooo

- NEIL WE NEED CROWLEY AS A LAWYER PLS THANK U they just got SEVRED✨💓

- lmao IT WAS FAKE HAHAHAHAHA

- Mr brown shut up pipe down back in your box

- see that's what you get when you run your mouth

- IS THIS EVERY

- CMON GIVE ME EVERY

- oh my god crowley is the PATRON VIRGIN saint of sex work I LIVE FOR IT god bless or maybe not

- IS THAT A PRAISE KINK I SEE

- "rescuing me makes him so happy" FUCKING DECEASED

- Muriel lmao we know this it's ok bby take HIM TO HEAVEN IN THE ANGEL-ON-THE-ASS TRACKSUIT

- the MUSIC OKAY ITS GOOD NOW YES YES YES✨

- GOING UP

- I'm dead

[daisygrayce]

Aziraphale: TIL we might be a couple

Again, I believe that Aziraphale and Crowley have swapped appearances for protection.

It’s been a couple days since my post on Aziraphale in Heaven. I had intended to get on to talking about The Confession, The Kiss and The Departure. BUT I realized that I can’t skip ahead in Aziraphale’s transformation. If we don’t talk about his romantic journey, we’re only seeing half of where he’s at when he declares his love and begs Crowley to run away with him.

There’s two parts to Aziraphale’s Season 2 love story: the talk with Nina outside of the coffee shop and then when he sits down with Maggie and Nina.

Part 1 - Outside the coffee shop with Nina

So far, the afternoon hasn’t gone particularly well for Aziraphale. Crowley has GIVEN AWAY his Dr. Who book and offered to let Mutt LOOK at his first edition of S.W. Erdnase’s “Expert at the Card Table”. Even worse, Crowley is refusing to talk about it.

And then Nina pounces. Her assumption that they were together was something Aziraphale has always denied. And like so many times in the past, he denies the association or the closeness of the association. For someone who has been on Earth for 6,000 years, Aziraphale is surprised by so many things. Nina’s observation carries an additional weight because it’s a natural an assumption, accepting not an accusation. Worse yet, she doesn’t give Aziraphale the room to deny the romantic association. She’s only looking for context.

He’s thrown. As he’s trying to find a way to re-frame his relationship with Crowley when she presses on. Her assumption that his relationship with Crowley is romantic, is something that hasn’t occurred to Aziraphale. He’s a voracious reader and has experienced romance but only in the pages of novels. And he’s not always the most adept at translating from page to present. He’s not surprised now. He’s floored.

But those thoughts get trampled by her suggestion that Crowley could be a “bit on the side.” He’s incensed that anyone would think anything less than pure of Crowley. All of the love and respect he has for Crowley comes bubbling to the forefront in his forceful defense.

And in that defense, he uses “angel”. This is so important. He realizes that for all of his talk about Crowley being a demon, he still sees him as an angel. Staying in character as Crowley, Aziraphale couldn’t call him a “demon,” but in that instant Aziraphale knows that it’s true. His voice deepens with realization. He doesn’t see Crowley as anything but the “angel” he met in the stars. Demon or angel, Crowley’s essence is pure good, good for him.

But that word also comes with a simultaneous understanding. Crowley calls him “Angel”. Annoyed. Amused. Bored. Always. He feels the term of endearment. He feels the affection. He’s never noticed. How could he have never noticed? Is that really the way Crowley feels? He’s devastated.

As Crowley, Aziraphale is left with few options to think over these new revelations, so he finds a bottle to help him process. Wine. Not whiskey.