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aethelflaedladyofmercia · 4 years ago

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Infection - Good Omens Fic

My second fic for tonight for the @bingokisses prompts! This one fills my second “Wrist Kisses” square, which was paired with “Patching up a wound.” Get ready for some hurt/comfort, strong angst, and Crowley desperately trying to protect his angel. Promise: this one ends in soft bed cuddles.

This will be edited before going on AO3, so let me know if you notice anything is off.

CW: blood, not too graphic but definitely there.

Aziraphale spread his hands before him, still steaming lightly from the force of the holy blasts he had thrown at the demons. They were fleeing, finally, five dark shapes vanishing into the soil before him. He clenched his jaw, holding his cold expression, his pose, and his breath until the dark stain of their infernal presence had dissipated from his mind.

Then, slowly, he lowered his hands to the wound in his side.

“Oh,” he murmured, as his fingers slid through the rents in the fabric of his tunic to find the deep gashes slick with blood. “That’s…a bit worse than I thought…” He pressed harder, and suddenly the pain lanced through him, burning tearing. His power reserves were low, but he’d need to heal that quickly or face discorporation and likely some uncomfortable questions from his superiors.

Lifting his trembling hands, Aziraphlae looked at the deep red blood, and saw a thick black shadow already spreading through it like a cloud. “Oh, very bad, indeed…” Demonic corruption. Already, he could feel the pollution working its way into him – not his corporation, but his true angelic body on the astral plane – seeming in like a toxin, corroding the light of his soul. If he didn’t purge the befouling influence quickly, he would else face something far worse than discorporation.

But that would require focus, quiet, and a spot to work where the world wasn’t filled with fuzzy mist��the ground not tilting alarmingly back and forth…and…

“Blast.”

He toppled over, collapsing into the dew-speckled grass.

Crowley tore through the forest, ignoring the stinging slap of tree branches and snaring twists of undergrowth that tried to slow him down. “Aziraphale!”

Another little stream opened up suddenly just ahead of him, and, unable to stop in time, he attempted to leap straight over it. Nearly made it, too, but the soft earth on the far side shifted and slid as soon as his feet touched it, and he rolled back down the bank, hitting the cold water with a splash.

“Stupid bloody – Aziraphale!” Somewhere in this endless ancient forest, on one of the countless hills or ridges or hollows, the angel was fighting, injured, needed his help and Crowley had miles upon miles still to search and he didn’t have time for this.

He set about scrambling up the far side of the bank, digging his fingers deep into the muddy earth.

It had started, nearly a hundred years ago now, with a suggestion in a misty field in Wessex.

“Be easier if we both stayed home,” he’d proposed, metal sabatons sinking in the English mud. He could almost picture it already, a nice little cottage and a roaring fire, a few glasses of the local brews.

But Aziraphale hadn’t been interested. “Absolutely out of the question,” and he’d stormed off full of all the sanctimonious indignation an angel could carry. “We aren’t having this conversation” – but he’d certainly followed it up with a strongly-worded letter, ensuring Crowley in the strictest of terms that he would never consider such a scheme, that any cooperation on assignments was simply inconceivable, that he would henceforth devote all his efforts to thwarting any of Crowley’s infernal works that he caught wind of, and do his utmost to ensure that all hellish influences were wiped from this peaceful island, nay, this blessed world and all its inhabitants…

Crowley read the letter twice, then packed up his armor and camp and headed for London.

Once he was dressed in proper, comfortable clothes, there was no chance anyone would recognize the sophisticated red-haired traveler as the dreaded Black Knight, and before long he had settled into an alehouse with his feet resting comfortably on a bench by the fire and set to work telling stories of the immortal warrior dressed all in black, leading raids against unnamed villages somewhere to the north.

Within a few weeks, the rumors reached him of Sir Aziraphale of the Round Table and his band of holy knights, scouring Mercia and Northumbria for signs of the Black Knight. Crowley tossed in a few stories about the rebel band joining up with invaders from the south with just enough tantalizing details to keep the angel on a wild goose chase for months and congratulated himself on a job well done.

When next Hell checked in, he shrugged ruefully and explained that Heaven’s agent (a fierce and terrifying opponent) had effectively stopped him at every turn but also that Crowley (a cunning and devious force for evil who deserved a commendation and a promotion) had prevented the angel from pursuing Heaven’s larger agenda. He added in some gossip about the queen he’d picked up from travelers out of Camelot, broadly suggesting that was somehow his doing, and declared his mission to the island an overall success.

And, incredibly, they bought it.

A very neat solution, Crowley thought several decades later as he lounged by the Mediterranean, sunning himself on a rock and sampling the latest developments in viticulture and winemaking. He was already trying to work out the best way to include “convincing monks to sell wine to a demon” in his upcoming report. It sounded like an appropriately demonic activity.

The countryside was swirling with tales of a terrifying monster ravaging the villages, fighting endless battles against a glowing warrior of light, based solely on rumors he started and allowed to grow and expand in the retelling. Seven different noble warriors – three armed with holy weapons that could only have come from Aziraphale – had come searching for the beast, and Crowley had gleefully sent each to a different corner of the world.

Everybody won, really: Crowley’s reputation was surging Down Below as tales of his narrow escapes grew; Aziraphale and his agents got to parade around being self-righteous; and Heaven and Hell took credit for whatever developments they wished.

What could possibly go wrong?

“…which kept me from directly joining the emperor’s invasion of Armenia, as originally instructed, but I was able to stay behind in Constantinople and focus on the corruption of countless aristocrats.” As if wealthy humans had ever needed help becoming corrupt, but it was the sort of result Hell liked.

Beelzebub glared down through the cloud of flies, and as always Crowley wondered if ze believed a word he said. It was impossible to tell, really; the Prince of Hell’s expression never wavered. “Tell me where you were szupposed to go next.”

“Another king’s court, thousands of miles away.” Crowley furrowed his brow, trying to remember.

“Dagobert, king of Austrasia, heir to the throne of all the Franks,” Dagon interrupted, mouth perpetually stretched into a grin with far too many teeth.

“Yeah, that one. And, really, I was looking forward to it.” The Franks had some of the best grape wine in the world, but he’d discovered that the people of the north had done some interesting things with mead and fruit wines, and over in Bohemia they’d started experimenting with hops in their beer instead of gruit, and really Crowley needed to give these developments his full attention. “But, you know, turned out that angel was still on my tail.” At this point, dropping rumors of his devious activities for Aziraphale to chase had become a game, and he’d left a trail of breadcrumbs for the angel all up and down the continent. “We had a great battle in the northern forests, and I barely escaped with my skin intact, but he’ll have a hard time recovering from the wounds I left him with.” He’d not seen Aziraphale in-person since that field in Wessex, but there was always a local legend of warrior fighting beast he could co-opt, and Hell did almost nothing to verify his claims.

“Laszt time you claimed he’d never walk again,” Beelzebub pointed out, looking distinctly uninterested.

“Did I?” Crowley might have gotten carried away. “Right. Well. He healed more quickly than I could have expected. Blasted angel.”

“Why have you not infected him yet?” Dagon wondered. “That would put an end to all this.”

Crowley ran his tongue over his teeth. Every demon carried some toxin or venom, the remains of their Grace, twisted and tainted by the Fall, and most could spread it through their claws or nails. Infected humans became more susceptible to suggestion and temptation; but to other supernatural beings, it was far more dangerous. The strongest could eat away at an angel’s true self, as holy water did for demons, only slower and more painful.

Crowley, serpent that he was, carried it in his fangs, which made it difficult to administer; and he’d always found it cheating, and a little cruel. In four and a half millennia, he’d only ever used it in the most dire of emergencies. “Well, ah, I did. Only, as you know, Aziraphale is – is impossibly strong. He seems able to shrug off what I can give him.”

Dagon’s perpetual grin grew even wider. “Good thing we sent a team, then.”

“A…a team?”

“After hearing your reports, Hastur and Ligur volunteered to take on the angel themselves. We had them bring a few specialists along as back up.”

“Oh.” Crowley’s stomach dropped down to the ninth circle and kept falling. “And…and when did they leave?”

“Two daysz ago,” Beelzebub offered. “Ligur reported they’d tracked the angel down momentsz before you came in. They’re ambushing him asz we szpeak.” For once, the Prince of Hell shifted forward, studying Crowley’s reaction with unreadable eyes.

“Oh. Well. Good for them. Ngk. Glad they can…glad to see…” He clenched his jaw before his two superiors could see how his teeth chattered, how the panic threatened to overtake him. Swallowing it down, Crowley tried again. “I mean, Aziraphale is one of Heaven’s greatest warriors, as I’ve personally experienced many times. I’m glad he’ll finally get what’s coming to him.” He tossed his head and continued as casually as he could, “Any chance I can join up with them? I’d love to, to witness this glorious…victory for our side.”

Crowley stood for an eternity, pinned between the sadistic gleam of Dagon’s eyes and the inscrutable calm of Beelzebub’s. His fist tightened, nails digging into his palm as he struggled not to show a single sign of worry, no trembling knees, no sheen of sweat.

Although the game wouldn’t exist for another twelve centuries, Crowley had already perfected his poker face.

Finally, finally, Beelzebub nodded. “It might be too late. Catch up if you can.”

The Germanic forest that seemed to stretch on forever, rocky ledges giving way to soggy river land and back. Humans lived here – humans lived everywhere – but there seemed to be none for miles in every direction, not even as much as a road. The night was silent as the grave, completely still, even the stars shrouded in clouds.

At first, Crowley crept along quietly, looking for hints of the demons’ passing, listening for the sounds of battle. Trying to maintain his cover as an interested observer. He could sense them – somewhere – not close, but not far.

After an hour of this, his façade began to slip, the worry bubbling to the surface. Soon after, there was no longer even a trace of demonic presence in the forest, apart from his own. Which meant they’d done their work and left. And that meant…

As the sun began to rise, he flung all caution to the winds, racing through the forest like a hunted deer, calling the angel’s name again and again. Maybe it was a trick. Maybe they suspected, maybe they were just waiting for him to slip up.

Or maybe they’d already killed Aziraphale. And it would be all his fault.

As he pulled himself out of the muddy stream, he felt it – the faintest hint of angelic presence, ahead and to the left. “I’m coming,” he whispered, his voice too thick to shout.

It took another half-hour before he found the clearing, bursting out of the trees into ground burned black, twisted and churned in a ring as large as a basilica, and there in the center, in a circle of grass incongruously untouched, lay a motionless white figure.

“Aziraphale!”

The ruined ground was hot on his feet, like hallowed ground, but he raced across it without a second thought, collapsing onto the blood-soaked grass. It seeped into the ground, too much blood, red turning to black before his eyes.

“No, no, no, no.” When last he’d seen Aziraphale, they’d both been dressed in sixty pounds of armor, Aziraphale’s surely blessed for extra protection; but now he wore the simple clothes of a traveler, pale blue tunic shredded, four deep lines carved into the flesh of his side. A bag lay beside him, loaves of bread spilled across the grass, as well as ceramic jars of alcohol, oil and honey. “Aziraphale, please…”

“C…Crowley?” His eyes fluttered open just for a second. “Looking…for you…”

“Don’t try to talk, Angel.” He shifted, lifting Aziraphale’s head to his shoulder, cradling the angel in his arms. “I’ve got you now.”

“Certainly…” Aziraphale’s mouth worked for a moment. “Got me…Clever trap…”

“I…Aziraphale, I didn’t know…I swear, I never thought…” Oh, Satan, he was getting paler every second. “I’ve got you, alright? I’ve got you.” One hand braced the angel against his chest, the other wandered down to the deep cuts in his side. The bleeding had slowed. Because it was healing? Or because he was running out of blood? “This might hurt.”

“Hurts…already…”

Crowley rested his fingers against the cuts, trying to ignore the way Aziraphale gasped, sounding too weak to draw breath. “I know, I know.” He closed his eyes, looking instead to the astral plane, searching for the heat and glow of Aziraphale’s true form. It should have been blinding; instead he found an endless sea of dark energy, pulsing, growing.

It was devouring Aziraphale, smothering him, infiltrating his Grace and turning it…necrotic. Killing him.

“Crowley…I…I…”

“I told you, don’t talk.” Crowley’s face felt wet. Without thinking, he brought his hand up, wiping his cheeks, leaving smears of angel blood under both eyes. “I…I can do this.”

Bracing himself, Crowley grabbed Aziraphale’s side, digging his fingers into the cuts. He pressed Aziraphale against him as the angel arched his back, crying out in pain, voice breaking –

Crowley – in a shape loosely approximating his human form – waded into the black mass. It sucked at his feet like a bog, and smelled even worse; thickening around his legs with every step, trying to hold him, pull him down. It stung where it touched bare flesh, and he tried to keep his hands clear as he searched.

At last he saw it – there – at the center of the twisted mass of decay, a single ember, flickering fitfully, sinking into the morass. He struggled towards it, as the dark energy nearly solidified, tendrils forming to pluck at his tunic and belt.

He reached out his hands and, yes, he could reach it, cradle it in his hands, lift the tiny spark of power free from the sea of death. All that was left of Aziraphale, a single brilliant gemstone, not even strong enough to burn him. He lifted it to his face, even as more dark tendrils formed, angrily trying to snatch back the treasure he guarded.

“Angel, Aziraphale, please…” But at the touch of his breath, the light stuttered and nearly extinguished. Of course. Angel, demon – incompatible.

One black coil snagged his wrist, searching, crawling towards the light.

“No,” Crowley snarled, transferring Aziraphale’s light to his other hand, “I won’t let you have him!” Closing his fingers carefully around the last fragment of Grace, he held it above his head, as more lines and waves grabbed at him, trying to pull him under. “You messed with the wrong bloody demon.”

He grabbed the tendril that held his wrist, twisting it around his arm like an anchoring rope. Once it was secure, he relaxed his arm, letting it become insubstantial as mist. The dark coil sank into him.

He’d hoped that the demonic taint would be compatible with his body, allowing him to handle it as easily as Aziraphale did holy water. No such luck. It burned and sizzled, like solid potassium into water.

Crowley braced himself and pulled.

Somewhere back on the physical plane, he writhed and screamed, body convulsing as another demon’s toxins ran through it, filling his veins like fire and ice. He thought his corporation would burst, torn apart, that his true form would be shredded to pieces under the pressure. He almost lost his grip, on both planes, almost broke the connection, almost dropped the precious light of Aziraphale back into hungry black chaos.

But however much it hurt Crowley, Aziraphale must feel it tenfold. Which made his silence all the more terrifying.

Hang on, Angel. Just a little more…

His body strained against him, trying to fall away, contact only maintained through his grip on the dark energy, taut as a bowstring even as he pulled it into him until –

POP!

The last of the infection broke free of its connection to Aziraphale, snapped into Crowley. On the astral plane, he collapsed to his knees, skin swollen from the effort of holding it all in. Carefully, so carefully, he lowered the last glowing fleck of Aziraphale’s soul, setting it free. “You…” he sucked in a painful breath. “You’re alright now. Just rest…”

Crowley’s eyes fluttered open, back in reality, body clammy with sweat, every joint and every organ burning with pain. He scrambled away from the angel to the edge of the grass just in time to cough – heave – and retch out what felt like gallons of boiling black vapor, steaming out of him, swept away by the wind.

When he finally felt empty again, his arms and legs were trembling from the effort of holding him up. He could feel the blood coating his face, dry and flaking except two wet channels under his eyes.

Still coughing, he managed to crawl back to Aziraphale. The wound at his side was bright red, no sign of the dark corruption that had nearly killed him. But the angel still twitched and jerked fitfully, and his skin was fever-hot. The demonic infection was gone, but a mundane, earthly one had taken its place.

“D’n w’rry, Angel,” he muttered, mouth numb with exhaustion. “Just gotta…” He miracled up a length of cloth, almost as long as he was tall, but that was the last of his strength; healing would be impossible.

Reaching for Aziraphale’s bag, he found a jar of strong Roman-style wine, alcohol mixed with vinegar and salt water. He pulled at the seal, wax and cloth breaking free and a stream of wine spilled across the cuts, rinsing them clean. Aziraphale flinched and whimpered, but Crowley held him in place with one hand on his hip.

“Almost done.” Remembering something he’d seen a human do in Athens, centuries before, Crowley broke open the jar of honey and smeared it across the gashes, sealing them under a thick, sticky layer. He hoped it would work. You never really knew with human medicine. “Alrigh’ Angel. Time to…to sit…”

He slid an arm under Aziraphale’s shoulders and lifted him as far as he could, nearly collapsing under the angel’s boneless weight, until Aziraphale’s head was on his shoulder again. Crowley shook out the cloth and began wrapping it around his middle.

Aziraphale felt a burst of heat, sparking through every part of his body, like he was being boiled alive from the inside out.

Then, just as abruptly, it passed, and he was resting against something sturdy and warm.

His side still ached and burned, but in a distant, fuzzy way. He couldn’t focus on it, but he could feel the gentle pressure of fingers moving here and there.

Wasn’t he supposed to be worried about something? Something important. Of that he was certain. His eyes felt heavy as the weight of the world, but he forced them open.

A pair of hands, stained red and black, tied a knot in a cloth that seemed wrapped around his middle. They moved slowly, awkwardly, as if they didn’t know what they were doing. He could feel breath stirring his hair, and it sounded heavy, laden, tired.

Aziraphale tried to tip his head back to see who he leaned against, but all he managed was to turn slightly, his eyes finding a vast expanse of impossibly black fabric. “C…Crowley…?”

“Nh. Told you…” The body behind him shifted, and Aziraphale lost track of his surroundings. When they cleared again, he was lying on soft grass. One hand brushed across his forehead, pushing away the curls, and a cool breeze prickled across his skin. “Better?”

The face hovering above fuzzed in and out of focus. Yes, it had red hair, and a narrow face streaked with blood. “You…” Aziraphale tried to lift his heavy arm, reach for the already-fading form. “You’re hurt…”

“Nah.” The figure scrubbed at his face, not noticing the blood. Was Aziraphale dreaming it? Did he also imagine the eyes turned solid-gold with exhaustion? “’m fine. Jus’ rest now.”

“No…I was…” his hand managed to reach his side. “Toxin…bleeding…”

“Don’ worry. All better.”

Better? Every angel knew nothing in Heaven or Earth could heal demonic corruption. Well. Perhaps he’d dreamt that, too. Perhaps he was dreaming now.

He managed to roll onto his uninjured side. There was a frightful chill, but trying to curl up pulled at his wound painfully. “Nf,” he managed, without even the energy to cry out.

“Cold?”

“Y’s.”

A moment later, all the cold melted away, replaced by something warm pressed against his back, a light touch resting protectively on his hip. “Got you,” the voice whispered, a gentle brush of air across his ear. Then a sharp snap some sort of blanket draped over him, shielding him from the wind and the sun. “S’good. Sleep now.”

“Can’t,” Aziraphale objected. “I never…”

With a sharp breath, Aziraphale woke up. For a moment, he was disoriented – it was dark, everything tilted and strange – but, no: black sheets, grey walls, a few books resting on the bedside table near a mug of tea. The bedroom in Crowley’s flat. Which meant that the arms gently wrapped around his chest, the body pressed against his back, and the face nuzzling his shoulder…

“Mhf. ‘Wake already?”

“Sorry, my dear fellow. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“S’fine.” Crowley shifted, bringing his chin up to Aziraphale’s shoulder, wriggling his body into a more comfortable position.

“I’m still not used to sleeping.” He doubted he’d been out for more than an hour. “Not sure I’ll ever quite get the knack.”

“Told you. S’fine.” Crowley’s voice was still thick and heavy. He clearly had no intention of waking up so soon. “You wanna read now?”

“Not just yet.” He patted Crowley’s arm and leaned into his embrace, feeling lips brush absently against the back of his neck. “I think I dreamt this time.”

“Really?” He could hear the grin in Crowley’s voice, practically feel it against his skin. “Thassa first. Dream ‘bout me?”

“You know, I rather think I did. We were in a field…”

“Hmmm. Picnic?”

But Aziraphale’s smile faded as the details came back. “Your hands were…they were red. And I was in so much pain. Crowley, I think it was…” Without realizing it, his hand was pressed against the four scars on his side. “It was when I…”

In seconds he shifted from comfortably at rest to alert and awake, heart thundering as if it wanted to break free. He remembered the attack – fourteen hundred years ago now – the struggle for his life – the wound – and waking up, a week later, lying alone in a dying field, weak and hungry. He was never sure how much of what he remembered was a fever dream – but someone had bound his wounds…and then left. The cloth was soaked with blood; it had never been changed.

He hadn’t seen Crowley for another thirty years. Aziraphale only ever alluded to the attack once, and the demon had just growled learn to take better care of yourself. Never a hint of why the forces of Hell had ambushed Aziraphale, or why they never returned, or if Crowley had really been there to heal Aziraphale afterwards.

He hesitated to mention it now.

But Crowley’s fingers glided down his arm, twining with his, pressing lightly into the scars as if to ensure they were fully healed. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No. I…I mean…it wasn’t the attack, though it felt as though it had happened only moments before.” Aziraphale shuddered at the memory of five demons, bursting out of the woods, claws and fangs and… “No, it was…surprisingly pleasant. I dreamt you were there. Afterwards. Taking care of me.”

“Oh.” Then, softer. “Oh.”

“You dressed my wound. Talked to me. And…and held me. Just like this.” He tugged Crowley’s arm across his chest again. “Stayed with me until I woke up.” His fingers played around Crowley’s, massaging knuckles. “I…ah…back then…I always wondered…”

“Yeah. That was…yeah. It was me.”

A lump formed in his throat, and all Aziraphale could do was nod, bringing Crowley’s fingers to his lips. How strange, to have confirmation after all this time. It shouldn’t have affected him, brought tears to his eyes, but, oh…

“Thank you,” he whispered, when he could speak again, and he pressed a kiss into Crowley’s palm. “I…I’m glad you were there.” More kisses, trailing to his wrist.

“Didn’t stay.” There was no mistaking the regret in his voice.

“Oh, no, I know you couldn’t.” Another kiss to the wrist. “It was a different time…we were different and…just that you stayed long enough to save me from an inconvenient discorporation…truly, thank you.” But when Crowley didn’t relax, Aziraphale switched to a teasing tone. “I used to think it couldn’t possibly be you. Why would a demon help an angel his own side had left for dead?” Ah. That wasn’t funny at all, was it? He continued, more serious. “I…I don’t wonder anymore. I know why.”

“Do you?”

“Oh, you silly old thing. Yes. I was quite fond of you back then, too, you know, though I didn’t trust you at all and very much wanted to throw you off a cliff for your…absurd pranks.” He smiled in memory. “And I would have helped you the same way, if you ever needed it.”

He lay there a moment longer, in the warm circle of Crowley’s arm. “I…don’t think I’ve ever told you…how very safe you make me feel.” Aziraphale turned over, just enough to meet Crowley’s eyes, expecting them to be warm and soft. Instead, he found them filled with pain. Aziraphale quickly reached up, cradling his demon’s face. “Darling, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“It…it was my fault.”

“What?” The words slid down his spine like ice, and Aziraphale scrambled to sit up. “No, it’s not your fault. It was Hastur and – and those other demons who attacked. I don’t know why they suddenly decided…Ah. You mentioned me?”

“More than that.” A tear ran down Crowley’s face, just one, and dropped unheeded between them. “I – I thought I was so clever. If I didn’t want to do a job, just say you stopped me. Told them how – how fierce you are. Fearless. Strong. And you are.” His eyes were pleading now. “I wanted them to…to think you were a-a-a worthy opponent.”

“And instead they decided to eliminate me.” He reached up to brush the tear track from Crowley’s cheek. “My love, no, it wasn’t your fault. I’m sure I gave Hell plenty of reasons on my own. You weren’t their only agent on earth in those days, and the rest were certainly not as fond of oyster dinners.”

“They wouldn’t have sent five demons if I hadn’t…”

“You don’t know that.” He kissed Crowley’s cheek. “And glad as I am for your help, I was fine. Really, my injury looked much worse than it was.”

But Crowley shook his head. “Angel…you almost died.”

“What? No, I…” He remembered hands, coated with red blood, and something black.

“I pulled all the toxin out of you. I…I held your soul in my hand. It was almost gone.” The tears started again. “You were almost gone. I…a few minutes later and…”

“Oh, Crowley.” Aziraphale pulled him into his arms, felt Crowley’s arms twist around him, tight as only a serpent’s embrace could be. “I didn’t know…”

“I stayed as long as I could, I swear. Two days.” Crowley shuddered. “Then they came back. Even more of them.”

Fear boiled through Aziraphale, as if Crowley’s words could summon the demons into their bedroom. Calm down. That happened fourteen hundred years ago. “What…what did you do?”

“Told you. I left.” His voice was strained, broken. “When I sensed them coming. I just…abandoned you. Led them on a chase. Told them you’d attacked me. Had reinforcements. Everything I could think of, until they gave up. And then I went back to Hell with them. Left you there.”

“Crowley. Look at me.” He pushed the demon back until he could see his eyes. “Thank you.” Crowley started to shake his head, and Aziraphale gripped his jaw firmly. “No. Don’t blame yourself. I was in no condition to fight, even if you could have woken me. And I would never ask you to fight a horde of demons. By leaving me, by leading them away, you saved me. And more importantly, you saved my best friend.” He leaned in and kissed Crowley lightly on the lips. “So. Thank you.”

“I wanted to stay.”

“I know. I…I wanted you too as well.” His fingers searched for Crowley’s, crept between them, and squeezed. “I hope, er, your former side didn’t do anything too bad when you returned.”

“Nah,” and there was that smile, the careless grin Aziraphale adored so much. “I was a legend. Only demon to ever face you and walk away unscathed. Even Hastur was afraid to face you again. Dagon had me develop a whole training course on angelic combat.”

Aziraphale threw back his head and laughed. “They thought you could beat me?”

“Oi! Mind who you’re mocking, I am the Serpent of Eden, Hell’s fiercest and most effective agent!”

“Only because you lie about everything.”

“You’re one to talk!” Crowley wrapped his arms around Aziraphale, pushing him back down into the pillow, laughing just as much. “You invented lying! To God!” His lips brushed against Aziraphale’s ear, but it was a serious voice that whispered, “I will protect you always, Angel.”

“I know.” He kissed Crowley’s jaw, then rested against his face, cheek to cheek. “Thank you.”

Eventually, they settled down to try sleeping again, Crowley pressed against his back, long fingers resting on the curve of his hip. With a snap, Crowley’s wing emerged, covering Aziraphale in a feathery cocoon. Just like in his dream.

There, in the embrace of his demon, Aziraphale felt safe, and warm, and welcome, and other things he’d never expected to feel. Whatever came next, they had each other. Forever.

#good omens fanfiction #good omens prime #ineffable husbands #hurt comfort #hurt aziraphale #protective crowley #but also #protective aziraphale #aziraphale and crowley #pre-arrangement #cw: blood #CW: wounds #bed sharing #sleepy cuddles #wing cuddles #My writing #tumblr fic

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lady-divine-writes · 5 years ago

Text

When an End is Really a Beginning (Rated M)

Summary:

Months after the Armageddon-that-wasn't, centuries after their adventures in Egypt, Crowley and Aziraphale have finally gotten to a place where they can be together in relative peace. And where the status quo seems nice and all, Crowley is ready to move forward. He hopes Aziraphale is willing to move forward with him. (1283 words)

Notes: As a patron of @whiteleyfoster, I had the honor of reading the ending to their amazing Prince of Omens comic. So, I wrote this as a thank you present (one of two). It contains no spoilers to the story that hasn't been made public yet. It's just a little epilogue that takes place after the events of the Good Omens mini-series, but includes the Prince of Omens version of the characters and references to their time in Egypt.

Read on AO3.

“Do you remember Egypt, angel?” Crowley asks, closing the book he’d been flipping through - one of about a hundred Aziraphale brought with him when he moved into Crowley’s flat. It’s a thick, rather daunting book titled Holy Treasures of Egypt. Crowley had sneered at it like a rival serpent when he saw it, but Aziraphale assured him that, like Crowley’s long lost Big Book of Astronomy, it was filled with more beautiful photographs than annoying words.

So Crowley gave it a go.

He ended up fixated on it all afternoon, reading it from the beginning - even the annoying words. He’d bring it closer when he thought he recognized a piece of art or jewelry, or to mock a particularly botched translation. Crowley had been so taken by the book, he even brought it to bed with him, focusing anxious energy on it instead of on his angel stripping off layers to join him.

“Egypt when?” Aziraphale chuckles, slipping his robe onto a nearby chair and climbing under the covers. “We’ve been there so many times! You have to be specific.”

“You know when,” Crowley answers softly - so softly, Aziraphale doesn’t hear it so much as it tugs at his heart.

“Remember?” Aziraphale says with a nostalgic smile. “Do you honestly think I could forget?”

“I don’t know,” Crowley mumbles self-consciously, worrying the edge of the blanket, rolling the fabric between his fingertips. “We’ve had quite the run. 6000 plus years crossing each others’ paths. The details could have gotten muddy on some of them.”

“My dear boy …” Aziraphale inches within a foot of Crowley and opens his own book “… I think our time in Egypt is the time you spent with me the longest. That was a first. Of course I’m going to remember it! And fondly so.”

“Was that … the only first you remember from that time?”

“No, and you know it, you old serpent!” Aziraphale teases. “That time was full of firsts. First kiss, first I love you … first time making love.” Aziraphale stops reading and sighs. He glances from his book to the demon beside him staring at the blanket in his hands hard enough to set it ablaze and wonders what’s going through Crowley’s mind.

It’s been months since the Armageddon-that-wasn’t, months since the non-executions that cemented their new freedom on Earth.

Months since they decided to go native and move in with one another.

They’ve made plenty of decisions in that time. Plenty of changes.

Crowley grew his hair out again. It’s pulled back now using the white ribbon Aziraphale gave him. The poor thing! Aziraphale thinks. If Crowley didn’t have his magic to keep it together, it would have disintegrated a long time ago. The great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandsaplings of the plant that came with it survived much the same way, and are happily potted in Crowley’s collection. As for the ribbon, Aziraphale knows Crowley keeps it on him at all times.

He discovered it in Crowley’s coat pocket when they switched bodies.

But it’s rare that he wears it, too afraid of losing it after all this time.

His wearing it now should be a sign, Aziraphale knows. He just needs to figure out a sign of what.

“Is there some reason you’re bringing it up, my dear?”

“No.” Crowley looks up to meet Aziraphale’s concerned eyes - eyes that know when he’s lying. “Yes. I guess, I just … I did a little math and today … well, I don’t know if you know this, but today’s kind of an anniversary … for us.”

“Is it?” Aziraphale asks, curious smile twitching his lips.

“Yes.”

“Which one?”

“The … uh …” Crowley’s cheeks pink as he remembers all three - one especially, even if it isn’t the point of the conversation. It amazes him that with the amount of times they’ve made love over the years - and the few times they’ve fucked - that that first time could make him blush like a teenager “… one that mattered most. The I love you.”

“Oh.” Aziraphale’s smile grows wider, making Crowley suspect he did know, even if he didn’t mention it. Why wouldn’t he mention it? “How do you suppose we should celebrate it then? We’ve already eaten dinner. We could go out dancing? To the cinema?”

“I got you a present,” Crowley admits. “I just … I might be a little nervous about giving it to you. Though, to be honest, I shouldn’t. I’ve done it once before.”

Aziraphale’s brow furrows. That he didn’t expect. “Oh?”

“Yes.”

“Consider me curious.” He sets his book aside and inches closer. “Please … may I have it?”

“Give me your hand.”

Aziraphale’s heart stops before he can move. He means to say sure. He means to say yes! But neither word comes out of his mouth. He lifts the hand closest off his lap - his right hand. Crowley shyly shakes his head.

“The … the other one, angel.”

Aziraphale swallows hard. He raises his left hand and gives it to Crowley. “This one?”

“Yes.” Crowley takes Aziraphale’s hand in his and starts sliding something down his ring finger. Aziraphale doesn’t see where it comes from. It could be that Crowley was holding it this whole time. When it reaches Aziraphale’s last knuckle, Crowley brings it to his mouth and kisses it. He returns Aziraphale’s hand to his lap and Aziraphale sees it: a shimmering gold band, Egyptian inspired - a serpent with ruby red eyes wrapped around itself.

Same as the circlet Crowley once wore in his hair.

“Oh, Crowley!” Aziraphale gushes, bringing the ring up to his face for a closer look. “This is … it’s exquisite!”

“Do you like it?”

“Yes! Yes, I …” Aziraphale peeks up, raises a brow. “Did you …?”

Crowley’s pink cheeks go flame red. He rolls his eyes. “No, angel! I bought this one. Actually, I had it made special. I thought it only fitting.”

“Fitting?” Aziraphale closes his hand into a fist, holds it against his heart.

“Yes. You and me, we’re one of a kind, I think. An angel and a demon in love? Don’t see that every day, do you? So I thought, you know, a one of a kind relationship requires a one of a kind ring. An …” Crowley clears his throat but his voice dips as if he’s not necessarily trying to be heard … in case he’s wrong “… engagement … ring.”

Aziraphale’s eyes go saucer wide, his entire face glowing with light shimmering from within. Regardless of what’s happened to them, of what Gabriel and the Archangels have said, what Heaven and Hell have done, no one, not even God Herself, could take that glow away from him.

That glow, in all its magnificence, is completely Aziraphale.

“Crowley, this is the most beautiful ring I’ve ever seen in my whole existence! Thank you! Thank you so much!” Just when Crowley thinks Aziraphale will lean in for a kiss, he turns his face to the side, bites his lower lip. “But … it’s left me a little embarrassed.”

And while color rises to Aziraphale’s cheeks, it drains from Crowley’s. “Why is that?” he asks, since that wasn’t his intention.

Not by a long shot.

But the color returns with a vengeance when he sees Aziraphale reach into the pocket of his pajama top and pull out a small black box.

A small black box nearly identical to the one Crowley hid underneath his pillow when he came to bed.

“It seems …” Aziraphale opens the box, revealing a silver band molded into the shape of two wings with a blue stone in between and offering it to a starstruck Crowley, “I may have gotten you a similar present.”

#Good Omens #good omens fanfiction #ineffable husbands #prince of omens #aziraphale #anthony j crowley #crowley x aziraphale #aziraphale x crowley

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theladydrgn · 4 years ago

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Vampire Aziraphale!!!!!! 😇

YEAH!!!!!

LIKE, OK, SO, i know Crowley technically fits the ‘vampire aesthetic’ but fussy, doesn’t know how modern technology works, dresses 300 years out of date Aziraphale is perfect to be a vampire!

I’m honestly really excited about it and it will probably be the next fic i write ones Serpent and The Prince is finished!

Have a little snip from early in chapter 1 ;D

Crowley had never been good with cold. A mixture of poor circulation and low body-fat meant he was more susceptible to low temperatures than others. It also meant he needed to either dry off or lose the wet clothes before he got sick, or worse.

“H-hey? C-c-could someone t-t-turn the b-bloody heat on?”Crowley called out, trying and failing to keep his teeth from chattering. Surely there was someone here? The door had been unlocked after all. There had to be a shopkeep or employee or someone.

Stumbling from one aisle to the next Crowley was on the verge of just giving up and shucking his clothes where he stood, public indecency be damned, when from around the next corner he bumped straight into a cloud.

“Oh good lord!” Said the cloud.

Strong hands gripped his arms, keeping him from just toppling right over.

“Oh you’re sopping wet! And freezing!”

Crowley blinked rapidly behind his sunglasses. The cloud – no. Not a cloud. The man, who looked like a cloud, sounded posh. Very posh. But Crowley’s glasses were smudged and streaked to the point of making it impossible to discern any details about the cloud-man other than cream and soft. His vision might have also been swimming a little bit, but it was hard to tell.

Very soft if the initial collision was anything to go by. Though at this point Crowley couldn’t care less if he’d bumped into a cloud-shaped man or a man-shaped cloud. He just wanted warm.

“C-cold...” Was all Crowley could mumble.

A strong arm slid around his shoulders. “Of course, dear boy. Come along now. That’s a chap.” Said the man-cloud-person.

Crowley allowed himself to be led, he didn’t exactly have the strength or wherewithal to object and besides, the cloud-man seemed to know where he was going.

#ask #tag game #my fic #dragon writes #vampire!aziraphale #hardcorenerdthings

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thechekhov · 5 years ago

Photo

This is shamelessly self-pluggy but I’ve been tormented with this fic for the past 3 weeks and I’ve been writing it quite regularly, so I wanted to have a proper header for it. Who knows, I might even finish this one.

Linked

Fandom: Good Omens

Pairings: Aziraphale/Crowley

Concept: Sometime between Crowley’s initial suggestion of starting the Arrangement in West Essex and their much later meeting at the Globe, Aziraphale had not only accepted the idea of working together, but also realized he didn’t even need to wrap Crowley around his finger - the Serpent of Eden would do that all on his own.

This is a story set in approximately the year 1000, where one demon is caught in a magic circle of a certain angel (definitely not on purpose or anything, nope, a complete accident, that was) and the two are subsequently forced to spend a bit of time chained to one another. Before either of them have time to get used to it, the worries and details of their arrangement come to a head, and they have to come to an agreement before a third party forcibly decides the next course of action for them.

#good omens #fanfic #chekhov writes fanfiction #chekhov writes #crowley #fem!crowley #chekhov draws GO

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humananalytica · 5 years ago

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Good Omens Holiday Swap

Fic for @maandarinee, based on two promps:

I always love Crowley and Aziraphale having some magic Connection where they're Connected for whatever reason and can hear/feel/whatever each other;

Aziraphale or Crowley gets summoned/captured/trapped and the other goes into Rage Mode while getting them back (alternative: one THINKS the other is dead [pls don't actually kill anyone/ bring them back miraculously] and goes into Rage Revenge Mode)

Hope you enjoy! Fic under the cut.

“Where the Heaven are you, you idiot? I can’t find you!” Crowley cast around wildly for even a hint of Aziraphale’s presence. He’d been terribly worried, and frustrated, then there’d been a flash of pain, and now- “Aziraphale, for God’s- For Satan’s- Ah! For somebody’s sake, where are you?!”

A wall of water slammed into Crowley’s chest and knocked him to the ground.

At the same time, a trace of demonic essence collided with Crowley and settled back in his ribcage, just as lost as the rest of him felt. “You’ve gone,” he said to the empty bookshop, “Somebody killed my best friend!”

“Bastards! All of you!” he screamed, disoriented and grieving. Aziraphale was gone and he wasn’t coming back, not ever, and the bookshop was on fire.

His gaze fell on a book that had, somehow, not yet gone up in flames. The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter. He picked it up. He could, perhaps, save just this little something from the fire. Crowley willed the doors to open for him and left the bookshop.

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Getting summoned was an exercise in bending quantum mechanics that always left Crowley vaguely nauseous. He didn’t really appreciate his corporation being jerked around without a warning. As a result, the small handful of humans [1] who had actually managed to summon him over the centuries tended to find him in a bad mood.

This particular attempt was one of the worst that Crowley had ever experienced. It was full of metaphysical holes, less of a net and more of a tangled mess of rope. It pinched his noncorporeal being uncomfortably when he pushed against the bounds of the circle, but didn’t offer burning pain or impermeable resistance.

“Demon Crawly, serpent of Eden.”

“Don’t use that name anymore.” Crowley drawled, tucking his fingers into his pockets. “Haven’t used that name in a couple millenia.” He rotated slowly, studying the summoning circle from all angles.

“It was the name that I invoked to summon you.” The summoner replied, without a whisper of confusion or doubt. “It is the name we will use.”

‘We?’ Crowley mentally hissed in irritation, even as he began cataloguing the ways he could get out of the situation. So far, it was looking like his summoner was working with outdated material, felt entitled to . . . whatever he was going to demand of Crowley, and seemed completely convinced that he hadn’t made a mistake. Relatively straightforward to work with, if you had a few milennia’s experience working with Hell.

“I need to learn how to have sex with a woman.” The summoner dramatically threw open the door to the windowless room, revealing a young-ish man with a sweatshirt hood pulled down to his nose.

Crowley blinked, trying to parse why sex with a woman was in any way relevant to what he’d, specifically, had ever done in Eden. Well. Better to let them tell you what they think they’re getting.

“So you came to me,” Crowley tilted his head and raised his eyebrows, as if asking a question.

“Yes,” he said, shuffling inside and shutting the door behind him. “I summoned you because you were the giver of all knowledge and the first tempter, and now I need that knowledge to be given to me.”

There were so many reasons why giving humans knowledge of Good and Evil did not equate to Crowley having some secret knowledge of how to convince a woman to have sex.[2] But Crowley guessed- he wanted what he wanted, and telling him ‘no, sorry, can’t help you,’ would have been met with hostility and disbelief.

“Well, you’ve certainly done your homework.” Crowley pressed against the boundaries of the summoning circle again, trying to gauge if the human took notice. No reaction was forthcoming.

“Can you help me or not?” the man whined, eventually.

“Possibly, but it might take a while.” Crowley hedged. “In the meantime, what should I call you?”

“Uh,” he stuttered, flustered, “‘Sir’ would probably be alright, ‘Master’ is a little gay, I think-”

“How about your name.” Crowley crossed his arms and gave a little half-smile. “Most people prefer that.”

The man paused, then seemed to collect himself. “Tristan.”

“Right, Tristan, I’ll see what I can do for you.” He glanced down at the circle, and his gaze caught on a phrase that defined him as ‘bound to be a servant’. A spark of an idea began to form in his mind. “We may have to make a few revisions to this circle, though.”

“What’s wrong with the circle?” Tristan snapped. “I didn’t make any mistakes. I checked.”

Crowley dropped to one knee and swept his hand over the characters in question. “Look, if you want to still have your soul after losing your virginity, you’re going to have to listen to me.” Tristan’s focus sharpened, and he knelt down opposite Crowley with palpable concern.

He pointed out a handful of words. “This bit defines me as servant of Hell. [3] Now, I’ll be sporting and fill you in on how it’s relevant here. Means that I’m obligated to deliver your soul to Hell if I hold up my end of the contract, deserving or not.”

“When I die?” He made no move to get an eraser or writing utensils, so Crowley pressed on.

“Preciscely,” he hissed, “And it’s whether you have sex once or you do it every day for the rest of your mortal life. Going to Hell for a shag is a load of bollocks, if you ask me.”

The subtle admonishing flew completely over Tristan’s head, not that the demon had expected much. He waffled for half a minute, then dragged a box of chalk out from under a stack of notebooks. “Which one makes you tied to Hell? I’ll just-” He mimed erasing with his free hand. “-and that should be good, right?”

Crowley mentally calculated the metaphysical gap that would result from an unbalanced circle without a complete binding clause and concluded that his odds were relatively good. “Here,” he tapped a single fingernail on the concrete floor, “In the lines closest to me.”

Tristan nodded, then crouched on the floor with an eraser. Crowley’s entire body tensed up on the physical realm as he focused on reaching through the holes in the binding towards home. The eraser wiped the characters into oblivion, and a half second later, Crowley tumbled into the back room of the bookshop. [4]

Aziraphale arrived a moment later, brandishing a teakettle in a manner that carried a subtle threat of bodily harm.

And caught sight of Crowley slowly rising to his feet and straightening his clothes. “What on Earth are you doing?” he asked, relaxing his stance.

Crowley, satisfied with the state of his clothing, flopped into an armchair. “I need a drink.”

[1] And in one memorable instance, some poor woman’s pet cats.

[2] Though he could guess that not summoning demons into your cellar whilst doing a low-budget impersonation of Emperor Palpatine would be a step in the right direction.

[3] This was a lie. In actuality, it defined him as bound to serve in general, implicating the summoner. Tristan, who was not remotely fluent in any of the Old languages, did not cotton on to this bit of deception.

[4] The exact mechanics of this maneuver are, naturally, beyond the human ability to observe. If one were looking for a good analogy, it would help to imagine Crowley as a rubber band, forcing himself through a very small opening by stretching very thin, and then abruptly springing back into his normal state once through. It was exactly as uncomfortable as it sounds.

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“Right,” Aziraphale said, adding generous pours of bourbon to two mugs of earl grey tea. “What has you so shaken?”

“Wiggled out of a summoning.” Crowley explained, turning his attention to his drink, taking a long swallow and relaxing back against the cushions. “Some idiot who wanted me to help him have sex.”

“Certainly not with-”

“With women.” he cut Aziraphale off. “Young, pretty ones if I had to guess a type.”

“I see,” Aziraphale replied, in a tone that encouraged more details.

“The entire thing was ridiculous, Aziraphale, you have no idea. He did a lot of research, only to put out the whole bloody thing out on a cellar floor with some school chalk. ’S insulting.” He took another swallow of tea, then reached over and topped up his mug with more whiskey. “I should probably try to track down where he got his materials, unless I want to be summoned every time one of his mates decides that I’m the solution to their dry spell.”

“I can reach out to some of my associates and see if any of them know anything about old summoning manuals reentering circulation.” The angel offered, eyeing Crowley with some concern. “There can’t be very many of them in circulation.”

Crowley nodded, accepting. “I’d wager that he found it online, but he also called me Crawly, so the original text is going to be from some point B.C.”

“That does narrow things down considerably.” Aziraphale fished out his pocket watch and glanced at it. “It’s quite late now, but I can sort out a few leads and make calls in the morning.” he glanced up to see Crowley pouring more alcohol into his mug. “My dear, are you alright?”

“Just. Eugh. Aftereffects from forcing myself outside of the circle without it breaking.” Crowley took a gulp of lukewarm tea-flavored bourbon and winced.

“Crowley. You’re shaking quite badly.” After a second of hesitation, Aziraphale gently prised the trembling mug from his grip and set it down on the table, keeping a hold on his twitching fingers.

Crowley blushed. “Sorry.”

“Apologising isn’t necessary.” Aziraphale frowned. “I can feel how distressed you are. It’s usually quite difficult for me to pick up on negative emotions.”

“Maybe you’re looking for it.” Crowley muttered into his free hand. “I can feel happiness and love if ‘m trying to find it. Usually just keep an eye out for the negative stuff, though.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Aziraphale agreed. “I should be in better practice when it comes to sensing distress.” He did not release Crowley’s hand, and the demon felt him probing further. “Well, you’re certainly not all right, I can tell that much.” The angel’s gaze was sharp.

“‘Sss fine. Aziraphale.” Crowley decided that he was not inebriated enough for the conversation and took more bourbon-with-a-splash-of-tea with a still shaking hand, swallowed hard.

“Is this how you would find me, when I would get into a spot of trouble?” he asked. “Tracking feelings of distress and worry?”

“Sssort of.”

“Well, what else then?” he pressed, and if he had noticed Crowley’s embarrassment, he ignored it. “Crowley.”

Bless it. Aziraphale was getting more worried, and more curious, which was a dangerous combination. His desire to soothe the angel managed to overpower his embarrassment, just barely. He finished what was left in his mug and tried to not think too hard about him still holding his hand.

“Do y’know,” Crowley said at length, “How little traces of demonic or ethereal energy can be left around if you try?”

“Yes.”

“Went a little further. Stuck a little bit of my soul with you back in Rome by accident. And it was useful to find you later, so I didn’t take it back.” And it had been a mistake. Crowley had been drunk on Roman wine and angelic company and he had been preemptively grieving losing Aziraphale’s presence for the night, and likely for the foreseeable future. He’d barely noticed when a piece of himself had wrenched its way out of his corporation and onto Aziraphale [5]. “I could sense your distress because part of me was always next to you. In a way.”

Aziraphale got a quiet, faraway look that, Crowley knew, meant he was very quickly sorting through new information. “I know that I shouldn’t have left it for so long, and, ngk” -I’m sorry that I did it without asking or telling you, the actual apology died in his throat.

The bookshop was silent, save for the clocks and the creaking of old furniture as Crowley sank down into Aziraphale’s chair, incandescent with shame. “It’s gone now, anyway. Got it back in the bookshop after you’d discorporated.” He had half a mind to withdraw away from Aziraphale’s judgement, but stayed resolutely in place. The angel deserved to know, at least.

The clocks continued ticking. Crowley resisted sliding onto the floor. Aziraphale had not removed his hand from his. He could sense sadness and maybe a little pity from the angel, if he looked, but there wasn’t any anger or fear, so the demon kept still.

Finally, Aziraphale shifted and sighed. “I suppose it could be considered an invasion of privacy, but I can’t say that I personally mind, the thought of you leaving a bit of your soul within my corporation.” Crowley wasn’t looking, but he could feel the angel’s smile. “It got us out of a fair bit of trouble.” His thumb stroked Crowley’s knuckles.

He vaguely wondered if drinking more would make the situation more or less bearable to deal with.

“Would you like to do it again?” Aziraphale said, at length. “And I could, perhaps, do the same for you, place a small part of my soul in your corporation permanently. If you’re amenable.”

Yes, a thousand times yes, I would do anything to be able to find you if you needed me. I’ve missed it. I would love to hold a piece of you with me always, Crowley thought, aching with hope. “Are you sure about this, angel?” came out of his mouth.

“Only if you are,” Aziraphale countered, radiating steadfast certainty. “I would like it very much. We’re on our own side, I want to reflect that.”

“I’d like it too,” Crowley managed, swallowing. “Just don’t want to saddle you with my emotions.”

“Crowley.” He finally looked at Aziraphale, startled by the intensity of frustrated love that flowed under and with the angel’s conviction. “I want to know when something is wrong. I would love to be able to feel you, Crowley, and I cannot imagine growing tired of you.” He smiled again. “If anything, all the past six thousand years have done is made me want to spend even more time with you.”

“‘Ziraphale.” Crowley whispered, nervous and elated and so in love that it ached. “Now?”

“Yes,” Aziraphale glowed, rising to his feet. “Just one moment.” He went around and drew curtains shut, concealing them completely from outside view. “Would you like to sober up a bit, dear?” he asked, straightening his clothes.

“I was incredibly drunk last time I did this.” Crowley protested, shuddering alcohol out of his bloodstream anyway and getting his legs underneath him.

“Do you remember how you did it?” Aziraphale gestured vaguely. “You may have to show me.”

“Here.” Crowley fumbled about in the metaphysical plane, pulling out roughly the same amount of himself that he’d unintentionally recovered in the bookshop fire during The End Times That Hadn’t Been. It manifested in his hand as an odd, shifting shadow, dancing around his fingertips and reaching for Aziraphale.

Aziraphale’s eyes flashed, and then the rest of him glowed, the vision of his true form superimposed over his corporation. With the infinite care of an antique book collector, he steadied Crowley’s wrist with his left hand, and with his right, drew the offered piece of Crowley into himself, guiding the little shadow to coil up and around his left arm.

Crowley felt as it settled against Aziraphale, and his sense of the angel sharpened into comfortable clarity.

Aziraphale inhaled and exhaled slowly, the image of his true form fading from view. With another breath, he brought a little bit of his soul out of his corporation, a white-gold flame that hovered in his cupped hands.

Crowley offered his left arm in kind, watched his true form as a piece of Aziraphale slid up his palm and forearm in an uneven starburst. It shivered as it settled in, mirroring the angel’s pleased wiggle in Crowley’s periphery.

“I’ve never felt you with such clarity before,” Aziraphale said, awed.

“Sorry.” Crowley offered on reflex, feeling a sleepy, pleasant buzz settle over him.

“Really, now.” the angel reprimanded gently. “It feels lovely, dear, and I don’t wish to be without it.”

“Mmm.” he mumbled, nearly unhinging his jaw with a yawn and sitting down on a couch. “Does feel nice.”

The cushion dipped with Aziraphale’s weight, and Crowley tried to discreetly scoot closer. The angel took notice and guided his head to his shoulder. “It was a bit reckless of me to do that, wasn’t it?” His thumb traced a delicate pattern along Crowley’s jaw.

“A bit.” He yawned again.

“Then again,” Aziraphale continued wryly, “It has been over a millenia since we established the arrangement, one could argue that this was a long time coming.”

“Hm.” he mumbled into the angel’s shoulder, all but melting into the touch. “Got there now.”

“You can sleep, Crowley.” He said, reclining and pulling the demon closer. “I’m not going anywhere.” The lights in the bookshop dimmed invitingly, and Crowley drifted off with Aziraphale’s hand in his hair.

[5] In his inebriated state, Crowley had been unable to distinguish it from the human version of heartbreak.

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Crowley could not relax. There was something irritating brushing at his consciousness, like a shirt tag. He couldn’t place its source, exactly, and over the course of the week he became increasingly more frustrated. Aziraphale had quickly noticed the frustration despite Crowley’s attempts to downplay it, proving to be a frighteningly quick study.

It wasn’t the new link between himself and Aziraphale, as far as they could tell. Neither one had particularly wanted to dissolve it to be certain.

He had been walking towards the Bentley, intending to return to the bookshop after caring for the plants in his flat, when the irritation that had been following him around intensified to a sharp tug. Ah, he thought, preparing to return to the not-quite-broken summoning circle, that explains it.

He rematerialized in the same circle, with its erased parts redrawn and an extra circle of text around the whole thing, adding a layer of restraints that Crowley couldn’t see an easy way out of. Tristan was standing with his arms crossed in front of Crowley, wearing a slightly different hoodie from the last time.

“Hi.” Crowley said, desperately trying to tamp down on his panic before it could show in his voice. “What brings me here?”

“You got out. That’s not going to happen again.” The man said, sounding understandably (if unjustifiably) pissed.

Crowley decided to try for honesty. “Look, I really can’t help you.”

“You will.” Tristan insisted. “I command you to!”

“Commanding me to do something-” Crowley hissed and recoiled from where he’d been probing at the barriers, nerves burning like they’d been sliced open and dipped in acid.

“So you found my extra protections.” he observed, “good luck getting out of those, Serpent.”

“Still won’t change the fact that I can’t help you. Both of us are wasting our time.” Crowley pushed again. The burning flared against his consciousness, greying out his vision. When he blinked himself back to awareness, he was kneeling on the ground, shaking.

Tristan was watching him, now seated on a rolling office chair. “Keep struggling if you want. You’re only making it harder on yourself.”

Crowley hissed at Tristan, dragging himself to his feet, spitting out blood from where he’d accidentally bitten his cheek.

“Crawly, Serpent of Eden, you are bound to serve me.” Tristan intoned, reading from a computer printout. “You will remain bound until I release you.”

“What do you wish of me, master?” the demon spat sarcastically. “Shall I perform a resurrection? Balance the moon on top of Everest? Either one would be easier than convincing a woman to ever have sex with you.”

“You’ll regret that!” Tristan glared at Crowley, then began rifling through binders. “I have something here that shows me how to punish you.”

Crowley stayed stubbornly silent, still aching from probing the barriers and trying to tamp down on his panic.

“You,” Aziraphale was suddenly there, voice flat and cold, “are going to stop this nonsense at once.” The angel, glowing, wings out, and eyes piercing, loomed over Tristan, who flinched in shock and scrambled away.

Crowley noted, distantly, that he could see the shadow of his essence snaking up Aziraphale’s arm in this form. Aziraphale cast a concerned glance in his direction.

“Ugnnnn.” The man whined, pressing himself against a wall. The angel huffed, and a moment later appeared much more human shaped [6].

“Now. You are going to listen to me.” Aziraphale said. “You are going to erase the circle immediately, in its entirety.”

“You can’t make me!” Tristan protested, even as he reached for the eraser and crouched down in front of the circle. “That demon will attack me.”

“You have my word as an angel that you will come to no harm from him.” Aziraphale said. “And I suppose that I can’t make you, but it will be much easier to restrain him if my hands aren’t busy from doing the erasing.”

He cast a wary glance between the two supernatural entities and began erasing. Crowley made a lunge at him as the circle was broken, just for show, and was caught by Aziraphale, who supported the demon’s weight without flinching.

“Thank you.” The angel said, when it was finished. “I would also like you to tell me where, precisely, you learned this ritual.”

The human sat down at his computer and navigated to a forum, gesturing wordlessly to the screen. Aziraphale shifted Crowley off of him and peered at it. “Fascinating.” He said, “Tell them that it didn’t work.”

“It did work!”

“In a manner of speaking, yes. But anyone who summons Crowley will have to deal with me, and believe me, I will know if someone summons him with bad intentions, and I will end it by whatever means necessary.” Aziraphale said mildly, putting himself between the back of the chair and the rest of the room.

Tristan looked at him, then mulishly informed his contacts that the ritual had been ineffective. [7] “That’s not gonna stop everyone.”

“More fool them.” the angel replied primly, then tapped the computer, which sparked and died with a few alarmed beeps.

“You can’t just do that!” The human wailed, scrabbling to unplug the computer and inspect it for damage. Aziraphale stepped back to support Crowley again.

“You’ll find that I have.” Aziraphale snapped his fingers. “We’re leaving now. Do not try this again. Goodbye.” He snapped again, and Crowley found himself standing in the middle of his flat, being held upright by the angel.

“Thanks.” He said, sore and delirious with relief.

“You’re quite welcome. Would you like to go lie down?”

Crowley did not want to leave Aziraphale’s company. “Are you going to come with me?”

“Of course.” His voice was warm and fond, and he swept Crowley into his arms. “You really did give me quite a fright.”

Crowley, too tired to care about the loss of dignity, steadied himself by looping his arms around the angel’s neck. “I suppose you would have felt the summoning.”

“I did. It was highly unpleasant, and I do not wish to repeat the experience.” Aziraphale nudged the bedroom door open and deposited the demon onto the bed.

Crowley stretched and removed his shoes. “Speaking of, what about his binders full of notes? They were everywhere.”

“Yes, I had noticed those.” Aziraphale said. “I took care of them.” [8]

Changing into sleep clothes was the work of a couple miracles, and then Aziraphale was sliding under the covers next to Crowley.

“I memorized the screen name of the original poster. I’ll have to look into it, see if they’re the rightful owner or if one of my contacts has been stolen from.”

“Can that wait until tomorrow?” Crowley grumbled. “I’m comfortable here.”

“Of course, dearest.” Aziraphale said, and Crowley felt a pulse of love from the angel. “Would you like me to spend the night?”

In response, he wrapped himself around Aziraphale, burying his face into his neck. Aziraphale chuckled and put his arms around the demon, pressing his lips to the top of Crowley’s head. “Sleep well, Crowley.”

[6] But no less furious.

[7] Which, if you want to be technical, was not really a lie.

[8] The angel had miracled all of the ink off of the pages and back into the ink cartridges that it had come from. One didn’t want to be wasteful, after all.

#good omens #fanfiction #my writing #this got longer that I was expecting it to.#maandarinee #go holiday swap #long post

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freyjawriter24 · 5 years ago

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Advent Omens: Cookies

This one might make you a little hungry - apologies in advance! Another of my responses to @drawlight‘s excellent winter prompt list - this time Day 18, which has been sitting unfinished in my drafts for ages. Enjoy!

-----

When he’d set out on this project, he hadn’t thought it would take that long. A couple of months, a year at most. Not the best part of a decade.

Trying, adjusting, trying again. He was almost at the stage where he was ready to ask for human feedback – in total secrecy, of course, under the empty threat of eternal torture in Hell. He could trust the American girl, certainly, and probably her husband, and their kids could give their feedback too, but they were probably too young to understand the intricacies of flavour and the importance of the whole thing properly. Adam and Warlock could probably be trusted to keep it secret, but he’d have to keep them out of the way afterwards, because when secrets were involved, they both had a habit of grinning at Crowley in such a way that the angel would figure out something was up in about two seconds flat. Other than that, he supposed he could try it out with random humans who didn’t know Aziraphale and would therefore have zero chance of passing any confidential information on, but that was worse, because he’d have to explain things and then wipe their memories afterwards, and honestly it just wasn’t worth the stress.

But he hadn’t told anyone yet. It was almost maddening, that, having to keep something quiet for so long without even a hint that there was something there to hide. It had been a while since he’d had practice at that.

Today was the cut-off date. If he wasn’t happy with it by this evening, there wouldn’t be time for the human trials to take place so that it was ready in time for Christmas, and so he would have to work on it for another whole year before showing Aziraphale. He’d gotten this down to a fine science, both the project itself and the timings of it, and he was not going to risk mucking it all up by going over deadlines and changing everything at the last minute.

“Right, you,” he said threateningly to the tray in this hand, but determinedly not putting a miracle into it. “You’ve got to be perfect this time, okay? Perfect. I do not want this to last another year.”

He opened the oven door and slid the tray inside, hitting the to-the-second timer at the same instant that he shut the door. It began to count down, and he glared at it for a second to make sure it knew what would happen if it wasn’t loud enough or on time enough or did anything else wrong.

Then he glanced at the counter, at the pile of stuff sat there.

“Ugh,” the being who was once the Serpent of Eden said, and reached towards it. “Now for the apple.”

He worked for another couple of hours, mixing and dividing and baking, plating up the results in colour-coded tins and setting a miracle over each of them to keep them at the perfect temperature. The clipboard was marked off as each batch came out, and sat beside the tins, waiting to be filled out with all necessary details when the time came.

Crowley didn’t realise he was humming until the tune was broken partway through by a polite cough. The demon froze, then whirled around, uncovered yellow eyes blown wide.

Any faint hope he’d had that the now-adult Antichrist had been the one to break into his locked flat vanished as his gaze fell upon the softly-smiling face of his husband.

“Angel...” The word slipped out without intent, as it often did when Crowley was suddenly caught by how beautiful Aziraphale looked. But this time the shock was more one of fear and embarrassment than just flat-out love. Though there was definitely a healthy dose of that in there too.

Unnecessary blood thundering in his ears, he took in the scene, trying to figure out how much Aziraphale knew. The angel was stood by the kitchen table, the rainbow of labelled tins in front of him. Crowley himself was stood by an obviously-on oven, clearing up an obviously-floured counter, but there was no tray in his hands, no actual evidence tying him directly to the tins on the table. Maybe he had a chance? But then, with a sinking feeling in his chest, he realised the clipboard containing his own handwriting was held gently in the ethereal being’s hands, and Crowley knew he was done for. Aziraphale knew the whole thing.

The demon stumbled through a few nonsense sounds, and then eventually fell quiet. And then changed his mind immediately.

“It was meant to be a surprise,” he said slowly, quietly, and he was distantly shocked to hear how broken he sounded.

“Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale said, dropping the clipboard on the table and crossing the room to him in a few quick, sure strides. The angel folded the demon to him in a strong hug, and Crowley hugged him back automatically, the contact no longer unusual or terrifying.

“If it helps, it was a surprise,” Aziraphale murmured, his chin tucked over his husband’s shoulder. “I didn’t even know there was anything I should be avoiding walking into. And it’s a wonderful surprise, too.”

Crowley mumbled something neither of them recognised as words into Aziraphale’s neck, and then resolved to just enjoy the moment for a bit. There was a time when we couldn’t do this. Something so wonderfully simple as this. He also resolved not to cry, and only failed a little.

“Are you okay, my dear?” Aziraphale asked when they finally drew apart. The angel was frowning at him in a concerned sort of way, and Crowley vanished any hint of tears with a click of his fingers, at the same time focusing on returning his irises to normal, human-like size.

“Yeah, sure, ’m fine, angel.”

“I really am sorry that I walked in on your surprise.”

“Nah, ’s not that. Well, maybe it’s a little bit that. But, I mean...” Crowley cast about for the words and ended up groaning at his own inarticulacy. “I just... It all got a bit much. That we can just do that now. Hug. In the middle of the kitchen. In broad daylight.”

Aziraphale’s face crumpled into a strange mixture of love and sadness and deep, deep understanding. “I know, my darling. I know.”

At that moment the timer went off. Crowley wavered for a second between the oven and the angel, then figured why not both and clicked his fingers as he stepped back towards Aziraphale and wrapped his serpentine arms around him. The final batch of cookies made it to the cooling rack right on schedule, and the two celestial beings enjoyed another moment that was all their own, still a novelty after only a decade being allowed that.

At some point, when they realised that the night had drawn in on the Mayfair flat, they broke apart again, limbs relaxing into this strange world where they could live together, be married to each other, and not have to deal with either of their respective Head Offices trying to murder them. They decided not to make the long journey back to the cottage tonight, and instead Aziraphale retrieved a collection of tartan blankets from a cupboard and arranged them around himself on the sofa.

Crowley brought a plate over with one of each cookie batch on it, and when the angel took it from him, he slipped under the blankets too and snuggled into Aziraphale’s soft embrace.

“They’re still just prototypes,” the demon warned. “I haven’t tested them on anyone else yet, so they might not be quite there yet...”

Aziraphale gave him a look, and Crowley shut up, nodding in acceptance.

“Which should I try first?”

The demon considered, then pointed, describing each by their major flavours.

“Gingerbread, white chocolate and raspberry, milk chocolate and orange, lemon with meringue chunks, then apple and cinnamon.” He considered this list, then nodded. “Yeah, that’ll work. Not the order I made them in, but they should all be the right temperature for what their flavours are.”

Aziraphale daintily picked up the first biscuit on the list, a simple round of gingerbread with a star pressed into it. ��Very festive,” he commented, smiling prettily.

“Yeah,” Crowley mumbled. “I was going to add some bronze edible glitter or something, but that kind of messed up the rustic aesthetic a little...” He trailed off, realising how much he was giving away, and buried his face in Aziraphale’s neck. “Urmph, just try it.”

The angel’s soft fingers found Crowley’s among the blankets, and squeezed. The demon clung on in return, and didn’t move until Aziraphale had tried every flavour of cookie he’d painstakingly put together from scratch through a decade of testing and tasting and so much baking, baking, baking.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale said finally, and the demon dared raise his head. The pale blue eyes were full of emotion, and for a second Crowley wondered (again) what would happen to him if he discorporated now from pure love.

“My dearest, most wonderful darling,” Aziraphale began, and there was a crack in there somewhere that made Crowley grip the angel even tighter to him. “I love you more than anything in the entirety of creation.”

“They that good?” Crowley asked, and pretended the odd note of his voice was a laugh.

“Oh, they are,” Aziraphale said, nodding and pulling Crowley impossibly closer to him. “But that’s not the point. You’ve...” The angel cut himself off, took a deep breath, and covered the break by pressing a kiss to Crowley’s forehead.

He drew back slightly and continued, gazing earnestly into the demon’s eyes as he did so. “You’ve put so much time and effort into this, into making these perfect, and that’s all for me, and I just...”

It wasn’t often that either of them cried, but they both forgave themselves for it on this occasion. The tears were heavy with millennia of affection, but they were warm with it, too, and the pile of blankets became a haven of strong arms cuddling close and gentle fingers brushing cheeks and soft lips offering kisses and endless words of love, and that was honestly all they needed.

The tins of cookies sat, perfectly warmed, on the kitchen counter for the rest of the night. They were retrieved in the morning, and offered out to anyone who ventured into the bookshop (as long as they promised not to buy anything), all of whom gave rave reviews of every single flavour.

Aziraphale encouraged Crowley to bake a batch of each to bring to Tadfield for the winter celebrations that year, and every one of the humans who tried them agreed with the angel’s assessment that they were the most delicious cookies they’d ever had. Thereafter, of course, Crowley’s baking was requested at every major event, but he didn’t really mind. It made his angel happy, and that was all he’d ever really wanted.

#advent omens #31 days of ineffables #cookies #good omens #My writing #drawlight #Aziraphale #crowley #fanfiction #yes i like cookies can you tell #and yes cookies are different to biscuits in the uk - cookies are the american-style chocolate chip or similar ones #technically some of what crowley bakes here would probably be biscuits - the ginger ones for example - but who even cares #for the purposes of this fic they're all cookies #dammit i've made myself hungry and we don't have any cookies in the house #i should probably go eat lunch

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banrionceallach · 5 years ago

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Good Omens Crowley thoughts and headcanons

In no particular order

I just found out that the name Anthony can mean ‘praiseworthy’. Which, like, that’s fucking heartbreaking. I firmly believe that no matter how many times Anthony Janthony Crowley protests against being called nice or kind or good, that’s just a self-preservation instinct because if hell finds out he’s doing good he (and probably Aziraphale) would be in danger of getting destroyed.

On a personal level I think he actually deeply appreciates being told that he’s good. Especially when it’s coming from Aziraphale. This is the guy who repeatedly mentioned that he didn’t mean to fall. Part of him misses Heaven (original flavour heaven with God present and communicating - not souless corporate heaven) quite desperately and wants to be told that he’s still worthy of it.

He was cast out for asking questions. This made him fall, as he says, doing a million light year freestyle dive into a pool of boiling sulphur. Nevertheless, throughout the show he continues to question God (show me a great plan! scene)

That bit where they’re watching Noah’s Ark and he questions Aziraphale: So, giving the mortals a flaming sword, how did that work out for you? To me there’s an underlying question there as well, viz. Did you get punished for disobedience? Did God throw you away too for not following orders or did They understand that you were just being kind, that you are good and caring? What did God think of your kindness? Are you like me now? Are you Fallen?

(The A/C shipper in me adds another unspoken question, which is : Do you need my help getting used to being Fallen? You’re still a kind anxious beautiful fusspot, you won’t do well in Hell they’ll hurt you. Do you need me to protect you? Let me protect you.)

Crowley really enjoys rescuing Aziraphale (from the guillotine, from the Nazis, turning up in a flaming car at the Armageddon and casually sauntering over while tossing Aziraphale a compliment) . Again, I think part of Crowley lives for validation and praise. Part of him wants to be the shining badass (arch?)angel coming to the rescue of his beloved. And when Aziraphale thanks him, he gets to feel that for a second. Yes. You are worthy, you are good, you never should have been cast out.

Shipper headcanon: I am convinced that Crowley has an entire daydream fantasy based around him rescuing Aziraphale from, Iet’s say demonic Nazis with guillotines. In the fantasy, after Aziraphale has been rescued he breathlessly confesses that he’s always loved Crowley and then they do one of those movie kisses where the hero bends the love-interest back as the impressed audience applauds.

He’s been coming back to this fantasy for 5000+ years. By 2019 it’s got quite specific details.

Personal AU ish Headcanon: Due to just not being that evil Crowley is actually immune to holy water. He just doesn’t know it. Possibly this something in a world where he used to be Raphael. Holy water won’t work on Archangels, even Fallen ones, especially not F-in-Evil fallen archangels like Crowley. For an evil Fallen archangel who’s into the whole do evil thing holy water burns like diluted acid, but can’t kill. For Crowley - it’s just water.

Crowley is actually good with kids. Aziraphale’s not terrible either. I think Warlock being kind of a dick is a combination of (a) Crowley and Aziraphale for all their influencing had positions as servants in the household not actual parents. (b) His mother might be okay (no evidence to the otherwise but she’s an ambassadors spouse so is probably very busy with work a lot of the time,) but I suspect that Mr I HAVE A MALE BOY SON Dowling at least probably dropped a pile of toxic masculinity into his kids impressionable head. (c) He’s 11. We’ve all been self-centred little shits when we were 11 (d) His parents named him Warlock. I doubt that was fun on the playground. He probably deeply wants a name like John or Owen or Tom.

If they actually co-parented a kid together, that kid would probably be fine, if a little odd about religious stuff.

Crowley definitely pulled a fast one and saved lots of mesopotamian kids from the Flood, while Aziraphale quietly looked the other way. (What? The notorious Serpent Crawly interfered with the Almighty’s great Flood Plan? How ridiculous. If he was around I most certainly would have noticed!! Incidentally he prefers Crowley. Er - so I’ve heard. From . . a demon I exorcised. Yes.)

Looking after 200+ kids until the waters receded meant that Crowley got a lot of experience with infants. He is ridiculously competent with small babies. Also he just likes them because the don’t know enough to be afraid of his eyes.

Funny HC: The Walk is genuinely because after 6000 years, this ridiculous dramatic Snek Man still can’t quite get the hang of legs.

Non Funny: it’s because of the curse God cast on him after he tempted A&E. Crawl on your belly and consume dust . . . .and if you don’t it’ll hurt. A Lot. Crowley has the angel equivelent of Scoliosis. His spine and hips are a mess in human form and he’s a regular on chronic pain management forums.

Coming across posts from kids with severe chronic pain makes him depressed and angry at God all over again.

#good omens #crowley #headcanon

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fortune-fool02 · 5 years ago

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More than just a tattoo

Soulmate AU

Crowley x demon reader

Warning: angst

I'm sorry if I got this sort of thing wrong. This is my first soulmate au. I might turn this into a bit of a story rather than a one-shot. Thank you.

Tattoos. Everyone had one, demons, angles and humans alike. They could only be seen by themself and their soulmate, it usually reflected their soulmate in some way.

Most demons kept their tattoos hidden, having a soulmate was seen as a weakness. Giving them a reason to feel emotions they shouldn’t. In most case, demons rejected their soulmates if they ever found them. Some demons believe that God created soulmates as a joke. Something to give them so they had something to lose.

***

[Name] sat down in their flat, their eyes tracing the tattoo. It was of a serpent curling around a flower. From the day it appeared on their forearm, they had tried to decipher the person the tattoo resembled. In secret, of course. They were not interested in their soulmate, they were just curious as to who their so-called significant other is.

***

[Name] stood in Aziraphale's bookshop with their eyes on a book in their hand, their mind drifting to ideas of tempting souls. Unlike Crowley, they wanted to make some progress with damming souls rather than just messing around with the phone lines and making half of London annoyed because of it.

The door opened, revealing the fiery haired demon with that look on his face he usually had when he needed help with something.

“Hey [Name], how’ve you been?” he asked, his tone laced with a sarcastic care,

“What do you want, Crowley?” [Name] asked, not bothering to look up from the book. He gave a low sigh,

“Well, you see...” That is never a good start, “I may or may not have pissed of a couple of demons and may or may not need a place to stay for a couple of days.” Crowley said, [Name] sighed softly. Of course Crowley would do something like that. Well... he was a friend. And [Name] did not turn away a friend.

“Okay then. Give me a couple of minutes to sort you a room and bring anything you deem important. Just in case.” they replied and Crowley smiled. Despite [Name]’s seemingly cold, uncaring attitude, they did have a secret caring side towards their friends -practically just Aziraphale and Crowley.

***

When Crowley entered their flat, the guest bedroom was already prepared for him and [Name] was sitting in the living room reading a book. Their dog approached the demon and sniffed him before lowering its head, its eyes glowing a dim crimson before returning to its master.

“I didn’t know you had a Hell Hound.” [Name] gave a small shrug,

“No one was looking and I was bored. Plus, he looked lonely.” they replied, giving the dog a scratch behind the ear,

“What’s his name?” Crowley asked, if it was anything like Adam had named it, he would be either impressed or disappointed.

“Cujo.” Crowley’s face fell at that. He slowly took a step away from the dog. “I’m joking, Crowley. His name is Fenris.” [Name] explained. He gave a small, uncertain chuckle before asking where he would be staying. [Name] led him to the room as well as giving a small tour around their flat. He took notice of the paintings that decorated the walls, giving the flat a sense of life; [Name] mentioned how they had painted a majority of them, and clearly took pride in them. The fiery haired demon then excused himself so he could take a shower.

***

As Crowley showered, [Name] glanced over at Fenris to see him staring at them.

“What is it?” they asked, Fenris only barked. “Hungry?” the dog immediately started to wag his tail, answering their question. [Name] set their book down and walked into the kitchen to feed Fenris.

Crowley walked in, wearing a pair of black shorts with a matching vest top, and went over the the fridge. His hair clung to his face.

“So, have you got any plans for tonight?” he asked, hoping to spark a conversation with [Name].

“No, not really. Why do you ask?” the demon stood up and turned to face Crowley.

“I was thinking we could...” his sentence died on his tongue. His golden, serpent eyes locked on their arm. [Name] followed his gaze to see their tattoo. Wait.

“You... You can see it?” The main reason why Crowley had never seen the tattoo before was because [Name] always wore some kind of long sleeved shirt, jacket, jumper, anything that covered their arms when outside.

“Yeah. Can you see mine?” he asked, turning around and lowering his vest top around his right shoulder blade to expose a paintbrush seeming to be painting a detailed painting of a wolf’s head. [Name] felt their heart drum against their rib-cage.

Crowley was their soulmate.

Hey, I’m just saying, if you want a second part to this, let me know. Thank you for reading.

#good omens crowley #crowley #crowley x reader #good omens crowley x reader #reader insert #good omens x reader #aziraphale #good omens aziraphale #fluff #angst #soulmate au

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hekate1308 · 5 years ago

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Owe No One Anything, Chapter Two

Read it on AO3

Link to chapter one

Only when he realized that Aziraphale didn’t recognize him did he become aware that both the look of disgust on his face and the demand that he leave were directed at him.

Panic washing over him, he stepped closer. “Angel? It’s me –“

“I am aware what you are, you –“

“No – it’s me, Crowley” he tried. “Your –“ demon, lover, soulmate. He didn’t think any of those words would reassure Aziraphale at the moment now though, so he continued with, “friend.”

Aziraphale laughed, but it wasn’t his usual happy laugh or the playful giggle had heard so often as of late. No; this was a harsh, cold sound, and Crowley flinched before he had even properly registered that his angel was capable of sounding like that. “Friends? We are not friends! We are hereditary enemies! We could never be friends! Plus I have never seen you before.”

“Of course you have” he said helplessly. “We thwarted the Apocalypse together, and –“

It was the wrong thing to say. Aziraphale looked genuinely upset. “The Ineffable Plan? Why would I foil the Almighty’s Great Plan with a demon? You fell from Grace!”

“Yes I did, but then we met in Eden and –“

His eyes flared up. “That was you!? The serpent?”

“Yes, we did discuss whether it was the right or the wrong thing –“ Crowley began desperately, but Azirahale wouldn’t listen to him.

“I got a reprimand because of you! You tricked me when I was supposed to be watching the tree –“

“Angel –“

“Don’t call me that” he hissed “There is no reason to be overly familiar. It’s not as if we had anything in common.”

Not as if we had anything in common.

Yesterday, they didn’t get up until it was time for lunch, instead cuddling and kissing in bed all morning.

“Aziraphale, please, you need to listen to me” he blurted out, desperation clawing at his throat. “It must be Heaven – I don’t know what they did to you, but you have to know that –“

“I certainly have to learn nothing you consider important information” he told him gravely. “You’re damned.”

“Yes I know but –“

“Stop it. This can lead to nothing. As a matter of fact” Aziraphale raised his sword, his wings coming out “I think it may be part of God’s plan that I should be the one to get rid of the serpent, after all I was there that day too –“

Crowley needed a moment to realize. Until now, deep down he hadn’t believed he was in danger. Yes, Aziraphale was confused and Heaven had screwed with his mind a but, but this was still Aziraphale, Crowley’s – Crowley’s everything.

And then he attacked.

Crowley could only just duck out of the way as he expertly wielded the sword.

He slipped behind a bookcase, his heart beating wildly, his mind insisting that this was impossible, Aziraphale wasn’t trying to kill him, Aziraphale would never –

The sword sliced through the wood.

Crowley stared. Even if he would have thought Aziraphale capable of trying to destroy him, certainly he would never do this to his beloved books –

Forgetting the danger he was in, he reached down and picked up one that had been cut clean in half. Oh no, it was a first edition of The Picture of Dorian Gray, Aziraphale would be so sad –

Movement in the corner of his eye caught his attention and reminded him that he had to move.

A second later, the sword cut the air where he’d been standing.

“Aziraphale –“ He had to duck again.

“Angel –“ He jumped back just in time-

He looked directly into his love’s eyes – eyes that were hard and unforgiving and showed no sign of the affection he’d come to cherish – and breathed, “Please.”

Aziraphale, who had been preparing to launch at him again, hesitated, and Crowley knew he had to take the opportunity. “I will fix this. I promise” he said helplessly, then ran out of the shop to all but jump into the Bentley and race away.

-----------------------------------------

His mind was in disarray. Even if he had ever believed Heaven would try and control one of their minds – it wouldn’t have been Aziraphale’s he would have been worried about. After all, Aziraphale was good. Yes, they had tried to kill him, but –

But –

To – to change him like that. To wipe away all traces of the angel Crowley loved so much.

He thought that he might already be gone forever – that they had simply deleted Aziraphale from existence – crossed his mind, almost causing him to crash.

He forced himself to stop the car and calm down. He couldn’t allow himself to get discorporated. Not when Aziraphale needed him. And he did need him.

Crowley had promised he would fix this, because he had to believe that he could. There was no reason to go on otherwise, and he might as well have walked straight back into Hell and ask that the holy water bath be run again.

They had not stopped the Apocalypse for this, damn it. For just one year after which Heaven interfered and took everything from them.

Think, he told himself, think.

First of all, he took in his surroundings, realizing that he’d automatically driven towards Tadfield. It was a small wonder – Aziraphale had insisted on keeping up with the Them and Book Girl and Computer Boy, and they had spent quite a few pleasant weekends there as of late.

Could the Antichrist help him? But he was a being from Hell, not Heaven, and that meant he probably had no power over whatever they had done to Aziraphale.

So what then –

But of course. Book Girl was a witch. Occultist. Whatever. She had some magical abilities that most humans didn’t believe in.

And right now, Crowley really could use the help of someone who could read auras. Maybe, if she saw Aziraphale, she would be able to pinpoint what exactly they had done to him… or tell Crowley that his angel was still in there after all.

Decision made, he drove on.

--------------------------------------

Aziraphale gasped awake. He had never dreamed before – had actually thought it wasn’t possible – and was now rather glad for it, since if dreams were like that –

Crowley blinked awake next to him. “’Ziraphale?”

“I – I had a nightmare. I think” he replied carefully, the details already slipping away again. Not that he minded. It had been a terrible dream.

“What? Come here –“ Crowley pulled him into his arms and pressed a kiss on his forehead, and Aziraphale relaxed, as always when he was with his dear old serpent. “Remind that next time when we decide to go to sleep I miracle you a dreamless nap” he mumbled against Aziraphale’s hair.

“Thank you” he sighed. “Guess we should get up.”

Cawley wriggled his eyebrows. “No reason to.”

“You can’t keep me in bed forever.”

“I can try” he said honestly.

“That may be, but I am dying for a cup of tea.” Aziraphale shoved him playfully. “Come on.”

Crowley groaned but complied.

Something niggled at the back of Aziraphale’s mind.

He ignored it.

-------------------------------------------------

It was another very good day. There had been a lot of those in the past year. In the afternoon, after a most pleasant lunch at the Ritz, he was reading while Crowley was lying with his head in his lap, dozing on and off.

After a while, Aziraphale put the book away and did something else he loved to do – run his fingers through Crowley’s hair. For some reason, the dream continued to trouble him.

Even though he couldn’t remember it anymore.

No; there was this one detail he could recall, and it was –

Please. Please – Crowley’s voice pleading with someone, pleading with him. He’d sounded so desperate, so panicked… Aziraphale never wanted to hear that tone of voice from him again.

He looked down at the sleeping demon and told himself not to be silly. It was just a dream. Everything is fine. Crowley is right here, you’re in your bookshop, you’ve been talking about buying a cottage in South Downs. Everything is fine.

And yet, a feeling of dread remained.

-----------------------------------------------------

“You’re so pensive today, angel” Crowley told him in the evening; they were having their weekly dinner at their favourite sushi bar. “Is that dream still freaking you out?”

He looked up from his sashimi. “Yes” he admitted.

“Hey” Corley took his hand; “Whatever it was, I am right here.”

His hand, as always, anchored Aziraphale, just like it had the night after the day that was supposed to be the end of everything and instead had been a new start.

How well he remembered the bus ride, when he’d allowed himself for the first time to properly reach out to this demon he loved so much.

“I don’t think I want to go to sleep tonight” he said.

Crowley shrugged his shoulders. “Whatever you want, angel.”

Again, that niggling feeling at the back of his mind…

He dismissed it. He was with Crowley, and the demon, who in the beginning had been rather reluctant when it came to public displays of affection, was holding his hand for all to see.

It was a perfect evening.

-------------------------------------------------------

In the end, Azirpahale would late decide, that was exactly what had tipped him off that something was wrong.

Everything being so utterly perfect.

It wasn’t that he and Crowley weren’t happy together – he liked to imagine they were very happy indeed – but that – well –

The demon had grown so… accommodating all of a sudden. Aziraphale didn’t want to sleep for a while? Normally he’d be expected to try and cajole him back to bed just because he was feeling playful. Aziraphale would rather have fresh produce from the farmer’s market than miracle them into their fridge? The demon he knew so well would have rolled his eyes, snapped his fingers and made them appear himself. A customer found his way into the shop per accident? They’d walk right back out, Crowley grinning at him, even though Aziraphale could easily have told them they were about to close.

Now, though… whatever Aziraphale asked for, whatever he wished, he got. Crowley didn’t try and persuade him to do things he didn’t want to in the first place or in a different manner to what he was accustomed to, he was constantly at his side, and he showered him with gifts and affection.

That of course was nothing new. But Crowley had always used to show his feelings in a… more subtle manner, for lack of ab better word (when he’d not been busy redirecting bombs so they would fall on Nazi spies) and this…

Aziraphale couldn’t even say why it troubled him.

It was like that dream of his that also continued to haunt him. That please…

But Crowley was fine and happy and right there, and that should have been enough.

Only it wasn’t.

He’d not even tempted a single person since Aziraphale had that dream, and he liked to do so behind his back from time to time, for “old time’s sake.”

And so, almost unconsciously, Aziraphale began to test his love.

“I think we should visits the Them again” he said one day. “And Anathema and Newt.”

“If you wish. We can drive down on Saturday.”

No.

Wrong answer.

Crowley usually grumbled and pretended he didn’t want to visit their friends before giving in. It was part of their routine.

What is wrong, Aziraphale wanted to ask. What happened, dear?

He didn’t.

----------------------------------------------

The sense of wrongness continued to grow. Try as he might, Aziraphale couldn’t help but think that the demon he shared his life with had changed, and it scared him. Crowley had always been reliable, always constant.

He couldn’t just go ahead and change. If their relationship had caused this, why would it have waited a whole year for it to take effect?

Aziraphale thought of his dream.

Please.

So scared, so broken…

Had someone done something to Crowley? But why, if anyone had the power, should they decided to mellow him?

It didn’t make any sense.

There was one way to be sure, though.

And so, as they sat down to dinner that night – Crowley having cooked – Aziraphale snatched his glasses off him. He’d noticed that he’d become strangely reluctant to take them off of late.

And when he looked into his eyes, he knew why.

“You’re not Crowley”.

Chapter Three

#good omens #my writings #aziraphale #aj crowley #ineffable husbands

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blitzturtles · 5 years ago

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[[Ineffable Husbands. Loose Feathers. I’ll post on Ao3 in a bit.]]

The moment he steps foot into the shop, Crowley knows there’s something wrong. He doesn’t know what, but it strikes him like a hand across the face. The hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, and there’s a familiar pressure that starts at his cuticles and expands outward.

It isn’t only that something feels off. The bookshop actually looks wrong in a way that he can’t fully wrap his head around. There’s obvious signs of dishevelment with books and various decorations out of place. Crowley can’t quite decide if anything’s missing or not, but he’s not exactly putting that much thought into it. They can broach that later. Together. When Crowley knows that his angel is safe.

He continues down an aisle and rounds a corner with fully extended claws held rigidly at his sides. There’s an entire row of emptiness that greets him and churns his stomach. They must have been after something specific, and Someone only knew that Aziraphale would be idiotic enough to get himself discorporated over a few, not-nearly-priceless-enough books.

Except they aren’t just any books. It’s a small section out of Aziraphale’s Wilde collection. None that are irreplaceable, but the angel is so damn sentimental that he may have put up a fight anyways.

What’s worse than that particular realization is the single, brilliant white feather on the ground, looking exactly the sort of damaged that comes as a result of a fight. There isn’t blood, but that does little to sooth Crowley’s spiking panic. If Aziraphale had been fighting with his wings out… He tries to push the thought to the side for now. He needs to focus.

The air around him reeks of some kind of distress that Crowley can’t place. His own only makes it worse to the point of it being downright nauseating, but he tries to identify something else. Adrenaline, perhaps. He can’t be sure. There’s still that lingering something that overlays and distorts, blurring the details until Crowley can’t find anything of use.

Go- Sata- Someone, he could use a tire iron right about now. He doesn’t think claws and fangs are going to cut it. Not until he rounds the next corner and freezes dead in his tracks. His eyes widen underneath his sunglasses, and, “Angel?” tumbles out before he can stop himself.

To Aziraphale’s credit, he manages to look incredibly sheepish, though it isn’t for the worry he’s caused. It’s for the position he’s been caught in. Huddled up in a corner with a small wall of books and fabric built up around him. His own eyes are equally wide, and his face is dusted with -- what Crowley would have usually called a fantastic -- shade of pink. His wings are out, though they’re hugging around his body tightly despite the obvious discomfort that it causes. The something is more obvious to him now that he has the pieces to put together. An angel’s fluctuating power, with spikes and dramatic dips, is incredibly distorting.

They both stare at one another for a long while with Aziraphale looking exactly as if he’s trying to miracle himself out of existence.

“You’re-”

“Yes!” Aziraphale’s voice is pitched higher than usual as he cuts Crowley off abruptly.

“Oh,” Crowley says with all the intelligence of your average snake rather than the wily serpent that he actually is.

Aziraphale starts to say, “If you could be so kind as to-” at the same time as Crowley says, “I could help you with-”, and they both stop short.

Something tells Crowley that Aziraphale meant to ask him to leave. Primarily out of embarrassment, no doubt. His wings are an absolute state. There are feathers pointing in every single direction imaginable, with a few going for the unimaginable. It looks downright painful in certain areas, and there are already several on the ground, detached entirely. Amongst the small hoard that Aziraphale has decided to make into his brick and mortar for his little wall, Crowley spots more than a few pieces of his own clothes. It’s endearing, really, and it makes up for the missing Wilde that he spots.

“Would you?” Aziraphale finally asks after the silence has dragged on long enough. It’s clear that he feels overwhelmed and possibly overstimulated. Crowley knows the struggle of trying to get through a molt on his own. The first time after his Fall had been true Hell.

“Turn around,” Crowley says in lieu of an actual answer. He closes the distance between them and moves to sit on a pile of clothes -- they look more comfortable than the books after all, and he’s less likely to get chewed out for it.

Aziraphale’s cheeks darken, but he does as he’s told without a word of protest.

Crowley can’t help the small smile that forms, but he shoves down the mixture of emotions that bubble up to focus on the task at hand. It’s likely to take awhile, so he decides to start with the obvious: at the base, which draws a soft gasp out of Aziraphale. Crowley doesn’t tease him for it, tempting as it might be. He doesn’t want to ruin this. He still regularly struggles to deal with the fact that Aziraphale so freely turns his winged back to him. To do it while molting, when an angel is arguably at their weakest, is incomprehensible.

“Thank you,” Aziraphale murmurs well over an hour into their grooming session.

“Anytime, angel,” Crowley answers without pausing.

#aziraphale #crowley #anthony crowley #ineffable husbands #good omens #otp: ineffable #blitzwrites #blitz

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aethelflaedladyofmercia · 4 years ago

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What Might Have Been - 15

(This one is almost certainly too long for Tumblr, and I highly recommend heading over to AO3 to read it.)

(CW: Brief female-presenting Crowley with she/her pronouns; absolutely heartbreaking ending. This is the story’s midpoint, I figured that was required.)

Here is the fifteenth (and so far longest) chapter for my @goodomenscelebration fic, following the Themes prompts. It tops out over 11,000 words. Please read responsibly.

Through the Years

Eden – 4004 BC

Aziraphale stood on the wall of Eden, watching the Man and Woman walk across the desert. Dark clouds rolled in, carrying something called rain, a storm. He’d worried about it when he’d first heard, but now he had more to worry about.

He’d spotted the lion.

He never should have let them out.

Oh, he’d been ordered to cast the humans out of their Paradise, and to stop them ever returning. Those were the exact words. Take this sword and make sure the humans never even think of coming back.

But perhaps if he’d pleaded, intervened, made their case…

This is for the best. He clutched the flaming sword, the warmth of it taking some of the chill from the rapidly cooling air. It’s for the best.

If he kept repeating it, he would believe it soon.

A noise along the wall pulled him back, a soft sliding that seemed to echo through the air.

He glanced left – just the trees tossing in the wind, as if the storm was taking a deep breath.

And to the right –

The Serpent.

It coiled beside him, just beyond the light of the sword, an enormous black rope, twisted over and across itself, golden eyes staring after the humans as they crossed the desert. The scales of its neck and belly were red as human blood. Its tongue flicked out to taste the air and it reared its head higher than Aziraphale’s.

And it kept rising, body sliding across itself, taking on a form that was more human-shaped. The end result was…nearly correct. Tall, narrow, black flecks of scale here and there. Hair red as blood, in long curling ringlets. Black robes, identical to Aziraphale’s but torn and ragged at the bottom. But the eyes remained unchanged – yellow and angry, squinting in the darkening sunlight, and the wings were black as a sky without stars.

“Well. That was a perfect disaster. I hope your lot is proud of themselves.”

Aziraphale shuffled his feet, fighting the urge to back away. This was his wall, his Eastern Gate. He held the sword before him and tried to look more threatening. “I don’t know what you mean. Nothing that happened here was our doing.”

The demon – obviously a demon, he could see the sigil of the Fallen just above his jaw on the left side of his face – turned to glare at him. “Nothing – so you think that was fair? That it was justified? One piece of fruit and you throw them out to die?”

“They’re not going to die,” Aziraphale said, watching the lion intently. “Not yet. There’s – there’s a Plan, you see.”

“Is there really? Is that great big hungry cat part of it?”

“I don’t…know the details, no one does. It’s ineffable.” The humans hadn’t spotted the lion yet. They were still clutching each other’s hands, scrambling across sand dunes in the growing gloom. “But so long as we trust in the Plan, it will all work out. You’ll see.” When the lion crouched, it seemed to vanish into the sand. “It’s for the best.”

Clutching the hilt of his sword, Aziraphale wondered how fast a lion was. The ones in the Garden simply lounged around, sunning themselves beside lambs. The ones in the world were supposed to be dangerous.

The Woman lost her balance and started sliding down the dune. The Man caught her, pulling her upright. He knelt down to check her for injuries. The lion crouched lower, unmoving.

“In case you’re wondering,” the demon started again, “its not taking a nap. That’s how they hunt.” He leaned a little closer. “It’s not pretty. You probably could have done them a favor and cut them down with the sword yourself.” Firelight glinted off golden eyes. “Be a lot quicker.”

“This is your fault,” Aziraphale snapped.

“My fault? I’m not the one who threw them into the desert for eating a snack!”

“That tree was forbidden! They knew that perfectly well. If you hadn’t told them to try and apple, they wouldn’t be in this mess, would they?”

The demon flared his wings. “Maybe your lot should have thought of that before you stuck a great big forbidden tree in the middle of Paradise! If you didn’t want the humans trying it, all you had to do was put it outside the blessed wall!”

“If they followed the rules that wouldn’t be necessary!” They would learn. Now that they knew the price of disobedience, they would learn.

A crack of thunder overhead. Aziraphale managed not to flinch – he’d read the pamphlets, he knew what it was, but hadn’t expected that sort of volume, the way it echoed across the land.

The demon sidled closer, despite the flames between them, until his black wing almost brushed Aziraphale’s white one. Down below, the humans clung to each other.

“You want to know something?” The demon’s voice was soft now, strangely silken. “I didn’t know anything about the apple when I came up. They just told me to go make trouble. I tried everything. Ripping up flowers, breaking beaver dams. Tried to get the animals to fight each other. Even broke open the wall to let everything escape.”

“I know. I saw your handiwork.” Aziraphale told him coldly. “The only things that left through it were the humans, after I sent them away. Even your actions served the Plan in the end.” He’d need to patch up that hole before the other angels noticed.

The demon made a noise of disgust. “That’s not my point – the point is, nothing I did made any difference.”

“That’s obviously because you aren’t very good at your job. I, on the other hand, was doing flawlessly until you came along.”

“Flawlessly?” The demon spat the word. “You let me right in. Not a very effective Guard if you ask me.”

“Guardian, not Guard,” Aziraphale corrected. “My orders were to…to keep them safe…” The humans had started walking again, right towards the waiting claws of the lion. Aziraphale pressed his left hand to his mouth, waiting.

“And now you’re just going to let this happen? How is that keeping them safe?”

“Orders change,” Aziraphale said around his hand. “Now I’m to – to make sure they don’t return.”

“Well, then.” The demon watched the lion shift, preparing to pounce. “Suppose this will take care of that.”

A bright line of lightning split the sky, and the demon ducked closer, practically under Aziraphale’s wing.

“I beg your pardon!” He stepped back, flipping the wing away, raising the sword to point at the demon’s chest. “What do you think you’re doing?”

The demon’s lips twisted. “Nothing, I suppose. Going back to Hell to report in.” He stepped away, arms wide. “Good luck with the next batch of humans.” A dark light surrounded him as he shifted back to Serpent form. “By the way, I’m probably going to get a commendation for this. Good job corrupting the humans, Crawly. Maybe even a promotion. What’s your side going to give you?”

And then he was gone, slithering over the side of the wall, vanishing into the earth below.

In the distance, the lion leapt, claws extended –

Mesopotamia – 3004 BC

A crack of thunder, echoing across the floodplain. A pair of enormous long-legged birds trotted past Crawly, heading for the boat. More animals behind them, horses, mice, rabbits…

The rumors were true, it seemed.

He moved through the crowd, asking questions. Who built this boat? Why here? Why so many animals? He got the name of the ship builders, not much else.

Already the air pressure had changed. Rain was coming, as it never did in this part of the world.

For a thousand years, Crawly had lived among the humans, delighted by their unlikely survival, their clever inventions, their endless, endless ideas. He doubted Heaven was quite so pleased, and it looked like the reckoning had finally arrived.

Up ahead, a pale shape leaned against the fence, watching. An angel, no, the angel, if he wasn’t mistaken. The smug bastard from the wall.

Wasn’t this a day for surprises?

Crawly sauntered up behind him, slipping into a bit of space to the angel’s right. No sword this time, at least. “Well. Fancy seeing you here, angel.”

He immediately stiffened, sliding a little further away along the fence. “Why have you come here, fiend? More mischief?” The angel sniffed. “I’m rather too busy to deal with your nonsense today.”

Crawly rolled his eyes. “Busy standing by and watching, as usual.” The angel’s fists tightened around the fence posts. Must have struck a nerve with that one. “So what’s the story? Word is, God’s angry again. What did the humans do this time? Bake a forbidden pie? Wear the wrong colored robes in a temple?”

“That is highly classified,” the angel said, watching two camels walking past. They seemed particularly unimpressed with the arrangements. “Suffice to say, it’s much worse than a little misunderstanding.”

“Classified. Do the humans even now why they’re being punished?” The angel’s silence was very telling. “Do you?”

“I don’t ask those sorts of questions,” he said, tilting his head back to glare up his nose at Crawly. “But we have made the humans fully aware of what we expect from them. As you know perfectly well, since you’ve been tempting them into all manner of sinful, depraved acts, in every city in the world.”

Crawly narrowed his eyes. “And how am I meant to be doing that? There’s tens of thousands of people in the floodplain alone. Millions around the world. Am I supposed to visit each one every day? Micromanage their lives? That’s your lot’s job, I don’t have time for that sort of one-on-one nonsense.”

“If not you, some other demon.”

“Really not how it works.” But the angel clearly had no interest in listening. He walked away, pushing through the crowd. Crawly would have let him, but the next animals to pass were a pair of lions, trotting along on lead ropes like a couple of well-trained dogs.

Something wasn’t right.

“What’s the punishment this time?” Crawly wove through the crowd, trying to keep up. “Yeah, lots of rain, I can see that. What’s the endgame? Destroy their homes? Their crops?” No response. “Why all the animals on a boat, angel? What are you planning?”

With a sigh, the angel turned back. “We’re…” he glanced at the boat again. “I am authorized to tell you that Heaven has chosen this village as an example. To remind the rest of the humans who keeps them safe.” He rubbed his hands together, probably in anticipation. “Something the others can’t ignore.”

“Something…” it clicked in Crawly’s head. “You’re going to kill them? Drown them all? For what? A few broken rules?”

“More than a few!” He dusted a hand across the fence. “They need to learn to obey. It has all been carefully planned. The site. The number who will die. The chosen survivors – everything has been selected for maximum effect. This…sacrifice is necessary.” He nodded his head. “It’s for the best.”

The sound of laughter, genuinely happy giggles, seeming so out of place in this dismal scene. Crawly looked at a corner of the fence, where three children played a game of chase, weaving around the posts and the legs of the adults. “Angel. Tell me the kids are going on the boat.”

“The loss of innocent lives is an essential part of our message.” Thunder roared overhead. “Once they know we are serious, they’ll fall in line.”

“You can’t believe that.” Crawly grabbed the angel’s shoulders, spinning him around. He needed to understand. “Nothing you do here is going to change anything! These people – those kids – will die for no reason.”

“Unhand me.” The angel grabbed his arm, twisted, and in a flash Crawly was sprawled on the ground, seeing stars flash against the clouds above. “You’ll see. This is for the best.”

He walked away as the first drops of rain began to fall.

Golgotha – AD 33

Another desert. Another disaster.

This one only effected a single person, directly at least, but wasn’t that enough?

Aziraphale didn’t want to see anyone harmed. If they just obeyed, no one would need to be harmed.

He needed to find a way to get through to them.

A flash of red, somewhere in the crowd. Aziraphale knew what he would see, even before his eyes turned from the gruesome scene, tracking the dark-gowned figure.

He looked different, but the angry slit-pupil eyes glared across the crowd, same as ever.

What cause did he have to blame Aziraphale? If he had never interfered – if the humans had never left the Garden – no part of this would ever have happened.

Crawly’s eyes met his. The demon shook his head and turned away.

Aziraphale faced again the scene before him, the Cross rising against the darkened sky, the man gasping in pain.

It was for the best. It was for the best.

Rome – Eight years later

Crowley stepped into the dark popina,[1] glad for a moment’s relief from the sun. It was still hot inside, the air heavy with the smell of humans pressed close together, but at least it wasn’t so blasted bright.

“What’ll you have?” the bartender glared at him, taking in the unusual gown, the circular brooch, the silver laurel crown in his red hair, the black bits of glass to hide his eyes.

Then she turned back to watch some men playing at dice in the corner, voices rowdy. Crowley wasn’t even close to the strangest thing she’d seen.

“Whatever’s drinkable. Leave the jug.” It would take several amphorae of alcohol to erase the last few days from his mind. And he still hadn’t managed to find a single depravity the Emperor hadn’t already indulged of his own volition, and worse than Crowley could have imagined.

Most days, he liked humans. This was not one of those days.

“Er, pardon me,” came a voice from his left, just as he took his first sip. “It’s…it’s Crawly, isn’t it?”

At the sound of the name, his stomach clenched, already-bitter wine turning sour in his mouth. He swallowed and turned to the angel, brilliant white toga hanging from the golden brooch, who smiled at him insincerely.

“Crowley, actually,” he snapped, returning to his drink.

“Oh! Oh, I’m dreadfully sorry. I’ve been getting it wrong all this time.”

Getting it wrong? He’d never heard the angel say his name, not once. He didn’t even know how he had learned it, but those celestial bastards had their ways. Maybe if Crowley refused to respond, he’d take the hint?

“Oh, you must forgive me, I really meant no offense –”

“Relax,” Crowley grunted, really not able to handle that look of distress, even just out of the corner of his eye. “You didn’t get it wrong, I changed it.”

“Changed it?” The angel slid onto the stool next to him. “You can do that? They just let you?”

“Not much they can do to stop me.” Except refuse to call him by his chosen name, which was what most demons did. But he would wear them down in time.

To his left, the angel was pouring himself a cup of wine from Crowley’s jug. “Oh, no, please. Help yourself.”

“Thank you, that’s very kind.” He took a sip, clearly rolling it around on his tongue, then swallowed with difficulty. “Interesting flavor,” he coughed. “Very, er, robust.”

“It’s cheap.” Hell still had trouble with the concept of money. Some jobs he had more than he could ever use, others he had to make do.

“Well, it certainly is…let’s say, bracing.” The angel tapped his cup, glancing nervously at Crowley. “So…what have you been up to? Still a demon?”

Crowley slammed up cup down. “Still…what sort of question is that?” He jabbed a finger towards the sigil mark on the left side of his face. “Did this vanish when I wasn’t looking? Suddenly develop a holy glow?”

“No, I suppose not.”

“You suppose not?” Crowley hadn’t had a good day and this nasty…prying…cold-hearted angel was exactly what he didn’t need. “So, what, did you think I might have been fired? Not keeping up my quota of souls for the Dark Lords? I mean, Hell doesn’t exactly sack us for that. There is a sack involved,” he conceded, draining his cup and filling it again. “And hammers. Red hot pokers. Really, it’s a great bonding experience for everyone. But then they let you out again and it’s back to work.”

“I…didn’t realize…it was a joke…”

“Oh, a joke. Is Ascending something angels joke about?” The word twisted painfully off his tongue. Demons didn’t talk about it openly, the possibility of returning to Heaven. The longing to feel complete again. What they would give to feel their Grace flow through them just one more time. But there were always whispers, in the darkest corners of Hell.

Crowley didn’t know how he felt about it. And it was too painful to even talk about right now. “How about Falling?” he demanded, changing tactics. “Is that funny, too? There goes another, hope the sulfur pits are still hot. They are, by the way, we keep them at just about four hundred fifty degrees. Haven’t had any newcomers in a while, but we’re always read for the next one.”

The angel looked paler than ever.

“How about you?” Crowley pressed on, because if he didn’t, something would snap inside. “Still an angel?”

He hadn’t meant anything by it, really. He’d hoped the angel would be offended, leave him alone, maybe think twice about snide comments in the future.

What he hadn’t expected was a cry of pain, the clay cup tumbling from shaking fingers to shatter on the floor. The angel pressed his fingers to his lips.

“Are you alright?”

The angel nodded his head, eyes squeezed shut.

Not my business, Crowley thought, glaring at his mug. Demons have our problems. Angels have theirs. None of my concern.

Except.

Except the angel had come over to talk to him. Rudely, managing to push all the buttons Crowley didn’t know he had, but still, he’d come over. And he hadn’t left, even when Crowley was rude back.

“Alright. Out with it.”

“I beg your pardon?” The angel waved a hand over the ceramic pieces, hurriedly reassembling them into some sort of abstract sculpture.

“Angel. You saw your enemy in a popina. You didn’t slip away, you didn’t call for back up, you certainly didn’t draw your sword. You sat down and started talking. Could it be you’ve got something you want to say?” He waved a hand over the messy pile of clay, turning it back into a cup. “Something you can’t risk getting back to your side?”

The guilty look told Crowley everything he needed to know. He refilled both mugs. “Whatever it is, I’m not going to tell anyone. Got no one to tell who would even care. So. Like I said.” He handed one cup to the angel. “Out with it.”

He turned the cup in plump hands, wearing an expression that might be a smile, but looked more like a frown. “How…how do you do it?”

“Do what? You’ll have to be a lot more specific.”

“How do you get the humans to do what you want?”

For the first time in four thousand years, Crowley very nearly blinked. “Wow. Straight to the trade secrets, huh?”

“I mean it,” the angel said, a note of pleading suddenly in his voice. “We’ve tried everything. We gave them rules, clearly outlining what they were supposed to do. It got…complicated. Then we tried to simplify. It got more complicated. We’ve punished them. Rewarded them. Sent them personal messengers and laws engraved in stone. Then you come along, and they forget everything. Turn to sin like that.”

“I seem to recall you once said I’m not good at my job,” Crowley said with a triumphant smile, taking a sip of the alleged wine.

“I’ll admit I was wrong,” the angel said, so sincerely, Crowley spat out his wine in surprise. The angel tapped the jug with his fingers, waved them over the cups, then tasted his own again. “That’s better. And I did think so at that time, it’s true. But for all you said you tried everything else first, it only took you two hours in the garden to ruin all our plans. Not the Ineffable Plan, of course,” he corrected quickly. “But everything we thought we knew changed in an instant. How?”

He was actually listening, Crowley thought, a little stunned. No one really listened to him, except to tell him to stop overthinking everything, stop asking questions. He lifted his cup again, found the liquid inside had been transformed into something light, sweet, with just a hint of bite at the back of the throat. It occurred to him that the angel hadn’t needed to change any wine except what was in his own cup. “How do you think I do it?”

“Well,” the angel fidgeted excitedly, a shy but genuine smile spreading across his face. “I have theories. At first, I assumed there was some sort of trigger for their obedience, and you worked it out first. Something like the Trumpets of Heaven that allowed you to put the idea directly into their minds.”

“Trumpets don’t work like that,” Crowley pointed out, going for another drink. “Otherwise, we never would have been able to rebel. If you don’t like what you’re ordered to do, they aren’t hard to ignore.”

The angel frowned distastefully. “I don’t know what liking an order has to do with obedience. But in any case, I realized that wasn’t it. Humans aren’t designed for angelic obedience; they need to be convinced to do what’s right. So, you’ve worked out how to do it. Some rhetorical strategy or reward guaranteed to get them to do as you ask. Something that’s more effective than any threat or promise my side can make.”

“Very well-reasoned,” Crowley said, finishing his cup.

The angel sat up proudly. “Why, thank you.”

“Completely wrong, though.” Crowley refilled his mug and considered the angel carefully. He could leave it at that. There were things he’d never told another demon, never told anyone. He shouldn’t consider telling an enemy.

But he wanted to say it. Wanted to know how the angel would react.

“I’ve told you before,” he finally said. “I don’t do anything at all.”

“Really, Crowley,” the angel scoffed. “You can’t expect me to believe that.”

“it’s true.” He shifted on his stool, leaning closer. “Back in the Garden, you want to know how I found out about the apples?” The angel nodded. “I slithered up, and the Woman was already talking to the Man about them. They’d been picking apples and gathering them for days, asking each other if it would really grant knowledge equal to God and the angels. All I had to say was yeah, probably.”

“So you did talk them into it!”

“I mean, barely?” Crowley shrugged, sitting up straight again. “If I didn’t say anything, they’d have tried for themselves in a day or two.”

“But surely,” the angel moved his stool closer. “Surely since then you’ve developed some sort of process.”

“Eh, generally Hell has some particular thing they want me to get a human to do. I’ve tried logic, threats, tricking them. I’ve even outright asked. Sometimes it works, sometimes they do something worse than Hell could come up with on our own, and sometimes, despite everything I do, they still do the right thing.”

“How often?”

Crowley tilted his head. “About half the time. I throw everything I can at them, and it works about half the time. Probably when they were going to do it anyway.” He jabbed a finger into the table. “That’s why I say: nothing we do matters. It’s all down to them, every time.”

“What do you mean, we?” the angel demanded, jumping to his feet. “How many of you are there, running around this world, trying to undermine my side?”

“Oh, you know that’s not what I mean.” Crowley leaned back in his stool with a smirk. “There are only two agents here on Earth, you and me. I know I’ve never convinced any human to do anything they weren’t already willing to do, and I’ll bet you came over here because you thought the same. We’re just here so Heaven and Hell can keep pretending they know what they’re doing. Act like they have some control over the situation, but we know it’s all a lie.”

I beg your pardon!” The angel’s voice broke through the background roar of the crowd, causing several humans to glance their way. Soft hands tugged at the bright white toga, pulling it straight. “I am most certainly not – not – no! My job has a purpose! I was put on this world to bring peace and order and safety and – and – and my very presence inspires goodness!”

Crowley finished his cup. “You know that isn’t true, or you’d never have spoken to me in the first place.” He waved to the bartender, picking up the jug, then turned to leave in a swirl of black fabric. “Face it, angel, you’re as useless as I am.”

“I am nothing like you!” The angel’s voice was high and strained in the sudden silence. “I am not useless!”

Crowley spun back, ready to tear the angel apart, but instead found himself meeting a pair of blue-grey eyes filled with pain and fear.

After all, useless demons were punished and reassigned. Angels with no purpose were discarded, or worse.

Throwing us head back to look at the ceiling, Crowley ground his teeth in thought. “Look. Angel.” He took a few steps back and lowered his voice. The humans were beginning to drift back to their conversations, at least. “I’m not saying you’re useless. Just the job they gave you.”

“Pardon me for not seeing the distinction.”

“There is one. I swear. You just…have to accept you can’t control humans. Keep an eye on them, try to nudge them when you can, claim credit when they do the stuff you’re meant to inspire and just…ignore the rest.”

“How?” His voice was pleading now. “I was made to protect them, to guide them! How can I just ignore what they do?”

“Gotta figure that out for yourself.” Crowley waggled the jug of wine in his hand. “I will say, enjoying the pleasures of the world helps. A lot.”

“Pleasures?” The angel’s lip curled distastefully.

“Yeah, you know. Food. Drink. Sleep. Music. And if you find an attractive human, well, that opens a whole other range of options.”

“Angels don’t…do those sorts of things.”

“Don’t they? You certainly know your wines.”

The angel adjusted the drape of his toga, chewing on his lip. “I…I have thought…there’s a new restaurant I’ve been meaning to try. Oysters. They’re supposed to be quite remarkable.”

“Sounds like the place to start.” Crowley turned to the door with a wave. “Not really my scene, though. I’m going to find a place to finish this jug and maybe pick up another –”

“I have a place.”

Funny how the world kept spinning after that. The crowd didn’t even pause in their conversation.

Crowley looked back over his shoulder.

“I’ve been in Rome for some weeks.” The angel moved towards him, one cautious step at a time. “I have a set of rooms. Really…quite nice. Several more amphorae of wine. If you’re interested.” He shuffled his feet, standing an arm’s length away. “You can tell me more about these distractions. I…don’t want to be alone with my thoughts right now. And I think…I might have more to say.”

Crowley crossed the last step between them. “You know, angel. I don’t think I ever caught your name.”

“Aziraphale. Angel of the Eastern Gate. Principality of Earth. Guardian of Humanity.”

Later that night

“Siz months,” Crowley declaimed, waving his cup of wine, pacing around the atrium. He paused again to study a potted plant. He could see yellowed leaf spots developing, even though it was clearly receiving more than enough sun. He jabbed a finger at it threateningly. “Siz months workin’ with the general on this whole thingy.”

“Which thingy?” Aziraphale sat on the far side of the impluvium, his bare feet dangling into the rainwater pool. He watched the ripples his toes made with a smile.

They were on the third amphora now, possibly the fourth. Crowley felt very relaxed, very open, unable to keep from sharing the thousands of ideas that ran through his head every day. And Aziraphale continued to listen. It was astounding.

“The thingy. Battle thingy. Plan. Take your boats and hit the other boats with them. Pwwffffffft,” Crowley waved his hands, making what he thought was the sound of two ships colliding at sea. Wine splashed across the floor.

“Not very safe,” Aziraphale decided after some thought.

“S’abattle. Not s’posed to be safe. Anyway. Was a bad plan. Cuz my side wanted them to lose.”

“Why did it take sis moths?” Aziraphale twisted his lips. “Sizzle mons…I don’ want to brag, but I can make a bad plan in under a nhour.”

“Angel. It is. So hard. To lose a battle on purpose.” He slumped against a column dramatically. “Harder’n trying to win. Too many things can go right. Gotta think of errything.” His cup was empty now. How did that happen? He wandered over to the amphora and refilled it, starting a fresh one for Aziraphale. “So. So. Six months. Day comes, all the boats all lined up…an’ the chicken won’ eat!”

Aziraphale nodded his head, then frowned. “Why’z the chicken on a boat?”

“Think she was a priest. An’ the general says they won’ fight until the chicken eats.” Holding the two cups, Crowley carefully circled around the pool towards the angel, who sat with his brow furrowed in thought.

“Chicken can’ be a priest,” he finally declared. “Can’ say prayers, see? No lips.”

“Zirpale.” Crowley frowned, scraped his tongue across his teeth and tried again. “Aziraphale. There’s a horse. In the Senate. I have no idea waz going on in this empire anymore.”

“Oh, I had dinner with Senator Incitatus,” Aziraphale exclaimed. “Lovely home, lots of marble. Didn’t much care for the oats.” He leaned forward, whispering a choice bit of gossip. “His wife Penelope was very rude, you know.”[2]

“Right.” Crowley handed Aziraphale the cup of wine, trying to process this information. “Where was I?’

“Chicken?”

“Yes. Wouldn’t eat. We waited all day and she jus’…jus’ sat there. And the other boats were –” he waved an arm towards the pool. “Thereish.”

“Maybe it was seasick.” Aziraphale took a drink of wine, then looked up, smiling brightly. “Should have used a duck! Ducks like water.”

“Eh. Mh. Fair point. No’ my idea, makin’ the chicken a priest.” He shrugged widely. “Anyway. By the time the chicken ate, winds’d changed, an’ our ships wouldn’ move. Other ones just – whoop – right up and set them all on fire.”[3]

“So you lost.”

“Yeah. But. Not how I was s’posed to lose.” He settled down, next to Aziraphale but carefully avoided the water. Angel might bless it by accident. Or on purpose. “They tell us…they say…erry choice, there’s a righ’ way an’ a wrong way, yeah? But ‘s’not true. There’s a thousan’ ways. Some right, some wrong, some jus’ dumb.”

“Chicken onna boat.”

“Tha’s m’point.” He leaned forward eagerly. “So if the humans do the wrong thing, it’s still wrong, even if it’s not what Hell wants, right? What matters is it’s wrong, even if it’s the wrong wrong, right?”

Aziraphale blinked. “What?”

“Does that answer your question?”

For another moment, Aziraphale stared at the black lenses Crowley wore, then let his eyes drift across the atrium. “My dear fellow, I’ve quite forgotten what I asked!”

“HA! Means I win.” Crowley drained his cup.

But the angel was frowning over something. “You said Hell…punishes you…if you don’ get enough souls.”

Crowley shrugged. “’S’Hell.” He traced a finger across the tiles of the floor mosaic, studying the colored stones.

“Are they…do they get angry? When y’do th’…the…the wrong-wrong-thing? Or tempt humans the wrong way?”

“Does it matter?” He didn’t want to think about that.

Aziraphale’s hand landed on the back of his, a gentle bit of pressure. “My side is – is very angry at you. All the time. Because you tempt th’humans to do all sortsof things. No one knows wha’ to expect. Drives Gabriel mad, you know.”

Crowley felt a smile coming across his face, like nothing he’d felt in a long time. His face grew hot, and he tugged his hand away.

“How about you,” Crowley said quickly. “You ever do a wrong right thing? Somethin’ that was right, but Heaven didn’t like it?”

“No!” Aziraphale sat up very straight, eyes wide. “M’n’angel. I only do right-right.”

“Aagh.” Crowley threw back his head. “C’mon. In four thousand years, there’s gotta be something you did. I did plenny Hell didn’ like.”

“No – no – no –” there was panic in his eyes now. “Crowley. If I diza – disoj – if I didn’ do what they said… I don’t know! I can’t!”

“Annnnngeeeeelllll,” Crowley drew out the word. “Not one li’l miracle on the side? No good deeds? You can tell me. Who’s gonna know?” He leaned closer, recklessly. “I’ll start. One time. In the north. This chieftain’s son was s’posed to kill this other chieftian’s son. Start a whole war. So I…” Crowley grinned. “Convenced ‘em to run off an’ get married. Their dads still got mad, war happened, bu’ they both lived off in th’ mountains.”

“Oh, Crowley. That’s sweet.”

“No’s’not. ‘S’horrible. There was so much fightin. So much. Your turn.”

“Well…one time…” His fingers tapped on the side of a cup. “One scribe was supposed to copy a poem about the king, but I didn’ like it, so I had him copy a different poem instead.”

Crowley blew a raspberry. “Weak! I was s’posed to help Hannibal fight Rome, but I wanted a nap, so I just told him,” he waved his hands, “elephants!”

“I may have accidentally invented the fruit cake?”

“No one likes fruit cake,” Crowley insisted, flapping a hand. “Don’t count. Ummmmm – Oh! I went for a swim ‘round the sea once, and now…’M a sea monster in six different miffs. I eat a princess in one!”

“Did you really?”

“Naaaah, just hissssed at her a little.”

“Oooh!” Aziraphale clapped his hands, smiling. “Stories! In Athens, I had a lovely talk with Aristo – Aristophan – with a play writer. And He wrote a charming story called The Clouds.”

“Didn’ that play get a man killed?”[4] Azirpahale’s face fell, but Crowley waved it off. “Aaaaah, these are nothin’. What’ve you done that y’r bosses would be mad about? Proper mad?”

Aziraphale pursed his lips and shook his head.

“S’gotta be something, Angel.”

“Well. P’haps.”

“A-ha!”

His fingers tightened around the cup, until cracks began to form. “I. At the Ark. I saved some of the humans who were s’posed to die.”

“How?” Crowley slid closer along the tiled floor.

“I – I – I took a family wi’ children. Moved them to th’other side of the world. Told them – told them they’d been spared, if the spread the story. Then…I did it again an’ again an’ again.” He looked up, eyes filled with tears. “That was good, right? The – the point wasn’t to punish, it was to send a message. Well, I helped spread the message. That’s good.”

“Ziraphale…” Crowley mumbled. He glanced at the pool, unable to meet those eyes. The water around the angel’s feet was wine-red, miracling out of his body as he spoke. “Why – why are you…”

“If I’m going to Fall, I want to do it sober.”

“No ya don’t.” If drinking had been an option during the War, Crowley certainly would have. “Why would you –”

“Not just the Ark,” Aziraphale rushed on. “I did the same at Sodom and Gomorrah. I stayed at Babel for months teaching the humans to speak each other’s languages again. In Egypt, the last plague, I – I – I took hundreds of firstborn sons and I – I hid them in safe places. It took weeks before anyone realized what had happened, we’d already left by then, so the point had been made, hadn’t it?”

Crowley pulled off his glasses, still staring at the angel’s panicked face.

“Don’t you understand?” Aziraphale dropped his cup, letting it shatter on the tile. “I’m the reason we can’t control the humans, I’m too soft with them, I don’t have the – the fortitude for this job. I undermine everything Heaven does, always have, and I hoped if I could find another way to control them…but it doesn’t exist, and they’ll find out, and I’ll Fall—”

“When you say…always have…”

“Eden.” Aziraphale pulled his feet out of the pool, turning to face Crowley entirely. “After you left. The lion attacked the humans. So. So I flew down. And I gave them my sword.”

“You what?” Crowley blinked.

“I’d been told to make sure they never returned, and I thought, well, if they’re able to feed themselves and stay warm and fight off the animals, they’ll have no need to come back, will they? I chased off the lion and I said here you are, flaming sword, everything you need in one. Take this, keep walking, never come back and…and take care of each other.” His hands came up, waving vaguely. “Was that the wrong right thing? Or just a wrong thing? I’ve wondered –”

Crowley was never sure why he did it.

The alcohol left his body, flowing into the pool to join Azirpahale’s. He grabbed the angel’s toga and pulled him close until their lips slammed together.

He waited for the smiting, for daring to defile a holy being, even if in an awkward, inexperienced way.

Instead, Aziraphale’s hand slid around his waist, the other cradled the back of his head, and warm lips parted below his and oh.

This was what the poets talked about.

Wessex – AD 538

The trumpets blared, the gates ground open, and the knights of King Arthur rode into Camelot, a clatter of hooves on cobblestones. Even had Crowley not been looking out the window, the cheers would have alerted her – it seemed every peasant and craftsman was out in the street, celebrating the return of their lords.

Her eyes searched for one in particular, the one she’d heard rumors of, but it was hard to distinguish one knight among all the shining plate and colorful banners. No, there. The one in a white fur cape, with a white horse. The one who carried no weapon. The smile spread across her face faster than she could bite it back.

“Come, ladies,” the queen said, rising from her throne. Her deep green dress was covered in lace and pearls, highlighting a flawless figure. Most humans didn’t see past that, to the sharp intelligence in her eyes. “The quest may be over, but our work has just begun. Keep the conversation at dinner light, no politics until at least the third course and if the Elaines would kindly spare us from their drama for a single evening…?” She raised an eyebrow at a knot of ladies, all different ages and appearances, who giggled behind their hands.

“My queen,” Crowley said, curtseying politely. “If I may be so bold as to ask for an introduction?”

“Of course!” Guinevere smiled, taking Crowley’s arm in hers. “You’ve hardly had a chance to meet any knights at all since your arrival. At least the questing season is almost over.” She lowered her voice as they walked. “The winters in Camelot may be cold and drafty, but at least we can convince the men to sit down and attend the duties of government. When there aren’t other distractions.” She eyed the Elaines again. “Your full introduction will wait until tomorrow, of course, when the king is ready to receive you. But I think we can at least find you a partner for dinner conversation.”

“I would be most grateful,” Crowley said demurely. “But is there any knight to be found who is as good a match for me as your own king is for you?”

The queen pressed her lips together, then smiled again. “Will you pretend you haven’t learned every bit of gossip about the men? Come. Tell me who you have your eye on, as if I couldn’t guess already.”

There was no mistaking the angel. Out of his armor, he worse a simple tunic of pale blue and white with silver embroidery that contrasted the bright, showy colors of the rest. He stood a little taller than most of the other knights, and she could see how his face beamed, radiant, as if he had stolen the stars and hidden them in his eyes.

Crowley berated herself for such foolish thoughts. It came from spending all her time surrounded by the ladies-in-waiting, but oh, it had been too long.

“…and though we found no sign of the Grail, your highness, I still feel the quest was a great success,” he was saying to some well-dressed human that was probably the king. “The people of Elmet were much heartened by your words and the relief you brought them after the famine.”

“Sir Aziraphale,” the queen chided. “That sounds an awful lot like politics, and you know my rules. The king needs time to recover from his journey.”

Crowley may have noticed Arthur reaching for his wife’s hand, but what expression either wore – or what looks Guinevere gave to the other knights – she missed entirely, because now Aziraphale smiled at her.

“It would appear you’ve gained another lady-in-waiting in my absence,” Aziraphale said, taking Crowley’s hand and bowing over it.

“Yes. Allow me to introduce the Lady Antonia of Crowley.”

“Sir Aziraphale,” Crowley curtseyed deeply. “I have heard much of your deeds.”

“And I believe I know of your family.”

“If it will not distract you from your duties,” she said, with a coquettish glance, “perhaps we can discuss old ties after dinner?”

“I look forward to the conversation.”

It wasn’t much of a conversation, though mouths were heavily involved.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Aziraphale managed, pulling his lips away long enough for a few words. “We agreed it’s too dangerous.”

“Maybe I wanted some danger.” Crowley shoved him against the wall of the castle, just out of sight of the hall where the Knights of Camelot feasted, and pulled kiss after kiss from her angel’s lips while his hands slid around her waist, pulling her closer. “Besides. I’m here on orders. My side thinks the island is getting too peaceful.”

“Too peaceful?” Aziraphale spun her away from the wall, backing her into the cushioned seat of a window. She fell onto the red fabric, and he bent over her, pressing kisses on her face as if to memorize the shape of her nose, her brow, her cheeks. “The kings of this island do nothing but fight!” He managed in between kisses, as Crowley twisted her head, trying to catch his mouth. “It’s all the queen can do to keep them from declaring war on each other every time they sit down to dinner.”

“Mmh.” Crowley pulled Aziraphale into her lap, kissing her way down his jaw and neck, as far as the lacing on the tunic would allow. “Probably why I was sent to ruin their marriage.”

“I don’t want to tell you how to do your job,” Aziraphale began, then paused to do something to Crowley’s neck that left her positively gasping. “But if you’re supposed to be seducing the king, you’re going about it all wrong.”

“Perhaps I need more practice.” She pressed her forehead to Aziraphale’s lightly rubbing their noses together. “I’m certain one of the chambers on this hall has a bed.”

“Nh,” Aziraphale groaned with a smile. “They’re going to expect me back soon. I really did just mean to find out why you’re here.”

Crowley let him stand, and he pulled her to her feet. They stood in the hall, arms wrapped around each other, her chin resting on his head. “I’m supposed to make Guinevere fall for one of the knights. We’re fairly certain without her there to balance the king, Camelot will fall apart in a matter of weeks.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“Well. The lust department had several suggestions. But naturally I arrive and she’s already in love with Lancelot.”

“Can’t blame her. Everyone’s in love with Lancelot.”

“Does that include you?”

“Don’t be jealous.” He brushed her lips lightly, and Crowley pulled him closer, into something much deeper and rougher. When they finally parted, breathless, they settled onto the window seat, side-by-side.

“Listen, you need to let me have this one,” Aziraphale said, twining their fingers together. “Not just because I was here first – though I was – but I really do think this is important. The island becomes more unified every year. People are happy under Arthur. And I think I’ve found the secret to the humans.”

“Not this again…” Crowley objected.

But he lifted her hand, brushing a kiss on every finger, every knuckle. “They don’t listen to us because we’re outsiders. We agree on this yes? But they trust a human leader, a charismatic one. We just find the right leader – like Arthur – and guide him on the right path, and he will ensure the rest follow.” His free hand slid up to cup Crowley’s face. “I have a whole report for Head Office almost complete. I’m certain it will go over well. I just need a few more months.”

“Oh, Angel.” She turned her head, kissing his palm. “I told you before. Nothing we do here matters. They’re already in love, she’s already tempted, and every day Arthur spends building his kingdom drives them further apart. It’s only a matter of time.” She leaned against his hand, searching his earnest eyes. “Let’s just enjoy this one. You and me, together, like…like humans…” It was strangely difficult to say.

“We can,” he said, hardly seeming to notice the pain she was in. “Once my report is ready, we can do – whatever game you like.” He pressed a kiss to the sigil on the side of her face. “There’s a lovely glade in the woods…I’d like to take you there next summer.”

Summer was far away. Already the queen received letters from her husband’s best knight, and the messengers carried notes back. But Guinevere knew what was at stake. “I think I can buy you a little time,” Crowley said.

Aziraphale smiled so brilliantly, her heart almost stopped beating. After nearly five thousand years, he still had hope, still believed he could make a difference. Sometimes, he even had Crowley believing again, thinking she belonged, a part of the world, someone who moved through it, helped to shape it, not just an outsider hammering around the edges, trying to make any impression.

It would hurt, later, when Aziraphale was proven wrong yet again. It would hurt them both. But now, in this moment, they had hope. And she loved him for it.

Crowley stood with a gasp.

“Crowley? My dear, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I – nothing.” She stepped away, finding another window to gaze out across the rolling fields of Camelot.

Aziraphale stepped up behind her, wrapping his hands around her waist, pulling her back into the curve of his stomach, enveloping her in his warmth. She tried not to let him see her expression.

She loved Aziraphale.

That was wrong. That wasn’t the Arrangement they had.

They coordinated jobs to avoid pointless conflict. They came up with clever lies for Head Office when half their assignments inevitably failed. They alerted each other to deeds the other could take credit for.

And, when they could, they distracted each other in the most pleasant ways possible.

They were not supposed to be in love.

London – 1601

“To be or not to be, that is the question…”

“Literature!” Aziraphale hissed happily, clutching at Crowley’s arm. He had that smile again, the one that always said he’d figured it out “Why didn’t I think of it before? It’s so obvious!”

Crowley looked fixedly at the stage, where the actor struggled to deliver his lines to an empty theater. Burbage was good, Shakespeare’s lines were clever (not that Crowley would admit either out loud), but still no one came to see the play.

“Pretty sure you’ve tried doing plays before. Remember what happened to Socrates?”

“It’s not the same!” He smiled at the stage, eating another grape. Crowley watched that smile through dark glasses, already bracing himself for what would come later. “For one thing, that was a complete accident. I had no idea comedy could be so cruel. For another, I wasn’t trying to manipulate anything, it just happened. But it worked!”

“Worked? It got a man executed!” Crowley circled behind Aziraphale, leaning close to whisper. “Besides, your side has had a stranglehold on literature for centuries. What gets copied, what doesn’t, thousands of sermons and treatises and bad poems.” He clenched his fist. “They’re just – so – boring!”

Up on stage, Burbage hesitated, shooting a glare towards Shakespeare that clearly said I told you so.

“Not you!” Aziraphale waved to the stage. “We were talking about a different play! This one is very not-boring!”

“It’s a little boring,” Crowley started, but Aziraphale scowled at him. “Fine. Yes. You’re very clever. Slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Good rhythm. Bravo.”

Shakespeare waved to his actor, and Burbage stepped to the center of the stage again. “To be, or not to be…”

“Oh, now he’s starting over,” Crowley groaned.

“Look, I have a plan,” Aziraphale tried again. “Popular literature. Comedies, love poems, things people enjoy hearing. We find the writers who are already very good, then just encourage a few new ideas into their stories. Use them as examples. Get people really talking about philosophy and morality.”

Already Crowley was shaking his head. “No, Angel. Besides, what’s so bloody good about this play? He just stands around talking about doing things, and never does anything!”

“Proof of concept. Besides, I happen to like it. Look, I’ll do some of the funny ones you like, too. All I do is get him to slip in a few particularly memorable lines, ensure the play’s success, and once all of London is talking about it, I can bring it to Gabriel and – and –”

“And what? Really?” Crowley circled again, to stand in front of Aziraphale, blocking the stage entirely. “You think humans don’t know how morality is supposed to work? Your lot have been feeding them rules for millennia. Nothing you can tell them now is new. It won’t change anything. Look.” He took Aziraphale’s hand in both of his, running his thumbs across the soft knuckles, feeling the way the angel’s fingers curled with a protectiveness Crowley didn’t deserve. Even after sixteen centuries, it could still make him shiver. “We’ve both got jobs in Edinburgh coming up. Forget all this. Let’s go north together, make a holiday of it. The giant monster can make an appearance at that lake you like, and then we’ll have it all to ourselves for a few days…”

Aziraphale’s eyes half-closed, and for a second, he leaned towards Crowley. Then he stepped away, quickly eating another grape. “Not where people can see us. We need to be more careful.”

“No one cares.” Crowley circled behind him, resting a hand on his lower back, feeling Aziraphale’s own shivers. “What do you say? You, me, a little journey north?”

“Crowley…I really think I have something here.” The demon groaned and stepped away, knowing what was about to come. “Look, if you could just – just cover my blessings for me while I get everything sorted out, I’m sure I can have a report ready in no time.”

“Angel, not again.”

But Aziraphale was looking at him with that mix of hope and pleading in his eyes, and it made Crowley’s heart melt all over again. He couldn’t say no. He could never, ever say no.

“Fine. Just promise me, when it all falls apart, this time you’ll do something for yourself. Take a rest. Enjoy life.”

“If you like, but it doesn’t matter.” Aziraphale smiled, like the sun emerging at the end of a storm. “This time it will work. You’ll see.”

Paris – 1793

“Animals don’t kill each other with clever machines, Angel. Only humans do that.”

“Crowley!” The angel leapt to his feet, turning with a smile that made Crowley nearly discorporate. Then he frowned. “Good lord. Is that what you wear to rescue me?”

“Sorry, left all my dashing hero outfits back in London.” He lurched upright and made to leave. “Maybe I should go get one. You mind waiting here a couple of days?”

“Don’t you – Crowley!” He looked back to find Aziraphale sinking back onto his seat. “Oh, you were right. It all fell apart.”

“I know, Angel. I read Paradise Lost. Pretty sure that’s not what you had in mind.” He settled onto the bench and took Aziraphale’s manacled hand in his. “What happened? Last time we spoke, you said it was all going well.”

“Well, I lied. It’s been a disaster from beginning to end.” He stared at the dripping walls of his cell. “I don’t understand. Look at – look at the Courtly Love poetry. The tales of chivalry. The same ideals over and over and people love them, follow them, emulate them.”

“Been a lot written about what your side has to say, too.”

“I know. But people don’t – they don’t love it, not the same way.” He lowered his voice. “Did you read those – those Puritanical treatises? It was like being lectured by Gabriel through a book, as unlikely as that sounds. And half the things they talked about are completely irrelevant! The humans always wind up more concerned with their own ideas and forget about the really important things.”

“So, why did you think it would be any different this time?”

“I don’t know! New contexts, new media. People were excited about literature as they hadn’t been for so long. It could be a fresh start for our message. Only when I pitched the idea to Gabriel, all he heard was the word new and next thing I know we’re organizing new translations of the same texts.”

“That explains the King James Bible.” Crowley had taken some joy in convincing Hell that the latest translation counted as a point for their side.

Aziraphale squeezed Crowley’s hand. “Then I tried suggesting some ideas to writers, personally, in dreams or at bars or all sorts of ways. But they all just took them in the wrong way entirely.”

“That explains Paradise Lost.” He’d enjoyed parts of that one.

“Yes. And I finally succeeded in getting some intellectuals to discuss morality, philosophy, science, all those big questions. And in the end, they pulled all our ideas to pieces and rebuilt them into something entirely different.”

“That explains the Enlightenment.” Crowley couldn’t help smiling at that. He loved when humans questioned things.

“And all that led to this.” Aziraphale waved manacled arms around the filthy cell. “A revolution and a hundred executions a day. All because I just…wanted people to talk about right and wrong.” He sighed. “So yes. You were right. Nothing we do makes any difference.”

But you tried, Crowley wanted to say. It’s been so long since I could bring myself to try. And you accomplished so much, even if it’s not what you wanted. You were brilliant. I love you.

He didn’t say that, though. There were some things a demon could never say.

But he had other words instead.

“Angel. What did I make you promise, two hundred years ago, when all this started?”

“That I would make Much Ado as popular as Hamlet. I really did try –”

“No, not that.” He stood up and pulled on the chain that bound the angel. “You promised if it all fell apart –” he tugged again, and Aziraphale stumbled to his feet – “you’d take a break from all this –” one more pull brought Aziraphale against him – “And do something for yourself.”

“Well. I suppose I did.” A little smile appeared on the angel’s face, as his hands started tugging on Crowley’s lapels.

“And it would be horrible – shameful – an unbelievable scandal if an angel were to go back on his word.” Crowley looped his hands around Aziraphale’s waist, pulling himself into that softness.

“Hmmmm,” Aziraphale rested his cheek against Crowley’s shoulder. “I thought we might get crepes.”

“It’s a start.” Crowley pressed a line of kisses across his jaw and down his neck, stopped too soon by the enormous cravat.

“And…see where the night goes?”

Crowley ran his fingers up Aziraphale’s spine, feeling those shivers once again. “I have some thoughts on that, too,” he promised, purring in his angel’s ear. “But after that?”

Aziraphale hesitated. “More crepes in the morning?”

“If you like,” Crowley laughed, “but not what I had in mind. Come on. You always have so many ideas for Heaven. Big elaborate plans. You must have one for yourself.”

“No I – I – it would be quite impossible.” He pushed away just a little.

“Yeah, probably, but that doesn’t usually stop you.” Crowley cupped Aziraphale’s face in his hands. He wanted to see that glow again, the look of hope. “Whatever it is, I can help.”

“I…there was one idea…I thought I might…open a bookshop.”

It took an effort not to frown at that. “A bookshop?”

“Yes! You know. Big leather-bound ones. Novels. Poetry. Even old journals. I could collect them, and repair them…”

“Sell them to customers?”

“Oh.” Aziraphale’s face fell a little. “I suppose…in the right circumstances. But I would also know all the latest books, and I could talk about the ideas in them. Maybe even get a cat.” He sighed. “I know it sounds foolish, but…I imagine it, in the heart of London, closing up early to go to the theater, or spend the night in with my collection and a bottle of wine…”

Yes, there it was. That smile. The one that made Crowley fall in love again every time. “And what are you going to call this business venture?”

“A.Z. Fell & Co. Just need to decide what the letters stand for.”

Crowley nodded. “And the Co?”

“Just a formality really.” His manacled hands found Crowley’s lapels again, smoothing them. “Unless, you know, someone was interested in being my partner?”

Crowley’s jaw hung open, trying to find the words, but it was too much. His heart raced until he thought it would burst. “You. You want me…?”

“Well. Gabriel would just make a mess of things.”

“But. Dangerous.”

“We’d have to be careful, but, well, we’re both very clever. Surely we could –”

The rest was cut off by Crowley’s lips, and by the sound of chains tumbling to the floor.

The next morning, Crowley sat on the right side of the bed, watching his angel dream.

He lay back across, to kiss Aziraphale’s cheek, then his bare shoulder. A smile grew across the sleeping face. “Cowey?” he mumbled.

“Shhh. Stay here. I’ve got some things to take care of first. I’ll see you in London. In our bookshop.”

Aziraphale waited for over two hundred years.

August 2008

The door to Aziraphale’s bookshop burst open with the sort of force usually associated with riots, attempted robberies, and visits from school groups. He turned from the customer he had been slightly-less-than-gently dissuading from purchasing a copy of Oliver Twist. It was one of the cheap paperbacks he kept around for persistent customers, but policy is policy.

A quick glance to the door to see who the troublemaker was.

A longer glance to take in the tall, dark being with the long red hair and the black glasses hiding any hint of his expression.

He pulled the book from the customer’s hand. “Everyone, please leave. We are closed.”

“But the sign said—”

“Everyone. Leave. We are closed.”

The three human customers shuffled their way out the door, past the impatient demon. Aziraphale took a deep breath before looking him in the eye – or at least the black lenses. “That includes you,” he said, voice as calm as he could make it.

“I – listen, we need to talk—”

“Oh.” Aziraphale took a step closer, watching the way Crowley twisted and squirmed. His clothing was ridiculous, trousers so tight he could hardly walk. He’d managed to cram a few fingers into the pockets, but they didn’t seem to be deep enough. “Now you want to talk?”

“Yeah, look, I’m sorry, Angel, I really am, but this is –”

“You said you would see me in London.”

“It’s…yeah, we’re in London—”

“Two hundred and fifteen years, Crowley!” Even though they’d been designed to absorb sound, Aziraphale’s shout echoed off the walls of the shop. “I have been waiting to hear from you for two centuries!”

“I…I had…”

“Oh, you had things to take care of?” Aziraphale stepped closer, jabbing a finger at him. “You could have contacted me!”

“It wasn’t safe!”

“Wasn’t safe? Since when do you worry about it being safe? You just waltz right in and introduce your newest alias, every time.”

“Angel—”

“Don’t you Angel me!” He shut his eyes and turned away. This isn’t how he’d wanted this to go. Don’t argue. It isn’t worth arguing. Just say your bit and send him away. “Crowley. In the last two hundred years, I’ve taken a…a lot of time to think about our…Arrangement. Things had gone rather too far.” He nodded, turning back. “Perhaps this separation was a blessing. In the future we should avoid—”

“Aziraphale, listen to me!” For the first time in so long, he felt those hands on his arms again, clutching him through the fabric. “Never mind any of that, this is important!”

It was an effort to catch his breath. “Let go of me, now.”

Crowley stepped back, holding up his hands, but the urgency hadn’t left his voice. “Hell has kickstarted Armageddon. It’s the end of the world.”

Aziraphale pressed his lips together. So it’s true. Plenty of humans had calculated the final date, and all of them had been wrong. He had hoped that Heaven’s information would also be incorrect. “Gabriel told me as much the other day. I’m meant to find out what I can and report back.” He cleared his throat, looking around at his shop, at his prized first editions, his music collection, the little row of silver snuff boxes by the window.

Six thousand years, and this was all he really had to show for it.

“I don’t suppose you know how long we have left?” he asked, trying to keep his voice even.

“About eleven years. The Antichrist has been delivered. I don’t know who they sent. I don’t exactly have a lot of fans downstairs just now but – but we still have time. We can track him down—”

“And do what? As you’re so fond of reminding me, nothing we do matters. Nothing I try makes any difference.” Aziraphale walked over to the desk where he kept his favorite first editions. Perhaps he could petition to have one or two added to the Library of Heaven, if they met the subject matter approval. Persuasion, at least, had served him well for many years.

“But we have to try.” Crowley danced around the edge of his vision. “You always say that. We have to try.”

“No, we don’t. There’s really no point. We can either try to avoid the inevitable, or we can prepare ourselves for it.” He wandered over to his music collection. Eleven years was probably enough time to learn to like one or two of Elgar’s works. Not enough time for The Sound of Music.

“Angel, please.” Crowley’s hand found that spot at the small of his back, the one that always made him shiver with delight. Oh, it really had been too long. “Don’t give up. Not yet. I can’t do this alone.”

“Just tell me this.” Aziraphale stared directly ahead, not looking at anything at all. “How long have you been in London? Months? Years? Decades?”

“Angel—”

“I saw the shape of the M25. Did you think I wouldn’t recognize a sigil?”

The hand pulled away, leaving him cold and alone. It was all the answer Aziraphale needed. “You should go now.”

He waited until the door clicked shut before sinking into his chair.

Then he searched his desk for a fresh piece of paper, and began to write his next report for Gabriel.

July 2019

Crowley pressed his mobile to his ear, leaning against the side of his Bentley. He heard a ring – another ring – a third –

“I’m sorry to say we are quite definitely closed. My regular hours are suspended, due to—”

“It’s me.”

A pause.

“How did you get this number?”

“What – Aziraphale, it’s the bookshop number. I got it the same way your customers do, unearthing a three-decade-old phone directory.”

“I thought I’d destroyed all those.”

“Will you listen?” Crowley shifted the mobile to his other ear. “I don’t have much time. I know where the Antichrist is. I know a bit more than that, too – what Hell is planning, where it’s all going to happen.”

A heavy sigh over the line. “If you’re going to say Megiddo, I already know that.”

His heart rose. “Aziraphale – you have been doing research! I knew you wouldn’t just give up. Don’t worry, I’ve got more than that – lots more.” He glanced over his shoulder. “I really – really – shouldn’t have this information, alright? But I think I’ve got a plan. I don’t know if it’ll save the world forever, but…it should buy us some time.”

Silence on the line.

“Aziraphale. I’m…I’m sorry. I really am. All I wanted was for you to be safe and…look…I can tell you more when we meet. I promise, I’m going to make it all up to you, in whatever time we have left.” More silence. “Do you need me to say it? It hurts, but I can—”

“No. Don’t.” Another pause, but this time with the sound of rustling paper in the background. “Just…tell me where to meet you. And when. I need at least a day to make preparations.”

Crowley had to put the mobile down and take a few deep breaths, pulling off his glasses to wipe at his eyes. “Right. Yes. Tomorrow is fine.” He turned a map towards him. “I can’t pick you up, not safe, but I can give you directions. Do you have some way of getting out here?”

The next day, Crowley paced beside his Bentley, waiting for the angel to show up. He was late.

Not late, actually. Technically, he still had several minutes to go. Aziraphale usually preferred to be early, but there could be many reasons he wasn’t able to find the spot. The plan was to meet here and travel the rest of the way together. He’d fill Aziraphale in on the details as they drove.

He thought he’d been clever, choosing the meeting spot, but the only identifying feature on this side road was a tree in the middle of a field. It was entirely possible the angel was ten miles away, waiting next to a completely different tree in an unrelated field and –

With an almost-unheard change of air pressure, Aziraphale was standing to his left.

“Angel,” he breathed out in relief. “You shouldn’t have done that. Anyone could have sensed your arrival. I’ve made a lot of demons very angry.”

“I know,” Aziraphale said, not quite meeting his eyes. That was fine. They would have time. The important thing was, Aziraphale had come. They were together again.

“Get in the car. It’s about ten minutes from here. I’ll tell you everything.”

“Yes. You really should tell us everything, as soon as possible.”

Another change in air pressure.

And Crowley turned to find Gabriel, Michael, Sandalphon and a dozen other angels standing behind him.

“Well done, Aziraphale,” Gabriel said, with a smile that made Crowley’s skin crawl. “Get the chains on him, I want to start interrogation as soon as possible.”

He spun back to Aziraphale, who held a golden chain in his hand. “You – Aziraphale, no.” Those hands reached for him, and Crowley stumbled back, barely able to stand, barely able to breathe around the awful, broken feeling in his gut. “You lied to me!”

“No, I didn’t – you just assumed – Crowley, please. This is for the best.”

“No!” In a flash of light, he was a serpent again, as big as he could manifest, slashing venom-filled fangs at the angels. It wouldn’t destroy them but it would burn, and he could probably get two before they took him down. He struck towards Gabriel, lashed his tail around towards Michael and her troops, and twisted away to the field, hoping for more room to maneuver.

He never made it that far.

Aziraphale leapt onto his back, pinning his face against the ground, as he twisted furiously, trying to escape. The metal chain slipped around his neck like a noose, pulled tight –

And suddenly, Crowley was human-shaped again, lying in the street, with Aziraphale sitting on his back, knees pinning his shoulders, hand pressing his face down into the pavement.

“Angel – please – don’t do this. Don’t do this.”

“Hush, dear. Don’t struggle. This is for the best. It’s for the best.”

[1] Popina – a bar in ancient Rome, usually serving the lower classes, with reputations for being rough

[2] Incitatus – Emperor Caligula’s prize racehorse, which he allegedly made a Senator, and attempted to appoint Consul. His ornate marble stable probably was real; his wife, the mare Penelope, is from Robert Graves’ I, Claudius

[3] This is not an actual battle, but combines details from the Battle of Drepana (249 BC, when Publius Claudius Pulcher threw the sacred chickens in the sea for refusing to eat) and the Battle of Actium (31 BC, when Marc Antony held his position while the winds shifted, until it was quite impossible to slip by Octavian’s forces). Romans were very fond of various forms of fortune telling; one tradition was that if the sacred chickens ate a certain way before battle, it was a good omen, but if they refused to eat, it was ill.

[4] Aristophanes’ The Clouds – a comedy about philosophy, ideas, religion and education. One character is a parody of Socrates, and allegedly the play was used as evidence in his trial that he “corrupted the youth,” leading to his execution

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