Chapter Text
“What are you doing Aziraphale?”
Aziraphale jumped slightly as the voice behind him spoke. He was far too distracted with ‘surveying’, as he liked to call it, Earth to even notice The Metatron behind him.
“What? Oh, yes! Just looking at Earth; making sure everything is in order. Miracles and all,” he said with fake excitement. Miracles used to be the highlight of his day. Now he just saw them as part of his job. Maybe it's because he wasn’t the one doing them anymore. Now he saw why the higher ups didn’t care how everything got done, just that it did.
He thought that being Supreme archangel would be everything he ever dreamed of.
He thought he could make a difference.
He was in fact doing nothing other than paperwork and managing heaven.
He gave up everything for this.
All he can do is hope that it will get better.
He always liked the brighter side of things.
He preferred ‘white’ in ‘black and white.’
Once someone had told him that sometimes he needed to find ‘gray’.
It was a lot harder than one might think.
Well for him it was.
He doesn’t have time to worry about these things right now; his boss still didn’t want to leave him alone.
“Oh, interesting. Everything going well?” The Metatron asked with a very disingenuine smile. Well ingenuine to anybody else in heaven, hell, everything in between, but to someone as loving and kind as the sweet, little angel he took it as the most genuine smile he’s seen in a while.
(Nobody really visits him; he chooses to believe they are busy)
“Why, yes! Earth is doing great! In fact we just finished a miracle!” he beamed. Although he found his job boring and mundane, he did enjoy watching the happiness on the human’s faces. The miracles did make him happy, not like before, but I guess that’s the price you pay for making a ‘difference.’
If only he were making a difference.
“Well isn't that great. Anything else interesting on Earth?” The metatron gave another insincere smile. Based on that tone Aziraphale was sure he was implying something. He just wasn’t sure what it was.
“What do you mean,” he cocked his head to the side slightly. The Metatron held back the urge to roll his eyes.
He truly was the most innocent angel out there.
“Like anything to do with that demon friend of yours?”
Oh.
Of course he wanted to know about Crowley.
All angels did.
Demons too.
Not because of his charm or the fact that he had a strangely good style for a demon. Or because he had weirdly vibrant house plants, and a Bentley with no scratches.
No, they wanted to know him because he was a demon who turned down salvation.
A demon who turned down being the right hand man of the Supreme Archangel.
A demon who couldn't choose between heaven and hell.
A demon who didn't want to choose.
None could understand why he wanted to be alone.
Once heaven and hell heard that the new Supreme Archangel would be the angel once labeled a traitor they were, for one, confused, and for two, sure that the demon would be joining.
When demons and angels alike found out, everyone thought he had either gone mad, hellish, or just plain died. Or some combination of the three. How he died they weren’t sure, but it was still a theory nonetheless.
Of course when word got out that he had just just plain stayed, everyone decided he had gone mad.
Those who knew him would agree.
Well not the angel, not anymore.
Those that knew him would say he’d gone mad. Not because he’d stayed, no. But because his angel didn’t.
He went mad because of a lot of things: sadness, anger, a weird sense of grief for a love that never had a chance, but never from regret.
No he didn’t regret the things that happened.
He wished it went differently of course.
He never really felt regret.
He always believed it would work out. For being a demon he was surprisingly optimistic (deep down of course.)
He felt guilt of course. Another thing demons never really feel.
But regret?
He really didn’t do the whole ‘regret’ thing.
He didn’t regret not going.
He didn’t regret kissing him.
He didn’t regret telling him how he felt. (Tell him is a generous word of course.)
He did regret one thing of course.
But I’m sure that’s not something you want to hear about, so let’s go back to the story at hand, shall we?
After a short break of course.