Chapter Text
No.
Aziraphale remembered his entire life with Crowley. How things happened and when. They'd jumped the track of fate before. But now, because of Crowley's heartless claim, everything felt wrong, and misplaced. He couldn't think. Couldn't move. He was… frozen.
“Aziraphale!” A hand touched the angel's shoulder, making him jump back. He'd been so lost in thought, he didn't notice that someone else was in the room.
“Sera!” Aziraphale shot up, taking a few steps back from the Seraphim. He'd just been ripped out of his thoughts so everything was fuzzy.
“Supreme Archangel Aziraphale, are you alright? You've been here for hours.” Sera tilled her head at him.
“Hours?! I… I haven't… been..!” Aziraphale drifted off mid sentence; spacing out again.
“Aziraphale..? How did the meeting with hell go?” Sera asked, trying to bring the Archangel back to reality.
Aziraphale took a moment to process that somebody was actually talking to him. He looked down at where Crowley had been, as a hologram. Where the demon had told him that he had been trying to collect his soul for the last six-thousand years. There was something wrong… so wrong with what he said. So much was wrong… wrong…
“Aziraphale?”
“Ah, yes! Yes! The meeting… well… Lucifer's right hand came… said hell wasn't apologizing and that… we had it coming to us…!” Aziraphale muttered, still stunned about everything.
“Oh my… Satan showed up? I knew I shouldn't have left you alone with him.” Sera was worried that Satan had scarred the very fabric of her newest angel's mind under her care.
“Satan? No.. no. Lucifer has a new right hand.” Aziraphale cleared up.
“What? Is his daughter his new right hand now? I thought she was too busy running her hotel.” Sera turned to Aziraphale, scratching her chin.
“No… it's Crowley. He rose through the ranks somehow… him and Lucifer must be… friends again.” Aziraphale cupped a hand to his face leaning against the table, devastated by his world crashing down.
Sera frozen.
“What?”
Lucifer and Crowley… are friends again? No. That couldn't be. She had made sure that those two stayed separated. The last time those two were friends, when they were angels, they brought humanity down. They'd started with asking questions… testing boundaries, giving the humans the fruit of knowledge. They brought sin to the world of man. Now, with such horrors in the world, what else could they cultivate? What other forms of madness could they make? This couldn't stand. They couldn't be friends again. She'd have to do something about it. She had to separate them.
She was pulled out of her thoughts when she spotted Aziraphale still breathing heavily in the corner of her eye. He'd been frightened by something in that meeting. She knew that Aziraphale was an ambassador on Earth for a few thousand years, that's why she even let him do this meeting in the first place, but had he run into the demon Crowley before? Had the demon tried killing him? They had to have met at some point, being on Earth together for all those years. Or was the fact that Lucifer and Crowley being close again that overwhelming to him?
"Aziraphale, are you alright? I know I must sound like a broken record…" The seraphim tried reaching out for her colleague, brushing her hand against his shoulder, only for him to jump back like a scared animal.
"I'm fine… just fine… i… I just… I'm going to visit Earth for a while. I'll be back..!" Aziraphale said before walking out of the room.
What had Crowley done to him? Sera knew the demon was responsible for bringing sin to the world of men, but what could he have possibly done to Aziraphale in the short time their meeting went on for.
________
Aziraphale arrived on Earth, in the wide London area. He was so out of sorts that he didn’t know exactly were where he was. He didn't care to know either. He just started walking, and walking, and walking. He bumped into a few people, got cured at, even one particularly annoyed pedestrian threw a cup of coffee at him.
Normally the angel would apologize, mutter out a 'sorry' and continue with his walk. Normally he would care that his favorite suit would have a huge coffee stain on it. Normally Crowley would be the one to miracle it away; making it better, and pick a fight with the guy.
Oh.
Aziraphale ended up in the park he used to meet up with Crowley; St. James. They'd feed the ducks. Crowley would always yell at Aziraphale when he brought anything for the ducks; other than frozen peas. Aziraphale would argue that God had made ducks before frozen peas were even in concept. Crowley would yell some more.
Aziraphale half expected a playful argument right about now. But Crowley wasn't here. He had chosen to leave for Heaven; Crowley, the demon he was, denied his offer of salvation.
Why did Crowley even deny his invitation to be an angel again?
His excuse at the time had been that he didn’t want to be on either side, but he turned right around to be Lucifer's right hand man? A man he's dispensed since the beginning. How did that even happen? Crowley had loathed Heaven and Hell alike. He hated his job; most of the time.
But now apparently this whole time Crowley was trying to collect his soul?! Had been trying to collect his soul their entire friendship?! Had been Lucifer's right hand the whole time?
That didn't sit right with the angel. It didn't… it didn't sit right; this wasn't right. Why wasn't it?
Aziraphale miracled some bread; to get his mind off things; and tore off a piece for the ducks. He might have slightly hoped this would summon a demon, if he was lucky. But nothing but cheerful duck sounds was all he got.
——---------
After a completely useless night's 'sleep', Crowley woke up still feeling like a fuckin' shity idiot, with a perching headache as a cherry on top. He crawled out of bed and dragged himself into the kitchen to grab his favorite cup of six-shots-of-espresso.
Fuck.
He still had to apologize to Charlie for yelling at her. And calling her a nosy ass bitch. Which she was, but he still shouldn't have vocalized that.
Fuck.
With all his luck in the stars Charlie walked into the kitchen, looking glum. She'd been a mix of sad and happy since the last extermination. And today she was sad. She sat a few seats from Crowley on the island, and face planted into the counter.
"Charlie… kid… you alright?" Crowley looked over at her, questioning a few life decisions that lead him to this point.
She let out a long, indignant sigh, not looking up.
Crowley cursed everything he knew in a single breath before he got up to sit next to Charlie, cup of espressos in hand.
"Kid… what happened?" Crowley asked, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder.
"Crowley." She rolled her face to look up at him, missy tears in her eyes. "Do you really think I'm a nosy bitch?" The kid started crying.
Crowley would have found this funny, if he wasn't the one who; a) caused her tears, and; b) now had to deal with them.
"No, no, dear. I didn't mean that. I was just… I had a horrible day yesterday and I snapped at you. I'm sorry." Crowley apologized, placing his cup on the island to hug her.
His shirt was now damp with tears and he hated it. He wished he could just miracle himself back in time and stop himself from snapping at her, but it wasn't like he had a flying blue time machine in this life.
"Wait!" Charlie sat up properly gripping Crowley's forearm for support. "You got injured yesterday! How did that happen? Are you alright?" Crowley was right, she is nosy.
"Augh…!" Crowley wanted to douse himself in holy water right about now. He was too hung over for this shit.
"Yesterday… the meeting with Heaven… the ambassador was someone I knew from before…!"
"Before? You mean before the revaluation?" Charlie asked, knowing that Crowley was one of the original fallen angels with her dad, but she didn't know much about him, and he tried keeping it that way.
Before? Well ya. Before the fall, before he came to hell, before he became Arch Duke of Hell.
Crowley nodded in agreement. "Ya… from before."
"Was it hard… remembering them? Remembering being an angel? I know Dad sometimes gets sad when he remembers his time in Heaven." Crowley's head hurt too much for him to be thinking this hard right now.
Sad? Was Crowley sad? Or was it something worse? He didn't miss Heaven. He missed his stars, of course, and not being torched; but he didn't miss Heaven. He didn't miss being an angel. He'd been a demon for much longer than he'd even been an angel.
He missed Earth. He missed his Bentley, wonder how they're doing. They know better than to let someone break in. He missed the bookshop where he'd take snake-naps on the dusty window sile; or when he'd get shit face drunk with Aziraphale.
Aziraphale….
He missed the bloody angel the most. But they both ruined their relationship by being prat's in their own ways.
".... I miss Earth. I miss what Earth had to offer." Crowley said after a long silence.
"Oh…!" Charlie let that slip out. Fuck. The kid was hell born. She'd never been to Earth before. She wouldn't understand why he missed it.
"Why'd you come down to hell then? Don't get me wrong Uncle Crowley! I really do appreciate all the help… but why would you willingly leave Earth… for Hell?" Charlie pressed.
Crowley saw a shadow shift unnaturally behind Charlie. Listening to them. Watching them.
"This isn't the place to say." Crowley's tone went back to cold and guarded. He took his coffee cup and left Charlie at the table.
______
Aziraphale was sitting at the pond for who knows how long. He was such in his own head he didn't notice anyone near him until someone touched his shoulder.
"Mr. Aziraphale?"
Muriel tiled their head to the side, not expecting the Supreme Arch Angel of Heaven to be back on Earth, sitting sadly at a pound, feeding the ducks bread.
Muriel looked different from the last time Aziraphale saw them. They still had the same face, but their choice in attire changed. They adorned a comfy light blue sweater, a knee length bash skirt and pink crocs with white socks. Their outfit was perfectly reasonable… except for the choice of foot wear.
"Oh, Muriel… it's lovely to see you again. How are you?" Aziraphale coughed out the lump in his throat. He still felt like crying over Crowley, but maybe having someone to talk to could help distract him a bit.
"I'm doing just fine, Mr. Aziraphale." Muriel sat beside him, swinging their legs over the edge of the pond like a child. "But… I can feel your… unhappiness?"
"Do you mean sadness, my dear?"
Muriel thought about it for a moment. "No. I can't feel your sadness, just your lack of happiness." which was something most angels could feel. The last time Muriel and Aziraphale met, he was extremely happy. But now. He didn't know when it all went wrong. When Crowley started hunting for an angel's soul for a promotion. Hunting his soul.
And he didn't know so many things. He was the smart one. He was meant to know things! Know better! Be better!
"Well.. you're not wrong… I am quite sad at the moment." Aziraphale admitted, ripping up some more bread for the ducks to eat, tossing it down.
Muriel looked sad that Aziraphale was sad. They had been so much happier living on Earth then in Heaven; even though they loved Heaven greatly and it was their home, but Earth was so nice. They understood why Aziraphale and Crowley worked so hard to keep it around. Crowley.
"Oh? What about Crowley? He always makes you happy!"
Aziraphale groaned at the mention of the demon who'd shatter his whole world view. Crowley had made him extremely happy… but now… he didn't know.
"Oh.. well… that's the thing, Crowley is the reason I am a bit sad at the moment, my dear."
"Why? Did your reunion in Heaven not go so well?" Muriel asked, knowing, or not knowing something important.
"What? What do you mean by that?"
"Oh… a few months back, actually not even a week after you left to Heaven, Crowley busted out of the bookshop, yelling about how he was going to 'the start of all his problems' and how he'd 'find peace in hell by killing… 'MrMeanieWhosNameStartsWithAnL', or die trying'." Muriel wouldn't say Lucifer. It was too unholy of a name for them to say, even if they were quoting something someone else said. They didn't understand that Crowley had gone out on a suicide mission not even a week after Aziraphale left him. What was Crowley's angle?
"What are you talking about?"
"Crowley was on such a rampage that his old friend… the guy with an L name… had cursed him to a life of misery. He was so angry that he left for hell that same day and I haven't seen him since." Muriel explained their part of the story. "I thought that he ended up in Heaven some how."
Crowley had tried killing himself by confronting Lucifer, no doubt. God! This is why Aziraphale didn't want to give him that holy water back in the 1800's and only gave it to him in 1950 because he was so hellbent on getting holy water he would have ended up dead regardless.
"Oh… Aziraphale… your eyes are leaking." Muriel pulled out a handkerchief that looked to be one of Aziraphale's old ones from the 1920's and handed it to him. It was white with red sticking around the border. Crowley had made him this one when he went on a sticking craze.
This just made him cry more.
Muriel was in full panic mood now. Even though they had been on Earth for a few months now, they rarely had to deal with human emotional outbursts of sadness. And this wasn't just a human. It was the Supreme Arch Angel Aziraphale. One of the highest angels in rank, crying. All they could do was pat his back and hoped this stopped.
"There there… I'm sure everything will be alright."
"No! Nothing is alright!" Aziraphale snapped, a dam of his emotional block spewing out. "Heaven is so boring, I have nothing that I enjoy up there! Michel is always looking over my shoulder! Sera doesn't know what to do and believed I came with all the answers! Hell is planning an uprising and Crowley shattered my entire world's view in one conversation!" Aziraphale let out, balling his eyes out, Muriel still had no idea what to do.
"Did what he say sound truthful?" Muriel asked, getting the other angel to look up at them.
"What do you mean?" Aziraphale didn't know what Muriel was talking about.
"Well one thing I learnt is that, if you can't feel the truth coming off them, the person is probably lying." Muriel explained the missing piece that Aziraphale should have caught all along.
The reason Crowley's clams made no sense was that they were all lies. Though he couldn't completely come to such a conclusion because he would have to check notes with Crowley, but still! Aziraphale knew what it felt like for Crowley to lie to him; like when he was tasked with killing Jobs' goats and children. When he looked him in the eyes and swore to him that that was what he wanted to do. It wasn't. Crowley had always had a good heart underneath all the black leathers and tucked in wings. He was good, and not truly evil!
He valued life greatly! And Aziraphale's life must be heart to him.
"Oh thank you my dear Muriel!" Aziraphale scared the poor angel with a fierce hug, making them yelp.
"No problem?" They patted Aziraphale's back awkwardly, not knowing what else to do.
Aziraphale then abruptly got up and left the park, aiming to get back up to heaven so that he could arrange or attend the next meeting Heaven and Hell had in hopes that Crowley would be there and he could talk to him.
Muriel sat there confused for a minute before also getting up and ready to leave. Eric might begin to worry if they didn't get back to the library soon.