Chapter Text
About 6 months after the Apocadidn’t, Anthony J. Crowley decided to move on with life. And by move on with life, he meant move away from the one thing that served as a distraction: one angel named Aziraphale. There was a hope that with saving the world, being able to live a somewhat normal life, and knowing more about each other after a body swap would mean they could move forward just a bit.
‘To the world.’
After that, things went back to how they were besides reporting to their respective sides. Crowley tried to get Aziraphale to go out on a proper date, like a picnic to a new park or somewhere other than the Ritz. Even to see a good Hamlet production, despite how bored he might be!
Alas, his angel never bit. Always he had to maintain the shop or you never know who is looking. So Crowley needed to get away. He was suffocating under the disappointment. He hired someone to take care of his plants and moved to Japan.
Why Japan? To cause chaos. To be himself. To work in computers. He liked technology, working as a human in technology he could embed a whole bunch of chaos that would only unfurl in time, or if the testers were good enough, be found at the last minute to then turn into a big delay in a release. Minor chaos, but things that could be felt worldwide, you know?
So, no a year post Apocadidn’t, Crowley sat and coded for about an hour a day at some random Japanese company, spent a solid 5 to 6 hours a day total thinking about the life Aziraphale and he should be having, and the rest of the time goofing off in ways that made it look like work or socializing in ways that made work happy. It wasn’t the worst. He was not suffocated, he did not feel boxed in or cornered. Most of the work events meant going out and getting drunk anyway, so that didn’t matter.
The hardest thing to explain had been his sunglasses. He miracled the job, but forgot to add in the sunglasses. What worked was saying he had an extreme light sensitivity and the few times he took his glasses off after a night of drinking, no one remembered anyway. Apparently tonight would be one of those nights perhaps, as there was some event with foreigners coming to test some software for something. He did not particularly pay attention, alcohol was alcohol.
He pushed back from his desk, grabbed his cigarettes and swayed off to the smoking room. That was another sweet thing about Japan, most of these offices had smoking rooms just built in.
“Crowley?” The voice of his dreams said from down the hall.
Shit. Were his thoughts getting to be a bit louder than just thoughts? He shook his head and walked faster, as if running away from a spector behind him.
“Anthony J. Crowley, you and your ridiculous name will stop right this instant!”
That was new. Normally his thoughts did not make demands of him. At least not such bland ones. Said Anthony J. Crowley stopped and looked over his shoulder. There stood both the brightest item in the world to him and the darkest corners of his mind.
Aziraphale.
“Oh hey Aziraphale. On a smoke break. Nice to see you, gotta go now,” he said turning and running down the hall.
“Crowley!” Another cut to his heart, because no footsteps followed him. Maybe he would skip and go get drunk alone tonight.