Chapter Text
The silence was absolute, pressing down with the force of the deepest oceans, already invented but not yet filled with anything that might feel the current. Silence had never reigned in these realms, filled with song and music and the ever present chime of bell like voices and wings stretched out in light, laughter and hymns.
Vaguely Aziraphale was aware of sounds and words, knew that there were voices, saw mouths opening in wails of pain and grief. There was nothing that reached his ears though, and if deafness had been invented yet he would have wondered if that was what had befallen him.
Angels did not need to breathe and had not yet gotten the time to copy the habit from humans, so Aziraphale didn’t. If it had occurred to him to let his body behave like a human, he would be panting and desperately try to reign in his gasps. As it was he only looked around with numb curiosity, aware of broken wings and bodies around him, and the sharp scent of brimstone and burning feathers surrounding him.
He tried to stand, but his leg informed him that he would surely be in terrible pain if he jostled his celestial body too much. He looked down at his horribly mangled right leg, light pouring out of the cracks in it. Aziraphale could not remember who had wounded him like this, just as he couldn’t remember the countless rebels he must have slain. Oh, he did know that he did, he remembered his hands moving in brutal efficiency and a flaming sword cutting through them. But he couldn’t remember who.
Aziraphale knew that his body would be in excruciating pain from his injuries and the exhaustion of the battle. Linear time had not been invented yet, so it was quite reasonable to assume that the fights had lasted for a century or more. There was something coiling in his chest though, an indescribable agony that corresponded to none of his wounds.
Distantly Aziraphale thought to call out, for whom, he wasn’t sure. A name rested on his tongue, caught in his throat, but the memory of it had burned clean away. He only knew that above all else, he desperately needed to know that the angel whose name it was, was safe. Had escaped the fights, had not gotten into the clutches of one of the Fallen – demons, that’s what they were called now, he had been told. His love was an artist, architect of light and beauty. Not a soldier at all. Oh, he would have gotten hurt terribly if he had gotten into the fight!
The Heavens were no specific place at all, but when Aziraphale looked up all the stars of creation stretched across the sky above him. He sighed, licking golden ichor off his lips, and frowned. He had always been a soldier, not in any way helping Her create. It was his duty to guard and keep this creation safe. From what, he hadn’t known then, but was all too painfully aware of now.
When Aziraphale closed his eyes he couldn’t recall the face he loved most above all. But he remembered a hand reaching out to him, elegant and well suited to guiding light and energy into those fiery orbs that now illuminated the universe. Instead of angelic skin and flesh and bone, Aziraphale could only remember limbs woven from starlight and cascading hair like solar flares, just as hot and bright against the darkness of space.
He remembered his elation and wonder that such a beautiful creature would cast its eyes on him, and his joy when fingers stained by stardust laced with his, how blessed he had felt when his beloved whispered of his devotion. Aziraphale had never thought of walking through the milky way to examine the creations, but his beloved had worked so hard on them and pulled him along to show him. Such a skilled crafter, and yet Aziraphale heard the echo of joy in his head. His starmaker had been more eager for his approval of his creations than even Her’s.
Aziraphale gasped quietly, and pressed his hand to his chest. His celestial body had no heart, but somehow he felt that this was where the pain came from.
Someone moved near him, and Aziraphale looked up to see Gabriel trudge by him, his wings all drooping and dragging over the battlefield, stained gold and black with the ichor of countless creatures. His hair had gone grey, or so Aziraphale thought. He had never interacted with the Archangel much, and couldn’t remember right now. His eyes looked as if they had lost their lustre, and a broken trumpet hung in his hand.
“Holiest Archangel,” Aziraphale called out, making a brief attempt to move, before reconsidering when his leg ached.
Gabriel paused for a few moments, before turning to the Principality. He smiled and it looked wrong. Fake smiles were invented that day, but everyone was too tired to mind at the moment.
“I see you fought well against those-” Gabriel made a vague gesture down, where Satan and his followers had pummelled to the ground.
“How many were lost?” Aziraphale asked.
The fake smile was still there, but unspeakable pain flashed over eyes that had gone grey as well. Aziraphale was sure they had been something like violet, before.
“More than half of those who had ever existed,” Gabriel said. “Even counting those traitors.”
Aziraphale shivered, aware of the horror clawing at the layer of shocked numbness that kept his emotions at bay for now. He couldn’t even fathom such loss. He had somehow known each and every angel, even if he had never spoken to them.
Behind Gabriel two more Archangels approached, Uriel and Michael, both still drenched in ichor. Tearing his eyes from them Aziraphale looked around, noting with surprise that there were broken bodies near him. Gold and black, lying near him like shattered porcelain. For the life of him he couldn’t recognize the faces of the slain around him.
The thought unsettled Aziraphale, and once again he tried to recall the name and face of his most beloved.
Again, all he could come up with was unspeakable loss. If he focused hard he could recall loving eyes, looking at him as if he was more beautiful than the stars contained within them. Wings, strong and just a tiny bit wider than Aziraphale’s own as they raced through the stars together. They were crimson and shone like garnets and rubies, speckled with gold and magnificent compared to Aziraphale’s own snow white ones. Much more lovely to behold. Why could he remember the wings but not the face?
“Forgive me for asking,” Aziraphale said, seeing no reason to be less than polite even given the circumstances and the battlefield around them. “But can I ask for the whereabouts of an angel in particular?”
Uriel’s eyes turned to him, exhausted and pained, Michael ignored him, and Gabriel’s smile remained unmoved. Briefly Aziraphale wondered if it hurt to smile like that, and if Gabriel even knew how to stop.
“You are a hero among us!” Gabriel said, “You can ask anything you like.”
“Where is- that is. I don’t know where-“ Aziraphale tried hard as he might to get the name out, but it was like trying to catch air in his hands. “My beloved. I can’t- Where is he?”
At this the smile dropped, and Uriel let out a pained keen. To his horror Aziraphale saw her skin crack around her face, a spider web of damage spreading over her body leaving light and ichor to pour out in ways that celestial bodies shouldn’t do. Michael took hold of her, wings wrapped around her body. Uriel gasped once, twice, before a numbness set over her and she sagged back, the cracks closing again, though the damage remained in a pattern of gold on her skin.
“We weren’t built for loss,” Uriel whispered, voice even but rough. “To process grief. It does this to us.”
She raised her hand, and Aziraphale saw the same damage on her hand as on her face. Michael carried something similar.
“My love… they… cut down right before my eyes. I can’t. We were not meant to sustain damage like this and heal from it. Our bodies can’t change like that.”
Gabriel gave her a sad look, and turned back to Aziraphale.
“The Almighty gifted us with blissful unawareness,” he said, not even trying to sound happy about it. “Those lost and those Fallen don’t exist in our memories anymore. I don’t think any one of us would survive if they did.”
“Cut down?” Aziraphale whispered and stared at Uriel in horror. The emotions were slowly trickling through the barrier of his shock. He glanced down at the dead around him, and stiffened.
Those Fallen and those slain were forgotten?
His beloved must have fallen victim to the traitors then. What other option was there? He was so far away from those demons, had never had a single rebellious thought in his heart. Of course he would have been slain then, just as Uriel’s love…
An anguished wail rose up, and only when Gabriel flapped his wings in alarm did Aziraphale realize that it was his own voice crying out. His hands flew to his mouth and shimmering tears welled up in his eyes, blurring his vision for the first time in his life. At the same time something ripped in his chest and with renewed horror Aziraphale watched his emotional pain create corresponding damage to his body. His tunic dampened with the ichor that oozed from the cracks spreading across his chest, his angelic light spilling out of the broken skin and threatening to split him wide open, to shatter-
“Calm yourself,” Michael snapped, making Aziraphale startle and right himself to attention, as much as he could. “Lingering on it will break you. Remain in control of yourself as Her gift of reprieve settles.”
Aziraphale nodded, eyes lingering on her own damage. He couldn’t remember who she had lost, though surely he must have known once. The pain of losing those he had known, chief of them his beloved, was more than he could handle. The waves of compassionate grief for Michael were too much on top of it all.
“You will feel better soon,” Gabriel promised, looking forlorn now, a hint of real emotion. “I already can’t be sure who my- who the lost one was to me.”
Aziraphale nodded and permitted the Archangels to raise him to his feet. Now that he was standing his ruined leg could be ignored for a while. He dutifully hobbled along with them, trying very hard not to think of a slender arm wrapping around his waist, or how he remembered fingers and the sweetest kisses on his skin.
How could his mind conjure up these images so clearly unbidden, when trying his hardest did nothing to make him recall his love’s face? How could he so clearly imagine lying against his body, and recall sweet words soothing his pain as gentle hands wiped the ichor from his face as he rested, but not the actual sound of a voice, or more than the taste of his skin and the feel of his feathers?
Surely it was more cruel to let him keep those memories and have him forget all else.
Then it occurred to Aziraphale that he was permitted to retain the love, but that the pain of it was dulled. Better than forgetting completely, surely.
Silent tears ran over his cheeks but if this was not becoming for a soldier of the Heavenly Host, none of the Archangels said a word.
*
Aziraphale rested against the warmth of his lover’s side, his cheek pillowed on crimson and golden feathers. The ground they lay on was clouds and wisps of a galaxy his love had worked on earlier, as comfortable as anything, and yet the wing had been offered freely, to keep Aziraphale off of it.
His fingers were tangled in hair the colour of burning stars, and an arm was wrapped around his body, keeping him close as if he had any wish to stray from his love’s side at all. The memory was crisp and full of love, but try as he might the features before him blurred into light. Only eyes, black and star spangled like the galaxies around them, were in focus. Such beautiful eyes surely were too precious to be purged from his mind.
They were completely alone here, far far away from any other angel. Of course the Almighty knew they were there, as She knew everything, and nothing escaped her gaze. But they were so far from her throne that Aziraphale still felt a sense of privacy, a concept that was still being worked on.
“How lucky am I that you chose to love me,” he whispered against the crook of his lover’s neck. “You create such beauty with Her light, and I’m a mere soldier. Nothing special compared to all of this.”
His love laughed, and Aziraphale knew what sounds he made, even if he couldn’t remember what they actually sounded like.
“What? You’re the best among all angels I know. And you are my angel, which makes you the most special in my eyes.”
Aziraphale laughed and his lips were caught in a sweet kiss. He could remember the taste of it, but not how soft the curve of his love’s mouth must look.
“I do feel a little foolish at times,” he confessed. “Guarding, but with nothing there to guard yet. It’s not quite ready, I heard. Whatever it is that the humans will live in on Earth.”
He saw the dried and crumbling stardust paint on his love’s fingers, but could not make out his hand as it rose up to cradle Aziraphale’s cheek.
“I wonder,” his love began, the wing not occupied by Aziraphale flexing briefly, catching the light of twin stars above their heads. “Why do we need soldiers and guards anyway? I get that there’s stuff to protect. But protect it from what? There’s nothing… there.”
Evil had not been invented yet, and neither angel had a word for this.
“Surely the Almighty has a plan for this,” Aziraphale said primly. He wondered this too, sometimes when he watched the other angels do things around him. It was never something he voiced out loud though. “It’s all in Her plan.”
“The ineffable plan,” his love laughed. His free wing covered them both, wrapping Aziraphale in a cocoon of red and gold, much to his delight. “Can’t wait to see where that goes.”
They lay quietly for a while, basking in the light of the stars and occasionally each other’s kisses. Eternity might have passed, until Aziraphale pulled at his love’s hands and helped him up.
“We should return to the others,” he said. “There’ll be songs and announcements soon, I’m sure of it.”
“And bland food,” his love sighed with a grin. He was so focused on his work in the stars, he often sighed and grumbled over the choirs.
“Between you and me, I am looking forward to what the humans will have for food,” Aziraphale confessed. “Growing something to prepare and eat it for energy? That just sounds delightful.”
Together they stretched their wings and flew off, hands still linked together. It had been before the trouble had started to rear its head, and there was nothing to tell Aziraphale that this wouldn’t just go on for the rest of existence.