Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It overwhelms him partway through the first act.

During conversation, at least, he can usually drown out the thoughts - write them off as the influence of nearby humans, or talk so quickly his mind can't focus on anything else. But now they're in a darkened theatre, and the scene onstage keeps blurring out, subsumed by his buzzing sense of doom. 

It would be so easy.

"Alright, angel?" Crowley doesn't bother lowering his voice, earning them dirty looks from the other patrons. 

Aziraphale manages a tight nod. Crowley, as always, has melted across his seat, hand dangling palm up off their shared armrest. It would be the work of a second for Aziraphale to summon holy fire and burn the demon's hand clean off. Aziraphale cringes, the thought lodged in his throat. 

He folds his hands tight in his lap and tries to concentrate on the swordfight unfolding onstage. He's seen this musical enough times to recognize the song, though he can't seem to keep track of the action. A saber glints under the stage lights, flaring like his own sword once had. It pains him, thinking of that sword in War's hands. He'd meant it as a kindness, not a burden upon humanity, certainly not a source of destruction. So many damned mistakes. After all the harm he’s caused over the years, perhaps it's inevitable he can't stop wondering who he'll hurt next. 

They're so fragile, humans. Simple to damage in a moment of carelessness. No chance of breathing life back into them, either. Or worse - 

Aziraphale glances across at Crowley, a new musical number onstage reflecting off the demon's glasses. If Crowley were discorporated now, Hell might never let him return to the surface. It's all Aziraphale can think about. 

House lights go up, and the humans begin to rise from their seats. Aziraphale blinks. "Is it over already?"

"Intermission," says Crowley, his brow wrinkling. "Were you even watching?"

"I'm a touch distracted," Aziraphale admits.

The demon studies him. "Want to bail?"

"Oh, but I'd hate to tear you away."

Crowley snorts. "You're the one with the hard-on for Victor Hugo. Told you I prefer the funny ones."

He gives the demon a grateful smile. "Lead on, then."

Crowley cuts through the mob in the lobby, Aziraphale trailing in his wake. Isn't that typical of their relationship - Crowley forging ahead, Aziraphale floundering behind. He wonders, now that the demon doesn't need him to cover the odd tempting, how long before Crowley cuts ties and takes wing. He did say he has plenty of other people with whom to fraternize. 

And maybe he'd be safer with them, given how Aziraphale can't help but notice the way Crowley has left his back exposed. Aziraphale could smite him right here. Is this some latent guardian angel instinct making itself known? His essence rebelling against his recent lack of blessings? His arms itch as if wrapped in damp tweed.

The night air provides momentary relief, the cold a shock to his system. Crowley seems less pleased. Aziraphale holds back a chuckle, since the demon's pencil skirt and stockings must provide little shelter from the chill. Then again, he suspects the garments' primary purpose lies more in the way of decoration than insulation.

He wrenches his gaze upwards, hoping the redness of his cheeks can be blamed on the windchill. "Once again, dear boy?"

Crowley's face pinches with a worry that makes Aziraphale guilty. "Got a bottle back at the flat that's marketed as ambrosia. I figured since you and I are the only ones who can verify…" He spreads his hands as far as he can while keeping his jacket wrapped tight.

Aziraphale's shoulders sag as he exhales. Decent wine, better company, and the opportunity to reminisce about the names they'd made for themselves three thousand years ago. 

An image boils up in his mind's eye - his hand outstretched to bless the wine as Crowley drinks it, tarry smoke billowing from the demon's mouth - 

Aziraphale buries his nails in his palm. Forcing his voice to stay light, he says, "I shouldn't."

"C'mon, angel, the later you open tomorrow the fewer customers you'll have to-"

"Crowley," he snaps. "I'm not interested."

"Right then," the demon says after a beat. "Lift home?"

"I can walk."

"You don't have to."

"I want to."

"Right."

His ears ache from the chill. "Sorry."

He expects a quip, but Crowley says quietly, "'S alright. Later, angel." He swings into the front seat of the Bentley and peels away.

Aziraphale shivers and sniffs. It had been such a nice evening too, Crowley showing up at the bookshop with a bouquet and dinner reservations.

His bad wing throbs. He wraps his arms around his middle and begins the long, cold trudge home.

~

Crowley doesn't call the next day.

He's probably busy. Nurturing those plants he goes on about, or watching Golden Girls, or - whatever Crowley does when they're not together. Aziraphale puts the kettle on and vows to think about something else. 

Only one customer stops by, thank goodness, and she's scared off easily enough by Aziraphale's insistence on telling her fortune. Useful trick, he ought to send Madame Tracy a thank-you note.

The sun falls and rises. Aziraphale immerses himself in Whitman. The sun hangs about until it realizes he isn't paying attention and sets again in a sulk.

No Crowley.

Aziraphale makes cocoa. He rereads The Importance of Being Earnest. The sun stops by, watches him dither, and stomps off in disgust.

No Crowley.

Whiskey this time. Aziraphale tries and fails and tries again to get into that new Dahlia Owens bestseller before giving it up as a bad job. The sun bounces up and down in the sky like an errant football.

No Crowley.

It's dawning on Aziraphale that he may have really hurt the demon's feelings. His stomach churns, and he drinks a great deal of tea to settle it. Still, he'd rather have the demon offended and safe. He'll apologize after he gets all these unpleasant thoughts straightened out.

It can't be that hard to purge the unwanted parts of your psyche, can it? He just needs some time alone to concentrate.

He turns the sign to CLOSED and retreats to his couch in the back. He wishes he could talk this through with Crowley. Maybe over a glass of 1998 Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame, Crowley had mentioned wanting to try that vintage. The demon would certainly be a kinder confidant than any of Aziraphale's former coworkers. Michael, for one, would deem him impure and smite him on the spot. Crowley doesn't mind that Aziraphale's damaged. Just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing, he'd said.

Just enough. Aziraphale frowns. What would Crowley think of his recent violent flights of fancy? He'd be pleased at first - he always enjoys finding little dull spots in Aziraphale's grace. But when he learned how deep the rot penetrated… 

Aziraphale will simply have to stop thinking the bad thoughts. He has to try harder. His failure so far has been a sign of weakness, but he can fix this. 

Well enough. He'll put any thought of harming Crowley - or anyone - out of his mind entirely.

A week later, he's made it through two chapters of Waters and one of Miller. He can't focus on the page. He fumbles the kettle when he pours the tea, his fingers stiff from clenching.

Here he rises, the unmasked villain, in his own fifth act - Iago, astonished at his own reflection. Violations play behind his eyes, injuries wrought upon Crowley, upon their acquaintances, upon the whole of humanity. Aziraphale can't bear to look in the mirror. His heart is revealed: deep down, he's viler than any beetle-eyed Hellspawn.

One little miracle, and he ruins everything. One wrong move, one failure to ignore the voice in the back of his mind, and he'll extinguish the brightest light in his sorry existence. 

As long as he can perform miracles, he's a threat. The only option is to clip his own wings.

In his bedroom, an old jewelry box inlaid with gold filigree lies between his first edition of the Malleus Maleficarum and an annotated copy of A Commentarie Upon S. Paules Epistles to the Corinthians. He raises the lid, revealing trays of rings and baubles, as well as several bottles of cologne that went out of production decades ago. Reaching up under the lid, he presses a hidden lever, and the top swings out to reveal the secret compartment underneath. 

Strictly speaking, he should have vaporized these tablets millennia ago. The Metatron was clear: warding against demons followed the Great Plan, but warding against angels was tantamount to swandiving directly into the sulfur pits. Aziraphale heard rumors of strongly worded letters being written to eleventh century witches who managed to rustle up these old spells. 

So. If he were an angel who followed the spirit of Heaven's decrees, he'd have destroyed the tablets long ago, and good riddance. As it is, no one outlawed owning the tablets. Aziraphale has been doing everyone a favor by preventing them from falling into the wrong hands. To even consider using them, after all, an angel would have to be both traitorous and potty as a March Hare. 

Slipping on a pair of nitrile gloves, Aziraphale lifts out the first tablet and adjusts his spectacles. He's a touch rusty on his cuneiform, so this may take a while. Perhaps that's for the best, since it will give him plenty of time to change his mind. 

He doesn't change his mind.

Chapter Text

The bell on the front door jingles, and Aziraphale's heart leaps. 

"Angel, you in here?"

"Coming, my dear!" He pauses to straighten his bow tie in the vanity before bustling to the front of the shop. The sight of Crowley, leaning on his Dostoyevsky collection like a collapsing popsicle stick sculpture, warms him. 

Crowley flicks his tongue out and makes a face. "Did you change your cologne? I don't like it."

Aziraphale pouts to hide his relief. He'd known the demon would identify something being off. Demons and angels are cut from sufficiently similar cloth that warding against ethereal power would register with the occult. "That's hardly a civil way to greet your host."

"I can miracle you up a bottle of the old stuff if you like. Can promise it'd be right, I think the smell's scorched into my nasal cavities."

"I haven't changed my cologne, Crowley."

"Got a roof leak, then? Something smells musty. Oppressive," he adds, rolling the word around in his mouth.

"You must be mistaken," Aziraphale says firmly. "Come along, dear boy, I've a 2011 Patine Syrah calling our names."

Adam had been kind enough to restore his vintage Persian rug, giving him an ideal hiding spot for the squiggles and stars of the warding. He leads Crowley carefully around the outside of the rug to make sure they don't inadvertently smudge out any of the sigils. If this works, he might replace the chalk with paint, or perhaps one of those permanent markers Crowley uses to draw on strangers' faces on the Underground. 

They have a perfectly lovely evening, Crowley regaling him with the stories of the politicians he's been baiting on the Twitter, Aziraphale waxing poetic about an illuminated Bible on which he's been bidding. While Aziraphale's accursed inner voice does pipe up occasionally, he basks in the knowledge that he couldn't smite Crowley if he tried. The warding prevents angelic miracles from occurring anywhere in a twenty yard radius from its center. 

Giddy with relief, and feeling rather foolish - he helped* stop Armageddon, of course he can deal with some unpleasant thoughts - Aziraphale keeps pulling out bottles, and Crowley keeps holding out his wine glass. Before he knows it, they're both exceedingly drunk.

* He helped in much the same way as that fourth kid in your group project helps, the one who won't answer their texts and misreads the prompt and leaves you to write their bibliography, but then somehow nails the final presentation. Too incompetent to be considered a good team member, but too useful for you to offer them in sacrifice to an eldritch god as a last-ditch effort to save your grade.

"'M glad you called," Crowley drawls from where he's draped over the back of the sofa. His hair floats in distracting waves around his face. "Thought you might get embarrassed and bluster off to some other continent for decades."

"I would never," Aziraphale says with the righteous indignation of the inebriated.

"Babylon."

"That doesn't count, I barely knew you back then."

"Sparta."

"You challenged me to a duel over," he pauses to sound out the name, "Lacedaemon's immortal soul, when we both knew I was the better swordsman. It would have been unspors- unsportsnam- bad manners for me to kill you on such unequal terms."

"Angel, I'm a sssnake. What I lack in skill I make up in agility." He jabs a finger at Aziraphale, overbalances, and falls off the couch in a flailing tangle of limbs. 

Aziraphale presses his lips together to suppress a laugh. 

Crowley props himself up on one hand and glares. The armchair under Aziraphale vanishes, and he falls to the floor with a squawk. "Really, my dear!"

He checks his nails, but his manicure remains unscuffed. Relieved, he looks up and nearly swallows his tongue. When did Crowley get so close?

"Brought you down to my level, I did," Crowley says, poking him on the nose. "Teach you to laugh at me."

They stare at each other, the air oddly charged. Aziraphale's heart flutters like a frantic baby bird. Why is he so affected by Crowley's proximity? Is he afraid, having the demon so close? They are hereditary enemies, after all. But no, he's not scared of Crowley, just what Crowley might do, what Aziraphale might do -

Aziraphale could strangle him, no miracles required. An image flashes through his mind, Crowley's yellow eyes bulging. 

He jerks backwards, knotting his fists behind his back. He looks anywhere but at his best friend. "Quite right, learned my lesson, jolly good, isn't it getting late?"

A beat, and then Crowley settles back on his haunches. When Aziraphale works up the nerve to glance at him, Crowley's face is a mask. "S'pose you're right. Lotsss of things to do tomorrow."

"Busy day planned?" Aziraphale asks with false enthusiasm. 

"Course. I've got hundreds at my beck and call. Celebrities eating out of my palm."

Aziraphale's gut twists. The wine must not agree with him. "Sounds lovely." It's barely two, much earlier than they usually adjourn, but something tells him the night's over. "Time to sober up, I suppose." 

Crowley nods, and the bottles begin to refill. Aziraphale concentrates, intending to banish the alcohol from his system. 

Nothing happens. 

Well, crumpets. He should have considered that placing sigils preventing him from causing harmful miracles would also prevent him from performing the useful kind. 

"Actually," he says quickly, "I might stay like this for a bit. I've been meaning to get through some Joyce. I've heard it's more palatable when the reader is, well."

"Drunk off his feathery arse?" 

"Rather."

Crowley snorts, gets to his feet, hesitates. "Thought I might drop by the West End Thursday night. I liberated-"

"Stole."

" Liberated two tickets to Marriage of Figaro from one of those YouTube influencers. Trust me, you and I will appreciate it more than he would have."

Aziraphale couldn't possibly ward an entire theatre against angels without catching Gabriel's attention. The bookshop itself is enough of a risk. 

He studies his shoes. "I'm afraid I'm rather busy Thursday."

"I can get the tickets exchanged."

"Busy for the rest of the month, in fact."

Crowley's mouth ticks down at the corner. "Course you are. My mistake."

Aziraphale waits until the Bentley roars away - you'd think Adam could have given the demon a muffler - and rubs the heel of his hand across his face. "Bugger."

~

No miracles means no vanishing hangovers. With the sunrise comes a blinding headache and the worst nausea he's experienced since the Ark. He staggers to the toilet he keeps for appearances' sake and empties his stomach of much of the wine he'd imbibed yesterday. His face glistens pale and sickly when he dares to glance in the mirror, his curls plastered to his scalp. 

Heaving himself off the tile, he goes to make the strongest pot of coffee he can. The crunching from his hand grinder grates on his skin.

Several fortifying cups later, he no longer feels like Azrael's next pickup. Sticky with sweat and as exhausted as he's been since the Apocalapsed, Aziraphale systematically goes through the facts. 

1. His violent imagination is unacceptably preventing him from spending time with Crowley.

2. Crowley's safety is more important than - well, anything.

3. Cutting himself off from angelic influence has proven ineffectual. 

3a. Therefore, the thoughts are not of ethereal origin. No angel has implanted the thoughts in order to torment him. 

4. Crowley would have noticed a demonic curse hovering over Aziraphale. Therefore, the origin of these thoughts is not occult either. 

4a. Unless Crowley were the one to curse him. He wasn't, though. He wouldn't. Aziraphale knows that down to his hollow bones. 

4b. Maybe Crowley didn't notice because he hadn't been looking for a curse. He'd brushed the wards off as a bad smell - maybe he'd mistaken the curse's scent for his own influence. Sandalphon had mentioned smelling an evil presence.

4c. Why is the idea of Crowley's scent* hanging around so distracting?

* Crowley smells like motor oil and wet grass, like licorice and spite and love. Quite a remarkable amount of love. It's no wonder the demon went to such lengths to save the Earth, given how much he seems to love it. Aziraphale had been rather bowled over, the first few times they'd interacted, by the love radiating off the demon. It had grown steadily for a while - presumably from interacting with the early humans - before leveling off. Aziraphale suspects the growth rate had only decreased because too much more love would either reverse the demon's Fall or cause him to spontaneously combust. Crowley wouldn't fancy either option.

4d. Why are so many of these bullet points about Crowley, anyway?

5. Regardless, he can't ask the demon for help. Aziraphale wouldn't know how to handle the resulting questions.

5a. Therefore, he needs an outside opinion. 

Aziraphale rubs out a curve of one of the sigils and breathes a sigh of relief as his powers flow back in. He restores his body to tip-top condition and takes a shower, blessing the water for good measure. A few minutes under the warm deluge, a fluffy towel, and he's ready to take on the world. Dressed in his most afternoonified waistcoat, Aziraphale flags down a cab* and points it toward Lower Tadfield.

* The cabbie was startled to find himself behind the wheel of the cab he had driven before the inception of the gig economy, especially since he'd retired seven years back. Still, he'd take any opportunity to stick it to Uber. That damned company had the devil's fingerprints** all over it.

** In fact, Uber was Aziraphale's fault. Nanny Ashtoreth had been nursing Warlock through a bout of the flu when the order came in, so Aziraphale had offered to handle the Silicon Valley trip. The angel had tempted a group of angel investors - not literal angels, mind you - into supporting Uber, while convincing their rival company to put those charming pink mustaches on the front of their cars. He'd considered these deeds equally weighted. When Crowley received the commendation for wrecking unionization and workers' benefits, she'd laughed at Aziraphale's spluttering explanation for fifteen minutes straight.

Chapter Text

Aziraphale remains stock still as Anathema swings the pendulum past his nose, by his ears, over his heart. She frowns and inscribes something in her notebook. Going to the cupboard, she hunts through jars, depositing a couple on the counter. 

"Christ's Eye and Bone of an Ibis," Aziraphale reads. "For purity?"

"Mixed with Lion's Tooth, they grant clear sight." She measures out spoonfuls of each and grinds them into powder with a mortar and pestle. An amber bottle supplies three drops of a liquid Aziraphale doesn't recognize. Anathema stirs it all into paste with a reed, then dabs a bit on each of her eyelids. 

"Hullo, Anathema," comes a call from the front room.

"In the kitchen," she calls back, replacing the jars in the cabinet.

Newton stumbles into the room looking like a lost Labrador puppy. He'd been at the airbase too, Aziraphale remembers, although he'd made less of an impression than the witch or the Them or the horsepeople or the angels or the demons or... well, anybody.

Newton gives Aziraphale a confused look. "Who's this then?"

Evidently the lack of impression ran both ways. 

"Newt, meet Aziraphale, Principality of the Eastern Gate. Aziraphale, Newton Pulsifer."

"Your young man?" Aziraphale asks in a stage whisper.

"His own young man," she says, holding out an unlit candle. "Blow on this." Aziraphale does as bid. Anathema lights the candle, holding it up to his face and staring through his pupils, one after the other. "No shadows hidden behind your eyes, and the pendulum stayed its course."

Aziraphale slumps. 

She raises an eyebrow. "You're the first client I've had who's disappointed he hasn't been cursed."

"I shouldn't be disappointed. Good to have one more possibility crossed off the list," Aziraphale says, willing himself to believe it. 

"I can still attempt an exorcism," Anathema offers, "although I doubt you can be possessed."

"You know what they say, dear girl, six impossible things before breakfast."

"About breakfast," Newton says, "shall I start the scones?"

"As long as you don't touch my oven."

Anathema searches for her grandmother's devil's trap knit blanket in the attic, while Newton and Aziraphale make awkward small talk. Newton seems like a sweet lad, though by no means the sharpest knife in the drawer.*

* Rather more pestle than knife, if Aziraphale were honest.

If this doesn't work, Aziraphale doesn't know what he'll do next. Maybe take a page out of Crowley's book and try sleeping it off. They say turnabout is fair play, and Aziraphale had been quite put out when Crowley napped his way through the nineteenth century.

Anathema spreads the rug in her parlour and places chunks of rose quartz in the cardinal corners. "Stand in the middle."

Aziraphale twiddles his thumbs as she reads passages from one of her spellbooks, wincing occasionally at her pronunciation. Modern Latin would have been laughed out of the pub in Nero's time. 

She reaches the end of the invocation. Aziraphale feels no different. "No luck?"

"You're not possessed, but I'm seeing something strange." Anathema buffs her glasses and peers at him. "I can make out an occult residue hanging around your body, as though you'd previously had a demon inside your corporation."

Aziraphale blushes. So the switch hadn't been seamless after all. They're lucky none of the archangels looked too closely. "If you can keep a secret, dear girl? That would be Crowley."

The witch blinks. "Well. I had wondered."

"He and I have much to thank your ancestress for."

Anathema shakes her head. "Only Agnes. She pulled much the same trick with me and Newt. Funny, though, I didn't realize angels and demons went in for that sort of thing."

"I'm quite confident we were the first."

"Congratulations."

"Thank you," Aziraphale says. After all, it isn't every day you fool the respective leaders of Heaven and Hell into believing you're your best rival.

They retire to the kitchen, where Newton is cutting dough into neat triangles and sprinkling them with sugar. Anathema slides the tray into the oven while Aziraphale peruses her impressive selection of tea bags. They discuss the anthology of British herbology Aziraphale will track down for her as thanks for her services, and Newton describes his new job as a beta tester* for Apple. The piping hot scones taste as good as they smell. It's overall quite a lovely tea until Anathema asks, "Why did you think you'd been cursed?"

* The company was in awe of his ability to break their tech. A Newt-proof phone was widely regarded as invincible.

Aziraphale studies his teacup. "No reason, just silly supposition on my part."

She gives his a crooked look. "The clear sight tells me when people are lying."

He sighs, wretched. "I've been having these - visions, I suppose. Dreadful things."

"What sort of visions?"

He wrings his hands. "I'd really rather not say."

"You can trust us."

Aziraphale does trust them, such as it were. He trusts them to be decent people who would be horrified to learn what he is really like. "I can't tell you. I'm sorry."

Newt stares at him, gears evidently creaking away in his mind. "Have you tried talking to a professional?"

Aziraphale gestures at Anathema. "That's why I'm here."

"No, like a brain professional. A psychiatrist or a therapist."

Aziraphale's head snaps back in indignation. "Certainly not. I was around for the beginning of that psychoanalytic poppycock." He'd tried therapy once, in 1905. Professor Freud had listened to him for all of twenty minutes before making the most outrageous suggestion about Aziraphale's relationship with the Almighty.

"It's far from poppycock," Anathema says crisply. "The field has moved beyond childhood fixations over the last century. I've been visiting a therapist weekly since the Apocalypse, and she's been very helpful."

"I'm glad for you, dear girl-"

"Dear woman."

"Indeed, my apologies. But I can't imagine a human therapist would be equipped to handle celestial psychology."

She gives him a crooked smile. "Then you're lucky to be speaking to a Device. I can put you in touch with a family friend in Chelsea who specializes in immortal cases. He's much better qualified than I am to give you a diagnosis."

Aziraphale hesitates. It's a lead, when moments ago he had none. "Is he discreet?"

"I'd stake my family name on it."

"Then I'd greatly appreciate it," Aziraphale says, rising quickly and making his escape before the voice in his head can remind him any further that the safest course would be to wipe this meeting from both their memories, or to wipe them both from the Earth.

Chapter Text

The fountain is a nice touch. Tucked away in the corner of the waiting room, water burbles cheerfully down a set of bamboo channels and into a dish. Only - Aziraphale looks closer - not water at all, but liquid light. A sigil carved in the bottom of the pool promises peace and privacy.*

* Messrs. Goldthwaite and Sons had hand-crafted the fountain as a favor some years back. Its predecessor had been irreparably clogged when the Swamp Thing let his child play in it while he worked through a cryptid crossword.

Aziraphale perches awkwardly on the couch, waiting to be called in. He regrets not bringing something to read. Flipping open one of the magazines on the coffee table, he scans the headline - Goat Sucker? More like Oat Sucker! Chupacabra's Inspiring Journey to Veganism - and hastily shuts it again. 

It's odd to be in a space designed to accommodate nonhumans. He appreciates the rooftop access in case he needs to stretch his wings, and he's sure Crowley would like the heated boulders piled in one corner. 

Or at least he would, were he in London. Two days after their disastrous nightcap, Crowley had left a breezy message on Aziraphale's ansaphone saying he was looking for a change of scene and would be out of town for a while. 

Aziraphale hopes Crowley won't stay away as long as he had last time. He respects the demon's need for space, but the 1970s really had been desperately lonely. Still, in the proper British tradition, Aziraphale carries on. He spent six thousand years managing on his own. He needs no one.

Which is why he feels rather out of place in the waiting room of Dr. V. Joe Weiss, LMFT.

Should he be here? He's bent a friendly ear to many a distressed human over the years, but rarely have they returned the favor. To require counseling, one must have uncertainty, and uncertainty implies doubt. By definition, angels do not doubt.

Still, he's no stranger to indulgence. This is just a new kind of dessert - unnecessary, but enriching. He refuses to feel guilty about it. 

"Mr. Fell?"

He takes a deep breath and stands. "Righty-o."

The man leads him down the hall into a sitting room with plush furniture. Light streams from the high window onto the bookcase, a quick scan of which reveals a selection ranging from the DSM V to The Gospel Book of St. Augustine . Not one tome by that awful Sigmund, which Aziraphale finds heartening. 

The man offers a weathered hand, smiling. "I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Fell."

Aziraphale shakes his hand, comforted by the calm in the man's aura. "And you, doctor."

"May I bring you tea? Coffee?"

"Tea would be lovely, thank you."

"You're welcome. Make yourself at home."

After testing both of the armchairs, Aziraphale decides to take the couch, since it affords him the best view of the exit. He checks the window and is pleasantly surprised to find thorough anti-observation sigils painted around the frame. The door yields similar results. Relieved, he settles back on the couch, folding his hands in his lap. One of the walls has been painted with a meadow mural. He watches as stalks of grass bob gently in a silent breeze. A darling little painted bunny twitches its nose in his direction, and he scrunches his in response.

The doctor returns with two mugs and shuts the door, placing a palm flat over the sigil at the top of the frame. It glows blue and fades. "This room is now sealed from external observation. Due to the sensitive nature of what my clients discuss here, I consider confidentiality to be of the utmost importance."

Aziraphale nods. "Good. That's good."

The doctor sits and rests his hands on his knees. "Before we begin, I must ask - have we met before? Perhaps at NecronomiCon?"*

* Rather like Comic-Con for immortals. Not a bad way to reconnect with old friends, but unfortunately also a good way to locate your old enemies. After the incident that old-timers refer to exclusively as The Hour of Blood, Con organizers instituted rules requiring weaponry of any kind to be left at the entrance. Yes, that includes claws and fangs. You can get them reattached by a crew of volunteer spellcasters when you check out.

"I'm sorry, I can't say I've ever been."

"The old days, then? I had my start in Bovillae in the 140s BC."

Aziraphale brightens. "Ah, they had the most exquisite blackcurrant buns! You were the one with the goats, weren't you. Vejovis?"

"Please, call me Joe."

"In that case, you must call me Aziraphale."*

* Given that he intended to reveal his darkest secret to this man, it only seemed proper he be known as his current self. He rather wished the Romans had asked his preferred name before slapping him with an unwieldy appellation. Crowley had pointed out at the time that "Prometheus" and "Aziraphale" have the same number of syllables, but it was the principle of the thing.

Joe nods. "Very well. Today is a preliminary appointment to determine if I am the best person to assist you with the challenges you're facing. Let me know at any point if there is something on which you desire clarification, or if something makes you uncomfortable."

"That shouldn't be a problem." The real difficulty is getting Aziraphale to shut up, or so Gabriel has repeatedly told him. 

"I'm glad to hear it. Remember, you are the focus today. My job is to guide you toward the life you want."

They speak for a couple more minutes about travel and payment. Aziraphale finds himself relaxing in the warm room with his hot tea.

"So, Aziraphale," Joe says once the logistics are dealt with. "I know Anathema Device sent you my way, but otherwise I am a blank slate. What brings you to therapy?"

Aziraphale hesitates. There's rather a lot to explain. "Have you been following the ethereal goings-on of the last little while?"

"The Apocalypse, you mean."

"Yes. I suspect I've been affected by it somehow, either as an accident or as someone's attempt at retaliation, after the holy fire was a bust."

Joe raises his eyebrows. "You are an angel. Wouldn't holy fire kill you?"

"That was rather the point."

"Perhaps you should start at the beginning."

So Aziraphale tells him - the abridged version, at least. From the beginning of the Beginning, with all its celestial choirs and blue light and synergistic management solutions, to the end of the End, a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc shared in a modish flat. Joe proves to be a good listener, nodding at the right moments and asking for clarification when Aziraphale skips a connection. He even manages to redirect the conversation when Aziraphale gets sidetracked.* 

* Once regarding Crowley's abominable poetry in the 900s, once soliloquizing about the most scrumptious mousse he'd rewarded himself with after one of Warlock's tantrums, and once trying to reason out whether Crowley could get those stovepipes on without a miracle.

"And then they snatched me away from a lovely walk in St. James', trussed me up, and, well, chucked me into the fire." Aziraphale studies his nails, not trusting himself to make eye contact. "Only it didn't take."

"Do you know why?"

Aziraphale squirms. "Perhaps."

There's a pause.

"If this is something you are not yet ready to speak of, that is perfectly acceptable."

"Sorry."

"We are here to help you, not retraumatize you by forcing you to relive things before you're ready." Joe writes something on his clipboard. "We can revisit it later, if you choose."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Joe sets down his pen. "Well, Aziraphale, you have told quite the story. I can see where you might want assistance processing, especially given your complicated relationship with other angels. But I have the feeling that I haven't heard why you chose now to visit."

He's right, of course. Aziraphale runs his thumbnail along the cuticle of his ring finger, searching for snags. "Spending time with others has grown… difficult."

"How so?"

"I keep having these visions - well, more ideas, I suppose - in which I do things, terrible things. Things well within my power."

"What sort of things?"

"Cruel things," Aziraphale says, wincing. "I could freeze pedestrians in the paths of cars, or trip Ms. Device and cause her to fall on that ridiculous knife she carries about."

"Do you have any desire to do these things?"

"Lord, no!" His fists clench. "They're horrible. I'd sooner visit the devil's tanning salon." He gathers his courage to peek at the doctor. He expects condemnation, alarm, maybe pity.

The doctor doesn't even appear surprised. His aura pulses with calm acceptance. Shocked, Aziraphale doesn't think to restrain the question that pops out next. "Why aren't you judging me?"

"First, because in therapy we refrain from assigning judgment to what happens in our minds and bodies, and work to be curious about it instead. And second, because you are not to blame for the thoughts you're describing."

The breath freezes in his lungs. "Really?"

"Indeed."

Aziraphale lets out a shaky breath. Tears prick at his eyes. Not a monster, then. Not that the alternative is particularly appealing. "So the thoughts do come from an external party. If even Anathema couldn't trace-"

"Not quite," Joe says. "No outside influences. What you have described sound like intrusive thoughts - unwanted, disturbing ideas which interfere with your ability to live your day-to-day life. They're common among humans, especially those with OCD." His mouth twists in a wry grin. "And no, it's not at all like you see in the movies."

"But that's a human disease. Angels don't have mental health issues." At least, successful angels. Would anyone really be surprised if Aziraphale's a bit broken?

"Let me ask you this," Joe says, leaning forward. "Imagine for a moment that other angels do have mental health issues. Do you think they would tell you?"

Chapter Text

On the bus ride home from his first appointment, Aziraphale notices that he could grab the steering wheel and send them careening into the Thames. He could, but he won't. He takes his seat, flushed with victory.

Later that week, he visits the cafe down the street, the one with those excellent chocolate croissants. He uses his powers only once, to relax a student studying for her A Levels. He doesn't make a scene. He hurts no one.

Crowley managed to drag him into an arcade exactly once back in 1987, which is how Aziraphale knows to characterize his attitude toward his thoughts as that game in which one bludgeons burrowing rodents with a mallet.

He mentions the metaphor to Joe at their fourth session. Joe chuckles. "Vivid, though it does sound like you feel out of control of the situation."

"Quite."

"Instead of whack-a-mole, can you think of a time that you rejected something undesirable and felt in control?"

Aziraphale lights up. "Customers."

"Go on."

"I run a used bookshop. Every so often, people will come in," he says, scandalized, "and try to buy my books. The absolute cheek of it."

Joe makes a note. "How do you discourage them?"

Aziraphale thinks of the corpse flower Crowley gifted him last month, miracled into perpetual bloom, and of the ominous anonymous reviews he's left on his own shop's Yelp, hinting at disappearing patrons. "Oh, you know. Poor customer service."

"Let's try something. Pretend I am a customer, approaching the till with your favorite book."

It feels silly, but Aziraphale dutifully pictures the Adam and Steve Bible in Joe's hands. His spine straightens and his eyes flash. How dare this human paw his grubby little hands all over-

"Hold that," Joe interrupts. "What are you feeling in your body right now? What has changed?"

Aziraphale blinks down at himself, his hands locked behind his back, his posture straight enough to make a poker weep with envy. "I feel poised, I suppose."

"Good poised or bad?"

"Good? I feel - prepared. Ready to fight." Powerful.

"Do you fight your customers?"

"Goodness, no, that would be dreadfully unfair. They're so fragile." Though he's been tempted. "I just escort them out."

Joe taps the arm of his chair. "Next time you have an intrusive thought, treat it like a customer."

"I'll try."

And he does. It takes several iterations - he's still struggling to accept that the thoughts aren't an integral part of himself, incapable of being banished. He sets his jaw and keeps trying.

Six days later, when it occurs to him that he could bless Crowley's drip irrigation system - he'd offered to care for the demon's plants while the dear boy is away - Aziraphale throws his shoulders back, raises his chin, and thinks, OUT.

And he'll be damned if the thought doesn't scurry away, hissing like a badger.

Aziraphale beams with a delight he usually reserves for raspberry creme brûlée. This is who he is, the one who thwarts the designs of evil. He isn't cruel. He can live with himself. The thoughts are merely thoughts.

He isn't a threat. He can see Crowley again. A bone-deep sense of dread he's carried for months evaporates under the blinding light of his relief.

He decides to celebrate with a visit to his favorite sushi restaurant. On the way, he buys a postcard at a little tourist shop on a whim. The card is a black-and-white photograph of Big Ben, circa 1930, with a Bentley* in the foreground on a snowy street.

* The Bentley is there because Aziraphale expects it to be. This startled the postcard, since previously the car on it had been a boring 1933 Chrysler Phaeton.

Back at the shop, he pens a letter on the card, briefly waxing poetic about the rainbow rolls he'd had that day, then describing his latest visit to Jasmine Cottage and Anathema's delight over the sixteenth century Booke of Magikal Charms he'd found for her. The letter shouldn't fit on the small square of card stock, but he expects it to, so it does.

I hope your quest is going well, he writes at the bottom. I anticipate your return with the greatest eagerness. Without you, the edge of every shadow has softened, making the city one great smear. In a fit of bravery, he adds, Though I am not surprised that all feels duller in your absence. I miss you dreadfully.

He worries his bottom lip. Too much? Maybe, but he can't get past the feeling that his distance at their last meeting drove the demon away.

Your affectionate friend,

Aziraphale

He opens the shop window and sprinkles birdseed, kept in a jar by the window for just that purpose, on the sill. Soon enough, a pigeon flutters down and accepts the postcard in exchange for food and pats.*

* He used to send letters by duck, but after Crowley briefly sunk them all in a fit of pique in 1986, the waterfowl have been leery of approaching the demon when Aziraphale isn't around. Pigeons, though, feel a great kinship for Crowley. Though neither celestial being knows it, pigeons are the only creatures who can identify that Crowley, too, is a reptile with wings.

Chapter Text

"Warlock and Harriet send their regards."

Aziraphale narrows his eyes. "And I suppose several dozen American politicians sent in their letters of resignation."

Crowley shrugs and tosses a handful of oats to the ducks, a smirk playing around his lips. "Their country loves a show."

Aziraphale has never fully understood Crowley's connection with Harriet Dowling, a friendship grounded in margaritas and mutual rage. When Warlock was four, Mrs. Dowling had confided in Nanny Ashtoreth that one of Thaddeus's colleagues was harassing his secretary, and Thaddeus had refused to step in. Ashtoreth had gotten a glint in her eye and asked for the tosser's name. Three days later, the congressman resigned and moved to Ireland. Mrs. Dowling caught on quickly enough and soon was bringing Ashtoreth lists of powerful men to take down a peg. They'd also meet for drinks on Nanny's days off, discussing Lord knows what.*

* Privately, Aziraphale suspects Mrs. Dowling carries a torch for Nanny. The thought makes him uncomfortable in a way he can't quite explain.

"And Harriet linked me to some of her old university dons," Crowley continues. "Stuffy old bastards."

Aziraphale works to keep the horror off his face. "You're thinking of going to university? In Virginia?"

"Just looking into degree options. Different culture out there. They call a professor Albert, not Doctor Professor Einstein. 'S nice."

Aziraphale resolutely does not think about the scrapbook hidden under his unused mattress, with aesthetic inspiration for English cottages and snake habitats. "Ah."

"A demon needs something to do, now that I haven't wiling to while away my time. Figured I brought the apple of knowledge to the humans, might as well take advantage of it. You got a better idea?" One side of his mouth twitches upward. "Or have you just been waiting for me to get back."

"I've been busy," Aziraphale says defensively.

"'The edge of every shadow softened without me,'" Crowley teases. "You were pining."

"I certainly did not pine."

"We used to go centuries without seeing each other, and now a month and you're languishing ."

"Angels don't languish. We exist in divine serenity."

Crowley makes a rude noise.

"In fact," Aziraphale says, inspired, "I had an appointment with a new acquaintance this morning."

"They change out the postman?"

Aziraphale sticks his nose in the air. "He's a friend of Anathema's. She thought he could help me with some, er, issues I've been having, so she set us up."

The demon digs into the tin of oats and aims for a mallard's skull, his expression neutral. "Always nice to have friends."

Oh bugger, is he going to be jealous? Aziraphale hadn't meant to imply he'd replaced the demon. "I wouldn't describe our relationship as friendly, per se."

Crowley actually turns his head this time, and gives Aziraphale a clear once-over. Aziraphale feels heat rush into his cheeks. "Is that why you're all-" He flaps a hand. "Relaxed?"

An angel can't help but preen. He hadn't realized his progress was so visible. "You noticed? Joe really is excellent."

"Ah." A pair of ducks sink like anchors.

"Really, dear."

Crowley uses his entire torso to convey his eye roll, and the ducks resurface, bobbing about in dismay. He lets out a deep sigh.

"Thank you," Aziraphale says. "I hope my connection with Joe doesn't bother you."

The demon scoffs. "When have you ever seen me bothered?"

"Might I remind you of Christmas dinner at the Dowling household, 2012?"

"That wanker Thaddeus claimed Supertramp was better than Queen! Have you listened to Breakfast in America? Of all the entitled, misogynistic-"

~

"I am afraid that's all the time we have today," Joe says, moving to his desk and pulling out his calendar. "Same time next week."

"Wouldn't miss it," Aziraphale says. He can't resist peeking over Joe's shoulder, but all the doctor's appointments are written in cipher, which is probably for the best. His gaze wanders over the rest of the desk, from a lush fern to a geode to - "Is that the Celestial Observer?"

"Indeed. I've had the paper delivered since the Crusades. It would have been helpful to have some forewarning."

"It's only intended to be delivered to those of ethereal stock."

The doctor smiles dryly. "You should come to Con this year. You would be surprised what you can get ahold of for the right price."

Aziraphale hesitates. "If it wouldn't be too great an imposition - my subscription was cancelled after all the hellfire unpleasantness. Might I borrow your copies once you're done with them?"

"Go ahead. I finished this one this morning, you may take it with you."

Aziraphale accepts the newspaper with thanks, unsure whether to hold it delicately or clutch it to his chest. He closes his eyes against an upwelling of bitter nostalgia. How can the pages smell both of fear and home?

Normally he'd take the Underground straight back to his shop, but he has an appointment with a realtor in a few hours to discuss what he's looking for in a property. London has worn on him, these last few decades. Now that he's retired, he thinks he might be ready for something slower.

There's a little park down the street from the realtor's office, with dog owners and children taking advantage of the sprawling lawn. Aziraphale finds a pleasant wooden bench under a birch and situates himself nicely, tucking his polished shoes out of view. Getting the hint, several clouds lurch away from the sun and lumber off to mope elsewhere.* Rolling his shoulders to resettle his puffed wings, Aziraphale soaks up the warmth. It lets him feel further from the disapproving gaze of Heaven, where the thermostat is set to an eternal 58 degrees Fahrenheit.

* Cloud spirits prefer to hang around those planning to picnic. Aside from the amusing human reactions, the spirits are fond of watermelon.

Nothing to it. He braces himself and snaps open the paper.

Aniedel Receives Medal for Battlefield Organization, proclaims the first headline. S&P* Sees 10 Point Rise in Third Quarter, declares the second. An article at the bottom of the page features an outset quote: "You need to keep going to persevere." Aziraphale checks - the quote, as he expects, is attributed to Sandalphon. The article is a reflection on how often AR's** printer ink cartridges must be replaced, since they register as empty every few days. Aziraphale smiles and reminds himself to tell Crowley that not even ethereal tech is immune to his wiles.

* Souls&Prayers Index

** They couldn't call it "HR" when they're not human, now could they?

Business as usual in Heaven, it would appear. Aziraphale releases a breath he hadn't known he was holding. He pages past reports of Michael's valiance and Gabriel's leadership. Uriel features in fewer articles, since she prioritizes performing her duties over bothering celestial journalists.

He reads the paper cover to cover, of course, and not just because he adores reading. It's not that he regrets choosing Earth over Heaven - far from it. He's so grateful for each day he spends wandering the surface of this wonderful world. And yet…  

He almost misses the article. Between the current fashionable eye/arm ratio and a photo of Gabriel shaking a benevolent fist down a stairwell, Aziraphale's eyes snag on his own name. He blinks, shaking himself out of his melancholy contemplation, and rereads the passage.

Reminder to all angels that any discussion, speculation, transcription, oration, or distribution of materials relating to the apocryphal Gospel of the Unfallen or the exile Aziraphale is strictly prohibited. Such activities are grounds for immediate demotion and/or discipline at the discretion of the nearest archangel.

The paper crinkles under his fingers. He's never heard of this Gospel of the Unfallen , but if he didn't know better...

...he'd say it sounded like a book .

A new book, one he hasn't read.

A book Gabriel has outlawed.

A tendril of smoke curls upward from the paper. Aziraphale startles and tones down the outrage in his gaze. He usually has better control than this. The printed word is sacred. Admittedly, he's always had less reverence for the Observer, given its status as the archangels' personal propaganda machine. He can't quite respect any publication willing to quote Sandalphon.*

* Indeed, the reporters would have preferred not to. They regarded Sandalphon rather like you would regard your boss's pampered attack chihuahua: dumb, vicious, and in need of a good kick.

But who in Heaven would be writing a book? Imagination is a gift intended for humans, not their winged overseers. Whatever the book is about, it must be based on real life.

Chapter Text

"And the archangel Gabriel spake unto him," the orator proclaims, her flashing eyes reflecting off the mirror-bright floor of Heaven, "But thou dost sully the celestial temple of thy body with gross matter. 

"And the visionary declared, Thou art a fool, for humanity in their unfathomable wisdom hath taught me the joy of feasting upon the raw flesh of the fish of the sea."

A murmur of appreciation rises from the assembled angels. They shift, their pastel pantsuits blurring individuals into one fluctuating mass.

"Did you really call him a fool?" Madame Tracy asks under her breath.

Aziraphale huffs just as quietly. "My dear woman, I am much more of a gentleman than the angel she's written."

"Your friends seem awfully taken with their version," Madame Tracy observes. A cherub glances over, and she gives them a beatific smile.

She's right, and Aziraphale can feel himself twisting her mouth in his dismay. Or should he say his mouth? Their mouth? Sharing a body makes possessives confusing.

Shadwell had been apoplectic when Aziraphale made the request, spluttering about Aziraphale's wicked intentions, but Madame Tracy had firmly informed the Witchfinder that the choices she made regarding with whom she shared her body were her own. 

So here they are, looking out of the same eyes once more. Aziraphale's heartbeat pounds in his palms. He's not sure if he's experiencing homesickness, fear of getting caught, embarrassment at being the venerated hero in the story being read aloud, or some horrible combination. Attending a forbidden reading of a forbidden book isn't helping, especially since Heaven doesn't believe in walls. 

"And the archangel Gabriel spake, The forces of darkness prowl this night. The Antichrist shall be delivered. See unto thy Adversary.

"And he turned away in his hubris. And the visionary saw unto his Adversary, and drank sweet wine, and spake, This world my charge is too precious, its people too exquisite, to destroy. Let us raise the Antichrist as our own, for I have faith in the Almighty's mercy, and I cannot bear to watch Her favored children suffer. "

Another murmur from the audience, this one louder, more fervent. 

"It was actually Crowley's idea," Aziraphale says under his breath. "He had to talk me around."

"I fancy it's easier for them to attribute the plan to one of their own," Madame Tracy muses. "Gives them more agency."

"Proper angels neither have nor desire agency."

"Then looks like you aren't the only naughty boy after all." She titters. "Mum raised me Roman Catholic, you know. Guess she was wrong about there being no Protestants in Heaven."

Strictly speaking, there shouldn't be any humans here at all. Deceased mortals go to Azrael's realm. Neither Heaven nor Hell has the nerve to claim what Death considers rightfully his. 

" And they shook upon their deal, and the visionary spake- " The orator looks past the crowd, and her eyes widen. "Uh, spake, that we could really use a more innovative stratagem for streamlining department messages, don't you agree," she coughs, "Michael?"

Alarm ripples through the crowd as they turn and cower away from the watching archangel. Aziraphale's stomach sinks into his heels. 

Madame Tracy raises a hand to cover their mouth and asks, "The boss?"

"The Almighty's Champion. Last time I saw them, they were coming to kill me."

"Zaapiel," Michael says, their voice cool. "You gathered an audience for your strategy discussion. I'm impressed."

"You know me," the orator, apparently Zaapiel, says with forced cheer as she tries to cram the scroll she'd been reading into her back pocket. "Only the best for the best place on earth. Wait, that's Disneyland. Best place above earth?" 

Aziraphale turns to flee while Michael is distracted, but Madame Tracy locks their knees. "You don't intend to run away!"

"I certainly do, unless you fancy us both being brisket."

"We can't just leave!-" Madame Tracy exclaims, which is when they both realize everyone is staring at them. Michael raises a single loaded eyebrow in their direction. 

Aziraphale's mind flatlines in sheer terror. Madame Tracy performs the body-sharing equivalent of shoving him out of the driver's seat and seizing the wheel. She meets Michael's gaze squarely, cocks a hip, and flips her hair over her shoulder. "That is to say, we can't just leave without..." She gives Michael an elaborate once-over and smirks. "Without saying goodbye."

Oh merciful Almighty, this is the worst plan. In a list of all the ways to attract an archangel's suspicion, this scores in the top five. There's no way -

Is Michael blushing ?

Madame Tracy saunters through the crowd, arms tucked behind her back to throw her bust forward. Angled so that Michael can't see, she flaps one hand in the universal code for shoo, get out of here . The angels around them exchange looks and start to edge away. 

"After all, I'd be derelict of duty if I didn't express my, ah," her gaze wanders over Michael's forearms, "appreciation for our valiant leader's attention to our modest little dramas." She stops with her heels inches from Michael's loafers and glances down coyly. "And I'm all about duty."

Michael tucks a finger under her chin and lifts until their gazes lock. Through his fog of fear and incredulity, Aziraphale sees that something like curiosity has thawed the archangel's expression. "You must be new. What's your name?"

"Jezebel," Madame Tracy says in a tone so sultry that several incubi downstairs spontaneously develop impostor syndrome. 

"I admire your dedication, Jezebel. Come by my office this evening and we'll discuss how you can serve."

"Gladly," she whispers. Aziraphale realizes with horror that their shared heart is dancing a Charleston. Really? Shadwell was bad enough, but Michael? Aziraphale cannot begin to comprehend this woman's type.*

* The only thing Michael and Shadwell have in common is their fondness for pointy sticks - Michael with their spear, Shadwell with his pins. It's for the best that Aziraphale can't extrapolate why Tracy prefers such things.

Michael smirks and releases Madame Tracy's chin. Only then do they notice that all the other angels have fled. Their lips press thinly together, and they stride away. 

Peering out from behind a column, Zaapiel asks, "Are they gone?"

"With a spring in their step," Madame Tracy says in satisfaction.

"That was incredible. Are you studying human seduction strategies? Maybe you can explain - I keep seeing references to garters being erotic, but I don't understand how a garter snake could even be used during-"

"Another time, love." Madame Tracy smooths her blouse. "That visionary you mentioned wanted me to pass on a message."

"You know the Unfallen?" 

"Intimately. He said to tell you-" 

She opens her mouth and pauses. After an awkward couple seconds, Aziraphale catches on and stammers aloud, "Er, you've some, um, original ideas that I'd love to discuss with you. Feel free to pop by my bookshop if you can, A. Z. Fell and Co., and, er, if you see a demon, don't smite him, he's house-trained."

Zaapiel bounces on her heels. "Brilliant, I'd been planning to reach out to him but this is even better. I can't wait to check out how he's been blending in with the humans. Do you think he knows about socks?"

"Er," says Aziraphale. 

"Such a weird idea, socks. The humans put their feet in shoes to keep their feet clean, and then they wrap their feet in cloth bags to keep their shoes clean. Tell him I said thank you, I'd love to accept his hospital titty."

"Hospitality?"

Zaapiel beams at Madame Tracy. "You have been studying!"

Having seen what they came for, Aziraphale leads them back to the nearest escalator down to Earth. As soon as they're out of ethereal earshot, he objects, "Propositioning Michael? That's your idea of keeping a low profile?"

"Oh, execs are all the same," Madame Tracy says as she straps on their helmet and starts her scooter. "Entitled, lonely, desperate for a smidge of validation. Poor things, they're all so spoiled with online pornography these days. Dress up neat, give them a taste of voyeurism, and they're putty in your hands."

"But Michael."

"Whatever buys the groceries, love." She navigates them around a cab and into a bike lane, swerving to avoid the parked cars. "And Michael's handsome enough for it. Don't suppose we'll make that appointment?"

Aziraphale shudders. "Certainly not."

"Pity. What do you plan to do about your little cult?"

Aziraphale doesn't answer, fidgeting with a pinky ring that isn't there. He can't wait to be back inside his own body, worn and soft in all the right places. He'd left it in the flat above his shop, having dusted off his mattress. He'd also left a note in case Crowley dropped by. He hadn't told the demon about his little jaunt upstairs. It would make Crowley worry, and Aziraphale hates seeing him upset. 

Well, he can get Crowley's advice on the gospel nonsense at the Cambridge plant sale tomorrow - with any luck the demon will use up his aggression on foliage before Aziraphale broaches the topic - and he'll talk the whole thing out with Joe next week. 

"Once upon a time I'd never have missed a Thursday night rendezvous," Madame Tracy says mournfully as they pull up to the bookshop. She struggles to turn the key in a lock that hasn't been oiled since the Second World War. "Suppose that's all you can expect from an old bat like me."

"My dear woman, I'm six thousand years old. I consider you the picture of youth."

Madame Tracy blushes.

Chapter Text

Overnight, he practices what he'll say to Crowley, how to spin his illicit reconnaissance mission to make it sound safe and reasonable. He recites his speech in the mirror. It's very convincing, if he does say so himself. After all, there's an unread book at stake.

A pity he doesn't get a chance to say any of it.

He's packing a picnic lunch when the bell on the shop door rings. Not the usual jangle indicating someone has entered - which would be odd unto itself, as Aziraphale locked the door - but a wild clatter as though someone has seized the bell and is shaking it like a maraca. 

Not a customer then, and Crowley doesn't bother knocking. Aziraphale lowers the butter knife, his fingers trembling. Surely avenging archangels wouldn't make such a racket? Hell might. They wouldn't come after him first, though. Cold settles into his bones. If they already got to Crowley, then there's no point delaying. He'll go out fighting and take as many of those witless fiends with him as he can.

The ringing continues, growing more frantic by the second. Aziraphale doesn't waste time on the stairs, transporting himself directly to his front entrance and yanking the door open.

Zaapiel stands wheezing on the front stoop, one hand grasping after the bell. Aziraphale's knees weaken with relief - Crowley, for now, is safe. Zaapiel holds up a finger as she fights to get her breath back. "I. Hate. Running."

"A sensible sentiment," says Aziraphale. "Er. Welcome?"

"Thanks." She takes a deep breath and straightens, sticking out a hand. "Quick introduction, I'm Zaapiel, kind of stalked you for a bunch of years, love what you've done with the planet. I'm hoping you can explain the purpose of a white elephant and help me fight off the archangels."

"Excuse me?"

"A white elephant. It's this weird kind of party where you bring unwanted-"

"The other bit."

"Oh, that." She waves a dismissive hand. "Had a row with my supervisor, said a couple things that could be construed as sacrilegious. They're coming to either kill me or demote me. Figured if we discorporate them, they'll buzz off long enough for me to get settled. Do you need a weapon? I've extras." She pulls from her blazer enough blades to service every butcher shop in the European Union. 

Aziraphale takes an automatic step backward. "That is so many knives."

"Like them? I've been collecting."

Aziraphale plucks a cheese knife from her fistful, setting it behind his till and gesturing for her to do the same with the rest. "First rule of rogue angel business, we don't go stabbing our bosses." 

"Come on, not even if they totally deserve it?"

Aziraphale tuts. He should turn her out. He doesn't have time to coddle some trigger-happy - er, hilt-happy - stranger, especially not one whose overconfidence borders on deadly.

"Oh, almost forgot," she says, pulling a hardcover from her blazer and flourishing it. "I brought you a copy of my book."

Fine, so he won't be turning her out. "Come with me."

He finds a permanent marker tucked behind a copy of The Myrmidons. Pulling back the rug, he fills in the section of the angel ward he'd scrubbed out weeks ago. The enchantment thrums to life. His powers drain away once more, leaving him to rub a knuckle into his temple. The spell aches like a band tightening around his cranium. "There."

"Brilliant," Zaapiel breathes. "They're going to be furious." She pulls out a sleek mobile. "Yell if you need backup."

"You're not coming?"

"Wish I could see the look on their faces, but I've got contingency plans to activate. My people need to know I've been made."

Aziraphale thinks longingly of the cucumber sandwiches half-constructed upstairs. "Er, jolly good. I'll go deal with our bosses."

"Not my bosses anymore!" She pumps a fist in the air.

He takes a deep breath, tugging down his waistcoat and shooting his cuffs. Nothing to it then.

Michael, Gabriel, and Uriel await him on the pavement outside his front entrance. Aziraphale swallows hard. His corporation wants to panic, but that won't help. What was that grounding technique Joe taught him? The counting one. 

Five yellow things he can see. The accents of his door frame. Sunlight glittering off a puddle. Pound cake on display in the bakery across the street. Uriel's gold body art. A poster advertising the new Intimate Books next door.

Four things he can hear. The rumble of cars on an adjacent road. A street violinist playing Danse Macabre. Plates clattering in the bakery. His own harsh breathing.

Three things he can feel. A light breeze. The press of his 1953 leather shoes against the top of his feet. The comforting snugness of his waistcoat across his belly.

Two things he can smell. Cigarette smoke - this is London, after all. That unpleasant ozone scent that accompanies instantaneous transportation.

One thing he can taste. He'd been nibbling on the extra cucumber slices when the bell rang.

He can do this. 

Aziraphale refocuses on his former employers and gives them a little wave. "Hello! It's a bit late to pop by for tea."

Gabriel glowers at him. "Traitor."

Uriel shakes her head. "Give her up, Aziraphale."

"Who?"

"Your little fan."

"Well, you see, it gets rather muggy during the summers, and moving air-"

"Shut up," Gabriel interrupts. "We may not be able to use miracles on your property, but you can't either." Michael unsheathes their spear with a glassy clatter. 

Panic climbs Aziraphale's throat. He struggles to force it back down. "Surely we needn't resort to fisticuffs." He can't die, not now, not here, not after everything they've been through -

"Don't worry, angel," drawls a familiar voice. Aziraphale's breath catches. Sleek and dangerous as a panther, Crowley saunters off the street and joins him on the front stoop, resting a burning elbow on Aziraphale's shoulder. In his free hand, he materializes what looks like an aluminum can attached to a handgun. "They were just leaving." 

Uriel's eyes narrow. "You wouldn't."

Crowley gestures widely with the blowtorch, smirking as she flinches. "Why not? It's not like I have to worry about hurting my angel. Would save us a lot of trouble in the long run." He purses his lips at Aziraphale. "Whaddya think?"

"We're not killers, my dear."

Crowley scoffs. "And which of us tried to off the Antichrist?"

"I was under a great deal of stress at the time, the world was ending!"

"Excuses." The demon swings his face away from Aziraphale's to glare at the archangels. "You still here?"

Michael sheathes their spear and takes a step back. 

"This isn't over," Gabriel vows.

"Never seems to be, does it?" Crowley gripes. "Thought we told you lot to bugger off last time."

"You watch your back, traitor," Gabriel says. "One of these days there'll be a fruit cocktail through your window!"

"Molotov cocktail," Michael corrects.

"To be fair," Aziraphale says, "I am a bit allergic to citrus."

Rolling her eyes, Uriel grabs the arms of both of her fellows and drags them away. Once they're out of range of the ward, they vanish.

Aziraphale sags against Crowley, trembling. "Thank you for the rescue, dearest. That was quite timely." His gaze flicks over Crowley's face, down to his maroon lipstick, back up. Crowley, his savior once again. Crowley, who always comes back for him. A warmth swells behind Aziraphale's ribs, overwhelming and achingly familiar. He swallows thickly.

Crowley coughs and pulls away. "Can't have you getting discorporated now. Who else am I supposed to drink with? Plus, your Joe'd be crushed. What'd you do to piss those holy bastards off, anyway?"

Aziraphale fiddles with his ring, forcing down his disappointment. "I may be sheltering a political refugee."

"You what?"

Aziraphale ushers the demon back inside, where Zaapiel awaits them eagerly. "You sent them packing? Serves those assholes right. This is the best day ever."

"Angel," Crowley says slowly, "who's the imp?"

She rolls her eyes. "I'm a seraphim, thank you very much. I won't accept disrespect from you just because you're our visionary's paramour."

"Paramour?" gulps Aziraphale.

"Visionary?" demands Crowley.

Zaapiel, beaming, draws another copy of her Gospel from within her blazer. How many can she fit in there? "The Unfallen will lead us into a new era of compassion and harmony."

"The Unfallen," Crowley repeats flatly.

Aziraphale flushes under his accusing gaze. "Don't look at me, I wasn't consulted."

"I'm so glad you invited me over," she tells Aziraphale, grinning ear to ear. "You're a huge inspiration to me. I've been saying for years, why should we let the humans burn up just to kick Lucifer's arse? The guy's a twink with horns, I could kick his arse myself. But it was always 'quiet Zaapiel, that's blasphemous Zaapiel, you're going to Fall with that kind of talk Zaapiel.' You, though! You're still one of us after you single-handedly derailed the Great Plan."

"Wha - single-handedly?" Crowley demands.

"People just need to hear your story, and they'll understand there's nothing to fear. I have agents poised to act in every major outreach department in Heaven. Our real challenge will be getting ahold of the Metatron's PA system. If we want your giant glowing head floating everywhere, you and I will need to pull off a daring-"

"Slow down," Aziraphale says. "I never agreed to be your co-conspirator."

She blinks at him. "We're both on the side of the humans. Of course you'll work with me."

"Like hell he will," Crowley growls. 

"Crowley, I believe this is my decision." To Zaapiel, he adds, "I'll let you know by Wednesday."

"But-"

"Wednesday. Not before."

"Right. Wednesday. Great, fine, yeah. My people can wait. I'm sure they'll be safe for a couple more days," she bites her lip, "even with Michael in a mood. I think your friend Jezebel stood them up."

Wincing at that, Aziraphale heads upstairs and rummages through his linen cabinet for fresh pillowcases. He always keeps the spare room in his flat furnished, in case Crowley ever needs a place to stay.* Ignoring Zaapiel's reproachful gaze, Aziraphale leaves her there to get herself sorted.

* He hasn't yet, but an angel lives in hope.

Crowley awaits him by the entrance. "You can't be considering this."

Crowley's right, he isn't. He already lived through one war in Heaven and doesn't intend to see another. Still, something in the demon's tone puts his back up. "Why shouldn't I?"

Aziraphale reaches over his desk for a canvas tote bag and loads Zaapiel's knives inside, then turns back to find Crowley a mere breath away. The demon plants one hand on the tabletop by Aziraphale's hip. "Because," he says through gritted teeth, "it's a harebrained scheme that's going to get you flambéd."   

"Or it could bear fruit." Aziraphale fights to keep his voice even despite his pounding heart. He wonders wildly if Crowley is going to grab him by the collar again. Oddly enough, he doesn't think he'd mind.

Crowley hisses. "Know what that is? That's your ego talking, now your little acolyte's blown it big enough to host the world's faire. You're going to get yourself killed."

Stung, Aziraphale pushes past him. "I can take care of myself."

"That what happened in Paris? Or during the Blitz? Or ten bloody minutes ago?"

"I'm sorry to hear protecting me is such a chore," Aziraphale says coldly. "Allow me to relieve you of that burden."

Crowley scoffs. "You're bluffing."

Aziraphale opens the front door onto the street. "Enjoy yourself at the plant sale."

For a split second, Crowley looks desperate, and Aziraphale wants to take it back. Then iron shutters slam down over the demon's face. "Enjoy yourself with Joe. Hope he's worth it."

"Worth every penny," Aziraphale says, unsure why his therapist is relevant here.

Crowley does a double-take. "You're actually paying him? You realize other people would provide you the same services without, you know, the money?"

What, does Crowley expect him to approach perfect strangers with his problems? "Joe's a professional. I wouldn't get the same quality from some crank off the street." Aziraphale nods toward the pavement outside. "I believe you were on your way out."

Crowley's lips press into a thin line. The timbers of the bookshop shudder as he slams the door.

Aziraphale trudges back up to his kitchen. He stares at all the hopeful open-faced sandwiches abandoned on the counter, slowly working up the energy to cover them with a cloth and place them on the top shelf of the fridge. Once he's done, he collapses into a chair and buries his face in his hands.

Chapter Text

"Would you prefer PG Tips or Earl Grey?"

"Earl Grey, please."

Joe rips open a packet and drops the tea bag into a green mug. He passes the mug to Aziraphale, who tightens his fingers around it, absorbing the precious warmth. Muted sunlight trickles through the window.

"You appear unusually distracted," Joe says. "What troubles you?"

Aziraphale studies the amber depths of his tea. "I've been asked to instigate a rebellion in Heaven."

"...You know, I was a barkeeper for seven centuries."

"Oh?"

"I thought, after all that time, I'd heard everything." Joe cracks a grin. "Congratulations. You managed to surprise me."

Aziraphale fills him in, from the newspaper article to the insurgent who claimed asylum in his home. "I told her I needed time to decide whether I had any desire to be her mascot. But I need to choose soon. That's why I rescheduled to today."

Joe rubs the bridge of his nose. "Then we must both endeavor to ensure this is the best session I have ever led. Since the fate of Heaven may hang in the balance."

That almost drags a smile out of Aziraphale. His head throbs with the residual headache of the ward, which he's left running since the archangels' visit three days ago. Zaapiel agreed to stay safely in the shop, though she spends most of her time pacing and interrogating customers about their dusting habits. She's a better deterrent than even the corpse flower. 

Aziraphale hasn't spoken to Crowley in three days. He's picked up the telephone receiver dozens of times, stared at it, and replaced it in its cradle. What is he supposed to say? 

"Let's begin with the basics. Do you feel you can say no to Zaapiel?"

"Morally?"

"No, practically. You spent six thousand years taking orders. Setting boundaries can be challenging. If you wanted to turn her down, could you?"

"I believe so." Aziraphale sips his tea and studies the meadow mural. "I've plenty of practice rejecting people." One person in particular. Let me tempt you to some barnacle goose, angel. May I tempt you to this dance? We haven't seen each other in a century, angel, let me tempt you back to my place…  If he can turn down such offers, offers he longs to accept, he can rebuff a woman he met less than a week ago. 

"I am glad to hear it. Now, do you want to?"

Daisies bend under a stiff wind in the mural. A painted lizard scurries for cover. "I don't have a choice. It would be too great a risk to do what she asks."

"Why?"

"I won't be responsible for watching my siblings Fall."

"You are not accountable for the actions of others."

Aziraphale gives him a look. "Even if I pop up there and say oh hello, lovely day to take up arms against a sea of troubles, do you hear the people sing!"

"If they followed you, those would be their own choices. But you're right, inciting rebellion is not a decision to make lightly."

"There is no decision. I simply can't do it."

"And yet you rescheduled to today in order to discuss this." 

Joe's houseplant has a spot on its leaf. Crowley would have an aneurysm at the sight.

"Can you talk me through your options?"

"I told you," Aziraphale says, "I've only the one. I must talk Zaapiel down and convince her to smooth the feathers she's ruffled. She won't be welcome back in Heaven, but I can help her find a human life somewhere protected. As an anthropologist, perhaps, or an investigative journalist. She stole my records from the angel documenting my actions, you know. That's how she got all these preposterous ideas about what I believe."

"Are they?"

"What?"

Joe watches him. "Are they preposterous?"

"Of course! I would never promote revolution against Heaven."

"Nor reformation?"

Aziraphale throttles his mug, the pressure grounding him. "Gabriel may be on the callous side, and I won't deny the whole Great Plan debacle was undertaken with unseemly haste, but the archangels have always prioritized the Almighty's design. We may not share a method, but we work toward the same goal."

"So you do not believe they should be challenged because they do the Lord's work."

"Yes."

"And yet you thwarted them during the Apocalypse."

"I never said they do Her work well." It comes out more snappish than he intended. He sighs, looking away. "Who am I to judge? Two months ago I believed myself the devil's sleeper agent. My fellows - they're impartial. Free of sentiment. Governance without compassion…" He strives to ignore the pit in his stomach. "It must be what She wants. Given She cast the others out and left Gabriel in charge."

"You have not been cast out," Joe observes. 

Aziraphale has never felt more aware of his scar. "I do remain ethereal." He takes a deep breath. "However-"

A knock at the office door. Joe frowns. "I apologize for the interruption."

Aziraphale waves it off, glad he hadn't had to finish his sentence. "Go ahead."

"Come in," Joe calls, and a pair of rhinestone-studded reading glasses peer in at them. "Yes, Lisa, what is it?"

"Sorry to interrupt, boss," she says around a mouthful of chewing gum, "on'y there's some scrawny ginger downstairs making a scene. Says he needs Mr. Fell right now pronto, it's an emergency. Your houseguest, Mr. Fell. She an old granny lady or something? He said to tell you she fell."

Chapter Text

Aziraphale's tea slips from his hands, splashing across the carpet. He tries to snap it dry, but his fingers shake too hard. He's going to be ill. "I need to go. My payment-"

"It will wait," Joe assures him. "Go to your friend. Call me if you need anything."

Aziraphale takes the steps two at a time. Crowley awaits him in the reception area, coiled so tightly he might vibrate apart. "About time."

"What happened?" Aziraphale demands as they hurry from the building. The Bentley pops her doors open as they approach, blaring Tchaikovsky's "Another One Bites the Dust."

"I don't know," Crowley hisses as he starts the engine with a roar. "Found her delirious on your front step." He peels away from the curb and floors the accelerator. Aziraphale swallows and clicks his seat belt into place. "Was raving about circles of protection and injustice." 

Aziraphale has to ask. "How do you know she's Fallen?"

Crowley cuts across two lanes of traffic and weaves through a group of motorcyclists, blasting the horn. "Not the kind of thing you miss."

"What do you-"

"Her wings, angel." His Adam's apple bobs. "They lopped off her wings."

Aziraphale feels sick, and not only because Crowley just wrenched them around a roundabout at five times the legal speed limit. 

"Newbies always smell the same, like burnt sausage. And the scorch marks, huge tip-off." Crowley's voice climbs a register. "Big ol' charred patches on that sacrosanct uniform, can't miss 'em."

"Crowley, you need to breathe."

"Demon," Crowley says, jerking a thumb at himself. "Optional."

"Not right now." Aziraphale takes a deep breath, holds it, releases it, pauses, then inhales again. "Like this. I'll count for you."

After the second set of eight counts, the demon's white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel relaxes a bit.

An anvil of guilt sits on Aziraphale's chest. He should have tried to dissuade Zaapiel when he visited Heaven. He never should have left her alone at the shop. He's always been so afraid of being damned for his sins, it had never occurred to him that someone else might shoulder his punishment. 

"Angel," Crowley says, sounding strained, "she'll need her back plastered. Her wings - was going into shock. Don't know how the - corporation will affect-"

"Dearest, what's wrong?"

"Can't much - longer," Crowley grits out. "Holding shop - sssstasis."

"You froze the entire shop in time for this long?"

They screech up in front of the bookshop. Crowley stumbles out, legs akimbo. "Couldn't risk-" He makes it a few feet past the front door before collapsing.

Aziraphale catches him and lowers him to the ground. The demon really is alarmingly light. A quick check confirms that Crowley's breathing is shallow but steady. Aziraphale takes off his waistcoat and folds it behind Crowley's head. Not much, but Crowley isn't the one in mortal agony at the moment. 

To remind him of that fact, a shriek echoes from upstairs. 

Crowley had left Zaapiel on the spare room's bed, the frame of which he must have vanished, since the mattress lies on the floor. Maybe he'd worried that her thrashing would send her off the side.

"Dear girl, I-" Apologies crowd in Aziraphale's craw, but this situation isn't about him. "I'm here to help."

"Burns," she gasps, her face gleaming with sweat.

"We must patch your injuries. Can you roll onto your stomach?"

She nods, her jaw clenched so tightly Aziraphale worries she'll fracture a tooth. Gingerly, she forces herself up on one hand. 

"I can help you if you're alright with me touching you."

"Go 'head."

He takes some of the pressure off her side as she rolls over. His skull aches. "This will go faster with magic. I'll need to remove the warding under the rug. It's a risk, but-"

"No," she says, "no miracles."

"But-"

Her hand latches around his arm and tightens like a vice. "No miracles."

He grimaces, but her instincts are likely better than his right now. For all he knows, ethereal power could damage her further. "As you wish. I'll get supplies."

He wishes he kept a first aid kit around the shop. After a couple minutes of frantic searching, he comes up with a tub of paste meant for bookbinding, rubber gloves, washcloths, soapy water, scissors, and a leather thong. 

With her permission, he cuts off the back of her blazer and blouse. Her flushed brown skin sweats unblemished underneath. Aziraphale squints and twists his sight beyond the mortal plane. 

Smoky grey feathers buffet him in the face, and he lurches back, bile rising in his throat. Where her innermost set of wings should be are bloody stumps. 

Angels have three sets of wings, one physical and two spiritual. The physical ones can be flared out on Earth, while the other four are comprised of sterling grace. When healthy, they swirl like wispy clouds on a windy day.

Zaapiel's remaining set churn with the ferocity of a hurricane. A steady silver trickle leaks from the stumps of her missing wings. 

Aziraphale offers her the leather band. "You'd be best off biting this rather than your tongue." She gives him a blurry look askance but accepts it between her teeth. Worrying his lip, Aziraphale dips a washcloth into his bucket of soapy water and dabs gently at her first wound. Zaapiel screams around the band. Her back arches, and she collapses onto the mattress, shivering. Aziraphale's own bad wing twinges in sympathy.

It occurs to him that Zaapiel is now a demon with good reason to hold a grudge against him. He could deal with that threat right now, while she's vulnerable. The bucket of water is ripe for blessing. 

He stares the thought down, picturing it as an especially persistent customer, and informs it tartly that he's closing up for the day. 

It takes him an eternity to clean out both the lesions, his wash water becoming frothy pink. Zaapiel eventually slumps into unconsciousness. Once he's sure no more shards of bone remain in either wound, he dries them off and, for want of a better solution, slathers them both with his bookbinding paste. No pearly light bleeds through his makeshift dressings, so he supposes it's a decent stopgap. 

Now that the worst is passed, he realizes that he's trembling. He needs to regroup. Even more than that, he needs help. Aziraphale covers Zaapiel in a light blanket and risks ducking out long enough to make a call. 

"Burn salve?" Anathema asks, her voice staticky. "That'll take time to prepare."

"Quick as you can, if you please. I've a firebrand bleeding out in my flat."

"What happened?"

"I'll explain when you get here. It's the most jiggerdy-jaggerdy mess." He knows he sounds petulant, but really, all he'd wanted to do was read a book. He isn't built to be a battlefield medic. Florence Nightingale always seemed so glamorous and heroic. Nothing about Aziraphale's blood-spattered smock smacks of glamor. 

He pops his head in to check on Zaapiel, but she remains dead to the world. Good, that means he can assuage the background anxiety he's had for the last hour and tend to Crowley. 

The demon stirs while Aziraphale carries him into the parlor. "Mmk. Not walking."

"That's right, I've got you."

Crowley squints at him, and Aziraphale can't help feeling glad he removed the demon's sunglasses before picking him up. He'd been worried at the time that they'd dig into Crowley's temples, but the extra honesty is a welcome benefit. 

"Thought you couldn't miracle," Crowley mutters.

"I don't need to. Really, dearest, I spend my free time rearranging the shop. Books weigh more than you do."

Crowley makes an odd whimpering noise. Aziraphale frowns. "Are you in pain?" Instead of answering, Crowley buries his face in the crook of Aziraphale's arm. Aziraphale's heart skips a beat, and he focuses on not dropping the demon.

He tucks Crowley into a corner of their couch, spreading a quilt over Crowley's knees. Aziraphale's hands linger, a surge of warmth overwhelming him as he gazes at the dozing demon. The amount of effort it would have taken Crowley to hold the entire shop frozen in time while he raced to Chelsea to pick up Aziraphale - it boggles the mind. And that Crowley chose to do it for a woman he barely knew-

"You truly are a selfless soul," he murmurs, brushing the demon's bangs away from his forehead.

"Lies and ssslander," Crowley grumbles, though he leans into Aziraphale's touch. Then his eyes fly open. "Creature."

"What?"

"Creature, animal, beast, critter, she got one?"

"Crowley, I haven't the foggiest what you're on about."

To Aziraphale's dismay, Crowley staggers to his feet, only to topple into Aziraphale's arms. Crowley growls and pushes himself upright again. "Demons can't hold ourssselves together without a beast to manifest through. 'S the animal in charge. My snake, Beelzebub's flies, Kasdaye's angler fish-" Leaning heavily on Aziraphale, he teeters toward the window and struggles with the latch. Shoving the windowpane out of the way, he sticks his head outside and yells, "Oi, birdy birdy birdy!"

Moments later the demon has a pigeon in his hands. It fluffs out its iridescent feathers and glares at him with one scarlet eye. 

Aziraphale quails a bit. "Are you quite sure-"

"He's perfect," Crowley announces, brandishing the bird with glee. "Budge up, we've an imp to sssave." 

He stumbles for the exit. Aziraphale rolls his eyes and scoops up both demon and bird. 

As soon as they make it into the bedroom - and this is not how Aziraphale pictured carrying Crowley into a bedchamber, not that he's ever imagined such a thing - Crowley flings the pigeon into the air. It flaps about in irritation before settling on Zaapiel's head and pecking at her eyebrows.

"Whuh?" she asks, stirring.

"Present for you," Crowley says, "straight from the streets of London, your very own winged rat." The pigeon glowers at him like it's wondering whether snakes are part of its natural diet. The demon sticks his forked tongue out at it.

Dismissing Crowley as too rangy to eat, the bird cants its body forward to peer Zaapiel in the eye. They gawk at each other. Aziraphale realizes he's holding his breath. 

The tension drains from Zaapiel's body. Aziraphale exhales. 

When Zaapiel speaks again, she sounds much more lucid. "This an initiation ritual? Am I a card-carrying member of Hell now?"

"Close. Still gotta go through hazing." 

She groans, and the pigeon hisses at Crowley. 

"Loads of hazing, all sorts of nasty things, you wouldn't believe the uses demons can come up with for an eggbeater-"

Crowley yelps at his sudden faceful of feathers and huddles into Aziraphale. The pigeon coos in fury and pecks at his nose. Aziraphale sighs, pulling his wings into the mortal plane to shield them both. "Zaapiel, could you please call off your friend?"

"Down, Dick," Zaapiel commands. The pigeon grudgingly lets off and nests in her hair. 

"You named him Dick?"

"Richard for short."

"I'm not sure that's how it works."

"How," Crowley demands from within the cocoon of Aziraphale's wings. "How can that creature fly over here."

"It has wings, dear boy."

"Demons aren't supposed to be able to separate from their animals," he insists. 

"Maybe I'm just powerful like that," Zaapiel says. 

"Impossible. The connection must not have taken."

"I can hear Dick's thoughts though. He doesn't think you're worth shitting on."

"Something's buggered." Crowley risks a peek beyond his buffer of white feathers. He does a double-take. "You've still got wings."

"Oh, thanks," Zaapiel says acidly. "Here I thought I'd lost them. Easy mistake to make, whether or not you've had a pair of limbs carved off."

"Bite me, fledgling," Crowley snaps. "Has no one upstairs bothered to dissect a demon? We're only supposed to have the solid pair. You've still got half your grace."

"How can that be?" Aziraphale asks. 

Dick tilts his head. Zaapiel twists to face them, wincing as her back stretches. "It happened when I stepped beyond the warded zone. I wanted to use a quick miracle to refill my bank account." A frisson of pain passes over her face, but she shoulders on. "The burning began just before I made it back. I must have fallen into the safe zone before my second pair of wings could be cut off."

But that makes no sense. "The Almighty's power is omnipresent," Aziraphale objects. Angels and demons might have mistaken the Great Plan for the ineffable one, but She wouldn't. Nothing could shake his faith in that. "No ward would slow Her down."

"Unless," Crowley says slowly, "She isn't the one making angels Fall."

Chapter Text

There is purification in punishment. Not "Forgive us for our sins" but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be the prayer of a man to a most just God.

Oscar hadn't realized how close he'd been to the true way of things.

Aziraphale should have known. Or at least, he should have guessed. Would the Almighty, in Her infinite mercy, ever chose to cast out Her children rather than redeem them? He should have realized the origin of so much suffering would never be divine. He's seen what the archangels are capable of. He should have guessed.

He can't stop thinking about what all this means in regards to him. On one hand, he no longer can assume his unfallen status means She is happy with him. On the other hand, his injury-

A plastic bag plops on top of the page. "Samosas," Crowley announces. "From that place near the thing."

"Do you know, for once I'm not hungry."

"Aziraphale."

Aziraphale sighs and sets The Picture of Dorian Gray aside. The samosas do smell divine, and Crowley ordered extra tamarind sauce. "Thank you."

"Don't. Purely selfish motivation, you hear? I can't have the one person on my side wasting away."

Aziraphale hums in response, which turns into a groan when he bites into the first samosa. "Oh, that's scrumptious."

Crouched next to Aziraphale's chair, Crowley lets one corner of his mouth curl upwards. He rests his chin in his palm. It's an odd parody of their many nights at the best restaurants London has to offer. Aziraphale can't deny he finds it reassuring. 

"Feeling better?"

"Infinitely." He feels cared for and cherished. When Crowley looks at him like that, he thinks he could do anything. How lucky is he that Crowley, the cleverest, bravest, most thoughtful being he's ever met chose him for a best friend. "You make me so very happy, dearest."

Crowley goes as red as his lipstick and glances away. "Er. Good."

Something about his tone sounds off. Well, of course it does. Aziraphale has been so busy pouting over his own worldview being turned upside down that he hadn't thought to wonder how Crowley, who was personally victimized by the archangels' culling of their ranks, would take the news. 

"Crowley," he asks, "how are you doing with all this?"

"Peachy."

"Dear boy-"

"I'm fine, angel. I'm great. Thought my membership to the club had been canceled by the manager, turns out it was a prissy bouncer with a big nightstick. Doesn't mean I can't drink elsewhere."

"You're always welcome to drink with me."

"Best idea you've had all night." Crowley sways to his feet and wends his way toward the liquor cabinet. "What's your poison? We have a Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon, an Emmanuel Rouget Cros Parantoux Pinot Noir, a Domaine Ramonet Montrachet Grand Cru Chardonnay…" Bottles clank as he shoves them aside, digging into the bowels of the cupboard. "A Petrus Merlot, and - angel, you've been holding out on me. Is this a Domaine Leroy Musigny Grand Cru Pinot Noir?"

"I'm afraid that one's off limits. I promised it to Joe."

"Joe," Crowley spits, making the name an invective. "What appreciation would a human like Joe have for good alcohol."

Aziraphale raises an eyebrow. "He did own a tavern for seven hundred years." 

Crowley drops the bottle. 

Aziraphale snaps it safely onto a table before it can shatter across the floor. "Are you alright?"

The demon stares at him. When he speaks, his words vibrate with careful neutrality. "You didn't mention Joe was immortal."

"Well, it would be awkward to go to a normal human." Aziraphale doesn't understand why Joe makes for such a touchy subject with the demon. Does Hell not approve of psychotherapy?* "They have no sense of perspective. Especially in this era, it's all blowing hither and thither, people wanting things before they even know the things exist, quite exhausting."

* Hell's official position was that they greatly disapproved of therapy, as it made humans harder to tempt. Off the record, Ligur had been the one to make Sigmund Freud popular. The dirty old man had drawn more souls to their side than any doctor since Faustus.

"So he'ssss not going away."

"I certainly hope not." 

Crowley's knuckles tighten on the cabinet door. "Sure seems like you're going fassst this time, angel. You've known him what, three months?"

"And in those three months he's changed my life." Crowley's shoulders twitch like he's been struck. An absurd thought occurs to Aziraphale. "Are you jealous?"

"Yes!" Crowley bursts out. "There, I said it, are you happy?" He spins away from the cabinet, sunglasses slipping down to reveal yellow eclipsing the whites of his eyes. "Alert the sexton, stop the presses, post it on your sssodding Facebook account."

"But I can't fathom why you'd be jealous," Aziraphale protests, bewildered. He's fond of Joe, certainly, and grateful to him, but it doesn't compare to the whitewater rapids of his regard for Crowley. "My relationship with you and him - my feelings toward you, versus toward him - they're nothing alike." 

"Nothing alike," the demon repeats. 

"So you needn't feel - threatened, or-"

"Nope, got it, loud and clear. Nothing alike. Understood. You know, I bet the imp hasn't tried samosas before."

It's a conversational pivot sharper than most turns Crowley makes in the Bentley, but at least this topic is one Aziraphale knows how to navigate. "Eating isn't encouraged in Heaven, no."

"You should bring her one. A samosa. Teach her what quality tastes like. The humans say food's like sex - abstain long enough and even the worst options start to look good. After sssix thousand years, easy for standards to get low."

"Well, she's lucky she has a connoisseur to guide her."

Crowley stares at him in silence. Really, he's behaving in the most unreasonable manner. Aziraphale needs to give him some time to cool off. He scoops up the takeout bag and marches to his spare bedroom.

Wrapped in a red tartan quilt, Zaapiel gazes out the window, one hand stroking Dick in her lap. The pigeon coos in fury at Aziraphale's entrance. "Hey," she scolds it. "Don't be rude. He's a friend."

"A most generous perspective, after all our association has put you through this week," Aziraphale says. He perches on the mattress next to her, studying the new lines carved about her mouth and forehead. Her eyes have reddened into whirls of magma. "Would you like something to eat?"

"Absolutely." 

Aziraphale blinks at the vehemence of her answer. 

She looks embarrassed. "I mean, yeah, why not. I definitely haven't wanted to try eating for the last three millenia, that would be pathetic."

Dick tries to take a chunk out of the first samosa Zaapiel unwraps, so she crumbles off a corner and offers it to him. The crust vanishes down his gullet so fast Aziraphale worries the bird might choke. Zaapiel takes a tentative nibble of the samosa. Her eyes widen, and she takes a much larger bite.

"Good?" Aziraphale asks.

"Incredibuh," she says, spraying crumbs on the bed. Dick lunges after them.

Aziraphale cringes. "Swallow before you speak, please."

She complies and says in a much clearer voice, "Incredible. There's so many different textures." She takes another bite and flinches, her hand flying up to cover her mouth. "Ow."

"Are you alright?"

She nods and swallows. "How do you chew without biting your tongue? It's in the middle of everything."

"Practice, I fear, is the only solution." He studies the yellowing wallpaper until she finishes. "What do you plan to do now?"

She shrugs. "Gabriel still needs to be thwarted. I figure it's gotta be him - Michael spends too much time training their troops to throw us away, and Uriel's smart enough to realize kicking us out strengthens Hell's forces. Gabriel's the only one thick enough to think this is a good plan."

She has a point, but this isn't why Aziraphale wanted to speak to her. "How do you feel?"

"Eh, decent. Your cute human friend's burn salve is great." She picks a crumb off the wrapper and offers it to Dick. "Expected it to be worst, if I'm honest. Always figured I'd be next to Fall.  I never was as good as the rest of you lot."

Aziraphale chuckles. "I'm sorry to break it to you, but I'm a rubbish angel myself."

She shakes her head. "Yeah, but you're good . I'm not. That's why I got interested in humans in the first place, they don't automatically feel goodwill and love for every one of their fellow creatures either." She makes a face. "Like when my boss wouldn't approve of my initiative to make our flyers out of paper. 'Doves are traditional, are you questioning the natural order?' No, I'm sick of choir practice notices smacking into the window behind my desk." She rolls her eyes. "I wanted to throw my segway at her."

"Did you?"

Zaapiel shrugs, unhappy. "No, but I gave her such bad reviews on RateMyConfessor that admin started an investigation. She didn't deserve that."

"My dear woman, recognizing your unkindness and working not to repeat it is the core of goodness. Angels are no more immune to cruelty than humans." He studies his fingernails. "I certainly have been petty once or twice."

" You?" Zaapiel asks, disbelieving. "You're the Unfallen. I figured you were so good even Gabriel didn't dare punt you downstairs."

"Far from it, unfortunately." Aziraphale hesitates. No one but Joe knows about his own intrusive thoughts. He'd prefer to keep it that way - then there's no danger of people judging him, or worse, fearing him - but Zaapiel confided in him. She deserves some reciprocal vulnerability. "Sometimes I'll even think of things that horrify me. It can be rather miserable." 

"Yeah," she says quietly. "It can."

They sit in silence for a moment. Dick waddles across the quilt to situate himself in a pool of late afternoon sun.

Zaapiel's mobile buzzes. She unlocks it, eyes widening as she scans the screen. "Shit."

"What?"

"I just got a message from an ally, one of the Grigori, who's in charge of monitoring the original holy spaces. They say just before I started to Fall, Gabriel took a stroll through the Garden. He hasn't visited it in centuries.” She looks up at him, eyes wide. “That must be where he's hiding the weapon."

"You mean to say-"

"Your demon likes those espionage movies, right, about the bondage of James?"

"James Bond."

A dangerous smile spreads across Zaapiel's face. Aziraphale has a bad feeling about this. "Grab him. We'll need his help to plan our heist of Paradise."

Chapter Text

The sandstone wall looms halfway to the sun. Aziraphale tilts his head back, shading his eyes as he squints toward the top. "I suppose we could fly in."

"Can't," Crowley says, hands slung deep in his pockets. The hot desert wind buffets his hair this way and that. "Might be sentries. We need to keep a low profile."

"Then perhaps dressing as though you're recently bereaved wasn't your brightest idea."

"This is the top recommended suit on four out of five cat burglar forums. I'll be blending in with the shadows of the garden, whereas you'll stick out in all that," he scoffs, flapping a hand at Aziraphale's suit, "like a nubile bride in a BDSM shop."

Aziraphale can begrudgingly admit that Crowley may have a point, but does the demon's getup need to be quite so skintight? He surveys the demon out of the corner of his eye, snapping his gaze away when Crowley notices him looking. There it is again, that odd charged quality to the air between them that has lingered ever since their last spat. And yet, Aziraphale can't quite call the tension anger. "Shall we take the side entrance?"

With some hefting of old stones, they clear the tunnel through which Eve and Adam fled. Aziraphale peers into the verdant tangle beyond. The air hangs still and silent, all of the beasts having been tossed out the front gate after the humans were ejected. Aziraphale is grateful he'd been too busy guarding at the time to be assigned to that task force - he'd heard horror stories about the difficulties of collecting every last gnat, not to mention the homing pigeons that kept coming back.

"Well, tally-ho," Aziraphale says, straightening his shoulders. He plunges into the garden.

They walk for a few minutes in silence, straining for any sign of defenders approaching. Nothing. Drapes of moist air enshroud them, muffling their footsteps. Vines knot themselves around bushes, trunks, errant roots. Fruit drip from every bough, sagging toward the carpet of moss. 

"Hasn't changed much," Aziraphale says, his voice muted by the sheer mass of green around them. 

"Nope." 

Aziraphale wrings his hands and tries for a smile. This is the original safe haven, why does he feel so nervous?* "How nice that it's waited for us. It's all coming back to me now, you know. I certainly spent long enough patrolling this old neck of the woods. I remember that fig tree, and oh, there's my favorite patch of blackberries. There should be peaches a skip up that creek-"

* This is the same uncanny sense of being out of place experienced by adult humans when they visit their primary schools after years away. The furniture all seems shrunken, the lessons incomprehensibly dull. There's a fundamental discomfort to realizing you have changed so much that a former home no longer recognizes you.

They come to a small clearing overlooking the wall, and Aziraphale lights up. "Why look, that's where we first met! You slithered up, all dastardly roguishness, but I stood firm against your wiles. Do you remember?"

"Been ages, angel, things are bound to fade."

"Ah, of course." Aziraphale's face falls. Silly of him to think Crowley would place the same degree of importance on their first interaction as he does.

Crowley throws his head back in a groan. "Ugh, don't pout, I remember, alright? Lead balloon, gave it away, right thing, wrong thing, blah blah, can we go?"

"Best get a wiggle on," Aziraphale agrees, though he feels warmer than he did a moment ago. "May I ask where we're headed?"

"I was following you."

"Me? But I've been following you."

"You're the one who was all 'get thee behind me, foul fiend.'"

"Yes, ages ago. Right now I figured you'd use your, you know," Aziraphale sticks out his tongue, going cross-eyed in the process, "snaky senses."

Crowley grins at him. "What was that again?"

"Oh hush."

"No, really, must have missed it, think I need another demonstration."

"But where do we go now?" Aziraphale frets. "If you don't know, and I don't know, we're rumbled! There's no one else here to ask."

"No one," Crowley muses. His head tracks around until he's staring at a fern. Slowly, he raises a single eyebrow. 

The fern's fronds quiver in fear.

Ten minutes and six traumatized plants later, they're trekking through the brambles toward the dead center of the garden. Their progress seems much easier now, with branches and mats of vine cringing away as they pass. Aziraphale tuts. "You went a bit overboard."

"Worked, didn't it?"

"That poor mulberry may never be the same."

"Sorry bundle of twigs deserved what it got. Its descendant ruined one of my best handkerchiefs in the fifteenth century."

"How on earth do you stain black fabric?"

"With effort," Crowley says darkly. He picks a dead leaf out of his hair and crumbles it between his fingers. "The cave should be just ahead, if what we were told is correct." 

An orchid cowers away from his ire. Aziraphale shakes his head. "Less intimidation, more investigation, if you please."

Sure enough, they push past a particularly thorny thicket and find themselves at the mouth of a cave, the depths plunging away into darkness. Sodden vines hang limp across the entrance.

"How quaint," Aziraphale says, striving for courage. "Sybil would be thrilled. Bit of herbal smoke, and it's the spitting image of Delphi."

Crowley snaps his fingers and lights a blue flame over his palm. When he pushes past the vines, though, it sputters out. He scowls down at his hand and snaps his fingers again. Nothing.

"Not enough oxygen?" Aziraphale ventures.

"Miracle fire doesn't need it. Must be some kind of warding." Crowley's mouth twists. "If we go in, we go in without powers."

Cold dread sinks in Aziraphale's gut. He swallows. "The humans seem to manage well enough. I suppose we'll make do."

Crowley nods, holding the vines aside so Aziraphale can slip into the cave. A gravel path meanders away into the gloom, the rough-hewn walls tightening around them as they descend.

Something about the dismal lighting, the closeness of the corridor, reminds Aziraphale of his brief jaunt down to Hell. He glances over, absorbing how Crowley's shoulders have hunched, his jaw set. Given how likely they are to die today, Aziraphale supposes he might as well be a little brave. He reaches out and grabs Crowley's palm.

The demon freezes, dragging Aziraphale to a stop. He stares down at his captured hand, then at Aziraphale, then back at his hand. Aziraphale waits.

Crowley gulps and interlaces their fingers. "Not a word," he warns. 

Aziraphale mimes locking his lips with his free hand, giving Crowley's palm a squeeze. The demon twitches, squeezes back briefly, and soldiers forward.

Pebbles crunch under their feet as they walk. The air grows chilly. When Aziraphale looks back, he can't see where they entered. Nowhere to go but onwards.

The corridor eventually opens up into a cavern sprouting dozens of stalagmites and stalactites. In the center of the room, one spike growing up has merged with one growing down to form a massive pillar. A sleek silver rope is knotted around its middle, the rest of the rope coiled at its foot. No mysteries as to the rope's purpose - four dark pits encircle the column, each about a yard in diameter.

"No exits," Aziraphale murmurs.

Crowley gives him a humorless smile. "Don't think Gabriel wants neighbors stopping by with souffles."

"I'd go for a souffle right about now." Aziraphale edges closer to the closest pit and peers into its depths, the blackness congealed like cheese. He snaps his fingers and commands, "Let there be light." Nothing. "Well, dear boy, I'm at a loss. Did any of your thriller films address which pit to choose when stealing a deadly weapon?"

"Thought you said blockbuster movies weren't worth paying attention to."

"To every thing there is a season, even that horrid Illinois Jones."

"That's not-" Crowley cuts himself off. "Look, I can see in the dark, I'll go down the rope and check where the big holes lead."

"Don't be ridiculous," Aziraphale says, swallowing a surge of alarm. "I've seen you fumble bags of potting soil. If you try to hold up your own body weight, you'll lose your grip."

"Got a better plan?"

Two minutes later, Aziraphale has one hand clutching the rope and the other wrapped around Crowley's ankle like the demon's life depends on it. 

"Hate this plan," Crowley mutters as Aziraphale lowers him into the first pit. 

"Yes, you mentioned. Do you see anything?"

"We've got rock, rock, and a bit of stone to keep it interesting. Go deeper."

"If you say so." Aziraphale braces himself and stretches his shoulder farther into the gloom. 

Crowley makes a frustrated noise. "There's a bottom, but I can't see details. Deeper."

"This position is already quite taxing."

"Angel, you've got to try harder."

Aziraphale strains to stretch a couple inches deeper into the pit. His shoulders cry out at the effort. "I've gone as far as I can, Crowley. I can't make myself longer for your convenience."

"Longer," Crowley repeats, sounding thoughtful.

The bony ankle in Aziraphale's hand shifts, going slick and tapered. For a heart-stopping moment, Aziraphale loses his grip. He tightens his fist around the scales - for they are scales, he realizes - so hard Crowley yelps. 

"You can't do that without warning," Aziraphale says, his voice coming out three octaves above normal. "Snakes are slippery."

"Bridged the distance, though, didn't I?" The words echo, accompanied by a faint splash. Aziraphale strains to see past the tip of Crowley's tail clutched in his sweating palm. "There's a lake down here. Some floating logs, real spiky ones. Don't see an exit. The logs might hold our weight, let me try-" Crowley spasms as the sudden sound of thrashing reverberates off the rock walls. "Shit shit shit get me out of here."

Aziraphale yanks him up with such force that he sends them both flying into a wall of the original cavern. Crowley lands in a tangle of coils beside him, hyperventilating. 

"What-"

"The fucking crocodiles ate my sunglasses," Crowley shrills. He buries his snout under Aziraphale's thigh. 

Aziraphale runs a knuckle down the length of Crowley's spine, the motion soothing in its repetition. It's a trick he discovered back in 1490, when he'd found a hammered demon rambling about strappado in a pub in Seville. Slowly, Crowley stops trembling. 

Aziraphale uses the time to bring himself back under control. Much too close. They'd been much too close. "I think," he says, "we should devise a new plan."

They regroup once they've both caught their breath. Crowley rules out the second pit by tasting the air over it and gagging like a cat with a hairball. Aziraphale eliminates the third by tossing a pebble into it and being deafened by the resulting explosion. He's very, very grateful that hadn't been the pit he'd lowered Crowley into.

The fourth pit yields neither poison fumes nor explosions. A pebble tossed into its depths clatters all the way down, skittering off sharp corners and skidding along inclines. 

"Maybe the trap only triggers once we're in jaw range," Crowley suggests as Aziraphale drapes him in scaly loops around his neck. "Like snapping turtles. I hate those self-satisfied hunks of shell. No sense of style. You don't see me acting like my tongue's a chunk of fish meat."

Aziraphale double-checks that the rope has been thoroughly knotted around the pillar. "Yes, dear."

"Azazel turned his tongue into a literal lump of rotting fish flesh, except he left the eyes in. Makes singing 'Happy Burntday'* next to him intolerable at office parties."

* Demons, being former angels, were created before time began and therefore cannot mark their birthdays on the calendar. Thus, they use the anniversary of their Fall as their excuse to hold raucous parties. Imagine packing the entire population of Australia into a Chuck E. Cheese shut down for health violations. Now imagine setting the building on fire. It's like that, but with moldy sheet cake.

Aziraphale tosses the free end of the rope into the fourth pit. "Hell has office parties?" Bracing his feet against the inner wall of the hole, he lowers them hand over hand into darkness

"We invented them. Small talk with coworkers, passing around a hat for donations toward buying a gift for some creep from accounting? Whole thing's a nightmare."

Aziraphale's patent leather shoes brush smooth stone, an improvement over the gravel of the room above. So little light penetrates down here that he feels as though he'd taken up Crowley's offer of a jaunt to Alpha Centauri after all. "Well, that wasn't so bad."

Crowley slips off his shoulders. "New tunnel's this way."

Aziraphale reaches after him but catches only air. Low visibility and snake on the floor make a recipe for bruised knees. "Where are you? I have no intention of tripping over you in the gloom."

"Satan, give me strength." Long fingers wrap around Aziraphale's forearm, tugging him forward. He stumbles the first step, righting himself and walking as quickly as he can to keep up with Crowley's loping strides. 

He doesn't much fancy being frog-marched toward their possible demise. He pulls his arm toward his side, getting Crowley to loosen his grip long enough for Aziraphale to slide their fingers together. He fights to keep the blush off his face, since Crowley's heat vision might pick it up. 

"Mixed messages, angel."

"For better maneuverability in case we need to run," Aziraphale lies.

"Sure."

They walk for what seems like hours. He hopes it's not actually hours. Anything could be happening up there. What if Zaapiel gets caught while they're not there to shield her? Scores of angels who foolishly believed in him could be burning to dust. Or what if Zaapiel proves handier with her knives than he anticipated? What if she slices and dices her opponents into ethereal nigiri? Chaos in Heaven, anarchy reigning supreme once more. Angel turning on angel, the armory raided, demons slinking up the service elevator to pick through the scraps of the aftermath. 

Without the quelling influence of Michael's ire, Beelzebub could unleash their hordes upon the unsuspecting humans. An entire planet of fangless prey, ripe for harvest. He shudders. Maybe Armageddon wasn't much delayed after all.

"Coming up to a door," Crowley announces. "Couple of unlit brassieres on the wall."

"I believe you mean braziers."*

* Some people might have referred to this as a Freudian slip, indicative of where Crowley's mind had been recently. Who could blame the demon, really? Holding hands with your archenemy-turned-beloved under the cover of darkness can be an intensely homoerotic experience.

"There's something written on the door, but I can't make out-"

Two torches flame to life, tongues of blue light throwing the tunnel into stark relief. Aziraphale blinks back the spots dancing across his vision. He glances over and catches Crowley's wide-eyed yellow gaze. Right, since his sunglasses ended up in the gullet of a crocodile. Odd how vulnerable he looks without them.

The demon crosses his arms over his chest. "This one's your purview."

Rows of text have been carved into the door, flickering in the Heavenly light. Below them glow the letters of the alphabet, each on an individual tile. Aziraphale reads the text aloud.

My first is in rainfall but never in snow

My second in ready but never in go

My third is in secret but never in tell

My fourth is in whisper but never in yell

Woodcarvers use me to rough out their wares

And I to a horse hoof will make repairs

Surprise someone with me and they may shriek

For once you have me it's harder to speak

"You sure this is Gabriel's front entrance?" Crowley asks. "Doesn't seem like he's got two brain cells to rub together."

"He must have convinced someone else to design it for him."

"Why go to all this trouble? Why not just a padlock?"

Aziraphale sighs. "Corporate indulgence? Gabriel's self-importance? I've heard tell that his favourite actor is that Harrison Chevy."

"Ford."

"As for the puzzle, the first four lines show up frequently in riddles, referring to letters of the answer. We're looking for a four-letter word." He frowns. "Not very informative comparisons, are they? Except for the third line - 'secret but not tell' means the third letter is an s, c, or r."

"Oh, hallelujah, that narrows it down."

"Once you have me it's harder to speak - perhaps it's something you hold in your mouth? A lolly, or a cherry, or oh, maybe a piping hot bite of mince pie-"

"Focus," Crowley reminds him.

"Makes repairs to a horse hoof - a horseshoe? Shoe has four letters, but they don't fit. A blacksmith? No, surely not. Bother. I don't suppose you know much about wood carving?"

"Hung out with a carpenter for a bit, remember?"

"Oh, of course. Do they have special tools to 'rough out their wares?'"

The demon drums his fingers on his arm. "First you sketch out what you're going for on the wood. You use a saw or chisel to cut out the basic shape, then you take a rasp to-"

"A what?"

"A rasp. You know, a gouge, a file."

"That's it! Crowley, you're brilliant!" Aziraphale presses the tiles with the glowing letters r, a, s, and p.

The floor vanishes from underneath them, and they plummet.

The landing knocks the breath out of Aziraphale. He struggles to inhale. His knee and elbow throb - they must have hit the ground first. The ceiling above solidifies into uncompromising stone. 

Crowley mutters a string of invectives next to him, some of which haven't been heard on earth for eons. "I hope the imp guts Gabriel like a fish."

"For once, my dear boy, we agree." 

He pushes himself up on his elbows and surveys the new space. No lights, but the room glimmers with internal radiance. The slick marble sucks warmth from his palms. He shivers. 

"Welcome," says a serene voice behind them.

Aziraphale whips around. An antelope skull, weathered yellow with curling horns, gazes down at him from the black stone wall. 

"Guess it's official," Crowley says. "Dagon and Uriel banged, and their goth lovechild took up interior design."

"You have passed the tests of the flesh and the mind," says the skull, paying him no heed. At least, Aziraphale assumes it's the skull talking, since that's where the voice emanates. The skull itself doesn't twitch. "Now you only need speak your heart, and the prize shall be yours."

"Three tests. The three aspects of the archangels," Aziraphale realizes. "Michael for physicality, Uriel for intellect, Gabriel for spirit."

"Gabriel for spirit?"

"They're archetypes, no one ever said they were accurate." He purses his lips at the skull. "What do you mean, speak our hearts?"

"Divulge your most closely kept secret, never before spoken to another soul."

"Ah," Aziraphale says faintly. "Naturally. Silly me."

Chapter Text

His most dearly kept secret. Gabriel does know how to dissuade the casual adventurer. Bilbo would be alright at this juncture - he'd confess a hunger for power, especially over those awful Sackville-Bagginses, and be on his way. Valjean would admit his protection of Cosette stemmed from his failure to save his sister's children, George would confess to being relieved at Lenny's death, Darcy would divulge that he always resented Bingley for his ability to move with such ease in society. Pettiness, disappointments, the tarnishing of souls.

But Aziraphale is more than a character in one of his beloved stories. He has carried his scar for longer than human imaginations can fathom. And not just to speak his shame aloud, but in front of Crowley, whom he should have told long ago. 

He could cheat and speak of his intrusive thoughts, which he still despise but which no longer scare him. But no, he's spoken to Joe about that, and even a bit to Zaapiel. He could skirt the issue and say something vague about being damaged goods, but he can't afford to get this wrong. They need Gabriel's weapon, whatever he's using to cast angels down. 

He has to say it. If Crowley is disgusted by him, then perhaps it's for the best. Better to break his own pathetic heart now than string the demon along under false pretenses any longer.

"Very well," Aziraphale says. His stomach flops, but he throws his shoulders back like Joe taught him and stares the skull straight in the eye. 

"Er," Crowley says, "I can plug my ears if you like-"

"You deserve to hear this."

"Aziraphale-"

"I should have Fallen."

A beat of silence. The skull waits, patient, inevitable.

"Angel, just because you have a taste for the finer things doesn't mean you should be charbroiled."

"Not for my spots of tea and biscuits, Crowley, nor even my pettiness-"

"Bitchiness."

"But from the start. From before the start." He swallows. "Crowley, I questioned Her." 

He'd been curious, sticking his nose everywhere it didn't belong. Michael would snap at him when he pestered her, so he'd gone to others for answers. After all, he reasoned, if She had given him a critical mind, why shouldn't he use it? At first, he'd wanted to know the details - how was the Earth built? What did dark matter taste like? Who were the two-legged creatures in the garden that everyone seemed so worked up about?

As time wore on and tensions rose, he learned to keep his questions to himself, even as their topics grew more dangerous. Why should Michael lead his choir, when they were so unkind to the fledglings? What was on Earth, and why couldn't he see for himself? Why wouldn't the Almighty speak to them anymore? Why had She left Gabriel in charge, and why hadn't anyone else been informed? 

He massages his knuckles, resisting the urge to dig his nails into his palm. "I was too scared to tell anyone I had doubts. I wasn't there when Lucifer tried to storm the throne room and demand an audience with our Mother directly, and my friends began to, to Fall-"

He can't meet Crowley's wide-eyed gaze anymore, can't bear to see any more blood drain from the demon's cheeks. "I didn't understand why She would let them suffer. I filed a complaint with Michael, avowing myself a character witness for Tamiel, who had gone to the throne room with Lucifer."

"You didn't."

"Tamiel had always been friendly to me. I thought she might still be reachable." He sighs. "I realized how foolish I'd been when, well."

He draws all three sets of his wings into their plane. He tucks the outer two against his spine, flaring the innermost set - the set Zaapiel lost - to their full span. He can't remember the last time he dared show this much of himself. Slowly, he turns so Crowley can see the damage. 

The demon makes a wounded noise. "Oh, angel."

"It never really healed," Aziraphale confesses, reaching over his shoulder to finger the notch where his wing meets his back. The scar tissue feels as stiff and knotted as ever. "Figured it was my reminder to toe the party line. Now we know Gabriel was the one casting us out willy-nilly, but I can't fathom why my prayers for mercy were the only ones answered."

"It was Her," Crowley says, serious in a way Aziraphale rarely sees. "Has to be. She saved you because you're the best of the blessed crop."

"That's very sweet, but-"

"Don't give me a 'but,' there is no 'but.' You're the only decent soul in their whole fluoride treatment of a pantheon. Someone's sake, Aziraphale, you almost took the big plunge and you still gave your sword away?"

Aziraphale had been expecting Crowley to act betrayed or bitter. He isn't prepared for whatever this is. "Paying it forward, wasn't it? I'd been granted mercy. After being thrown from their home, I thought the humans deserved a bit as well."

Crowley throws his hands in the air. "You see that?" he demands of the skull. "That's the kind of holier-than-thou nonsense I deal with."

Aziraphale huffs. He reveals the secret he's kept for six thousand years, and this is what Crowley focuses on?

"Don't know how I stand it," Crowley tells the skull, lounging against the wall beside it. "It's unbearable. Unconscionable."

"Really, dear boy, that's a bit-"

"In the face of all his bloody pigheaded kindness, how couldn't I fall in love?"

A beat.

"I beg your pardon?" Aziraphale says faintly.

Crowley grins at him from under half-lidded eyes. "Fall in love. Pulse-racing, disgustingly tender, arse over tits in love with you, angel. You make my heart fuzzy like rotting fruit. How's that for a deepest secret?"

"Inadmissible," says the skull serenely. "Invalid submission."

"What!"

"Error code 329G - failure to retain secret."

"Oh come on, you stupid hunk of bone," the demon groans, sliding a couple inches down the wall. "You're ruining my big reveal."

"You have shared this information with nine hundred and forty-seven mortal humans, twelve immortal humans, three demons, seventeen-"

"Yeah, so I'm a chatty drunk, sue me." Crowley runs a hand through his hair. In an aside to Aziraphale, he demands, "Can you believe this guy?"

"I don't know what to believe at the moment."

"Look, fine, details - I've been falling for Aziraphale since I met him in the garden."

"Error code 329G - you shared this secret with both poet Andrew Marvell and musician Hoz-"

"You can shove your error codes," the demon growls, "up my scaly arse."

"Don't come on to the skull, dear boy, this is stressful enough already."

"Still awaiting user input," the skull reminds them.

Crowley throws up his hands. "Nothing else to tell you, bone face, I gave you my deepest secret."

"False."

The demon makes an incoherent noise of frustration. Aziraphale wishes he didn't have to push, but they can't give up now. Too much is resting on this. "Dearest, we're so close."

"I won't say it."

"Please."

"I won't."

"Crowley, it's our only chance."

Crowley hisses, lips curling to display his bared teeth. "You want me to debase myself, angel? Rip my entrails out and display them for your consideration? Fine. I'm glad you found your beau."

"My what?"

"Your boy toy, paramour, inamorato, gentleman of the night, sugar baby, whatever you call him." Crowley glares past Aziraphale, bitter. "He makes you happy, and your happiness is the most important thing in the whole blasted world."

"Submission accepted," says the skull, an archway rippling with silver light materializing underneath it.

Aziraphale flounders in his confusion. Has he somehow stepped into an alternate reality? Is this an illusion created by the archangels to torment him? Or did he actually manage to acquire a boyfriend without noticing? It wouldn't be the first time he overlooked the subtleties of human courtship, but he hasn't entertained so much as a flirtation with a human since Oscar. "Crowley, regarding my, uh, beau-"

"Don't make me repeat myself, angel." The demon sounds exhausted. "Joe makes you happy."

Oh. Oh dear.

"I just wish," Crowley starts, before cutting himself off with a shake of his head. "Doesn't matter. I'm happy for you." He jerks a thumb at the stone arch. "Doomsday weapon that way. Let's save the world again, yeah? Becoming a habit for us. Might want to reconsider that, easy for it to cut into your skincare regimen." 

He strides through the archway before Aziraphale can answer. Aziraphale stares after him. So the demon's in love with him but won't make a move because he's convinced Aziraphale is dancing the Paphian jig with his therapist. 

He'll deal with this later. Steal Gabriel's weapon, then untangle his mess of a love life.

Crowley loves him. Giddiness surges through him. Taking a shaky breath, he turns his eyes skyward and murmurs, "Thank you." 

He straightens his bowtie and marches through the portal. 

The bright sunshine on the other side blinds him. He shades his eyes, blinking as tan and grey blurs resolve into a greenhouse atrium sprouting cacti every few feet. Crowley stands stock still ahead of him, shoulders drawn up in his best approximation of a cobra's flared hood. Aziraphale reaches for him, but a familiar voice freezes him in place.

"Aziraphale, glad you could join us!" Gabriel flashes him a toothy grin that nine out of ten dentists would feel the inexplicable urge to punch in. "I can't believe you two took the sucker's way here! That's great, I always hoped someone would be dumb enough. Now tell me - was it terrifying?"

Chapter Text

"Gabriel," Aziraphale stutters, his heart pounding in his chest, "I wasn't, um, expecting you."

"There's an alarm on the cave entrance, idiot. Did you really think I'd leave my favorite weapon where anyone can get at it?"

"Yeah," Crowley says, turning to give Aziraphale a hard look. "Really should have thought this plan through."

"The more fool us," Aziraphale agrees, fiddling with the buttons on his waistcoat.

"Gotta say, Gabe," Crowley drawls, "I question your priorities. We break into your top-secret storage to steal the weapon you've been using to make angels Fall all these years, and you want a Yelp review?"

"I appreciate feedback," Gabriel says, spreading his hands. In his right glints a scythe, the hooked blade affixed to a gold handle so gaudy it makes Aziraphale's eyes water. The scar on his wing aches in recognition. "You know what they say, the customer is always right! Except when they disagree with me. And you clowns will be dead before you leave this room anyway, so it's not like I can ask you later."

"The riddle room could do with refreshments," Aziraphale offers. "Perhaps a soft cheese and some blueberries to whet the palate while visitors ponder the puzzle."

"Right, forgot, your ideas are worthless. Guess it's time, boys." Gabriel hefts his blade.

"Now, let's not be hasty," Aziraphale says, eyes darting to Crowley. "Deep down you surely don't want to kill us."

"Aziraphale, killing you is the last thing I intend to do today. After that, I'm giving myself the night off to celebrate! It will be such a relief to have you out of my hair."

"Over my dead body," Crowley growls.

Gabriel waves a dismissive hand. "If you want. I'm not picky about order, just result. Do you have any idea how annoying you two cockroaches are? Can't burn you in hellfire, can't dunk you in holy water, can't make you Fall. You know, Aziraphale, I tried mercy with you. I figured I'd toss you downstairs where you'd be someone else's problem, but your damn wings refuse to be clipped. I've tried thirty-seven times, and what have I got to show for it? Zilch. You're a pain in my ass."

This is news to Aziraphale. He hasn't felt a single attempt since the first, which means Someone must be shielding him. The thought settles warm around his shoulders. Zaapiel will be pleased that her nickname for him fit so well.

Crowley makes a derisive noise. "Listen, Gabe, I know thinking's a bit of a challenge when you're denser than a neutron star, but it ever occur to you that maybe She doesn't want him Fallen?"

"More likely he's defective." Gabriel adjusts his grip on the scythe and steps forward.

"And after us, after Zaapiel, who next?" Aziraphale asks, desperate to stall for time. They need Gabriel to keep talking. "How many of our brethren will you consign to cinder and ash, pretending your will is the Almighty's?"

"As many as it takes," Gabriel says with a shrug. "Since She stopped answering prayers, I'm the closest thing you luddites have to an all-powerful being. I should thank you two and the loudmouth, you've given me the perfect opportunity to consolidate my hold on Heaven. Just in time, too, Michael and Uriel have been getting twitchy."

"You're a bloody megalomaniac," Crowley says, throwing his arms out so wide that he nearly gets two handfuls of cactus spines. "What do you think will happen when you make half the angels Fall? You'll be overrun. Hell already burns effigies of you, they'll be dying to get their hands on the real McCoy."

"Heaven and Hell are in the same damn building, idiot. Everyone gets a flooded basement once in a while. Not as glamorous as a final battle, but you know what I always say - work smarter, not harder!"

Aziraphale shudders at the thought. One pipe leak, miracled to gush when it should have trickled - they might not even suspect it was sabotage.

"To recap," Crowley says, glancing in Aziraphale's direction, "you're planning to kill us, make all your critics Fall while pretending it's Her doing, depose Michael and Uriel, and drown Hell in holy water."

"What can I say? I'm a changemaker."

"Sure thing, Mr. Waternoose.*" Crowley shoots finger guns in Aziraphale's direction and grins. "And to all our fantastic viewers, don't forget to like and subscribe!"

* In addition to his fondness for action films, Crowley had amassed knowledge of a vast number of films aimed at young children, the inevitable result of playing nanny to a fussy faux-Antichrist.

The archangel blinks. "Excuse me?"

"I'm afraid, Gabriel," Aziraphale says, breaking into a broad grin, "you have committed the most classic mistake in villainy - monologuing. I have a surreptitious camera concealed within a button of my waistcoat, so while you brayed your dastardly plans like the ass you are, we relayed the footage in a living stream-"

"Livestream, angel."

"-To Zaapiel and her technologically inclined friends."

"Great reception out here," Crowley agrees, pulling out his mobile and peering at the screen.

"But how?" Gabriel demands. "My WiFi network is password protected."

Crowley gives him a scathing look. "Your password is 'password,' dipshit."

Gabriel huffs. "Congratulations, Aziraphale, you've doomed your allies. I'll have to murder them now, when they would have only Fallen."

"Not a bad plan," Crowley admits, stretching languidly while Aziraphale watches in appreciation. And he can watch freely now, he realizes with pleasure, knowing his appraisal would be welcomed. This is shaping up to be an excellent day. "Might even have worked if we hadn't already hacked into the Metatron's mainframe to display that recording for every angel in Heaven."

Gabriel pales. "You can't. I have the best firewalls."

"We," Aziraphale says, "have Newton Pulsifer.*" 

* More importantly, they had Anathema Device, who had planned the entire subterfuge. What, you really thought Aziraphale or Crowley came up with a plot that complex on their own? Those two couldn't keep track of a baby in a hospital only serving three patients.

In two flares of white light, Michael and Uriel flank Gabriel. Beelzebub appears moments later with a twist of night sky. Their flies hum in agitation.

Uriel raises an eyebrow. "Getting twitchy, were we?"

Gabriel lunges for her, scythe gleaming, but Michael moves faster, slamming their spear into his skull. His eyes roll back in his head as he drops. Michael plants a loafer on the small of his back, their upper lip curled in disgust.

Aziraphale darts forward to pick up the scythe, blushing as all eyes fix on him. He grips the golden shaft awkwardly, holding it as far from his body as possible. "I suppose the next question is what to do with this."

"S'cuse me," says a voice behind him. He turns to find a familiar courier offering him a pad. "Been sent to pick up a package. Sign here."

Nonplussed, Aziraphale draws the glowing squiggle of his signature on the pad and allows the courier to tug the scythe from his unresisting grip. The man climbs into his van and motors away through the sand and flagstones. Such is the way of things, Aziraphale supposes. 

Beelzebub glowers at the archangels. "We will not be fluzzzhed out of Hell. If you attempt it, we will zzzzend zzuch a firestorm through the central heating that you zzzzhall all crisp alive."

"Of course not," Uriel tells them. "It would be stupid of us to try." She tosses Aziraphale an irritable look. "Unfallen, Gabriel's right, you're a pain in the ass. Unfortunately, you also have some interesting ideas. Report to my office tomorrow at seven. Bring Zaapiel."

Aziraphale gives her his most innocent face. "I'm sorry, you must have forgotten that I don't work for you anymore."

Uriel rolls her eyes. "Report at seven, please."

Aziraphale beams, his heart swelling as he hears Crowley choke down a laugh. The archangels and Prince of Hell vanish, leaving them alone. 

"That went much better than our Nazi caper," Aziraphale says. "I believe I'm warming up to espionage. Becoming a bit of an expert, even."

"This mean you'll let me bring Ian Fleming novels into the bookshop?"

The thought pains him, but any healthy relationship requires compromise. "If you must," he sighs. "Keep them out of sight of the rest of my collection, I couldn't bear to have my first-editions think less of me."

They wander toward the greenhouse front entrance, which opens back into the garden, just beyond the first cave they'd entered. To Aziraphale's delight, Crowley doesn't think to re-materialize his sunglasses. It brings Aziraphale such joy to watch the demon's amber eyes light up as he laughs. He could live in this moment forever. 

He wants to spend the rest of his life with Crowley. 

Certainty locks into place around his ribs. He'll speak to the realtor tomorrow, perhaps try to get his hands on a brochure for Havant & South Downs College, since Crowley had mentioned wanting to try for a degree. In the meantime - "You know," he says, "all this excitement has me rather peckish."

"The Ritz?" Crowley raises a hand in preparation to snap them there.

Aziraphale tilts his head back, inhaling clean air as the sunlight soaks into his skin. "Actually, I thought we might take the long way." He pulls his wings into their plane, launching himself skyward. He revels in the wind carding through his hair, the warmth suffusing his feathers, the demon darting after him calling objections to his unfair head-start.

No matter how high he soars, he needn't fear. There will be someone to catch him. He's the Unfallen, after all.

Chapter Text

The meeting with Uriel goes about as well as Aziraphale expected, which is to say it's an absolute nightmare. 

He clutches the handrail of the escalator as it lowers him back to Earth. Taking care to breathe from his belly, he reminds himself that the ordeal is over. No more roundtable discussion, no more animosity behind polite smiles, no more display surfaces that demand you plug into a nonexistent port. Aziraphale only wishes he had port, or perhaps a tumbler of whiskey. Buzzwords like "paradigm" and "holistic" might have gone down a bit better if he were roaring drunk.

"That was wicked!"

Aziraphale will never understand extroverts.

"Those were authentic turn-of-the-century SMART boards!" Zaapiel enthuses, clutching the owner's manual they'd spent twenty minutes pouring over. "Faulty connectivity and all! Humans find the wildest ways to make simple tools unusable. And the novelty post-it notes! That was the best brainstorming session I've ever been in."

As far as Aziraphale knows, it's the first brainstorming session either of them have ever been in. Historically speaking, Heaven hasn't encouraged independent thought. 

"Do you suppose they'll consider what we said?"

Zaapiel's brow furrows. "Obviously. We're making a difference. That's why Michael came up to congratulate us after the meeting adjourned."

Actually, Michael had collared them to demand Madame Tracy's telephone number. The less Aziraphale thinks about that, the better. 

"Bureaucracy is a cantankerous beast," he warns her.

"Not even the archangels could fail to act after that meeting. Your speech about the corrosiveness of shame brought tears to all our eyes, even Michael's."

"Really?" He can't help puffing up a bit at the idea. 

"Well, not literally. But they wept in their hearts of hearts, under that thick shell of brusque sexiness."

Aziraphale groans. "Not you too." Dick smacks him in the back of the head. He cringes away from the vicious creature. "Would you please control your animal?"

"It's his nature to be fierce." Zaapiel strokes the bird’s feathers, crooning one of those bebop songs* Crowley blasts when he gets drunk enough to believe he can dance. Aziraphale is beginning to sense the danger of allowing Zaapiel and the demon to associate.

* "Born to be Wild" by Steppenwolf. Crowley takes advantage of the bookshop's speakers - which Aziraphale certainly never purchased - to play all the classic rock songs that the Bentley refuses to tolerate.

"Is Crowley picking you up?" Zaapiel asks as they step off the elevator and wend their way through the lobby. 

Aziraphale's nerves sing at the demon's name. He fights to keep his expression neutral. "No, he mentioned needing the day to promote robocalls. I thought I'd pop by Barrafina for a spot of lunch, I've heard marvelous things about their courgette flowers. Would you care to join me?"

"I'd be honored."

"My dear woman, you're the most popular author in Heaven in the last two thousand years. It is I who am honored."

That makes her grin. "You're right. I'm pretty damned cool."

They board an empty bus line at Stanmore, choosing to stand. Aziraphale wants to know all the details of how Zaapiel and her allies sneaked Anathema and Newton into Gabriel's office. Apparently they'd learned the hard way that Newton and hoverboards don't mix.

"Next stop," the driver calls, "Queensbury, The Honeypot."

Zaapiel turns to Aziraphale with a mischievous look he doesn't trust. "So?"

"What?"

"How was your date last night?"

Last night, yes. The dinner he and Crowley had shared at the Ritz, during which neither had brought up Crowley's love confession or what it meant for them. 

All his life, Aziraphale has thought of his plumage as dove-like. Perhaps a fowl comparison is more apt, given that he's apparently a complete chicken.

"It was simply dinner," Aziraphale says. "Lovely, of course."

Zaapiel frowns. "Weird. Anathema told us we should let you two get it out of your system. I assumed 'it' meant libido."

Aziraphale is so busy blushing and stammering denials that he almost doesn't register when the bus driver announces, "Next stop, death."

The engine grinds to a stop, leaving them in an abandoned parking lot. The driver steps into the aisle and pulls out a handgun. Oh, Aziraphale is such an oblivious fool. Of all the ignominious ways to die, being kidnapped by Sandalphon must be worst.

His golden tooth glinting, Sandalphon says, "Don't try to escape, I've warded the whole omnibus against both angels and demons."

Zaapiel squints at the gun clutched in the angel's meaty hand, not looking nearly as worried as the situation calls for. "You're holding that backward."

"Why would you tell him?" Aziraphale demands, his heart hammering as Sandalphon adjusts his grip to point the barrel in their direction.

"I was Gabriel's number one," Sandalphon says, his voice as fleshy as his scalp. "Now I'm Michael's eight thousand and sixteen." He splits an ugly glare between the pair of them. "They demoted me because of you."

"Sorry, mate," Zaapiel says with false sympathy, "but they actually demoted you because you're incompetent."

He's going to die here. Will Aziraphale even be sent back to Heaven if he gets discorporated in a warded region? Will he be stuck here in spirit form? Will he simply cease to exist? It will drive poor Crowley mad, not knowing what happened. He sends a plea to the Almighty to watch over his demon for him.

Sandalphon points the muzzle of the gun at Aziraphale's head with a sneer. "Goodbye, devil's whore."

Aziraphale closes his eyes. He's glad Crowley doesn't have to see this. The shot rings out, and time stands still.

And stands still.

And stands still.

And continues to stand still.

Shouldn't he have been hit by now? Aziraphale cracks open an eyelid. 

The bullet hangs centimeters from his head, frozen mid-flight. “Incompetent," Zaapiel says again, plucking the bullet from midair and offering it to Dick. The pigeon swallows it whole. Zaapiel cocks an eyebrow at Sandalphon, whose face has gone the color of oatmeal. "You warded against angels and demons. I'm neither." 

She snaps her fingers, and a flood of power surges through the bus. Sandalphon flies backward, his head cracking against the front windshield, and crumples to the floor. 

Making a face, Zaapiel dissolves the gun into mist with a flick of her fingers. "That was disappointing, I didn't even get to use my knives."

"Better luck next time," Aziraphale says, his ears ringing. He could have died. Been murdered, anonymously, in the grimy carapace of a red London bus. 

"You think this wasn't a one-off?"

"Without question. When you wave a banner, the forces of tradition and ignorance will invariably attempt to cut it from your hand. All we can do is stay true to ourselves." He knows what he has to do. Determination settles in his gut. "And once in a while, be courageous. I need to go."

"What about lunch?"

"Some other time," he promises, hopping over Sandalphon's prone form and hurrying from the bus. There's no time to lose. When he reaches the boundary of the ward, he miracles himself directly to Crowley's flat and pounds on the front door. "Crowley, open up, there's something I have to say to you."

After a long moment, the door cracks open. A rumpled Crowley peers out at him, soft red bangs falling across his bleary eyes. "'S early."

"It's eleven. I swear, if you sleep through another century, I'll be dreadfully cross."

Crowley rolls his eyes and waves Aziraphale in. "I'm just taking a nap, chill. Spelunking for scythes wears a demon out, 'm too old for this." He snaps his fingers, exchanging his black silk pajamas for his usual skintight ensemble, complete with those damned sunglasses. "Tea? Cocoa?"

"Crowley, there's something very important I need to say to you."

The demon’s mouth twists downwards. “Whiskey it is.” 

Aziraphale trails after Crowley into the kitchen, where the demon pulls out a bottle and slams the cabinet door shut, making Aziraphale wince. Without turning toward him, Crowley flaps a hand. "Get on with it."

Hardly an auspicious opening, but Aziraphale is determined to say his piece. "I'm moving."

The demon’s profile hardens. "You're what."

"I'm leaving London. The realtor and I are meeting this afternoon to go over the paperwork." Aziraphale wrings his hands. "I've found a lovely little cottage, you see, off by the ocean. Lovely windows and big, sunny rooms, and quite, ah, quite a nice garden, actually."

The demon folds his arms over his chest, his hip propped against the kitchen counter. "Finally escaping the hustle and bustle of the city, are you. Congratulations. No more smog and urbanites."

"I was wondering," Aziraphale says, his stomach in knots. He refuses to lose his nerve, despite Crowley’s forbidding scowl. "If you would be interested - no pressure, mind you, I don't - that is to say, if you're not comfortable - but I was rather hoping-"

"Spit it out."

He takes a deep breath. "Move in with me."

Crowley scoffs. "Buy me dinner first."

"I have, Crowley," Aziraphale snaps. "Hundreds of times by now. I think we're rather past that stage."

The demon holds up his hands in mock surrender. "So you're a third date guy, I get it. Dunno, angel. There's so much going on in London, with all the people and things and...stuff." 

"There are people,” Aziraphale says, his voice sharp with nerves, “and things and stuff in the countryside too, you know."

Crowley turns back to the cupboard with a huff, yanking out a plain black coffee mug. "Where's your boyfriend fit into this?”

Oh, for Her sake, this again? Aziraphale knows he and Crowley both have a tendency to be a bit dense sometimes, but this really is absurd. “Crowley-“

“You forming an immortals commune?" Crowley asks, rolling the vowels around in his mouth like bitter seeds. "Bring the imp, I can grab a couple decent blokes from downstairs who bother to bathe once in a millennium."

“About Joe," Aziraphale says, his heartbeat thrumming in his palms, "there's been a misunderstanding-“

The demon bares his teeth. "You've already invited him. Oh, real sweet. Sorry, angel, I won’t play third wheel to your happy little duo.”

“If you would just listen, I’m trying to tell you-“

“Not my thing, third wheeling,” Crowley says, twisting the lid off the whiskey with too much force and upending the bottle into his mug. “‘M more of a fifth wheel that falls off the car and causes a pileup on the motorway, smears some brains on the pavement, real nasty-"

Aziraphale's patience snaps. "For fuck's sake, Crowley, Joe is my psychotherapist."

A beat.

Crowley stares at him like he’s manifested extra heads. Aziraphale feels rather red in the face.

After a moment that lasts at least twice as long as they’ve been on earth, Crowley says, "He’s your-”

“Yes.”

“And not your-”

“Yes.”

“So you haven’t been-”

“ No,” Aziraphale says. Then, “Dear, your drink.”

Crowley glances down at his overflowing mug and the excess whiskey soaking his shoes. It’s miracled away in a flash. “You have a therapist?”

“Obviously,” Aziraphale says tartly, before taking a shaky breath. Has the room grown smaller? He can feel Crowley's gaze on him, too warm, like standing next to a bonfire. “Would you mind if we adjourned to the parlour?”

“What? Yeah, of course, whatever you want.”

Aziraphale uses the transition to plan out what he’s going to say. Once they’re ensconced on either side of Crowley’s sleek leather couch, he continues. "I’m very grateful for Joe. He's helped me a great deal over the last few months. I've been-" The words stick in his craw, but he forces them out. "I've been having a bit of a tiff with some unpleasant thoughts. I think they’d always been lurking, but realizing we had free will - well. Things got harder after the Apocollapse.” He shoots Crowley a nervous glance. “OCD, you see. Not really a walk in the park."

"I didn’t know,” Crowley says quietly.

"No, I - I made sure of that. But I'm getting better. I'm learning which thoughts are representative of me, and which are, well, just thoughts."

Crowley takes off his sunglasses, his amber eyes serious. "Aziraphale, I don't know what you've been going through, but I can tell you now there's nothing in all creation that would make me think of you as anything less than the kind, brilliant bastard you are."

Aziraphale bites his lip, fighting back tears. "That's, ah - thank you, Crowley. That means the world to me."

"Always, angel."

Aziraphale reaches out across the expanse of the couch and folds his hand around Crowley’s. "What you said before. About going off together."

Crowley’s slender fingers tighten around his own.

Aziraphale concentrates on his breathing. The air hums like a plucked string. This is ridiculous, why is Aziraphale more scared now than when they'd literally faced down Satan? 

Though, to be fair, this time he has more to lose.

“Decided you might fancy a vacation after all?” Crowley asks, sounding like he’s doing his best to stay cool.

"I always fancied it, dearest, but I thought - I was so afraid, Crowley, that I would get it wrong. I had to fix everything before I could even consider it. The world, the cottage, my thoughts, they all had to be just so. A storybook happily ever after." Aziraphale blows out a breath, tipping Crowley a wry look. "But twenty minutes ago Sandalphon tried to kill me."

Crowley sits bolt upright. "He what?"

"Oh, don't worry, Zaapiel handled it."

Crowley surges to his feet, murder on his face. "I'm going to rip Sandalphon limb from limb, that sleazy little ball of marmot earwax, he'll wish he'd never been created, he-"

"Crowley, listen to me," Aziraphale insists, tugging him back down. "I could have died." The demon cringes at the words. Undeterred, Aziraphale squeezes their joined hands. "Don't you understand? I've been a fool for waiting. We might be immortal, but our time here could easily be finite. And I want to spend every moment of that time with you." 

Crowley stares at him. Aziraphale reaches up, running a finger lightly over his cheek. "You're my best friend, Crowley. You're the one person with whom I want to watch the end of the world."

"You love me," Crowley says, like he can't believe it.

"Desperately so."

And there's that gorgeous smile, so deep and wide Aziraphale could drown in it. Crowley looks away, blinking rapidly, even as he presses his cheek into Aziraphale's palm. He clears his throat. "Cottage, you said? Suppose my rent was getting a bit high anyway. Bloody gentrification."

"Dearest," Aziraphale says, "I would very much like to kiss you now."