Chapter Text
It was just supposed to be a quick stop on their way back to the Bookshop.
A brief visit to the hospital, a few angelically inspired prayers for healing, and they would be back in the Bentley and on their way again. Until Aziraphale tried to walk into the lobby and saw the colorful chairs and tables, the shelves of picture books and the large almost offensively cheerful aquarium filled with tropical fish.
“Are you okay, Angel?”
“Of course I am. I am a Principality, Guardian of the Eastern Gate. I can handle this.”
Crowley knew he wasn’t, but he also knew this wasn’t the time to ruffle his Angel’s feathers, not even a little bit. He had just picked Aziraphale up at Heathrow after an extended business trip to Israel and the angel was being uncharacteristically close-mouthed about how the trip had gone.
“Is that why you’re stopped in the doorway? People are starting to stare, Aziraphale. What now?”
“I don’t suppose you could do it Crowley? I’m really very tired and it is just a quick in and out, you’ve done it before, loads of times.” Aziraphale was really warming to his subject now, his eyes wide and pleading. “Please? I’ll do whatever you want tomorrow.” He stared at Crowley for a long moment as if willing him to say yes, then slowly and deliberately batted his eyelashes at him.
It was too much for Crowley. “Enough! Let me get this straight. There’s too much CUTE in here for you, Principality and Guardian of the Eastern Gate, so you want ME, the original SERPENT from the Garden of Eden to perform a miracle in a FUCKING children’s hospital. I don’t do CUTE. I’m a Demon! To me, CUTE is a four-letter word. CUTE is your job, Angel.”
“You KNOW how awkward I am with children, especially sick children. This last week was hard enough, unspeakably hard in fact, babies playing with deadly weapons, blowing each other up, and all in some misguided attempt to please HER. PLEASE, I’m begging you. If we mean anything to each other, just do me this one small favor right now, Crowley… without any more questions.”
“Alright, alright. Go wait outside. Where exactly do I find the kid anyway?”
“Second floor, fourth door on the left, room 236A. She’s about seven. Th…”
“DON’T.”
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t thank me. Just get outside and keep an eye on the Bentley while I get this over with.”
Aziraphale pressed his hand quickly, mumbled something under his breath that might have been thanks, and bolted with unseemly haste for the door they had just entered.
Crowley looked around. There was a lift at the far end of the room, surrounded by bright motivational posters and a group of anxious looking humans staring at the display.
He started over, hoping to slip into the lift at the last moment, then stopped. The huge bouquet of pink balloons bobbing in the hand of one of the taller would-be lift passengers was a dead giveaway. The kid looked barely sixteen, and not even for his Angel was he going to endure a lift ride with a pubescent, anxious, new father. No way. He would just have to find the stairs.
He scanned the lobby again.
No stairs.
Not even a doorway marked Staff Only. He could have pulled that off, Staff Only. But no, there was just the offensively bright lift, whose doors were just now sliding open, and a huge glass door marked plainly Emergency. Damn. He shoved his way in just as the doors slid closed again and plastered himself against them, leaving as much space as he possibly could for the other passengers.
It wasn’t enough. Balloons bounced around his head, nearly knocking his sunglasses from his face, and an absolutely humongous teddy bear bobbed it’s head in time with the Muzak. At least he only had to endure it for two floors, though it seemed more like 50.
On the second floor, Crowley sprung through the doors like a projectile, and, satisfied that no one else wanted this floor, gave the lift a gentle push on it’s way to speed the departure of all that PINK. He straightened his sunglasses, indulged in a quick sinewy stretch, turned to his left and started counting doors.
Chapel.
He went back and counted again.
Room 236A: Chapel.