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Aziraphale stared out the window of Crowley's flat, down at the street below. Even at this early hour—late hour? He wasn't sure—there was still the occasional car passing by, and even rarer was the person on foot.
So far, it seemed like the whole world was still holding its breath, waiting for a war that wasn't going to come. In the morning, he imagined, there would be a great exhale, a sensation of having survived the worst, even if most people didn't know exactly what "worst" they'd survived.
He looked back to Crowley, lounging at his desk. "How long can you stop it?"
"Two minutes?" Crowley said after a moment of consideration. "Maybe three. Could do longer, but I'm a bit worn out. And too much longer might be noticed."
Aziraphale nodded. So they'd have two minutes to make their switch, two minutes where Heaven and Hell wouldn't be able to see that they were doing. It seemed like no time at all, and yet it was still more than they'd had in...decades, probably.
He turned back to the window, looking out at the world that was still here, cocooned in night. So many people sleeping now with absolutely no idea that the world had nearly ended just a few hours before, would have ended if an eleven-year-old boy hadn't decided that he liked the world too much to make it go away.
And Aziraphale had stepped away from his side to stand with Earth and with Crowley, as he should have done years ago. Had done, on some level, although not on all the levels that mattered.
So much time wasted, and if this plan didn't work, so little of it left to them.
"Having second thoughts, angel?" Crowley asked quietly, from right beside him.
Aziraphale jumped only a little; he hadn't seen or heard Crowley moving. "No," he said. "Not at all."
"We don't have to do it."
Aziraphale turned to him, unable to believe his ears. "Yes," he said quietly, even though volume certainly wouldn't be an impediment to anybody who wanted to listen to them, "we do. If we want to live to see this time tomorrow, we do."
Crowley's face was utterly inscrutable, worse with his eyes hidden by his glasses, but he gave a little nod and held up his hand, ready.
"Are you sure?" Aziraphale asked, because perhaps it was not really him Crowley had been worried about.
Crowley hesitated for just a moment, and then took off his glasses and set them aside, his beautiful eyes burning gold. "Yes."
He so rarely got to see Crowley's eyes; he often forgot the intensity of them. Aziraphale cleared his throat twice, trying to find his voice again. "Then we are in agreement. Do it."
Crowley snapped his fingers, and a car passing by stopped in the middle of the road.
They had two minutes.
"We should—" Crowley started.
"Wait," Aziraphale said.
Crowley's eyebrows shot up. "Wait? For wha—"
Aziraphale reached up and cupped his cheek, drawing his thumb along it, and the words cut off with a slight choking noise. Crowley stared at him, his golden eyes huge.
Aziraphale wasn't sure who was shaking more, him or Crowley. "I'm sorry," he whispered quickly. "I should have listened to you sooner."
"Angel—"
"Quiet," Aziraphale scolded, but his heart wasn't in it. "We only have two minutes—less, now—and I need you to know before we switch. You were right. You were right about it all, and I didn't want to see it. You"—his voice caught, and he had to force it through—"you are my friend, you are my closest friend, and I like you tremendously. I always have. And I'm sorry, I'm so sorry for every time I've said otherwise. I never meant it, but I knew I wasn't supposed to like you so much, I knew I wasn't supposed to love you so much, and it terrified me. Because I knew if anybody found out, I could lose you forever, and I couldn't bear it. I couldn't."
Crowley pressed their foreheads together with a quiet exhale. "Aziraphale. We don't need to, not now, not—"
"I do," Aziraphale cut in. "I need you to know. On the chance this doesn't work, if after six thousand years these two minutes are all we have, I need you to know how very, very dear you are to me. How very dear you always have been to me. And I'm so dreadfully sorry I didn't let you know sooner."
He tilted his head, just enough to brush a kiss across Crowley's mouth, not as much as he wanted but it was enough; oh, it had to be enough. He could not let Crowley take his place in Heaven without letting him know how much he loved him, without ensuring that Crowley could carry that love with him whenever they were separated. He already regretted how much time he'd wasted; with so little of it possibly left to them, he had no intention of wasting another second.
Crowley hissed softly and wrapped his arms around Aziraphale's waist, pulling him closer and kissing him quite thoroughly, as though he'd been waiting to do this for years and had needed only the invitation.
Love pressed back on him, so bright and beautiful and huge that Aziraphale could feel the very air pulsing with it, almost like another living thing. He'd sensed love before, so much love from so many different people for so many different reasons, but it all paled in comparison to this, so brilliant and powerful that it overwhelmed him. This love had built and bloomed over centuries, over millennia, compounded between the two of them even if they'd never given voice to it until now.
I love you, he thought, pushing the feeling into their kiss. I love you, I've loved you for centuries, and I'll love you beyond time. I'll love you when we're all that's left behind. I'll love you forever.
Aziraphale would have gladly, happily stayed here kissing Crowley until dawn, but even he could feel the bubble of time pressing in on them. It would not stay stopped forever. He pulled back, but did not take his hand from Crowley's face.
Crowley dipped back toward him, as if for another kiss, but stopped just short of it with a shaky sigh. His eyes were fully gold now, just as they had been on the wall at Eden.
He was beautiful, and Aziraphale loved him. "How long?"
"Twenty seconds," Crowley said hoarsely.
Aziraphale had a thousand other things he wanted to say, but their time was up. "We'd best switch, then."
"Yeah," Crowley said, his eyes still wide and unblinking.
He gently brushed Aziraphale's face, and Aziraphale leaned into the touch. Oh, how he wished they had longer. For two immortal beings, how could they have such little time?
He took a deep breath and focused, and the tips of his fingers began to tingle where they touched Crowley's skin. The tingling traveled up his arm over the rest of his body, and he felt himself changing.
Before his eyes, Crowley's face shifted, his eyes fading from gold to blue and the sharp angles of his face changing to the soft roundness of Aziraphale's. In just a few seconds, Aziraphale had gone from looking slightly up at Crowley to looking slightly down at himself.
It was a very strange sensation. Aziraphale straightened and stepped away; all his limbs suddenly felt too long and gangly.
Crowley snapped his fingers again, and the car in the street started moving again as if it had never stopped in the first place.
Their two minutes were up.
"You should probably get some rest," Aziraphale said, and oh, that was strange, to be speaking with Crowley's voice. "You've done quite a bit today."
"I'll rest when it's over," Crowley said, and made a face. "Oh, that is weird."
"Very weird," Aziraphale agreed. "At least it shouldn't be for too long?"
"Shouldn't be," Crowley said in a voice that very much doubted that should. "Meet you in the park at ten, then?"
"I'll see you there," Aziraphale said. "And...if you wouldn't mind checking on the bookshop?"
He didn't know if it would have been restored, if Adam's remaking reality would have brought it back, but...well, one could hope.
"Of course," Crowley said. "And, er, if you'd keep an eye out for the Bentley?"
That same note of hope. Aziraphale smiled. "I certainly will."
Crowley started to leave the flat, and then paused with his hand on the door. "I knew."
"I'm sorry?" Aziraphale asked.
Crowley looked back at him, unblinking, and Aziraphale was fairly sure his own face had never been so still or serious in six thousand years. "Everything you said. I knew." His face softened, not quite a smile but something about it still made Aziraphale's heart clench. "I've known for a while."
"Oh." Aziraphale took a shaky breath. His heart was doing something very acrobatic and likely unhealthy, if he'd been human. "Oh. That's...very good, then."
"Do you know?" Crowley asked softly.
If he hadn't before, the sheer brilliance of Crowley's love when they'd kissed would've done it. Aziraphale nodded. "Yes."
"Good," Crowley said, and this time he did smile, just a little. "Still is nice to hear it, though."
"Well." Aziraphale cleared his throat. "Then I shall endeavor to tell you far more often."
If they made it through this, he would tell Crowley every day. Multiple times, until the demon was fairly sick of it.
Crowley's smile tipped up a fraction more, and he patted the doorknob and finally opened it. "I'll see you at the park, then."
"See you there," Aziraphale said, and then Crowley left, pulling the door shut behind him.
Aziraphale went back to the window and watched Crowley walk down the street, the tan coat swirling behind him as he did. The sky was getting brighter now, the sun rising on a day it shouldn't have, a day that should never have existed, according to the Great Plan.
But in the Ineffable Plan, well, that was a different story, wasn't it?
In the Ineffable Plan, the world didn't end—or well, not entirely. Not through a war, anyway, but because of a boy reshaping reality so that he'd never been the Antichrist in the first place. So the world from Saturday had ended, after a fashion, but with a lot less death and destruction than everybody had thought. There was still a world, after all; it was just a slightly different one than they'd had yesterday.
Maybe in the Ineffable Plan, in a world that didn't quite end, a demon and an angel who'd spent six thousand years becoming a little less demonic and a little less angelic could indeed fall in love. Perhaps, in this world remade by an eleven-year-old boy, they could even be together.
And on a bright Sunday morning that wasn't supposed to exist in the first place...well, one could hope.