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Crowley had just coiled down for a nap on his favorite chair. It was a pretentious, but well worn affair, as in keeping with most of Aziraphale’s furniture. A soft blue with gold jacquard leaf printed across it rubbed pleasantly against his scales. He slept on a velvet, embroidered pillow, long deprived of it’s full stuffing and lumpy in all the right places. His black and green countenance blended nicely into it, just enough to be ignored, but not enough to be accidentally sat on.
Ding!
The shop door opened to admit a smiling young man, a fox in human figure, his 9 tails invisible to most eyes1. Not Crowley. He knew a huli jing when he saw one. He hadn’t seen Wei Wuxian in several hundred years. They’d only been passing acquaintances over a bottle or two (or 20) of wine2. Still, one did not forget that chaotic grin. Wei Wuxian was an admirable walking disaster.
As members of different pantheons, they’d interacted some. To truly get things done, occasionally one of them had to admit the other existed. Only occasionally. It was considered gauche really. Of course, if Wei Wuxian was anything, it was gauche.
Crowley liked that about him.
Wei Wuxian glanced over and gave him a nod, which Crowley actually lifted his head to return. That’s how much he liked the young fox.
Aziraphale, his cheerful expression carefully masking his irritation at having an actual customer, stepped out of the back, a mug of fragrant tea in his hand. Crowley licked the air. Oolong. How nice.
Azirphale’s tea cup shook in its saucer when he laid eyes on their customer and his fan of fluffy tails. Crowley wondered if the two met before, but one didn’t find many huli jing in London bookshops. Huli jing weren’t voracious readers, generally speaking. Taking a deep breath, Aziraphale tried to pull himself under control. After all, there was no way of knowing if the customer knew Aziraphale could see what he was. He puffed his chest out. If Aziraphale could face down the apocalypse he could certainly handle having a customer.
“Yes, can I help you?” Aziraphale asked in his best disinterested shopkeeper tone. Wei Wuxian did not look like a person who could afford books from Aziraphale’s shop, not that anyone could as they were not actually for sale. His black hair was long, tied up in a ponytail with his signature red ribbon. His black jeans were tight enough to see the outlines of his thigh muscles and his red, laundry worn t-shirt read, Donuts and Death Metal in black block print.
“Ah, yes, I’ve heard that you might have a book I’m looking for.”
“This is indeed a bookshop,” Aziraphale condescended. If he was hoping to piss Wei Wuxian off enough to make him leave, Crowley thought he had no idea what he was in for3.
“The shopkeeper in Cairo said he sold you his copy of Master of Diabolism,” Wei Wuxian announced with a wide grin.
Aziraphale glanced over at the chair Crowley was on and Wei Wuxian followed his gaze. Against the back of the chair was Crowley’s current favorite slutty novel, Grand Master of Diabolism.
“Oh, not that one. The real one with actual spells in it. Although I’ve read that one and I think they actually got a few details right.”
Aziraphale eyed the fox critically before pulling out his ledger and looking through each entry. He took his time. Wei Wuxian whistled and played with his hair. Crowley tensed for a moment, but nothing seemed to be rising from the dead, so he went back to his snooze position. Finally, after 23 minutes and 52 seconds, Aziraphale announced, “Ah, yes, I have two copies. Do you have gloves with you?”
Wei Wuxian extracted a pair from his back pocket, which, how did he even fit anything in there? He dangled them proudly.
“And they’re clean?”
“What use would they be if they weren’t?”
“I suppose. You may sit over there.” Aziraphale indicated the couch. “I’ll bring them out.”
“Great!” Wei Wuxian bounced over and took a seat. He fidgeted for a few moments, played with his hair some more, then took his phone out and began texting. Crowley drifted along in the companionable silence, letting himself fall into a light doze. In just twenty minutes, the sun was going to be coming in through the window at the perfect angle to make his scales warm.
Too soon, Aziraphale returned with two books and grudgingly set them down where Wei Wuxian could see them. The young fox looked them over before making grabby hands at one of them.
“That’s the one!” He nodded to himself. “That other one is a copy and it’s not accurate in places. Was using one of those copies before that Xue ChengMei made and not only was his handwriting abominable, although what do you expect from a psychopath, but he got experimental with the material sometimes. Nearly blew up Chicago.”
“He did?”
“I did.” Wei Wuxian grinned unrepentantly. Grabbing the original volume, he held it up and let it fall open. “Yes, this, this is mine. It’s all my notes on bringing back Wen Ning’s consciousness into his corpse.”
“Necromancy?”
“Right, you don’t want me to get that wrong, would you? You could have a zombie apocalypse on your hands and then what? After everything the two of you have done to save the world, it’d be an awful waste.” Wei Wuxian hummed to himself as he looked it over. “How much for it?”
“I’m afraid you could not afford it.” Aziraphale held his hands behind his back, one wrist catching the other around his delicate snake cuff links4.
Wei Wuxian laughed, bright and full of sunshine. For those who could see them, his tails wiggled and wagged, curling around one another. “But I wrote it. This is my book.”
“Well yes, however you must pay for it.”
“You haven’t said how much it is.”
“More than you have.”
“Well, obviously, I don’t have anything, but I do have a boyfriend.”
Ding!
“Speaking of,” Wei Wuxian said.
Through the door stepped a vision in jade, his skin fairly glowing in the afternoon light (which was still 2 minutes away from being perfect.) His long black hair was tied up in a top knot and he wore a blue ribbon across his forehead. His jeans, proper blue, were also tight enough to make out his thigh muscles, but only because his thigh muscles were that incredible.
“Lan Zhan! Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian called out to the heavenly being, for he was just that, an immortal cultivator, “pay for this book for me? It’s full of my old notes. Maybe I won’t blow things up anymore!”
“Unlikely,” Lan Zhan said, but handed over his credit card anyway — a black American Express card.
“Yes, well...” Aziraphale handled the thing like he didn’t also have one of his own, which he mostly used to buy ice cream and bird seed for the ducks.
“I must have this book. I won’t leave here without it,” Wei Wuxian said.
Lan Zhan frowned. “Everyday.”
“Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan, he must sell me the book first.”
“Everyday5,” Lan Zhan said again, almost frowning, nearly a facial expression.
Wei Wuxian looked expectantly at Aziraphale.
“I’m afraid the book is not for sale,” Crowley’s angel said, his arms crossed and chin raised imperiously in a way that told Crowley he was not to be moved.
“Well then, I cannot leave,” Wei Wuxian responded. “Get me a pillow and a blanket. You can put it on the card.”
“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan said, “Everyday.”
“If he won’t sell me the book, we’ll have to do it right here,” Wei Wuxian said. Standing, he pulled his shirt off.
“My good man!” Aziraphale protested.
OK, at this point, enough was enough. Crowley flowed forth from the chair, his scales gleaming into skin. Couldn’t they have waited half an hour to do this? He looked at HanguangJun’s placid expression. Obviously not.
“Angel! Angel! Sell them the book or they’ll have sex on the couch.”
“Oh, my heavens! You would not!” Aziraphale protested.
“He’s right. We totally would,” Wei Wuxian confirmed. “Wouldn’t we, Lan Zhan?”
“Hmh.”
“See?”
“I don’t think that’s a word.”
“Sure it is. It means everything, like Aloha or literally.”
“Literally does not literally mean everything,” Aziraphale protested, as a good angel should.
“It seems like words mean whatever you want them to these days,” Wei Wuxian responded, chaos gremlin that he was.
Crowley had to head this off now or there would be sex.on.the.couch, which was not to be suffered. “Angel! You are arguing with a huli jing! Arghhh!”
Wei Wuxian grinned unrepentantly. “If it helps any, I was always this bad.”
“Angel, sell him the book.”
“But, then I’ll have to give it to him,” Aziraphale whined, wringing his hands. “Besides, I don’t even know what it’s worth.” He turned to Wei Wuxian. “I’ll have to research what it’s worth and get back to you.”
“Fine. We’ll fuck while we wait.” He popped open the button on his jeans. Lan Zhan made no move to stop him.
“No, no! Okay, because i would never be able to get the smell out. You can have the book, but it stays mine. You just can take it.” Aziraphale pinched the bridge of his nose. “Please take good care of it.”
“Of course, I’ll take care of it like I wrote it, which I did.” Picking up the book, Wei Wuxian cradled it against his chest. “C’mon, Lan Zhan, let’s go fuck.”
“Mnh.”
The two exited the shop, Wei Wuxian giving Crowley a jaunty wave. Growling to himself, Crowley flowed back into snake form and curled up on the chair again only to find his perfect sun position had been missed.
Dammit, Angel!