Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

This Is Not A Regency Love Story (It's A Complete Nightmare)

A Good Omens fanfiction

Part 1 of 4

The wind blew blustery around the bookshop, slanted rain beating against the front door, and Aziraphale peered out the window, lifting the curtain back.

A worried expression camped on his face.

"Oh dear, oh dear." The angel let the curtain drop and wrung his hands. "I don't suppose we ought to have phoned and cancelled? I shouldn't like to think of them out in this weather. Especially given that unreliable Japanese locomotive Newton drives. They're bound to have a wreck in this downpour. What do you think, Crowley?"

"Mmm?" said the demon, rather absently, glancing up from his place on the couch and craning his neck.

Aziraphale looked frustrated. "Newton and Anathema – they're dropping by the bookshop today – did you forget?"

"Nah, I remembered," said Crowley, still sounding distant and uninvolved, more preoccupied with the small dust ring on the arm of the couch he was lazily dragging one finger along than he was with whatever Aziraphale was on about.

"Well, then, do you suppose" – the angel (who did not like to be ignored, particularly by Crowley, though he knew from 6,000 years' past experience the demon sometimes did it just to get a reaction out of him) was becoming a trifle testy now – "we ought to have cancelled?"

"Wasn't us that made the plans," he pointed out. "They're the ones who contacted us out of the blue and said they had something to show us."

"Yes, I do wonder what it is they didn't feel able to share over the telephone."

"Dying to know," said Crowley, in a voice which implied the opposite.

The angel rolled his eyes, but before he could make some manner of retort, there was a knock at the door and he hurried over. "Oh, goodness. That'll be them."

"Or a customer," Crowley teased. He could be merciless, when he wished to be.

Aziraphale ignored him, too busy opening the door and making a grand fuss about hustling the couple inside and offering them something hot to drink. "Nice cup of tea, perhaps?"

Anathema smiled. "I don't suppose you've got anything stronger?"

"As a matter of fact, I do." Aziraphale beamed at her. "Well, come in, both of you, and we'll pop open a nice bottle of wine." He gave Newt a sympathetic glance as he passed. "I trust the ride over from Tadfield wasn't too unpleasant?"

"In Dick Turpin? Never." Newt was very nearly as loyal to his car as Crowley was to his beloved Bentley (and Anathema, more privately, was to her bicycle, Phaeton). Which was much easier, these days, since Armageddon hadn't happened and the car – perhaps because of something Adam unwittingly dreamed up – ran a great deal smoother. But they do say he that is loyal in what is least is loyal in what is most.

"So." Crowley held his wineglass up for Aziraphale to refill once he'd gotten their guests taken care of. "What was it we needed to see?"

"Well," began Newt, "it's a bit...strange..." He brought his wineglass to his lips, took a sip, made a face, then forced himself to swallow. The second sip, which he was more prepared for, he seemed to enjoy rather a good deal more. "Your kind don't have ancestors, do you? Or mums, even?"

"No," said Aziraphale. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, going through some of Sargeant Shadwell's old things – he's moving to the countryside with Madame Tracy, don't know if you heard – we found this strange antique photograph."

"It looks like Aziraphale with Reverend Pickersgill – but it's obviously our vicar's ancestor from the Regency era – there are records of his life," Anathema explained. "We've found a name and address. Even a place of burial. Nothing very interesting. That isn't the puzzling bit. The puzzling bit...well..."

Crowley and Aziraphale exchanged a look, as if they'd begun to work out what was coming.

"Bother," murmured the angel into his wineglass.

"The funny thing," Newt continued when Anathema faltered, "is that the person who looks like Aziraphale in the photograph is clearly a woman."

Anathema, reaching into a waterproof leather satchel she'd brought along, pulled out the old, cardboard-backed sepia photograph to show them. And indeed, it did appear as if a female version of Aziraphale – wearing rather a great deal of white lace – was standing beside a man who was a dead-ringer for Tadfield's own Reverend Pickersgill.

"Very well, yes," sighed the principality, "that is me, I'm afraid."

"But why are you a girl?" asked Newt.

"Well, his lot are sexless unless they really want to make an effort," said Crowley, shrugging. "You never know for certain what they'll turn up looking like when they're in a corporate form."

"Oh, my lot, is it, mister self-denial?" Aziraphale frowned at him. "As if demons were somehow exempt from that rule?"

"Right. Whatever. You're just mad because you almost had to marry Parson Pickersgill."

"I did not!"

"You did," insisted Crowley. "I saved you, angel; not that I ever heard a thank you for it in the last two hundred years." His auburn eyebrows lifted above the top of his sunglasses. "Give, give, give."

"Crowley, if you recall, I sent you a lovely fruit basket and gold pocket watch in – oh, when was it? 1825? – to show my gratitude for the part you played in all this; which you promptly sent back with a terse note saying didn't I know the forces of Hell were going to flay you if they found out you came to the assistance of an angel and to desist at once."

Crowley considered this, rummaging blankly through the oversized antique trunk of his memory and stumbling upon something, at last, which clicked. "Oh...yeah..."

"And, I will have both our guests know, I had matters perfectly well in hand." Aziraphale reached over and touched Anathema's arm. "You see, my dear, I was undercover."

"So this was some sort of angelic espionage?" asked Newt, intrigued.

"Exactly," he said, smiling over at Newton with warm appreciation.

Crowley snorted.

"I'm sorry." Aziraphale glared. "Did you want to tell this story?"

"You know, I think I will." Crowley downed the last of the wine in his glass and, reaching for the bottle to refill it, began. "It all began while I was out for a stroll on the grounds of this delightful estate I'd recently arrived as a guest at–"

"Hem," Aziraphale cut in.

"Wot?"

"Stroll? You were running like your life depended on it."

"I was walking fast – anyway–"

"What were you running from?" asked Newt.

Crowley looked as if he'd just had an iron girder dropped rudely in front of his train of thought. "Mmm?"

"Yes." Aziraphale looked a bit smug. "Do go ahead and tell them, Crowley."

He muttered something that sounded like "pack of pearls".

"What was that?" said Anathema, frowning uncertainly.

"He was running away from a bunch of girls brandishing parasols," Aziraphale told them. "And their mothers."

Crowley held up his hands. "Those weren't ordinary girls – those were bloody piranhas, I tell you!"

"Vampires?" said Newt with almost a hopeful ring in his voice.

"Worse," Aziraphale said, lifting a pale eyebrow and bringing his wineglass rim to his lips. "Girls who'd just come out into society and heard Crowley bragging about his alleged 3,000 pounds a year income."

"Right. Well, nobody warned me if I exaggerated one time at a card table, harmless little bluff, a bunch of horrifying middle-aged women would sic their daughters on me like bloodhounds!"

1822 (Or Thereabouts):

"Mr. Crowley! Oh, dearest Mr. Crowley, do wait up!"

"For Satan's sake!" Crowley, near the border of the property and feeling rather like a spent fox about to be descended upon by hungry, howling dogs, their masters – namely these girls' horrible mothers – on chargers just beyond, dived – arms raised up over his head – into the hedges.

When the figures in springtime pastel dresses clustered around the hedge, each arguing with their nearest companion about which way the eligible gentleman had gone and whose fault it was they'd lost track of him, a black serpent with a red underbelly sprang up and hissed at them.

About half the group fled, screaming about a poisonous snake which had attacked them for no reason at all and what was the gardener thinking letting such dangerous vermin have free rein on the grounds where civilised ladies took their exercise, while one brave – or more probably insane – young lady proceeded to try and whack at it with her parasol.

While she aimed her blows, she had brought into her mind something she'd heard a religious instructor going off about once while she only half-listened, preoccupied with her (at the time) new muff and crystal-bead slippers. "Vile serpent, tempter of Eve! Take that!" She would have been shocked to know, really, if only she ever could learn of it, just how right her generalized guess was.

Luckily she was of that class of person who is trained to make a scene rather than to accomplish anything and – frankly – she missed, leaving Crowley unscathed, having succeeded in doing damage to nothing other than the hedges themselves.

"Oh, dearest Eliza, it's no good! The snake will not be smashed. Whatever will we do? I think I shall faint if you cannot kill it!"

When she and her remaining companions thus concluded their lack of success was due to some ill-will or force beyond their means rather than general incompetence, they broke into further hysterics and took off back towards the house for help. (They'd never been told they were unaccomplished in anything, buoyed in ego by mothers and nursemaids and flattering friends alike, and each assumed, while dutifully admitting – on Sundays, as piety required – they must have some as of yet undiscovered fault, they were truly perfection personified.)

When they were little more than screaming specks in the distance, Crowley returned to his favourite shape, spluttering curses directed towards everyone he could think to curse, including some who almost might not have deserved it.

Leastwise, not entirely.

He made a rude gesture in the direction the girls had gone. "And the horse you cackling hens rode in on!" he spat, taking a step to his right and treading accidentally on something that went, "Ow!" and then, "I say! Do have a care!"

A buxom blonde person – at first glance a lady wearing a dress of blue organdy with a shock of long, disheveled platinum curls about her face – popped up beside him. "Do you mind? One is trying to privately avoid society, and you just come–" The woman halted. "Crowley?"

"Aziraphale?"

"Well, well – fancy running into you here."

"I hope you don't take this as a very personal remark, but why are you a woman?"

"Oh, I'm pretending to be the female acquaintance of..." The angel's pretty golden brow furrowed. "Well, honestly, I'm not sure – I lost track last week, if you must know. But, no matter.

"Anyway, it's a very important mission for Heaven, or so I've been told, and I'm not actually permitted to vacate this place until I've received leave from my superiors."

"So you're meant to lounge around here, not certain what you're supposed to really be doing, with no direction, pretending to be a lady of high-society?" He shrugged. "I suppose there are worse things. What the deuce are you hiding in the hedges for?"

Aziraphale's expression was suddenly stricken. "Er... I – completely by accident, and unencouraged, I assure you – seem to have gotten myself engaged."

"Engaged?" Crowley repeated. "Engaged for what?"

"Engaged to be married – betrothed."

Hoof-beats sounded past them in a hurry as a random voice belonging, evidently, to a young man on horseback, called out, "The wedding's on Wednesday!"

Crowley gestured with one thumb over his shoulder. "Angel, who is that?"

"Oh, that's just Thomas. Oldest son of the family – never actually seen him off horseback." Aziraphale pushed a few curls back, giving a little eye-roll. "As far as I'm able to gauge, his entire life and duty consists of riding around and making random proclamations."

"He's the one you're affianced to?"

"Oh, good lord, no – not him."

Crowley laughed. "Yeah, that would be a bit strange."

"It's actually Parson Pickersgill."

Crowley then proceeded to laugh so hard he sank back down into the greenery wheezing.

"It's not funny!"

"It is if it's the same Parson Pickersgill I met back at the main house."

"Well, I imagine it would be." Aziraphale looked very prim, mouth flattened into an aggravated line. "Not a common name, what."

"How does he walk with that stick constantly up his arse?"

"Yes, yes. I suppose he is rather stuffy, but I'll thank you not to make derogatory statements about the gentleman who has expressed his intentions towards me. It's not seemly."

"Oh, come on, angel, even by accident you could do better than that idiot."

"I freely confess he's not the brightest man I've ever met – but I mean, compared to us" – Aziraphale gestured between them – "what human is?"

"If I handed you a rock, right now, and said, 'here, have a throw', chances are you'd hit someone more intelligent than Parson Pickersgill."

"This is all a dreadful misunderstanding."

"So, the wedding's on Wednesday, eh? Am I invited?"

"No!"

"As your friend, I'm deeply wounded you don't want me there for this momentous occasion. Deeply wounded, Aziraphale. You've cut me to the quick."

Aziraphale stomped a foot, swishing a flurry of layered skirts. "For pity's sake, you can't even enter a church!"

"Well, yeah, I guess there's that," he sniffed. "But still. I don't like being excluded from my best friend's wedding."

"There isn't going to be any wedding, you complete buffoon!"

"Yeah? Why's that?"

"Because, you idiot, I've informed my Head Office about the need to, shall we say, speed things up a bit, and they've absolutely assured me Gabriel is on his way."

"And...?"

"And, don't you see? As soon as he gets here, I'll be relieved of my post, free to flee – as myself, not this absurd façade – and not a moment too soon. I simply need to keep a low profile until then."

Crowley was smirking, plainly amused. "And you really think he'll be here in time?"

"Yes, of course! It's all going be tickety-boo."

"It's just, if you ask me–"

"I didn't."

"If you ask me," he insisted, "Gabriel is always making excuses for turning up late."

"I say–"

Crowley did a bad impression of Gabriel's deep (vaguely American-sounding) voice. "Oh, I was fighting the prince of Persia by myself and Michael was the only one who showed up to help me..."

"Listen–"

He pressed on. "I was held up because Zechariah got mouthy."

"Er, yes, well..."

"M'point is, he's not exactly what you'd call reliable."

"He'll be here, Crowley."

"If you say so." He glanced out at the horizon, then looked back at Aziraphale. "You have rather a large front as a woman, d'you realise that? Was it intentional? Because that doesn't seem highly practical to me. Don't they just sort of bounce about everywhere when you walk? I think you've got the wrong size corset for those things, honestly."

"My face is up here!" Aziraphale pointed emphatically, speaking with an ice-cold tone.

"You could quite literally poke an eye out."

"Crowley?"

"Yeah?"

"Do shut up."

"Just one question before I do: how does one get engaged by accident?"

Aziraphale's eyes narrowed. "One innocently heads down to the library and gets one's path blocked by a pushy parson who babbles something or other – then one says, 'yes, yes, whatever you want, please just move, I only came down here for a book, you know' – and then they're all congratulating one at making such a handsome match – a husband with 500 pounds a year is certainly more than one could expect, they say – and insisting one compare fabric swatches." The angel shuddered at the memory. "Turns out the 'something or other' was a blasted marriage proposal."

"And from Parson Picks-his-nose, of all people, that's got to be rough."

"I've tried to dissuade the odious man, but he can't take a bloody hint – just waxes on about how unabashedly angelic my face is."

Crowley held up a finger. "Well, I mean, he's not wrong." Not in a literal sense, anyway.

Aziraphale chose to ignore that. "It is nice as far as boosting one's ego goes – always pleasant to be admired and the first three dozen love poems were rather flattering – but honestly! This has gotten beyond excessive. It's running me ragged, Crowley." Then the angel's expression changed to one of mild relief. "I must confess I'm very glad you're here after all; it might be easier to hold Pickersgill at arm's length until Gabriel arrives if I can invoke the Arrangement for help now and again."

"I'm really not sure our Arrangement covers something like this – I mean, using my vacation time to help you avoid the affections of a deluded human?" He began to circle Aziraphale, tutting. "That's a pretty big favour, angel."

"I'll fill out your Hellish paperwork for the next six months."

"Eight."

An eye roll, but agreement. "Fine, agreed. Eight."

"And you'll try to make it look like my handwriting this time?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"And I'll help you avoid those girls who chased you over here."

"And?"

"And what the bloody else d'you want?"

He shook his head. "I was just waiting to see what else you offered."

"You absolute snake."

"Ah, don't I know it." The demon grinned.

"Well, let's get back to the house for tea."

The hoof-beats came galloping by their nearest neighbour-hedge again, clearing it with a jump towards their left while the rider was halloing to them loudly over his shoulder. "Tea is served at quarter after four!"

"Yes, thank you, Thomas," snapped Aziraphale, testily. "That was exceedingly helpful."

"How does he do that?" Crowley wanted to know.

"I don't ask these questions."

"Oh, thank you, Mr. Crowley – God bless you, you beautiful man – you've found my darling betrothed!" Pickersgill, who'd run over to them the moment they entered the parlour, held out his thick arms towards Aziraphale.

"Yes," sighed the angel. "Hello, Picky, old bean."

"Angelica, I was so worried! I've told you many times not to wander the grounds without me – you're far too delicate."

Crowley sucked in his lips and made frantic wheezing noises like someone trying very hard not to break into a fit of riotous laughter.

"Not one word," Aziraphale muttered in a low snarl. "Not from you."

"Angelica, my sweetling, think of what too much exertion might do to your tender womanly constitution! You might catch a chill and die of consumption, or fall and break your legs, and I wouldn't know where to look for you."

"I can assure you, parson, my health is not in any imminent danger." Aziraphale grimaced and took several stumbling steps backwards before Pickersgill could make physical contact. "Please don't touch me, there's a good fellow."

Crowley was shaking so hard from repressed laughter he'd slid sideways and knocked over a statue of a hawk, which he was frantically trying to catch before it hit the ground.

He failed, only being spared the appalled, accusatory looks of the rest of the fancy guests because – despite it breaking into two neat pieces – the noise of the crash was muffled by the plush carpeting.

"Are you hungry?" Pickersgill asked the supernatural being he believed was his soon-to-be bride. "I imagine you've had a most upsetting day."

Aziraphale did brighten at the offer of food. "Oh, yes, I am feeling rather peckish, thank you." The angel's eyes darted to the side. "Go on and sit down, I'll follow." Then, in a reproachful hiss, "Crowley!"

"Wot?" he mouthed.

The angel gestured dramatically with two hands at the broken statue.

Crowley – his cheeks gone pink – attempted to nudge the broken bird behind a silver trolley with his left foot.

"Oh, stop it! We're guests here – behave like it." Aziraphale bent over, grabbed the statue, and – using a quick miracle – repaired it, the two halves readily becoming one whole hawk again, and set it back on the low marble column it had originally been perched atop of.

"Angelica?" chortled the demon.

"I didn't put a lot of thought into the name – I had other things on my mind."

"Clearly."

"Do stop being an ass, Crowley."

After an awkward tea, which was largely spent with Aziraphale trying to use Crowley as a buffer and the girls who'd pursued him earlier glaring jealously across their tea-things at the angel who they thought really hadn't any right to take all the eligible men, someone announced that they must have music.

"Oh, yes," simpered the girl who Crowley recognised as the one – Miss Eliza – who had taken several whacks at him in his serpentine form, "and I think our dearest Angelica ought to rise up and sing for us."

"Oh, yes, do!" said Crowley, lolling his head against the back of the sofa and spreading out one arm. "This should be very entertaining." Something pinched his lower back – it turned out Aziraphale had rather longer nails (though they were just as elegantly groomed) in his guise as a female and decided to put them to use. "Owww!"

"What's amiss, Mr. Crowley?" asked one of the girls' mothers, looking up from her sewing in some alarm.

"Eh?"

"You cried out in pain."

"Nah, I didn't. I was...just...ummm..." He couldn't very well say 'the bloody principality pinched me', so he pretended to be singing. Off key. Which Aziraphale knew was only for show, since the demon could sing perfectly well when he wanted to. "Owwww say can you seeeeeeeee..."

One girl shrieked and covered her ears with exaggerated disdain, and Aziraphale, giving an eye-roll in her direction, privately hoped she had an earache later.

"Uhhh...by the dawn's early...something or other..."

"Pray do not sing that vulgar American song here," said the mother.

Crowley mercifully cut off. "Right."

"Everyone please be quiet," moaned Aziraphale, rising from the sofa with resignation. "You all win. I'll sing if someone will be good enough to accompany me on the pianoforte."

"Ooh, I'll do that," offered Crowley, raising a helpful hand.

The angel sighed, "Mr. Crowley, do you know how to play the pianoforte?"

The demon lowered his hand. "Sorry. I forgot that might be necessary."

A red-haired girl seated near Eliza offered and, shuffling over to the pianoforte, began to play.

"Give 'em hell! Waahooo!" Crowley called encouragingly as Aziraphale began making several throat-clearing noises.

Eliza – glancing between them with a look of pure disgust – folded her arms across her chest sulkily, her trembling lower lip protruding.

"My Angelica has the voice of an angel," said Pickersgill, puffing out his chest proudly.

"Obviously," said Crowley, with the implication that he'd just said something akin to the sky being blue or water being wet. It was a tone that, outside of polite society, would surely have been followed by, "You idiot."

And Aziraphale began to sing. "Ooh, each morning I get up I die a little... Can barely stand on my feet..."

"Hold up," Anathema cut in, her dark eyebrows coming close together. "I'm going to stop you right there. How could Aziraphale sing Somebody To Love before Freddie Mercury was even born?"

"Perhaps," suggested Newt, "it's similar to how the Flintstones can celebrate Christmas."

No one granted this remark the dignity of an answer.

"Uhhh..." said Crowley, giving an impassive-faced Anathema a rare snaky blink as he sheepishly lowered his wineglass. "Yeah. Right, sssssseeeeeeeee... It's..."

"You don't remember the actual song I sang, do you?" demanded Aziraphale.

"It's been over two hundred years!" he protested, sloshing his near-empty wineglass.

The truth was, after a couple of centuries, most remembered songs in Crowley's mind went the way of the Bentley's radio and turned into something else – usually Queen, nowadays.

"Listen, guys. As fascinating as this obviously completely accurate story is, I need to use the bathroom," Anathema decided, turning to appeal to Aziraphale, who got up to show her where the bookshop's lavatory was.

"I still want to know what happened after Aziraphale – or, I suppose I should say, Angelica – sang in front of all those people," Newt told Crowley, leaning forward earnestly. "How did he get out of marrying Pickersgill? Did Gabriel turn up after all?"

The demon raised an index finger and wagged it. He reached for the bottle of wine to refill his glass yet again, letting out a low belch followed by a succession of tiny hiccups. "To be continued."

Chapter Text

This Is Not A Regency Love Story (It's A Complete Nightmare)

A Good Omens fanfiction

Part 2 of 4

1822 (or thereabouts):

After Aziraphale sang for the other guests at tea, several in the group decided they wanted to enjoy the oncoming twilight hours out on the veranda, dramatically thinning the crowd in the room, but unfortunately for the angel Pickersgill was not among them. He seemed quite determined to spend every possible moment when his betrothed despite a number of meaningful hints that she was tired and tomorrow was a big day, and hadn't he best leave her alone so she could turn in early?

The angel was immensely grateful to Crowley, who – despite getting constant invitations to join the bulk of the group on the veranda – stayed with them the entire time, sandwiched directly and uncomfortably between Aziraphale and the parson on the sofa, and prattled on with forced merriment about whatever he could possibly think of to fill the awkward, terse silences.

He was being such a loyal ally, in fact, that Aziraphale had almost decided to forgive him for all his teasing earlier – almost.

Then, when the hour was getting later than any of them liked, Pickersgill – his former glowing opinion of Mr. Crowley rather dimmed by this point – rose from his place and said, "Oog, blooop, blooop, gugh! Guup guurp!"

Newt blinked rapidly. "I'm sorry, Pickersgill said what?"

"What he actually said was, 'I shall retire for the evening; I see there's no getting any privacy worth speaking of here'," Aziraphale sighed. "I do believe Crowley's getting a bit too drunk to continue." He turned to his friend. "It's time for you to sober up again, my dear."

"M'drunk," slurred the glassy-eyed demon – not that anyone could see how glassy they were behind his sunglasses, of course. "M'not that fine."

"Now, Crowley."

"Right, okay. If's wot y'want." He concentrated and the wine bottle refilled as he began to sit up straighter.

"How the hell did you do that?" demanded Anathema.

"This is what surprises you?" Aziraphale asked pointedly. "Honestly, child! You know we're supernatural entities, after all. And it's only wine. Er, recycled, perhaps, but only wine all the same."

"I mean I guess...I just never thought..." stammered Anathema, uncertainly, turning to Newt. "What do you think?"

Newt squinted down at his nearly emptied wineglass, then glanced at the bottle – and over at Crowley – again; he cringed and set the glass down. "I think I'm done."

"Where was I?" asked Crowley, leaning over to reach for the bottle.

A shivering Aziraphale wearing a soggy shawl over a white cotton nightdress, drenched from head to foot, pressed the drooping toe of one squelchy slipper to the door of the bedroom Crowley was occupying and, finding it unbarred, barged right on in.

"Crowley!" exclaimed the angel, looking for the demon in the dark. "Are you awake, dear boy? Some jokester has punctured my hot water bottle – a nasty trick, if I do say so – and now my entire bed's aflood. I'm at my wit's en–" A pause. "Ooh, strawberries!"

Sure enough, there was a large gold-rimmed porcelain bowl full of the delicious fruit on a tea-tray on the night-stand by Crowley's bed.

Aziraphale stumbled over, losing one slipper and abandoning it to wherever in the carpet it'd happened to stick, and began merrily eating the strawberries up with relish. Crowley wouldn't mind.

"Oi, those aren't for you!"

Swallowing, Aziraphale – with red-stained lips – turned to see Eliza, also in a nightdress (though notably made of much thinner, more transparent fabric than Aziraphale's was), with an expression of fury on her half-shadowed face.

"Bother," said the angel, feeling – no doubt – as if the strawberries were going to come right back up again. "Pardon the intrusion, miss. Have I got the wrong room? I'll replace the strawberries if you wish it." A pause. "Although, hang on, is that not Crowley's silk top hat – hanging just over there?"

"Those," continued Eliza irately, as if Aziraphale hadn't spoken, "were for Mr. Crowley, for when he gets back from wherever he is."

"So this is Crowley's room, then."

"Yes, and I'm waiting for him – I couldn't catch a single minute with the man earlier because–"

"He ran away from you?" Aziraphale offered innocently.

"No," she sputtered out, seething with jealousy. "Because of you."

"Me?" Aziraphale's very red mouth parted and hung agape.

"Yes, Angelica, you – he stared at you the entire time we were having tea and you were standing in front of the pianoforte."

"I think that's rather because I was singing." Which, if Eliza recalled, she'd suggested Aziraphale do in the first place.

"And after that?"

"I was eating cake."

"Nonsense – you deliberately hoarded all his attention for yourself, even though you've already bagged a parson with an income of five hundred pounds. I think you're utterly selfish, and I don't know why he was looking at you anyway – you're much too fat to be pretty. Pretty enough for someone worth 3,000 pounds, that is. I mean you're all right, I suppose, for Pickersgill. At any rate" – she fluffed her long dark hair – "I expect the charming Mr. Crowley was merely being polite and it was really me he wanted to spend the evening with."

After the shock of the appearance-related insult began to lessen, like the fading sting of an unexpected strike to the face, Aziraphale began to feel rather indignant towards this remarkably stupid, careless girl's actions. Even if the spoiled little deluded thing had been right, and Mr. Crowley had wanted her (and not been a demon), to come into a gentleman's bedroom, undressed, at night, with snacks and promises of a good time, was not at all seemly.

And the angel proceeded to scold her for it, chastising her to have a care for her reputation, and insisting she promise never to do anything of the sort ever again, only for Eliza's eyes to narrow as she pointed a finger and snarled, "And what about you, then?"

"Er." Aziraphale hadn't considered that, unused – still – to being a young female. "It's different for me. This isn't about me."

"Because you're engaged, you mean?"

"Er, yes, if you like."

"And Picky's all right with you just coming into Mr. Crowley's bedroom like this?"

"Young lady, this is not about me; I've had quite enough–"

"Be a shame if somebody told him."

Aziraphale brightened, voice suddenly brimming with hope. "Would you?"

"What?"

"Never mind."

The angel sighed, disappointed. Then, with one plump, pink hand motioning at the doorway, "Now look here, young lady, I must insist you vacate this room at once!"

"I'm not leaving – I'm waiting for Mr. Crowley – you are the one leaving."

"The hell I am!" Aziraphale, fed up, tried to grab Eliza's arm and drag her out – only for Eliza to latch onto a length of damp blonde curl and yank.

"Ouch, you little – !" Aziraphale bit back a swear word.

"You wish to quarrel with me?" Eliza demanded. "Shall we wrestle? I have no fear – you are no match for the likes of myself."

"Do stop twisting my arm!"

"Take that!"

"Stop kicking!"

"Shove me again, Angelica, and next time I get a shot in, I'll claw out your stupid bovine eyeballs!"

"You're a very violent young woman, d'you know that?"

"What are you going to do about it, you soft, floppy thing? Sit on me?"

"As a matter of fact," Aziraphale considered pertly, "that's actually not a bad idea. Should subdue you for a moment or two, what. I'll give it a try."

Eliza suddenly gasped in alarm, her voice sounding squashed and restricted. "How dare you! Get off me, you great big cow! Get off!"

"Did you just buck me? That is exceedingly unladylike, Eliza – I'm telling your mother about that tomorrow, don't think I won't. Where's my damned slipper? One's gone in the carpet, but I've got the other here. Let me get it off and I'll show you exactly what I think of you. You need a good spanking – that's what you need, you petulant little cuss!"

"Hang on," said Newt, "how did you know all this?"

"Wot?" Crowley's brow furrowed. He seemed annoyed by the interruption.

"He's right – if Eliza and Angelica over here" – Anathema looked at Aziraphale, who blushed – "were alone in your room having a cat fight about which one of them had to leave it, how did you know what was happening?"

"Did Aziraphale tell you about it later?" asked Newt.

"No," said Crowley, rather impatiently.

"Then how–" began Anathema.

"I'm getting to that," huffed the demon.

There was the loud creaking of a mattress. A black coverlet fell away. A red head popped up, eyes still shut. "Are you two going to fight over me all bloody night? Because if you are, I'm going to take my pillow down to the tea-room. I'm trying to get some sleep."

"It's Mr. Crowley!" exclaimed Eliza, shoving Aziraphale away and bull-rushing to the bedside.

"You mean to tell me," Aziraphale blurted, breathless and sore and outraged, wobbling tiredly forward, an upraised and very damp slipper in hand, "you've been under there this whole time?"

Crowley fumbled for his sunglasses, put them on – much to Eliza's confusion – then got up with an exasperated yawn. "Yup."

"For pity's sake, Crowley, why didn't you say anything?"

"To tell you the truth, I was hoping she would leave."

"You heard him, Angelica – the man wants you to leave."

"I mean you," snapped Crowley.

Eliza burst into tears and fled the room, wailing, her hands over her face.

Aziraphale was – despite everything that had just transpired – evidently struck by raw feelings of sympathy. "Oh, poor thing."

"She's a viper, that one," Crowley snarled, gnashing his teeth together and shuddering.

"You'd know," sighed Aziraphale.

"So. Somebody poked a hole in your hot water bottle, eh?"

The angel's eyes narrowed. "I should have known!"

"Wot?"

"It was your doing, wasn't it?"

"Me? No! Nothing to do with me!"

"I'm glad to hear it," said Aziraphale, rather wearily. "Truly. Sorry for accusing you. It's been an exceedingly long evening."

"S'alright." Crowley got up and lit a candle. "Come on. Let's get you something dry to wear."

"Something of yours?"

"Yeah, what else?"

"Crowley – you're thin."

He yawned. "Wot's your point, angel?"

"How do you expect anything of yours to fit me?"

"Call it a demonic miracle – come on." The demon waggled his free hand – the other holding the candle up a little higher, more for Aziraphale's benefit than his own, since he personally had hellishly perfect night-vision – and Aziraphale took it gratefully, if a little sullenly.

"I'm honestly a little surprised you've taken to buying clothing lately – rather than making garments appear over you, I mean – I know that's not really your style."

"Hmm," said Crowley with a little shrug, letting go of Aziraphale's hand and flinging open his wardrobe. "I'm just sort of trying it out, seeing how I like it – and I don't." He couldn't think of a bigger waste of money, really.

"I don't know, I thought your dark red cravat today was lovely."

The demon chuckled. "I didn't buy that one – the one that came with the suit was too itchy and I couldn't wear it."

"Ah. I did notice it matched your hair a little too well."

Crowley handed the angel a plain black shirt with a loosely-formed neck. "And then if you sort of cut the middle out of these and unbutton the sides..." He tossed out a pair of breeches made of fabric that looked slightly more breathable than being underwater. "You'd have..."

"The world's most uncomfortable skirt," Aziraphale lamented.

"I have a black kilt from when I was in Scotland."

"I'll take it – what were you doing in Scotland?"

"Tempting a farmer."

"Ah – how'd that go?"

He grimaced. "Let's just say your lot won that one."

"Oh, rotten luck – I do hope they weren't too hard on you down in Hell."

The demon's replying laugh was dark, and Aziraphale wisely said no more about it, slipping behind a screen to change. The angel re-emerged looking like a ragged blonde refugee draped in unflattering and ill-fitted shapes and hues, but it was comfortable enough to pass a few hours.

Aziraphale shook out a head-full of curls, freeing them from the wide collar of the shirt. "I don't know how you do it."

"Do what?"

"Did, I suppose I should say – go about with long hair all the time, I mean."

Crowley chuckled. "Yeah, I guess it would take some getting used to in your case, amirite?"

"Oh, Crowley, I don't want to be used to it – I want this nightmare to be over."

"There, there," sighed Crowley, bending over and patting the angel's broad shoulder. "There."

"Oh, that's very comforting," Aziraphale sniffed crossly. "And why do all of your clothes smell like sulphur?"

"Occupational hazard." He took pity on his friend. "I hardly notice any more. Oi, you know, if you wanted, I could help you with your hair."

"Really?"

"Yeah, why not? Can't have you going around with it matted." Crowley filled a basin with water and took out a comb.

He also set out some eggs and a glass vial of rosemary, gotten from goodness – or perhaps badness – only knew where. This made the angel hesitate, fairly certain the demon wasn't planning on fixing them both omelets.

"You do know what you're doing?" Aziraphale double-checked, easing down by the fireplace, which Crowley lit with a snap of his fingers. "It's not going to turn a funny colour or fall out, I mean?"

Crowley snorted.

"Yes, dear, I know, I was just asking."

Anathema sighed, drumming her fingers. "We're not about to have to listen to a full description of you cleaning and combing out Aziraphale's hair, are we?"

"Oi," huffed Crowley, cross at being interrupted yet again, "d'you want to hear this or not?"

"Can't we just skip ahead to interesting bits?" Newt asked.

"Hey. Where is Aziraphale, anyway?" Anathema leaned over the side of her seat, searching around for the angel. "I don't see him."

"Right, angel." Crowley pouted moodily down into his wineglass. "Leave in the middle of my story, why don't you?"

He appeared, then, holding two leather-bound books. "Look, Crowley, I found the diaries we kept during my unfortunate betrothal to Pickersgill!"

"What're you talkin' about? I never kept a diary!" the demon exclaimed.

Waving one of the books, Aziraphale asked, "What do you call this, then?"

"A journal."

"Let's see this." Anathema took Aziraphale's diary in her hands, flipped a few pages, admiring his lovely copperplate handwriting, and chuckled. "You describe everything in that house – even the leaves on the flowers in the vases."

"I'm a very thorough record-keeper," he said proudly, with a satisfied grin on his face.

Crowley made a mocking expression and murmured something under his breath.

Standing up and skipping over to Aziraphale, Newt took Crowley's journal in his hands, settling back down to read the only line written within he could find; the rest was all doodles and angry squiggles and cuttings pasted in it, more like a sloppy scrapbook of sorts.

"I hate," he read aloud, "this bloody house."

Aziraphale rolled his eyes.

"So, what happened after you took care of Aziraphale's hair?" Newt insisted, closing Crowley's journal and setting it aside.

"M'tired," grumbled Crowley, staring blearily into the flickering firelight.

Lolling a couple feet away, a little closer to the fireplace, Aziraphale rolled over, head propped on raised wrist, and glared. "I don't care – I'm not going to bed with soaking wet hair."

"Well, I can't sleep with you sitting here sulking."

Giving the demon an annoyed head-shake, the angel sighed, a little reproachfully, "It really didn't help that you used heated water with egg. What the hell were you thinking?"

"S'not my fault – I didn't know it would cook!" Crowley protested – it had never cooked for him, and he'd never used anything but hot water when cleaning his own hair with the exact same mixture, back when he'd worn it long.

Although, that very well might have been simply because the demon had never believed it was possible for an egg to cook in a person's hair – and so, for him, it didn't.

The angel held up a hand. "Irregardless, I've just gotten the scrambled egg off my scalp, and I'm not about to curl up in some draughty corner until it's completely dry."

"To be fair, angel, your hair was wet when you came in here."

"Not this wet."

"Really, Crowley, can we please talk about something other than Aziraphale's hair?" pleaded Anathema, groaning softly. "Didn't anything happen?"

"I'm getting to that!" snapped the demon, pouring himself another drink. "Hold your..." He waved the bottle. "Hold your...whatever you want to hold..."

The door to Crowley's room banged open.

"This isn't a damn lounge!" snarled the demon. "Why is everybody storming in here?"

Pickersgill and Eliza's mother – for it was them, in the flesh, because who else would it have been – paid no heed, the one flaring his nostrils and the other gasping for her smelling salts.

"Oh, hello, Picky." Aziraphale rolled over, lifted a hand, and waved cordially.

"So it's true!" gasped Pickersgill, one hand pressed dramatically to his heart.

"What the heaven are you on about?" demanded Crowley, rather at his wit's end.

"When Eliza told us what was going on in here," exclaimed Eliza's mother, wheezing like she was having a panic attack, "we didn't want to believe it."

Aziraphale's face untwisted into an expression of rapture. Hands pressed together as if in prayer, the angel glanced up at the ceiling – gazing heavenward with delight – and murmured, "Oh, thank you!"

"What exactly did she say happened?" hissed Crowley.

Eliza's mother was sobbing too hard to answer. She was very nearly sobbing too hard for Pickersgill's reply to be heard over those wretched 'wounded moose' noises she was making.

"Eliza informed us," said the parson, "that you had lewd intentions towards both herself and my betrothed – making suggests that they both join you this evening – but when she refused, darling Angelica, seduced by your offer of cardinal sin, agreed to join you."

"Dreadfully sorry, Picky," said Aziraphale, not really sounding it – rather the opposite, to be sure. "I fear I'm a dreadfully weak woman who was unworthy of your offer of marriage. I shall dearly miss you, old bean, but perhaps this is for the best."

Crowley shot the angel a scorching expression.

"Don't worry, darling Angelica, I do not blame you."

Aziraphale was crestfallen. "You don't?"

Pickersgill, all understanding and softness towards her, shook his head. "I shan't punish you for this sorry excuse of a man attempting to spoil our happiness."

Crowley pointed and exclaimed, "Ha!"

The angel's eyes rolled up to the ceiling again, with rather a different expression in them this time, akin more to that of someone who has been the victim of a cruel practical joke. "Come now, really? What have I ever done to any of you?"

"From you, sir" – the parson narrowed his eyes at Crowley – "I demand satisfaction. My Angelica has the virtue of an angel, and you've attempted to sully her."

"Oh, good lord," moaned Aziraphale.

"Yes, yes," grunted Crowley, waving an arm dismissively. "What's it to be, pistols at dawn?"

"No – we shall have a proper duel, man to man." The parson puffed out his chest and smacked it with one clenched fist. "Steel on steel. As God intended it."

"Swords?" Crowley couldn't help it – he blanched. He was a good fighter, in general terms, as only the dirtiest demonic tricks cam make one, but gentlemanly fencing wasn't really, well, his scene.

"Indeed, sir – tomorrow, after breakfast." Then, turning to Eliza's mother, the parson added, "Do dry up, Marianne, no one has betrayed you and yours– your daughter remains untainted."

She just wailed louder.

"Marianne," tried the parson again, with less gentleness in his voice.

Crowley cleared his throat. "Allow me."

Aziraphale shrugged at Parson Pickersgill, who gave 'her' a quizzical look.

Crowley snapped his fingers and the hideous noise emanating from Eliza's mother stopped at once, as though it were a mist evaporated into the draughty air above their heads.

"After breakfast," the parson said, with finality, storming out, followed closely by Eliza's panicky mother, who currently couldn't make any noise come out of her mouth no matter how rapidly she moved her lips or strained her throat.

"Now it's getting good," Anathema declared.

"Glad you approve," said Crowley, his tone heavy with sarcasm.

"Better than Emmerdale and EastEnders combined," Newt added cheerily.

Anathema lifted an eyebrow, turning her head to stare at him.

He shrunk back in his seat, smiling toothlessly, cheeks hot. "My mum watches a lot of telly during the day."

The library was so silent they could – without using any supernatural means – hear a clock three rooms away ticking.

"Why are we in here?" demanded Crowley, tired and painfully aware of breakfast being scheduled for less than two hours hence.

"Because, my dear," sighed Aziraphale, "we need to prepare you for this absurd duel Pickersgill insists upon."

"As far as I'm concerned," growled the demon, "the blasted parson can have you."

"Crowley!"

"Fighting your idiot fiancée was never part of the Arrangement."

"I'll be doing your paperwork from Hell for eight months, remember?"

He spoke through his teeth. "It's not worth it – and a fine job, I might add, you did of keeping Eliza and her damned mother away from me last night."

"Oh, nonsense – you're just being tetchy." The angel waved that off. "Besides, for all we know Gabriel could turn up before breakfast is even concluded."

"I'm not holding my breath."

"This is simply a precaution."

"This is stupid."

"You do know something about swords, I take it?"

"I know if I run you through with one of them right now, you'll go back to Heaven and my current problems are at an end."

The angel's hands planted themselves about the hips. "Except for the part where you have to explain to Pickersgill that you murdered me in cold blood for no apparent reason."

"Jealous rage," he offered dryly.

"I hate you."

"No, you don't."

The angel turned around – spinning at the heel like a mini hurricane – and, disappearing behind the stacks, came into sight again carrying several heavy gilded tomes. "These are on the sort of techniques I believe old Picky will be employing when he fights you after he's eaten."

Head tilted, Crowley examined the books, gauged their thickness, and winced. "Can't I just...I don't know...make his head explode or something?"

"Crowley, you simply cannot go about exploding my fiancée's head – it isn't polite." The angel hesitated, slightly tempted to let him despite everything just said. "Not to mention the dreadful mess."

"Bleh," agreed Crowley, albeit reluctantly.

"So how long has it been since you've last held a sword?"

"Hmm, half a century at least."

"Oh dear" – hand-wringing – "you will be dreadfully out of practice, then. I was a bit afraid of that."

"So. I guess we'll have to call the duel off, then."

"He'll never let you – he's dreadfully stubborn." Aziraphale pulled out two wooden practice swords, offering one to Crowley. "I'd better try to give you some tips."

"Where were you even keeping these?" mused the demon, taking the wooden sword and, rearing back a bit, making a few weak swings like he was about to hit a home run.

"Never mind that." Aziraphale lifted a hand and flicked. "Just keep backing up and then try to come at me; I'll be defence here." The angel raised the wooden sword with the natural smooth motion of a trained swordsman even the guise of a human female couldn't hide. "Don't go easy on me – there's no reason to be afraid – you can't possibly hurt me."

"Yeah?" Crowley wasn't supposed to take that as a challenge, but he did so anyway, wilding swinging forward.

Aziraphale stuck out a foot (clad in a cream-coloured satin, high-heeled slipper) and tripped him; the demon landed on his face, gaining nothing but a mouth full of braided rug.

"s'not fair," he murmured, pulling himself back up. "Cheating."

"Next time do try not to run at me like you're trying to take my head off with an axe." Aziraphale tapped his shoulder with the blunted wooden point. "Just lunge forward, lift your arms – without flapping them."

"If this was a battle I would have won," Crowley said sullenly. "You'd be dead."

"Perhaps." Aziraphale made an impatient, tooth-sucking noise. "And if this were your duel with Pickersgill you'd be face down in the mud while that pompous clergyman stood where I'm standing now, gloating."

"Angel, this is hopeless."

"Don't be so dramatic – you just need to brush up on a few things."

Crowley tossed his wooden sword aside and slunk down into the nearest chair – a sleekly carved pearwood rocker. "Look. If you want me to kill him, I can do that. If you want me to win this thing fair and square..." The demon shook his head and rocked harder, back and forth, creaking. "We're doomed."

"Well, I don't want you to actually kill Picky."

"No? Grown fond of your sweetheart, have you?"

"You know I haven't." Aziraphale glared daggers. "Oh, there must be something between dispatching the odious man and...and..."

"You could..." Crowley's sunglasses – which were slightly askew from Aziraphale tripping him – slid to the bridge of his nose. "That is, you could always make him fall asleep after breakfast, or lock him in a closet somewhere. If there was no Picks-his-nose, there'd be no duel."

"He'll only want to duel with you the next time he sees you."

"Newt, Aziraphale," huffed Crowley, glaring glarefully in their direction. "Would you mind not crunching so damn loud while I'm telling this story?"

Newt swallowed guiltily, giving the demon an apologetic smile.

Aziraphale blithely licked a glob of butter off his thumb and reached back into the bowl situated between them.

Leaning forward, Crowley sniffed, his nostrils twitching. "What's that you're eating anyway?"

"Popcorn," Aziraphale told him. "Did you want some?"

Nodding, the demon got up and stuck his fist in the bowl, pulling out a handful.

"What happened to your duel with Pickersgill?" Anathema pressed.

"After popcorn," Crowley insisted.

Chapter Text

This Is Not A Regency Love Story (It's A Complete Nightmare)

A Good Omens fanfiction

Part 3 of 4

1822 (or thereabouts):

The duel between Pickersgill and Crowley had devolved into rather a nasty battle – one which Crowley, looking quite ragged and torn up, seemed to be losing. They were, for some reason, having their dramatic duel in the garden, right in the middle of an obscenely large patch of daffodils, and Crowley was currently flat on his back, dodging Pickersgill's lunges, strikes, and blows by vainly rolling over from one side to the other, while Aziraphale – wearing a pale blue dress – stood with the onlookers, watching nervously.

Cornered and not much able to fight back in his current position, it looked like it was all over for poor Crowley, and it was uncertain whether Pickersgill was going to merely slap him with the flat of the blade or attempt to run him through in a most ungentlemanly fashion, despite the risk of it putting the ladies watching quite off having their tea later.

Aziraphale suddenly charged forward. The angel planted himself between the parson and the demon. "Stop it!"

"Angelica, get out of the way," whined Pickersgill.

The angel smoothed back a small cluster of stray blonde curls. "Picky, I will never marry you!"

"What, you mean you love this...this...scoundrel?"

Crowley rolled over again and managed a (somewhat bloodied) smirk.

"He's almost a stranger and I prefer him to you!"

"That's Big Fish," said Newt.

"Eh?" Crowley narrowed his eyes at him.

"Newt's right," Anathema put in, tilting her head to the side. "That can't be what happened – you're just plagiarizing a scene from the movie Big Fish."

"Right down to the daffodils," Newt added.

"What's next, Pickersgill has a stroke in the wash-room and you get recruited to the army?" Anathema snorted.

"No, it's not what happened," sighed Aziraphale, giving Crowley a cool look of resigned annoyance. "Crowley, that's a movie we watched together last week – it had Ewan McGregor, and you made several strong remarks throughout about there not being nearly enough aquatic creatures in the picture as a whole – don't you remember?"

Crowley muttered something lacking any comprehension for the present company, save for Aziraphale, who frowned and made a pointed comment about the demon minding his language in the future if he pleased.

"What I don't get," said Newt, thoughtfully, "is – if you're going to plagiarize a film – why not pick one that actually makes you look like the hero? Like The Matrix or something."

"He's got the sunglasses for it," Anathema noted.

"Oh, never mind, I'll take over the telling for a bit," Aziraphale decided, ignoring the manner in which Crowley had folded his arms across his chest and was looking away from them sullenly.

"Nooh, geeeentlemen," said a man who looked remarkably like Sergeant Shadwell – and was very possibly his ancestor, thus explaining how the photograph of Aziraphale and Pickersgill ended up in the mad witchfinder's possession in the first place – glancing from the parson to the demon with a stern expression, "this is to be a clean, preeper fight fer the honour of..." He trailed off, noticing Aziraphale. "Her?"

The angel reached up and fluffed a few curls near the shoulders self-consciously.

"Really? Wheel, then. No accountin' fer taste," sighed the Shadwell lookalike.

Aziraphale was greatly offended by this. "I say!"

Hooves clopped by. "Has everyone heard? There's going to be a duel! Pickersgill is fighting for Angelica's honour!"

"Yes, thank you so much for that revelation, Thomas!" called Crowley, hissing and sputtering over his shoulder, and making a lazy sort of practice swing with his fencing sword in the opposite direction simultaneously. "There's no other bloody way I could have known that, is there? S'not like I'm in it or anything!" The sword cut noisily through the crisp morning air. Swish, swish.

"The reeels are as follows," continued Shadwell's ancestor as though there had been no interruption.

"The what?" exclaimed Pickersgill, looking suddenly bewildered.

"The reeeels!" he bellowed irately. "Dun't ye speak preper English, ye great southern pillock? Reeels!"

"Steady on, old boy," said Pickersgill. "Don't upset yourself. 'twas a simple enough question, I think."

"I believe he means rules," Aziraphale put in quietly, sounding serenely cross and quite ready to storm off and abandon this whole offensive scene at once if the increasingly ghastly surrounding circumstances would only permit it.

"Quite right." Pickersgill granted the angel a melting smile. "Thank you for your insight, sugarplum."

Crowley glanced over at the angel and mouthed, "Sugarplum?"

"Dat's what I said, yeh greet ideet, reeels!"

"Come on, Gabriel," muttered Aziraphale, shifting nervously from one foot to the other. "Where are you?"

"The reels are, there shan't be nah stabbing or pokin' below dah belt, nah kickin' in the manly regions – hem, hem – and no cheatin' of any keend. Nooh begin."

Pickersgill struck, Crowley dodged. Pickersgill grunted and made a slash at Crowley's legs – Crowley leaped over the blade in a smooth motion which would have looked very impressive if it hadn't concluded with him landing in a deep mud puddle and getting splattered nearly head to toe.

Seeing Pickersgill's sword heading straight for Crowley – who was fumbling in the mud for his own, apparently sunken – Aziraphale hastily performed what the angel hoped one could reasonably insist was barely a miracle (if called on it) and sent the parson's blade flying across the lawn.

"If only," one of Eliza's dim friends bemoaned, "it had not rained so much last night – we should not have all this uneven mud lying about."

Eliza herself began to loudly – and hysterically – complain that this was all Angelica's fault, really, because if she hadn't been throwing herself at Mr. Crowley to begin with none of this would be happening.

As for Eliza's mother, Crowley had quite forgotten to restore her voice, so nobody understood what she was trying to say. The general agreement among the whispering guests, though, was that it was no doubt very much in line with the opinion her offspring was giving.

But Crowley was on his own ground now, mud or no mud. It was a hand-to-hand combat, and no one was calling it out (Shadwell's ancestor had gotten bored and wandered off to smoke his pipe). He wrapped himself around Pickersgill, hopped on his back, got the parson in a headlock, and squeezed.

Then the parson unexpectedly sneezed and Crowley went flying backwards into the mud again, unable to regain the upper-hand as quickly as he'd lost it.

"Oh dear," sighed Aziraphale.

Pickersgill flung himself at the demon, who went sideways onto a dirt-lined slope and should by all accounts have been fine... But he was not getting up. He was bent over and digging with his bare hands, as if frantically searching for something in the muck and mess again.

"What are you–" began Aziraphale, before noticing Crowley's eyes were squeezed tightly shut and he was not wearing his sunglasses. The angel swore, despite everything, including the very real possibility of being overheard. "Shit."

Crowley slithered out of Pickersgill's grasp twice in quick succession, but they were both lucky attempts, since he was going entirely by sound.

"Oh, it's always something, isn't it!" cried Aziraphale, and – lifting up a handful of layered skirts – rushed forward, kicking off a pair of very fine shoes and wadding in, snapping for them both to break it up at once. "This was my best muslin."

"My sweetling darling!" Pickersgill beamed. "You've come to defend me. Risking even your delicate constitution in the process! Your love is so pure!"

Aziraphale had already grasped Crowley about the armpits and could not have looked less concerned about Pickersgill. "Yes, yes. Whatever you say."

"I'm the one over here, my love – perhaps you cannot tell it is me because we are both covered in mud."

Ignoring him, Aziraphale whispered, "Your spectacles; where have you lost them?" into Crowley's ear.

"Not sure... What direction was I facing when you got here?" asked the demon.

"Very well, then – just keep your eyes shut and lean on me. I've got you, dear boy."

"Angelica!" The parson sounded desperate. One could almost feel sorry for him – almost.

Aziraphale, though, was rather drained of pity and sympathy for the moment. "Oh, do shut up, Picky!"

"I could have taken him if–" began Crowley, in protest.

"I know, Crowley, I know – you were good," sighed Aziraphale, lifting the demon the rest of the way out of the mud and towards the cleaner part of the lawn.

Newt glanced away from Aziraphale to stare at Crowley for a long, uncomfortable moment. "Somehow that is more embarrassing than your version – I didn't think that was possible."

"So," said Anathema, when a little of the fury had gone out of Crowley's glareful glare and Newt had looked away apologetically, "I take it Pickersgill agreed to call off the wedding after that? You were finally off the hook?"

"No, no. Far from it," Aziraphale told her, reaching to refill his wineglass (missing it twice in the process) and Crowley's – which was outstretched and being shaken meaningfully in his general direction. "Somehow the ridiculous man was convinced he'd won the duel and wished to show me off, still claiming me as his soon-to-be-wife, at the next ball – which was held the following evening."

"And how did that go?" Newt asked curiously.

"Well," began Crowley, lowering his glass.

Aziraphale stood in a long, wide clearing of the dance hall, arms out, waiting.

Crowley ran forward gracefully and, springing up onto the balls of his feet, dancing towards the angel, was lifted up about the midsection while the crowd applauded thunderously.

I...had...the time of my life...

"Do stop making things up, my dear." Aziraphale's unamused eyes darted over to Crowley, who was standing on the other side of the backroom now. The angel was clearly regretting that he'd let his friend resume the telling of this story. "And step away from my Victrola, please – it's not a toy for you to play your bebop on."

Crowley switched the music off with a pert finger snap.

"Did you really just plagiarize Dirty Dancing?" asked Anathema, blinking rapidly.

"You know, the man is supposed to lift the woman..." Newt fumbled out, flapping his hands in a nervously expressive fashion. "Not the other way around."

Aziraphale arched a pale eyebrow at the demon. "I told you, Crowley."

"Nobody puts Crowley in the corner," added Anathema, swallowing back a giggle.

"The truth is Crowley can't dance," Aziraphale said finally. "And he's a mite tetchy about it."

"Oi," hissed Crowley. "I happen to like dancing!"

"That makes it a great deal worse, trust me," insisted the angel, downing the remaining contents of his wineglass in a single, dismal gulp.

"So Crowley didn't dance at the ball that night," said Newt, haltingly, his tone uncertain.

"Oh," Aziraphale grimly assured him, "he did."

"What I still don't understand is: why was I forced out of the dance hall?" grumbled Crowley, leaning against the outdoor wood panelling on the side of the building.

Not to mention, he'd also been banned for life. Which, in his personal case, was – if you didn't count possible discorporation as a real death and thus an end to it – quite a long time.

Seemed a bit harsh, really.

A few feet away, a smart-looking grey horse hitched up to a sleek coach (the owner of which was no doubt inside having a grand old time) let out a whinny and rapidly shook his head up and down, unhappy at being in such close proximity to a tipsy demon.

"I could venture a guess," said Aziraphale, a touch pertly.

Crowley sniffed. "Too much, was it?"

The angel raised a thin, gold eyebrow. "You somehow weren't – at any point this evening – aware the dashed maracas might be – just slightly – over the top? It never once occurred to you?"

Crowley shrugged and shrank into himself, bringing a vivid green bottle containing some sort of spirits to his lips and having a long swig. "Angel?"

"Oh, goodness, yes." Aziraphale took it from him gratefully and had a long swallow as well, not even bothering to wipe the lip of the bottle first.

"You know, I was only trying to prevent Pickersgill from cornering you into dancing with him all night."

"He wasn't going to, Crowley – I told him I didn't know how to dance." The angel took an extra drink before handing the bottle back. "Which, really, was what you ought to have done."

"It was fun, though."

"Oh, yes, fun for you." Aziraphale made a tooth-sucking noise of frustration. "You can't imagine the lingering state of mortification for me."

"Oh, shut up." He reached up and removed his sunglasses, cleaning them and giving the horse – who was still watching them – a wary yellow side-eye. "S'not like it gets any more embarrassing than being betrothed to Picks-his-nose in the first place, is it?"

Aziraphale lifted a finger to protest then – lowering it – conceded. "I suppose you're right."

"Angel?"

"Yes?"

"You are aware Wednesday is now less than forty-eight hours away."

"Yes."

"What are you planning to do if Gabriel doesn't arrive in time?"

"Oh, Crowley, you simply can't imagine the terrible bind I'm in," exclaimed the angel, with a little stamp of the foot for emphasis. "I'm on a mission – I'm not permitted to just leave... It's not the same for you. Hell just–"

"Hell just what?" He shifted and – replacing his sunglasses – gave the angel a look.

"I didn't mean–"

"Hell just lets me do whatever I feel like?" The demon's voice was dark with dripping, oily sarcasm. "Is that what you really think?"

"Well, they're not exactly..." Aziraphale began to stammer. "They're not exactly against disobedience."

"They are in my specific case – when it's disobedience against them."

"No chance they'd offer me some sort of temporary asylum if I fled my wedding to Pickersgill the night before – completely blowing my cover – and my lot got a little...shall we say...tetchy about it?"

Crowley chortled. "Are you kidding me? They'd probably die of mirth if they knew an angel got himself betrothed to an idiot clergyman – be far too busy falling out of their chairs and pounding the floor with their fists."

Pouting, Aziraphale pushed back a tangled curly blonde fringe. "Well!"

"I could write them, mention it, leaving myself out of it." He made a popping noise with his mouth. "They might send you a nice selection of tableware – as a wedding gift – if we catch head office in a good mood."

"Oh, well, there's no need – Eliza's mother is already giving us that, albeit in a most hideous china pattern." A small shudder, and then the angel paused, brow lifted. "Your head office in Hell has good moods?"

"Better moods," Crowley amended.

"Ah."

"How long d'you think it'll be until somebody lets Pickersgill out of the coat room?"

"As long as it takes them to find another spare key, I suppose." Aziraphale fingered an ornate brass skeleton key half-concealed within a fold of sprigged muslin.

"You know he'll be looking for you the moment he's out, sugarplum," teased Crowley.

The look Aziraphale gave him then was more scorching, hotter and crosser – he knew from personal experience – than Hell in the summertime. "You cannot imagine what I'd do to you right now," said the angel, very slowly and pointedly, "if it weren't for the Arrangement."

Actually, Crowley could – he could imagine it very well indeed – and it surprised him as soon as he realised this. It was enough to make him lapse into a real silence on the subject for almost a full minute.

If he'd been feeling braver, he might even have apologised.

The following morning, after an uneasy breakfast at which nobody would properly look at Crowley (even Eliza, who still wanted him desperately for what she judged as his 'decent looks' and 3,000 pounds yearly income, was somewhat cooled in her passions after seeing him dance the night before) except for Aziraphale (who was only viewed by a gloating Pickersgill as 'especially cordial, even to the flashy and undeserving' for such behaviour), found the angel in the final fitting for a wedding dress.

Crowley peeked his head around a screen. "You decent back there, angel?"

Lifting a heavily layered white silken skirt, Aziraphale stomped over to him. "Oh, something needs to be done, Crowley!"

"I'll say – your head is way too big for that veil they've got out for you."

"What? No, not that!" A moment's reflection, and then, "And, no, it isn't, thank you."

"You look like a snowman," said Crowley, merrily.

Aziraphale's lower lip began to tremble. There was as much water as there was fire in the angel's eyes now.

"All right – I'll take care of it," sighed the demon, a soft touch for tears. "I'll put an end to your damned engagement if it'll make you stop looking at me like that."

Hands on the hips, "And how, pray, are you going to do that?"

"Don't you worry your pretty little head, angelface – Crowley's got a plan."

"Don't talk about yourself in the third person, dear; it's creepy."

"What was it?" asked Newt.

"What was what?" mumbled Crowley, barely taking his lips off the rim of his wineglass.

"Your plan," said Anathema.

"Oh, it didn't work, so..." He smiled weakly. "We can skip that part."

"No, I don't believe we can," insisted Aziraphale. "Tell our friends what happened."

"And no stolen movie scenes this time," added Anathema. "Tell us the truth."

A skinny, loose-hipped, red-haired woman – who had arrived an hour earlier and professed herself to be the long lost (or perhaps estranged or half or something, it was difficult to keep track) sister of Mr. Crowley – wearing a dress of black-and-red wool, a cameo broach with the contour of a snake's head on it, and a pair of black, gold-rimmed spectacles stormed out of the tea room she'd just been alone in with Pickersgill.

Her expression was furious as she sauntered over to Angelica, who gave the woman an uneven smile and with repressed mirth asked how it had gone.

The red-haired woman leaned close and snarled, "For the record, I rejected him!"

"My fiancée didn't fall victim at once to your captivating charms?" If any spying onlookers hadn't known better, they might jolly nearly have thought Angelica was being sarcastic.

"That bastard," hissed the woman, in a lower voice, "said I wasn't feminine enough to tempt him!"

Angelica patted the woman's shoulder. "It's all right, Miss Crowley; we both know you're beautiful on the inside."

"Shut up."

"Wow." Anathema gawped at Crowley.

"It seemed like a good idea at the time," grumbled the demon.

"I still can't believe you got rejected by Pickersgill," mused Newt. "He looks like a halibut."

"Oh, right. This from a man who'd be lucky to come out of a phone-booth looking like Clark Kent," Crowley said with more venom in his voice than was, perhaps, strictly needed.

Newt shrank back, reprimanded. "That's fair," he conceded.

"I thought you looked very well that day, Crowley," Aziraphale added mercifully, even if it was – more than anything else – damning the demon with faint praise.

And Anathema, in a quick – if somewhat unexpected – show of affection, leaned forward, grasped one of Newt's hands in her own, and squeezed it reassuringly. She had no problem with his looking like Clark Kent on a good day. She'd gotten her tall, dark man – asking him to be handsome as well bordered on being unreasonable.

Crowley – still rather vividly coloured in the face – excused himself to go to the lavatory and did not come back for several minutes while the other three sat with their hands in their laps, staring blankly at one another.

Aziraphale twiddled his thumbs and glanced absently out the bookshop window.

Chapter Text

This Is Not A Regency Love Story (It's A Complete Nightmare)

A Good Omens fanfiction

Part 4 of 4

1822 (or thereabouts):

They – Aziraphale and Crowley – were looking at a most remarkably large (as in it quite literally took up an entire wall) portrait of Parson Pickersgill. In it, he was striking a pose that was probably meant to be alluring to his darling Angelica – somehow or other – but actually looked a great deal more like the man had been in the process of a having a stroke and the portrait artist had simultaneously despised his dying subject and had rendered the soon-to-be stiff's nature as uncannily as humanly possible, nothing useful softened and even the smallest flaws horrendously emphasised.

"It's meant to be his wedding gift to me," Aziraphale informed Crowley – in a weak voice.

Crowley stared. "It's horrifying."

"I know."

"I'm looking at it as hard as I can, and I can't think of one positive thing to say about it."

It was true; even the colours and shading were awful.

"I know," repeated Aziraphale, more tersely.

"I think that might actually be a rendering of what mothers tell their children will be coming for them when they don't eat everything on their plates."

"I know, Crowley."

"It's the worst piece of art" – and it was sacrilegious to even call it that, really – "I've ever seen." The demon's hands were behind his back as he circled his angel and occasionally braved another glance at the monstrosity on the wall in front of the gobsmacked celestial being. "And I've been friends with artists in every country in Europe."

Aziraphale was unconvinced the demon was not – how could it be put nicely? – full of cart-horse manure. "Oh," said the angel, exasperated, "you have not!"

Crowley seemed to nod with his whole body. "I bloody have."

"Really."

"More of them are with my lot than yours."

The angel rapidly listed off a few countries, and – without hesitation – Crowley supplied the names of famous artists he claimed to have known intimately.

"Hold on. Intimately?" Anathema quirked an eyebrow at what she judged to be an odd word choice.

"Not like that," Aziraphale told her in a low, impatient voice. "Shush."

Crowley just looked vaguely puzzled, pressing on – nonetheless – with the story he was trying tell.

At any rate, Aziraphale couldn't help admitting to of course having heard of all the names the demon had rattled off, and that Crowley seemed, certainly, to know rather a lot about them.

"You might," he conceded, "have met them."

"Oh, you wound me – would I lie to you?"

"You're a demon." It was what they did, wasn't it?

But Crowley was silent, perhaps a little hurt.

"Italy," said Aziraphale, more to fill the silence than in hopes of actually catching Crowley off-guard this time.

"Leonard da Vinci." Sometimes Crowley still missed him, actually, and rather a lot more than he would admit, as demons weren't meant to be so fond of humans as all that.

"Portugal."

For a moment, Aziraphale thought him stumped – then he said, "Vasco da Gama."

"Ah-ha."

Crowley stopped pacing. "Wot?"

"Vasco da Gama was an explorer."

"Eh?" He removed his sunglasses; his yellow irises seemed to shine in the slanted interior lighting. "Wot's your point?"

"My point, dear, is Vasco da Gama was not an artist."

"He had hobbies, Aziraphale!"

"Miss Angelica?" A maidservant entered the room, wheeling in a silver cart with something layered and white atop it on a glass stand. "Your wedding cake's just arrived from the bakery in Paris. It is a triumph, if I do say so, miss."

"White sugar," whistled Crowley, thrusting his sunglasses back onto his face and then turning around to examine the cake with exaggerated interest. He circled the large pastry and tapped his index finger against his lower lip. "That's unexpected. Exactly how much is Picks-his-nose spending on this wedding?"

"He said he wanted the cake to be as white as his bride," the maidservant informed him.

Aziraphale's expression was trapped somewhere directly between flattered and insulted.

"Heh, you're pasty," Crowley laughed, pointing.

"I simply avoid getting too much sun," Aziraphale said defensively. "It's not good for my corporation's skin." Then the angel lifted a glass knife from beside the decorative stand. "How big of a slice did you want, Crowley?"

"Wot, don't tell me you're cutting it already?"

"Something's got to get me through this."

"Can I...?" began the maidservant, a trifle sheepishly.

"Oh, certainly, my child – you rather look like you need it." The angel hacked out a large slice, dropped it onto a saucer scarcely big enough to hold it, and passed it to her.

"Just a sliver for me, thanks," Crowley said, holding up a finger.

"You know, you're not really supposed to eat the cake before the wedding," Anathema commented dryly.

Aziraphale rolled his eyes. "I wasn't planning on there being any wedding!"

Crowley gestured at him with his thumb. "He still had himself convinced Gabriel was on the way. Rather sad, really."

"It would have been worse," Aziraphale insisted, "if I'd let all the expensive ingredients that went into that lavish cake go to waste."

"Was at least good?" Newt wanted to know.

Aziraphale and Crowley exchanged looks, brows lifted. Turning back to Newt, the demon nodded with rather charming enthusiasm at the memory while the angel merely shrugged.

"Yep."

"I've actually had better – the frosting was much too thick."

"It tasted fine to me," insisted Crowley.

"That's because your slice was too thin for the frosting to matter very much." Aziraphale wrung his hands. "It was also, moreover, far too crumby."

Aziraphale and the maidservant were both on their third slices of cake. Crowley – comfortably full and declining any further offers of another slice for himself – was watching Aziraphale eat while still staring at the giant portrait.

The angel pointed a fork. "It's occurring to me that we would have exceedingly hideous children." Even leaving off the – rather icky – supernatural/human element, it was becoming quite apparent Picky didn't have many good – or even decent – features to pass on.

"Oh, you're an angel, I don't think you can have human children," said Crowley, in the sort of light-hearted voice that seemed almost to suggest – despite his teasing – he might actually be unaware of the process of human procreation.

Which, honestly, would have been Aziraphale's take on the demon's innocent-sounding inflections as well, had the angel not been on earth at the time of the Nephilim before the flood and thus all too aware of what Crowley must have seen occurring between his lot and human women back then; unless he had slept through it or somehow forgotten. Perhaps, though, Crowley was only messing with his friend – he always was the teasing sort, and never would – or will, in all likelihood – confirm it one way or the other. He is, after all, the sort of demon who resists the 'too easy' answer, in any narrative; he is endlessly stubborn that way.

But Crowley's inflections, at the moment, were not the primary focus of their conversation; Aziraphale had other concerns.

"Oh, thank you – not, of course, that I'm worrying about it – I've got nothing to worry about."

"No; course not."

"Gabriel is coming."

"Sure."

"Crowley..."

"Wot, I said sure."

"You didn't mean it."

"No, but still."

(The maidservant – if you're wondering – wasn't following this conversation. She was hearing it, to be sure – but she was glad enough of anything that excused her from work on a Tuesday, so that was all right – they could have been planning to murder Pickersgill and she probably still wouldn't have ratted on them. An afternoon off was an afternoon off – and there was fancy cake to boot. Them talking about being supernatural entities weighed very little in the balance of that. She had, evidently, not one spiritual bone in her body nor the smallest whisper of curiosity in her mind which – charitably – might be called dull but was more accurately willfully ignorant.)

"I'm not actually going to marry Picky."

"Course not." Crowley examined his fingernails.

Aziraphale blanched, an expression of pure horror camping on pale, pursed lips. "Oh, good lord! What if I actually have to marry Picky? N'angel, for heaven's sake! I can't be a parson's wife!"

"That's right – you can't."

"I can't live at that termite-infested parsonage – I'll go positively mad. Completely bonkers. Not to mention all my books will be ruined. And I suspect you may have been correct after all, about my head being too large for that most unfortunate veil."

"That's right – it is."

"Crowley!"

"M'agreeing with you – what more d'you want?"

"I want this nightmare to be over," moaned Aziraphale, head lolling, setting down the plate with a few bites of cake coagulating in its thick white frosting still stuck to the middle. "That's what I want." Then, "I suppose Gabriel can have the whole thing annulled if he arrives only a few minutes too late?"

"Yeah," said Crowley, without much sincere feeling.

"What did you do?" asked Anathema.

"I couldn't risk my cover, as you know," Aziraphale sighed, "so – come Wednesday morning – I put on my wedding dress and was whisked away to the church."

"I tried a few things to put a stop to it," Crowley admitted.

"By which he means he tripped Picky on the staircase," Aziraphale told them.

Crowley added, rather proudly, "And then – when that didn't work–"

Aziraphale cut in with, "My affianced proved remarkably resilient – bounced right back up." He took a sip of wine and smacked his lips. "Rather like rubber."

"Weebles wobble but they don't fall down," Newt sang gleefully.

"Anyway," Crowley continued doggedly, "when that didn't work, I released a small army of rats into the coach which was intended to convey the wedding party to the church."

"Willard," guessed Newt, sitting up straighter in his seat, his face plastered with a happy grin which suggested he'd just won a round of Bingo; "you're plagiarizing Willard."

Aziraphale shook his head. "No, 'fraid not – that's really what happened."

"Oh." Newt was disappointed; he sank back down again.

"Damn, Crowley," said Anathema, sounding impressed.

"S'not like it worked." The demon shrugged, a gesture that almost came across modestly.

Leaning over to pat his shoulder, Aziraphale said, "It's perfectly all right, Crowley – I do know you tried your best."

Behind the veil – which did look rather the wrong size though there was no helping it now – Aziraphale was sweating bullets. The back of the dress clung to the angel's clammy skin; the angel's palms were so soaked with perspiration that – when Pickersgill reached for one of the angel's hands in a clumsy show of affection during the ceremony – he made a face and dropped it immediately.

The parson wiped his dampened hand on his suit trousers.

Aziraphale tried, frantically, to think of anything to delay the ceremony further.

Gabriel was coming; the angel just needed to hold out until then. Nobody in Heaven was really going to let this happen to one of their own. Even if Aziraphale wasn't a particular favourite, only think of the paperwork if they let this occur! The paperwork! Ghastly! Nobody wanted to be charged with sorting through a mess like that. Least of all the archangels.

Everything was going to come out all right in the end. It was going to be just tickety-boo.

Eliza was sitting in one of the front pews, dabbing her dry eyes with a lacy handkerchief which matched her sparkling white-lace gloves. Her mother sat – in a settled, grim manner – beside her, holding a slate and a piece of chalk in her lap. Crowley, evidently, still hadn't gotten around to restoring the woman's voice (he'd had more important things on his mind).

Too bad, Aziraphale thought. No voice meant she couldn't object at an opportune moment, as hysterical women of her kind were delightfully wont to do.

When the preacher, who spoke so mercifully slowly and with a glorious speech impediment which made Aziraphale think everything might be held up just beautifully after all, inquired of those present if any of them knew of a reason the parson and Miss Angelica could not be joined together as man and wife, though, they weren't left in the lurch as far as drama went.

The door at the back of the church swung open, bathing the dappled chapel with bright light, and – for a glorious half second – Aziraphale believed it must be Gabriel, just in the nick of time.

Then there was the shadow of the intruder, which inexplicably lengthened atop so that it almost looked like a pair of devil's horns, then the yipping cry of, "Ow! Ouch! Ooh! Oooh! Hoooot."

Crowley.

Oh dear. The demon meant well, of course, but he was bound to blow the angel's cover like this and Heaven was going to be cross. Aziraphale let out a groan and flung back the veil, storming forward with a look of exaggerated fury. "What the hell–"

The demon came hopping up the aisle, struggling against obvious pain. "I – ooh, ow – object!"

"You!" cried Pickersgill, aghast.

"Yessss," snarl-hissed Crowley, leaping over a low iron-grated railing that seared the sides of his (obviously not shop-bought) trousers, leaving a series of tiny, filigree-shaped holes. "It issss I." In an attempt to not topple over, he rested a hand on the side of a pew, and a little curl of smoke appeared near his wrist. "Oochy! That's unpleasant." He yanked his hand back and continued to hop up and down.

Aziraphale gave a small eye roll.

"Everyone..." The demon gave the guests a little salute. "I have to say that I cannot stand by and watch this woman marry this buffoon because–"

Eliza began to cry for real, weeping as if the world were only just now ended.

"Oh, put a stocking in it," huffed Aziraphale, tossing the bouquet at her head.

"This woman is the woman I..." Crowley's brow wrinkled; Aziraphale's lifted. "Eh," he dithered, distracted – no doubt – by the feeling of heat building rapidly in his body from the blasted church. It was like being a roasting goose in an oven. "...Borrowed money from the other day... But that's not actually all that relevant now... What was I saying? I... Oooh, ow, ow."

"Do you have a point?" demanded Pickersgill, glowering. "Because, sir, if you do, I insist you get to it at once before I have you forcibly removed."

"M'point is..." Crowley stammered, face flushed, trying desperately to think of a point. "M'point is..." He lunged forward and grabbed Aziraphale's plump wrist, tugging. "My point is – we're leaving this church together and there's nothing you can do about it – so long suckers!"

"You cannot..." huffed Aziraphale, running to keep up with the demon, puffy skirt draped over one arm, the other being yanked none too gently towards the church door. "You cannot simply kidnap me during my wedding! I'm not really an expert, you know, but I'm quite certain they have rules about these sort of things – rules and very depressing stage plays!"

"Au contraire, Aziraphale," – and he manically swung a piece of broken beam he'd wrenched free from the siding at one of Pickersgill's outraged relations with his free hand as he spoke – "I am currently proving it's very possible for me to kidnap you during your wedding!" He hissed dramatically over his shoulder, chucking the beam and tugging Aziraphale even harder. "Ooh, ow, ow, ow! Keep moving, angel, we've nearly made it out!"

"What'm I meant to tell Gabriel?"

Crowley made a rude suggestion as to what, exactly, he ought to tell the archangel.

"Well!"

As soon as they were out, Crowley snapped his fingers and the door shut and barred itself behind them.

Aziraphale – despite everything – let out a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness" – for better or for worse, for good or for evil – "it's over."

"Eh," said Crowley, guiltily.

"What eh?" asked Aziraphale, smiling tightly. "I suppose, at this point, we'll just go onto the next part of your plan – I don't agree with your methods, but it does seem to be getting workable results thus far." A pause. "I'm not being kissed by Picky in front of a hundred of his closest friends right now, for one thing. Always a blessing, that." The angel shuddered. "So. Next part of your plan, please. Let us proceed with it at once."

"Well..." Crowley bit his lower lip.

"You do..." stammered the angel. "You do have another part to this plan? A getaway cart, or...something...?"

The demon was scratching the back of his head. "Not at the moment."

"Oh, good lord – I don't believe this!" An incredulous foot stomp on the gravel right where the holy ground ended. "You didn't think it through!"

"Well, excuse me," snarled Crowley, whirling to face the angel. "Excuse me if I just didn't want to see you embarrassed!"

Aziraphale gestured back at the church door, which was rattling violently, no doubt because of the guests – and Picky, worst of all Picky himself – trying to get out and stop them. "What part of any of that wasn't embarrassing? I'll have you know Angelica's reputation is quite spoiled by that horror display you put on."

"Perhaps Angelica just needs to loosen up," sneered the demon, a touch sourly.

"Think of something!" demanded Aziraphale, arms tossed frantically into the air.

Crowley sniffed. "Right. Give me a second."

There came the merry clopping of hooves. "Did you hear? Angelica's run away from her own wedding – with Mr. Crowley!"

"Thomas," said Aziraphale, voice cracking, dress swishing, "it literally just happened – and you weren't there – how the hell did you...?"

Crowley grinned. Then he promptly flung himself forward in a full-body strike and shoved Thomas off the horse, flinging his own leg over the saddle.

"I appear to be on the ground," murmured Thomas, as if in some sort of shock from not being accustomed to separation from his horse; he was rubbing his head and blinking blearily. His bowed legs made no proper effort to rise. "It would seem Mr. Crowley means to steal my horse."

The horse, carrying Crowley, danced while the demon frantically 'whoa whoa'-ed at it, his long fingers fumbling with the reins.

Aziraphale was caught between going to help Thomas and attempting to get on the horse with Crowley. The angel wanted out of there desperately, but... Well, dash it, you couldn't just...just...no matter how much you might...it wasn't...wasn't right...

Crowley – finally having gotten the horse to steady slightly – offered his hand. "Come on, angel."

"One does not," snapped Aziraphale, glancing down at Thomas who was now rolling over in the gravel like he'd been shot, "pass by on the other side!"

Jerking his head so hard that his sunglasses fell off (and were promptly trampled under the horse's hooves), Crowley leaned forward, putting his hand closer. "This one does!" His serpentine eyes gleamed unrelentingly. "Now get on the damn horse!"

The church door was beginning to splinter; Aziraphale looked back at it with trepidation, horrified at the thought of Pickersgill and the rest bursting out and demanding an explanation, then at Thomas one last time. The angel groaned and – placing one plump hand in Crowley's – was pulled up behind the demon.

Aziraphale wobbled unsteadily. Usually the angel was good on horseback, but as 'he' wasn't the one directing the beast – who was still terrified of the demon it was carrying – and currently encumbered by an elaborate wedding dress, it was all that could be done simply to keep balanced.

The angel gripped Crowley's thin waist and squeezed. "Jolly good, what. Ride like hell, dear boy! Yaah!"

Crowley rolled his eyes.

"M'horse," groaned Thomas, almost up now but not quite.

"Go, Trottingham, go!" the demon hissed at the horse – despite the fact that the horse's actual name was simply Sal.

The irate horse neighed and reared, flinging them off, directly into a bush located only a pitiful couple of broad strides down the path.

"I hate you," whimpered Aziraphale, tearing off the end of the wedding dress – consisting, unfortunately, of most of the skirt – which had gotten caught in the bush on the way down. "I positively loathe you."

"Shut up," snapped Crowley, rising up dazed and looking about for the horse – who luckily was only a few feet away, munching on the lawn. "Nice stockings, by the way."

"Well, they ought to be," the angel muttered. "They certainly cost enough."

"Hang on." The demon paused, studying his rising angel friend for a moment. "I don't believe it – you're actually wearing a garter!" He started laughing so hard his whole body shook. There were actual tears of mirth in his yellow eyes. He pointed. "It's right there – on your right leg, obvious as anything. Oh, I'm never going to get over this – that's too much! You can't make this up."

"The undergarments looked incomplete without it!" protested Aziraphale, arms crossed, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other. "Just get me out of here, please."

"And after that complete disaster," Aziraphale told them, "we made our way to meet the nearest public stagecoach..."

"Hold up," Crowley said, turning his head both ways confusedly and granting his friend a rare snaky blink. "Which one of us was telling this part of the story again?"

"I don't know – it doesn't matter," decided Aziraphale.

"Right – I want another drink," the demon concluded, eyeing his wineglass for the umpteenth time and dragging his little finger along the rim.

"You know what I'd really like?" Anathema said suddenly, her eyes darting entreatingly over to Newt. "A hot cup of coffee."

Newt asked Aziraphale if he minded him going into his kitchen in the back and fixing Anathema some coffee.

"Of course not," Aziraphale said politely. "You're my guest – why would I mind? Please, go on and help yourself." He pointed helpfully. "It's right through there – you can't miss it."

"Yeah, but don't touch his angel-wing mug or he might smack you on the back of the head so hard you wake up an hour later on his couch with a lump," Crowley warned, leaning over the arm of his seat.

"For pity's sake, that was one time," protested Aziraphale. "It was only a protective reflex." He smiled sheepishly at Anathema by way of explanation. "You see, Crowley isn't always very careful with the crockery, and I'm afraid I panicked."

"It hurt." Crowley pouted sullenly.

While Aziraphale panted and ran on ahead towards the back of the stagecoach, Crowley paid the driver and hopped in, following the angel.

Simultaneously, the two supernatural beings looked out the windows on either side, just as the curtains were being drawn. Their eyes met each other's, after that, and they began to laugh.

Crowley threw his head back and clapped his hands together. Aziraphale smiled broadly, a toothy, stupid-happy grin.

The other passengers on the stagecoach – about three of them, all stuffier than a newly ordained priest on nitrous oxide – were staring at the couple judgementally.

Suddenly all too aware of the torn wedding dress and visible undergarments and what it looked like, sitting in the back there all disheveled with Crowley, Aziraphale reddened but remained smiling.

Then Aziraphale started really deeply thinking again of the dreadful trouble he might be in with Heaven, even if it wasn't exactly his fault a demon kidnapped him and carried him off.

A lot of the fun of it was beginning to fade from Crowley's mind, too, as the adrenaline rush wound down, leaving behind only the reality that, for the moment, he didn't really have anywhere worth speaking of to go. He'd spent the last money he'd got at a card table on the fare. He hadn't the foggiest clue where they were headed.

The demon and angel turned their heads to smile at one another, then looked away, dead straight on, the previously jovial expressions falling from their drained faces rather rapidly.

Aziraphale looked at Crowley one last time, as if for some reassurance – which the demon didn't bother giving, just staring, unblinking.

The remainder of the angel's smile was entirely gone now.

"I've got your coffee." Newt handed a steaming mug – a plain one with no trappings or fancy handles – to Anathema.

Her eyes fixed on the sloshing, brown brew. She blew on it lightly. "Hello dark roast my old friend."

"And" – Aziraphale spread his elegantly manicured hands – "that's pretty much it."

"You never saw Picky again?" Newt asked.

"Mercifully no."

"And Gabriel?" Anathema asked, taking a sip of gloriously bitter coffee.

"He never actually brought it up," Aziraphale realised, rather slowly. "Not that it matters now – given Heaven's current opinion of me."

"Probably a good thing, yeah?" suggested Crowley, scooting over and taking his best friend's hand reassuringly.

"Crowley, what do you suppose happened when he turned up?" Aziraphale mused, giving Crowley's warm fingers a thankful squeeze before letting go.

The demon shrugged.

1822 (or thereabouts):

"Stop the wedding!" cried Gabriel, bursting through the half-missing church door, accompanied by a stream of near-blinding white-gold light. "I'm here! I've come at last to..." He trailed off. "To..."

The only person present – admittedly rather grimy-looking and with an unpleasant wheezing cough – appeared to be mopping the pews. He looked rather ill-tempered at the interruption, barely granting Gabriel and his angelic presence the smallest nod of acknowledgement.

The archangel – decked out like a proper Regency dandy with only the slightest hint of anxious dishevelment about his otherwise flawless appearance – halted, blinking his violet eyes and looking every which way. He even ducked and squinted in passing while marching doggedly up the aisle, as though he thought Aziraphale might be hiding under a pew.

"Where the hell is everybody?"

fin