Chapter Text
Crowley was a demon.
He liked being a demon. Most of the time.
It meant that he could get away with things that other sorts of conscious beings or entities couldn’t, simply because Bad was his very state of being. Nobody could stop a grizzly bear from defending her cubs, nor deny a crow her curious and clever nature. It was instinct. Inbuilt, from the very beginning. It was a given, then, that demons could do evil and not care about anything in particular, because that was the way they were made.
And so, Crowley had every excuse to be mildly annoying at every opportunity. It was perfectly acceptable for him to not really care much about anything at all. A self-proclaimed bastard, he often thought (or tried to convince himself) that he might just have been the worst demon to have ever lived.
Worst, as in … the worst. The most evil. The most dastardly and bastardly. He thought as much that evening while halfway through a box bag of wine he’d miracled out of the nearest One Stop, and his worn DVD box set of The Golden Girls . He thought so because he’d not long knocked out the phone signal for the entirety of the City of London, just because he’d felt like it.
His cat, Lucy, a sleek black feline with yellow eyes, blinked down at him from atop her fluffy cat tower. She couldn’t say anything, but Crowley knew that she agreed with him; that he was decidedly an evil genius for conjuring up the master plan of upsetting the humans enough that mild carnage would ensue, meaning Hell would keep off his back for another few months.
Just the way he liked it. His infernal spirit slurped up that delicious, raging energy like a kid with a cold slushie on a hot day. No Demon Lords or pesky imps with pitchforks to be seen. It was just him, his similarly uncaring pet cat, and four human women who dealt with the world with unadulterated sarcasm.
And wine. A good friend of his, to be sure.
Crowley was just settling deeper into his leather armchair with a third box bag ensnared in his arm like a baby, when his phone pinged.
His sigh broke the stark silence between episodes. Right. Wi-Fi was still a thing. He might have just overlooked that one.
It was work. More precisely, one Anathema Device who was so bold, so daring as to email him outside of working hours. He glared at the notification a moment, but wasted little time in opening it to scour the contents.
Crowley. Can’t get through to your phone. Whatever you’re doing, drop it RIGHT NOW. We’ve got a big one.
With a growl, Crowley paused the DVD and sat back, deciding to reply only once he’d poured himself yet another glass of wine.
I’m having some much needed Crowley Time, thanks. Wait until tomorrow. He messaged back, aggression in the frantic movements of his fingers. The email sent off with a satisfying whooshing sound.
The reply was near instantaneous.
WE HAVE THE KEY.
Crowley blinked once. Twice. He didn’t blink often, but this was something of a special occasion.
He didn’t bother replying. He was up in an instant, miracling his feet into snakeskin boots and yanking his smart, women’s fit jacket onto his body. After one hefty gulp of wine for good measure, and an urgent scratch on Lucy’s soft head, Crowley kicked off his DVD player and stalked out of his flat with sudden purpose. He whistled as he went, cool as a cucumber, hands stuffed in the pockets of his too-tight leather trousers. His walk wasn’t entirely as slithery and sexy as he liked, however; he was rather drunk, and demons like him didn’t sober up for anybody.
Or anything. Even if that thing was set to change his life forever.
It was a very good day to be Crowley.
The Museum of Occult Paraphernalia.
It was tucked somewhere unassuming on the outskirts of Soho. A 19th Century building that loomed over the street, it was somewhat crooked and spooky looking.The only indication that it was a museum was a small, rusted sign by the Victorian front door. Nobody so much as looked at it as they went about their evening. In fact, it was pretty rare that anybody actually went inside for a look around.
Just as Crowley liked it. While the building was a museum at first glance, it served as something more of a base of operations for him and his small team of human lackwits.
Flinging his jacket over his shoulder, he sauntered up the steps and inside. He turned left into what was once a living room in times past - now a space housing plinths and pedestals and glass cases filled with mysterious oddities and artefacts. Antique furniture lined the walls. Cobwebs reached in from the cavernous original fireplace, drifting on a faint, frigid draft.
It was something of an antithesis to Crowley’s preferred standards (that was, clean and cold and modern). However, for a creepy old museum designed to turn people away and make them forget all they had seen, it was perfect. All he had to deal with on occasion were alternative influencers turning up to take selfies next to the rumoured demon skull pride of place in the middle of the room.
(It was, in fact, a demon’s skull. To frustrate the humans further, Crowley allowed the rumour to persist.)
He drew the heavy curtains across the window, casting the space into a dim, mysterious light.
“OI!” He shouted, and flung his jacket down onto the old leather sofa.
A moment of silence - then the scuffling of feet from the back room. Anathema led the way, as she always did, excitement ablaze in her dark eyes. Newton was at her heels, rather more nervous about the entire extraordinary affair, and likely not entirely understanding it.
In Anathema’s hands was a heavy chest that looked as though it had been about the block a fair few times. It had probably seen a few global disasters, the rise and fall of empires, and cursed many different greedy and unsuspecting humans in its existence; it was that old and nefarious. It clunked down onto the desk nearby, dust puffing out of the seam between the trunk and the lid.
It was old. Crowley could feel the decay of its atoms for himself. Thrilled, he stalked forwards like a serpent on the hunt, eyes set on his prize.
“At bloody lassst,” he hissed, pleased. His hands touched the dark shell of the chest. “Yes. After all those wretched replicas and fakes, this is the one.”
“How can you tell?” Anathema asked, sounding vaguely concerned despite her evident glee. “I mean, it must be the one. It was dug up from the bottom of the Dead Sea and doesn’t show any sign of corrosion or rotting at all.”
“That’s how I know. The elements this is made of can’t be found on Earth. It’s reserved for special use by certain celestial entities.” Crowley said the last three words with an edge of venomous derision. “They must have thought it would be safe to just dump it somewhere on Earth and forget about it. Idiots.”
“Um, they?” Newt cut in, about to poke curiously at the carven material of the chest, but Crowley smacked his hand away.
“Don’t even think about it. D’you have any idea how long I’ve been looking for this thing? Get your poxy hands all over it and it’ll malfunction.”
Anathema tutted disapprovingly, though still regarded the ancient chest with evident awe.
“This was really made by Heaven, huh?”
“Yep. Chills me to the very pits of my infernal soul just looking at it,” Crowley said, smirking wryly. “Witch Girl, you can open it first. Y’know, just in case there are any anti-demon booby traps encased in it.”
Anathema and Newt glanced at each other, vaguely annoyed but no less curious.
“I really don’t know about this,” Newt uttered weakly, cringing. “You know. Opening old, spooky things. Haven’t either of you ever seen Indiana Jones ? Or The Mummy ? I don’t like the idea of getting my face melted off, or hunted by some vengeful entity -“
“I can do both of those things to you -“
“Moreover, we really don’t have any idea what the key is.”
Crowley grunted and folded his arms. “Look. It’s a Heavenly box designed to contain a key that leads to a cache of holy weapons. Or a weapon. The script on the Mesopotamian tablet was all worn off. But I know the cache leads to something good, and the key was made so that the entrance could be accessed again, so this chest isn’t going to melt your bloody face off, awright? It just might make a meal out of me, though.”
“I’ll open the stupid thing,” Anathema said, rolling her eyes. She straightened the chest so that it faced her, and her fingers lightly traced over the strange, alien engravings etched into its surface. “What are these? Is it Enochian?”
“A warning,” Newt unhelpfully added.
“Yes, it’s Enochian. And no, it’s actually a recipe for authentic Italian bolognese, if you must know.”
Newt’s eyes lit up. “Really?”
“Of course it bloody isn’t! It’s detailing the Creation. Even I’m on there. See?” He pointed at a squiggly character carved by the lock. “The Serpent. Right celebrity, I am! Well, chop chop. Get the lid off. I’d like to have this over and done with before Christmas, thanks.”
Anathema sighed, dry as a stale breeze in a desert. Steeling herself, she touched at the complicated locking mechanism on the front and fiddled with it for a moment, attempting to turn the interlocking dials. No matter what position she tried it from, not a single dial would budge.
“Does it need a key?” Newt asked. He pushed his glasses up his nose and leaned in to get a closer look - but he didn’t get too close, nerves alight in his boyish features. He uttered an anxious laugh. “That would be odd, wouldn’t it? Needing a key to get to a key. Uh … anyway, it looks like there’s no keyhole.”
Crowley ground his teeth, immediately vexed. Pressing his fingers thoughtfully to his chin, he stared at the loathsome chest as though strongly considering making it his next meal. He was a big, old Serpent. He could cope. He could probably manage to choke down Newt, too, for daring to laugh at his misfortune.
With an annoyed grunt, he spun the chest towards him and placed his hands on the surface. He felt the alien material, letting a little of himself sink through into the molecules of the structure to attempt to sniff out its secrets, as it were - but as expected, he quickly felt the familiar sting of holy arise to meet him in the middle. Crowley hissed and wrenched his hands away from the chest.
“Bugger. It’s warded against interfering demonic scrotes like me. Not to mention the lack of a bloody keyhole. Witch Girl, you’ve got half a brain! How the wretched Hell do I get in that thing?”
“You know, I think the only people that can answer that have wings and halos, Crowley. You’ve still got half of those and a former life as one of them. I know you like to think you’re all large and in charge and boss humans around -“ she paused to sigh again when Crowley nodded, “- but we can’t answer this one for you. You’re ancient. You must have some idea.”
“If I did, don’t you think I’d already be on a bloody plane heading for my treasure by now?”
Crowley fiddled with the complicated lock some more, then grabbed the chest and tried to wrench open the lid with brute strength, swearing towards the heavens as he did. After several minutes of pulling, kicking, and even jumping on the chest, the trio stopped and stared at it with nervousness and frustration, and it seemed to stare right back with a gloating sort of air.
Crowley glared. Then, he rolled his shoulders and turned away, dropping himself into an ancient leather armchair and kicking his feet up on the coffee table by the fireplace.
“Bloody fuckery, that’s what it is,” he grumbled, steepling his fingers at his chin. “Absolute wankers. Jokers, the lot of them. Probably staring down having a right old chuckle at my expense. It’s probably voice activated, or - or a bloody password or something, I don’t know.”
They all contemplated that in silence. Crowley could sense Anathema and Newt looking at each other behind him, probably pulling expressions of frustration. He could taste their doubt in the air like a particularly unpleasant fart. Well, they could doubt him if they wanted to. They didn’t have to understand; they were only human, and humans lived short little lives where they didn’t have to worry about Hell and its various nefarious agents.
Well. Not until they died, anyway.
Troubled, Crowley brooded away, glaring into the magically lit flames of the hearth.
It was evening. Some God-forsaken time, assuredly. Takeaway bags littered the table and the floor. Anathema was opposite Crowley, dozing off with a half-empty paper cup of Coke balanced precariously on the arm of her chair, and her round glasses were crooked on her nose.
Newt was staring fondly at her. Eventually, he moved to drape a knitted blanket over her, then returned to his place at the writing desk with his various screwdrivers and ominous looking tools. Adjusting his glasses, he leaned in and continued trying to pry the lock on the chest open.
“It’s futile, you know,” Crowley muttered into the stark silence. He sunk further into his chair and scowled. “Those bastards up there would never let a human get to their precious key.”
“If it’s precious, why did they throw it into a lake and forget about it?”
“So that it wouldn’t be found. Obviously. Can’t have any nasty little mortals or demons going hunting their treasure, can they? They have to have all the nice stuff.”
“Why didn’t they just hide it in Heaven, then?” Newt questioned, scratching his head.
“‘Cause they underestimate humans and their ability to find things. They especially underestimate and don’t understand human greed. They probably didn’t think in a million years that that stupid chest would be dug up and sold on the Israeli black market, but there we go. Surprising lot, you are. At least I can’t be traced to its discovery.”
“Just its purchase and possession?” Newt inputted meekly. Unhelpfully. “Maybe we’re not supposed to get into it. Maybe the treasure isn’t supposed to be found.”
“That’s what they want you to think. Who cares if I’m supposed to find it? I want to find it. And if I want something, I think I’m entitled to bloody well get it. This is just another hurdle. I’m the Serpent. I’m the Original Sssin. The Temper. If I want to get into some stupid old chest, I will , mark my words.”
“For what?” Newt pressed, nervous. “You’ve never told us what’s in the hidden cache this key leads to.”
“I did tell you, you snotty ignoramus. It’s a weapon that’ll protect me from Hell when they inevitably realise that I detest every single one of them with every ounce of my infernal spirit and would much prefer to spend the rest of my days on Earth, thank you very much. They’ll destroy me before they let me stay on Earth just because I want to. Or, they’ll imprison me in Tartarus for the next, oh, I don’t know … eternity. Do you need to hear that again?”
With a sympathetic little noise, Newt gave up poking the lock with his Philips screwdriver and sat back in his wooden seat, turning the chest slowly around, instead.
“There must be a clue,” he mumbled quietly. “Like … like a computer password. You can tell it to give you a clue if you’ve forgotten it.”
“Or, in your case, the computer blows up in your face before you get that far.”
Newt flushed, disheartened. “We’re trying to help you, you know. There’s no need to be rude about it.”
“Nghh.” Crowley looked away and folded his arms tightly across his chest. “Whatever. Witch Girl here’s fast asleep. That’s really helpful, innit?”
“She’s tired,” Newt responded with sudden, uncharacteristic venom. The boy seemed to immediately regret that, looking away from the demon and eyeing the doorway to the hall longingly. “She hasn’t been well.”
That was news to Crowley. Annoyed, he miracled some more wine into his waiting glass and bitterly downed it.
“You lot don’t tell me anything,” he grumbled. “Alright, fine. Look for a clue and get back to me.”
Sighing heavily, Newt stretched until his back cracked, then unfolded himself out of the chair to get his coat.
“Well, there’s a big picture of a crown on the back. Bigger than the other symbols, I mean. What does that mean in Enochian?”
Crowley’s interest was mildly stoked. He considered that a moment, then rolled out of his chair to slink over to the desk, turning the rear of the chest towards him. Indeed, there in the very middle of the plate was a carven symbol of a four-pronged crown. Narrowing his eyes, he leaned down to get a closer look, and made out the small decoration on the crown to be the four Cardinal points.
His corporation’s heart skipped a beat.
Newt, who was halfway through putting his coat on, froze. He must have seen the look on Crowley’s face.
“What is it?” He asked in a small voice, then gulped. “Is it a clue?”
Crowley’s throat felt strangely tight. There was an ancient pain blooming forth in his chest, leaking in from some old, forgotten place. It was a rose, thorny and sharp, cutting him from the inside out as it emerged from the cool dark. But, it was beautiful, too. Eternally so.
He placed careful fingers onto the symbol, feeling it and tracing it to prove to himself that it was real, that it was there . That he hadn’t imagined it, that there was no cruel divine prank afoot.
As though stung, he quickly pulled his hand away and just stared, instead. His heartbeat pounded loudly in his skull.
“Um, Crowley?” Newt bleated.
Crowley came back to himself, though the deep ache in his chest lingered.
“What?” He snapped, shoving the chest away.
“Are you …? Does that mean something, then? The crown?”
“No.” With a sallow frown, Crowley grabbed his jacket and then clicked his fingers, miracling away the rubbish strewn about. “Doesn’t mean anything. We’re done for the night. If you’re staying here, lock the doors.”
With that, he pulled his jacket back on and slunk out of the living room-turned-museum without so much as a glance behind him. A sharp spike of doubt formed a cloud about the place, and he was more than glad to abandon it for the safety of his Bentley (parked illegally on yellow lines). He slid into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut.
Silence engulfed him. It was like a familiar friend. One that left the passenger’s seat eternally empty.
He gripped the steering wheel a moment, collecting himself.
Despite the sudden pain, the dreadfully old ache of yearning and confusion, something fluttered there in his chest. Just as it had thousands of years ago, in a garden long lost to the sands of time.
But demons didn’t feel things like hope. Hope was for simpler creatures. With a snarl, Crowley shoved his foot on the clutch and started up the engine. He didn’t care. He didn’t. Demons didn’t care about anything.
It was time to get blisteringly drunk and start over.