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Tug if you need me, Crawly had said once, back before he was Crawly, smiling at the touch of the thread he had formed — the ribbon of woven ethereality, tying his own essence to that of the angel who had accepted the other end.
Tug if you need me, he had said, in the reality before lines were drawn and sides were chosen.
Tug if you need me, he had said, an eternity and a moment before the Rebellion.
But then things — all things — had changed. And though the thread neither snapped in the Fall nor was lost in the War, Crawly had nevertheless assumed the bond they had once shared was, like so much else, gone for good.
Everything was different, now.
Or at least, so he had thought.
~ ~ ~
He was glancing warily up at the Garden Wall, first Earthly mission accomplished, when the serpent’s gaze intersected — by luck, fate, instinct, or perhaps something else again — with that of the beautiful, fluffy-haired, flaming-sword-wielding angel standing there.
The glance lasted only a moment. But in that moment, the serpent saw the silent, stunned flash of recognition pass across the angel’s face; a perfect, vibrant mirror to the light suddenly flaring in Crawly’s own awareness.
Recognition. Grief. Hope. Pain. Affection.
Memory.
And at first, Crawly thought it was indeed nothing but memory that made him fancy he felt the strand around his metaphysical finger tighten — tighten, and pull, so very timidly, in the direction of the figure atop the Wall.
What was that?
The string tightened again, then, just slightly stronger, more perceptible… and its direction, this time, completely unmistakable.
Wondering, Crawly raised his serpentine eyes once again. He was in time to catch the tentative, surreptitious, almost painfully hopeful expression on Aziraphale’s face.
Tug if you need me echoed in his memory. And slowly, softly, gently — forcing himself to act with the utmost care despite the leaping flames of hope and joy in his heart — Crawly tugged back.
~ ~ ~
Maybe not all was lost after all, he thought a bit later, as he scaled the wall and prepared to comment on lead balloons. Maybe it wasn’t true that everything was different now.
Many things had changed; most of them, perhaps, beyond recall. But the thread woven of love and celestial silk was still there, one end tucked snugly within Crawly’s being.
And, it seemed, he and Aziraphale still needed each other.