Chapter Text
Even in the beginning, before Everything had been invented with only a word and thrust into glorious and everlasting motion, before life itself properly existed, there was death.
(Small ‘d’, mind you. Not the git on the tacky motorbike.)
Fortunately, in the context of ‘non-living’ objects, death usually leant itself to Creation (how kind). Matter made matter; for instance, a nebula giving birth to a star, whose explosive death-nova forms another nebula, and suchlike. One seed from a flower becomes two becomes two hundred billion trillion. The death of one individual leading to the propagation of all.
God is esoterically pragmatic like that. A 'little bit OCD', if you will. The universe is an infinitely expanding circle, omnilaterally symmetrical. If God was a gardener, every star and planet would be planted like flowers in straight, practical lines that extended into eternity, petals that disassembled and re-formed seven times each before blooming.
Humans called it deadheading. And God so loved cutting the heads off of flowers. After all, They did it all the time.
✶
✶
The beginning was coming to an end. Unfortunately for some, the beginning wasn’t the only one.
The angel, Crowley, was currently kneeling on a bottomless floor on the bedside of a newborn galaxy—of which waited patiently for its turn to be formed—but Crowley paid it no attention. Around him, there was electromagnetic fields of space everywhere that there was a where, pulsing with flashes of energy as dark matter flitted around the lonely spaces in-between. Like water in a basket made of spiderwebs. Whatever those were.
Something of note: it was enormously, unusually bright for the area. So much so that a person could theoretically observe all this brightness one million years away and still assume a star existed there. But that person didn't exist, and neither did the star. There was only light. And that light was not a star, but something else entirely. And Crowley was holding the source in all of his two hands.
Heart aching and breaking in equal measure, he carefully cradled the spherical remains of what certainly used to be a star, a perfect ball small enough to rest in his palms, arms raised like an offering. It was not dissimilar to how the human Eve would eventually cradle the body of her slain son, Abel.
There lies the rub; stars were not supposed to be so tiny—nor so bloody hot, now that you mention it. In Crowley’s hands rested the equivalent of hundreds of suns, and it was admittedly a bit much, even for him. His skin was smoldering, smoke tendrils rising into the great luminous clouds that floated above, expanding in tandem with the universe. In a few hours, his flesh will have melted clean off. He hardly noticed.
Hands shifting, Crowley brought it closer to his chest. Or her, rather. All that was left of her body that he could find. Between his fingers beamed brilliant shafts of light, warming his knees. It was terribly, terribly cold out here. The idea was that he might help her conserve heat for as long as he could, for once her light went out, there was no bringing it back. So far, it wasn't working.
She was small. So, so very small. Used to be one of the biggest stars around, this one, and so radiant that anyone who looked at her would start spontaneously, uncontrollably sobbing in a vacuum that frowned on the existence of liquid (or maybe it was just Crowley who did that). The point was, she most definitely did not look like this when last Crowley was in the neighborhood, the one he'd built all nicely for her.
One single tear escaped Crowley’s impassive face, and was immediately reduced to a hissing vapor.
A proper no angel’s land out here, now. Nothing but a debris disk and miles of circling dust matter to show for it all. Except for the light, swallowing everything. A proper shame sunglasses hadn’t been invented yet. Crowley was fairly certain his eyes were on their way to becoming permanently blind. God really ought to have someone hand out some proper workplace safety equipment.
Speaking of the Almighty. Did God... know? Surely, They must have known. Surely, any moment now, it would all go back to rights again, for this was not Creation; quite the opposite. Who in their right mind would want ever this?
Something else of note: as Crowley cradled one, also did he cradle a second thing, though in a different sort of way. This second object was not a star, or anything resembling one. And it made its home inside of him, as odd as that sounded. He had been aware of it for some time now as he kneeled bleakly on some faraway planet’s horizon. It was… something else, something he had not been Created with. Something that wasn’t quite something. Not now. Not yet.
A hole. Crowley could hear it within, whispering in the silence his star left behind. The language of eternity given voice.
The Hole (whatever it was, it didn't yet have a name) that was collapsing inside of him was decidedly not grief, for grief also hadn’t been invented quite yet. The universe held no knowledge of sadness, nor tears, nor lamentations, for every day thus far had been a Joyous one. It was, and is, as God commanded—such words spoken, as always, as if in an empty room that no-one else could hear.
Omnilateral symmetry. Perhaps there were to be seven days of destruction next, God’s way of saying bugger all to their collective hard work. Crowley’s work. Maybe the whole cosmos was next, and all the heavenly host with it. Now wasn’t that a cheerful thought.
Peering through the blinding haze, Crowley watched mutely as ten million little lights in a vast distance traveled in all directions except his own. Clearly they were avoiding the area. No doubt all heard the bloody massive explosion, felt the shock-waves ruffle the tips of their feathers, saw the cosmic dust get everywhere and make a proper mess of things. Probably no one wanted clean-up duty. Or maybe, they just didn't know what in the currently-under-construction-Heavens had happened and were too fearful of the Almighty to ask.
His upper lip curled at the idea. Though it wasn’t as if he was asking, either. One may as well stop to ask the electricity why it pulsed.
The Hole got a little bigger. The solar winds blew; Crowley coughed on burning stardust, spitting it out as sparks that quickly snuffed out. Wind was not supposed to blow in space. But blow it evidently did. Crowley was starting to realize there were more than a few things he had thought were not supposed to be, yet were. That God had not been quite as forthcoming as one could have reasonably expected God to be, with suchlike very trivial things such as the death of a supermassive star, and what have you.
The Hole got a little bigger. And Crowley, a little smaller.
"Bugger this for a... meteor?" he sighed softly as such an object hurtled towards him with increasing velocity and speed. (And not a meteorite, mind you. Crowley would have strong words with anyone who happened to confuse the two—the differences were obvious.) The more he looked, however, the more he saw that the meteor was actually neither quite meteor nor ite.
Someone was rapidly approaching, he could see. An aerolite with its tail on fire. Another angel, one who gave a damn enough to investigate all the wailing, or all the lack of it. About time. His hope had been abandoned in the debris field, lost to the aether.
"Oh. It's you," Crowley sniffed to the appearing angel as they assumed their corporeal form, the one he’d met by Messier 16. He didn’t even try to hide his disappointment; he'd been hoping for a Throne at least, someone who'd report this to the top without a fuss. Someone besides himself, of course. Just his luck.
"Greetings. Yes, quite," said the Principality cheerfully, Azira-something or other, wings gracefully catching the blasphemous wind. Bit of a namby-pamby, Crowley had thought back then. No suggestion box, indeed.
The angel at least had the good sense to swap the cheeky grin for something more grim; maybe it was the anguished expression on Crowley’s face. He opened his mouth to speak, but Crowley quickly seized his moment now that he had an audience in front of him.
“She—she used to have such a lovely voice, this one,” Crowley wailed, peering down at the little blue ball; her silence hummed an echo. “The real big ones, y-you know, their voices are deeper. More so than the wee-er ones. ‘Course, ha, no sound allowed in space, but seismic waves, all 'a that. Point is, they can, well, sing, and their voices all sound special. Did you know that?”
Miserable, he tried to bury his face into his hands, but they were currently occupied in addition to trying very hard to burst into flames.
“The, um… ‘stars’, was it?” the other angel folded his fluttering hands. “No, no, I do believe I did not. It’s not exactly, ah, my department.”
Crowley looked away dejectedly, saying nothing more. He did not need oxygen (not that there was, in fact, much of it around), but he felt as though he was deprived for breath. Like every time he tried to breathe, the vacuum refused to manifest something he could work with.
In his peripherals, the other angel shook his wings and squinted, looking uncomfortable.
“What exactly… happened here?” he questioned worriedly. “There was a rather loud boom-ish sort of sound some days ago. It nearly startled me into dropping my celestial protractor..! I had happened to be in the middle of looking over the design of what is to be called, ahem—a ‘human genitalia'.”
(Against his will, Crowley found himself wanting to ask what that word meant, but was far too busy moping.)
Shielding his eyes, the Principality scanned the debris field, the clouds of brilliant color that were slowly growing dimmer. His pale eyes changed their hue to mirror the dust, Crowley noticed. His curly hair appeared almost to become a glowing crown.
“...gosh. It truly is quite bright, isn’t it? I mean, I hardly even realized there was a galaxy here.”
Soon, there wouldn't be a single stitch of light left, as though it had never existed.
Crowley sniffed again.
“I just… I-I don’t exactly understand, really,” he bemoaned. His voice swelled, more angrier in tone than what was probably allowed, and the other angel flinched. “It's just, how could this have happened? A massive bloody star, exploding. How could the Almighty not have seen this coming? Warned me?? Not exactly a bed of roses, was it, stuffing all of the radioactive material into a star and pre-aging it. I built her, exactly how she was meant to be, I swear it! She was positively luminous! She was absolutely perfect! She was, she was—”
Then, instead of proper words, Crowley let out a queer sort of noise. As if the Hole inside of him spoke. A kind of sob crushed between one’s teeth, trying desperately to break free. It did not resemble any noise he’d ever made in his entire existence. Crowley shamefully swallowed the vibrations of his voice’s nonexistent echo. But then, he made the noise again. And again. Then once more after that.
Crowley numbly watched the other angel move in the corner of his vision, waiting for him to fly away. Wouldn’t blame him, really. Bit of let down, this whole conversation, he was sure. However, instead, the angel twitched his wings, and suddenly became next to Crowley. Floated there for a moment before settling down onto his knees, sitting back on his legs and smoothing out his robes with an exhale. They were so close now that Crowley could smell the magnesium on the other's breath.
Crowley avoided his face, but the other didn’t look at him, instead gazing solemnly into the vast expanse. The two of them side-by-side made a pair of identical black shadows stretching into the infinite.
“Didn’t even get the chance to name her,” he mumbled. What a load of bollocks this whole lot was. The other angel hummed, an expression of uncertain pain on his face. The radiant light quite suited him, as though he were made of the stuff (they both technically were, but still).
“Ah. Um. May I?" he requested softly while motioning to the little star, his eyes as round and wide as she was. "Hold it, I mean. I do promise to be extremely careful.”
No. No, absolutely not.
“Yeah, sure,” Crowley said, his voice in pieces that searched aimlessly for gravity. With a difficulty that he ignored, Crowley stiffly pried the star out of his hands, his flesh ripping and dissolving, the extreme coldness of space boiling his black, naked blood. The other angel made several alarmed noises at the display.
“Oh my Go—, stop! Your—your hands..!” he cried as he reached shaking hands towards Crowley's, eyes bulging in alarm. Crowley grimaced, pursing his lips. The Hole inside of him was eating its fill, all of those pesky sensations that could be called ‘pain’. He hardly felt any of it. Just the wind through his hair, and the Hole.
“She’s all neutrons now, so, a wee bit clingy to anything with physical matter, ha,” Crowley explained dully. “I’ll get better. Anyway, here.” He offered the star resting on the tips of his fingers, and the angel flinched away. “Both hands, if you will. And do not drop her, mind you.” Not that it mattered in the slightest.
With a comically frightened expression, the Principality flicked his eyes at Crowley's in hesitation before reaching for the little star with trembling hands, seemingly intimidated by the sheer amount of heat the star was giving off in waves. Once he had her, though, he slowly composed himself, peering down at the star with careful awe, face aglow. Crowley preened a little at this (she was his handiwork, after all).
After a long minute, the other angel looked back at him. His hands were still upturned and raised.
“I must say, she certainly appears to be, well, alive,” he professed weakly. “I-I mean, what I meant to say is, with utmost candor, that she is truly the most dazzling object I have ever had the privilege of laying my eyes on. I-if that eases you, at any rate.”
Crowley clicked his tongue and turned his jaw dismissively, and the other's face fell.
“S'just leftover energy from the explosion, is all. Her luminosity now is a credit to her, but it won’t last ‘cause there's bugger all left inside to maintain it. She’ll fade away, and then…”
And then… what? He found himself at a loss. It was the first time he had given it a thought. Against his better efforts, his eye and upper lip began to spasm.
With an appropriately mournful expression, the Principality caressed the star’s stellar corona then, embarrassed, withdrew hastily. Remained still once again. Silence held the bubble of the universe in its grip. Ten million aerolites seemed to fade from view, and all the breathing stars with them. It was then that the other angel came to some kind of realization, for he appraised Crowley with uncomfortable compassion.
“This phenomenon... it's called death, you know,” he said, and his voice was unbearably kind. “It's described as, something that happens when some thing in particular reaches the end of its life—”
“I’m not a dunce, I know what death means,” Crowley snapped. “And she’s not dead. Just… dying. Dead-but-not-quite, and-perhaps-even-never. Ahem. In a manner of speaking.”
He regretted his harsh tone as soon as the other’s face hardened, so he hastily kept the flow of words going.
“I-I ‘spose I just thought, well, that that was something only humans would do. Snuff it, I mean,” Crowley confessed. “Not out here. Not to them. I really thought—and this was daft of me, I know—that it would all last for... well, forever. That God wouldn’t just take it all away. I mean, six thousand years! Really!”
He was actually crying, now. Big, fat tears that formed perfect spheres before boiling away. He exerted no effort to do anything about it. There really wasn't a point.
“And all for bloody what?” he breathed, and the winds carried his voice away.
“Well... my dear boy, I suppose I really must thank you, then,” the other angel exclaimed out of the blue; Crowley flinched, but didn't dare look at him. “A-after all, I’ve never been this close to a real star before. I wouldn't forget her vivid splendor in a hurry, of that you can be certain!”
Another eternity passed (or perhaps only a moment) as the two kneeled, Crowley in unhappy silence and the other one thinking desperately hard of how to break that silence. Evidently succeeding, the other angel straightened his back and rolled his shoulders, golden-hemmed sleeves falling to his elbows as he held Crowley’s little star up to the Heavens like a precious offering.
“All flesh,” he uttered mightily, voice clear, “is like grass.”
Crowley stared over at him with mild concern. Somehow, this only seemed to encourage him.
“All flesh is like grass,” he continued determinedly, “and all its beauty is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, and the flower falls when the breath of the Lord blows on it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will last eternal.”
Decidedly finished, he raised his brow at Crowley with hopeful expectation and the hint of a smile.
“Well... what’s all that mean, then?” Crowley wryly indulged him, ruminating. “...is that, like, from a film or something?”
“What? No! Of course not!” the angel loudly insisted, offendedly stomping his foot (about as well as one could while floating in space, anyway). “It just means that! Well… t-there are a great many temporary things within this splendid macrocosm. As it is written! The greatest star will ultimately perish, all the way down to a single insignificant blade of grass. Someone really ought to have told you, and for that I apologize. You must have missed the memo, that one said that nothing at all lasts forever, or even for a very long time. Humans in particular will be rather short-lived, for example. And that's entirely the point.”
He took a short breath, as if he himself were still grappling with that notion.
“But… none of it means that, despite their deaths, their lives were not truly beautiful and full of light. That it didn’t all mean something.”
“I see,” is all that Crowley said, blinking in the face of the other angel's passion. It was all he would say for a great many minutes. During this time, the angel carefully handed him back his nameless star with a pointed nod. But no point in giving her one now.
The Hole inside of him was reaching its collapsing point; Crowley wondered how much longer he could ignore it before he, too, exploded into dust and other gross fleshy bits. Meanwhile, the light of his star was noticeably fading, growing dim at a troubling rate. It was then that Crowley made his decision. Sitting here for six thousand years was no longer that appealing, anyway. His knees were beginning to ache, among other things.
For the first time in approximately seven days, Crowley arose from his kneeling position, stretching his legs while slowly extending his torpid wings. Eyes swimming with Crowley's reflection, the other angel did the same, taking care to brush the dust from his clothes (it had been piling up on the both of them due to their slight gravity).
“Well, I ‘spose we should get a move on. Let dead stars lie, all that,” Crowley mumbled gloomily. Where ‘on’ was, he wasn’t sure. Back to work, probably, building galaxies, nebulas, all the while knowing the fates of their stars. This must be how gardeners feel; whatever those were.
“Yes,” the other angel solemnly agreed while twiddling his thumbs, not actually moving. “Ah! Right. But, before we take our leave, would you like me to... say a few words? It would be my pleasure.”
Crowley paused, a bit puzzled at this.
“Words? That’s entirely all that we’ve been saying, Angel. Blah blah blah,” he remarked, bending his neck to the side as he stretched.
Despite his derisive tone, Crowley... didn't dislike the experience. Talking, that is. Weren't exactly many blokes to talk to around here. He supposed he didn't do nearly enough of it.
“Special words,” the other angel promised, wagging a finger. “To pass on that which has passed on, in a sense. We’ve been calling such a thing a ‘eulogy’, or… well, there are a few names for it. There are rumors that the future will contain a great many lamentations, you see, and some will be commemorated with all manners of words and speeches. It’s quite a nice thought, I think.”
“Can’t make things any worse, I ‘spose.” He still wasn’t sure what the other was getting on about. Crowley would surrender his little star, but not yet. Just another moment more.
“Alright then. Here goes nothing,” the angel said and, to Crowley’s bewilderment, he began to raise a single wing, reaching it towards the zenith before proceeding to pluck a large feather from within. On the feather, Crowley caught a glimpse of tiny golden-lettered lines (...strange). When Crowley looked up, their gazes accidentally met; the angel's eyes never once left his face, not even when Crowley turned away. The angel cleared this throat with a thoughtful pause, and began speaking in a voice that commanded even the electricity to stop and listen:
✶
“Do not stand at my grave and weep. I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am the thousand winds that blow; I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain; I am the gentle autumn's rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush, I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight. I am the soft star that shines at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry. I am not there; I did not die.”
✶
When the angel was done, Crowley carefully studied him while pretending to look off elsewhere, and realized with befuddlement that the both of them had a little something else besides scales falling out of their eyes. What a pair of right bleeding hearts they two were. Ridiculous.
“That was… certainly something,” Crowley admitted, turning the angel’s pleasant voice around in his mind. “Did you think up… whatever that was?”
By nature, he was too proud to admit that he'd actually enjoyed it, but somehow, the other angel seemed to understand this.
“Why, yes! It’s called poetry,” the Principality explained earnestly, his brilliant smile the crescent of a moon. “It’s going to be all the rage on Earth, I hear! Well, only after they figure out how to write with sticks and discover literacy, of course. Truthfully, I’m uncertain how long such processes will take.”
Crowley considered this. “You know… I might have to pop over to this ‘Earth’ sometime, what with you going all on about it. See what all this so-called genitalia business is all about.”
(Maybe only before the human people invented poetry, though. It was alright. Though a bit windbaggy for Crowley's tastes.)
Neither mentioned it, but the other angel very visibly perked up at Crowley’s words (the part about Crowley visiting Earth, of course). This flustered him, just a little. Clearing his throat, Crowley turned his face to his star for the final time, committing her light to memory.
“Fare thee well, soft star,” he hissed into his hands and, without hesitation, kissed his star with (literal) burning lips before casting her upwards into the zenith. A final gesture of what once was, what is, and what no longer ever shall be.
Only, that entire last bit didn’t quite happen. For the Hole inside of him, growing all the while, had decided very suddenly to become the Hole outside of him.
Crowley let out a sudden strangled yelp as he began to violently choke on an object that very determinedly did not want to be inside him a single minute longer. Due to the extreme gravity, the star in his hands proceeded to hurtle with all of her might towards said object; which, mind you, happened to be inside his mouth. Crowley's wings began to spasm, flapping wildly in all directions as he wrapped his hands around his throat in a panic, plummeting fast, falling and falling. Through the din, Crowley could hear the other angel shouting, chasing in pursuit.
For a long moment, Crowley imagined that this was his turn. To die, that is. These days, he stumbled upon the idea in every corner of his brain. Perhaps there was no limit to the dying, even for angels, and it might be stupid of them all to continue believing otherwise.
God really was turning out to be quite cruel, after all. A real despot, a proper au-to-crat. Much more so than Crowley had ever expected. Or ever dared to, that is.
It carried on like pandemonium for several strickening moments when, out of nowhere, an arm was swung with great might, giving Crowley a proper hard whack on his upper back. This succeeded instantly; whatever was lodged in his throat came flying out with the force of a comet. Repeatedly, Crowley spat out the foreign taste of negative space as he panted, the other angel fretting over him all the while.
“What was that for??” Crowley sputtered, rounding on the other once his voice returned. “That hurt, you know! Could’ve died, honestly, and then what would you have told God?”
“Hush! Look,” the other angel urged as he pointed in a direction, looking as frightened as Crowley had ever seen him before, and immediately Crowley shut his gob. “What in the name of all that is holy is that!?”
Still rather put off from being assaulted, he looked where the angel was pointing, and then promptly regretted doing so.
Something enormous was very much in the middle of devouring what was left of Crowley's poor star, as well as all her light with it, every last photon and particle. He watched it happening, and the very action of doing so was everything and all that he existed for. The space around the two angels was bending in every direction, and it was becoming very unnaturally dark very quickly, all the dust and bits of matter around caught in what seemed to be a rapidly expanding vortex, one that neither of them could physically see.
Needless to say, a bit unnerving. But Crowley was not afraid, in such a way that light is not afraid. He forgot the other angel, who was shouting at him with tearful words he didn't hear. His self-preservation cast aside, Crowley moved closer, then closer still, and knew emptiness by the dust of Its infinite brow. Swallowing, he peered down, into, above, as well as around it, all the while hovering in place.
There was nothing inside. And past that, when there was no longer nothing left, there was Everything.
Crowley concluded it to be a Hole, the very epitome of that word. A rather very black one, now that you mention it, and so dark that not even poor light could escape (he had not known it was possible). Out of nowhere, a hand suddenly grabbed his shoulder, startling him half out of his wits. It was just the angel, who currently seemed to be the embodiment of 'immense terror'. If angels could piss themselves, well, the whole situation would have just become all the more awkward.
“What… what is that... loveless, Godless existence...” the angel uttered hoarsely. He bumped into Crowley as he fumblingly moved to hide behind him, but appeared to recover a scrap of dignity at the last second.
Crowley looked at the black Hole (or rather, the Hole looked at him, and Crowley gazed back into howling nothingness), taking nonexistent breaths of empty air to calm himself, his heart going mad in his chest. Where his little star no longer had a voice, this... thing most certainly did. And It was silent. And It was screaming. And It was the emptiest song he had ever heard before in his life. It was then that Crowley understood.
“It is merely,” Crowley said as he at last gave a name to something imponderable, “the very culmination of grief. The only kind that the universe knows how to have. Best we, ah, leave it alone. Right about now would be lovely, in fact.”
“Good idea,” called the other angel from hundreds of miles away, his foot already planted in practically another galaxy. Feeling a bit put out, Crowley gave the Hole one last long look before he followed, and all the light left in that lonely corner of the universe pursued him.
✶
When they were a good distance away (multiplied by seven) and the Hole was no longer in sight (though it never exactly had been), the two drifted along together as they brought themselves to rights. Their tired wings beat in automatic tandem, falling in and out of harmony before finding each other again. The other angel kept looking pointedly in one direction, clearly eager to leave. Wordlessly, Crowley knew it was goodbye, probably even for good this time, after all of the chaos that neither could explain. A sad sort of dread creeped in where the Hole once was. Far away, yet closer still, ten million lights swiftly converged, all of them brighter than they’d ever truly know.
It was then that Crowley remembered something he’d been meaning to ask, feeling like bit of a pillock for not doing it before. He turned to the other angel, starting when he saw that he was still glowing as radiantly as before. He could nearly see the other's halo; this distracted Crowley for a long moment before he picked his jaw off the cosmic floor.
“Azra, umm, Fell, was it?” Crowley tried, wracking his brain. "No, don't say it. Aristophiel.... Artiya'il! No? How about Azazel, then? Hang on, I already know an Azazel..." It was here that Crowley ran out of 'A' names. Not his strong suit, titles.
“Gosh, I would certainly hope not,” the angel replied with a humor Crowley didn't understand as he busied himself with straightening his hair, a subtle flash of disappointment wavering his smile. “I am Aziraphale. Pleased to make your acquaintance. For the, um, second time. And your name is—?”
For whatever reason, Crowley not only had the idea that he'd made the angel a bit unhappy, but Crowley even felt... off about it, too. It was a foreign feeling to him, and sat in the back of his chest where the worst of himself was kept, growing larger all the time. He took a short breath of gaseous fire and exhaled nothing at all, as if to rouse himself.
“Well, Angel," Crowley drolled with undeserving cheek. "I suppose we’ll have to meet a third time if you want to know that.” For the first time in seven days, he managed a small, toothy smile, and it was as genuine as anything. Aziraphale didn't respond, instead looking rather out of breath. Perhaps still recovering from all of that undignified shrieking and desperate fleeing.
In reality, Crowley never imagined that their paths would ever cross again. His duties as a Seraph placed him among the stars, waiting on the nebulas hand and foot, midwifing planets, the like. And Aziraphale was to make his house on the pale blue dot that had recently popped up in the unknowable distance, tending to the humans and their 'genitalia'. Whatever that was.
A small light in both of their eyes, reflecting some distant dead star one million years away. Unfolding his hands, Aziraphale released a large white feather—the very one he’d plucked from his wing, with the poem on it—into the outer dark whereon it would drift, seemingly for eternity, if not longer. It was a proclamation of love in the void where nothing unlonely survives; not even a star.
✶
✶