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15 May 1968, Clydebank, Scotland
The shipyards are burning. The main road in the town has buckled somehow, like it’s been blown up by the Luftwaffe again. Aziraphale holds the Fruit of the Tree in hand as a torch out the broken part of the windshield, illuminating the park Crowley is driving the Bentley through at breakneck speed.
“Shit,” Crowley swears as they bump over something that was likely alive not so long ago; the Bentley whines, unhappy being treated like a tank. “Not you, darling –”
The sky cracks open with lightning. Aziraphale screams, partly because the Bentley rolls over something else and goes briefly airbourne and because of the deafening crash of thunder that follows. The Bentley lands hard, sparks from the brakes, Crowley scrambling to release the Spear in its fly-off position so they don’t flip.
“What I wouldn’t do,” Aziraphale wheezes as they finish spinning and get back onto course, heading for the beam of light stretching straight up into the sky, their best guess of where Adam might possibly be, “to be able to fly!”
“In this?” Crowley yells as more lightning splits the sky. “You’re safer swimming –”
The thunder is even louder. Crowley feels their left eardrum vibrating intensely, and they barely avoid vomiting with the wave of nausea that accompanies the sensation. Aziraphale screams, yanking the Fruit back and dropping it into his lap, his much more sensitive ears bleeding.
“Zira –”
“Drive!” Aziraphale shrieks, hands over his ears, eyes screwed shut as he tries to focus his energy on healing his ears.
Crowley swallows, blinks, and locks their eyes forward. They drive, using a thread of divinity to see, ears ringing. The storm is demonic, but the lightning is divine, and Crowley can feel the burn of Words of Power at the back of their tongue. Their heart hammers, even though it does not need to beat, but their hands are steady, palms dry.
“Damn,” Aziraphale groans as they go over something and land with a thump. “Damn –”
In all of Time, Crowley has never chosen to go to battle.
Time is over.
Crowley looks toward the light and drives.
The End comes in the broken berths of Bowling Harbour. The ships are burning. The customs house is blown out. When there is no longer sound enough road for the Bentley to travel, Crowley and Aziraphale spill out and run, Aziraphale holding the Fruit to light the way and Crowley scrambling after, Holy Spear in hand. The land buckles, waves from the Cylde rising up and smashing against the rubble.
Once upon a time, Crowley spread their wings to shield Aziraphale as the Great Flood came.
Now:
“We have to swim,” Aziraphale howls, barely heard over the wind.
Crowley holds out their hand, and Aziraphale places it on his shoulder. Crowley clambers up, wrapping their legs around Aziraphale’s hips as Aziraphale takes one step, a leap, and dives into the water, a monstrous shark that carries the Fruit between sharp, dense front teeth.
They swim, swift, fast, and against the current. The pillar of light is closer, centred upon the deck of a great, out-of-date steamer. At the stern, Aziraphale stops, shifting back into his preferred human shape to grasp the side. He still holds the Fruit in his mouth, transformed into an ice axe.
Above them, at the source of the light, there are voices, powerful and screaming.
“Now, me,” Crowley says, against the shell of Aziraphale’s right ear.
They wrap their arms around Aziraphale’s chest, crossing the Spear over him, and spread their wings. Aziraphale grips the Spear, which he’s always avoided touching, and tucks their knees together as Crowley takes them airbourne, the first time since Verdun that Crowley has taken flight. The extra weight without calling on excessive divinity feels strangely light, and Crowley realises that they’re able to split their wings into multiple pairs, usually something they require Her Word to do.
But this is not the time to think of such things. Now, they fly, cresting over the railing of the steamer, and see:
Lucifer, who is Satan and gargantuan and monstrous, hulking over the smashed steam stacks.
The Four Horsepeople, unmasked and hideous, War and Famine and Pollution grinning and ready. Death’s skull will always smile.
A gaggle of children, a mixture of nine, ten, and eleven-year-olds, clinging to each other in a circle of Hellfire.
And Adam, in tears, as Michael, in full angelic glory, tells him he has to chose:
“This is your Destiny, Adam Young. You are meant to bring the End and Create the world anew. You must see now that your father has come to you.”
There’s a sensation. A rocking. A tearing.
“MICHAEL.”
The thin, injured space in Crowley –
Lucifer, Michael, the Horsepeople, Adam, the children turn –
Aziraphale’s hands clutch Crowley’s upon the Holy Spear –
“WHERE IS GABRIEL?”
And Crowley can hear it is their voice, and it is them speaking, but they are on the deck of the ship, and Michael’s mouth is open, eyes wide with shock, and Crowley –
“Raphael?” and it is Lucifer who asks, surprised and equally shocked but so very curious, just like he always has been. “What are you doing here?”
And Adam, tears streaming down his face, wails and runs towards them. Aziraphale lets go of the Spear and leans down, letting the boy jump into his arms and burrow his face against his chest. Crowley holds their Spear. They do not blink.
Crowley steps forward.
The whistle sounds, shrill, somewhere very close and faraway.
“Where is Gabriel?”
“Gabriel isn’t here,” Michael says, but her eyes dart back and forth, and Crowley’s vision turns too sharp and too focused, and they know:
“You are an angel, Michael,” they say, and their Holy Staff is a branch of the Tree of Knowledge, and they know: “You shouldn’t lie.”
Michael’s face turns to stone. Lucifer twists his head. Horrible and horned, stripped of all the beauty he so loved:
“Little demon,” he says, and it is Aziraphale, who is shielding Adam with his whole body, “give me my son.”
“No,” Aziraphale says, quivering and soft and deafening.
“NO,” Adam says, squeaks, screams. “NO, NO, NO.”
Lucifer is still. Michael is still. The ship groans. The Horsepeople wait, and the children sob. Crowley’s mind runs a thousand different scenarios a minute, but they discard them nearly as quickly. There will be no chance to plan. No recourse to reinforcements.
This is it.
“I am your father,” Lucifer says, terrible and angry. “You will obey me.”
“No!” Adam says, and the world shivers, shakes. “Parents don’t wait eleven years to show up!”
Lucifer’s mouth is open, infinite rage and power on his tongue, and Adam screams:
“I WANT THIS TO STOP! YOU’RE NOT MY FATHER! I WANT DAD AND PAPPY BACK!”
The river rises. Crowley flares their wings to maintain balance, feels Aziraphale skid backward and crash into the right plumage. Everything seems to spin, the stacks cracking, and the children are almost in the Hellfire, and Adam –
“Everything,” he says, louder than anything, softer than everything, “will stop now.”
The sensation of nothingness. The epicentre of a black hole. The meeting of the sky and the sea.
Crowley wraps their arms around Aziraphale and Adam, folding their wings forward, slamming their Spear deep into the deck, holding them steady, shielded, sheltered.
The world ends.
In a Beginning, On the Very Smashed Up Banks of Bowling Harbour, Scotland
“Crowley,” Gabriel says, very faint and faraway, “we need to stop meeting like this.”
These words make no sense until several thoughts register with equal, utter immediacy in Crowley’s muddled mind:
- They are sopping wet.
- Their wings feel like they might be broken. There are also at least six pairs.
- A child is pressed against their chest. They are tugging on Crowley’s shirt, trying to get their attention.
- Aziraphale is patting Crowley’s face, which means they’ve taken a blow to the head, passed out, or both.
“You can let them go,” Gabriel says, slightly closer now, like he’s walking down a phone line, which makes no sense because he never uses a phone.
“Can’t,” Crowley manages; their throat is full of blood. “Wings broken.”
A pause. Aziraphale and the child have stopped touching them.
“Crowley,” Aziraphale says, very wretched, “forgive me.”
“You’re forgiven,” Crowley says, even though they have no idea what they could possibly be forgiving Aziraphale for, and then Aziraphale uses his greater strength to move Crowley’s wings.
The world blinks out.
When it filters back in, Crowley is staring up at the sky. It’s very blue. Really bizarre for Scotland.
They’re in a horrible amount of pain.
Adam leans over their face, blocking out the sky, eyes huge and worried.
Crowley remembers, all in a flood, what happened.
“I think I can heal you,” Adam says, and does.
Crowley sits up. Aziraphale reaches for them immediately, putting a hand on their left shoulder. Gabriel is squatting in the debris and muck, pale and faint, and Beelzebub is standing behind Adam with the gaggle of children who had been in the Hellfire circle. Crowley opens their mouth, coughs, and splatters their newly pristine suit with dark blood and a great deal of coagulated mucus and ash.
“It’s fine,” Crowley says because it is; their lungs are clean and they feel weirdly healthier than they probably ever have; Aziraphale and Gabriel both look like they would wring their neck if Adam and the other children weren’t here; “What happened?”
Aziraphale and Gabriel open their mouths, but it’s Beelzebub who says:
“Maybe we could discuss this somewhere that isn’t going to sink into the river,” they say, grouchy even as they gently soothe the child closest to them. “I can’t swim.”
This is how, in a strange, rambling way, they end up in a pub several blocks north of the mysteriously restored clearing house. The proprietors are confused because they had thought they’d been blown up just a couple hours before, but Gabriel puts a truly staggering amount of money on the counter, and they present him with the most expensive bottle of scotch they have. It’s not what Gabriel wants, but Crowley absolutely could use a drink, so they reach around their brother and grab it before he can tell them to put it back.
“Thank the Lord for Her gifts,” Crowley says, before remembering that their wings are still in the physical realm, and their Spear is awfully Holy in the dim, intermittently flickering lighting; they clear their throat and end up needing to spit more blood and ash into their handkerchief. “The money’s real, right?”
“Of course it is,” Gabriel says, supremely annoyed.
“Crowley,” Aziraphale says, more gentle than he probably should, and Crowley lets Aziraphale drag them to a stool next to a rickety long table; they plop there obediently, and that seems to reassure him. “Stay.”
“Stay?” Crowley asks, even though there’s blood and ash all over their front, lips, and chin. “I am not a dog –”
“Jesus Christ,” Aziraphale sighs, telegraphing that he’s going back towards the bar.
“I really couldn’t deal with him right now,” Crowley says before realising the bottle they have by the neck is sealed. “Hey! I need a glass!”
Crowley ends up sat at the table with Adam and the children, who call themselves the Them, all of whom have been provided some sort of fruit-flavoured slurry. Aziraphale had brought Crowley a rock glass, which isn’t the way to treat a scotch as good as this, but it’s perfectly serviceable because Crowley could just drink straight from the bottle. It wouldn’t be a good influence with the children around.
“We drink, you know,” the boy with spectacles says as Crowley knocks back a second, very generous serving.
“I don’t think Adam’s parents would approve of me giving you alcohol,” Crowley says because they know very well what preteens get up to on the sly.
Adam and the Them look over to Gabriel, Aziraphale, and Beelzebub, who are having a Very Important Whispering Discussion at the bar. Crowley could listen in if they wanted to, but they very much do not want to because this is quite enough for a day. They deserve to have some very top shelf scotch, which drowns out the lingering taste of blood and ash and mutes the absolute horror of everything that just occurred, including the realisation that Lucifer or Michael or both likely discorporated Gabriel and Beelzebub.
“Are you going to keep your wings like that?” Adam asks, strangely normal for having just essentially reset the whole of Creation by stopping The End.
“I don’t know if I can change them back,” Crowley says because they’ve never stayed as multiple pairs without divine mandate; they push their wings out of the physical realm before they get drunk enough to forget. “I’ll figure it out later.”
“You’re a really weird adult,” the girl with fluffy hair observes.
“Concussions will do that to you,” Crowley says sagely, pouring themself more scotch.
“Crowley,” Gabriel calls, which distracts them enough that they pour more than a large mouthful before they right the bottle, “stop being a bad influence to my son.”
“I’m nothing of the sort,” Crowley says, and they stand up, taking the glass and bottle with them, because Aziraphale looks ready to murder Gabriel. “What’s this secret cabal –”
“This is not a cabal,” Beelzebub murmurs, looking exhausted.
“Alright, a meeting of minds,” Crowley says, feeling very reasonable as they prop themself against the bar next to Aziraphale.
“Are you always annoying when you’re drunk?” Gabriel asks, very judgemental.
“No,” Crowley says because sometimes they’re morose or passed out in a ditch.
“This isn’t Crowley drunk,” Aziraphale sighs, leaning around them and taking the glass to have a long pull. “Oh, this is actually good.”
Crowley wants to kiss him. The adrenaline is starting to wear off, leaving behind fuzzy edges and a peculiar type of recklessness that makes it difficult to think through decisions. Aziraphale’s eyes flicker, following Crowley’s thoughts as he hands the glass back to them. The glass is cool, scotch sloshing gently. It stirs another, more pertinent thought.
“What happened?”
Gabriel and Beelzebub glance between each other. Crowley tips the rest of the glass back and refills generously.
“We’re not entirely sure,” Beelzebub says, harsh and with a simmering sort of anger that leashes demonic power. “I couldn’t take a human-like form because of Pollution doing something that disrupted my flies, and Gabriel –”
“Michael and I had a fight,” Gabriel says, bland and stony. “I told her that Adam was my responsibility. She didn’t agree. I got discorporated.”
Crowley holds their glass.
“Did Adam see that?” Crowley asks, conscious of how Aziraphale has placed the palm of his hand at the small of their back.
Gabriel and Beelzebub grimace, an oddly similar expression despite Beelzebub’s teeth. Crowley sips their drink, feeling the threads of adrenaline and a fragile sort of disappointment twisting in their gut.
“Well,” they start when the door to the pub opens and Death comes in.
Time seems to slow.
Crowley steps forward instinctively.
ARCHANGEL, Death says.
“Death,” Crowley says, striding forward before Gabriel can open his mouth. “There is no one here for you at this time.”
I AM HERE FOR A PURPOSE, Death says because it is not bound by the same rules as all other existences; it is Creation’s shadow.
“Oh,” Aziraphale says, behind Crowley, and they turn to find Aziraphale rummaging through his clothes urgently. “Oh, shit –”
“You lost the Fruit?” Crowley asks, feeling less hysterical and more weirdly amused.
“I wasn’t exactly thinking about it when the ship blew up,” Aziraphale grits out as he searches his hip pouch for the third time.
THIS ISN’T ABOUT THE FRUIT, Death says.
Crowley turns back. Death is looking at them, much like it did aeons ago on the Shore of the Sea. Time has displaced itself. Crowley is very aware that Adam is extremely aware that his friends are not occupying the same flow of time and space as them from how quiet the table is.
“I made my choice,” Crowley says because they did not want The End to come, and it has not; life is going on; no matter how it may look, this is Adam’s will. “As Creation’s shadow, that means you continue to have your Purpose.”
YES, Death says, and it is smiling, bone white and familiar. I WAS ONCE AZRAEL, THE ANGEL OF DEATH. BUT TIME IS OVER.
“Time starts again,” Crowley says immediately, recognising the cyclical structure of the conversation. “You’re here to talk to Adam.”
YES, Death says, and it seems pleased insomuch a being like it can be.
“No,” Beelzebub and Gabriel say.
“Okay,” Adam says, quiet and resounding and very brave.
Time moves sluggish and unmoored. It’s Adam’s doing more than anything else. It occurs to Crowley, as Adam steps down from his stool and walks the short space to stand next to them, that he no longer has his original Purpose in the Ineffable Plan. Or perhaps he does.
The Antichrist is meant to oppose Jesus Christ and all of Christendom. That did not happen in the chaos on the ship. The Second Coming has not yet occurred. The saints and martyrs did not return to earthly form, did not gather, did not usher the vengeance upon those still living.
“They rushed it,” Aziraphale says, blank and flatly surprised.
“Adam,” Gabriel says, stepping forward.
“I’m not afraid, Dad,” Adam says, very gently.
Crowley thinks of the feeling of stardust beneath their fingertips.
“Adam,” Beelzebub says, very upset.
“It’s okay, Pappy,” Adam says, and he smiles because he is young and very, very brave. “You’re my parents, and eventually it is the child’s responsibility to take care of their parents.”
Aziraphale’s nails are digging into the fabric at the small of Crowley’s back.
“Adam,” Gabriel says, almost wretched.
“It will be okay,” Adam says, very honest.
He turns and looks up at Death, unresistant and unprotesting and completely without guile.
“You just want to talk.”
Death is quiet, looking at Adam.
Oh, Crowley realises.
This is what I looked like on the Shore of the Sea, they realise.
YOU DID NOT END ME, Death says, and it is curious, just like it was all those ages ago. WHY?
“Because all mortals must die eventually,” Adam says, simple and true. “If I ended you, I would end the world, wouldn’t I?”
YES, Death says, and it smiles. EVENTUALLY THE END WILL COME.
“I don’t want The End to come,” Adam says, and he does not flinch or yell or whisper; he looks Death in the eye and says: “I don’t think you do either.”
WHAT MAKES YOU THINK THAT?
“You wouldn’t have come here, if you wanted that,” Adam says, matter of fact.
Death is still smiling. It does not move. It does not need to.
I WILL SEE YOU AGAIN, ADAM YOUNG.
“I hope it’s when I die,” Adam says, far too wry for an eleven-year-old.
Death laughs, like nails on a chalkboard, and is gone.
Time moves again.
Beelzebub lunges forward and hugs Adam. Gabriel joins them as the children at the table look about in confusion.
“Crowley,” Aziraphale murmurs.
Crowley turns. Leans over to where they set their glass and the bottle on the bar. They put the glass in Aziraphale’s hand. They toast each other, glass rim to bottleneck. Aziraphale slugs back the contents of the glass, and Crowley fills their mouth with scotch. The burn screams down their throat and fills their belly with fire.
With life.
They’re alive.
30 May 1968, Berwick Street, London
As with all things:
Life goes on.
Back in London, Crowley goes to work and finds that they’ve all been given three months of on-call leave because the hospital has almost no patients due to a miraculous recovery of everyone. Crowley, after going out drinking with his colleagues, walks for a long time along the Thames, mildly drunk as they watch fish jumping in the pristine water. They cross at Hungerford Bridge and walk up towards Soho, tapping their Spear in its walking cane disguise against the cobblestones. In the height of the late spring evening, the theatres and cinemas sparkle, names of stars up in the lights.
Crowley, standing in Leicester Square, thinks it's beautiful.
It’s very late by the time they reach the bookshop. The lights are on upstairs, and Crowley fishes out the key to the front door. It jiggles as they push it open, and the electric lights flicker as Crowley shuts and locks it again.
“Zira, it’s me!”
“Upstairs!” is the answer.
Crowley climbs the winding stair. Aziraphale is in the kitchen, shirt sleeves rolled up, feet bare on the floor as he putters about with making what smells like hot chocolate. Crowley hangs up their coat and hat, crossing to join Aziraphale at the stove. They wrap their arms around his waist and stand on their toes to peer over his shoulder.
“That looks nice.”
“It should be,” Aziraphale says, calm and very content. “I’ve added cinnamon. Would you like some?”
“Mhm, no, thank you,” Crowley hums, pressing a kiss to the back of Aziraphale’s neck before drawing away. “Do we still have that Cabernet Franc Davies brought over a couple days ago?”
“Yes,” Aziraphale says, turning the stove off as Crowley wanders towards the liquor cabinet, “it’s in the fridge.”
It is very nice chilled. Crowley opens the bottle as Aziraphale ladles his hot chocolate into a very large mug. Crowley pours themself a large glass before retrieving some of the quince jelly in the fridge. They cut it into bite-size pieces and place them in a friendly pile on a saucer, placing everything onto a tray.
“Where?”
Aziraphale gives Crowley a once over before nodding towards the bathroom. “You smell like the Thames.”
“The Thames is clean these days,” Crowley points out, following Aziraphale even so.
They bathe together, the water warm and welcoming. Crowley lounges, sipping wine and looking at the painted ceiling as Aziraphale occupies himself between his hot chocolate, the quince jelly, and plaiting and unplaiting Crowley’s hair. The radio is reading the forty-eight minutes past midnight shipping forecast.
“I have a question.”
Crowley blinks. Shifts to look at Aziraphale. He watches them with a strange expression. Not quite shuddered but not entirely open.
“Yes?”
Aziraphale turns the bit of quince jelly in his fingers. “When Adam healed you,” he says, and Crowley straightens slightly because they’ve not really talked about what happened, except for what they had to back before they left Adam and everyone else back in Glasgow, “why didn’t he heal your back?”
The old axe wound. Crowley reaches over the side of the tub and refills their wine glass. When they settle back, Aziraphale is squishing the quince jelly between his fingers, gaze tracking Crowley without blinking.
“It might not be something that can be healed,” Crowley says, and they rest a hand on Aziraphale’s knee, half-reassurance, half simply for the touch. “I don’t mind.”
“It hurts you,” Aziraphale says, quiet and insistent.
“It does,” and that’s the truth; “I know it bothers you. But I really don’t mind. It’s an old wound, and some things are meant to scar over rather than fade away.”
Aziraphale’s face screws up. He sighs and drops the destroyed bit of jelly back onto the saucer. He wipes his fingers on a corner of his towel, frowning.
“Crowley,” he says, and Crowley sits up, moving their legs together, knees and ankles knocking against each other in the tub, “I’ve been thinking we should move out of London.”
“Oh?” Crowley asks because that’s not what they expected.
“I was talking over the phone with Beelzebub,” Aziraphale says, and he relaxes because he must have expected Crowley to be angry, although they can’t imagine why. “They’re thinking of moving the family to Linlithgow for a while. Just to keep things quieter after the whole mess, and Adam would still go to school as usual by train with Gabriel. Apparently he works at Glasgow Savings Bank.”
The idea of Gabriel having a normal job as a banker is enough to make Crowley nearly snort wine out their nose. They swallow instead and cough a bit before laughing into the lip of their glass. It’s a very nice wine glass. Crowley hasn’t seen it before.
“I bought it from Liberty,” Aziraphale says, warm and amused.
“Lovely,” Crowley says, peering at the maker’s mark at the bottom. “I will admit, I don’t particularly want to live near my brother, but I don’t mind moving out of London, although I think Davies will be annoyed with us. Do you know where?”
“I was thinking South Downs,” is the tentative answer, “or Canterbury, or maybe Gibby in Wales even. Somewhere closer to the ocean.”
Crowley opens their mouth but stops as Aziraphale holds up his hand.
“You don’t need to tell me now,” he says and it’s warm and soft, and all that they could ever want. “I also don’t mind moving to France, depending on how the chaos turns out.”
“Your French is awful,” Crowley teases, which earns them a massive eye roll. “I wouldn’t mind, although if anything happens with Adam, we can’t be too far away.”
“Dunkirk, then,” Aziraphale offers, eating the last of the quince jelly. “Or Calais. I remember you enjoyed living there in the fourteenth century.”
The last time Crowley was in Calais, it was under siege. The city was in ruins. Crowley remembers rather less than they should of that. They’d been blown up three days in and woke up looking at the smoky sky. They lay there for hours, their corporation knitting itself back together until they could push the collapsed church wall off their legs.
“Not Calais or Dunkirk,” they say because Aziraphale has read something off about their expression and is sitting up. “Boulogne-sur-Mer, maybe.”
“Sure, I like fishing,” Aziraphale says, and he levers himself up to get out of the tub. “Come on. The water’s cold.”
They get ready for bed. It’s warm enough that they don’t bother with nightclothes, and the new lights Aziraphale had installed don’t hum nearly as loudly, a vast improvement for Crowley, who has always found the electric noise distracting from sleep or other bedroom activities. They climb into bed, making a tangle of their limbs, kicking and shoving the quilt away.
“It’s really too hot for that,” Aziraphale grumbles as Crowley tries to find a comfortable position against the mess of pillows at the top of the bed. “Do you need to be up early tomorrow?”
“No,” Crowley says, flopping back; Aziraphale’s hands immediately grab their hips, lifting and settling themselves together for lazy friction. “Do you want to fuck me –”
“Soon,” Aziraphale says, before looking up, oddly shy. “I’d actually like to see your wings tonight.”
Crowley blinks before they shake their head, smiling at the helpless little spark of adoration the bubbles forth in their chest. Aziraphale smiles back, sitting on the bed as Crowley lurches off the pillows they worked so hard to get comfortable upon, arms wrapped around Aziraphale’s shoulders.
“We went years without doing anything with my wings,” they say, both truthful and coy as they pull their wings into the physical realm.
Aziraphale doesn’t respond immediately, looking up at the top two pairs that frame Crowley’s head. They don’t pull their halo in the physical realm because it would burn Aziraphale’s eyes, but Crowley knows Aziraphale is thinking about that. The way the light would highlight the plumage. The way it would throw into stark relief the small imperfections in the left wings where the feathers are too dense in parts and too thin in others. How the lower fifth and sixth wings are just slightly crooked.
“I’m going to touch you,” Aziraphale says, and then he does.
He traces his fingers with his sharp nails through the dense patches of feathers. Crowley shivers because it’s an odd sensation, slightly uncomfortable because the skin beneath is so sensitive but also something of a relief to get fresh air into the down. Crowley, in the past couple of weeks, has mostly been using the occasional, very low-tier miracles to maintain their wings. A proper grooming is a luxury they hadn’t been able to focus on, let alone prioritise in the fallout of the Apocalypse That Wasn’t Just Yet.
They don’t know where Michael is. What Heaven is up to. The fact their wings remain in full archangelic glory is a constant reminder that the battle isn’t over. Just delayed.
“I saw you once,” Aziraphale says, fingers threading through Crowley’s wings, gentle and steady and sure, “before I fell.”
Crowley raises their hand. Cups Aziraphale’s cheek. They rub the pad of their thumb over his cheekbone. Rough, bumpy skin, pockmarked and pitted. Perfect.
“You were alone in the Garden, weaving colour into dandelion heads. I was at my station on the Eastern Gate. I was supposed to be watching the Gate, but I couldn’t help but watch you. I thought you were the loveliest part of Creation.
“I think that is when I fell in love with you.”
Crowley breathes out.
They feel like they could cry with how wonderful they feel.
“I’ve always loved you,” Aziraphale says, and there are no more secrets between them, nothing more to keep them divided, “even though sometimes you go too fast for me. I would fall all over again, if that means I can love you forever.”
Crowley breathes in.
“Zira,” they say.
Against their palm, Aziraphale looks at them. Calm and sure. And Crowley knows:
“You are the first being who ever showed me love.”
Real love. All those years ago, when Crowley had been at a crossroads, and they had felt so desperately lost and stupid because everyone else seemed to know what they were doing and how they fit into the Ineffable Plan: Aziraphale had stood up for them, had shouted them down from their uncertainties, and had treated them like they were worth something more than just their Purpose and skills. And Crowley had loved them, at first reserved and fragile and tentative and then, as time inevitably rolled on and Aziraphale never left, always came back:
“And you taught me how to love,” they confess and Aziraphale’s eyes are murky, teary as they smile back. “You showed me that I could be brave because, so long as I have you, I have nothing to fear.”
Aziraphale closes his eyes. Opens them.
“Crowley,” he says, and they press their lips together, soft and firm and sure.
Because no matter what comes:
They have each other.