Work Text:
“Well they’ll surely have noticed downstairs.” Aziraphale worried his lip, letting go of Crowley for only a moment, “You just did a very good deed indeed.” The moon lit their path back through the graveyard, and the angel was determined to get the two of them out of there while he could. Best not to let the local authorities know about the activities of tonight, lest they be involved in some sort of suspicion with the humans.
“Urgh- Trust me, if Hell noticed that little display I’d already be…” Crowley stopped his feet from moving, and Aziraphale made no attempt to take more than a few steps forward, looking around nervously, then back at the demon. “I’d already be…”
In the silence of Edinburgh air, cold and crisp, the floor opened up with a growl, and Crowley was sucked down beneath the surface with a sudden cry of terror. Aziraphale stared in horror and watched the hole close up, before making his way as quickly as possible back to the shop.
And it was the last he saw of Crowley for a very long while.
In fact, the next time he’d seen the poor dear, it had been a dreary and wet day, and the demon had all but stumbled into the shop, hissing out in pain while he disrobed from his winter coat. His hair had grown out into long locks again, falling down past his shoulders, outfit having changed with the last 50 years he’d been gone, though it was subtle, the change was still there.
“Blessed rain and blessed weather..” He grumbled as he staggered through the door and fell in a less than graceful way on the sofa in the back of the shop. “Oh, Crowley.” Aziraphale clapped his hands together and smiled, supressing the urge to break out his best bottle of wine to celebrate them being back together. “I’m so glad to see you back my dear fellow, I was terribly worried when-” Aziraphale bit his lip at the urge to say when Hell dragged you out of my arms, what pray tell happened down there? It wasn’t good etiquette for such things, and he knew they didn’t speak about that stuff on any other occasion.
Crowley shifted on the sofa and hissed painfully, “Yeah, yeah. When I was in Hell. I get it Angel no need to-” he let out a frustrated breath when he leant backwards on the cushions- “fret.” The word finished with gritted teeth, and Aziraphale worried his lip.
“Wine, Angel? Cold night, quiet and all that. What’s been happening with you down on Earth, hm?” Crowley tried to keep his voice casual, but it was so clear he was in pain, and Aziraphale was trying so hard not to think of what could have possibly happened downstairs for him to react like this. There had been a few occasions where the demon had disappeared for several years at a time, but he’d always come back looking right as rain. This was so different.
It took a moment for the angel to even realise Crowley was offering them a night in of chatter and banter. “Oh, oh of course. Wine, yes. Let’s see I have uhm- I have wine. That I do have.” He disappeared into the kitchen momentarily, returning with a bottle of Chateu Lafite Rothschild from about twenty years prior. “Lovely vineyard, I should know really I was speaking to one of the children of the family several years ago, and they seemed like such nice people, they practically handed me a dozen bottles.” He poured two glasses, handing Crowley one, and watching him squirm in an attempt to get comfortable.
Crowley was clearly trying to stay focused during Aziraphale’s ramblings, but it didn’t work, for either of them really. Aziraphale was trying to keep conversation going, which had always been especially easy with Crowley since he’d chime in every so often with a hum of agreement or short remark about something Hellish or Heavenly that the humans had managed to do on their own, but right now it was difficult. Crowley wasn’t giving his little snarky remarks or humming or acknowledging the angel. By someone he was trying. That much was clear, but it was undoubtedly difficult.
When Crowley shifted again, for what was probably the hundredth time that evening, Aziraphale put his glass down and stood up, “That’s enough Crowley. What in Heavens name have they done to you?” He stepped closer to the demon, and Crowley gawked at the sudden attention on him. “Wha- What are you talking about Angel?”
Aziraphale merely huffed, “Don’t think I haven’t noticed the way you’re clearly struggling to even sit comfortably, Crowley. I’m not blind.” He snapped his fingers, and a first aid kit fell right into his hands. “Now, show me what’s wrong dear, I can help.”
Crowley shifted uncomfortably, and Aziraphale wasn’t sure if it was because of the pain or if it was because he didn’t want to talk about it. Both broke the angels heart just a little.
Crowley had landed smack in the centre of one of the empty offices of Hell, silence and chills sending him a very clear message as to what was going on. “Er- Hello?” He called out, voice echoing against the damp walls.
“Straying to the path of light? We would have thought you’d learnt by now.” A voice rang through the room, and Crowley shifted, dusting himself off as he stood up and looked around the dark room. “Who- uh, who am I speaking to right now?” He called out, waiting for a response.
The voice that echoed back was sinister, as if having waited for this moment, “You and I know each other very well Crowley. I’ve been watching you. Letting it slide… not anymore. Not this time. Earth is a long way away now.”
The words were cold, thick against the demons skin, and Crowley wasn’t really sure what to make of it. If this thing had been watching him? Who’s to say Heaven wasn’t aware of Aziraphale’s bad deeds he’d been doing?
Crowley wanted to summon himself back to Earth, pretend this didn’t happen and go have a drink with the angel while they talked over the nights occurrences, but it wasn’t an option at the moment. Especially when he’d felt two very cold and dark hands wrap around his waist, not physically there, but metaphysically, he could feel it.
“I would have thought you’d have learnt by now.” The voice tutted, pulling Crowley into the darkness he was sure wasn’t there a second ago. He shouted out, gasped, and writhed, but nothing worked. Words weren’t coming out, and the echoing stopped when he disappeared with the voice.
Aziraphale was waiting, impatiently at that. There he was thrumming his fingers along his arm; a stern look on his face while he waited for Crowley to speak. “What’s done is done.” He said after a long moment of silence, and the angels heart seemed to chip away at the very idea that Crowley was just going to leave it at that.
“I can help, Crowley. Let me see. I-”
“No.” Crowley hissed out, more aggressive than his usual refusals for anything between the two of them, “It’s fine. You don’t want to see it.” He added, softer than his individual word.
“I do,” Aziraphale hushed out gently.
“You don’t.” Crowley snapped again, this time with no bite. “Trust me Angel, it’s all- gross and bruised and- and bloodied. You don’t want to.” He waved his hands around to emphasise his point, which seemed to do nothing to sway the angels persistence. “At least tell me.”
Crowley’s throat dried and his jaw twitched as he stood up with gritted teeth and struggled to shed his vest, then made the failed attempt to get his dress shirt off. “Let me, dearest.” Aziraphale stood up and stepped into the demons personal space, which made everything suddenly hotter around them. He was gentle and precise with each button, threading it through the hole and letting the fabric open up more and more with each pop. “Oh- Crowley.”
The demons usual pale skin was now battered and coloured a terrible bluish-green, red lashings spread across the sides of his stomach like a belt, “Oh- Oh Crowley why wouldn’t you tell me about this?” Aziraphale supressed the urge to sob, and Crowley sucked in a shaky breath. “Knew you’d react like this.” His voice came out broken, vulnerable, and helpless.
Ever so slowly, Aziraphale guided him back down on the sofa, and knelt close to his face. “My dear, I only worry.” He pulled out some ointment and started dabbing both old and new cuts. Both stung. “Mnyeah, I know..”
Softly, Aziraphale fixed up the injuries that he could on Crowley. He’d use a miracle if only it wouldn’t set Heaven off for his usage. About two thirds of the way through cleaning up his body, Crowley had managed to fall asleep at the hands of the angel.
“Oh darling,” Aziraphale brushed some red curls behind the demons face, and he stared softly at Crowley sleeping soundly, and probably for the first time since their last meeting at the least, safely.
Aziraphale couldn’t imagine the torture he’d been put through simply by doing something that he thought was right. Not good, not heavenly. Just him. The idea that Aziraphale hadn’t even thought about saving the young girls, it made his stomach knot. Crowley would have been a better angel than him, and he had already fallen. But for such simple things. Such ludicrous things.
With a sigh, the angel finished mending Crowley’s skin, and snapped the first aid kit away. He didn’t leave his side that night, or the next few days for that matter, being that it was a few days before Crowley woke up at all. But he slept comfortably, without stirring in his sleep, only mumbling something vaguely incoherent about a day and a half into his nap.
Aziraphale wasn’t sure what he’d said, or who he might have been speaking to, but when the word “Ngel..” left those lips, Aziraphale’s heart fluttered, and he sunk into his armchair a little more. He’d wait. He’d wait forever if that was what it took for the demon to safely love.
He’d wait.