Chapter Text
Year 3024
When the Supreme Archangel Aziraphale was captured by Hell
It had been a long and boring eternity. Unbeknownst to Crowley, it was about to become a very strange week.
Crowley sauntered vaguely over to his throne, subtly updated the stale miracle to make it more cushion-comfortable, and then languidly threw himself into its monstrous embrace, one leg thrown over an arm.
The throne was housed in an industrial basement warehouse in the bowels of Hell, which was considered peak real estate by Hell's standards. Sewn into the throne were the additions by the two Grand Dukes before Crowley: a base of the bones of angels in the first war melted together by Lilith, and a backing of holy blades woven together with the strings of fate of the damned long dead by Bathin. Crowley had added old compact discs from the world above and layered them over the back of it to give it the semblance of snake scales. Not just any discs, but read-write discs with bad quality pirated Hollywood movies on them; the subtle kind of insidious evil Crowley enjoyed.
The throne of the Grand Duke of Hell, Satan’s Left Hand of Darkness. Bent at the sides, straight-backed, teeming with dark energy, and even more uncomfortable to sit on than it looked. Crowley peered up at the high dark ceiling and languished in contemplation.
Shax, Furfur, and Dagon shoved their way into the cold anteroom, heavy iron door groaning open and hitting the wall with a twang.
“M’Lord,” said Dagon as she approached, “we have great news – ”
Furfur shouldered into her back. “Fuck off, I wanted to tell him.”
Dagon shoved him back. “Ya lose, ya snooze.”
Shax neatly stepped around them both and told Crowley, “Some demons have caught an angel.” Her eyes lifted to the ceiling. “Up there.”
Dagon and Furfur groaned. “If you’re gonna announce things,” Furfur groused, “do it with a bit of grandiosity, a bit of drama .”
Shax looked confused. “What, like – ” she waved her arms around like a stiff presenter of The Price Is Right . “Like this?”
Furfur finger-gunned at her. “Exactly.”
Dagon had sidled up to Crowley’s right side. “He was seen fumbling around on Earth, picking through the ruins,” she told him with glee. “It was an opportunistic snatch; the abduction of the century, I’d say.” Her eyes flashed. “Nay, the millennia!”
“Oof,” commented Crowley, pleased and amused. The events of the day were sure to cultivate gossip in the otherwise mundane day-to-day demonic life of Hell below the crust of a post-apocalyptic Earth. There weren’t many damned in Hell these days to torture with Friends reruns or Crowley’s favourite – walking on Lego – so any entertainment was good entertainment. “An angel of Heaven, dragged screaming and crying through the hot salt of Hell.” He stroked his chin. “That is so sad .”
“That’s sarcasm!” Shax told Furfur triumphantly. “I recognised it this time!”
“Good job, Shax,” Crowley drawled.
Shax was stunned and pleased. “Oh, really, my lord?”
Crowley shrugged his shoulders. Being Grand Duke of Hell meant he could do almost anything he wanted, even praise his little team of stooges. “Yeah.”
The door opened again, and Josh and Paul pulled in the angel.
Their captive was dressed all in white and had an old potato sack over his head. To the angel’s credit, he wasn’t being dragged or roughly forced as such; he was keeping pace with the two demons, who growled menacingly into his canvas-bag covered ears before pulling him into the dim spotlight in front of an amused Crowley.
“Kneel before the Grand Duke!” Josh boomed.
The angel reluctantly did as he was told. “This is all rather irregular,” the angel said primly, voice muffled by the bag.
Crowley gestured lazily and Josh ripped the bag off the angel’s head.
The amused smirk was involuntarily wiped off Crowley’s face.
The angel blinked up at him with wide, bright blue eyes. His blonde curls, mussed by the rough manhandling, were in disarray. But he was, Crowley acknowledged, very beautiful, even in his roughed-up state.
Crowley schooled his features. He hadn’t wished for his sunglasses in quite some years, but he wanted them now.
The angel stared up at him with wonder, which quickly melted into imperiousness. “I am the Supreme Archangel Aziraphale,” he told Crowley with barely a waver in his voice, chin lifted, “and you would do well to let me go.”
Grand Duke Crowley stared back. “Supreme Archangel Aziraphale,” confirmed Crowley flatly.
“Oh, I know you,” Furfur said slowly, with disgust. “Back in the twentieth century. You two” – he gestured between Crowley and Aziraphale – “used to be an item .” He practically hissed the last word.
“What?” Crowley barked at Furfur with genuine confusion. On the one hand, Crowley was glad for the distraction; on the other, the statement didn’t make any sense at all. “I have never met this angel in my life!” This was technically a lie; Crowley had met this particular angel only two days ago purely by accident, but only then. “I mean, I knew about the Supreme Archangel Aziraphale, but I had no idea he looked like – ” he gesticulated at the celestial creature in front of him with an ungainly flailing of his hand, at Aziraphale’s head and his general prettiness, and hauteur, and, dare Crowley admit to himself – attractiveness .
“Quite so,” Aziraphale put in. “We’ve never met. This is the first time.”
“Right,” Crowley agreed. “Never even laid eyes on him from afar. And certainly not, y’know” – his voice went down an octave – “up close.”
“I remember you too,” Shax drawled at the angel. “ You kept the previous Archangel Gabriel in your bookshop.”
“I promise you madam,” the current archangel said with aloof disgust, “I did not own anything of an Earthly nature, as I am an angel . And I certainly did not keep the previous archangel in there like a book on a shelf.”
There had been plenty of time in the last few hundred years for Crowley to sit and think. And he had noticed and acknowledged that his own memories of the past prior to the Second Coming were slim, to say the least. His memories taken from before the Fall seemed to have been extracted precisely, with the intent of deleting certain conversations, or certain actions, or blueprints of nebulas and constellations, and so on.
But from the moment Crowley had tempted Eve in the Garden and onwards, there was basically nothing up until 2024. The occasional biblical scene was there – bits of the flood, talking to Job – but not much else, like someone had put a hand into his head and sloppily grabbed what they could, and just decided to leave a handful of presumably important bits behind.
This angel in front of him – prepossessing and hand-cuffed, with an anti-miracle sticker on his cheek – was clearly in a similar situation as Crowley as far as memory loss went.
Crowley would always attempt to be honest with himself, even though he tried very hard to be dishonest with everyone else as was his due as a demon. He understood Aziraphale: his confusion, the looking into a room in his mind and wondering where the furniture used to fit, and where it all went, and who took it.
“What should we do with him?” said Dagon with glee. “Feed him to the trolls? Lower him slowly into a vat of boiling acid?”
“Stick him in a room,” added Furfur, “make him listen to twentieth century trance music for eternity.”
Aziraphale made a face.
Shax said, “We should offer him on a platter to Satan, our lord and master,” which had the other three groaning in unison, what with how boring the suggestion was.
Crowley tilted his head and considered Aziraphale’s pale neck against the white-and-gold of his angelic attire, the curve of one ear. The way his hair curled near his jawline. Aziraphale, to his credit, only sat with his shackled hands in his lap, back straight, expression haughty. He was majestic in a way no one else in the room was, despite being the only one on his knees.
“We’ll have a dance party,” Crowley decided, calculating internally, rapidly, “to celebrate. We’ll invite everyone – ”
“Kind of have to,” Furfur cut in, “since Jesus took most of the souls during the Second Coming – ”
“ – AND,” Crowley exclaimed over the top of him, “we’ll do the thing you just said. The slow lowering of him into a vat. But of lava, because boiling acid has a really bad smell, and also I don’t think we have much left in stock.”
“Right,” said Dagon, “good idea, m’lord. I’m as happy as a pig in shit.”
“I’ve got lots of those,” Crowley sniffed.
“Pigs in shit?”
“No, good ideas.” Crowley changed positions in his throne, crossing one long leg over another. Then he flicked his fingers and said, “Take him to the dungeons till we’re ready for him.”
Josh and Paul lifted Aziraphale to his feet and walked him back to the door.
“I’m really glad we’re having a party,” Josh told Aziraphale conversationally as they left the room. “We haven’t had a good dance-off in a long time. I’ve been practicin’ me moves.”
“Good for you, old boy,” Aziraphale said agreeably. “Though not so fun for me, I suspect.”
*
Year 2024
One thousand years before the Supreme Archangel Aziraphale was captured by Hell
“It’s official,” read the clickbait article headline, “Jesus Christ more famous than Taylor Swift!”
Aziraphale beamed down at his celestial phone, then lifted his head to look at Jesus, who was on stage. The crowd was screaming and wild – a packed out concert full of adoring fans.
Backstage and hidden from view behind the curtain, Aziraphale leaned sideways and showed Michael his phone screen. She only rolled her eyes and said, “And so he should be! Else what are we doing here, sullying our feet on Earthly ground?”
Aziraphale looked down at his shiny white shoes. All the angels of Jesus Christ’s personal guard wore white shoes. And white trousers, and white jackets, and white shirts.
“Hello, London!” Jesus shouted into his microphone, and the crowd went wild. “How are you doing!” The crowd went even wilder at that, somehow.
The music started and the backup dancers pranced onstage as Jesus started to sing a pop song about praising the Lord, and how, after the Apocalypse, all the good people will be in the Lord’s embrace.
Aziraphale couldn’t help but nod his head along. The track was quite the bopper. The fans, knowing every lyric of every one of the songs on his latest album, sang along with Jesus, and waved their white cross light sticks with the beat of the music.
Next to Aziraphale, Michael sighed with boredom.
*
“You were amazing!” Aziraphale gushed as he followed Jesus into his five-star hotel room. Michael, Uriel, and Saraqael entered the room after them with less enthusiasm but no less haste. “The crowd tonight really loved you.”
“Thanks, Aziraphale,” Jesus said honestly, throwing him an indecipherable look – something that seemed along the lines of pity, but Aziraphale failed to understand it. Jesus turned to the mini bar and pulled out a mini wine bottle. “Drink with me?”
There had been many a hotel night where Jesus would ask him if he wanted a drink, and Aziraphale would always say, “No thank you, I do not sully my angelic temple.” He said it tonight and then added: “But I will draw you a bath.”
Jesus turned away to the wall, tipped his chin up, and threw back the whole contents of the bottle down. Aziraphale went into the ensuite to start the taps on the free-standing bath, as he had said he would. When he came out again, Jesus was standing on one side of the hotel room, arms crossed, while the other three angels stood on the other side and stared him down.
“Oh, come on,” Jesus implored the angels, “we could do it – wouldn’t it be fun? A night on the town? And the four of you could come, bodyguard me the whole time – “
“Absolutely not,” Michael snapped.
“What are you going to do exactly?” Saraqael sniffed. “Get plastered while listening to doosh-doosh music? You can do that quite well in here.”
Uriel leaned against the door and said nothing.
Aziraphale took in Jesus’s forlorn expression and went over to him and touched his arm gently. “Cheer up, child,” he said to Jesus. “We can see what’s on the hotel television and choose a fun film. Have a sleepover! What do you say?”
Jesus gave Aziraphale a sad smile. “Okay, Aziraphale,” he said quietly, “we can have yet another sleepover. But only with you; I want the other three to bugger off.”
“Charming,” Uriel murmured.
Michael fixed on a fake smile and said, “That’s fine; we have duties to attend to in Heaven anyway.”
“No we don’t,” said Saraquel.
Michael threw a fake smile at her colleague. “Yes we do. And we’ll be back, first thing in the morning,” she added to Jesus and Aziraphale.
“Take your time!” Jesus called after them.
Aziraphale heard Uriel mutter, “Such an annoying brat,” before they slammed the door behind them.
Jesus’s shoulders relaxed. He rummaged through the mini bar again and pulled out some amber liquor. “So,” he said as he straightened, “what do you want to watch?”
“Let’s watch Breakfast at Tiffany’s again!” said Aziraphale brightly. “That movie always cheers you up.”
Jesus’s brow creased with both affection and confusion. “Aziraphale… you do know that, uh. That – uhhh. That the lead character of Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a. Is a um….”
“A what, dear?”
“A sex worker,” Jesus answered in low, conspiratorial tones.
“What’s a sex worker?” asked Aziraphale.
Jesus exhaled a long, incredulous sigh. “’Kay. I’m going to have that bath now.”
*
Jesus sat cross-legged on the king sized bed with yet another little bottle of alcohol in one hand and the TV remote in the other. He gestured at Aziraphale with the remote and said, “ What are you wearing?”
Aziraphale flapped his arms out and then pressed them to his sides again. “Pyjamas!” he answered.
“They’re yellow,” Jesus laughed.
Aziraphale pouted. “I like yellow,” he told him, “it’s pretty. I always liked people with yellow eyes. I think it’s a nice colour to have.”
Jesus laughed again, but it came out as a huff of air. “People don’t have – you know what? Never mind. Come sit with me and watch your favourite movie.”
They watched the movie, and then watched another. Halfway through Casablanca, Jesus whispered something low and soft like the rustle of feathers, and Aziraphale suddenly felt very sleepy. He closed his eyes for a while, listening to Rick Blaine croon in that baritone voice of his. Around five minutes later he felt the bed rock as Jesus got up, then felt the shift in the air as he moved around the room.
Aziraphale opened his eyes and sat up, rubbing his eyes.
Jesus froze. His hand was on the door handle of the hotel room exit, eyes wide and guilty like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He was dressed in a flowing green shirt and tan leather jacket, and white trousers that said “King of kings, Lord of lords” down one leg – fashionable clothes, and clearly not pyjamas for sleeping or having a slumber party.
Aziraphale’s jaw dropped. “You’re – you – you’re escaping!” he exclaimed, pointing an accusing finger in Jesus’s direction.
Jesus twisted his mouth in guilt. “Okay,” he said, “hear me out. See I’m always working and then going back to the hotel room, and working, and doing promos, and going back to the hotel room and look – “ He twisted back and came to Aziraphale’s side and kneeled on the floor. “I’m bored, I want to have fun. Let me go out this once, I’ll come back before dawn – “
“I’m afraid not,” said Aziraphale gently. He felt for Jesus, he really did. It was hardly the sacrifice of the cross, but it was a sacrifice nonetheless: to work and work and have no life, no friends outside the angelic bodyguards who watched him all the time, sometimes with their own grating and contagious boredom and often with disdain.
Jesus’s eyes widened with an idea. “Come with me! I’ll be on my best behaviour, and you can body-guard me the whole time! I’ll be meeting a friend – she’s really nice and sensible, you’ll get on well – and the three of us will have a fab time.” He titled his head and widened his big eyes like a puppy dog begging for scraps off the table. “Please, Aziraphale.”
*
Aziraphale caved in the end, and, embarrassingly, it hadn't taken much. After he had miracled his clothes back to a white suit and they had gathered themselves into the back of a taxi, Aziraphale finally wondered where they were going.
“Gonna pick up my mate,” Jesus told him. “Then head to the clubs. Bars? Gay bars mainly, tonight - I'm assuming that's your cup of tea. What do you think?”
“I think gay clubs are jolly good,” said Aziraphale brightly. “Any kind of club that is happy means it’s good, right?”
Jesus gave a nervous, high-pitched giggle, peering at Aziraphale side-along.
They came to a dark London apartment building and took the lift to one of its highest floors. Jesus knocked, and the door was opened shortly after by a tall, slim man in dark sunglasses.
Despite appearing to have just woken up – dressed in black sleep trousers and a soft looking dark v-neck, and with rumpled red hair – the man was gorgeous. His expressive mouth was turned down, eyebrows arched above his sunglasses, before coming down as his forehead creased in confusion.
“Crowley, hi, it’s me, ya boy Jesus!” Jesus was grinning. “Long time no see. You’re male now, that’s cool, suits you! It’s been how long? One thousand, nine-hundred and ninety-two years, I guess? Can we come in?”
“Jesus?” Crowley muttered, his voice deep and rumbly like hot coals tumbling together. He pulled the door wider to let him enter, which was when he noticed Aziraphale and froze, staring.
“Yup,” said Jesus, pushing his way into Crowley’s apartment. “I brought my bodyguard with me, sorry about that, hope you don’t mind.”
Crowley and Aziraphale were just kind of – standing in the doorway, staring at each other. Aziraphale could not discern Crowley’s expression, but Aziraphale forced himself to name his own emotions: he was in awe, mostly, and feeling hot in his cheeks, and a lump of want lodged in his throat.
Crowley finally had to look away as he shuffled back to politely allow Aziraphale to enter.
“He’s an angel,” Jesus told Crowley, gesturing at Aziraphale vaguely, as he headed down the corridor. “So you can take those sunnies off; we’re all friends here.”
Crowley lifted a hand to his own face. His hand was shaking as he slowly pulled his sunglasses off and placed them on the side table that housed his keys.
Aziraphale’s lips parted. Crowley’s eyes were yellow , and so, so beautiful, and expressive. Crowley seemed to be – sad, for some reason, and also a little hazy, like he had just awoken from a long nap.
“Hi,” Aziraphale breathed and gave Crowley an unnecessary little wave. “I’m… Aziraphale.”
Crowley’s expressive eyebrows pulled down, his mouth pushing itself into an angry moue. “Yes, I know.”
Jesus had disappeared further into the apartment. Crowley elegantly swivelled on his own heel and stalked down the corridor in the direction Jesus had left, hips swaying and gait swift, but no less an angry fashion than if he had stomped all the way. This person seemed to be more about stealth and speed over strength.
Aziraphale followed him.
Crowley stopped at the doorway of the kitchen, arms crossed and shoulders hunched. “He doesn’t remember,” he growled at Jesus.
“His memory was erased,” Jesus replied without turning. He was rummaging through Crowley’s pantry. He pulled out a box of coco pops and brandished them. “These any good?”
“Probably been expired a few years,” stated Crowley automatically. “Stick with the subject,” he bit out. “’Erased’?”
Jesus went hunting for a bowl. “Heaven loves erasing angel memories. They do it all the time.” He paused for a moment to ponder. “I think they’re addicted,” he said eventually.
Crowley growled deep in his throat.
Aziraphale put his hand up like a kid in a classroom. “Excuse me, kind sirs, but I don’t think my memory has been erased. I would know,” he finished with a small disbelieving laugh.
“You wouldn’t know,” Crowley told him, turning to face him; “that’s kind of the point of erasing anything.”
Aziraphale blinked several times, but still failed to parse this new information under the strong gaze of this handsome man. He changed the subject instead. “Are you a demon? Only your eyes – “ Aziraphale pointed to his own eyes. “ – and your voice – ?” Aziraphale touched his own throat, and the small gesture seemed intimate, suddenly. He pulled his hand away and placed it behind his back. Being in Crowley’s presence was strangely overwhelming, like everyone Aziraphale had ever met was a pale, black-and-white facsimile, and Crowley was the technicolour, real thing. Like Aziraphale had been waiting all his life to meet this fire-haired, bright-eyed person. Which was ridiculous, but there it was.
“He is,” Jesus said, having found his bowl and spoon, “but don’t worry – he’s one of the good ones.”
Crowley growled again, but this time it was deep, and guttural, and impatient. “I’m not good, I’m never good.”
“Well,” said Aziraphale, unable to look away from Crowley’s jawline, “if you are in Jesus’s favour, then you are in mine. Demon or no.”
Crowley didn’t seem the least bit happy about this. “I’m in a nightmare. I need alcohol.” He swayed his way to his kitchen and pulled out a bottle of wine and a glass from a cupboard. Placed the glass on the bench next to Jesus’s bowl, now full of expired cereal, twisted open the wine bottle, went to pour himself a glass. Changed his mind last-second and drank the wine straight from the bottle.
“That’s the spirit!” Jesus cried in glee, before crunching down dry cereal. He swallowed his bite and then let his spoon fall into its bowl with a crunch of cereal and a high-pitched clatter of the spoon. “We’re going clubbing! But for now I’m going to raid your wardrobe!” Jesus flounced off down yet another dark, narrow corridor.
“Jesus Christ,” Crowley muttered, after he had managed to pull his mouth from the wine bottle.
“Yes?” called Jesus from another room.
*
During his adventures in Crowley’s wardrobe, Jesus had found a feather boa for Aziraphale and a jaunty hat for himself. Jesus had commented on Crowley’s ownership of the boa, laughing, but Crowley had only glanced at Aziraphale and mumbled incoherently as they crossed the busy London street to the club with the longest line.
“Do you want me to miracle you so no one recognises you?” Aziraphale asked Jesus when Crowley only turned away, ignoring Jesus’s comment.
But Jesus decided not to, and he didn’t want to use his fame to cut the line either, stating that it would be unfair to the people already waiting. Some people in the line shyly asked to take selfies with him, which he always said yes to with a smile.
Aziraphale got to work, subtly miracling the more boisterous to slide further away, and concentrating the occasional miracle to control the interest of most the crowd, their eyes sliding away from Jesus and back to their social media feeds on their phones. But even while he did all this, he was ever conscious of Crowley standing in the line near him, like a warm hearth at his back. Like Crowley, not Jesus, was the centre of the crowd, of any room he occupied.
The music from the club entrance wafted out with too much bass. When they were finally in, Crowley said something as he moved off, Jesus and Aziraphale following.
“What did you say?” Aziraphale exclaimed.
“I said, I NEED A DRINK,” repeated Crowley.
It was crowded, people shoving into them as the mosh of people moved in an uncoordinated stream to and from the bar.
“I’M BUYING,” said Jesus. “WHAT DO YOU WANT.”
“HE WILL HAVE A BLOODY MARY,” Crowley replied for Aziraphale. “AND I WILL HAVE A BLOODY MARY.”
“I’M A LITTLE OFFENDED BY YOUR CHOICE, CROWLEY,” Jesus told him.
Jesus had two shots of clear liquor. Bored of waiting for their cocktails, Jesus sashayed to the dance floor and was immediately welcomed into the enthused hip swinging and arm flailing of complete strangers. Aziraphale was overwhelmed by it all even just standing at the bar: the music so loud as to be barely recognisable as music, the stale scent of smoke from the smoke machines, and green strobe lights that seemed to exist just to make the place more confusing. All he could do was follow Crowley, newly made cocktails in both hands, as he made his way through the throng and up the stairs to the mezzanine floor.
The crowd here magically parted to present a table and two metal stools bolted to the floor. Crowley sat. Aziraphale, on the stool across from him, could see, from that particular vantage point, Jesus dancing, a man dancing at his front, and another man grinded at his backside.
“There’s a lot of men here,” Aziraphale observed.
Crowley, having put down both drinks on the table, gave him an incomprehensible pursed-lip look. Then he clicked his fingers and the sound died down to almost nothing but a very faint bass.
“Oh,” Aziraphale sighed in relief. “Oh yes, that’s much better.” He looked around: everyone was still dancing and carrying on. “A sound bubble?”
Crowley pushed his sunglasses up his nose and then cuddled the bloody marys close. He mumbled a string of words that ended in, “Yeah.”
Crowley’s sunglasses slipped down the bridge of this nose again, but this time he didn’t bother to push them back up. He regarded Aziraphale with solemn, glowing eyes.
“So, you…” Aziraphale looked for words, fumbled around in his mind for small talk. “You and Jesus were friends, then? Before?”
Crowley took a sip of his drink. “When he was the messiah? Mmm, yeah. He’s a little different this time around.” He gestured vaguely. “Took him all around the world. China, Persia, Cambodia, even Australia.”
“You wanted him to know,” guessed Aziraphale, with affection. “You wanted him to see .”
“Waste of time,” Crowley grumbled into his drink. “Look at him now, flouncing around the place, irritatingly famous…” They both observed Jesus then – the way the crowd seemed to face Jesus now, like levels in a circle. The song changed to one of Jesus’s techno remixes, and everyone in the room – seemingly in a trance – got into neat rows and started to dance the whole choreography perfectly in sync to the music.
Aziraphale was alarmed.
Crowley laughed low and humourlessly at the sight. “Must be fun,” he said sarcastically, “babysitting him all the time.”
“Uh, no,” Aziraphale dithered, watching the whole room taken in by Jesus’s dance miracle with growing trepidation. “I mean – “ he quickly back-stepped in alarm – “I mean yes, it’s a calling. It’s the ultimate calling, really… this is God’s son we’re talking about. No higher blessing if you think about it.”
Crowley looked disgusted. “He’s a boy playing pop idol.”
“He’s more than that,” Aziraphale argued, sitting up straighter on his rather uncomfortable stool. “Did you know, Taylor Swift once had a concert where the whole front row of fans lost their memories? Apparently it occurs when humans truly believe they have seen God. It happens to Jesus’s fans all the time. He’s the real deal, the bees knees. I honestly don’t understand why you don’t seem to like him much – you were friends in the past, you’ve admitted it yourself.”
Crowley drained the first drink and slammed the glass down. He ignored the second drink for placing both his forearms on the table and rocking forward. He was looking into Aziraphale’s eyes now over the rims of his glasses, eyes blazing with anger. “I had a friend once,” he said, voice clipped on every word. “Well, not just any friend – my best friend. And then one day he left, and went back to Heaven, and he left me behind.” The last word sounded like it was caught in his throat, wet, tear-soaked. “Tell me it was worth it.”
“Sorry,” said Aziraphale, “I don’t really understand – “
“He and I had history,” Crowley told him, eyes not leaving his face; “years and decades and centuries and millennia of history and friendship and – not all of it was good, but it was ours and – You. The past few years – there are parts missing. Do you remember… well, anything? Anything good, bad, special?”
Aziraphale racked his brain and tried to remember, tried to look into the shadows and the dark that seemed to occupy his mind, like the wobbly space puzzle pieces made before they were set down in their correct places. “I don’t know, Crowley,” Aziraphale said eventually, looking to the side, eyes not quite focused on the dance floor below. “I…” he trailed off and frowned in alarm.
The patrons of the club had stopped dancing, and were all turned to Jesus, swaying to the music towards him, like the branches of trees caught in heavy wind. Leaning forward, then back, then forward again, in sync.
Crowley had drunk part of the second bloody mary. “Then tell me it was worth it, angel,” he said, words slurring a little. “Tell me you are at least having fun as the Supreme Archangel, bossing everyone around. Tell me you get a little thrill every time Michael rolls her eyes, or Uriel glares at you – “
“I’m not the Supreme Archangel,” Aziraphale corrected quickly. He almost laughed, except he was distracted and halfway out of his seat in preparation for what was surely a Jesus Rescue Mission. “I’m a Principality, always have been. Elevating me to Supreme Archangel is lunacy; I don’t know what gave you that idea.”
There was a rumble of a growl. Aziraphale turned his attention to Crowley in time to see him clenching his teeth, his cheeks red with an infernal power within. He was counting under his breath.
Aziraphale glanced from Crowley, who was smoking and hideously angry… to Jesus, about to get swamped by fans. Jesus had only just noticed his predicament and threw a panicked, beseeching look up at Aziraphale.
Aziraphale felt like a parent with two toddlers, both about to have tantrums or hurt themselves, and not knowing which one to help first.
Crowley’s fists were clenched tight on the table. Aziraphale leaned forward, grabbed Crowley’s fists in his hands, and tried to pull Crowley’s anger into himself. “Let go,” Aziraphale told him –
Crowley’s anger pushed through his fists and into Aziraphale. He had braced for pain, but he instead felt a rush of heat and want and heady pleasure, like being lowered into a hot bath after a long cold day – like a massage on tight back muscles – like lust but in a pure form – like the anticipation of a party – like settling down in front of a hearth and listening to the rain outside – like the curl of his toes – like the curl of soft crimson hair –
- like ecstatic love –
- intoxication but brief –
- like standing on a wall covering someone with your wing, so they don’t get rained on – like the swell of pride after protecting someone –
- like waking from a pleasant dream and knowing the day will be even better –
Like the –
Like –
All the lights in the club blew out. So did the music.
Aziraphale gasped in a breath, forcing air into his corporation’s lungs. Then he made for the stairs. He had to get to Jesus, fast, get him out of there. Crowley was on his heels, drink abandoned, and together they managed to push through the crowd, grab Jesus – sans jaunty hat – by his arms, and haul him through the mosh, out the door, and onto the dark street.
Jesus had brought someone with him.
The handsome young man and Jesus were laughing, drunk off alcohol and the experience and each other. “That was so much fun,” gasped Jesus. “You should have joined us on the dance floor, Crowley.”
Crowley grunted, scowling.
“Man, you used to be cool,” Jesus told him, sizing him up. “The fun we had. Anyway, this is Fred – Fred, this is The Guys.”
“Hello,” greeted Fred with a cute, dimpled smile. “Also, my name is Willy.”
Jesus and Fred-cum-Willy skipped off across the road, weaving between traffic, heading back to Crowley’s apartment.
*
“Is Jesus Christ your real name?” Willy asked as he and Jesus headed down one corridor of Crowley’s maze of an apartment.
“Well, I won’t tell you my Earthly name,” Jesus said, “but when I was younger, the kids around my town used to nickname me Greasy Johnson.”
Willy laughed as he and Jesus disappeared into the guest bedroom.
“Aaahhh!” Crowley yelled in their direction. “You can’t have sex in there! Go back to your hotel room!”
Jesus only stuck his hand out and gave a wave before pulling it back inside the room and slamming the door shut.
Left in the dimness of the hall light, Aziraphale put a hand on Crowley’s arm. “Are you alright?”
Crowley closed his eyes for a moment, sighing through his nose, and pulled his sunglasses off. He tossed them aside somewhere where they clattered and possibly broke, but Crowley just did not seem to care. He slunk down the corridor and into another bedroom, then slid onto the covers of the well-made bed, face-down.
Aziraphale dithered in the room, not knowing if he had permission to join him, or if he should go to the lounge room and try to figure out how to use Crowley’s smart TV. But then Crowley moved, made a come-hither gesture, and Aziraphale awkwardly got onto it with him, lying on his back.
His eyes drifted from the velvet curtains on the windows to Crowley next to him, face mostly obscured by the smash of sheets against it, and his auburn hair. But the eye Aziraphale could see was open, not looking at him, just – staring at nothing.
A slow blink.
“’m not the best company tonight,” Crowley mumbled eventually.
“It’s alright; I’m rather enjoying just being here,” Aziraphale told him kindly, honestly. He thought about the feel of Crowley’s anger pulsing through him, about the set of his strong jaw, the swing of his hips. “I want to be your friend,” Aziraphale told him. He wanted to be Crowley’s friend, to have Crowley take him places, like Jesus said he used to do. “I love you,” Aziraphale told him.
Crowley’s eye closed, and he turned his body away. “You’re not my Aziraphale,” he told the velvet curtains. “My Aziraphale would never say that.” He bent his knees further to curl himself into a ball, like a snake trying to coil into itself.
How sad, Aziraphale thought, how stupid the old me must have been. He laid there on the covers until Crowley had fallen asleep, then got up to find something to occupy himself, since angels, as a rule, did not tend to sleep.
In the back of Crowley's wardrobe there was a box of soul music CDs. Jammed behind that was an old paperback: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.
Lying next to Crowley, Aziraphale managed to finish reading most of the novel before accidentally falling asleep. He dreamt of being surrounded by happy angels, all talking and laughing with him, only for a comet to land on their heads, shattering their false sense of never-ending joy.
*
They were awoken the next day by a series of bangs on the front door.
Aziraphale heard the clomp-clomp of a young man’s hasty footsteps as Jesus strode past Crowley’s bedroom door to answer.
“Oh, you’re here!” said Jesus to the occupants of the front door. “Great. I’m sure we have lots of work to do, yada yada, let’s go –”
"Where have you been?” Michael demanded. “You were meant to stay at the hotel.”
Aziraphale lifted himself from Crowley’s bed and snuck to the bedroom door, quietly opened it, and peeked his head around. Michael, Saraquel, and Uriel were crammed into the doorframe with equal expressions of stormy irritation. Jesus was leaning against the door itself with an excess of indolent happiness, like he’d spent the whole night on the receiving end of a back massage.
“It’s alright, guys, don’t worry!” Jesus said at length. “I just stayed at a friend’s.”
“Where’s Aziraphale?” Uriel drawled, their voice deep and no-nonsense. “He was supposed to stay with you.”
“Ah yes,” said Jesus, eyes lifting to the ceiling in thought or possibly a staved-off eye-roll, “I gave him the day off.”
“The day off ?” It was Saraquel’s time to ask questions now, and she was scoffing and huffing with every word. “We’re angels; we don’t have a day off … this concept is outside the angelic realms of possibility.”
“It’s this concept the humans have in this country,” Jesus patiently explained. “Basically, Aziraphale is allowed this day to do whatever he likes, so long as it’s not work. AND he gets paid for it, so don’t dock his celestial wages!” He waggled his finger at the three angels, who simultaneous leaned back a little away from it as if it were a knife. “Aziraphale will be at work tonight in an absolutely smashing state, so let’s go get the tech rehearsal done. C’mon! C’mon c’mon c’mon…” He gestured at them to shuffle out the doorway and into the corridor.
As Jesus turned to pull the door shut, he caught Aziraphale’s eye and threw him a grin and a wink.
Door finally shut and the apartment once again quiet, Aziraphale stepped into the dark hall properly. The sun which had pushed its light through the gap in the curtains in Crowley’s bedroom told him it was morning, even if the light did not penetrate the hallway he was standing in.
He heard Crowley roll out of bed with a grumble and a yawn, before he too slunk into the hall like a wary half-domesticated cat. Aziraphale turned from the front door to face and greet him, quietly, with a, “Good morning.”
“What’s good about it,” Crowley rattled.
Aziraphale had the sense that no matter what he himself said, no matter how bright or cheerful, any words would only push Crowley deeper into depression, his face crumbling before Aziraphale like paper in a tightening fist. Aziraphale felt like a bottle being emptied of its golden contents, poured desperately into Crowley, who could only absorb it and compress it and make it disappear into nothing.
But Aziraphale wanted to be Crowley’s saviour in the same way he wanted to be Crowley’s confidante. And so he vowed he would try to help Crowley again and again, for the rest of the day, if the day was all they had.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Aziraphale sighed in a lazy-morning fashion, keeping his smile warm and inviting, “you’re in it.”
Crowley’s expression changed from shuttered to vulnerable with only a tilt of his eyebrows. He was still wary, leaning away from Aziraphale slightly, like he didn’t know whether to believe Aziraphale or not.
There was a nervousness between them. But it was the good kind, the anticipatory kind.
Azirpahale took it.
“What should we do today?” he asked.
“We could,” suggested Crowley lowly, “go out for breakfast? There’s a nice café round the corner.”
Aziraphale knew how deleterious his next words would be, but spoke them anyway. “I don’t… I don’t consume Earthly food.”
Crowley’s expression shuttered. “Right,” he said, “of course.” He scratched his head and looked anywhere but at Aziraphale. “I need a coffee.”
“Can I come?” piped up a voice from behind Crowley. Aziraphale and Crowley twisted to look and saw a man standing in the corridor.
“Who in heaven are you?” Crowley growled at the young man.
Aziraphale answered for him gently, “It’s Fred from last night, remember?”
“It’s Willy, actually,” said Willy pleasantly, full dimples on display. “It’s a mistake more common than you’d think.”
“Get out,” snapped Crowley.
*
Crowley scowled at the road as he drove on it, swerving through traffic and miracling the lights to turn green as he approached them. Aziraphale held on tight to whatever smooth part of the Bentley’s interior he could get his hands on.
Crowley slammed on the brakes.
They had arrived.
“‘Give me coffee or give me death’,” Aziraphale read aloud as he stepped out of the vehicle on wobbly legs.
“I usually ask for death,” Crowley grumbled, “but today I shall dredge up some courtesy and ask for coffee.” For all his depression, Crowley had a very animated way of speaking: his whole face and body moved with every enunciation, every syllable. He strolled to the café door with a loose sway of limbs, like arms and legs were an after-thought, or a bit of costume jewellery. Courteousness promised, Crowley held open the door for Aziraphale, and they stepped inside the loud, busy coffee shop.
The wait in line was almost as awkward as the drive over, but it gave Aziraphale time to absorb the scenery. People chatted seriously or with laughter. Graffiti on the walls told of a pleasant chaos and of a comfortable occupation of space. When they drew closer to the counter, Aziraphale cooed at the cups with lids with little holes for drinking, which came with teddy bears cuddling them, their little paws tied with a bit of string.
“How adorable!” Aziraphale told the cashier when they arrived out the counter.
“They’re free all this week with a coffee purchase, to promote environmental change,” the cashier told him monotonously. Her eyes flicked between Aziraphale and Crowley. “Mr. Fell. Six-shots-of-expresso,” she greeted.
“Aziraphale, this is Coffee Maker.”
Coffee Maker was unimpressed. “That’s not my name,” she told him.
“It isn’t?” Crowley drawled.
“No. And Mr. Fell knows who I am.”
“Actually,” Aziraphale corrected lightly, “my name is not Mr. Fell. It’s Aziraphale, just Aziraphale.”
Coffee Maker sighed the sigh of a Very Busy Person. Crowley explained, “He has memory loss. Amnesia. Doesn’t remember you or pretty much anyone including himself. And he won’t have anything. Just my usual,” he added, rapping his knuckles lightly.
“Actually,” piped up Aziraphale, “I would like the teddy bear cup, if you are giving them away.”
Coffee Maker was exchanging cash with Crowley when she replied, “Help yourself.”
As soon as Crowley had received his beverage and Aziraphale had taken a moment to cuddle the teddy bear and cup, they exited the coffee shop to stride across the busy street to a book shop.
Crowley swung his way in like he owned the place and barked out, “Muriel!”
The shop was a giant mess of dust and books and splattered sunlight from the windows. It smelt of old paper and leather and had a warmth that seemed to gather in the corners and swirl around Aziraphale like the air itself was glad to see him. “Hmm,” said Aziraphale, both pleased and disconcerted.
“‘Hmm’,” repeated Crowley, “what does ‘hmm’ mean?”
“I don’t know,” Aziraphale answered honestly. “This place, it feels…”
Crowley stepped towards him. “Feels…?”
“Lonely,” Aziraphale decided.
Crowley’s brows creased downwards behind his sunglasses. Whatever he might have said next was interrupted by a head poking around from behind a bookshelf. “Hello Mr. Crowley!” said the head. “Oh, and Mr. Aziraphale, too! Welcome back!”
“’Welcome back’?” Aziraphale questioned. “I must correct you, dear sir: I have never stepped foot in this establishment in my life!”
Muriel came around bookshelves properly. “Oh,” they said sagely, “memory erasure. Not to worry, happens all the time. My name is – Muriel!” they sang their name, then added, “Principality in This Part of The World, former Recording Scrivener, 37th class.” They turned to Crowley with a snap of their heels, like a soldier saluting an officer, and said, “I have a question: if someone comes in and gives me a book, does that go against bookshop protocol?”
Crowley groaned, shoulders slumping. “This is going to take a while,” he informed Aziraphale. “How about you go through the shelves and have a look around while I deal with this?”
Aziraphale did as he was told, still patting the head of the teddy bear like one might a sleepy kitten. As he moved into the shadows of the aisles, he heard Crowley explain to Muriel, “As a bookshop owner you can procure books however you wish. Usually, you would need to order them through the Internet.”
“But if someone came in and just gave me a book,” said Muriel, “for free, is that against the law?”
“No, it’s not against the law,” Crowley told them, voice patient though it was deep with a kind of grumbling rumble. “If they gave it to you freely, that is. Who were they?”
“I don’t know,” said Muriel. “I’m still getting used to genders in this day and age but I think it was a woman. She was wearing lots of skirts. Or maybe she was a man, because she wore glasses.”
“What?” said Crowley.
“Well,” Muriel explained, “only men wear glasses, but she wore glasses.”
“Right... Try not to worry; just chuck it in the back and forget about it.”
Aziraphale wasn’t really listening. He had found himself at the back behind the spiral staircase, staring at a bookcase.
The bookcase was tall and wooden and solid; and, although it should have been against the wall, it stood out in relief compared to the others. The books were old paperbacks with titles such as The Left Hand of Darkness and The Picture of Dorian Gray . There was a thin book whose words were hard to read… and as he braced himself against the side of the bookshelf to read Animal Farm , some of the books’ titles lit up.
Surprised, Aziraphale stepped back with a sharp inhale. The lit silver of the titles moved, like strokes of an invisible painter, and rearranged themselves in front of his eyes.
“Ohhh,” said Aziraphale in wonder, “seems I’ve triggered a miracle.” When the wisps of light finally stopped moving to become solid, it read the words:
WISE MAN SAY
“’Wise man say’?” wondered Aziraphale out loud. “Isn’t that grammatically incorrect?” He took a deep breath and called, “Crowley!”
Crowley came immediately, marching around the staircase with Muriel on his heels. “What?”
“What does this mean?” Aziraphale asked him.
Crowley stepped back in alarm, then stepped forward again so he was by Aziraphale’s side. Muriel crammed up next to Aziraphale, and three sets of eyes stared at the magical words.
“I have no idea,” Crowley eventually answered. “Muriel?”
“I didn’t do it,” Muriel told him. “Mr. Aziraphale probably did it before his memories were taken.”
Crowley had removed his sunglasses at some point, and he faced Aziraphale now with yellow eyes bare and imploring.
Crowley was standing so close Aziraphale could smell the heady scents of coffee beans and wood smoke. “‘Wise man say’,” Aziraphale asked softly, “what is its meaning?”
“Las Vegas,” Crowley told him, his voice deep in its quiet rumble. “We dined there together, once. A real den of iniquity that place, especially in the nineteen seventies.” The look in his eyes was piercing as he answered, “ Only fools rush in. ”
Aziraphale repeated, “Only fools rush in.”
The bookcase rumbled and shook.
It moved as the silver words disappeared, and slid itself sideways in minute, shaky ways. The three of them stared and moved back, and waved the dust away. Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird threatened to fall off and Aziraphale instinctively stepped forward and righted it.
When it seemed the bookcase had completed its movement to the side, where it had one stood was now a large gaping entryway to a dark, secret passage.
“Oh,” Muriel breathed.
“Quite,” Aziraphale agreed. Empty sconces lined the walls. Aziraphale lit them with a click of his fingers, and the light they cast presented them with a tunnel tall and wide enough for adults to pass through, even with shelves lining the right wall.
It would seem that Aziraphale was the bravest; perhaps such bravery was born from amnesia, or perhaps he had always been that way. Either way, he was the first of the three to step into the cold tomb of the underground tunnel. Crowley followed, then Muriel.
The shelves seemed to hold nothing but dust. However –
“The dust markings on these shelves,” Crowley remarked.
“What about them?” said Aziraphale, peering close to the nearest head-height shelf. The dust had settled on the shelves in a pattern of little arches.
“Look closely at them,” said Crowley. “If one were to take a book off a shelf, wouldn’t one drag it across the dust, leaving a mark?”
“Yes, one would,” Muriel agreed with enthusiasm. “But these books look like they just all disappeared at once!”
“Delicately lifted,” Crowley murmured, touching the dust with one finger and then examining the residue on his index finger. He rubbed index and thumb together in consideration.
“Oh look!” Aziraphale exclaimed when he spotted an object on one of the lower shelves. He bent over and lifted a book that had been lying there askew and forgotten. When he straightened and blew on its cover, the ensuing cloud of dusk made him and Crowley cough, and Muriel sneeze. With great curious haste, Aziraphale opened it, flicking randomly through its pages. “It’s empty,” he concluded dejectedly.
“Explains why it was left behind,” remarked Crowley.
Aziraphale flicked through more blank pages. “Does it? Oh, of course…” Aziraphale closed the book and examined its cover. Handwritten in black ink was the word ‘Diary’ and then a numeral hash, as if waiting for a number to be assigned to it.
“This place,” Aziraphale said softly, with dawning realisation, “it held diaries. Shelves and shelves of diaries. But what happened to them?”
Crowley was giving Aziraphale a peculiar look, as if trying to read him like a cryptic crossword.
“I found something!” announced Muriel.
They were further down the tunnel and were squatting close to a lower shelf. With a grunt, they pulled out an old wooden chest.
It was not a large chest, but rather one for storing letters or knick-knacks. It was heavy, and dragged on the floor with a grating sound, and was decorated with ornate steel, with a built-in lock.
“Got the key?” Crowley quipped.
With bated breath, Muriel tried to open it anyway.
The lid creaked as it opened an inch. Muriel paused and turned their head one way and then the other to exchange glances with demon and angel in turn. And then they opened the lid slowly…
….all the way…
…it was empty. The three of them sighed in disappointment.
Muriel let the lid slam shut with a bang, and then straightened.
The tunnel, for all its mystery, had turned out quite lacklustre in its contents. Seeking a conclusion to their journey, Aziraphale led the way along it and found a short set of stairs, just above which was a slither of light.
“There’s a doorway here!” he announced. “Let’s see if I can just –” He hesitantly climbed the stairs and pushed the door open –
Light temporarily blinded him. He blinked it away as best he could so as to focus on the room he had found himself in. The room was full of a busy array of colours: on the walls, on the central display tables –
“Mr. Fell!” exclaimed the only occupant of the room in rather happy, high-pitched tones. “You came in the back way! I haven’t seen you do that in, well…” The young lady paused in thought. “Well, in never to be honest!”
*
There were colourful record jackets covering every available wall space, and record jackets on the tables ready to be flicked through by browsing fingers, and record jackets on the windows, and a picture of one on the shop keeper’s t-shirt.
She wore a bandana headband and an affectionate, welcoming smile. She was trying for conversation - “Mr. Fell!” and “So glad to see you again!” - but Aziraphale’s eyes were still adjusting to the onslaught of colour. He took the teddy bear off the cup, placed the cup on the edge of a shelf stacked with records, and – having nowhere for the soft toy to fit – passed it to Crowley, who wordlessly took it. And then Aziraphale flicked through record jackets in wonder. Music drifted into the room and into his ears, with the crooning lyrics:
Well, where, oh, where can my baby be?
The Lord took her away from me
She’s gone to Heaven, so I got to be good
So I can see my baby when I leave this world…
Muriel was swinging side-to-side in a dance. Angels should not dance, Aziraphale knew; but Muriel did, and Aziraphale found only charm in it. “What is this song, Maggie?” Muriel asked the shopkeeper. “It’s nice.”
“ Last Kiss by J. Frank Wilson & The Cavaliers,” Maggie answered, “off their 1964 album of the same name.”
Muriel nodded in politeness, rather than in agreement or knowledge.
The room was bright. Crowley was incongruously stormy.
Aziraphale had moved away from him to look at more records, but Crowley sidled up to him again, teddy bear crushed to his chest where his arms were crossed. “Ask her,” Crowley barked at Aziraphale.
Aziraphale tore his eyes away from the ‘Rock and pop, J to K’ section. “Ask who what?”
Crowley huffed out an exhale like a bull, then turned on his heel and marched to Maggie where she was standing near the counter. “Why is there a tunnel between the book shop,” Crowley bit out, “and the record shop?”
Maggie blinked up at him with wide eyes. She made a thoughtful little hmm sound as she considered his question, then answered matter-of-factly, “There were too many records.”
“What,” said Crowley. Whether he realised it or not his sunglasses were still off, so she was on the receiving end of the full burn of his stare.
It did not phase her. “There were too many records,” she repeated.
“Who owns the tunnel,” Crowley demanded, “you or Aziraphale?”
This question was a hard one for her. She had to stare out the window a while to think on it. “I suppose I do,” she said slowly. Then she shook her head. “No, he does. No! I am an independent person, so I own it. No wait, I rent it. Well, it’s not really a tunnel, is it? It was a storeroom. Before that, it was an umbilical.”
“Ooooh,” said Muriel, who was listening from across the room, “that makes more sense.”
“No,” enunciated Crowley, “it doesn’t.”
Aziraphale felt it was time he stepped in to the conversation before Crowley’s anger culminated into his head exploding, or whatever it was that occurred when demons lost their tempers. “Maggie, is it?” Azirapahle asked her gently. “Why don’t you start from the beginning.”
She looked at him curiously. “Mr. Fell, why are you talking to me like you don’t know me? Did you lose your memory?”
“It was taken from him,” Crowley told her lowly.
“Oh dear,” she said. “Luckily, I can help with that.”
The song over the speakers ended. Crowley and Aziraphale stared at her. “You… can?” asked Crowley.
“Yes, I think so. Well, I’ve never done it before, but I can try. I just sort of go like this but in reverse –” She tapped Crowley’s forehead with two fingers then, with the same hand, smacked the teddy bear in his arms.
Crowley reeled back. “What the fuck! What the Heaven was that?”
Maggie stared at her offending hand. “Oh, I may have gone a little over…”
“That was a miracle,” Aziraphale realised, even though he couldn't comprehend what the miracle was. “You’re not human. What are you?”
“I’m a person ,” Maggie told him, offence bringing the lightness of her tone down a notch.
“The tunnel!” Crowley snapped. He was panting, like he’d just come back from a run around the block. “Explain, now.”
Maggie tsk-ed in disapproval at his angry demeanour. She answered sharply, “My great-grandmother had a little record shop in the corner of Mr. Fell’s book shop.”
“No she didn’t,” argued Crowley, “I would have remembered something like that. And Aziraphale is a private person; he’s always hated people in his bookshop, so why would he let someone in to sell records in a corner of it?”
Maggie blinked several times, processing this. “You’re right,” she realised, “she didn’t sell records. She kept records. Nope!” she stopped herself. “That’s not right either. She organised records. See, she was version one, I am version four, so my functionality is different to hers.”
Crowley was staring at her. He did not blink. Aziraphale was flummoxed and did not understand a word of what she was saying.
“My grandmother,” Maggie continued, “she struggled to keep the growing records to one bookcase, so she created the storeroom and stored records in there. But when Mum came along, that wasn’t enough, so she converted the storeroom into the umbilical, so she could create this space.” Maggie threw her arms out, indicating the record shop. “She put records in here, too, and tried to get my brothers and I to help organise all the records; but we thought that was boring . I wanted to do something else with the space. So after my brothers ran off to live their own lives, I converted the space into a record shop!” She beamed proudly.
“And the records that your mother had?” asked Crowley. His voice was low, flat. “Where are those?”
“There were just so many of them,” Maggie confided. “So I…” She looked inwards, eyes vacant.
Crowley stepped closer to her. “You. Did. What.”
“I converted them,” she said slowly, remembering. “I converted them and stored them in… here.” She pointed to her own head.
A pause. No songs played over the speakers. Muriel was still at the other side of the room, covering their mouth with both hands.
Then:, “Oh right!” Aziriaphale exclaimed, making everyone jump. “By records you mean diaries . I get it now.”
“Not just diaries,” Maggie told him, “but journals, photos, memories, and feelings! Oh, so many feelings. You had a lot of those. You even had a couple of videos on VHS. You really liked to keep a record of pretty much everything, except for perhaps the dull days. So my great-grandmother, you see - you created her to keep a running index on it all – she had a really good system in place – well anyway, I’m rambling a bit – she was your Record Keeper. And now I’m your Record Keeper.”
“You’re an AI,” said Crowley in wonder. “Well, maybe an AAI. Angelic Artificial Intelligence.”
“I’m a person ,” Maggie reiterated. She turned to Aziraphale fully. “Do you want your records back? I can give you a copy.”
“Alright, may as well,” said Aziraphale.
Maggie held out her hand palm-down and intoned, “Wise man say.”
“Oh, um,” Aziraphale dithered. He remembered the password, and placed his hand over hers. “Only fools rush in.”
Maggie placed her other hand on top of his and said, “But I can’t help,” then waited.
Aziraphale placed his spare hand over hers. “Um…”
“But I can’t help,” Maggie repeated.
Aziraphale looked to Crowley for help.
Crowley’s shoulders were tense, and he had gone pink on his cheeks and the tips of his ears. Something like anticipation stuck in his throat as Crowley moved forward, slowly, and bent his head towards Aziraphale’s ear. Aziraphale’s heart picked up the rapid thump-thump as Crowley whispered, “Falling in love with you.”
Aziraphale closed his eyes against the wash of heat through his body. He repeated the words, quietly, like fog escaping a glass: “Falling in love with you.”
Eyes already closed, Aziraphale felt himself list to the side in a swoon, his hands gently slipping from Maggie’s after only a moment, his shoulder pressing into Crowley’s chest, and Crowley’s arms wrapping around him in a steadying embrace.
*
Aziraphale remembered a time when he had strolled through the park, past a playground with playing children, and heard the tune of the ice-cream truck. Delighted, he’d looked here and there, trying increasingly desperately to force his eyes to follow the trail of music caught by his ears.
But no matter which way he’d turned his head, the music of the ice-cream truck seemed to both be coming closer and driving further away.
The children in the playground did not seem to harbour the same frustrations, occupied as they were in their own make-believe games. Aziraphale did not even crave ice-cream overly badly in that moment – but it was not the ice-cream itself but the sense of missed opportunity that was making him increasingly upset the longer the truck continued to be elusive.
Its music seemed to play on for hours, even after he had left the park.
Receiving one’s memories after not having been in possession of them after quite some time had the same feeling.
The memories were there, like a far-away almost-close music that brought with it love and nostalgia.
He didn’t remember them in order, either.
Aziraphale remembered:
He and Crowley drank cocktails in Las Vegas, Elvis performing Can’t Help Falling in Love.
Wise man say, Elvis crooned.
“Well that went down like a lead balloon,” Crowley said once, black wings flexing in the sun.
“Just a demonic miracle of my own,” Crowley said softly another time, face half in darkness.
Wise man say…
“Oh, no no no, not your magic trick,” bemoaned Crowley on a park bench. “It’s embarrassing. You know real magic.”
“Yes,” said Crowley, yellow eyes ablaze, “I want to murder the blameless goats of blameless Job.”
Only fools rush in…
“Oh, I’m down with ‘wicked’.” Crowley grinned at that moment. Then, in the same night, he called for Aziraphale, “Where are you!”
“I’m here!” Aziraphale called back.
… only fools…
…rush in…
“We could have been us.”
… only fools…
“I’m here!” Aziraphale called.
…rush in…
“A group of the two of us,” said Crowley.
But I can’t help…
Aziraphale must have managed to give Maggie one last experience in more feelings than images, of Crowley confessing to him, pouring his heart out, and Aziraphale wanting so desperately to confess the same.
Falling in love with you…
He pulled himself from the trance with a giant inhale of air into his lungs. He’d ended up lying across Crowley, who had sat down with Aziraphale in his strong arms, sharp hip digging into Aziraphale’s own softness. And with one swift move, Aziraphale moved up Crowley’s body, shuttered his eyes, relaxed his jaw, and kissed him.
The press of mouths was both familiar and new, the memory of their first kiss lingering in the back of Aziraphale’s mind as he moved his mouth over Crowley’s. His love filled him like a warm scented bath overflowing, the feeling of it in his fingertips where he touched Crowley’s jaw, the reflection of it in the way Crowley kissed him back.
Aziraphale pulled his mouth away but did not go far. “The others..?”
“Went to get coffee,” Crowley told him. Golden eyes peeked from beneath lowered lashes. “You remember.”
“I remember,” Aziraphale confirmed. He swallowed. He leaned forward and kissed him, butCrowley gently pushed him away again by the shoulders, then seemed to change his mind and chased Aziraphale’s mouth with his own, kissing him again.
Eventually, Crowley whispered, words kept close between them, “I can’t do this, angel. I can’t do this again.”
“Why?” said Aziraphale, anguished.
“You’ll go,” Crowley predicted.
Cognitive dissonance reigned in Aziraphale’s mind: Crowley was correct, but also so, so wrong. “I’m not going to leave Earth this time,” Aziraphale promised. He caught the flash of helpless hope that came over Crowley’s face. “But…” Aziraphale whispered.
“But,” agreed Crowley. He moved to stand up, pulling Aziraphale with him with his great strength.
Aziraphale stood before Crowley yet again, as he had so many times before, face turned upwards imploringly. “But Jesus Christ is here. And he’s right, and good, and I want to help him. You like him too, don’t you?”
“He’s alright,” Crowley murmured. He blinked slowly, like he was drained of thought, but no less emotional than before.
“He’s going to bring peace to the land,” Aziraphale argued. Crowley had not disagreed with him, exactly, but he seemed to slowly withdraw. “What if you… What if you help him, like you did last time he walked the Earth? You and me, together –” His throat caught on how familiar this conversation sounded to his own ears, the horrible, familiar despair on Crowley’s face. “Let’s both help him, this time. Not just you, not just me.”
Crowley stared at him for such a long moment that when he lifted his hand to graze his knuckles against Aziraphale’s jawline Aziraphale barely registered the touch. Crowley’s hand lingered, and Aziraphale finally caught up to the warmth of Crowley’s fingers against his skin.
“Okay, angel,” Crowley said. He dropped his hand and turned his face to the window, the bright light shining through made him narrow his eyes a little. “Speak of the devil,” he added.
Jesus was outside, strolling down the busy street. People and cars stopped to stare and bask in his glowing glory. He took a couple of selfies with adoring fans, hugged a granny, and waved to a group of friends.
It took a while for him to finally make it to the record shop, but when he did, he pushed through the door, alone, grinning easily and genuinely happy to see them.
“Hey, guys!” he greeted. “Oh My God My Mother, I love this place!” He pivoted on one heel three-sixty, eyes and mouth wide. “It’s so colourful and happy!”
For some reason, Aziraphale’s instinct was to not tell Jesus he had his memory back. But he did inform Jesus, his own mouth widening into a grin, “We have some news.”
Jesus turned to him, smile lopsided with half-uncertainty. Crowley fished a pair of sunglasses from his jacket pocket and placed them on his own face, then crossed his arms.
Aziraphale told Jesus, “Crowley and I… Well, we’ve decided to help you. Together. Isn’t that grand?”
Jesus’s answering grin was as bright as the sun, eyes twinkling like light reflected on deep twilight waters. “Yes!” he exclaimed. “Haha! That’s amazing news!” He hugged Aziraphale and then Crowley in turn, then left a hand on each of their shoulders. “I’ll be honest, I was so worried when I came here looking for you. I thought, ‘I’m due for a difficult conversation’. But you guys… ahh!” he cut off his own sentence with a happy yell. “This calls for a selfie!” And with that, he abruptly whipped out his celestial phone, turned around and posed. Aziraphale barely had a chance to smile before a picture was snapped.
Jesus stared at the photo on his screen for a while. “I’m going to cherish this moment.” Then he inhaled deeply through his nose and turned to them, smoothly pocketing his phone. “So! This is going to be much easier working in a team. Best team ever! I’ll just, um…” He strode in a circle ,looking this way and that – then he drew a magical line in the air with his finger from which hepulled a whiteboard and marker.
Jesus cleared his throat. “So, okay. I’ve got a five-year plan. Barely in motion. Early days.” He drew a circle in the middle of the whiteboard and then wrote PLAN in the middle. From the circle he drew a line, then wrote WW3 at the end of it.
Crowley frowned. “Please tell me that stands for World Wrestling 3."
Dread filled Aziraphale, making him breathe faster. Was it just him, or was the room getting darker?
Jesus laughed. “Oh, Crowley,” he said, “you’re so funny. I missed you. Anyway, you don’t have to worry about this part of the plan, because the human race is nearly there at this rate. It’s a shame we lost Trump, but there are many other politicians in place I can use and work with.”
“‘It’s a shame…’” Aziraphale repeated slowly, quietly, “‘we lost Trump’?”
Aziraphale and Crowley exchanged glances. Crowley’s expression did not change much though, because –
Because Crowley knew .
Jesus gestured placatingly. “Again, don’t worry about this step. I’m all over it. I’m just going to make sure nuclear war occurs within the five year plan –”
Aziraphale felt himself dip into the tell-tale signs of hyperventilation. He felt rather than saw Crowley reach for his hand, and Aziraphale took Crowley’s warm hand into his own and held on tight.
Jesus drew another line and wrote ROBOT DOGS on the end of it. “I know artificial intelligence isn’t necessarily your strong suit, Aziraphale, but I’m going to get you to head this one,” Jesus told him as he drew a little picture of a dog with floppy ears and crazy eyes. “Obviously ChatGPT is absolutely rubbish, but the British military has a particularly volatile AI in the works at the moment that will be just perfect for human reduction. I’ll get you to pop over to your nearest military base when you have a moment and give them a couple of blessings to get their drones and dogs into a more bloodthirsty mood. Speed up production too, if you can.”
Jesus drew another line. At the end he wrote ZOMBIES.
“You are gonna love this one, Crowley. I’m going to get you to manage the team in Hell who will be overseeing the zombie virus. Check in with Furfur; he’s worked with zombies before. It’s going to be so fun for you guys; gonna make the last pandemic look like a fun fair.”
He drew one more line. At the end he wrote RAPTURE. Then he dropped the marker and put his hands on his hips and announced, “Ah, my favourite part of the plan. I am going to have a blast .” He turned to Aziraphale and Crowley –
And saw their faces.
Aziraphale wasn’t the kind of angel to faint like a stereotypical maiden, despite his record of putting himself in situations which required Crowley rescuing him. But he felt faint now.
Jesus’s smile faded and his brow creased. “Oh, Aziraphale,” he breathed in disappointment, “you got your memory back.” He gazed at Crowley next. “I guess you gave it to him, somehow? You are so much more powerful than The Metatron gave you credit for.”
Aziraphale could not speak, so Crowley did it for him: “You want to kill everyone on Earth. Destroy everything. Why?”
Jesus laughed incredulously, then tipped his head to the side in confusion. “Are you seriously asking me that?” When the angel and demon did not answer the son of God, he told them, “This place is a shithole.” He looked at them imploringly, like he was hoping that they were joking. When they didn’t respond, Jesus explained, “There’s nothing good left here. Ninety percent of the world’s forests are gone. There’s rapid global warming. Just last year, ten thousand baby penguins died in one single moment. Suicide and violence are at an all-time high. Like –” Jesus huffed and puffed, still unable to believe that Aziraphale and Crowley did not see that the world’s inhabitants were worth destroying. “I have to do something, don't I? I can’t just leave Earth the way it is. That would just be cruel.”
“There are people here,” Crowley growled angrily, “ children living here.”
“Well, yeah,” said Jesus, looking offended. “That’s why I’m thinking of doing the Rapture sooner rather than later. I’m going to judge everyone and send all the innocent souls to Heaven first. Then , when they all start dying, I’ll judge the rest of the dead, and if they’re, like, you know, borderline innocent, I will send their souls to Purgatory for reincarnation. I mean, I know Purgatory is the first level of Hell, but I’ll be taking control of it, see. Then, when we make Earth two-point-zero,” he added, explaining slowly but enthusiastically, like it’s the best idea ever, “we’ll repopulate it with the almost-good souls. With some tweaking, of course. Turn down the greed and violent tendencies, something like that, I don’t know.”
“Earth 2.0,” Crowley clarified. “And when the people of Earth 2.0 don’t reach your standards, are you going to kill them all again and make Earth 3.0?”
Jesus blew out air through pressed lips, making a faint raspberry noise. “Honestly, Crowley, you are hard work. I’ll be judging the souls in Hell, too, you know,” he added, like he was offering him a complimentary coffee with his meal. “All the souls who went to Hell hundreds of years ago for misdemeanours, like cheating on their spouses, will get a re-judgement. A chance to prove they’ve been rehabilitated and can go on to the next life. Honestly, I don’t know why you’re both upset.”
“And the children?” Aziraphale put in quietly.
An expression of cognitive dissonance seemed to cross Jesus’s face before it disappeared with a press of his lips. “Children and parents are constantly suffering in this current mortal realm. But then, you don’t really care about that, do you?”
Aziraphale took offence, and the anger that pulsed through him was refreshing. His eyes flashed.
Jesus met his gaze with ire of his own. “I heard a rumour the two of you met for a romantic rendezvous in France during the Reign of Terror. You both lived in London during the height of the British Empire and all the splendour that went with it, having romantic cups of coffee while the world suffers the worst slave labour it has ever seen.” Jesus shook his head in disappointment. “I need your help. Both of you. But The Metatron was an idiot to only erase the memories of one of you, so let’s just try this conversation again, okay?”
Crowley squeezed Aziraphale’s hand, pulling Aziraphale’s attention back to him.
Crowley said, “I love you too,” and of course , Aziraphale had told Crowley he had loved him last night, hadn’t he?
“I’ll never forget you,” Aziraphale told him. “It doesn’t matter how many times they do this to us, I’ll find you again, do you understand?”
Jesus raised a hand, performed his miracle, and Crowley’s eyes rolled back before his lids closed. He flopped into Aziraphale’s arms, fast asleep. Aziraphale lowered him gently to the shop floor, vision becoming blurry with tears as he adjusted Crowley’s head, swiping a thumb lovingly against his jaw.
Jesus said, “It’s not so bad. I’m going to make Crowley the Grand Duke of Hell. There’s a power vacuum down there and I actually believe he will be very good at the job. Not only that –” Jesus grinned down at Aziraphale, all teeth, “I’m going to keep The Metatron’s promise and make you Supreme Archangel of Heaven. Won’t that be nice?”
Aziraphale glared up at him. “Go fuck yourself,” he said, voice hoarse.
Jesus lifted his hand. “You should lie down for this,” he advised; “wouldn’t want you to hit your head.”
*
Year 3024
(One thousand years later)
After the Supreme Archangel Aziraphale was captured by Hell
It had been a long and boring eternity.
Crowley sauntered to the dungeons where the Supreme Archangel Aziraphale was being kept prisoner.
Archangel Aziraphale, Crowley thought to himself with guarded affection. He told his demon heart to stop beating so rapidly, and for his hands to stop shaking.
With a flick of his fingers, Crowley miracled open the door to the dungeons.