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The TARDIS had no windows. Not that windows would do you any good when moving through time as well as space. As such the Doctor had developed something of a habit of parking the TARDIS in rather odd and/or unconventional places. They only parked the TARDIS inside when they intended to do so. Most of the time.
But there were times that the TARDIS had materialised indoors and the Doctor (and their current companion) didn’t know until they stepped out. Office buildings, alien spaceships, and on one notable occasion, an Angel’s bookshop. Windows would have helped immensely in all of those cases.
It was a pleasant Thursday afternoon. A. Z. Fell and Co. was still open for business but was not going to be for much longer, at this rate.
Aziraphale sat on the sofa tucked away behind the bookcases halfway through a reread of Agatha Christie’s Death in the Clouds when he heard a peculiar sound. It sounded like a cross between an out of tune violin and a car horn.
The Angel abandoned his book on the sofa to go investigate what had made the sound, although not before he had marked his spot with a bookmark. Emerging from within the shelves, Aziraphale discovered a blue Police call box standing in the middle of the open space between the door and the bookcases. Which certainly hadn’t been there earlier.
What was that doing here? Police call boxes hadn’t existed since the 1950s and certainly not inside shops. Let alone his shop.
The box’s door creaked open and two people emerged from within. A red-haired human lady in a gray dress and purple cardigan, and…a very familiar-looking person in a long brown coat whose aura was definitely not human despite their appearance. Aziraphale caught sight of some kind of machine that was glowing green behind them.
“The 2020s! fantastic decade—“
“Why do you have my husband’s face?” the Angel demanded, before he had the time to think of anything else to say.
“What?” they questioned. Both of the newcomers looked very confused.
What were they? A Demon with the power to steal other’s faces? Another Angel with that power? Or something else entirely? They must have the ability to change face.
And Aziraphale hadn’t seen Crowley all day, it was nearing three p.m., the last time that he had looked at a clock. Usually the Demon would have shown up around lunchtime at the very latest, like clockwork.
“Your face, it isn’t yours. Why did you take it?” he pressed. “What did you do to Crowley?”
“Crowley?” they asked, the confusion disappearing from their face.
“No, no! I haven’t done anything to them!” they insisted. “Well not in the last twenty years, at least,” And then, quieter: “He’s still hanging around here? After all this time?”
So this mysterious unknown not-human did know Crowley after all. It wasn’t just the face that was the same (well, except for the hair), it was the voice too.
“Yes?” he said, unsure of what else to say. Now it was his turn to be confused.
“And if he’s your husband…you must be Aziraphale!” they exclaimed, eyes lighting up.
“I am,” he confirmed with a nod.
“Doctor, who is this man?” the lady asked, interrupting their conversation.
“Someone very dear to a friend of mine,” they told her. “Speaking of, where is Crowley?” They looked around the shop, as if trying to find the Demon, even peering around the police box.
“Sorry, who are you?” Aziraphale asked, instead of answering their question.
“I’m the Doctor,” they introduced themself.
That was a very vague name, or was it a title in the way that the word was intended to be used?
“And this is Donna,” They turned to the red-haired lady.
“Hi,”
“What exactly are you a doctor of?” he asked.
“Oh, many things,” they said with a gesture to nothing.
Before any of them could say anything more, the door opened and someone entered the shop.
“Angel? You here—?“ Crowley’s voice called out.
The Demon came to a sudden stop not too far from Aziraphale. He looked both shocked and confused, although certainly more shocked than confused.
“Doctor? What’re you doing here?” he asked. “What’s with the face? And that suit? Where’d the scarf go?”
“Sorry about the face — I knew it looked familiar,” they said, the second part sounded like it was more directed towards themself than Crowley.
“You two do know each other!” Aziraphale interjected. “Crowley, how do you know this Doctor?” He turned to his husband.
“Oh, they’re an old friend,”
Well that was infromative.
“Would someone please tell me who you two are?” Donna asked. “Or am I gonna have to keep standing here all confused?” she added.
Aziraphale echoed the sentiment.
“Right, yes…Donna, this is Crowley, I met them in the 1860s, although not with this face,” The Doctor introduced him. “And this is Aziraphale, he owns this bookshop,”
“Hello,” the Angel greeted pleasantly. “Now, this is very interesting and all, but could you please park that…police box—“
“—the TARDIS,” the Doctor corrected him.
“—the TARDIS outside? This bookshop is still open and I doubt that you want any customers who come in here to ask questions about it,” Aziraphale said.
“No, no I do not. Won’t be a moment,”
“Thank you.”
The Doctor and Donna returned back inside the police box, shutting the door behind them. The same out of tune violin-car horn cross sound filled the shop and the TARDIS faded out of sight.
It reappeared in the alleyway behind the bookshop, not that either Aziraphale or Crowley would know that.
The Doctor and Donna came back inside after having moved the TARDIS.
Despite Aziraphale’s confusion and mistrust of them, Crowley seemed to not only have befriended the Doctor but trusted them too. And he did not trust people easily, so the Angel decided that he would trust them as well. For the time being.
The rest of the afternoon saw a pot of tea (which had originally been lemon-ginger but had since been miracled into the green it had remained as for the next three hours) being shared and even more questions from both sides.
“Those two…they weren’t human, were they?” Donna asked when she and the Doctor were back in the TARDIS standing around the console later.
“No, they aren’t,” they agreed as they fiddled with something.
“Then what are they? Aliens? They looked pretty human,” she commented.
“They’re not technically alien either, not in the same way I am,”
Okay, now that’s just confusing.
“What do you mean ‘not technically alien’? You aren’t having me on, are you?” Donna said.
“Nope. Supernatural beings — well Angel and Demon but that still counts as supernatural,” the Doctor explained.
Of all the wild things that she had been expecting them to say, supernatural beings hadn’t even made the list.
“What? An actual angel, like those in the Bible? Not like those murderous statues?” she questioned.
Although, now that she thought of it, those two being a Demon and an Angel made rather a lot of sense.
Who was which? Aziraphale definitely seemed more angelic than demonic but the way he had come storming out of the backroom and accused the Doctor of stealing his husband’s face, but Crowley appeared the opposite. Honestly it seemed equally possible that both of them were either.
“Those ‘murderous statues’ are Weeping Angels, Aziraphale’s just an Angel,” the Doctor explained, having finally finished with whatever he had been doing to the console. “Now, what do you think about a visit to Alpha Centauri?” they asked.
Well, now she had the answer to her most recent question.
“That sounds lovely,” Donna said. “As long as we’re going there because you want to and not because we’re responding to a signal,” she told them, sternly. “I don’t want another Library situation just yet,” she added.
“There’s no signal this time, I promise,” they reassured her.
“Alright.”
The sound of the TARDIS dematerialising filled the alleyway. It caught the attention of a man wearing far, far less clothing than was considered socially appropriate, not just in this century but in any century, carrying a cardboard box who happened to be walking past.