Archive of Our Own ^beta

Crowley's flat was typically empty of reading material. He loved newspapers, particularly British newspapers, and was quite proud of tabloids in particular, more for what they did to the brains of average people than for any of the actual stories. He'd yet to receive a commendation for them though, due to his inability to convince his superiors that nearly everything printed was, in fact, a sleazy lie.

Demonic intelligence was exactly like that of angels; not much higher than that of humans but with the benefit of a lot more experience. The intelligence and experience of Crowley's superiors had led them to believe that humans were capable of anything, that the Virgin Mary was an attention whore, and that aliens had abducted Elvis Presley. Despite his protests that only two of those things were true, Crowley had gotten points docked for telling the truth. He was still quite bitter about it, and therefore allowed very little printed material through his door.

However, a duffle bag full of books had been dropped by his front door where it sagged sadly, contents obviously sensing that they were not welcome. He'd driven off before the angel had a chance to fetch them from the car and as they were largely old, cryptic works of nonfiction, Aziraphale was likely to be quite upset about their loss. Crowley was pleased with his work, all in all.

He draped himself over his couch to lie back and await the fruits of his labors--namely, the angel huffing his way up the stairs (the lift being mysteriously out of order) and knocking politely on the door and even more politely asking for the return of his belongings (for which he had paid good money, he would undoubtedly mention. Good American money, no less). After listening to a lecture on exchange rates, the global economy, and the unsanitary nature of paper money in general, Crowley would saunter over and finally open the door, looking as innocent as a man-shaped being with bright yellow eyes, vertical pupils, and an interesting tongue could.

This would fool no one, of course, least of all an angel who had known the man-shaped being since approximately the dawn of time (give or take a little nothingness) but it would be amusing nonetheless.

Then he would invite the angel in to search the place, offer him tea, cocoa, or wine, and give him liquor no matter which he chose. Within twenty minutes the books would be found and forgotten and they'd be debating the relative merits of their favorite alcoholic beverages over the millennia (Aziraphale would choose some ridiculously obscure wine but he'd be lying, and Crowley would argue for absinthe but eventually admit to favoring one of the cheap American beers. 'They do so much of my work for me,' he'd say, to make the angel sigh). And then when he got bored, he'd lie down to enjoy perhaps a decade of deep, dreamless sleep.

After two hours of maintaining his careless sprawl across the couch, Crowley abandoned it and sat up, scowling. No fruit seemed to be forthcoming. Aziraphale was undoubtedly attempting to spite him. He was probably waiting for Crowley to bring the books back, operating under the assumption that Crowley had a shred of decency buried somewhere deep inside him and would begin to regret his actions sooner or later.

Which Crowley did not and would not, of course.

He can be so stupid, Crowley thought as he gripped the handle of the duffel bag and left his flat. He could be so stubborn. Aziraphale could never give up on a lost cause; he still believed in that whole ineffability business for Go--for Luc--for Someone's sake.

The flat locked itself up behind him. The houseplants rustled and something that was just barely a sound drifted through the empty space. Maybe the heat had clicked on. Maybe a butterfly had flapped its wings and sent tiny ripples of wind whirling around the world. Maybe a breeze caused by the recent slam of the door had rustled the leaves of the houseplants and made a noise like the sigh of a soldier allowing himself to relax for one brief moment.

Probably not, though. No demon with an ounce of self-respect would need heat, after all.

~~~~~

"Do these blasted birds never die?" Crowley snapped as he thumped down onto the bench that Aziraphale had claimed. It had been several years since the last time they'd sat together on this bench, but it might as well have been the previous afternoon for all that things had changed. An elderly drake who looked exactly like the elderly drake that Crowley had been attempting to drown for what seemed like centuries floated placidly near the shore, belly suspiciously round. He was undoubtedly full of pastry, as Aziraphale had a shredded danish on a napkin spread across his knee.

Better his belly than the angel's, Crowley thought, not resisting the urge to poke Aziraphale in his well-padded side. It wasn't Crowley's job to resist his urges, after all.

Aziraphale blinked at him, looking as innocent as it was possible for a man-shaped yet vaguely pastry-like being with blue eyes and an ordinary tongue to look, which was actually not very innocent in the case of this man-shape. Something to do with the mouth, Crowley had always thought. "Well," he said. "Erm. No." He coughed.

Crowley sighed. "Oh, all right, if you feel you must," he said. He took a piece of danish and tossed it to the little drake, who went from placid to gobbling to placid again in what was remarkably less than two full seconds.

"I just wanted to be certain that we'd find some familiar faces upon our return," Aziraphale said. "Because of the neighbors all moved or dead and the no one to recognize us at our favorite little cafes, if our favorite little cafes were still open at all. So I thought, who could still be around, unchanged, without inspiring comment?"

"The ducks."

AND ME, said a tall person in black who sort of stood nearby, not watching Aziraphale and Crowley or the ducks. He had his eyes, such as they were, on a pair of nondescript gentlemen who might as well have had Secret Government Operative written all over them. YOU CAN FIND MY FACE WHEREVER YOU GO. IT WILL BE AS FAMILIAR TO YOU AS YOUR OWN.

He grinned. He couldn't quite manage to do anything else, after all. IN FACT, IT WILL BE YOUR OWN.

"Quite right," agreed Aziraphale, who promptly forgot the person as soon as he had finished speaking. "The ducks. A good idea, if I do say so myself."

"Hmph." Crowley tossed more pastry. "Got your books in the car," he said, casually. "Thought you might want 'em back."

Aziraphale turned sideways and beamed at him, clapping gloved hands. "Oh, I knew you'd bring them. Thank you, Crowley. I've been looking forward to putting them on my own shelves for an age."

"Yeah, well, if you want them you'll have to sink my duck." Crowley smirked, looking at Aziraphale from over the top of his dark shades, being sure to put a little extra gleam in the yellows of his eyes.

"That stopped impressing me years ago, dear," Aziraphale said, patting his hand affectionately.

Crowley slumped a little, stopped making his eyes glow, and pushed his shades back up. "You'll have to go to the Ritz with me, then," he said, only a trifle petulant. "And buy me lobster for lunch."

"Oh, I spent quite a bit on those books, you know," Aziraphale said. "And my shop was closed for all the years that we were gone. Does it have to be lobster? Perhaps...tuna?"

"Fine, I'll buy my own damned lobster. Just--" Crowley rose and stood, glowering, arms folded over his chest. "Just get in the car, angel," he hissed. "Or your books get it."

"If you feel that strongly about it, I suppose I could join you for a meal." The rest of the danish was dispersed among the ducks and Aziraphale rose and began to brush the crumbs off his jacket. Because he was who he was, some crumbs remained and Crowley was obliged to brush those ones off himself. No food in the car, that was the rule, and Crowley enforced it rigidly. He wasn't about to lower his standards for one sloppy angel who couldn't seem to avoid crumbs, he thought, scowling.

Then Aziraphale coughed a little, politely, and he realized that there was less brushing going on than he'd intended, and more gripping of the shoulder. He gave the angel a hearty, companionable thump on the back and then said, "It's a wonder you don't have mice living in your pockets, 's all," and strode off to the car.

~~~~~

The tall person in black stared at the drake. The drake stared back. It had been old even before Aziraphale had gotten to it, and for a duck to get old required some fierce duck intelligence. It knew what it was looking at and what it was expected to do.

However, it also know where its pastry came from.

YOUR TIME TOO WILL COME, the tall person didn't say. The duck, who had heard him quite clearly anyway, flicked its tail feathers and paddled away.

HMPH. He turned, and his pale horse was there at his side, though no pale horse had walked across the grass or swum across the pond to join him. WE WILL RETURN, he told the horse before he mounted it and rode off, resolutely ignoring the harsh, smug chortle of the drake.

~~~~~

After lunch, Crowley didn't drive the angel back to his bookstore, and Aziraphale didn't ask to go. They listened to Crowley's favorite mixed CD on the ride to his flat (a soundtrack of insanely rich artists all singing about their childhoods in poverty, illegally downloaded off the internet) which was one of the few things that could be left in the car without becoming a Queen album. This, Crowley felt, was due to the fact that the music currently playing was far far worse than anything Queen had ever manifested, and therefore it needed no alteration.

He carried the bag of books to the lift (which was mysteriously working again. Perhaps the maintenance man had come before five on the appointed day. Or, perhaps, the demon in residence had decided he didn't want to hike up the stairs) and his apartment unlocked itself for him. The plants rustled to attention. Despite the fact that it was unplugged and lacking speakers, the stereo began to play something far more melodious than Crowley's mixed CD, although the song it played had never been recorded and had not actually been performed since roughly 56 BC.

Crowley dropped the duffle bag by the door, earning a glare from the angel that quite pleased him. "Tea? Cocoa? Wine?"

"Oh, cocoa, if it's no trouble," Aziraphale said.

Crowley smiled, and materialized a tumbler of scotch. Aziraphale looked down into the glass, shrugged, and sipped. Crowley's feeling of self-satisfaction came back in full force. His plan had been working all along, he congratulated himself, for here was the angel wandering his flat, alcoholic beverage in hand.

Of course, there was no lecture forthcoming so far as he could tell and the bag of books looked much less sad and neglected with their owner there, so what exactly Crowley had been right about was unclear. The presence of the angel was technically the only thing that matched his original plan.

That seemed to be quite enough for him.

He glared at his houseplants as Aziraphale approached them, to remind them of their manners; his smug and satisfied feeling increased when they trembled and spread their luxurious greenery just a little bit more.

"No need to terrify them so," the angel said disapprovingly. He ran his hand lightly over a few of the weaker leaves and they grew stronger and more brilliantly green; he touched the soil around their roots and every plant looked suddenly a bit taller.

Crowley scowled. Aziraphale had done that to his garden in America and Crowley had never managed to get it properly cowed again afterwards. "There's every need; you take your hands off them right now," he hissed with as much threat as he could manage. The angel looked at him fondly and finished his work with the plants.

"I hate to be a demanding guest, my dear," Aziraphale said when he was done. "But could I trouble you for something perhaps a little more, mmm, fermented than this? I seem to recall that you have a particularly fine hand with ouzo, once upon a time."

"It's no trouble," Crowley said, smiling just a little. "'sss no trouble at all."

~~~~~

Four hours later, the angel had exhausted Crowley's ability to materialize ouzo and gotten into the absinthe, and Crowley himself was getting quietly sloshed on cheap American beer.

Aziraphale was talking. "An' my neighboys. Bors. My neighbors. They're hardware."

"Like wrenches?" Crowley asked. He had his chin braced on his hand, though perhaps it was the other way around, and was watching Aziraphale with the bleary lack of concentration of someone who was going to need lots and lots of aspirin in the morning, provided he forgot that he was a demon, which was a possibility after enough beer. "Like, whatzit, nuts and bolts?"

"Nuh, no, their shop is hardware. And my other other other neighbors--" He leaned across the table and beckoned to Crowley, then winced when their heads banged together. "Owwww. Make your head less hard."

Crowley tried but nothing happened. "Can't," he said, apologetically. "Seems to have gotten stuck that way."

Aziraphale frowned at him and continued. "My other other other neighbors still sell pornography," he said. "'z very interesting; for a welcome present they brought me--"

"Duuuuuun wanna know," Crowley said, holding a hand up. "Shh. Duuuuuuuun tell me."

"Fine. Tell your own. Your own stories." Aziraphale sat back and copied Crowley's pose, chin in hand. "Hmm. And how was your first day back?"

It was bloody boring and I couldn't wait until you came back to entertain me, Crowley thought, perhaps a little less blearily than he should have. Then he shrugged. "Nothing much different. Plants got all relaxed." He glared in their direction. "Limp, like," he said, raising his voice. "Need to take something to the incinerator tomorrow, I 'spect."

Something squeaked. Possibly it was the sound of a terrified fern cowering in its pot. Or, possibly, the demon's apartment was infested with mice.

"And? What else?"

"Uh." Crowley looked around. "'z prolly it. Don't know." He shrugged again. "Don't really care."

"Really, my dear, that. Shameful, that is," Aziraphale murmured. "You don't care about anything that happened while we were away?"

Crowley thought about it again. "Uhm. Nah."

The angel hummed to himself for a moment, which meant he was thinking hard. Really hard. The music of the celestial spheres is mostly just angels trying to add one to two. Or subtract one from billions, which is much easier.

"Oh, yes," he said, sitting up and beaming across the table. "I've got it, Crowley! Our godson, Adam. Surely you're interested in what's happened to him since we left?"

"You," Crowley said, pointing to a place where the angel wasn't, quite. "You. You."

Aziraphale blinked at him, then looked around. When he met Crowley's gaze again--well, when he looked at his own reflection in the dark shades--he seemed surprised to be the center of attention. Who else would I be looking at? Crowley tried to ask. What came out was, "Mphgumph."

"Sometimes I just can't tell if you're using slang at me," Aziraphale complained, frowning, tapping his manicured fingernails against the table.

Crowley tried to whack his hand to get him to stop that infer--that bless--that tapping, but missed and knocked himself off balance. "Was a brat," he said insistently to the table top. "Brat. 'z all grown up now and bet he's a bigger brat, is all. Also, you're not a. You're no king. I have no Frankenstein or myrrh. And t'other one. Ours was the other one, anyway. Drink more and shut up."

"That's all wrong. That's wise men, not godfathers. I mean, we're not wise men, we're godfathers. His as much as Warlock's, the dear boy!" Aziraphale beamed. "Although if you'd like, we could certainly bring Adam something. A gift. A welcome home present." He smiled some more in what Crowley felt was an all too godfatherly kind of way, which was clearly meant as an assault. Crowley put his hand up so he couldn't see the angel's face anymore but his hand just got warm-feeling and tingly. The angel was really beaming. He didn't even have a halo and he was still all glowy, and that could mean only one thing.

"Tollhouse?" he said hopefully, putting down his hand. If he had to go play the doting godfather, maybe he'd at least get some chocolate chips out of the deal--

"Sugar, I think," the angel said. "Sober. Should be sober for baking." He shook himself a little, then sat up straight. "You too," he demanded, and Crowley sighed.

Sugar cookies. He hated sugar cookies, as Aziraphale knew very well. Punishment, that's what it was. Retribution. "Didn't even creassssse your bookssss," he hissed, but he sobered up and then set about straightening his clothes. He snapped his fingers, and immediately looked as neatly pressed as any gentleman turned out by a valet. "No, leave it," he said to the angel, who was struggling to put an arm back into the sleeve of his suit coat. He was wearing armbands to hold his rumpled shirt sleeves. They made Crowley want to do bad things, like turn them into rubber bands meant to be snapped, or something. Something. Something else.

Aziraphale looked at him and he looked back, and the coat went back to being draped over the back of Aziraphale's chair.

"We should make them from scratch," Aziraphale said thoughtfully, after they had stared at each other a while. Crowley, who had never hated the angel's love of doing things the way real people did any more than he hated it in that moment, snapped his fingers, and set the oven to preheat.

~~~~~

He spent most of the ride to Lower Tadfield sulking and materializing chocolate chip cookies, which he ate with lots of little satisfied noises and no offers to share.

Served the angel right, he thought, licking melty chocolate off his fingers. So far as he was concerned, this was the most foolish of fool's errands, and absolutely no way to spend his first evening back in England after more than a decade in America. He'd much preferred sitting at his table and drinking with the angel, which was how he'd spent a good deal of that decade. Aziraphale had been more fun there. Crowley was half-tempted to remember a 'forgotten' task and make the angel go back with him.

"Probably won't even remember us," he grumbled when he was tired of the cookies and perhaps feeling a bit ill. That was the problem with putting so much effort into a making a body be very nearly human. It started freaking out about things like overindulging in chocolate and watching an angel bite his lip as he decorated baked goods. Was almost enough to persuade a demon to drop the man-shape altogether.

Almost.

"If he does remember us, he'll probably try to smite us," he continued. "Probably got a sword. A good sword. Real Toledo steel. Dipped in holy water and. And." He tried to remember something that the angel really hated. "And raspberry vinaigrette," he said triumphantly. "Positively dripping with raspberry vinaigrette!"

"He'll remember," Aziraphale said, tranquil as a summer day.

Tranquil summer days always made Crowley want to kick things. He scowled and the car, now painted in a glossy, blood red, the kind of blood red that suggested an artery bleeding itself out, shuddered around them and went faster. Much faster and it'd break the sound barrier, Crowley thought, and he pushed a little more. There was a satisfying BANG and the angel looked at him with disapproval. The angel always looked disapproving when Crowley drove. Sometimes, he even looked disapproving when Crowley was stopped.

Once, in America, Crowley had smiled at a pretty girl while their cars sat side by side waiting for a light to go green. You'll want to pull over in the next busy intersection and strip naked and run across the road, he thought to her, imagining all the lovely accidents. But there were some girls who were completely immune to his suggestions--usually, they were the ones who had already done every wild and devilish thing he could think of for a pretty young girl to do.

This one had looked at him and looked at his car and said, 'Compensating much, hon?' and then laughed as she drove off. He'd popped all four of her tires and crashed her into a telephone pole, and if the angel had actually had blood pressure, he'd have had a stroke.

In the end, Crowley had to let her walk away from the, uh, 'accident' unscathed. That hadn't been part of the plan, and he still regretted it bitterly. But better that than facing the angel's ire, which wasn't nearly as fun as his disapproval, and usually involved a lot of huffy sniffing and not speaking until Crowley had managed to do nothing at all like apologize, and yet still make him less mad. That was a very fine line to tread and sometimes it just seemed easier to avoid the situation entirely.

He smiled at Aziraphale. This was his best smile, the one with a surprising number of teeth and the flicker of a forked tongue between them. "Raspberry vinaigrette and cheap wine," he hissed, and Aziraphale looked away. It was good to know that there were some things that seemed to work against the angel; these days it seemed like entirely too many things worked for him. Crowley sat back in his seat and gloated, feeling quite a bit better about this waste of an evening.

~~~~~

Tadfield had not changed, so far as Crowley cared to see. It was green. The sunset had a lovely glow that made the whole area seem peaceful and sleepy. The angel shifted in his seat and sat up straighter, made a little noise that had Crowley snickering for the next four miles, until they passed an older gentleman walking an obviously elderly and arthritic poodle. The gentleman stared at the car as it approached, stared at it as it went past, and then stared as it drove away.

The staring as they drove away might have been because Crowley turned his head all the way around on his neck to stare back, but it might have been because of something else. Crowley's appealing smile, for example.

"It's still loved here," the angel said, and Crowley turned his head around. There was a smile on that round, creamy face, the kind of smile that didn't appear often. Crowley gulped. "He hasn't left. It's still so loved. But it's. It's." He hummed, and lapsed into a close imitation of angelic catatonia.

"It's? It's what? It's annoying? It's quaint? It's about to get eaten by a creature from the deepest depths? What?" he snapped, after the humming had gone on for so long that he was feeling a vague urge to hum too. Demons don't harmonize, he reminded himself. Not unless it's with tones that make the ears of all the listeners explode and their heads fall to the ground in big mushy heaps, anyway.

"It's the love of a caretaker, of someone who understands his place," Aziraphale said, and he sighed. "Oh, it's beautiful, my dear. He really has grown up. Turn left here."

The car turned left as Aziraphale said the words, as obedient as ever. The road they turned onto was long and winding and narrow, and deserted. There were no houses, only fields that stretched off forever, and dark, shady woods of the type favored by old British poets. Crowley entertained a moment's brief fantasy of fire, and they drove on in silence until a sign appeared, freshly painted in green and white.

In big, spiky block printing, obviously done by hand

ADAM'S GARAGE AND FIX-IT

In smaller letters with more curve and curl to them

THERE IS NO DAMAGE THAT WILL NOT BE UNDONE

Larger letters again, in a different, more tidy hand

Reasonable Rates! The Best Service Around! Inquire Within!
(Turn Left at the Next Drive, Knock at Office Door!)

"The Antichrist runs a fix-it," Crowley said, slowly. For roughly the millionth time since he'd been shoved onto this planet slithering and hissing, he was surprised by what all they got up to when you left them alone for a moment or a decade or two.

Aziraphale laughed, which was rare enough that Crowley looked at him with genuine surprise, and then had to be glad for the safety of his shades. The angel was beaming at him again. "Come now, Crowley," he said merrily, "who better for the job than the boy who could destroy anything?"

~~~~~

Back on the main road, the older gentleman stared off into space, deliberately ignoring the poodle.

Sirs, he thought, just today I was confronted by a young man who could...who had...whose head...

Sirs, the lack of respect shown to a gentleman my age by the youth of today is a startling contrast to the days of my youth, when decent people kept their heads turned the right way around...

The poodle groaned, and Mr. Tyler scowled but did not look in its direction. As Shutzi grew increasingly aged, certain, erm, bodily functions seemed to slow down. They also seemed to require more effort and vocalizations. R.P. Tyler sometimes thought to himself that it was as if the old dog, who could be a cheeky bastard on occasion, was deliberately attempting to embarrass its owner. This was quite incorrect, of course.

As far as Shutzi was concerned, Mr. Tyler's mortification was merely a pleasant bonus.

SUCH TRIALS DO NOT LAST FOREVER.

"Excuse me, sir," snapped Mr. Tyler, "as I think they go on quite long enough, and are certainly not for strangers to comment upon--oh."

The pale horse dipped its great head to sniff at Shutzi in a mostly friendly fashion. Shutzi's bladder immediately emptied, which would have been a tremendous relief to both the small dog and its master, if the small dog hadn't been at the farthest end of its leash, trembling in terror, and its master hadn't been lying on the grass on the side of the road, heart quite suddenly stopped.

Mr. Tyler's vague memory of himself turned to the stranger. "And now what?" he demanded irritably. "How will my dog get home? And who will mow the lawn? Grass doesn't care for itself, you know."

I KNOW, Death said. BUT IT IS NO LONGER YOUR CONCERN.

"Maintaining the beauty of Our Fair Village is the primary concern of all its inhabitants, sir--"

YOU ARE THE INHABITANT OF A NEW VILLAGE NOW.

Then the stranger was gone. Mr. Tyler thought to himself, Sirs, the appalling lack of concern shown for our lives, or deaths such as they are...

The world faded away.

~~~~~

If it suits you to think that Shutzi waited with all the loyalty a beloved pet can muster for its newly deceased owner until someone found said deceased owner and pulled the leash from its cooling, stiffened hand, you can do so. Try not to think about the poodle's panic, its natural instincts, its still sharp little teeth.

Imagine instead that there will be a small statue erected in that same spot a few years later when Shutzi gives up the ghost, so to speak. His loving mistress will come by once a week to change the jeweled collar around the slim concrete throat. Sentimental folks will tear up a little when they hear the story, and children will pet the statue's head as they pass it by.

Isn't that a lovely image? Think about that instead, and don't worry. Nobody blamed Shutzi for what actually happened, anyway.

~~~~~

The porch of Adam's home was surrounded by bright flowers, carefully planted in regimented rows. There was a short stand with a shallow bowl containing an iridescent round ball. There was a thin layer of green slime around the base of the ball. There was also a flat little wooden man bent over to water the garden with a flat little wooden hose.

Crowley kicked him.

"Really, my dear." Aziraphale sighed at him as they climbed the stairs to the front door. "Was that necessary?"

Crowley ran his tongue over his teeth. "Yesss."

A little sign over the doorbell read 'please knock at the side door if you're here for business. please go away if you're here to sell us anything but candy.' Aziraphale shifted the covered plate from one hand to the other, dithering, until Crowley nudged him out of the way and leaned against the doorbell.

And leaned against the doorbell.

And leaned against the doorbell.

From inside the house came the sound of booted feet slamming down a flight of stairs, and then the door was being opened by a frazzled-looking young woman with flame red hair. She looked them up and down and said, "If you or anything you own or anything that owns you is broken, go to the side door. Otherwise, go away." And she started to shut the door.

Crowley shoved a large, snakeskin probably-a-shoe against the door and smiled at her. "I'd be glad to go away," he said, "but thisss one wantsss to bring Adam Young a treat, and we won't be leaving till it'sss done. May we come in?"

"Do step aside, my dear." Aziraphale smiled kindly at the woman, who was staring at Crowley with narrowed eyes. He leaned forward. "My companion will feel much more civilized if he's allowed to use your, erm, powder room," he whispered confidingly.

She looked at Aziraphale and her face relaxed subtly. Still, she hesitated another moment. Aziraphale continued smiling at her, his soft face the personification of benevolence. Crowley sulked. Clearly fighting her natural instincts, the woman stood aside. "Adam's in the garage," she said reluctantly. "Have a seat--first door to your left--and I'll just fetch him for you."

Aziraphale brushed past her, still smiling, patting her shoulder as he went. Crowley lingered to smile at her and say, "Thanksss," then sauntered after the angel. He felt much better again. He was very nearly having fun.

The plate was set on a table and the wrap pulled back. Everything on it was, of course, still as soft and warm as it had been fresh from the oven. Aziraphale picked through the stack of books beside the couch, shaking his head sadly at title after title. Crowley paced the room, taking in everything--the neatly arranged CDs on shelves, the stereo system that made his look like a shabby relation, the greasy towel carelessly kicked under a greying armchair, the swords crossed over the fireplace. The dog bed under the window, covered in white, tan and black hairs, surrounded by horribly mutilated toy rabbits. It was all very homey. It made him want to be violently ill. He turned to the angel, mouth opened to complain--

And Adam entered the room.

Well, to say that Adam entered the room would be something of an understatement. It was more like, Adam had suddenly appeared in a place that had been a weak imitation of room, like a faded photograph, and transformed it into a place that was warm and dry and got lots of sunshine no matter what the weather was, and always smelled of lemons and vanilla. Even though the room had been warm, dry, and nicely scented before he'd come into it at all. Everything was amplified. Everything felt more real than it had been before.

Crowley sniffed. He disapproved of parlor tricks.

"Hello," Adam said. "Been a while, 'asn't it?"

Aziraphale moved towards Adam, hands extended. "My dear boy," he said, sounding delighted. "How good it is to see you again! Have you been well?"

Adam allowed the angel to pull him into a brief hug. "Well enough." His voice was a clear, mellow tenor. He patted Aziraphale's back and Crowley saw that his hands were scarred, his fingers long and thin, the nails not quite entirely clean. He met Crowley's gaze over Aziraphale's shoulder and his eyes were a shade that Crowley had not seen in at least a few millennia. The same went for the dark gold of his hair, and the pink of his mouth, the beauty of his skin. He had chosen to be human, but blood would tell. Blood would always tell.

When Aziraphale stepped back, Crowley held out a hand, and Adam shook it briskly, then held it, and Crowley's gaze. "Take off the shades," he said, and Crowley did, tucking them into his jacket pocket with his free hand. Adam studied him, then smiled. "Much better," he said approvingly. "You shouldn't wear them. No one sees what you really are anyway, you know."

"Crowley has always had some silly little affectation," Aziraphale said. "You should have seen him in, oh, Greece a few thousand years ago; he always wore this little crown of--"

"Shove it, angel," said Crowley, glaring. Another of the body's little tricks that he quite despised was the flush. He did it no more than once every few hundred years, and usually on purpose. Some found it quite a temptation, after all. But this wasn't on purpose and if Aziraphale didn't shut up before it got worse, Crowley'd be forced to discorporate him, and he'd enjoy it. A lot.

Or he could just get his own back. He took his shades back out of his pocket and slid them on, instantly more comfortable. The glare became a leer and he said, "I could always tell him the story of your first attempt at the gavotte."

"I had two left feet at the time," Aziraphale explained sheepishly. "Small problem in Issuing. Got it figured out, though." He smiled at his feet which were, indeed, one left and one right, and both on their correct leg. His socks wouldn't match, Crowley knew, because he wasn't quite that good, but it was still an improvement.

Adam smiled, then sat down on the couch. There was a blur of motion that resolved itself into a small tricolored dog that scrambled out from underneath and went up, to sit on Adam's lap. It had one ear turned inside out, a stubby, wagging tail, and glowing red eyes.

"The hell-hound?" Crowley said, astonished. "It should only have served you as long as you were, erm." He waved his hands. "You know. Bent on destruction, and all that."

"He's my dog." Adam shrugged. "That came first, I guess."

"He must be quite old by now," Aziraphale said. He reached out to scratch the dog's head, and it grinned at him ferociously. His hand detoured to the plate of cookies instead.

HE WON'T LET ME HAVE THE BEAST, Death complained, voice perilously close to a whine.

Adam grinned. "No. I won't."

AND I CAN'T HAVE THE DUCK.

Aziraphale coughed. "Crowley's quite fond of it, I'm afraid," he said apologetically, and then he looked around, surprised. "I'm sorry," he said to Adam, "Did I just say something?"

CAN I HAVE THEM? Death asked. If a being such as himself could be said to sound hopeful, he would have. Instead he mostly sounded rattly.

Adam looked at the angel and the demon, his head cocked. He scratched Dog's side, and the little mutt's eyes closed in ecstasy. "Not as they are," he said to Death. "They're your cousins and therefore out of your league, I'm afraid."

DAMNATION.

"Out of that league, too," Adam said.

"I've always liked Manchester," Crowley said vaguely, then he blinked.

"Want one?" Adam held out the plate. Crowley took one and bit in. It was no longer one of the despised sugar cookies and was, in fact, gooey with chocolate. "Sit down and tell me how you've been." Adam sat back with one in his own hand. "I'm just dying to know," he murmured, smirking.

ONE DAY YOUR FATHER WILL REALIZE THAT I KNOW BEST AND THEN YOU WILL KNOW MY FURY.

Crowley shook his head, trying to get rid of the feeling that there was water in his ears. He sat down and tipped his head to one side, to the other, while Aziraphale popped a cookie into his mouth, got crumbs on his jacket that Crowley just knew were going to make their way into his car, and smiled at the Antichrist. "Well," he said, "we were reassigned, the two of us, on a temporary basis. I had no orders other than to thwart wiles, as usual. Crowley was to do as he felt best."

"Tempt," Crowley said helpfully, sprawling in his chair.

"Somehow it happened that we came to be working together." Aziraphale studied his neatly manicured nails, buffed them on his jacket. Crumbs fell off his lapel and into his lap. "And it took, oh, the better part of a decade, but yesterday I received word that it was time to come back. The forces of Good must have managed to prevail."

"Although Evil couldn't have lost too badly." Crowley licked his lips with his flickering tongue, and grinned.

Adam looked up at them and said, "I know that stuff, I know all of that story." He leaned forward. "Tell me," he said, "the story about your house."

"Erm," Aziraphale said, and Crowley turned on him.

"You see what happens? There we were, being all social and--" He looked at Adam, swallowed. "And plotting to rule the world and, and thwart the ruling of the world, right? But you had to go all nostalgic and 'let's visit our godson, the dear sweet boy!' and now look, we're being asked by the Antichrist to explain the New Arrangement! Are you happy, angel?"

Aziraphale coughed. "Um."

"Pair of great bloody idiots, we are," Crowley muttered. He picked up and savaged a cookie between his long, rather sharp teeth. "Go on, tell the boy everything, and be quick about it. I hate to wait when I'm about to be inconveniently discorporated."

"Right," Aziraphale said, trying to rally. "Right. Well. It happened like this--"

~~~~~

Pepper thumped up the stairs. She thumped down the hall. She thumped over backwards on the wide bed in her room and said, casually, "Got company."

Brian looked up from his easel--they'd flipped for whether this room would be his studio or her bedroom, and he'd lost because she'd taken Judo for seven years and he didn't like to get beat up by girls, and then he'd moved his art supplies in anyway. He had yellow paint on one eyebrow, brown paint across his cheeks and nose like freckles, and a puddle of blue paint on the small stretch of tarp where he was set up. A hamburger wrapper skittered across the floor, blown by a breeze that didn't quite exist.

"Yeah?" he asked. "What type?"

Pepper thought of the shoes, and the cookies, and the aura of good and evil that had not exactly followed the company in but instead preceded it, leaking into the woodwork and saturating the front hall. There'd be stains, of that she was certain. "The kind we won't remember came by," she said grimly. "Adam'll see to that, 'm sure."

"No point to worrying about it, then," Brian said, adding a careful daub of the blue paint to his canvas. Were she to look over his shoulder, Pepper was certain she'd see a big, chaotic splash of cheerful blue where he had just been.

"Hmph," she muttered. "Why he gets to have all the fun, I will just never know."

~~~~~

Adam sat back, waiting. Crowley chomped a cookie and spewed crumbs across the couch like gore in a bad horror film. I hope they never come out and the boy gets pests, he thought viciously.

Aziraphale looked back and forth between him and Adam, obviously at a loss for words. "There was. We had no assignments, and we were doing things alone, way across the country from each other, and then we weren't, and then. There was chess. And a house." He stopped and waved his hands, flustered. "Or maybe there wasn't. Maybe that wasn't it at all," he said. He sounded mournful.

Crowley groaned and swallowed the little bit of cookie that he hadn't mangled. "You know what--just shut up, and please, allow me," he hissed at the angel, who had the audacity, the utter nerve to look back at him with what appeared to be gratitude. He bared his teeth and turned to Adam. "It goes like this--that vile angel wantonly seduced me," he said.

Aziraphale spluttered, and Crowley sat back with his arms crossed over his chest and a scowl on his face. He really, really hated being discorporated. He also did not enjoy the torture chambers of Hell very much. Served the angel right to take the blame.

Although. He didn't have anything that even vaguely resembled a conscience, unless you counted Aziraphale, yet there seemed to be a small something eating at his insides when he looked at Adam and thought of how much worse the punishment would be for an angel who fell than for a demon who got a bit above himself. He tried to remember the last time he'd eaten a rat whole but the memory was pretty vague, so probably the rat wasn't still alive in there. Maybe the cookies hadn't baked enough, he thought.

Adam studied him for a moment, then looked at the angel. "Is that how it happened?"

"I don't believe I was wanton," Aziraphale protested weakly.

Crowley hissed, frustrated. "This hurts me, you know," he said to the angel, and then he turned to Adam. "Ignore him. This is how it really happened--"

~~~~~

Crowley had often thought that America was just his kind of place, full of men and women with extremely loose, susceptible minds. And then on the other hand were the type of tightly wound religious nutjobs who had no idea how easy they made his job, and that was before you added in the glories of all that money, technology, poverty, bureaucracy, and the hundreds and hundreds of channels on the television.

When the Infernal Powers informed him that he was being temporarily reassigned there, it didn't seem so very bad. Especially when he could've been reassigned after the, erm, incident, and sent right down to stay with Hastur for the very longest time.

"And what are my orders?" he asked.

ORDERS? asked the female anchor of the evening news. She sounded testy. Since her real personality was shoved down somewhere deep inside herself, screaming, the testiness could only have belonged to Crowley's superiors. That was a good thing, though. When the demons of Hell sounded cheerful, it was time to worry. WE HAVE NO FURTHER ORDERS FOR YOU, CROWLEY. JUST GO TO AMERICA, AND BEHAVE YOURSELF, OR YOU WILL FIND THAT THE DARK COUNCIL WILL BE VERY, VERY EAGER TO SPEAK TO YOU UPON YOUR RETURN.

AND TEAR YOUR FLESH FROM YOUR BODY IN SMALL, UNTIDY STRIPS, said the male anchor, licking his lips. SMALL, UNTIDY, VERY TASTY STRIPS, CROWLEY. LIKE CHICKEN STRIPS IN A BARBECUE SAUCE OF YOUR BLOOD, PAL. GOT IT?

The female anchor shoved the male anchor off his stool. OW! he said, from beneath the desk, and Crowley winced. The female anchor was probably wearing very pointy shoes, and seemed to have quite a kick on her.

When the male anchor had stopped moving, she tugged her suit coat back into place, patted down her hair, and took a deep breath. SORRY ABOUT THAT, she said, sounding genuinely apologetic. DUKE HASTUR HAS BEEN QUITE EAGER TO SPEAK TO YOU, CROWLEY. WE WOULD SUGGEST THAT YOU AVOID SPEAKING WITH HIM IF YOU DESIRE TO RETAIN YOUR TONGUE. HOWEVER, AS WE THINK THAT THE NUMBER OF YEARS YOU HAVE SPENT UP THERE HAVE PROBABLY MADE YOU QUITE TASTY, HE IS NOT WRONG, CROWLEY. WE WOULD ALSO SUGGEST THAT YOU AVOID COMING INTO OUR PRESENCE IF YOU WISH TO RETAIN YOUR FLESH.

Crowley coughed. "I'm not very tasty," he mumbled, pinching the skin on the back of his hand. "Dried out, like. Lost all my seasoning. See that? Pale. Bland. Sort of hairy. Sorry. Could suggest any number of politicians and taxi cab drivers who might be more to your tastes, though."

The female anchor looked at him balefully. THEY ARE THICK ON THE GROUND HERE, CROWLEY. DON'T BE STUPID. AND SEND VERY REGULAR REPORTS FROM AMERICA, CROWLEY. IN TRIPLICATE. YOU UNDERSTAND?

"Got it," Crowley said, and he reached for the remote. The television snapped off. As usual, that had little enough affect on the lower-downs of Hell. AND BALLPOINT INK THE COLOR OF FRESH BLOOD, he was told. IF FRESH BLOOD IS UNAVAILABLE. WHICH IT HAD BETTER NOT BE, CROWLEY, OR YOU MAY COME INTO OUR PRESENCE AND NEVER LEAVE IT AGAIN.

"Fresh blood, yeah," Crowley said. He stood and edged out of the living room, grabbing his keys on his way to the door. "Chow!"

WE SHALL, CROWLEY, his empty lounge told him, chuckling. It was an evil chuckle. It could hardly be anything else, could it? GO, BEFORE WE INVITE YOU TO COME JOIN US.

"Urk," Crowley said, and he went.

~~~~~

He was just going to leave, really, but how could he just disappear from London without taunting Aziraphale one last time?

The door to Aziraphale's shop was locked, and the sign in the window had been flipped to CLOSED. Since Crowley had never seen it flipped to OPEN, that didn't bother him, and the lock couldn't stop him. He put his hand on the doorknob and it turned with a vaguely apologetic snick--locks understood their place in the life of AJ Crowley.

He found the angel in the crowded, dusty upstairs room. He was placing a neatly folded tartan sweater on top of another neatly folded tartan sweater in an ancient suitcase. "What's this, getting rid of these? Did your sense of style finally reach the 1960s?" Crowley asked, touching the sleeve of a sweater that was doomed to be folded shortly. "What's the next big thing for you, angel, bellbottoms?"

"I'm not the type to wear flowers, Crowley," the angel said with a self-deprecating laugh.

Crowley sighed. "Bellbottoms. Not flowers. Trousers."

Aziraphale blinked. "But I already do wear trousers. Mind you, nothing will ever convince me they're as fashionable or durable as the humans seem to think they are, but one does what one must to stay abreast of the trends, eh?"

Once, Crowley had wondered what despair really felt like. He was a demon, it wasn't like he felt much other than smug satisfaction and occasionally evil glee. But that had been long before the fourteenth century, of course, and at least several hundred years before he'd had to attempt to convince Aziraphale that bear skin tunics were not still appropriate attire, no matter how well they washed and wore.

"Sure," he said. "Though some of us have better abreasts than others, I think. What're you packing for, anyway?"

Aziraphale looked up from bundling balled-up socks into the cracks and crevices of his luggage. His round face looked suddenly wretched. "Reassigned," he said, shrugging. "I was going to stop on my way to the airport and tell you. Because of our little Arrangement, you know. Didn't think it'd be quite fair to pop out of town without warning. In case you, erm, assumed I'd be keeping an eye on your work."

"Really." Crowley raised his eyebrows. "I was stopping in to tell you that I'd been reassigned. Where're you bound?"

"America," Aziraphale said, standing there with his hands full of socks, and surprise leeching away at the wretchedness. "And yourself?"

"America." Crowley flicked his tongue across his lips, considering. "Isn't that...odd."

Aziraphale shook his head and returned to his packing. "Almost ineffable," he said. "But America's quite a large country, you know. Spacious. We might go ten years without meeting again, in a country that rambling."

Crowley smiled. "Somehow I doubt that," he said.

~~~~~

He left Aziraphale in Philadelphia. "The Americans call it the City of Brotherly Love!" the angel had said on the ride over the vast blue ocean. He had seemed quite thrilled with that idea. Crowley had thought about telling him that just because the Americans called it something agreeable didn't mean Aziraphale would fare better there than an idealistic tourist with a pretty guidebook and no common sense would fare in London, but that would have prepared the angel for a let-down. Crowley couldn't do it.

Not because he didn't want to disappoint Aziraphale, of course, but because it was practically his job to toss the angel into situations he wasn't prepared to deal with. That was all. If he'd done anything else, he would have left himself open for trouble, like a grateful angel asking him to stay and keep him company in a big, lonely new city. That would be the road to a dozen kinds of madness, like keeping Aziraphale from being eaten by sewer monsters or saving him from orphans who needed adopting or something.

"Right then," he said, as Aziraphale got out of the car and gathered his luggage. Crowley hadn't even contemplated leaving his car behind, and he'd tempted the angel into coming for the drive by telling him it'd conserve fuel and save the price of a ticket, or the stress on his wings. Neither of them flew much anymore. It was hard to find enough room to spread out in London, these days, and even bodies with wings needed exercise if they were to stay fit. "I'm off. See you later?"

"I'll go back to London someday, after I finish my mission. Assuming I'm ever given a mission, of course." The sidewalk was crowded and someone bumped the angel from behind; he turned his head to apologize cheerily for blocking the way.

Crowley thought, he is going to be eaten alive over here, with what might have been a sense of helpless fondness were he capable of being fond of anyone. Which he wasn't. The humans hadn't changed him that much, after all. "Someday in London, then," he said, and held out his hand.

Aziraphale shook, much more at ease with the gesture than he had been before they thwarted Armageddon, and Crowley got back in the car and drove away.

~~~~~

The first six months were practically a vacation. He mucked around a bit with politics but he'd been at that for several millennia, and it was really getting rather tedious. So he played a few games in finance but the heads of any number of large corporations were already on the right path, and that soon got old as well.

"I should think sssmall," he told himself. That had worked well for him in recent years, after all. So he smiled at a few people and got a job, and worked hard to overhaul the Customer Service department of a good-sized insurance agency.

He got another commendation from Hell for that one.

The seventh month, he rested. Las Vegas did not need his, erm, help, he discovered. He filed a few reports claiming all kinds of ludicrous things and got credit for them, though. There were some benefits to having a bad rep for telling the truth. But the lights got to him eventually, not to mention the vulgar displays of, well, vulgarity. He'd lived in England too long perhaps, and had developed a taste for more refined and subtle evil.

In month eight, he found himself wandering idly across the country, causing troubles here, leaks there, and random acts of bad drama everywhere, but the thing that would've been referred to as his heart if he'd had one--well. His heart just wasn't in it anymore.

He found, to his horror, that he wanted to see his plants, to sleep in the big bed of his own flat, to visit Shropshire and check up on the progress of Manchester. He was disgusted, absolutely positively disgusted to realize that he had wondered what Aziraphale was up to and was even more repulsed when he realized that he didn't just want to know, he very nearly cared.

And then one day nine months after he'd left Aziraphale in Philadelphia, alone with his luggage, Crowley sat in a city park playing chess with an elderly gentleman he was certain he could tempt into rampant cheating. It was a warm, sunny day that made him glad for his shades, and then suddenly it seemed both warmer and sunnier. He looked up and there was the angel, beaming.

Clearly, Aziraphale was happy to see Crowley. Crowley, for his part, was almost prostrate with agony when he realized that he was glad to see the angel too.

"I didn't know what city I was in," he said defensively, and Aziraphale nodded, still beaming. Crowley bared his teeth and hissed. "You win, Mike," he said to the elderly gentleman, without taking his eyes off Aziraphale. "Beat me fair and square. Try not to let it go to your head, all right?" Then he rose and left the old man chortling to himself, apparently delighting in his own trickery.

"It was very kind of you to bring that man such happiness," Aziraphale said as they walked down the quiet, shady path that led out of the park.

"He's going to take what he learned and cheat his way through everything from now on, Social Security, his taxes, Bingo," Crowley said, with satisfaction. "Small-scale mayhem, maybe, but ripple effects like you wouldn't believe. 's not so nice after all, hmm?"

"Will he really?" Aziraphale was still beaming. "Or will he soon feel guilty about how he played the game, vow never to cheat again, and then teach an impressionable young child to play honest and fair, no matter what the cost?"

Crowley looked back. The old man had a new opponent, a little copper-haired girl whose mother was looking on indulgently.

He hissed.

"She'll be a marvelous president some day," Aziraphale said. "And all because of you!" He gave Crowley's arm a quick pat. "Thank you, Crowley, really."

"You're welcome," Crowley said dourly. "Did you plan that or was it just a joyous, ineffable coincidence?"

"There are no coincidences, my dear." Aziraphale looped his arm through the demon's, and leaned closer, smiling. "There are only plans that we will never comprehend," he said, tapping two fingers against his temple in an all too knowing manner.

Crowley's tongue flickered. "Getting ssssmug, angel. Better watch out or you'll find yourself in my shoes."

They both looked down. "Well," Crowley said. "You get my drift, anyway."

~~~~~

The doorbell rang. Aziraphale startled, and Crowley stopped talking. The Antichrist and the hell-hound were already on their feet. "Don't move," Adam said over his shoulder, and Crowley promptly got up to start pacing.

"He said don't move!" Aziraphale whispered fiercely. "Sit! Sit!"

Crowley looked at him. "Oh, what. What's he going to do, demand to hear all the details about how I, a servant of his father, consorted with angels? What's he going to do to me worse than kill me and send me down to play with Hastur and all my old friends?" He snorted, and resumed his pacing. "Besides, my stomach hurts," he complained, patting it.

"Too many cookies," Aziraphale said disapprovingly.

"Too much telling the truth," Crowley said.

"Pepper!" Adam called. "Johnson's here!"

"Don't know why I can't just go get her," rumbled an unknown voice at least two octaves below Adam's mild tenor. "Don't see why I've got to wait. Are you her father then, Young?"

"You wait down here because if you try to go up the stairs, you'll bust them," Adam said.

A quick thud-thud-thud above their heads, and then feet stomped down the stairs. Dog came scurrying back into the room, followed by his master. Adam had quite the arrogant saunter, Crowley was pleased to note. All those golden curls and the pretty eyes had worried him a bit.

The girl who had let them in poked her head into the room. She glared at Crowley and Aziraphale. "Nice to meet you," she said, casting a significant look at Adam.

"Oh, we've met before, my dear," Aziraphale said, rising. "Quite a long time ago, however. No wonder you don't remember!"

"I'm sure that has nothing to do with it," she said. "Come back tomorrow, and I'll meet you for the first time all over again." And then she was gone, stomping away, taking the rumbly-voiced guest away with her.

Adam sat back down. "That was Pepper's boyfriend," he explained. "Plays American football. Massive guy, truly massive. He puts one foot on our stairs, he's going right through 'em. Haven't had a chance to reinforce 'em yet."

"I, ah, had thought that perhaps she was your lady friend," Aziraphale said, flushing a little. "She grew up to be quite a lovely girl, and she opened the door, and--"

Adam smiled. "Nah. Me 'n Pepper 'n Wesley 'n Brian all live here. Most of the town thinks we're a crazy hippie commune of some sort."

"Are you?" Crowley asked. Aziraphale made an incoherent little noise, and Crowley looked at him, exasperated. "What! He brought it up!"

"We're not talking about his living arrangements," the angel said.

Crowley threw up his hands. "Didn't we come here to see what had changed with him? Is a crazy hippie commune not a change, Aziraphale? No? Why not? Oh, that's right, because we actually came out here to be discorporated!"

"Why don't you start again," Adam said. His hell-hound jumped up and settled in his lap. Crowley looked at it, and it lifted a lip and growled softly.

I remember when you were nothing but a pitiful whelp with no teeth, Crowley thought, and now look at you. Little lap dog. It seemed to him a shameful thing, but then again, it wasn't as if he was in a place to judge shameful things. The boy put a hand on Dog's head and it closed its beady red eyes, blissful, and Crowley thought about walking arm in arm down a Philadelphia street with the angel on a sunny day.

He looked away, and started again.

~~~~~

Food was an essential part of their meetings, as the demon was quite fond of it, and the angel had decided to enjoy it as well, after some years of guilt and pondering over vices. It was one of the few things on which they had come to completely agree--a good meal was one of the best reasons to maintain a human form for any length of time. Well, food and alcohol. And in Crowley's case, sleep had become a major reason to keep his body going, although a few millennia of trying to tempt the angel into developing the habit hadn't provoked even one nap so far as he knew.

"I need to be alert in case you try to pull something," Aziraphale had said in his prim, plummy voice sometime around 1500 BC. Even then, he'd had something of an English accent.

"But what challenge is there in trying to tempt people if you're not awake to thwart me?" Crowley had asked almost three thousand years later, frustrated after yet another unsuccessful attempt to lull the angel into trying it. This was several years after the Arrangement had really begun to develop, and he was not surprised to find that he really wouldn't much enjoy tempting were the angel not trying to outwit him. How could the Arrangement have come into being, otherwise? It had to have some other benefit than convenience, and it did. It was more fun.

A few hundred years after that, in America, Crowley caught himself yawning after a rich lunch and a few glasses of an even richer wine. He put his head on his hand and flickered a smile at the angel. "You trying to get me drunk so you can thwart without interruption?" he asked.

Aziraphale chuckled and topped off his own glass of wine. "I would never, my dear," he said complacently. "Not quite my style, is it?"

"Could be. You're quite the sly dog, in your way."

"And you're quite the wily serpent." Aziraphale toasted him. "Where are you off to next, Crowley? Have you planned your next act?"

Crowley sat up and shook off a bit of the wine, though not enough to lose the pleasant, fuzzy-headed feeling. "I hadn't really thought of it," he said vaguely. "Been wandering. Been here and there." He leaned towards the angel across the table and looked at him over the shades. "Been a bit bored," he confessed. "This place virtually runs itself, don't it?"

Aziraphale nodded. "So does London, when we're not messing about with it."

"True enough." Crowley put a fingertip in the small ring of condensation left by his wine glass, and drew a little smiley face. Then he gave it fangs, and horns. Then he wiped it out. "I was thinking I might stay on this coast for a bit," he said to the tabletop. "Perhaps a bit further north. Have some fun with those stalwart New England types, and all."

"Ah." Aziraphale cleared his throat, and Crowley looked up, expecting something, although he was fairly certain that he wasn't letting himself know what. The angel frowned at him, then hummed a bit. "Do you have a base here?" he eventually asked, and Crowley sat back.

"No," he said, smiling. That was what he had been expecting, then. Good to know. "Do you?"

"I have a little house." The angel waved a hand. "Hmm. Just a bitty one. It wouldn't do to go with anything too ostentatious, you know. The bookstore is closed while I'm here, after all."

"But is it big enough to serve as a base for two?"

"Erm. I don't see why not," Aziraphale said slowly, as if the idea had just occurred to him when Crowley suggested it, instead of when he himself brought it up, and he suddenly wasn't certain whether he should thank Crowley for mentioning it or run away screaming.

Crowley knew which the angel would choose, if given enough time to think about it. There were benefits to knowing someone for six thousand years, after all. You could always make them a cup of tea just as they liked it, for example, and it took no more than a whisper of effort to get what you wanted from them.

"Show me," he hissed. "And then we'll talk."

~~~~~

As it turned out, Aziraphale's little house was in a pleasant little suburb and it was, in fact, an absolute pit.

"And believe me, angel, I know from pits," Crowley said. "Does this one even have indoor plumbing?"

He was prowling through in search of evidence that the place was truly inhabitable. There was only one level so he found the kitchen rather quickly. There were indeed faucets in the sink, and water came out when he turned the handle. However, it came out slightly rust-colored. Somewhere behind the walls, pipes rattled and groaned.

"I don't know anything about plumbing," Aziraphale said defensively when Crowley stared at him, listening to the water rumble into the sink. Crowley sighed and fixed everything with a thought, then stalked out in search of the bedrooms.

"You only have the one," he said, when the last three doors opened into a bedroom, a bathroom and a closet, respectively. "And no bed in it at all."

Aziraphale frowned. "I still don't sleep, you know. But if you have a problem with the accommodations, Crowley, you certainly aren't required to stay. In fact--"

"No, no," Crowley said. "No problems. See?" A wave of his hand and a huge, heavy bed appeared in the bedroom, dominating the available floor space. Another wave and it was covered in sheets made of the finest Egyptian cotton.

"I'm surprised you didn't go for red satin," Aziraphale sniffed, and Crowley looked at him in amazement.

"You know about red satin?" he asked. "'m shocked, shocked and appalled. What all have you been learning from these lascivious Americans, angel?"

"You also aren't required to stay if all you're going to do is make nasty insinuations."

Crowley grinned. "Who said that was an insinuation?" he hissed. "I was just wondering. Do you have a guilty conscience, Aziraphale?"

"No--and at least I have a conscience at all!"

"I had one, but I drowned it." Crowley covered the sheets with a thick quilt and covered the two small windows with matching drapes, then shut the door. "Cozy," he said, smiling. "I'll get used to it, don't you think?"

"I've decided you're not to get used to it. You'll be on your way to somewhere more luxurious soon, yes?" Aziraphale turned and marched back towards the little kitchen, his head held high.

Crowley trailed behind him, waiting to see him stumble. Not the most graceful of creatures, the angel. Six thousand years in a body and he'd finally mastered the digestive parts, but still had horrid motor skills. Showed his priorities quite clear, that. "It's possible," he said agreeably. "In the meantime, I don't suppose you're interested in making a couple mugs of cocoa?"

"Make it yourself," Aziraphale sniffed. "I'm not a servant, you know. If you're going to take that attitude about this New Arrangement, you can just go right now, I think."

Then he tripped.

Crowley sighed happily, feeling a truly demonic level of satisfaction for the first time in months, and he reached down to give the angel a hand up. "I'll stay, since you've asked so nicely," he said, grinning.

And because he was feeling so magnanimous in this (entirely unanticipated, he reminded himself) victory, he made the cocoa after all.

~~~~~

"Don't forget to tell him all the parts about when I tried to get you to leave," Aziraphale said. He was picking at his perfectly manicured nails, sulking.

"Oh, yeah? And why don't you tell both of us about the times when you actually tried to get me to leave. Go on." Crowley spread his hands and looked at Adam. "Fascinating stories about nothing, those," he confided. "He protested a bit that first night, and by the next morning, you'd have thought we were following a routine centuries old."

"A good breakfast provides the necessary fuel for a body to get through the day with," the angel said, with a great deal of dignity, all of it seeming slightly injured. His suit coat was rumpled, his hair was tousled; his wings would have been all ruffled and crooked if he'd had them out. He was Out Of Sorts, and yet still gave the impression of being as proper as a schoolteacher. It made Crowley's fingers just itch to destroy him.

Oh, not destroy destroy, but rip his coat, perhaps tousle his hair even more, get his wings into a disgusting condition.

"Don't be fooled by his prim exterior," he told Adam, ignoring the angel's indignant sniff. "He's been around too long, he's not nearly as angelic as he ought to be. But then, you already knew that, I suppose."

"He's not nearly as demonic as he ought to be," Aziraphale muttered. "I once watched with my own eyes as he helped a little old lady cross the street, and he regularly rescues kittens stuck in impossible places. Practically the patron saint of trapped kittens, he is."

Crowley took off his dark shades and rubbed them with the hem of his soft black shirt, then looked up to smile at Adam with all the yellow gleam that he could muster. "Well, I ate enough of them in my day, I thought it was time for something new."

"Kittens or old ladies?" Adam asked.

"Both," Crowley said. "Though truth be told, the kittens were tastier."

~~~~~

Pepper called Wensleydale's office from Greasy Johnson's cellular phone. "You should go home soon," she told him when he answered, sounding distracted.

"Piles of work here, Pep," he said. "Piles."

"Well, there'll still be piles in the morning then. Stop shoveling that shit and go home. Adam has guests, and I don't like the looks of them."

"Well, let Brian handle them," Wensley said, but he didn't sound distracted anymore. He sounded resigned.

Pepper grinned. Wensleydale was undoubtedly the most intelligent of Them, but he was still remarkably easy to manage. She put her hand on Greasy Johnson's massive knee and squeezed, smiling at him when he looked over at her. He smiled back, moon-faced with delight at her presence, but still more of a challenge in his way than any man she'd ever met. She quite liked him, now that they were all out of school and grown up a bit.

They'd never last, though. His given name was actually John. John and Pippin Galadriel Johnson? Jack and Pip Johnson? Greasy and Pepper Johnson? No. She wasn't writing it on a notebook, let alone a marriage certificate.

"Brian's painting," she told Wensley. "I told him, but I think that were he to walk downstairs right now and find Adam and the two gents tearing each other apart, he'd pause long enough to get blood on his shoe which he'd then track up and down the halls while he looked for a phone to call one of us with, until he forgot why he was looking for the phone and went back upstairs to paint some more. Trailing blood all the way, Wensley. Do I have to tell you how hard blood would be to get off the carpet runners?"

Wensleydale groaned. "And you're off on a date with fathead Greasy, are you?"

"I am," she said, squeezing Greasy's knee again. They were probably stretching the definition of 'date' a bit, but that was all right these days, wasn't it? "And shut your mouth. I don't tell you who to date, do I?"

Wensley laughed. "As if you could, Pepper-girl. All right. I'll pack up here and head back to the house. Should I pick up anything on my way?"

"Milk, bread, chocolate of some sort if you know what's good for you, and carpet cleaner." She grinned. "I'll see you tomorrow morning, darling. Thank you!" She hung up and then slid Greasy's phone back into his jacket pocket.

"Makes me jealous," he grumbled. "Living out there with the rest of Them, all domestic-like. You know what everyone thinks, don't you?"

"Indeed I do," Pepper said, still grinning. "I've read Mr. Tyler's letters to the editor regarding our 'situation', and quite frankly, they alone would keep me convinced to never, ever move. But let's not talk about that tonight, hmm? They'll handle themselves, I think." She leaned over as close to his ear as her seatbelt would let her go and whispered something far more interesting than a grocery list, then sat back smugly when he gulped and stuttered.

Even Greasy Johnson, hulk that he was, could be managed. It was easy and, Pepper thought as she shook back her hair and chuckled to herself, a great deal of fun.

Then something caught her eye, and she frowned. "Stop the car," she said. "Stop it!"

Greasy looked at her oddly but slowed down. When the car was almost stopped, she opened her door and got out. She checked for traffic then trotted across the road and crouched. "Shutzi!" she called. "Come here, puppy. Come on!"

The little dog came to her and stood at her feet. It was shaking and looked up at her with the roundest, most pathetic little eyes she'd ever seen. Its leash was dragging behind it, and something was caught in the hand loop. Pepper squinted in the weak evening light, and then said, "Oh." She looked down the road, into the grassy ditch that ran beside it, then carefully unsnapped the leash from Shutzi's collar and picked up the trembling old dog.

"What is it, Pep?" Greasy called to her as he jogged, huffing, from where he'd parked the car.

"Going to need your phone again," she said grimly, and she went up to meet him before he ended up beside most of Mr. Tyler in the ditch.

~~~~~

Soon enough, Aziraphale's little pit had the best paint job, the most neatly graveled drive, and the most extravagantly lush gardens on the block.

"I'm just upping your resale value," Crowley said, when Aziraphale confronted him about it. "Surely you don't want to complain about bringing a bit of beauty and color to your neighborhood? Surely you don't object to tidy little profits? And surely, surely, you don't disapprove of flowers?"

"Well, no," Aziraphale reluctantly admitted. "The house looks so sweet, Crowley, but that's not the point. The point is. Well, couldn't you at least have not made it all happen overnight?"

Crowley blinked. "What, someone noticed?"

The angel groaned. "Everyone noticed, Crowley. Everyone noticed the paint, and the drive, and the gardens, and the Bentley, and, in the words of my neighbor Gladys three doors down, my 'handsome young...friend.' Everyone has noticed."

"So Gladys thinks I'm handsome, does she?" Crowley went to the door and looked out, trying to see the house three doors down.

"She's ninety-two and quite safe from your wiles," Aziraphale said drily. "But she seems to think that I'm, erm, not."

"Everyone thinks you're quite the poof," Crowley said. He was still trying to see Gladys' door. Being ninety-two did not actually make one invulnerable to wiles, after all.

"Yes, which makes me wonder if having you move in was quite the right thing to do."

Aziraphale sounded genuinely concerned, and Crowley looked at him with what was almost but not quite genuine pity. "No," he said patiently. "Everyone has always thought you were homosexual, angel. People in countries that wouldn't have names for hundreds of years, people in ancient Greece, people in Rome, people in France and Russia and England and Zimbabwe. The people here in this little neighborhood think so too, and I suppose some of them are quite offended that you've got a live-in, but most of them don't really care about you one way or the other, and the rest are quite pleased. Don't worry about it. Do you think I should take to gardening in tiny cut-off jean shorts?"

Aziraphale put his head down on the kitchen table. "I've walked this planet since 4004 BC and I'm just now getting my first headache," he mumbled into the rather grungy wood. "Do you think I should just hand myself over to the proper Powers and confess to making a fool of myself with a demon on my first assignment after the last time I made a fool of myself with a demon?"

Crowley came away from the door and patted the angel on the back. "I think you should have a couple drinks and then come out to thwart me," he said, smiling to show all of his teeth, of which he suddenly seemed to have several extra.

Aziraphale stayed slumped over for a moment, but then he sat up again. "Ouzo?" he asked hopefully, and Crowley, who was feeling quite inordinately generous (which is to say he felt generous at all) said, "Whatever you want, angel."

~~~~~

Some people were quite capable of never working a day in their lives. They chose to be lay-abouts, they claimed to be working on Great Novels, they claimed they were misunderstood, they got married directly out of school, they attended universities for years and years and years without ever settling on a career path. Really, Crowley wished he was one of these people. He had a job because it was who he was, but he put as little effort into it as he could manage. Because humans were who they were, just a little bit of effort on his part tended to be quite effective, which was fortunate. It allowed him to live a rather comfortable lifestyle, after all.

The angel, however, had been hard at work since the very day he was manifested. Guarding gates, wielding a fiery sword, teaching, protecting, etc etc. It was only during the past century or so that he'd relaxed enough to open the bookshop and spend his days working at keeping the customers out and creating the most extensive catalogue of old, misprinted Bibles that would ever exist. Forced to abandon his store by a move to America, Aziraphale had started off simply encouraging good behavior and thwarting the days away, but it wasn't quite enough.

So, every morning, he came out of their parlor after a hard night's work reading and being good in various ways, and made a strong pot of coffee. He left Crowley two cups. He had some toast and jam and oatmeal. He read the morning newspaper. Then he carefully locked the door behind him (he'd never bothered before, but he really didn't want some poor unsuspecting robber to break in and encounter Crowley before the demon had enjoyed his coffee, he'd explained one day when Crowley wandered out of the bedroom early enough to observe the morning routine) and walked the three blocks to the bus stop. From there, he went into the city, and straight to his job in one of the library branches.

By noon, he was home again, and bubbling over with news of library overdue fines paid or, in certain cases, disappeared, as well as petty thefts averted, vandalism halted in its tracks, and children taught to truly enjoy reading.

Crowley listened to it all patiently, and then talked about his morning. "After breakfast, I banged on the bedroom wall and called your name a bit," he'd say. Or, "I gossiped with Gladys this morning. She's an evil old woman, angel. We should have her over for tea." Or, on a particularly productive day, "I tied up the telephone line for hours, sending people spam-emails. Oh, the rage, it'll be beautiful. D'ya think I'll get another commendation?"

In the afternoons, they'd pop off to some other locale and enjoy the sights, and get in a little more temptation and virtue. They had dinner in a new restaurant in a new city nearly every night, and returned home in time to watch the evening news and try to catch glimpses of their handiwork or its ripple effects. Most nights, Crowley went to sleep after, and Aziraphale did not.

It was a remarkably easy way of life to fall into. Sometimes Crowley had the uncomfortable thought that it was a bit too easy, but that idea always slid out of his mind before it could get a really good hold. He went back to teasing their neighbors, or mocking the angel, or drinking with the angel, or idly trying to mess with the angel's good works, all worry gone like it had never been.

And then, one evening as they sat on the couch snickering over the downfall of a particularly nasty public figure, Crowley turned his head and there was Aziraphale, relaxed and happy on his half of the couch, wearing his favorite khaki slacks and ancient, tattered sweater, looking back at him.

"I didn't mean to do that," he muttered much later, when he was on his own side of the couch again. He finger-combed his hair, trying to get it back into its artful tousle, and ignored the warm, swollen feel of his lips.

"What did you mean to do then, remove my tonsils?" Aziraphale wasn't quite ready to put himself together again, it seemed. His sweater was even more tattered at one shoulder, where Crowley had ripped it a bit in order to get a better angle on the angel's neck, and his hair looked quite a mess, and his eyes were completely dazed.

Altogether, it made Crowley feel something that wasn't nearly close enough to annoyance for his taste. Still, there were ideals that he had to uphold in his way, and so he snapped, "If I wanted to remove your tonsils, I'd go at you with a dull scalpel, not my tongue."

"Then you meant to do exactly what you did," the angel said. He nodded. He sat up straight, took a deep breath. It came out on a long, low hum, and his face tightened a little, and then something about him changed. Then he stood, twitched his sweater back into place, and held his hand out to Crowley, who just looked at it.

"I want to keep doing it," Aziraphale said simply. Crowley considered him, his head tilted, his suddenly dry, permanently wicked tongue flicking at his swollen lips.

And then he took the angel's hand.

~~~~~

"So you see," he said to Adam, "Seduced."

"Put that way, I do sound rather wanton." Aziraphale groaned. His face was buried in his hands, but his ears were flaming red. Crowley would bet that his chest was red too, and the crook of his wings. Aziraphale had even less control over the hated flush than Crowley did. Probably because he'd never learned to manage his heart quite as well, Crowley thought, but without the feeling of satisfaction that would normally accompany such an idea. "I gave myself genitals."

"Messed 'em up a bit too, that first time," Crowley said. "Bad pipe job, you ask me."

"I never did know anything about plumbing," the angel agreed wretchedly.

THAT'S DISTURBING.

Adam scratched Dog behind his funny ear and considered the miserable pair of supernatural beings, who were staring rather intently at each other. "Well, practice makes perfect," he said matter-of-factly.

~~~~~

Afterwards, Aziraphale shut his eyes tightly and lay flat on his back, his hands crossed over his chest and his legs crossed at the ankles. Crowley looked up from trying to figure out what exactly the angel had done to get that bit there, and considered him.

"Is this guilt?" he asked suspiciously. Then he suddenly realized what it was that Aziraphale had managed to do, said, 'ah-ha' to himself, and passed his hand over the angel's groin.

"I'm trying to sleep," Aziraphale mumbled, cracking one eye open to look down at him. "Oh, that feels much better, Crowley. Thank you."

"Ask me before you manifest important bits again, all right?" Crowley said, and then he slid up the bed and wound his arms over the angel's chest. There were certain things that demons in all their forms really enjoyed. For most of them, it was torture and bloodshed, but Crowley had been a snake long enough that he mostly really liked being warm. "Don't try so hard," he advised, pushing and tugging until Aziraphale was spread out more comfortably for him to rest upon. "Either it happens or it don't. Can't force stuff like sleep, Aziraphale."

He started taking slow, deep breaths. Aziraphale automatically mimicked him after a moment or two, something it was almost impossible not to do when you had a breathing body draped over your own, Crowley had found. Happened with not-breathing bodies as well, but that was far less entertaining, and probably wouldn't help induce the angel to sleep. He was soft that way.

Soft other ways too, Crowley thought, a hand on the rather fleshy waist of an angel who was too fond of indulging certain appetites. Perhaps it wasn't a bad thing, he thought, grinning to himself. Underneath him, Aziraphale slowly relaxed, and relaxed, and then finally went limp. Asleep, Crowley realized. He would never have really thought that the vigilant angel would crack.

It was tempting to get out of the bed and go wreak some havoc, but he wouldn't. Aziraphale would probably never sleep again, if he did, and Crowley sort of preferred him like this. He was quiet, and he was warm. Crowley curled up tighter, closed his eyes, and followed the angel into sleep.

~~~~~

"I quite enjoyed the sleeping," Aziraphale said. "Once I'd gotten the knack for it, that was almost my favorite part. No offense intended, of course," he said to Crowley, who shook his head.

"None taken, because it was not." Crowley stood towering over him, arms crossed over his chest. "In for a penny, in for a pound, angel. You quite liked the fu--"

"Crowley!" Aziraphale snapped, with a significant look in Adam's direction.

"Fur rug in front of the fireplace, I was going to say." Crowley leered at the angel. "Thought I was going somewhere else with that, did you?" he said (and of course he had been). "Quite the pervert there, aren't you?"

Aziraphale glared at him. "Shut up and finish telling the story."

"Can't exactly do both, can I? Besides that, what else is there to tell? You want him to hear about every last one of the days we spent in America? Might take some fair bit of time, as there were almost eleven years' wo--"

He stopped, suddenly struck by a realization. "Hey, almost eleven years' worth of days. Had you realized that we spent just over four thousand days in that little house, angel?"

Aziraphale blinked at him, and then tilted his head. Crowley could tell he was doing the math for himself, and when the angel's blue eyes widened suddenly, knew he'd reached the same conclusion. "Oh," Aziraphale said, sounding a bit dazed. "Oh, you're quite right, Crowley. 4004 days exactly. That's--"

"Quite the coincidence, ain't it?" Crowley looked at Adam, who looked down at Dog. The Antichrist was smiling.

No. No. Not smiling. The Antichrist was smirking.

"Raaargh," Crowley said, and then he leapt at the young Beast.

He landed on the couch head first, with neither Adam nor the blasted hell-hound within reach. The angel shrieked his name, clearly appalled and not in Crowley's favorite way. He turned himself 'round and there was Adam in front of the fireplace, hands on his knees, laughing silently but so hard that he appeared incapable of standing up straight.

"What have you done," Aziraphale moaned. "Have you quite lost your mind, Crowley?"

"Ask him." Crowley cleared his throat. Over the millennia, he'd heard quite a few humans go choked on rage but he'd never experienced it for himself before. It was quite unpleasant. "Ask him what he's done," he managed to rasp, pointing at Adam.

Aziraphale stared at him for a long moment before realization dawned. Then he turned his gaze to the Antichrist.

"Dear boy," he said, his voice as calm and cool as glacial ice in a place where no spring thaw ever happened. "My dear boy, I don't suppose that you'd have dared to go messing about with us?"

Adam held up a hand and took deep breaths, then stood up straight and wiped his eyes. "Whoo," he finally said, smiling at them. "You guys should have seen your faces. Discorporated." And he promptly lost control of his laughter once again.

"I don't know what punishment to mete out," Crowley said to the angel, over Adam's laughter. "But it will be dire. It will be extravagant. It may be excessive. It may even be--"

I SAY THAT ALL THE TIME AND NOTHING EVER COMES OF IT, Death said, mournfully of course. QUITE A FEW PEOPLE HAVE SAID THAT, OVER THE YEARS. AND NOTHING. EVER. COMES OF IT. QUITE FRUSTRATING, I MUST ADMIT.

"Well, we aren't people," Crowley snapped, and then he blinked at the angel. "Did you just say something? No?" He shook his head. "Bizarre," he muttered.

Adam wheezed a little, then straightened again. "I'm done, I'm done," he said breathlessly. "You wanna take a swipe at me now?" he asked Crowley. "Because you can, if you'd like." He smiled. "Or at least, you can try."

Crowley considered the Antichrist's beautiful, smiling face. "I'll pass for now," he said with all the dignity he could muster. "But you had better watch your back, boy."

"No more treats for you," Aziraphale said to Adam, taking the plate and putting the plastic cover back over it with hands that shook a little.

"Aaaw," Adam said. He genuinely looked a bit distressed, and frowned at them. "Hey, you don't think I made you do it, do you? Because I didn't. I don't do that kind of thing anymore."

"How else do you explain it?" Aziraphale asked. Crowley looked at him, but Aziraphale did not look back.

Adam moved towards the angel and Crowley leapt up off the couch, though what he thought he was going to do, he didn't know. But the Antichrist didn't even look at him, just crouched beside the chair Aziraphale sat in and said, "I don't create, and I don't destroy. I chose a different function."

He put a hand over the angel's on the arm of the chair. "I filled a vacancy, y'see?" He smiled. "I mend."

Crowley sat back down on the couch with a thump that disgorged dust and cookie crumbs, and licked his lips. "You always said he had a sense of humor," he said to the angel, dazedly.

"Which I do," Adam agreed. "Though I take my job very seriously."

"But I didn't expect you to think that my li--erm, existence--was funny," the angel said sadly.

"I didn't, I don't. I just thought it needed a bit of a repair." Adam patted Aziraphale's hand, and then rose. "You're not going to be in trouble for what has happened," he said, and it didn't sound like reassurance. It sounded like a plan. "You have nothing to worry about. You can go home now and carry on however you want, and no objections will be raised. That's why you're here today, isn't it? Because you came home, and didn't know what to do with yourselves?" He looked at Crowley, who nodded. "No objections," he repeated quietly. "And if there are any, we'll take care of them."

"'We'll'?" Crowley asked, suspiciously.

"What Azrael and I can't handle...well, nothing exists that we can't handle, quite frankly," Adam said. He held out a hand to Aziraphale, who took it and rose from the chair. "Go home, no worries," he urged. "But come back some time, yeah? I quite enjoyed our little visit."

"We'll be sure to do that," Crowley said sarcastically. He took the dazed angel's arm and marched him out of the room, followed closely by the Antichrist and the hell-hound. It would have been a grand exit, but Aziraphale stopped at the door. Crowley attempted to tug him out onto the porch, but the angel could be surprisingly immoveable when he felt like it.

He turned back to Adam. "You were very naughty," he said, dignity and wounded pride dripping from every word.

"All I did was put together what should never have been separate," Adam said. He and Aziraphale studied each other for a long, silent eternity.

Then Aziraphale held out the plate of cookies, turned again once Adam had gravely taken them, and walked away.

"You know, he's never that nice to me, and I'm only half as bad as you," Crowley said. "It's not hardly fair, I don't think." He took one of the cookies, then sauntered off the porch and followed the stumbling angel to the car.

~~~~~

"Passed a great red job flying out of here like a bat out of Hell," Wensley said nonchalantly after he'd hung up his coat and found Adam sitting in the darkened parlor. He sat next to Adam on the couch and nudged his arm, intending to tease. No signs of blood so far as he could see and the car had held the correct number of upright bodies, so most likely they'd just been normal customers. Pepper had probably just wanted him to come home in a hurry and forget her chocolate so that she could yell at him later.

But Adam turned to look at him, and he was frowning.

"Do you think I mess about too much, Wens?" he asked, searching Wensleydale's gaze in the dim light coming from the fire lit in the hearth. "Are there things I should leave alone to fix themselves, if they will?"

Wensley patted Adam's shoulder. "Even you can't fix something what's determined to stay broken," he said comfortingly. "Whatever it was, they'll be happy you repaired it soon as they get over the shock of seeing it whole."

Adam stared at him, and Wensley let all his certainty show on his face. Eventually, Adam sighed and nodded, relaxing against Wensley's side. "Want one?" he offered, and Wensley took a biscuit off the plate that Adam held. It was soft and warm and delicious, far superior to any baked good ever made by a member of their household.

"Oh, fantastic," he said. "Can't be too mad at you if they left you these, Adam. Best ever." He swallowed and then, in an innocent tone, asked, "Will we still remember them in the morning, do you think?"

Adam gave him a sharp look, and then smiled. "You will, Wensley. Promise."

~~~~~

Beside him, Aziraphale sat with his hands folded in his lap and his eyes closed, but he wasn't sleeping. Crowley knew how to tell that well enough, anyhow. Mad, he though. Just mad, is all. He'll be over it be the time we reach London. But the rat eating sweets in his gut seemed agitated, nonetheless.

Without asking the angel, he directed the car towards the bookshop. When they pulled up before it, Crowley cleared his throat, and Aziraphale opened his eyes.

"This isn't your building," he said flatly.

Crowley coughed. "No."

Aziraphale nodded. "Ah. I understand." He put his hand on the door handle and said, "Good night, Crowley. I'm certain we shall see each other again soon." He pushed the door open--

And looked very surprised when it didn't go. "Crowley?"

"I don't think I can let you out," Crowley admitted.

Aziraphale struggled with the handle for a moment, but it was well and truly stuck. Locks really understood their place in the life of AJ Crowley, after all. Eventually, the angel sighed and sat back. "More of our godson's work, do you think?" he asked.

"No, this is all me. I really can tell the difference, you know. Perhaps not five thousand years ago, but I've learned a great deal about free will since then. It's sort of infectious." Sort of infectious and sort of painful. Like the Plague. But like the Plague, it could be survived. You could even learn to thrive despite it, provided you had the right basic temperament. Which he did, of course.

He took a deep breath. "Come back to my flat with me. Theplantswon'tbethesamewithoutyou," he said in a rush.

Aziraphale blinked at him. "I'd assume you'd think they were better off without me," he said. Crowley shook his head, and the angel's eyes narrowed. "Don't you think that Adam caused us harm, Crowley?"

Crowley shrugged.

"Don't you think that we'll be punished?"

"If we were going to be, it would have happened long ago, and you know that as well as I do," Crowley said. Both Heaven and Hell were bureaucracies, it was true, but they were both staffed in large part by the overly eager and the fairly competent. Crowley usually received both his reprimands and his commendations in short order.

"You don't think that Adam made us do something we would never have done on our own?" the angel demanded.

Crowley looked at him. He was so familiar--he'd had other faces over the last few millennia, but the soul (if you believed that angels had them, which Crowley did, but then he was also tempted to believe that demons had souls too and that was quite a radical idea, he knew) the soul behind the eyes was always the same. Perhaps more relaxed, more human, but then, so was Crowley himself. That had been inevitable. And possibly ineffable, though he'd never admit out loud that he had ever thought such a thing.

"Been heading towards this since that day in the Garden, haven't we?" he asked, and as he said it, he knew it was true. He reached out and took the angel's smooth, warm hand in his own. "Come back with me," he hissed, smiling like he couldn't help himself, which he mostly couldn't. "We'll have a drink. Yeah?"

Aziraphale's eyes narrowed further, almost disappearing in his soft face, but his fingers were curled with Crowley's. "Ouzo?" he asked, hopefully.

And Crowley, feeling generous (as only this angel could make him feel), laughed and said, "Whatever you want, angel," and turned the car towards home.