Work Text
War flew through the skies, screaming her delight.The air was shimmering gently, dancing with motes of dust caught in the flickering air filtering through the cracks in the shades on the windows of Aziraphale’s bookshop. It would almost have been beautiful, if the light wasn’t a sign of humanity’s inhumanity, the relentless destruction and murder of it all.Aziraphale should be in a shelter, he thought. Giving comfort and discreet healing where he could, in the confines of the underground. He had no excuse, except that the constant human fear and misery was wearing on him. So many sieges, so much horror across the centuries, so many crying children and pale worn faces, Famine and Pestilence trailing in War’s wake and Death, as always, everywhere. Millennia after millennia, nothing changed but the causes and methods. The angels themselves had, he supposed, set the pattern with the War in Heaven.He would be of help afterwards, he promised himself. He would do as much good as he could manage without drawing attention to himself, visitations of angel mercy being out of fashion with those in command these days. He just needed some respite, away from human pain, with his books and the only truly congenial company he had.It was all so loud. The rise and fall of the wailing sirens, the terrible roar of the planes, the screams of the missiles, the stutter of answering anti-aircraft weapons, the explosions and fire as London was ripped apart again.In the noisy darkness, Aziraphale tidied. It went against all his principles; a tidy shop was an inviting one, and once humans came in, they often wanted to buy books. But he had to express his nervous tension somehow.His instincts told him something evil was behind him, and perhaps it showed how unangelic he could be that this single, personal evil was a comfort in the evidence of a multitude of human evil. He turned, almost smiling, towards the slim dark shadow.“Didn’t mean to interrupt your very important work. Just wanted to know if you could do with some tea.”Tea. Aziraphale’s guilt prickled a little. Tea was precious right now, a relief in the madness, and Aziraphale had no right to the packets in his kitchen when humans were doing without. But Crowley fancied himself as a spiv right now, either because he liked the flashy suits or to be avoid doing actual harmful acts of wickedness in these terrible times. One way or another, a lot of contraband packets ended up in Aziraphale’s little kitchenette. No one could survive six thousand years on Earth without a few Earthly indulgences.“That would be very welcome, my dear fellow.”They stood close to each other, while Hell rained down on London and an actual demon was offering comfort in the only way he could be sure would be welcome. Aziraphale wondered if Crowley knew that at this moment, as in so many others, he was more of a rock to him than Heaven. That he was a spot of dark, cool, quiet beauty in all this ugliness and chaos and heat.There was a strange expectancy in the air that had nothing to do with the bombing. Then Crowley gave one of his strange snakelike smiles, and went to the kitchenette.Some tea would be nice. Aziraphale followed him. The gas ring flickered, but even with the blinds up, it would have been nothing in this hell. The planes had already found them.“We’ve passed forty days and forty nights,” Crowley said, as he touched the teapot to warm it, a small miracle, and scooped in tea. “I know it’s nothing in the grand scheme of things, but…”Aziraphale thought of the stories he had heard from some Polish refugees he had been trying to comfort, and shuddered. “I wonder if it’s really worth it. Perhaps it's not.”“Don’t talk like that.” Crowley’s voice took on a warning note, and his stance was a little twitchy.“What’s the point of trying to save them when they do things to each other like this?”“Ssshhut it,” Crowley hissed. “You don’t know who’s listening.”“What would they hear in this racket? I don’t wonder that you cursed—”Crowley’s mouth was on his, sweet and soft and cool, swallowing the blasphemy before it could be spoken, kissing away the danger, scooping up his doubts with a soft forked tongue and swallowing them, taking them into himself.Crowley had kissed him like this once before, in Jericho. What had been Jericho, after the walls fell. Aziraphale hadn’t been part of any grand angelic plans, had just been been staying with Crowley in a rather nice little tavern. Raphael had commanded him not to interfere. And he had a demon to hide from the angels. Afterwards, Aziraphale and Crowley had looked down at the bodies of the tavern keeper’s children, their little hands still clinging to their mother’s blood-drenched skirt, and listened to the screams and sobs of the bereaved girls thought worth enslaving rather than killing. Aziraphale told himself, this is my God’s Plan, and for the first time he looked at the abyss of Hell and thought it might not be as bad as this after all.“How did it feel, to Fall?” he’d asked Crowley. “Because I—“Crowley had kissed him like this, with the same feeling that he was taking Aziraphale’s pains and doubts into himself. Aziraphale hadn’t Fallen, he’d gone on, and regained his faith in the Ineffable Plan. He would be a terrible demon, anyway. He might be pretty capable at doing some demonic tasks in the Arrangement, but it was a relief going back to doing good afterwards. They’d never spoken of it afterwards. They would never speak of this, either. But in this suspended moment, where anything might be said or done, and put away afterwards, there was something he needed to say.“I love you,” he whispered against serpent-dry lips, and was almost sure he felt it back.Then they had some tea. Because life went on, and so did they. And in the end they both had something to cling to, even in the dark.