Happy Holidays, Crowoxy!
Dec. 30th, 2019 06:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
goe_mod posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
go_exchangeRating: Teen
Pairing/Characters: Aziraphale/Crowley, Warlock
Summary: Hastur discovers Crowley’s betrayal on the fields of Megiddo--and Warlock is the one who pays the price.
Tags: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Kid Fic
Notes: Title comes from Queen’s “The Prophet’s Song”. Based on the following prompt: Nanny Ashtoreth/Crowley and Warlock after the events of the Not Armageddon. Specifically focusing on Warlock getting attacked by Hastur on the fields of Megiddo. Rating Gen - Teen per choice.
Many thanks to Alston for the beta!
It’s the sort of remark, Warlock thinks, that would have made Nanny laugh.
Well. Not laugh, exactly. Nanny never did that. But she had smirked here and there when she thought no one was watching, usually at Thaddeus’s expense, and once had even lowered her spectacles to give Warlock a quick yellow-eyed wink behind his mother’s back.
Telling this archaeologist that he smelled like shit? Nanny would definitely have smirked at that. Might even have covered her chuckle with a cough. Warlock likes to think so, at least.
He wishes Nanny was here with him now. The archaeologist smells of shit, yes, but there is something frightening about him as well. A dark energy that hums just beneath the surface, threatening to break loose, and his pupils are so wide that black eclipses both of his eyes.
Warlock takes an uncertain step back. The archaeologist’s lip curls, and he’s practically vibrating with rage.
“Wrong boy,” he snarls. “You’re the wrong fucking boy!”
Without warning, something slams into Warlock, knocking him to the ground. He lies there in a daze, the wind forced from his lungs, dust stinging his eyes. He gasps, trying to fill his lungs with air again while his ears ring painfully.
And then the archaeologist is on him, straddling his chest, pressing a clammy hand to Warlock’s forehead.
“Who are you?” he snarls, and then agony overwhelms Warlock’s senses. He squeezes his eyes shut, tries to block out the pain--
And then he is in the nursery, warm and comfortable, leaning heavily against Nanny as she reads him a story. A flash, and then he’s digging through the garden for earthworms after a summer storm, Nanny encouraging him while Brother Francis looks on. Another flash, and he’s in bed, the covers pulled up to his chin, while Nanny sings to him. Nanny is--Nanny is everything, and he doesn’t know what he’d do without her. He can’t remember a time in his life when she wasn’t there, can’t imagine a life without her--
A flash, and he’s seven years old, his face buried in Nanny’s skirts as she says goodbye to him. He asks if he can call her, and she says she doesn’t have a phone, and that hurts, because who doesn’t own a phone? Nanny is lying to him, and he doesn’t know why. He lifts his tear-stained face out of her skirts to look up at her--
“Crowley,” the archaeologist snarls, yanking his hand away from Warlock’s forehead. Warlock returns to reality all at once, his head pounding, the taste of blood in the back of his throat. “Of course it would be you, traitor.”
Warlock struggles to sit up, and the man backhands him. He slumps back in the dirt, dazed. His head falls to the side, and his gaze lands on someone crumpled in the dust. No, not someone--his father. His mother lies next to him, and the bodyguards that had accompanied them on this trip are all unconscious as well.
Or are they dead? Warlock stares at his father’s chest, wills it to rise, but through the haze he can’t tell if his father is breathing.
“You’re coming with me.”
The man is on him again, his filthy hands fisted into the front of Warlock’s t-shirt, and before he can even scream, darkness steals over him.
****
“Is there anything I can say in my own defense?” Aziraphale asks.
It’s strange, wearing Crowley’s face and speaking in his voice. Even stranger, navigating the world in his body, which is a handful of inches taller than Aziraphale’s own and considerably more lanky. He feels slightly off-balance at all times--which, admittedly, does help him imitate Crowley’s walk.
“No,” Beelzebub says. “The evidence against you is insurmountable.”
“I don’t know if I’d say that--”
“Bring me the boy,” Beelzebub interrupts, their voice considerably louder than his own, drowning out his words. They snap their fingers, and two demons drag a human into the room.
Not just any human, but a child. A young boy. Aziraphale can sense that much, even before the child lifts his head and looks Aziraphale full in the face, and croaks, “Nanny?”
Oh, no. Aziraphale’s useless heart kicks up several notches in his chest. Warlock’s face is a mess of cuts and bruises, and he’s hanging limply from the demons’ hands. All at once, the game has changed--he’d already made his peace with the fact that their plan might not work, and he might not return from this alive. It was worth it, if it kept Crowley safe.
But now, not surviving is no longer an option. He has to get out of this alive, because that’s the only chance Warlock has of making it as well. If Warlock dies down here, Crowley will never forgive him. More than that, Aziraphale would never be able to live with himself if that happened.
“We always did wonder how you managed to send us such detailed reports on the Antichrist,” Beelzebub says. “Turns out it was because he wasn’t the Antichrist at all. You swapped the real Antichrist out for him, all so that you could pose as the boy’s nanny and play house with an angel for seven years while sending us false reports.”
“Lord Beelzebub, I assure you, I delivered the Antichrist as instructed. I had nothing to do with--”
“Shut up.” Beelzebub waves a hand in Warlock’s direction, and the boy begins to scream. His face contorts in agony, and blood leaks from his nose. His legs give out, and the demons hold him upright. “You expect us to believe you didn’t purposely lose the Antichrist? That you weren’t trying to avert the Apocalypse?”
“Why would I want to avert the Apocalypse?” Aziraphale demands, arching one of Crowley’s eyebrows for good measure. “I’m all for the Apocalypse, me.”
Beelzebub waves their hand, and Warlock’s screams redouble. Smoke starts to rise from his clothing. He twists in the demons’ hands, trying to break free and failing miserably.
“Yes, all right!” Aziraphale says, hoping that the desperation he feels hasn’t leaked into his voice. What would Crowley do? “I admit it. I delivered the Antichrist to the wrong family, and then I lied to you about it for seven years so I could foil your plans.”
He kicks himself mentally for that. Crowley doesn’t say things like foil. Thankfully, Beelzebub doesn’t seem to notice.
“Traitor,” they snarl at him.
“Yes, I am.” Aziraphale flashes them a cocksure grin and adds, “So what are you going to do about it?”
Taunting Beelzebub, it turns out, gets him exactly what he’s been after--execution by holy water. It’s Michael who brings it, and oh, he should have known. Of course it would be Michael. And Heaven accuses him of being a traitor.
What would Crowley do? Make a show of it, of course, which is exactly what Aziraphale does. He flicks water at the watching demons and asks for a rubber duck, and then, when he has every demon in the room properly terrified--Beelzebub included, he’s pleased to note--he leans over the edge of the tub and says, “I think it’d be best if I were left alone from now on, don’t you? Oh, and I’ll be taking the boy.”
He walks out of Hell with Warlock leaning on him heavily for support. The boy doesn’t say a word, just stares blankly ahead while blood continues to trickle from his nose and a gash on his forehead. He’s filthy, covered in bruises, and limping heavily. Aziraphale wonders how long he’s been here. Hours? Days? No more than a week, thankfully, but how did he get here in the first place? Adam reset the world, but somehow that must not have extended to Hell. If it had, Warlock wouldn’t have been stuck down there.
They reach the lobby, and Aziraphale lowers Warlock to the floor. He crouches in front of him and runs his hands over the boy, checking for more serious injuries. His ankle is fractured, and Aziraphale performs a minor miracle to heal it. The rest of his injuries appear to be superficial.
“I know you must have questions,” Aziraphale tells him. “And I will answer them. But first you must trust me.”
“Okay, Nanny.” Warlock’s voice is faint, and Aziraphale’s heart tugs. He holds out his hands, and Warlock grasps them after a moment.
“Close your eyes,” he says, because it will be less disorienting that way. Once Warlock has done so, Aziraphale draws on the well of power within himself and transports them both to the bookshop.
He doesn’t often do that, peel back reality and step through it like a door. It’s an odd sensation for an angel; he can’t imagine what it must feel like to a human. Warlock staggers the moment his feet touch the floor, and Aziraphale grabs him to keep him from falling.
“There, dear boy, sit down.” He helps Warlock over to the sofa. Warlock hisses and bites his lip as he gingerly sits down, his injuries clearly paining him. Aziraphale would snap his fingers and heal the boy, but something about that feels...off. Wrong. Transporting them here took more effort than it normally would have, for one thing. He’s no longer brimming with power, that much he can feel.
Aziraphale reaches inside, probes at the source of his powers like a human might poke at a sore tooth, and feels...cut off. Limited. He can’t feel his connection to the Host any longer. He hopes that it means that Crowley walked out of Heaven, demoted but unscathed. He can’t bear to think of what the alternative would be.
Aziraphale still has his some of his powers, but without the Host to draw on, he’s not sure how long it will last. But he has more immediate concerns right now. Namely, a human child he just rescued from the bowels of Hell. Warlock’s injuries need tending, and he’s got to get in contact with Crowley somehow. Aziraphale turns to leave the room, to fetch some supplies, but a hand latches on to his.
“Don’t go.” Warlock’s eyes are wide and frightened.
“I’m not going far, dearie,” Aziraphale says, in what even knows is a poor imitation of Nanny’s accent. “I’ll be back.”
Warlock shakes his head.
“No, please.”
Well. This will just be one more thing they’ll have to explain to the boy, then. Aziraphale closes his eyes, draws on that dwindling well of power once more, and summons Crowley.
He hasn’t done that in almost two millennia. He finds it rather rude, for one thing, to summon a being without their prior knowledge or consent. But he’d told Crowley they would meet in St. James’s Park, and that was half an hour ago. Crowley must be halfway to full-blown panic by now. He can’t very well fetch Crowley himself, because that would leave Warlock alone. There’s a thump in the other room, and then Aziraphale hears his own voice shout, “What the fuck, Aziraphale?”
“In here,” Aziraphale calls back to him, and it’s a strange sight to turn and see himself walk through the door. “We had a bit of a...change of plans. I came across someone in Hell that I think--I think you need to see.”
Crowley stops dead, wide blue eyes fixed on Warlock. Warlock, for his part, merely frowns in confusion at him.
“Brother Francis?”
“Oh, bless it.” Crowley strides over to Aziraphale and holds out his hand. “Switch back, angel.”
“Yes, I think that’s best.” He clasps Crowley’s hand, and in a moment it is done. He’s back in his own body, and Crowley is in his, and Warlock is staring at them both in mute horror.
“What,” he whispers, “the fuck.”
“I’m dreadfully sorry about that, young Warlock,” Aziraphale says. He gestures at Crowley. “This is your nanny. I’ll go put some tea on, shall I?”
****
Nanny is staring at him like he’s just walked out of Hell--which, if Brother Francis is to be believed, he has. It’s as good an explanation as any for everything that’s happened to him since the desert.
“Nanny?” he says tentatively. “Are--you a man now?”
“What?” Nanny blinks at him. “Oh. Yeah, s’pose I am. For a few years now.”
“And...English?”
“Erm...yeah.”
Warlock blinks at him, and then shrugs. It’s not the weirdest thing that has happened today. “Okay.”
Nanny scrubs a hand through his hair, crosses his arms, uncrosses them, and finally shoves his hands in his pockets. He looks so uncomfortable that Warlock has the sudden urge to just disappear, and that hurts almost worse than his injuries do.
He’d never before considered that Nanny might not want him around, and wasn’t nearly as pleased to see him as Warlock was.
For some reason, that’s the thought that puts him over the edge, despite everything else that’s happened these past few days. Before he can stop himself, Warlock bursts into tears.
Nanny is at his side in an instant, pulling Warlock to him. Warlock buries his face in Nanny’s shirt, distantly aware that he’s smearing blood and tears all over the grey, but he can’t stop himself. For his part, Nanny doesn’t seem to care. He strokes Warlock’s hair and murmurs to him, just like when Warlock was little.
“You’re safe now,” Nanny says. “You’re not there anymore, Warlock. You’re here, with me.”
Carefully, he draws back, and puts a finger under Warlock’s chin to tilt his face up. He examines the damage, a crease growing between his brows.
“Did they do this to you?” he asks quietly.
Slowly, Warlock nods. Nanny’s expression darkens.
“I’ll be right back,” Nanny says, and leaves the room. He returns a few minutes later with an armful of supplies and a bowl of water.
Nanny pulls a chair up to the couch and sets to work. He washes the grime from Warlock's face and neck with surprising gentleness. His hands aren't soft, not like Warlock remembers, but he's careful around the cuts and bruises. He places plaster over the worst of the cuts
"Warlock, what happened? Last I heard, you were in London with your parents.”
"How did you know that?"
"Been keeping tabs on you, hellspawn." Nanny tweaks his nose, like he used to do when Warlock was small. But then Nanny's expression darkens. "Evidently, not close enough tabs."
"Dad went to Israel for work. We all went with. There was this...archaeologist."
Brother Francis comes back into the room. He's carrying two mugs of tea, one of which he hands to Warlock. He keeps the other for himself. Now that Warlock thinks about it, he can't remember ever seeing Nanny consume food or drink, not in all the years he cared for Warlock.
"An archaeologist."
"Yeah. He smelled like shit."
That startles a laugh out of Nanny, and Warlock is inordinately pleased by that. Brother Francis, however, frowns.
"That'll be Hastur, then, I assume."
Realization seems to come over Nanny, and he sobers.
"Hastur was the one who took you?"
"Yeah. He was angry--he said I was the wrong boy. I don't know what he meant. And so he knocked everyone out, and he took me. He said I was in Hell, and that he was a demon..." Warlock trails off. He remembers Nanny's yellow snake eyes, remembers what the other demons said about him at that farce of a trial. "Nanny...are--are you a demon?"
Nanny shares a look with Brother Francis. Warlock can't interpret the silent conversation that passes between them, but then Nanny turns back to Warlock and leans forward in his chair--
With a soft whoosh of air, two great black wings appear behind Nanny. Warlock jumps. They fill most of the remaining space in the small room.
“Um,” he says. His nanny can sprout black wings out of his back. Okay, that’s...also not the weirdest thing that’s happened today, but it’s getting close.
"Do you remember," Nanny asks him, "how you always asked to see my eyes when you were little?"
Warlock swallows. "Yeah."
Nanny leans forward some more and points at his sunglasses. "Go on, then."
Warlock darts an uncertain look at Brother Francis, who gives him a tiny nod. He reaches out and pulls the sunglasses off Nanny's face. His eyes are closed. After a moment, he blinks them open and looks at Warlock.
"Whoa." Warlock had only had a brief glimpse of Nanny's eyes all those years ago. He hadn’t realized that Nanny’s eyes were so...catlike. No, he realizes after a moment. No, these are the eyes of a snake. "Nanny, your eyes are so cool."
Nanny holds out his hand, and Warlock gives him the sunglasses back. He puts them back on.
"Yeah, well, most humans wouldn't agree," he says gruffly.
"Well, you always said I was special."
Brother Francis hides his sudden grin behind his mug. Nanny rolls his eyes--Warlock can tell, even with the sunglasses.
"Yes, I'm a demon," he says finally. He waves a hand at Brother Francis and says, "He's an angel. And you--well, for eleven years we thought that you were the Antichrist.”
Warlock blinks at him. "What does that mean?"
"It means that we spent eleven years believing you would bring about the end times. Armageddon, the apocalypse, whatever you want to call it," Nanny says. "And, ah. Well. We wanted to make sure that didn't happen."
He launches into the tale, about how he had posed as Warlock's nanny while Brother Francis was the gardener, each of them responsible for influencing Warlock's upbringing in the hopes that they would cancel each other out and Warlock would turn out to be neither good nor evil, and wouldn’t end the world after all.
"Wait a minute," Warlock says. "How did you know in the first place? Who told you I was the Antichrist?"
Now Nanny looks distinctly uncomfortable, and a pitying look crosses Brother Francis's face.
"Because I was responsible for delivering the Antichrist to a human family," Nanny mutters finally. "The Antichrist was supposed to be given to your parents to raise, but the baby swap went wrong. The Antichrist ended up with another family, and you were given to the Dowlings instead."
"They're not my mom and dad?"
"They're your parents in every way that counts," Brother Francis says gently. "They did raise you, after all."
Warlock wonders what boy got the life he was supposed to have. The life he would have had if Nanny hadn't interfered. He wonders if that boy's father was gone all the time, too, and if his mother had left his upbringing to his nanny and his tutors as well.
Probably not.
"Your name isn't even Ashtoreth, is it?" Warlock says to Nanny. "And yours isn't Brother Francis."
"No," Nanny agrees. "I'm Crowley. This is Aziraphale."
"So I should call you by those names instead?"
Crowley shrugs. "Makes no difference to me."
“Okay, Nanny.” Warlock looks between the two of them. “So what happens now?”
“I think we’ve all had a very long day--quite a long week, really--and it would be best to revisit this in the morning,” Brother Francies says. “Warlock, I have a flat upstairs. You can shower if you like, and the bed’s all yours. I don’t sleep, as you can imagine.”
“I’ll show him.” Nanny stands, and his wings vanish. He holds out a hand to Warlock. “Come on, my hellspawn.”
Warlock stands gingerly, all at once aware of the bone-deep ache that suffuses his whole body. He grunts when he tries to take a step and pain lances down his leg. Nanny is there for support. He doesn’t carry Warlock upstairs, as Warlock had been half-dreading, and instead merely offers Warlock an arm to grab. Slowly, achingly, they make their way up the stairs.
Brother Francis’s flat is as cozy as the bookshop downstairs, though considerably less lived-in. Warlock showers gingerly, hissing through his teeth whenever he accidentally aggravates an injury. His body is littered with black, blue, and green bruises. They stretch across his chest and down his arms, darken his thighs and legs. He can’t remember receiving half of them; after a while, the blows had blended together and he lost track.
Nanny’s waiting for him in the bedroom when he comes out of the shower, dripping wet and wrapped in a towel. His lips thin when he takes in the bruises he can see on Warlock’s arms and legs, but he says nothing about them.
“These will be too big on you, but they’ll do,” he says, handing Warlock a black cotton tee and black pajama bottoms. “We’ll have to get you clothes in the morning.”
Warlock steps back into the bathroom to dry off and change. These must be Nanny’s, he concludes. The pajama bottoms are too long, so he cuffs them around his ankles, but the shirt is almost a decent fit. Nanny’s narrow, like him.
“Are you tucking me in?” he asks Nanny when he returns to the bedroom to find him still there.
Nanny arches an eyebrow at him over his sunglasses. “Problem with that?”
“M’too old for it,” Warlock mutters, even as he realizes that the last thing he wants is for Nanny to leave.
“That sounds like something your father would say,” Nanny says disapprovingly. He draws back the blankets, and Warlock crawls into bed. “Aziraphale and I will be downstairs if you need anything.”
“M’kay,” Warlock murmurs. The moment his head hit the pillow, sleep began to pull at him incessantly. Nanny tucks the blankets around his shoulders. “‘Night.”
He feels something brush his forehead. “Good night, Warlock.”
***
Warlock falls asleep quickly--unlike when he was a baby, Crowley notes wryly. He goes back downstairs and finds Aziraphale seated at his ancient desktop, glasses perched on his nose, browsing the Internet.
"You know that's a blessed disconcerting sight, right?" he says as he goes over to a nearby cabinet and fetches a bottle of wine and two glasses.
"I do know how to use technology, thank you," Aziraphale says. "And a good thing, too, because I think I've found something quite interesting."
Crowley pours two glasses of wine and goes over to the computer. He hands Aziraphale a glass, and then leans over his shoulder to peer at the screen. It's a newspaper article, dated only a few days ago.
"American diplomat Thaddeus Dowling's envoy was attacked while he was in Israel on business," Aziraphale says as Crowley scans the article. "Everyone was knocked unconscious. When they came to, there were no injuries, and nothing had been stolen. No one can figure why it happened, or who would do this. But that's not the interesting part."
Aziraphale runs his finger down the screen. "At no point is Warlock mentioned in this article."
"And that's odd?"
"He was with them when this happened," Aziraphale says. "Don't you think it's odd that Thaddeus and Harriet and all their bodyguards are mentioned, but not Warlock? No one thought the child of an American diplomat almost being murdered was newsworthy?"
It’s a good point. Crowley fishes his mobile out of his pocket. He only has a handful of numbers saved on it--the bookshop, Aziraphale's mobile (which he never uses, the stubborn angel), and the Dowlings' numbers. He dials them, one by one, until finally someone picks up.
"Harriet Dowling."
"Mrs Dowling, it's Lilith. Lilith Ashtoreth," Crowley says, putting on Nanny's voice for the first time in four years.
"I'm sorry, who?"
"Your son's nanny."
"What are you talking about? I don't have a son," Harriet says. "Who are you?"
Crowley ends the call. Aziraphale is staring at him in wide-eyed shock.
"Well," he says. "Fuck."
"Quite." Aziraphale takes a long swallow of wine. “We need to discuss what to do about Warlock, but I believe much of that hinges on what we both went through today.”
“Agreed. How was my trial?"
Aziraphale launches cheerfully into his account of Crowley's trial, gleeful at having pulled the wool over Hell's eyes (and maybe revelling just a bit in having been given an excuse to be a complete bastard to Michael).
"How were things upstairs?" he asks when he's finished, and Crowley's been dreading this question but he knows he can't skirt around it.
"You didn't even get a trial. It was straight into a column of Hellfire for you."
Crowley can tell that Aziraphale isn't surprised, and also that he’d still been holding out hope that perhaps Heaven would have given him a chance. Hurt flickers across his face, and then cold resignation sets in.
"I see."
"I breathed Hellfire at them," Crowley says. "You should've seen their faces, angel."
"I don't really think you can call me that anymore, my dear." Aziraphale's lips twitch. "But thank you for that. I still seem to possess some of my powers, at least, but I don’t know how long that will last."
“Same,” Crowley says, nodding. “I have my powers still, but they feel...subdued. Muted. I can’t believe you were able to summon me.”
“I think that’s the last time I’ll be doing that,” Aziraphale says sadly. “I don’t feel quite capable of it anymore.”
“So,” Crowley says. “We do things the human way, unless it’s absolutely unavoidable.”
They lapse into silence, which is unusual for Aziraphale. Usually Crowley can count on him to have an endless string of topics that he wants to talk about, and all Crowley has to do is listen and interject in the right places. He can't think of a thing to say, or at least, he can't properly articulate yet the thoughts swirling in his mind. They've each told their respective sides to fuck off, and almost died because of it. They no longer have jobs. They no longer have a purpose. This is what he wanted from the start, the two of them on their own side, but now there's a nagging in the back of his mind.
What comes next?
What are they supposed to do now?
And now there is Warlock to consider.
"Do you think Adam can fix it?" Aziraphale asks eventually. "Undo the reset, as it were. At least in Warlock's case."
"Dunno, angel. I doubt it. He made himself human, as far as I can tell. I don't think he's capable of it."
"We can ask him."
"Sure."
Aziraphale considers him for a moment.
"You don't want that," he says. "You don't want Adam to fix it."
Crowley swirls the wine in his glass, watches it for a moment.
"Well, it's like you always say. Maybe it's all part of Her ineffable plan, and we shouldn't question it."
Aziraphale is giving him A Look. Crowley can feel it. He refuses to acknowledge it.
"My dear," Aziraphale says gently. "You cannot claim that something is ineffable simply because it's what you've always wanted."
Crowley drains the rest of his glass and stands. He isn't having this conversation right now.
"Think I'm going to kip on your sofa tonight, angel, if that's alright."
"Of course," Aziraphale says, though Crowley can hear the frown in his voice. "But, Crowley--"
"Good night," Crowley says loudly, and shuts the door to the backroom.
***
Crowley's sleep that night is restless and broken. He gets up several times--at least once an hour--to check on Warlock. The boy's sleep seems to be deep and uninterrupted, so deep is his exhaustion. It's a small comfort. Crowley knows peace like this won't last.
Warlock stumbles downstairs mid-morning, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
"Hey, Nanny," he mumbles in a sleep-roughened voice. "Hi, Brother Francis."
"Good morning, dear boy," Aziraphale greets him. "Would you like something to eat? Crowley's just been to the shops."
Warlock shakes his head.
"Tea, then?"
"No, thanks."
"You have to eat something," Crowley says. He slips into Nanny's voice without meaning to, and Warlock looks at him, startled. "How about some toast?"
Warlock wants to refuse, he can tell, but the boy nods after a moment. Crowley fixes him some toast--the human way, there's no point in wasting their powers on frivolous matters--and Warlock nibbles at it half-heartedly.
Aziraphale is giving him a pointed look. Crowley sighs.
"Warlock, we need to talk about your parents." He sits down next to Warlock, who pauses mid-chew. "They're alive, first off. But you've been erased from their--well, from their reality.”
“So they don’t remember me?”
“It’s more than that,” Crowley says. “You never existed at all, for them. They never had a child. Reality has been rewritten, and they're not your parents any longer."
"Oh." Warlock sets his piece of toast carefully on his plate. He’s struggling to keep his composure--Crowley can tell from the way he hangs his head so his hair falls in his eyes, by the tremulous note to his voice. "So...who are my parents?"
"I don't know," Crowley says. "Technically, you shouldn't exist. The Antichrist’s parents are now his biological parents, and yours never had children. I don’t think you have parents. Honestly, Warlock, I don't know why you're still here."
"Crowley," Aziraphale admonishes softly, and Crowley winces. He supposes he could have worded that better.
"Not that I'm not grateful," he says. "I just--I can't explain it."
"Can you fix it?” Warlock looks up at him, his eyes overbright. “Make them my parents again?”
"No," Crowley says. "I'm sorry. Aziraphale and I have been...retired by our respective offices. We have the ability to perform minor miracles, but our powers are finite, and have been greatly reduced. We would have to rewrite reality to put you back in their lives again. We can't do something of that magnitude, not anymore."
Warlock pushes his hair out of his eyes. "So what happens to me now?"
"We're not certain yet," Aziraphale says.
At the same time, Crowley says, "You can stay with me."
Crowley and Aziraphale look at each other. Aziraphale tries to convey with his eyes that this is a terrible idea, Crowley, what are you even thinking. Crowley ignores it.
“I have a flat in Mayfair,” Crowley says. “You’ll stay with me for a while. Until we get everything sorted.”
****
In his six thousand years on this planet, Crowley’s never actually lived with another being, human or otherwise. Not for any extended period of time, at least. He’s shacked up with humans here and there over the millennia, but never for more than a few days at a time (with two notable exceptions, in the 1470s and the 1980s, when he spent the better part of three years with two extraordinary humans).
Having Warlock around isn’t too much of an adjustment. Crowley has to keep his refrigerator stocked with human food, for one, and had to actually hook up all of his appliances so Warlock could use them, since he couldn’t simply imagine that they would work and it would actually happen.
Warlock is a quiet child. He watches television, mostly, and sometimes he reads (from books Crowley is certain he has never owned, which means that Aziraphale has been squandering some miracles by sending books to his flat), and he sleeps for the rest of the day. That’s understandable, at least according to the articles Crowley has looked up online. He’s healing from a traumatic experience, both physically and emotionally, and that’s going to take a toll.
Crowley starts to find himself at loose ends. He has no more orders coming to him from Hell, and no reason to go about what used to be his usual business. He’s spent six millennia securing souls for Hell for the express purpose of keeping himself out of it, but without that fear hanging over his head, he isn’t sure what to do with himself.
He has no doubt this isn’t the last he’s heard from Hell. He’d meant it when he told Aziraphale that there’s another war coming, this time against humanity. But his more immediate concern is revenge coming in the form of a rogue demon who decides to take matters into their own hands. Namely, Hastur.
He’d been a bit showy with that bucket of holy water. He could have used half that amount and still destroyed Ligur. He should have done that, shouldn’t have squandered the whole thing, because there’s no way Aziraphale will be able to procure more. The kind found in churches here on Earth pales in comparison to what Aziraphale obtained for him from Heaven, and there will be no more trips Upstairs for him.
Crowley has always kept wards on his flat. Nothing that would keep determined demons out--case in point--but enough that someone would have to know exactly where to find him in order to enter the premises. He can’t strengthen them, not without his powers, and has to trust that the ones he put in place years ago will hold on their own.
He spends his days worrying, which isn’t much different from his life before the Apocalypse, but now he can’t use orders from Hell as the distraction he so desperately needs. He watches television with Warlock--and tells the story of how he invented reality television with great relish--and sleeps at night when the boy does, and terrorizes his plants. It helps to pass the time.
Aziraphale checks in with Crowley every day. The angel has grown relatively comfortable with using the mobile Crowley got for him, even if he doesn’t entirely approve of it. He has admitted that it’s come in useful on more than one occasion, and he does enjoy sending Crowley messages (Crowley, for his part, would never admit even under threat of Hellfire that his heart stutters every time his phone goes off, because he knows it’s Aziraphale and he loves getting texts from the angel). Crowley keeps him updated on Warlock’s condition, and Aziraphale chats about the bookshop, and they make plans for future lunches and dinners.
Aziraphale stops by the flat one week after the failed Apocalypse, arms laden with food and drink. Crowley relieves him of his burden, carrying the bags into the kitchen to unpack and sort through everything.
“You planning on feeding the entire street, angel?” he asks as he unpacks what looks like enough food to do so twice over.
“I wasn’t sure what Warlock liked. It’s been four years, after all,” Aziraphale says. “Anything we don’t eat tonight you can serve him as leftovers.”
He says leftovers like it leaves a particularly bad taste in his mouth, and Crowley laughs.
“Hellspawn,” he calls, “you hungry?”
“Really, Crowley.”
“What? It’s what I’ve always called him.”
Warlock comes out of Crowley’s bedroom, earbud still in one ear while he holds the other in his hand.
“Oh, hey, Brother Francis,” he says, brightening at once. “Wow, that’s a lot of food.”
“Well, I wasn’t sure what you would like. You’re looking better.” Warlock comes over to them, and Aziraphale brushes his long hair off his forehead, examining the healing cuts and bruises on his face. “Would you like some food?”
Warlock eats dinner with them, then disappears back into the bedroom. Aziraphale presses his lips together, but Crowley waves it off.
“He’s fine, angel, that’s just what kids do. Besides, he knows we need to talk. Or did you truly come over here with no agenda?”
“I have missed you this past week, my dear.”
“Missed you, too, angel, but you’re avoiding the question.”
Aziraphale sighs. “I paid a visit to Tadfield this week.”
Crowley goes still. “I see.”
“I’m sorry, my dear, but I needed to know--it didn’t seem right to keep the boy from his family if there was a chance that reality could be fixed.”
Crowley’s breath stills in his chest, and so does his heart. He curls his fingers carefully around the wine glass and brings it to his lips for a long swallow.
“What did Adam say?” he asks in a carefully-measured voice.
“It’s as you thought,” Aziraphale says. “Adam made himself human. Well, he’s a human with a few supernatural abilities, but the majority of his powers are gone. He reset what he could. He couldn’t see Warlock in Hell, and that’s why he wasn’t pulled out when the reset occurred. And since the Dowlings were here on Earth but their son was somewhere undetectable, reality rewrote itself as though Warlock never existed.”
“But he does, angel. He exists.”
“Yes,” Aziraphale agrees. “I know. So what are you going to do about it?”
Crowley sets his empty wine glass on the table. He leaves his hand there, gently resting on the bottom, and traces the stem with a finger.
“Crowley…” Aziraphale trails off. “That isn’t a good idea.”
“Why not?” Crowley asks. “I raised him, Aziraphale.”
“You were his nanny, dear.”
“What does that matter? The Dowlings were never around. Who else but me raised him?”
Aziraphale doesn’t seem to have an answer to that, and covers it with a long swallow of wine.
“Well,” he says, “I think it should be up to Warlock, don’t you?”
****
Warlock’s injuries heal slowly--far more slowly than they should have, but since they were inflicted by a supernatural being, Crowley assumes that’s normal. He has to assume that it’s normal, or he’ll never be able to sleep at night.
He sleeps very little as it is. He can’t fully relax, not with Warlock in the flat. Crowley doesn’t want the boy anywhere else, but he’s painfully aware that he’s a shadow of his former demonic self. Once, he could have taken on a legion of demons without blinking. Now, even the lowest of them could destroy him, leaving Warlock completely defenseless.
They could run. Where would they go? Crowley sprawls on the throne in his office and opens the Big Book of Astronomy, flips through a few pages, and then closes it with a grunt of frustration. He turns to the globe instead, because he has to be realistic, and spins it, running his finger along the surface. Much as he wants to flee the planet, that’s not practical for a human child to run away to the stars with him--and he can’t do it, anyway, not without his powers. It’s nice to imagine it for a moment, though. Taking Warlock to Alpha Centauri, to Andromeda, to Arcturus. Showing him the nebulae and galaxies and stars Crowley shaped in his hands.
There’s a faint sound from the other end of the flat. Crowley tenses, listening.
It’s a whimper, barely audible, but the instincts Crowley picked up from his days as a nanny never left him. He unfolds himself from his throne and stands. His joints crackle like they always do, painful as usual, the price he pays for trying to fit his serpentine body into a human corporation. They’re too stiff for him to run, so he hurries to the bedroom as fast as his legs will allow and pushes open the door.
Warlock’s curled up on his side, his back to the door, shoulders shaking. Crowley crosses the room to him and lays a hand on his back.
“Hellspawn,” he murmurs. “Warlock, it’s okay. I’m here. You’re safe.”
Warlock recoils away from his touch, and Crowley knows not to take it personally, but it still stings. He goes around to the other side of the bed and crouches in front of it. He touches Warlock’s tear-stained cheek, smoothes his damp hair off his forehead.
“Warlock,” he says, louder. “Warlock, it’s me. Wake up.”
Warlock’s eyes fly open, wide and terrified, and he gasps.
“It’s Nanny,” Crowley says softly. He goes to snap his fingers before he remembers, and instead leans over to turn on the light manually. “See? It’s only me, and you’re in my flat. You’re safe.”
He sits on the bed. Warlock’s trembling beneath the blankets. Crowley coaxes him into a sitting position and cups his face, taking stock. The bruises are still livid against his pale skin, and though teary, his eyes are clear when he looks at Crowley. Not a demonic possession, then, or a supernaturally-inflicted dream. Just a normal, human nightmare.
“You’re safe,” Crowley repeats again, quietly. “They’re not taking you back there. Not while I’m around.”
Warlock leans into him. Crowley holds him, marveling at how big he’s grown. He’d seen Warlock not a week ago at his birthday party, but Crowley’s mind had been admittedly on other things at the time.
“Hellspawn,” he murmurs, stroking a hand through Warlock’s hair, “what happened down there?”
Warlock says nothing for a long time. He’s not asleep, Crowley can tell that much from his breathing and from the way he tenses in Crowley’s arms. Crowley assumes he’s not going to answer when Warlock finally says, “They hit me.”
Crowley has often entertained fantasies of killing Hastur, but they were always only that--something to pass the time, or to bring him out of his darkest spirals. Something to cling to. But now, he thinks about how he can make this a reality, even without his powers. “Because you were the wrong boy?”
Warlock nods slowly. “And because…”
He trails off.
“Because of me,” Crowley says in a low voice. “Right?”
Warlock says nothing, which is answer enough. For a while, they sit in silence, until Warlock whispers, “He said you killed someone.”
“Another demon,” Crowley says. “To be fair, he was trying to kill me first.”
“Oh.” Warlock’s still and quiet for a while. Crowley can feel the precise moment the dam breaks, because Warlock tenses in his arms and hot tears splash onto his hand. “Nanny, it was awful.”
“I know.”
“I thought--I thought no one would ever find me. He said--he said no one cared, no one was even looking for me.”
“I would have noticed.” Crowley can’t hold him any tighter, not without hurting him. “I would have, Warlock.”
“You didn’t, though.” Warlock sniffs, but doesn’t pull away. Crowley cups his head with one hand, holding Warlock to him.
“I would have,” Crowley says again. “I keep tabs on you, hellspawn, I’m not lying about that. We both do. Or didn’t you notice that the terrible magician at your birthday last week was Brother Francis?”
Warlock rubs his nose on the back of his hand. “What?”
“And I was a waiter. Ducked out when it all went to...well, hell.” Crowley pulls a black silk handkerchief out of his pocket and gives it to Warlock. “I didn’t say anything to you at the time because the world was literally ending.”
“But it’s not anymore.”
“No, not anymore. It’s safe.”
“Are we?”
“You let me worry about that.”
Warlock slowly calms. The tears stop, at least, but he doesn’t seem inclined to go back to bed. Crowley can’t say that he blames him.
“Would you like Nanny to sing you a song?” Crowley asks, only half-joking. Warlock chokes out a laugh.
“About crushing the world beneath my feet?”
“Well, it’s that or Queen,” Crowley says, and Warlock snorts. He’d taken Warlock for the occasional drive when he was small; the boy knew about the Bentley’s odd quirk.
Warlock draws a shuddering breath.
“Actually, can you--” he starts, breaks off, shakes his head. “Like when I was little, and it was storming.”
“Of course, darling,” Crowley says, in Nanny’s voice, and a ghost of a smile flits across Warlock’s lips. “Here, budge over.”
Crowley’s bed is a four-poster monstrosity that fills nearly the entire room, piled high with thick blankets and pillows in black and varying shades of grey. There is a small indentation on the left side from where Warlock had been sleeping these past few nights, and he settles back into it. Crowley stretches out next to him and holds out an arm.
Warlock is bigger now than he’d been all those years ago, obviously, but his head still slots perfectly under Crowley’s ribcage. He rests his head on Crowley’s stomach, face turned to the window and ear pressed to Crowley’s nonexistent navel. He’d left a book face-down on the table, and Crowley picks it up, glancing at the cover.
“A Separate Peace?” he murmurs. It’s not one he keeps around the flat, that he knows.
“Found it,” Warlock says, and of course it’s probably Aziraphale’s doing.
Crowley cracks the book open to the page where Warlock had left off, and begins to read. He speaks the words in Nanny’s lilting voice, and Warlock sighs, some of the tension bleeding out of him. He drapes an arm across Crowley’s stomach and snuggles closer, and Crowley melts. He has missed this. Warlock had never gone to his parents when he woke in the middle of the night, had always sought comfort from Nanny. He had fallen asleep like this in her bed too many times to count, and she had always carried him back to his room before the night was over. But Crowley doesn’t have to do that this time--doesn’t have to send Warlock back to his room alone, doesn’t have to turn him over to parents who treat him with mostly with disinterest.
Warlock soon grows heavy against his side, his breaths coming deep and even. Crowley idly strokes Warlock's hair, the dark strands sliding between his fingers. Warlock doesn’t so much as stir. Dead to the world, then. Crowley shifts his shoulder blades and manifests his wings--there is a reason the bed is massive, after all. He luxuriates in the feel of silk sheets against his wings, and it feels good to stretch them out after days of keeping them cramped inside his corporation. He drapes the left over Warlock, sheltering the teen, and sets the book aside.
Hours pass. The night grows deeper, colder, while Crowley turns their options over in his mind. He can probably throw Hastur off their trail for a while, zigging and zagging their way around the globe, hiding in well-populated areas where there would be interference from millions and billions of souls. But it’s not something that would last forever, and wouldn’t bring them peace.
“So if you know how to take care of plants,” Warlock murmurs, startling him, “how come you were the nanny and Brother Francis was the gardener?”
“It was my idea to interfere with your upbringing in the first place,” Crowley says. “Seems only fair that I got to call dibs.”
“You wanted to be the nanny?”
Crowley lifts an eyebrow at him. “Are you complaining?”
“No,” Warlock says quickly. “Of course not. You were great.”
Crowley snorts. “I’m good with kids, that’s all. Much better than Aziraphale, at any rate. For what it’s worth...I liked being your nanny. You’re my wee hellspawn, and always will be.”
“Stop it,” Warlock says, ducking away, but Crowley can see that he’s fighting a grin. "How did you become a demon?"
Crowley's hand stills in Warlock's hair, then continues its ministrations.
"I had...questions," he says quietly. "Questions that Heaven didn't like, so I Fell."
"You always told me it's good to have questions."
"It is." Crowley tightens his wing around Warlock. "It is, and you must never forget that."
"What did you do...before?"
"Before I Fell?" Something cold slithers into Crowley's stomach. He's never even had this conversation with Aziraphale. "I was an angel."
"Did you know Brother Francis?"
"No. He's a young angel, by our standards. He was created shortly before the war, the first war, and that's about the same time that I Fell. I have been around for...eons. Almost since the Beginning. Not the beginning of Earth, but the beginning of everything."
"Did you live in space, then? Before the Earth?"
"I suppose you could say that." Crowley doesn’t even know how to explain the concept of Heaven to a child, a child who has a mortal's brain. Warlock can’t begin to comprehend it.
"You've seen the stars, then."
Crowley feels a small smile tug at his lips. This is a memory that doesn’t hurt. One that he cherishes, despite everything that had come after.
"Darling," he murmurs, "I made the stars."
Warlock lifts his head to look at Crowley. "Really?"
"Really." Crowley brushes a strand of hair off Warlock's forehead. Those amber eyes, wide with curiosity--how he has missed them. "I hung the stars. I shaped planets in the palm of my hand. Nebulae were my specialty. I created entire galaxies.”
Warlock rests his head on Crowley’s stomach again, and lets out a slow sigh.
“They’re beautiful, Nanny,” he says softly.
“I’m glad you think so, hellspawn.”
****
It takes two hours for Warlock to fall asleep again. Once he does, Crowley closes his own eyes, and is instantly unconscious.
He’s jolted awake by an inhuman stench, and the sound of Warlock screaming. Crowley reaches out a hand, grabs Hastur by the back of his filthy coat, and throws him to the floor. The spell momentarily broken, Warlock collapses on the bed, chest heaving and limbs twitching. He gasps through sobs. Crowley scrambles to his feet.
“Get out,” he says, in as cold and terrible a voice as he can manage.
Hastur is immediately on his feet again, and crowds Crowley against the wall. Behind him, Warlock starts to get off the bed. Hastur throws out a hand and flings Warlock into the wall without looking. Crowley hears his head crack against the wall, and then Warlock collapses on the ground in a heap.
“No,” Hastur murmurs. “I don’t think I will. You're going to hand over the boy to me."
"No, I don't think I am."
Hastur's lip curls. “Give me the boy.”
“He’s right there. Take him for yourself.” That’s a dangerous game to play with Hastur, but somehow Crowley doesn’t think this is what he’s after. Not entirely.
“No,” Hastur says. “You’re going to hand him to me. You’re going to wake him up, and you’re going to give him to me. I want him to watch. I want him to know exactly who sent him back to Hell.”
“That’s never going to happen.”
"The longer it takes you to hand him over, the worse his death will be,” Hastur says. “How much are you willing to let him suffer?"
"What does Hell care about the boy, anyway?" Crowley asks. He's stalling for time; it's the only tactic he has at his disposal. "He's not the Antichrist."
"Hell doesn't give a shit what happens to the boy, you’re right, but I do. This is payback, Crowley."
“Here I am!” Crowley throws out his arms. “You want your revenge, you can have it. I’m right fucking here, Hastur, and even you can sense that my powers are depleting. I’ve been cut off. You can do what you like to me, and I can’t do a thing to stop you. So go on. Do it.”
But Hastur merely grins. “No, don’t think so. The worst thing I can do to you is to take that boy to Hell and make sure he knows you’re the one who sent him there. So that’s what I’m gonna do.”
Warlock stirs, groaning as he comes awake.
“Warlock, stay there,” Crowley commands as the boy sits up, groggy and clutching his head.
“Nanny?”
Hastur’s lip curls.
“Nanny. Pathetic excuse for a demon, you are. Well, go on.” He waves a hand at Crowley. “Go to the boy, Nanny.”
Warily, Crowley side-steps around Hastur and crosses the room to Warlock. He drops into a crouch and takes the boy’s chin in his hand, searching his eyes.
“Yeah, that’s a concussion,” he murmurs. “Whatever you do, Warlock, you can’t fall asleep. Understood? Not until I say.”
The door to the flat bangs open. Crowley jumps at the unexpected noise. Hastur’s eyes dart to the bedroom door, uncertain. So he hadn’t been expecting this, either.
Crowley pivots to his feet as the bedroom door swings open, and Aziraphale comes into the room.
“Warlock,” Aziraphale says mildly. “Close your eyes, dear boy.”
“What?” Warlock whimpers. Crowley drops to the ground and gathers the boy against him, clamping a hand tight over his eyes.
“Angel, you shouldn’t--” he tries, but it’s too late.
Aziraphale’s true form is, well, fucking terrifying. Angels are not beatific sights to behold. They are awful, horrific creatures. Merely gazing upon one in its true form would be enough to kill a human at the very least. At worst, it would drive them mad.
Even Crowley can’t look at Aziraphale in his true form, not for long. The moment his eyes start to burn, he squeezes them shut and presses his face to the top of Warlock’s head. Warlock is trembling in his arms. All Crowley can do is hold him tighter, and hope Aziraphale holds out longer than Hastur.
The holy light that Aziraphale’s body emits is pervasive. Even with his face buried in Warlock’s hair and his eyes squeezed shut, it still leaks through. Crowley is sweating, burning up with the intensity of it. A full demon like Hastur, one who is still connected to the power of Hell, must be in agony.
And then Hastur screams. Screams like he did when Ligur dissolved before his eyes, a scream that echoes on and on and on--
The screaming stops. The light vanishes. There is a thud, and Crowley opens his eyes to see that Aziraphale has fallen to his knees next to them. Hastur is gone.
“Alright, angel?” Crowley croaks.
“Yes, dear boy, I’m fine.” Aziraphale puts a hand on Crowley’s shoulder to steady himself. Crowley can feel tremors still wracking it. “Though I’m afraid that’s it from me. No more miracles, frivolous or otherwise. That took about the last of my powers.”
“I’m--”
“If you’re about to apologize, please refrain from doing so. I have no regrets.” Aziraphale touches Warlock’s cheek. The boy is unconscious, but breathing. “I believe it would be safest if we relocated to the bookshop, however.”
“Can you get us there?” Crowley asks. “I don’t have much left, either, and what powers I do have need to be saved for Warlock.”
“Of course.”
****
Aziraphale drives them back to the bookshop in the Bentley. Crowley sits in the back seat, cradling Warlock’s unconscious body. The passing street lamps illuminate his battered face. Crowley cups it gently, smoothing a thumb over a bruised cheek.
“I did this to him.”
He doesn’t realize the words have left his mouth until Aziraphale says sharply, “Crowley, don’t.”
“The Youngs are his parents. They should have raised him.”
“And the Dowlings would have received a different child, who still would have been named Warlock and who still would have had that upbringing.”
“I could fix it.” Crowley swallows. He’d dismissed the idea out of hand the first time it crossed his mind, but he hasn’t been able to banish it entirely. “I have enough power left to do it, I think.”
“No.”
“Well, I wouldn’t be able to make them his parents, but I can alter their memories. Make them think they have two sons, not one. Adam would be his brother, the Youngs would be his parents…”
“What if you don’t have enough power to do even that?” Aziraphale counters. “What if it doesn’t hold? And Warlock will always know the truth. You can alter their memories, but they will remember things that he never experienced, and that isn’t fair to him, Crowley. It isn’t fair to make the Youngs believe they’ve given him a happy life, when he knows it’s a lie. Warlock doesn’t need a fake family. He needs you.”
“I don’t know what to do, angel.”
They arrive at the bookshop. Aziraphale parks the car, and then twists around in his seat to look at Crowley.
“Like I said before,” he says, laying a hand on Crowley’s knee, “that’s for Warlock to decide.”
****
Healing Warlock depletes most of the power that Crowley has left. He mends the concussion, a fractured wrist, a broken rib, and a litany of cuts and bruises. He takes away most of the pain, too, and puts Warlock into a deep sleep. Exhausted, he collapses next to Warlock on Aziraphale’s bed. Aziraphale tugs off Crowley’s boots and then spreads a blanket over them both before leaving them to sleep.
Crowley reaches out and places a hand on Warlock’s chest, reassured by the rise and fall of it. He remembers a multitude of sleepless nights spent in Warlock’s nursery, watching the infant as he slept in his crib, making sure he didn’t stop breathing. Human babies were fragile things, even ones fathered by Satan, and he knew Warlock could have stopped breathing at any time, and for no reason. It happened to human babies all the time.
HIs sleep is deep and dreamless. He wakes when he feels Warlock stir beside him, and the boy blinks open bleary eyes. It’s at least midday, Crowley estimates from the sunlight streaming in through Aziraphale’s window. They’ve been asleep for at least twelve hours.
“He’s gone,” Crowley says when frightened eyes meet his. He smoothes the hair off Warlock’s forehead. “He won’t be coming back.”
“So now what?”
“I think that’s mostly up to you,” Crowley says. “I have some powers left. I could alter your parents’ memories, write you back into their lives, and send you home. I could do the same thing for the couple who should have raised you, the parents you were born to. I know who they are. They have a son already, so it’s just a matter of making them believe they’ve had twins all this time.”
“I thought you said you couldn’t do that,” Warlock says softly. “You and Brother Francis, you said you couldn’t do something...something of that magnitude.”
“I don’t have the power to rewrite reality, that’s still true,” Crowley says. “I can’t insert you into their lives for real. I can’t make you their son. All I can do is alter their memories, so they never question your presence in their lives.”
Warlock looks away.
“It wouldn’t be real, though,” he whispers. “None of it. All of their memories would be fake.”
“That’s true,” Crowley concedes. “But everything that comes after...that would be real.”
Warlock turns back to him. “Can I stay with you?”
“Is that what you want?”
Warlock gives a tiny nod. Crowley pushes himself into a sitting position and leans back against the headboard. Warlock sits cross-legged on the mattress, watching him hopefully. Crowley touches his cheek.
“You were just a job, you know,” he says softly. “But then your mother put you in my arms for the first time and I--well. I wasn’t supposed to get attached.”
Warlock, blinking rapidly, whispers, “I love you, too, Nanny.”
Love. He doesn’t use the word. Aziraphale spent millennia believing it was an emotion Crowley couldn’t feel, and Heaven’s twisted definition of it is a poor imitation of what he’s seen of it on Earth over the years. Humans, Crowley thinks, know love better than the angels do.
“Are you sure about this?” Crowley presses. “Warlock, you need to be absolutely sure, because I don’t have a lot of power left. If I do this...I can’t undo it.”
“I want to stay with you,” Warlock presses. “Nanny, please.”
Crowley closes his eyes and, with the last of his powers, manifests a slew of paperwork. Birth certificate, adoption papers, everything needed to show that Warlock is his and always has been. He files the originals away in the backroom with the rest of Aziraphale’s documentation regarding the bookshop, and puts copies in Aziraphale’s desk and his own back in Mayfair.
He opens his eyes and reaches for Warlock, who goes easily into his embrace.
“Still gonna make you eat your vegetables,” he says into Warlock’s hair.
“No, you can’t,” Warlock says, and they dissolve into laughter. The bedroom door opens, and Aziraphale stands there, regarding them with some bemusement.
“What’s so amusing?” he asks.
Crowley ruffles Warlock’s hair. Warlock ducks away, laughing.
“Congratulations, angel. It’s a boy.”
****
Crowley only intends for them to stay at the bookshop for a few days while they recuperate, but those days stretch into weeks, and soon enough the days are growing short and there is a bite to the air whenever he ventures out.
They're settling into a new normal. Aziraphale actually starts running his bookshop like a legitimate business, and allows customers to occasionally purchase books (the ones that he's willing to part with), though he still keeps wildly unpredictable hours. Crowley gets Warlock enrolled in school. Things from his Mayfair flat start to migrate over to the bookshop--first his plants, then his record collection, and then bits and pieces of his wardrobe. By mid-autumn, they finally give up on the pretense of maintaining separate homes, and Crowley sells his flat.
It’s a tight fit in the bookshop, without the aid of miracles. Crowley’s plants sit on every available surface and in some cases overflow onto the floor, and they squeeze his record collection into the backroom, along with his gramophone. The lectern from the church and his priceless da Vinci sketches, he reluctantly puts in storage. There’s no room in the bookshop for any of his furniture. The bed is the only thing he regrets not being able to bring over, but Aziraphale already has one and Warlock is the one using it.
It’s a good thing that, as far as he and Aziraphale can tell, they are still immortal beings even if their powers are gone. Crowley doesn’t need to eat, sleep, or breathe, though he does the latter two. Sleeping because it’s enjoyable, and breathing because Warlock finds it unnerving when he doesn’t. Crowley sleeps on the backroom’s sofa at night while Aziraphale putters around, doing whatever it is Aziraphale does at night when the rest of the world is asleep. It’s soothing, having the angel nearby. Crowley finds that he dreams of the fire less and less as time goes by, though he still can’t bear for Aziraphale to build up a fire in the grate on chilly nights, so they have to use the building’s old heating system instead.
Crowley has done well enough with stocks over the years that he doesn't need to work, at least not for another human lifespan or two. At first, he’s concerned with how to fill his time, but he soon finds that having to do things the human way takes up the majority of his days. Cooking for Warlock and Aziraphale, cleaning, caring for the plants, running out to the shops, laundry--a multitude of things that once he would have snapped his fingers for, now he has to do without the aid of his powers. He finds he doesn't mind as much as he thought he would. And while he may not be receiving orders from Hell anymore, he still stirs up mischief when he can. Mostly, this boils down to gluing coins to the pavement or starting senseless arguments on Twitter, but at least it keeps life interesting.
"Crowley!" Aziraphale calls to him one morning from the backroom. "Do you have a moment, dear?"
"Sure thing, angel."
Crowley sets down his mister and goes to the back. Aziraphale is sitting at his desk, which is even more of a chaotic mess than usual.
"What's all this?" Crowley grabs the nearest piece of paper and peers at it. It's a real estate listing for a cottage in the South Downs. A quick glance at the rest of the papers Aziraphale has spread across the table shows that he's been looking at houses all over England, most of which are in villages and towns that hug the coast. "Going somewhere?"
"Well, that's what I wanted to speak to you about." Aziraphale takes off his glasses, folds them, and tucks them neatly into his pocket. "Yes, I’m considering it. I thought a change of scenery might be good."
"You're not serious." Crowley stares at him. "You'd leave London? The bookshop?"
Us, is what he doesn't say.
"I have no intention of parting with the bookshop," Aziraphale says. "But yes, I thought we might want a change of pace, so to speak. Don’t you agree?"
Crowley's racing mind takes a moment to catch and process those words.
"We?" he asks.
"My dear, you don't think I have any intention of going anywhere without you, do you?" Aziraphale's smile is warm and gentle. "After all the trouble we went through to save the world so we wouldn't have to be parted?"
"We really didn't do much saving of the world, that was all Adam," Crowley mutters, but a pleasant heat has spread through his chest. "You really want to do this?"
“Look at this place, Crowley.” Aziraphale waves a hand at the room, which is as cluttered as every other corner of the bookshop and the flat above. “There’s hardly any room here for the two of us, let alone a child. You’re sleeping on the sofa. Half of your things are in storage. And this place holds so many awful memories for you, dear.”
“Only the one,” Crowley says quietly. “And it’s not so bad, angel. I have two centuries’ worth of wonderful memories here.”
“And one memory that overshadows them all,” Aziraphale presses gently. “I want to live somewhere that doesn’t give you nightmares. I want Warlock to have the space to grow up. If you’re adamantly against it, then we won’t go. But I’d like you to think about it.”
Crowley looks down at the piece of paper still in his hands. The cottage pictured on the listing manages to look cozy and spacious all at once. It’s shaded on two sides by towering trees, but there’s a sun-drenched lawn on one side of the cottage that would be excellent for a garden.
“You’re holding what I believe is the top contender,” Aziraphale says. “There's room enough for my books and your plants, and a bedroom for Warlock and one for you. The space out back looks like it would be big enough for a garden, but I'll let you be the judge of that. We could go take a look tomorrow. If you'd like, of course."
“Sure.” Crowley hesitates. “And...we should bring Warlock. I want him to like it, too.”
“Of course. It would be his home as well.”
****
In the end, they choose a cottage in the South Downs. They move truckload by laborious truckload over the course of a few weeks, until the last of Brother Francis's books and Nanny's clothes are brought over from the flat above the bookshop in London.
They spend the winter settling in. Brother Francis unpacks all of his books and organizes the library to his liking. Nanny spends most of his days out back, fixing up the conservatory that sits on their property and planting his winter garden. Warlock explores their new village, riding his bicycle through town and hiking up and down the bluffs. It doesn’t snow this close to the temperate sea, and the winter is mild.
Spring is wet, the damp pervasive. Even though he can’t turn into a snake anymore, Nanny is still susceptible to the damp chill that plagues their days. He sits as close to the fire at night as he can stand, and wears so many layers that it’s easy to forget how thin he is. He spends most of his time tending to the garden in his hot conservatory, and braves the outdoors only when it’s time to plant the garden for the coming summer. Brother Francis doesn’t sleep, but through the winter and spring he retires most nights to Nanny’s bed with him, to provide added warmth throughout the night.
They’re good together, Warlock thinks. He doesn’t know how he missed it as a child, how obvious their bond is. They rarely kiss and only sometimes touch, but their devotion to each other is undeniable. They’ll be together for the rest of eternity. Warlock likes the thought of that, is pleased that Nanny won’t be alone after he’s gone. Because even though Nanny and Brother Francis aren’t supernatural beings anymore, they aren’t exactly human, either. Nanny doesn’t need sleep like Brother Francis doesn’t need to eat. They do it because they enjoy it, but their bodies don’t need any of the upkeep that human ones do. As far as anyone can tell, they are both still immortal. They’ll be around long after Warlock--and the Earth itself--has turned to dust.
Warlock is glad they’ll have each other.
Summer comes on all at once. The days are long and unusually hot, and Nanny basks in it. They take the occasional trip to Tadfield, where Warlock meets the actual Antichrist and his group of friends. He likes Adam Young well enough, and his parents are nice. Warlock knows now that the Youngs are his real parents--or at least they were, before reality got rewritten. He knows that Nanny could have inserted him into their lives, if he’d asked. Nanny would have done anything for Warlock, if only he asked.
Warlock’s glad that he didn’t.
They mark his twelfth birthday quietly, without much fanfare. Nanny makes him a cake, and Brother Francis presents him with gifts. They make a day of it down by the beach, staying until long after sundown. They stretch out on the sand, which still holds the day’s heat, Warlock’s head pillowed on Nanny’s stomach. Nanny’s head rests on Brother Francis’s thigh, and he’s idly stroking Nanny’s hair.
“Nanny,” Warlock says, “did you make all the stars?”
“Most of them.” Nanny’s voice is thick and sluggish; he’s halfway to sleep. “I had assistants.”
“My dear,” Brother Francis murmurs, “I didn’t know you were a starmaker.”
“Why d’you think I wanted you to go to Alpha Centauri with me, angel?” Nanny lets out a slow sigh. “One of my favorites, that one.”
“You can never visit them again,” Warlock says softly.
“I can see them every night from here.”
“That’s not the same. It’s not the universe.” It’s profoundly unfair, Warlock thinks, that Nanny isn’t allowed to visit the very stars he had shaped. That he should lose everything for asking questions, when humans have done far worse than that throughout history.
“I don’t need that universe, darling.” Nanny runs his fingers through Warlock’s hair. “Not when I have my own right here.”
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Date: 2019-12-31 08:01 pm (UTC)Dammit, there isn't one. *pouts*
This is a magnificent story. I was so horrified about the way that Warlock was treated, and growled in a very satisfied way when Aziraphale dealt with Hastur.
And Crowley adopting Warlock and the three of them moving to the cottage was just gorgeous.
Fabulous story. Thank you for writing it.
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