Author's Note: I've gotten around to finishing this chapter at last; I don't know why but this part just didn't seem to want to be written. Apologies again for the roughness of the writing at some parts.
This chapter mirrors the events of the second chapter, but is told from Crowley's point of view.
After their conversation that rainy day in Eden, Crawly had been foolish enough to let himself hope for…well, not for friendship with Aziraphale, per se…but some sort of truce, maybe. The angel hadn't seen completely unbearable—ridiculously pompous, as all angels were, but his holier-than-thou attitude hadn't been quite as overblown as it was among the rest of the hosts of Heaven. And, well, who knew, maybe he was as desirous for some sort of company as Crawly was.
That ridiculous notion was swiftly corrected at their next meeting.
Crawly had been whisked back to Hell almost as soon as news of the humans' Fall had reached his bosses' ears—not long after his brief conversation with Aziraphale, in fact.
He'd been praised for his work by Satan himself, and received a very generous commendation for a prime spot in line with those waiting for fresh human souls to torture—but to the astonishment of the higher-up demons, Crawly had turned it down. He persuaded his masters to allow him to return to the surface to continue to wreak havoc. He argued that it was in Hell's best interests to have an agent up there, seeing as Heaven did, and that it was more logical to send up someone who was already familiar with the place.
"And this time, may I suggest a human form, my lord?" he asked hopefully. "That's what the angel's got, you see. Plus, it'll be easier for me to tempt people if they aren't suspicious of me—and I doubt they'll be trusting snakes again any time soon."
It was granted him, to his delight. Unfortunately, though, his request took some time to process, and nearly twenty Earth years had passed since the Tree incident when he reappeared just outside the gates of Eden in a brand new human body—he looked very dashing in it, he thought, once he'd mastered the use of his limbs. There were a few irregularities to it—it retained the yellow eyes of his serpent's body, for instance; and his tongue was rather pointier and more…flexible than he remembered Adam's and Eve's being. But he'd blend in well enough, he figured, when more people had popped up. After all, being a demon had its advantages—he could simply will them not to notice his peculiar features.
When he'd found the humans again, who had wandered off quite a ways from Eden, he discovered that things had gotten very rocky very fast in his absence. In fact, "finding" the humans isn't quite the term for how he located them again—"stumbling over the still-bleeding corpse of one of them" is more accurate.
He was making his way through a field that bore the signs of human cultivation, excited to think that after several weeks of searching he was about to see them again at last: Adam and Eve—and a few new ones no doubt; he was sure the couple must be hard at work heeding the whole "be fertile and multiply" thing.
Crawly parted a particularly thick cluster of wheat and his next step brought him toppling over a figure on the ground.
"Oh, pardon me," Crawly said as he regained his balance and stepped back a few paces. "Not the wisest place for a nap, if you ask—"
He cut himself off as he noticed that the person was lying very, very still, and was ominously silent—not snoring the way Adam always had back in Eden.
He didn't recognize the face, though it bore resemblance to its father's, and its hair was the exact same shade as Eve's. After only a few moments he saw what was wrong: there was a huge gash on the forehead, with something scarlet and sticky oozing out of it, pouring into the tangled beard and slowly pooling in the dirt beneath the head.
Blood. His mind suddenly exploded with new words to describe the sight before him. Wound pain corpse murder gruesome. Lifeless. Dead.
He staggered backward, clutching his head in agony and feeling a roiling in his stomach. He tumbled back in to the wheat and was violently sick for the first time ever, his innards heaving and retching.
When he finally stumbled back out, shakily wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, there was someone standing over the body.
A pair of brilliant wings drooped down over the figure's back, and a terrible frown was etched into his inhumanly beautiful face: Aziraphale, the angel from the Garden.
"Oh, Abel. This is not what you deserved," Crawly caught him murmuring sadly.
Aziraphale looked up as Crawly lurched through the wheat, and his frown hardened into a glower that was terrifying to behold.
"You," he said. "I might have known. Cain was a good person; he never would have done this on his own. But he had a tempter whispering horrific deeds into his ear!"
"Hey, look, I didn't have anything to do with—"
"Silence, thou dealer in deceit!" And Crawly felt his mouth shut of its own accord. "Thou shalt pay for thy wickedness today, vile serpent of the Darkness."
A sword was suddenly in the angel's hand—not the flaming one of old, but a good, solid blade nevertheless. Bless it all, Crawly thought to himself, and willed a sword of his own into existence.
Neither won that duel; it was a pathetic fight, really, with neither very skilled in dealing blows while in a corporeal form. They would learn over the coming centuries how to fight, how to parry and attack and maim, where to aim for a mortal hit. But for now, both were clumsy with a physical blade, and after several long hours each slunk away from the other, nursing minor wounds that stung with the newness of the sensation of pain.
Crawly knew after that encounter to stay out of the bloody bastard's way, and he did. As the human race grew and spread out across the planet, he followed whatever civilizations Aziraphale didn't choose. For the most part, it worked very well, leaving him free to make a mess of things and the angel free to do…angelic stuff, he supposed.
Crawly developed a definite fondness for the people he was required to hassle. They were always building things, always dreaming up new objects and ideas, and when he wasn't working to make their life hell he was mingling with them in their cities and on their farms, laughing with them and drinking with them and occasionally even befriending specific individuals (though like his heavenly counterpart he learned very quickly the hazards of that practice, and as years passed he took greater care not to get too attached to any one human).
His masters checked in on him every now and then, and he made sure to have plenty of evil exploits to recount. He found that he didn't even have to be the cause of an immoral event to take the credit for it—as with the murder of Abel. And for the most part he had almost complete freedom, certainly more than could be had in Hell, and he loved every minute of it.
The only part of life on Earth that he didn't enjoy was when he ran into the angel. He hated battling Aziraphale, and hated when it ended in the discorporation of either one of them—it was decidedly unpleasant to end up back in Hell for the decade or two it took for them to get around to giving him another body; but it was equally horrible having to feel his blade enter the soft skin of his opponent , to see the quick look of shock and pain on the Enemy's face as spirit fled flesh.
But that didn't mean he could afford to show the stupid angel any mercy. So he didn't, fighting as viciously as one would expect of an Agent of Hell.
Until one day, when he just couldn't bring himself to deal that lethal blow another time.
It was all the way in fifth century, in what would one day be known as Ireland. Crowley—for that was what he now called himself, had been calling himself for several millennia (Crawly just wasn't him, somehow)—was strolling across the wildly beautiful Celtic countryside, heading for a settlement quite some ways away. He could have flown, of course, but the day seemed made to be walked in. He was in no hurry; Down There had contacted him and told him to head over to this little island and make some trouble, but they still didn't understand how Earth time worked and probably wouldn't check up on him again for several years at least.
Anyway, he was walking along a sunny field, when abruptly he saw someone and stopped short.
His form had changed from the last time Crowley had seen him; his hair was now a violent shade of red and his skin pale and freckled—but there was no mistaking that aura. It was the angel. The Enemy.
Except…Aziraphale wasn't doing anything that was an immediate threat to Crowley's life, or even anything particularly angelic. No thwarting, no smiting, no good-deed-doing, just…lying there, in the grass.
Crowley grinned to see that the angel's freckled skin was beginning to redden in the noonday sun; the poor bastard would have some pretty bad burns by nightfall. For now though, Aziraphale appeared to be at perfect peace with the world, his eyes shut and a smile on his lips. He looked very unlike the bearer of heavenly fury Crowley had grown accustomed to seeing since after Eden. He looked…human.
Crowley suddenly had a stupid idea. A very stupid idea, he'd reprimand himself later.
There was Aziraphale, reclining there, as relaxed and innocuous looking as he'd been in the Garden. And, well, it was a nice day. What harm could there be in approaching him, and maybe…Crowley didn't know, joining him resting there in the pleasant meadow, or something?
They hadn't run into each other in a long while, and their last fight hadn't been particularly brutal. Perhaps they could put their differences aside, just for the afternoon.
Later, Crowley would wonder what the hell he'd been thinking.
How should he approach, though? "Hey, you mind if I join you?" or "Why don't we call a truce on the whole blast each other into oblivion thing for a while?" or maybe just "Nice weather we're having"—no, no, all those were rubbish. He sighed. He'd just wing it, he decided.
He walked through the tall grass until he was directly in front of the angel, who finally stirred as the demon's shadow fell over him.
Crowley formed his mouth into what he hoped was a winning smile. Aziraphale scrambled to his feet, a hunted look on his face.
"Aziraphale," Crowley began, but before he could say more the angel was diving for his sword where it lay in the grass and spinning around again to point it at the demon.
He hadn't even given Crowley time to explain himself, he thought indignantly, fixing the angel with a furious and hopeless glare.
What choice did Crowley have as Aziraphale lunged at him but to draw a blade of his own in defense? He wasn't about to let himself get discorporated without a fight.
Still, something ached inside him as he swung his sword again and again and the meadow rang with the sound of metal on metal.
Their combat took them to the meadow's edge, where a cliff overhead jabbed itself upward into the sky.
Both fought with a ferocity fueled by desperation and despair; Crowley's muscles began to burn with exertion and the angel continued to press him mercilessly.
"Are there not plenty of other places you could spread your foul sin, demon?" Aziraphale shouted. "Why here? Why can't you just leave this island alone?" He aimed a particularly vicious blow at Crowley's head that nearly hit its mark.
Aziraphale was distressed enough to have unfurled his wings, a fact that Crowley did not fail to notice. Finding himself cornered against the cliff and tiring quickly, the demon realized he'd have to use that mistake to his advantage if he wanted to survive.
Crowley's guard was wavering, which allowed one of Aziraphale's thrusts to make contact, knocking the sword from the demon's hand. To Crowley's dismay, it skidded several feet across the ground, far out of reach.
Aziraphale raised his sword. As the blade arched through the air towards Crowley, time froze.
Crowley willed his flesh to morph and shrink, folding in on itself into a smaller, smoother, scaled form. It was an unpleasant sensation, certainly; but it beat the feeling of a blade slicing through his neck.
In one fluid movement as his body was shifting into a serpentine shape, he launched himself at his Enemy, aiming for the exposed wings.
His fangs bore through soft feathers and imbedded themselves deep into the delicate flesh along the top of Aziraphale's wing.
He heard the angel gasp, and felt frantic spasms shake the wing to which he clung. He felt venom flow from his mouth into the angel's veins, and widened his jaws, dropping to the earth as Aziraphale collapsed beneath him.
With a thought and a twitch that flickered up his scaled form, Crowley rearranged his physique back into a human shape. He strode over to his sword and picked it up, then advanced on the angel lying in a heap in the grass.
Aziraphale's eyes were shut tight, agony scrawled across his freckled features.
Do it, you idiot. Just do it already. Crowley stood frozen over his Adversary, lying crumpled and helpless in the dirt. You know he'd do it to you—has done it to you, and will again.
The pale neck exposed to Crowley's sword was pink with the first hints of sunburn.
To his chagrin, Crowley found he couldn't do it, couldn't summon the willpower to swing his blade. He fled from the meadow, rebuking himself severely all the way.
Later, when he was nursing a drink in the home of a family he'd persuaded to let him stay the night, he asked himself what the hell he'd been thinking. It had been an absolutely idiotic notion—what would it have accomplished even if it hadn't ended inevitably in swordfight? And why had he'd been so keen to talk to blessed angel anyway? What craziness had possessed him to go and seek an angel's company?
It's because you're lonely, a tiny voice from the depths of his mind piped up, startling him so much that he almost tipped over his mug. He hastily pressed the thought down, back into the bowels of his brain; but he couldn't deny that he had thought it.
Lonely? Ridiculous. Well, sure, all demons were lonely, in a sense—cut off from Heaven, isolated from any sort of affection, and close relationships being taboo even amongst themselves, they lived absolutely without anything that even approached friendship. But loneliness suited them. In the melee of backstabbing and treachery that was Hell, such seclusion was a demon's one protection.
But on Earth…on Earth, surrounded by humans who all loved and hated each other, who based their entire existences on the relationships they formed with one another, well…a demon was apt to grow tired of isolation.
Yet what human could serve as a fitting confidant for a demon?
Crowley scoffed at himself—an angel was certainly no better a companion for a demon than a human would be.
Still, over the next few months he wondered how Aziraphale was faring, whether he'd recovered from the snakebite or if the venom had managed to discorporate him. And over the next several decades, in which they both seemed to avoid confronting each other more fastidiously than ever, Crowley often thought back to his glimpse of a softer Aziraphale—the being he'd observed sunbathing in the meadow had not been a steadfast soldier of Heaven dealing out righteous smiting, but an angel who'd spent too many millennia in a physical form, basking in the simple human joys of sun and breeze.
And Crowley often wondered whether Aziraphale ever looked back at that day and pondered what had caused the demon to stay his hand.