Ezra was finding it difficult to pinpoint the exact moment that the sky aligned with the state of the world as explained by Crowley's watch. True, it had turned a rather odd and rainy sort of purple, but this could have less to do with the coming apocalypse and more to do with the fact that this was London.
The gaslights around them ignited in the drooping fog. Crowley, who was dragging Ezra past a row of houses that stood eagerly at attention, glared at a small wooden building that was blocking the intersection until it took a terrified step back. "Of course they would listen to you," Ezra complained.
"Why shouldn't they? I designed them."
Ezra groaned. Of course he had. "Because it drives people bonkers," he guessed.
"Exactly," Crowley said, pulling Ezra through a hatch in the ground that he hadn't even noticed.
They emerged into a rather boxy, underground space that featured all the modern lines of a cave with the beauty of a minimum-security prison. "My newest invention," said Crowley with a weak smile, "it's called a Parking Garage."
Ezra, squinting into the haze of darkness, could make out the figure of a colossal machine. As he stepped further into the space, he realized—not without the requisite sense of horror—that he recognized it.
"Get in," said Crowley, who had swung himself gracefully into the carriage's lush interior.
Ezra stepped gingerly onto the kneecap of one of the thing's legs and sat to Crowley's left. Then Crowley pulled some sort of lever, and Mr. Bentley was crawling excitedly towards the exit ramp. "Now, I'm not going to ask what's going on," said Ezra as they emerged into the—now bruise-colored—daylight, "I just want to know WHAT'S GOING ON."
"You think," said Crowley, completing a three-point turn, "that I know?"
Ezra gripped the underside of the cushy seat as the carriage began to clip along at a fast cantor, outstripping their surroundings and exhaling spurts of steam with the force of a barking spider. "Yes," said Ezra, "I think you do."
The feeling had come upon Ezra suddenly, in the small openings in time where he wasn't bouncing almost out of his body in a mutant carriage of combination arachnid and canine heritage beneath a putridly indigo sky. There had been a girl with a bicycle…
"We're not going fast enough," Crowley shouted as they soared past the Royal Opera House.
Though Ezra was of the personal opinion that they had left 'fast' behind several dozen blocks ago, he was rather more focused on the slippery sensation in his stomach that always meant he had forgotten something.
The world outside the window was marbled and blurred. Ezra wasn't even sure if Mr. Bentley was still on the ground. They weren't bouncing as much, which should have been more reassuring than it actually was. Now, what had the girl said?
Ezra found his mind slipping into a funnel and everything was bent and awkward. A bird in the hand is worth a bicycle in a bush…Crowley was wearing those goggles and they were moving so fast so fast they should have caught fire. He will call on you this Thursday.
Be careful what you sign.
The carriage stopped so quickly it was as though it had been plucked out of time. Three strangers stood in front of them, and there had been, there were, windows on the carriage, but Ezra could hear them.
The one in the middle, the one with the debatable solidity and the anxious part in his hair stepped forward. "You must be Aziraphale."
Ezra, confused beyond measure, looked at Crowley. The latter blanched.
The stranger smiled. "Thank you, Crowley. I couldn't have done it without you."