Sorry it's been a while, but it's here!
Chapter Five
Crowley awoke to fire and pain.
Many people have a visual idea of Hell in their minds, a cacophony of heat and fire with screams and smoke and lingering dread. Whilst this is all very true for the main forum of the Underworld with its offices and imps and paperwork (after all, they do have an image to maintain), the actual Pits, Sanctums and Circles each have their own feel. For example, the Seventh Circle of Hell (reserved for lawyers and maths teachers) is a cold and empty plane of nothingness, full of rock and ice and nothing.
And the Third Pit, reserved for traitors and employees only, was fire. Fire and pain, and the torment of your victims.
"So, you're awake." The voice was familiar, but the tone was odd. "Take your time," the voice continued, in the manner of one who quite emphatically means the opposite.
"..Az-?" he rasped, wrenching open his eyes. Sure enough, the angel was standing over him, blue eyes surprisingly cold and hard. His pale face and eyes reflected and glinted in the firelight, and his blonde hair, usually a veritable halo, looked almost eerie.
"Ah, so you do have a voice, my dear," Aziraphale replied sardonically, and Crowley blinked.
"Aziraphale? What the- what on earth's going on?"
"Come now, my dear, surely you can work it out?" the angel stepped backwards as Crowley sat up, raising one hand to his temple. Then, confused, he felt his face. No sunglasses.
He looked up at his friend. There it was again – the cuttingly sarcastic smirk, the cold light in his eyes… Glancing around, he felt his stomach turn to lead, and, defying all physical laws, try to force itself up his throat.
"Ah, now you're getting it."
"Why are you doing this?"
"This?" Aziraphale gestured at himself innocently. "Well, we upstairs were thinking, and we were thinking – what is the best way to really hurt a demon? Now, normally it would be pain, torture and a remission of allowances. But you," he leant forwards, grinning wickedly. The expression completely changed the cast to the angel's face, and the one person Crowley had ever really considered angelic looked positively demonic. "You get the special treatment.
"You didn't really think we'd forget about stopping Armageddon, did you? One eleven-year-old whelp tells us to leave you alone and we jump, eh? No – we were just waiting for you to slip up. And look where it got us – look what we have found!" The 'angel' leapt up, gesturing wildly with his hands, the very picture of excitement. "A demon hanging around with an angel! Who'd have thought?
"And not just any demon," he hissed, turning to face Crowley. "The very demon we were hoping to see. You."
"Great," Crowley replied sarcastically, not bothering to get up. "Now you've got me. Argh argh argh. Bring on the pain and torture and fiery implements."
"Oh no," the false angel drawled. "Were you not listening? Really, we credited you with more intelligence than this. You get the special treatment.
"In other words, you get me."
"You," Crowley replied, disbelievingly. They were shutting him up with this complete idiot for a few years. He resisted the urge to laugh. This would be a doddle.
"Well," Aziraphale's double amended. "Not quite. Maybe I was wrong to say you get me. You get him."
Crowley raised one eyebrow. It dropped as the false angel waved his hand negligently in his direction. His eyes slipped shut and he fell backwards into unconsciousness.
It started to rain, the icy droplets soaking into his jumper and soaking his hair to lay flat against his head. The chill of the night was starting to edge into his bones, but still he ran, ignoring the odd looks on the rare occasions he saw someone else. He only slowed when he spotted the apartment building and, nursing a stitch in his stomach that made him gasp for breath, he half-jogged across the street.
In his heart, he knew before he even opened the door, before he saw the abandoned plants on the windowsill, before he frantically threw open every door in search that Crowley wasn't there. It didn't feel like he was there – the plants were respiring in a relaxed fashion, and the apartment felt empty and disused.
Instead of flopping down on the sofa like he wanted to, he headed determinedly for Crowley's depleted bookshelf. Thankfully enough, there, next to a first-edition adult copy of 'Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets' (the demon's personal favourite), was exactly what he was looking for.
The Demonic Bible.
Skipping through passages at random, he ignored the way his skin wanted to recoil from the pages and instead hoped, heart in mouth, that what he was looking for, what he'd heard about –
There. His finger stopped dead.
"For those who doth wish to entere thee realme of thee Under Worlde, take thee these stepps."
He stood there for a long moment, staring but not really seeing the words underlined by his fingertip. Going into hell… If he did this, there was no chance to get back Upstairs. He'd be giving up his angelic ways for good.
But if he didn't, then Crowley – Well, he'd never forgive himself.
After a moment, he carefully closed the tome, keeping his page with his finger as he headed into the kitchen. He wondered idly where one would get warm cockerel's blood at three in the morning in London.