Wednesday

A Good Omens fanfiction

Part 6 of 12

"Well, seeing that today certainly is my day – why don't you call me Wednesday?"

– American Gods, Neil Gaiman

"Stop it – you've got to listen to me!" whined Crowley as Aziraphale yanked him – bound hand and foot – out of the back seat of the Ford Fiesta.

"Raphael, look here, while it might not be important to you, I've put a lot of thought and effort into this plan and – like it or not – you are going to shut up and get tied to the damn tracks, even if I have to carry you there kicking and screaming." With that, the impatient Prince of Hell bent down, lifted Crowley up, and tossed him over his shoulder. "Do I make myself clear?"

"Do whatever you have to, angel, just hear me out," he begged, swallowing back every sardonic retort he had saved up in the darker corners of his mind, knowing from recent experience they wouldn't help his case here. "There's something very important you need to know."

Still marching forward, Aziraphale tightened his grip slightly. "That's another thing – why the heaven do you keep calling me angel? That's the fourth time today, since you got in my car. I'm not–"

"I know," huffed Crowley. "It's a force of habit."

"What habit?"

"That doesn't matter now, forget it. What matters is you can't go back to your flat today." He lifted his head, trying – despite the awkward angle, given he was draped over his shoulder – to look properly at Aziraphale. "Promise me you won't."

"Why not, pray?"

"You'll get hurt."

"I'm not going to get hurt, you white-feathered fiend!" Aziraphale tossed him down – they'd reached the tracks. "What in celestial lighting is the matter with you? You've been strange all day."

"Ssssatan and Beelzebub are going to pay you a visit and they are not happy!" Crowley spoke through gritted teeth. "Don't ask how I know – I can't tell you. Just don't go back to the flat today. Go any place else. Spend the night at a nice hotel."

Why didn't Aziraphale listen to him? This was his sixth try since he'd sworn to his reflection he was going to help the blasted demonic version of his best friend avoid the trauma of Satan's punishment. And he'd gotten discorporated each bloody time!

Somewhere around the third time, he found himself starting to think outright abandoning the cocoa and cheesecake bribery method in favour of frantic straightforwardness might have been a mistake after all.

Not that this dawning revelation changed much.

Four times he'd gotten hit by that Piccadilly line train, just as Aziraphale planned; one time he'd been shot in the chest by accident, when he forgot to warn Aziraphale in time the safety was off on his handgun.

Being rather a gentlemanly demon, Aziraphale had then offered him an almost heartfelt apology for the accident before shooting him twice more in quick succession so he wouldn't just lie on the ground bleeding slowly to death as opposed to a quick dispatching.

And, the very last time before this, he'd gotten so hysterical that Aziraphale hit him with a shovel Crowley hadn't previously been aware was even in the back of the Ford Fiesta before the former angel dug it out and promptly cracked him upside the head with it.

He hadn't meant to discorporate him via that shovel, of course, just shut him up, but unfortunately Aziraphale was the sort of supernatural being who didn't always know his own strength, and next thing Crowley knew he was back in Heaven with Gabriel and Sandalphon. Again.

Aziraphale blinked impassively. "Why do you keep elongating the letter S?"

Right. He'd never been a serpent here. Just another strained force of habit this Aziraphale wouldn't be used to. Still, that was way too far off from the point he was trying to make, and he was running out of time. Aziraphale was already rolling his sore body onto the tracks and readjusting the ropes.

"Promissssse me," he insisted, not even struggling as his wrists were more tightly secured.

"You're rather spoiling this for me, you realise?" sighed Aziraphale, shaking his head and stepping back for his own safety.

"I can't... I can't do this any more," whimpered Crowley, turning his head as tears he'd been trying to hold back escaped and rolled out from the corners of his eyes and streamed down his face.

Aziraphale softened. "Oh, my dear, don't cry." For a moment, it looked like he really was going to bend over and untie him, as though he truly did feel that badly over Crowley unexpectedly breaking down into tears. Perhaps he would have, too, if only the train hadn't been coming – if there had been anything like time to make up his mind. Instead, he just patted his cheek the same way he had plenty of times in this repeated scenario before; the only difference was that his manicured fingers came away rather wet. "Well, no hard feelings, Raphael. Steady on. Remember, it's only discorporation."

"What's with him?" Sandalphon whispered, in a nasal hiss, to Gabriel.

Crowley's blinking, discorporated form wasn't looking at them, or acknowledging their questions.

"Raphael." Gabriel snapped his fingers. "Hey, buddy! Over here!"

"Yeah?" Crowley glanced at him, briefly meeting his worried periwinkle eyes.

"What's going on?"

"Was it the demon Zira?" added Sandalphon.

Gabriel let out a sigh that was probably meant to be sympathetic but in actuality would have made Crowley want to clout him if he hadn't felt so utterly drained. "What did that vile creature do to you this time?"

"I keep failing him," murmured Crowley, despondent. "No matter how many times I go through this, I fail him. He's all on his own."

"Wait, slow down. What are you talking about?" Gabriel made a face. "Something going on? Michael mentioned you were having a bad day."

"Hmm, for quite a while now, yeah."

"I think somebody might need to stay in Heaven for a while to recover," Sandalphon suggested, rolling his beady eyes.

Crowley immediately snapped out of his detached stupor. "No! No, no, no!" Not again. "I'm all right, really, I'm just a little tired – give me a new body and I'll be just fine, I promise." The last thing he needed was to be forced to sit in his office and stare at the white walls until God told Gabriel to send him back to earth again. He forced a tight smile that was more serpentine than angelic. "Guys, please, trust me on this."

After a long, uncertain pause, Gabriel nodded. "I do trust you, Raphael." He snapped his fingers and the paperwork materialised in front of them. "Just let me know if you need help." He clearly didn't mean with the paperwork.

Crowley felt the slightest twinge of regret that he couldn't take him up on the offer.

He might not like Gabriel, might consider him a complete prick, might largely blame him for this Aziraphale's downwards tumble, and badness knew he'd probably never forgive the other Gabriel – the one back home – for the callous way he'd ordered Aziraphale to hop into the blazing hellfire, not knowing it was actually Crowley he was addressing.

All the same, it was becoming abundantly clear he wasn't getting anywhere on his own. Gabriel back in his real life hadn't always been awful, either; a couple of times that Crowley recalled, mostly from before the rebellion, he'd almost been nice – almost.

But, then, he'd tried telling Gabriel before about the time-loop and the archangel just accused him of making up fairy-tales.

And even if he did believe him, out of old-time loyalty between angels of shared rank, he'd never help him protect Aziraphale. That was another dead-end, and he knew it.

"You're shaking," Gabriel told him.

"Just...you know...raring to go," he lied.

"Do try not to let Zira discorporate this body," Sandalphon snipped, reaching for Gabriel's hand as if to draw him away. "They don't grow on trees, Raphael."

It was at this point Crowley decided he was going to need some help – even if it couldn't be from Gabriel.

So he made a few calls from the landline and – less than two hours later – he had his contact seated in a metal folding chair across from him beside the houseplants (which still seemed completely out of place in what Crowley would always consider to be Aziraphale's bookshop, no matter what).

"Who better," Crowley said, not with as much sincere confidence as he wished he had, "than you?"

And Sergeant Shadwell blinked at him frostily and said, "Aeeeye?"

Okay, right, so there were a lot of people better for this sort of thing than Shadwell – he was just the first one to come to mind. Crowley simply happened to have had his number memorised. It turned out to be the same here as it was back home, in the world that had made sense – and he even had the same confused, dim-witted receptionist Crowley eventually realised was actually good old Madame Tracy.

Even with her commercial being broadcast at odd hours on the telly, she was still in the same place, apparently.

"Yes, love," she'd said, her familiar, high voice rather comforting, a tie to how things were supposed to be, "I'll see if he's in – but I've got to be quick about it. Can't really talk now. It's one of my mornings, you know, and I can't simply leave my poor gentleman like that for long..." – there had been the sound of a door creaking open – "Coo-eee, Mr. Shadwell, are yooou innn? Telephone for you. Sounds a bit like that Raphael man from the telly, sweet but not so proper, you know? Do hurry and take it, love – I've got to get back."

"That southern pansy kin bloody well weit until I've got the handset between meh fingers, Jezebel!"

(Interestingly, in this particular case, Madame Tracy's 'poor gentleman who could not be left alone in the flat' was not naked or in any state of sexual arousal; they were just having some tea together – that is, the beverage, not the meal, since it was far too early for that, though she offered him some shortbread biscuits with white icing – and she wasn't even dressed for work, wearing her loosest-fitting cardigan and plainest skirt. But a good excuse was a good excuse, irregardless. And, besides, her darkly-dressed, refined-sounding gentleman drumming his elegantly manicured fingers against the table while he waited for her to get back was paying for her time, so she was still on the clock, technically.)

Crowley had almost wanted to say a warmer hello to Madame Tracy before she handed him over, just glad to hear an almost-friend's voice, but he figured she wouldn't know him here and it would just confuse everybody.

Besides, even if he was meant to be an angel here, he couldn't risk getting into the habit of being too nice. Dangerous pastime that was, being kind. Real bugger.

So he'd got Shadwell over to the shop and tried to explain his predicament.

"So, this brew the demon in your timeline gave ye, it's witchcraft?"

"Uh..."

"Cause, as much as I want to be of assistance, Mr. Antonius, I only catch witches."

"Right..."

"Though," he said, stroking his chin thoughtfully, "if I got oot meh thundergun, I could shoot bricks at this Zira fellow for you – get 'im before he gets yeh." He waggled his hoary eyebrows. "Whaddya say to that?"

That was not what Crowley had had in mind. He buried his face in his hands and moaned softly.

"Yeah," he murmured, "this might have been a mistake."

Another Wednesday repeat, another failure behind him.

"Who better than you?"

"Well," said Newton Pulsifer, shyly, cheeks aflame, holding his fluttering hands in his lap, "I'm flattered, but I really do think this goes a bit beyond my training as a wages clerk."

"Who better than you?"

The grimy eleven year old child seated in the folding chair (who, admittedly, Crowley had basically, if you had to put a label on it, kidnapped) began to cry.

Unable to locate Adam (or even Warlock, who Crowley would have gladly settled for at this point, even if he wasn't really the son of Satan), the former demon had been delighted when he'd spotted Brian – who apparently lived in London in this version of events – skipping down the pavement and identified him as one of Adam's little friends.

"I just want to go hooomeeee," wailed Brian, who – in a state of terror at being taken off the street and sequestered alone with a long-haired stranger who might be some kind of hippie – completely missed the point of the time-looping Wednesday story being frantically recited at him.

Feeling guilty, Crowley handed the sobbing child ten quid and told him to go buy himself an ice cream cone.

He brightened, and asked for more money, one measly ice cream cone hardly seeming to be enough to make up for the trauma he'd just endured.

And, being something of a pushover when it came to children, Crowley gave it to him.

"Cor!" Brian clutched the wrinkled money in his hands, staring down at his sticky fingers in a state of wonder. Honestly, he hadn't expected that to work. He was going to fill his pockets with sticky, melting sweets as soon as he got out of here, not sparing another thought on the fact he was meant to be in school. "Thanks."

Crowley waved him out. This was far from his proudest moment. He was usually much better with kids.

"Who better than you?"

The young woman with the ponytail gawked at him. "You're insane, you are." Her upper lip curled in distaste. "You aren't a bit like this on the telly. No wonder they took you off the air. Lucky ya didn't get locked up."

Crowley took a step towards her, and she held up a hand defensively.

"Oi, calm down, I'm not going to hurt you, I just–"

"You stay the bloody hell away from me," she snarled. "I've got pepper spray in my clutch...some place..."

The aforementioned clutch was lying several feet away, quite uselessly, where she'd left it when she took her pen out, before he launched into his tale of parallel worlds and time-loops.

"I know it sounds crazy, but–"

"Don't talk to me – you're a complete nutter." Her eyes narrowed, she pressed her hand against the door, feeling to let herself out onto the street if he got any nearer. "Don't even look at me, starin' all mad like that, you're probably thinkin' of stickin' me in a meat locker somewhere, I bet."

"Got it." Crowley retreated a couple steps, giving her space. "You still want me to sign that?" He motioned, tiredly, at her book.

She considered, pausing for a moment, then handed it over. "Yeah, obviously."

"Obviously," he mocked, taking it from her outstretched hands and quickly scrawling an autograph.

Then he kicked the beaded clutch towards her with the side of his foot.

"Oh." She flushed, then faltered; not exactly apologetically, but close enough. "Thanks."

"Who better than you?"

Crowley paused, looked askance at the handset in his hand, remembered he was talking to Michael, total wank-wings extraordinaire, and said, "Wait, hang on, never mind – I'm not that desperate," dropping it back down onto the receiver.

Michael frowned from her place on the double-decker bus, clenching her long fingers around her glowing mobile. "Well. That was rude."

"Who better than you?"

"Rooof!"

So now Crowley knew he really had well and truly lost it. He'd literally snatched up a stray because it looked liked Adam's small hell-hound, Dog, and recited his entire life-story to it while it stared at him with its head angled and occasionally made little throaty noises that might have been sympathetic or might have been begging for food.

Probably it was begging for food.

"Right. You're a dog – what was I thinking?" He picked up the animal from its perch across the folding chair – whining and unwilling to leave, its formerly wagging tall now rigid – opening the door to put it outside. "Ow!" It had bitten him on the leg as he set it down. "Son of a bitch!" Literally.

So. Help was out of the question, then.

He was on his own.

Again.

"Let's just get this over with." Crowley held his wrists together and leaned over the car seat. "Go on, tie them."

Aziraphale blinked at him in confusion. "Steady on, dear fellow, you could put a little more enthusiasm into this. I get that your lot are big on the whole turning the other cheek business, but this is just–"

"What's it matter? Whatever I do, the end result is the same."

Although he was now dutifully knotting the cords around Crowley's slender wrists, Aziraphale was looking rather discomfited, like all the wind was being taken out of his sails. "That's hardly sporting of you."

"Well, I can't fight you."

"Sure you can." He almost sounded as if he were trying to be encouraging. "I'll loosen the knots up a smidgen and you can begin struggling. That's a start."

"No," he argued, wearily, "I can't."

"Why-ever not?"

Crowley just looked at him.

"I'm only doing my job, Raphael."

"What damnable difference does that make?"

"We're on opposite sides!"

"So?" Crowley shook his head.

"You're completely spoiling this for me, you realise?" sighed Aziraphale, letting go of his opponent's wrists, leaving them only half-tied, and sinking back into the driver's seat. "What's the matter with you today?"

Crowley pulled a hand free of his bonds and placed it over one of Aziraphale's.

The Prince of Hell automatically stiffened and started to yank his own hand out from underneath. "What the–"

Tightening his bony grasp on the former angel's plump hand, Crowley swallowed, looking straight ahead, out the windscreen. "Don't. Just don't. Don't say anything."

"Go on, get out." Aziraphale concentrated, and the locks clicked upwards. "Do it before I change my mind."

They appeared to be – rather than at the location Aziraphale had always made Crowley walk to the tracks from – in front of St. James's. The familiar park looked so tranquil from the window.

Hope swelled within Crowley, all the more potent for being unexpected. "Come with me."

"What? No!"

"We need to talk, you and I – let's go feed the ducks."

"I..." He sounded flustered. "I don't think that's a good idea."

"But letting me go is?" Crowley's hand rested tentatively on the car door. "Azirap–"

He glared.

"Zira, whatever. Listen. Satan and Beelzebub are already planning to punish you. Letting me go–" He didn't know what to say. It wasn't as though he actually wanted Aziraphale to discorporate him, but letting an archangel go – just because he looked sad and held his hand for a few moments – wasn't exactly going to make what the Prince of Hell returned to at his flat go over any smoother. Even a high-ranking demon risked the wrath of the Dark Counsel by going too easy on an archangel without a damn good excuse. "We need to work together."

His charcoal eyes clouding over with sudden mistrust, Aziraphale's whole body visibly tensed. "How do you know what Satan's planning? You're an angel." The locks clicked back down. "If this is all some sort of trick, Raphael–"

"It's not."

"Damn you. This isn't fair!" Aziraphale kicked the tire iron exasperatedly under the seat; it rolled with a clump, clump, clump. "You can't do this!"

"Do what?"

"We've been enemies for years, and you've never once acted like I was anything but a nuisance, now you–" He gnashed his teeth together. "I don't know what to do."

"Let me help you," Crowley pleaded. "I don't want to see you get hurt again."

Bending forward, Aziraphale rested his forehead against the steering-wheel. "Oh, my dear boy, you can't. There's no helping me."

"Why not?"

"Because it's too late." He lifted his head and looked at him, still not with trust but definitely with deepening pity. "It's been too late for a long time." Somewhere outside, nearby, a pigeon cooed. "Sometimes I think, for me, it always was."

"That time..." Crowley inhaled deeply. "That time in my office, before the rebellion. I didn't mean what I said." He was sure it was true – no version of him could be that cruel. "I was just having a bad day." You're not a problem, you never were.

Aziraphale laughed, actually laughed, and Crowley wasn't sure if it was intended to be nice or else menacingly bitter. "Thank you. But you're a bigger idiot than I thought if you believe I didn't work that out ages ago."

"Then why–"

"I've told you, Raphael, it's my job – angel, demon." He motioned between the both of them and sighed. "You know that would never work."

Crowley lifted his brow. "I've seen it done."

"If you're referring to Michael and Ligur, I'd hardly use that as my prime example of cooperation between our respective sides."

"Nah, that wasn't who I meant."

"I mean, perhaps if we had even the slightest common ground, if you were a demon, too–"

Crowley's blue eyes widened – somewhere in his mind flashes of light were going off, switches were being flipped. "Wait. Hang on. What did you say?"

"I said, if you were a demon–"

"Angel, you're brilliant! Come here!" And he threw his arms around the startled demon in a tight, quick, crushing embrace. "You've just told me how to make you listen." The irony was so beautiful he could cry. All those people he'd asked for help, and the one with all the answers had been the demonic version of his best friend all along. "Who better than you?"

"Get off me!"

Crowley pulled away, beaming. "Sorry."

"What the heaven was that all about?" Aziraphale demanded indignantly. "Grabbing onto me like that! You've wrinkled my coat."

"Now," said Crowley, happily, "I've just got to figure out a way to get myself discorporated."

"Oh," snipped Aziraphale, reaching under the seat for the tire iron, which was still in reaching distance despite being kicked about. "If you're suddenly keen, I do believe I can help with that."

'ello, it's Wednesday morning!

Crowley sat bolt upright in bed and, reaching over the square reading glasses, made a grab for the silver sewing scissors beside the alarm clock radio, sweeping them up.

In one single, dramatic flourish, he took his free hand and wrapped his long hair around his wrist twice before reaching back and cutting it all off at the nape of his neck.

It's overcast today with a fifty to sixty percent chance of rain, so you best have your brolly on hand just in case–

Crowley brought his hand – the twisted red coils of his newly shorn-off hair still tangled around his wrist – down on the radio alarm clock, stopping it.

Desperate times, desperate measures.

He looked up at the mirrored ceiling for what felt like the millionth time. His face appeared very tired and very pale. And why not? He'd been through a lot. Everybody else involved in this nightmare had the sweet mercy of amnesia as Wednesday started up again for the umpteenth time, while he was forced to remember – to take the slow, repetitive path over and over and over again.

It was good he remembered everything, though, because now he thought he knew what he had to do and was ready to do it. Finally. No more floundering about in the dark, trying to do whatever this version of him was meant to. It was high time he cut the crap and acted like himself and took full control of this once and for all.

This Aziraphale would never listen to the archangel Raphael. Hell had him scared senseless. Zira was, ironically, such a good, posh little demon he'd never willingly stray from what was put before him – even if they were cruel, it had to be better than the alternative he'd given up. Because he couldn't cope with the fact that he damned himself.

No, Raphael would never get through to him. Even if it broke both their hearts, in this version of events, their respective sides would always stand between the pair of them like a double-edged sword, like a barbedwire fence with a big 'don't touch' sign in huge, gaudy letters at the front.

He might, however, be willing to listen to a certain demon named A.J. Crowley.

Unknowingly, he'd outright told him as much.

Those bright blue eyes staring down at Crowley now were – unfortunately – exasperatingly, unchangeably angelic-looking.

But that soon wouldn't matter; he knew exactly what the right pair of dark sunglasses could hide.

A pair of sunglasses materialised on his face, as if they'd grown there, right out of the (now faintly glowing) eyes they shaded, as natural as the leaves of a houseplant.

A/N: Reviews welcome, replies may be delayed.