A/N: One instance of strong language, reader discretion suggested.

Wednesday

A Good Omens fanfiction

Part Eight of Twelve

They complain about him being inhuman... He is inhuman. But why should he be human? Are angels supposed to be human?

– T.H. White

Aziraphale struggled to recall when he'd last – in all his long years of existence, from the day of his creation onward – been this utterly humiliated. He came up with rather a short list.

Largely, this – this – well... Well, it just took the bloody cake, didn't it?

No, it didn't merely take the cake – it baked it and sold it and smashed it onto faces like Americans on the telly were always doing with gushy banana cream pies.

All right, so the metaphor running through his mind at the moment was becoming a bit stretched – in the way that an elephant is a bit big – but who could blame him? At this very moment, an archangel, who didn't look a thing like an archangel today though he certainly had done yesterday, was pointing a gun – the frazzled demon's own gun, stolen from his car – and forcing entry into his flat. So pardon him if he mixed and strained a few comparisons the wrong way about!

"What if I screamed?" demanded Aziraphale suddenly, in a low, surprisingly level voice. "What if I threw back my head and shouted, 'look out, he's got a gun, call the police!' right now?"

Raphael didn't so much as flinch. He almost looked like he might yawn – which Aziraphale thought rather rude of him. "Then I'd tell them it's your birthday." He didn't elaborate on his meaning, didn't say 'I'd tell them this was planned, play-acting'; he didn't have to, it was implied by the slight quirk in the corners of his mouth.

"You wouldn't!" The Prince of Hell was nonplussed. "You snake!"

"Oh, angel, you have no idea!" He actually laughed.

"Sorry." Aziraphale narrowed his grey eyes. "Did I say something funny?"

His tone had been cold, sarcastic, even a touch threatening in a vague sort of way, but Raphael – his mouth still quirked rather dementedly – responded as if it had been a real question. "Yes, quite."

"I don't suppose there's any chance you're going to tell me what's in the bookbag you're carrying?" Aziraphale said next, in rather a different voice, motioning with curiosity at the tan bag in the angel's other hand – the one that wasn't holding a handgun.

"You'll find out soon enough." Raphael cocked the gun pointedly. "Stop stalling and let's get going – we might not have much time."

Time for what, exactly? He fought back a shudder and unlocked the door, letting them both inside. The jangling keys nearly fell from his hands – he didn't want to admit, though, not even to himself, that they were shaking.

Raphael made straight for the lounge.

Aziraphale felt his throat closing on him as he watched, not quite helplessly yet also not certain he could bring himself to spring out at the angel and throw himself on his back to stop him, either. His heart beat like a hammer. Not my lounge. Anything besides that. The books – all the books!

The angel opened his bookbag.

Aziraphale staggered forward. "Oh," he said, when he reached him, a little disappointed. "It's empty." There were few sights more disheartening than an empty bookbag.

Raphael pointed the gun at him again. "Right. Now, you just pick up your best books – the ones you would run to save if there was a fire – and start packing them in."

"I will not!" squealed Aziraphale, gone hoarse.

"You will, or I'll dispatch you back to Hell." He held his arm up a little higher, wagging the gun about. Then he sighed, "Just do it, all right?"

"Shoot me, then." Aziraphale stared him down.

"How can someone as clever as you be so stupid?" The ginger eyebrows above his sunglasses sank downwards. "Now," he hissed through clenched teeth. "Books. No more talking."

Eyes darting, Aziraphale snagged a stack of brochures, most of which he'd planned on throwing away – including a rather ironic one for a place called Tadfield Manor – and tried to drop them into Raphael's bookbag.

The angel stopped him, his mouth a grim, impatient line. "I wasn't created yesterday – the books, Aziraphale."

"Zira," he corrected, chucking the brochures in a scattered mess across the lounge, wishing afterwards he'd thought to toss them in Raphael's face, knocking those stupid sunglasses right off it. "It's Zira."

"If you won't choose them yourself, I'll do it." He reached for a fat leather volume with a silver sigil on the spine and Aziraphale struggled to show no reaction; then a little whistle of an anxious breath escaped from one of his nostrils and Raphael smiled like a snake. "Ah, definitely one of your favourites." He lifted the book and placed it inside the bag with unexpected gentleness. "Stays with me, then."

"You're robbing me?" Aziraphale gasped, staring like he still couldn't quite believe it was even happening – which he couldn't. "My dear fellow, why–"

Raphael aimed the pistol and fired at the leg of the nearby wooden trolley. It shattered.

The demon couldn't help it; he jumped.

"That was a warning, Zira." Raphael bared his teeth again. "Your most valuable books, shut up and put them in the damn bag."

Biting onto his lower lip, willing himself not to cry in front of an archangel – wondering why he wasn't just throwing himself onto the floor and refusing, why his legs and arms were betraying him as readily as Raphael was – he began placing his greatest, dearest treasures into the tan bookbag along with the first precious volume Raphael had taken.

When it was full, the angel snapped it shut, the gun still fixed on Aziraphale so he couldn't leap forward and snatch back so much as a single book.

Emotions were ripping through the Prince of Hell so rapidly he didn't know what to do with himself. He wanted to curl up in the corner and mourn his stolen books – books Raphael would probably sell or destroy (some of them were on the occult, he'd likely earn a promotion of some kind for doing that). He also wanted to grab Raphael's arm and quietly enquire if he was free for lunch; he was becoming increasingly fascinated with this new version of the angel he'd thought he knew pretty well, before today, and was harbouring, despite himself, a desire to talk to him over a nice, hot meal. He wanted, more than either of the other two options, to take the dense copy of The Amber Spyglass from its place on the shelf and hurl it at the angel's head.

"Please." The word slipped out; his mouth was trembling.

And, in that moment, the confusion in the demon's already completely blown mind doubled.

Because Raphael did the most unexpected thing yet. Which was saying a lot, given what he'd already been doing. He placed the bookbag down, put the gun beside it and – after carefully putting his heel down on it so Aziraphale couldn't take it for himself – reached for the demon's arms and squeezed them consolingly.

His face was wholly different, the corners of his mouth gone soft with sympathy. It was like they were on some sort of movie set and a director had just shouted, "Cut!"

Perhaps, Aziraphale considered, Raphael was having some manner of delusional breakdown.

"I am so sorry about what's going to happen after I leave." He kept a strong grip on his arms so he couldn't squirm free. "I don't think I can stop it. Believe me, if there was any other way..." He shook his head. "If I could, I'd go through it for you."

"Steady on, Raphael." Aziraphale gulped, dropping his gaze and staring down at the long, thin hands holding firmly onto his elbows. "I don't know what the heaven you're–"

Raphael let him go, retrieved the gun and the bookbag, and began heading for the door.

"That's it?" His hands planted themselves on his hips, indignant.

Raphael lifted a black fedora off the nearby rack and placed it on his head, tipping it as he reached for the door handle to let himself out.

Because, of course, the demon thought bitterly, he might as well steal my new hat, too. While he's here. Might as well happen.

"You might just as well take the scarf, too," huffed Aziraphale, gesturing at the rack angrily. "It's a matching set."

It didn't really matter, though – the books meant more than any lousy hat, and they were about to disappear, maybe forever, with the retreating archangel.

He didn't reach for the scarf, didn't acknowledge Aziraphale's statement at all. "I'm so sorry you have to get hurt again." And he left.

"I loathe you," Aziraphale murmured (too quietly for the vanishing angel to hear), and didn't actually mean it – not in the slightest.

Aziraphale had resolved that – the very next time he saw him – he was going to give Raphael a good talking-to. That was the only way with some persons. Certain supernatural beings you could knock about on the head or clout and get the clear message across, but others needed a good, sound shaming, a no-nonsense, what-were-you-thinking, and no mistake.

Raphael obviously – as he'd made it plain to see – fell firmly into the latter category.

He was just wringing his still-shaking hands, thinking about exactly what he would say, and how he wouldn't stand for this sort of behaviour in the future, enemies or not there must be a line one never crossed, they were professionals and must act as such, when a dreadful feeling came over him.

It wasn't something that should have made him feel like the floor was opening up, about to swallow him, but it did.

Satan was coming.

"Oh shit," he murmured.

There was a time – and despite it really having been quite long ago it didn't always feel so – Aziraphale would have been delighted to see Lucifer. But things changed. These days, his old mate Lucifer, who'd seemed so generous and caring when he'd been there for him after Raphael's hasty rejection that day in his office, was someone else entirely.

Aziraphale didn't like to think that, perhaps, this was just who he'd really been all along, underneath.

Didn't like to think it, but often found himself doing so in spite of himself.

When Satan arrived, entering without knocking, he wasn't alone – Beelzebub was with him.

Aziraphale felt the blood drain from his face. He had nothing personally against the Princess of Hell. She was all right, mostly. Not particularly competitive with him usually – their clashes, when they happened, were relatively minor. Well, minor for a pair of demons that shared a high rank, anyway. Professional was probably the better word to describe it. However, if Satan brought her along, wanted her to see what he did to him, this couldn't possibly be good.

"Satan, Beelzebub." He flashed them his brightest smile and stood with his hands behind his back. "I wasn't expecting both of you." His eyes darted between them, struggling to show no fear. "What a pleasant surprise."

Beelzebub sighed impatiently. "Zzhut it, Zira."

The devil's steps as he approached Aziraphale were loud, unfriendly. "You know what you've done, don't you?"

And for a horrible moment, Aziraphale didn't know what he was talking about and found himself thinking, inexplicably: He knows what's under the bed – oh, Heaven, no, wait, Hell, er, somebody help me!

Then he wondered why in celestial blazes he had thought that. There was nothing but cardboard shoeboxes under the bed. Nothing the devil couldn't see. Nothing hidden. What did his mind think he was protecting in that panicked moment? Maybe he was going mad – or it was the full moon, like with Marjorie Potts thinking the phone would ring earlier.

"You know," said Satan, leaning forward, his face so close to Aziraphale's their noses nearly touched, "what I've told you before about these little fuck ups of yours. I will not stand for them!"

Words came from the demon's whirling mind to his mouth and rested heavily on his tongue, as though glued there; Aziraphale knew better than to say anything in reply. He would have to simply buck up and endure what came next.

"Well, Beelzebub, would you like to say anything to your friend before I commence punishment?" Satan drummed his fingers – the tips of which were giving off little fiery sparks – against the nearest wall, and they echoed, like heavy raindrops on a glass pane. "Your poor, fat little friend who just couldn't cut it?"

Beelzebub shrugged. She had little enough to say to Zira on a good day – what did she need to say to him now, when Satan was poised to beat the ever-living daylights out of his corporation? If she felt any pity for him, you couldn't tell it from her placid, wholly unmoved face sweating slightly under her furry, fly-shaped hat.

Satan reached with his other hand, gripped Aziraphale's chin and, pressing himself close against the – now shivering – demon, put his lips next to his ear. "Do you want to know a secret, darling?"

Aziraphale said yes. There was no other acceptable response.

"This is going to hurt you so much more than it's going to hurt me."

While the punishment went on, longer than seemed possible, Aziraphale tried to think of something else. Something nice. He tried to let his mind take him away to a better place, and when it didn't – when it kept thinking of random things of no importance, like lists of food items he wanted to purchase for the flat, and when exactly the repairmen were meant to stop by and fix the fridge – he cursed his lousy imagination. You would think reading as often and as widely as he did would sharpen his ability to drag his mind into the sweet comfort of a random fantasy on a whim.

It didn't, though, and he was – passingly – angry at God for giving him what was apparently a broken imagination. Even back in Heaven, before becoming a demon, he was fairly sure he'd never had a very good one.

For whatever reason, instead of a sweet lie, instead of an invented happy place where the searing pain might be dulled, Aziraphale kept thinking about the first time he saw Raphael.

He'd been grinning – almost ear-to-ear – at something another angel said, his blue eyes glittering with laughter, and he had looked so much kinder – so much more easy-going and understanding – than Gabriel and Uriel and Michael.

Aziraphale's own eyes – which had also been blue, back then, before hellfire changed them – had watched him, following his distinctive red hair like a beacon on the edge of the blurred white hallway, until he was out of sight. He'd promised himself, in that rather starstruck moment, if he were ever in real danger, or truly afraid for himself, that was the archangel he'd go to, the one he'd trust.

It wasn't a resolution which had turned out particularly well, or even one he could look back on without his cheeks burning hot from raw embarrassment, though he no longer truly blamed Raphael for the way things unfolded.

Anyone could have a bad day.

He was having one right now.

"You won't disappoint me again, will you, darling?"

Everything hurt. Blood dripped from his nose. Aziraphale swallowed, then murmured promises pushed past a swollen mouth; promises that he'd be everything Satan wanted him to be from now on, that things would be better, that he would be better.

For some reason, whenever he hurt him, Satan always insisted on hearing Aziraphale tell him he was better off for it; everything short of literally thanking him for hurting him.

The first time he ever hurt him, shortly after the failed rebellion, Aziraphale had made the mistake of looking angry – even a little defiant – simply because he was so stunned. He hadn't thought the angel Lucifer, who'd once been so comforting and gentle towards him, would do such a thing. Furthermore, now Aziraphale knew not to take it personally – now he knew, nine out of ten times, it was a show for Beelzebub, to keep her in line, nothing to do with him. But the first time had been different. The first time they'd been alone in a storage corner of Hell, and Lucifer had just lost it on him for some reason or other.

Then, after it was over, and had gone way too far, when Aziraphale got visibly upset, he'd struck him again – so hard Hell seemed to be spinning – and demanded he never, ever look at him like that, not if he knew what was good for him.

"I have done so much for you," he'd snarled. "I've given you everything – power, position. And I can take it away. Don't you ever disrespect me again."

So Aziraphale took it – all the pain and humiliation – in stride these days. Except, even so, it didn't spare him from getting another thudding blow that tossed him against the wall, which he slid down slowly, whimpering.

"Not quite zzo uppity now, izz he?" buzzed Beelzebub. "Are we done here, Mazzter?"

Aziraphale held his breath, hoping Satan would confirm that they were.

"No. Not yet." The devil paused, staring down at him with glowing red eyes. "He hasn't learned his lesson."

"Mazzzter–"

"But, don't worry, he will – before we leave, he will."

Despite Aziraphale's frantically begging them not to, swearing he had learned his lesson, Satan set his lounge aflame.

He tried to put the fire out himself, rather pathetically, with nothing but his breath, blowing on it like it was hot soup.

Beelzebub smacked him across the face.

He grovelled, still struggling to make one of them take pity on him, to no avail. "Stop! You'll burn up everything."

"No," said Satan, looking at him with an expression that was suddenly, terrifyingly possessive – the only glance he'd given him during the entire visit which felt chillingly personal. "Not everything, my sweet darling. Just the part you care about."

There was no point in trying to heal himself. Satan would know. You couldn't use occult power without him knowing. Typically, his usage wasn't audited, but they'd be paying attention today, after what they'd just done.

Aziraphale had stared brokenly at his burned-up lounge for a while before he finally staggered into the bedroom. He was very nearly never in here. It felt strange to crawl under the dusty covers, aching and in stinging pain all over, and wish for blackness, for complete oblivion.

Buzzz. Brriiingggg.

He rolled over, tossing back the thick black bedspread. The action released a little cloud of dust that made him sneeze, causing a new, dark line of blood to drip from his damaged nose. Damn. He'd just gotten it to clot, too.

Aziraphale did consider not getting up. Except, it might be the repairmen, for the fridge, and who knew when they'd be back again if he let them leave.

As he stumbled to the door, the Prince of Hell invented an elaborate story about falling down the stairs earlier – in case his visitors, whoever they were, asked what had happened to his face.

If he'd had a good imagination, it might have been an interesting – and therefore potentially believable – story, but it wasn't anything of the sort, and he was still despairing of it by the time he undid the locks, muttering, "Just a moment."

It wasn't the repairmen.

It was Raphael, standing there sombrely, holding up the tan bookbag. "Hi."

"Hello." As if in a trance, Aziraphale reached out and wrapped his sore fingers around the handle, taking it from him.

"Well, nice seeing you again." Raphael smiled tightly, then turned and left.

At first, Aziraphale couldn't speak or think for the life of him. He just kept looking from the tan bookbag to the empty space where Raphael had been standing.

Then, as if a magic button had been pressed, releasing him back to himself, he gently placed the bag down and ran out into the hallway after the archangel, calling his name. "Raphael! Raphael! Raphael, for pity's sake, wait!"

But he was already gone.

Aziraphale frantically tried to get the doorman's attention.

"Jesus!" the doorman cried out, recoiling. "What the hell happened to you?"

"Long story." The demon waved it off. "I'm perfectly all right. Listen. A tall, thin man – dark suit, red hair, sunglasses. Did he just come out this way? Please. This is frightfully important."

"He did," the doorman told him, nodding.

"Did he say anything? Anything at all?"

"Nothing, sir."

Aziraphale slowly ascended the stairs, going back to his flat feeling very, very lost. What Raphael had just done for him had no possible explanation. Why and how would he have–

He opened the bookbag, examining the neatly-packed books – the best of his collection, saved from a fire the archangel couldn't have known about – and drawing them out as if each one was made of pure gold.

From between two large gilded tomes, a gleaming white envelope slipped out and fluttered towards the floor.

Aziraphale caught it between two fingers just in time and drew out its contents: two pages, both sides with writing on them.

Raphael had left him a letter.

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