XX — An Uneasy Acquaintanceship
Gabriel hated it down here.
Dirty didn't cover it. There wasn't a word in English that did, actually—there was a Tagalog word that was a close approximation, "layogenic"—which essentially meant that all the wonders of the Earth were great in theory, and from far away, but up close? Well, you don't squint at a Monet, right?
Being boots on the ground, so to speak, and having to actually breathe in the smog and smells of civilization? Not a fan.
"Do you think there's any way we could get demoted further?" Gabriel posed.
"Think they just send you to Hell at that point," Beelzebub answered, only half-interested in what he was saying.
They stood together in St. James Park, staring down at the ducks with contempt. He and Beelzebub had both been the defunct scapegoats for the derailed attempt at The End, as they were Crowley and Aziraphale's immediate superiors and therefore, by corporate tradition, were to be overwhelmingly punished in the stead of the people who had actually screwed up.
How was he supposed to know just how native Aziraphale had gone? Much less fallen in love with a demon—granted that was largely speculation, but it was hard to assume anything else. Crowley had clearly corrupted Aziraphale at some point in the past. Who knew how long he had been lost to Heaven? Maybe it was from the very start. They had been down here together for a long, long time. And, come on, was Gabriel expected to keep track of every little thing Aziraphale did? He had his own job to do! He couldn't spend all of his time breathing down one angel's neck! There were millions of them.
It was monumentally unfair. And he had told the Metatron as such, but then there'd been some thunder rumbling and Heavens trembling and the Metatron had gently reminded him that he spoke for the Almighty.
Gabriel had promptly shut up. For all he detested being on Earth, being dead—or worse, Falling—that was even more unpalatable.
"All I'm saying is, if I screwed up bad enough, maybe they'd just put me at a desk somewhere. Menial work. I'd still be in Heaven," Gabriel continued. He idly watched a few nearby humans toss chunks of bread to the ducks. Didn't ducks have trouble digesting bread? Maybe the humans were trying to kill them as some kind of sport. He didn't bother to keep up on their leisure activities anymore. He'd lost interest once they'd stopped cheering at public executions.
"Aziraphale was rubbish at his job," Beelzebub pointed out. "Never sat him at a desk."
"Well we didn't KNOW he was under-performing," Gabriel argued.
"You didn't check."
"Neither did you!" he accused, aiming an accusing finger in Beelzebub's direction. "You never checked on Crowley! Obviously!"
"Well, that's why we're both here, izzzzn't it?" they snapped, the fly on their head buzzing in irritation. "Managed to miss that our main operatives on Earth were consorting. Brilliant minds, we are."
Gabriel sighed, ire leaving him. He tugged his scarf tighter around his neck. Not that he could feel cold—he'd left all of the annoyingly realistic mechanisms out of his corporeal form—but it just seemed like the thing to do, with how blustery the wind was getting. "Wanna go for a walk?" he asked tiredly.
Beelzebub scowled. "No."
The two of them walked together anyway.
They didn't like each other. The word hate had been bandied about, but Gabriel didn't usually think about other beings enough to assign that kind of feeling to them. And now that he had how much he hated Aziraphale as a point of reference, he couldn't say he hated Beelzebub. He certainly didn't like them, and they didn't like him, but there was something to be said for being able to stand one another.
He preferred Beelzebub's company to humans, and vice versa. Made the whole 'Earth's lead operative' business at least something close to tolerable.
Side-by-side, they strolled through an open air market. With fall settling into London(1), pumpkins and squash abounded, fruit falling more and more out of season. He'd wanted to argue being stationed in London specifically, but with Crowley and Aziraphale clearly still lurking in the area, it made sense to stay here and keep an eye on them. Never mind that the most easily accessed portal to Heaven (and Hell) lie within the city limits.
He was mostly on surveillance duty. Occasionally getting sent off for a minor miracle or a blessing, a task far more boring now that he'd been forbidden from appearing in his celestial form. Half the fun of helping humans had been scaring them senseless in the process. Meanwhile, Beelzebub had been merely given the order to cause as much trouble as demonically possible. Hell had plans in the works to try to push the world into its own apocalypse. Things were so off the rails now that hands had been forced; the demon lord had nipped off to America more than a few times in the past six weeks, with the explanation, "If Armageddon's going to happen, that's where it'll start."
Gabriel agreed with them, not that he'd ever say it aloud.
Beelzebub stopped in their tracks when they neared the edge of the market, near a fruit stand, mostly covered in overripe bananas and oranges.
One of the bananas was ringing.(2)
Gabriel and Beelzebub exchanged a glance.
"Your people?" Gabriel said, lifting an eyebrow.
Beelzebub's sour expression was answer enough. They picked up the banana, and Gabriel worked a small miracle to avert the eyes of the human running the stand.
"What?" Beelzebub answered shortly.
The banana was evidently on speaker. "Lord Beelzebub," came a panicked voice on the other end—Gabriel didn't know to whom it belonged, he'd never bothered to learn the names of any of the demons in Hell's upper hierarchy besides Beelzebub's. "We—we have a problem!"
"Calm down, Hastur. Just tell me what'zzzz happened."
"There's—demons, we've never seen them before—and, and they're killing everybody!"
Things had gotten ugly quickly.
Sam had been optimistic at first. "Well, it'll be even easier for us to pass through Hell as demons, right? We don't have to pretend to be carrying information, we can just...be. Keep a low profile, get out, go meet up with the others. Aziraphale said that both Heaven and Hell have portals to London."
But they'd been noticed as soon as they'd slogged their way anywhere near the exit.
"Oi, you lot," crowed a demon with a crocodile aspect. "What d'you think you're doing?"
The three of them froze. Sam and Dean, as one, looked to Crowley to take the lead. He was the actual demon after all; if anyone could talk them out of this, it was him.
"Going out for a smoke," Crowley said, face betraying no sign of concern.(3)
"How come I've never seen you 'round here before? You new?"
"Oh, no," Crowley gave a little shake of his head. "Earth-side, usually. Nipped in for new orders."
"From who?"
"Dagon," Dean interjected quickly, no doubt latching onto the first demon name he could think of. They had angels and demons in common from both of their worlds, hopefully Dagon was one of them.
Evidently, that had been the right answer, because the crocodile demon seemed to lose interest in them almost immediately. "Oh. That's alright then." He shot them a perfunctory glare. "Don't be takin' too long out there. Work to be done. Souls to be damned."
"Of course, of course," Sam agreed, nodding along.
As soon as the crocodile demon was out of sight, the three of them merged with the stinking mass of Hell's denizens, all breathing a combined sigh of relief.
"That was fucking close," Dean said under his breath. "Seriously, Crowley? Smoke break? I know you can lie better than that."
A ripple went through the demons crowded around them. Heads turned in their direction.
Dean had said the wrong thing.
Murmurs of "Crowley? Did he say Crowley?" sprung up all around them, and the shuffling herd ground to a halt.
"Uh oh," said Sam.
Things had devolved quickly from there, but they found out rapidly that angel blades and Ruby's knife were just as effective at killing demons in this universe as they were in their own. They cut down demon after demon with relative ease, because clearly none of them had been prepared for a battle on their home turf, much less against much better-armed opponents. No one in Hell seemed to be armed, actually, which made the corresponding slaughter all the less panic-inducing.
But they couldn't kill every demon in Hell. Even they weren't that good.
Their streak of (good?) luck didn't last, however. The three of them, soaked in blood, ended up clapped in irons after an echoing snap from somewhere in the distance.
"Two of them are humans, you idiotzzzz!" buzzed an enraged voice out of Sam's line of sight. "You can work miracles! Bloody use them! Can never find good help nowadayzzzz...bring them to the council chambers!"
Soon they found themselves in what looked to be something equivalent to a immensely dirty, disused meat market, with tiers of stone seats leading up to just below the ceiling. Behind them, dusty windows, with crowds of demons behind them, looking on. They were stripped of their weapons, including Michael's Archangel blade, easily the most valuable thing in their possession. Not good. Not good at all.
They were forced to their knees, side-by-side, facing the buzzing individual from before, a fly demon who looked like they had already lost their patience with the three of them.
"Who are you?" they demanded. "You're not demons."
"Actually," Crowley corrected, "I am. Not these two, of course, far too bumbling—but I'm a demon. Through and through."
Not exactly true, but Sam wasn't about to correct him.
"Hastur tells me Fido here called you Crowley."
Dean bristled at the nickname, but said nothing. Mercifully.
Crowley quickly replied, "Pronunciation is everything, love. Name's Crowley. Where I come from, I'm the King of Hell."
Shocked whispers throughout the room.
"SILENCE!" crowed the fly demon, and the gathered demons quieted accordingly. "Never heard of another Crowley, and I've never seen you before. And we only have one King, and that's Lucifer."
"We're not from here. Different universe. I came to...parlay," Crowley began, and Sam could see the wheels spinning in his head. "These two humans are my slaves. Merely wanted them to look the part so as not to arouse suspicion, but because they're idiots by nature, that went out the window rather spectacularly."
"Laying it on a little thick," Sam said out of the corner of his mouth, but a sharp kick from Crowley silenced him. Slaves? Really?
"You expect me to believe you're from another world?" challenged the fly demon.
"Lord Beelzebub," said a frog demon from behind her. "We did find a...thing."
Beelzebub took a deep breath, closing their eyes, as if counting to ten. "What thing?"
"A portal. We were gonna draw straws to figure out who has to go through and see if they disintegrate or not," Hastur explained. Sam recognized him from the fray earlier—mainly because the demon was currently missing his right hand, thanks to Sam. And he'd done a lot of shrieking.
"Send one of DD's clones through," Beelzebub ordered. "That's what he's for."(4)
"Yes, my Lord."
Hastur scurried off, but not before grabbing a demon with a—rabbit aspect? maybe?—and dragging him by the back of the collar out of the room.
"Parlay," Beelzebub repeated, peering more closely at Crowley. "For what purpose?"
"Heard through the inter-dimensional grapevine that your lot were having some trouble. Impotent apocalypse and all that. Thought you might want a hand, and my Hell—well, we'd be ever so happy to join forces. Take both of our worlds for our side. Because it is our side, isn't it? Tiny differences, yeah—but Hell's still Hell, no matter the set-dressing." Crowley eyed the room with visible distaste, no doubt thinking of his simple and efficient never-ending line.
"And you expect me to take you on your word alone?"
"Oh, of course not. Sweet mother of Hell, we're demons." Crowley snapped his fingers, and his lion aspect vanished. Sam wished desperately he had done the same for he and Dean.
It also occurred to Sam in that moment that yes, they were chained—but the iron shackles weren't enchanted in anyway. Crowley's powers weren't bound.
He was just playing along. Sam wished he knew what Crowley's endgame was, but he had to just hope that Crowley had a well-thought out plan. He'd had a long history of being ten steps ahead of everybody else, so while Sam wouldn't say he trusted Crowley, he at least trusted Crowley not to do anything to get them killed.
A quick but subtle dart of his eyes to Dean's hands confirmed his suspicion that his brother was already dislocating his thumb to attempt to get out of the irons. Sam started to do the same. Maybe Crowley could talk them out of this, but he wasn't about to put all of his eggs in one basket.
Crowley let his eyes flash Crossroads red. "But I think you can tell I've got some power on my side, hmm? And what reason would I have to lie about this?"
Beelzebub narrowed their eyes at Crowley. "Every reason in the world."
"Fair enough. What could I say to convince you of my good faith?"
Beelzebub didn't seem to have an answer for that. They paused to consider the question, but demons quickly began jeering behind and above them. Mostly eager shouts of, "Kill them!"
One of the louder demons proposed, "Feed them to the hounds!"
And thus began a chant of, "Hounds! Hounds! Hounds!"
Beelzebub sank low in their throne, rolling their eyes. "Take them to the dungeons! I need time to think!"
Disappointed boos from the crowd, and one melancholic cry of, "No hounds?"
Then, they were dragged off to a damp, dark, miserable cell—very on-brand, given everything they'd seen in this Hell so far. As soon as the door slammed shut on them, snuffing out almost any visible light in the room, Dean slipped off his bindings and threw them to the side with a clatter. Sam followed suit. With a snap of his fingers, Crowley was freed as well.
Dean massaged his wrists, grimacing. "This is going real fuckin' great. You really thought that line was gonna work? Two Hells working together?"
"They didn't kill us, now did they?" Crowley shot back. "We did have a discussion about gratitude, didn't we? And how you might try it on for size?"
"Can we just focus on how we're getting out of here?" Sam interrupted before the two could devolve into an argument.
"We could just fight our way out. Was going well enough last time," Dean pointed out.
Sam looked over Dean's injuries; he was bleeding badly from several places, and the ring finger of his left hand looked near close to falling off. His face was a mess of bruises, his nose possibly broken. Sam could tell from the flare ups of dull agony all throughout his body that he wasn't much better off. Crowley had already self-healed and looked fine, but he'd been a mess when they'd been escorted to their audience with Beelzebub. Granted, Crowley could heal the two of them—but their odds of killing their way out were pretty slim.
There were thousands and thousands of demons down here. They needed a better plan.
"We need something more elegant," Crowley said, frowning. He moved forward, pressing one finger to each of their foreheads and healing them instantaneously. "Perhaps we give it a mo—our dear fly in chief may consider my offer."
"Where exactly were you going with that anyway?" Sam asked. "What were you trying to accomplish?"
"I was hoping they'd want to see the might of my own demonic army," Crowley said dryly. "Which, doesn't exist—but it would get us back through the portal and on home turf, and we could teleport away and leave my mother to deal with whatever else came through." Crowley tilted his head, a thought clearly hitting him. "Huh. I suppose she'll be having a few demons in her lap in the near future. What a shame."
"She's your mom. You're not worried about her?" Sam asked, brow furrowed. "I know there's no love lost between you two, but seriously, Crowley. You have to care about her at least a little."
"You want to know what I've figured out in recent years, Moose?"
"No, but I'm sure you're going to tell me."
"I've figured out that there's no caring a little about anything. You either care, or you don't. And caring...that opens up a whole nasty can of worms, doesn't it?" Sam couldn't make out Crowley's full expression in the dim light of the cell, but he knew it wasn't a happy one. "I could care about her. I choose not to. It's not worth it."
"Why not?" Dean asked, no trace of scorn in his words.
"Because if I do, she can hurt me," Crowley told them with surprising honesty. "I'm all good on that, thanks. Now, back to the matter at hand—"
The cell door slammed open with such a loud bang that all three of them jumped. Hastur stood in the doorway. Next to him was an enormous dog, a nightmare fuel version of a bull terrier, with huge, slavering jaws and wickedly black eyes.
"No. No no no no." Dean was already backing against the far wall of the cell. "Jesus, they're so much worse when you can see them."
Sam had to agree with him on that one. He pressed himself to the wall next to his brother. Weaponless as they were, they had no way to kill a hellhound.
"Lord Beelzebub has decided they don't believe anything you say and it would be less irritating if we just killed you. Have a nice time with the dog. We haven't fed her in a millennia." Hastur laughed, high-pitched and manic, and then slammed the door yet again. "Bye!"
The hellhound growled.
Dean's eyes pinched shut, panic overwhelming him. "Shit, shit, shit, shit."
"Crowley, can you get us our weapons back?" Sam asked desperately.
The demon was standing with his back to the two of them, facing the hellhound.
"Crowley!" Sam repeated, louder.
"We won't need weapons, boys," Crowley told them, sounding the picture of nonchalance. Crowley snapped his fingers, and a large steak appeared in his hand. Sam didn't want to contemplate precisely what the meat was. Crowley tossed it to the hellhound, who snapped it out of the air with glee. "There we are. Not been feeding you properly, have they? Poor thing. This place is begging for the ASPCA."
"Crowley do you seriously fucking think you can sweet talk a hellhound—" Dean let out in a rush, but Crowley merely held up a hand.
"I'm a demon of particular talents," he said simply, then extended his raised hand to the hellhound, who had demolished the steak in seconds. "You know something like you when you see it, don't you? I won't harm you. You need a master, darling, and these buffoons down here certainly don't make the cut, do they? You'd be better off with me, I think."
Another steak was miracled into existence, and Crowley handed it to her that time instead of throwing it. She ate gratefully, but to Sam's surprise, Crowley didn't lose any fingers.
She looked up at Crowley, and gave a questioning woof.
Crowley extended his hand again, palm up.
"C'mere, sweet girl."
The hellhound licked his palm.
"You've got to be kidding me," Dean said, relaxing every so slightly next to Sam.
"You're the Hellhound Whisperer," Sam laughed breathlessly.
"Always been good with dogs." Crowley scratched idly between the hellhound's ears, and she closed her eyes happily. "A bit of affection can go a long way."
"Okay, so, what...she's not gonna eat us?"
Crowley smiled faintly. "You wouldn't do that, would you girl?"
She barked happily.
Crowley turned to Sam and Dean. "What do you think the chances are that the other hellhounds down here are also horribly mistreated?"
Aziraphale stepped through the portal in Heaven, and out into Crowley's flat. He breathed a deep sigh of relief the second his feet touched the floor in his own universe. Home again. It could only be better if it was the bookshop—but he'd been making subtle changes to Crowley's flat over the six weeks since Armageddidn't, sneaking in a few bookshelves, a warm throw blanket here and there, a better kettle—and it had become as much of a home to him as his personal lair.
Though arguably, home was wherever Crowley was.
And Crowley was here. And hurrying up to him. Crowley paused, considering him for a moment. Aziraphale let out a huff of surprise when the demon hugged him. Tentatively, he hugged him back.
"You alright? Everything go as planned?" Crowley asked into his shoulder.
"The Winchesters and their Crowley should be meeting us here soon. I gave them directions, and I think at least Sam listened enough to remember them," Aziraphale replied, withdrawing from Crowley and giving him a warm smile, touched by his concern and touched further by his openness in expressing it. All of this was frightfully new, and it brought to life a nervous energy in his stomach that made him feel as though he was about to burst.
Crowley returned the smile, but the anxiety was obvious in his face. He wasn't so confident as he'd been before, faintly brain damaged in their cell. "You think they'll be able to slip through our Heaven without getting caught?"
"The ruse of being demons carrying important information should get them far enough. Just tell the angels something about us if they ask, and that'll do, I expect."
"And if it doesn't?"
"They have the mirror. Let's try to be positive, yes?"
"Oh, right, sorry, power of positive thinking is enough to capture an Archangel without him turning us into burn marks on the floor," Crowley said, pulling a face.
Aziraphale gave him a wry look, but pressed on: "Where are Anathema and Newt?"
"Sent them to Soho, gave them the key—we need to draw that Heaven-thingy you've got there, get Gabriel to come here. Told them to take a picture of it, couldn't remember exactly what it looked like."
"Surely we could just go to the shop to call on him?"
"You want to try to haul him four miles to the bloody hole in the universe? We don't even really have a way to hold him. We need to get him through to the other side before he figures out what we're up to," Crowley reasoned.
"I suppose you're right...ah, but I may have something to properly bind him." Aziraphale reached into his pockets, extracting the decanter of holy oil and angel cuffs the Winchesters had been kind enough to loan him. "And Dean still has Michael's Archangel blade, so if things go terribly awry..."
"Not much good to us dead, is he?"
Aziraphale aimed a taut frown in his direction. "I meant to wound, not kill."
"Be more fun if we could do both, but," Crowley shrugged. "We still don't know if this stuff'll even work here." With cautious movements, he took the holy oil from Aziraphale's hands. He'd been able to walk through holy fire without incident, but it was meant for angels—and not the Fallen variety.
Aziraphale was similarly worried. The angel cuffs, according to Crowley, had done little other than stifle his powers, and he'd been able to snake out of them with ease. The holy fire hadn't affected him at all. But what about on an angel, rather than a demon?
"I'm afraid there's only one way to find out." Aziraphale miracled a lighter into his hand. "We start a fire, and see if it burns me."
"Are you mad?" Crowley demanded, reeling away from him and clutching the holy oil tighter to his chest. "We've no clue what it could do to you!"
"I could just dip my finger in it, dear boy, it's not as if I want you to set me on fire—"
"What if one drop is all it takessss!" Crowley hissed. "After the—The Incident—I never want to have you in the same room as anything flaming ever again."
Aziraphale softened in spite of himself. He still thought Crowley was being rather over-dramatic, as he was wont to do, but Aziraphale also understood that the demon had gone through something when he thought Heaven, or Hell, or both had erased him from existence, and the bookshop with him. If the state he found Crowley in thereafter was any indication, the demon was...impacted, to say the very least of it.
Sobbing, drunk in an East London bar, hapless, hopeless. Ready to give up.
Ready to die.
"I'm fine, Crowley. They never burned me. Up or Down."
"They could have. They tried to!" Crowley burst out. "I was there, angel, and I saw that smug git look on Gabriel's smug git face and—" Crowley looked away, jaw working. "This all seemed like a lot better idea in my head than in practice."
"We have the Winchesters and Crowley to help. And more importantly, we have each other." Aziraphale gingerly removed the decanter of holy oil from Crowley's hands, setting it down on the kitchen counter. "We stopped the apocalypse, Crowley. Surely we can do this." He put his hands on Crowley's biceps, urging the demon to look at him, rather than staring moodily off into the distance.
"Usually you're the one who freaks out at times like this, why are you so calm?" Crowley muttered, somewhere between curious and reproachful.
"To be honest with you..." Aziraphale allowed himself a cold little smile. "I rather think I'd like to see Gabriel taken down a few million notches, after everything. He tried to burn me...so I'll cage him. Forever."
That brought Crowley's attention back to him, sunglasses sliding down his nose enough to reveal a flash of gold. He smirked.
"What?" Aziraphale asked, brow furrowing.
"Kind of hot when you get all vengeful."
Aziraphale blushed spectacularly, and was in the process of sputtering out a response when suddenly his own reflection in Crowley's sunglasses was replaced with the blurred face of Dean Winchester.
"Oh thank God, they're not making out this time—" he said, panting, made somewhat comical by his canine aspect, "—hi, what's up, uh—real quick—how do you get to the London exit in your version of Hell?"
"Hell?" Aziraphale repeated, floored.
Crowley whipped off his sunglasses and turned them in such a way that he and Aziraphale could both see Dean. "How the Heaven are you in Hell?"
"Portal emptied us out there—look we really don't have time for exposition just—" Barking filled the air, shouts, screams, terrified whimpering. Aziraphale could make out the fast moving figures of Sam and the Winchesters' Crowley dipping intermittently out of frame. "How the FUCK do we get out of here?"
"It's not exactly easy to explain, we purposefully make it confusing, it's Hell," Crowley said. "But look, there's a life-size statue of Dick Cheney caddy-corner to the down escalator—"
"Don't we want the up escalator?" Sam called. More barking.
"Hell's only got the down escalator. Gotta climb it if you want back up—what did you three do?"
"Tell you when we get there. PETA would be proud, let's put it that way."(5) Dean lowered the mirror, and just before the connection cut, he called, "See you topside!"
Crowley's sunglasses returned to their usual mirror surface. The demon lowered them and looked seriously at Aziraphale. "Going fabulously so far, isn't it?"
1. Beelzebub had taken to fall, and more importantly, Halloween, as it meant they didn't have to work a constant miracle to blend in with humans, as everyone just assumed that they were wearing some kind of costume, and didn't earn more than a few impressed glances while walking the streets of London.
2. Hell had improved only slightly in their abilities to contact their Earth operatives—sometimes they at least managed vaguely phone-shaped objects, rather than just whatever electronic device happened to be nearby, but not once had any demon been able to properly dial and reach the phone Beelzebub had obtained for communication purposes. It didn't help that Beelzebub had never turned the phone on, much less activated it, but they were several hundred years behind in their knowledge of human technology.
3. It just so happens that Crowley was right in assuming Hell was a non-smoking area; Heaven was as well, though for completely different reasons.
4. DD—Disposable Demon, as he was known in Hell. His actual name was Erik, and he really didn't like his nickname, but when your singular talent was the ability to replicate yourself (a talent he did not make any effort to learn and had absolutely no idea why he was capable of it at all) you can't really expect an entire nether realm full of demons not to use that to their advantage.
5. PETA wasn't something Crowley had invented, but it was something he took credit for. He'd gotten a commendation for that one.