Disclaimer: Oh Aziraphale, I want to be your stalker. *Manic Sigh* Unfortunately, you and Crowley can never be mine. *Sob*

ALL IN A LIFETIME'S WORK
Chapter 7

Aziraphale stirred with a massive headache. Something sticky had almost glued his left eye shut, and he had to make a great effort to open his eyes. He saw red through the left and realized it was blood. His blood. His mind reeled with pain and confusion, trying to connect two and two together. Why in heaven's name was he in tremendous pain and... why cant he seem to move his arms or legs? Wasn't he supposed to be singing right now?

"Mister? Mister!"

A small voice tried to cut through the haze of confusion and helped Aziraphale focus a bit. He raised his head, and almost threw up from dizziness.

"Mister please wake up. Please wake up!" The voice's urgency snapped the dazed angel to narrowing his eyes to concentrate. He tried his best to take stock on his situation; he felt his arms bound tightly behind the chair he was sitting in, his ankles tied securely to his seat's legs. Aziraphale realized that his jacket was gone, his sneakers too, bare feet touching the cold cement floor. A large pool of blood was clotted down the left side of his shirt. His mind was swimming in panic and he willed his bounds to be gone.

Nothing happened.

"Mister! Get up, he's coming back soon. You have to get up. You have to!"

Aziraphale swallowed, mouth dry; who was that? The voice was small, like a little girl's, shrill and bordering on hysteria. "Who?" he asked hoarsely. He had a throbbing headache.

"Him!" she was so close to sobbing, "Him, he's coming. Hurry mister angel sir. Hurry! You're an angel, right? He says you are. You can save us mister. I know you can." The girl was babbling, and Aziraphale's vision finally focused onto a young girl crammed into a small cage of sorts a few meters from him. She seemed to be wearing a private school uniform, dirty and torn, her mousy brown hair tangled into a mess framing her small desperate face. It broke Aziraphale's heart. She couldn't be more than 12.

"Tell me who's coming. Where are we?"

She pressed her face closer to her prison's bars, "I don't know. But he's a bad man mister. He's bad. He'll kill us. He will! Mister angel, free us please."

Aziraphale wondered at this, angel? Why or how would she guess? The answer though was for him to see soon enough; as his pale eyes roamed the room to take stock of their situation, a shocking sight greeted him. The room, an abandoned studio of sorts was large and had walls covered floor to ceiling of news clippings, posters, memorabilia, graffiti, maps and knick knacks all on Azira. His face, cut out from various magazines and posters, even clothes he recognized were his littered the place, pictures he did not recall having been taken. Wings were scrawled everywhere as well as graffiti. There were no windows, and there were only a smattering of furniture; a table nearby, a few more chairs, a television and refrigerator, a bed. He'd scarcely realized that his stomach had turned itself inside-out when he heard footsteps coming down an unseen set of stairs.

"No!" the girl whispered harshly, "No, no, no... he's here!"

"I see you've made friends Azira." the horrified Principality turned to the voice, finding a young man smiling down at him. He almost looked like he had fangs. "Or should I call you Aziraphale?"

*******

"Where is he Crawly?!" The archangel glowered at his human form's most menacing, "Where is Aziraphale?!". He was beyond furious, he was beyond all anger. He probably couldn't have articulated what he felt at that moment even if he wanted to. Gabriel was worried to pieces and angry beyond description at how something like this could happen under his watch. It was taking all of his self-control to keep his sword from materialising and smiting every vaguely evil little thing in sight. It certainly didn't help that a demon was standing next to him.

Crowley on the other hand was also righteously angry but knew enough to hold back. He's seen what archangels can do, and none of them had been half as crazy-mad as Gabriel was right now. He didn't want to take his chances. He'd also die first before losing face to the enemy by bawling his eyes out. "I don't know. But, do you actually think Hell's so stupid to take one of yours?"

"You tell me snake, nothing like this ever happened until you showed up."

"Maybe I didn't need to Gabriel. This was bound to happen. You put Aziraphale out there and expect only good things to happen?" Crowley snapped, "Wow. Where have you been to? Didn't you even think of giving the angel some sort of security?"

Gabriel sniffed, "I distinctly remember you telling Aziraphale that no mortal could probably take down an angel."

"Didn't know angels eavesdropped. Aside from being so inanely naive."

"I was not eavesdropping. You were well within earshot." There was a moment of silence, and Gabriel took a deep breath. "This isn't helping us find Aziraphale."

Damn right, Crowley wanted to say, but bit it down. He looked around; Aziraphale's dressing room had literally been turned upside down in the hopes of finding any sort of clue. It was only Crowley's recollection of the unusual later a week back that held any lead. They both stood there, unable to comprehend that their bodies were steeped in shock. It was Gabriel who spoke first breaking the uncomfortable silence;

"I will ask Heaven if they know where he is. But I truly doubt they would." Gabriel looked away, as if debating wether or not to trust the demon. Yet Aziraphale's trusted him, so Gabriel went with his instincts and continued. "I can't sense him. If I can't, then there isn't much else my side would know anyway."

Crowley nodded grimly "I can't either." he turned to leave and the archangel watched him.

"Then where are you going?"

"To find Aziraphale."

"How are you going to do that?"

"I frankly don't know." Crowley paused before exiting through the door, "But I will find him Gabriel. With or without heaven's help. And when I do, I will tear that bastard who took Aziraphale limb from limb and shove his soul into Beelzebub's a--"

There was a sharp laugh in a voice equally grim, "Please don't demon," A pause and tight-lipped smile, "You'll have to leave some for me."

******

"Why do you look so surprised Aziraphale? Really. I should say that the expression doesn't suit you like they do in the movies." The man leaned down to study the angel's face with a half-smile playing upon his lips. "Though... I think it does. So horribly endearing i must say."

Aziraphale watched him with wide eyes, finally connecting two and two together. "You're the one who sent me a letter..." He swallowed, watching the man smile like a very efficient predator, dark green eyes glowing with glee. Aziraphale realized that he was rather tall, taller than Crowley probably; and had he passed him on the street, the man would have constituted a fairly good example of human beauty. His eyes though, told of a very different asset; an insanely malicious flame burning within.

"Yes. You never wrote back. It hurt me you know. You hurt me." he sighed picking up things distractedly on a nearby table, putting them back down. Aziraphale's terrified mind registered them as parts for a firearm. "Especially when I watched your interview on TV. You had someone else. That Oprah-bitch, can't even extract any really good information out of you. But I have to thank her though, if it wasn't for her, I would never have known you were going out behind my back."

The man turned back to the angel, face contorted in anger. "How fucking could you?!" he punched Aziraphale's jaw and his head snapped to the side. The pain was unbelievable, Aziraphale's vision clouded almost to darkness. He willed the pain to go away, but it just won't. Why wouldn't his body obey him?! This realization doubled the angel's panic. Something was wrong.

"Angels aren't supposed to hurt people. Angels aren't supposed to cheat!" The man shouted with a force that belied his lunacy.

"I've ... never... cheated. Not... ever." Aziraphale's said in between labored breaths, forcing down the building nausea, this place felt very wrong now. He hasn't felt this aura in years... thousands of years. He forced himself to focus; talk he told himself, get as much information as you can. Stay calm. "Wh-what is your name?" he braced himself, expecting another blow.

"John." was the reply. It was quietly said and the pain Aziraphale expected didn't come, he almost sighed in relief. "Your lover must have taken all my letters from you. Forced you to forget about me." John picked up a waiting gun at the table, "But I can make you love me again, angel. I can"

Aziraphale looked away, "Why do you say I'm an angel?"

John seemed to like this question and slid the gun between his belt and jeans. He leaned back on the table, ignoring the sobbing girl a few feet away. "Its rather obvious. You glow when you sing Aziraphale. I can almost see your halo sometimes."

"People see what they want to see... John."

"Yes. They only see those bright lights behind you, they only see your clothes, your face, your mortal body." John's eyes roamed the room, "There were so many clues, people are just blind. But I'm not. I'm real smart. I am.

You're Azira Fell. You're also A. Ziraphael. It took me a long time to realize this, you liked keeping secrets from me. I know you've never been born. You have no papers, nothing. Just taxes. You're real good with your taxes.

I knew for sure you're an angel when you saved that girl who came onstage for your concert. That was last year. You knew she was dying, and you took away her cancer. I know. I followed that bitch home for daring to touch you my angel. She didn't even know she was cured then, but I, I watched her. I watched her realize the miracle. That's how I found out."

John's eyes were unfocused and manic. "Then that got me thinking, is that why you pretended not to know me? You were afraid I'd found out your secret? But it was something else apparently. You were getting rid of me."

Aziraphale tore his gaze away from the stairs behind him thinking desperately of a plan to escape. He eyed the terrified girl. Her eyes were tear-streaked and as wide as the angel's. "Then what does she have to do with any of this? Let her go. Then we can talk... about this."

"Oh. Quite a lot." John smiled, "She's here to make sure you do everything I want you to do." he said matter of factly, slowly sidling up to the bound angel. He leaned forward to caress Aziraphale's cheek as he sat down to straddled him in one catlike motion. He wrapped his arms around the angel's neck, "I'm sure you've realized how mortal you are in this room. Probably what took me the longest was finding the right combination of demonic sigils and latin texts to keep you mortal. At least in here."

It was then that Aziraphale realized just what the graffiti was, he just couldn't see the sigils because his vision had been reduced to a human's. He swallowed nervously, "Then you know that all I have to do is escape this body."

John pressed his forehead to Aziraphale's and closed his eyes, "Of course. So why would I let that happen by killing you? We've got so much catching up to do, and I know you can be quite stubborn if you wanted to. There's only so much pain I can inflict, and I know you will endure it. So whats the solution?" He opened his eyes and turned his gaze towards the terrified young girl, and Aziraphale was no idiot to realize what he meant.

"Oh don't you dare hurt the little one." Aziraphale uttered angrily under his breath.

"That depends on how compliant you can be." The smile on John's face was feral. "Now kiss me angel. Make it up to me."

Aziraphale looked away, his heart hammering, this could not be happening to him. Every fiber in his being fought against it, he felt trapped and cornered and he would gladly die sooner than let anything happen to the girl. He closed his eyes and steeled himself as he leaned forward begrudgingly and brought his mouth to his captor's. The kiss was dreadful and cold, Aziraphale forcing himself to press his lips to the other's. He withdrew, cheeks aflame, ashamed and disgusted, and he felt a hard slap sting his face.

"You call that a kiss?" John withdrew the gun from his belt and snapped off its safety. "You disappoint me Aziraphale. I said, kiss me."

"I... I c -can't. I won't." Aziraphale stammered. He will not. He will not! His mind told itself. "I will not."

"Are you sure?" John trained the gun towards the little girl's cage, and if her eyes could have widened any further it would have filled half her face.

"L-lets be reasonable, John. You can't do this. I can't."

"Stop being stubborn angel. " he fired off a shot towards the girl and she yelled. It was a tremendous sound, and there was a terrible moment before they heard her screaming and sobbing, a hole burned into a wall not a few inches from her head.

John turned back to Aziraphale who was the perfect picture of horror.

"Now. Kiss me Aziraphale. Kiss me the way you kiss your lover."