Chapter Text
They’d forgotten to close the curtains last night. The sun was bright on Aziraphale’s face as he woke, slowly and somewhat groggily, stretching to clear the worst of the sleepiness. Crowley was asleep next to him, as he so often was when Aziraphale woke, and Aziraphale took a minute to just watch him and appreciate the quiet before sneaking out of bed, twitching the curtains closed on his way out.
Ordinarily he’d have gone back to the bookshop, with Crowley so decidedly asleep, but there was a perfectly respectable-sized pile of books on the coffee table in Crowley’s sitting room, so Aziraphale decided to put off going home for a while. He could always go and retrieve more books later, if he ran out, or nip down to the bakery if he got too bored. He’d just sit here for a while, then.
The books weren’t quite to Aziraphale’s taste, but then again, he was in Crowley’s flat, probably reading Crowley’s books. He could easily have gone and gotten his own if he wanted to be picky. It was just that there was something so peaceful about sitting here, knowing that Crowley was only a room away, knowing that he could stay as long as he wanted now, without looking out for who might be watching.
Peaceful, and a little disconcerting, to be sure. It occurred to him eventually that his distraction might not be entirely the fault of the less-than-enthralling books, and more the fault of his thoughts wandering repeatedly to how ephemeral everything was. How close they’d come to losing it all.
But there, that was some months in the past now, and he had been doing a remarkably good job of setting such thoughts aside. He didn’t have anything to worry about now, and it wasn’t worth fabricating things just so he could sit and dither. It must be the quiet that was getting to him. Maybe a walk wouldn’t be such a bad idea after all.
The bedroom door swished and Crowley emerged, looking remarkably dressed and ready for the day for someone who had just taken a rather sizable nap. Aziraphale smiled at him. “Are we going out today, then?”
Crowley frowned faintly. “I wasn’t planning on it. Do you have something in mind?”
“No,” Aziraphale said, glancing down at the book still open in his lap. “It’s just, you know.” He gestured at Crowley’s jacket and shoes.
Crowley looked down at himself and shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.” He slipped the jacket off. “I was thinking of making some cocoa. Do you want some?”
“That would be lovely,” Aziraphale said, flipping absently through the pages of his book. “Shall I come help?”
“No need.” Crowley leaned over and kissed Aziraphale on the cheek. “I’ll take care of it.”
And then he was off and out of sight, leaving Aziraphale wondering just when they’d added kisses to their repertoire of affectionate gestures.
~
A mug appeared between Aziraphale and his book.
“Here you are,” Crowley said.
“Oh,” Aziraphale said, somewhat startled. He took the cup. “Thank you, my dear.”
Crowley smiled warmly. “Anything for you.”
Aziraphale smiled back. It was impossible not to, when Crowley looked at him like that. Such moments weren’t so rare as they used to be, but they were still occasional and fleeting, looks to be treasured rather than taken for granted.
Crowley sprawled next to him on the sofa and took up the television control. “What shall we watch?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Aziraphale said, setting a bookmark between the pages and looking up. “Whatever you want.”
“I want to watch whatever you want,” Crowley said, clicking through the options at a mildly blinding speed.
“You know I can’t remember half the options that they put on that thing,” Aziraphale huffed, sipping his cocoa. The liquid came through far too easily, and he frowned down at the lonely three marshmallows floating on top, hardly covering the surface. It was almost an insult to the drink, to have less than five. Crowley knew that.
But there. He had been sitting too long and was getting grouchy. They must have finally run out of marshmallows, and it wasn’t like it was worth either of them miracling more. They’d have to go to the shop.
He was staring into the depths of his mug and contemplating the unfairness of things like finite bags of marshmallows when Crowley’s head landed on his shoulder.
Aziraphale startled and looked at him. Crowley had shifted closer and curled up against him, gaze fixed on what looked like one of those “blockbuster” movies that were all over the theatres these days. They did have a certain drama to them, though Aziraphale found the narratives got boring somewhere around the fifth building crashing down around the hero’s ears. Still, at least Crowley wasn’t asking him what to put on anymore.
He was so distracted by the comfortable weight of Crowley on his shoulder that he forgot to be melancholy about the lack of marshmallows in his cup and took a sip. The sweetness washed over his tongue, somehow adding to the drowsy feel of the day. Perhaps it was the cloudy sky outside. Not a scrap of sunlight had made its way through the windows all day, and the few glances Aziraphale had bothered to take in their direction had shown little more than fog. It was cozy, really, if he thought about it. Just him and Crowley, settled in on the sofa with cocoa and some television on a rainy day.
He sat back a little and tried to focus on the story unfolding on the screen before them.
~
Aziraphale was nearly through the stack of books on the table. He would have gone to the shop to get himself more the day before, but Crowley had given him a particularly large-eyed and pleading look, and Aziraphale had given in, content with spending a little while longer folded up together on the sofa.
As midnight had passed by, Crowley had announced his desire to retire to bed, inviting Aziraphale to join him. Aziraphale, not being much of a fan of sleeping multiple nights in a row, declined. He found himself mildly surprised that Crowley had followed through on his plan alone, given the demon’s own propensity to spend weeks or months awake, but they had talked before about the different ways to use their freedom, now that they had it, and sleep was one of the top choices on Crowley’s list.
Now the demon was somewhere in the kitchen again, clinking about amid the mugs that seemed to make up ninety percent of his dishware. Aziraphale had half a mind to go see what he was up to, but his chapter was nearly finished, and he was finding himself somewhat at a loss. Everything chafed today, his surroundings, the books, even Crowley, almost. And that really wasn’t fair. Aziraphale was perfectly capable of dealing with his own thoughts and feelings. He shouldn’t have been here stewing in them instead of putting them where they belonged.
Crowley emerged then, carrying two mugs, which he somehow sat down with without spilling. He handed one to Aziraphale and flopped back, brushing the angel’s book in the process.
Mildly irritated, Aziraphale held the book out of the way and glared at his friend, who was frowning thoughtfully at the wall.
“Really, dear, you could be a bit more careful,” Aziraphale said, when it became clear that Crowley wasn’t noticing his displeasure.
“Oh,” Crowley said, looking back at him like he’d just been pulled out of something very far away. “I’m sorry. Can I do something?”
“No,” Aziraphale sighed and carefully closed the book. “Are you all right? There seems to be something on your mind.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” Crowley tapped a finger absently on his cup. “I was just thinking about Armageddon.”
Aziraphale sat back carefully. This wasn’t a topic they usually danced so close to. It felt too fresh, somehow, something that they had to let percolate for a while before they could put it into words.
“Were you?” he said finally.
“Yeah.” Crowley leaned back. “Especially the way we got out of our punishments, after. Wasn’t that great?”
Aziraphale smiled at the memory. That last-ditch effort, the one move that had gained them their freedom, that was one of the things that only made him giddier with time.
“I suppose it was,” he said.
Now Crowley was smiling too, a contented mirror of Aziraphale’s own expression. “Tell me again how you did your part?”
Aziraphale felt his smile falter a little. Something about the question felt odd, which was silly. This was Crowley, after all. Questions were practically woven into the very fabric of his being.
Yet something niggled at him, a gnawing hesitation that stopped him from answering right away. He took a sip of cocoa to calm himself…and pulled it away, staring into the depths of the mug.
Inside, two marshmallows floated, forlorn, paltry, and wrong.
~
The creature beside him on the sofa was not Crowley. It looked like Crowley, and it…almost…acted like Crowley, but it was not Crowley, and terror settled in the pit of Aziraphale’s stomach like a rock. He’d been such a fool. How long had he been here, ignoring all the signs, while Crowley was off who-knows-where, replaced by this- this imposter? What had happened? How had Aziraphale not noticed such a thing?
He took a deep breath and refocused on the entity next to him. He had to know. But he couldn’t just ask. He must…he must pretend he hadn’t noticed. But he absolutely must not answer the question.
Aziraphale pasted on a smile, realizing his old one had dropped entirely. “I’m not really in the mood, dear,” he said, as genuinely as he could manage. “It’s not such a pleasant topic, really, and we were having such a nice time!”
For a second, the not-Crowley eyed him. Aziraphale held himself very still, hardly breathing, until…
“Whatever you want,” not-Crowley said, and Aziraphale nearly choked with the force of holding back a relieved sigh.
Yet the relief was short-lived, as he realized that dodging such a dangerous question was only the beginning of what he would need to do. It wasn’t enough to discover this imposter. Now he had to find where Crowley had gone.
He nearly made an excuse and escaped to his shop to regroup right then and there, but something told him that would be suspicious. He didn’t know who this really was, after all. He didn’t know what they wanted, or who had sent them, or anything, really. But if someone had gone to the trouble of replacing Crowley with a lookalike, they would undoubtedly dislike it if their plan went awry.
Aziraphale took a deep breath and deliberately relaxed into the sofa. Beside him, not-Crowley sat, innocuous and still.
They sat in what felt to Aziraphale like a very tense silence for several minutes.
Then not-Crowley leaned forward and turned on the television again. Aziraphale wondered if he could slip out unsuspiciously while they were watching. It seemed as good a time as any. He just had to…
Not-Crowley slid closer, leaning on Aziraphale. Aziraphale caught his breath hard against the terrifying hatred that wanted to bubble out at that, at this cheater, liar, touching him as though they were friends.
Unless. Unless it was actually Crowley, and Aziraphale was being a terrible fool about this whole thing.
He needed space. He needed to think, and he needed to research.
“I’m going to go to the shop for a while, I think,” he said as gently as he could.
“But the program isn’t finished,” not-Crowley protested, which wasn’t like Crowley at all.
“I just have to pick up a few things,” Aziraphale said, and stood up.
He expected another protest, but as he left the room, not-Crowley’s eyes refocused on the television and he didn’t say another word. Trying not to feel as though the whole thing was too easy, Aziraphale reached for his coat on the hook.
Which wasn’t there.
Aziraphale frowned at it. He always put his coat inside the door when he came here, just like at home. It should be right in front of him. But it wasn’t.
He almost called to Crowley, asking where his coat had gone, but then he remembered that Crowley wasn’t there. And the last thing he needed was not-Crowley to come up with another reason for him not to go.
Coatless, Aziraphale slipped out of the flat and down the hall.
~
The lift wasn’t working. Granted, the lift often wasn’t working, but that really wasn’t an obstacle Aziraphale had been looking for today. Mood soured even further, he made for the stairs, just barely managing to avoid taking them two at a time.
The stairs went down for a long time. Longer, Aziraphale finally realized, than they usually did, despite the height of Crowley’s flat. He stopped and looked over the railing.
Far, far below, the stairs faded into mist long before he saw anything approaching the bottom. Looking up, they coiled around and around until they were too far away to see detail. That was… definitely not right.
This was not London, Aziraphale realized with a strange, terrified clarity. This was not Crowley’s building, any more than the creature upstairs was Crowley. This was something else, something unearthly and wrong. And for some reason, he was the only real thing in it.
Oh lord. Was he real? How did one tell reality, anyway? And why, why was this happening?
He gripped the railing tightly. It felt solid under his hands, cool and smooth like metal, and that was somehow worse than the alternative. If everything around him could have looked unreal, grounded him in the very reminder of its wrongness, that would have been better than this constant questioning.
It was useless to keep going. He would only get lost. And yet…he couldn’t go back and face a fake Crowley again yet.
Aziraphale leaned against the railing and tried to imagine that there was a landing, somewhere just below the mist.
~
The bed was soft under him, the covers warm. Around him the room was silent and peaceful. Aziraphale let himself come back to consciousness slowly, reveling in the quiet of morning.
He opened his eyes at last and gazed at the ceiling. Something uncomfortable niggled in memory, like something he had to think about. He frowned mentally at it. He didn’t want to think about things right now. He wanted to roll back over and perhaps have a bit more of a nap.
He rolled over.
The thought announced itself with no such pleasantries as a “good morning” or “if you please”.
Aziraphale abruptly found that he didn’t want to sleep any more. Something was wrong, something that felt fuzzy and out of reach, like the…like the…
He remembered mist, then, flowing over stairs that should have ended long before, and an echoing emptiness in a place that should have had the thrum of life somewhere nearby.
And the pale imitation of Crowley, walking around with a face it had no right to wear.
Aziraphale sat up. Crowley — the creature that looked like Crowley — was asleep next to him. The room looked exactly as it should. Outside, the sky was grey.
Aziraphale slid out of the bed. He didn’t want to stay there, didn’t want to look around a familiar room that wasn’t truly familiar at all, didn’t want to sit next to a Crowley who was not. He wanted — he needed — to get out.
His coat was still missing as he passed through the entryway and out into the hall. He felt a pang at the empty hook, as though the coat had been taken from him. Although…had it been? How could he know, truly, what was missing, when “what was missing” seemed to include…everything?
He tried the buttons on the lift again, but they didn’t even light up, the number screens above the compartments showing nothing at all. He almost made for the stairs again on reflex, but made himself turn the other way. The stairs had given him no success last time. Perhaps there was another option.
He took his time, checking doors and scanning the ceiling. Each door was locked, and Aziraphale couldn’t quite bring himself to miracle them open. Someone might live there. He couldn’t invade their privacy, even if he had the excuse of not quite believing they existed in the first place.
There was another set of stairs at the far end of the hall. The door opened easily, as stairwell doors ought, and Aziraphale looked over the railing.
He saw no mist. Only the stairs of a tall residential building, stretching down to what might have been an end.
Aziraphale started down, hope quickening his heart, and his pace to match.
It was only after some ten minutes that it occurred to him to look over the rail again.
There was still no mist. Only the stairs of a tall residential building, stretching down, down, down, to what might have been an end.
It was some time before he mustered the will to start back up again.
Will that dissipated almost instantly when he realized that he had no idea how far he had gone.
~
Daylight spilled across Aziraphale’s pillow, to his irritation. Were the curtains in this place really so badly designed as this? Couldn’t an angel get a proper night’s sleep anywhere but his own bed?
Crowley stirred beside him, and most of Aziraphale’s annoyance evaporated. It was impossible to be grouchy with Crowley right there, waking up and blinking at him slowly out of those soft eyes…
It occurred to him that he didn’t remember getting into bed. Nor did he…quite…remember coming to Crowley’s flat in the first place. Come to think of it-
His legs ached faintly, as though they’d been overused and he’d forgotten to miracle the tiredness better.
Crowley smiled at him. “What shall we do today, sweetheart?”
Sweetheart?
The thoughts that had been dancing around the edges of Aziraphale’s mind swam back into focus, and he shivered involuntarily. Of course. How had he forgotten? This wasn’t Crowley. This wasn’t even Crowley’s flat. This was something else, something wrong, and so far Aziraphale hadn’t made even the most basic of steps toward figuring out what it was or why he was here.
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said, trying to keep his voice light. “What would you like?”
“Whatever you would,” not-Crowley said, and Aziraphale suppressed another shiver with some effort. For the first time, he wondered what would happen if he actually did choose something he wanted. What if he said something like, I’d like to go to my shop, or Get me out of this terrifying time loop, or I just want a decent book for once? What would not-Crowley do then?
He looked into the eyes of the apparition that wore Crowley’s face…and his curiosity crumbled.
“Perhaps we should watch some television,” he suggested, with no enthusiasm at all.
~
For all of the things Aziraphale despised about fake-Crowley, there was one major upside. They were extremely easy to sneak away from. Aziraphale hardly had to do anything more than slip off the sofa and make for the door, and he was out and alone. He didn’t even bother checking the lifts or the stairs today, but went straight for the door of one of the other flats. The privacy of others was no longer his top consideration. It didn’t even rank on the list when compared to the yawning emptiness that seemed to be growing in him every time he took a turn and found it a dead end.
The door was locked, unsurprisingly. But locks were no match for an angel. It was a matter of a simple miracle before the handle turned and the door swung inwards. Aziraphale stepped forward eagerly, wondering if there would be inhabitants, or even just a blank flat beyond…
Blinding white mist swirled forth, surrounding and swallowing him until he might have been nothing but mist himself, save for the solid feeling of the door in his hand.
~
Aziraphale had been awake for a long time. He had not been awake at first, and then he had been, and then when he had finally dug up certain memories that had not been immediately forthcoming — mist, blank lift screens, neverending stairs — he had very carefully continued to seem asleep. There was a missing piece somewhere, a pattern that he could feel but not quite see. He just needed…
Eyes closed, he focused very hard on those fuzziest memories. What did they have in common? Why did they feel that way? What, in a word, was going on?
In the stairs. Mist, stairs stretching on and on and on…and then a beautiful morning filled with light. Again, stairs, endless stairs, broken lifts…and waking up in bed. One more, in the hall, with the door to the other flat. He’d gone looking for answers, pushing his way towards getting one…and now here he was, waking up in a soft, comfortable bed. A prison.
Did someone know he was looking for a way out? Was there a plan behind this whole thing, someone watching his every move and resetting him when it went wrong? Did they…were they purposely trying to make him forget each time he looked for an answer to what was going on?
The idea was chilling. Surely they knew it wasn’t working, if so. Why would they keep trying — whoever they was, anyway. Was it going to work sometime? Would he wake up in this room and believe Crowley was sleeping next to him? Would he never find out what had happened to the real Crowley?
Aziraphale tried to breathe in such a way as to calm himself. He remembered now. He had remembered before. He would find out what was happening, and he would win his way out of it. Anything less was unthinkable.
Beside him, the creature who was not Crowley stirred.
~
A door opening under his hand, revealing no answers but mist.
A grey-skied morning, the feeling of peace.
Memories, dragged back from the brink of oblivion, the peace shattering on their edge.
Cocoa.
Another door.
Another morning.
The same memories, recalled once again by the determination of a mind that would not be outwitted easily.
Remember what you said about how it was to stand in that hellfire, sweetheart?
A new door, a new morning, old memories, again, again, the routine run doggedly by one who refused to do anything short of everything possible.
Television programs.
One more door.
One…last door.
Mist.
And one more morning, where memories that had been recalled so many times suddenly felt just a little bit harder to pull up.
~
Fake-Crowley had very few settings, Aziraphale had learned. Among them seemed to be “sleep”, “make cocoa”, “watch television”, and, when enough time had passed, “talk about Armageddon”. It made them extremely boring to spend time with, even once Aziraphale had reread the bland books on the table once, twice, and countless times. He thought it was the boredom that kept him coming back to pushing at the edges of this prison, wandering away down the stairs or miracling open a useless door just in case it might have something to break the monotony.
Each time, he woke up in bed as though it were a perfectly normal morning. Each time he briefly felt peace, and calm, and safety.
And each time his own curiosity shattered it, dragging clarity back from the fog.
Eventually it started to get harder. Eventually he started to consider letting go of the memories and sinking into the comfort of ignorance, and when he reached for the mist that encompassed that which he’d forgotten, it was harder to find.
That was when he stopped exploring. It hurt, oh, it hurt to know what he’d lost, and it hurt to know that nothing would change. But something deep inside him told him that if he accepted this as his fate, it would never forgive him.
The something felt a bit sharp and grumpy. A bit like Crowley. Like real Crowley.
So Aziraphale stopped exploring. He stopped drinking the endless cups of cocoa. They never had enough marshmallows anyway. Sometimes he would pretend to watch the television, even if his thoughts weren’t on the action on screen. Occasionally he managed to drag himself through one of the boring books, in the hopes that perhaps his reading mind wouldn’t shrivel up and die if he exercised it occasionally.
He did his best not to look at the fake-Crowley, who still insisted on being in his space all the time, and he never, not once, spoke of Armageddon.
He just stared at the grey sky out the window and tried to find something to hope for.