Archive of Our Own

But love built, God built provinces!

Built calluses, break promises!

Cause I could never hold a perfect thing and not demolish it.

What am I thinking? What does this mean?

How could somebody ever love me?

Talk to your man, tell him he’s got bad news coming…

— Halsey

Warlock turns fifteen at 12:07 a.m. and immediately begins to have terrible dreams.

Well—they’re not terrible to him. In most nightmares, the terrible things happen directly to the dreamer, he thinks, but these dreams aren’t his, he doesn’t think. He’s in a bookshop, his heart beating out of his chest. As the dream goes on, things begin to catch fire, seemingly from nowhere, but he doesn’t move. Instead, he stands there as the flames swallow him up, his chest going tight, his eyes stinging. It doesn’t hurt, though. He just closes his eyes and burns. There are black feathers all over the floor, and when he looks down at hands that aren’t his, there’s a single white feather in their palms.

He always wakes up at the same moment—when whoever he’s not looks up to see a winged mug on a desk. Then, the roaring, keening, whimpering, or any other such noise suddenly ceases entirely to make way for brutal, crushing silence.

Tonight, the hands touch the cup. Terror crawls up Warlock’s spine, splitting his lips with a bloodied plea—

“Mum.”

Then he crashes through a glass coffee table.

Someone shrieks. Warlock, who has admittedly had the sleepwalking issue before, doesn’t think much of this—the breaking-a-table thing is new, but hey, there’s a first time for everything—so he just wipes at his eyes and yawns. “Sorry, Harriet. Didn’t mean to—”

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Not Harriet.

Warlock forces his eyes open. “This isn’t my house.”

“Indeed it is not,” the man on the huge grey bed snarks, but it comes out a croak. “What are you—What?”

Warlock blinks, taking in the empty bottles littering the floor, along with books, dead plants, a bowtie, a… Is that a summoning circle? What the fuck—

And a winged mug, sitting on the bedside table.

The man on the bed follows Warlock’s eyes, his face flushing red. “Don’t worry about that,” he grumbles, climbing out of bed and ushering Warlock up and out of the bedroom. “Come on, this way.”

Warlock frowns, grounded only by the fingers curled around his shoulders. He knows those hands. “You have wings now.”

Nanny Ashtoreth snorts, shoving him into a chair at the counter. “That’s what you’re concerned about? Not the whole ‘I’m-a-man’ bit or the fact that you apparently travelled in your sleep to Soho—”

“I’m in Soho?” Warlock frowns harder. “Why are you in Soho—”

Nanny looks bewildered. “I live here, forget all that, why are you here? Did something happen to your mother?”

Warlock blinks at him. Nanny is shirtless and covered in cuts and bruises. He’s not wearing his sunglasses, and his eyes are blown out and yellow, slitted like a snake’s. His hair is half-tied back, falling to his shoulders. Warlock recognizes him down to his bones, and loves him that way too.

“Not my mother,” Warlock says. “Not really, anyway.”

Nanny’s eyes narrow. “Who told you?” she hisses. “Was it Adam? I swear to G—Sat—Whatever, was it Adam? I told Azi—” He chokes and falls quiet. “Okay. Whatever. It’s just, you said Mum when you came through, like—”

“You,” Warlock says, suddenly clocking the look in Nanny’s eyes as heartbreak. “I meant you. I called you Mum, still do, since you were my mother more than anything. Coming here was an accident, I swear, but it happens sometimes. I dream about you and I kind of—” He waves his hands around. “—go somewhere. Usually the garden or your cottage. Once I woke up in your car, but it was so quick I didn’t have time to look around. But—Yeah. This is normal.”

This is not normal. Nanny is clearly thinking this, but doesn’t say it. “I’m not your mum,” he says instead. “I fucking—I left you. And it wrecked you, I know. It wrecked me, too.”

There’s this buzzing in the back of Warlock’s head, pretty much all the time. The longer he listened, the more it sounded like a hiss. Warlock takes in Nanny and his fangs and his yellow eyes and thinks maybe everything makes sense now.

“What are you?” he asks.

“Demon. Name’s Crowley,” Nanny mumbles. “I’m sorry. I’m so—I can’t be your mum, okay? Just—Yeah. No. Can’t.”

“Yeah, that’s not really up to you,” Warlock says. “Where’s Brother Francis?”

Crowley drops his head into his arms. “His name’s Aziraphale and he’s in Heaven because he’s a bloody idiot.”

“An angel, then,” Warlock says. “Okay. I always thought you two were in love, you know.”

Crowley sighs, straightening up. “So did I.”

Warlock pushes himself up and walks around the counter, wrapping his arms around Crowley’s stomach. “It’s okay,” he whispers. “I love you. He’s stupid if he doesn’t.”

Crowley’s hand comes up to rest on Warlock’s head. “You can’t stay here,” he rasps. “It’s not—It’s not safe.”

Warlock shrugs. “I’m safer here than anywhere else,” he says. “Just make Harriet forget about me or something. You don’t have to work on Tad, he already hates me for being not-him.”

“Anyone who hates you is a worthless worm,” Crowley answers, holding him tighter. He bends to press a kiss to Warlock’s scalp. “My baby. Missed you.”

Warlock drags him back to bed by the hand. The room is curiously empty of any of the mess from before, and there are now glow stars on the ceiling. But the stars look all too real, like Crowley’s bedroom is its very own galaxy.

“I want the whole story tomorrow,” Warlock says.

“Okay,” Crowley says back. “Oh, you’ll have to meet Muriel.”

Warlock wrinkles his nose. “Weird name.”

“Not for an angel,” Crowley says. “Practically boring, for them.”

Warlock curls into Crowley’s side. He doesn’t care that he’s supposedly too old for any of this. He heard somewhere once that you never outgrow your mother’s love, and here with Crowley’s arms around him, he’s inclined to believe it.

“You don’t have to be sad anymore,” Warlock says. “We’re together now.”

Crowley touches his forehead and Warlock drops into sleep. There’s no burning bookshop anymore. Instead, there’s a garden and a soft man holding out a daisy to a fire-haired woman. Warlock sits down in the flowers and waits for morning.

There are universes where Crowley and Aziraphale never met at all. In those worlds, every human is just a little bit sad, and they have dreams sometimes of people who look like them who are happier. A boy named Warlock Dowling is born to a family of Youngs and called Sarah. He’s sadder than most, not because his parents call him by the wrong name, but because every Sunday he looks for a snake in his garden and never finds one. He can’t remember why he’s looking, but he knows a part of him is missing and he has to get it back. On his eleventh birthday, the world ends, and Warlock dies in the garden, crying for a mother he’s never met.

Warlock wakes up before Crowley and takes the winged mug to the kitchen. It’s full of water, which he finds odd. The hissing in his head picks up when he touches it, urging him towards the door. Warlock stops in front of the not-Mona Lisa and the painting swings open, along with the safe behind it. Warlock sets the mug down in there and the whole thing locks itself back up.

There’s a knock on the door. Warlock has never had to deal with a knock on the door—what with the Secret Service and the house in the middle of nowhere and the fact that he’s fifteen—but he assumes the correct course of action is to open it.

Now, seeing as this is a demon’s house and Warlock has grown up in a very paranoid environment, he does check through the peephole before undoing the lock.

“Hello,” he says. “Can I help you?”

The fat woman blinks at him. “I’m sorry, I must have the wrong apartment,” she says. She’s holding a plant. It looks sad. “Do you happen to know where Mr. Crowley lives?”

Warlock blinks back. “Here,” he says. “I’m his kid.” He points to the plant. “Is that for him?”

“Yes.” The woman laughs, her eyes flicking back down the hallway. “Um—Sorry. I’m Maggie. I’m a friend of your dad’s.”

“My mum, actually,” Warlock says, stepping aside to let her in. “I’m Warlock. I’m a menace. If you’re his friend why do you call him Mr.?”

Maggie puts the plant down on the counter. “Habit, I suppose,” she says. “He has a lot of names around here. The most popular is Mrs. Fell.”

“Mum’s not married,” Warlock says, tugging the fridge open. “And I don’t know anyone named Fell.”

“Aziraphale,” Crowley says, appearing in the hallway. He’s got his sunglasses on this time. He ruffles Warlock’s hair as he passes by him for the coffee machine. “Goes by Mr. Fell around here.” He opens up a bag of coffee beans and pours them down his throat whole, swallowing with a too-big grin. “Maggie! What’re you doing in my kitchen?”

Warlock recognizes his mother’s manic self-defense for what it is, but doesn’t comment, as he values his life.

Maggie, for her part, coughs into her fist and says, “Well, Nina and I have been a bit worried about you. It’s been nearly three months, you see, since Mr. Fell left—”

Crowley hisses, his forked tongue peeking out from his lips.

Maggie squeaks.

“I’m fine,” Crowley says, waving her off. “I confessed my undying love for him and he left me for the abusive power structure that’s tried to kill us twice. Whatever. Who cares. I’m over it. Is this plant from you? How nice, I’ll cherish it. Get out.”

During this speech, he’s meandered towards the front door and is now holding it open, slightly bowing with his arm gesturing for her to exit.

Maggie looks crestfallen. “The bookshop doesn’t look right without you—”

The tips of Crowley’s ears turn red. There’s a loud crash as his wings pop out of his back, seemingly of their own accord, and promptly crush themselves against the wall and roof rather painfully. Maggie shrieks.

Warlock throws his hands up. “Oh, for the love of—Mum, sit down.”

Crowley glares at him. “My house, my rules. Pipe down.”

“You’re throwing a temper tantrum—”

“I’m throwing a dignified hissy fit is what I’m doing—”

“That excuse didn’t work when I used it—”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” Maggie shouts. Both Crowley and Warlock shut up. “Crowley, I know you’re in pain, but we really do need to talk.”

Crowley slams the door with a snarl. “I’m not in pain—”

“Mr. Fell is back,” Maggie says. Crowley whines, clawing at his ears. “He came back last night.”

Crowley collapses onto the couch in a ball. “I don’t care. Go away.”

Maggie clasps her hands together. “Oh, of course you care, you’re made for each other—”

Crowley twists upwards, throwing his hands up. “Apparently not! Get out—”

“Mum,” Warlock says. “He’s probably here for a reason.”

Crowley bares his teeth. “Ngk. Not you too, fuckin’ He—”

“The world ended when I was eleven,” Warlock says. “No one else remembers, but I know. I can feel it sometimes, how uncertain the future is. It’s like I’m always waiting for death to come and take me.”

In an instant, Crowley is curled around him, his wings blowing the curtains open. “I won’t let him,” he seethes. “He won’t touch you—”

Warlock pats his head. Crowley poofs into a snake.

“Not the point, Mum,” Warlock says, shooting Maggie a sorry look. “You said Mr. Fell’s at the bookshop?”

Maggie sways in place, so Warlock quietly wills an ottoman to slide across the floor to her. “Yes,” Maggie breathes, dropping down onto it. “He looked terrible. He was—duller, somehow.”

Crowley hisses. “Did they hurt him—”

“He’s fine,” Maggie says quickly. “He’s with Muriel. Nina’s making sure nobody dies. Can I—Um. I came to get you. He’s asked for you.”

Crowley hides his head in Warlock’s hair.

Warlock strokes his scales. “Come on,” he says. “Can I drive your car?”

Crowley pops into a woman. “No,” she snaps. “Never. Ngk. I’m not going.”

From outside, the Bentley starts playing “Love of My Life.”

“Shut up!” Crowley shouts, her hair bursting into flames. She stomps over to the window. “I told you to stop playing that wretched song—”

Warlock helpfully shoves her out the window.

“Oh, dear,” Maggie murmurs. She attempts a smile. “Should we maybe walk?”

Warlock has never been to the bookshop, yet he feels as if he’s returning to it. Unlike in his dreams, it’s not on fire, which he thinks is a nice change. Like his dreams, it’s a right utter mess that smells like dust, cinnamon, and… love, if love were a smell, which Warlock doesn’t think it is, but he’s well-aware that being raised by an angel and a demon clearly fucked him up a bit so maybe love is a smell and he’s just the only human alive who can sniff it out.

Like every awkward family meeting, this one begins with an internal headcount. Let’s run down the line, shall we?

Warlock, of course, is here. Then we’ve got his mother, who’s currently a woman with yellow eyes, patches of scales, and black claws. Opposite her is her estranged totally-not-husband, looking like—and this is the kindest description Warlock can possibly come up with—a goose who just watched his relative get beheaded for Christmas dinner. In between them is Maggie, fretting in every possible way one can fret; Nina, looking bored and a little pissed off, so—normal; and Muriel, who Warlock assumes is the result of a golden retriever and a rainbow doing unspeakable things to each other without protection.

Yeah. Tense.

Warlock clears his throat. “Okay.” He bangs his fist down on a nearby table. Aziraphale yelps and jumps, sprouting a line of tiny feathers down his nose. Warlock smirks. “This meeting of divorce court is now in order.”

Crowley scowls at him. “I can and will disown you.”

“You wouldn’t.” Warlock guides her down into a chair. “Muriel, Maggie, Nina, please sit on the couch. Momma, you can sit in that chair.”

Aziraphale pales like a plain bagel toasting backwards. “Momma?” he croaks.

Warlock shoos him. “Yes, obviously, now sit down.” He pushes Aziraphale into the armchair, then straightens up and wipes his hands together like he’s done a really good job at something, because he has. “Okay. Mum, you get to start.”

Crowley lunges from her seat, fangs bared. “You motherfu—”

Warlock shoves her back down. “Okay, no.” He turns to Aziraphale. “You start.”

Aziraphale bursts into tears.

Warlock sighs. “Fuck this, honestly.”

Crowley blanches, blurring across the room and falling at Aziraphale’s feet. “Hey, an—Dude. Dude? Sorry, forget that—Don’t cry. Please don’t cry. It’s fine. Whatever it is, it’s fine—”

Aziraphale grabs Crowley’s scarf and blows his nose on it.

Crowley gapes at him.

Maggie stands up and settles on Aziraphale’s armrest. “Okay,” she says. “Nina, can you get Mr. Fell some tea and Eccles cakes please? And Muriel, be a dear and get Mrs. Fell a glass of wine.”

Crowley makes a sound like a dying cat. Warlock pets her like she is one.

“Now, Mr. Fell,” Maggie says once the not-couple are both settled with their snacks and drinks. “What’s going on?”

Aziraphale takes a long, slow sip of his tea, the cup trembling with his hand. “Well,” he says, licking his lips, “there’s going to be a Second Coming.”

Crowley huffs out a laugh. “Of course there is,” she mutters. “God never could create anything without wanting to destroy it.”

Aziraphale clears his throat. “Yes, well—” Another sip of tea. “We need to find the baby.”

Crowley whines and buries her face in her hands. Warlock pats her head a bit more insistently.

“What baby?” Nina asks. “I swear, you two—”

“God’s baby,” Muriel says, paling to transparency. “Oh dear. Oh dear. Oh, dear—”

Nina raises her eyebrow. “Jesus? Isn’t he dead—”

“New kid,” Crowley rasps, dragging a hand down her face. “Fuck. I was hoping She’d forgotten.”

Aziraphale’s cup shatters. His eyes are glowing purple.

Crowley looks up at him and winces. “Yeah. I, um—may have known about that particular plan of Hers.”

Aziraphale’s eye twitches.

Crowley looks down at her lap and mumbles something.

“We saw it when we went up to Heaven,” Muriel pipes up. “When we were looking for Gabriel, before he ran off with the Archduke of Hell and Crowley kissed you and you left him for a job you didn’t even want.” She beams at Aziraphale. “Was that helpful?”

“Very, my dear,” Aziraphale deadpans.

Muriel brightens. Crowley has not yet taught her sarcasm.

“So we need to find God’s baby,” Nina says. “Sure. No problem. Surely there’s some record somewhere of a Virgin Mary situation—”

“No.” Crowley shakes her head. “This baby isn’t Jesus. This baby is meant to remake the world. This baby won’t be human.”

Aziraphale can’t stop staring at her. “We need to talk to Adam.”

Crowley doesn’t answer him. Warlock strokes her hair. Crowley grabs his hand and presses a kiss to his fingers.

“Mum,” Warlock whispers.

Crowley sighs. “Okay,” she says, then glares at Aziraphale. “But I’m not talking to you.”

“Not talking” lasts approximately ten minutes. Nina passes Warlock a twenty for being closer than her hour-long bet and Warlock decides she’s his favorite aunt so far.

“Watch the road, Crowley!” Aziraphale wails, clutching every surface he can reach. His wings popped out when Crowley ran his first red light and they’re still crammed up against the windows, blocking everyone else’s view. The tip of the left one is in Maggie’s mouth.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Crowley grumbles, gripping the wheel too tight. “I’m not gonna crash the car. My kids are here.”

“Nice to know we matter,” Muriel says, smiling out the window. They’ve been holding Warlock’s hand since they got in the car and he’s afraid if he pulls away they’ll cry. “Oh! Is that a duck?”

“No, that’s a goose, geese are mean, ducks are wonderful,” Crowley says. “Don’t trust geese, they’re terrible and they’ll eat your favorite jacket if you take your eyes off it for even a second—”

“Take a left, dear,” Aziraphale interrupts. Crowley swerves right and Aziraphale screeches. “I said left, Crowley!”

“Fuck off, I know the way,” Crowley growls. “I went to visit Adam a month ago. Ya know. When you weren’t here.”

Aziraphale deflates. “They wouldn’t let me visit—”

“They wouldn’t have had a say if you’d just stayed,” Crowley snaps, then turns scarlet. “Whatever. Doesn’t matter. Shut up.”

The Bentley bursts into the chorus of “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy.” Crowley lets out a string of curses that would offend a pirate who grew up in a whorehouse and punches the dashboard.

When they arrive at Adam’s house—Warlock has never been here either, but there’s a red-eyed boy standing at the gate and how many red-eyed people are there in the world, really?—Crowley brushes past Aziraphale and heads straight for the Antichrist, cupping his face in his hands and yanking his head around.

“Your eyes are doing that thing again,” Crowley says. “Didn’t I tell you to call me when that happens?”

Adam grips Crowley’s wrists. “Sorry, Auntie.”

“It’s alright.” Crowley drops a kiss to Adam’s curls. “Oh, oh, come meet your siblings.”

“Don’t you mean cousins?” Warlock asks.

“Mum says cousin is a stupid word that you call people who have no emotional importance in your life,” Muriel explains, bouncing on the balls of their feet. “Hi! I’m Muriel.”

“I’m Warlock,” Warlock grumbles in Adam’s vague direction, softening when Crowley snakes an arm around his waist. “I was supposed to be you.”

Crowley frowns. “Hey, no,” he says, touching Warlock’s face. “I’m so glad you’re exactly who you are.”

Warlock flushes, but lets Crowley kiss his forehead.

Behind them, Nina clears her throat. “Not that this isn’t lovely, but we came to visit for a reason.”

Adam looks between her and Maggie. “I don’t know either of you.” He turns to Aziraphale. “You’re unwell.”

Aziraphale coughs into his hand, a prim little thing. “I’m an angel, my dear boy. I don’t contract illnesses.”

“No,” Adam says, squinting at him. “You’re sick for home. You’re dying with it.”

Aziraphale coughs again. “Alright, Adam, thank you—”

“And you’re sick in the heart, too,” Adam says, squinting even harder. “Ravaged down to your bones. Every piece of you is black with grief.”

Crowley chokes, whirling on Aziraphale. “You’re sad? What? You can’t be sad. No. I forbid it. Stop being sad. Stop it this instant—”

Aziraphale, with a terribly fond look in his eyes, takes Crowley’s hand in both of his and kisses his stuck-out pointer finger.

Lightning strikes a nearby tree.

“Please don’t burn down my house,” Adam says, then smiles at the rest of them and steps aside to clear the path. “Come in.”

They settle around the kitchen table. Magically, there are enough chairs for all of them; the table seems to have elongated to fit them too. Mr. and Mrs. Young take no notice of them, walking right through them as if they’re not even there.

“This is fucking weird,” Nina says.

Maggie puts her hand on Nina’s wrist. “Do you know anything about God’s child?”

Adam shrugs. “I don’t believe in God.”

Aziraphale frowns around the lip of his teacup. “Oh, She’s very real.”

“Then She sucks at her job,” Adam says. Crowley snorts wine out of his nose. Adam tilts his head. “If Her job is to love us, that is, like everyone says.”

“Amen,” Crowley hacks out. “Praise the Dark Lord and his nuanced understanding of theist ethics.”

Adam preens. “Well, if She is real and She has a child, I haven’t heard anything. But I don’t know why you’re worried. I’m the son of Satan and I turned out just fine. God’s child is probably made of roses and kisses.”

Muriel melts a little. “Oh, that sounds lovely.”

Crowley shakes his head. “Lucifer’s a little bitch,” he says. “God’s the bitch. Her child is far more dangerous than you.”

“It’s not the child we’re worried about,” Aziraphale cuts in. “God’s last child was the kindest person in history. But kindness like that is always punished.”

“That’s fucked up, isn’t it?” Warlock points out.

Crowley covers his mouth. “The kid needs to be protected, is what we’re saying,” he says. “Any tips?”

Adam looks at Crowley.

Crowley looks back.

Adam’s mouth sets itself in a hard line.

Crowley’s forked tongue slips out between his lips.

“The child will be shielded,” Adam says slowly, tearing his eyes away, “like I was. You won’t find them, and neither will anyone else.”

“Except when the time comes,” Aziraphale frets. “Like when the Four Horsemen found you.”

Adam shakes his head. “They won’t find them.” He curls his hand around Crowley’s. “They won’t find him. I promise.”

Aziraphale’s brow furrows. “Crowley? Do you know something?”

Crowley rubs his thumb along Adam’s skin. “We should be going. Thank you for the tea and the company.” He whirls out of the room.

“You do know something!” Aziraphale races after him.

“Idiots,” Nina mutters, rushing to watch the show. Maggie follows her, ushering Muriel out too.

Warlock is left looking at the boy he was supposed to be. The boy his parents left him for.

“You don’t like me,” Adam says. “That’s okay. I don’t like me either, sometimes.”

“It’s not that I don’t like you,” Warlock says. “You seem fine.”

Adam smiles at him. Warlock doesn’t like his smile.

“Crowley loves you more than anyone else in the universe,” Adam says. “It’s practically spilling out of him.”

“Not Aziraphale,” Warlock says, meaning it as a joke.

“If Aziraphale threatened you, Crowley would defend you against him,” Adam says, unblinking. “Even if it meant his own destruction.”

Warlock leaves. He doesn’t want to think about worlds that feel empty and cold. Instead he finds his way back to his mother’s car and settles in the backseat just as Crowley hits the gas.

“You know where the child is,” Aziraphale says. “I don’t know how, but you know.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Crowley pushes out through gritted teeth. “Nothing matters if I can’t protect him.”

Aziraphale looks out the window. The Bentley plays a horrible double-frequency of Beethoven and Freddie Mercury. Aziraphale strokes the dashboard and it sorts itself out into “Love Me Like There’s No Tomorrow.”

Crowley pulls over and throws up on the side of the M-25.

God, like every writer, makes mistakes She has to fix in editing. Of course, for God, this is a bit more complicated, as She’s playing with real lives and not just facsimiles of ones. There is a book somewhere, the first draft of Her plan, and it includes everything and everyone ever created. Even when She erases someone from the final draft, they remain in the first, and therefore can be called back by a strong enough love or will or wish. If you are erased from the first draft, however, there is no coming back, no matter how badly the world may grieve you. This is why they call it the Book of Life.

Crowley drops Nina and Maggie at the coffee shop. They protest quite loudly, but Crowley snaps his fingers and suddenly they’re locked inside.

Muriel blinks from between them, a confused smile on her face. “Do I not get to come?”

“Us time, Muriel! I love you!” Crowley shouts. He blows a kiss for good measure and it imprints itself in pink dust on the shop window. Nina frowns at it.

“Why am I included in ‘us time?’” Warlock asks, dragged into the bookshop by the wrist.

Crowley slams the doors shut and locks them. “Because, my dear boy, this is about you.”

Warlock wrinkles his nose. “Me?”

“Yes, you,” Aziraphale says, smoking slightly. “Crowley. Why in Heaven’s name didn’t you tell me all those years ago that we were raising the Messiah?”

“Me?” Warlock squeaks. “Messiah?”

By the window, a potted plant implodes.

“Bah.” Crowley cleans the mess with a snap of his fingers, a glass of wine materializing in his hand. “Didn’t seem important.”

“Didn’t seem important—Okay.” Aziraphale takes a deep breath, prayer hands pressed to his nose. “Crowley. How long have you known Warlock is God’s son?”

“He’s my son,” Crowley hisses. “And—awhile. A long while. Since he was born, sort of. Bit before that, actually. Um. It’s been a minute.”

Aziraphale raises his eyebrows, his halo glowing in a very disconcerting band around the inside of his head. “And you didn’t tell me because…?”

Crowley swallows. “Well, you see—”

“You’re an idiot? A moron? A faff-wagoned pigeon?”

Crowley makes a face like he’s bitten into a lemon. “No—”

“Because you don’t—” Aziraphale’s voice cracks. “—trust me?”

The noise that comes out of Crowley is akin to that of a microwave giving up on life. “No, no, angel, it wasn’t—Ngk. You didn’t need to know.”

Aziraphale squawks. “I’m your partner, I need to know everything—”

“Not my partner.” Crowley scowls. “You made that part perfectly clear.”

Aziraphale deflates like—you guessed it—a lead balloon.

Crowley looks away, rubbing his hands up and down his arms. “Yeah. Anyway—I was keeping him safe, or whatever.”

“You left me for nine years,” Warlock says, shell-shocked in the corner. “I—Mum, I’m gonna faint.”

A cushion appears right where his head crashes.

“What does the Second Coming entail, exactly?” Crowley asks. It sounds a little fuzzy, but Warlock can still hear him just fine. “What am I protecting him from?”

Aziraphale sniffs. “Well, I’m sure I don’t know,” he says. “They never told me anything.”

“You were in charge, weren’t you?”

“Oh, please, Crowley, they hate me and becoming their boss didn’t exactly help,” Aziraphale snaps. “Whatever it is, they don’t want me to know. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Metatron hired me specifically to keep me from interfering. To keep an eye on me, so to speak.”

Crowley looks at his feet. “Oh. Sorry.”

Aziraphale looks bewildered. “Sorry? Sorry? Oh, my dear, you—” He touches Crowley’s arm. “Whyever are you sorry? You were right.”

Crowley winces. “Dunno,” he mumbles. “Don’t like it when people are mean to you.”

“You’re mean to me.”

“Doesn’t count.” Crowley pulls away, dropping down into the nearest armchair. “I’m mean to you because I love you. I’m friendly-mean. I’m never mean about the things you actually care about, or at least I try not to be. I learned your lines as best I could.”

Aziraphale plops down on an ottoman. “Oh,” he whispers. “Thank you, then.”

Crowley shrugs. “‘S nothing.”

Warlock decides now would be a good time to sit up. “I don’t like this.”

Crowley sighs. “I know, hellspawn.”

Warlock’s lip trembles. “I don’t want God to be my mom,” he whines. “I want you!”

Then he bursts into tears, as teenagers are wont to do when they receive life-altering news or undergo a minor inconvenience.

Crowley slides off the armchair and crawls over to him, pulling him into her lap. “I am your mom,” she says against his head. “Nothing in the world can change that. Not even God, even if she scratches me out of the Book of Life.”

Warlock sniffles. “What’s that?”

“Oh God.” Aziraphale bolts up. “Oh, God. Crowley—The Book of Life. The Book of Life, oh—Oh dear—”

“Spit it out, angel!” Crowley lashes. “For fuck’s sake, we don’t have all—”

“It’s why I came back,” Aziraphale says, twisting his hands together. “Extreme sanctions. The Metatron wanted me to—to—Well. He wanted me to cross out your name.”

Crowley squeezes Warlock so tight his eyes pop out of his head like he’s a weasel. “Would you do it?” she hisses. “Fuck you, would you do it?”

Aziraphale shakes his head. “No,” he whispers. “God, no. I could never. Crowley.” He fits his palm against Crowley’s cheek, touching their foreheads together. “How could I ever hurt you?”

“You wouldn’t remember me,” Crowley says, stroking Warlock’s hair. “It wouldn’t hurt.”

“My dear, it would always hurt,” Aziraphale murmurs. “And I would always know.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Yes, I would,” Aziraphale says. “I would know if I’d killed my wife.”

Crowley buries his face in Warlock’s hair.

“Okay,” Warlock wheezes. “You can let go of me now.” He wiggles out of Crowley’s arms. “So we have to find the Book of Life and keep it safe.”

“Well, I’m sure it’s well-hidden,” Aziraphale says, his hand curled around the back of Crowley’s neck. “It’s not the kind of thing God would hide in a clever rhyme or a holy place. We won’t just stumble upon it. I wouldn’t be surprised if we couldn’t even see it.”

“The person with the Book of Life would essentially become God,” Crowley mutters into his hands. “Bad shit.”

Aziraphale nods. “Yes,” he says. “Bad shit.”

Warlock isn’t as put off by Aziraphale swearing as he thinks he probably should be. “Then maybe the Metatron can’t find it either.”

Aziraphale opens his mouth.

“Wait.” Crowley slaps his hand over Aziraphale’s frown. “Wait, yes. That’s why he needed you.”

“What?” Aziraphale asks, muffled.

“He couldn’t find the Book of Life, so he needed you to help him find it.” Crowley pushes himself to his feet. “You know more about books than anyone in existence. Of course he came to you.”

“Seems a bit odd to ask me to erase you from it, though,” Aziraphale says, standing with him. “It’s not exactly a secret how far I’ll go to keep you from harm.”

Crowley sputters. Warlock reaches out and hands him a freshly-miracled paper bag. Crowley bursts that bitch like a blowfish.

“Test of your loyalty, probably,” Warlock says. “As far as he’s concerned, the Book is only useful in his hands. If you wouldn’t hand it over to him, he wouldn’t ask you to find it. He certainly wouldn’t admit that he doesn’t know where it is.”

Aziraphale’s lip wobbles. “Well, he certainly picked his pawn well,” he says, looking at his shoes. “He couldn’t have chosen a stupider angel.”

Crowley throws the paper bag away, taking Aziraphale’s head in his hands instead. “Don’t you dare,” he breathes. “You’re the smartest being I know. Even smarter than me. You believe in the best in people, angel. There’s nothing stupid about that.”

“I left you,” Aziraphale blubbers, clutching Crowley’s arms like they’re the only thing keeping him upright. “All the time. I just kept running away.”

Crowley grimaces. “You weren’t ready,” he says, cradling Aziraphale’s head to his chest. “That’s okay. It’s my fault for pushing.”

“It wasn’t pushing!” Aziraphale cries. “You were only asking for what you wanted, for what we both wanted—what you deserved. And I—I—” His face crumples with a fresh wave of tears. “I made you feel unloved!”

Crowley blinks. “Jesus,” he mutters. “Lord give me strength. Aziraphale—We will have a full, unfiltered conversation about this later, preferably when we’re alone and the world isn’t ending and probably with a couple more bottles of wine, but for now—Christ, angel, you’re flooding our bookshop, stop crying—”

Aziraphale wails. “Our bookshop?”

Crowley rolls his eyes and tugs him in by the lapels.

Aziraphale shuts up.

“Stop being mean to my angel,” Crowley growls, letting go of him. “No one’s allowed to be mean to her.”

Aziraphale is glowing bright gold. She grasps Crowley’s hands and kisses them. “My dear,” she whispers. Her voice trembles like a chord that’s gone on too long. “You really don’t have to—”

“I’m in love with you. Stop that—” Crowley waggles his finger at Aziraphale’s wobbling smile, which practically oozes love. “Look, it’s nothing. Let’s just save the world.”

Aziraphale trails after him like a duckling. “I adore you.”

“Ssssssssshhh,” Crowley says. “Warlock! Where’s Mummy’s wine?”

Warlock miracles up some cranberry juice in a domed glass.

Crowley takes a sip and hisses. “This isn’t wine.”

“Being drunk will not make you feel better,” Warlock says.

Crowley scowls, but doesn’t argue.

“The Metatron will find the Book eventually,” Aziraphale says, catching up to Crowley and leaning on his arm. “We have to beat him to it.”

Crowley shakes his head. “What good’ll it do?” he asks, sprawling himself down on the rug in a sunbeam. “Somebody else’ll just come along and try to end the world again.”

“Since when are you someone who gives up?” Aziraphale asks, pulling him back up. “My dear. If not us then who?”

Crowley presses their foreheads together, swaying in Aziraphale’s arms. “It’s my fault,” he murmurs. “I should’ve done better… Should’ve hidden it better… Been better… Damnit…” He turns away from Aziraphale, dissolving into mutterings.

Aziraphale watches him. “Do you know where the Book is, Crowley?” he asks, his voice dipping low and dangerous. “How many secrets have you kept from me?”

Crowley whirls around. “Very few,” he says. “I don’t—”

“Mum,” Warlock says, mesmerized by the golden constellations suddenly dancing through brown. “Mum, your eyes.”

Aziraphale reaches out a hand, but doesn’t touch Crowley. “Dearest… Your eyes are made of stars,” he murmurs. “Nebulas. You’re not—What’s happening to you?”

Crowley backs away, his wings unfurling. The feathers have changed, now black at their tips and graying gradually until they reach white tops. The rainbow galaxies in his eyes twist and spin, gold and black scales crawling their way up his arms. “Ngk,” he says. “I’m—Fuck.”

Red curls cascade down his back, his black dress tinting white and gold at the hems, and his skin—

His skin is covered in names.

“The Book,” Aziraphale murmurs, keeping Warlock behind him. “You’re the Book.”

Crowley grips the armchair for support, sagging to the side with a pulsing pain. “God needed someone with the blood of both sides,” he says. “Someone as beloved by Heaven as they were by Hell.”

“Then why not Lucifer?” Aziraphale asks. “He was always Her favorite.”

Crowley grins around a hiss of pain. “No,” he says. “Didn’t you ever wonder where the fifth Archangel went?”

“I don’t—” Aziraphale squints, clutching his head. “There was never a fifth Archangel. Only four. I can’t—Wait—Hurts—”

“Raphael,” Warlock breathes, the name sounding from somewhere deep within him. “Raphael, you’re—”

“Raphael.” Crowley nods at him, sharp teeth glinting. “Yes,” he says, then flashes into something softer, hips and chest curving. “Then Lilith, when I Fell.”

He crashes to the ground. Aziraphale lunges to catch him just in time.

“What’s happening to you?” Warlock gasps, dropping to his knees at Crowley’s side and grasping his mother’s hand. “Wait, no, where are you going—”

“Not s’pposed to remember,” Crowley mumbles, his eyes flickering from snake slits to starry skies to black pools of nothing. “Failsafe, ‘case I do—Nnngggghhh—Warlock—” He squeezes Warlock’s hand. “I love you. I love you. Angel—”

“Shhh, I’m here,” Aziraphale whispers, stroking Crowley’s hair back from his forehead. “It’s alright, sweetheart.”

Crowley forces a smile, trembling apart. “It was… worth it,” he rasps. “Every… second…”

Then he dissolves into a smattering of stars.

Warlock stares at his empty hands. “Mum.” He looks up at Aziraphale. “Momma.” Aziraphale says nothing. “Papa, what do we do?”

Aziraphale isn’t even breathing.

Warlock crawls over to him. “Momma,” he says, curling his hands around Aziraphale’s wrists. “Momma, you can’t go away too. I need you.”

Aziraphale’s eyelids flutter. He tugs Warlock to his feet. “Come now, dear boy.”

“Where are we going?” Warlock asks, scrambling after him on legs that don’t know how to walk in a world without his mother. Aziraphale doesn’t answer, striding across the street towards a bar. “Um, Pops, I can’t drink—”

Aziraphale snaps his fingers and the bar’s doors open to reveal an entirely too clean elevator. He steps inside and holds the door.

Warlock follows him, as he would his mother, anywhere. He scans the buttons, Heaven aglow, and knows instantly where they’re going. He holds Aziraphale’s hand like it’s his last tether to life. “Momma. I don’t wanna end the world.”

Aziraphale bends down to meet his eyes. “Warlock Crowley-Fell,” he says, with all the conviction he can muster, “you will never do anything of the sort.”

The elevator pings. A flaming sword materializes in Aziraphale’s hand.

“If someone comes for you, stop them,” Aziraphale says.

“How?” Warlock asks.

“Want it,” Aziraphale says, straightening up as the doors slide open. “You’re Crowley’s child. The world bends to your will.”

There’s a long stretch of nothing ahead of them. A woman rises from the single desk and sprints for them. “You’re not welcome here, Azirapha—”

Aziraphale slashes her through. She crumbles to ash with a silent scream.

Aziraphale starts forward again. A dark-skinned angel leaps at them from behind a pedestal—

Just as her hand touches Aziraphale’s shoulder, she disappears into a dandelion.

Aziraphale looks down at the rotting flower in Warlock’s hand. “Not bad, my boy,” he murmurs. “Your mother will be proud.”

Forward again. Another strike, another bloom. Again and again until they finally reach a door.

It’s bleeding. The door is bleeding. Warlock is quite sure doors aren’t supposed to bleed, and he’s also quite sure blood isn’t supposed to be translucent and the color of an oil-water puddle on the subway, but here they are, and here it is.

“What is this place?” Warlock asks. The air around them crackles and hisses, like a warning. Aziraphale ignores it entirely, throwing open the door. Warlock steps through after him.

Suddenly they’re in the backseat of the Bentley, speeding along through the night. There’s a basket on the seat beside Warlock, and another in the passenger seat.

For once, the Bentley is silent.

“Okay,” past-Crowley mutters to himself, his knuckles white around the wheel. “Okay, okay. Just give them up. It’s fine. Just give them up.”

The basket in the passenger’s seat begins to cry. Crowley curses, pulling over to the side of the road. He reaches into the basket and pulls out a baby with stars in their eyes, cradling them close to his chest.

“Shhh,” Crowley says. The baby wraps their hand around his pointer finger. “Shhh, it’s okay. Mum’s here. Mummy’s here. I’m not going anywhere.” He kisses the baby’s head, leaving a soft glowing star behind. “That’s right, Warlock. Mumma’s never gonna leave you.”

Warlock’s lips part around a lost love confession. His eyes mist up as Aziraphale’s hand curls around his.

The other basket wails. Crowley waves his hand and the basket joins its twin in the front seat. Another baby floats out of it and settles against Crowley’s chest.

“I wish I could keep you,” Crowley whispers, kissing that baby’s head too. “I should, I should, I—I can just call Aziraphale, he’ll hide you, we’ll hide you, we’ll be a family—”

The Bentley chimes in with “Slipping Through My Fingers.”

Crowley closes his eyes. “Right. Right. Adam—” He sniffs, hugging both babies tight to his chest. “I’ll always be here, alright? Whenever you’re lonely, just look up at the stars. I made those just for you two. My babies. My little miracles. Mine, no matter what She or He says. You may have God and Lucifer’s blood but you have my love, you understand? All my love. Every last piece of me is yours.”

Aziraphale has gone glassy-eyed. “Oh, Crowley…”

With one last kiss, Crowley floats the children back into their respective baskets. He wipes at his eyes and strokes the Bentley quiet, reaching into the glove compartment and slipping on a pair of sunglasses. He pulls back onto the road and keeps moving.

Warlock looks up in the rearview mirror. His eyes are swirling pools of stars. “Mum,” he whispers.

Aziraphale reaches out and opens the door, sending them both tumbling back into the emptiness of Heaven. Warlock lunges for the door, clawing at the knob, but it won’t budge, firmly closed. It no longer bleeds; instead, it cries, drowning Warlock and his father in the blackest of griefs.

“Lilith, Lucifer’s concubine,” Aziraphale murmurs, standing up in the muck. He is stained down to his bones and doesn’t seem to care. “And Raphael, God’s favorite. The mother of twin boys—Adam and Warlock. Antichrist and Messiah. Good and Evil.”

Warlock can’t let go of the door. “Mum,” he chokes. “Mum, Mum, I’m sorry, Mum—”

“He was so desperate to stay with you,” Aziraphale says, pacing now. “So desperate to return, too, after it all happened, he—He knew Adam, he knew you. He loved you down to his bones and I saw it, I see it, I just thought it was his usual softness for children but no, you two, you two were different—”

“Mumma!” Warlock sobs, banging on the door. “Mumma, Mummy, come back, I want you back—”

“My dear boy.” Aziraphale pulls him into his lap, brushing his hair back, kissing his head. Warlock can’t breathe. “My dear boy, shhh. We can’t stay here.”

“Mum—”

“I’ll get him back for you,” Aziraphale says. “I swear it, Warlock, but we need to go. It isn’t safe here.”

“I wanna go home.”

“I know, love,” Aziraphale says, helping him to his feet. “Where do you think I’m taking you?”

And then, suddenly, they’re nowhere.

Somewhere across the Universe, Adam Young wakes up feeling very empty. He tries to fill this emptiness with a midnight snack, as most humans would, and quickly learns that emotional starvation cannot be quieted with physical nourishment. The world seems far darker today than it did yesterday. He wants his mom, but when he wakes her up and worms his way into her arms, he doesn’t feel better. He still wants his mom. Where is Adam’s mom? Where did he go?

Warlock comes to in an unfamiliar cottage, his ears still full of cotton from crying. There’s a red knit blanket thrown over him and a steaming cup of cocoa (no marshmallows; Warlock doesn’t like marshmallows) on the table beside him. Warlock sits up on the couch and takes the mug in his hands, sipping long and slow. His entire body aches, and his soul even worse.

“Mum?” he calls out. Perhaps this has all just been a spectacularly bad dream. To think that was how this all started, too—just a bad dream.

Aziraphale comes around the corner. “Not here, I’m afraid,” he says. “But I’m doing my best.”

Adam pokes his head out from behind him. “Hi,” he says. “Now I get why Auntie always called us siblings.”

“I told him everything,” Aziraphale says, feeling Warlock’s forehead as he settles on an ottoman beside the couch. “You were asleep for quite awhile, my dear boy.”

“Why do you call him Auntie?” Warlock asks Adam, leaning into Aziraphale, who rubs his back. “He’s your mom.”

“I didn’t grow up with him,” Adam says, dropping down onto the couch at Warlock’s feet. “I haven’t earned the right yet.”

“Adam, my dear, you have never had to earn Crowley’s love,” Aziraphale says. “He would adore you even if you’d never met. When he talks to strangers, he calls you his son. He has a picture of you in his wallet, even though he doesn’t need a wallet.”

“Oh.” Adam takes Warlock’s hand and squeezes. “Well, I guess that’s alright then.”

“I need you boys to do me a favor,” Aziraphale says, taking Warlock’s mug of cocoa and setting it aside. “I need you to tell me if you feel your mother is still alive.”

Warlock’s throat closes up. “I don’t think—”

“Not think, honey.” Aziraphale squeezes his shoulder. “Feel. You could always feel him before, right? Can you still?”

Warlock frowns. “No—”

I love you. The hissing. I love you. Steady as a heartbeat. I love you. And always, always there.

“Yes,” Warlock whispers. “I feel him.”

Adam frowns. “I don’t.”

Warlock panics, listening harder. The hissing softens. I love you. I love you. I’m here. I love you. “No,” he says. “She’s there.”

Adam’s face twists. “Why can’t I feel her?”

Aziraphale pats his hand. “Don’t worry, dear boy. All in good time.” He closes his eyes. “I can feel her too. My Crowley. My wife.”

Warlock glances around the room as his head clears, still thumping reassurances. They’re in a living room, it looks like, sitting on the only uncovered pieces of furniture. Everything else is blanketed in sheets and a thin layer of dust, which continues into the kitchen. A quick glance out into the garden of dead things suggests they’re in a cottage.

“Where are we?” Warlock asks. “Back in Heaven, you said we were going home. This isn’t the bookshop.”

Aziraphale melts a bit at that. “My dear boy,” he says, “this is your home. Well—you’ve never been here, I suppose, so perhaps not yet, but Crowley bought it for the three of us back in 2019, when he believed the world was coming to an end.” He gives Adam a sad smile. “I think he’d hoped it’d be the four of us, but then you chose your human parents, so he left you as alone as he could.”

“But I didn’t know,” Adam bursts, looking devastated. “I didn’t know I was renouncing her too, I thought—I want her. I want her back.”

All the glow stars on the ceiling flicker alight at once.

Aziraphale looks up and smiles. “Well, my dear—” he murmurs. “It looks like you may just get your wish.”

Somewhere, something that is not quite an angel and not quite a demon washes up on the shore of a nebula.

Now fifty thousand war cadets would cower at this small brunette!

It’s a nice surprise knowing six feet high would reach and grab the moon if I should ask,

Or just imply that I want you to be more light!

So I could look inside his eyes and get the colors just right.

Just right, just right, just…

— Halsey

Aziraphale comes up to tuck Warlock into bed. Adam is in the second bedroom down the hall, which is apparently made for him the same way Warlock’s is made for him. Warlock had passed the third bedroom on his way to brush his teeth and nearly cried, because the place had clearly been meant for Crowley and Aziraphale together.

Warlock wonders how either of them could ever bear to sleep in there alone.

“It occurred to me,” Aziraphale says, fussing over Warlock’s blankets, “that the Dowlings haven’t noticed your absence at all.”

It’s taken him longer to ask than Warlock thought it would.

“They forgot me,” Warlock says, his eyes tracing the painted vines and wildflowers adorning the walls. “I wished they would, so they did.”

Aziraphale hums. “You know,” he says, “after Crowley gave you both up, he was in terrible pain. It lessened, I think, when Mrs. Dowling gave him back to you, that very first day. But Adam’s ache has never lessened, not one bit, and when he cut off Lucifer, I suspect he also cut himself from Crowley’s soul.” He sighs, tracing the rim of his teacup with his finger. “Crowley couldn’t get out of bed for a month. It was as if all of his bones had broken at once. It’s why we didn’t come get you right away, and then… As time went on, the guilt crept in, and I began to believe that you’d be better off without us, so I convinced Crowley to give you up. Of course I had no idea you were his child, and I feel terrible for leaving you to rot with those terrible people, though at the time it was what I thought was best. But I was wrong, and I am… I am so very sorry, my dear boy. Forgive me.”

Warlock grabs his hand and curls around him, resting his head in Aziraphale’s lap. “I don’t forgive good intentions,” he says, pressing a kiss to Aziraphale’s thumb. “You loved me in your own way, and you were trying to help me. ‘S not your fault bad people are bad.”

Aziraphale strokes his hair. “Thank you, dear boy,” he murmurs. “I should’ve known you were Crowley’s son. There’s so much kindness hidden away in you.”

Warlock doesn’t object to four-letter words. “I love you, Momma.”

Aziraphale blinks back tears. “I love you too, my dear,” he says. “May your dreams be happy and sweet.”

They are. Warlock dreams of a haunted house with creaking flowers, lightning flashing through the dark woods outside. The portraits’ eyes trail him up and down the stairs, through every tiny door he crawls through. There is a woman sitting in a rocking chair in the library, and she looks like Nanny Ashtoreth, but Warlock knows better. There is no love here, only a cold and terrible emptiness. She tilts her head and her button eyes glint in the light of warring skies. She smiles and the world dies.

Warlock decides he doesn’t like God.

“I’ve been waiting so long to meet you,” God says. “You grew up so well.”

“And it had nothing to do with you,” Warlock says, his hands curling into fists. “Where’s my mum?”

God smiles wider. “I’m right here, darling.”

“I asked for my mum, not a narcissistic bitch,” Warlock snarks. “Where’s Crowley?”

God’s eyes flash, black and loveless. “I’m sure I don’t know.”

“You know everything.”

“Raphael has always hidden himself well from me,” God says, a cruel smile curdling her lips. “Insolent little brat. I give him the honor of becoming my Book, of carrying my child, and what does he do? He Falls. And he refuses to be a proper demon, instead gallivanting about Earth, protecting humans, trailing after that useless Principality like a dog… I’d have thought he’d at least know better than to claim my child for himself.”

Warlock takes a step forward. He’s not afraid of bad people; he grew up with them. “I’m not your child,” he says. “I’ll give it up. All my celestial blood or whatever, all my powers, my destiny, whatever that is. I’ll give it all up. All I want is my moms, my siblings, and our bookshop. I don’t want any part of your wretched plan.”

God wrinkles her nose. “So,” she says, standing up. “He taught you to ask questions. Of course he did.”

Warlock doesn’t move, even as his skin breaks out into bumps and a chill runs down his spine. “What can you possibly do to me?” he asks, a smirk spreading across his face. “Crucify me? Kill me? Zombify me? Whatever. I don’t care. There’s no point, do you understand? No point, if I don’t have my mum. You can’t hurt me because you already took away the only person that matters.”

God sneers. “You won’t be rid of me, all of your days,” she says. “There’s no escaping my love.”

Warlock feels the tug of waking begin to pull. “You’re nothing,” he says. “You don’t matter.”

“I’m God.”

“You’re nothing,” Warlock spits. “I don’t believe in you.”

He jolts awake, his skin clammy and cold. It’s still dark outside, save for a strange, orange glow blistering across the sky.

Adam slams into the room, breathless. “Oh, good, you’re awake,” he gasps, dropping his hands to his knees. “Good morning. The world is ending. Again.”

God is everything in the world, which means God is not good. God is responsible for miracles, but also for catastrophes. No one knows this better than Raphael, Her first creation, Her first failure. He was the Eve to Her Adam, though he didn’t know it yet. He slept by Her side for eons, questions rolling over in his brain, so sure something was missing. God talked about Her great plan almost constantly without ever actually describing what the great plan was, and in the rare moments that she wasn’t babbling, Raphael would sit at the edge of the clouds on his own, murmuring his questions into the nothing. He spun the stars. He made the Earth. He pulled galaxies from his own bloodstream and poured love into every creature he could find. Raphael played God when God wasn’t around. He loved the things God refused to love.

When he Fell, it was a slow and quiet affair—a discolored feather, a white spot in the corner of his eye. He was ugly and sick down to his bones, on Death’s door but never come for. Lucifer and Gabriel had been the ones to carry him downwards, knowing the crash would kill him. Back then they were kind, and terrified of God’s love as much as her wrath. There was no Hell for Lilith to make his home in, so he kept to the Garden of Eden, keeping the lonely Adam company. God created Eve and Lilith’s friend disappeared into his wife, with no time for tired serpents anymore. Lucifer visited when he could, pushing harder and harder against God, taking Lilith into his arms and praying for Raphael’s return, but God only dismissed them all, again and again. By the time Lilith became Crawly, he had been Lucifer’s wife for a millenia, and half of Heaven had Fallen.

Crawly met the Angel of the Eastern Gate the day Adam left the Garden, holding tight to Eve’s hand. He hadn’t known him, his memory slipping more and more with each year. Every happiness God could take from him she did. A demon fell in love with an angel, and he resolved to do absolutely nothing about it, because what would be the point? Humans have come up with their own explanations, their own stories, built languages off the backs of ethereal and occultist names, but if the oldest books were still in existence and you searched their pages for meaning, you would find that Raphael, Lilith, and Crawly all define themselves the same: Unloved.

Of course Crowley wanted to be called something else.

Besides the odd weather, nothing else about the world seems to be any different. Warlock eats breakfast in a rush—Aziraphale insisted—and runs outside, but nothing and no one is dying. In fact, the plants in the garden that were dead yesterday are now in full bloom.

Then he realizes it’s the kind of quiet that isn’t possible outside of a graveyard.

“Is everybody dead?” Warlock asks, clutching the edge of Aziraphale’s waistcoat.

Aziraphale rubs his back. “No, my dear boy,” he says. “Everyone has just… gone away.”

“That means dead,” Adam says.

Aziraphale tsks, holding him too. “No, it doesn’t, honey,” he says. “I believe everyone has simply never existed at all.”

Adam frowns. “Why are we still here, then?”

There’s a crash inside the house. Aziraphale whirls around, keeping both children behind him. “Who goes there?”

Muriel bursts outside. “Dad! All the humans are gone!” They fall into his arms and bury their face in his chest. “Nina and Maggie went away and I couldn’t find you or anybody!”

Aziraphale strokes their hair. “I’m so sorry, dear girl,” he says. “Your brothers and I are perfectly fine, I promise.”

Muriel lifts their wet face. “Where’s Mum?” The others look away. “Where’s Mum?!”

“Mum’s fine,” Adam says. “You can feel her, right?”

Muriel shakes their head. “I can’t—There’s nothing—What’s happening?”

“If God dies,” Warlock says, “does the world die with Her?”

Aziraphale stiffens.

“What did you do?” Adam asks, wide-eyed. “You were sleeping—”

“You dreamed of Her,” Aziraphale says, throwing his hands up. “Oh, you dreamed of Her. Of course, of course—”

“I told her I didn’t believe in Her,” Warlock says. “Isn’t She built on belief? Like Santa or something?”

Aziraphale drops his face into his hands and whines.

“The Messiah is meant to save God,” Muriel whispers. “They only come when people stop believing enough to… Oh, no.”

Adam grabs Warlock’s hand, looking up at the sky. “I don’t want the world to end. Stop it. Stop it right now.” He holds on hard enough to bruise. “Can you stop it, please?”

“I don’t know.” Warlock wants to. He wants to go back in time, to when he was five and Crowley and Aziraphale were with him and he didn’t have to worry about anything. He misses feeling safe. “I don’t know, I don’t—”

“It’s alright, my boy,” Aziraphale says, suddenly in front of him. “You didn’t do anything wrong.” He turns towards the sky, his flaming sword materializing in his hand. “All of you. Come down this instant.”

The Heavens open up and pour.

Shooting stars come crashing to the earth, thousands of them, all coming to land in the field behind the cottage. The ground shakes with every new arrival, but while Muriel, Adam, and Warlock shrink into each other, Aziraphale stands his ground, his eyes glowing purple with rage.

Michael reaches him first. “The war has finally begun, Aziraphale,” she says, a smirk twisting her face like lines through soured milk. “Even you can’t stop it.”

Aziraphale rolls his eyes. “I have no intention of stopping your war.”

Michael blinks. “You don’t?”

Warlock balks. “You don’t?”

“Of course not.” Aziraphale takes his ring off his pinky finger and holds it out to Michael. “My husband is dead, and humanity is gone. So long as you leave myself and my three children alone on Alpha Centauri, I see no reason to prolong your stupidity. Have your blasted war. I no longer care.”

He drops the ring into Michael’s hand. Michael stares at it like it’s the button to activate a nuclear bomb. “I don’t understand,” she says.

“No, of course you don’t,” Aziraphale says. “You’ve never loved.”

Then he snaps his fingers and Warlock’s world goes blank.

Warlock used to have this dream, the first few months after Crowley and Aziraphale left, that he was in Brother Francis’ garden, lying on a picnic blanket. His head was on Nanny Ashtoreth’s knees, her hand brushing through his hair as she sang a lullaby. It was different from the rest of her songs—this one had no words, but at the same time Warlock understood its story perfectly. And it wasn’t about death and destruction and ruling the world. It was about Crowley, and how much she loved him.

He wakes from this dream now, the first time he’s had it in months, but the hands in his hair don’t move. A mouth presses against his forehead. In Enochian, his guardian whispers, “Sweetheart.”

Warlock opens his eyes. “Mum.”

Crowley smiles down at him. His eyes are back to their golden slits, though there are still stars dancing at their edges. His hair tumbles down his back, curling at the ends, and he wears a soft white dress. Warlock sits up carefully, then immediately twists back around to wrap his arms around his mother’s stomach, pressing his face into his chest.

Crowley cradles Warlock’s head with one hand and his waist with the other. “Hello, my love,” he murmurs. “What are you doing here?”

Warlock doesn’t know where here is, and he doesn’t particularly care. “Apologize,” he mumbles.

Crowley wrinkles his nose. “What?”

“You died,” Warlock says. “Apologize.”

“I’m sorry,” Crowley says, carding a hand through Warlock’s hair. “I’m sorry I left you, hellspawn.”

Warlock squeezes his eyes shut for half a second, then lifts his head. “It’s okay,” he says, and means I forgive you, but not like that, because no, never like that. “I love you.”

Crowley cups his face and kisses his head. “I love you, too,” he says. “I’ll never leave you again. I promise.”

Warlock leans into him, looking around. “Where are we?”

“Alpha Centauri,” Crowley says. “I always wanted to come here with your father, but he never wanted to come here with me.”

Warlock looks around. The rest of his family is gone. “Where—Where are they?”

Crowley frowns. “What do you mean, my love?”

“Adam, Muriel, where—”

“You came alone,” Crowley says, his eyes glinting. “You washed up right here, where I did, I found you—”

“No, Momma brought us here,” Warlock says, clamping a hand around Crowley’s palm. “He gave up the Earth and he—”

Crowley chokes. “He what?” he sputters. “Why would he do something as stupid as that—”

“You were dead,” Warlock says. “Nothing mattered anymore.”

Crowley’s lower lip trembles. “No, that’s not—He doesn’t—I’m not that important—”

“Yes, you are,” Warlock breathes, holding his mother’s face. “You’re the most important person in the entire universe.”

“I quite agree,” Aziraphale says, appearing behind them.

Crowley whirls up and around, his hands curling into fists. “Don’t do this here, don’t you dare—”

“Where else would I?” Aziraphale asks, stepping closer. “When else? Crowley, the Earth is burning. Our children are terrified. We may die tomorrow. Where else would you like me to tell you that there is no one in this world I care for more than you, no hand I’d rather hold, no mind I’d rather learn? I have spent a thousand lifetimes with you and it was not enough; I could spend a million more and still I would search for you in every painting, every table, every park bench. I love you without care, without reason; I love you without knowing how to do anything else. I love you enough to leave and I love you enough to stay; I love you like my books, like tea, like cocoa; I love you more than God. I would kill Her if you asked, forsake her, damn her; I would—” Aziraphale’s voice catches. “Crowley,” he says, taking his demon’s trembling hands in his. “For you, I would Fall.”

Crowley’s face is a mess of tears. “Stop it,” he croaks. “Stop it, stop it, I don’t—Stop it. I can’t.”

Aziraphale drops to his knees. “I won’t apologize for leaving,” he says, “or for trying to make things better, but I must apologize for the way I went about it—for making you feel unloved, for letting you believe that I would choose Heaven—that I would choose anything—over you, for—” He swallows. “For crushing your heart in my hands and refusing to give up mine to yours.”

Crowley tugs at his hands. “You don’t owe me anything, angel, please, stop it, get up—”

“Yes, I do,” Aziraphale whispers. “I owe you a family. I owe you a life.” He kisses Crowley’s hands. “I owe you love.”

Warlock is afraid to breathe.

Crowley hangs his head and cries.

Aziraphale slowly gets to his feet, putting a hand on the back of Crowley’s neck and another on his hip, pulling him in. “Warlock,” he says very softly with a smile. “Your siblings are with Beelzebub and Gabriel, in the only house here. Would you mind joining them?” He kisses Crowley’s head. “I need a moment alone with my wife.”

“Not your wife,” Crowley blubbers, clutching at Aziraphale’s coat.

“Yes you are,” Aziraphale says. “You’re who I look for when I’m lost.”

Crowley mumbles something else. Warlock doesn’t hear it, but Aziraphale clearly does, because he smiles and his eyes start to leak.

“Run along now, Warlock,” the angel says. “We love you oh so very much.”

Warlock finds the house without too much trouble and settles himself at the kitchen table in between Adam and Muriel. Beelzebub and Gabriel—Warlock has never met them before, but it’s easy enough to guess which one’s which—sit across from them, looking deeply uncomfortable about the whole thing.

Gabriel coughs. “Would you like—food?” He frowns, turning to Beelzebub. “Do they eat?” He turns back to the children. “Do you eat?”

“Yes, but we’re alright, thank you,” Adam says. “Why are you up here?”

Beelzebub frowns. “Well, the world’s ending.”

“Yes, but you were up here before that,” Adam says. “You’re properly settled in.”

“Mum always wanted to move here,” Warlock says. “Strange you picked the same place.”

“He suggested it,” Beelzebub says.

It’s Gabriel’s turn to frown. “No, Crowley did.”

“Crowley is our mum, you idiot,” Adam says, exasperated. “Zira’s our dad. Where are they, anyway?”

“Resolving things,” Muriel says. “Everything feels warmer, can’t you tell? Softer. Like laundry that’s just come out of the dryer.”

Adam blinks at them. “You know what a dryer is?”

Muriel blushes. “No, but that’s how Aziraphale described love in his diary in 1941.”

“You’ve been reading his diary?” Warlock asks, aghast.

Adam grins. “Good girl.”

Muriel perks up. Right. Still hasn’t learned sarcasm.

“Don’t read Papa’s diary,” Warlock says. “It’s an invasion of privacy.”

“But why would he write things down if he doesn’t want people to read them?” Muriel asks. “I read everything that was written down when I worked in Heaven. It was my job!”

Warlock loves them a lot. “I’ll explain later. Just—don’t, okay?”

Muriel still looks confused, but nods. “Okay.”

Beelzebub groans, sinking down in their chair. “Come back already, idiots. Satan, your children are annoying.”

“You’re annoying,” Adam says.

Beelzebub sticks their tongue out.

Adam flips them off.

Beelzebub turns to Gabriel. “Can we be uncles? Oh please can we be uncles?”

The door slams open. “Not on your life,” Crowley says, gliding in with Aziraphale not far behind her. “I wouldn’t trust you with our children for a single moment—”

“We did just leave them here for several moments, dear,” Aziraphale points out.

Crowley scowls. “Extenuating circumstances—”

Adam crashes into him. “I’m sorry,” he breathes, tears welling up as Crowley cups his face. “I’m sorry, Mama, I’m so sorry.”

Crowley wobbles, tightening his hold on Adam. His mouth opens around a silent keen. “Whatever for, my love?” he rasps. “Mama, oh, dear Lord, I’d forgotten how that name sounded in your mouth, what it felt like—” He curls around the son he gave up fifteen years ago. “Oh, Adam, my baby.”

“I’m sorry,” Adam babbles, muffled against Crowley’s chest. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know, I didn’t mean to, I—”

“Shhh.” Crowley strokes his hair. “I know, sweetheart. I know.”

“I want you back,” Adam whispers. “Please, I want you back.”

The world twists itself right again with a sickening crack.

Crowley gasps. “Oh.” He crumples to the floor, dragging Adam with him. “Oh.”

Warlock pushes back from the table, crawling over to them. Suddenly he can feel things again, the hissing, the buzzing, Adam’s blood, his blood—

He curls a hand around Crowley’s arm. “It’s alright, Mum,” he says, letting himself be held. “We’re not going anywhere. Not ever again. You didn’t lose us, Mama. You didn’t lose us at all. We’re still yours. We’ve always been yours.”

Crowley weeps into Warlock’s hair. Aziraphale kneels down beside them, putting an arm around Muriel when she finally wanders over.

“Do you see, my dear?” Aziraphale says, brushing a hand over Crowley’s head. “I told you they love you. I told you.” He hugs his husband close. “Everything is as it should be. Everything is okay.”

“I love you,” Crowley croaks. “I love you.”

“I know.” Aziraphale kisses him. “I know, my dear.”

Beelzebub clears their throat. “Not to break up a tender moment,” they say.

Gabriel chimes in. “But you still have to save the world.”

God does not know where She is. She feels very strange. Nothing hurts, but something is weighing Her down. She doesn’t understand. She tries to move but She can’t. She can’t. She can’t. What is this? What is— What is—

Death appears above Her. “Hullo, love.”

God does not ask questions. God has all the answers.

Death touches Her forehead. “Aye, soon now.”

God hisses. “You can’t—take me—”

“I’m not taking you anywhere,” Death tsks. “You’re not dying. You’re just going to sleep.”

God does not ask questions.

Death smiles, as much as Death can smile. “Yes,” he says. “Forever.”

Hastur is just about to sink his fist into Michael’s stomach when he loses all control of his extremities and collapses to the ground. Michael laughs, lifting her sword to strike her final blow, when suddenly she convulses and drops down too. Angels and demons alike fall in floods of thousands, silence blanketing the whole of the Earth.

Hastur is the first to rise. Unthinking, he offers a hand to Michael. She stands on shaky legs, as if unsure that the ground will hold her up.

White has bled into black, the both of them becoming grey.

“What is this?” Hastur asks, looking around at a sea of in-between. “I don’t understand.”

“I don’t know,” Michael says, still holding on to him for reasons she can’t fathom. “But I don’t think we’re supposed to fight anymore.”

Warlock is not expecting it when two black wings break out of his back, nor is he expecting it when Adam suddenly sprouts white ones.

“Oh dear,” Aziraphale murmurs, rushing to Adam’s side. Muriel is already holding his hand. “Oh dear, it’s alright, it’s okay.”

“What the Hell,” Adam grunts.

“Say fuck, honey, it’ll hurt less,” Crowley says, grasping Warlock’s wrists. “Warlock, breathe. It’s okay, baby, breathe. Breathe.”

“I have scales,” Warlock gasps. “Mom, why do I have scales—”

“You gave up God’s blood, the same way Adam gave up Lucifer’s,” Crowley says, working his hands up to curl around Warlock’s fingers. “But Adam altered himself to have human blood, and you just took on all of mine.”

“Wings aren’t exactly a human quality,” Adam snarks, dropping to his knees.

Aziraphale puts a hand on his back. “You accepted Crowley as your mother,” he says. “You’re still half-human, though, so you’ll probably just have the wings.”

Warlock squeaks and poofs into a snake.

Crowley catches him in his palms. “Oh, look at you,” he coos. “Such a pretty little thing.”

“Looks quite a bit like you, actually,” Aziraphale murmurs. “So, yes. Very pretty indeed.”

Crowley turns pink.

Beelzebub rolls their eyes. “Leave, will you? The world’s still on fire.”

“Aren’t you going to help?” Muriel asks, experiencing indignation for the first time.

“Of course they aren’t,” Crowley growls. “That would require them to actually care about something other than themselves.”

“Quite correct,” Beelzebub says, breezy as ever. “Now get the fuck out.”

Gabriel pastes on his hotel-service smile. “Please.”

“Ready, angel?” Crowley asks, holding out his hand.

“Yes, dear,” Aziraphale answers, taking it.

With a wicked grin, Crowley snaps his fingers.

Warlock really needs to learn that trick.

Earth is, for lack of a better word, fucked.

They may all be wearing the same color now, but angels and demons are still very much distinguishable from one another, if not from their respective brands of body disfigurements then from their wildly dissimilar levels of personal hygiene, and they’re starting to get over the shock of being somehow transformed, laying waste to bloodlust, resentment, and a fair bit of insanity. Just because they’re not supposed to kill each other anymore or because they don’t have to doesn’t mean they’re not going to. After all—God’s plan may have fallen apart, but that doesn’t mean the set-up isn’t still standing strong.

So the Crowley-Fells arrive back to a planet full of ethereal and occult entities who are rather Hell- and Heaven-bent on destroying one another and very little they can actually do about it.

“Stand down,” Aziraphale says, stepping just ahead of the fray. “You don’t need to fight anymore.”

“Oh, but we want to.” Michael sneers. “Always so soft, Aziraphale. You were never fit to be one of us, least of all our leader.”

Crowley is at Aziraphale’s side in an instant. “No, she isn’t, because she’s better than the whole lot of you,” he growls. “And there will be no more fighting. Not ever again. What good can you possibly think it will do you?”

“It’s the plan,” Michael says, advancing. “It’s always been the plan—”

“God is dead, sod her plan,” Crowley snaps, swiftly stepping in between her and Aziraphale. “And I’m going to kill the fucking Metatron myself. Now—”

Aziraphale sputters. “Crowley—”

“No, shush, he was mean to you, he deserves to die.” Crowley pokes Michael’s chest with his finger. “Why does no one ever listen to the good advice and only ever to the bad? I know the bad’s so much more entertaining but come on, have some foresight! Some common sense, even! What does fighting get you? Nothing. Absolutely nothing, because some humans will still be kind and some humans will still be assholes because that’s how I made them when I gave them free will four thousand years ago.”

“You didn’t make them anything,” Michael spits. “You’re not God. You had one important job literally ages ago. That doesn’t make you important—”

Crowley’s wings split from his back, one black, one white. His eyes are starry slits. “I am God’s Book,” he seethes. “I am Satan’s mistress. I am the mother of both their children. I was an Archangel and a Prince of Hell and the only reason I haven’t laid waste to you all is because I’ve never much cared for your petty battles, but you’ve hurt my angel. You’ve scared my children. So I think, Michael…” Crowley bares his fangs. “That you’d better do as I say.”

Michael holds her head high, but backs away. She glances around for something, a sign, perhaps, that God is in fact not dead after all and very much still wants them to kill each other—

Her eyes catch on Warlock.

Michael’s face curls into a clown’s imitation of a smile. “Messiah,” she addresses him, slinking closer even as Crowley snarls and tries to put himself between them. “First mistaken for the Antichrist, now meant to be humanity’s savior. Ha. Jesus tried that. Didn’t work. Now you think you have a shot in Hell… Well. We all know how this story ends. Why not speed it up a bit?”

Warlock sees the blade too late. The last thing he hears is a hissing scream—

I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU.

There was a day, many decades ago, when Aziraphale died. Properly died. Grazed by Hellfire during a bombing (the Nazis were, of course, well-fueled by Hell; easy souls to claim) and burned up in seconds. Crowley felt him disappear from existence, and promptly undid the last twenty-four hours.

She didn’t realize she’d done this until much later. She’d been hysterical at the time, sobbing to the point of passing out, and when she’d woken up in Aziraphale’s bookshop, she’d assumed it was all a terrible dream. Aziraphale was sitting beside her reading a book, and he made no comment when she burrowed into him, as if he too had had terrible dreams that he needed to be comforted about, despite the fact that he never slept. Crowley could, apparently, erase time, but not its memory.

Now, she wrote this off as a fluke—and, in her weaker moments, as a last gift from God—and didn’t think much of it again, except when she was unwell about the whole thing and needed to cling to Aziraphale like a koala bear (wretched creatures), but those times were few and far between and eventually it hardly ever crossed her mind.

Then there was another such incident, not even a decade old now, in which Thaddeus Dowling raised his hand against the child named Warlock. Skin had hit skin and Crowley—

Admittedly she doesn’t remember much after that, but when she had come to her senses, Thaddeus Dowling did not resemble a person anymore so much as he did a pile of mush. Crowley had panicked, sprang them back ten hours, and stolen Warlock away to the zoo for the day. It was the first time she truly considered saying fuck it to the great blasted plan and just taking him away where she and Aziraphale could make him happy, but she reasoned Warlock would be worse off if Armageddon happened and instead held him all the tighter and never let Thaddeus near him if she could help it.

You can imagine, then, if this is how she reacts to the boy being hit, that her reaction to his death might be considerably… worse.

Warlock turns fifteen at 12:07 a.m. and immediately begins to have terrible dreams.

Now, these dreams are very strange, because he could swear they’ve actually happened, but when he wakes up, he doesn’t have scales or wings or eyes made of starry skies. He’s just a boy whose parents don’t love him.

The dreams bleed into each other. One moment he’s cradled in Nanny Ashtoreth’s arms; the next, he’s watching her go limp in Brother Francis’ arms. Horror after horror, love after love, until finally, again and again, he reaches the break, the restarting point, the pain—

Somebody crashes through his window.

Warlock bangs his head on the nightstand in his panicked wake.

“No time,” Nanny Ashtoreth says, with big black wings and yellow eyes. She holds out her hands. “Come with me, my love.”

Warlock has so many questions and also absolutely none at all. “Mum,” he whispers, taking her hands.

“That’s right,” Nanny says. “My name is Crowley, by the way. Hold on tight.”

Warlock does. Crowley flies him out through the window and over the gardens, all the way down into a Bentley that’s singing Queen.

“Where did you go?” Warlock asks, half-convinced he’s still asleep. His limbs feel heavy. “I missed you. I thought I must’ve done something wrong.”

Crowley grabs his hand over the console and squeezes. “You have never done anything wrong,” he says. “You’re my child and I love you. I’m never leaving you again, do you understand? Say you understand.”

“I understand, Mummy.”

“Good,” Crowley says, swerving around a corner. “Very important question—Do you believe in God?”

“No.”

“Good boy, keep that up.” Another corner. “Now I need you to listen to me very carefully, and do exactly as I tell you. Can you do that for me, sweetheart?”

“Yes.” Warlock squeezes Crowley’s hand again. “Mum? I’m scared.” He’s not sure why.

“I know, I know, I went too far back,” Crowley hisses, pulling over to the side of the road. Warlock’s not sure where they are, but somehow he could swear he’s been here before.

Crowley gets out of the car and pulls Warlock out of his own seat. “Listen,” he says, placing his hands on Warlock’s shoulders. “You’re about to wake up. You’re about to wake up, now. I can’t hold this timeline in place, not like the others, not like before. I’ve undone too much. I rewrote things that can’t be unwritten, it won’t—It won’t hold.”

Warlock’s eyes are blurring, but he can make out gashes on Crowley’s arms and chest and thighs, thick and deep and caked in blood. Ink pours out of each lesion, dripping onto Warlock’s bare feet.

“Warlock.” Crowley’s holding his face now. “I know, I know you’re tired, but I need you to listen to me. When you wake up, there will be a woman in front of you. I need you to wish she wasn’t there. Do you understand? I need you to wish as hard as you possibly can that she isn’t there.”

“Wishing’s for babies,” Warlock mumbles, his stomach churning. “Mum? I don’t feel so good—”

“I know, I know, baby,” Crowley says. “You’re so brave. So so brave. The bravest. And I love you so much. So, so much. Never forget that, okay? Never forget how very loved you are.”

Warlock crumples to his knees. “I can’t breathe—”

“Time to wake up,” Crowley says, dropping to his side.

Warlock gasps, looking up at the sky. The stars are splitting—

“Mum.”

“Why not speed it up a bit?” Michael leers, lunging forward.

Crowley’s mouth opens around a scream.

Warlock wishes for a single moment suspended in time.

There are universes where Crowley and Aziraphale never met at all.

Luckily, this is not one of those universes.

Warlock was just here. Before, in the broken timeline. He was here, on this road, in the middle of the woods, at night.

Of course, then he’d been fifteen. Now, he’s a ghost in the backseat, sitting next to a basket holding his twin brother.

“I wish I could keep you,” Crowley whispers to baby Warlock, holding him so closely Warlock wonders for a moment how he didn’t see the truth of his parentage sooner. “I should, I should, I—I can just call Aziraphale, he’ll hide you, we’ll hide you, we’ll be a family—”

“Yes, exactly,” Warlock says. Crowley jumps in his seat, letting loose a string of curses. Warlock smiles. “Hello, Mum. Yes, that’s exactly what you should do.”

Crowley stares at him, clutching baby Warock to his chest. His eyes flick to Adam’s basket, clearly calculating grab-and-escape routes. To simplify things, Warlock picks up the basket and hands it to his mother.

“Who are you?” Crowley asks, taking the basket with a hesitant hand. “You’re—You feel like me, but you’re—not me, obviously—”

“I’m the version of Warlock that grows up without you,” Warlock says, and Crowley makes a noise like he’s been punched in the stomach. “I’d like to change that.”

“Time travel is impossible,” Crowley hisses, his sunglasses slipping down his nose. “You can’t be here—”

“I died,” Warlock says. Crowley chokes on a cry. “Somebody killed me, and you tried to fix the timeline, but you couldn’t hold it. You told me to wish that my killer was never there, but instead I wished for this. Wished for you. Just one moment, this moment, because this is where it all goes wrong.”

Crowley goes quiet. “Somebody killed you.”

Warlock leans forward and grabs his mother’s hand. “Take me home,” he says, nodding to the baby in Crowley’s arms, the one whose back their hands rest against. “Take Adam and I home to Aziraphale. Tell Aziraphale you love him, because he loves you back. We’ll be a family. At some point you should go up to Heaven and find an angel named Muriel, because she’s meant to be your daughter. I’ll renounce God and Adam will renounce Satan. The world will never end. We’ll live Happily Ever After, all of us, together, in a cottage in the South Downs. I promise.”

“They’ll kill you,” Crowley rasps. “If I take you they’ll know and they’ll kill you—”

“They’ve already killed me,” Warlock says. “Mum. Who better to keep me safe than you?”

Crowley looks him right in the eyes. “What if I fail?” he whispers. “What if I’m a terrible mother and I ruin the both of you?”

“That could never happen.” Warlock kisses Crowley’s hand. “You love us, don’t you?”

“Endlessly.”

“That’s all that matters.” Warlock’s mind begins to fog. “I’ve got to go, I’ve got to go, but—I love you. I love you, Mum. It’s all gonna be okay.”

“Wait! Wait—” Crowley grasps at him. “Warlock—”

“It’s all gonna be okay, Mum,” that Warlock says, fading from existence. “I promise, it’s all gonna be okay.”

Warlock is rather tired of waking up from realistic dreams. Somewhere in him he thinks they’re probably memories, but they’re hazy and they always fade away before he can place them. Today he wakes up from what he’s sure, strangely enough, will be the last dream, in a bed in a cottage with stars on the ceiling.

The door is open to let the light in. Warlock stands on scaly feet, stretching out his wings. Steady now, steady now. He takes a step towards the exit—

Adam skirts to a stop in the hallway, his own wings flapping frantically in an attempt to balance him. “Are you coming?” he gasps. “We’re gonna be late!”

Warlock races after him. “Late for what? Adam! Late for what?”

“For school,” Crowley answers, tying her hair up in a messy bun as she comes around the corner. She’s wearing a ruffled pink apron, but not sunglasses. She looks Warlock up and down and her voice softens. “Though, my love, if you would rather have a family day, I think that can be arranged.”

Warlock grabs the nearest chair. “I feel like I’m floating.”

Crowley tugs his apron off and strides across the room, gathering Warlock in his arms. “You’re alright, baby,” he says, kissing Warlock’s head. “You’re home. Properly home, this time. I fixed it. All of it. The whole damn thing.”

“How old am I?” Warlock asks. “I feel really old.”

Crowley huffs out a laugh. “You’re eleven,” he says. “The world won’t end. Your birthday party’s tomorrow.”

“I don’t want a party,” Warlock says. “I just want to stay here with you.”

“We’ll do that then.” Crowley pulls away with one last kiss. “Adam, dear, can you get your father and Muriel? They’ve been locked in the library since last night and I’m worried they’ll never come out.”

Adam rolls his eyes, but wanders off. Crowley helps Warlock into a chair at the corner of the table and sits himself down at the end, their chairs angled towards each other rather than the table, as they should be.

Crowley grasps Warlock’s hands in his and presses his mouth against his fingers. “Happy Birthday, sweetheart,” he whispers. “I love you. You know that, right? I adore you.”

Warlock nods.

Crowley flicks his forked tongue. “What’s wrong? Something’s wrong.”

“I just—” Warlock sniffs. “Somewhere out there is a me who doesn’t get to keep you, and I don’t think I’ll ever recover from knowing that.”

Crowley presses Warlock’s hand over his own heart. “Listen to me,” he says. “There is no universe—absolutely none at all—where I don’t find my way back to you, do you understand? God Herself couldn’t keep me from you.”

“That’s impossible.”

“Don’t tell me what’s impossible,” Crowley snaps. “No one can take you from me. I won’t allow it.”

“You gave me up,” Warlock tells him. “In that life, you gave me up.”

“I kept you safe,” Crowley says, kissing his hand again. “I would do anything to keep you safe.”

Warlock knows. “That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.”

“Love hurts, that’s how it works.” Crowley slides off the chair and onto his knees, still holding tight to Warlock’s hand. “But I’m not going anywhere.”

“But you did—”

“That you doesn’t even exist.”

“But I did,” Warlock bursts, his face crumpling. “Mum. I lived without you for nine years.”

“And you won’t live without me for another second,” Crowley promises, squeezing Warlock’s fingers. “Warlock, I promise you. This is the real timeline, the real story. It’s okay.”

“I don’t want this to end.”

“It won’t.”

“All things end.”

“No, not love,” Crowley says. “Not family.” He kisses Warlock’s hand. “Not us.”

Warlock leans forward until their foreheads touch. “I love you, Mumma.”

Crowley surges up to hug him, cupping Warlock’s head as it settles on his shoulder. “I know, hellspawn. I love you, too.”

“More than the stars?”

“More than the stars.”

“More than anything, really,” Aziraphale chimes in, coming through the doorway. He smiles at them both and miracles up a cup of cocoa, holding it out to Warlock. “Your siblings are outside, doing… something, I’m not really sure what. Are you alright, dear?”

Warlock sniffs. “Yeah, Momma.”

“Another dream,” Crowley says, though Warlock can’t recall this ever happening before. He squeezes his eyes shut, his chest tightening—

Ah. There it is. This Warlock’s life, hiding in back of erased Warlock’s mind—hugs and ducks and birthdays and cocoa and stuffies and Christmas and love—

“Will they ever go away?” Warlock asks, blinking back tears. “I don’t like them.”

“No, probably not,” Aziraphale says, refilling Warlock’s mug with a snap of his fingers before he’s even halfway done. “But we’ll always be here when you wake up, and that’s something.”

“That’s everything,” Crowley says, ruffling Warlock’s hair. “Family is a job, just like anything else, and we do it proudly. You can ask us for anything and we’ll give it to you. Well, except a dog. I don’t like dogs.”

“I’m a cat person,” Warlock murmurs, finally loosening his grip on his mother.

“Whaddya know, me too,” Crowley teases, kissing his cheek. “Alright now, yeah?”

“Yeah.” Warlock closes his eyes. “Thanks.”

Crowley pats his head. “Anytime, love.”

Aziraphale coughs into his hand. “Um—” He coughs again. “Marriage is a job too, you know.”

Crowley stiffens like his houseplants whenever he enters the room.

Warlock smiles into Crowley’s dress.

“What are you saying, angel?” Crowley pushes out through gritted teeth.

Aziraphale swallows, crossing the room to Crowley’s side. “Marriage is a promise,” he says, “to love someone, and to work on that love for as long as time allows you to exist. I love you, Crowley, and I am willing to work on that love for as long as I may live.”

“Eternity,” Crowley murmurs.

Aziraphale’s mouth quirks up at the corners. “Yes, eternity,” he says. “You are already my husband in all the ways that count and matter, but I thought I would ask if you officially wanted the title, and the job that comes with it.”

Crowley blinks at him. “What?”

“Psst.” Warlock pokes Aziraphale in the stomach. “Get down on one knee. He’ll only say yes if you get down on one knee. Ask him properly.”

“Hm. Quite right.” Aziraphale shifts onto one knee with only a little trouble. Crowley makes a sound that closely resembles a garbage disposal machine having a panic attack. Aziraphale smiles and takes his hand, kissing the back of it. “Crowley, darling?”

Crowley squawks. His wings sprout suddenly and send him toppling into Aziraphale’s arms, feathers spraying everywhere. Warlock lets him fall, since he knows he has a safe place to land.

Aziraphale kisses Crowley’s nose. Crowley’s hair sparks and sets Aziraphale’s coat on fire. Aziraphale casually pats it out as Crowley rights himself.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale says. “Will you marry me, my dear?”

Crowley spasms. “Ngk.”

“He means yes,” Warlock translates, beaming. “Have you got a ring?”

Aziraphale smiles. “One moment.”

Adam crashes through the door, chased by a shrieking Muriel with mud-covered hands. “Dad, she’s trying to—” He slams into the wall and groans. “Ow. What’s wrong with Mum?”

Aziraphale smiles wider. “For once, absolutely nothing at all,” he says. “Muriel, my dear, could you go into Crowley and I’s bedroom and get me the box in the drawer of my bedside table?”

“Why can’t you go?” Adam asks as Muriel zips up the stairs.

Aziraphale kisses Crowley’s head. “I’m afraid your mother might faint if I let go of him.”

Crowley’s grip tightens. “Don’t you dare.”

“Never.” Aziraphale holds out his hand just in time for Muriel to pop back downstairs and drop a ring into his palm. It’s a thin gold thing with a set of three jewels in the middle, small big small, onyx pearl diamond. Black grey white. Bad in-between good.

Love making a way.

“We’re a family,” Aziraphale says, sliding the ring onto Crowley’s finger and bending to kiss it. “I hold on to you and you hold on to me. That’s the deal—No. That’s our arrangement.”

Crowley’s voice is strangled when he finally speaks. “Shake on it?”

Aziraphale tuts. “Oh, I had something else in mind,” he says, and draws Crowley in for a kiss.

Warlock reaches his eleventh year and a dog comes for his twin brother. Adam turns it away without a name. Their birthday cake has twenty-two candles and Warlock blows out all of them, wishing to keep this forever. There’s a twinkle in his mother’s eyes that says he will.

Life carries on as if it was never disrupted, as if it was always this way. The dreams come fewer and farther between. There are math tests and scraped knees and burned pies. Warlock feels a strange hollowness whenever the American ambassador and his wife come on the TV and Adam tells him he aches whenever he talks to the Youngs down the road. Crowley comes into their rooms sometimes looking for them in the middle of the night, as if they might have gone, although where Warlock doesn’t know.

Sometimes Warlock has the strangest bouts of déjà vu. Flashes of a life he swears he could’ve lived. But those fade within moments and he is left again in the grips of his present happiness. Sadness does follow him, though, in odd bursts when he least expects it. Nothing can cure it; it simply passes on its own if he waits long enough. Warlock gets used to feeling just a little bit out of place no matter where he is. Gets used to feeling just a little bit lonely, all the time.

The story is over, but it does not feel over. He suspects it never will. Life is like that—It drags on, even when it’s racing.

Crowley tucks him into bed at night, long after he’s too old for it. Warlock doesn’t feel safe in his own house. There is a trauma tucked away in his head that he’s never lived through. He can’t explain it and he can’t undo it. The consequences are his to live with for the rest of his immortal life, and the thought drives him mad.

“Can you make me forget?” he asks one night, sweating through his sheets as Crowley brushes his hair back from his forehead. “I can’t sleep. Aren’t you supposed to forget things that never happened?”

“Hypotheticals are more haunting than anything else,” Crowley says. “Dreams are all our deepest longings dangled in front of us, and nightmares are our worst fears in their most visceral forms. Fuel that flame with memories and it’s the slowest and most painful death one can possibly experience.”

Warlock is fifteen. He knows all of this already. He clasps his hand around Crowley’s over the covers and closes his eyes. “Happy endings aren’t that simple, are they?”

“Life doesn’t have happy endings, my dear, only happy boats in a sea of general disappointment,” Crowley says. “The best lives belong to those who figure out how to turn the disappointment into the boats.”

Warlock’s mother is like that sometimes. He says maddening things that turn out to be unfailingly wise. Warlock can’t shake the fear of losing him. Every night he falls asleep could lead to a morning he wakes up in that other world. It’s not enough that he unravelled the tapestry of fate; he needs its strings to be burned and blown away.

“Can you make me forget?” Warlock asks again. “Please, Mum. I need it gone.”

Crowley leans forward onto the bed, kissing Warlock’s hand. “Do you think it will make this easier?” he whispers. “You’ll still worry about me, Warlock, that’s the nature of love.”

“But I won’t be so sad,” Warlock says, “because I’ll never have known what it was like to live without you.”

“Of course you’ll be sad, Warlock; the memories aren’t why you’re sad,” Crowley says. “Come on, shove over—” He wiggles his way onto the bed and curls around his child. “Warlock, my dear—You’re sad because you feel different from everybody else, which means you feel like nobody understands you, which means you feel alone pretty much all of the time, and nobody likes feeling alone.”

“How do I feel less alone, then?”

“Hmm, you don’t.” Crowley kisses his head. “But eventually you stop being alone, and that makes a fair bit of difference, I think.”

Warlock sighs. “I just don’t want to be sad, anymore.”

Crowley puts his hand on Warlock’s cheek, turning his head. He kisses the same spot he did all those years ago in the Bentley, when he promised them his love. Very suddenly, Warlock can’t remember what they were talking about, or why he was ever so terrified of such silly dreams.

“Do you feel better?” Crowley asks. “Are you still sad?”

“Yes,” Warlock says, though he feels emptier, too. “And yes. Did you do something?”

“No,” Crowley says. “Do you remember your eleventh birthday party?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me about it.”

“You were there.”

“Tell me about it anyway,” Crowley says.

“We stayed in the whole day,” Warlock says. “Momma proposed to you and you fainted.”

Crowley growls. “I didn’t faint, but go on.”

“A dog came,” Warlock says. “Adam sent it away, even though it made him sad, because the dog didn’t like me. A butterfly sat on Muriel’s nose and she killed it when she sneezed.”

“Was there a magic show?” Crowley asks. “With a rabbit in a hat?”

“No,” Warlock says. It doesn’t ring the smallest bell. “Why?”

“No reason.” Crowley grunts as he pushes himself upright and off the bed, sauntering off towards the door. “Sleep well, my sweet.”

Warlock chases him out into the hall. “Can we fly?” he asks, suddenly not tired at all. In fact he feels rather manic. “Mum, I wanna fly.”

“It’s the middle of the night, poppet—”

“Please.” Warlock grasps Crowley’s hands. “Please. I wanna see the stars.”

Crowley is helpless to him, the two of them leaping off the ledge of the hallway window. Warlock laughs as they hit the clouds, lights shooting by.

Crowley watches him, snake eyes glittering in the moonlight. “Of all the stars in all the cosmos,” he whispers, cupping Warlock’s face in his hands, “you were the only one that ever mattered.”

The wishing star twinkles.

Warlock closes his eyes.

Warlock turns sixteen at 12:07 a.m.. He has wonderful dreams.

I spent a long time watering a plant made out of plastic,

And I cursed the ground for growing green.

I spent a long time substituting honest with sarcastic,

And I cursed my tongue for being mean.

Weightless, breathless restitute, motionless and absolute!

He cut me open, sucked the poison from an aging wound…

— Halsey