The Gospel of Crowley

by gutterandthestars

Summary:

Crowley tempts Jesus in the wilderness! Turns out Jesus gives as good as he gets.

Also Crowley pines over Aziraphale and has Big Gay Angsty Feelings because, well. Because Crowley.

Jesus ships it...

The author works out her ex-churchy feelings, but mostly this is Crowley getting maudlin, protective and lovesick over Aziraphale.

Chapter 1: Base Jumping With Angels

“Go onnnnn, do it!” tempts Crowley, leaning into his companion’s ear and shouting to be heard over the wind. “You want to, I can tell. I’ve seen how you are with your friends. You’re a cheeky shit, I know the type. You’d love it.”

Crowley pulls back to peer at the face of the man sitting at his side. His name is Yeshua Ben-Joseph, or Jesus in the heathen Greek, formerly of Nazareth, lately of Capernaum, currently forty days into a gruelling ritual fast, and as of right now, enjoying the benefits of demonic teleportation and the wind in his hair. 

They’re on the highest wall of the Great Temple of Jerusalem - Mk. Two - both of them perched high above the city’s bustling streets, ankles swinging in the breeze. There’s a distinct twinkle in this Jesus fellow’s eyes as he meets Crowley’s gaze, utterly unflustered. Crowley tips his head, and narrows his eyes further. 

“There, look,” says Crowley, pointing, triumphant. “I can see the corner of your mouth all twitchy, yes, that corner, just like that.” 

Crowley pokes it with his pinkie finger. His companion’s lips do indeed twitch and his eyes still have that dark glitter of amusement, despite the unhealthy bags underneath them. “Don’t deny it,” Crowley accuses him, with a jerk of his chin towards the chaos of humanity going about their lives below. “You’d love to see that lot down there all slack-jawed and gawping.”

“You’d think so, but I really wouldn’t,” Jesus says, grinning and leaning back on his hands. He kicks his heels, more relaxed than Crowley would credit to most humans.

“No?” asks Crowley, reconsidering. “No, okay, you’re probably going to get more than your fair quota of that soon enough, what with one thing and another. Still, think about it. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, just for a moment, to be seen for who you really are.” 

Jesus blinks. That seems to strike a chord and Crowley knows, he knows , what that sore little patch of resentment feels like. It’s hard to be a thinking being in an unfair world. Particularly hard to be one that never really quite fit in with any of the other thinking beings in their circles - be those circles the traditional concentric architecture of hell or the more human socially constructed ones. 

Sensing he’s encountered an opportunity as well as a nerve, Crowley decides it’s time to push. He busts out one of his best conversational tactics, questions. 

“You’ll be fine, won’t you? If you’re right about all,” Crowley flaps one hand up and down, “this. You’ll float down like a feather, or land on a big cushion or something. Your lot have that written down somewhere,” he says, nonchalantly, or the best he can approximate while having to raise his voice to be heard over the whistling wind. “What is it, that verse? Very musical, stirs the blood, or it would if I had blood. Do I have blood? Dunno, never checked.” Crowley notices he’s gotten distracted and brings himself back to the very serious, Hell-Appointed, matter at hand. He shakes himself  “Anyway. How’s it go? Oh yeah...” 

Crowley takes a deep breath and launches into rousing song, clutching his linked hands to his chest.

“He’ll point you out to all his angels,

    and they’ll rush to lift you up in their hands,

    so that you won’t strike your foot against a single stone...

                  Or go shplat, splurt, crunch, all over the ground.”

“Poetry, I thought,” Crowley concludes, waggling his eyebrows at the man beside him, who’s openly laughing now. “I may have added that last bit,” he admits.

“It’s also written,” says his companion, a little hoarsely, leaning in and bumping his shoulder against Crowley’s, “that one ought not put the Lord your God to the test.” His wide eyes, too-innocent-to-be-really-innocent, meet Crowley’s, all but batting his eyelashes. The cheeky git.

“Pah, not my Lord, but yeah, probably for the best,” shrugs Crowley. “‘Course it all sounds considerably more likely if you don’t know any angels personally. Pompous bastards, angels, in the main. Let’s be real, wouldn’t lift a finger, let alone their hands. You’d fall right past while they were busy preening their feathers and there you’d be, flat as a Passover loaf, right there on the pavement. Job done. They’re pieces of work, your basic angel.”

“What, all of them?” asks Jesus, brightly, too knowing. 

Crowley gives him a suspicious look.

“Weeellll. Most of them. Nearly all of them. All but one of them really,” says Crowley, damning his already damned mouth for betraying him.

“Oh? Is this an angel you, oh how’d you put it? ‘ Know personally ’? Do tell,” says Jesus, grinning from ear to ear. Crowley scowls and tucks his scarf more securely over his shoulder. This breeze is mussing up his outfit.

“You shut up, this isn’t about me,” scolds Crowley. “We were talking about you getting a bit of solid proof of all this Son of Man business. Go on, jump. Either you’re right, and you get the rush of  your life, or you’re wrong and you get the rush of your life followed by a swift and merciful end as you pop off this mortal coil.”

“This is a test, isn’t it?” asks Jesus. He lifts himself up on his hands, bottom sitting on clear air, rocking himself back and forth as if thinking about it. 

Everything about his entire demeanour suggest he’s yanking Crowley’s latrine sponge good and hard. 

Crowley was right, this man is the biggest shit he’s had the pleasure of dealing with. Aziraphale doesn’t seem to mind stringing Crowley along a bit, professionally speaking, over the years, but the angel is not nearly as secure in himself around Crowley as this man is. Jesus is still feinting towards the edge of the drop. He’s even making little ‘oooo’ noises as he does it. 

Crowley makes his own noise best described as exasperated and throws his hands in the air, glancing downwards as a human might glance upwards, a universal gesture of ‘what’re you gonna do?’

“Yes, fine, you got me. The supernatural entity who’s transported you from your nice, comfy, utterly barren desert to this conveniently tempting lookout point has an ulterior motive. Cue gasps of surprise, what a shocker. So it’s a no then?”

“It’s a no, Crowley. Sorry. Not that tempting, I’m afraid. Is this all you’ve got?”

“What? Of course not!” blusters Crowley, affronted. He knows he’s showing his hand but it’s just too high stakes, this one. A direct order from Head Office, Satan Himself appearing in the body of a feral dog to deliver his instructions and the obligatory threats of eternal torment should Crowley in any way fuck up. That poor animal, it was enough to put the fear of Hell into anyone. 

Crowley rushes to justify himself. “Nah,” he says to Jesus, making a dismissive gesture. “This is just the warm up. You haven’t even seen the temptation I’m capable of, you’d better gird your loins ‘cause this is about to get personal.”

“Oooh, promises,” says Jesus, camp as what will eventually be celebrated as Christmas. “Where to next?” he asks. Crowley gives him a once over, taking in the gaunt cheeks and the shake in his hands and wrists from even the small exertion of strength Crowley’s just witnessed.

Crowley cocks his elbow in invitation. 

“Ehhh, you’re looking a bit peaky, to be honest. You must be hungry. It’s been, what, forty days? Ridiculous. Let me tempt you to a bite to eat.”

Jesus loops his narrow hand through the gap and clutches Crowley’s sleeve. “Do your worst, demon,” he says, with a fond smile.

“Right then,” says Crowley, and snaps his fingers.

The top of the wall is suddenly empty, and the wind - well known to blow where it will and having more space to work with than it did a second ago - rushes into the void with a pop.

Chapter 2: Desert Interlude

Summary:

Crowley plans his next move, only to impale his foot on a thorn. Dramatic flailing ensues.

They reappear in the desert on the far side of the Jordan. Jesus stumbles and Crowley plants his own feet to compensate, hauling him onto a comfy looking rock. 

Crowley hasn’t actually spent a lot of time with Jesus, the latest pawn in the plan of Her Upstairs, who this man addresses as good ol’ dad. 

Papa. 

Pops. 

From what Crowley’s managed to glean, he’s found a lot to relate to in this odd little carpenter from the North. Jesus is irreverent, fond of questions and of teasing his friends, sick to the back teeth of the relentless unfairness of life and - underneath - deeply sad with it. He’s young, not yet thirty, and he’s still got back teeth. Human bodies are so transient, thinks Crowley, particularly without regular access to proper dental hygiene. After whatever all this is plays out, Crowley’s going back to Rome. At least there’s plumbing there and decent booze. 

Anyway, what was he on about? 

Oh, yeah. Sick to the back teeth of how regular people are constantly fucked over by the world. About how the rich get rich, and the poor get poorer, and the ones who get ahead do it by building a ladder from the bones of the people they’ve trampled to get there.

Crowley glances over at him. Jesus is taking a breather, resting on the rock. He’s weak without food - which plays in Crowley’s favour - and Crowley plans his next move. He’s not pacing. He’s strolling. All right, it’s in circles, but it’s sinister strolling, like a panther, very dangerous vibes and he’s doing a very good job of being cool, thank you very much, until he slips out of one sandal and puts his weight down on a branch full of thorns.

“Ow, ow, blast it all, dammit and buggery, fuck that’s sharp,” he screeches. “What is it?” He pokes at his foot, which is bleeding. It feels like it’s gone all the way through, although he can see it hasn’t. Still. Ow, bloody ow. He hops on one leg, clutching his instep with both hands and trying to get a better look.

The tired, hungry man lolling weakly on the rock beside him rolls his eyes. He pushes Crowley onto the flat rock and takes a look. He ‘hmms’ thoughtfully.

“Well, at least now we know you really do have blood,” says Jesus. “I think it should be on the inside though.”

“Har-bloody-har, so funny, I’d heard you were a wit. I see they weren’t wrong,” snarls Crowley, hot and embarrassed, on his back with one leg in the air, fingers laced together behind his raised knee. “Have mercy, isn’t that crap supposed to be another one of your things?”

“Oh hush, be silent, demon,” says Jesus, and moves to take Crowley’s foot in his hands. 

Crowley’s mouth slams shut, but then he has a thought.

“Hang on,” he warns, alarmed, jerking his foot out of reach. “Can you touch blood? You can’t, can you, you’re fasting. Isn’t that bad? Won’t you have to do it all over again? You should back off. You already look half a bowl of porridge away from something Eziekiel would try to prophesy over, who knows what another forty days would do to your silhouette.” 

Crowley draws his foot back further, meaning to pull away, but Jesus snorts. “Good one, Crowley, but you’re missing the point. Why do so many of them miss the point?” he asks, as if to the heavens. “Give me your foot, you idiot.” He makes grabby hands.

Crowley flops backwards and extends his foot for inspection. It’s cradled in calloused fingers that just manage not to tickle as they catch in the hairs there.

“You’re thinking about it aren’t you? Tickling me,” demands Crowley, craning his head up from where he’s lying flat on his back on a rock like the snake he is. “Torture a demon when he’s down, I bet you get points for that.” He flumps back, resigned to his fate.

“You asked me to jump off a building ‘just for a laugh,’ the moral high ground is still mine even if I was remotely interested in keeping it. We should wash this, it’s a mess. There should be water not far away. Stay there, I’ll go fetch some.” The poor man looks about ready to keel over, but he’s about to make a trek to Satan-knows-where just to mop up some fallen angel. The kindness is palpably painful. It can’t be borne.

Crowley snorts and taps the rock with his good heel. Water springs forth, gushing from the face of the rock. 

Jesus puts his hands on his hips and clears his throat. 

Crowley rolls his head round to look him in the eye.

“Very demonic,” says Jesus.

“Weeelll, it’s for me, not for you, isn’t it? Looks good, too, with the tempting. Bet you’ll have to try twice as hard to keep from drinking the stuff if you’re sticking your hands in it.” Crowley tears a hand-width of cloth from the end of his headscarf and passes it over.

“I’m not fasting from water, Crowley,” he says, gentle, with fond exasperation. Funny how Crowley brings that out in people. He takes the proferred scrap of scarf and soaks it in the infernal and miraculous spring. He wrings it out in his hands. His possibly-kind-of-sort-of-divine hands. 

Crowley has an awful thought. He flails his hands in horror.

“Oh, hey, wait, wait, wait a blessed minute. That’s not Holy Water, is it?” yelps Crowley, in a panic.

Jesus looks at the cloth, water dripping from his hands, and catches some of the drops in his palm. He closes his eyes, lifting his face to the sky for a brief moment. He raises his hands as if in supplication.

Then he grins and flicks all ten digits right at Crowley’s face. 

Crowley throws himself backwards, berating himself in terror. How could he have been so stupid, let his guard down, in front of the Enemy’s Most Favoured Son, call yourself a demon of the world, what a moron… He claps his hands to his face and waits for the pain. And waits. Any moment. Surely. A droplet runs down Crowley’s nose, into his palm, down the papery inner skin of his wrist and splashes softly on the dust of the rock.

He utterly fails to melt into his component molecules.

There’s decidedly unholy cackling coming from in front of him.

“Oh for Heav.. for fuck’s sake, I always said you were a bastard,” howls Crowley, huffing and sitting up and rearranging himself to restore what dignity he can until he feels the metaphorical and emotional drop in temperature. 

Then he thinks could stick his whole fist in his mouth, except of course his foot is already there.

“Shoot,” says Crowley, panicked and chargrained, reaching out with spread fingers. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

His companion sighs. “It’s hardly the first time someone’s questioned my parentage, Crowley,” he says with a wry twist to his lips.

“No, no, but I should know better. It’s not like I don’t know who your parents are. Shitty thing to say, anyway, I didn’t think. ‘m sorry. Really.” 

Jesus smiles sadly, takes a deep breath.  “Yeah. Anyway, it’s okay. You say you didn’t mean anything by it. If you say so, I believe it.” He bends back to Crowley’s foot with the cloth.

“No, really, I didn’t fucking mean it,” says Crowley, not really listening.

“I said I believe you, Crowley,” says Jesus. “I trust you.” 

Crowley feels his eyes widen, he’s filled with a shocking deluge of warmth that is very much not okay.

“What?” he fumes, ignoring the fact that a moment ago he was apologising to this man. “How dare you? No. You take that back. I’m a demon, didn’t you hear? I’m evil. I’m not trustworthy, I’m … oooh, ow, oh shit…” 

The pain in Crowley’s foot recedes accompanied by a horribly biological sucking sound.

Jesus waggled the thorn he’s drawn from the soft arch of Crowley’s foot and tosses it away. Distraction accomplished. He wraps the damp cloth around Crowley’s sole and washes it clean. Then he smirks, raises an index finger and as Crowley scowls and flinches in anticipation, runs it down the hyper-ticklish and slightly scaled arch of Crowley’s foot. It doesn’t tickle at all. Crowley feels the pain disappear in its entirely. He grabs his foot back and tucks it up to see. No sign of a mark. 

“There. All better. Should we go for a wander? I think it’s been a good five minutes since you tempted me to anything, and that was a false lead anyway, with the water. What’s next on Hell’s agenda?”

Crowley, for the first time in several decades, blinks. Twice.

“Alright, then,” he says. 

Chapter 3: There Are Starving Children In Samaria Who’d Be Grateful For This

Summary:

“Honour,” spits Jesus with a venom that could make Crowley’s snakey self jealous, “has nothing to do with justice. Honour is what priests demand when they’re concerned poverty is prompting the poor to pursue inquiry rather than obedience.”

The desert is dominated by brown, bare earth and stones strewn over dusty hillocks. There’s some vegetation - scrubby bushes that hoard water jealously, their leaves thick skinned and narrow - but it doesn’t brighten the landscape. Mostly what Crowley’s surrounded by are shades of beige, fading gradually deeper and greyer under the sinking afternoon sun. It’s hot. Crowley’s dessicated tongue swipes the air; he tastes dried sap and dirt and unwashed rabbi.

Jesus is getting a bit wobbly by this point, an unavoidable consequence of not eating for forty days, an observation Crowley intends to exploit. He’s sure he’s getting somewhere with this temptation. If he plays his cards right, he might not only persuade this one human to save their own life but improve the life of every human on the planet. 

Crowley has a plan.

“It’s not about you,” argues Crowley, mid-flow. “If you want to starve yourself, fine, you’re a grown man. It’s not like I care. Probably get a commendation for it - Son of God, withered away under the influence of his own stupidity, well done Crowley. What an evil demon you are. Satan’s so impressed, keep up the bad work.”

Crowley’s Audience of One rolls his eyes and makes a ‘go on, go on’ gesture with a roll of his skinny wrist. 

Crowley’s pacing himself. He’s had four thousand odd years of tempting humans and he knows that you don’t just jump in there yelling at them about all the evil they could be doing and how fun it could all be. No, you work up to it. Get the obvious bits out of the way at the beginning and then move on to the real meat of the thing. He’s laying the groundwork for the real thrust of his argument, and he knows it’s going to be a good one. Well. Bad one. A good-bad one? 

Whatever.

Here’s the thing though: it’s this ambiguity that’s the fulcrum about which Crowley’s going to make his case. A demon on the job has to have pretty decent reasons lined up to persuade mankind into thoroughly bad behaviour, otherwise it’s not temptation at all, it’s just cheering on some arsehole who was going to do terrible things anyway, probably in more intricate and horrific ways than Hell could ever think to suggest. No, to tempt the virtuous you have to present these things carefully. 

Yeshua Bar-Maryam, son of a woman who sang her children to sleep with lullabies all about  justice for the poor and righteous comeuppances for the rich, is not going to be tempted into doing the bidding of Hell for Hell’s sake. But what about the sake of humanity? Jesus is choosing to fast and forgo sustenance, bully for him. Not all who waste away from lack of food have the option.

If only - Crowley will say - if only there was someone who could do something about that.

Admittedly, if this works out, Hell might end up having pointed - and boy do they know pointed - questions for him. Crowley is sure that ‘solved world hunger’ isn’t a Key Performance Indicator that’s going to hold much clout when it comes to his, Crowley’s, centennial reviews, and the betterment of humanity definitely isn’t on Hell’s list of preferred Business Outcomes. But if he succeeds in his wiles and tempts this man away from Heaven’s - or Her - purposes and distracts him into using his power in earnest, he doesn’t really think Hell is going to mind what he uses those powers for . They’re usually more about the general mayhem than the actual specifics.

This, Crowley thinks, is what he’s going to start calling a win-win. Maybe even Aziraphale will thank him. He winces. Best not get his hopes up.

“Consider this,” begins Crowley. “There are people - a lot of them are children - starving, everywhere. All over the world. Think about it! You could make such a difference. You could snap your fingers, like that , and all these rocks would turn to bread, and no-one would need to go hungry ever again.”

The click of Crowley’s middle finger and thumb echo over the empty landscape, bouncing off the bluffs in the distance and echoing in the silence. It’s deafening. Condemning.

Jesus breaks it, eventually. He hums.

“Technically speaking, so could you,” he tells Crowley. “Your demonic powers extend that far, at least.” 

Jesus’ eyes are a little bit pitying and they’re unafraid to meet Crowley’s own serpentine versions, even as the demon’s expectant, encouraging stare gradually falls in disappointment.

“Oh yeah, that’ll go over well with Downstairs,” says the demon. “‘We’re seeing a surprising number of daily miracles, Crowley. What can you possibly doing with them, Crowley? Why are all the humans so much happier, Crowley?’ I’d give it maybe half a century before Dagon cottoned on. They’re not actually one of the stupid ones. With your powers, though, Hell couldn’t touch you. You could really do it!” 

Crowley straddles the nearest rock, so he and Jesus are nearly knee to knee. He sways from side to side, an echo of the snake seeping through his currently-Palestinian exterior.

“How will that actually work out any better?” counters Jesus. “I thought you were clever. The bread will go stale within days. It’ll all turn back to dust and so will I, eventually. I’m mortal. I’m unlikely to make it to even the fifty years you’re expecting. What am I going to do? Click my fingers every morning and provide for the world till the day I die, exhausted and elderly and surrounded by my great-grandchildren, should God allow me such fortune?”

“Does that sound so bad?” asks Crowley, helplessly.

“Crowley, can I make hunger and poverty go away by making bread? Those things run deeper. You’ve been around for the toils and tales of mankind long enough to have seen that.”

“Oh, come on! Surely it’s better than nothing,” pleads Crowley. “People really are starving! Make some loaves!”

“Do you think I don’t grieve all of this?” Jesus asks. “Do you think I don’t see it? Isn’t this happening to my neighbours?”

Crowley puts all his derision into a theatrical snort. “Aren’t they all your neighbours? If you can see all the hunger of the world, aren’t you honour bound to intervene if you can?”

“Honour,” spits Jesus with a venom that could make Crowley’s snakey self jealous, “has nothing to do with justice. Honour is what priests demand when they’re concerned poverty is prompting the poor to pursue inquiry rather than obedience.” 

“What sort of inquiry?” asks Crowley, despite himself. He’s a demon of questions, after all.  “‘How come the priests and Levites eat roast lamb every day when all I and my children have is beans and pottage?’”

“It’s a reasonable question,” says Jesus with slightly less heat but no less sincerity.

“It is,” says Crowley, one finger in the air. “And one that would be irrelevant if you were to enact our ‘stones-to-bread’ plan.”

“It doesn’t solve anything,” says Jesus, looking sadly at Crowley. “It wouldn’t make a difference in the long run.”

Crowley is suddenly incensed. He sweeps one arm towards the horizon.

“How is that any consolation to a mother of five in bloody Caesarea who’s having to hand over so much of her husband’s income to your King Herod’s money-men that she has to fuck Roman soldiers in exhange for bread for her children?” 

“I imagine that it’s no consolation at all,” says Jesus.

“Right! So do something!” Crowley feels his claws lengthen, his incisors grow to points. Crowley’s on his feet now, stalking back and forth, kicking up dust and wearing a groove in the thin desert crust. Jesus is watching him pace from his perch on the rock. “It’s your law that insists on feeding the people who need it, I’m a demon. What do I care if they all waste away or die of some Latin pox while they do all they can to survive? It’s your job to care! Don’t you care?!”

Crowley lunges at this, means to push Jesus back from his smug perch, means to let his hands and fists do something . His claws snag in the folds of Jesus’ tunic as he drags the man to his feet. Jesus’ eyes are sad, but not afraid.

Crowley stops, Jesus’s palm flat to his chest. Neither demon nor man breathes until, possessed of the physical need to do so, Jesus exhales and sags back down to the rock.

“Take a break, Crowley,” he advises, glancing up at the wide eyed, frozen demon. “I’ll be here when you get back.”

“Fine!” yells Crowley, shaking himself off as if to get his limbs moving again. “Fine!”

He storms off. He’s not done, he’s got one more shot at this, but he’s certainly had enough for now. 

This is clearly all that comes of a demon trying for the good thing. Let the idiot stew in what remains of his own stomach acid and starve. Crowley doesn’t care.

Chapter 4: Interlude 2

Night falls, and Crowley sulks. Stars that sang to the thrill of Crowley’s once-angelic hands burn orange and gold in the purple-dark of the sky. After a while it gets too cold for him to really appreciate them.

Crowley shivers in the dark, his arms wrapped around his knees. 

He hears the only other occupant of this patch of desert approach before he sees them; the gentle crunch of stones under leather-shod human feet. Sooner or later the noises, coming ever closer, stop. Crowley can hear the rustle of a cloak and quiet breathing. His face is pressed to his arms; he doesn’t look up till a familiar voice breaks the silence.

“Peace?” asks Jesus. Crowley opens one eye to see the man himself, pale in the starlight, extending a hand to a demon. Ridiculous. Crowley cracks the lids of the other eye and rolls both of them.

“Depends,” snarks Crowley. “Peace like your lot mean it, or Peace like the Romans mean it?”

“Oh, the first one, definitely. I decided early on that ‘my way or you’re breaking rocks to build the highway’ wasn’t going to be my style.”

Crowley laughs.

“Not sure how well that’ll go down, to be honest,” he says. “The other one then. Shalom, wholeness - yeah that sounds like something I’ve got coming to me. Demon, remember? No peace, no satisfaction. No ssssalvation. ‘A good man will obtain favor from the LORD, But He will condemn a man who devises evil.’ Isn’t that right, Rabbi?”

“Demon, remember? You’re not a man, doesn’t count,” says Jesus, and waggles his fingers. 

Crowley concedes the point and lets Jesus grasp his elbow and haul him to his feet. He’s weak, but Crowley was created mostly of sinew and bone and hasn’t eaten in, well, ever, so it cancels out. All of the calories Crowley has consumed on this planet have so far been in liquid form.

“For a demon, you know a lot of scripture,” comments his companion, releasing Crowley to draw his own cloak around himself. The chill of the air in the desert at night really does bite. Crowley suppresses a shiver - his own cloak is pretty flimsy - and tilts his head as if to consider the implied question.

“Weeellll,” he drawls, “Opposition Research, you might call it. Don’t need to know scripture to be good , but to persuade people to be evil you need to know what they think you’re guilting them into. S’kind of my thing: knowledge of good and evil. Don’t know what’s wrong without the rules, do they? No rules, no sin, no temptations, no job security. It’s in my professional interests to know your laws.” 

“Hmm? Oh, I like that,” says Jesus. “If I remember that I’ll pass it on. Thanks, could be useful.”

Crowley gives himself a small mental kick. He probably shouldn’t be saying all this to someone who’s so pivotal to the plans of the Enemy, but the air is frigid. Crowley’s mouth tends to run away without leave of his brain when the temperature dips below that of a warm afternoon. Snakes, cold blood and so forth. He’s feeling sluggish. He staggers a little, and curses again, internally. Smooth, very demonic, he chides himself.

Jesus notices, because of course he bloody does. 

“Oh, Crowley. Are you cold?”

Crowley sneers. “Am I cold? Is that what you shambled your way over here to ask me? It’s the blessed desert in the middle of the night, of course I’m c-c-cold.” 

Oh great, thinks Crowley. Now his teeth are chattering. 

Jesus clicks his tongue like an elderly Jewish aunt, which makes sense since presumably he has plenty of role models. 

“Sit, demon. Honestly. Why am I always surrounded by idiots?”

He also tugs off his outer cloak - he’s got two; at least between Crowley and his infernal mark one of them went into the desert prepared for the daily temperature differentials. He still must be freezing, as he wraps the cloak around Crowley and sits them both down so they’re shoulder to shoulder, Jesus on the left, Crowley on the right.

“I don’t need your help!” says Crowley, leaning into the warm body next to him despite himself.

“It’s not help. ‘If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. In doing this, you will heap coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you’ ,” quotes Jesus. “Also goes for cold and clothes. Pure self interest, plus in theory I get to set your hair on fire.”

“Oh yeah, The Lord: your Dad, your Heavenly Parent, my Mother, She’s just charming, isn’t She,” grumbles Crowley, nestling further down into the cloak he’s clutching about himself. Still, at least burning coals would be warm.

Jesus lets his feet splay out in front of him, making himself comfortable on the sand. “Come on,” he says to Crowley, “you’re doing fine. Tell me something, keep your mind off the chill. How’d you find me?”

“Ohhhhh, I don’t know if I should tell you that,” 

“Classified, is it?” asks Jesus, mildly.

“Nah, ‘s just kind of embarrassing,” says Crowley, averting his eyes. “Before, in the river, with your cousin. I was there.” 

“Oh, you saw us? How’s that embarrassing? Did John’s camel hair shirt ride up? Awkward, that, all the swirling water, hazard of the job...”

“Oh, as if I care what John keeps under his donkey-wreck of a tunic. No, it was because it was an accident. I was just there to stir up some trouble with the crowds, foment some unrest and so forth. The other thing… It wasn’t even on my mind. I’d had instructions to hunt you down since birth, thirty years I spent looking, nothing and then, foom . There you are. Revealed for all to see in front of God, Man and all the supernatural entities in Heaven and Hell.”

“So it was my tunic that rode up?” says Jesus, smirking. Crowley smacks him on the arm.

“You’re such a tool. No. You went under the water and when you came out, She called you Beloved Son. I heard Her. Hard not to really, Holy Proclamation out in the open like that. Like being boxed ‘round the ears by a Tarshish fishwife, I think they’re still ringing and it’s been, what, forty days. Yeah. Beloved Son, how about that. Must be very affirming. Our Mother, acknowledging you publicly, must be quite a thing...” 

Jesus is quiet, listening. Crowley stares up at the stars. It’s been a long time since he felt their substance stream through his fingers. It was beautiful, and he’s still angry because it’s not fair. He didn’t plan to rebel, he just wanted to know things, and by the time he realised what Lucifer and Beelz and sodding Hastur intended it had already gone to pot. He remembers pain, and the agony of separation. He remembers love, unreturned. 

Crowley thinks that if Jesus tries to tell him God still loves him, or that - like Aziraphale - it’s all in some ineffable bloody plan, he’s going to scream. The man beside him is silent though, leaning close up against Crowley’s left hand side, and Crowley’s still huddled in his cloak.

It wasn’t, and still isn’t, fair.

It’s not fair for a lot of people, really, and that gives Crowley his next idea - the logical follow up to their argument over bread.

“Let me show you something,” pleads Crowley.

“It’s dark,” Jesus protests.

“Here, it is,” agrees Crowley, smiling. “But - and you may not know this - the earth is a sphere. Somewhere, it’s morning. Come see.”

Crowley’s incisors glitter in the starlight. He offers his hand. When Jesus reaches to take it, Crowley yanks hard. He catches the scruffy and scrawny man in his arms and he unfurls his wings, deep matte black, like the void before creation. He miracles his muscles warm, the better to act on his latest and final temptation.

“Hold tight,” he advises his passenger, as he crouches down and leaps straight up, letting his broad wings power them up into the night.

Chapter 5: Unlimited Opportunities For Travel

Summary:

...I showed him all the kingdoms of the world...

It’s even colder up here. 

Jesus is clutching Crowley’s neck, plastered to the demon’s front out of the way of the wings that have propelled them this far. Crowley is supporting him around the waist and expending another minor miracle to keep them warm and supplied with air. Below them, the globe revolves in all its spherical majesty, feathered with cloud, glowing blue and gold in the hemisphere known as Daytime as it reflects the rays of the sun.

“Oh, come on!” yells Crowley, as they hang in mid-air smooshed cheek to cheek, staring down at the view. “No human’s ever had a view like this!”

“Are you going to terrify me into Hell, Demon?” Jesus howls over the bass gusts of Crowley’s wing beats. “Because it might be working!”

“Nope!” chirps Crowley, with a manic grin. “We’re going to see some things!” 

Jesus screams as Crowley furls his wings and they both drop through the thermosphere, until Crowley has mercy a mere second later and miracles them back down to the earth’s surface. He brings them to a stop on some dewy grass with a soft thud. He’s enjoyed his little trip to sort-of-space. It’s been a while. 

Jesus is less convinced and wheezes, bent double with his hands on his knees. Crowley feels a little guilty - the man’s already light headed with hunger, he probably doesn’t need to be lightheaded with terror and acceleration as well. 

Crowley goes over and pats him gently on the back. Jesus wobbles upright and scowls.

“What - and I say this with all the import of my authority, Crowley - the fuck?”

“It’s the world. Bigger than you think, isn’t it?” says Crowley, grinning. 

“It’s something alright. We’re standing on that? It’s round! Wait, hang on. Where are we standing?” 

Crowley looks around. He has them perched on a mountain, on a grassy slope overlooking a valley. There’s a village below, and people are making their way into the fields as the early sun burns off the clinging morning mist. Children chase chickens, cows are led out to pasture and the muffled donk-donk of their bells on their necks rises to greet the two tourists on the hill. 

“Uh, China somewhere I think?” he says, running a hand through his long hair. “You know, go east from where you live and keep going. This bit’s ruled by the Han Dynasty. Got an Empire bigger than the Romans and, well. It’s an empire, and you know what the Romans are like. Same but different. This one’s had some trouble recently. Civil war, arguments over succession, then geography decided to take a hand and one of the big rivers here split in two, drowned a lot of people, displaced a lot of farmers. They did the human thing...” Crowley and Jesus share a look.

“...took up arms against the government?” 

“Bingo,” says Crowley, snapping his fingers. “And succeeded, until a few years ago. Called themselves the Red Eyebrow - not my doing, you understand, all their idea. They used paint. Distinguishing mark. Know how the other fellows beat them in the end? They painted their soldiers’ eyebrows red too! Masses of confusion, stabbing, utter farce. Thing is though,” says Crowley, taking a dramatic breath. “Thing is, it’s not just the soldiers - poor buggers - and it’s hardly ever the nobles, that suffer the most is it?”

“Crowley…” starts Jesus, but Crowley ignores him and carries on, gesturing at the bucolic scene below.

“All this squabbling over who rules who, and whose interests are being served and you know who’s interests definitely aren’t in the mix? Kids, usually. Women, often. Poor people, odd people, people whose bits don’t work the way most people think they should. Hurt people. People who,” here he gestured to his eyes, “can’t pass in a crowd. Those people always lose.”

Jesus spreads his arms, palms to the early morning sun, and gives Crowley a Look. 

“Yes, what would a mendicant teacher of dubious parentage and controversial morals, whose parents had to flee the country to save his life before he was two years old, now living in territory occupied by a brutal and unstable oppressor, and who speaks with a regional accent that’s the national laughing stock, possibly know about survival on the margins?” Jesus asks drily, rolling his eyes. 

Crowley squints. He pauses.

“Fair point,” he says, acknowledging this with a nod. He continues, “Anyway. We agreed…” 

“Sure, we ‘agreed’,” says Jesus, cutting in.

“We agreed ,” Crowley repeats, “that none of us could fix the hunger thing without fixing the root of the problem. So you fix the root of the problem. That’s the key, see? With Hell’s power and your compassion you could change everything. You could rule this place with a kind hand. And I don’t mean China. I mean all of it. I’ll take you anywhere you want to go. Show you the Maya and the Mahameghavahana and the Mauretanians and a whole bunch of other civilisations not beginning with M. You can help. You can rule them all. You could make it all fair, finally.”

Crowley pauses for breath. He’s not fond of begging, but he’s willing, for the right cause. 

“You’ll do it anyway, isn’t that the eventual plan? Isn’t that what She has up her sleeve? Just do it in the name of Hell instead of Heaven. I’ve got authorisation to make you live forever, give you all the power you need, even if you don’t get it straight from good old Pops. Work for my boss instead of Gabriel’s boss. You and I both know it’s just names for sides. It doesn’t matter. Have you met Gabriel? He doesn’t give a shit, he’s just in it for the oneupmanship and the status. I’m not pretending Hell cares any more about people than Heaven does. Of course they don’t. Demons are all self serving gits, but so are angels. What matters is that you care. A human, for the humans. Isn’t that you?”

Jesus is looking all sad again and Crowley’s got a sneaking suspicion that it’s pity he’s seeing there, for him, Crowley, and - no - he can’t deal with that. He gestures again, limply, to the valley below.

“You can have it all, just… Come on. Do it for them.”

“They’ll all die eventually, you know. We’ll all die eventually,” says Jesus, with a shake of his head.

“Well… yeah,” says Crowley, who furrows his eyebrows, wrinkles his nose. “You’re not going to solve death . But for a lot of people it will be a much less shitty ride getting there.”

Jesus laughs. Laughs! thinks Crowley.

“Oh, I see what He sees in you…” Jesus chuckles.

“Excuse you, Aziraphale doesn’t see anything in me, thank you, not if he can possibly help it,” says Crowley, offended and yeah, okay, hurt by the insinuation. “And don’t change the subject. I know you’re angry as I am.”

“I’m not going to clap my hands and do away with the responsibilities carried by every human on the planet. I’m not going to take away people’s right to choose. I won’t control them.” 

“Not control! Regulate! ‘s different,” pleads Crowley.

“It’s not my path Crowley. I can’t serve Hell, even for them.”

Crowley feels all the air go out of him, as he deflates like a punctured sheep’s bladder.

“I know. I know, yeah? I just thought… I thought it could be different,” says Crowley in a small voice. Jesus squeezes his shoulder. 

They stand, for a while, looking at the green mountains and the little valleys and the lives of the little rural community below. It’s all a far cry from Galilee, at least in the visual sense. Everything else, probably not so much.

“Take me home?” asks, Jesus eventually.

Crowley nods, and embraces his failed assignment, miracling them back to the desert with a blink. They both gasp at the cold, are blinded by the sudden dark. 

Crowley doesn’t think about the fluidity of pronouns, and who, exactly, Jesus meant when he said ‘He’, until days after all this has passed.

When he finally does, he has to have a bit of a lie down.

Chapter 6: Mission Unsuccessful

Summary:

Crowley gets drunk and maudlin.

“Let there be light,” mutters Crowley, and lo, there is light - a little orange flame balancing on Crowley’s palm. He brushes it off onto a nearby bush, where it burns merrily without doing the plant a lick of damage. The light wavers on their faces as they stare at each other; it feels weirdly intimate to Crowley, surrounded as they are by the darkness.

“I need a drink,” mutters Crowley, and slaps his palm against a handy rock. 

A jug of wine and a couple of cups appear, and Crowley shakes one in Jesus’ direction. Jesus declines, so Crowley banishes the second cup and fills his own. He sniffs it, winces, then knocks it back in one, follows up with a second, treated likewise, then pours another. 

Jesus is watching him from a perch of his own, his sandalled feet dangling an inch or so above the ground. He still looks wan and exhausted, the flickering light of the hellish flame casting the lines on his face in deep shadow. He’s smiling though, looking at Crowley indulgently as Crowley does his best to get as sloshed as demonically possible in the short amount of time available.

“Going to tempt me to sloth now?” he asks, patting the rock next to him. Crowley misses the rock and slumps at Jesus’ feet. He rests his head on the rabbi’s bony knees and closes his eyes.

 “Nah, I’m done. All done. No more temptation for me. ‘m gonna leave you alone now.”

“So what, you get three tries and you’re out of the game? Seems arbitrary,” says Jesus, carding his fingers absently through Crowley’s hair. Crowley trills and cranes his neck into it. He jerks his head from side to side, feeling the tug as his long curls catch on the fingers digging into his scalp. 

“I reckon they’ve made a deal,” he says, meaning Heaven and Hell. “I get first crack, then they send in the angels.”

“Oh, will I get to meet your friend?” Jesus seems to light up at that.

Crowley makes a noise of disgust, or tries to. It’s not his fault it comes out rather pathetic.

“Don’t let him hear you call him that,” wails Crowley, opening his eyes wide and flapping his hands. Wine sloshes on the cold ground; Crowley doesn’t notice. “He’ll run a mile, no - two. And I doubt Aziraphale will get a look-in for this gig. A celebrity like you? Gabriel will want his grubby fingers all over that.”

“Aww, that’s a shame.” He pouts . “I wanted to see what sort of being has stolen your sad, sarcastic, sweet little heart,” says Jesus, patting Crowley’s head to punctuate each patronising little sibilant.

“Fuck you,” snaps Crowley. 

“Not sure your Aziraphale would like that,” sing-songs his antagonist.

“You get his name out of your mouth,” threatens Crowley. The threats are neutered by the fact that Crowley’s hair is still entirely draped over Jesus’s knees.

“Whatever you two have got going on won’t be discovered on account of me. I promise,” soothes Jesus, leaning down to make reassuring eye contact with the panicky demon.

“There’s nothing to discover,” mumbles Crowley.

“Sure, for now. But I believe in you,” he tells Crowley, patting him on the head and being far too perky. Breath he doesn’t need heaves in Crowley’s chest. 

The sky is dark now, even the stars have gone to bed, and it’s maybe a couple of hours until dawn. The two beings - human, and human-shaped - are silent for a bit. Crowley lets his head spin with the effects of the drink; his extremities tingle with a numbing and anxious buzzing that could be alcohol or the results of the emotional evening he’s having.

“You going to get in trouble with your superiors for this?” asks Jesus, after a while. “Failing to recruit me, I mean?”

“Nah,” says Crowley, with a dismissive flutter of his fingers. “Honestly? I think they were expecting me to fail.” 

He’s not quite so sure of that as he makes himself sound; it was all billed as rather important and if Satan decides to take this one personally Crowley may well be in for a minor eternity of having his innards slowly extracted by a cackling and rowdy squabble of imps. He doesn’t think so though. He’s their established agent on Earth and since Jesus is apparently intent in doing his Divine Parent’s will, Hell will need someone around to dog his steps and keep the demonic intel coming. That’ll be Crowley. He certainly can’t imagine Ligur or Hastur pulling something like that off with any finesse. Satan likes Crowley’s finesse.

“So now I have to play host to angels?” asks Jesus. “What’s that going to look like?”

Crowley’s grimace takes over his entire face.

“Ugh,” he groans. “Angels. I hate them. They’re so… smug. Stuck up, self-glorifying feather dusters.” He sits up and hitches around to face Jesus, tucking his legs under him, lotus style, the better to gesticulate dismissively. “Each angelic meeting’s like a circle-jerk of platitudes, this ever decreasing spiral of corporate wank masquerading as wisdom. It’s like when Her Upstairs made them She forgot to put in the bit of the brain dedicated to taste. And all they do is hang around with each other, so how’re they ever going to learn how utterly out of touch they are with, you know, all this? ” He describes a wide circle in the air above his head with the palms of his hands, indicating the world in all its roundness.

“Crowley!” Jesus teases, mock appalled, “Are you a snob?”

“It’s not about the aesthetics!” denies Crowley, then immediately concedes the point. “Well, okay, it is, a bit; no one ever created anything interesting by aiming predominantly for mass appeal, but mostly I mean they’re all pricks. Don’t care about a thing except scoring points for the home team. ‘Human suffering’s great, makes us look good when we swoop in and intervene’ , sort of thing. As if there wasn’t already enough pain on Earth to go around. Bas… uh. Basket cases. Utterly bonkers. You’ve got more compassion in an eyelash than the entire Heavenly Host combined.”

Jesus is watching him carefully. “Except for one,” he says. “You like that one.”

“Oh sssshut up,” says Crowley, without heat. “He’s as bad as the rest of them, half the time. Just not so mind-obliteratingly stupid. The other half of the time… Well, he’s been around on Earth a while. Shouldn’t be surprised if he picks something up, should we?” 

“No indeed,” says Jesus, smiling.

Crowley stands, dusting off his robes and rearranging his scarf over his tangled hair.  “Anyway,” he says, “it’s been a real treat, honestly it has, but I should hurry off, they’ll be on their way to collect you and I don’t want them to catch me here.”

“Got any advice before you go, demon?” asks Jesus, standing up to join him.

“What, about the Archangels?” 

Jesus shrugs. Crowley considers it.

“Okay. Well. If you’re going to make a stupid joke, don’t let Sandalphon think you’re serious, he’s very literal and he’s a bit trigger happy with the old smiting.”

“Okay,” says Jesus, nodding.

“And Uriel, best not kid around with her either, Uriel’s a company gal, wing tip to wing tip. No imagination, no interest in anything beyond Heaven’s Glorious Cause. No sense of humour at all.”

“Uriel, right.”

“Gabriel’s just a tool,” says Crowley, earnestly. “You can handle him easy, just don’t get between him and his own ego, lost cause that one. Just… Watch yourself, okay?”

“Sounds like I’d be happier with Aziraphale,” says Jesus with the tiniest teasing little smile. Crowley rolls his eyes.

“He’d certainly be better at food. Goodness knows what that lot will conjure up. I prefer the alcohol, myself. You ever want a recommendation for a good vintage, look me up.” 

That reminds him. He wills the alcohol out of his system, hating the furry feel it leaves on his tongue. Now sober, he shuffles his feet and looks down at the pebbles underfoot. Goodbyes are always awkward.

Crowley finds his shoulders grasped by bony fingers and before he can move, a bristly beard is brushing his face and chapped lips press a kiss to his own smooth cheek. He looks up into bright, smiling eyes.

“You’ll be kind enough to pass that on to your angel for me, will you?” he asks, squeezing Crowley’s biceps.

“Not bloody likely,” says Crowley, with a sniff, and blinks for the third time in a decade. Then he clings a little bit. He is absolutely not going to cry.

“Get going then,” said Jesus, taking a step back. “It’s been a pleasure, Crowley. I’ll be fine, I’m hardly going to be star-struck. They’re only angels. ‘Worship the Lord and Him only’ , as the ol’ text says. Besides, you showed me the world. Anything they bring will be a let down after that.”

Crowley smiles despite himself, and looks over his own shoulder towards the direction of the river, before turning back to the man in front of him. He vanishes the flame in the bush with a thought and takes a few steps backwards, his allotted opportunity over.

“I’ll be back you know,” he yells from the dark. “I’m not giving up. Just biding my time, seeking my moment. I’ll find an opening, you wait. You’ll see me when you least expect it. I’ll flounce in, all fancy and you’ll be all, ‘Crowley, you were right, people are idiots, let’s fix it all, yada yada’ . You’ll see.”

“Can’t wait!” Jesus shouts. 

Crowley, feeling weirdly hollow, goes.

Chapter 7: Angelic Epilogue

Summary:

...and angels came and attended to him...

Crowley swaggers off until he judges himself out of sight, then stops posturing and starts to make his way in earnest through the wilderness to civilisation. He’s hurrying under the cover of darkness until four flashes of blinding white light illuminate the desert from behind him. Curious, he circles back silently. The air smells sharply of ozone; Crowley’s nose itches.

He ducks behind a rock, curious - spying, gathering research against the Enemy, he tells himself - switches to snake form and slithers in closely to listen. No-one said not to listen. This is fine.

A strident, cock-sure voice cuts the air.

“So!” it blares. “You passed the tests, then! Demons, very stupid creatures. Beings of ultimate depravity - also, don’t you notice the stink?” Oh, Gabriel , thinks Crowley. Never change.

“Oooh, yes,” says a quavering tenor whine, “there’s a real whiff of evil about the place. Nasty things. Smelly.” Sandalphon, decides Crowley. What a twat.

“Let me take care of that for you,” says a polite voice Crowley recognises as belonging to Uriel. Peering out from behind his rock, Crowley sees them waving one glittering hand and miracling the surrounding rocks with fat, white candles. Crowley tastes the air and gags. The candles smell of what - in around two thousand years time - he will eventually recognise as eau-de-car-air-freshener. 

Then: “This is Aziraphale, our man on the ground as it were,” says Gabriel, and Crowley nearly swallows his forked tongue. 

Sure enough, Aziraphale is right there, winding his fingers together nervously and fiddling with his robe. He looks worried but, as always in Crowley’s eyes, radiant. In the company of other angels in particular, Aziraphale is luminous by comparison. Crowley inches his way closer, wriggling on his belly in the dust. When he hears what Gabriel says next, he freezes.

“Oh, hey, that demon’s not still hanging around is he? Wouldn’t want him troubling you after this nightmare evening, ahahaha.”

Crowley sees Aziraphale blanch and scan the landscape nervously. Crowley shuffles a little lower into the dirt.

Jesus glances over, and there’s no way he can see Crowley at this distance, even without the blinding effect of standing in a pool of candle light. Crowley knows he’s hidden in these shadows, but Jesus looks right at him all the same.

“No, there’s nothing evil here,” says Jesus to Gabriel. “All I sense is love.” Then glances back towards Crowley’s hiding place, widens his eyes and smirks, the blessed carpentry tool .

Crowley bites down on the urge to hiss. Aziraphale, standing a little apart from his three colleagues, sags almost imperceptibly. Crowley watches him shake his head as if to clear it, straighten up and step forward alongside Gabriel and the others.

“Well, we are angels,” Gabriel is saying with a typically bland smile, “it’s in the job description. Now, Aziraphale, what is it we have brought the Son of Man to consume?”

Aziraphale visibly collects himself and rubs his hands together, reaching into some pocket dimension to miracle up a tray.

“Well, I brought bread, of course,” he enthuses, beaming. Crowley’s attention is rapt, as ever. “I bought it from a charming woman on the streets of Bethlehem, she does make it so well...” 

Gabriel rolls his eyes and makes a ‘get on with it’ gesture, and Crowley - who had been about to think much the same thing, albeit with considerably more fondness - immediately hopes Aziraphale describes each and every item of food in minute detail so Crowley can listen to every moment of it. He gets at least part of his wish, as Aziraphale lets his annoyance show for the briefest of instants before turning back to Jesus and continuing. 

“Here’s olive oil, for dipping. I thought you’d appreciate some figs, but I would go easy with those, you know. Breaking a fast can be a dicey process so, yes, well. Apples and honey, almonds and raisins. Nothing too rich, don’t go overdoing it,” he advises Jesus, placing the tray on a wooden bench he’s miracled up for the man to sit on. 

Crowley’s feeling embarrassingly warm listening to this profound eagerness. He doesn’t eat, but he knows Aziraphale is in the habit, and it sounds a lot like the angel has thought about this meal with great care. Gabriel immediately ruins the moment.

“Yes, yes, thank you, that’s enough,” says the Archangel, with palpable condescension. “You’re quite the food expert, I think we all can tell. Now run along, Aziraphale, we’ll take it from here.”

The whole of Aziraphale’s face falls.

Crowley writhes in his scales, utterly incensed. One day he’s going to do something terrible to Gabriel and, dammit, he’s going to enjoy it. He’s mollified slightly by his observation that Jesus looks like he’s trying not to curl his lip in disgust at the Archangel’s words.

Aziraphale looks devastated; his eyes are enormous and sad, but he bows his head in farewell, smiles tightly, says to Jesus, “With your permission,” and turns away. Crowley’s fallen heart feels even more stomped on than usual.

Jesus, though, steps up before Aziraphale can leave and clasps Aziraphale’s hands.

“Aziraphale,” he says, warmly. “Thank you. Go in peace and may God bless you.” He smiles, eyes twinkling at Aziraphale, and Crowley doesn’t quite know what to do with everything that’s going on right now. He isn’t breathing, that’s for sure.

Aziraphale seems flustered. “Oh,” he protests, “I don’t think Her blessings are for me, just for me to distribute , as it were.” Behind Jesus, Gabriel is rolling his eyes, Uriel’s lips are pursed and Sandalphon just looks scornful. Aziraphale notices, and literally flaps in panic - his hands, not his wings - “No,” he says, “I didn’t mean to…”

Jesus - and Crowley wants to both hug him and murder him - smiles and says, “I think, Aziraphale, there are a lot of things that are meant for you that you haven’t yet accepted. I hope you do, one day. Be brave, angel.”

Aziraphale’s eyes leap to meet Jesus’s - thrice-damned, thinks Crowley - face. Jesus beams.

“I’m so glad I met you,” Jesus says. “Go, I hope we meet again.” 

“Thank you. I… um, I hope so, too,” says Aziraphale and all but scarpers into the night. Crowley ducks in case he’s in the path of the fleeing angel’s old-fashioned footwear, but Aziraphale passes his hiding place with yards to spare.

“Now he’s gone, you can tell us all about it,” oozes Gabriel, presumably attempting to be what passes for solicitous in his rat-trap of a mind.

Crowley decides he’s heard enough and that it’s time to get the hell out of there. He slithers away across the dry plain until he’s far enough away to change back. By then, the dawn is breaking in the east, but it’s still isolated enough that Crowley judges it safe to spread his wings and fly the rest of the way. 

He feels vulnerable and peculiarly empty. What he needs, he decides, is cold air and acceleration, the feel of the wind in his feathers. He needs space and a good stretch in his own shape. And then he needs another drink and to sleep for a month, at least. He’s going to get on with that.

As he rises with the dawn, Crowley angles himself towards his current lodgings and soars upwards in the morning light. The wilderness and the world spread out below him, still home to hunger and injustice, war, sickness and, inevitably, death. It’s home to humans, in all their complicated glory and corruption; it’s home to Crowley; it’s home, somewhere, to Aziraphale; and maybe, somehow, also, to hope.

 

THE END

Notes:

Oh, I'm so pleased at how this turned out. I could write about these characters all day. Let me know if you enjoyed it!

==========

There are three mentions in the canonical gospels to Jesus being tempted in the desert.

Mark’s version - true to form - is the shortest. It reads “...he was tempted by Satan for 40 days. He was there with the wild animals, and the angels took care of him,” (Mark 1:13). Okay, it’s something to work with, but like, details Mark. Please.

Of the other two (Matthew and Luke) the order of the three temptations varies.

Matthew 4:1-11 has Satan - who’s presumably delegated to Crowley as usual - encourage Jesus to turn stones into bread and break his fast. Next, Jesus is told to jump off the highest wall of the temple in Jerusalem and let angels catch him, as if to prove he’s 'the Son of God'. Finally Jesus gets taken up to a high mountain and shown the kingdoms of the world - ‘all this I will give you, if you bow down and worship me.’

Luke 4:1-13 has Stones-To-Bread, Kingdoms-Of-World, Base-Jumping-WIth-Angels.

I’ve switched it up so the funny one’s first, because asking someone to jump from a high building just for shits and giggles? 100% Crowley.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of First Century Feelings