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Because I did a GO fic, and then I did a SPN fic, and suddenly it just seems to make sense to do the crossover. *shrugs*
Title: Arrangements
Rating: PG
Fandoms: Good Omens, Supernatural
Continuity: Well post-book for GO, somewhere post 5x10 for SPN
Characters/Pairings: Dean, Cas, Sam, Aziraphale, Crowley. Hints of A/C, and Dean/Cas, while Sam's just sort of looking askance at everyone
Summary: Team Free Will meets everyone's favourite angel and demon. Free will, Falling and the nature of certain arrangements are discussed
Wordcount: 3789
Disclaimer: Kripke, Pratchett and Gaiman own. Also, possibly, God. Not me, anyway.
A/N: It seemed to make sense at the time? Also, I can't quite remember what happened to the flaming sword at the end of the book, but for the sake of argument, Aziraphale got it back in time for this fic, okay?
Part of this is because the angel doing his damnedest to stare Cas down is wearing what looks for all the world like a tartan suit. Part of it is that the demon in question (and yeah, it's kinda weird seeing Crowley again, especially since he's gone golden-eyed in the interim) is currently all but pissing himself laughing. Part of it is the sheer weirdness of the situation.
But mostly? It's the bristling, determined, hurt-my-demon/humans[insert whichever appropriate here]-and-I-will-end-you vibe they have going. Cas on one side, all intense, vibrant stare and scrappy determination, and this Aziraphale dude on the other, all plump immovability and righteous fury. The holy tax accountant and the British professor in the stare-down to end all stare-downs, single-mindedly determined not to move.
Crowley is really starting to wheeze alarmingly, he can't help but notice. Not that he blames the guy.
"Ah, Cas?" he tries, trying to force his face to straighten and at least look serious. Not very successfully, if Sam's muffled snort is anything to go by. "Cas, I'm sure if we, you know, asked nice or something ..."
"Be quiet, Dean," Castiel commands, not even blinking. Aziraphale narrows his eyes at him. Dean can feel the snickers bubbling up insistently, and clamps his teeth around them.
"Angel," Crowley breathes, straightening a bit to weigh in from his side. "Angel, I think ..." He coughs, holding his side against the tremors. "I think ..."
"Hush, dearest," Aziraphale murmurs, almost absently, waving the hand not holding the flaming sword at him. Crowley stuffs a desperate fist in his mouth in response, which makes Cas frown and Dean press fingers to his own mouth hurriedly. Sam appears to be trying to fold up his entire sasquatch bulk into a ball, and shaking slightly.
"You are not on Lucifer's side," Cas says at last, glaring at the other angel, who sniffs in affront.
"I should think not!" Aziraphale huffs. "And you, I do hope you're not answering to that puffed up little fundamentalist, Zachariah?" His nose wrinkles. "He's an odious little creature, you know."
Sam makes a strained wheezing noise.
"I do not," Cas growls. "He has tried to kill Sam and Dean too many times." And yeah, that's sort of sobering, that, and kinda warming too.
"And you," Dean murmurs, because it's important. It's pretty damn important. "He killed you too, Cas." And Sam has straightened beside him, and even Crowley seems to have sobered a bit, but it's Aziraphale that stuns them at that. The other angel goes stiff and startled, then something like liquid fury filters across mild features, before a deep, pained compassion floods them and a number of things happen in very quick succession.
Aziraphale drops the sword and reaches out with a pained "Oh, my dear!" for Castiel.
Castiel flinches in something like shock, and the angel-killing blade jumps in his hand.
Sam and Dean are already moving forward, trying to get between the angels before someone does something stupid, though Dean's not entirely sure which one he's expecting to do it.
And Crowley, in a freakishly fast and entirely too serpentine move, has inserted himself between them, one hand catching and turning Castiel's knife-hand away from his back, the other arm wrapping around Aziraphale's waist and physically hauling him back through the turning of Crowley's body. The demon is somewhere between grinning and swearing, his knuckles white around Cas' wrist, and his suddenly golden eyes glaring full into Aziraphale's face.
"For Someone's sake, angel! No rushing the paranoid angel with the knife! Are you trying to get yourself killed!" It comes out of him in a stunned, breathless hiss, and Dean realises that Aziraphale had wrapped startled arms around Crowley's chest when the demon grabbed him, and currently seems to be trying to wring the life out of him. It's an oddly amusing image, or would be, if Castiel wasn't still shaking in the demon's grasp.
"Cas!" He and Sam are on either side of their bewildered angel, Sam looming glaring over the demon while Dean tries to turn Cas to face him, to see if he's alright. Cas' head turns, his body imprisoned by the fierce grip around his arm, and he looks at Dean in stunned confusion.
"Dean. I ..." He winces as a tug on his arm causes Crowley's fingers to tighten convulsively, and then Sam's huge hand has landed on the demon's arm, and his brother is making him feel sixteen different kinds of proud while glaring furiously at a demon in his angel's defense.
"Let. Him. Go." Sam rumbles, squeezing a little himself, pulling a pained hiss out of Crowley. Sam bears down, and for a second Dean fancies he can hear the demon's arm actually creak, and then Aziraphale has caught Sam's arm, untangling himself from Crowley enough to glare at the three of them. Four of them. Anyone in range, really, Dean thinks.
"If you could all stop being such children," the tartan angel says, prissily, and Dean can't help snorting at him.
"Angel," Crowley says, faintly. His arms is starting to bend under Sam's grasp. Castiel's is kinda bending along with it. Sam's isn't budging under Aziraphale's, but then the angel hasn't really exerted himself yet. Altogether, they look like some bizarre fraternity in the middle of a very antagonistic handshake, and Dean just can't shake the urge to giggle at them. Not that he'd ever actually giggle. But. You know. Whatever the manly version is.
"Hush, dear," Aziraphale chides gently, and turns to smile at an increasingly flustered Cas. "Castiel. I'm sorry, I didn't think. Crowley's always telling me I need to be a little more cautious." The demon rolls his eyes expressively at that, but the angel is continuing, very kindly and earnestly, and it should look fake, it should look like the fakest fake thing to ever fake fakiness, but it doesn't. Not even to Dean, and he's been paranoid about that kinda thing for a pretty long time. "But I really wouldn't hurt you, so if you could just ... if you could just drop the blade?"
"Ah," Cas answers, frowning. "Yes?" And he drops the angel-killer. Dean's almost sure he sees both Crowley and Aziraphale sag in relief.
"Thank you," the angel whispers, beaming at Cas like he just delivered a baby or something, all wide, expansive pride and gratitude. Cas blinks at him, completely at sea, and just keeps staring in confusion as Crowley pries his fingers away from Cas' arm, and glares at Sam until he gets his own back too.
By mutual unspoken agreement, everyone takes a little step back. Sam and Dean close ranks around Cas, shielding him between them like a pair of bookends while he blinks at them, and Aziraphale folds himself around Crowley, tutting at the white marks pressed into the demon's arm, tracing them with soothing fingertips while Crowley glares at him in embarrassment. Everyone takes a moment to calm down and breathe, and regain a little equilibrium.
Then: "You know, you're pretty chummy, for an angel and a demon." Dean hears himself say, distantly. Sam glares at him, the bitchface he gets when he thinks Dean has been neglecting his brain-to-mouth filter again, but since Dean didn't actually say 'gay', he's gonna count this as a victory, thanks. Besides, all it gets him is one of Aziraphale's weird smiles, and Crowley rolling his eyes again.
"Blame the angel," the demon grouses, trying unsuccessfully to tug his arm free from Aziraphale's ministrations. The angel in question smiles serenely at him, and pinches his wrist.
"Now, dearest. It was you who suggested our little Arrangement in the first place! Hold still, dear, I'm not finished." Dean can feel himself staring. Sam and Cas aren't far behind.
"You have not ... you are not Fallen," Cas says, very quietly, watching as Aziraphale's fingers wipe the blooming bruises from his companion's arm, the other angel's expression soft and concerned and whole. Castiel's, by contrast, is a chest-clenching mix of wistfulness and confusion and soft pain that makes Dean want to wrap the angel to his chest and apologise with everything he has for making Cas choose him in the first place. It hurts, that expression. It really hurts.
Aziraphale looks up at him at that, that depthless compassion and low-banked fury flickering once more through blue eyes, and he shakes his head. "No, my dear. No, I am not." And there is such an aching sympathy in his voice, Dean can feel all three of them, himself, Cas and even Sam, flinching back from it. Aziraphale looks at them, and it's the way Cas had looked at him, that first time, seeing right down to their souls, seeing every scar and wound and black mark inside them, and understanding each one completely, empathising with every last one.
"It's not so bad, you know," Crowley says suddenly, his head tipped sideways, unconsciously angled towards Aziraphale even as he meets Castiel's wounded gaze. "Being Fallen. It's not so bad." He shrugs uncomfortably, waving his freshly healed hand in a vague gesture. "Heaven and Hell, they're just sides, when it comes down to it. Just different suites in the big game of ineffable Solitaire. They don't ... they don't have to mean anything. Not to you. Not if you don't want." Castiel stares at him. They're pretty much all staring at him, and the demon glares back defensively. "What?"
"You're ... you're Fallen?" Sam says at last. "You're an angel?" And Crowley blinks, long and slow, and flushes sheepishly as he remembers what he told them last time. Remembers what he let them think. That he was a demon. A human-soul-warped-by-Hell kinda demon. That he was in this for survival, because angels, even Fallen ones, weren't all that likely to be looking out for demons.
"Er," he says, shrugging and trying an uneasy grin. "Didn't I mention that?"
"No," Dean growls, hand twitching for a weapon at his side. "No, you really didn't." He and Sam bunch closer together around Cas, glaring at him, while the angels stare between them. Then Castiel looks at the demon, and frowns.
"I cannot ... You do not feel like one of the Fallen?" A question, curious, precise. Castiel is doing his curious bird head-tilt thing again. "You are not spoken of in the lists of the Fallen. Crowley is the name of a demon, no more." And, well, yeah. Not really angelic, as a name. But Crowley is grimacing, and shaking his head in exasperation.
"Yeah, well. I didn't want to spend eternity walking around with a name like 'Crawly', did I? Fitting for a serpent, maybe, but hardly dignified, is it?" And he's huffing, tired and annoyed as Aziraphale strokes his arm soothingly, but Cas is still frowning.
"That is not an angelic name either," he says, slowly, working something out. "The serpent ... of Eden? Yes? But he was ... the serpent was not an angel ..."
"He doesn't remember his name," Aziraphale interrupts softly. "Neither of us has ever been able to remember it, not in six thousand years. I don't think he Fell, as such. Not with the Legion. He's just ..." A smile, deep and real and sincere. "He's just Crowley. The angel who sauntered vaguely downwards, and happened to land in a serpent's body at the right time in the right place."
"And proceeded to invent original sin," Crowley chimes in, with just a hint of smugness, and shrugs. "I wouldn't worry about it, you know. Sometimes these things just happen. Ineffable. That stuff."
Dean stares at him. "Sometimes things just happen?" he asks, incredulously, furiously. "What, sometimes angels just Fall, for no reason?" He can't think that. He can't. Because if God is going around just randomly knocking angels down, just tripping people like Cas into the Pit for shits and giggles, there is something seriously screwy with this universe, and he really wants a word with the freaking management!
"Not for no reason," Aziraphale says, gently. "There is always a reason. Always. Even if we can't remember it, or don't understand it. We are each where we are meant to be. We just have to act as we think best, and trust that we are following in His plan."
It's quiet, and reasonable, what he says, and Dean can tell he really believes it, but he can feel Cas shaking slightly beside him, feel the echo of doubt and pain in his angel, feel the remembered horror as he realised that he'd pulled Cas down out of Heaven to die, and all he can feel is fury. "Reason?" he snarls. "What the fuck possible reason could He have for knocking Cas down just for helping us?! Just for trying to stop the Apocalypse that, oh yeah, you guys keep trying to start! What the hell kinda reason is that?"
Aziraphale stares at him for a long minute, at both of them, all three of them, kindly blue eyes moving from face to face as Crowley stands beside him, golden eyes creased into pained understanding. Aziraphale doesn't get it. Dean can see he doesn't get it. But the demon does. Crowley does.
"Maybe it's not like that," the demon says softly, hunching his shoulders uneasily as they all turn to look at him. "Maybe it's not meant as a punishment. I mean, Lucifer, the Legion, yes, but even then ... We Fall when we make choices. When we decide to do something we believe we shouldn't do, and face the consequences." He smiles for a minute, twitches faintly. "That doesn't have to mean those choices are wrong. That doesn't even mean G... God thinks they're wrong, either. Maybe it's just ... we choose to stand on our own two feet, and He ... lets us."
They stare at him. Dean can't seem to think of anything else to do.
"I chose to stop the Apocalypse too," Aziraphale speaks up suddenly. "But I chose ... I believe, have always believed, that our Father never meant for the world to be destroyed. He never meant to hasten the end. When I took up the sword against Lucifer, against the End ... I did it knowing it was my Father's will. I think ... I think that's why I haven't Fallen, and you ..." He smiles, very gently, at Castiel. "You did, Castiel. Not because you went against our Father's will. But because you made the choice for yourself, for your own reasons. Because you expected to Fall for it."
Castiel says nothing. Dean thinks he probably should, just to break the silence, just to lift the weight of it as Aziraphale rests kindly eyes on his angel, and Castiel stares uncertainly back, brow wrinkled in fear and pain and a sort of tentative hope. Dean thinks he should say something. Should call bullshit, something. But he doesn't. He can't.
"Fallen doesn't have to mean evil," Crowley says, softly, at last. "I mean, it can. In some cases, it definitely does. But. It's ... It's choice. You Fell because of one choice. That doesn't mean you have to stop there. You can keep choosing. You know? Choose to stand by the humans, if you want." A faint grin. "They are kind of worth it, after all. Choose to give Heaven and Hell the finger, tell them to bugger off and leave your planet alone. I mean ... He knows everything, doesn't He? All in the plan, ineffable, that shit? Well then. Maybe we were meant to choose what we did, you and I. Maybe we were meant to stand up and flip Heaven the bird. Because, I don't know if you've noticed, but Heaven aren't making the best decisions at the moment."
Sam snorts. "Tell us about it." Dean grins at him, a little, and Crowley gives them a sly, conspiratorial grin.
"Yeah. Zach's gone a little ... fundamentalist, I've heard. Bloody fourteenth century minds, the lot of them. He'd have fit right in with Torquemada and his little bunch, you know." A hiss of something vehement under his breath, that makes Aziraphale's eyebrows shoot up beside him. "But enough of him!"
"Hey, you don't have to tell us twice," Dean drawls, mostly because it's true. And the less they talk about that little sack of angelic shit, the better for his blood-pressure. "Don't even have to tell us once!"
"I'm sure he has his ... I mean, I'm sure there's some redeeming feature in him," Aziraphale protests, unconvincingly.
"There isn't," Castiel speaks up, back in full-on frown again, Dean's own righteous angel of judgement, and he can't help but grin at him for it. Aziraphale frowns at them, but since he's outnumbered, and called Zach 'odious' himself not half an hour earlier, Dean figures he can stuff it. Crowley apparently agrees, elbowing the tartan angel in the ribs, and grinning as Aziraphale flaps at him in disgust.
"Anyway!" he says brightly, shooting Crowley a searing glare that is completely ignored. Huffing, Aziraphale turns back to them, to Cas, really, and that gentle, sincere smile appears again. "Crowley ... well, he's annoying, but I think ... I think he may be right, in this case." He beams at them, coming forward a little to reach out and take Cas' hands between his own. "You may be Fallen, my dear, but I don't think you could ever be anything but angelic." He's all but glowing at them, beaming with faith and trust and love until it almost hurts to look at him, and for a second he's so much more than some frumpy English professor, more than a soldier, almost, maybe, more than an angel. For a moment, Aziraphale looks like he's touching something far too vast and deep to understand, something made entirely of love. "You've made the right choice, Castiel," he murmurs, deep as oceans. "I know you have. And when it comes down to it ... He will know that too. And He will reward you for it. I know He will."
Cas swallows, hard. "I don't ..." he rasps, gravelled and sad. "I don't need ... I just ..." He makes a little noise of frustration, his hands tightening in Aziraphale's. Dean finds himself rubbing at his angel's shoulder, trying instinctively to soothe, and startles a bit when his hand bumps into Sam's, trying to do the same. He meets his brother's eyes, sees the pain in them, the understanding. Yeah. Cas isn't the only one hoping to Hell he's made the right choices. Or hoping that he might from now on, at least.
"You can do this, you know," Crowley says, oddly gentle and trying not to look it, tipping his head uncomfortably to the side even as he leans in around his angel and touches Cas's wrist gently. "It takes some practise, of course, and you're never going to get the jump on me, even if you did have six thousand years to practise in, but ... it has its own rewards, this choice thing." He smiles, smirks, a quicksilver slide of wry amusement. "Ask any human. And hey, since you've picked them first, well, you're sort of already an agent on Earth, and that's my department, me and the angel here, so ..." He rubs the back of his neck uneasily, glaring at them. "Well, we could maybe look out for you. A bit. Sometimes. Maybe. In exchange for the occasional service, and all."
"Dearest!" Aziraphale's all but beaming at him. "You mean ... you want to make him part of our Arrangement?" They're staring at each other, the angel delighted and the demon apparently very uncomfortable, and Cas is looking between them with hope and confusion, and right, nice and all as it might to for Cas to have a bit of back-up, there is something Dean really needs to get straight first.
"Hey, guys?" They turn to look at him, Sam and Cas included, and Sam can tell by his expression what he's going to say, he can see it, he can see his brother panicking, opening his mouth to stop him, but Dean has to ask, because he's not letting his angel enter into any 'arrangement' with these jokers without getting one thing perfectly clear, not after all the touchy-feely shit they've had going for the last hour or so. So he opens his mouth before Sammy can get a word in, and says: "This arrangement, it's not gonna involve ... I mean, you're not gonna ask ... you're not gonna corrupt him, or anything, are you?"
For a second, there's no response. Well, except for Sam rolling his eyes to Heaven and very obviously trying to pretend Dean isn't actually related to him. Aziraphale and Cas are staring at him blankly, obviously having no clue where he's going with this, but Crowley ... oh, that demon knows what he means. He knows exactly what Dean is getting at, and the smirk that crosses his face is like the dictionary definition of smug.
"Oh, I don't know," he purrs, golden eyes gleaming. "I think he and my angel here would look really good together, don't you? And there is a whole world of things we could introduce him to ..."
And Dean's this close, this close, to decking him, when something in his tone apparently rings a bell with Aziraphale, and the angel suddenly squawks and slaps Crowley so hard upside the head that the demon actually falls over. Laughing. The whole time.
"Crowley! You dirty ... you, you demon you! What have you ... how could you ..." He stops, running out of words, and turns to Dean with a growl and red in his cheeks, flapping his hands flusteredly. "It's not like that! We're not ... we don't ... we wouldn't ... It's a business arrangement. We work together. That's all! I would never ... Believe me, I would never let him get his grubby little claws into ... oh, Castiel, no, you don't have to worry ..."
Castiel is staring at him like he's mildly insane, all baffled confusion and innocence, and Crowley is in stitches on the floor, and Sam has buried his face in his hands, and suddenly, yeah, Dean can kinda see how this might be a good thing. Maybe. Just a little. Hell. It's not like things can get any worse. And these guys might be insane, completely and utterly, and 'business arrangement' his cute little ass, but heh. Not like Dean can throw stones, is it? Maybe it could work. Maybe it could.
But he's telling people here and now, looking at Cas' baffled, earnest face. No-one, and he means no-one, is corrupting his angel except him.
Hey. Maybe him and Cas can have an Arrangement of their own?
Contd: Footsoldiers
Title: Arrangements
Rating: PG
Fandoms: Good Omens, Supernatural
Continuity: Well post-book for GO, somewhere post 5x10 for SPN
Characters/Pairings: Dean, Cas, Sam, Aziraphale, Crowley. Hints of A/C, and Dean/Cas, while Sam's just sort of looking askance at everyone
Summary: Team Free Will meets everyone's favourite angel and demon. Free will, Falling and the nature of certain arrangements are discussed
Wordcount: 3789
Disclaimer: Kripke, Pratchett and Gaiman own. Also, possibly, God. Not me, anyway.
A/N: It seemed to make sense at the time? Also, I can't quite remember what happened to the flaming sword at the end of the book, but for the sake of argument, Aziraphale got it back in time for this fic, okay?
Arrangements
The angels are having a Big Mad Staring Contest of Doom. Seriously. Dean would be worried, really worried, what with there being both an angel and a demon to deal with, not to mention the whole flaming sword thing, except that he's too busy being morbidly fascinated to bother.Part of this is because the angel doing his damnedest to stare Cas down is wearing what looks for all the world like a tartan suit. Part of it is that the demon in question (and yeah, it's kinda weird seeing Crowley again, especially since he's gone golden-eyed in the interim) is currently all but pissing himself laughing. Part of it is the sheer weirdness of the situation.
But mostly? It's the bristling, determined, hurt-my-demon/humans[insert whichever appropriate here]-and-I-will-end-you vibe they have going. Cas on one side, all intense, vibrant stare and scrappy determination, and this Aziraphale dude on the other, all plump immovability and righteous fury. The holy tax accountant and the British professor in the stare-down to end all stare-downs, single-mindedly determined not to move.
Crowley is really starting to wheeze alarmingly, he can't help but notice. Not that he blames the guy.
"Ah, Cas?" he tries, trying to force his face to straighten and at least look serious. Not very successfully, if Sam's muffled snort is anything to go by. "Cas, I'm sure if we, you know, asked nice or something ..."
"Be quiet, Dean," Castiel commands, not even blinking. Aziraphale narrows his eyes at him. Dean can feel the snickers bubbling up insistently, and clamps his teeth around them.
"Angel," Crowley breathes, straightening a bit to weigh in from his side. "Angel, I think ..." He coughs, holding his side against the tremors. "I think ..."
"Hush, dearest," Aziraphale murmurs, almost absently, waving the hand not holding the flaming sword at him. Crowley stuffs a desperate fist in his mouth in response, which makes Cas frown and Dean press fingers to his own mouth hurriedly. Sam appears to be trying to fold up his entire sasquatch bulk into a ball, and shaking slightly.
"You are not on Lucifer's side," Cas says at last, glaring at the other angel, who sniffs in affront.
"I should think not!" Aziraphale huffs. "And you, I do hope you're not answering to that puffed up little fundamentalist, Zachariah?" His nose wrinkles. "He's an odious little creature, you know."
Sam makes a strained wheezing noise.
"I do not," Cas growls. "He has tried to kill Sam and Dean too many times." And yeah, that's sort of sobering, that, and kinda warming too.
"And you," Dean murmurs, because it's important. It's pretty damn important. "He killed you too, Cas." And Sam has straightened beside him, and even Crowley seems to have sobered a bit, but it's Aziraphale that stuns them at that. The other angel goes stiff and startled, then something like liquid fury filters across mild features, before a deep, pained compassion floods them and a number of things happen in very quick succession.
Aziraphale drops the sword and reaches out with a pained "Oh, my dear!" for Castiel.
Castiel flinches in something like shock, and the angel-killing blade jumps in his hand.
Sam and Dean are already moving forward, trying to get between the angels before someone does something stupid, though Dean's not entirely sure which one he's expecting to do it.
And Crowley, in a freakishly fast and entirely too serpentine move, has inserted himself between them, one hand catching and turning Castiel's knife-hand away from his back, the other arm wrapping around Aziraphale's waist and physically hauling him back through the turning of Crowley's body. The demon is somewhere between grinning and swearing, his knuckles white around Cas' wrist, and his suddenly golden eyes glaring full into Aziraphale's face.
"For Someone's sake, angel! No rushing the paranoid angel with the knife! Are you trying to get yourself killed!" It comes out of him in a stunned, breathless hiss, and Dean realises that Aziraphale had wrapped startled arms around Crowley's chest when the demon grabbed him, and currently seems to be trying to wring the life out of him. It's an oddly amusing image, or would be, if Castiel wasn't still shaking in the demon's grasp.
"Cas!" He and Sam are on either side of their bewildered angel, Sam looming glaring over the demon while Dean tries to turn Cas to face him, to see if he's alright. Cas' head turns, his body imprisoned by the fierce grip around his arm, and he looks at Dean in stunned confusion.
"Dean. I ..." He winces as a tug on his arm causes Crowley's fingers to tighten convulsively, and then Sam's huge hand has landed on the demon's arm, and his brother is making him feel sixteen different kinds of proud while glaring furiously at a demon in his angel's defense.
"Let. Him. Go." Sam rumbles, squeezing a little himself, pulling a pained hiss out of Crowley. Sam bears down, and for a second Dean fancies he can hear the demon's arm actually creak, and then Aziraphale has caught Sam's arm, untangling himself from Crowley enough to glare at the three of them. Four of them. Anyone in range, really, Dean thinks.
"If you could all stop being such children," the tartan angel says, prissily, and Dean can't help snorting at him.
"Angel," Crowley says, faintly. His arms is starting to bend under Sam's grasp. Castiel's is kinda bending along with it. Sam's isn't budging under Aziraphale's, but then the angel hasn't really exerted himself yet. Altogether, they look like some bizarre fraternity in the middle of a very antagonistic handshake, and Dean just can't shake the urge to giggle at them. Not that he'd ever actually giggle. But. You know. Whatever the manly version is.
"Hush, dear," Aziraphale chides gently, and turns to smile at an increasingly flustered Cas. "Castiel. I'm sorry, I didn't think. Crowley's always telling me I need to be a little more cautious." The demon rolls his eyes expressively at that, but the angel is continuing, very kindly and earnestly, and it should look fake, it should look like the fakest fake thing to ever fake fakiness, but it doesn't. Not even to Dean, and he's been paranoid about that kinda thing for a pretty long time. "But I really wouldn't hurt you, so if you could just ... if you could just drop the blade?"
"Ah," Cas answers, frowning. "Yes?" And he drops the angel-killer. Dean's almost sure he sees both Crowley and Aziraphale sag in relief.
"Thank you," the angel whispers, beaming at Cas like he just delivered a baby or something, all wide, expansive pride and gratitude. Cas blinks at him, completely at sea, and just keeps staring in confusion as Crowley pries his fingers away from Cas' arm, and glares at Sam until he gets his own back too.
By mutual unspoken agreement, everyone takes a little step back. Sam and Dean close ranks around Cas, shielding him between them like a pair of bookends while he blinks at them, and Aziraphale folds himself around Crowley, tutting at the white marks pressed into the demon's arm, tracing them with soothing fingertips while Crowley glares at him in embarrassment. Everyone takes a moment to calm down and breathe, and regain a little equilibrium.
Then: "You know, you're pretty chummy, for an angel and a demon." Dean hears himself say, distantly. Sam glares at him, the bitchface he gets when he thinks Dean has been neglecting his brain-to-mouth filter again, but since Dean didn't actually say 'gay', he's gonna count this as a victory, thanks. Besides, all it gets him is one of Aziraphale's weird smiles, and Crowley rolling his eyes again.
"Blame the angel," the demon grouses, trying unsuccessfully to tug his arm free from Aziraphale's ministrations. The angel in question smiles serenely at him, and pinches his wrist.
"Now, dearest. It was you who suggested our little Arrangement in the first place! Hold still, dear, I'm not finished." Dean can feel himself staring. Sam and Cas aren't far behind.
"You have not ... you are not Fallen," Cas says, very quietly, watching as Aziraphale's fingers wipe the blooming bruises from his companion's arm, the other angel's expression soft and concerned and whole. Castiel's, by contrast, is a chest-clenching mix of wistfulness and confusion and soft pain that makes Dean want to wrap the angel to his chest and apologise with everything he has for making Cas choose him in the first place. It hurts, that expression. It really hurts.
Aziraphale looks up at him at that, that depthless compassion and low-banked fury flickering once more through blue eyes, and he shakes his head. "No, my dear. No, I am not." And there is such an aching sympathy in his voice, Dean can feel all three of them, himself, Cas and even Sam, flinching back from it. Aziraphale looks at them, and it's the way Cas had looked at him, that first time, seeing right down to their souls, seeing every scar and wound and black mark inside them, and understanding each one completely, empathising with every last one.
"It's not so bad, you know," Crowley says suddenly, his head tipped sideways, unconsciously angled towards Aziraphale even as he meets Castiel's wounded gaze. "Being Fallen. It's not so bad." He shrugs uncomfortably, waving his freshly healed hand in a vague gesture. "Heaven and Hell, they're just sides, when it comes down to it. Just different suites in the big game of ineffable Solitaire. They don't ... they don't have to mean anything. Not to you. Not if you don't want." Castiel stares at him. They're pretty much all staring at him, and the demon glares back defensively. "What?"
"You're ... you're Fallen?" Sam says at last. "You're an angel?" And Crowley blinks, long and slow, and flushes sheepishly as he remembers what he told them last time. Remembers what he let them think. That he was a demon. A human-soul-warped-by-Hell kinda demon. That he was in this for survival, because angels, even Fallen ones, weren't all that likely to be looking out for demons.
"Er," he says, shrugging and trying an uneasy grin. "Didn't I mention that?"
"No," Dean growls, hand twitching for a weapon at his side. "No, you really didn't." He and Sam bunch closer together around Cas, glaring at him, while the angels stare between them. Then Castiel looks at the demon, and frowns.
"I cannot ... You do not feel like one of the Fallen?" A question, curious, precise. Castiel is doing his curious bird head-tilt thing again. "You are not spoken of in the lists of the Fallen. Crowley is the name of a demon, no more." And, well, yeah. Not really angelic, as a name. But Crowley is grimacing, and shaking his head in exasperation.
"Yeah, well. I didn't want to spend eternity walking around with a name like 'Crawly', did I? Fitting for a serpent, maybe, but hardly dignified, is it?" And he's huffing, tired and annoyed as Aziraphale strokes his arm soothingly, but Cas is still frowning.
"That is not an angelic name either," he says, slowly, working something out. "The serpent ... of Eden? Yes? But he was ... the serpent was not an angel ..."
"He doesn't remember his name," Aziraphale interrupts softly. "Neither of us has ever been able to remember it, not in six thousand years. I don't think he Fell, as such. Not with the Legion. He's just ..." A smile, deep and real and sincere. "He's just Crowley. The angel who sauntered vaguely downwards, and happened to land in a serpent's body at the right time in the right place."
"And proceeded to invent original sin," Crowley chimes in, with just a hint of smugness, and shrugs. "I wouldn't worry about it, you know. Sometimes these things just happen. Ineffable. That stuff."
Dean stares at him. "Sometimes things just happen?" he asks, incredulously, furiously. "What, sometimes angels just Fall, for no reason?" He can't think that. He can't. Because if God is going around just randomly knocking angels down, just tripping people like Cas into the Pit for shits and giggles, there is something seriously screwy with this universe, and he really wants a word with the freaking management!
"Not for no reason," Aziraphale says, gently. "There is always a reason. Always. Even if we can't remember it, or don't understand it. We are each where we are meant to be. We just have to act as we think best, and trust that we are following in His plan."
It's quiet, and reasonable, what he says, and Dean can tell he really believes it, but he can feel Cas shaking slightly beside him, feel the echo of doubt and pain in his angel, feel the remembered horror as he realised that he'd pulled Cas down out of Heaven to die, and all he can feel is fury. "Reason?" he snarls. "What the fuck possible reason could He have for knocking Cas down just for helping us?! Just for trying to stop the Apocalypse that, oh yeah, you guys keep trying to start! What the hell kinda reason is that?"
Aziraphale stares at him for a long minute, at both of them, all three of them, kindly blue eyes moving from face to face as Crowley stands beside him, golden eyes creased into pained understanding. Aziraphale doesn't get it. Dean can see he doesn't get it. But the demon does. Crowley does.
"Maybe it's not like that," the demon says softly, hunching his shoulders uneasily as they all turn to look at him. "Maybe it's not meant as a punishment. I mean, Lucifer, the Legion, yes, but even then ... We Fall when we make choices. When we decide to do something we believe we shouldn't do, and face the consequences." He smiles for a minute, twitches faintly. "That doesn't have to mean those choices are wrong. That doesn't even mean G... God thinks they're wrong, either. Maybe it's just ... we choose to stand on our own two feet, and He ... lets us."
They stare at him. Dean can't seem to think of anything else to do.
"I chose to stop the Apocalypse too," Aziraphale speaks up suddenly. "But I chose ... I believe, have always believed, that our Father never meant for the world to be destroyed. He never meant to hasten the end. When I took up the sword against Lucifer, against the End ... I did it knowing it was my Father's will. I think ... I think that's why I haven't Fallen, and you ..." He smiles, very gently, at Castiel. "You did, Castiel. Not because you went against our Father's will. But because you made the choice for yourself, for your own reasons. Because you expected to Fall for it."
Castiel says nothing. Dean thinks he probably should, just to break the silence, just to lift the weight of it as Aziraphale rests kindly eyes on his angel, and Castiel stares uncertainly back, brow wrinkled in fear and pain and a sort of tentative hope. Dean thinks he should say something. Should call bullshit, something. But he doesn't. He can't.
"Fallen doesn't have to mean evil," Crowley says, softly, at last. "I mean, it can. In some cases, it definitely does. But. It's ... It's choice. You Fell because of one choice. That doesn't mean you have to stop there. You can keep choosing. You know? Choose to stand by the humans, if you want." A faint grin. "They are kind of worth it, after all. Choose to give Heaven and Hell the finger, tell them to bugger off and leave your planet alone. I mean ... He knows everything, doesn't He? All in the plan, ineffable, that shit? Well then. Maybe we were meant to choose what we did, you and I. Maybe we were meant to stand up and flip Heaven the bird. Because, I don't know if you've noticed, but Heaven aren't making the best decisions at the moment."
Sam snorts. "Tell us about it." Dean grins at him, a little, and Crowley gives them a sly, conspiratorial grin.
"Yeah. Zach's gone a little ... fundamentalist, I've heard. Bloody fourteenth century minds, the lot of them. He'd have fit right in with Torquemada and his little bunch, you know." A hiss of something vehement under his breath, that makes Aziraphale's eyebrows shoot up beside him. "But enough of him!"
"Hey, you don't have to tell us twice," Dean drawls, mostly because it's true. And the less they talk about that little sack of angelic shit, the better for his blood-pressure. "Don't even have to tell us once!"
"I'm sure he has his ... I mean, I'm sure there's some redeeming feature in him," Aziraphale protests, unconvincingly.
"There isn't," Castiel speaks up, back in full-on frown again, Dean's own righteous angel of judgement, and he can't help but grin at him for it. Aziraphale frowns at them, but since he's outnumbered, and called Zach 'odious' himself not half an hour earlier, Dean figures he can stuff it. Crowley apparently agrees, elbowing the tartan angel in the ribs, and grinning as Aziraphale flaps at him in disgust.
"Anyway!" he says brightly, shooting Crowley a searing glare that is completely ignored. Huffing, Aziraphale turns back to them, to Cas, really, and that gentle, sincere smile appears again. "Crowley ... well, he's annoying, but I think ... I think he may be right, in this case." He beams at them, coming forward a little to reach out and take Cas' hands between his own. "You may be Fallen, my dear, but I don't think you could ever be anything but angelic." He's all but glowing at them, beaming with faith and trust and love until it almost hurts to look at him, and for a second he's so much more than some frumpy English professor, more than a soldier, almost, maybe, more than an angel. For a moment, Aziraphale looks like he's touching something far too vast and deep to understand, something made entirely of love. "You've made the right choice, Castiel," he murmurs, deep as oceans. "I know you have. And when it comes down to it ... He will know that too. And He will reward you for it. I know He will."
Cas swallows, hard. "I don't ..." he rasps, gravelled and sad. "I don't need ... I just ..." He makes a little noise of frustration, his hands tightening in Aziraphale's. Dean finds himself rubbing at his angel's shoulder, trying instinctively to soothe, and startles a bit when his hand bumps into Sam's, trying to do the same. He meets his brother's eyes, sees the pain in them, the understanding. Yeah. Cas isn't the only one hoping to Hell he's made the right choices. Or hoping that he might from now on, at least.
"You can do this, you know," Crowley says, oddly gentle and trying not to look it, tipping his head uncomfortably to the side even as he leans in around his angel and touches Cas's wrist gently. "It takes some practise, of course, and you're never going to get the jump on me, even if you did have six thousand years to practise in, but ... it has its own rewards, this choice thing." He smiles, smirks, a quicksilver slide of wry amusement. "Ask any human. And hey, since you've picked them first, well, you're sort of already an agent on Earth, and that's my department, me and the angel here, so ..." He rubs the back of his neck uneasily, glaring at them. "Well, we could maybe look out for you. A bit. Sometimes. Maybe. In exchange for the occasional service, and all."
"Dearest!" Aziraphale's all but beaming at him. "You mean ... you want to make him part of our Arrangement?" They're staring at each other, the angel delighted and the demon apparently very uncomfortable, and Cas is looking between them with hope and confusion, and right, nice and all as it might to for Cas to have a bit of back-up, there is something Dean really needs to get straight first.
"Hey, guys?" They turn to look at him, Sam and Cas included, and Sam can tell by his expression what he's going to say, he can see it, he can see his brother panicking, opening his mouth to stop him, but Dean has to ask, because he's not letting his angel enter into any 'arrangement' with these jokers without getting one thing perfectly clear, not after all the touchy-feely shit they've had going for the last hour or so. So he opens his mouth before Sammy can get a word in, and says: "This arrangement, it's not gonna involve ... I mean, you're not gonna ask ... you're not gonna corrupt him, or anything, are you?"
For a second, there's no response. Well, except for Sam rolling his eyes to Heaven and very obviously trying to pretend Dean isn't actually related to him. Aziraphale and Cas are staring at him blankly, obviously having no clue where he's going with this, but Crowley ... oh, that demon knows what he means. He knows exactly what Dean is getting at, and the smirk that crosses his face is like the dictionary definition of smug.
"Oh, I don't know," he purrs, golden eyes gleaming. "I think he and my angel here would look really good together, don't you? And there is a whole world of things we could introduce him to ..."
And Dean's this close, this close, to decking him, when something in his tone apparently rings a bell with Aziraphale, and the angel suddenly squawks and slaps Crowley so hard upside the head that the demon actually falls over. Laughing. The whole time.
"Crowley! You dirty ... you, you demon you! What have you ... how could you ..." He stops, running out of words, and turns to Dean with a growl and red in his cheeks, flapping his hands flusteredly. "It's not like that! We're not ... we don't ... we wouldn't ... It's a business arrangement. We work together. That's all! I would never ... Believe me, I would never let him get his grubby little claws into ... oh, Castiel, no, you don't have to worry ..."
Castiel is staring at him like he's mildly insane, all baffled confusion and innocence, and Crowley is in stitches on the floor, and Sam has buried his face in his hands, and suddenly, yeah, Dean can kinda see how this might be a good thing. Maybe. Just a little. Hell. It's not like things can get any worse. And these guys might be insane, completely and utterly, and 'business arrangement' his cute little ass, but heh. Not like Dean can throw stones, is it? Maybe it could work. Maybe it could.
But he's telling people here and now, looking at Cas' baffled, earnest face. No-one, and he means no-one, is corrupting his angel except him.
Hey. Maybe him and Cas can have an Arrangement of their own?
Contd: Footsoldiers