#ofeasterngate

in the near year it had been since their last conversation ( if one could call it that ) crowley had spent it in a few different states : angry, so angry he wanted to tear the shelves down in the bookshop and chuck all of the books into the street to be taken, ran over, pissed on, whatever else. he wouldn't have cared ( yes, he would have and so he'd never have actually done it ). horribly sad, depressed one could even say. and a moment or two of self pity and loathing thrown in here and there. but, with no idea of what to say and no way to contact the angel, he stayed in his own lane.

once the mood swings calmed enough that he could look at the ' A.Z. Fell and Co. ' sign without grinding his teeth so hard that he brought tears to his well-hidden eyes, he started mulling on some ideas. ideas just in case aziraphale didn't want to be in heaven running things anymore. alpha centauri had been offered twice now with little success so he struck that off the list. maybe they could visit some day, if the angel ever forgave him. if he ever apologized. but that wasn't what he was thinking of now. no, he was thinking of what gabriel and beelzebub had started. a truce, a stasis of sorts, a 'live and let live' type of motto. it would take a lot of work, which he was loathe to think of having to do anything with any other demon or angel other than his own.

he sat doing all this in his bentley a safe couple of blocks away from the bookshop. nina and maggie would talk of how sweet he was to be keeping an eye on the place while mr. fell was gone. and how right they would be that that was exactly what he was doing. in the seat beside him and crumpled up in the back were pages of furious scribbling, holes ripped through in places where he had crossed something out so vehemently that the paper couldn't stand the force of it anymore. balls of paper were amongst a few bottles of wine and one of liquor. he may have drank excessively in the beginning.

[ 📲 : angel ] oh yeah?

[ 📲 : angel ] any of interest to me?

@ofeasterngate sent: [ TXT ] :   i need you to delete our texts. [X]

'Cause, y'see, Elijah Reynolds ain't blessed by God. That'd be his brother, and Elijah knows that for a damn fact. He stands with the angel in a field of sunflowers, all faced towards the sun, but Elijah's back is to them, the sun, and Aziraphale.

👀 when did you realize you were in love with Aziraphale? | @wcndxrlnd

Crowley blanched. That would be the question, wouldn't it? The nagging curiosity that was thrown his way. Not something easy to talk his way around with a little clever wordsmithing. Aziraphale. The softest spots always needed prodding with the sharpest stick. At the earliest convenience, it would seem. And Aziraphale was sure one heaven of a soft spot.

Growling in his throat, he tipped his head back a little to glance away, hands finding his hips. He doesn't want to talk about this, but there's a spell on the question. Something meant to loosen his tongue like alcohol did to a drunk. Without the fuzzy feeling or the wobbly balance.

"1941." It came out almost as a snarl as he looked back at the one asking the question. Briefly. Then he's looking away again. Down, up, to the side. Anywhere but at the other. "Walking into a church. Conssssssecrated ground and the like… Ngk– I didn't want him to get disssscorporated. Couldn't ssstand the thought of it–"

He remembered that night. Saving Aziraphale and his damned books. The books had been the real show of affection. Crowley didn't put the same importance on them that the angel did, but knowing how Aziraphale felt, he had rescued them too. Assured their survival so that they would clutter the shelves of Aziraphale's shop decades later. And though it might never mean the same thing to his Angel, Crowley remembered the blisters on his feet afterward. Injury that no amount of miracles would heal.

Everything is the same through the end of 2.6.

Aziraphale goes to Heaven with the Metatron with intentions to take the post offered to him after the dramatic kiss between he and Crowley.

Aziraphale is there in Heaven for around a year before he realizes that nothing he is doing will make a difference with the Metatron as a puppeteer. The Metatron says he is "the hand of God", but is enacting things that may not be so.

Aziraphale comes back to Earth to search for Crowley (and find him easily not far from the bookshop) to ask for his help.

In the time Aziraphale has been gone, Crowley has been researching and thinking of solutions on his own. Most of which are.... dumb except a few more plausible ones.

They meet after this time of being apart, speak enough to make it so they can work together again, but everything between them is by no means resolved. They are on a time crunch before the Second Coming starts. They make up officially and thoroughly later.

They decide that instead of the universe being destroyed and started over again, Aziraphale and Crowley want to go to God and Lucifer to make a compelling argument that the story isn't over. Because there were millions of people in the middle of their story. And their story (as a couple) isn't over yet either. It hasn't even begun, truthfully.

One of Crowley's ideas was to search for Gabriel and Beelzebub to ask their help. The two are reluctant to help at first, but realize there is no hope for the other pair to ever be together since Aziraphale has been marked by The Metatron. Only the love they share shakes their unwillingness. Now, they are a team of four.

Between the four of them, they could just... let humanity be for the most part. They take on a supervisory role with no supreme rulers of either Heaven or Hell because it's more just that way. There are checks and balances having a council of four who care in varying degrees for humanity.

Their combined efforts make an impression on God and Satan/Lucifer who decide to let them try.

The only thing they need the two (God and Lucifer) for before they can fuck off is to sentence any angel and demon unwilling to support this new plan to live one life term on Earth with none of their power or miracles to help them.

The Metatron, Uriel, Michael, Saraquel, Sandalphon, Dagon, Shax, Furfur, and Hastur (these most notably but there are others) are among those banished to Earth. Once the period of banishment is over, their willingness to join into the new plan will be weighed. If there has been no improvement in their understanding of the human world and why it is so important, they will face a new judgement undecided yet.

The Four (as Crowley, Aziraphale, Gabriel, and Beelzebub are now known) decide to expand the corridor between Heaven and Hell to merge the two into more of a cooperative.

That connection space is where they would have to process humans as they pass on, but it's less black and white. No eternal damnation or heavenly delights as much as each person comes in, their soul is still judged, but the sentence is less torture and more service based.

Anyone deemed to have committed evil acts have to do good service to balance it out before they can go on to the afterlife. So, souls are rehabilitated instead of damned.

Some demons and angels are sent to Earth (not banished) to learn how human's work to properly be judged for rehabilitating souls. They work in undercover positions that people take little notice of in the service industry, such as transportation workers, doormen, receptionists. They do not interfere.

The demons remaining in the Cooperative Space are converted to task masters for humans doing their service duty basically which could be enjoyable for them since all they did was torture and make people wait in line.

Angels manage paperwork and keeping up with the tasks each soul has done to contribute to rehabilitation.

They are all still angels and demons because the identity runs deep in their make up, but it takes on far less meaning in the grand picture of the world. They are no longer tempters and influencers of good or evil. Humans chart their own way through the world.

Then, The Four can live amongst humans and just watch them, supervise, and perform miracles every so often (mostly for their own benefit like Aziraphale wanting the car to be yellow when he drives it).

Crowley and Aziraphale spend most of their time between London (the bookshop) and the Cooperative Space.

they were standing nearly side by side in silence. nearly because the angel was ever so slightly in front of the other. cherubic hand extended towards him, warm and rosy. crowley's knuckles clenched and unclenched at his sides, whitening every time they tightened. he could see the sadness in the edges of the angel's face. that wasn't something he could stand very well. in fact, he avoided it at all costs. he would try words first. ❝ angel, it'll — it'll be alright. ❞ they were a feeble attempt as far as comfort goes. long fingers outstretched and their palms found each other's as the pads of his fingers landed on the back of aziraphale's hand.