Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

‘No!’ said Aziraphale firmly, ‘Absolutely not. It is quite out of the question and, quite frankly I’m surprised that you would even suggest it.’

‘You’ll have fun angel!’ drawled Crowley, running his fingers languidly along the spines of the books on the shelf and setting Aziraphale’s nerves on edge as he did so.

The angel glared at him and pointedly straightened the books. ‘It won’t be ‘fun’ because I have absolutely no intention of going,’ he said, ‘I have already given you my answer.’

Crowley deliberately and slowly pushed one book half an inch out of line from the rest. ‘You are going angel.’

Aziraphale pointedly turned away to put the book back where it belonged, then spun round to face Crowley, drawing himself up a little taller to look down his nose at him. He straightened his waistcoat. ‘I’m afraid I shan’t.’

Crowley considered moving another book, but decided not to push his luck. He shrugged and played his trump card. ‘You will, because I’ve already promised Nina and Maggie that we will both go.’

‘Crowley!’

‘A promise is a promise angel.’ Crowley said, wagging a finger earnestly and arranging his features into the type of expression one might give a wayward child.

‘You have absolutely no business making promises on my behalf.’

‘You can’t let them down.’

He’d won, he knew it. Aziraphale’s face ran through several different emotions before settling on righteous indignation.

‘Well really!’ pouted the angel. ‘I do think that at the very least you might have consulted me first.’

‘Yeah, but I knew you’d say no,’ Crowley retorted, flopping down into a chair and sprawling across it untidily in a way that the angel found both irritating and alluring. ‘Much better this way. I get to manipulate you into going, Maggie and Nina get the benefit of your delectable company and we all have fun.’

Aziraphale glared at him. ‘If you knew that I would say no, then you had an absolute obligation to not commit me to something against my will!’ he said. ‘I’m very cross with you Crowley.’

Crowley smiled benevolently. ‘You’re missing the part where we all have fun! Come on angel, I know it’s not exactly your thing, but who would you rather spend a weekend with?’

‘Practically anybody.’ Aziraphale muttered darkly. ‘At this precise moment, I'm not certain that I even like you very much.’

‘Ah you do really angel!’ Crawley said voice full of justifiable (if arrogant) certainty. Beside, you like Maggie and Nina.’

‘Well, yes,’ Aziraphale conceded, unwilling to let his annoyance at Crowley spill over. ‘But even so. I think you have behaved in a terribly underhand way.’

‘Well obviously,’ Crowley grinned. ‘That’s the demonic modus operandi.’ He jumped up and made his way round behind Aziraphale. ‘I’ll make it up to you,’ he whispered seductively. ‘Promissse’.

The angel raised his eyebrows an infinitesimally small amount. ‘I should hope that you would.’

Crowley placed one hand on Aziraphale’s hip and caressed the angel’s waist.

‘Not now!’ Aziraphale interrupted him firmly. ‘I am still far too cross with you to even consider… well, that.’

‘Later then,’ said Crowley with a grin, utterly unperturbed by the rebuff. ‘Later I’ll make you …’

‘Well anyway!’ Aziraphale interjected hurriedly. ‘Why are Nina and Maggie so very keen for us to join them in any case?’

‘Maggie’s friend’s band is playing,’ said Crowley. ‘And Nina’s got a pitch for her van. She’ll be selling coffee and cake and stuff. Besides, who wouldn’t want to go to Glastonbury?’

Chapter Text

‘Er… are you going to wear that?’ asked Crowley a little apprehensively.

‘I am indeed,’ replied Aziraphale in a voice that made it clear he would entertain no further discussion on the matter. ‘I have packed a pair of Wellington boots, should the necessity arise.’

‘Right,’ said Crowley, ‘Er… good. I just wondered whether the bow tie was a bit much.’

The angel fixed him with a hard stare. ‘I have standards!’

‘Course you do.’ Crowley replied. After all, why not wear a cream outfit from the nineteenth century to go camping in a muddy field with thousands of other people? To be fair, Crowley reasoned, Aziraphale was unlikely to be the most flamboyantly dressed person there, and what was a little mud when clothes could be miracle clean?

Crowley himself was dressed all in black, but with a little more leather and substantially more studs than he usually wore. His hair was a fiery orange and spiked forward in an edgy quiff. To tell the truth, Aziraphale was really rather taken with Crowley’s outfit, and most particularly by the low slung jeans and tight belt, although all the demons in hell would not make him admit as much.

The bookshop door rattled and Nina and Maggie entered, laden with bags.

‘Cool look!’ Nina said approvingly to Crowley as she dumped her rucksack loudly on the floor. ‘Love the chains!’

‘You look lovely as well Mr Fell,’ said Maggie with a generous smile, putting down a large carrier bag that seemed to contain an entire Ikea aisle of cushions. ‘Are we all ready then?’

‘Think so,’ said Crowley, ‘Fuck knows how we’re gonna fit everything in the Bentley!’

‘It is so kind of you both to come with us!’ Maggie gushed enthusiastically. ‘We’re really grateful.’

‘They owe us!’ said Nina pointedly. ‘We fought demons for them.

‘Ah, you loved it!’ Crowley drawled with a laconic smile. ‘Bit of extra excitement in life for you.’

Nina cocked an eyebrow doubtfully. ‘I can think of other ways to describe it.’

‘Anyway,’ Crowley continued, ignoring her, ‘We’re really looking forward to going, aren’t we angel?’

Aziraphale, momentarily distracted by the unreasonably casual way Nina had stuffed a now-bent paperback into the side pocket of her rucksack, received an unceremonious elbow to the ribs from Crowley and hastily arranged his features into a passable impression of enthusiasm. ‘Oh of course!’ he said, making up in facial expression for what he lacked in sincerity,’ Absolutely!

Nina fixed him with a hard stare. ‘You know you’re shit at lying, right?’

‘Oh but he’s come such a long way!’ said Crowley, grinning at the angel. ‘You should have seen him the first time he tried it. Awful. Really fucking shit.’

Maggie giggled.

‘I hardly think that the ability to lie with impunity is a trait that should be considered desirable,’ Aziraphale protested, a little put out by the mild insults and ruffled by the bent cover of Nina’s book.

‘It is in a café!’ Nina retorted.

Maggie looked shocked. ‘Nina! You can’t say that!’

‘If I told some of our customers what I was really thinking, they wouldn’t stay our customers for long,’ Nina said, a note of strident vehemence in her voice.

Actually, Aziraphale could see her point. There were moments when the same could be said for his bookshop. There had definitely been times when, ‘Oh it’s really no trouble,’ and ‘It’s so lovely to see you!’ were a little less than strictly accurate. In fact, when he really thought about it, the tension between good manners and honesty had been his constant companion throughout most of his six thousand millennia.

‘Anyway,’ said Maggie, changing the subject with bright determination. ‘It’s going to be such fun! I’ve been looking forward to it all week. I’ve got a list of all the bands I want to see.’

Nina laughed affectionately and rolled her eyes. ‘Seriously, you want to see her list!’

‘Gotta get there first!’ said Crowley. ‘Come on, let’s go and load up the car. Grab your kit folks.’

‘No angel!’ he added hurried, ‘You are not taking all those books!’

Aziraphale smiled sweetly, ‘Oh, but I am! I have done my research and I think you’ll find that it is widely accepted that a good book is absolutely indispensable on a camping trip.’

‘A book angel,’ Crowley complained, ‘Not an entire shelf’s worth. And it’s not as if there won’t be other things to do. Plus we don’t have room.’

‘Oh, I’m sure fitting everything in won’t present any problems,’ said Aziraphale breezily as he headed towards the door, ‘It’s a simple matter of making optimal use of space. Making things tessellate as it were.’

‘I’ll tessellate you!’ Crowley muttered.

Aziraphale shot him the type of insolent pout that left the demon weak at the knees. ‘I don’t think that would be very appropriate at this precise moment dear boy, but perhaps there might be time later.’ He paused for an infinitesimally small moment. ‘I believe that is also a rather popular pastime at these type of events in any case. After you my dear.’

* * * * *

It was quite miraculous really, the way that Aziraphale managed to get everything fitted onto the Bentley’s small luggage rack. But fit it did and with just enough room to spare for him to add his light reading For the quieter moments. Maggie and Nina exchanged a look at this, but said nothing. Then, Crowley backed the car carefully towards the little converted horse box and Nina hitched the trailer carefully to a sturdy tow bar which had most definitely not been there that morning. Under Pressure the Bentley complained as Crowley eased forward, the radio striking a particularly plaintive note.

‘Shhhh’ soothed Crowley, stroking the steering wheel affectionately. ‘You can cope. I believe in you.’ The Bentley made it quite clear that whilst of course she could cope – what did he take her for after all – she was just a little put out at being taken advantage of in such a presumptuous way.

‘Get in,’ called Crowley out of the window, ‘Let’s get going.’

‘I must say,’ said Aziraphale, looking approvingly at the smart little trailer, ‘I do rather approve of taking tea making facilities with us. We’ll be able to stop absolutely anywhere should the desire arise.’

‘We’ve got all sorts of cake and biscuits too,’ said Maggie. ‘Absolutely loads of everything.' She looked proudly at Nina, 'The caramel slices are amazing.'

‘They sound divine!’ said Aziraphale, ‘Well,’ he corrected himself, ‘Rather better than divine actually since heaven doesn’t really go in for that type of thing.’

‘Did you just say something was better than the divine?’ teased Crowley quickly. ‘Watch it angel, we’ll make a heretic out of you yet.’

‘Oh don’t be silly!’ retorted Aziraphale colouring deeply. ‘You know quite well that wasn’t what I meant at all.’

‘It doesn’t matter what you meant angel…’ Crowley smirked.

Maggie reached forward from the back seat and patted Aziraphale on the shoulder. ‘We know what you meant Mr Fell, and it was very sweet of you to say so.’ She turned sternly to Crowley. ‘You shouldn’t tease him so much.’

‘Ah, he loves it!’ said Crowley confidently. ‘It gives him more opportunities to prove his holiness by being all forgiving.’

‘Well,’ said Aziraphale firmly, ‘I shall forgive you of course, but there will be a penance that you will be required to perform.’

‘Oooooh,’ said Nina knowingly, ‘It’s like that is it?’

‘Map!’ said Crowley quickly by way of a distraction and hoping that he wasn’t blushing as much as it felt like he was. ‘Someone needs to map read. Maggie, Nina? Either of you want the job.’

Nina looked incredulous. ‘Don’t you have Satnav? Or are you both actually stuck in some previous century?’

‘Of course we do,’ said Crowley, gesturing to an unusual mahogany cased Satnav that perched precariously on the dashboard, entirely unconnected to anything, and remarkably free from batteries. ‘Latest model.’

Maggie blinked in surprise.

‘You could put it that way,’ said Nina, ‘That particular model is all of… I dunno… three seconds old?’

‘Use the left lane to turn left,’ said Freddie Mercury’s voice, ‘and follow signs for M3.’

‘And we’re off!’ said Crowley happily. ‘Glastonbury, here we come!’

Chapter Text

The Bentley purred along the M3, still moderately miffed at the audacity Crowley had shown in saddling her with this… this thing that trundled inelegantly behind her, dragging in the wind and throwing her balance.

I wanna ride my bicycle she hinted darkly through the radio. Bicycle, bicycle!

Behave! Hissed Crowley dangerously.

‘Oooh, Queen!’ said Maggie enthusiastically. ‘I love a bit of Freddie Mercury, don’t you?’

Aziraphale pursed his lips in apologetic disagreement. ‘I’m afraid I find some of his music just a little bit raucous. Very talented of course,’ he added charitably, ‘but not all entirely to my taste.’

‘Maybe you’ll prefer this then’ said Maggie, scrabbling in the depth of her bag. ‘I’ve got the latest album from my friend’s band. You might like them better. They’re very melodic.’ She rummaged deeper in the bag, ejecting a packet of toffees, a crossword book and a folding hair brush. ‘That’s strange. I could have sworn I put it in here.’

Put it back! Crowley said firmly in his head. He gripped the steering wheel a fraction harder. Now! The car juddered grumpily and Aziraphale shot a sidelong quizzical look at the demon.

‘Ah! Here it is!’ said Maggie emerging triumphantly from the bag. ‘I knew I put it in here. Try this.’

She passed a shiny CD case forward to the angel who subjected the artwork to careful scrutiny. The cover featured several women wearing elegant evening dress and standing in the middle of a snowy field. They looked, Aziraphale thought, terribly cold. He clicked the case open and extracted the CD which squeaked in protest as he freed it from the fiddly little plastic clip. He signed quietly to himself. There was nothing inherently wrong with CDs of course, but he preferred the, well, ceremony perhaps would be the correct term, that accompanied vinyl. Aziraphale thought nostalgic thoughts about the soft hiss made by a tissue paper inner as it was extracted from a cardboard album sleeve and the satisfying weight of a record - tipped from its fragile paper envelope- falling heavily into his hand. Then, he’d deftly flip it between his palms, the sharp edge scraping his skin as he spun it horizontal so as to place it careful onto the spindle before lowering the needle gently onto the run out groove. He wished half-heartedly he was back in his shop. Burying the thought with a sigh he lined up the CD with the slot on the player and pushed gently. Nothing happened.

‘What’s wrong?’ Crowley said quizzically.

‘It won’t go in,’ said Aziraphale.

Crowley glanced across, ‘Have you got the angle right? Try wiggling it.’

Aziraphale paused and arched an eyebrow at the demon. ‘I am perfectly adept at getting things lined up correctly without the need for unnecessary wiggling as you should know.’

Nina suppressed a snort of laughter.

‘No,’ continued Aziraphale calmly. ‘I think perhaps another course of action is required.’ He placed one hand gently on the Bentley’s dash board. ‘My dear, we’d really all be terribly obliged if you could see your way clear to playing this CD.’

The Bentley’s engine stuttered a few times. A good mechanic would have been able to identify it as the sound of the engine misfiring due either to worn spark plugs or an ineffective fuel filter. A really superhumanly excellent mechanic might be able to suggest that it was the sound of a vintage Bentley wrestling with an difficult decision.

And it was such a conundrum. The Bentley was really terribly fond of the angel and he’d asked her so nicely. On the other hand, her patience was already spread exceedingly thin what with that infernal thing bumping along behind her and the quite frankly unreasonable number of people and bags stuffed unceremoniously into her interior.

‘Please?’ added Aziraphale. He was doing the smile too, she could hear it in his voice. That smile should be bloody illegal, Crowley had growled to her once after being on the receiving end if it. S’pose to be demons who do the manipulating, not fucking angels.

Making decisions was not her strong point.

The Bentley was vaguely aware that she hadn’t always been sentient. The knowledge that she had existed before she was conscious was there the same way that a forgotten dream can lurk around the edges of memory. There was a short amount of time right at the beginning of her existence that was devoid of memories. Had she been privy to human experiences, she might have compared it to the way humans memory trails off into nothingness at some point in early childhood.

The Bentley sighed, a cloud of black smoke shot out of the exhaust pipe and with a last peevish - and distinctly dramatic - burst of Too Much Love Will Kill You, accepted the CD.

‘Oh thank you!’ said Aziraphale, ‘I am really very grateful.’

That said, as the first notes of Maggie’s friends band warbled through the radio, he rather wished he hadn’t bothered.

They made good time to Glastonbury. This was at least in part due to the Bentley working out her frustrations by belting down the fast lane at eighty miles an hour and taking great delight in sneaking up on modern jaguars and BMWs before roaring past and leaving them for dust.

‘We’re going quite fast,’ Maggie observed in a deliberately casual tone as Wiltshire scenery shot past the window in a blur of cows, sheep and hedgerows. ‘I didn’t know that vintage cars could go this quickly.’

‘My car can!’ said Crowley proudly. ‘She’s a superb piece of engineering’.

‘Well, she’d better not be breaking any of my cups,’ said Nina firmly, looking back at the bouncing trailer as it wobbled dangerously from side to side. Aziraphale made a mental note to be sure to be the first person to open the trailer on arrival and to do some very firm expecting everything to be fine.

‘Travel sweet?’ asked Maggie, opening a tin of boiled sweets and scattering a fine powder of sugar over the interior of the car. Crowley grimaced, blinked hard and the powdered sugar vanished before the Bentley had time to react.

‘Good trick.’ Nina observed. ‘Can you do the same to wash up? ‘Cos that’s gonna be your job.’

Aziraphale took a sweet. ‘Mmm, barley sugar. My favourite. What a treat.’

Maggie frowned in confusion. ‘It says mixed berry on the tin.’

‘Definitely barley sugar,’ said Aziraphale with happy conviction, popping the amber sweet in his mouth with a delicate action that sent a little shiver of anticipation down Crowley’s back.

‘Let’s play animal, vegetable, mineral.’ Maggie suggested through her travel sweet.

Nina rolled her eyes, but smiled indulgently at her girlfriend. ‘Fine. You think of something.’

Maggie thought for a moment. ‘Got one.’

‘Is it a mineral?'

'No.'

'Is it alive?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is it animal?’

‘No.’

‘Is it a vegetable?’

‘No.’

Nina narrowed her eyes.

‘Is it a demon?’

Aziraphale settled comfortably back into the seat, mentally filtered out most of the music (which hardly counted as a miracle) and decided that perhaps the weekend wouldn’t be quite so dreadfully bad after all.

Chapter Text

‘Good Lord!’ said Aziraphale with feeling, ‘What a traffic jam.’

‘Be glad we’re arriving with the other traders!’ said Nina firmly. ‘It will be far worse tomorrow when the public arrive!’

Aziraphale looked apprehensive but said nothing as they inched slowly forwards down the lane. Crowley drummed his fingers idly on the steering wheel and left the Bentley to her own devices. It was exactly the sort ankle-numbing stop-start traffic jam that made even the most dyed in the wool manual driver consider the merits of an automatic and Crowley was very much of the opinion that there were times when he was prepared to trust the Bentley’s initiative. For her part, the Bentley – who had largely got used to That Thing behind her - purred gently in a superior sort of way, appreciating the warm sunshine on her bonnet and silently judging the lesser vehicles in the queue.

‘Nearly there!’ Maggie said, pointing, ‘I can see our gate now.’

‘Got the forms?’ Crowley asked.

Nina passed forward a bundle of paperwork. ‘Registration forms and the site map. We collect the traders’ pass later.’

Aziraphale took the bundle, extracted the relevant bits, glanced at the site map and did a swift double take, the perfect arch of his eyebrows registering surprised horror.

‘It’s big,’ said Nina, amused by his expression.

Aziraphale squinted closely at the map and tried to picture all the campsite areas filled with tents; Hundreds and thousands of badly pitched tents. Then he mentally added hoards of people absolutely everywhere, all moving, drinking, talking and doing assorted human things. Aziraphale - who was rather good at visualising things - took one look at his mental picture and quickly stopped thinking. Obviously, he liked people, but heavens, there were limits. People individually were fine, wonderful even, but people en masse were… well, they could be exceedingly trying.

‘It’s mad,’ said Maggie, ‘But fun!’

Aziraphale twisted round in his seat and managed to bestow Maggie with a slightly uncertain smile and a miniscule nod. ‘I do hope so.’ He turned back to face the front and wriggled his shoulders in annoyance.

Crowley, picking up on the angry angel vibes, glanced across at him at him. ‘Not convinced?’ he whispered.

‘It will be indistinguishable from one of the lower levels of hell,’ Aziraphale hissed.

‘I can assure you it won’t angel,’ Crowley said with certainty. ‘Not even close.’

Aziraphale glared and folded his hands neatly in his lap. ‘We’ll see.’

‘The toilets, admittedly, are an experience.’ Maggie piped up from the back.

‘Thankfully, that at least that won’t present a problem!’ said Aziraphale, resolutely not allowing his imagination to do any visualising in that direction and exceedingly thankful for his angelic constitution which made such things unnecessary.

Crowley laughed. ‘It could be, if you want the full experience angel. It’s not like it isn’t an option.’

‘Everyone needs their own horrific Glastonbury bog story.’ Nina added. ‘It’s not a real festival unless you’ve at least considered pissing in a bottle, seen a shit that makes you marvel at the wonders of the human digestive system, or bartered for toilet roll.’

Aziraphale closed his eyes against a sudden influx of unwanted images. ‘No. Absolutely not.’ Quite frankly, he couldn’t think of anything worse. He took a steadying breath and reminded himself that cheerful optimism in the face of adversity was very much expected of angels, as was being charitable towards ones friends, however deeply irritating they were currently being. With a great effort, Aziraphale dug deep into his reserve of positive emotions and managed a beaming smile. ‘Oh look, I do believe we are nearly at the front of the queue.’

The Bentley chuntered forward and stopped beside the gate. Crowley, elbow casually on the doorframe of the window, offered up a beaming smile.

‘Documents?’ said lead security man returning the smile. ‘Nice car by the way!’

‘Thanks,’ said Crawley, handing over the paperwork to be checked.

The man rifled through the pages quickly, then gave a quick nod. ‘Right you are, know where you’re going? Good. Have a great festival!’

* * * * *

Getting the trailer set up was a simple matter of finding their trading pitch and unhitching it from the deeply relieved Bentley. Aziraphale took the liberty of opening the door and taking a quick look inside with the strong expectation that nothing would have been broken during the more exciting stages of the journey. By some miracle, everything was indeed where it should be except for some anomalous broken glass on the floor which disappeared as soon as Aziraphale noticed it.

‘Don’t worry, we’ll come back and sort out the stuff inside later,’ said Nina to Aziraphale. ‘No need to do that now. Let’s go and get the tents up and then have a look round.’

Maggie stood back, hands on hips, ‘It does look good!’ she said approvingly, ‘The lettering came out really well.’

Nina nodded, ‘Let’s hope it pulls in the punters. Now, tents!’

The Bentley, released from her burden, glided over the grass and back up to the campsite, which was already beginning to fill up with an eclectic mix of canvas.

‘Ok, tents,’ said Crowley vaguely. He unzipped one of the tent bags and tipped everything noisily out onto the ground in a untidy heap of poles, pegs and canvas. ‘Right,’ he said uncertainty, and looked hopefully over to Aziraphale. The angel, who was staring out across the site and wearing what might very well be described as a rabbit in the headlights type expression, made no immediate move to help.

Nina folded her arms and looked sternly at the demon and the angel. ‘Have either of you two ever put up a tent before?’

‘Of course!’ said Aziraphale in indignant tone, pulling himself together in rather a hurry. ‘Many times in fact. During the Exodus there were quite a few occasions when my help was needed in assembling rather a significant number tents. And St Paul was a tent maker of course and on one notable instance he required assistance with…’

‘I meant this century!’ Nina cut in with an exasperated sigh. ‘Fuck it, even this millennia! Modern tents aren’t made of goat skin and camel hide. They’ve got lots of elasticated poles and little toggles.’

‘And they can be quite fiendish to put up!’ added Maggie. ‘Often all the sets of poles look the same but one lot will be just a bit shorter than the others. And the fly sheet looks like it should fit either way round, but if you get it wrong the doors don’t line up.’ She pulled a face, ‘It’s almost as if they are designed to be difficult.’

Aziraphale turned to give an enquiring look to Crowley who was shuffling bits of tent around in an attempt to appear busy. ‘Well? Are they one of your infernal designs?’

Crowley shrugged. ‘Er… maybe…’

‘Well, there we are then.’ said Aziraphale breezily, drawing again on his stock of angelic positivity, ‘In any case, I’m sure we shall be able to manage just splendidly. It can’t be so very difficult, mere children manage it after all. I believe boys scouts are particularly adept at it.’

‘And girl scouts,’ Crowley put in quickly before either Maggie or Nina could comment. ‘Don’t forget the girl scouts.’

Aziraphale nodded emphatically. ‘Oh absolutely!’ He picked up the nearest section of pole and looked rather non-plussed for a moment as the other sections followed at high speed in a chaotic clatter of poles and elastic. ‘Ah, right, I see.’ He smiled at Nina encouragingly. ‘Not to worry, I’m actually rather good at things requiring manual dexterity. We shall have this up in next to no time.’ He snapped the poles together reasonably competently then swung round in search of the canvas. The end of the pole waved dangerously close to Nina’s face.

‘Don’t wave it around like that!’ Nina said sharply, ‘You’ll have someone’s eye out!’

‘Yeah!’ Crowley added with a wink which was rather wasted behind sunglasses. ‘What have I told you before angel? Don’t wave it around in public. Remember Tuscany.’

‘Well really!’ said Aziraphale very much affronted and suddenly a little hot under the collar, ‘As you well know that was all a misunderstanding and…’He tailed off suddenly. On second thoughts, perhaps it would be wisest not to elaborate. He allowed the sentence to hang in the air unfinished.

‘What happened in Tuscany?’ Nina demanded.

‘Have you got it up yet?’ asked Maggie innocently, appearing in the nick of time to save Aziraphale from Nina’s cross examination.

‘Well,’ said Crowley conversationally, ‘The angel has erected his pole. Nearly done mine. Not quite there.’ He grinned at the angel. ‘I’m not as quick as he is.’ Aziraphale, deciding that the most dignified response was to say nothing resolutely ignored the jibe and tried to work out whether to arousal or annoyance was his primary emotion. He wanted it to be annoyance, but the sight of the demon knelt on the ground in front of him in those scandalously low rise jeans really wasn’t helping. Aziraphale had a few stern words with himself and tried to stop staring, or at very least, to stare in a way that was marginally more subtle.

Crowley clicked the last sections of pole together. ‘Done. Now we’ve just gotta thread it through the bits in the canvas.’ He smiled at Nina, ‘see, I remember how these things work.’ He flicked his eyes across to the angel. ‘Wanna put your one in first?’ He lowered his voice, ‘Gotta be firm but gentle.’

Aziraphale gave him a look. The look he intended to give was a withering sort of one that would eloquently indicate that all these inuendoes were far beneath him and could they please just focus on erecting – no, not that word – assembling the tent if it wasn’t too much trouble, thank you very much. The look that actually came out was something that, if put into words, would require an age restriction warning.

‘I’d tell you to get a room,’ said Nina with a sigh, ‘but you need to finish putting it up first.’

Aziraphale, after yet more stern words with himself, hitched his trousers carefully at the knees and knelt down with a slight wince. He shouldn’t be aging, but either the ground was getting further away, or he had not spent enough time on his knees recently. Threading the pole through the channel in the fabric proved to be a little less straightforward than he had first assumed. ‘Bother!’ he said as the metal snagged on the fabric for the third time. ‘Wretched thing! Does it really need to be quite such a tight fit?’ Really it would have been much more sensible to make the thing just the tiniest bit wider. ‘Don’t!’ he added quickly as Crowley opened his mouth to speak, ‘I think I have rather a good idea of what you’re going to say, and I’d really rather you didn’t if it’s all the same to you.’ Any more suggestive comments from Crowley and the tent pole would not be the only thing fighting for escape.

‘We could offer to help,’ Maggie whispered to Nina as they stood watching.

Nina shook her head. ‘Nah, it’s good for them,’ she grinned at Maggie, ‘And I’m enjoying it.’ She looked at her watch. ‘Tell you what, lets put our tent up, then, if they’re still struggling, we’ll help them then.’

* * * * *

It took Maggie and Nina rather less time and substantially less bickering to get their tent up and the bags packed away, but by the time they had, angel and demon had got both poles through the outer canvas and Crowley was somewhere beneath the blue dome, toggling the inner sheet into place. Judging by the string of expletives, he’d just discovered that he’d started with the wrong toggle. The canvas shook.

‘Why the fuck aren’t we doing this with mir… the easy way?’ a disembodied voice complained.

Aziraphale bent forward and carefully addressed the bulging bit of canvas that he assumed contained the demon’s head. ‘Er… because, it is a very public place and we agreed to be discreet!’

The bump recoiled sharply. ‘That’s my fucking ear angel. Don’t shout. It’s a piece of canvas, not a bloody soundproofed wall.’

There were a few scuffling noises and the tent suddenly looked a little less shambolic. Crowley, emerged backwards, nearly tripping over the guy line as he did so.

Aziraphale narrowed his eyes. ‘You cheated.’

‘Prove it.’

‘Tell me you didn’t.’

‘I put every fucking toggle through a shitting eyelet at least once, that oughta count as doing it properly. Then I … did a few things to straighten it up.’

‘Define a few things’?’

‘It’s up!’ said Crowley, with an air of finality. ‘That’s all that matters.’

‘Well done!’ said Maggie, patting him on the shoulder in a way that was only slightly patronising. ‘It looks great.’

‘Is that it?’ said Aziraphale, frowning.

‘Yeah,’ said Nina, ‘Congratulations! You’ve put up a tent. Crack open the champagne.’

‘No,’ said Aziraphale, gesturing towards the tent. ‘Is that all of it? It looks dreadfully small.’

‘It’s a six man tent!’ said Nina, ‘for two of you. I think you’ll cope.’

‘It’s only really for sleeping in,’ explained Maggie in soothing tones, ‘You won’t actually be in it much, so it doesn’t matter if it’s a bit cramped. You’ll get used to it.’

Aziraphale looked at the tent with deep suspicion and sighed. It wasn’t even as if it was one of those pretty bell tents or smart traditional affairs with shiny wooden poles and smart green canvas. The nasty blue nylon flapped noisily in the slightest breeze and the neon guy lines were a hideous shade of florescent yellow.

‘Perhaps,’ he said uncertainly.

‘Why don’t you take your books into the tent Mr Fell,’ said Maggie kindly, ‘then perhaps it will feel a bit more like home. And I’ll make everyone a cup of tea.’

Crowley grinned. ‘Tea and books. You’ve got him sussed Maggie. I’ll help you.’

‘And I’ll sort out our beds,’ Nina said to Maggie, ‘And make mine a coffee.’

* * * * *

‘What the actual fuck have you done?’ Crowley asked when they returned a few minutes later with drinks.

‘Nothing much,’ said Aziraphale casually, affecting an extremely innocent expression. ‘A couple of minor changes, little improvements here and there.’

‘It’s not even the same bloody tent!’ Crowley said. ‘And there’s bunting. Why the fuck is there bunting along the ridge pole. Hell, why do we even have a ridge pole? It’s not the shitting 1940s?’

‘I’d appreciate just a little less swearing,’ Aziraphale admonished. ‘I think you’ll agree that it does look rather better.’

Crowley glared at Aziraphale. ‘We said no miracles. And if you were going to bloody well miracle us back into some … some Boys Own adventure novel, why the hell did I spend fifteen minutes of my life shitting around with toggles?’

‘I hardly think fifteen minutes is significant given your rather generous life span,’ said Aziraphale archly. ‘And if we have to camp, we are absolutely going to do it in style.’

‘It does look lovely,’ said Maggie, admiring the bunting. ‘But isn’t it even smaller than the last tent?’

‘I think you’ll find it is quite surprisingly spacious inside,’ said Aziraphale mildly.

‘I bet it is!’ Crowley said darkly. ‘How many rooms have you given us?

‘A couple.’ Aziraphale admitted. ‘Do come in and look round!’

Chapter Text

‘And this is your idea of roughing it?’ said Nina, giving Aziraphale a hard stare. The angel countered with a beatific smile, positively radiant with self-satisfaction.

‘It’s his idea of not roughing it!’ grunted Crowley, ‘s cheating angel!’

Aziraphale delicately straightened a glass vase and moved the silver carriage clock an inch to the left. ‘I agreed - on sufferance I might add- to camp. I most certainly did not agree to ‘rough it’.’

‘Should’ve guessed,’ Crowley muttered.

‘Well, she’s impressed!’ Nina said with an amused nod towards her girlfriend.

Maggie was still looking around her in awe. ‘But… it’s… it’s bigger on the inside!’ she said in tones of wonder, ‘And there’s a bookcase.’

‘There’s a bloody sideboard and two sofas in the next room!’ said Crowley. ‘And yeah, it is bigger on the inside. It’s like the fucking TARDIS.’

‘Hardly!’ Aziraphale tutted, ‘You do exaggerate my dear. It has absolutely no travel capabilities whatsoever. I have merely created a small amount of extra space.’

Crowley hissed. ‘Sss not a ssmall amount of extra space angel. S’got six sodding rooms.’

‘I do think,’ said Aziraphale firmly, ‘That for a being who will quite happily post himself down a phone line, you’re making rather an unnecessary fuss about a little detail like dimensions.’ He paused for a moment to give the words time to take effect. ‘Drink?’

‘Well, I had just made you tea!’ said Maggie in mildly aggrieved tones, ‘and there’s cake.’

‘Ah yes,’ said Aziraphale, hastily closing the door of the drinks cabinet again. ‘And very welcome it is too. Perhaps we should take tea through here?’

The sofas were large, soft and upholstered in a bold print that the angel clearly thought in keeping with a festival vibe. The geometric design had a definite early 70s vibe and were very much not in Aziraphale’s usual style. Rather touching really, Crowley admitted grudgingly. The angel was at least trying to get into the spirit of things. And, although he was loath to admit it, Aziraphale had done a fucking good job. The pot plants were a nice touch, though the cacti looked dangerously close to the entrance. But it was still cheating and Crowley felt that he had been slyly outmanoeuvred. He sat down grumpily on the irritatingly comfortable sofa, sipped his tea and glared at the bookcase.

‘The bathroom is through there,’ said Aziraphale with a casual wave of his hand, ‘only a shower, no bath I’m afraid, and the bedroom is that way.’ The bed was technically superfluous of course. Neither of them needed to sleep, even if Crowley was inclined to indulge himself whenever the mood took him. But a bed made certain other things easier, more comfortable and in Aziraphale’s rather traditional mind, less scandalous than the alternatives (even though the alternatives could be quite thrillingly appealing on occasion).

‘Let me get this straight,’ said Nina carefully, ‘You’ve got a working shower inside a tent?’

‘Is that wrong?’ Aziraphale asked. ‘I’m not particularly au fait with the traditions of camping.’

‘Well, it’s not normal!’ said Nina looking to Maggie and Crowley to back her up on this.

‘Ah,’ said Aziraphale in the tones of one who considers normal to be overrated. He smiled broadly at the women. ‘You are of course both most welcome to use the um…facilities in the bathroom. I gather that those available for public use can become a little undesirable after a time.’

‘Er… thanks…’ said Nina trying to work out if things had crossed over from deeply strange to actually creepy. ‘It’d only be a little weird wandering through your tent in the middle of the night for a piss.’

‘Oh I thought of that!’ said Aziraphale with happy enthusiasm. ‘The bathroom has a back door. I can change it of course, but currently it comes out in what I think is the porch of your tent.’ He smiled broadly again. ‘Rather convenient I hope you’ll agree.’

Nina looked nonplussed for a moment, then decided that having a working en-suite attached to her tent substantially outweighed any indignation she might have felt about the invasion of privacy.

‘Can I explore?’ asked Maggie gleefully.

‘Be my guest!’

‘You do know,’ said Crowley sternly, wagging a finger at the angel and looking vaguely triumphant, ‘that you’re not really supposed to connect your tent to someone else‘s without their permission.’

Aziraphale turned hopefully to Nina, ‘Do I have your permission my dear?’

‘I guess,’ said Nina with a resigned shrug.

‘Permission gained!’

‘You’re meant to get permission first!’ Crowley complained. ‘Not charm them with working plumbing and then ask if they mind.’

Aziraphale reached for a cup and took a sip of tea. He looked at Crowley over the china rim. ‘I might point out that one is equally supposed to consult one’s friends before making promises on their behalf.’ He said archly, ‘And besides, provided they are indeed ‘charmed by my plumbing’ as you put it, then I fail to see the problem.’

Crowley opened his mouth ready to counter with a witty retort but realising he couldn’t think of one, shut it again.

‘He does have a point.’ Nina said, caught between the desire to have been consulted and appreciation of the end result. ‘I mean, it’s great, but it’d be more normal to ask first.’

Aziraphale blinked. ‘I didn’t realise humans had established conventions governing such things.’

‘Oh I bet they have!’ said Crowley, ignoring the sarcasm. He spoke with the absolute certainty of one who could take personal credit for a lot of the appendices in planning policies. ‘It all comes down to whether the boundary - ‘ but before he could elaborate Maggie burst back into the room, from the opposite direction in which she had left. She looked more than a little flustered.

‘Well?’ said Crowley. ‘Is the angel’s plumbing up to standard?’

‘The bathroom is a-ma-zing!’ said Maggie, emphasising every syllable, ‘but you’re gonna need to move the entrance a bit!’

‘Oh,’ Aziraphale frowned. ‘I can of course, but why?’

‘Because,’ said Maggie, only marginally wild eyed, ‘that’s not our tent!’

Aziraphale nearly spilled his tea in surprise.
‘Good gracious!’

Maggie giggled nervously. ‘I didn’t notice when I first stepped into the porch. Then, I unzipped the main bit of the tent. And… well, there were people!’

‘Shit!’ said Nina, pulling a sympathetic face but also clearly trying not to laugh. ‘What did they say?’

‘Well,’ said Maggie, flapping her hands awkwardly. ‘I told them to get out at once. I still thought it was our tent you see. Then… well, then I realised it wasn’t… so I left. Quickly.’

Nina sucked in her cheeks and just managed to keep her sense of humour reined in.

‘But…’ blustered Aziraphale in confusion, ‘I’m quite sure I put it in the right place.’

Crowley stretched casually, taking up even more of the sofa than should have been possible. ‘Looks like you made a mistake angel.’ He smirked.

Realisation dawned.

‘You utter fiend!’ Aziraphale’s eyes sparkled the colour of an angry ocean as he glared at the demon. ‘You moved it!’

Crowley basked in the force of Aziraphale’s indignation. He loved Aziraphale angry. What he liked best of course was Aziraphale angry with someone else, determindly defending the weak and to hell with the consequences. But Aziraphale’s ire directed at him ran a close second. Especially when Aziraphale did that thing with his eyes and used that tone. Crowley was rather an expert on psychology (it was requirement for effective tempting) and could have psychoanalysed his own response to angry angel quite perceptively. It would have made interesting reading and featured words like ‘masochist’, ‘complex’, ‘desire’ and ‘dominate’. Had he done so, and had Aziraphale been privy to it, the angel would have been both horrified and deeply thrilled.

As it happened, Aziraphale did actually have quite a good idea of the impact his rage had on Crowley and - as it was not the effect he was currently aiming to achieve - he switched to petulence instead.

‘That was terribly unfair on poor Maggie,’ he said, giving her a sympathetic look. ‘What if she had seen something … well… untoward?’

‘She’d have coped,’ said Crowley without an ounce of remorse. ‘She’s not easily shocked.’

‘She is actually here!’ Maggie pointed out indignantly, ‘And can speak for herself.’ She summoned a look of teacherly disapproval and directed it firmly at the demon. ‘That was ever so mean of you Crowley. ‘Changing it round when Mr Fell had got it all set up so nicely.’

And it was very nicely set up. It might have lacked a bath, but the shower was generously proportioned with clearly labelled controls. Maggie had noticed this with particular approval. Too many showers featured decidedly ambiguous and frequently counter intuitive controls and Maggie did not appreciate standing naked in the corner of an unfamiliar shower trying to work out how to persuade the thing to produce the hot water whilst avoiding the jet of liquid ice that streamed relentlessly from the rose.

Besides the shower, there was an aesthetically pleasing basin with two types of soap and a cupboard with fleshly laundered bath towels smelling of lavender and camomile.

And a toilet. An actual, plumbed in toilet rather than a glorified bucket festering gently inside a plastic hot house and surrounded by a fetid atmosphere of sewage and disinfectant.

Aziraphale had originally considered providing two toilets (though he’d have called them lavatories) side by side so that Maggie and Nina could have one each. He wasn’t - as one might infer - very familiar with the etiquette of toilets in general. The last time he’d actually been inside one had been in Roman times when multi seater facilities had been all the rage. Thankfully, he had thought it wise to do a quick bit of pre miracle market research and had hastily amended his plans.

Next to the toilet stood an unobtrusive cupboard full of loo rolls. Maggie, a veteran of many a music festival knew the importance of a reliable supply of soft paper.

‘It really is a lovely bathroom!’ Maggie said emphatically to Aziraphale.

The angel beamed. ‘I’m so glad you like it.’

‘And you,’ Maggie said sternly to Crowley, ‘can put it back the way he made it.’

‘Spoil sport!’ Crowley retorted, still rather hopeful of some more angelic ire. But Aziraphale, mollified by Maggie’s enthusiasm, had his mind on other things.

‘I think cake was mentioned?’ he said hopefully, producing a little stack of cake plates from the sideboard and looking round for something to put on them. Maggie produced a Tupperware box full of jam and coconut slices and offered them round.

Whilst we’re on the subject of cake ‘ said Nina, taking a coconut slice, ‘Quick reminder, if someone offers you brownies, don’t take any.’

‘They might have drugs in them,’ Maggie explained in a stage whisper and mouthing the word ‘drugs’ with exaggerated emphasis.

‘I’m aware!’ said Aziraphale, as Crowley tried to hide his amusement. ‘But you needn’t worry, I am quite capable of looking after myself.’

‘Sure, angel?’ Crowley teased. ‘You do like cake.’ He watched as Aziraphale took a delicate mouthful of coconut slice, appreciating the expression of bliss that spread across the angel’s features and the way he closed his eyes for a fraction of a second longer than usual. When he swallowed with the tiniest sigh of enjoyment, a shiver ran down Crowley’s back.

Aziraphale met the demon’s gaze, ‘Brownies made for that purpose rarely have much in the way of culinary merit!’ he retorted disparagingly. ‘I shall have no difficulty in controlling myself.’

The same could not be said for the demon. Crowley squirmed as Aziraphale took another delicate bite.

Nina’s eyebrows shot upwards. ‘You’ve had them before?’

‘Well not intentionally obviously!’ said the angel, dusting desicated coconut from his fingers. ‘This is delectable by the way! Who made it?’

‘Me,’ said Nina, ‘With Maggie’s jam. How did you have them unintentionally?’

‘In precisely the manner you were insinuating might occur. I was offered them by somone who rather naughtily did not reveal what they contained.’

‘What happened?’ asked Maggie, giving in to curiosity.

‘As it happens, very little,’ said Aziraphale rounding up the last crumbs from his plate with a damp forefinger. ‘Obviously my constitution is considerably more resistant to such things than than a standard human one would be. I will admit that it was one of the rare occasions that I have indulged in a brief nap.’ He glanced across at the demon, ‘Of course, had they been better baked then perhaps I should have inadvertently indulged to a greater degree and who knows what might have come to pass.’

Crowley gave a shrug. ‘I’m sure they weren’t as badly cooked as you made out Angel! How wrong is it possible to go with a brownie?’

‘Quite substantially apparently.’

Nina looked from demon, to angel and back again. Crowley fidgeted in her gaze. ‘You…’ she said slowly, ‘fed him hash brownies without telling him!’

‘That’s so dangerous!’ interjected Maggie in horror. ‘And very wrong!’

‘I’m a demon!’ protested Crowley indignantly. ‘I’m s’pose to do bad stuff! Demons tempt. It’s my job. Can’t be a demon without tempting.’ Besides, he thought, tempting Aziraphale hardly counted.

‘Yes,’ said Maggie, ‘in theory, but you’re nice!’

‘More importantly,’ said Nina, eyes glinting dangerously, ‘if you dare do anything to any of my stuff… then think of the worst things hell could do to you and double it, because that’s what will happen!’

‘She means it!’ said Maggie. ‘Don’t test her.’

‘Oh, I’m sure he’ll be on his very best behaviour!’ said Aziraphale confidently. ‘Won’t you my dear?’

‘Course,’ muttered Crowley, who had a very healthy respect for the wrath of Nina. ‘Wasn’t going to do that anyway.’ He grinned suddenly. ‘I have other plans!’

Aziraphale raised his eyes heavenward and took a deep breath. ‘Oh dear! I don’t suppose you would care to share them?’

‘Patience is a virtue!’ Crowley teased. ‘You should know that angel. And you’ll find out in good time.’

Chapter Text

The next morning dawned fine and bright in the village of Pilton. This was rather a surprise to the weather forecasters who had anticipated grey skies, squally showers and a biting north easterly, weather more similar to that experience by the rest of Somerset that day*. However, Pilton had the type of morning in which the grass was lightly damp with dew, the sun’s rays already warm and a mild breeze trickled through the treetops as a promise that the heat would not tip over into oppressive. It was, in short, a perfect morning*.

‘The weather’s so much better than they said it would be!’ Maggie said happily.

‘Is it my dear?’ said Aziraphale mildly, sipping tea from a bone china cup and quailing slightly as the tang of UHT milk hit him. ‘I must confess that I don’t think I took much notice of the predictions.’

‘Well, I’m not complaining,’ said Nina, who had her suspicions but had decided not to voice them.

‘Oh me neither!’ said Maggie quickly, shaking out the table cloth that she thought she had forgotten to bring and setting it carefully on a folding camp table. Nina put down a stack of bowls and a box of cornflakes.

‘I know it’s basic’ she said, with a defensive look in Aziraphale’s direction, ‘but it’s food. We can buy something better later.’

‘We do have pastries in the van,’ Maggie added, ‘If you’d prefer…’

Nina quelled her with a glare. ‘There for us to sell Maggie!’

‘I’m sure cornflakes will be perfectly adequate,’ said Aziraphale magnanimously, surreptitiously blinking in the direction of the milk carton. ‘It is very thoughtful of you both to provide breakfast.’ He glanced over to the tent. I’ll summon Crowley shall I?’ He laughed self-consciously, ‘Ah… well, not ‘summon’ in the sense of.. er.. well perhaps I should say I’ll see if he’s up.’

He caught Nina’s insouciant expression and blushed. ‘Oh, I didn’t mean …’

‘I’m here!’ said Crowley, stumbling out of the tent and walking straight into the bunting. ‘Fucking flags everywhere. Morning ladies.’

‘Tea?’ asked Maggie.

‘He’ll have coffee,’ said Nina confidently. ‘It’s strong’ she assured him.

Crowley smiled. ‘You know me so well.’

‘You looked as though you had a good night’s sleep my dear,’ observed Aziraphale conversationally whilst making a very particular effort not to stare. Crowley was wearing a different outfit this morning. It included the deliciously tight trousers and the studded belt, but paired with an unfamiliar top made of something silky that fell in slippery folds and shimmered like snake skin.

‘Watching me all night were you angel?’ said Crowley with a wink.

‘I’m a guardian!’ protested Aziraphale hastily reorientating his gaze towards the demon’s face. ‘Watching is absolutely part of that remit. In any case, whilst I may have glanced in once or twice, for the most part I was reading. One of the books that I brought with me is a most interesting account of the history of Glastonbury and it’s role within Christendom.’

‘Sounds fascinating.’

‘It is rather.’

‘Just checking,’ broke in Nina, taking the conversation back a step to the important bit, ‘You didn’t happen to just glance in on Maggie and I at all did you?’

‘Well of course not!’ said Aziraphale quickly, looking horrified at the thought. ‘That would be deeply inappropriate!’

‘Good’ said Nina firmly. ‘’Cos that’d be weird.’

‘Oh our angel’s never weird!’ grinned Crowley.

Aziraphale smiled indulgently at the gentle teasing and dug his spoon into the bowl of cornflakes that Maggie had passed him. The cereal crunched sending tiny, dislodged bubbles jostling upwards to pop with a minute spatter. It had to be said that so far camping was proving rather better than he envisaged. Last night, for example, had involved a lot of highly educational reading, a few instances of not strictly necessary guardianing and a very pleasurable couple of hours during which the bed had proved more than adequate for activities other than sleeping.

‘I take it you approve of the bed?’ Aziraphale had asked rather pointedly afterwards.

‘I approve of what’s in the bed,’ panted Crowley with a grin, running his eyes appreciatively along the angel’s form.

‘Oh hush!’ said Aziraphale, embarrassed.

Yes, so far camping was turning out to be distinctly acceptable, provided that one had the right equipment and pleasant company. The last time he had camped for any length of time (and not willingly he might add) there had been rather a surfeit of camels and, well, what camels are apt to produce. Aziraphale appreciated that all God’s creatures were charming in their own way, but camels were among those that he classed as better at a distance. The one that had trodden heavily on his tent in the middle of the night and left a malodourous gift beside his bedding roll would have had to have travelled a very long way indeed before he was prepared to regard it as anything other than a bothersome nuisance.

Happily, Somerset had rather a dearth of camels. There were cows. He’d seen a few in the distance, passively chewing the cud and watching all the unusual activity in their fields with mild interest, but they behind a reassuringly sturdy fence and not inadequately roped to a withered desert shrub. Besides, cows produced milk, milk was a necessary constituent of a good cup of tea, and thus cows were very dear creatures indeed. He was more than happy to share the countryside with cows.

Aziraphale consumed another spoonful of cornflakes and thought happy and benevolent thoughts about the world in general. Of course, that might all change once the masses arrived. It was busy enough with all the staff and traders, and he was rather dreading the sheer quantity of people and all the noise and human smells that would be attendant, but he was doing his best not to let such thoughts spoil the morning.

‘Good coffee!’ said Crowley approvingly. He fixed eyes with the angel ‘Strong, hot and smells delicious. Just what I like.’

Aziraphale, pink-cheeked, looked away quickly as a fond smile twitched at the corners of his mouth.

‘Have some more,’ said Nina, nodding in the direction of the jug.

‘Oh, I intend to!’ said Crowley, keeping his eyes on the angel.

‘When everyone’s finished breakfast,’ continued Nina- very much not oblivious but pretending to be – we’ll take you on a tour of the site.’

‘There’s loads to explore!’ said Maggie. ‘It really is a good to get your bearings now. Gates open at eight, so we’ve not got much time before it really starts to fill up.’

Aziraphale twisted round in his chair, squinting apprehensively across the fields full of tents and spaces soon-to-be-filled with tents. ‘It does look really rather enormous!’

‘It’s just the angle’ said Crowley modestly.

‘Hardly!’ said Aziraphale with such pointed conviction that this time it was Crowley who blushed.

Aziraphale took another look out across the site. It looked in both form and scale rather like the type of weird and wonderful cityscape that certain brands of sci-fi envisaged as the future for humanity. Bright colours, bolds shapes and industrial gantries popped up here and there, sprouting from among low lying marquees and trading vans. Already, it was bustling with site stewards, stall holders, techies and staff. Spreading out from the temporary metropolis, winding paths led to the various areas marked out for where the slum of punters’ tents would soon appear.

‘It’s big’ said Nina following Aziraphale’s gaze, ‘but there’s signs everywhere. Anyway, half the fun is getting lost and finding yourself somewhere that you didn’t expect to be.

‘I’ve already found myself somewhere which I didn’t expect to be!’ Aziraphale said mildly.

Crowley stretched. ‘Good for you to broaden your horizons Angel. See something new.’

Aziraphale was tempted to point out that as he had seen the stars born, the Earth drowned and the antichrist rise, his horizons were already rather significantly broader than that of the average London bookseller, but he thought better of it.

‘Have you finished breakfast yet?’ asked Maggie, torn between good manners and impatience. ‘We should get going.’

‘Done,’ said Crowley, draining the last of his coffee and letting out an exaggerated sigh of appreciation. ‘Lead on. Come on angel.’

With Maggie as enthusiastic group leader they headed away from their tents and into the site. ‘There is so much to see.’ Maggie advised. ‘Don’t try to take it all in now. I’ll point out some of the main things so that you can get your bearings. It looks so much more amazing at night anyway. Place will be buzzing.’

‘Jolly good,’ said Aziraphale, feeling the weight of expectation to say something encouraging but rather perturbed at the idea of his nocturnal peace and quiet troubled by hoards of awake humans.

‘Ribbon tower,’ said Maggie, pointing to something that looked rather like a Maypole on steroids.

‘Descriptive!’ murmured Aziraphale, vaguely wondering whether the enormous colourful streamers really counted as ribbons as such. Back in the 1950s he’d had a brief stint temporarily manning the haberdashery stall in a department store and found all the buttons, trimmings and coloured ribbon rather delightful. He’s bought several lengths of tartan ribbon that he’s used to hold together some of the more fragile ancient manuscripts in his collection.

Nina was instructing Crowley on the differences between the various bars and where to find the most edgy night life.

‘Treetop bar is atmospheric. Great vibe. Unfairground is creepy and unnerving. Get all the weird stuff there.’

‘Is it though?’ said Crowley. ‘I’ve seen a lot of creepy. Expert in creepy.’

‘Yeah, maybe not then,’ Nina agreed. ‘Might not live up to your expectations.’

‘Oh now that is rather fun!’ said Aziraphale catching sight of the words ‘Glastonbury on Sea’ arching high in the air in front of a traditional seaside pier. ‘It’s even got a bandstand!’

‘They had a fortune teller last year!’ said Maggie, affecting an mysterious voice and widening her eyes for impact.

Nina pointed over to the right. ‘That way’s the craft bit, Shangri la and the healing fields. Gong baths. Mantras. Sacred flames. Chanting, all that shit.’

Crowley nudged Aziraphale in the ribs. ‘Sounds right up your street angel!’

Nina pointed left, ‘Over there is Arcadia. Big dragonfly thing made of a helicopter.’

Aziraphale blinked ‘Oh my!’

‘It’s amazing’ said Maggie, stressing every syllable, ‘But better seen in the dark.’

‘A lot of it is better at night,’ said Nina. ‘Luckily, we’re trading 9-5. No one wants tea, coffee and cake in the evening anyway.’

Aziraphale looked pained. Far be it for him to say, but there was no hour of day or night at which tea and cake was not welcome.

‘There’s tons of bars.’ Maggie added.

‘And I’m gonna sample them all!’ said Crowley, flinging his arms wide in such an expansive gesture that Aziraphale was forced to take evasive action.

‘Well,’ said Maggie an hour later, flopping down on the grass outside the acoustic stage, ‘That’s the main stuff. We didn’t go up to the Woodsies and there’s load of bits to explore properly later, but hopefully that’s enough for you to get your head round it all.’

Aziraphale, whose head felt scattered to the four winds rather than neatly around anything, least of all the layout of the site smiled vaguely.

‘Well,’ said Crowley, elbowing him enthusiastically in the ribs. ‘What’cha think angel. Excited yet?’

‘Oh, terribly,’ Aziraphale answered, wearing an expression akin to that of a small animal who has been unexpectedly disturbed. ‘It’s all… er… most interesting.’

‘Gates open properly now,’ said Nina, looking at her watch. ‘Maggie and I have got things to do. You two okay to be left alone?’

Crowley gave her his most innocent smile. ‘Do we look like we might not be okay?’

‘Do you really want me to answer that?’

‘We’ll be absolutely fine, my dear,' Aziraphale assured her in his best comforting scared humans voice.

Nina looked uncertain. ‘Just don’t I dunno, cause a riot or break anything.’

* * * * *

Angel and demon meandered back through an unexplored section of market. Crowley sniffed the air appreciatively. From somewhere, the smell of burgers suggested that one of the more organised venders had decided to capitalise on the captive cliental. Other traders were still setting up.

‘Not open yet,’ called out a woman hanging up rows of brightly coloured dungarees next to some ethically sourced ponchos.

‘Yeah, we know.’ Crowley answered. ‘Just exploring.’ He ran his eye along a row of T shirts with edgy designs. There were several that he’d definitely wear. As a rule, Crowley didn’t buy clothes preferring to just manifest whatever he fancied; it saved on washing and it made for some innocent fun when he was bored. He’d once gone through six different outfits on the Metropolitan line between Paddington and Edgware Road much to the bemusement of a rather elderly lady who decided that she should stop putting off her overdue eye test**.

He nudged Aziraphale, ‘Hey angel. You need some more casual wear.’

‘No’ said Aziraphale automatically. He followed Crowley’s gaze and his eyes widened. ‘Definitely no.’

‘Spoilsport.’

‘I very much doubt I shall ever find it necessary to wear a T shirt,’ said Aziraphale tartly. ‘They are for children and for those engaging in sport.’ He paused for emphasis. ‘And there is absolutely no chance that I would ever willingly wear one making such a crude suggestion.’

‘Maybe I’ll get you to wear one unwillingly,’ murmured Crowley. ‘Sounded like a challenge to me.’

Aziraphale refused to rise to the bait. ‘If you wish to take it as such, so be it,’ he said calmly. ‘It is a challenge which you shall not win.’

‘That’s fighting talk angel.’

‘Get behind me demon!’

‘Now?’ said Crowley playfully, ‘It’s a bit public for that!’

‘Wretched creature!’ said Aziraphale, ‘You are exasperating and quite impossible!’

Crowley basked in the force of an angelic glare that would have quelled a lesser demon and held Aziraphale’s gaze. He narrowed his eyes seductively and opened his mouth just enough to tease. Aziraphale lost control of the glare which wobbled into a self-conscious smile. Crowley clicked his fingers and suddenly the phrase ‘Exasperating and Quite Impossible’ appeared on his slinky top in Aziraphale’s elegant, old-fashioned handwriting.

‘At least you come with a warning,’ the angel said dryly.

They sauntered past several more clothing stalls with similar selections of merchandise and passed a purveyor of candles (‘rather unwise in a tent’) and a couple selling some Celtic-style jewellery (‘terribly inaccurate from a historical perspective’). At the end of the row was a stall colourful with rocks and crystals, or – if they banner above the velvet covered table was to be believed – amulets and talismans. Along the front of the table sat inviting little bags and bowls each with a different type of treasure inside. Crowley poked at the nearest bowl curiously.

‘Must you touch everything?’ complained Aziraphale, mildly embarrassed.

‘Guardian angles,’ read Crowley, ignoring him. ‘Guaranteed to bring protection.’ He grinned, ‘Apparently they attract angels. Let’s see if it works.’ He picked up the little crystal figure, waving it close to Aziraphale’s face. ‘Nope, not working. Maybe I’m doing it wrong.’

‘I’d really rather you didn’t’ said Aziraphale firmly, redirecting Crowley’s hand away from his chest. He took the crystal angel from Crowley’s hand and put it decisively back in the woven basket. Beside the basket was a little black piece of paper with a short explanation of the item and the (frankly exorbitant) price. Aziraphale read the information with the type of very deliberate interest that precedes strident disagreement. His mouth twitched. He read a few other labels. If the information was correct, then this small stall contained the wherewithal to open his third eye, rid him of negative energy, ward off evil, ensure inner harmony and initiate spiritual awakening, although to do all that he would have to part with quite a considerable amount of money.

Meanwhile, Crowley had found tray of heart shaped rings that claimed to know when the wearer was in love and promised to convey the information back to them with a subtle change of hue. Stupid to use a heart really he thought, not the most obvious body part to pick. He stared at the for a moment. He could easily transform them into something more apt, his and hers designs of course. Humans would love that. Maybe in a variety of sizes. Or, rather than changing colour, they could grow.

‘Excuse me!’ Aziraphale’s voice interrupted his musings. The angel had accosted the stallholder with that icy level politeness and beaming smile which suggested he was only a few stages removed from a smiting. ‘I wonder if you could be so kind as to explain to me exactly how these crystal angels work?’

‘S the power of the stone,’ the stall holder explained. ‘Nature’s full of power. Always there for the finding, just people nowadays aren’t spiritual.’ He twitched his nose. ‘D’you believe in angels?’

‘Well, yes of course,’ said Aziraphale, ‘but I think that you’ll find…’

‘You’ve got a guardian angel,’ the man butted in. ‘Did you know that? Got a guardian angel looking out for everything you do. Like your own personal heavenly security.’

‘Possibly,’ said Aziraphale, ‘but that doesn’t quite explain…’

‘Always with you, your guardian,’ said the man. He pointed to his hat. Three white feathers poked out of the beaded hat band. ‘From mine,’ he explained. ‘Couldn’t miss ‘em. Just lying on the path for me to find. A sign.’

‘That’s a swan,’ said Aziraphale tersely. ‘Angel feathers look quite different.’

‘Aziraphale!’ said Crowley in warning tones.

‘And you’d know would you?’ the stall holder asked. ‘What do angel feathers look like then?’

‘Not like a swan feather!’ Aziraphale countered. He pressed his lips together to stop himself from elaborating. Of course, the stupid man couldn’t be expected to know that angel feathers were an entirely different shape, far more luminous and generally utterly unlike a swan feather in almost every way possible. Human stupidity was invariably annoying, but it took on a new and elevated level of irritating when it pertained to heavenly mysteries.

‘Get yourself a crystal angel,’ said the stallholder in the manner of one conveying a great secret, ‘and maybe you’ll find an angel feather. With you all the time, your angel.’

‘For the love of G… all that’s holy that’s a swan feather,’ said Aziraphale irritated to the cusp of blasphemy, ‘And besides, if as you claim my angel is with me all the time, why in Heavens would I need a crystal angel to attract it?’

The man looked at Aziraphale, then stabbed the air with a tattooed forefinger. ‘That is a good point,’ he conceded. ‘Hadn’t thought of that. You’re clever.’ He nodded slowly for a moment, then turned to Crowley, ‘And what about you young sir. You ever feel the presence of your angel?’

‘Oh all the time!’ said Crowley, ‘Barely a moment that I’m not aware of him, needy bugger. Sometimes I wish he’d just piss off. Anyway, we must be off, got friends to meet up with.’

‘Alright,’ said that stallholder philosophically. ‘See you around.’

‘Don’t pick fights with the humans!’ whispered Crowley, physically steering Aziraphale away by the elbow.

‘But it’s all such utter rubbish!’ hissed Aziraphale, shaking his arm free from Crowley’s hand. ‘I don’t know how they have the absolute nerve to make people part with their hard-earned money for that… that… ineffectual tat.’

‘People like it, angel’ said Crowley soothingly. ‘No one believes it.’

‘Some people do!’ said Aziraphale with feeling, ‘And people like that… that rogue back there ruthlessly exploit their naivety.’

‘Yeah, well, maybe people need to learn not to be so trusting,’ said Crowley, uncomfortably aware that a not insignificant portion of his time was spent exploiting the trusting nature of humans in a variety of creative ways.

‘You can’t blame people for having hope!’ Aziraphale shot back. ‘Or for being desperate for that matter.’ That was the problem. It was always those that had the most to lose that ended up being taken in: The sick who’d run out of other options; The terrified who needed comfort; The destitute clinging to the hope of better luck around the corner. Aziraphale turned earnest eyes on Crowley. ‘It’s just not fair to turn people’s trust into a something to hurt them.’

‘No one is gonna be devastated to discover that a crystal angel doesn’t actually work,’ said Crowley. ‘People spend thousands on insurance. No one expects them to ever pay out. Humans expect to get conned. Then they enjoy complaining about it.’

‘It’s the principle,’ huffed Aziraphale, marginally mollified, but refusing to let go of indignation just yet.

‘You’re just grumpy about the swan feathers!’ said Crowley slyly. He grinned, ‘Should’ve got your wings out and shown him the real deal.’

‘Don’t tempt me!’ said Aziraphale petulantly. ‘Or I shall go back and do that very thing.’

‘I’ve told you before,’ said Crowley firmly, ‘There are some things that you just can’t get out in public. It’s inappropriate.’

Aziraphale gave him a look and opened his mouth to speak.

‘Don’t say it!’ Crowley interrupted, pointing at his top. ‘I know. I’m exasperating and quite impossible. I remember.’

‘You are being very silly!’ said Aziraphale, unable to keep affection out of his voice. Crowley was right, in the grand scheme of things, what harm was a little crystal angel? And whilst stupidity was so very irritating, it was hardly a great moral failing. Aziraphale sighed, wondering whether all angels sometimes struggled with finding humans – some humans – irritating. He love them all, of course he did, just that some humans were – like camels - rather better at a distance. Still, practice makes perfect, Aziraphale told himself, shaking off the feeling that as the years had passed he’d got worse rather than better at bearing fools gladly. In any case, whether he liked it or not he was going to get a great deal of practice at dealing with an excessive quantity of humanity at close quarters for the next few days.

‘So do you?’ asked Crowley impatiently.

‘Hmm?’ said Aziraphale who hadn’t been listening.

‘Want to get crepes? There’s a stall selling them over there.’

Aziraphale brightened at once, ‘Oh absolutely!’

Chapter Text

‘That was scrumptious!’ said Aziraphale with a happy sigh. ‘Although rather difficult to eat given the inadequacies of the utensils provided.’ He dropped the paper pate and wooden cutlery into the bin.

Crowley raised an eyebrow. ‘I suppose you expected fine china and a cake fork?’

‘That would have been desirable,’ Aziraphale agreed, ‘But I would have settled for a plate that did not bend and an implement capable of cutting.’

Crowley, who had rather enjoyed the moment that the angel had almost dropped the whole thing in his lap and very nearly sworn, grinned to himself.

Aziraphale patted his mouth fastidiously with the corner of a paper napkin. ‘I suppose it would be rather decadent to have another.’

‘Terribly naughty,’ agreed Crowley with an inviting pout. ‘Think how good it will tasssttte.’

‘Now you’re tempting me!’ Aziraphale demurred.

‘Alwaysss!’

‘Well, I shall resist your evil ways!’ Aziraphale retorted, ignoring the shiver of desire that ran up his spine whenever Crowley spoke to him like that. ‘But, I shall perhaps indulge again tomorrow.’

‘Ssuit yourssself,’ Crowley whispered into the angel’s ear and brushing cheeks with him as he did so that Aziraphale suddenly found another crepe was no longer the first thing on his mind.

They left the food area of the market and headed south, drawn perhaps by some vaguely deterministic forces towards the healing fields and sacred space. The site was already considerably busier and - as Aziraphale noted with mild concern – noisier than it had been an hour ago. Without really meaning to, they found themselves on the edge of the craft area. Large signs displayed the various things on offer. Aziraphale studied them with interest. There were an improbable number of activities relating to willow, some mildly kinky things with leather, a number of expensive classes that used silver as well as some like spoon-carving and knot work that might actually prove useful in certain camping scenarios. One thing in particular caught his eye.

‘Oh there’s traditional book binding!’ he exclaimed happily.

‘You can do that already!’ Crowley pointed out.

‘Well yes,’ said Aziraphale, enthusiasm undampened, ‘But it might be rather interesting to see if the techniques are any different.’ He lowered his voice conspiratorially, ‘It is quite a significant period of time since I had any instruction in the matter.’

Crowley snorted. ‘Literally no one knows more than you about all that stuff angel.’

Book-binding was one of many things that Aziraphale had learned the 'proper' (i.e. human) way. Long before Heaven had selected a bookshop as an embassy and centuries before the advent of printing, he remembered watching Egyptian artisans cutting the reeds, extracting the pith and slicing it into perfectly neat narrow strips of fibre. He’d been fascinated by the humans’ ingenuity as they placed the damp strips across each other, allowing them to bond into a flat sheet as they dried.

‘Terribly clever how you do that!’ he’d commented, after silently watching a teenage Egyptian apprentice for some time.

‘Would you like to try?’

‘If I may!’

He’d briefly wondered if it was quite proper for an angel to take instruction from a human when the Almighty had created things to be the other way around, but his enthusiasm overrode his scruples. Making papyrus proved to be both time-consuming and fiddly, but later when he lifted up his (rather uneven) piece of papyrus he felt for the first time the flash of creative satisfaction. Holding something that only existed because he had made it was really rather wonderful and it had gave him a warm glow of power quite different anything accomplished miraculously. When Aziraphale had realised with a sickening jolt that that feeling was pride, and thus a sin, he’d destroyed his first little work of art, ripping it to pieces and grinding the torn fibres into the mud of the river bank. Destroying what he had made hurt, but that was his penance for such sinful emotions.

Two centuries later in a back street in Rome, Crowley had been leaning casually against the doorframe, watching the worker within.

‘I dunno why you make the whole thing out of gold,’ he’d said conversationally to the goldsmith, ‘You could just as easily make it out of some cheap metal and coat it. No one would ever know. If it looks the same, it’s worth the same, right?’

‘Don’t listen to him!’ Aziraphale had said quickly. He’d been leaning against the side of the other doorframe, vaguely glowing in the bright Italian sunshine. ‘You have the integrity of your craft to maintain. Whatever would people think if they were to discover that you had ever stooped so low as to use a base metal in your art? Absolutely beneath you! Am I right?’ And he’d flashed the goldsmith one of his deeply encouraging smiles.

The goldsmith had smiled in a slightly sickly way and surreptitiously kicked some suspicious offcuts into a dark corner.

‘It really so very clever all the crafts that these humans have.’ Aziraphale had said to the demon as they walked in the same direction heading - completely by chance - towards the same tavern where they would - totally coincidentally - each pick the same shady spot to enjoy a drink. ‘Did you see the way he was making that gold wire. Absolutely phenomenal. And those little embossed patterns on the panels! Imagine having the skills to craft that.’

‘You or I could make something better in an instant,’ Crowley had retorted, clicking his fingers to illustrate and doing it so decisively that the angel ducked reflexively.

‘Oh but it’s hardly the same!’ said Aziraphale. ‘The human way looks so much more, well, fun.’

A little later, when they were seated in the back corner of the tavern and Aziraphale was still extolling the virtues of human craftsmanship, Crowley had put down his drink and sighed. ‘Why don’t you try if you’re so interested?’

Aziraphale had shrunk back. ‘Oh, I couldn’t possibly!’

‘Why not?’ Crowley had pressed. ‘Thought you were supposed to, you know, fit in?’

‘Are you tempting me demon?’ Aziraphale had asked suspiciously.

Crowley had shrugged. ‘No. Just a thought. Forget it.’

Aziraphale had tried to forget it, but that little seed of suggestion took root. If he were to, well, blend with the humans, then it made sense for him to have a trade, to have interests even. Perhaps it couldn’t hurt to dabble in some human skills. Not gold-smithing, that world attracted far too many crooks and greed for it to be a suitable environment for an angel questioning his own virtues, but there must be some pursuits that were more wholesome.

First, he’d tried working as a scribe. Copying out religious texts in the draughty cloisters of a Northumbrian monastery seemed eminently suitable for an angel, and whilst there was a certain satisfaction to be had in carefully painting the illuminated capitals, any dangerous pride he might have felt were counteracted by the hours of boredom engendered by mindless copying. He was not entirely disappointed when a heavenly summons sent him to Germany.

‘May I enquire what for?’ he’d asked.

‘Some guy has invented a thing,’ said Gabriel dismissively, ‘A thing that makes books. Lots of books. Does… stuff to make them fast.’

‘Oh, how exciting!’ Aziraphale had said enthusiastically. ‘Such a wonderful idea!’

The expression on Gabriel’s face told him that this was the wrong thing to say.

‘That’s not what head office thinks,’ Gabriel had reprimanded. ‘We don’t want everyone having books now do we? Terrible idea.’

‘Er… no?’ said Aziraphale, ‘Of course…Erm… might I ask why? I mean, I would have thought that heaven would be rather, well in favour of books. Wonderful way to spread knowledge.’

‘Aziraphale, Aziraphale,’ Gabriel tutted, disapproval seeping through the façade of geniality, ‘Always quite the idealist aren’t you?’

‘Is that a bad thing?’ Aziraphale asked before he could stop himself.

Gabriel performed a little pantomime of considering this question for a moment before rocking forward with an, ‘Ah…. Yes… duh!’

‘Right,’ said Aziraphale tightly, deliberately not flinching as Gabriel leaned into his space. ‘So I am to…’

‘Sabotage. Break stuff.’

‘Er…’ said Aziraphale.

Urial leaned in and whispered something in Gabriel’s ear. The archangel gave a disappointed frown. ‘Really?’ He turned back to Aziraphale. ‘Monitor,’ he corrected and ‘Midi…’ Gabriel glanced to Urial for help.

‘Mitigate.’ Urial supplied.

‘That too,’ said Gabriel. ‘Go and… do that.’

Germany had been rather a nice change from Northumbria. The weather was better, the food was better and, it had to be said the company was better too.

‘I thought I might see you here!’

‘Hoped you mean,’ said Crowley with a knowing look.

Aziraphale made no comment, but sat down next to the demon. ‘You’re well I take it?’ he said, noting how well the slashed doublet suited Crowley’s form. ‘So, what mischief have you been causing?’

Crowley leaned back, lifting his arms hight to rest his elbows on the back of the wooden bench and brushing Aziraphale’s shoulder as he did so. ‘Well, you know… this and that.’

‘Influenced any printers?’ Aziraphale asked casually.

‘Maybe,’ Crowley concurred. ‘I prefer to think of it as inspired.’

‘It was a clever idea,’ Aziraphale admitted. ‘So much more efficient to make the letters reusable. You know, I would have been rather proud to have come up with that one myself!’

‘Watch it angel,’ Crowley warned, ‘Heaven doesn’t approve, remember.’

They were silent for a moment.

‘I must admit,’ said Aziraphale carefully, ‘I don’t quite see how it counts as demonic, what is the end goal as it were?’

‘Money,’ said Crowley, ‘Obviously. It’s always money. Greed. Avarice all that stuff. Plus, more money for less effort, so that’s sloth, indolence. Something like that.’

‘Ah,’ said Aziraphale. ‘Of course.’

‘And it undercuts all those monks busy copying out manuscripts. No need to do that anymore. No point being locked away in monasteries for years.’

‘There is that,’ Aziraphale agree. He paused. ‘Am I to infer that was your main purpose?’

‘Dunno, do you want it to be?’

Aziraphale shrugged, his shoulder touching again with Crowley’s hand as he did so. Neither of them flinched from the contact.

‘Got your superiors worried anyway,’ grinned Crowley, ‘Worried enough they’ve sent you. What are you supposed to do? Thwart me?’

‘Monitor and mitigate,’ said Aziraphale automatically. ‘Gabriel would, I think, rather I destroyed everything.’

‘Cock’ said Crowley emphatically. ‘So, what are you going to do?’

‘Well,’ said Aziraphale, ‘I think it would be… er… unwise to do anything hasty. Monitoring takes time of course, and I shall have to formulate a long term plan to mitigate your wicked ways.’

‘Though you might,’ said Crowley, not bothering to hide the smug notes in his voice.

Thinking back, mid-fifteenth century Germany had all been very pleasant. He’d learned to bind books (all part of fitting in with the humans) and had become really rather good at it. First, the leaves had to be folded and hand-stitching together before the pages could be carefully cut apart. That done, the codex had to be sandwiched between cloth or leather covered board and fixed in place. Aziraphale was particularly fond of marbling the end papers; the great swirling patterns reminded him of those first days of creation with the great mists of the cosmos. The whole process was one of immense satisfaction (a very different emotion to pride he told himself), and he was rather thrilled to learn that books he’d bound became really rather sought after.

‘How’s monitoring going?’ Crowley had asked, sipping beer and watching as Aziraphale tucked into an apple tart.

‘Rather well as it happens,’ He’d replied. ‘I think I can truthfully say that I have the relevant demonic elements closely under observation.’

‘That must be such as burden for you,’ Crowley had said in what was quite frankly a sarcastic tone.

‘It’s one that I am willing to endure.’

‘How about mitigating?’

‘Well,’ Aziraphale, had said, ‘I would hope that Heaven will be rather pleased with my influence there. A magnificent new edition of the Bible can hardly be seen as anything but a force for good.’

‘Sure about that?’ asked Crowley, ‘Everyone upstairs happy with people reading the Bible for themselves? Nothing in it they’d rather try and keep secret?’

Aziraphale recalled he’d thought quite carefully before answering. ‘I would hope not.’

As it turned out, not everyone had been completely happy about people reading the Bible for themselves. They’d been rather a furore about that (along with one or two other issues) in the centuries that followed.

Nevertheless, Aziraphale couldn’t help but feel, well, proud of that Bible. He had an edition of it back in the shop, one he remembered having worked on. The marbled papers twinkled like stars forming in a nebular and gilding skimmed across the embossed leather glinting like the scales of a snake.

‘Oi, Angel!’ Crowley’s impatient interrupted his thoughts. ‘You gonna stare at that sign all afternoon?’ He paused, then frowned. ‘You alright?’

‘Tip top,’ Aziraphale replied automatically returning from the fifteenth century with alacrity. He pointed at the list of crafts, ‘Anything that takes your fancy?’

‘Yes,’ grinned Crowley, not looking at the sign.

Aziraphale tried to look disapproving and failed. ‘My dear, you are quite incorrigible.’ He changed the subject. ‘I believe that it’s probably time we rendezvoused with Maggie and Nina?’

‘Guess so,’ said Crowley, he looked at his watch. ‘Can’t be late. Not long til the real fun begins!’

‘Real fun?’

‘Music,’ said Crowley, strutting to an imaginary band, ‘Extraordinary quantities of alcohol, dancing, debauchery.’

‘Ah,’ said Aziraphale, ‘I suspect that we might have somewhat different interpretations of what constitutes fun.’

‘Nope,’ said Crowley confidently adding a less than subtle gyration to his hips, ‘I know what you find fun angel, and I can assure you …’

‘Apart from that!’ Aziraphale said quickly, looking round in the hope that there was no one near enough to overhear them.

‘You’ll enjoy it Angel,’ said Crowley, shimmying over to him, ‘Think of it as renaissance dancing with less space and fewer rules.’

‘And, I hope no zombie invasion,’ muttered Aziraphale.

‘Well, it is Glastonbury,’ shrugged Crowley, ‘So anything’s possible, but it probably isn’t likely.’

Chapter Text

It was, as Aziraphale had rather suspected, conspicuously not like renaissance dancing. Renaissance dancing was conducted calmly in elegant surroundings to music that had a tune. It had rules; that was one of the things Aziraphale liked about it. There were steps to be learned in advance and a lot of it could be conducted without breaking a sweat, although one or two of the jollier ones verged toward the brisk. It was romantic, exceedingly decorous and very refined.

What was happening now was absolutely nothing like that and had rather more in common with the chaos that ensues when a hoard of hell’s fiends baying for blood happen to interrupt your ballroom dance by means of an ill-mannered brick flung through the window. It was loud, licentious and rough. The repeated invasion of personal space was particularly trying and Aziraphale, who was constitutionally obliged to apologise if a person bumped into him, rapidly found that he was unable to keep up with the siege of physical contact.

‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ he winced as a lady in improbably high stilettos stood heavily on his foot. ‘I do apologise for getting in your way.’ He stepped back and received an elbow to the ribs from the wild gyrating of someone who’d learned to do the twist in the 60s and was damn well going to prove that they’d still got it. ‘Please excuse me. Ah. So sorry. Oh dear.’

‘Are you alright Mr Fell?’ Maggie shouted over the music grabbing him purposefully by the wrist and pulling him firmly towards her. She looked both amused and concerned but the crinkles around the corners of her eyes suggested that amusement was gaining the upper hand.

‘Absolutely tip top,’ Aziraphale said exuding altruistic insincerity and deeply tempted to perform the type of miracle that turned people into smaller, quieter and generally less bothersome creatures. ‘I’m afraid I’m not entirely familiar with the steps to this erm… dance.’

‘Oh there aren’t any steps,’ said Maggie. ‘You just make it up.’ Beside her, Nina danced with the confident abandonment of someone who doesn’t give a fuck what anyone else thinks.

‘No rules Angel,’ Crowley added. ‘Just move like this.’

Aziraphale looked at the way Crowley (who was a better dancer than the average demon, but probably not quite as good as he thought he was) flung his limbs into an improbable succession of shapes. Aziraphale was extremely confident that there was no version of reality in which he could move in any of those ways. And if he could, he would not be doing so in public. Some of the movements would have been scandalously illegal at several points in history and there were others that would have been similarly condemned had the powers that be had the imagination and foresight to envisage them.

‘Just do whatever dance move you do know,’ said Nina encouragingly, snapping her hips in time with the beat and constructing a complicated sequence of shapes with her arms.

‘Best not,’ said Aziraphale firmly. Whenever he traced complex figures in the air, material objects were liable to find the ordinary regularities of physics no longer applied.

Nina shrugged, although it was hard to tell against amid all the other apparently random movements. ‘Suit yourself.’

‘Come on Angel,’ said Crowley, pausing mid thrust to pout seductively. ‘I know you dance.’

‘But the rhythm is completely wrong,’ Aziraphale protested, not in the least immune to Crowley’s persuasion, but utterly scandalised by the thought of massacring the charm the gavotte or compromise on the stately elegance of the pavane. ‘The steps won’t fit at all. I couldn’t possibly.’

‘You can do it,’ Maggie said, taking both his hands this time and manhandling him gently into a sort of shuffling two step. Aziraphale, bound by good manners not to wrench his hands free made a half-hearted attempt at following her lead. Maggie beamed. ‘See, told you.’

The song finished with an ecstatic crescendo, whipping at least some of the audience into a hysteria of emotion. Crowley strummed air guitar with gusto flinging his head back in a way that made the sinews in his neck pop. ‘Drink?’ motioned Nina, out of breath and grinning broadly as the last notes died away.

‘That would be very welcome,’ Aziraphale agreed extracting his hands from Maggie’s grip with a little nod of gratitude.

‘You know,’ Crowley said to the angel in a loud whisper as they threaded their way through the crowd, ‘I bet I could get you to move in interesting ways…’

Aziraphale gave him the sort of look that informed him that if he continued to make such comments in public his chances of being able to follow up on them in private later would be substantially reduced.

Nina led them towards a large wooden bar that looked like the architectural love child between the wild west and a pastiche of medieval England. A steeply pitched tie-beam roof, hung with wooden shingles and festooned with fairy lights, loomed against the rapidly darkening sky. Below, was a timber-framed bar draped with plastic ivy and open on all sides. In lieu of tables, large barrels stood dotted around the MDF floor, self-consciously random in lay out.

‘Just like old times,’ observed Crowley sardonically.

‘Hmm,’ said Aziraphale, looking critically at the mock Tudor structure and mentally cataloguing the cacophony of historical inaccuracies. ‘I seem to remember more in the way of walls.’

‘What do you guys want to drink?’ Nina asked, casting a vaguely disapproving look at a sign proclaiming ‘Ale and Wenches’ that hung from one of the beams.

‘Ale,’ said Crowley. ‘Not in the mood for wenches.’

Nina transferred the disapproving look to him.

‘I’ll have a non-alcoholic cider please,’ Maggie said. ‘One of the fruity ones.’

Aziraphale squinted at the chalkboard behind the bar and wished that whoever had written it had been a little more circumspect with their flourishes. ‘A white wine please. And a glass of sparkling water if I may.’

‘Coming right up,’ said Nina, inadvertently dropping into her café persona and heading over to the bar.

‘Table free,’ Maggie interjected, swooping round behind Crowley to claim a vacated barrel and beckoning the others over to join her.

Aziraphale looked with undisguised distaste at the abandoned array of plastic glasses abandoned amid a soggy beer mat.

‘No miracles,’ Crowley reminded him before the angel could tidy up with a subtle wave of his hand. ‘Gotta just lower your standards. Leave them.’

‘I’d really rather not,’ Aziraphale retorted, picking up the offending items with his finger tips and bearing them at arms’ length over to the nearest bin bag as if he were carrying an unexploded bomb. Really, was it too much to expect that humans would clean up after themselves? Untidiness was one thing and he would even admit to creating a certain level of academic clutter himself, but leaving one’s detritus inconsiderately lying about to inconvenience others was quite unacceptable. He dropped the cups into the sagging rubbish bag where they fell with a mildly resentful plastic clatter and returned to the table dabbing delicately at his finger tips with his crisp white handkerchief. A sensation of general grubbiness persisted.

‘Over here,’ Maggie called out to Nina who was just returning with the drinks, weaving her way between the other patrons with practiced ease.

Nina unloaded the tray. ‘White wine and a sparkling water for you, Ale for you. It’s called Inferno. Seemed appropriate. Fruity cider, no alcohol for you,’ she lifted her own glass, ‘Well, cheers!’

‘Cheers!’ said Crowley.

‘Ah yes, cheers,’ added Aziraphale, mildly distracted by the challenge of clambering onto a bar stool without compromising on dignity. He perched on the polished seat, feet neatly together on the stretcher, back ramrod upright. It was far from comfortable and the round curve of barrel table was awkwardly pressed against his knees. He glanced sidelong at Crowley, envious of the way the demon casually inhabited the space and marginally jealous of the stool which had one of Crowley’s long legs wrapped lovingly around it.

‘So,’ said Nina putting down her glass and looking at Aziraphale with an amused grin. ‘Not a fan of hard rock then?’

‘I think he’s doing very well,’ said Maggie staunchly.

Nina shrugged in Maggie’s direction. ‘I didn’t say he wasn’t.’ She turned back to the angel, ‘But do you like it?’

Aziraphale, relieved that now he was slightly further from the source of the noise and his chest was no longer reverberating to the drum beat, could think of several possible answers. None of them seemed very polite. He settled for diplomatic ambivalence. ‘I’m not terribly familiar with it I’m afraid.’ He smiled apologetically. It was the smile he usually reserved for gently letting down customers when they tried to buy a book.

‘Ah, get some more alcohol in you angel,’ Crowley said, knocking back the rest of his pint by way of demonstration. ‘Be ripping up the dance floor before you know it.’

Aziraphale blinked in surprise, ‘Surely that would be rather counter-productive?’

‘’s an expression angel. Means dancing,’ Crowley leaned forward and lowered his voice to a husky whisper. ‘Wildly!’

‘Ah, well in that case I don’t think…’ Aziraphale began, somewhat flustered by the implications of that wildly.

Crowley grinned and prodded at Aziraphale’s glass. ‘Drink up angel. Need a few more of those to loosen you up. Find your wild side. Set it free’

‘I’m quite sure I don’t have wild side,’ Aziraphale protested.

‘Oh you do!’

‘I very much do not!’

‘I think,’ interjected Maggie, ‘That maybe we should try the main stage. There’s a band playing that describe themselves as classical fusion.’ She smiled reassuringly at Aziraphale. ‘You might like them better.’

‘Yes perhaps,’ said Aziraphale vaguely, privately certain that the point of classical was that it was very much not fused with anything else and thinking wishful thoughts about being alone with a gramophone.

Crowley tapped the top of the barrel meaningfully. ‘Another round first. I’ll get them.’ He slid down from the stool, gathered up the empties and strolled off towards the bar. Aziraphale watched appreciatively as Crowley snaked with easy elegance between the assorted bodies and wondered if the demon knew just how mesmerising his swagger was from behind. Or indeed from any angle really. There was something fascinating about the swing of those long limbs and the way that the demon seemed to move through a crowd with scarcely any contact like a – what were those floating beetles called – a pond skater, that was it, like a pond skater on water. Aziraphale let out the breath that he didn’t know he’d been holding and realised suddenly that perhaps he shouldn’t stare quite so obviously. Glancing sideways, he caught Nina’s eye. She was watching him with that tiresome knowing look of hers, eyes twinkling accusingly. He grimaced in embarrassment.

Nina raised her hands in a placating gesture, laughter pulling at the corners of her mouth. ‘Hey, no judgment here. I can appreciate a good arse, even on a man. You ogle him all you like.’

Maggie giggled as Aziraphale winced at the coarseness of the language. ‘I wouldn’t quite call it…’ he began before trailing off, unsure quite how to finish.

‘I think it’s lovely,’ said Maggie, springing to his defence as usual. ‘It’s sweet that you look at him with so much love.’

‘Lust!’ corrected Nina under her breath, still smirking.

Aziraphale blushed deeply, opened his mouth to protest and found that all he could manage was a rather inarticulate stutter that did absolutely nothing to plead his cause. Thankfully, before he could say or do anything incriminating, Crowley returned just in time to provide temporary salvation from the genial teasing. ‘Yours,’ he said, pushing a cup half filled with an amber liquid down in front of the angel. Three ice cubes clinked musically together as the contents sloshed a settled.

‘That’s not wine!’ Aziraphale objected sniffing at it so suspiciously that Crowley had a sudden flash back to memories of roast oxen and a very much more innocent angel yet to discover the pleasures of gluttony.

‘You’ll like it better,’ the demon retorted. ‘S’stronger. Don’t worry, I got you the good stuff.’

‘You’re trying to get me tipsy!’ Aziraphale said trying to inject a note of disapproval into his voice and feeling that he should probably object more than he actually did.

‘No,’ said Crowley shamelessly, ‘I’m trying to get you recklessly drunk. Drink up.’

Aziraphale raised his eyebrows. ‘Then I fear you still have rather a long way to go.’

‘Plenty of time,’ said Crowley. ‘Night’s young yet. Come on, get that down you.’

‘Go on Mr Fell,’ said Maggie with the vicarious enthusiasm of someone who doesn’t drink but is very happy to encourage others to do so to excess.

Aziraphale took a delicate sip. The burn of the alcohol mingled with smoky oak tannins gave him the sensation of imbibing a rather well-mannered fire. Ice cubes bobbed against his lip with a sudden flash of cold and the tiniest of shivers ran down his spine. It was very much the good stuff! Rather a shame about yet another plastic cup of course; That did detract somewhat from the overall experience. In the bookshop, he had a lovely collection of cut glass whisky tumblers that he’d been given, when was it? Well, it must have been back at the turn of the century now. Their sweeping notches split the colour of contents into an array of sparkling amber crescents that reminded him of the glowing russet of fox’s fur, or indeed the auburn locks of a certain demon. Aziraphale inhaled the smell of whisky and thought of several very particularly happy evenings spent with Crowley over a glass or two of Scotland’s finest. The warm tingle of alcohol coupled with the glow of romantic memories fortified Aziraphale into cheeriness. Even if the music – if one could call it that – was not absolutely to his liking, perhaps it was one of those earthly pleasure that would grow on him with time. Nothing wrong with trying new things after all: Every old pleasure was once a novel risk. And the company, well that really couldn’t be nicer. He took another, larger mouthful of whisky to consolidate the burst of optimism and beamed purposefully at his companions, ‘Well, shall we return to the ah fray?’

Crowley looked amused. ‘Really angel? Found your wild side after all?’

‘Merely sharing in the interests of my friends!’

Maggie smiled encouragingly. ‘I do think you might actually like it. I mean, it’s not Shostakovich, but it might be closer to what you enjoy.’

‘Come on then,’ said Nina, motioning to Maggie to finish her cider. ‘Main stage is this way. Let’s go and find out what the hell classical fusion is.’

The route led past another market area and thus through a confusing array of smells from the stalls and food vans. From somewhere to the left the sharp aroma of coffee sliced through a billowing sickliness of candyfloss and churros. Sweet scents mingled the savoury; homely jacket potatoes competed with both aromatic curries and the meaty punch of seared burgers. Aziraphale gave in to the lure of mini doughnuts, buying a bag of ten from a lady in a pink and white striped van. Be bore the white paper bag back proudly back to the others. ‘Do have one!’ he said, offering up them up hopefully. ‘They’re simply scrumptious.’

‘Oh, I probably shouldn’t!’ Maggie said with the intonation of one wanting to be persuaded otherwise and looking longingly at the crispy golden sugar and cinnamon covered bites of dough. ‘I’ve had so many sweet things already today.’

‘But you must!’ said Aziraphale, shaking the bag ever so slightly so that the sugar crystals shimmered and the smell intensified. ‘I can’t possibly eat them all myself.’

Maggie shook her head, ‘Really, I…’

‘Please?’ said Aziraphale, deploying his most irresistible smile into an expression of altruistic hopefulness. ‘I did buy them to share.’

Maggie’s resistance crumbled. ‘Well, perhaps just one.’

Aziraphale turned to Nina. ‘You’ll have one too of course my dear?’

‘Well… um ok, thanks,’ said Nina wavering for a split second before committing to the inevitable and reaching into the bag. She jerked her head towards Crowley, ‘I thought you were the one supposed to be doing the tempting!’

Crowley smiled. ‘Yeah, well we have an arrangement. He’s dabbled in temptations for years.’

‘Oh but this hardly counts!’ Aziraphale protested waving the bag in front of Maggie again and keeping it there until she took a second.

‘And he’s devastatingly good at it.’ Crowley added conversationally. ‘Really fucking good. Whole Empires would fall if he smiled at them with those pleading eyes.’ He threw out his arms in a gesture encompassing not only the immediate surroundings but all of human history. ‘Pick the most staunchly principled person you can think of. Anyone at all. Literally anyone. Angel’s only gotta look at them and they’d be selling their soul for a farthing.’

Nina laughed. ‘So you’re both manipulative bastards then! I guess that figures.’

‘Being persuasive is not the same as being manipulative,’ said Aziraphale firmly, scrunching up the now empty paper bag. ‘And I’ve only ever performed the most minor and insignificant of temptations.’ He looked meaningfully towards Crowley and lowered his voice into a gruffer register as if sharing a salacious secret, ‘Whereas he, well! You should see what he can accomplish when he’s really trying.’

‘Yeah, I can imagine!’ laughed Nina as Crowley basked shamelessly in Aziraphale’s praise. ‘God help us when the two of you together turn on the charm.’

‘But of course you’d never try to manipulate us in any way,’ said Maggie confidently.

Angel and demon exchanged a split second glance.

‘Of course not!’

‘Never!’

The answers came in unison and just a trifle too quickly to be entirely convincing. Fortunately, Maggie seemed oblivious. ‘That,’ she said pointing ahead, ‘Is where we are heading.’

‘Gosh,’ said Aziraphale uncertainly.

The pyramid stage, unlike many things in life, lived up to its name in both form and function. It squatted in the Somerset field like an incongruous import from a steam-punk version of Ancient Egypt and had been built on a similarly monumental scale and Crowley, who remembered the real thing, was suitably impressed. In the dusky half-light the crowd in front of the performers moved like an alien sea creature, glittering with iridescence whenever a stray limb or torso flitted into the beam of one of the many lights. The whole mass gently pulsated in time with the strains of the music which – in spite of Maggie’s optimism – bore only the faintest resemblance to anything classical. Aziraphale paused as his burst of optimism wobbled against a rally of insistent second thoughts that included several very valid arguments as to why music festivals were really not his thing; he steeled himself to encounter the vast shifting mass of humanity and took stock.

On balance, whilst the crowd was bigger than the one he had recently escaped, it looked marginally more tolerable. There was far less of what passed for dancing, the crazed gyrating having been replaced with gentle swaying, and the music – which still left an awful lot to be desired – was not threaded through with quite so much heavy-handed percussion. Nevertheless, it was all rather overwhelming.

‘It’s quite a sight isn’t it?’ said Nina who appeared to be having a rather more positive reaction to it than the angel.

Maggie paused beside her, hands clasped together in barely concealed excitement. ‘I love it so much!’ She reached out to Nina, drawing her close and then snuggled her cheek against her girlfriend’s shoulder. ‘I’m so glad that you’re here with me this year. Sometimes it feels like a real miracle!’

‘Match made in heaven!’ said Crowley in only marginally sardonic tones. ‘Like someone planned it.’

‘No, no.’ Aziraphale broke in hastily, postponing his own inner crisis of confidence to divert potential disaster. ‘Just normal human love. Nothing miraculous or manipulative at all. Perfectly standard human affair of the heart with absolutely no heavenly – or demonic - involvement. All quite normal. Very, very ordinary in fact.’ He glared at Crowley, although in the half-light the effort was wasted.

‘What was that?’ said Nina, who’d got quite thoroughly side-tracked impulsively kissing Maggie and fortunately hadn’t been listening.

‘Er,’ said Aziraphale, thinking rapidly and doing a bit of on the spot editing as he realised that ‘very ordinary’ might be taken to be rather an insult. ‘Er, I was saying that your love is quite extraordinary! Very special’ He flung his arms wide for emphasis. ‘Completely wonderful. Spiffing.’

‘Isn’t it!’ agreed Maggie slightly out of breath from the kiss and dreamily wondering whether to go back for seconds now or wait until later.

‘Oh rather! ’ said Aziraphale, with so much emphasis that he was in danger of tipping from sincerity into parody. ‘Quite marvellous.’

‘Let’s go on!’ said Maggie, having come to the conclusion that further kissing could wait. She tugged at Nina’s hand, ‘I want to go and join in properly.’

Nina smiled indulgently, allowing the more restrained and cynical parts of her nature to be swept along by Maggie’s enthusiasm as she dragged her forward.

‘Right,’ said Aziraphale nervously, ‘Right, well… I suppose we should er… Gosh, that really is an awful lot of people.’ He took another deep breath. Humans apparently found the deep breath thing helpful when steeling themselves for unpleasant tasks. Aziraphale was far from convinced that it actually did any good beyond adding a tiny delay to whatever undesirable thing was to be done, but like so many actions that he’d perfected over the centuries, it had become second nature.

‘Come on angel,’ said Crowley, ‘You’ve been in bigger crowds than this!’

‘Well precisely!’ said Aziraphale. ‘But rarely willingly.’ He looked again at the heaving mass of people. ‘I think that the last time I was in something of this scale quite a few of them were unfortunately very dead and most of those that weren’t were trying to run away.’ He paused, lost in the memory. There had been a lot of screaming.

‘Ah,’ said Crowley. ‘Yeah, I remember crowds like that too. This one’s different. Fewer guns and stabby things. More kissing.’

‘Hmm…’ said Aziraphale, forcing a smile. ‘The er.. “music”’ (he gave the word its own inverted commas) ‘is not entirely dissimilar in pitch.’

‘Philistine!’ said Crowley, but his tone was gentle.

‘Now that really was a long time ago,’ mused Aziraphale, a more genuine smile playing on his lips this time. ‘And I believe you were the one stirring up trou … er … mixing with the Philistines. I was allocated to the other side!’

‘Ah you should’ve joined us.’ Crowley countered. ‘Better beer. And they had cake. Little raisin cake things. You’d liked them. Offered them to Baal all the time. He never ate them of course.’

Aziraphale hmm’d non-committally.

‘What was it with the cake?’ Crowley continued. ‘Plain cake, fine. Stick some raisins in and suddenly it’s idolatry. And was it all types of cake or just special ones? I mean, is it a case of plain scone, have as many as you like. Fruit scone and suddenly you’ll be damned?’

‘Only some cake I think’ Aziraphale said. ‘I seem to remember King David had a rather good fruit cake recipe that the Israelites were permitted to enjoy.’

‘So just no cake for the Philistines?’ Crowley said, ‘Fuck it was all so petty back then.’

‘I wish,’ said Aziraphale awkwardly, ‘Well, I wish that we’d… that I’d found more ways to… well, fraternise with you. Back then I mean.’

‘Prob’ly good thing you didn’t,’ Crowley said, ruefulness audible beneath the lightness of the words, ‘I might’ve tempted you to a teacake and then how would we have averted the apocalypse? Couldn’t ‘ve pair up to combat heaven and hell if we were both employed by downstairs.’

Aziraphale nodded. ‘There is that I suppose. Nevertheless…’ He sighed and left the sentence hang unfinished. From somewhere in front of them one song ended to rapturous applause and excited whooping as the stage lighting flashed in a frenetic display of artistic hysteria. Aziraphale motioned in the general direction of the action. ‘In any case, perhaps we should go and do battle with the ah… benevolent hoards before Maggie and Nina wonder where we’ve got to.’

*****

‘So,’ said Crowley later in the comfort and comparative quiet of their tent. ‘Not converted to classical fusion then?’

‘Not entirely,’ Aziraphale admitted.

Crowley pouted, ‘Maggie will be so disappointed.’

Aziraphale gave him a stern look. ‘I have absolutely no intention of telling her.’

‘Ah! Lying by admission.’

‘Sparing her feelings.’

‘Same thing.’

Crowley stretched, then yawned. The sofa was comfortable. He could get used to Aziraphale’s version of camping.

‘Are you going to go back down to join them?’ Aziraphale asked after a minute.

Crowley shook his head and swirled the contents of a wine glass. ‘Nah, not tonight. I’m done.’ He smiled encouragingly at the angel. ‘You survived the first proper day though.’

‘Yes.’

‘Enjoy any of it?’

‘Some of the food is rather good.’

‘Anything else?’

‘The kiss was passable.’

It had been more than passable of course but no need to say that. Not when Crowley was fishing so shamelessly for compliments. Nevertheless, being kissed right at the end of one of the slower, more romantic and almost passably melodic songs had gone someway to persuading Aziraphale that music festivals could have the odd redeeming moment. Even the presence of the large crowd around them had added a certain something to the experience.

‘Passable!’ Crowley repeated indignantly.

‘Yes,’ said Aziraphale firmly, ‘Passable.’

'Hmmm' muttered Crowley, wondering whether to take up the implicit challenge now or wait until he had finished his glass of wine and could really commit wholeheartedly to a kiss and anything that might follow. It was good wine. He made a swift decision. The kiss could wait. Afterall, the angel wasn't going anywhere.

'Do you think they suspect?' Aziraphale asked suddenly.

'Who suspect what?' said Crowley, justifiably confused by the abrupt change of direction.

'Maggie and Nina. Do you think they suspect that we, well, we assisted them in their romantic endeavours?'

'Nah,' said Crowley dismissively. 'Humans don't think like that. They're big on all that free will stuff. Everyone's a free agent, 'specially in love.' He swirled the glass again. 'Humans like to think that they have control of everything. Free spirits. All about choice, nothing caused.' He wagged a finger at the angel, 'Really though they're terribly, terribly predictable. Like cogs in a machine. If you know a human well, nothing they do will surprise you. Nothing at all.'

Had he known what tomorrow had in store, he might have been rather less confident.

Chapter Text

Aziraphale felt that the second ‘proper’ day had gone passably well really: Nina’s café van had been a roaring success, cornering the market in strong espresso and homemade Eccles cakes with a significant dash of life advice thrown in for free. After lunch (a rather wonderful pasty with an exotic curried filling that the Cornish would disown), Aziraphale had dragged Crowley to Glastonbury on Sea and made him listen to a very jolly brass band from the vantage point of a jauntily striped deck chair. Later, they had watched encouragingly as Maggie’s friend’s band performed to rapturous applause during the early evening slot on the acoustic stage. Finally, Aziraphale had spent two happy hours in the craft field, forging a poker in the blacksmithing tent. He didn’t really need a poker, much less a hand crafted one, but wielding a large hammer on glowing steel turned out to be a rather effective way of venting the assorted frustrations that had been building since they arrived.

‘Woah, not quite so hard!’ the blacksmith had warned, giving him the sort of disbelieving and confused look to which humans are prone when a quietly spoken, bow-tie wearing antiquarian book seller turns out unexpectedly to have the strength of Thor.

Aziraphale wondered perhaps if he hadn’t enjoyed the hammering just a little too much. He turned the poker over in his hand, admiring the form. It was well-weighted and the barley sugar twists that he had put in the handle made for a good grip. It felt balanced. He gave it a surreptitious swipe, very much not pretending that it was a flaming sword. He’d enjoy showing it to Crowley later, explain all the subtleties of the process and point out the various artistic choices he’d made. The demon would tease him of course, but that was all part of the fun. Aziraphale looked at the clock, ticking quietly in the corner of the tent and wondered just how drunk the demon would be by now if he’d done as he intended and conducted a thorough and academic comparison of what the different bars had to offer. At some later point, Aziraphale noted to himself, he should probably seek Crowley out and remind him to sober up before it got too late.

‘Anyone about?’

Nina’s voice sounded muffled through the walls of the unusually well sound-proofed tent.

‘In here,’ Aziraphale called out, relinquishing the poker hastily. ‘Do come in.’

‘Just you?’ Nina asked, putting down a plastic Tupperware box and looking round.

Aziraphale nodded. ‘Just me. I’m afraid I haven’t seen Maggie for several hours and Crowley is still embracing the the dubious virtues of drunkenness.’

‘Impressive!’ said Nina. She pointed at the Tupperware. ‘Spare cakes. They need eating today. Got cream in. Help yourself if you’d like.’

‘How splendid,’ Aziraphale said, taking one and noting with approval that the cream was paired with generous quantities of fragrant raspberry jam all sandwiched between two geometrically accurate circles of chocolate sponge. It was a particularly pleasing combination. Aware of Nina’s eyes on him, Aziraphale embraced the performative aspect of enjoyment, lip-licking and murmuring praise. He was just considering whether a second cake might perhaps be in in order when there was a sudden commotion and Maggie burst in in a chaos of fidgety panic.

‘Promise you won’t be cross,’ she said, looking nervously between Nina and Aziraphale whilst simultaneously apparently trying to tie her own hands in knots. ‘Have you ever said yes to something by accident?’

‘Frequently,’ said Aziraphale dryly.

‘No,’ said Nina.

She folded her arms and looked sternly at Maggie, ‘What have you said yes to?’

‘Don’t be cross,’ Maggie said again . ‘I didn’t mean to ok? I was just trying to be supportive and then... Oh this is such a bad idea. I don’t know why I agreed. It just seemed the right thing to say, but it’s not as though we can even play instruments.’

Nina’s eyes narrowed. ‘Instruments?’

‘I know we can’t,’ said Maggie quickly, ‘but I wasn’t thinking and I made it sound like we could and she was so grateful that I couldn’t go back on it and… oh it’s such a horrible mess.’

Centuries of dealing with humans and their inability to express themselves with sufficient clarity, (particularly at moments of stress such as might occur if an angel appeared unexpectedly) had left Aziraphale reasonably good at putting two and two together and coming up with a servicable approximation of four, nevertheless, it never hurt to ensure that one was in possession of all the facts.

‘I think, my dear,’ he said gently, ‘That to avoid any misunderstanding we’d appreciate it if you could begin at the beginning.’

Maggie gulped and turned anxious eyes on the angel. ‘Right. Well. I’d gone back down to the van because I left my phone there when I locked up earlier and while I was there a girl… I mean, a woman, but she was really young came up looking very upset. She said she needed a coffee, so I made her one even though we weren’t open. It’s her first festival as an organiser but things keep going wrong and now the main act that she recommended for the Fields of Avalon has cancelled.’ Maggie paused, overcome with all the emotion of a borrowed disaster.

Aziraphale made suitably sympathetic noises and felt suddenly grateful for the fortifying effects of cream cake. He had a feeling that he was going to need it.

‘And am I to assume that you have somehow volunteered us to take their place?’ he asked carefully.

Maggie nodded and then buried her face in her hands. ‘I don’t know how it happened. I just said that I had friends that might be able to help and because she already knew I have a record shop she thought I meant musicians and… Oh it’s such an awful mix up.’

‘But why didn’t you explain?’ said Nina.

‘I didn’t have the heart to disappoint her,’ said Maggie. ‘She was so hopeful you see.’

‘She’s going to be disappointed at some point,’ said Nina bluntly, ‘Unless she’s hoping for three blind mice on a recorder, which is all I can play.’

‘I know,’ said Maggie quietly, ‘I just… I dunno.’ She looked pleadingly at the Aziraphale. ‘I just hoped…’

Aziraphale took the type of deep breath that accompanies a very determined effort to put firmly-felt frustration to one side. He adopted an expression of long-suffering competence and patted Maggie reassuringly on the arm. ‘Don’t worry my dear, I’m sure we shall think of something.’ She looked at him gratefully, face filled with the type of trusting expectation that gave Aziraphale a swooping lurch of dread.

‘Hang on,’ said Nina, latching onto the most obvious ‘something’ with frustrating speed and fixing Aziraphale with a determined look that made it clear that she would see though any half-hearted obfuscation. ‘You must be able to play stuff. Can’t you strum a harp or something?’

Aziraphale’s jaw tightened into a minute grimace at the stereotype. ‘I think you will find that particular misguided notion is a romanticism on the part of humans.’

He was tempted to elaborate, but the very uncompromising expression in Nina’s eyes made it clear there were more pressing concerns to attend to than a short history lesson in the frankly ridiculous human misconceptions about angels.

Nina continued to apply the visual equivalent of thumb screws. He caved. I have dabbled in music from time to time, I’ll admit.’

She nodded. ‘Thought so.’

‘Not the harp!’ he added firmly, ‘And in any case I’m afraid that my brief efforts have left me far from professional. ’

‘Why not?’ demanded Nina. ‘I thought your type didn’t have to learn things. You just, choose to know it or something.’

‘Like downloading an app,’ said Maggie suddenly brightening.

‘Not like downloading an app!’ said Aziraphale a trifle sharply, glancing skywards in a silent appeal to the universe for additional reserves of patience. ‘And besides, that’s cheating.’

‘But you can…?’ Nina insisted.

Aziraphale felt the situation rapidly escaping his control. ‘It is technically possible, yes.’

‘Well,’ said Nina with unreasonable certainty, ‘I guess that’s one of us that can be in a band. What about Crowley? Can he do the same thing?’

‘He can play the trumpet,’ Aziraphale admitted. ‘He was rather good at one point I believe.’

Maggie looked round suddenly, noticing for the first time that Crowley was missing.

‘Where is Mr Crowley?’

‘That,’ said Aziraphale, ‘Is an excellent question.’

‘A bar,’ said Nina. ‘God knows which one. He said he was going to work his way round them all.’

‘Lucky him!’ said Maggie despondently. ‘I could do with a drink.’

Aziraphale felt the same. He wished that he had accepted the offer to get – as the demon had put it – ‘As steaming as hell’s best sulphur pools and tighter than Sandalphon’s pompous arse’. Aziraphale had been tempted, but ultimately had declined on the grounds that some peace and quiet in the tent would provide much needed solitude and a chance to recover from the excess of humanity that the day - charming though it had been - had contained. But now he wished with the desperation of all the hounds of regret that he had chosen differently. If he had, his mind continued, torturing him with possibility, he would presumably be enjoying a merry and possibly marginally incoherent conversation over more alcohol than was decent. Instead, he was crisis managing a disaster in which the solution loomed, deeply unattractive and yet utterly inevitable.

‘I think,’ he said, marshalling his thoughts and dismissing the unworthy ones with a determined flick of his better nature, ‘That perhaps our first port of call would be to go and locate Crowley.’

Chapter Text

‘We’re doing what?’ slurred Crowley, struggling to focus. He’d been happily minding his own business - well, mostly minding his own business - and sampling a selection of more unusual spirits before the sudden appearance of Aziraphale, Nina and Maggie heralded everything becoming a lot more complicated.

‘Sober up!’ Aziraphale hissed.

Crowley blinked, staggered and would have fallen over had Maggie not been there to steady him. Shushing off her assistance with a wave of his hand, he attempted to formulate a sentence ‘S’all right. I’m all right. Dunno why they don’t make the floor leffal.. lev… flat.’ He blinked again owlishly. He didn’t remember speaking being this difficult last time he’d tried it. Maybe someone had done something with his tongue. He flicked it out experimentally. Forked. That might explain it.

‘Crowley!’

The voice sounded – what was the word for it – began with a p.

‘Do wha’?’ said Crowley, peering closely at the angel’s face. That was definitely a frown and the eyes were doing something intense. ‘You look shress’t. Have a drink. Thish one’s good.’ He waved his glass so violently that it would have gone all over Nina but for the fact it was already mostly empty. Crowley peered hopefully into the depths of the glass. ‘Strange… it’ss gone.. Ne’r mind. I’ll get more.’

‘Is he ok?’ asked Maggie nervously.

‘He’s fucked,’ said Nina succinctly.

At some point during his centuries on Earth, Aziraphale had learned that there are a variety of different human responses to moments of stress. Some humans swear. Aziraphale, who prided himself on his ability to express himself articulately without the need for blue language had in actual fact tried the occasional expletive and found them to be singularly disappointing in terms of effect. Other humans cry or run away. Unfortunately, whilst Aziraphale would much prefer to not be dealing with the unfolding of this particular crisis, a sense of misplaced duty – not to mention a fairly stern helping of self-control – ruled out any form of self-indulgent emotional break down. The final human option available to him was the old parental favourite of taking a deep breath and counting to ten before saying anything that one might regret. It didn’t really feel remotely adequate for the situation, but lacking any better options, Aziraphale tried it anyway. Twice. The outcome – if indeed there was one – was negligible. He chose his words carefully.

‘Crowley, we would all appreciate it very much if you could put the glass down and sober up.’

He hoped that the irritation in his voice was less evident to the others than it was to himself.

Crowley stared uncomprehendingly at him and swayed gently.

‘Please don’t tell me you are too far gone to remember how?’ snapped Aziraphale, feeling his reserves of angelic patience draining close to an all time low. He closed his eyes for a moment and tried again to summon loving competence.

‘Coffee,’ said Nina decisively. ‘If we get enough coffee down him, we can get him functional.’

‘And precisely how much coffee do you think it will take to get a d.. someone of his constitution sober?’ hissed Aziraphale, failing to find loving competence and falling back on frustrated sarcasm instead. ‘Given that six shots of espresso has no noticeable effect on him whatsoever.’

Nina shrugged. ‘Dunno. But the sooner we start, the sooner we’ll find out.’

Grudgingly, Aziraphale was forced concede that she was right. It wasn’t a good plan, but it was the only one they had. ‘Very well then. I suppose that it can’t hurt to try.’

The walk back from the bar to the tent was slow, ungainly and not entirely uneventful given that they were steering demon who had only the most basic control of his limbs and a desire to be going in a different direction. It was further complicated part way back by Crowley discovering another rather pressing need resulting from failing to sober up. This necessitate a detour via the festival toilets.

‘Just don’t touch anything,’ said Aziraphale pleaded desperately through the plastic door.

‘Can’t aim if I don’t!’ Crowley called out cheerfully from inside the cubical.

Aziraphale turned several shades pinker and darted a nervous look in the direction of the women, ‘Oh, I er… didn’t mean… of course you have to…’

‘Not u’less you’re gonna come an’ help me,’ Crowley cut in, ‘Might work better if you did. Not gonna lie, thish aiming thing’s hard.’

Nina giggled. ‘Well?’ she said pointedly to Aziraphale who was positively twitching with suppressed irritation and embarrassment.

‘No!’ he said, ‘Absolutely not.’

There was a succession of very biological sounds which Aziraphale tried very hard not to hear then Crowley swaggered out, flinging the door back so hard that it rebounded noisily. Aziraphale shuddered as the suspiciously grimy plastic bumped against the demon’s sleeve. He performed a brief but thorough miracle disinfecting everything within a twenty yard radius.

‘All done,’ said Crowley proudly. ‘Not done that very often. It’s ashually quite –‘

‘Absolutely!’ Aziraphale interrupted loudly, intensely keen to not discover just how Crowley intended to finish that sentence. ‘We really must be hurrying along now.’

‘Don’t see why!’ Crowley grumbled, glaring briefly at a tussock of grass that had jumped out at him in the dark. ‘You shtill haven’t ‘splained what all the rushhh is about.’

‘Yes we have,’ said Nina, ‘Several times.’

‘It’s actually my fault,’ said Maggie apologetically, gently guiding Crowley back to the centre of the path and deftly avoiding a stray guy line. ‘But Mr Fell has got a plan!’ she tucked her hand through the crook of Crowley’s arm and drew him close conspiratorially, ‘He says you play the trumpet very well.’

‘Does he now!’ said Crowley, directing at Aziraphale the sort of expression one gives a person who has just spilled a rather salacious shared secret. He winked shamelessly. ‘Well, he certainly enjoys it.’

‘Oh for heaven’s sake!’ said Aziraphale as Nina snorted with laughter. Maggie looked momentarily confused until realisation dawned. ‘That was … I mean… I did not…’ Unable to find a way to finish the sentence without adding fuel to the fire, he lapsed into silence.

They made it back to the tent without any further incident although Crowley fired several more hopeful winks at Aziraphale which the angel studiously ignored.

‘I’ll make coffee,’ said Nina, taking charge. ‘Back in a minute.’

‘I do hope this works,’ muttered Aziraphale, more to himself than to anyone else. He wan’t feeling particularly optimistic on that count.

Good as her word, Nina returned almost immediately with a mug of coffee filled with as many espresso shots as she dared. It was so strong that it had created its own atmosphere, and acrid fug filled the tent.

Aziraphale wrinkled his nose reflexively.

‘Are you sure you haven’t made it too strong?’ Maggie whispered.

Nina huffed a short laugh. ‘I’ve got the next one lined up. This is a man whose standard order is enough to send most people tachycardic. He’ll be fine.’

‘Drink,’ she said, putting the mug in front of Crowley. He gave it a disparaging look.

‘Please,’ said Maggie, smiling sweetly. ‘Nina has made it for you specially.’

Crowley looked from one to the other in the manner of one trying to solve a particularly fiendish puzzle. ‘Are you trying t’ to ge’ me sober?’ he asked slowly.

‘Yes!’ Maggie and Nina chorused in an exasperated harmony.

‘Why?’ asked Crowley, deeply suspicious.

‘Tell you what,’ said Nina, framing the order as a negotiation, ‘You drink that first, then, when you’ve sobered up a bit, we’ll explain why… Again!’ she added, under her breath.

Crowley directed another suspicious look in her direction, and took a gulp.

‘Right,’ said Aziraphale briskly. ‘Crowley is, I trust, on his way to becoming sufficiently functional.’ He looked at Nina and Maggie with more hope than expected. ‘Are you sure that neither of you can play anything at all?’ There was just the faintest note of pleading in his voice.

‘Recorder,’ said Nina, ‘Badly in year three.’

‘No,’ said Maggie, ‘I mean, I know a couple of guitar chords, but I can’t play.’

‘Then there’s nothing else to be done,’ Aziraphale said firmly and with more patience than might be expected in the circumstances, ‘I shall just have to possess you.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Erm… are you sure that’s a good idea?’

‘Quite sure,’ said Aziraphale, ‘unless you have a better suggestion.’ He looked expectantly from one to the other.

Nina put her hands on her hips. ‘Not being possessed sounds like a better idea.’

Aziraphale affected the soothing tones and calm manner of a primary school teacher negotiating with an unreasonably petulant child. ‘Come, come, there’s nothing to it.’

‘But why do you want to possess us?’ Maggie said, her voice moving up yet another couple of tones. ‘How does that help anything.’

Aziraphale fixed her with the type of expression reserved for patiently explaining the blatantly obvious. ‘If you can’t play an instrument, I’m afraid I will have to do it for you.’

Maggie blinked. ‘Can you do that?’

‘Well shall find out presently, shan’t we?’ said Aziraphale breezily, very much hoping that he could, ‘Although I would suggest that it might be wise to have a little practice first. I shan’t have to possess you fully of course, just have use of whatever bits are required for your chosen instrument.’

He hoped he sounded more confident than he felt. In theory of course there was nothing to it. Angels could manipulate matter at will. Demons possessed people all the time. Sometimes hoards of them piled into a single human host and set up a sort of, well, one could presumably call it a sort of commune there. And demons were not known for being particularly bright or competent. That said, possessing two people at once and playing two – no three, he’d have one himself of course – instruments simultaneously did threaten to stretch his multi-tasking to the extreme. And if he were to lose concentration for a moment, well, that didn’t bear thinking about.

‘Have you done this before?’ said Maggie, interrupting his internal monologue.

‘In a manner of speaking.’

Nina gave a curt laugh. ‘That means no.’

Aziraphale pursed his lips, ‘Well the specific situation is hardly likely to have arisen previously is it?

‘Point taken.’

‘Shall we have a little practice then?’ His tone was excessively cheerful.

‘If we must.’

‘I’m really not sure about this.’ Maggie began. ‘I mean, I know were doing it because of what I said, and I really appreciate the fact that you’ve thought of a way that we can -;

‘Be quiet and let me possess you!’ said Aziraphale, quelling her with a glance that, if Crowley had seen it would have left him rather exited.

‘Sorry.’

‘So, what do we do?’ asked Nina. ‘Just stand her like lemons?’

‘Precisely,’ said Aziraphale, ‘And try to be receptive.’

Chapter Text

The initial practice had not, Aziraphale thought apprehensively, given one much grounds for optimism. The whole business had proved just as tricky as he’d feared and might have reminded him of an exceedingly complicated three legged race had he ever had cause to participate in such a thing. The complexity was in part due to his insistence that he would not be in control of any more than was absolutely necessary. Thus, whilst he had control of the elbows, lower arms and hands, Nina and Maggie retained authority over all other bits of their respective bodies. Consequently, the whole process was a distinctly collaborative affair which worked when they were in perfect sync, but failed spectacularly as soon as the slightest of stumbles left them pulling in drastically opposite directions.

Furthermore, as an angel, Aziraphale could only easily possess with permission. If either Nina or Maggie momentarily lost concentration and forgot to cede control of the respective bits - moving automatically to scratch an itch for example - the result would be a brief and unholy tussle as two minds fought to control a single limb.

‘Ow!’ exclaimed Maggie, aiming to scratch her nose and succeeding only in poking herself in the eye with a drum stick. ‘This is really hard.’

Aziraphale withdrew his influence, temporarily giving up any attempt to guide Maggie’s right hand. ‘There you are my dear. Better?’ He smiled patiently. ‘Jolly good. Right, shall we have another little go?’

Maggie nodded, but Nina paused.

‘Just a moment.’ The weight of her bass guitar hanging from a woven band of colourful fabric across her shoulder had pushed her bra strap into an uncomfortable position. Without thinking, she readjusted it, tugging it back so it lay flat as it should.

Aziraphale flinched. ‘Please don’t do that,’ he said, trying to keep the tetchiness out of his voice.

Nina frowned. ‘Do what?’

Aziraphale flushed. ‘Put your hands… there.’

‘They’re my hands!’ Nina said, not unreasonably.

‘But I can feel what you’re doing with them!’ said Aziraphale unhappily. ‘And, well… it’s not.. um quite -’

Nina sighed. ‘It’s just a bra strap. You’ll live.’

The second attempt had gone a little better. Nina and Maggie had more of an idea of what to expect and did a superior job of not fighting Aziraphale as he steered their hands into playing the right chords and rhythms. Aziraphale, for his part, had at least got to grips with the notes and had remembered that the best way to play music was actually to not think about it but let the muscle memory take over. His own fingers were beginning to find the shapes on the fret board of his guitar with comparative ease, shifting between chords without the conscious need to picture where each fingertip should fall. Obviously, the details were a little different when steering someone else’s limbs into the appropriate positions, but the principle was the same. The part of his mind controlling Maggie’s drumming had found the right rhythms and he had discovered that once he had set everything going, it was not too difficult to keep the pattern. Nina’s bass guitar was a little more challenging. The similarity between what he was doing with his own limbs and what he was trying to do with hers offered more opportunities for confusion, but he’d found a way to make it work. Yes, it was beginning to look as though they might actually be able to do this. Aziraphale began to feel, if not optimism, then a little less active dread.

‘Hey! That was good!’ exclaimed Maggie after a semi-competent play through in which there were no dramatically wrong notes and no one got poked in the eye. She looked enthusiastically round for confirmation. ‘Wasn’t it?’

Aziraphale allowed himself to look a little pleased. He nodded. ‘A distinct improvement.’ Perhaps it wouldn’t be quite such a foregone disaster after all.

After an hour of practice, things were definitely looking up.

Nina ran her hands experimentally along the neck of the guitar. ‘Kinda feels like I have half an idea how to play now.’

Maggie nodded enthusiastically. ‘Me too. This has been amazing. I tried to learn drums before,’ she added, pulling a face at the memory, ‘I was awful. It’s so much easier knowing how it should feel.’

Nina grinned at Aziraphale. ‘Maybe you should give lessons. A whole new way of teaching music!’

‘Hmm,’ said Aziraphale, non-committal. ‘I suspect that it might lead to some rather awkward questions. Possession is generally rather frowned upon I believe.’

‘Now, there’s just one other tiny thing,’ said Maggie, changing the subject and adopting a tone of voice that made it clear she expected objections. ‘We really ought to make sure we look the part.’

‘Look the part?’ repeated Aziraphale carefully.

‘Yes,’ said Maggie quickly. ‘It’s great if we – you – can play the music, but we need to really look like a band to put on a show.’ She looked hopefully from Nina to Aziraphale and back again. ‘Don’t you think?’

‘I’m really not sure that’s necessary,’ began Aziraphale, trying to ignore the way Maggie’s enthusiasm visibly deflated as he spoke.

‘I suppose not,’ Maggie agreed with a wistful sigh, ‘I mean, I know it isn’t necessary, but it might be rather nice. And fun?’ She looked appealingly at Nina again, seeking an ally. ‘After all, they’ll be expecting a Queen Tribute band, and Queen had a pretty flamboyant style.’ She paused, ‘I don’t mean we have to pretend to be them, but I think we need, well, a certain look.’

Aziraphale gave her a certain type of look.

Nina grimaced then shrugged. ‘I guess I’m in.’ She turned to Aziraphale. ‘You?’

Aziraphale was torn. On the one hand, a rather significant and insistent part of his personality was absolutely horrified at the thought and reminded him that he’d spent several centuries carefully honing a very particular aesthetic with which he was very comfortable. To deviate from it now – particularly in such a shocking and public manner - would be both deeply embarrassing and might warrant certain expectations regarding future behaviour that he absolutely would not be prepared to honour.

On the other hand, a smaller but substantially more wild part of his nature was unreasonably excited by the notion. The situation - whilst very much not of his choosing - gave him permission to be (for a strictly limited time) different. And that was thrilling. Aziraphale knew that he could be exceedingly flamboyant when the situation called for it. He’d done it many times in the past of course. After all, it used to be the case that a key part of being an angel was standing on a rock wearing something with an unsubtle amount of gold on it and declaiming dramatically about good tidings or issuing firm warnings. He’d rather enjoyed that: The imposing voice; The back lighting; The gold. It wasn’t what one wanted to be doing (or wearing) all the time, but just occasionally… It was the same with that little flutter of excitement he’d felt when he put on the magician’s cape. Oh, he felt a little foolish too of course, with the drawn on moustache and the ridiculous feather boa, but sometimes one needed to be prepared to look a little silly to put on a show. And he could put on a show.

Both aspects of his personality would have been engaged in a fairly equal stand-off but for the fact that there was a third strand of his being. And this strand quietly suggested that Crowley’s reaction to seeing him in such a provocative outfit was likely to be, well, memorable, perhaps very memorable indeed. Crowley had previously pointed out (only a little petulantly) that most of Aziraphale’s more exciting looks, the toga, the doublet and calf-clinging hose, had occurred at the look-don’t touch pre-relationship stage of their existence when, as he said, he had not had the opportunity to fully appreciate them. Perhaps now was time to redress the balance and, well, reap the rewards so to speak.

Aziraphale’s more formal self briefly attempted to crush the little voice of lust (although he refused to identify it so crudely), but quickly recognised that it was unequal to the task.

‘Very well,’ he said, affecting the manner of one putting one’s own interests to one side and acquiescing reluctantly to a friend’s wishes.

‘Really?’ said Maggie, in gleeful surprise.

‘If needs must,’ said Aziraphale.

Nina gave him a knowing look, seeing through the martyred tones. ‘Crowley will be pleased.’

Aziraphale blushed and had the good grace not to correct her.

‘Wow,’ said Maggie, still not quite able to believe that she had attained cooperation so easily. She looked at her watch. ‘I’ll just dash out and get some bits together. Stay here!’

‘She means don’t run away,’ said Nina. ‘I’ll go and see if our drunken demon is any closer to being sober.’

Aziraphale sat down, grateful for a brief period of peace and quiet; the calm before the storm as it were. Although perhaps the calm between the storms would be more apt. It had been quite an afternoon. He flexed his fingers, easing out the stiffness caused by two hours of unexpected guitar practice. Still, there was a certain satisfaction to be had in their endeavours and the soreness in his fingertips caused by the metal strings of the (miraculously acquired) guitars acted as a physical reminder of their efforts.

Nina reappeared. ‘He’s closer to functional,’ she said. ‘Might be fast tracking through the hangover. Is that a thing?’

‘Possibly,’ said Aziraphale and trying to remember the last time Crowley had sobered up the human way.

‘Well anyway,’ continued Nina, ‘I’ve told him to sleep for an hour and then drink more coffee.’ She gave Aziraphale a stern look. ‘You’re sure he’ll remember how to play the trumpet right?’

‘Yes,’ said Aziraphale with certainty. ‘It was a key part of his – er – former role. He won’t have forgotten.’

Less than half an hour later Maggie returned with two bulging bags and a gleeful expression. ‘Ready to be transformed?’ she asked.

‘Not entirely,’ said Aziraphale, eyeing the bags with suspicion.

‘Go on!’ teased Nina. ‘Think of Crowley. Be brave.’

***

It was, thought Aziraphale, looking at himself in the mirror, quite a look. The eye-liner was shockingly daring. And the - what was it Maggie had called it? - choker, that was it. That was provocative. He placed his fingers to his throat, touching the silver chain lightly. It wound twice around his neck, uncomfortable yet sensual at the same time. The rest of the outfit could have been sourced from Crowley’s wardrobe given its style although in actual fact Maggie had done a quick sweep around several of the market stalls and come back with a leather jacket with dramatic lapels, sequins and silver zips; a thin skin-skimming sleeveless top; and tight black leather trousers. Aziraphale looked at his reflection again. He looked every bit the rock star. Or fallen angel.

‘You look amazing!’ said Maggie confidently, ‘Eyeliner looks great on you. You have such lovely eyes.’

‘I have to say, I’m impressed!’ said Nina, the note of surprise in her voice making it a slightly back handed compliment. ‘Who knew an angel could look… like that!’

Aziraphale briefly wondered what would happen if he were to report to Heaven similarly attired. It would certainly cause a stir. Technically, there wasn’t a specific dress code to which angels on Earth had to conform, but there were rather firm expectations in which leather trousers and studded belts certainly did not feature.

There was a small commotion from the entrance to the tent as Crowley came out, backwards, straight into the bunting. Again. He was clearly still slightly tipsy but well on the way to functional.

‘I’m back!’ he announced, trying to disentangle his sunglasses from several yards of coloured flags and struggling rather. ‘The demon is returned. Sober. Functional. Ready to rock and roll.’ He succeeded in extracting his glasses and spun round. ‘That’s what we’re gonna do right? Make some nois- ’ He caught sight of Aziraphale and stopped mid-sentence.

‘Fuck!’

‘Is that good fuck or bad fuck?’ asked Nina.

Crowley withered her with a glance. ‘Bloody good fuck of course.’ He stepped back and ran his eyes up and down the angel. ‘Really bloody good.’

‘Given the advanced levels of inebriation that you attained earlier, I hardly think you are in a position to tell!’ said Aziraphale firmly, feeling the need to deflect the compliment, but appreciating it nevertheless.

‘I like it!’ said Crowley, still taking in the details. ‘I really like it. You should dress like that more often.’ He looked hopeful.

‘Yes, well,’ said Aziraphale, trying not to make it too obvious that Crowley’s reaction was absolutely the desired effect, and very much not succeeding. ‘It’s hardly appropriate for the bookshop, and I don’t think that my superiors would approve.’

‘Don’t see why not,’ said Crowley, stepping closer and slipping a hand inside the jacket in search of the angel’s hip. The top was so thin that his palm may as well have been resting directly on Aziraphale’s skin. With the other hand, he pointed to the sequin doves emblazoned across the sleeves of the jacket. ‘Heaven should love that. Nod to the Holy Spirit. Or dove of peace. Take your pick. Very theological, doves.’

‘I suspect there might be other aspects to which they might object,’ said Aziraphale pointedly.

‘Yeah, maybe!’ agreed Crowley. He grinned. ‘I like those bits.’

Aziraphale combined a pout and a raised eyebrow into an insouciant look, but said nothing.

‘Right,’ said Nina. ‘Well, that seems to have had the desired effect. I’m going to go and change.’

‘Me too,’ said Maggie.

They disappeared off to their tent.

‘The desired effect?’ Crowley teased. ‘Trying to impress me were you angel?’

‘Trying to look the part,’ corrected Aziraphale, giving Crowley a brief knowing look before ducking his gaze self-consciously away. ‘I take it you approve?’

‘Course I bloody do!’ said Crowley. ‘I love all of it. S’pecially this.’ He waved his hand in a way that incorporated absolutely every aspect of the angel. ‘You look spectacular!’

‘Oh hush!’ said Aziraphale, more than faintly embarrassed. ‘It was Maggie’s doing.’

‘Maggie chose well!’ said Crowley. ‘You look hot.’

‘Then let us hope I don’t burn for it.’ Aziraphale countered, but he looked pleased.

It wasn’t long before the women reappeared similarly, if less dramatically, transformed. Maggie had given her normal look a goth twist with a short black tartan skirt, knee boots and a lace white blouse and done her hair in high pigtails. Nina had an asymmetric sequin top and seventies inspired flared velvet trousers. Both looked as though they were feeling some of the the same mix of apprehensive disbelief that Aziraphale felt.

‘I can’t believe we’re doing this,’ said Maggie, suddenly nervous. ‘What if it all goes wrong?’

‘Can’t be worse than a hoard of hostile demons,’ Nina pointed out.

‘Yes but…’ began Maggie, who felt at this precise moment that possibly it could.

‘I’m sure everything will be perfectly fine,’ said Aziraphale, adopting the role of morale booster and finding – somewhat to his surprise – that he was actually almost looking forward to their moment on stage. ‘In any case, I believe that the time has come for us to – er – face the music as it were.’ He turned to Crowley. ‘I presume Nina has explained the plan?’

‘Yeah,’ said Crowley. ‘Thought she was joking. Apparently not.’

‘Ah,’ said Aziraphale. ‘I take it you are – erm – up for this as they say?’

Crowley gazed at the angel, unwilling to take his eyes off him, even for a second. ‘I have never been more up for anything!’ he said with devastating certainty. ‘Hope the trumpet is ready for the experience.’ He winked.

‘Provided you play it with your usual expertise, I’m sure it will cope!’ Aziraphale countered, emboldened by the outfit and giving Crowley a look that was so wildly suggestive that Maggie felt the need to look away to give them privacy.

‘You’ve created a monster!’ Nina whispered to Maggie with a low laugh. ‘I like it.’

‘Let’s go!’ said Crowley decisively. ‘Lead the way rebel angel.’ He leaned in and whispered something so only Aziraphale could hear.

‘Perhaps later,’ said Aziraphale firmly. ‘I make no promises.’

They set off, Aziraphale walking with an unaccustomed swagger that was 60% accounted for by the tightness of the trousers and 40% by the look in Crowley’s eyes.