Title: In the Space Capsule (The Love Theme)
Author: amuly
Pairing: Aziraphale/Crowley
Fandom: Good Omens
Rating: NC-17
Note: Inspired by In the year '39 by stitchy.
This is an official (approved!) sequel to In the Year '39 by master artist, story teller, and plushie maker stitchy. Thanks for letting me play in your sandbox!
Happy 50th anniversary of the moon landing, everyone.
Summary: An angel and a demon stared at each other in space suits across the moon and let that just hang there between them for a moment. Aziraphale sighed and scuffed his space-boots against the dock he was standing on. "Oh..." "That's it, come on," Crowley said, because it was decided, now. Lunar dust was a truly fine dust, much unlike anything on Earth. Especially without the atmosphere to clump it up. It puffed up around Aziraphale's space boots as he stepped off the dock, swirling around his spacesuit-clad legs. He couldn't see Crowley's expression from behind the glare of his helmet, but he could feel the like of it. His whole body radiated it, just standing there, legs straddling either side of the ATV, one hand on the steering handles, the other not quite reaching out to Aziraphale, but tilted toward him, palm open. Or, I finally gave in and wrote 13k of philosophy and drinking in space. (FYI: the sex scene is self-contained in the second chapter.)

***

Chapter 1

Aziraphale raised his eyebrows as the third slot machine in a row chimed its winning music and began to pay out in gobs. He poked at his fruity nebula drink with the silly straw.

"Another one?"

"It's all very nefarious," Crowley insisted. "The more they win, the more they play. Addictive cycles and all that."

"But if they keep winning..."

"Well." Crowley nodded his head back and forth, peering over his wholly unnecessary and conspicuously out-of-place sunglasses into his cosmic cosmo. It was blue. "Then the casino loses, hah. Nefarious."

They slid against the bar as one unit, both of them gesturing for a refill of their respective drinks. Crowley downed the last of the blue stuff and slid his glass away. He poked at Aziraphale until the angel rolled his eyes and offered him a sip. Another slot machine jangled joyfully. Aziraphale squinted at the old woman pumping her fist.

"She's going to give ninety percent of her winnings to her church," Aziraphale read off her.

"So? Not my business what she does with the money."

Aziraphale glanced back at the other old woman who'd won just before her. "She's giving hers to her temple."

"Listen, it's not my fault if the humans don't know what to do with their sinful winnings," Crowley muttered.

"Nefarious," Aziraphale quipped.

"Shut up. Oi, barkeep. C'mon, my friend is dangerously close to having a coherent thought, we can't have that."

---

The first excursion was on the moon, naturally; it being the first (and last) thing they'd be passing by before they reached Mars' own moons for some off-ship adventuring. Crowley lounged with his back against the viewing windows as Aziraphale peered down at the craterous surface as they settled into a low orbit above it.

"That Helium 3 mine is running at well below proper safety standards," Aziraphale muttered, mostly to himself.

But Crowley was mostly himself, so naturally he replied: "Corporate greed, of course. Cutting corners, saving a buck."

"Was capitalism one of yours?" Aziraphale accused.

"Wasn't communism one of yours?" Crowley shot back. Aziraphale winced.

"No playing fair with that one. Honestly, give anything to those mad Russians, what do you expect is going to happen?"

"About... exactly what happened," Crowley pointed out. Aziraphale hummed, already distracted again by the mines he could see from the ship windows.

"Really, deplorable conditions..."

And then they weren't, anymore.

Crowley looked vaguely embarrassed, but Aziraphale felt satisfied, and neither could exactly tell which one of them had been the one to do anything, which maybe meant neither would get that miracle ticked against them.

Aziraphale tugged at Crowley's arm. "Oh, do come along. I've reserved us lunar ATVs!"

Turns out, ATVs were definitely one of Crowley's. Though Aziraphale could see Gabriel being quite into them. Monstrous machines they were.

Crowley was cackling in his ear through the in-helmet radios.

"Afraid of a little moon dust, angel?" Crowley roared past Aziraphale in his ATV, kicking up mounds and mounds of the fine dust. Or, appeared to roar: more in the visuals than the sound, because of course, it was all so eerily quiet. Just the sound of Crowley breathing in his ear and lobbing the occasional insult his way. It was uncomfortably intimate.

Aziraphale's ATV caught on a mound of rocks, tilting sickeningly to one side before coming to rest once more on all four legs. His movements were slow, gravity one-sixth of what he was used to, ruining centuries of carefully calibrated motor-skills. His forehead was sweating but he couldn't mop at it, what with it being inside his helmet and all.

"I hate this, no." Aziraphale decided on a dime. He turned his ATV around and headed back to the station.

"Aziraphale!"

"No, no. It's too bumpy and fast and-"

Aziraphale nodded at the excursion employee who was waiting at the ATV docking pad. Because there wasn't any sound, Aziraphale didn't realize Crowley was behind him until he was, standing on top of his ATV and doing his damndest to emote disappointment through a whole lot of space gear. Aziraphale stamped his foot.

"It's not for me, I'm afraid. You, you go off." He shooed his hands at Crowley. "Enjoy yourself. In fact, I think I'd much enjoy watching you from here. With, ah, my new friend..." he trailed off, turning to the employee who was returning the ATV to its charging station. He didn't look at Aziraphale.

"I'd much rather enjoy myself with you," Crowley said.

An angel and a demon stared at each other in space suits across the moon and let that just hang there between them for a moment.

Aziraphale sighed and scuffed his space-boots against the dock he was standing on. "Oh..."

"That's it, come on," Crowley said, because it was decided, now.

Lunar dust was a truly fine dust, much unlike anything on Earth. Especially without the atmosphere to clump it up. It puffed up around Aziraphale's space boots as he stepped off the dock, swirling around his spacesuit-clad legs. He couldn't see Crowley's expression from behind the glare of his helmet, but he could feel the like of it. His whole body radiated it, just standing there, legs straddling either side of the ATV, one hand on the steering handles, the other not quite reaching out to Aziraphale, but tilted toward him, palm open.

Aziraphale climbed on behind him and hugged him tight. "Don't go too fast."

"Always do."

---

"I'm going to be a spaceship pilot when I grow up!"

Aziraphale had been looking for Crowley (honestly, the ship was tiny, where could he have gotten off to?) but found his attention caught by the excitable little girl with her face plastered to the deck windows. Her hands were both slammed against the thick glass alongside her face, fingers pressing so hard they were nearly flat. Her expression as she looked upon the great, yawning void before her was nothing short of rapturous.

Aziraphale glowed with soft contentment, watching her.

Jesus' favorite had always been the little ones, of course.

Aziraphale's joy was curtailed by a gruff voice declaring: "Not with the kind of money we're spending on your school you're not."

The girl glanced away from the stars up at her father. "Why not? It's a captain!"

"It's a glorified bus driver," her father grumbled.

"It's a noble profession," Aziraphale muttered to himself. Neither the father nor daughter seemed to hear. The father's mobile flashed in his hand and he wandered a few feet down deck. Quietly Aziraphale sidled up next to the girl, taking in the view. She had returned her gaze to the stars, but the light in her eyes was ever-so-slightly dimmed.

Mustn't have that.

"Ah, there's my favorite nebula," Aziraphale commented to himself. The girl's head whipped up to examine him.

"Where?" She squinted out at the space before her. "I just see stars!"

"Oh, well it looks like stars from here, of course," Aziraphale agreed. He pointed, hardly having to look. He could always feel it, if he thought about it. "The Carina nebula, it's... that point, right there." He waved a hand at the girl's mobile, which she had on the window ledge in front of her. "Ah, see? Your mobile pulled it up."

"It's a tab'," the girl said, shooting him a look. Oh, who could keep up with that stuff, really? But then she was glancing down at her mobile and beaming. "Wow! That's that, that little star way out there?"

"Oh, certainly. Space is just so stupendously, incomprehensibly vast that things of such utter complexity all narrow to the same tiny points, given such distance."

The girl's father was wandering back over now, though he didn't seem too concerned with a strange man talking to his eight-year-old. Aziraphale kept a whisper of good feeling in his mind.

"I wanna have adventures across the galaxy," the girl hissed.

"You could," Aziraphale told her. He glanced at her father, then leaned down to whisper with her. "There are plenty of very important, very smart things you might do in space. Great works your father would be proud of. And you'd be amongst the stars."

The girl clutched the nebula to her chest. Her eyes blazed. "I'm going to live here. I'm not ever, ever going to leave."

Aziraphale winked at this good girl and slipped away. In fifty years, she'd be one of theirs. The Dyson sphere her company would build would bring free energy to the whole of the human race.

Crowley found him whistling a jaunty tune up deck. The little devil was clutching two terribly complicated-looking drinks in his fists, dark green voids swirling with dashes of color, inside a mug shaped like a horse's face. Crowley grinned as he shoved one into Aziraphale's hand.

"I sense a tyke defying her father, well done, break those commandments."

Aziraphale hummed as he took a long sip of his drink. Oh, well that was atrocious. He took another sip. "It's all about the big picture, Crowley."

"Sure it is, love. You know what they say about the road to hell." Crowley gulped at his drink then pulled a horrendous face. Aziraphale chuckled as he sipped at his. "Oh, blimey, that is wretched. Who gets off making a drink this terrible and naming it after a nebula, really?"

"It's the midori," Aziraphale pointed out. He finished his in one long pull, then swapped his empty glass for Crowley's. "You've always hated it."

"Disgusting. I'll get you some more."

---

"What do you think the plan is?" Crowley mused. He was sitting on the bathroom floor, back against the bathtub-which-defied-all-logic. Aziraphale made to sip delicately at his wine only to end up sloshing some in the tub. He frowned down at it and opened his mouth all the wider the second time around, gulping down an excessive mouthful of red. Well, it was good wine. He was just trying to make sure it didn't go to waste.

"Well, right now: get a bit pruny... cuddle up with a book and read for the rest of the night? You don't have to join me, of course-"

"'Course I'm going to join you," Crowley muttered, before, "No, not- not your damned... Not you. Not tonight. I mean-" Crowley gesticulated wildly, wine sloshing dangerously in his glass. Aziraphale blinked slowly as he considered the physics of holding out his glass and trying to catch any wine Crowley spilled.

Probably just end up spilling his own, the way his coordination was going at the moment. Aziraphale brought a second hand to his wine glass and clutched it protectively just under his chin.

"Everything! The universe! World didn't end after six thousand years in fire and flame, yeah? So what now?"

"Well. It's been hundreds since then," Aziraphale pointed out.

"So then what? We get another century? Another sixty? It just keeps going and going and going and going and going-"

"For eternity," Aziraphale piped up hopefully. He wouldn't mind eternity if there were still humans around.

(He didn't think he'd mind eternity even without the humans, so long Crowley at least was around.)

(But the humans were jolly good fun, too.)

"-be, because you've got heat death."

Aziraphale had been staring at Crowley's hair, thinking about eternity.  

"Sorry, what's this about death?"

"Heat death," Crowley repeated. He turned around, draping his too-long arms around the rim of the tub. Aziraphale smiled at him. "It's when all the stars go out."

"Out? Why are the stars going out?"

"Because of... physics. Entropy. Eventually the stars go out because they've... burnt themselves all up. Whole universe goes cold."

"Well that can't be right. Did you do that?"

"No, it wasn't me. It's before our lot, before any of us except..." Crowley waved irritably upwards. Aziraphale glanced up worriedly and sent up a silent prayer of contrition on Crowley's behalf.

Aziraphale pondered this for a long, long moment. He gulped at his wine which, of course, always helped such ponderings along their merry way. Sure enough, an idea struck him. He leaned over towards Crowley, dropping one arm over his, Crowley wrinkled his nose at his now-wet sleeve but Aziraphale missed that expression.

"Is that true, though? Or is it just what the humans think is true? Like, you know, the dinosaurs and the whatnot. The humans think the universe is millions... or billions... trillions? No, heavens no, must not be that long... well, some sort of length a great deal longer than six thousand-odd years. And all their... you know, physics gobbledy gook must be based on that, right?"

"That ‘physics gobbledy gook' is how we're flying through space right now as our squishy human selves and haven't been discorporated yet," Crowley pointed out, but he was smiling. Their faces had gotten quite close, in all of Aziraphale's enthusiasm for this conversation. Aziraphale sighed and rested his head on Crowley's arm where it was still draped around the rim of the tub.

"Well, the Almighty had to let the humans get some things right. Set down rules for them to discover. Otherwise..."

"Otherwise they'd all be stark bonkers," Crowley agreed. He drank using his free arm, the one Aziraphale wasn't almost-dozing against. "But you think they could get spaceships right but not like... the fourth law of physics, or whatever the hell it is."

"Even if they did it doesn't matter," Aziraphale pointed out. "Just because a law of nature says the universe will end up cold and desolate, life snuffed out in an infinite void, doesn't mean it will. Laws of nature are..."

"Gobbledy gook?" Crowley whispered, fondly. Aziraphale nudged at his arm with his forehead.

"Exactly."

He might have nodded off for a minute, because next thing Aziraphale knew, the water was splashing around him and suddenly the tub was a lot more cramped. Aziraphale lifted his head and smiled as Crowley's face scrunched up oddly as he lowered himself into the bath. He caught Aziraphale looking and muttered, "Well. You'd soaked my shirt."

He had miracle himself into his trunks—or maybe gotten changed the human way, but Aziraphale doubted he'd drifted off for that long. Crowley's legs were terribly long and he hung one out of the tub, the other curled up to his body. Aziraphale stuck out his foot, nudged at Crowley's ankle with his own. It felt positively scandalous, bare ankle brushing against bare ankle (and in the water, positively obscene), but it got the desired result. Crowley smiled and stretched out his leg, letting his foot come to rest in Aziraphale's lap. Aziraphale finished off his current glass of wine and passed it to Crowley, so that he could reach under the water and take Crowley's foot firmly in hand. As dug his thumbs into the arch Crowley hummed and slunk down lower in the water, spine turning more invertebrate with every press of Aziraphale's fingers.

"I do love those trunks on you," Aziraphale commented.

"The lengths I go to for you, angel," Crowley shot back.

A warm contentment filled Aziraphale's chest, surely spilling over to the point that even Crowley had to be able to feel it. Of course Aziraphale knew the lengths Crowley would go for him. Had gone: ends of the earth, and all that. Aziraphale ducked his head and concentrated firmly on Crowley's foot under his thumbs.

"I don't think the Almighty will let it come to that," Aziraphale said, much later. They were sprawled across their California King-sized bed together—well, Crowley was sprawled, sunglasses abandoned as he stared about their heads at the stars glimmering motionlessly above their heads. Aziraphale was sitting up against the headboard, book in his lap, reading glasses perched on the end of his nose.

"Stars going out?" Crowley picked up the thread, because of course he did. They had sixty plus centuries of practice at this, after all.

"Yes. I don't think the Almighty would let that happen. What would... why, there wouldn't be a point to it, would there?"

"What's the point of any of it all," Crowley muttered darkly.

"There's a point," Aziraphale sighed. "Of course there's a point. It's just-"

"Don't say it," Crowley groaned. Aziraphale twisted his lips primly. Well. It was. Ineffable.

"That won't be the end," Aziraphale repeated, assuredly. "After all: we thought we had the end all figured out once before. But now, look at us: still here. Why should this end be any different?"

---

Crowley was laughing with his eyes as he stared at some humans having a dismayed argument with some harried cruise workers. Not that you could see his eyes, behind those ridiculous sunglasses, but Aziraphale could always tell these sorts of things. Six thousand plus years of staring at the same face helped.

"What's the trouble?" Aziraphale asked. He handed Crowley a bloody moony. Crowley handed him back the celery stick speared with three olives. Aziraphale hummed as he snacked away at it. Delicious.

"Left something on the moon, looks like."

"Oh, well that's a shame."

Crowley was practically tittering. Aziraphale narrowed his eyes and paid closer attention to the argument. After a moment he rolled his eyes and leaned back.

"A camera? I don't understand what the fuss is."

"It's not the camera: it's what's on it."

"Well, photos of their trip, of course," Aziraphale supposed. But Crowley was shaking his head. He leaned in close to Aziraphale and dropped his voice to a low rumble.

"Kiddie porn."

Aziraphale stiffened, olives gone sour in his mouth. Crowley nodded over at the humans.

"And now they're going to get found out."

Aziraphale glanced at Crowley, schooling his expression to careful blankness. "How positively evil of you."

Crowley sipped at his drink, eyes gleaming. Then he smacked at his lips, eyeglasses falling to the brim of his nose as he studied his mostly-empty glass. "Well that was a jolly good bloody Mary, compliments to the bartender."

"Bloody moony, actually." Aziraphale waved the remnants of the last celery stick at him. "It's why they had three olives each."

"Because everyone knows there's... three moons?" Crowley said flatly.

"Yes. Er, well- on this trip! Earth's moon, then Phobos and Deimos."

"I thought Phobos—er, Deimos? One of them, whichever—was the only one with excursions?"

Aziraphale shook his head, chomping at the last bit of celery. Really, very good work on the bloody moony, just the right amount of spices and whatnot. They should definitely get another round.

"Well, yes, but. Still. Mars cruise ship, two moons there, one here."

"Bit of a stretch."

"Well I'm not complaining, are you?"

"Always. Come on," Crowley pressed his hand to the small of Aziraphale's back. "Let's get another round."

A table opened up on the stern, miraculously, and Aziraphale and Crowley found themselves seated with the best view on the spaceship, Earth's moon falling away slowly before them. Crowley absently cheersed Aziraphale with their dual bloody moony's as he stared at the great, glowing rock receding into the distance. Beyond that, of course, floated the earth: still blue and white, at this distance, but growing smaller by the minute.

"Every human being ever born was born on that little mud ball," Crowley mused after they both enjoyed long minutes of silent contemplation.

"Not every human who ever died, died there," Aziraphale pointed out.

Crowley frowned. "I blame the Russians."

"It wasn't just them-"

"A lot of it was them."

"Well then who gets blame for the Russians?" Aziraphale teased.

"Fucked if I know, could never figure out where those nutters came from."

"Pelmeni are delicious," Aziraphale pointed out. "And mustn't forget beef stroganoff."

"Vodka," Crowley conceded.

"And there's nothing quite as unique as their architecture. Petrograd-"

"Saint Petersburg."

"Oh I can't keep up."

"It was Saint Petersburg first."

"Yes, and then I tried to be thoroughly modern and catch myself up, but then they kept changing it- Point is-"

Crowley stirred his drink with his celery before handing the stalk over as a metaphorical (and somewhat literal) olive branch. Aziraphale gamely took it from him.

"-beautiful city. Like no where else in the world."

"I liked the cartoon."

"The cartoon?"

"They made a, you know, kid thing." Crowley waved vaguely. "About Anastasia."

"Oh!" Aziraphale lit up. "I saw the play. Lovely."

"You think your lot have any Russians up there?"

Aziraphale blinked. Thought about it, for a while. "Well, I... I suppose must do, right?"

"Can't think of any, can you?"

"Well it's not as though I have a mental list," Aziraphale huffed. "And they don't... I'm on Earth-duty, it's not as though I have... cause..."

"Don't let you visit the humans, do they?"

Aziraphale buried his nose in his bloody moony. "Not as though either of us have spent any more time than necessary in our respective offices—certainly not sight-seeing."

"Big names never go to you, anyway," Crowley pointed out. "Sure you've got plenty of, you know, devout peasants. Sweet little old babushkas."

"Probably," Aziraphale agreed. He wondered if they had Anastasia. Poor girl. The children were blameless.

"But we got the Czars. All those party leaders. Catherine, oh boy, is she fun."

"Those were all rumors," Aziraphale grumbled. "She was lovely. Well... not lovely, but. A leader of her people."

"And, thusly: ours."

Aziraphale sighed. "It's not right, you know. How many your side seems to get."

Crowley jerked forward, drink sloshing in his glass. "She commanded armies, she started wars! Killed millions! Hell, she murdered some people herself, not even in war, just because, you know. ‘Ah, this servant cocked up my favorite dress, off with her head' that sort of thing."

Aziraphale felt like that wasn't true but didn't know enough to say otherwise. He felt vaguely ashamed of that so he tried moving the conversation forward.

"I just mean: being a human is so difficult, at times. Doing the right thing, knowing what the right thing to do is, before you even get around to the doing of it! And then you've got unintended consequences..."

"Road to hell, and all that."

"Yes, precisely." Aziraphale stared moodily into his bloody moony. "I don't think I ever really bought into the eternity of hell fire and torture thing. Rather figured everyone would get... I don't know. Straightened out. Eventually."

"Well, there's time yet," Crowley quipped. He leaned back in his chair, long legs stretched out beneath the table and crossed at the ankles. He drained half his drink as the moon edged further and further away. His sunglasses glimmered in the moonlight. It was magnificent.

After a moment Crowley spoke again: "You know who bothers me?"

Aziraphale set down his drink, focused on the demon next to him. "Whom?"

Crowley wrinkled his nose at Aziraphale's grammar, expression tossing an insult his way even when his mouth was otherwise moving the conversation forward. "All those philosophers. And scientists. The whatnot. You know: big brains. Asking-"

Crowley trailed off.

Aziraphale stayed quiet.

He quite wanted to reach out and cover Crowley's hand with his own. But Crowley, suddenly aware that he'd given too much away, turned from Aziraphale, sucking too quickly at his drink.

"I need another," he announced. "Another moon-y or you want to switch it up?"

Aziraphale checked his watch. It was getting on towards noon. Ship time, that was. "How about an eclipse? It looked scrumptious."

"There's food bits in it, isn't there?"

"An apple slice!"

Crowley made an irritable little noise, but nodded. "Right. Be back in a jiff."

While he was gone Aziraphale managed to flag down a waiter and order a charcuterie board "for the table." Crowley was gone longer than a "jiff", but Aziraphale had hardly expected otherwise. In the meantime he nudged a little boy in the direction of his increasingly frantic parents and helped a teenaged boy realize that the way he was thinking about his best friend required a bit more attention. In twenty years they'd foster homeless LGBTQ kids together. Aziraphale hummed contentedly to himself. Hmm, but he could do with some more alcohol.

As if summoned by his very need (Aziraphale was being to suspect, lately, that actually might be the case) Crowley sidled into his seat again, holding two cocktails in one hand and two long stemmed ridiculous looking things in the other.

"What are those," Aziraphale asked. He slipped the apple slice from his eclipse cocktail and snacked on it. Oh, yes, that was lovely.

"Aren't they mad?" Crowley beamed. "I love them. ‘Milky ways' they're calling them. Bailey's Irish cream and..." he squinted at the drink, which surely did have the liquor shot through it, but there was some other alcohol it was floating in. "Well, whatever the hell else. Guinness, maybe? Looked good, anyways, cheers."

"Cheers," Aziraphale agreed as they clinked what had surely been originally long island ice tea glasses together. After taking a long draught from his Crowley nodded his eyebrows over at a teenaged boy. "See that? I just made the kid realize he's in love with his best friend. Parents're going to have a fit, he won't speak to them for years. Take that, fifth commandment."

Aziraphale hummed noncommittally. Instead he just said: "Fourth."

"Whatever."

"I was thinking," Aziraphale said, "about philosophers."

Crowley slouched, just a bit more snake-like. "Yeah? What about?"

"Well. It's just, I don't think the question-asking was the problem with them, you know?"

"Mmhmm. You think we got Socrates not because of the shit he talked to Euthyphro but because of all those folks he murdered oh wait right he never did that did he?"

"Which one was Euthyphro, again?" Those Greek boys all kind of blended together after a while. Aziraphale flushed at what lewd thing Crowley might have said to that thought spoken aloud.

"The one with the... you know. Euthyphro problem. The circle." Crowley waved his finger in a circle, must unhelpfully.

"Remind me?" Aziraphale asked. Crowley sighed and took a long drink from his milky way.

"Right, so. Big question, what's piety, or holiness, or what have you. Pagan gods so they go through all these stupid questions first like ‘but what if the gods contradict each other how am I supposed to make Apollo happy if that pisses off Diana' or whatever, you know the such and suchlike. So, get through all that nonsense, then you're left with ‘well, what if God said that pedophilia and rape and murder were all good, tomorrow morning? What then?'"

Aziraphale squirmed. Well.

"So you get this classic problem, now: Is it right because God says it is or does God say it is because it's right?"

Oh well that was just. That was sneaky, was what that was. Damned big brains. Why couldn't they all be like Aquinas, there was a nice chap. Or Anselm, helpfully going about proving God exists to all and sundry. Not... not this.

"I don't see why it can't be both."

"Isaac and Abraham, Angel."

Well, bollocks. Aziraphale squirmed some more.

"I still must insist that Abraham was right to do what he did. You must obey God's commands, that's the whole point-"

"Unless the plan is for us not to follow the commands." Crowley showed his teeth. It was hardly a smile, in so many words.

"The plan can't be for us to not follow the plan..." Aziraphale trailed off weakly.

"Until it is."

Aziraphale sputtered.

"You better hope it is, angel. For your own sake."

Well, there was that. Aziraphale buried his face in his milky way and didn't come up for air until it was through.

"What do you think the answer is, anyway?" Crowley mused, because of course he wouldn't let this go, of course he wouldn't stop asking these moral quandary type questions. Once fallen, always fallen.

"It must be both. It's right because God says it's right, and God says it's right because it's right."

Crowley groaned. "That's no answer, c'mon! If God woke up in a bad mood tomorrow and said ‘Alright, you lot: rape and murder everything you see. Toss the puppies into volcanos and the kittens into the boiling sea.'"

"Well, that very nearly happened," Aziraphale grumbled.

"And you defied it."

"Because it wasn't really God's will," Aziraphale insisted. "It may have been what Gabriel and those lot thought they ought to do, but it wasn't what the Almighty was truly planning, because it would have been bad and so Her Holiness would have never-"

"But that's just a cop-out," Crowley insisted. "What if God did-"

"God wouldn't-"

"Couldn't?"

"Wouldn't."

"Ahh!" Crowley grouched, flinging himself back against his chair. "Spoken like a damned Catholic is what that is. So, what, God could command rape and murder to be the de jure of the day-"

"There's nothing outside the Almighty's infinite potential," Aziraphale confirmed.

"-but God wouldn't."

"Well... no. Then it... that wouldn't be God, now would it?" Aziraphale blinked at his own cleverness. He smiled when Crowley frowned at him. Oh, had he stumbled upon something right? "Take the last time, right? I kept trying to get in touch with the Almighty, but kept getting Gabriel and Sandalphon or even the Metatron. They kept telling me this was God's will, but, well, I didn't believe them! And, it would appear, they were quite wrong on that, now weren't they? Anytime we've thought God has commanded something immoral, well, have we really been sure it was God? There's so many damned intermediaries and whatnot—and that's for us! Imagine how many intermediaries the poor humans have between themselves and Her Infinite Grace. So when something smells fishy, as it were, you should take a look at make sure if it's God's will or if maybe you're being told to commit a load of morally dubious acts by some... un-godly charlatan."

"Say that to Gabriel's face next time we run into him, I want to get a picture of that."

Aziraphale shot Crowley a mean little smile. "And so, my point: God is Goodness. Utterly! This is the nature of the Almighty, is it not? So whatever the command, if it is not good, why, it couldn't possibly be God's. And if it appears not good and appears to be God's, well, you must be wrong on at least one count. Def-in-itionally!"

Crowley scratched at his chin, longer fingers clicking open and then slowly curling back into his palm. Finally he sighed and clicked his tongue in defeat.

"Adams."

"Adams?"

"Philosopher bloke. Catholic. Said the same thing."

"Oh! Well." Aziraphale beamed. "See?"

"Don't buy that myself," Crowley muttered.

Aziraphale nearly said "well of course you wouldn't," but he bit his tongue. Sore spot, and all that. He knew he was arguing that the Lord was somehow right, in Her infinite wisdom, to toss Crowley and the rest out from the beneficence of Her Most Holy Presence. And of course, Aziraphale wasn't... so much of the agreement, if he had to admit it to himself, in his heart of hearts, on that point as of late (as of, possibly, the last several centuries).

On the other hand, had Crowley not been of the fallen and Aziraphale an angel and had they not been them and the rest of the lot been the rest of the lot, the apocalypse wouldn't have been avoided, now would it have? So then perhaps it was the right thing, for Crowley to be fallen, in the long run.

On the third hand, what really was the point of it all in the first place, put it that way?

Aziraphale sighed and plucked the apple slice out of Crowley's eclipse cocktail. No use thinking like that. Some questions were not for him to ask. Aziraphale understood that.

Crowley didn't.

That was kind of the heart of it all.

They finished their drinks and Aziraphale polished off the charcuterie board. Crowley's hand slid over the small of Aziraphale's back as they strolled the deck, both their gazes fixed on the slowly receding Moon and Earth in the heavens behind them. Aziraphale felt a vague sort of impulse to hold Crowley's hand, but by that time his hands were shoved into his impossibly tiny pockets, so Aziraphale settled for letting their shoulders bump as they walked. Crowley seemed all game for that.

"You know why you fellows got Socrates, though, don't you?" Aziraphale picked up the thread of their conversation.

Crowley had been staring above his sunglasses at the moon, snake eyes exposed so he could most fully take in the sight before him. He flipped them back up as he turned to Aziraphale. "Hm? What, because he questioned the gods, wasn't it? Trying to prove Apollo wrong, that can't go over well with the Almighty."

"No. Well. I don't know. But, it was more likely that try at martyrdom," Aziraphale explained.

"There was nothing ‘try' about it, I seem to recall..."

"Not- no. He basically did it to himself, with the trial, and all. Had the chance to defend himself and just dug his grave some more. Then they gave him the chance to choose his own sentence and he basically talked them into giving him the death penalty."

"Thought God loved Her martyrs," Crowley snickered. "Martyr city up there, innit?"

"He had children," Aziraphale said, tone clipped. He gazed at the Earth, blue and brilliant before them. "He had young children."

"‘The Greater Good.'"

"‘Pride goeth before the fall.'"

Crowley sniffed loudly. "Don't like that one much myself. Oi, hey, what've you got there?" The waiter came over to the two of them, plate of horribly garish drinks balanced on his upturned palm.

"Tequila moonrises!" he informed them chipperly. Oh, Aziraphale thought to himself, that sounded quite good. He smiled at the waiter, who... oh my. Was smiling back in quite a way. Aziraphale vaguely hoped Crowley wouldn't notice (usually it was Crowley getting all the attention. Or at least, so it always seemed to Aziraphale).

"Thank you, we paid you," Crowley muttered at the waiter, dismissing him handily. The waiter smiled blankly and wandered off as Crowley turned to pass Aziraphale his drink. Very fruity. Positively ridiculous. Aziraphale stole the white peach slice (supposed that's what made it a tequila moonrise?) from Crowley's drink. Crowley's eyes, not as hidden as he thought they were, flickered down at Aziraphale's lips as he sucked the juices from them.

"Besides, what's pride got to do with it? I don't even think your side has a good handle on that one, seems like you toss it at anyone you don't like. Wasn't Joan of Arc prideful? How about Jesus?"

"You know he wasn't; you specifically tempted him that," Aziraphale pointed out.

Crowley made some vague sounds of denial but didn't outright contradict him on that.

"But really. Thinking that..." this was dangerous territory. Aziraphale had to tread lightly. "Like he thought he invented ‘asking questions.' Like that was the great step forward western civilization needed him to sacrifice his life for and abandon his children."

"Father of western philosophy, so apparently he was onto something," Crowley muttered.

"Did he have to die for it? He'd already said what he was going to say—Plato was already there, writing things down."

"Well, does a father have any unique obligation to his child? Any more than he has to other children? Hundreds of others? Millions?"

"Well he made the little blighters," Aziraphale insisted. "He must."

"But if you neglect your child—and it's not like he was pulling an Abraham on the kids, his friends were all wealthy, the kids were going to be fine—for the sake of millions of other kids. Don't you think that balances out? Big picture?"

"God is not a utilitarian."

"How do you know?"

Aziraphale's eyes slid nervously away.

See? This was the problem with demons. Especially this particular demon. Always asking questions.

And then Crowley asked such an odd question it nearly sent Aziraphale sprawling. "You going to eat your peach slice?"

Aziraphale turned to Crowley with shock, a gasp, only to find the little devil laughing at him. Well, really. Aziraphale scoffed and slapped at Crowley's arm.

"It's not funny."

"Only because you couldn't see the face you just made, angel. Honestly, keep your peach slice. All yours."

He bumped his shoulder into Aziraphale's as they rounded the deck, Moon and Earth now at their backs.

"C'mon, angel. Let's go bless the slot machines."

---

Aziraphale poked at the slot machine button ("Since when had they stopped using the big arm on the side?" "Since around the time cordless phones were invented, angel.") and watched as the digital simulacrum of three wheels spun round and round before coming to rest on a combination of planets and galaxies. The machine dinged happily at him, digital coin sound effect indicating he'd won some amount of money. It didn't really matter how much, of course.

"Well, what's the point if you win all the time?" Aziraphale wondered out loud.

On his left, Crowley leaned around in his chair, just enough to bump his shoulder into Aziraphale's before leaning away. "It's not all the time," Crowley insisted. He glanced around the room at all the happy gamblers focused intently on the machines. "Just ticked up the percents a bit. Skewed the odds. It's not even a double-digit change, hardly noticeable."

"Seems awfully kind of you."

"Not hardly, are you kidding me? Look how many more people are gambling right now, because of me!" He gestured broadly around the in-ship casino, which did seem to be rather packed. Not that Aziraphale had any basis of comparison.

"Is it really a sin if they're winning?" Aziraphale mused.

"They won't always be in a demonically-skewed casino, Aziraphale," Crowley pointed out. "Get them hooked now and they'll always be seeking out that high. Intermittent conditioning, most nefarious exploit in the human brain, let me tell you."

Aziraphale frowned. Well that sounded positively evil. Then Crowley's shoulder brushed his again.

"Hey. How about a refill?"

Aziraphale glanced down at his cup perched in the helpfully-attached cupholder on the front of the slot machine. Crowley was right, it could do with a topping off.

"Oh! Well, alright then. Ah, let's see..."

"I'll get you something new," Crowley promised as he picked up both their empty cups. "Something with unnatural colors and bits of food for you to munch." He snapped his teeth on the last word, convincingly viperous. Aziraphale scrunched up his nose in subdued laughter and returned to his slot machine. He lost twice in a row, but then won more than enough to make up for it. He honestly didn't understand what humans saw in these machines. And he didn't think he'd find it more fun if he lost more often. Where would the logic be in that?

"It's a Moscow Mir."

Aziraphale peered into the copper mug with interest. "Oooh. What makes it a Mir?"

"The fact that we're in space, I imagine," Crowley sneered. He dropped himself alongside Aziraphale, legs too gangly for the stool and seemingly going everywhere, including into Aziraphale's personal space. Not that they hardly had space personal from each other: it all kind of mushed together, some centuries back. Aziraphale sipped at his drink through its tiny straw. It was delicious at least, Aziraphale could give him that. But... he frowned down at the lime, and just the lime, that adorned the drink.

"And two seats at the table at the Chef's table opened tonight."

Aziraphale beamed over at Crowley, who just rolled his eyes and jabbed petulantly at Aziraphale's slot machine. It paid out ten quid. Aziraphale sighed.

"Don't understand this, really."

"What's there to understand?"

"The point of it." Aziraphale poked the button again. He lost a quid. He poked it again. Another quid down. "There's really no trick to it, is there?" He wasn't really asking.

Crowley shrugged, expression vaguely baffled. "Well... no, not so much. Not at all. Click and spin."

Click again. Five quid payout. That put him up three. Click again. Quid gone. Click. Another. Click. Ten quid payout. Up eleven.

"But why would they even bother?"

"Because they think they could make money."

"There are better ways to make money. Ways that don't lose you money."

"Because they think they could make a lot of money."

"But they won't."

"But they might."

Click. The machine paid out twenty quid. Aziraphale spun away from it on his stool, sucking on his Moscow Mir. "But why?"

"You might as well ask why the humans do anything." Crowley snorted and poked at the button on the machine. It paid out a respectable five quid. He poked it again, not even watching it as it spun but instead turning his attention to Aziraphale. "And that, angel, is pretty much in-eff-able."

He said it with a smirk, like it was something dirty. Aziraphale scowled at him over his copper mug, even as Crowley smiled meanly at him. Were they having a row? Aziraphale wasn't sure when it had started. Or what it was over.

"But there's a point to their lives. They have a purpose. This—this doesn't have any part in that. It has no point."

Crowley snorted and drained half his Moscow Mir in a crunching, gnashing sort of gulp. He smacked his lips together cruelly. "That'd be news to the humans. That they have purpose."

"Well they do. They might not know it, but they do."

"Oh right, what was that again?"

"Well, it's-"

"If you say ‘ineffable' I'm burning this whole place down."

Aziraphale tsked softly. "No you wouldn't."

Crowley shook his head in disbelief at Aziraphale, like he was being impossibly dense. Which, well: maybe he was. But maybe Crowley was, too! They both knew they didn't know God's plan for the humans. That was kind of the whole thing.

When it was clear Aziraphale didn't have an answer Crowley turned back to his slot machine, poking the little clicker too fast to even enjoy the bells and whistles of the machine. Which, for goodness' sake, if you took the noise and lights away from the experience it seemed even more self-obviously pointless.

"Honestly, ‘what's humanity's purpose?'" Aziraphale muttered. He sipped at his Moscow Mir. "You might as well ask ‘what's anything's purpose?' ‘What's the point of anything?' ‘What's our purpose?'"

"I did."

Aziraphale stiffened, hand resting gently on the spin button. Crowley wasn't looking at Aziraphale. Aziraphale wasn't looking at Crowley. Aziraphale's spine was straight. Crowley sprawled all over the place.

"I... I didn't mean-"

Crowley slammed his hand on the spin button rapidly, like he was trying to break the damned thing. "Of courssse you didn't mean. You are Aziraphale, princcccipality. You would never..."

"It's not our place," Aziraphale murmured. He didn't know why he said it. He didn't even know if he believed it, at this point.

"Well then what's the sodding point?" Crowley hissed. He kept slapping the spin button. "If we've got a mission, a plan, some blasted purpose we're supposed to fulfill, what's the point of leaving us in the dark?! Why can't we know?"

"We must not need to."

"Shove ‘need'! What if I want to know? Why can't I? I'd do a better job if I knew. What, is the Almighty afraid I'd cock it up? Afraid we'd run off and do just the opposite? That's more their lot's style. It's not us. It's not how we were made."

"Maybe it's the sort of thing that if you know, you can't do it," Aziraphale pointed out, rather reasonably, he supposed. "It's... it's like faith. If you get proof, well, you can't have faith anymore. Ruins the whole job."

"We don't need to have faith; we've stood in Her Ever-Loving Presence!"

"I said maybe it's like faith." Aziraphale sipped at his Moscow Mir.

"You want to know," Crowley whispered, leaning too close. Aziraphale gulped nervously at his drink. He was down to ice chips. He should really get a refill.

"What I want doesn't factor into what I do."

"Liar."

Aziraphale wanted to protest that he was an angel, he wasn't a liar. But then his eyes skittered nervously over to Crowley's and he caught a glimpse of Crowley's eyes behind his sunglasses, daring him to try and protest otherwise. They both knew better. Aziraphale crunched at some ice in his mug. He really needed a refill.

"You called the Almighty," Crowley pointed out.

"Tried," Aziraphale protested weakly.

"You wanted to know. You tried to know. You tried to ask."

"I was trying to inform-"

"It's the fucking all-seeing all-knowing AlphaAndOmega you don't need to inform Her of anything."

"My mind wasn't on the role of angels in the ineffable plan," Aziraphale said, nearly rolling his eyes. "I had more imminent concerns at the moment."

"But it was," Crowley argued. "Because it's all the same thing, innit? The ineffable plan, the antichrist, the humans, us, them." You. Me. "What's the point of it all? Why are they even here? Why are we even here? Why is there something, instead of nothing? And why the Creator of it all not just tell us?!"

"I need a refill," Aziraphale announced, jumping up from his seat.

"You're running away," Crowley accused.

"I'm not. I need a refill, and this conversation is boring me anyway. We should get off it because I'm positively falling asleep."

"You're just angry because you know I'm right," Crowley hissed.

 Aziraphale turned his back on Crowley with a jerk. "Don't flatter yourself!"

"I'll flatter myself all night long!"

"That doesn't even mean anything!" Aziraphale shouted back as he stormed away.

"Aziraphale. Aziraphale! Ah, angel, come on-"

There was a noise like Crowley was getting up to follow him, but then a horrendous clanging and lights and music started raising a terrible din. Aziraphale glanced over his shoulder to see the slot machine Crowley had been sitting at had hit the jackpot and was letting everyone in the vicinity know it. Crowley rolled his eyes and was trying to push away from it, but the little old ladies that had before been mere set dressing to their conversation now were clamoring to him, eager to get a look and congratulate him.

"No- No, really, look, my- Why don't you just- There's a love, let me- Aziraphale, will you just wait- Excuse me, miss, here, you take it-"

Aziraphale caught Crowley's eyes across the casino floor and put on his absolute best smirk just for him. Crowley's eyebrows shot up and his jaw dropped down as Aziraphale arched one single brow and turned on his heel, stomping out of the casino deck. Serves him right, to be hoisted by his own petard. Or something.

---

The chef's table was lovely, if a little bit gauche. It may be a space-cruise-ship, but it was still a cruise ship, with all the limitations on fine dining that included (more so, of course, given that they were in space).

Crowley wasn't there. Aziraphale picked at his artfully plated croquette de pomme de terre au fromage, finding himself for once sorely lacking in appetite. But then an older woman on his right engaged him in conversation and he forgot about one overdramatic demon and fights over nothing.

"Were you with someone? I'm surprised there's an empty seat; the tickets were so expensive!"

Aziraphale's left hand fluttered over to Crowley's empty place-setting, right dabbing the corners of his mouth with his napkin. "Oh, n- y- ah, yes, my-"

Aziraphale's brain very quietly but yet dramatically ground to a halt.

"Cr- Anthony. He, ah... Wasn't feeling well, I'm afraid."

The old woman made a sympathetic noise, face crinkling in understanding. "Ah, what a shame. I do hope he feels better. Do you have many excursions planned?"

Well, not planned, exactly. But Aziraphale smiled politely and nodded. "Oh yes; we'll be going down to Deimos when we come up on it."

"So lovely. Walter and I have a vow renewal service scheduled for one of our days on Mars."

Aziraphale smiled genuinely, basking in the love he could feel emanating from this woman. "Oh, that's wonderful. How many years?"

"Fifty," she said proudly. "Which not many get, these days. I wasn't sure we would, either: I didn't meet Walter until my mid-thirties. And the later you meet, of course, the older you have to live!"

"Looks like you two managed just fine," Aziraphale noted. He placed one hand over hers on the table, performing a very small, most certainly unnoticed blessing for the couple. "And I'm sure you've got another fifty more ahead of you."

The woman laughed and gripped at his hand, and Aziraphale forgot all about a pouting demon, skulking somewhere around the ship. All those questions about meaning and purpose, and here, right here: Crowley should have just come to dinner and met this lovely woman and her dear husband, and that would have been questioned answered. Aziraphale basked in the woman's love for her husband all through coffee and dessert.

Crowley'd show back up eventually, Aziraphale knew. After all, they were on a spaceship, millions of miles out from anything. It wasn't like Crowley was going to discorporate himself just to escape having a conversation with Aziraphale (it might not have stopped him in the past, but these days neither was too sure about their standing with their respective home offices. Best not to test these things, if they could be helped).

Aziraphale sat in the bath that night, sipping at the wine they'd brought with them, and listened to the quiet of their room. He leaned his head back against the rim of the tub and closed his eyes, sighed. Honestly: what was the point of it all? What was the point in asking such a question? You'd never get an answer, and the asking of it, well. Where was the good that ever came of that?

---

The first stop, after the moon, was Deimos: moon of Mars. (For some such science reasons, Deimos was the one that had excursions on it, while Phobos did not.) They approached it at "night", according to ship time. That meant the observation deck was dark, perfect viewing as Deimos loomed into view before them, a dark shadow in a sea of stars. Mars was rising on their port side. Aziraphale stood out on the observation deck and watched as a foreign moon filled the field before him.

Crowley stepped alongside him.

Aziraphale folded his hands over themselves, gazing out upon the moon.

"Clever humans," Crowley muttered.

"They do keep managing," Aziraphale agreed.

Crowley passed over a glass and Aziraphale held it as Crowley filled it with a bold red. Appropriate, of course. They were angels: they understood the power of symbols.

They were angels. Aziraphale's lips twisted at his own mental slip. One of them wasn't any more, of course.

They drank mostly in silence through the night, watching as the ship carefully fell into orbit around the moon, Mars and the sun rising every twenty minutes or so. Eventually "sunrise" came to the ship itself: lights going on, more people joining them on the observation deck, crew scurrying to ready the excursion ships for launch. An angel and a demon were a solid four or five bottles in by then, though you wouldn't know it from the single bottle they'd been drinking the whole night. Another hour, and the humans started piling into the excursion landers. Aziraphale leaned against Crowley. Crowley let him.

"Look at them," Aziraphale breathed.

"I am," Crowley replied.

They fell silent again for who knows how many minutes. As the humans launched to wander around the surface of a foreign moon, Aziraphale held his glass out to Crowley who refilled it without a word.

"Maybe this is it," Aziraphale mused. "Maybe we're here..." He trailed off. It was a lot, and it was big, and he didn't want to be presumptuous. But... "We're the ones on the wall," Aziraphale declared. "We're here to watch over them."

"That was your job, on the wall. Wasn't mine."

"And what have you been doing for the ensuing sixty-three odd centuries?" Aziraphale pressed him. Crowley opened his mouth petulantly, searching.

"Ahhh well. You know..."

"We've been observing them," Aziraphale asserted confidently. "We're here to bear witness."

"Bear witness to what?" Crowley grunted.

Aziraphale tsked loudly and stared out at the surface of the foreign moon that the humans were landing on. Families with their children, old and young, couples and friends and loners, men and women and all else besides. Crowley drank his wine, because of course he knew.

"But what's the-"

"If you say ‘point,'" Aziraphale threatened with no heat. Crowley fell silent for a whole thirty seconds.

"-the point?"

Aziraphale wondered how to explain the old woman from dinner and her husband Walter, getting ready to renew their vows on the surface of an alien world. Wanted to share the physical aura of love that surrounded the conversation, and the couple, and wrap Crowley up in it. Maybe then he'd understand.

Maybe then he'd pretend he didn't, because he didn't want to. Because the questions were more fun.

Aziraphale thought he was better than that; but there was never any telling for sure, was there?

Aziraphale placed his hand over Crowley's on the observation railing. Crowley fell very, very still. After a long moment he turned his hand over, and then, look at that, they were holding hands, together. There was no way for Aziraphale to share the memory of the woman's love with Crowley, but love was love: easy to come by, impossible to tie down and stick in place, like a butterfly on a board. Ephemeral.

Maybe Crowley would like that word more than ineffable.

"It's in the doing of it, my dear," Aziraphale whispered. "Just look at them, out there: doing."

Crowley's thumb swiped over the back of Aziraphale's hand, fidgety energy still coiled beneath his skin even as some small portion of Aziraphale's calmness infected him.

"Doesn't seem like enough."

Well there's your problem, Aziraphale thought. It wasn't the asking questions. It was the dissatisfaction with the answers, always: unsatisfied. Searching. Wanting. Aziraphale held his hand and prayed for it, just once, to be enough for Crowley.

"They've done this great thing," Aziraphale said. "And they're sharing it with each other, with their families, their loved ones."

"So someone remembers it," Crowley murmured, and maybe God did still answer prayers.

"Someone like us."

Crowley's lips parted, a small gasp of divine comprehension smoothing the lines from his features, face almost just reminiscent of how it must have looked in the before. Aziraphale held him close, although you wouldn't know it to look at them, just their fingers laced together.

Eventually the moment had to end, like all such moments do. They were, after all, ephemeral. Crowley slipped away full of manic energy and Aziraphale was looking for the observation deck bar to try whatever new concoction they'd thought up for the first moon of Mars. And then Crowley returned and had his on Aziraphale's back, murmuring about how their favorite breakfast place on the ship was doing a special excursion day brunch.

(They did make it down to Deimos, the second day they were in orbit. There was a domed park with a zipline tour and bungee course. Crowley had invented zipline tours, so of course they went on it, with Crowley snickering at the impatient and bored humans spending ninety-five percent of their time stuck queuing. Aziraphale felt quite sick on the bungee course, all the hopping and bouncing and one-one hundredth gravity. Crowley thought it was a hoot.)

---

"So there's Mars."

"There is Mars, indeed."

Crowley pursed his lips out, then pulled them back in a snarl, taking in the great big red planet before them. Aziraphale couldn't help glancing between Crowley and the excursion ships, which were loading up as they stood there, watching. Crowley stared down at the planet. Aziraphale stared between Crowley, and the planet, and the ships.

"Just ask it already."

"Oh let's go, please?" Aziraphale smiled broadly. "It'd be the first other planet I've ever step foot on."

"Would it be?" Crowley mused, affecting disinterest. But he was already sauntering down to the ships, hands in his pockets. Aziraphale skipped a little as he hurried to catch up.

"You know space exploration is one of ours," Crowley pointed out as their excursion ship launched. Aziraphale tittered reproachfully as he nudged Crowley away from the window, trying to catch a glimpse of the red planet for himself.

"It most definitely is not," Aziraphale insisted. "It's obviously divine."

"Oh really? How'd you figure?"

There it was. Great big red planet, coming around to fill the entire window. Aziraphale gasped, as did the rest of the ship, crowded around their own windows. Truly divine.

Just next to his ear, Crowley was humming in quiet awe—or so Aziraphale imagined was the sentiment. He glanced back at the demon, who was uncharacteristically taciturn. Aziraphale smiled a secret smile to himself, then nudged Crowley with his hip.

"See? Divine."

Crowley shook himself, struggling to remember his evil nature.

"Waste of resources," he managed to grumble out. He shook his head again, breaking his gaze with the wondrous sight before them. He gestured about the excursion ship at the humans gathered about the porthole windows, fighting for a moment in the red planets glow. "You think any of this lot go hungry at night? Ever worry about how they're going to pay their bills?" He scoffed. "Space exploration is for the filthy rich, the one percent of the one percent, and it's to the detriment of the rest of humanity."

"How- How could you-!" Aziraphale spluttered. He fidgeted with the hem of his shirt, at a loss.

"Well: think about it. All this money they could be spending on feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, vaccinating the masses: instead, they spend it all on a leisure cruise. Just to say they saw something new. To posssst the best picturesssss online, and make their friends envioussss."

"What about all the good that's come of it?" Aziraphale shot back. "The advances in science, in research-"

"Advances in building bigger space engines, in artificial gravity for space ships, in space food for space men-"

"Sustainable energies, more efficient waste recycling and water reclamation, climate change data-"

"Massive tons of greenhouse gasses dumped into the atmosphere with every launch. Rare elements used up and exploited. Helium is a non-renewable resource, angel, you know that."

"The humans aren't perfect," Aziraphale agreed. "No action they do will be wholly good. But nor is it wholly evil! The advances in science, in medicine, in personal technology: those all filter down into the common good!"

"It's ssssselfish," Crowley hissed gleefully. Aziraphale's head snapped to the left.

"It's not. It's inspirational. It's exactly the point: it's stupid, and it's bold, and it's brash, but it's inspiring."

"Babel," Crowley reminded him, circling around behind him. Aziraphale glared at him as he resettled on his right.

"No. It's not prideful. It's inspirational. It's creation: it's the spark of the divine!" Aziraphale thought of that little girl on the observation deck. The one who had been so inspired by the vast, unlimited potential of space, of the universe at the edge of her grasp, that she'd go on to invent an entire system to bring free energy to the world.

"It's exactly what we were saying-"

"We?"

"About the point of it all. The point is in the doing, my dear. And look, here-" Aziraphale reached out and grabbed Crowley's elbow, veritably manhandling him to look through the porthole window with Aziraphale. "Look at what they've done."

Crowley's cheek was pressed against Aziraphale's temple as they looked upon the humans' mighty works. And what they felt, in both their hearts, was the furthest thing from despair.

Neither one was sure which stepped foot onto Mars first. It was probably for the best. For all they knew, it had been at the exact same moment. And so, an angel and a demon stood on the surface of a foreign world, peering around at the horizon out beyond the domed enclosure, miles and miles and miles of red earth stretching out in every direction.

There were no words. Aziraphale reached out and touched the back of Crowley's hand. Crowley twitched, then placed his hand on the small of Aziraphale's back.

"Come on, angel." 

***

Chapter 2

Aziraphale sighed as the sun set over the horizon, leaning perhaps more heavily against Crowley's side than he should for propriety's sake. But it was all so wondrous, so magnificent, seeing what the humans had done. Being able to be here, embodied in human bodies, on a planet which had never been built for the fragile little peoples. But the clever humans had built ships and domes and carted oxygen molecules across the void of space and deposited it all here, on another planet, just so they could do silly things like stare at sunsets with those they loved, a world away from where they'd learned to love them.

Aziraphale dabbed at his eyes. Oh. He hadn't meant to get so emotional, but. Oh. It was truly a wonder.

"C'mon." Crowley's voice was soft, full of kindness. Like he knew how much this meant to Aziraphale (like maybe it meant even half as much to him). "Ships leave in ten. Unless you want to be stuck here overnight."

"We should have booked a room," Aziraphale regretted, voice a little wet. "I... I wished we had. I hadn't known how it would feel, to be..." here. With you.

Crowley's hand was at the small of his back, but he was leading him away from the ships back to orbit. "Oh come on, now. All you had to do was say. We've got a room."

Only then did Aziraphale manage to tear his gaze from the rapidly darkening Martian horizon to look to Crowley. He was smiling at Aziraphale, and Aziraphale wasn't sure how long Crowley's focus had been on him and not the sky. "Oh, oh. That's so ki-"

Crowley grunted stiffly, hand sliding from Aziraphale's back to his elbow. "Well don't make me regret it, c'mon. Wouldn't mind seeing the Martian sunrise, as it was. Hell of an experience to have. And there's probably some, I dunno... lonely couples at the hotel bar I can tempt into making bad choices on their vacation."

"Of course," Aziraphale agreed, placatingly.

They had booked the honeymoon suite, apparently. Aziraphale snickered to himself as Crowley tried to act like he was making Aziraphale horribly uncomfortable with the implications. He wasn't uncomfortable. Hadn't been for a while, just. Hadn't found the right occasion, either. Without the... human impulse... it all seemed like the sort of thing you saved for meaningful moments, like a special vintage of red.

Their room had a wall of windows of the Martian skyline, and after they walked in, a view of the Martian night sky above them as well. Aziraphale grinned up at the see-through dome, naming the stars in his head. But he couldn't help glance over at Crowley and tease: "What: mirrored ceiling too much of a cliché?"

Crowley sputtered a bit, trying to come up with some clever retort after another. Finally he sighed, shoulders slumping. "Rather look at your face than myself, angel. Can't imagine I'd be interested in whatever stupid expression I found myself making mid... well."

Aziraphale stepped closer to Crowley, eyes trailing up and down his body. He was still wearing the somewhat ironic tourist clothing, though his pants were too tight. And shirt, as well. He always wore everything too damn tight.

"Crowley, I was thinking..."

"Mm, mustn't have that," Crowley whispered. He leaned in, one hand going up to brush Aziraphale's hair from his forehead—as if it was ever anything but precisely in place. Aziraphale sighed into the touch and smiled softly. Crowley glanced at him, from behind those blasted sunglasses, silent question in his eyes. Aziraphale lifted his hand slowly and plucked the glasses from Crowley's nose.

"I thought it might be fun," Aziraphale continued to try and explain himself. "Just... a new planet, new..."

Crowley was shushing him lightly, other hand come up to stroke at Aziraphale's hip. It was all so tense and soft, exciting but safe. Aziraphale let Crowley nudge those knobby knees against his thighs, the two of them dancing lightly backwards towards the bed.

"Angel: I know you," Crowley assured him. "We're on the same page."

"Well, we..." Aziraphale swallowed nervously as the backs of his knees hit the bed. Crowley kept going, but Aziraphale didn't let himself get pushed back just yet, so now they were just. Touching. Everywhere. The lengths of their bodies, pressed together as one. "We usually are," he finally managed to agree.

Crowley kissed him, then, and Aziraphale thought briefly that he ought to take control of the situation, lest Crowley think too highly of himself.

On the other hand, he was kissing Crowley, and he couldn't much think of anything just then. Especially when Crowley nipped gently at his lip, tongue darting out like it was scenting him. Aziraphale whimpered into Crowley's mouth as he opened his, and then he was laying back on the bed, Crowley crawling all over him like it was old days again, back in the beginning. Aziraphale, for his part, mostly just spread his hands around Crowley's sides—honestly, the dear boy needed to eat more—and held on tight.

"Ah, have we..." Crowley glanced down between them. "I haven't really given it much thought."

Aziraphale hummed. "Yes, me neither."

"Boarding passes say ‘mister,'" Crowley mused with a shrug.

"Wouldn't want to make liars out of ourselves," Aziraphale agreed, and concentrated for a moment.

"Right, because that's a sssssin," Crowley hissed. When he swallowed Aziraphale's mouth up once more, their hips rolled together and an altogether new, electric sensation ran through them. They both gasped and glanced down between their bodies.

"Well that's feels right odd," Crowley muttered.

Aziraphale frowned. "You don't like it?" Personally he very much did—the swelling, the light-headedness, the warm, full sensation... But of course, if Crowley wasn't game-

"No, no, I didn't say that," Crowley mused, somewhat slowly for Aziraphale's taste. He was still staring down between them, little frown line between his eyebrows. Aziraphale studied him, waiting. "Just a bit..." Crowley shifted, face scrunched. "Uncomfortable."

Realization spread across Aziraphale's face.

"It's your trousers, you muppet," Aziraphale pointed out.

"No no, the trousers are the same, it's this penis-"

"No: you're wearing women's trousers. They're too tight."

Really. Aziraphale chuckled to himself as he rolled them over, straddling Crowley's hips. "You've never had something in there before?"

"Never bothered," Crowley said with a shrug. He glanced down between them, where Aziraphale was making quick work of his belt. "Maybe I should have gone with the lady-bits, to match the clothes."

"Well, generally speaking this is all done with the clothes off, so it doesn't really-" Aziraphale stopped, Crowley's jeans unbuttoned and hands on his zipper. He gasped and looked swiftly up. "Oh, I didn't even ask! Is this alri-"

Crowley threw his head back and laughed, slapping Aziraphale's hands away. "Honestly, angel, here. Yes it's alright, come on, get them off."

"Well excuse me for not being presumptuous," Aziraphale quipped. Then he stopped and stared, head tilted a little to side, as Crowley's cock finally escaped the confines of his trousers.

"Ah, yes, that feels much better." Crowley shimmed his hips in all sorts of sinful directions as he shoved those jeans further down. Eventually Aziraphale reached down to help out, though his eyes were focused on the semi-erect cock bobbing to and fro between his legs.

"I think I very much like yours," Aziraphale finally admitted.

Crowley blinked and glanced down at it, like he'd forgotten it was there. "Oh yeah? I pick a good one?"

"Well, I think I ought to-" And like a man possessed, Aziraphale kneeled down and took Crowley's dick into his mouth.

"Oh-hey-! Saints above, Jes- oh, okay." Crowley spluttered, body thrown upwards before he finally fell back against the mattress. "Oh, oh, that's..." His mouth opened wide and closed, then opened again as a choked groan worked its way out of him. "Oh, that's. That's..."

Aziraphale slipped his mouth from Crowley with a pop, replacing it with his hand for just a moment.

"Quite good, is it?"

"Damned good, jolly good," Crowley agreed, looking utterly overwhelmed. One hand came up to slap at his own forehead. "Even... even that," he nodded down at Aziraphale's hand. "Bloody hell, that feels great."

"Well, we had quite suspected, hadn't we," Aziraphale reminded him.

"Hey, could you..."

And it was because he asked it nicely, because it wasn't a demand but an actual request, that Aziraphale smiled up at him. "Of course."

It was also because, Aziraphale had found in the previous twenty seconds or so, that he quite enjoyed ‘sucking cock.'

Crowley's penis was firm and delicious under his tongue, and he quite liked, well, having something in his mouth. It was fun, to suck at Crowley's cockhead, to tongue around the rim, to pull back the foreskin and lave the flat of his tongue on the thick vein this exposed. It was even more fun to hear the incessant gibberish that spilled from Crowley's mouth as Aziraphale put his to work.

It was also quite a bit of a turn on, apparently, to suck cock. Aziraphale found his mouth watering much the same as it would for the most delectable of desserts, with the added sensation of arousal hot and heavy between his legs. He sucked down, and back, then pulled off to play with the balls Crowley had so thoughtfully included underneath.

"Ngh! God, Angel-"

"Don't-" Aziraphale pulled back with a wince. Crowley's thighs squeezed around him.

"Don't blaspheme," Aziraphale begged.

"What, am I ruining the mood?" Crowley teased.

"You blaspheme again and I'll forget all about this organ," Aziraphale grumbled.

"Okay, okay," Crowley murmured. His hand snaked down to run its fingers through Aziraphale's hair. "I won't, I promise."

Duly assuaged, Aziraphale bent back to his task. He sucked one ball, then the other, into his mouth, tugging the wrinkly sac only just so tightly, rolling the firmness he could feel inside over his tongue. A giggle escaped Crowley's throat, mixed in with groans and moans of the quite erotically charged variety. Aziraphale released the sac to his hand and grinned up at Crowley, even as he continued to roll it between his fingers.

"You enjoy that, then?"

"It's a blast," Crowley said, tone trying for sarcasm but sentiment obviously genuine. He propped himself up on his elbows and grinned toothily down at Aziraphale. "How about you find out for yourself?"

Aziraphale considered that, then shook his head. "No, I think I quite like this part this way ‘round. But..." his gaze shifted, trailing down Crowley's body, settling finally on his darkly-haired thighs. He quite subconsciously licked his lips. "I would like to have you, now, I think."

Crowley was nodding enthusiastically, dragging his ridiculous slinky shirt above his head in order to lay, fully naked and fully pliable to Aziraphale's whim.

"Yessss: have me, have me."

Aziraphale almost didn't take his time with his own clothes, until he did, unable to shuck them off with the abandon Crowley managed. But once they were away he crawled back onto the bed with Crowley, whose hands immediately went for Aziraphale's face, pulling him in for a wet, sublime kiss.

"God, I love you," Crowley grumbled into Aziraphale's mouth.

"I'll allow just that one blaspheme," Aziraphale conceded. Crowley kissed him harder, stealing breath he didn't have from his lungs. When they parted, panting for no reason other than the intensity of their feeling for each other, Aziraphale rolled his forehead against Crowley's, touched his hand to Crowley's cheek.

"And I, you, of course."

"Of course. Now have me, angel."

Aziraphale rolled them both onto their sides, curling up behind Crowley, groin-to-rump. His hand fluttered down over Crowley's malnourished little bum, squeezing it gently, tickling his fingers over the dark dusting of hair there. Crowley laughed, face snuffled into the expensive sheets.

Aziraphale felt especially conspicuous performing a miracle under these circumstances, but, needs must. And he could always say he was just using it for... lamp-lighting, if anyone asked (no one would ask. No one had asked for centuries). Crowley flinched, then relaxed, as Aziraphale's hand slipped between his thighs.

"It's oil," Aziraphale told him.

"Are you anointing me?" Crowley teased, but it sounded like a plea.

Aziraphale pushed between Crowley's thighs, forehead pressed to the crook of Crowley's neck.

"Yes," he whispered. A choked-off cry escaped Crowley's throat before he could help it. Aziraphale pressed kisses to Crowley's shoulder, trying to soothe the noise away. Meanwhile, Aziraphale could barely contain his own depth of feeling, erection quickly becoming the central focus of his whole being. The way Crowley's thighs squeezed tight around him, oil slickening the way, creating the perfect balance of friction and slide, wet heat engulfing him... Aziraphale panted as instinct took over, hips jerking steadily against Crowley, driving himself in and out.

Crowley growled low in his throat. "Yes angel, yes, take me-" he grunted as Aziraphale's passion overwhelmed him, hips jerking harder against him. Crowley's hand clutched at Aziraphale's hip, fingernails digging in. "Harder, yeeeeesss..."

Crowley's hips were moving with him now, bodies falling into the oldest rhythm two bodies could. The slap slap slap of wet skin on wet skin filled the room, their panting breaths joining it. Aziraphale felt... felt... He moaned and pressed his mouth to Crowley's shoulder, his neck, overwhelmed at everything he was feeling, both physical and otherwise.

"Ggggg I love you, Angel," Crowley growled. "Give it- Give it to me good, I- Ggggg..."

"Yes, yes, Crowley," Aziraphale whimpered, teeth accidentally scraping a line down Crowley's jaw. A desperate whine jerked from Crowley's throat, head falling back toward Aziraphale.

"Oh my- Aziraphale, I-"

Aziraphale leaned forward, grabbing Crowley's chin in his hand so they could kiss, and kiss, and kiss. Aziraphale's hips had a life of their own, fucking between Crowley's thighs as he spiraled towards the culmination of his pleasure, the release he knew his arousal was cresting towards. His penis had begun to leak, extra wetness making the way all the more slick, viscous fluid coating the hair on Crowley's thighs, the skin of Aziraphale's erection. It was all a terrible mess but it was all so erotic at the same time, Aziraphale couldn't get enough of it. He rubbed his hand through the wetness before bringing it around to Crowley's front, reaching for his answering erection straining between his legs.

"Ngh, Angel, don't-"

"I'm close, Crowley," Aziraphale assured him. "I... Hnn..." Aziraphale licked into Crowley's open mouth. Crowley's eyes blinked up at him, irises completely blown, no white left, just all golden snake. Drool dripped from the corner of Crowley's mouth. More mess. Aziraphale kissed him some more, tasted his spit. He loved it.

Aziraphale jerked Crowley smoothly in his fist, swiping his thumb over the head to capture the precome leaking there and adding it to the wetness. Aziraphale groaned, kiss gone sloppy, tongue trailing down Crowley's mouth to his jaw to his neck. Crowley keened when Aziraphale scraped his teeth against his neck then lapped at the sore skin.

"Ssssseriously, Angel, I'm-"

Aziraphale gasped and shoved his forehead against Crowley's shoulder. Oh, oh, what... This feeling, he'd... He'd heard... He squeezed his eyes shut hard, hips slamming against Crowley's ass. "Fuck, Crowley-!"

The noises Crowley made were positive obscene as he spilled into Aziraphale's hand. Aziraphale almost wished he wasn't coming himself so he could appreciate them more fully, but as it was his brain was going white as he fucked, and fucked, and poured himself out between Crowley's thighs, striping that hairy flesh with gobs of viscous white fluid. His mouth hung open as his cock jerked and twitched, little spurts of fluid still spilling, flesh over-sensitive and trembling as he held onto Crowley, held them tight together, riding this storm out with one another.

"Aziraphale, Aziraphale, Aziraphale..." Crowley was whispering. After a long, long moment Crowley jerked, hand going down to nudge Aziraphale's every-so-gently away from his spent member. "Ugh, that is disgusting," Crowley grumbled. Aziraphale huffed and pressed gentle kisses to Crowley shoulder.

"It's beautiful."

"Right mess is what it is. Gross."

Aziraphale brought his hand up to examine it, gobs of Crowley's cum stuck to it. He brought it to his mouth and lapped experimentally. Hmm. To his liking, then. He'd rather suspected, as he had enjoyed the slight taste of precome he'd noticed when he was "blowing" Crowley earlier. He lapped a little more off, then wiped it on the sheet behind him. No need to be a glutton about it.

"That was lovely. I enjoyed that very much."

Crowley made some sort of whiney grunt, then rolled over, nudging at Aziraphale. "Turn about, I want to hold you," he murmured. Aziraphale happily obliged, pressing himself contentedly back against Crowley's lanky frame. Crowley snuffled his nose into Aziraphale's neck, making all sorts of silly, nonsense noises that amounted to happiness. After a moment he huffed, hot air tickling Aziraphale's short hairs.

"Could do without the mess, honestly." He shifted against Aziraphale's back, poking at his thighs. Aziraphale felt a vague tingling sensation in his incorporeal parts—Crowley miracling away the remnants of their love-making.

"Messier than I thought it'd be, actually," Crowley complained. Aziraphale just smiled, eyes shut, drifting happily in the cozy contentment this moment brought to him. Crowley's nose poked behind his ear. "Hey, are we done with the... the bits and bobs? I don't like how it looks, hanging about."

"Ruining the line of your groin?" Aziraphale teased. But he was already letting his be on its way, fading out from between his own legs. "No, that's quite enough of that for a while, I think," he agreed.

"Ah, good. Is fun and all, but..."

"Special occasions," Aziraphale agreed. "Quite."

"Don't let me stop you," Crowley went on. "Anytime you want to. Just say the word, we'll miracle some or another bits up and make things happen."

Aziraphale laughed, face pressed to the sex-warmed sheets. Crowley was huffing at his back, amusing his own damned self, as he always could.

"Maybe you should try the other bits, sometime," Aziraphale suggested. "If you don't like it dangling there. Help with the mess, too, I would imagine."

"Might do," Crowley agreed.

Eventually, shortly, Crowley grew restless. He clambered over Aziraphale and out of the bed (he didn't have to go that way, he could have gotten out his side of the bed, but he was a little bastard like that) to explore the extent of the amenities offered in their suite. Aziraphale was happy to stay in bed, staring at the stars above them, and maybe fantasizing about what the room service menu had to offer.

"Hey, angel, look at this."

Aziraphale kind of let himself... slide over the edge of the bed, head upside-down as he searched for Crowley. He was crouching over by the bar, which was apparently compliments of the "Honeymoon Suite." In his hand he held a bottle of wine, reading over the label. When he glanced over and saw he had Aziraphale's attention he waved the bottle at him.

"Genuine Martian vintage, apparently."

Aziraphale wrinkled his nose. "Oh, it's probably dreadful." He rolled onto his stomach with a smile. "Come on then: pour us a glass."

He let himself roll from the bed to the floor, padding over plush carpet on bare feet to join Crowley sprawled out next to the bar. Crowley kind of gestured with his body, even while he was uncorking the bottle (rubber corks, these days: no more cork trees left) and sorting out their glasses. Aziraphale read him clearly and cuddled into Crowley's side, leaning his head on Crowley's shoulder as he watched him work.

When they both had a glass Aziraphale leaned away from Crowley just enough to swirl his wine properly, eyeing it in the dim Martian starlight.

Crowley held up his glass, jaw flapping open before he shut it, without a thing to say. He frowned over at Aziraphale who smiled back at him. "Well?"

Aziraphale thought for a long moment. They could toast to new beginnings, new experiences. To the humans, in all their cleverness. To spaceships and long-overdue vacations. To the meaning of it all, whatever it might be.

But all that felt like a lot of questions with no answer. Those weren't exactly Aziraphale's scene. So instead he held up his wine glass and smiled softly at Crowley.

"To us, my dear."

Crowley's jaw worked, fighting at a smile that broke through anyway.

"Ah, well. Alright then. To us."

Their glasses clinked, and the wine was awful. But it was new wine, on a new world, from a vineyard the humans would have had to make themselves from the soil on up. Context was everything, sometimes. Aziraphale sighed and drank the Martian wine on the floor of their hotel room, eyes drifting closed as Crowley began to muse on the ethical ramifications of human space exploration in the centuries to come.

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