#aziraphale is also suffering but fucking hell neil

[vroomvroomwee]

I think Neil might have girlbossed a bit too close to the sun with Crowley this season.

Of course, the 6000 years pining and never having that love come to fruition. Finding your soul mate and losing him without ever having him in the first place. Bearing your heart open and declaring your love in every. way. you. can and still be rejected. Feeling absolutely worthless and unlovable after you see the person you hate the most, choose love and then see the person you love the most not choose you.

Oh yeah, and he lost his apartment, his belongings, his plants are decaying, and he's homeless and living in his car.

Like, it's not just the trauma from falling, but he also just had to add that his memories were probably erased. As if that is no big deal?! Oh, and, oops, he got tortured several times throughout the eras.

... and I forgot to mention, he also doesn't have ANY friends.

[actual-changeling]

some more script book shenanigans: apocalypse edition.

honestly yeah that's it. that's the show, summary right there.

followed by this because crowley has not suffered enough yet apparently. "that one hurts" YEAH IT SURE DOES NEIL

what the fucking hell indeed.

also uh. neil. neil please what the fuck. why does that hit so hard

what if this was my last straw, huh????

also don't imagine this line but with the sword pointed at crowley

definitely don't think about crowley in pain and on his knees with aziraphale standing above him, flaming sword in his hands. don't think about the fact that this already happened, and that now aziraphale might make his threat come true.

come up with something or i'll never talk to you again.

[monsterfucker-lisa-swallows]

it’s 1 am and i’m exhausted because i just got off my shift at the Retail Hell Job a few hours ago and have been writing because the only fucking time i have left in my day to write is at midnight because minimum wage existence steals my day...but anyway, that’s my excuse for this post then i’m gonna immediately pass out and forget i said anything. (i’ve said most of this before, but after the scene i was just working on, i wanted to put it all in one post)

@neil-gaiman, thank you so much for good omens. And thank Terry from beyond the grave (my word choice is suffering, I apologize, I got my good words out on my own writing over the past several hours). Not just because the book gave me so much comfort when I read it as a teenager (Crowley is so easy to project my trauma onto, you have no idea, I’ve talked about this often and at length), but because even today with the series being out it continues to give me something. You see, my girlfriend lives in England and I live in America. We’ve been friends for 6000 years almost 9 years but only just admitted our feelings to each other last year during a kind of apocalypse of my own. (It involves a fall from grace of my own, long story short...) Seeing as we’re both broke we’ve never gotten to meet in person, but that’s fine. I’m planning a visit next year and eventually I’ll move there. She relates more to Aziraphale, while I relate more to Crowley, so it’s a workable arrangement. (Did I mention Aziraphale is very easy to project our autistic traits onto?) Anyway, she hadn’t read the book previously, but we met because of Doctor Who when we were teenagers so of course she wanted to see it and now she’s reading it. And she’s absolutely obsessed. It’s given us something else to connect over, which is really hard to do with the time difference and the fact that we very often have such different tastes. (Hoping to get her at least onto Discworld next, I’ve been meaning to read more of those but finding the time is always a thing...)

Anyway, i wanted to say all of that before I got into the Other Stuff.

First, thanks for casting David Tennant. It was a special vindication because I said 8 years ago when I first read the book that he should play Crowley but at the time I was Big Obsessed so everyone was just sort of like that’ll never happen, but I’ve done community theatre casting so I have an eye for these things. I’ve been an actor since I was 9, but only on the community stage, and David’s filmography inspired me in a big way when I got into Doctor Who at 15. He made me realize I’m fascinated by long-form visual storytelling and actually want to work in TV. I’ve kept following his work and he keeps consistently picking projects that I find helpful in some way or at least inspire me as an actor. And of course he just had to go play Crowley. Not just because I predicted it like I’m a modern day Agnes Nutter, but because I always had a crush on Crowley so that’s fun just kill me now, Casanova, it’s easier.

I want to also thank Michael Sheen. Because I went through some really traumatic events when I was a teenager that took me away from the stage and took away my confidence and self-worth. Something about Michael’s (and David’s, of course) performance reminded me of what I loved about acting and how much I miss doing it. I still can’t really, right now, because gotta scrape by and earn a living and eventually move, and plus I am far too passionate about acting to allow my performance to suffer because I have to divide attention and give less of it to the show...but it reminded me of exactly what I love about storytelling. Got me looking for an acting coach so I can do this properly, maybe someone to help with accent work, perhaps a proper screenwriting course...This all really reminded me of what I love about storytelling, which I never really lost, even though I lost my confidence. So I’m working on that, getting back to who I always wanted to be before the trauma took that away from me. Thank you all.

Also send my best to Amanda. I read the Art of Asking last year and was blown away. But I always am by her work - big fan of her music even before I was a fan of yours, Neil, but not before I was a fan of David Tennant’s...the web of influence is ever expanding.

For Satan’s sake, I gotta go now. I’m gonna regret this in the morning. Getting a bit embarrassed. Hope this wasn’t too weird I just know that when anyone tells me they like what I’ve done in any aspect with one of my projects I enjoy it, so I wanted to, I guess, pass that along. Again, really sorry. Totally feel free to ignore me, I know this was long and a bit Much.

[dazedandinked]

Bad man, sad man - (Chapter 1/2)

Fandoms: Peaky Blinders (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett

Additional tags: Crossover, Alternate Universe, Season 3 Spoilers, Mentioned Character Death, Strangers to Friends, Friendship, Humor, Light Angst.

Summary:

Birmingham. Gray skies, dim light and tumbledown houses all served with a thick layer of dust on top. A place spat out from Hell, completely Godforsaken. Like, literally.

The perfect place for a demon like Crowley and a haunted man like Thomas Shelby.

A/N:  Hello everyone! This is my first work in a very, very long time and I really hope you all enjoy it as much as I do. It's quite an unusual crossover, but I love these series too much and I was really inspired by their characters.

You can find it on AO3 https://archiveofourown.org/works/17984987/chapters/42482834

Chapter 1: None of my pain and woe can show through

Birmingham.

Gray skies, dim light and tumbledown houses all served with a thick layer of dust on top. A place spat out from Hell, completely Godforsaken. Like, literally. Crowley got off the train (obviously he could pop himself out everywhere, but he really had a passion for cars, trains and all the-engine related stuff) and inhaled sharply, lungs filled with the intense taste of smoke. Just like home, he thought.

From the very first moment he stepped out of the coach, he understood. Surrounded by pain and despair, it wasn’t surprising that a demon could feel some kind of attraction to this miserable, bleak hole. But there was… more.

According to Crowley, every nook of England was soaked with hopelessness and suffering - it was 1924, what did you expect?- but he knew that something, or rather someone, had brought him there. He heard him call, a loud hearth-wrenching prayer (not the usual buzz of human thoughts), and, for the first in a time in a very long time, he couldn’t resist answering.

He strolled through the narrow streets of Birmingham, following the low cry. Excitement and curiosity building up into his chest.

***

Crowley stopped in front of the heavy wooden door.

A church. Seriously?

He slithered silently through the narrow nave,  moving closer to the pew where the man was sitting. The light was weak, but the demon could still see his shape: dark short hair, shoulders slumped under the weight of his coat. The more he walked, the more he could feel the distinctive heat of the fury and the cold  sadness that guided him. And the strong smell of whiskey.

Another lost, drunk soul looking for comfort in a church, nothing unusual. But Crowley heard his prayer and he wasn’t looking for God. He was swearing and shouting, this mind lost in a flow of painful thoughts. He wanted damnation, not redemption.

Everything hidden under a mask of indifference.

When he was by his side, the demon sighed heavily to make the man aware of his presence. He tensed, the hand running to the grey flat cap on his lap.

“Looking for some quiet, uhm?”

The man looked carefully at Crowley, blue clear eyes still alert despite the alcohol. He tried to figure out if the red-haired man next to him was a threat (a business rival, a disappointed client or another killer), but he didn’t quite fit the picture.

“You don’t look like a devoted christian,” Crowley added.

“Neither do you,” he sniped coldly, “and not a priest for sure.”

Crowley  laughed with a choked hiss from the back of his throat. “ Amen, I suppose.”

He took a seat next to the other man, bumping their shoulders lightly and making him feel noticeably uncomfortable. Oh, this was one of Crowley’s favorite things about interacting with humans: they don’t have the faintest idea of what they are looking at, but they could feel the danger (some kind of primal self-conservation.) Nevertheless, the man’s face didn’t show any emotion, still cold and restrained. Crowley surprised himself thinking that maybe, just maybe, he could like this human somehow. Well, everyone knows that he’s an unconventional demon.

“You’re not from Birmingham, I would recognise you. Not the kind of man who can go unnoticed. Where’re you from?”

“London,” a lie he got used to saying among may others.

“And you are here for business? Pleasure? Quite an unwelcoming place for a vacation, I must say Mr. …”

Too many questions, Crowley thought, they never talk this much. People usually get too nervous and scared to speak and the demon had to use all his abilities to make them at ease, ready to confess all their sinful wishes. He quite liked this standard procedure.

But not him. Too drunk, maybe?

“Anthony  Crowley.”

“Thomas Shelby,” and they exchanged a brief handshake. Thomas couldn’t not notice that Crowley’s cold hands (colder than his own) had some tiny scales-like scars.

“Anyway, I’m here for business. I go wherever my presence is required and you look like someone who might need my help.”

The demon made the round dark sunglasses slide down his nose, showing his bright yellow eyes just for a second (he had a thing for drama.) Normally he would have been a bit more subtle, using the right amount of charm and touching the right spots. But there was something about Thomas he couldn’t place. He didn’t feel the instinct of hiding his true nature and he couldn’t understand why.

The man beside him didn’t flinch as Crowley expected, the only reaction he got was raised eyebrow and a gaze full of curiosity. The demon couldn’t imagine that this wasn’t Tommy’s first time having visions and seeing what Hell probably looked like.

Crowley smiled.

“How can I help you, Mr. Shelby? What’s the wish that makes you burn like this?”

“I don’t need help. People come knocking on my door asking favors, the whole city owns me.”

Crowley raised his hands, a small smile on his lips. It never happened before that someone resisted his offers.

No matter how much time you’re around, he thought, there always is a first time.

“Ehi ehi, didn’t mean to offend, your reputation precedes you,” Crowley paused to compose himself and bring out his most persuasive voice, “but just between us, if someone could make your wishes come true, what would you ask for?”

Thomas frozen still, trying to swallow the tension. He felt the eyes of the man staring right into his soul behind the dark lenses. If he still had a soul. For the first time after France he realized he was … weak and vulnerable.

No one makes Thomas Fucking Shelby feel weak. It was a fact.

“I’m not talking about your kind of business. I’m just a poor sinner who’s asking for a bit of trust.”

“And it takes one to know one,” the other ended.

Thomas sighed, turning his eyes on the cap again. Crowley made a small smile: finally, he could see the wreck on the perfect facade.

The levee is going to break, the demon thought. And it did with a last desperate glance.

“I want everything,” he spat out, his cracking voice, “I want them to feel the way I felt when they took her away from me. Oh, God, she was too much for me, I knew it. I should have let her go when I had the chance… An— And I want to take everything away from them, Russian bastards.” and than he rambled something angrily in Romani (Crowley supposed.) Thomas took a deep breath. “I want them to feel empty and hunted as much as I do, and I want to be the cause of their despair. I want back all the strength they took me away.”

The fury and the hatred in Thomas’s eyes disappeared when his gaze met Crowley’s, understanding all the things he had just said, wishing he could take it back. It was the first time he spoke about what had happened, and he did it with a stranger. He stared at the floor, taken aback by his own feelings. Shame, for sure, but also… relief? He was back at five, when he confessed Polly he had stolen from the shop at the end of the road, his cheeks burning and eyes blurred with tears. Fortunately, he had drunk enough to blame the whiskey.

He expected to be mocked, and he was quite surprised when the man beside him just put a hand on his shoulder. Crowley smiled… softly. Was it — compassion? No, impossible. But it really felt the way Aziraphale described it. And he couldn’t stop. If other demons could see him now, they wouldn’t make him forget.

“Is that all? No money, no women… Not an island in the middle of the Pacific?”

Thomas shrugged, smiling slightly. “Too ordinary?”

“Oh no, just— you were right since the beginning. I don’t think I can help you.”

Thomas stared in confusion. “But I— I answered your question, I told you what I want and…”

“Of course, but it doesn’t make any sense, you know? Asking me something you already have, and you can do on your own.” Crowley winked, patting Thomas’ shoulder again.

“The situation is bad, I know, but you do look like a man who can handle all this shit. You’re still in charge. Maybe, the only thing you really needed was someone to talk about all you’ve been through.”

Thomas stared at him, finally regaining the determination lost a couple of glasses ago, and  Crowley knew his (terrible) job was over. They sat in silence a bit longer, looking at the small altar. Crowley glanced dismissively at the huge cross hung on the wall.

Shit, this is not my job. One of your tacky dressed guys should be here, not me!

But he was happy no other creature had answered the call. And he was not sure he had done a good action, in the angelic sense of good, after all: Thomas was back and he’d have continue doing his violent job.

Oh well, you could have come and done it your way, he thought, giving a last accusatory  look at the sky above the ceiling.

His mental argument with the upstairs was still going when Thomas cleared his voice.

“A drink. We definitely need a Drink. Unless your city taste is too sophisticated for a simple pub in Birmingham,” he smirked and then got up, walking toward the exit without waiting for Crowley. The demon laughed and followed him.

"I don't really care where the pub is as long as its whiskey is good.”

"Oh man, don't worry about that.”

And they walked through the narrow streets of Birmingham again, until they reached the Garrison.

***

Believe it or not, that wasn't their last drink together.