Commentary on 'Bright with his Splendour', part two
They were enemies, then friends, then enemies again. Sometimes they were both at once. Crowley – he had decided ‘Crawly’ didn’t really fit a fellow who walked on two legs – felt contemptuous and jealous and sorry for the angel, and did his best to go drinking with him as often as possible. They treated their work with deadly seriousness and as an enormously stupid game. He enjoyed laughing at the angel for his deep streak of snobbish vanity – he’d decided what was good about clothing quickly enough and wore the best quality he could find. Crowley sulked when the bastard pointed out his vanity and the way he stubbornly refused to appear as anything other than young. They laughed together over successful ploys, or stormed off in a huff if the mood took them, one or the other having just lost an argument, a soul or a country. A year or a decade or a century later they would march back when the perfect rejoinder had finally sprung to mind. It was an odd set-up, but Crowley thought it worked just fine.
He thought Aziraphale enjoyed the fighting. It was so satisfying to land a decent blow on someone, to break bones and tear flesh and to know it ultimately didn't matter, that he was damaging a piece of equipment, not a person. Of course some of the fun wore off the first time he didn't manage to repair the damage to his body quickly enough and found himself incorporeal and chilly. It was months before he managed to contact Hell, months of whispering instructions in dreams to a magician, months of watching the idiot struggle and fail to remember in the morning. He found the long elaborate explanations he was required to give to the bureaucrats tedious in the extreme and was overjoyed when a new material body was grudgingly approved. He took better care of the new one and managed nearly a full two centuries before giving in to the temptation of a knock down, drag out fight with the angel.
I picture Crowley at this point as being on a high, out to enjoy himself as much as he can on an extended holiday from Hell. Aziraphale is well on the way to being the only other person Crowley sees as real, and the realer he seems to Crowley, the less Crowley fights with him. Crowley's thought that it's satisfying to fight when you know you're only damaging equipment is not very truthful (he's best at lying to himself) - at this point he quite enjoys causing pain, although the longer he stays out of Hell the more that tendency recedes. He's also taking out his frustration and misery at having Fallen on Aziraphale.
How did he get new bodies if they were needed? I think he'd stay well away from the office himself, for fear of not getting out again, so I went with the wizard + occult ritual approach here.
On balance, he thought he preferred the times when he and Aziraphale had one of their friendly truces. It made his life easier and gave him someone to get plastered with. He loved alcohol, loved the dizzy feeling in his head, loved the fun of staggering round and really loved the nonsense it made him say. Physical life was growing on him. He didn't think of his body as equipment any more; more and more it was simply him. He found it easier and easier to forget he'd ever been anywhere but on earth.
There was originally a long drunken conversation between Crowley and Aziraphale instead of the preceding paragraph. ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
louiselux and foreverdirt both told me it should be taken out as it slowed down the story and seemed to have no purpose than to give an echo of the dolphin conversation. They were quite right! I seem to remember that it started and finished with Aziraphale holding Crowley up as he puked drunkenly. Lovely.
He was dozing in a tavern over a rather nice little concoction the barmaid had thought up when the summons came. A madman begging outside suddenly stiffened like a dog that had caught a scent and came slinking in to him.
"Push off!" the barmaid said.
The madman stuck a hand under her skirt and cackled as she ran off, shrieking.
"There you are," he said.
"Piss off," Crowley said.
"We've been looking for you, Crowley," the madman said. "Why don't you submit a list of all the pubs on Earth? It'll make you easier to find, you malingering little snake."
Crowley sat up straighter. Bugger. Of all the times to get a possess-o-gram. He'd fancied a rest.
I wondered how Hell contacted Crowley before radio. Probably it was up to him to get in contact most of the time via goat sacrifice or something, but if they wanted to get a message to him, I thought possessing a vulnerable person was probably how they'd do it.
"There's trouble on the mainland, Crowley," the madman said. "Go sort it out."
"Sure. Which mainland?" Crowley said. "This island's equidistant from Europe, Africa and the Levant."
Crete.
The mad beggar dropped into a crazy hunched pose, and the glow died away from his eyes. He held out a hand.
"Alms?" he said hopefully.
"Shit," Crowley muttered.
He shoved what was left of his lunch at the beggar and walked out the door.
Although he walks out on the man, and doesn't give him money, Crowley actually gives him charity here. Not that he'd ever admit such a thing.
It took over a year, and by that time the trouble was so big he didn't need a hint. Walking through the Levantine country villages he heard story after story of miraculous healings, the dead raised and - what really annoyed him - demons being cast out left, right and centre. Bloody angel. This wasn't like him - far too active. He must have been at the spicy food again. What did he think he was playing at? Crowley was going to have to give him a stern talking-to. This was totally out of character; he'd either gone mad, or -- Crowley paused. Or it wasn't the angel. Those persistent rumours and prophecies. . . shit. 'Trouble' was not exactly what he'd have called it.
This - if he was right - could really ruin his life. And life, in all its glorious messy vitality, was something he didn't want ruined. This could be the beginning of the end. Life had people, noise, entertainment - fun. He wanted fun and that's what he was having. But he was working for people who didn't know what fun was, or who at least had their own highly specialised definitions. Crowley shuddered. It had been a very long time since he allowed himself to think about his superiors' ideas about fun. He wondered what it was they did with the souls of the damned, and decided he was better off not knowing. He was very grateful he'd got up to Earth before any humans showed up Downstairs. When he thought of some of the things he'd seen done to other demons and then thought of the huge hunger Hell had for human souls --
Crowley has never had his claws into a damned soul, having been on earth from before any humans died, which may be one of the reasons he's less demonic than most of the others.
He had to face it, he supposed. He liked humans, truly he did. They were funny, quick thinking creatures, attractive in their bright mortality. Like butterflies, he thought. Here one minute, gone the next, but pretty while they lasted. For all he liked humans, however, his work involved sending them to a very bad place. In fact, the more he liked them, the more likely it was they'd end up there. He was not, he thought, a prime example of a good friend. That was worrying, and every step he took through this blasted country made the thought overshadow his mind more. He shouldn't hang around with humans, he thought. Or he should at least stop liking them so much. If the bastards would just stop writing amusing plays and playing pleasant music and doing all the other things that made humans fun to be around his life would be so much easier. Of course, if they stopped doing all that they mightn't be so attractive to his bosses or the angel's bosses, and he could find himself out of a job and chained to a desk for all eternity. He ran through a possible list of desks to be chained to and decided he didn't like any of them. He bet the angel didn't worry about this sort of thing. Send them off to a better place, their eternal home, that's what would be going through Aziraphale's mind if a human dropped dead just because a fellow forgot they didn't have indestructible livers. Aziraphale wouldn't be looking round guiltily, wondering if getting pissed with a demon was a damnable offence if you didn't know that's what he was. Of course, thinking that then made him think that drinking with a demon on a semi-regular basis when you were perfectly aware of what he was probably was a damnable offence. He just wasn't going to worry about that, though. Not now. He didn't have the time. The angel could take care of himself. He wished the angel was around. He could really do with someone to discuss this with.
He tracked the Trouble down to the capital city by the trail of happy, healthy, non-possessed people. That was Hell for you, he mused, trouble was defined as the absence of pain. Of course, this really was Trouble, and he didn't want to think about it too closely. It might make for pain-free humans, but he'd had a continual headache since he set foot inside the country. Everywhere he looked he saw things he remembered, or thought he should remember. He kept catching glimpses of white out of the corners of his eyes and could feel angels all over the place. No one had challenged him yet, but he was on edge. He wished he were armed.
The capital city was crowded with pilgrims and revolutionaries and soldiers and tourists and assassins, all piling in for the big festival. Not to mention the locals all intent on fleecing the visitors while complaining about all the bloody foreigners hanging round gawping at the sights. Normally Crowley wouldn't have been found dead in the place, mainly because of his fear he'd be found dead. He looked nervously up the hill with its immense temple. He could feel the thing pulsing away, and always knew just where he was in relation to it. It was something he hadn't felt for a very long time. He couldn't be lost in this city if he tried. He saw other, minor demons. They peered out of the faces of the mad and the sick, and looked like they were running scared. As well they might, he thought; he was running scared. He could feel the temple and he could feel the path he was following. They were similar; but the path led to an individual while the temple led to - his mind shied away. He was better with individuals.
Crowley here avoids even thinking words like 'Jerusalem'. What he feels from the temple is the presence of God (another word Crowley avoids thinking).
I like the image of the other demons peering out of their victims, terrified.
He slipped along the narrow, crowded streets, never seen by the jostling mass of humans. At one point he swayed, dizzy and faint and looked down to see long dried spots of blood in the dust. He knelt, one hand hovering over the spot, but wasn't so stupid as to touch it. He straightened up and quickened his pace, now physically pushing the humans aside. The path led him out of the city again, off to a slight rise. He shook his head over the fact that he could just have walked round the walls. People were milling about, murmuring in disappointment or loudly proclaiming that they'd never been taken in for a minute. Crowley's gaze was drawn slowly to the top of the rise and he stood there entranced. For a moment he felt vertigo, and heard the wind rushing upwards past him, saw the light receding. He - he knew this man. He stood there and swallowed heavily, remembering the brightness and the long fall into the dark. He looked around, feeling light-headed and dazed. All around there were demons, looking up, yearning and creeping a little closer, then backing off fearfully. He wasn't imagining it, then. He had to get up there. He had to make sure. He had to do something, although he wasn't sure what. He took a few hesitant steps forward and something hit him hard. He sat down in the dust in surprise.
This is the second time Crowley sees Christ. This time he tries to get closer, although he's not sure why. Like all the other demons present he is feeling homesickness and regret, although not yet repentance - he still thinks of himself as an unfortunate victim of circumstance, and tends to conveniently forget the fact that he's Hell's field agent.
"Get away from here," a voice said, so thick with fury that it took him a minute to recognise it as Aziraphale.
He looked up to see the angel standing over him with balled fists, looking decidedly righteous. He held a hand up in surrender and slowly got to his feet.
"I don't mean any harm," he said.
"No harm?" Aziraphale said scornfully. "Your people have plagued him all this time and now -- this."
He waved a hand at the scene behind him.
"Exactly how does this count as 'no harm', Serpent?"
"You don't understand, Aziraphale," Crowley said. "None of that was me. Come on, it's me you're talking to. I just -- want to be here. I need to go up there, I need to --"
Aziraphale punched him in the mouth and followed it with a blow to the stomach as he staggered back and fell over.
"Filthy -- lying -- snake," Aziraphale said, accompanying each word with a kick.
"Please --," Crowley said.
They'd been on good terms for years. He couldn't believe Aziraphale would turn on him now, not when the angel knew Hell never told him anything important. He hadn't known about this, he'd had nothing to do with this. And it was so unfair of Aziraphale to think he did, let alone to be hitting him when he felt so weak and sick. He hadn't seen the angel since they'd parted amicably in Rome a decade previously, and this wasn't exactly the most pleasant of greetings. He felt tears start up in his eyes at the unfairness of it all. The angel stopped kicking him and glared down with a look of anger and intense hurt.
The unfairness of Crowley's existence seems to be a major part of Crowley's mindset in GO - he doesn't consider it very fair to be handed the Antichrist, he doesn't seem to consider it very fair that he Fell. Here he thinks it's unfair that Hell's field agent should be blamed for what looks like Hell's victory (Aziraphale is kept as much in the dark by his superiors as is Crowley by his).
"Please," Crowley said again, holding up a hand.
Aziraphale frowned, and began to reach down to take his hand. There was a sound like a huge peal of thunder. The angel whipped round to stare uphill with a desolate cry as the sky went pitch black and Crowley felt the temple behind him give a massive pulse. He shot to his feet.
This is the Luke's Gospel version, where the sun goes dark and the veil of the temple is torn apart. (In Mark's Gospel only the tearing of the temple curtain is mentioned, while Matthew's Gospel has the darkness, the torn curtain, an earthquake and the dead rising from their graves. John's Gospel simply has Jesus dying without any special phenomena to accompany the event.) The torn curtain (covering the entrance to the Holy of Holies) symbolises God's presence rushing out throughout the world.
"Aziraphale!" he screamed as the wind rose.
A mighty wind roiled around him and then he and the angel were rolling head over heels down the slope, past the humans who remarked to one another that the breeze seemed to be getting up a bit. The temple exploded, metaphysically speaking. Crowley could feel it in every part of him and he shrieked in fear as he felt What was coming. A hand suddenly clamped across his mouth and something heavy crawled on top of him.
"Quiet!" Aziraphale yelled in his ear.
Crowley nodded frantically and Aziraphale took his hand away and wrapped his arms around Crowley's head. Crowley screwed his eyes shut and buried his face in the angel's shoulder, wrapping his arms tight around him. All about him he could feel the Presence, vast and silent. Please, he thought, desperately clinging on to Aziraphale, pleaseohpleaseohplease. Dimly, as if from far away, he could hear Aziraphale whispering the same thing. He felt the weight of eternity pressing down on them, holding them immobile, and then the sensation faded away and he began to hear mortal sounds and felt the sharp stones pressing into his back. He could see the light come back even though his tightly shut eyelids, but it was several moments before he could persuade his hands to unclench their death grip on the angel's tunic. He opened his eyes and looked up past Aziraphale at the bright and colourless sky, feeling both their hearts hammering. Aziraphale propped himself up and stared down at him with an expression of deepest shock and relief, then knelt back and looked up the hill, his hands pressed to his own mouth. Crowley struggled up beside him and looked up in misery. There was no one up there any more. There was only dead meat.
One of the most difficult things to do in writing, film, etc, is to depict God. The twin perils of cheesiness and offensiveness are always waiting. I certainly wasn't going to try to show God on-screen, so what we have is a purely terrified-Crowley point of view - for the first time since the War he can feel the presence of God, but cannot hear anything, and doesn't try to see anything either. He hasn't got any actual request formulated in his prayer - although a large amount of it is of course a plea for his continued existence.
They sat together silent and unnoticed in the dust. All around them humans went about their business, giving thanks that the unseasonable weather had cleared up so quickly.
* * *
There's a jump of a thousand years here, to the year 1023. (Jesus has to have been born by 7 BCE at the latest, if he was born and then put in danger as a toddler in the reign of Herod the Great, who died in 4 BCE). So let's say there's been exactly 1000 years since the Crucifixion, a nice round number. With their usual skill at absorbing human influences from their surroundings, both Crowley and Aziraphale have taken on board the corrupt practices of the Byzantine civil service.
Sitting in Constantinople a thousand years later, in his pleasant apartment with its fine view of the sea, Crowley wondered if humans ever managed to design clothing that was fashionable, beautiful and comfortable all at once. The imperial eunuch he was currently tempting looked like he was boiling alive in his heavy, jewelled robe. Crowley nibbled at a section of pomegranate and wondered why he was even bothering to corrupt the fellow. Everyone at the court was already corrupt, you practically had to bribe people before they'd so much as say 'good morning'. He waved the bureaucrat away irritably the moment he'd got the silly fellow's signature. They always wanted to sign in blood. So melodramatic, humans. He hoped the fellow enjoyed having the facility to screw the girl he'd become infatuated with. Of course, if it was discovered he wasn't really a eunuch he'd lose his cushy court job, and the girl would probably run off to find a new rich protector. Ah well, Crowley thought, such is life. He resolved to start spreading rumours about his visitor in a few weeks. He took his drink and went to lean against a window frame, admiring the way the sun was sparkling off the water and the bright ships. Someone cleared their throat behind him, and he turned to see a fellow even more richly dressed than his recent guest.
"How lovely to run into you here, Crowley," Aziraphale said.
"Why don't you sell that and support a few deserving urchins off the proceeds?" Crowley said, waving his goblet at the embroidered monstrosity Aziraphale was swaddled in.
"Oh, no. I need it for my work. They do expect one to be well-dressed around here, you know. Haven't you seen their pictures of angels?"
Crowley snorted, strolling over to pour wine into the second goblet that had appeared meaningfully close to the jug. He handed it over, cut another pomegranate into pieces, and handed that to Aziraphale as well.
"Before you say anything," he said, "that guy came looking for me, not vice versa. He's already a lost cause so don't waste your time trying to show him the error of his ways."
"Oh, dear me yes," Aziraphale said. "He's been embezzling from his department for months to pay for some floozy."
"Charitable as ever, I see."
"She's two-timing him of course, with a handsome, penniless - but well-endowed, one assumes - gardener."
"Terrible people, these floozies."
"The gardener meanwhile, has a boyfriend he's really awfully fond of but he thinks what the poor fellow doesn't know won't hurt him. However, the boyfriend - who had originally been studying for the priesthood until he fell head-over-heels in love and ran away from the seminary - has of late been plagued with guilt and is visited in his dreams by what he's perfectly sure is the devil, who tells him he's going to burn for his horrible sins and must be useless in bed anyway seeing as his one true love is off messing around with girls every chance he gets, and it really looks like this unfortunate fellow is going to snap one of these fine days and chop his friend up with the axe that a little voice told him to go and buy yesterday. Stop me when this starts getting too familiar, won't you, dear?"
"Oh," Crowley said. "That gardener."
He gave the angel a feral grin and drained his goblet.
"Mmm. That gardener," Aziraphale said, refilling Crowley's drink.
They drank in silence for a moment. Aziraphale watched Crowley steadily over the rim of his goblet.
"I have a proposal for you," he said.
"Get down on one knee," Crowley said, "I want this done properly."
"Aren't we just a natural comedian these days? Do you enjoy being commended for your work when you pull off something big?"
Aziraphale's rather camp in this scene, and is certainly enjoying himself teasing Crowley.
"Well, of course."
"How about when I pull off something big? Your people understand that you can't win all the time, don't they?"
Crowley grimaced.
"I have to explain in minute detail how I could have possibly let you get away with anything. My paperwork more than trebles."
"How interesting. That's more or less what happens with my people. And the only way to avoid the unpleasantness is to work even harder to thwart you, and of course, you have to work even harder to thwart me, and we end up in a spiral of piece-work that takes up every available moment and we achieve less and less, and end up relieving stress by creating little tangles like your current amusement."
"So?" Crowley said.
Aziraphale smiled cheerfully and cut the last pomegranate in half, passing one piece to Crowley.
Another three-fold pattern here, with the three pomegranates - Crowley eats one, Aziraphale eats one, they share the third. Pomegranates were one of the early Christian suggestions for what the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil might have been.
"I propose we stop."
"Sorry?"
"It's really quite simple - we stop interfering in each other's work. So we both get things done, without constantly looking over our shoulders to see where the trouble is going to come from."
Bang! It's the Arrangement! In its simplest, early form - no doing of each other's job at this stage. I think Aziraphale came up with the idea through a close observation of Byzantine politics.
"Sorry?" Crowley repeated. "You're an angel. Are you seriously telling me you're going to give me a free hand to further Hell's schemes?"
"And you'll give me a free hand to further Heaven's schemes."
"You're mad. It won't work. Suppose you reported me?"
"Suppose you reported me? See? It's reciprocal. Now - we'd have to keep each other apprised of anything big. Otherwise there'd be questions about why the relevant one of us didn't thwart in time. I'll be honest, Crowley --"
"Oh, good."
"We'll probably both end up with fewer pats on the back overall, but we'll also have fewer smacks on the wrist. And we'll be able to actually do our work - and take time off too, if we want."
Crowley shook his head in amazement. The angel couldn't be serious. It would never work. But -- maybe he could pretend he'd been convinced. He could play the angel along, and keep records and turn them all over in a century or two. He sipped his wine. Of course, the bastard probably expected him to do just that, so he'd be keeping records as well. It's all be down to which of them could turn the records in first. One would get a commendation - if it could be played right - and one would most likely be recalled. Hmmm. He didn't want to be recalled. And he didn't really want the angel recalled either, not if he was the sort of angel who came up with suggestions like this. You could work with a fellow like that. Crowley realised he was talking himself into this stupid arrangement.
"All right," he said. "I'm game if you are."
"Play fair, now," Aziraphale said.
He may be good, but he's not stupid. Aziraphale is manipulating Crowley here, playing on his weaknesses on the topic of fairness.
"I always play fair!" Crowley said, stung. "I only give people what they want. I don't cheat."
"Prove it," Aziraphale said.
"Watch me," Crowley snapped.
Aziraphale held out a hand. After a moment Crowley shook it firmly. It wasn't all that demonic to be working with an angel, but he quite fancied the idea of time off.
"What about the revenue commissioner, the floozy, her gardener and his lover?" Crowley asked.
A reference to the film The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, And Her Lover. I've never seen it, but it's a memorable title.
Aziraphale heaved a sigh as if the mere thought was exhausting.
"Tell you what," he said. "I'll flip you for them."
The coin spun up into the air, turning over and over, waiting for one of them to break concentration.
I enjoyed making both of them so callous in this scene - they're in one of the stages of treating their jobs as a stupid game, and don't pay much attention to the fact that the game pieces are human beings. They're really quite human in this scene, but it hasn't made them very nice people - they're vain, lazy and contemptuous of other people.
* * * * * * *
