lunchbreaks | rp with me!

Crowley pulls a face, and then reaches behind himself, grabbing the pair of thick rubber gloves, the ones he wore when he handled holy water.

"It's demonic," he says, offering them to Aziraphale. "And you don't know what my blood could even do to you, neither of us do. Don't risk yourself over me."

It can't hurt that bad, he thinks, looking at the pillow. Bite down on a pillow? He can't be so embarrassing that he's going to need to bite down on a pillow. Then, Aziraphale puts the ring of angelic grace around the wound, and it burns with the holiness of it. It burns like nothing Crowley has experienced before. He cries out, and tries to stifle it.

He takes a breath. If there's one person in the whole of Creation----"I trust you," he says.

Aziraphale puts the gloves on, because he doesn't really need it, but honestly he's expecting it to kind of bust out Alien-style (or he would, if he had seen Aliens), so he doesn't know how to tell Crowley that was sweet but ultimately not necessary.

He, at arms length, cuts the wound open and the disgusting maggoty sludge starts to pour out since it has nowhere else to go but through the hole. It's a lot more live and a lot less spouty than Aziraphale would have guessed, but that's good for one of them, at least.

With the gloves on, though, he scrapes the excretions off of Crowley's legs and onto the floor. Once he's fairly certain he's gotten most of it, he undoes the top of the salt and pours a whole lot of it to cover the maggots. He'd read it in a Good Housekeeping article once in the 1800s.

Crowley can handle pain----to a point. Hastur's curse is revolting, disgusting, and but mostly painful. Had he been imaginative, he'd have hit Crowley with something festering, something that changed him, something unique. But no, he stuck him with something that ate at his flesh, something normal for a demon. Something easily fixable. What a waste of power.

"He had one solid hit in, and he hit me with this," Crowley hisses. "You know, I don't even think he was really trying."

The salt covers the disgusting creatures, and they shrivel under the dehydrating effects. That's good----prevents Hastur from suddenly reapppearing on their doorstep. That would be something to be seen.

"Couldn't have gotten out of every battle unscathed," he says, and he makes a bandage pack appear in his hand. "It'll need to heal."

"Yes," Aziraphale remarks. "And I don't think I can help you with those burns I made." He hopes that Crowley doesn't start having blisters from them, but they're probably better than having live maggots underneath your skin. "But you should probably wash that out with soap and water first."

Wouldn't do to have lingering effects of Hastur in the apartment, either. Aziraphale goes to get something to clean this up off of the floor, since a miracle won't do. He doesn't even think that Crowley has the proper materials for it, so he tries to scoop it up with the gloves and carry it over to the garbage disposal. Well, okay, he thinks it's a sink. Crowley will have to notify him that there's a bunch of blades down there.

"Disposal is above the lightswitch," Crowley says, absently, gesturing to the switch. Who wouldn't know what a disposal is?

He moves to stand, and promptly goes back down onto the stool. Nope, he's going to have to try that a little slower. He tries again, and sits. He can wait. He'll wash the wound out in a few moments. No need to rush it.

"I pushed Hastur into a blessed rain cloud," he says. "Didn't see him burn, but I really think his odds for survival are fairly slim."

He wouldn't put it past the demon, though. Hastur was sneaky, and survival was all he knew. He could go from discorporated to reanimated faster than anyone Crowley had ever seen, short of Beezelbub themself.

He doesn't even know what a disposal is, but he flicks the switch and jumps back as the blades turn on, careful not to drop anything on the floor. Oh, a little warning for your angel friend who still calls bicycles velocipedes, please.

Aziraphale drops the contents down the sink and then washes the gloves, going to scoop some more off the floor when he sees that Crowley hasn't moved from his spot. "Oh, dear." He'll help Crowley in a second, after he's finished what he's started. He found a roll of paper towels, also probably from the seventies. "You know, he got what he deserved. I probably blessed that cloud." Him or the Pope. It was pretty difficult watching the Pope be fighting heaven at the time, but he's glad for it now.

He's gotten most of it out, and he very carefully takes the gloves and tosses them directly into the trash, making his way over to Crowley. "Easy does it," he warns, before trying to pick him up.

"Good thing it was you," Crowley says, moving to the angel's arms. He can't put any weight on the injured leg, but he can put some on the other. "Wouldn't have been any fun if it was anyone else."

And, while Crowley couldn't have fought Hastur on his own, he could certainly have fought him with his friend. Defeated him with Aziraphale by his side. Or, well, up in the air. There, part of the battle. Metaphorically by his side.

"Thank you," he says, finally, as they move their way towards the washroom to clean him up. "For this."

It's a bit embarrassing. Crowley is always the one to save Aziraphale, and now here Aziraphale is, saving him twice in one day.

"Well I can't just stand here and do nothing," he says, arm around Crowley, trying to get him to the bathroom which is honestly way too large and very prisonlike. His whole flat is just so concrete and empty. But he supposes that the only thing that really needs to be in it to make it feel lived-in is Crowley.

He turns the tap on and then rolls up his sleeves, because he doesn't want Crowley to object to his help and then wind up hurting himself even more. Really, he hadn't imagined ever bathing Crowley to make sure that he wasn't infected with other demonic entities, but there was always a first time for everything.

At the very least, he'll hand the body wash to Crowley. Can't be touching any of the demonic goo.

"No, of course not," Crowley says. "You're too good."

In a way, Crowley is almost grateful to be hurt. With Aziraphale focused on him, focused on helping him, he's not focused on their plight, on what's happened to the world. It's just this, for a few moments. It's just the wound and Crowley and taking care of him. And while it's embarrassing to be the one to be taken care of, it's worth it to give Aziraphale that reprieve.

"I had thought to be a bit more dramatic after all of this," he says. "Post a few victory photos to Instagram. Not---" He takes the soap and winces as he touches the wound. "---clean something like this out."

"You can still post photos on your forum," he replies. "Sorry, that's a bit old-fashioned. Your bulletin board." The smile he gives Crowley is just so innocent. "But after this," he says, and stays by his side while he cleans up.

If it helps, Aziraphale doesn't think this is embarrassing in the least, one because it's Crowley, who just helped him save the world, and two because he owes Crowley a few saves. And it isn't just about goodness, he wants to say, because he cares for Crowley. So much, and he's spent all these years denying it. And at the end of the Earth, when Heaven and Hell knew already, he hardly thinks it matters anymore to hide it.

And yet, something about him is still hiding in the shadows, refusing to make itself known.

For all that they've done, he feels a bit cowardly.

Crowley scrubs out the wound, which has lost its rancid smell for the smell of his body wash and some water. It's hardly the best, but it's much better than before. He remembers the days where the best sort of cleanliness they got was mud and a bit of water to rinse it off with, so this is really a vast improvement. Many of the demons in hell still prescribe to that sort of cleaning schedule.

He gestures to the cabinet by Aziraphale. "There are bandages in there," he says. "We can wrap it, it'll heal up. Probably take a bit longer than a normal wound might because of----"

Because of the angelic blessing, really, but he doesn't know how far the curse would have spread without it. It blisters in the circle around where Aziraphale cut into him.

"But it'll heal."

"Oh," he says, and then rifles through for some burn cream. Why a demon would keep burn cream in his apartment is beyond him though, and he miracles some of it up. "That should help with the pain and the scarring," he says, looking on sympathetically. He doesn't know how else he should help, but at least he knows that he'll heal now, and not slowly turn into a pile of maggots.

He pulls a stool up to sit by the tub, and with his elbows laid on the rim, looks up at Crowley. "When Heaven and Hell come looking for us," he says. "We should switch. You go to Heaven, and I to Hell, wearing each other's faces. I think that's what the prophecy is trying to tell us."

"Which prophecy?" Crowley says. "Oh---Oh, right, the one you said. Mind your faces."

He applies the burn cream to his leg and it stings, but then it feels cooling. He begins to wrap the wound slowly. It's not perfect, Crowley is no healer by any stretch of the imagination, but he can tend himself all right.

"I'm not sending you into Hell," he says, firmly. "It's----not like what you're expecting, and I wouldn't want to put you through it."

He doesn't want to imagine what they'd do to him, but he thinks that boiling lava and beating with crowbars wouldn't be out of the question.

"Agnes Nutter is never wrong," he says. "And I thought it might have been about the war but it can't have been," he adds. "Because you were wearing my face and nothing happened. I can take a few days in Hell, Crowley. But if I go back to Heaven, I don't think I'll return."

He reaches for Crowley's cheek, and places a hand there. "And if you go to Hell, I don't think you'll return either. And I can't allow that." He feels so vulnerable in this moment, casting desperate glances at Crowley, trying to get him to see.

"Then I won't let them take you," Crowley says. He sees Aziraphale's vulnerability and wants to make him not fear it. He wants to show him that he can protect him, that he can stop this. Of course, he couldn't exactly stop the apocalypse itself, could he? Aziraphale led the armies that stopped all of this from continuing.

Aziraphale's idea could be a smart one. An angel in Hell could do a lot of damage, especially if they weren't expecting it. But an angel in Hell could also be hurt very badly very, very fast. Crowley keeps thinking if he can just keep Aziraphale safe, keep him from getting caught at all----well, then it won't matter, will it?

"We can stop them," he says. "We have the whole human race on our side. They can't defeat all of them."

"We can do that while switched," he offers."Maybe we're meant to. But I don't think she'd be wrong about just this," he says. After all, Crowley might not know them but Aziraphale has read through all her predictions. He's searched it out for so long.

Crowley, meanwhile, is the sweetest demon he's ever met. How protective he is of Aziraphale, it makes him warm and plucks at a tightly wound heart string.

He sits upright and leans into the tub, reaching out and cupping Crowley by the cheek. "I can't lose you either." He turns on the puppy eyes. He only really even half means to do it, since he meant what he said.

"No, don't," Crowley says, shaking his head. "You know I can't say no when you look like that." That's the face that got Hamlet its audience, that got several whores new lives in Rome, and got a lot of other nonsense tasks completed by Crowley over the centuries. Crowley has always thought that it's for the best that Aziraphale isn't a demon, because with a power like that face, he could have made a lot of temptations really, really easy.

Crowley tilts his head, leaning it a bit into where Aziraphale is touching his cheek. "Oh, all right----but you're not going in there. We'll just...swap places for a bit, whenever we're out in public. If they come for us, we'll be each other. I'll ward up the flat, we can be ourselves here."

"Okay," he says, and then in his best attempt at trying to be Crowley, all cool and nonchalant: "Think I'd make a good you walking down the street, no one'd even notice the difference."

Then he wrinkles his nose, a thing that Crowley never does, why the hell does Aziraphale think he does this?

It's about as good as his magic act, but damn the boy tries.

Crowley watches this and lets out a sigh. "They're going to eat you alive in Hell. Possibly literally. You have to---you know, act like you actually don't care. Except about your clothes, because if you're wearing my clothes I do care what happens to those."

He doesn't even care one iota about his clothing, but entirely about the angel inside of them. If something terrible were to happen to Aziraphale, especially if they thought they were doing it to Crowley, that would be worse than just dying.

"If they attack you, they'd be breaking the truce, they have to know that," he says. He lets out another breath. "Which they might want, because they didn't get a definitive victory."

"I really think everything will be fine, Crowley." He'll just have to keep practicing. He really didn't think it was all that bad, though he does agree it needed a little work.

"Besides, it isn't breaking the truce if they fight me, I hardly think we count anymore. It's just you and me, and they don't want anything to do with us." It's what he chose, and it's what he'd choose all over again given the chance. Crowley's still standing, and if nothing else, they have at least the time in his flat together.

He reaches for a towel to dry off Crowley's leg, and then fusses with the bandages; it's probably best he do this part.

"We're on the humans side," Crowley says. "They can't keep thinking this is only about them forever."

Aziraphale fusses, and Crowley lounges back in the tub, letting him have at it. It's a fairly large tub, actually, though he can't remember the last time he used it as an actual tub. Showers, mostly. Just to clean himself off, make sure he was prepared and perfect for the day. But he had it. There was a lot on this flat he had that he never used. That kitchen, his bed, his nice couch. Never really thought about it until now.

"We could confront them," he suggests. "Together. Swap faces, like you said. And go in, demand the humans have rights for the truce."

"We could, but if we're together, they'll what, try to haul us off separately?" He asks as he dresses the wound. He has a soft touch, a nice bedside manner, and hopefully doesn't hurt Crowley any more than he is already hurt.

"I just don't know if we have enough to barter with them. You know how arrogant Gabriel and Beezlebub are, and ever since they've become the mouthpieces for God and Satan..." he starts.

He worries his hands together. "You know, this means you're going to have to do the bulk of the healing when we leave here."

"Maybe," Crowley says. "But we will be stronger together. It's better than being alone."

Maybe they won't know what to do with them. Maybe Aziraphale and Crowley can work together to keep them down. He doesn't know. All he knows is that he can't stand the idea of sending the angel into Hell alone. Not after watching him fight, not after holding him here in this flat. If they had avoided the War entirely, he might have been able to handle some secret mission off to Heaven alone, but not now.

He sits up, reaching out to take the angel's hands.

"We've beaten them once. We had nothing then, and we beat them, remember? This time, we've got tricks they don't know about."

"Alright," he says. "Alright, we'll ask them to write Earth into the truce." He doesn't sound so convinced, but if he knows one thing, it's that Crowley can talk himself into anything and he can string together enough to pieces go together.

"Will you give me five more minutes?" he asks. "And then I think I'll be ready to go out again. If you are." He does need the practice. He's rehearsing all of Crowley's mannerisms in his head, not sure if he just has no hip bones or if he's going to look like an awkward duckling when he attempts it.

"We'll go tomorrow," Crowley says. "We just survived a War, today, angel, I think we deserve a few minutes rest."

By 'we', he means Aziraphale. He can't just throw him back into the clutches of the angels that fast. They only just got out of there. He's also not so keen to see Beezelbub having just destroyed one of their Dukes. And there is always the possibility---however unlikely---that Hastur survived the raincloud. Crowley would avoid that for a lifetime if he could. He can't, but he would if he could.

He shifts himself, trying to stand out of the tub. "Come on, time I actually see what that bed is like."

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