Chapter Text
“You left.” That was about all he could manage with his head feeling so hollow. His hand clenched tighter in Nanny’s shirt, where he still hadn’t let go. He’d been persuaded to release his grip on Mr. Fell—Brother Francis—fuck what the fuck—and he was already regretting it, already felt the loss at his side. He felt Nanny shift her—no, no his—arm across his shoulders, holding him close against his side, pulling him off of his own chair and more onto Nanny’s—Crowley’s? God, what—God. It was too much, it was too—and his head ached already, plus the soreness in his shoulder he didn’t understand, and his stomach, fuck, his stomach would feel better if they turned it inside out, he was sure of it. He was too worn out to cry properly anymore. Just a little bit of shaking and some new tears on his face.
But they noticed. Both of them, Nanny was already wiping away his tears, and Brother Francis was back, cramming onto the narrow kitchen chair next to him and wrapping him up in warmth. Warlock immediately locked his hand in the front of his shirt. He wasn’t making that mistake again.
“I’m sorry,” Brother Francis whispered into his hair, chanting it like a prayer. “I’m so sorry, dear boy, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.” Nanny just held him, beyond words. Warlock could understand that.
Then the kettle started to whistle, high and painfully sharp. Warlock squeezed his eyes shut against the flaring pain in his head, but they flew back open the instant he felt Brother Francis start to stand up, start to pull away, start to leave—
“No, no please, don’t go!” he cried. Every ounce of strength left in his body went into holding onto his shirt.
Brother Francis leaned back down and ran a gentle hand over his hair. “I’m not going anywhere. I promise, I’ll be right here, I just have to—”
“No no no no don’t, don’t leave me again, please, don’t go don’t go don’t go…” he sobbed. He saw Brother Francis hesitate, but then he didn’t care anymore because he was sitting down and holding him again. Somehow, he didn’t see what happened, but somehow the kettle stopped screaming, and even though nobody had gotten up there were three steaming mugs on the table. He didn’t care. He wasn’t going to drink it, anyway, not if it meant he had to let go of them.
They stayed there, three people squeezed onto two chairs and holding each other so close they had no problem fitting. It was easier to think here. Even under the pain, Warlock’s mind was starting to sift through things and figure out what the hell had just happened.
“You’re—I’m—” His voice hiccupped as he tried to piece together the right words. “The—the person you lost, who looked like…”
Brother Francis laughed weakly, like he was also realizing just how absurd it had all gotten. “It was you, my dear. It was you the whole time.”
“But why?” He sniffled, and shifted upright a bit, so he could see their faces better. “Why’d you think I was dead?” Nanny’s arms tightened around him, almost enough to be painful, but he still seemed too overwhelmed to speak. Brother Francis took a breath.
“It was… when you went to Megiddo, there was a… man, a man there, called Hastur. Do you remember?” Warlock nodded slowly. He wouldn’t have remembered the name, but he knew who Brother Francis had to be talking about: the strange man in the dirty coat, the one who had freaked his parents out so much they’d had to move all the way across the ocean. “We, ah, well, we know him… from…” And he watched as Brother Francis and Nanny’s eyes met and they shared one of Those Looks, that thing his parents had done so goddamn often he’d never even tried to get them to stop.
“Don’t,” he snapped, loud enough to startle both of them. “Please don’t do that, just tell me.”
Nanny finally spoke up, and his voice was rough and waterlogged and lower than he remembered, but it was still so clearly Nanny. “We will. We will, I promise, but, just…” He looked to Brother Francis to find the words he couldn’t.
“Not tonight.” Brother Francis’s hand lifted from his shoulder to smooth down the hair on the back of his head, calming and slow. “It’s too much. For any of us, it’s too much tonight.”
Warlock nodded, suddenly exhausted again. “Okay. That’s okay.” He trusted them. He had trusted them right from the start, right from the first time he walked into the bookshop. “So you’ve… been here… the whole time?”
Brother Francis tipped his head side to side in a clear “sort of.” “And before. It’s…” he sighed. “It’s all a bit complicated, I suppose.”
“But this is… this is real. You’re… not really Brother Francis and Nanny Ashtoreth.” Nanny’s head jerked towards him with a pained sound, eyes wide and visibly panicky even behind his sunglasses. “You’re—no, you’re my Brother Francis and Nanny. Just, not… they’re not real. You are.” He pushed himself a little farther into Nanny’s arms as he relaxed again.
Brother Francis was nodding. “As far as… well, no, no that’s a good way to look at it. We can explain better later.”
Warlock took a long breath. It was easy now, breathing, and he savored it, taking in the smell of tea and coffee and leather and old paper and wondering how in the world he hadn’t noticed the familiarity of it before. “Can I ask one thing now?”
“Of course, darling. Anything.”
“What’s… what’s your name? Your real name?”
His face softened, bright blue eyes shining. “Aziraphale,” he said softly.
Warlock tipped his head to the other side so it landed on his shoulder, and Brother Francis—Aziraphale, he tested out the name in his head, Aziraphale—carefully brushed his hair away from his face. “I think I like Francis better."
That startled a laugh out of him, vibrating his chest against Warlock’s side, and he tucked his head against his shoulder, letting the happy wash over him. “My darling, you can call me whatever you’d like.” He pressed a kiss to Warlock’s hair. “Whatever you’d like, dear b—oh!” He tensed up, but Warlock didn’t move, didn’t move an inch from the circle of his arms. “Oh, my dear, I’m—oh we’ve been deadnaming you this whole time, I’m so sorry, that was—”
“’S okay,” Warlock mumbled into his shirt.
“No, it’s… oh, I’m sorry, we’ll stop—”
“No, no it’s not…” he sat up a little better, hoping it might help his brain find the words. “It’s not… not a deadname, really, just… not all the time? I don’t know, I don’t know…”
Nanny ran a still shaky hand up his back. “You don’t have to know. ‘S okay, sweetheart, you don’t have to know anything, that’s fine.”
“Just tell us what you need. Is… would you rather Warlock or Ashley, right now?”
“…Warlock,” he answered. “It… feels nice when it’s… when it’s you saying it, I…” He felt his voice cracking apart again, and new tears building up in his eyes. “I missed you. I missed you so much, I thought—thought you were gone, you left me and—and—"
“We love you.” Nanny’s hand came up to his cheek, and he could see the tears tracking down from under his glasses. “You have to know that, Warlock, we looked for you, we—we tried, we just—” His eyes were getting wider, his breathing faster, and he was looking between Warlock and Brother Francis with mounting horror. “We didn’t—fuck, no, fuck we gave up.”
Brother Francis reached his free hand to cup his husband’s cheek. “Oh, my love…”
“We gave up, angel, we gave up on him, we could have—what if—”
That was enough of that, Warlock decided, and he buried his face in Nanny’s shoulder, felt his arms come up automatically to pull him closer. He thought about how distraught Nanny—Crowley? Fuck, that was still doing his head in—how distraught he had looked when he laughed that one day in the bookshop, how he’d quietly left the room whenever he came in. “It’s okay,” he said into his neck. “I’m okay."
“We should have been there.” He was shaking. “We should—we should have kept looking, we never should have left you.”
“I’m okay now,” Warlock repeated. “I’m okay.”
They didn’t move for a while after that. Warlock let himself melt into Nanny’s embrace, let Brother Francis card fingers through his hair and murmur comfort to both of them.
He shifted awake some time later with his head cradled against a soft cotton shirt and sturdy arms holding him against a warm chest. He blinked blearily around the hallway he was being carried down. “Where’s Nanny?” he mumbled.
He could feel Brother Francis’s voice resonating in his chest and burrowed his head into it. “He’s right behind us, love,” he answered, and dropped a kiss into his hair. Warlock hummed and let his eyes drift shut again.
He didn’t know how the bed he was set down on was so warm, or where the soft pajamas they helped him change into had come from. He didn’t know why Nanny didn’t need sleep, too, or how Brother Francis’s tea suddenly reappeared as he settled into an armchair in the corner of the room.
He didn’t care. Because for the first time in years, the first time since he was very small, he got to fall asleep listening to his lullaby.
***
Aziraphale woke up to a faint buzzing sound. It stopped before he was really conscious, and he shifted back down in his chair to doze off again. He didn’t often fall asleep at all, but apparently last night’s emotional roller coaster ride had been enough to—
He jerked upright again, head ringing and heart pounding in his chest, suddenly convinced it had been a terrible, cruelly lifelike dream, that nothing had actually changed and the world was spinning on without him. But as soon as he got a clear view of the bed he relaxed again. Because there he was, their Warlock, curled up small under the duvet, all grown up but alive, breathing deep and slow, still fast asleep right where they’d tucked him in.
He stood carefully, stretching out his back and then tiptoeing around to the side of the bed. He dropped a kiss to Crowley’s cheek where he still slept slumped down in the chair he’d dragged over the night before. Leaning over the bed, he brushed Warlock's hair back to do the same, and noticed that the ends were dyed a subtle shade of blue, so dark he hadn't even seen it before. Aziraphale carded his fingers through Warlock's hair, and felt all the air in his chest expand and start to glow with warmth.
He didn't know what had happened to Warlock in the years since he and Crowley had left. Well, that wasn't true; he knew Theodore and Harriet Dowling perfectly well. And if Warlock's panic attack was a sign of anything, it was that they hadn't improved with time. (And they would be having a conversation about how to handle that situation.)
And yet, all Aziraphale felt was happy. Because despite everything, Warlock's life had been getting better in the month or so he had been back in London. Out from under his parents' thumbs at last, he was finally able to make his own choices, and learn about himself, and be the kind of teenager who could just dye his hair without worrying about anything. And his friends--Lord above, his friends were incredible. Aziraphale would never stop being grateful to them for being so supportive, and protective, and for realizing when Warlock was in danger and bringing him to them. (Although they would be having a conversation about how they'd gotten into that situation.)
Aziraphale pressed a gentle kiss to Warlock's temple, trying to send him all the warmth and joy he was feeling, to let him know how incredibly proud he was. He was just leaning back and considering whether he should go make tea when he heard the same buzzing that had woken him up.
As he never actually used the mobile phone Crowley had bought him, it took Aziraphale a moment to realize the sound was one of those on vibrate. Once he figured that out, though, it only took a quick look to determine that the phone was Warlock's, set on the bedside table when they'd miracled his clothes clean and folded the night before.
The last thing he wanted to do was pry, but knowing this was at least the second call the phone had gotten in the past few minutes, he checked the screen. He just missed the incoming call, but the notification list popped up, and his eyebrows creased, a layer of trepidation bubbling into his stomach. Fourteen missed calls. Nearly a hundred texts. He wasn't sure how to find out who they were all from, and poking around Warlock's phone, manually or miraculously, seemed like a bad breach of privacy. But at the same time...
He glanced over at Warlock, sound asleep and still recovering from both the alcohol and the miracles Aziraphale had used to remove it. Goodness knew he needed rest. (And Aziraphale knew goodness.) But fourteen calls couldn't just be ignored, so even with a guilty weight in his stomach, he took the phone out into the hall. It took him another minute and a minor miracle, but he managed to call back the most recent number. Luckily, the name that popped up on the screen was one he knew.
"Jules? It's Mr. Fell," he said as soon as the phone was picked up.
"Mr.—oh god oh god is he okay? Is Ashley—"
"He's fine, dear." Aziraphale put on his most soothing voice. "He's going to be perfectly alright."
"Oh, god, he's—he's—" For a moment, Aziraphale was concerned they might be hyperventilating, but he needn’t have worried; they were getting enough air to start yelling. "OLLIE! RACH, Rach, he's okay, Ashley's okay!"
Aziraphale made out a long string of expletives and several blasphemies in the background of the call before Rachel's voice suddenly took over the phone. "Ashley? Are you—"
Aziraphale interrupted before she could get too upset. "I'm sorry, my dear, this is Mr. Fell. Ashley's sleeping at the moment. But I promise you, he is more than alright."
Rachel took a shaky breath. Amidst the continued background cursing, he made out something like a question, and after another moment of muted chaos Rachel said "Here, wait, just let me..." and all of a sudden the sound evened out. Ollie’s impressive use of profanity came through loud and clear, sharply contrasting Jules saying a quiet prayer in Arabic. Rachel just seemed to be trying to catch her breath.
Fourteen calls. A hundred text messages. All from three terribly hungover teenagers desperately trying to make sure their friend was alright. Had Aziraphale still been on speaking terms with Heaven, they would have been getting a hell of a report. (Not literal Hell, mind you, that would rather defeat the point.)
“Can we come see him?” Ollie was still borderline shouting. “Can we—are you still at the—fuck, shit did you have to take him to the hospital? Fuck fuck can we—”
“Breathe, Ollie.” If there was a little bit of miracle in his voice, Aziraphale felt no guilt over it. “We’re still at the bookshop. I have some, ah… medical… training. I could—we were able to keep him here.”
“Can we see him?” Jules asked quietly.
Again, there was that joy, that pride in these kids and how good they were to each other. “I think that’s a marvelous idea,” Aziraphale said gently. “But I’m not sure when he’ll wake up. He needs rest more than anything right now.”
“Okay,” Rachel spoke up again. “Okay, can you call us? When he wakes up?”
“Absolutely.”
There was another moment of faintly shuddering breathing before Jules took over the phone. “Thank you,” they said. “Thank you, Mr. Fell, thank you so much.”
“You are so very welcome,” Aziraphale replied. “And thank you for bringing him here. He might’ve—it would have been much worse if you hadn’t.”
None of them responded to that. From a distance, he could hear Rachel muttering to herself, chanting “he’s okay, he’s okay, he’s okay,” under her breath.
“He is,” Aziraphale said firmly. “He is perfectly okay, and so are all of you. Though we will be having a discussion about safe drinking habits when you’re all here.”
“Don’t worry,” Ollie grumbled. “I’m never fucking drinking again.”
Aziraphale chuckled. “I don’t think that’s necessary, dear. You were all very lucky this time, but as long as you’re more careful in future you’ll be fine.”
After a few more reassurances, and a firm promise that he would have Warlock call them as soon as he was able, Aziraphale ended the call and went to the kitchen to turn on the kettle. He wasn’t very surprised to find Crowley there a moment later, sleep rumpled and slouched in the doorway. “Good morning, darling.”
“Hey, angel…” He looked distracted, but let himself be led to the rickety table and took the tea Aziraphale handed him. Aziraphale just sat and sipped his, willing to wait however long before his husband was ready to put what was bothering him into words.
“He’s still sleeping?”
“Mhm. Out like a light.” Crowley fiddled with his mug, and took a breath. “We need to figure out what we’re gonna tell him.”
“I won’t lie to him again,” Aziraphale said bluntly.
Crowley shook his head firmly. “No. Absolutely not, never. But it’s… I mean it’s a lot, angel. It’s not just him, it’s Adam, and the apocalypse, and—and the fucking reality of the universe. All that at once’s gotta be too much for him to process.”
Aziraphale hummed in thought. “Maybe not. The Them took to it all rather quickly.”
“The Them were eleven, angel. And they had just seen Adam fly, and conjure literal aliens, and fucking--they beat the fucking horsepeople of the apocalypse, you can’t use them as a measure for normal reactions to this stuff.”
“Fair,” Aziraphale said. “So where do we start? Heaven and Hell?”
Crowley made a face. “Maybe we should avoid the angel and demon thing. To start.”
Aziraphale felt his eyebrow raise. “That’s a rather important detail, dear.”
“I—just—let’s try to keep it to him, at first, yeah? Maybe start with the baby swap?”
“Yes, well… it may not be the best idea to jump in with the fact that his parents weren’t really supposed to be his.”
The mention of the Dowlings had an immediate effect. Crowley’s face darkened, losing all its sleepy concern in a breath. His mouth twisted in a snarl, and the dim morning light suddenly flashed on his glasses sharp as knives. “His parents. Shit, when I—I’m gonna fucking—”
“Yes.” Aziraphale covered Crowley’s fisted hand with his own. “You will. We will. But this is about Warlock now. We have to take care of him first.” Crowley’s hand clenched tighter under his, but he hissed out a long breath, doing his best to calm down. Aziraphale waited, and pushed down his own fury. His had been simmering below the surface for hours, boiling away inside while he forced every movement and every word to be easy and calming. They needed gentle, right now, and he may have been a Principality, a defender and a warrior first and foremost, but he was the Principality who had given away his sword to keep Adam and Eve warm. He was also made for kindness and love.
“Okay,” Crowley said after a few moments and several deep breaths. “Okay, but we still gotta… still gotta figure out what we should start with.”
Aziraphale shifted in his chair. He had an idea of what they should start with, but he would have to change Crowley’s mind about it. “My love… he won’t think badly of you.” He’d thought Crowley might play dumb, but he just stiffened and looked away, his face turning red. Aziraphale squeezed his hand. “He won’t. He loves you, my dear, and he knows you love him. Knowing you’re a demon isn’t going to change that.”
Crowley scoffed, but it came out a little choked. “Easy for you to say,” he muttered. “You’re a fucking angel.”
“He needs to know, darling. It’s… I think it’s the best way to introduce everything. As a first step. He knows us, that should make it easier to process, and it’s the reason for rather a lot of what happened. And it won’t change how he sees you. I’m absolutely sure of it.”
Crowley didn’t look at him, and didn’t respond except to flip his hand over to better hold Aziraphale’s. They sat there quietly for a while, while Aziraphale drank his tea and Crowley fidgeted with his. Aziraphale had nearly finished his second cup when he heard stockinged footsteps in the hall, and looked up to see Warlock in the doorway. His face broke into a smile he couldn’t have stopped if he tried. “Good morning, Warlock, darling!” He didn’t miss the way Warlock’s shoulders relaxed as soon as he said his name. Lord above, all three of them must have woken up scared that this had been a dream, that it was too good to be true. “Did you sleep well?” Warlock nodded, then grimaced and brought both hands to his head with a groan.
Crowley was out of his seat in an instant. “Are you alright? Do you feel okay?” He placed a hand on Warlock’s forehead to check if he was feverish, but as soon as Warlock felt the contact he fell into Crowley’s arms. Crowley didn’t complain.
“‘M okay,” Warlock mumbled, with his cheek pressed to Crowley’s chest and his eyes closed. “‘S just my head hurts.”
“I’ll bet it does,” Aziraphale chuckled. He stood and pulled another mug from the cabinet, the kettle suddenly steaming again with only a thought, but stopped in his tracks when he realized he didn’t know how Warlock took his tea. That would only be the first, he was sure, on the list of things they’d missed as their little boy grew up without them. For a moment he was horribly, horribly sad, but then he realized that it almost… didn’t matter, now. Because now he could ask. He wished he already knew, but if the alternative was never finding out that Warlock liked milk and no sugar, he would pick this every time.
They settled down at the table again, in a looser mirror of the night before. Warlock shifted between leaning against Aziraphale’s shoulder and letting Crowley rub his back when the pain in his head spiked. There would be no miracling this. Even if Aziraphale had it in him to do more healing, he couldn’t very well leave Warlock with none of the consequences of his poor decision making. That’s what being a parent was about, wasn’t it? Keeping your children safe enough to learn their lesson and giving them a soft place to land when they needed it.
Warlock was quietly thrilled when he learned his friends had been calling after him. “Oh,” he said, blushing furiously. “That’s, um. Yeah. They can—I can just go get dressed, if they want to come over. Won’t take long.” He pushed his chair back and moved to stand, but he stopped before he’d gone far. “Wait, but…” He fumbled for words, and at almost the same time Aziraphale and Crowley each took one of his hands. “I—I want to tell them. Who you are, why I—why I know you, but…”
Crowley looked up at him with a faint smile. “But that’d be easier if you knew, wouldn’t it?”
Warlock’s blush deepened, but he nodded. Aziraphale saw Crowley take a deep breath, and he reached across the table for his hand. “Are you ready to do this, my dear?” He took another breath, but nodded firmly.
Warlock’s face turned curious, and he turned all of his attention to Crowley. “...ready to do what?” And Crowley didn’t turn away, didn’t look down, just reached up for the sunglasses that had always been perched on his nose when Warlock was in the room. He smiled again, still gentle, but brighter this time.
“Love, I’m ready to do anything for you.” And he pulled the glasses off.
*** 5 Months Later ***
“Don’t you dare.”
“Hmm…”
“Look at my face, Olivia. Don’t. You. D—”
Fwip. “Uno.”
Rachel slammed her cards down on the table. “Why? Why do I even play with you anymore, you always fucking win.”
“Oldest sibling skill.”
“I’m an older sibling!”
“Oldest, Rach, you don’t count.”
“What about my only child skill?”
They both looked at him pityingly. “Honey. Sweetheart. Light of my life, there is no such thing and you are the proof.”
Jules peered over Rachel’s shoulder. “You know she hasn’t actually won yet.”
“She’s going to. I know it, she always does this, you’ve got a wildcard left, haven’t you?” The offending card was dropped to the pile. “I hate you.”
They were interrupted by a knock on the door, and Warlock—it was a Warlock day today—stood up. “I got it.”
“Oh, shit, is it time already?” He heard them start to scramble behind him, running around to pull themselves together.
When he opened the door, he was greeted by a lanky man in black with sunglasses on his nose and a grin bright enough to power the sun. “Hey, kiddo.” And just like that, he was wrapped in Crowley’s arms. The hugs were still a bit long, still a little desperate, still making up for the years of hurt.
He really wasn’t bothered by that.
After a moment, Crowley looked over his shoulder into the flat. “You lot ready?”
“Nope!” Ollie ran past with a granola bar in her mouth, and Crowley let go of Warlock to follow her.
“You better not throw up in my car again.”
She gave him her most nonplussed look. “Then maybe you shouldn’t drive like a fucking maniac.”
“He is a fucking maniac,” Rachel called from the sofa.
“Hey!” Crowley’s tone was serious, but the ghost of a smile was clear on his face. “Young lady, I pay a quarter of your rent, I do not have to take this sass.”
Warlock stepped past him to grab his shoes. “You knew what you were getting into.”
Crowley stared at him for a moment, then sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “You know what, I can’t even say anything when it's you, you’re my fault.”
“Yup.” Warlock could feel his grin almost down to his toes.
“Mr. Fell’s coming too, right?” Jules asked. They were ready to go—shoes on, jacket zipped, bag on their shoulder.
Crowley nodded and leaned against the doorframe. “Yeah, he’s out in the car. No point in—”
“Hello, dear!”
“FUCKING—heaven, angel, don’t do that!”
Aziraphale leaned through the doorway, hands clasped behind his back. “Are we ready to go?”
Warlock finished tying off his shoelaces. “Nearly.” He looked up and found Ollie holding a hand out to him. Grinning (and maybe blushing, just slightly though) he let her haul him to his feet.
“Oh I’m so looking forward to this,” Aziraphale was gushing to Jules. “I haven’t seen a production of Earnest in years.”
“Thank you for lending it to me,” Jules said. “I’ve never seen a play I’ve read before, I’m really excited.”
“Did you get to finish it?”
“Just yesterday.”
“Oh that’s wonderful. It’ll make so much more sense, believe me, I love Oscar’s work dearly, but he does like his subplots and disguises.”
“Right,” Rachel joined them by the door. “I haven’t read a play since high school, what’ve you gotten us into?”
Crowley flung an arm around her shoulders. “Don’t worry, kid, sit with me, I’ll point out all the sex jokes.”
Aziraphale shot him a look, but Crowley just laughed and started ushering them all out the door. “Show starts at four, you lot, let’s go, get a move on, we’re gonna be late.”
“Oh, Warlock, dear, aren’t you going to be cold like that?” Aziraphale asked as he passed, and Warlock realized he’d forgotten his jacket. When he came back with it tossed over his arm, his friends were halfway down the hall, and a mismatched pair in cream and black were headed after them. A mismatched pair that was so incredibly familiar he couldn’t really stand it, and he hurried to lock the door so he could run after them and squeeze in another hug before they reached the car.
“Oi, Warlock! You ready?” Rachel called back to him.
And he was. Dare he say it, he really was.