Just a Little Longer

It had always been a sight to behold, seeing how the remnants of the sunlight fell on the astonishing architecture that had been conceived by human hands. No matter how many times he walked by, it kept leaving him speechless, impressed at how talent had been refined by the people throughout the years.

Aziraphale had found himself in need of fresh air, nothing like a stroll through nature to perk him right back up. He had been quite busy these past few months, with the whole having to take care of Babylonia's future business. Heaven had heard from some sources, unknown to him, that there were some demonic influences at play around here. And of course, they had sent him to investigate.

He had arrived posing as an apprentice scribe. He had learned a thing or two about men's behavior from his years of wandering around the distinctive civilizations, at heart, they never truly changed. If a person was presented with a chance to make their work easier, or even to just pass it to someone else, it would be taken.

The supposedly wise superiors would give their work to their students in a poor excuse of teaching, when it was more of a case of having no desire to do it themselves. As an angel, he should not see things this way, he should be thankful really, it would make it almost effortless for him to reach the leaders and learn about their plans.

As the days passed by, Aziraphale began to grow distraught, with all of the ideas of war going around. He had found some impish demons here and there, shooing them to his best capabilities, but once they had planted their influence, well, let's just say it was hard to steer humans away from a path if they had already made up their mind about it.

This morning however, while he was enjoying the light through the windows as he read some stone tablets that had been so graciously given, he was disturbed by a message suddenly appearing next to him. It seemed his next task had made its presence known, without any acknowledgement of what he had been trying to achieve here.

Aziraphale had spent the rest of the day announcing to the people he had grown close to about what would be his abrupt departure, packing up what little he had so that he could leave the next day. They offered him ways of travel, which he thanked, but did not accept. Where he was heading to was going to need more of a miracle than anything else.

As the day got darker, he thought to himself how he would miss this place, he always felt sad at leaving his temporary homes, but he was needed elsewhere. This walk was almost like his way of saying farewell.

Step by step, he made way until his eyes caught a somewhat familiar silhouette sitting by the riverside. He felt his heart skip a beat, as it normally did when he thought he spotted Crawly in a crowd. The last time he had seen his friend had been a few decades back, Aziraphale scolded himself at the hopefulness he felt as he got closer.

His assumptions turned out to be correct, it was Crawly indeed, but the nearer he got, the more he noticed that something was out of sorts. The way he was seated, his nonchalant posture having basically disappeared, leaving someone frozen in time looking forward in his stead, hand absentmindedly playing with the water.

Blame his angelic nature, but at that moment Aziraphale wanted nothing more than to offer comfort to his dear adversary. He sat next to him, the other not showing any reaction to his presence, he was truly gone in thought. The angel rested his hand on the one playing with the water, knowing that it would be cold due to the time of night.

That seemed to shake the demon out of his stupor, almost freaking out until his gaze landed on the figure next to him, with the smile and soft eyes that always seemed to be reserved for him when the day darkened. He poorly tried to fake his coolness, no need to worry the angel with his thoughts, they were not important anyhow.