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*ahem*

a_fell and I were deep in conversation on Y!M tonight, and having profoundly depressed ourselves with our Milliway's Antics Of Woe, decided that what we needed was a nice bit of Aziraphale/Crowley fluff to cheer ourselves up. We started writing, trading paragraphs back and forth, until, predictably, I stalled.

I wibbled for a while, before coming upon a sneaky idea that would get me out of having to write the next paragraph. And lo, the first Milliway's Round Robin was born. We have started the fic, and it is up to you guys to finish it. So, here's how it's gonna work.

I'mma post what we had so far under the cut, except for the last paragraph of

a_fell's which caused me to stall. This will be posted in the comments, and that is how the story will continue; paragraph by paragraph, comment by comment. You have until 10pm GMT on Sunday evening to finish the fic, so that it's sitting nicely wrapped and waiting for your poor co-mod after her long absence from the crack that is Milliway's.

Have at it, patrons!

Aziraphale didn't have to look round, because there was no one who felt quite like Crowley. His presence was a slight acid tang to the senses, a quite unearthly feeling that simultaneously made him miss heaven and be grateful for Earth - something he'd been feeling quite a lot lately. That was Crowley all over, though- a mass of contradictions. The Angel emptied his bread bag of crumbs, folded it fastidiously and replaced it in his pocket before turning.

"Good afternoon, Crowley."

He received no reply, and turned to see the demon watching the ducks, where they were squabbling over one of Aziraphale’s crusts. The sunlight glinted brightly off his sunglasses.

"Why do they do that?" he asked abruptly.

"I’m sorry?"

"Why do they bother fighting like that," Crowley gestured vaguely, "when there’s the rest of an entire bag of bread floating around the lake?"

Aziraphale considered for a moment.

"Survival of the fittest, I'd imagine. It's the explanation that seems to be rather in vogue at the moment. Unless it was something about butterflies..." He watched the ducks a little longer, then sighed. "It's rather like the humans- always wanting what someone else has. The grass is always greener, and all that."

Crowley was silent, and Aziraphale knew that he was trying quite hard not to make a pointed remark about how this theory didn’t just apply to humans and small water-dwelling birds. It was a losing battle, but the angel cut in before Crowley could say anything.

"Lunch?" he asked.

Crowley raised a dark eyebrow, and grinned.

As they walked through the park, unhurriedly making their way towards Crowley's car and the Ritz (or wherever it is they would end up), Aziraphale took a deep breath and smiled. It widened as he heard the impatient sigh from behind him.

"Oh do stop being a spoil sport, my dear. It's not my fault I happen to be feeling particularly benevolent today. After all, we're lucky-"

"Yes, yes, lucky to have averted the Apocalypse... do stop harping on about it, angel."

He could have stopped, then, but the tone of impatience in Crowley's voice was almost refreshing. He'd been acting so strangely since it had happened.

"And - and I know I don’t say this enough, Crowley - I couldn’t have done it without you." The demon rolled his eyes. "I always knew that deep down inside -" the angel tried valiantly to suppress his laugh, as Crowley groaned and covered his ears to block out the rest of the sentence.

All the way back towards the Bentley, the two teased each other good-naturedly, falling back into old patterns as if they’d never stood together and almost faced down all the hosts of Above and Below. It was good to have this Crowley, his Crowley back, Aziraphale mused. He smiled as he recognised the familiar insults traded back and forth, and breathed deep the familiar smell of the Bentley as the leather creaked under him.

Aziraphale rummaged through Crowley's glove compartment, pondering as he did so why precisely it was called a glove compartment. Most of it he dismissed summarily as "be-bop", featuring as it did covers with outlandish designs and glossy photographs and heavens he'd had no idea someone's tongue could be that long. Finally something a little more sedate caught his eye, and he fished it out.

"Excellent."

Crowley looked over.

"What's excellent?"

The demon craned his head around, then started laughing.

"What?" said Aziraphale defensively, shielding the tape case with his hand.

"You like Carmina Burana? Hell, angel, there's hope for you yet."

The drive to the Ritz - for of course, it was the Ritz to which they went - was rather more tame than Crowley’s usual style, and the demon had seemed impressed that the tape Aziraphale had selected had lasted almost a full half-hour before acquiring some distressing electric guitar solos.

When they arrived, their usual table was free, and the maitre d’ greeted his two favourite customers with a delighted, if somewhat predatory smile. The angel ordered the Peking Duck for Crowley without even thinking about it, and the demon chose the wine.

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"Oh for... I can see you're carefully skirting the issue- bring up the Apocalypse if you must."

Aziraphael looked up in mild surprise. Actually, he'd been considering the recent acquisitions he had coming into the shop, after that... well, *that* Miss Turner had insisted on taking entirely too little money for them. Crowley hadn't shut up about that for days.

"Oh, yes, of course. The apocalypse." They hadn't really mentioned it since. Crowley had tended to growl in the back of his throat when Aziraphael had tentatively mentioned it, so he'd stayed silent until Crowley was ready. The time, it seemed, had come. "And... what was it about the apocalypse I wanted to talk about?" he asked pleasantly.

‘How would I know, angel,’ Crowley answered, rolling his eyes in a vain effort to conceal the amusement hidden in them, ‘Perhaps you wanted to make cryptic comments about what our involvement might mean now, or maybe to discuss setting up a Springeresque before and after show for those who participated. Actually, that may not be such an idiotic idea. There could be a killing made on the merchandise alone.’

"Hmm... would there be snuffboxes?"
Crowley hissed, mildly annoyed, "Be seriousss, angel."
"How can I be serious when I don't know what I am to be serious about? Perhaps it is you who has the apocalypse on their mind?"
Crowley was silent. Elsewhere in the restaurant, a bottle of champagne exploded in the face of a pair of newlyweds.

"Now really, my dear," scolded Aziraphale. "Was that necessary?"

Crowley snarled, "Get on with it, angel. Start talking about whatever it is you're on about or I'll be forced to kill you. And that would disturb my enjoyment of lunch."

Aziraphale paid special attention to picking a piece of lint off his lapel. Finally he said, "Do you feel any... different? I mean, since then, has anything changed or felt strange to you?" He gazed at the demon, his calm expression at odds with the look of puzzlement in his eyes.

"A few things," said Crowley, tensing slightly. "Apart from the things that Adam changed, I mean. Ligur's back, for instance, and he shouldn't be. I drowned him in holy water, for Go- for Sa- oh, for someone's sake! It's not just his body that should be gone, it's his essence. A demon isn't supposed to be to survive coming in contact with pure holiness."

"You've been in contact with me for the past six thousand years," Aziraphale pointed out. "That might imply something."

"Such as?"

"Well..." Aziraphale shifted uneasily in his seat. "Either I'm not nearly as holy as an angel should be, or..." he swallowed and forced himself to say it. "Or you've changed after all this time. You're not a demon any more, Crowley."

Crowley stared at the angel in shock and disbelief. "You take that back!"

"Think about it," Aziraphale said. "You haven't received any new orders from--from Down There since the near-Apocalypse, have you? In fact, Hell hasn't contacted you at all, not even for punishment? And you opposed Hell itself. You were ready to fight the Morningstar! Michael had qualms about fighting the Morningstar, and Michael was created as a war angel! And young Adam said that he knew all about us both--Crowley, there's only one being in the entire universe who knows all about us both.

"Maybe Hell got it wrong. Maybe Adam wasn't the Antichrist at all. Maybe..."

"The Second Coming? Angel, you're mental."

"I would think so too," Aziraphale said thoughtfully, "if it weren't for the small matter of his triumph over the Four Horsepersons."

"What does THAT have to do with anything?"

"Crowley--he defeated War, Pollution, Famine and Death. The first three strong and godly humans and spirits could defeat, at least for a while. But to defeat Death itself--the coldest and cruelest of the angels..."

"Implies the possibility of resurrection," Crowley replied in a dull voice. "Self-resurrection. A being who can overcome death just by being himself."

Aziraphale nodded mutely.

"Yes, but--" Crowley whipped off his sunglasses and stared yellowly at Aziraphale. "Do these look like the eyes of an angel?"

"Crowley, he may be God incarnate, but he's also eleven years old. He probably thinks that your snake eyes look--hep, or something."

There was silence as Crowley stared at the tablecloth unblinkingly for a few minutes, causing the pepper, mustard and ketchup spilt on the tablecloth to re-shape themselves into intricate formulae which would have made Albert Einstein dizzy. At last he looked up and stared desperately at Aziraphale.

"But I don't want to be an angel again," he said plaintively. "I did that once. And once was enough."