So I bastardised two books with one fic. IDEK. Features rampant anachronisms and made up stuff and footnotes, also I haven't read Good Omens in over a year so I might have messed up the characterization. And the plot is really no plot, there's just... stuff that happens. Yeah. And then mistletoe.
---
Crowley was opposed to Christmas on moral grounds [1] but he found that Christmas in the nineteenth century were much too dull for his tastes. Too much going to mass and singing bad hymns and women in drab dresses.
[1] Or at least he would have been if he wasn't opposed to morals as well.
Say what you wanted against Louis XIV, but that man knew how to host a decent party. And then those damn revolutionaries just had to go and chop off the heads of every interesting person in France. Of course, chopping heads had been exactly what Crowley's superiors [2] had wanted -- bloody murder, panic in the streets, the price of bread rising -- but it was a shame about the parties.
[2] Technically they weren't his superiors since they weren't above him but rather below, infernal hierarchies being what they are. But inferiors just doesn't have the same ring to it, and anyway hell isn't literally underground. [3]
[3] Unless you're in a Looney Tunes cartoon. [4]
[4] They won't be invented for over another century yet anyway.
He'd ended up wandering off to England a few weeks earlier with some orders from Down There about starting a plague. Privately he thought that his superiors were being way too old fashioned but he didn't mind an excuse to get away from Paris. Too many Frenchmen there. Not that Crowley had any problems with Frenchmen, it was their damn language. It's hard to speak French fluently when you have a tendency to hiss any word, even those without an actual 'S' in them.
So here he was at the ball hosted by the admiralty, all alone [5] in a foreign land. The two men in front of him (Captains of the Aerial Corps, from their uniforms) were clearly just as bored of his company as he was of theirs and were trying to hide this with various degrees of success.
[5] Aziraphale had stayed behind, claiming that some of the French painters were on to something. Crowley would have bet against it, but angels didn't bet. He hadn't asked why but suspected it was because either A) angels weren't allowed to do anything fun or B) ineffability.
The younger man -- Captain Granby -- made a great show of going to fetch them a glass of wine. Crowley smiled and thanked him, hoping he would forget to come back. Him and his companion were nice people... and that was the problem. It was just Crowley's curse, he always found himself falling in with the good crowd.
Captain Laurence seemed about to make yet another spirited attempt to drag Crowley into a conversation. It would probably help if this didn't involve dragons, since Crowley had an intense dislike for dragons. [6]
[6] There was something unnatural about a big toothed creature with all the potential to cause havoc and none of the predisposition to do so. He thought that dragons were the black sheep of the family, so to speak.
"I see they've put mistletoe everywhere," he commented, wincing at the idea of making small talk. About Christmas decorations too.
"Yes, it's very festive, isn't it?" Laurence replied. Crowley wondered if he just liked to hear the sound of his voice or if he really found mistletoe to be such a fascinating subject. "Not that we keep up with any of the pagan customs of course," he added hastily. "But I believe it was thought to repel evil spirits."
Crowley sniffed. "No, I just have a small allergy," he began, only to be interrupted by a tap on the window panes. Outside, Laurence's dragon was trying to attract his captain's attention.
"Laurence, it started snowing again!" he said. "Come and see this."
"He likes snow," Laurence told Crowley apologetically. "I don't even know why, Lord knows we saw more than enough while crossing from China. Granby," he called to the other man who was just now returning with two glasses of wine, "could you please keep Mister Crowley company while I go and see how Temeraire is faring?"
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timeasmymeasure
Crwley/Granby
Date: 2010-12-30 10:49 pm (UTC)---
Crowley was opposed to Christmas on moral grounds [1] but he found that Christmas in the nineteenth century were much too dull for his tastes. Too much going to mass and singing bad hymns and women in drab dresses.
[1] Or at least he would have been if he wasn't opposed to morals as well.
Say what you wanted against Louis XIV, but that man knew how to host a decent party. And then those damn revolutionaries just had to go and chop off the heads of every interesting person in France. Of course, chopping heads had been exactly what Crowley's superiors [2] had wanted -- bloody murder, panic in the streets, the price of bread rising -- but it was a shame about the parties.
[2] Technically they weren't his superiors since they weren't above him but rather below, infernal hierarchies being what they are. But inferiors just doesn't have the same ring to it, and anyway hell isn't literally underground. [3]
[3] Unless you're in a Looney Tunes cartoon. [4]
[4] They won't be invented for over another century yet anyway.
He'd ended up wandering off to England a few weeks earlier with some orders from Down There about starting a plague. Privately he thought that his superiors were being way too old fashioned but he didn't mind an excuse to get away from Paris. Too many Frenchmen there. Not that Crowley had any problems with Frenchmen, it was their damn language. It's hard to speak French fluently when you have a tendency to hiss any word, even those without an actual 'S' in them.
So here he was at the ball hosted by the admiralty, all alone [5] in a foreign land. The two men in front of him (Captains of the Aerial Corps, from their uniforms) were clearly just as bored of his company as he was of theirs and were trying to hide this with various degrees of success.
[5] Aziraphale had stayed behind, claiming that some of the French painters were on to something. Crowley would have bet against it, but angels didn't bet. He hadn't asked why but suspected it was because either A) angels weren't allowed to do anything fun or B) ineffability.
The younger man -- Captain Granby -- made a great show of going to fetch them a glass of wine. Crowley smiled and thanked him, hoping he would forget to come back. Him and his companion were nice people... and that was the problem. It was just Crowley's curse, he always found himself falling in with the good crowd.
Captain Laurence seemed about to make yet another spirited attempt to drag Crowley into a conversation. It would probably help if this didn't involve dragons, since Crowley had an intense dislike for dragons. [6]
[6] There was something unnatural about a big toothed creature with all the potential to cause havoc and none of the predisposition to do so. He thought that dragons were the black sheep of the family, so to speak.
"I see they've put mistletoe everywhere," he commented, wincing at the idea of making small talk. About Christmas decorations too.
"Yes, it's very festive, isn't it?" Laurence replied. Crowley wondered if he just liked to hear the sound of his voice or if he really found mistletoe to be such a fascinating subject. "Not that we keep up with any of the pagan customs of course," he added hastily. "But I believe it was thought to repel evil spirits."
Crowley sniffed. "No, I just have a small allergy," he began, only to be interrupted by a tap on the window panes. Outside, Laurence's dragon was trying to attract his captain's attention.
"Laurence, it started snowing again!" he said. "Come and see this."
"He likes snow," Laurence told Crowley apologetically. "I don't even know why, Lord knows we saw more than enough while crossing from China. Granby," he called to the other man who was just now returning with two glasses of wine, "could you please keep Mister Crowley company while I go and see how Temeraire is faring?"
(cont.)