Nalomat Drov

A/N: As a failed history major, Good Omens is a very exciting playground for me. With that being said, however, expect a) artistic liberty to supersede historical accuracy and b) the typical Good Omens-esque anachronisms.

St. Petersburg, Russia, November 16th, 1916

The bathhouse was dark, dank, and steamy, and filled unsurprisingly with a great deal of sweaty, hairy, middle-aged men. The noise of chatter, splashing, and the occasional burst of laughter filled the tight, sauna-like space. Outside, a snow storm raged. Mild by Russian standards, but for Crowley, who had spent most of his time in the much more mild-weathered France over the past few years, this was just too bloody freezing to put up with. Sometimes being cold-blooded came in handy, but certainly not in this instance.

Crowley pulled off his ushanka and gave it a shake, trying to dislodge the snow from it. He'd really rather be somewhere other than here at the moment, but the temptation of warm water was too much to resist, as was the thought of ridding himself of the horse scent that befouled him. He really hated the things. Even Crowley's massive black draft horse, Lord Bastard, didn't take much to him. They grudgingly tolerated each other at best. The only fun he ever had with him was the fact that he had a continuous minor miracle working to make Lord Bastard's eyes appear aflame.

Talk about a quick way to clear traffic on a road.

He'd thought of just taking a carriage to St. Petersburg, but carriages meant having to deal with humans in at least some capacity, and to say his social batteries had been low of late would be the understatement of the relatively young century. He had slept for a blissful fifty two years, only to be roused by Hastur (someone you do NOT want to wake to see standing over your bed, mind) and told that Things Were Afoot. Big bloody things, and Hell needed their Man on the Ground to help instigate proper trouble.

A war. A big one. The biggest one, possibly.

The past two years had been a misery. He'd tried to avoid war, in recent centuries. Satan knew he'd seen enough of it in his time. Other than a few brief pop-overs to America during the revolution, he'd tried very hard to steer clear, sowing chaos elsewhere and always managing to make up just the right excuses to be nowhere near a battlefield.

But there was no getting out of it this time. Hell wanted him present and accounted for. He'd still managed to gently twist his orders enough that he hadn't been forced to do anything particularly horrid. Of late, he'd been busying himself trying to get French and German soldiers alike to desert their posts before they reached the front. Tempting humans into cowardice and disloyalty, shaming their families back at home, becoming war criminals.

Young men abandoning their duty...before they could be torn to shreds in the trenches for the sake of absolutely fucking nothing. Better a deserter than dead, you ask him.

Crowley worked a discrete miracle to ensure one of the steaming hot pools in the ground of the bathhouse was empty and waiting for him. He stripped quickly and slid in, electing to keep his sunglasses on his face, in case any passerby decided to look too closely at him. He ran a hand through his currently shoulder-length hair with a sigh, sinking low into the tub and relishing the near boiling heat. He let his eyes slip shut and tried to empty his head. He'd earned a little relaxation before he had to start his assignment here. One he was less than pleased about.

He'd almost drifted off when he heard a tentative call of his name behind him: "Crowley?"

His eyes snapped open immediately.

Standing off to the side of the tub, bare except for a rough spun wool towel slung around his waist, was Aziraphale. The angel looked largely the same as he always did, fair blond curls resting just so on his head, blue eyes still very...blue. He'd foregone the sideburns he'd adopted in the 1860s, clean-shaven once more. Idiot angel. Nothing would make him stand out more in St. Petersburg than a lack of facial hair. Then again, he wasn't sure he wanted to know what Aziraphale would look like with a beard.

Still. He'd never seen the angel even close to undressed before, and...not a bad sight to behold, that.

A blush crept up Crowley's cheeks, and he forced his thoughts to stop their wandering. "Aziraphale? What the Heaven are you doing here?"

Aziraphale looked intensely uncomfortable. "I should think the same thing as you."

"Why not just miracle yourself clean?" Crowley countered.

"Then why didn't you do that?" the angel shot back.

The silence of the past fifty years hung heavy between them, but it was nigh on impossible not to slip back into their usual banter.

"Well, it's the process of the thing, isn't it?" Crowley shrugged. "It's nice."

Aziraphale relented, issuing a stiff nod. "I agree." He gestured down at the bath. "May I?"

Oh, from half a century of no communication to, "let's get naked together!" The angel was giving him whiplash.

"Err—well—just—" Crowley spluttered messily, before managing a faint, "Yeah. Yeah, fine." He pointedly looked away when the angel dropped his towel, fearing discorporation. He had really begun to think he was never going to see Aziraphale again. And when he had imagined when they might next meet, if they ever did, this was certainly not what he had pictured.

But Aziraphale was here. And that was, undeniably, a Good Thing, no matter which way he rotated it in his head.

Aziraphale eased himself into the water with a pleased sound of relief, sinking in almost up to his ears. "Oh, that's just wonderful. It is absolutely miserable out there. The snow hasn't let up for weeks, it seems. And it's not even winter yet."

"Never been to Russia before, have you?"

"Not in several, ah...yes, I suppose it would've been over a thousand years, now."

"Well. It gets bloody cold."

"...Right."

Crowley idly considered drowning himself. Were they really talking about the bloody weather?

An awkward silence followed. Crowley hated it. Aziraphale obviously did too, as he quickly fumbled to break it: "So, what brings you to St. Petersburg? I'm surprised you're not in Germany."

"They're making all their own trouble over there. Not much use for me." Crowley drummed his fingers on the damp edge of the tub, debating how much to tell Aziraphale. "Head Office wants me to do some meddling over here."

Aziraphale's face pulled in all the wrong ways. Crowley could see the anxiety written there; the angel was in a fuss over something. "Oh?" He knew Aziraphale would continue without further goading, so Crowley just arched an eyebrow and waited.

Aziraphale's forced formality and politeness vanished in an instant, and he became visibly distraught. "Oh, Crowley, they want me to KILL someone!"

Crowley snorted. "You say that like you're surprised. Your lot loves killing. Look at the Crusades. This is really the first time they've asked that of you?"

"Yes! I've—the, the Fire and Brimstone, that's always been above my pay-grade. It's rare I'm asked to do anything...messy. And this, well, it doesn't even bear thinking about. How can they expect me to end a life? I'm an angel!"

"I think your idea of what that means is vastly different than that of The Powers That Be." Crowley's brow furrowed, a realization hitting him. "Odd, though...I've uh, I've been asked to protect someone."

The two shared a knowing, vaguely horrified look.

"You don't think—" Aziraphale began.

"—I do. Who'd they tell you to kill?"

"A Russian peasant. His name is—"

"—Grigori Rasputin," they finished together.

Crowley groaned loudly, and Aziraphale sank lower in the bath, lips pursed in a displeased line.

"Bollocks," Crowley cursed.

"Not often we're directly at odds with one another. This does so complicate things."

"Doesn't complicate them, just makes them a whole lot more irritating. One of us has to take a loss on this."

A thrill of fear on Aziraphale's face. "Heaven won't be happy with me if I don't deliver, Crowley. Especially given recent...creative differences with Gabriel."

"Is that what we're calling them now?"

Aziraphale shrank a bit, fidgeting with his pinkie ring and looking positively stifled. "The—the hospitals. They're...well, have you been to any of them?"

Crowley didn't need the angel to elaborate. "Mhmm."

"They're awful. So many of the soldiers, they're ever so young. Limbs lost...minds damaged. Whole lives ruined by all of this, and for what? A game for old men, with these boys as their chess pieces."

Crowley softened. "You've been working too many miracles, haven't you?" he asked quietly.

Aziraphale sighed. "Far too many. I've had to be very careful. Gabriel even went so far as to threaten me with a recall."

His chest tightened at the thought. "They wouldn't."

The angel's eyes grew distant, and faintly, he said, "I think they would, actually."

Upstairs hadn't tried to make any attempt to recall Aziraphale in well over a hundred years. He'd thought after the incident in 1800 they would be safe for longer, but apparently not. "That's why you're really here, isn't it? Can't just miracle yourself clean."

"I've had to approach things in a far more human way of late, yes."

"So, not only do you have to kill Rasputin, but you have to do it the old-fashioned way."

"Yes," the angel replied miserably.

"Well, we've got to figure out something. We can't kill him AND keep him alive."

"You, ah..." Aziraphale pouted in his direction. "You could kill him. Hypothetically."

"Oh and go against direct orders? No thank you. Don't feel like vacationing in Dis after all this sod is done and over with."

Aziraphale deflated somewhat. "I suppose you're right."

Crowley exhaled through his nose, trying to think. "As long as I make what looks like best efforts to keep him alive, chances are I won't be punished severely. Just given another shit assignment, more like."

Aziraphale brightened substantially at that, sitting up straighter in the bath. Crowley tried not to start counting the light dapple of freckles over his shoulders. "So you'll help?"

He leaned his head back, frowning. "This is going to take some finesse, angel. Maybe just let me handle it."

He'd closed his eyes, but he could hear it in Aziraphale's voice that he'd annoyed the angel. "Do you think just because I can't perform miracles at the moment that I'm just, what? Useless?"

"I didn't say that, but go off, I guess."

"I am still perfectly capable of thwarting you!"

"Uh-huh."

Crowley cracked open one eye in time to see Aziraphale glaring at him in an all-together nonthreatening way. Even in full steel plate armor Aziraphale had never managed to look remotely threatening a single day in his life, and certainly not now, nude and damp in a tub, with the moisture collected in the air slicking his hair down so his curls were plastered across his forehead.

"So," Aziraphale said stiffly, clearly still miffed by the finesse comment. "Any brilliant ideas?"

"Of course."

When Crowley didn't offer more, Aziraphale rolled his eyes. "And those ideas are...?"

"Well, you don't want to kill the bloke firsthand, and I can't, so. We do what we always do. We get the humans to do the work for us. You've any idea how many plots have been hatched to kill Rasputin? A woman half stabbed him to death in the street last year, started tearing out his guts with her bare hands. He's not well liked."

Aziraphale was aghast at the thought. "I should say not! How on earth did he survive?"

"Search me. He's one of ours, that goes without saying—but, a lot of people think he's ours in a more literal sense."

"A demon? Why would he need protection, then? And my lot surely would have told me. They would have armed me with—" Aziraphale broke off, but Crowley heard the silent holy water at the end of the sentence. Yeah. They weren't going there right now.

"Human or not, he's done a better job of being a demon than any demon I've met. Truly depraved, that one. Thinks he's the second coming of Christ."

"We do tend to get one of those every decade or so."

"Yeah, but not like this, angel. He's got a whole weird sex cult behind him, the Tsar and Tsarina included. They think he's a mystic, a prophet, whatever—some of his followers even call him God."

Understanding dawned on Aziraphale. "So this is why Heaven wants him eliminated..."

"A pretender to the throne. Among other things. So, everyone hates him—we just have to capitalize on that. He's already paranoid that some of the Romanovs are conspiring to kill him. Says he'll curse them if they do it. Don't know how serious that threat is. Can't really curse anyone if he's dead, can he?"

"Perhaps he's a witch?"

"Doubt it. Smart money says he's just an incredibly lucky scam artist. But he can't get lucky every time."

"What would you say our next step should be?"

"Slip into the court. Make friends. Listen. Find out who wants Rasputin dead the most, sow some seeds...simple enough job, really. And when the time comes, I'll make it look like I was trying very very hard to keep poor Rasputin alive, but alas, that thrice-blessed Principality beat me to the punch."

Aziraphale gave Crowley an incredibly warm look, one he hadn't been on the receiving end of in a very long time. Crowley's heart skipped several beats in his chest, and he tried to look nonchalant.

"This is very kind of you to do for me, Crowley. Thank you."

"Oh for the love of Somebody, stop. You're like to make me vomit," Crowley said, flustered. He rose from the bathtub, feeling incredibly self-conscious as he climbed out, and not missing Aziraphale's eyes on him.

"Still," the angel insisted.

"Shove it. And we need to be careful about this—sounds like the featherdusters are watching you more closely than usual. We'll meet back here in a week, compare notes. Agreed?"

"Yes. I'll see you then. And Crowley—"

Crowley miracled himself back into his clothing, forgoing putting it on normally. He tugged his ushanka back on and held up a hand, worried he was about to be thanked again. "Don't!"

Crowley departed, leaving Aziraphale alone and bemused in the bathtub.

When next they met, Aziraphale was already waiting for him in the tub. He looked marginally less like he wanted to die than he had the week before, but his humors were still distinctly soured.

"I do hope you've had better luck than I have," he said without preamble upon spotting Crowley's lanky form sauntering in his direction.

"Loads. Why? Hit a snag?"

Aziraphale seemed put out. "I rather think they don't like me here."

"Yeah, I have no idea what wouldn't endear them to a beardless English nobleman who can barely speak a lick of Russian," Crowley responded in a monotone.

"I'll have you know, my Russian is coming along quite well."

"Ya somnevayus chto, krasivyy angel," Crowley replied. The befuddled look he received in response told him that Aziraphale's Russian lessons weren't coming along nearly as well as he wanted Crowley to think. "Suppose you got the last word, at least?"

"Oh, stop it," Aziraphale scolded him. "Just tell me what you've learned."

"Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich and Vladimir Purishkevich," Crowley declared, pacing around the bathtub. "They want Rasputin dead, badly. Just trying to find a way to trap him, but neither of them are close enough to the Tsarina's inner circle to have any way of getting Rasputin alone."

The angel seemed to consider this information. "Not close enough, hmm. I may have something after all."

"Well, don't beat around the bush."

Aziraphale raised an eyebrow at Crowley. "Are you getting in or not?"

"Err. No. I'm fine, thanks. Now talk. What'd you find out?"

"Well, the Tsarina's nephew, Prince Felix. He's in the minority that seems to have grown fond of me. And by the minority I essentially mean just him."

Crowley squinted at Aziraphale through his sunglasses. "Felix?"

"...Yes," the angel said slowly, not understanding Crowley's demeanor.

"Best watch yourself. The syphilis around here runs rampant, I tell you—"

"I don't appreciate your assumptions!" the angel squeaked, aiming a very cross look at Crowley. "And he's married."

"Get with the times, angel. Marriage don't mean much anymore. Felix and his wife are the biggest swingers this side of the Urals, and they don't care which direction they swing to."

"You know from personal experience?"

Crowley blinked. "So what if I do?" Of course he didn't—messing about with a bunch of Russian nobles trying to fuck their way through the Great War and hoping the locals didn't revolt on them, no, he was good on all that. But if it rattled the angel to think so, all the better.

Aziraphale opened his mouth to say something, but didn't speak, as if he thought better of it. After a moment of considering his words, he said, "My point is, we should unite the three. That certainly has the makings of a conspiracy, wouldn't you say?"

"With how fragile everything is right now, three is about all you need. Every Senator Rasputin didn't personally put in place wants him to choke. People'll be out cheering in the streets when he's dead. Only one mourning him will be Nicholas and Alexandra, anyway, and I expect Nicholas will mourn more for the loss of his drug dealer than anything else."

Aziraphale reeled in faint alarm. "I thought the Czar was on the warfront?"

"Oh, he is, but before he was, all he did was rail lines in the royal palace with Rasputin. It's been utter debauchery in there for years. The drugs, that's..." Crowley felt a wave of disgust roll over him, "it's the least of it, to be honest."

Crowley halted just behind Aziraphale, but the angel turned so he could still look properly at Crowley. Crowley pointedly looked away.

"Crowley," Aziraphale said, his voice surprisingly gentle. They hadn't been so gentle of late, with so much ice to thaw yet between them. "You would tell me if—if killing him was the wrong thing to do, wouldn't you?"

You wouldn't let me help to conspire to kill a good man? You wouldn't let me do the wrong thing? Crowley heard the real questions behind Aziraphale's words. So bloody ironic that he was expected to be the one who knew what the right thing was. He could get extinguished by Down Below for even contemplating doing the right thing, much less helping an angel do the right thing.

But he'd been taking that risk for thousands of years. He didn't know why the angel never seemed to register that. Always expecting this to be the time the real Crowley would come out, the evil bastard, the demon, the serpent.

"Surely you've heard the things they say in court," Crowley murmured, barely loud enough for Aziraphale to hear over the general din of the bathhouse.

"I—sometimes it's difficult to tell hearsay from fact."

Crowley stuffed his hands in the pockets of his trousers. Aziraphale beseeched his eyes, but Crowley stared off somewhere into the middle distance. "He's done things. To women. Bad things."

Aziraphale's mouth twisted into a grimace.

"And they say things about...what he might've done to the Czars daughters. That's just speculation, but—"

"Do you believe it?" Aziraphale cut in, dispensing with any dawdling.

Crowley gave a curt not. "Considering? Yeah. I do. I met him, the other night. Not directly. Saw him across the room at a feast." Crowley swallowed with some difficulty, a bit shaken by the memory even now, days later. "I've never seen eyes like that on a human."

"Did you sense anything from him?"

"Something awful. But nothing occult, I don't think. But oh, he's evil. No arguing that." He gave up the ghost with a single sigh. "He's practically the devil incarnate, Aziraphale. Offing him does net positive good in the world. I wouldn't lie to you about this. Especially considering I'm going to be the one walking away with a black mark on my record for budging this up."

"Crowley—"

"I've gotta get going. I'm supposed to have a pint with Vladimir and Dmitri. I'll tell them about Felix. We'll work something out." Crowley was already heading for the door.

"And? We'll meet again here, next week?" Aziraphale called after him.

Crowley raised a hand in parting. "See you then, angel."

And one week later, they returned. This time both fully dressed, with no intention of bathing.

"Invite sent," Aziraphale said, pleased.

"Cyanide given," Crowley replied with a thin smirk.

"I'd call my touch more delicate, but it does seem we're lining everything up appropriately."

"Rasputin won't be able to resist that story about Felix's wife being afflicted with nymphomania. That seems to be right up his alley so far as his 'healing powers' go."

"So, now we just—"

"Get our own invitations," Crowley interrupted Aziraphale, who he could tell was fully prepared to sit back and watch the chaos unfold. "I have to go pretend to try to save him, and if I'm stuck with this dog and pony show, you better believe I'm dragging you along."

Aziraphale blanched at that. "Crowley, I've no desire to watch a man die!"

"You should. With this one, you should," Crowley said darkly. "And I don't know how this is all going to shake out. I might need your help."

"You've gotten along plenty fine the past fifty years without my help."

"Not like I've done much," the demon muttered, crossing his arms and avoiding Aziraphale's eyes, hating that bitter note in the angel's voice, as if he hadn't been the one to walk away, as if he hadn't been the one to very directly not talk to him for half a bloody century.

"Oh, what, you've just been resting on your laurels all this time?"

Crowley shrugged. "Been sleeping."

Aziraphale, taken aback, furrowed his brow. "Sleeping? Surely not the whole time..."

"Hastur slapped me awake about two years ago. Told me I had to get in on the action over here. Surprised they let me sleep that long. Probably 'cause I told them I singlehandedly started the American Civil War."

"You haven't been to America in almost 150 years!"

"Yeah, well, they don't know that, now do they?" Crowley sagged into the wall. "If you want to leave, leave. No one's stopping you."

The angel's expression reflected subdued hurt at his words, and Crowley instantly felt like worse than slime. Which was bollocks all on its own. How many times had Aziraphale intentionally cut with his words and not given a single damn about it? And now here he was doing that THING with his eyes.

"You didn't stop me last time, so I don't suppose you'd stop me now, would you?" Aziraphale huffed, and looking resigned, he made for the door to the bath house.

Before he could make it far, Crowley called after him. "Did you want me to?"

"Want you to what?" snapped Aziraphale.

"Then. When we...fought. Did you want me to stop you?" he lifted his head, finally deigning to look at the angel.

Aziraphale stood there in his winter-inappropriate nancy clothing and his hair done just so his curls could dare to be called artful, hands perfectly manicured and fiddling with the edge of his waistcoat. "I. Well." Any composure the angel had melted away in an instant. "Yes," he said emphatically. "Crowley, I was trying to protect you, not—not make you leave."

"You're the one who left!" Crowley burst out, surprised by the volume in his own voice.

They were starting to attract the attention of the other bathers. Narrowed eyes, etcetera. Not good for them to draw too many onlookers, with both of their rather precarious political positions in the Romanovs' court. Crowley snapped his fingers, and time ground to a halt. He encroached on Aziraphale like a man possessed, backing him up against the wall. The angel flattened his hands, palms against rough wood, and just watched Crowley.

"I wasn't going to help you kill yourself," Aziraphale said evenly, his entire focus on Crowley.

"Funny that you assume that's what I wanted."

"Well, it was, wasn't it?" insisted the angel. "A suicide pill."

"I wanted to be able to defend mysssself," Crowley hissed. "But it's easy for you to assume the opposite, isn't it? Oh, poor damned Crowley, hates himself so much, just looking for a clean way to end it."

"I didn't say that!"

"You didn't have to." Crowley made to back away from Aziraphale, but the angel seized his wrist, surprising him.

"I don't think that," he said fiercely, "and I would appreciate it if you didn't put words in my mouth."

"What does it matter to you either way? Why does it matter one blessed shit what I do with that holy water?"

"You know why!"

"No. I don't," he told Aziraphale with thick honesty, feeling the anger leave him, replaced with a resigned bitterness he was all too used to. "Do whatever you want, angel. You don't have to hang around here. You've got other people to fraternize with, right?"

He intended for his words to sting, and judging by the stricken look on Aziraphale's face, he'd succeeded.

When he tried to pull away that time, the angel let him. Crowley was almost to the door before Aziraphale's voice stopped him.

"I don't, you know."

Crowley looked over his shoulder at Aziraphale.

"Have anyone else to...fraternize with," the angel elaborated haltingly. "Contacts. Coworkers. Friendly acquaintances. But you're my only…"

Still can't say it, can you? "You're only what?" Crowley challenged.

Aziraphale stayed miserably silent, eyes leaving Crowley and going to the floor.

Crowley snapped his fingers, and time restarted. Without another word, the demon left.

Crowley wished dearly not to be stuck in a fetid basement with Grigori Rasputin, but yet, here he was.

Okay, the basement itself was actually quite nice, being as extravagant as any other part of the Yusupov Palace, all red velvet carpets, marble and polished oak, and of course the crest of the Czar visible on silk banners breaking up the monotony of Russian realist paintings from the late 1700s, which...weren't great to look at.

Vladmir, Dmitri, and Felix were radiating smugness when Rasputin arrived at Yusupov Palace, guiding the enormously foul-smelling peasant into the lower levels, where Crowley waited, playing the part of a lingering houseguest in wake of a small party. Tables were laden with cakes and wines, and Dmitri had spiked all but a few with the cyanide Crowley had provided.

"Pardon the mess, Grigori, we did have a small get-together," Felix said with a broad wave of his hand. "If you'd like, you can—"

Rasputin had already bee-lined for the food. He didn't even notice Crowley. Thankfully. He'd love to never to meet those eyes again.

"Princess Irina will be here shortly, just finishing up her powder," Felix continued, bouncing on his feet, very pleased that their plot was coming together so well, but Crowley couldn't allow the evening to be so clear cut, unfortunately. Had to at least look like he was making an effort with his assignment, lest he find himself getting a refresher course in Hell torture from the Dark Council.

Rasputin wolfed down several cakes and chugged a glass of wine in short order. Crowley made to miracle the poison out of his food, but was distracted by footsteps pounding down the stairs.

Vladimir and Dmitri both shot confused looks at Felix. The Prince brightened.

"Ah, another friend of ours has arrived—a consultant, if you will," Felix said.

Crowley's eyes widened when Aziraphale arrived at the bottom of the spiral stone staircase, dressed up in typical Russian noblewear, and on his face was a weak attempt at a beard. So. He'd listened after all.

Felix greeted Aziraphale warmly, Vladimir and Dmitri eyed him with distaste.

Aziraphale wasted no time in sidling up to Crowley. "Hello," he said politely.

"Hello," Crowley echoed back without enthusiasm. "Surprised to see you here."

"Yes. Well. I thought you...might want back up," Aziraphale replied in a hushed voice.

Crowley offered a helpful, "Ngk."

Aziraphale leaned closer, watching Rasputin's back as he wordlessly continued to eat his way through the poisoned party favors. "He's ingested it, then?"

"Yeah."

"And you've miracled it out of his system, I take it? As he's still standing?"

Crowley realized with a jolt that he'd never actually gone through with the miracle to stop the cyanide from melting Rasputin's insides. Oops. "I...didn't, actually."

Aziraphale looked alarmed. The growing concern on Vladimir, Dmitri, and Felix's faces echoed a similar sentiment.

"How long does cyanide take to kill someone again?" Crowley asked faintly.

"It's almost immediate. He should already be dead."

Rasputin was very decidedly not dead.

"Ah, yes, jolly good," Aziraphale said, clearing his throat. "So happy to have you here, Grigori, much to discuss, but if I may just beg Felix's company upstairs for a brief moment?"

The madman only glanced over his shoulder at Aziraphale. "Do what you will. There is nothing for me here until you bring me the princess."

Crowley suppressed a thrill of disgust, but accompanied Aziraphale and Felix upstairs, while Vladimir and Dmitri continued to stare at Rasputin in unabashed confusion and no slight amount of terror.

Once in the parlor, Felix slammed the door. He whirled on Crowley. "Your poison didn't work! Was this all a ruse?"

"You want to drink the bit that's leftover and find out for yourself?" Crowley snapped. "It's the real deal."

Felix didn't look like he believed that for a second. Vladimir and Dmitri trusted Crowley far more than the Prince, who had been roped into this plot solely because of Aziraphale's influence, no doubt. Merciful then, than Aziraphale came to his defense.

"Crowley wouldn't deceive you in such a way, my dear, I promise you that," Aziraphale said, putting a light hand on the young Prince's shoulder. "Something else must be...afoot, here."

Felix looked at Aziraphale, searching his eyes. "Are you sure there wasn't some mistake?"

"Positive," Crowley and Aziraphale chorused together.

The Prince softened, deciding to take Aziraphale's word for it. Crowley privately thanked Whoever that Aziraphale was like catnip for most men who leaned toward the same gender. With those stratosphere blue eyes, perfect curls, and bright smile, Aziraphale could be far more tempting than any demon, convince a human of even the most ridiculous falsehood—his talents were plain wasted as an angel, all things considered.

Felix buried his face in his hands, clearly panicking. "What do we do now? I never considered that this wouldn't work."

"Well." Aziraphale frowned. "There is, the uh...old fashioned, method. So to speak."

"You own a gun, I assume?" Crowley drawled. Most of the nobility went target shooting often, though most of them never even dreamt of using one for its intended purpose.

"A revolver. Yes. In my bedroom. But...kill a man?"

"I'm sorry, wasn't that the plan the whole bloody time?" Crowley asked, exasperated.

"Quite different methods, dear, have some sympathy for the poor boy," Aziraphale chastised gently, rubbing a hand down Felix's back.

Crowley just sneered. "All fun and games until you have to look 'em in the eye, hmm?"

Felix just shook his head, lip trembling. "In the court, they've—they've called him a force of darkness, before. The Devil Incarnate."

"He's not the devil," Crowley stated matter-of-factly. "But, force of darkness, well. Not far off."

With a deep breath, Felix said, "I'll get it. The gun." He retreated upstairs to his bedroom, leaving Crowley and Aziraphale alone.

"How in the unholy FUCK is that git still breathing?" Crowley hissed, whirling on Aziraphale. "He has to be a demon, it's the only explanation."

"But you would know another demon if you saw one, yes? Recognize your own kind? Or at least I would detect some infernal glow from him. He's human. A horrible human, undeniably, but I sense nothing else of a supernatural nature," Aziraphale responded hurriedly. "Crowley—what—what if the gun doesn't work?"

"Then you and I have far bigger concerns than reports to Home Office, angel."

Felix returned moments later, pocket bulging with the presence of a revolver. With a shaky nod, he indicated they should head back to the basement dining room.

Vladimir and Dmitri were keeping Rasputin busy, discussing the 'cleansing ritual' for Princess Irina. When Felix, Aziraphale, and Crowley entered the room once more, Felix wasted no time.

"Hell will be too good for you, d'yavol!" he shouted, a tremble in his voice as he raised the gun. He shot Rasputin point blank in the chest, and the mad monk collapsed.

Everyone stared down at Rasputin's body. His eyes stared at nothing. Blood leaked from his chest, spreading in a slow puddle around him.

Felix stood frozen.

"Not much one for foreplay, are you?" Crowley asked, breaking the silence.

Vladimir and Dmitri smiled simultaneously.

"Look at the stones on this one!" crowed Dmitri with great cheer. "You've done Mother Russia a great service, my Prince."

"The Mad Monk is dead!" Vladimir grabbed one of the few unpoisoned glasses of wine and raised it. "To Prince Felix!"

Crowley and Aziraphale watched with awe as the three co-conspirators went from murder to celebration in one minute flat. They drifted upstairs, and Crowley and Aziraphale followed, though both cast glances in Rasputin's general direction. Apparently the three men were planning to take care of the body after their post-assassination wetting down.

"Well. Tales will certainly spread about him surviving the cyanide. That'll work in my favor," Crowley pointed out mildly. "And you did what you came here to do. So...all's well that ends well, I suppose?"

"I'm still unnerved by all of this," Aziraphale admitted while he subtly took an entire bottle of wine from one of the Usupov's wine racks. After uncorking it, he poured he and Crowley both a glass. "I've no explanation as to how he survived…"

"Cock-up? Not on my part, of course. Dmitri was in charge of all that. I know I gave them Grade A cyanide. As if there's a Grade B."

"I don't know, Crowley, but something is terribly off about all this."

"Don't be a killjoy, angel. You'll get your gold-star from Gabriel. Maybe you won't even have to be on miracle rations anymore."

Aziraphale's mood seemed to lighten at the thought. "I must admit, it has been difficult. I just...don't understand why we aren't allowed to perform more miracles in times of great distress. Surely the quota should be raised based on current events, yes?"

"You said that in the 14th century, too. Don't bother putting anything in the suggestion box. Trust me. That's how I ended up—" he gestured vaguely down at himself, "like this."

Aziraphale's eyes turned crushingly sympathetic. "A punishment that didn't fit the act, in my opinion."

Crowley stilled in surprise, his lips barely an inch from the rim of the wine glass. That had been quite the bit of blasphemy on Aziraphale's part, even if he said it only in passing. It was rare he would say something so...not condemning of Crowley. Usually it was, "so all this is your demonic work!" or "well, you are a demon," or something like that.

He realized he was staring at Aziraphale's profile, and pointedly looked away before he could be caught.

It was sometime into the celebration that Vladimir stopped boisterously telling a story about his most recent hunt and held up a hand. "Shh!" he ordered.

Dmitri narrowed his eyes. "What?"

"Do you hear that?"

Felix crept closer to the basement. Swallowed nervously. "Surely...surely it's just the rats. The cat's gotten old and fat, hasn't been mousing like it used to…"

Aziraphale and Crowley exchanged a look.

"We'll go with you to check," the angel told Felix decisively, and Aziraphale's presence seemed to embolden the young man.

The three made their way back down the stairs once more. Rasputin was just where they left him...or was he? Crowley detected a barely noticeable smear in the puddle of blood, like Rasputin had rolled to the side before rolling back to his previous position, prone and very much dead on his back.

"Check his pulse," Felix ordered, and Crowley wasn't sure which of them he was talking to, so he took up the task himself.

He stooped down next to the dead monk. Grimacing, he rolled up his sleeve and put two fingers to Rasputin's steadily graying neck.

He tried to find a pulse...listened, felt…

Crowley blanched. "Oh, fuck."

At that same moment, Rasputin's eyes sprung open, and he let out an inhuman roar, sitting up ramrod straight.

Aziraphale and Felix both screamed as if they were seeing who could hit the perfect high C. Felix whipped out the revolver again and promptly unloaded the entire thing into Rasputin's chest. Crowley threw himself away from Rasputin, not looking to get shot himself, but the motion dislodged his sunglasses from his face.

Felix, eyes wild, looked at Rasputin, now flat on his back again and even deader than before, then looked at Crowley.

"VLADIMIR! DMITRI!" he shouted.

The men came thundering down the stairs, and Crowley realized too late his mistake.

Vladimir and Dmitri were armed as well, and raised their weapons at Crowley as Felix reloaded his revolver.

"No! Stop this immediately! He didn't do anything!" Aziraphale burst out, waving his hands frantically. Crowley scrambled, searching for his sunglasses, but finding only shell-casings and blood on the stone floor of the basement. He could miracle them back on, sure, but that would only further damn him.

"The eyes of a serpent!" exclaimed Dmitri. "An unholy cohort of Rasputin's!"

Crowley held up his hands. Heaven take him, he couldn't stand when humans got up in their histrionics like this. "Yes, that's why I was trying to get you to KILL HIM, because I'm in league with him!" he huffed. "For your information, I've a medical condition...snake-eyes-itis. It's a thing. Look it up. Problems with the liver, you know."

They all aimed at him.

Crowley was shocked when Aziraphale jumped in front of him. "Stop!" the angel shouted, voice deepening and resonating within the basement in a not-entirely human way. "You'll not hurt him! He means you no harm! He's—"

A fleeting meeting of the eyes over Aziraphale's shoulder, celestial blue into serpentine gold.

"He's my friend," Aziraphale finished, voice cracking.

Crowley stared at Aziraphale's back, mind tripping over the word.

Not demon. Not "we don't know each other."

Friend.

The three Russians were of course not stirred by Aziraphale's loud proclamation of friendship, but the fact that he'd unintentionally compelled them not to kill Crowley. Hopefully that miracle wouldn't cost Aziraphale somewhere down the line. The trio lowered their weapons with dazed expressions. Crowley quickly miracled sunglasses back onto his face while they were distracted.

Felix blinked through his confusion. "Right...yes...of course. I'm sorry, Aziraphale. The demon Rasputin has got us thinking all manner of madness."

"He truly was a thing of the devil," Vladimir added.

"We'll not leave him here again," Dmitri decided. "I've an automobile—we shall put him in the trunk and take him to the Neva, dump his body there. If he still yet lives, somehow, then surely the cold will freeze his infernal bones so he is not a danger anymore."

"Yes, yes, trunk, dead body, dumping it in the river—on board with that," Crowley said in a rush, rising to his feet and dusting himself off. "Let's be on with it, then, shall we?"

An hour later, Crowley and Aziraphale stood on the banks of the Neva, staring at the hole in the ice that Rasputin had been dumped in. Behind them, they heard the raucous engine of Dmitri's 1914 Dodge Touring roar to life. Crowley had decided he rather liked this new human invention, the 'car', and would likely get one for himself, soon, once a few of the kinks had been worked out.

Anything was better than riding a damn horse.

They'd told the three Russians that they would stand guard over Rasputin's corpse for a bit, to make sure he didn't come crawling out of the ice like the demon he so unarguably was. Felix, Vladimir, and Dmitri had thanked them in short order and then scurried off, looking like they'd very much enjoy forgetting this evening at their earliest convenience.

"What a monstrous man," Aziraphale said, breaking the quiet of the early winter night.

"Really no idea how he managed to survive all that," Crowley admitted.

"Human tenacity?"

"Doubt it."

A wolf howled in the distance, along with the wind, which bit through Crowley's clothes. He shivered. Aziraphale looked at him, concerned. Crowley went rigid when Aziraphale pressed the back of his hand to Crowley's cheek.

"Crowley, you're freezing."

"Cold-blooded, angel. Comes with the territory."

Aziraphale withdrew his hand, but did surprise Crowley by pressing close to his side, entwining their arms. "Well, I'm not. Cold-blooded that is."

The angel was indeed very warm, and Crowley relished in the relief of him.

"What will you do now?" Aziraphale asked quietly.

"Try to go back to London for a bit. Hope Hell doesn't send me back to the warfront. Getting sick of all that."

"I can certainly understand why."

A few minutes of companionable silence, and Crowley savored the closeness of Aziraphale in spite of himself. Tried very hard to ignore the steadily rising ache in his chest, knowing that they would be parting again. And who knew how long it would be before he saw the angel again, this time around?

Fifty years. Thank Satan he'd slept through most of it.

Aziraphale surprised him for the third time that evening and leaned his head against his shoulder.

"Well, if you do come back to London—the book shop door is always open for you."

Crowley idly wondered if this was what forgiveness felt like. He didn't know if he was receiving it or giving it when he tilted his head just so to rest against Aziraphale's.

"S'pose I could stop by sometime."

The two friends stared out over the half-frozen river together for a long time. But for immortals, time matters very little. Even as long as fifty years.