By Order of Lord Beelzebub
Anthony J. Crowley X GN!Demon!Reader
Summary: Lord Beelzebub has sent you to ask Crowley about the angel, but you're left with more questions than answers.
Tags: Crowley is rocking the dom energy, he/they pronouns for Crowley, Crowley’s S1 apartment, weird but enticing energy, confused Reader, mentioning of death/murder and Reader’s past life as a human
Word Count: ~ 1,860
A/N: I haven't seen S1 in ages so apologies if Crowley's apartment isn't too accurate, I based it on a single picture. This is part 1/2 (so far) of my “By Order of [...]” mini-series, so make sure to check out the second part when I post it in 3 years :’). Thanks for being patient with me. Enjoy. x
“Are you who they send now?”
Crowley has no shame in the way they eye you up and down, dark glasses pushed down his thin nose, giving you the pleasure of slitted yellow eyes.
Helplessly you stand in what you assume to be his living room. Dark grey walls filled with nothing. No art occupies this place, if you ignore that big golden throne-like chair right in the middle. It's placed in front of a big desk made of what looks to be red marble. More gold than you’ve ever seen is carved into the legs of it, heads and shapes and details too small to make out from afar.Â
The space itself doesn't look too bad, just... empty. Lifeless. What a foolish thought, expecting life from someone dead, someone fallen.
Perhaps you assumed so much time on earth to have changed him. At least that's what a lot of other demons seem to think. It's the reason you're here after all.
“Hell just wants to know—,” you start, but Crowley interrupts.
“Has Beelzebub swallowed too many flies again?”
He pushes the dark glasses back up to cover his serpent eyes. A crooked smirk appears on the former angel's sharp features and despite the shades you can see their head move slightly with the way he scans you up and down. Again.
Sure, you might've only been a demon for a measly fifty years, but no one has ever looked at you that way before. Not on earth and sure as hell not in, well, hell. It sends a shiver down your spine and you're not sure that you like it. Usually you're the one sending shivers down various spines. You're a god-damned demon after all.
“Just tell me what you've been doing with that angel,” you finally manage to state the reason for your appearance.
Your words make Crowley's brows rise behind the frame of their dark spectacles. In a voice pitched suspiciously high, he asks, “What angel?” giving you one last look before turning around.Â
With swinging hips, shoulders moving up and down at each of their few steps, Anthony J. Crowley strolls to the only chair in the room and rests his arms on the back.
It's only when the demon moves away from you that you realize the proximity both your undead bodies had been in.
Crowley had opened the door to his living room for you to enter and then just stood there, eyeing you, interrupting you.
Technically you don't need to take a breath, let alone sigh to help ease the tension, but you still do. Some habits from earthly life are hard to shake, you've realized.
“The angel,” you reply, a few tense seconds later.
“White hair, loves books, is dressed like Bilbo Baggins…”
It's fairly obvious that Crowley knows exactly who you’re talking about but he's gone back to staring. They don't even try to hide it and you suppose they never would. The whole reputation of a demon is to be cruel, evil and spread everlasting feelings of unease. Though you're still not sure if unease truly is the feeling you'd use to describe the nervous tingling sensation that settles in your gut.
“Really...?” the former angel asks after failing to answer all of your previous questions.Â
“You are who Beelzebub sent?”
“What's wrong with that?” you retort snappily, crossing your arms over your chest in a defensive manner. It’s time he gives you what you came for.
Your reaction makes them laugh. At least that's what you assume to be the meaning of a strange snorting sound as Crowley shows you his teeth. It's been more than a half a century since you've last heard someone express joy, glee, delight… Hastur’s occasional barking barely counts as laughter.
“The angel.” you press, trying to stay present, standing in this empty flat in the spotlight of their hidden gaze.
“Right.” Crowley grins, still a demon, still unpredictable.
“Sit.”
He pulls back the chair, the throne, but instead of allowing you to take a seat, they’re the one whose swinging ass plants itself on the red cushion. Crowley’s teasing smirk catches your puzzled expression. And just as you are about to protest, to say something, anything, that vaguely expresses the mix of confusion and pressure of having to timely accomplish Beelzebub’s task, the six-thousand year old demon gestures at the desk in front of him.
They cannot be suggesting what you think they are—
“Oh, come on. Don’t be a prude,” Crowley teases, nodding their head at the red marble, underlining the fact that he is indeed suggesting what you think he is.
“Sit, and I’ll tell you what the ray of sunshine wants to know.”
“Ray of sunsh—?”
“Beelzebub,” the immediate clarification follows. He invitingly waves at the desk in front of them once more.
You’re not sure what game he’s playing or what he might gain from this but given the fact you’ve spent the last few minutes being entirely unhelpful to your boss, you decide to play along… Just for now. Just until he’s given you what you need.
The red marble is hard as you skillfully jump onto it, hands propped on either side of your hips to hold you upright. For a second you get hit with the urge of swinging your feet like a joyful kid, experiencing the wonder of freedom, but seeing Crowley sit in front of you keeps you somewhat professional. If anything about this scenario can be counted as professionalism.
The former angel is right. Why in hell did Lord Beelzebub decide to send you of all demons? You are nothing but common; tortured for all eternity, because you did something that pissed off the almighty creator. Still dressed in the same bloody clothes that the coroner had picked off your murdered body.Â
An untimely death might happen to most of humanity but yours was not something you had on your agenda for that particular day. Though you should’ve seen it coming…
“So?” Crowley asks, catching your drifting thoughts before you could realize they were slipping away.
Like a lost Duke of Hell he sits there, in front of you, below you, their body language exuding nothing if not utter confidence. He’s got his limbs spread out to the side to make him lie more so than actually sit on the big chair.
Your reflection stares back at you in the darkness of their glasses and it's a somewhat disappointing image. Sure, there isn't exactly an overflow of mirrors reaching hell, but you still hoped to remember yourself looking at least a little more put together than what reality presents you with. A little more human. The deep wound splitting the area of your left eye in half begs to differ.
“So,” you repeat, shaking your head in a vague attempt to appear a little more collected. It takes you a second before you're back where you should be: right here.Â
“Just… an update, I guess”
Your own stammering makes you cringe; confidence wiped away with a single resurfacing memory.Â
The demon raises an eyebrow.Â
“An update?” they repeat as he leans back a little more.Â
“I haven't seen an angel in a few hundred years.”
There's nothing convincing about Crowley’s voice taking on that overly nonchalant tone, head turning to the side as if something particularly interesting was happening in the empty space to their right.
“No angel at all… Not a single one. Not. A. One.”
He spreads out that last syllable, lazily clicking their tongue at the end. He cannot possibly expect you to believe that.
You may still not know the first thing going on below the earth, but something you could trust from the moment you entered the fiery gates of the underworld was that Lord Beelzebub, as cruel or unforgiving as they were, would not have sent you here for nothing. Especially not with the pressing urgency having buzzed out of their dirty mouth as they appointed you with this task.
For a few moments Crowley’s statement exists in the air, floating between you like a misty cloud filled with lies and an underlying promise. Not one made to you, but a promise nonetheless.
Eventually you clear your throat, the lack of moisture making it feel like turf in summer heat.
“You're lying.”
A self-sufficient grin spreads over the redhead’s sharp features.
“We’re demons. That's what we do.”
With long, smooth fingers, they take off the dark shades, serpent eyes staring right into yours. It’s an act of dominance, really, a desperate hope that your respect for one of the first demons as himself might stop you from pushing further.
On a regular day it might even have worked. That, and if he hadn't been rumored to be working with the opposition.
“Lord Beelzebub demands an update,” you overgo their little dramatic act.
“I won't return empty-handed.”
“Ngh,” Crowley grunts, the bridge of his thin nose scrunching up in disapproval.Â
“They could’ve sent anyone. Anyone… And they sent you.”
His eyes are so very yellow, their gaze a burning fire right in the depths of your empty stomach.Â
“What— How do you mean?”Â
It makes you want to slide back on that expensive desk you're still sitting on, feet in the air, hands propped on the sturdy surface for stability. You can feel the cold of the red marble under your touch. It’s almost grounding in this absurd situation, but Crowley's intense stare forces your attention back on them.
A low grumble escapes his throat and in a motion so very quick he’s back on his feet. The sudden height of that slim figure takes you by surprise, the way they stand in front of you, eyes focused on nothing else.
“Tell you what,” he mumbles, sounding like they're ringing with themselves.
“You accompany me to a bookshop and maybe I’ll remember a detail or two about what that Buzzkill sent you to figure out.”
Their offer seems just as absurd as the situation you have found yourself in. With your head tilted upwards at them, you feel like a mouse caught in a trap, when all you were sent to do was retrieve that little piece of cheese for your boss.
“Why a bookshop?”
“Come on,” he says, a sudden newfound purpose causing them to reach forward and he holds a hand out for you to take.Â
“When was the last time you've been to a bookshop? It’s nice. Lots of… books… and such.”
“I don't— I really shouldn't… Lord Beelzebub—”
“... will still be spitting flies when you return.”
Where they were right, they were right… Still—
“Argh,” the fallen angel promptly snarls and an abrupt grip on your wrist pulls you straight from the table, right against him.
Crowley's dark jacket is surprisingly soft, you notice, as your hands instinctively grab the fabric for much needed stability.Â
They don't seem to mind that much, only leaning back a little to still be able to look at your burning face.
“Come on now, demon. Live a little.”
You barely have enough time to take note of the irony, before you’re being yanked out of this bland apartment and onto the streets of a busy London.