Part of me thinks that the biggest gut punch of the ineffable divorce for Crowley wasn’t the “I forgive you”, wasn’t the “I don’t think you understand what I’m offering you”. No. No. The biggest twist of the knife came from the
Because Crowley knew that Aziraphale would never say no to Heaven. I doubt he could forgive himself if Aziraphale denied himself an opportunity at happiness, or atleast closure, or even a sense that he tried one. Last. Time. But “You’re the bad guys”? I don’t think Aziraphale meant anything by this- I think it slipped out as things do when you’re upset. But to Crowley, after an eternity of being a friend, something more that a friend, something adjacent to lover, after longer than 6000 years of proving that he was never a “bad guy”, to hear the words come out of the one being who ever truly understood that you weren’t evil- who never treated you as such- must have been- well- we saw what happened. I think that is the moment Crowley’s life that he had worked so hard to build alongside Azi unraveled. Never once have they seen each other purely as “the enemy” and yet this idea of Crowley being anywhere related to the “bad” side (presumably) lingers in Aziraphale’s mind. Because Aziraphale was the only one who ever saw Crowley as more than just an evil demon. We see that in Eden, in the Job minisode, in Edinburgh, in Armageddont. Because Crowley knows hell are the bad guys but he also knows that heaven aren’t any better. Because Crowley has spent his entire existence trying to separate himself from both sides of the system. He doesn’t want to go back. Aziraphale, on the other hand?
Because, at the end of the day, even if both sides are just as bad as each other, the demon will always be the “bad guy”, won’t they?
