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[howarewefortime]

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Re: -01 HRS

[flip_the_lights]

In spite of the immense white shield, the burn in Olivia's eyes only worsens for a moment.

She swallows, and nods, and places her hand within Crowley's.

Re: -01 HRS

[aj_crawley]

There's a faint squelch of mud (and probably worse), and Crowley's expression twitches for a moment in desperate, ragged amusement.

But then, impossibly, there's something else: a faint glow of heat from his hand, curling between his palm and Olivia's and into the veins. It's a familiar warmth, old as anything: the warmth of sun on buzzing bees and lazy grass and all the things you should be doing but you're not. The warmth of flushed, breathless laughter as you plead for mercy and the tickles keep coming. The warmth of a small head tucked sleepily beneath your chin.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil."

Re: -01 HRS

[flip_the_lights]

She closes her eyes.

Olivia wears a thin gold necklace as often as she can: a crucifix inherited from Marilyn Dunham, blessed with the power of a mother to keep her child safe from harm. As the warmth weaves up her arm, a coil of it settles just underneath her breastbone, as if drawn to the pendant. Maybe she's imagining it. Maybe she's not.

Her ankle hurts so much, until, very suddenly, it doesn't any more.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death," she whispers.

(It's curling up beside Ella to read her a bedtime story. It's a bed shared with John, when their nights were filled with giddy newness. It's a fire to beat back the Boston winter, a joke shared with Rachel, a peaceful walk on a sun-dappled path.

It's Peter's smile.)

"I will fear no evil."

Re: -01 HRS

[aj_crawley]

Still got it, Crowley thinks to himself, breathing out low and controlled. It's not the first time he's done this (as more than one discreetly untruthful report of Aziraphael's will attest), but it - it takes concentration.

And Crowley's concentration is spread rather thin.

Still.

It's the eiderdown warmth of rain outside, and knowing that you don't have to get up - not quite yet. It's the welcoming warmth of a hot drink cradled in cold-nipped fingers. It's: I'm glad I exist.

It's the warmth of being solid, even when everything else seems to be fading away.

(It's also, for one fleetingly bizarre moment, the crunch of popcorn and the swish of red velvet curtains, the glow and speckle of the cinema screen and a set of bullet-hole windscreen transfers.)

Gently, Crowley squeezes Olivia's hand and grins, a flash of white amidst the muck.

"For I am the baddest motherfucker in the goddamn valley."

Re: -01 HRS

[flip_the_lights]

Olivia's eyes fly open. She stares.

And then -- in the middle of the end of everything -- she bursts out laughing, in a way she hardly ever laughs, waterlogged at the edges but full and genuine.

"For I," she agrees, her voice clear and unyielding, "am the baddest motherfucker in the goddamn valley."