Terry Pratchett: Good Omens

But you couldn't tell that to demons like Hastur and Ligur. Four­teenth‑century minds, the lot of them. Spending years picking away at one soul. Admittedly it was craftsmanship, but you had to think differently these days. Not big, but wide. With five billion people in the world you couldn't pick the buggers off one by one any more; you had to spread your effort. But demons like Ligur and Hastur wouldn't understand. They'd never have thought up Welsh‑language television, for example. Or value­added tax. Or Manchester.

He'd been particularly pleased with Manchester.

"The Powers that Be seem to be satisfied," he said. "Times are changing. So what's up?"

Hastur reached down behind a tombstone.

"This is," he said.

Crowley stared at the basket.

"Oh," he said. "No."

"Yes," said Hastur, grinning.

"Already?"

"Yes."

"And, er, it's up to me to‑?"

"Yes." Hastur was enjoying this.

"Why me?" said Crowley desperately. "You know me, Hastur, this isn't, you know, my scene . . ."

"Oh, it is, it is," said Hastur. "Your scene. Your starring role. Take it. Times are changing."

"Yeah," said Ligur, grinning. "They're coming to an end, for a start."

"Why me? "

"You are obviously highly favored," said Hastur maliciously. "I imagine Ligur here would give his right arm for a chance like this."

"That's right," said Ligur. Someone's right arm, anyway, he thought. There were plenty of right arms around; no sense in wasting a good one.

Hastur produced a clipboard from the grubby recesses of his mack.

"Sign. Here," he said, leaving a terrible pause between the words.

Crowley fumbled vaguely in an inside pocket and produced a pen. It was sleek and matte black. It looked as though it could exceed the speed limit.

"S'nice pen," said Ligur.

"It can write under water," Crowley muttered.

"Whatever will they think of next?" mused Ligur.

"Whatever it is, they'd better think of it quickly," said Hastur. "No. Not A. J. Crowley. Your real name."

Crowley nodded mournfully, and drew a complex, wiggly sigh on the paper. It glowed redly in the gloom, just for a moment, and then faded.

"What am I supposed to do with it?" he said.

"You will receive instructions." Hastur scowled. "Why so worried, Crowley? The moment we have been working for all these centuries is at hands"

"Yeah. Right," said Crowley. He did not look, now, like the lithe figure that had sprung so lithely from the Bentley a few minutes ago. He had a hunted expression.

"Our moment of eternal triumph awaits!"

"Eternal. Yeah," said Crowley.

"And you will be a tool of that glorious destiny!"

"Tool. Yeah," muttered Crowley. He picked up the basket as if it might explode. Which, in a manner of speaking, it would shortly do.

"Er. Okay," he said. "I'll, er, be off then. Shall I? Get it over with. Not that I want to get it over with," he added hurriedly, aware of the things that could happen if Hastur turned in an unfavorable report. "But you know me. Keen."

The senior demons did not speak.

"So I'll be popping along," Crowley babbled. "See you guys ar‑see you. Er. Great. Fine. Ciao."

As the Bentley skidded off into the darkness Ligur said, "Wossat mean?"

"It's Italian," said Hastur. "I think it means 'food'."

"Funny thing to say, then." Ligur stared at the retreating taillights. "You trust him?" he said.

"No," said Hastur.

"Right," said Ligur. It'd be a funny old world, he reflected, if demons went round trusting one another.

– – -

Crowley, somewhere west of Amersham, hurtled through the night, snatched a tape at random and tried to wrestle it out of its brittle plastic box while staying on the road. The glare of a headlight proclaimed it to be Vivaldi's Four Seasons. Soothing music, that's what he needed.

He rammed it into the Blaupunkt.

"Ohshitohshitohshit. Why now? Why me?" he muttered, as the familiar strains of Queen washed over him.

And suddenly, Freddie Mercury was speaking to him:

BECAUSE YOU'VE EARNED IT, CROWLEY

Crowley blessed under his breath. Using electronics as a means of communication had been his idea and Below had, for once, taken it up and, as usual, got it dead wrong. He'd hoped they could be persuaded to subscribe to Cellnet, but instead they just cut in to whatever it happened to be that he was listening to at the time and twisted it.

Crowley gulped.

"Thank you very much, lord," he said.

WE HAVE GREAT FAITH IN YOU, CROWLEY

"Thank you, lord."

THIS IS IMPORTANT, CROWLEY

"I know, I know."

THIS IS THE BIG ONE, CROWLEY

"Leave it to me, lord."

THAT IS WHAT WE ARE DOING, CROWLEY AND IF IT GOES WRONG, THEN THOSE INVOLVED WILL SUFFER GREATLY. EVEN YOU, CROWLEY ESPECIALLY YOU.

"Understood, lord."

HERE ARE YOUR INSTRUCTIONS, CROWLEY

And suddenly he knew. He hated that. They could just as easily have told him, they didn't suddenly have to drop chilly knowledge straight into his brain. He had to drive to a certain hospital.

"I'll be there in five minutes, lord, no problem."

GOOD. I see a little silhouetto of a man scaramouche scaramouche will you do the fandango . . .

Crowley thumped the wheel. Everything had been going so well, he'd had it really under his thumb these few centuries. That's how it goes, you think you're on top of the world, and suddenly they spring Armaged­don on you. The Great War, the Last Battle. Heaven versus Hell, three rounds, one Fall, no submission. And that'd be that. No more world. That's what the end of the world meant. No more world. Just endless Heaven or, depending who won, endless Hell. Crowley didn't know which was worse.

Well, Hell was worse, of course, by definition. But Crowley remem­bered what Heaven was like, and it had quite a few things in common with Hell. You couldn't get a decent drink in either of them, for a start. And the boredom you got in Heaven was almost as bad as the excitement you got in Hell.

But there was no getting out of it. You couldn't be a demon and have free will.

I will not let you go (let him go) . . .

Well, at least it wouldn't be this year. He'd have time to do things. Unload long‑term stocks, for a start.

He wondered what would happen if he just stopped the car here, on this dark and damp and empty road, and took the basket and swung it round and round and let go and . . .

Something dreadful, that's what.

He'd been an angel once. He hadn't meant to Fall. He'd just hung around with the wrong people.

The Bentley plunged on through the darkness, its fuel gauge point­ing to zero. It had pointed to zero for more than sixty years now. It wasn't all bad, being a demon. You didn't have to buy petrol, for one thing. The only time Crowley had bought petrol was once in 1967, to get the free James Bond bullet‑hole‑in‑the‑windscreen transfers, which he rather fan­cied at the time.

On the back seat the thing in the basket began to cry; the air‑raid siren wail of the newly born. High. Wordless. And old.

– – -

It was quite a nice hospital, thought Mr. Young. It would have been quiet, too, if it wasn't for the nuns.

He quite liked nuns. Not that he was a, you know, left‑footer or anything like that. No, when it came to avoiding going to church, the church he stolidly avoided going to was St. Cecil and All Angels, no­nonsense C. of E., and he wouldn't have dreamed of avoiding going to any other. All the others had the wrong smell‑floor polish for the Low, some­what suspicious incense for the High. Deep in the leather armchair of his soul, Mr. Young knew that God got embarrassed at that sort of thing.