alright, I just got bitten by Harry the rabbit’s baby, Harry the Plot Bunny, but since I’m knee deep in like 5 other fics you’re just gonna have to get told this story on a twitter thread.

Gather round children it’s story time with Aunt Stan. It’s a story about stars. About loss. About family.

So, in the beginning, before he Fell, Crowley made stars. He helped build nebulae. He helped design the constellation Taurus, and he was oh so proud of it.

The overall shape was a group effort. The Crab Nebula and Crystal Ball Nebula were collaboratory experiences. But the one thing- the one thing Crowley had absolute and total intellectual property right over were—

The Pleiades.

Although ‘intellectual property rights’ is really the wrong word, because those stars, those seven beautiful sparks of light, were a part of his soul, his divinity.

They were his daughters.

They were Crowley’s ineffable mark on the universe. He hadn’t been asked to create them, he just did, and gave them a place in the sky before he could ask for permission.

Who was supervising star development across the newly-created cosmos?

Lucifer. Morningstar.

(Duh.)

He didn’t reprimand the proud angel who made his own executive choices. He praised him. Said it showed ‘real initiative’. ‘Admirable resourcefulness.’ ‘One of a kind creativity.’

‘There’s a bright future for you, kid.’

He held out his hand. Crowley, with stardust in his eyes, took it.

He Fell.

And his daughters?

They followed.

Crowley made a swan dive into a pool of boiling sulphur. When he did, the seven sisters followed in a shower of sparks. Meteors streaked the sky on his way down. His girls couldn’t let him go alone.

The first few hundred years after the fall were a mess. Crowley was a mess. Black wings. New eyes. Scales. And oh Satan, he could turn into a snake now. Best for his daughters not to see him like this. So he sent them away. “Stay in the ssssky. It’s for your own good!”

Besides, Taurus was beautiful, of course the archangels wanted to keep it and take all the credit. Taurus wasn’t Taurus without the Pleiades. They’d be safe there, shining, watching. Guiding mankind. Inspiring them. So, reluctantly, they left.

The sisters returned to the heavens. Their father sank into the depths of hell. Once the cosmos was set in motion, the star development department was made redundant. But before they shut down the labs and cleared out the desks, Michael had one order to give the sisters:

“Forget your creator. He’s not of Heaven any longer.”

But of course, any daughters of Crowley’s would be rebels.

They never forgot. And like hell they’d ever let him forget, either. So they sent out the meteors, let it rain light over earth. The serpent looked up and smiled.

They did it every year, and the humans noticed. They called the message the Taurids, because they came from Taurus. And the Pleiades themselves were written, branded into legend and myth across every culture in the world. Seven sisters who stuck together.

Eventually Crowley got himself together...eventually. Figured out the shapeshifitng thing. Learned to like his snake eyes. Learned to preen his dark wings. Tempted Eve. Met Aziraphale. You know. Still made time to watch the stars. They watched him, too.

Well, that’s how it went for six thousand years. The world got busier, so did Heaven and Hell. Crowley didn’t always have time to watch the Taurids anymore. The sisters didn’t mind. They sent them out anyway. An act of rebellion. ”Dad was an angel once. Don’t you forget it.”

After Armageddon’s thwarted, things change in more ways than one. Crowley’s not alone anymore. He has his angel, and they move into their cottage. They’re on their own side, neither of Heaven nor Hell.

And they’re happy.

It is a clear night in the first summer after they move in when they hear a knock on the door, insistent, excited. Apprehensively, Crowley opens it.

Standing on the threshold are seven women. Their skin is pale. Their hair’s like sea silk. They wear sheer, silvery gowns, and their eyes-

Aziraphale notices their eyes are golden.

And behind them, streaks of light rain from Taurus and dissolve in the atmosphere.

They rush to embrace Crowley, laughing and chattering like schoolgirls. Aziraphale’s never heard laughter like it.

“Girls- girls, please- heh, I missed you too—“

“Crowley, do you know these women?” asks Aziraphale incredulously.

The demon extricates himself from supple limbs and grins.

“Sure I do,” he says. “Angel...these are my daughters.”

The sisters titter an introduction and pull Aziraphale, laughing, into the group hug. Photons dance around the living room.

And for the first time in six thousand years, the demon Crowley finds his entire family complete.

No more watching from afar. No more need to keep distances. No more reaching across light years for a mere brush with someone you can never be with.

And, all right, every year the sisters visit their dad. Sorry, their dads They come down with the Taurids from summer to autumn and fill the cottage with laughter and light, and the floor is strewn with stardust when they leave.

But they always come back. And the cottage door is always open for them.

fin