A/N: Legend says all Good Omens' fic titles turn into Queen lyrics after a fortnight, so I made sure this one doesn't have to. From Who Wants To Live Forever.

All characters belong to their rightful creators.

Check out on AO3/works/19796761 for better formatting.


Touch my world with your fingertips

There is something awfully familiar about the figure swaggering through the lawn at St James's Park. Black jacket flowing gracefully off the man's shoulders, that could've been a puffy coat just as easily; the posture, tall and threatening, with just enough edge to the shoulders to say back off and off my way, but somewhat lacking the confidence to pull it off properly. The hair, ginger of all things, immediately flaring up the sense of wrong, wrong, wrong and should've been soft brown instead, I'm sure; the glasses, round and big and pretentious.

'What's up with the glasses, you moron?' Donna thinks, unsure why she cannot turn her gaze off that man. He's not even her type, for goodness sake, all gangly and matchstick-like.

But there is something about him. Something odd and familiar in the entirely wrong way and Donna just stares. Intently.

She follows his saunter from her comfy spot in the sun, focused on how much the hip-roll seems out of place. She watches as he slowly approaches a bench occupied by some other man, dressed in all cream and tartan, and seemingly completely engrossed by the book in his lap.

Her brows rise to all heavens when the matchstick-man casually jumps over the back of said bench like a rebelling teenager he very much is not, screeching 'angel' loud enough even she can hear. The other man, pretty angelic indeed, now that she thinks about it, slams his book shut with visible irritation, murmuring something in return. He doesn't look like he's about to chase the intruder away, though – on the contrary, in fact. When the matchstick-man sprawls himself on the bench like a jelly octopus that's been exposed to the sun for too long, and reaches to place one of his wiggly arms behind the angel-man in a classic, cheesy move – his whole face lights up with bliss so pure that for a second Donna is certain it's going to melt her eyes away.

It doesn't. But Donna's not sure she's ever, ever seen so much love spilling from one's expression and it's boggling her mind because she knows that shit alright – she's watched every soap opera available on cable.

It also drives her mind astray from the strange duo, bickering now softly out of her reach, up to another blond person she must've met a long time ago. A girl, crying on a beach, surrounded by high, hostile cliffs and cutting cold wind. But it wasn't love in her eyes that could melt mountains and move the worlds, it was sorrow. Despair deeper than the ocean at her feet and darker than the heart of a man she was begging to stay.

Donna doesn't know where that image even came from – she's never been closely acquainted with any blond troublemakers, because clearly that's what the girl had to be, or even better – their dream lovers from the stars. What a ridiculous idea, really!

The vision fades away and Donna does a good job at convincing herself it must've been just a flashback from some movie she saw ages ago and doesn't even remember, triggered unquestionably by that quaint sense of familiarity she—

Oh.

According to her mother, Donna might have never been the brightest girl around, but she sure as hell is perceptive enough to notice that her friends on the bench are now sporting two paper coffee cups while chatting fondly and batting eyelashes at each other like a pair of falsely bashful schoolgirls. Well, at least the angel-man is. But Donna would bet real good money that underneath his stupid glasses, matchstick-man is doing the exact same.

The thing is, though, there aren't any coffee stands near this area, not close enough for her not to notice one of them being gone. And she knows. Because she's checked. Right before she finally settled with her sunbed in this particular sunny spot. She is also sure as hell matchstick-man wasn't carrying any with him when he came in jumping like a spring gazelle, oh no.

Strange.

But also…

Shouldn't she be somehow used to strange?

Shouldn't she—

Donna can almost quite literally feel her mind do a nasty backflip when she blinks and the angel-man is now holding a paper bag full of baked goods she can smell all the way across the lawn, that wasn't there just a second ago.

And she remembers, just a little bit.

A distant sound of roaring engines. A deep blue box and I'll be here forever, and… giant spider things? And the smell of nothing but ashes and the taste of bitter tears in the darkness. The warnings, the excitement, the raw thrill of running for her life in the lands far, far away.

The faces with no mouths and no hair, deserts made of diamond and the toxic air. The endless skies, the horrors, the eldritch terrors starved for nothing but love. The years that never were.

The mechanical voices, spinning helpless and screaming for help, her own hands playing alien machinery like a piano and the excruciating pain.

Drowning in the memories that are so obviously hers but also aren't, Donna no longer knows where she is, not really. The warmth of the sun feels too much like a burning supernova and how does she even know that?

She blinks and blinks, trying in vain to shake off the sensation but the world around her only grows louder and brighter and louder and brighter and it spins faster and faster and faster and she is a prisoner on a carousel of things that didn't happen—

And silence.

For one, sharp second of blasted, blessed clarity, Donna can see everything.

That was—

…and

IS

a n d

W

i

L

L

b

E

.

.

.

.

.

Reality falls back into place with the sound of a finger snap and when Donna blinks again, the only things left on the bench are a single black feather and a forgotten mobile phone.

She doesn't notice a wet trail on her cheek or a deep voice whispering at the back of her mind:

And then you forgot.


Listen I set out to write some cute Zira meets Ten and Is Not Impressed fluff, not this, but here we fuckin are. I don't make the rulz, OK.

You can also find me on tumblr at takenene

IMPORTANT! Cell0113 rewrote this piece from Crowley's perspective so go read that too on ao3/works/19810231 because it's awesome!

Now also kind-of a sequel for both here: FFnet/s/13350832/1/