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With Gleaming Starlight

Introduction

Slash and gen; mostly the former, as the fandom seems to be about 99.99% slash. Good Omens is my favorite book ever, and there's some incredible fic in the fandom (and a lot of crap as well). More Good Omens fic may be found in crossover recs.

Crowley/Aziraphale

I am generally rather wary of Crowley/Aziraphale, since the fandom has so many "Canon? what canon? Crowley and Zira-chan are so kawaii!" people, and the resulting fic, while sometimes well-written, is not even remotely connected to the Crowley and Aziraphale I know and love. A few authors, however, write simply bloody wonderful Good Omens fic. jenelin is one of them; her Glasses has Crowley and Aziraphale switching glasses, and just generally being sweet (unwillingly, on Crowley's part, of course). Fluff in the best sense of the word.
Crowley took off his glasses and blinked furiously. "It's too bright in here."
"Dear," said Aziraphale, grabbing Crowley's glasses, "this is quite possibly the darkest restaurant I've ever been in."
"I have sensitive eyes."

It Was, Of Course, the Sunset's Fault, by jenelin. Somewhat softer than the usual characterization of Crowley, but I don't think it's inconsistent with the book; clever, witty, and all-around cute.
Aziraphale had been so damn calm about it. As if it was not at all out of the ordinary for Crowley to kiss him. Forcefully. In the middle of the street. "Well. How interesting. I'm dying for a cup of tea, how about you?"

Lent, another story by jenelin, is about Aziraphale giving Crowley up for Lent, or trying to. Aziraphale's struggles are amusing and rather cute, and Crowley's apparent diffidence is spot-on.
But what to give up? After much deliberation over whether he could really live without books or sushi for forty days, he finally realized that there was really only one answer.

Changing authors, there's Twofish, by a demon, in which Crowley and Aziraphale keep fish, or try to, and there is snark, alcohol, and a very unusual take on supernatural sex. (Caveat: The betta lore is not what I would call highly accurate, so if you're a die-hard betta-raiser, you might have a few issues. Me, I pretend that Crowley's betta is some sort of special supernatural betta, or something.)
Before the past week Crowley had never given much thought to fish. Oh, he had thought of them as food, of course, and as...well, food. Except for one notable occasion as a rather nasty projectile. And when a few had fallen on his head during Almostaggeden, as he had come to call it, during the mass downpour of fish that took place - like being slapped about the head by an old seal, it was, having a fish land on you from that height.

Daegaer is truly a blessing unto the fandom. Prolific and talented, with a bizarre sense of humor and an impressive knowledge of theology (it's her job!), she makes not only serious Good Omens fic work, but also deeply bizarre and random goofy ideas that people throw at her work (although some of those get a bit scary when people don't realize she's joking). A shining example of latter would be A Good Example, wherein Crowley and Aziraphale are Amish (not really), and highly amusing events occur.
"This is an Amish town, Aziraphale," he said. "These are not the youth of today. They don't even have buttons, for crying out loud, let alone MTV and designer drugs."

Daegaer also wrote the the Fluffy Japanese Schoolboys AU, which as far as I know has no title. I would like to stress that this is a parody, as too many people in the fandom seem to have missed the point. I firmly believe that only Daegaer could pull such a inherently bizarre and potentially traumatizing idea off, and she does so masterfully. It is funny. Read it. There's also a frighteningly funny "deleted" scene here which Daegaer describes as being "like a ball of poisonous fluff concentrate." It involves Hello Kitty, and really, that's all you need to know before reading it.
"You guess so. Some Buddhist you are. Do you believe in karma?"
"After my result on the last history test? Damn right I do."

I can't rec every story by Daegaer, much as I'd like to (most of her stories may be found in her LJ memories, here), but here are some of my favorites in a more serious vein.

Reading Instructions, by Daegaer, is hard to describe without giving away everything, but basically it is the beginning of an accord between Crowley and Aziraphale, some really great jokes, and the dawn of a new era. Also, Gabriel is creepy.
Gabriel smiled, his expression full of love and entirely devoid of either sympathy or understanding.

I have an especial weakness for Daegaer's WWI Crowley. No Man's Land, the second drabble here, is an interesting look at Captain Crowley, which stands on its own if you know the premise. Over the Top is, I think, her first longer Great War story, is a sharp, biting vignette, and a characterization of Crowley as believeable as it is compelling and unusual. Bright With His Splendour (part two here) is about War in Heaven and war on earth and is sort of a sequel to Over the Top, although it stands on its own beautifully. At the Going Down of the Sun is another sort-of sequel, wherein one of Crowley's men remembers.
Anyway, Crowley thought a little hysterically, so many men were shell-shocked it was the ones who weren't who stood out as abnormal nowadays. His own hands hadn't been steady for weeks, which he was ignoring as best he could. He thought he was doing pretty well, considering. All the other officers he regularly saw stuttered or twitched as well as having shaking hands. He was fine. Tiredness, that's all that was wrong with him.
(from Bright With His Splendour)

Moving away from the intensely depressing for a bit, Daegaer's Seville is sweet and lovely without being complete fluff. One of her many strengths as a writer is her ability to meld the painfully sad with the beautiful and lovely (or humorous), and she does that perfectly here.
'Won't you have a little marmalade on your toast, Crowley?' he'd say cheerfully, or 'Wouldn't you like some candied peel, Crowley?' or, 'Dear me, you haven't eaten any fruit or vegetables for sixty years, aren't you worried about getting scurvy, Crowley?'

Remember the wingfic fad a while back? Well, being as how wingfic is canonical for Good Omens, Daegaer wrote wingless fic, and pulled it off. Flights of Angels is touching, funny, and it mentions Mongols (a sure way to my heart)!
Crowley woke up with the impression that the Golden Horde had set up camp in his mouth. There was a distinct taste of yurt. He'd been quite fond of the khans, he thought muzzily. Good senses of humour. The fermented mares' milk, though. That had been a bit off.

Daegaer also wrote some wingfic, sort of. It makes me grin with sheer evil delight, and there's not much I can say about The Terror that Flies-by-Night without spoiling it.
"Aziraphale, I want to see you now. If you come over now you can legitimately not open the shop," Crowley said cunningly. "Book-buyers will have been thwarted for another day."
"On my way!" the angel trilled, and slammed the phone down.

Mother of God, also by Daegaer (I swear I'll move on to another author soon!), involves Alexander the Great, his mother, and a really mean Crowley, and it's a fascinating bit of literary history-myth.
And then it all went wrong. The kid started liking Persia. That wasn't meant to happen. He started being fair and even handed to the people he conquered, appointing Persian governors, not allowing his friends to be rude to visiting dignitaries, making speeches about how good government would yield good results.
"Come on, have just a few of them strangled," Crowley would whisper. "At least kick your damn dog once in a while!"

At last moving along to another author (although I do suggest checking out Daegaer's other stuff -- it's all good, and there's much, much more), here's the perennial Good Omens rec and, to my knowledge, the fic that spawned the fandom. I don't know if she should be proud or scared. The always-excellent torch's And when he falls is a dry, understated, extremely fabulous piece about thwarting and tempting in Hyde Park.
"The word you're looking for," Crowley said, "is twee. And coming from you, that's a really, really big stone in a really, really, really glassy house."

And now, afrai, my cohort in crime whose brilliance I'd really like to steal. Blanket rec for her (and especially for her excellent Good Omens WIP which I'm not actually reccing 'cos I don't rec WIPS but if I did I would), but especially the following:

afrai's Living Arrangements is sort of related to Carina's Clocks (recced below) in that it starts with the basic premise of one of two main characters becoming human. In this case, however, it's Aziraphale, and the ending, although equally open-ended, is rather grimmer, I think. A funny, sad, sometimes disturbing and always well-written story.
"There's mould on your carpet," he said.
Aziraphale shut the door, locking it, and came over to look.
"That's not mould; that's carpet."
"Oh."

In afrai's drabble Sex, Crowley and Aziraphale try falling in love. To say more would be to spoil it, being as how it's a drabble and all, but it's...rather different from the usual Crowley/Aziraphale, trust me.
Once, Crowley and Aziraphale tried falling in love.

Shati is a gem I learned of only recently, when afrai recced her. Her tone is spot-on, and even her slash stories have content beyond "blah blah C and A in love," a trait which I find marks the better stories in the fandom. In Apples, Adam reveals a secret, and it is really, really funny.
There were things Adam couldn't tell even the Them. Some of those things were dark and arcane matters fit not for the ears or eyes of mortals; some, like his secret stashes of Gundam Wing slash, ranged from dark to fluffy and were written with other body parts of mortals specifically in mind.

War/Pepper

Bizarre, yes, but it has a certain amount of potential, when Pepper's older. The fabulous afrai basically invented this pairing, and made it work. Sparks is the first story, of a sharp, angry romance -- it's not easy to love an anthropomorphic personification. (some Brian/Wensleydale implied)
"Seven dead in Kosovo today," she says without preliminaries, "you bitch --" and she closes the door with a bang that means it isn't supposed to stay closed. It's a bang that says, Knock on the door and yell back, but War is new at this whole humanity gig and she makes possibly the worst mistake in her life, even counting Switzerland. She leaves.

Also by afrai, A Strenuous Family is sort of a sequel to Sparks (maybe) and sort of a sequel/remix to my Cry Havoc! and Let Slip the Spawn of War (which is the lesbian equivalent of mpreg, and a joke, so's you know), and it is far superior to the latter. Not so much a War/Pepper story as a story about their children, and death, and other strenuous things.
"If I'd known this would be the pay-off, I'd've killed the little buggers when I spawned them," said War bitterly. Pepper put her to bed two hours later, reflecting that she couldn't complain, really. She had three beautiful boys and a -- someone who loved her with a wordless intensity, and if Bob was smoking pot and Pete was insisting on being called Friendly Fire, which family didn't have their problems?

Gen

It used to be hard to find any gen in this fandom, much less good gen, especially good gen, after Wallwalker's excellent Horseperson fic vanished. The situation has changed, rather, since the arrival of the excellent Daegaer unto the fandom, and there are a few others who write fabulous gen.

CobraGirl's Genesis 3:25-27 is oddly sweet, in a style as close to the Gaiman-Pratchett style as I've seen, and lovely fill-in scene for the book. Also, Good Omens genfic is in rather short supply, and this is one of the better pieces.
"Wonder what it'll be like out there," she whispered. "More difficult, I expect. But...." Her fingers fluttered against her belly. "He wouldn't kill us, would He? It - it's the first thing we've done wrong, after all, and I'm sure He doesn't hurt people on their first offenses, but it was such a terrible thing, and - " She broke off and gulped in air, trembling violently now.

Clocks, by Carina/mercuriosity, is "humanfic done right." Hell punishes Crowley, and this really isn't a happy story at all, but beautifully done.
He ignored the stop sign on the corner, rounded the curve too fast. Some things, at least, hadn't changed. But it was a different sort of recklessness that propelled him on now. Before, he'd known he would emerge unscathed. Now, he just didn't care.

CorianderEisenhower's The Storm, one of the rare pieces of really excellent gen in the fandom, involves ducks, St. James Park, and a couple of really fascinating original characters, along with commentary from Crowley and Aziraphale. It has its funny bits, but it's primarily a serious story, dealing with WWII, and the similarities between sides everywhere.
"Well, of course you're against the war. It's too . . . messy. If you take my meaning. And not good for relations. Not good at all." He borrowed part of Pieter's bread and threw it in the shallows, where a blackish grey duck battled fiercely with a brown duck for the bit. "And that's how it is, isn't it? Savage things fighting over a bit of crumb even though they don't need it. Neither black or white, though you cheer one on anyway."

Come and See, by afrai, is about a lot of things, but mostly about Famine and his relationships with the other horsepeople. Beautifully characterized and written and downright creepy.
The first thing he remembers as himself -- as Famine, who walks and talks and writes his name in flaming letters -- his very first memory is that of waking to the distorted face of a dying man.
This probably explains a lot about him.

And a drabble and almost-drabble by afrai, Jesus and His Fine Wings Made Him Vain. The first is a serious drabble, with comparisons of religious figures and such; the second, rather different in tone, is wingfic. Sort of. This being afrai, there's a twist, and you really should read it for that.
Jesus was a nice boy.
(from Jesus)

Pamphlets, by Shati, is technically gen. Aziraphale deals with door-to-door evangelists, and it is Funny.
But they won't go away. And no amount of persuasion will convince them that he is perfectly Saved, although, no, technically, he is not a born-again Christian.

East of Eden, by Shati, is about Cain and Abel, and the involvements of Crowley and Aziraphale in the matter. This is Crowley and Aziraphale before they're friends, and it's the perfect blend of funny and really unsettling.
Sometimes, Aziraphale asked him for help in other matters. "Do you know how to get stains out of wool, vile monster?"
"I hear pig's blood works well," Crawly would respond, all golden-eyed innocence. "Make sure you scrub it in well."
Sometimes he nurtured the sneaking suspicion that Aziraphale was on to him and simply went along out of curiousity. They were really very impressive explosions.