Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

Sitting by the banks of a sludgy river, the apocalyptic Horseperson Pollution receives a package: “a circlet of white metal, set with diamonds” (193) that immediately turns black upon his touch. Admiring the blood-red sky, he sets forth to meet with the other Horsepersons on this, the final day before Armageddon. The delivery man returns to his van, notices the destination on his final delivery is “everywhere,” and walks out into the road, where he is struck dead by a speeding car. He delivers his last message, which is for Death itself: “Come and See” (194). That same morning, Newton sets out for Lower Tadfield armed with his arsenal of witch-finding tools.

In a flashback, Agnes Nutter walks calmly from her cottage to the pyre the angry mob has built for her. She climbs atop it while Witchfinder Thou-Shalt-Not-Commit-Adultery Pulsifer, Newton’s ancestor, lights the fire. Concealed within her petticoats, however, are “eighty pounds of gunpowder and forty pounds of roofing nails” (202). The ensuing explosion decimates the entire village and everyone in it. A note left in her cottage bequeaths her book to her son, John Device.

In the present, on the way to Lower Tadfield, Newton encounters a UFO. Three aliens disembark, and they warn him of Earth’s diminishing polar ice caps. Then, they pass along a message of “universal peace and cosmic harmony an’ suchlike” (205), although they have no idea why. They climb aboard their flying saucer, and Newton drives on.

Adam and his friends are discussing Satanism and deforestation—hot topics in the New Aquarian—when they hear the sound of crunching metal on the road. They check it out and find an overturned car and Newton unconscious inside. They seek help from the nearest house, Jasmine Cottage, where Anathema has already laid out bandages and first-aid items in anticipation. A short time later, Newton wakes up, Anathema at his side. She introduces herself as a witch and hands him a card bearing a prophecy from Agnes Nutter’s book—the prophecy that foretells his arrival. Anathema tells Newton about her ancestor and how her prophetic visions worked—more vague glimpses that she would relate to her own knowledge than predictions of specific events. Having spent her life interpreting Agnes’s visions, she tells Newton that the end of the world is due in five or six hours.

Adam, pondering the many ills of the world, hears a sudden voice deep inside himself. It says that the world is in trouble but that he can do something about it: “That’s what you’re here for. To make it all better” (222). He’s filled with despair about environmental degradation and animal extinction, openly pining for Armageddon so humanity can start over. His pessimistic temper worries his friends. It seems to affect the very air around them, which turns chilly and dark.

As Anathema and Newton chat, it becomes clear that Lower Tadfield is a village unchanged by time. The weather is remarkably consistent, no new housing developments have been built in recent memory, and the residents themselves cling to old-fashioned ways of living. “It was as if a large part of the twentieth century had marked a few square miles Out of Bounds” (226). Anathema shows Newton another prophecy, this one predicting the coming of the Antichrist. Though it claims that Lower Tadfield is where the child will appear, Anathema cannot detect any evil in the village at all—only love.

It starts to hail, and Adam leads his friends down to the quarry. Evidently aware of who he is now, he imagines a new world order built to his own specifications.

Jaime Hernez, a maintenance worker at a shopping mall, eats his lunch against a small, sickly tree in the plaza. Suddenly, the tree begins to grow at an accelerated rate. Outside, trees burst through the sidewalks and the asphalt, causing mayhem. Realizing the tree in the plaza lacks sufficient light, Jaime climbs a rafter and smashes the smoked plexiglass dome roof. Light floods in, and the tree bursts from its planter, rises to the full height of the mall, and, with Jaime astride one of its branches, it shatters the dome. Across the city, trees cover everything in a lush canopy. On the open sea, meanwhile, a kraken awakens and rises to the surface.

Back in Jasmine Cottage, Newton and Anathema take refuge from the impending storm. Newton reflects on his life: dull, monotonous, and utterly lacking in adventure or love.

Witchfinder Shadwell suspects Newton may be in danger, so he seeks Aziraphale—who has visited him once before—to borrow train fare to Lower Tadfield. In his bookshop, Aziraphale decides to tell Heaven about Adam, hoping to avoid war. The Metatron (God’s spokesperson), however, informs him that war is necessary so long as Heaven wins. Aziraphale then calls Crowley to inform him that the End is near when Shadwell interrupts him, having heard the entire conversation. He approaches Aziraphale, chanting an exorcism spell and stepping perilously close to Aziraphale’s sacred circle (used for calling Heaven). Attempting to save Shadwell’s life, Aziraphale steps into the circle himself and vanishes.

Meanwhile, in Crowley’s luxuriously modern apartment, an irate Hell calls. The child Warlock, who they believed was the Antichrist, knows nothing about the End of Times. They believe the mishap is Crowley’s fault, and they threaten him with severe punishment. Out his window, Crowley sees Hastur and Ligur pull up to his building. As they break through the front door and ascend the stairs, Crowley removes a flask from a wall safe, empties its contents into a bucket, and props the bucket above his office door. When Ligur enters the office, the bucket falls, dowsing the demon with holy water and melting him. Crowley then stalls for time by deceiving Hastur. He makes a phone call and disappears. A moment later, Hastur disappears as well. A disincorporated Crowley races through the phone line, Hastur close behind. Then, with his own phone ringing, Crowley exits the line at precisely the moment his answering machine picks up, trapping Hastur within the machine’s tape loop.

Crowley drives to Aziraphale’s bookshop to find it ablaze. He runs inside looking for Aziraphale, but the shop is empty. He retrieves Agnes’s book, climbs into his Bentley, then drives away. A heavy rain begins to fall.

Scarlett enters a café in which a group of bikers play a trivia game. Soon, Famine, Pollution, and Death join her. In the quarry, amidst the violent storm, Adam regales his friends with tales of how great things will be in the aftermath of the great storm. A lost Aziraphale, meanwhile, pops up in random locations—the Australian outback, a Haitian jungle, an American evangelical megachurch—searching for Crowley. Following his escape from Hastur and Ligur, Crowley races toward Tadfield, but he finds the M25 Motorway transformed, emitting a strange, demonic chant: “Hail the Great Beast, Devourer of Worlds” (281). He is stuck in the worst traffic jam London has ever seen.

As the Four Horsepersons ride to Tadfield on motorcycles, signs and portents abound: fish fall from the sky; Newton loses his virginity to Anathema; and Madame Tracy, Shadwell’s neighbor and part-time psychic, for the first time channels an actual spirit, Aziraphale, who tasks Shadwell with killing the Antichrist.

Hastur is liberated from Crowley’s answering machine by a random sales call. Crowley, desperate to reach Tadfield before The End, drives his now battered Bentley over the M25, a “screaming, glowing ribbon of pain and dark light” (308). The car bursts into flames.

In the quarry, Adam claims Tadfield for his own in the aftermath of the great storm, but his friends are defiant. Tadfield, they claim, belongs to all of them. They walk away, abandoning him for going too far. Adam, desolate over losing his friends, lets out a cry of anguish that shakes the heavens. A sudden stillness settles over the village, and Adam, now purged of his demonic self, entreats his friends to help him avert Armageddon.

All concerned parties—Crowley, Aziraphale, Shadwell, the Four Horsepersons, Anathema, and Newton—converge on the Lower Tadfield Air Base, with Adam, his friends, and Dog close behind. Disguised as generals, the Four Horsepersons bypass security and gain access to the base’s computer systems. While War, Famine, and Pollution hack into the system, Anathema and Newton trick a guard and enter the base as well. As Adam and his friends approach the base, Adam, still wrestling with his demonic tendencies, formulates a plan: “We need some stuff, I think. We need a sword, a crown, and some scales” (344). While Shadwell and Madame Tracy, who is possessed by Aziraphale, argue with the guard at the base gate, Crowley pulls up in the burned wreckage of his Bentley. As the security gate mysterious rises, Adam and his group charge through.

Inside the gate, the kids try to decide their next move when armed soldiers question them. With a single command, Adam renders them unconscious. As Armageddon slowly unfolds, electrical grids around the world go haywire, and the world goes dark. With civilization on the brink of annihilation, the Four Horsepersons exit the building, their mission accomplished. Inside the control room, Newton and Anathema try desperately to reverse the damage. Overhead, hosts of angels wait, poised for the coming battle.

Adam and his friends confront the Four Horsepersons attempting to leave the air base. With Adam firmly in command of his powers, he tells Death to call off the Apocalypse. Using their crudely fashioned weapons—sword made of wood and string, scales made of twigs and string, and a grass crown—Pepper, Brian, and Wensleydale dispatch War, Famine, and Pollution respectively to oblivion. Challenged by Adam, Death eventually spreads its wings and departs. Armageddon, while not proceeding strictly according to plan, continues nevertheless. Inside the air base’s control center, Newton lays a hand on one of the computer cabinets, thinking of how to repair it, when its lights flicker off. The nuclear countdown is averted, and all over the world, malfunctioning electronics suddenly work once again.

The crisis is avoided but only temporarily; Heaven and Hell are determined to wage their war. In a flash of lightning, the Metatron and Beelzebub appear. They attempt to convince Adam that the Final Battle must occur, but he wants no part of it. He doesn’t understand why the world has to be destroyed simply because humans act as they were created to act—like humans. Aziraphale and Crowley leap into the debate, arguing that the Great Plan, which foretells a last battle between Good and Evil, might not be written in stone. Perhaps Adam’s refusal to participate is, in fact, part of the plan. On uncertain philosophical ground, Beelzebub and the Metatron back off, and the hosts of Heaven and Hell retreat to their respective camps. The sky clears.

When Anathema argues that Adam should use his power for good, he responds that non-interference is the wisest option. Suddenly, the ground shakes violently. The Devil himself is approaching, furious over this new turn of events. Aziraphale (flaming sword in hand), Crowley, and Shadwell step out to confront him. Before he erupts from the ground, however, Adam gestures with his hand, and all is quiet. Humanity, it seems, is saved for now. Later, as Aziraphale and Crowley enjoy a bottle of wine on the air base tarmac, a delivery man pulls up and collects the discarded crown, scales, and sword.

The following morning, Newton wakes in Jasmine Cottage, the events of the previous day a blur. He answers a knock at the door and finds a solicitor with a package for him and Anathema, a package that has been in the law firm’s custody for 300 years with instructions to deliver it to Jasmine Cottage on this date. Inside is a small iron chest containing additional prophecies of Agnes Nutter, prophecies “concerning the world that is to come” (386).

Around the world, tensions ease considerably. Atlantis sinks beneath the sea again, and global electronic systems are functioning normally. Aziraphale and Crowley stroll through Saint James Park and discuss the future. They wonder if another battle is looming, an inevitable part of God’s grand design, but they ultimately decide these questions are unanswerable and go to lunch instead.

In a complete break of routine, Shadwell and Madame Tracy dine together in her apartment. A dream nags at Shadwell, an inner voice telling him that it may be time to retire from witchfinding and settle down. Madame Tracy proposes buying a small cottage in the country for that very purpose.

Adam is grounded, his father certain he had some role in the previous day’s events. As he sulks in the yard, he gives in to temptation and creates an opening in the surrounding hedges. Dog escapes, and Adam must chase him down. Out in the neighboring fields, Adam has a vision of Agnes Nutter in the chimney smoke from Jasmine Cottage; she winks at him. Free and boundless, at least for the day, Adam steals some apples from a neighbor’s tree and runs off into the fields with Dog.