Awareness had become a strange thing to Sam - a sort of dream after having spent so long surrounded completely with nothing, with darkness and emptiness, he wondered grimly if it was a nice change, a welcome one.
The first thing he felt was warm, a gentle caress that brushed lightly against his consciousness, so completely and utterly foreign compared to the icy grip he had felt for the duration of his time asleep. He frowned. Was this even wakefulness? There was no indication of such - he was still blind as always, and the only thing that had changed was his awareness- a coma, perhaps? It made sense, more than he'd like to admit, and Sam felt faintly concerned at the lack of emotions that thought brought. As fast as his thoughts had began, and he felt the flare of emotion, it faded, replaced with complete serenity, it was as if he was nearly unable to feel any emotion other than calm- to prevent panic? But that would indicate that someone was- in one way or another- controlling his current state of being.
Nope, nothing other than calm, even at such a pretense. What a lovely measure- or perhaps not, his current thoughts couldn't be completely trusted, after all.
Amusement, he could feel amusement, what was more disconcerting was that it was not his own. "Hello?" He tried, surprised when he actually heard the words leave his mouth, reverberating around the empty space in an oddly familiar fashion. He was in a limited space, then- a room? Had someone just turned out the lights? He attempted to move and found he could not. He wasn't held in place or anything, it was as if he was never even capable of movement in the first place.
...Perhaps he wasn't…
There was a chance- small as it was- that he was in his own mind. But then who was in here with him?
Suddenly, as if brought forth by his revelation, there was light. At first he was blinded and- unable to shield his eyes- he could do nothing but wait to adjust to the sudden change in his environment.
To say he was startled would be an understatement. He was standing amidst a forest of towering trees, oaks, pines, maples. Leaves twisted and fluttered in the breeze, but never dared break from the sturdy, powerful branches that bore them, as if unable to tear themselves from their home - or lifeforce, he supposed. His emotions remained unsurprisingly blank at that thought, despite its grim nature.
Golden sunlight- looking almost unreal in it's nearly ethereal nature- drifted lazily between wisps of branches and leaves, scattering the bright colour over the soft looking green grass, which he found he could feel beneath him, as if he'd foregone shoes. Before him stood a towering oak, clearly ancient as it reached for the heavens, spanning high above the other surrounding trees with it's gnarled branches and plethora of soft-looking leaves. He couldn't help but find it beautiful in it's- once more with such a word- nearly ethereal nature. In fact, everything looked like such, too gorgeous to be real, and yet too corporeal not to be. He could even hear the branches shifting neatly in the faint breeze, and could smell the soft scent of nature tickling at his senses.
"Beautiful, isn't it?" Sam whirled around, noticing for the first time that he too had a corporeal form, he was real, human again, no longer just a strain of thoughts. He knew there should have been more panic at the thought that someone had invaded what felt- oddly- like such a private, sacred place, but there was none. It turned out, no such fear was warranted, for before him stood none other than God and The Darkness, Chuck and Amara. Siblings reunited, together again.
"...Yes." Sam agreed, glancing around curiously - was this of Chuck's making?
"Oh no, this is all yours, Sam. It's your mind - or, the way you choose to perceive it, I suppose is more accurate." Sam did little more than hum in response, still eyeing the trees around him with curiosity. So this was his mind? Where did he store his memories, his thoughts, his emotions? Chuck had called it his own perception, so perhaps these were not complete things? Perhaps they were not visible, maybe they were laced and twined deeply within the air around him, or maybe they were buried in the earth, thrumming and flaring with life, given and fueled by each brief thought, every flicker of emotion.
Chuck chuckled, and- oh, he of all people should have been able to come up with a better description than that- God chuckled? Well, he sounded slightly insane, but better than the former, he supposed. "-No, Sam." Chuck's words interrupted his train of thought, and he found he didn't mind much. "Why don't you take a closer look?" He gestured to the big tree just over Sam's shoulder, and he found himself complying easily.
He stepped up to the ancient oak, and finally saw what Chuck meant. Each leaf, every bud contained a memory. Within he could see flashes of his past, his childhood. Days spent watching tv with Dean, or swimming on hot days in nearby ponds. The closer they were to the tree, it seemed, the younger he was, and the older memories grew outwards. He could only see his younger days, currently, so he assumed the newer memories were at the top. It was then that he noticed something very odd about the memories - he could only see the ones he wanted to remember. With a confused frown, he felt himself giving the tree roots a compulsory glance. Oh.
Running from monsters, fights with dad… he could only imagine that his- likely plentiful- repressed memories were at the very tips of the roots, where he had no access.
He noticed another thing, soon. He had saw the memories, and remembered the emotions behind them, but he hadn't felt them, his mind was blank, empty… Sam reached out, and brushed a gentle hand against the bark.
HappinessExcitementSadnessRageFear
He pulled away with a gasp.
"I probably should have warned you against doing that," Chuck's voice sounded, undoubtedly amused, with a hint of apology, "I've been muffling your emotions a bit, and they're conjoining in the same place you store all emotions." Sam turned, raising an eyebrow, marginally more composed than a moment earlier.
"Muffling?"
Chuck grinned. "Okay, more like repressing, but I didn't want you to panic!" He justified, and Sam snorted.
"You don't have to, not anymore at least. Now that I know it's just you guys I should be alright- just don't spring anything too crazy on me." He smiled, feeling a few emotions begin to trickle in neatly.
"Okay, then let's talk."
Sam considered some sort of compulsion when he settled down comfortably in the grass, the two Beings following suit. "Why am I here?" He prompted, figuring it better if he took charge of the conversation now while he still could.
"Ah, well that's certainly not the question I wanted you to ask." He mused, taking a moment of silence to think.
"Well, here's the thing, Sam. I've made a mess, and you- with some prompting from My Sister- have taught Me something. It's My job to fix it. I can't just leave you and your brother to fix every little problem with the world, it should be My doing. It is- after all- My own creation. I claim you to be my sons and daughters, and yet I leave you all to suffer? So that's what I'm doing. Fixing my mess, starting with the most broken."
"I'm not broken." Sam spoke automatically, conditioned by years of being a Winchester, where weakness was not taken lightly. Chuck shot him a look, and his jaw snapped shut. He hadn't even notice it had opened again to continue.
"You spent five millennia with an enraged devil, being pulled apart in every way imaginable. You broke the world, multiple times, in fact, and fixed it every time. Pieced together the broken shards to the best of your ability and slapped on a band aid. You've spent years training to be a killer, a murder, something you hate, even if most of them deserved it-"
"-Stop!" Sam hissed. He had winced with every reminder, every flash of memory that flitted before his gaze. His eyes were clenched shut tightly, and his fists matched at his sides, nails digging sharply into his palm, though no bite of pain followed. "I get it."
"Do you, Sam?" Chuck asked, leaning forward suddenly when Sam's eyes snapped open. "Because I don't think you do- you know that saying? 'Tip of the iceberg?' Well what I've said? That is the tip of the iceberg. That tree full of memories behind you? That towers over everything else in your own mind? That is the tip of the iceberg, those roots go so far down you'd need a damn drill to get even half-way down. So do you? Because I can't. I can't comprehend to which extent you've been broken, and I can see all of you, Sam. Your mind, your soul, even your memories. All of it." His voice was oddly composed for such a speech, there should have been an ounce of anger in His tone, if not pure, undiluted rage.
Sam swallowed. He had no relevant response to that- let alone comprehensible. "Oh." Was the best he could manage.
"Yeah, oh. Anyways-" it was as if his entire demeanor shifted in an instant, he became much more upbeat, shedding the solemn tone of earlier. "-In response, I've decided to send a select few-" his eyes twinkled, "-off on a vacation of sorts."
"Vacation?" To say he was glad for the change of topic would be an understatement.
"Oh yes- do you remember the books 'Harry Potter?" He asked curiously, a smile playing at his lips.
"...Yeah?"
"Good, because you won't for very much longer." Sam's brows furrowed for a moment, before his eyes lit with understanding.
"Are- are you sending us to Hogwarts?" His eyes widened, and he couldn't stop the faint bounce that accompanied his words. He'd loved Harry Potter since he was young, so to finally be apart of such a lovely world…
Chuck's eyes glittered with joy, "yes."
Amara spoke up for the first time, she too carried a hint of a smile, "though we wouldn't want any spoilers, off course. You'd know that you were inside of a book series you've read- but you won't remember a single thing about said series. Okay?"
Sam nodded his agreement, he understood why he would not be allowed to remember it. He would have to suffer war blindly, but it wasn't as if it was anything new, he'd been fighting blindly his entire life, and no wars were without casualties, without sacrifices.
"Now," Chuck continued, "I've decided to give you and your brother- who, yes is going with you- a little gift." He reached out across the space between them to grab hold of something just over Sam's shoulders. He gasped, it felt like someone had just grabbed his arm- but, different… for one, he knew he did not have an arm on his back attached to his lower shoulder blades, and second, whatever it was wasn't an arm. Now aware of it, he understood that it felt like a-
Wing. Chuck had just pulled a wing from behind his back- had folded it around so the soft converts brushed against his arm and shoulders- and the thing unfurled between them. Sam had wings.
"Sorry, that's why you were asleep so long- it isn't easy to turn a human into an angel, you know." Sam's mind spluttered to a stop. Did he say… angel?
"Yep, an angel. Wings, grace, blade, all the works. Congratulations, Sam." His mind was still blank, shocked into silence. He felt like an outsider, watching in as he slowly began to extend the free wing, turning to look over his shoulders as it flared and re-furled. Beneath dark feathers he could see- could feel the muscles shifting, smooth as each piece worked in harmony to create movement. Somehow, he expected it to feel awkward, or jerky or-or something! But it didn't, it just felt… right.
When his mind jolted back into wakefulness, his first thought was- oddly enough- I have pretty wings. And they were… pretty… with long, neat feathers in a deep, dark reddish-brown colour, a few scattered within were a sharp gold, or a wine red, a soft cream or even a mud brown, creating a contrast for the regular feathers, which were a mix of all the colours. Even gold, now that he took a closer look. In fact, they looked more like they belonged to a girl than a 6'5" hunter. Speaking of measurements, just a single wing looked to be about eight or nine feet across, which- factoring in his body- was at most an entire wingspan of between sixteen and eighteen feet.
"Close, actually, your entire wingspan is actually twenty-two feet, with your wings each at ten." Chuck supplied with a shrug, "what can I say? I like even numbers." Sam blinked.
Okay. Okay. That was… impressive.
"Anyways, Sam, I do have to speak with the others as well, I have two more after you, so I'll leave you with this. You won't understand why you're going with the people you are, at first. But you will, eventually. My advice? Let go, relax, and don't act too harshly."
"No fights," Amara added softly. "Goodbye, Sam. We'll meet again soon."
"Goodbye, Sam."
Sam blinked, and then they were gone. "Goodbye." He whispered softly to the empty air, before everything went dark, and he was plunged back into the land of the living.
Sam awoke to silence. He was alone when he sat up, sitting in a plain room with only a dresser and the very bed he lay on to show for. He sighed softly, running a hand through his hair, before he turned to his wings. He had yet to touch them, and the feathers did look quite soft. He imagined it might have some sort of calming effect, likely akin to running a hand through your hair, but stronger.
The second his fingertips touched feathers of silk, his mind was overtaken by electricity. He jerked his hand away, stifling a startled noise. It was like tingles, all throughout both of his wings, and it spread down along his back until he shivered. Damn.
"They'll calm down a little bit, but they'll always be sensitive like that-" a familiar voice commented from the doorway, "-they need to sense air currents." Sam swung around, eyes wide as they focused on a very familiar- very deadAlive man.
"Gabriel?" He was leaning against the wall, just next to the door, arms crossed over his chest in a motion he had come to know as defensive.
"That's my name, don't wear it out." His tone was light, but with a notably dark edge. Sam blinked, and very quickly realized what his wings were doing. They were quite ruffled, half-curled around him, as if ready to defend against an enemy at any instant. Then, he noticed Gabriel's wings. There were six of them, and the glowing gold nearly burned his eyes. They were half-spread, ready to take off at any instant. Nervous. His brain supplied, though he had little time to wonder just how he knew that as the blonde spoke.
"We were wondering when you were gonna wake up, kiddo."
"We?" Sam started, before shaking his head, "nevermind, where's Dean, or Cas? Where am I? And how did you get here- weren't you dead?"
Gabriel gave a wry smile and kicked off the wall, arms uncrossing as he stepped up to the bed. " I was, then Dad decided he didn't like that. Little Cassie and Deany-boy are still asleep, as for where you are, though?" He just shrugged. "I dunno, we all woke up here."
Gabriel seemed to realize that his wings betrayed his mood, because they furled to his back, and his posture straightened slightly.
"Still asleep? They must be who Chuck said he needed to speak to next. Can you take me to see them? And who is 'we', by the way? Chuck said there would be others, but I never expected you, and with his last words I'm a little worried about who he's talking about." Sam returned his wry smile. "Let me guess, one of them is the devil."
"Wow, nothing gets past you, kiddo. Looks like Luci, Mikey, myself-" he winked, "-of course, little baby Cassie and Deany-boy are going to Hogwarts. Together."
Sam's eyes widened a fraction, "Michael?" He certainly hadn't expected that.
"Yes?" Sam blinked, startled as a man- no, an angel appeared in the doorway. He was in an unfamiliar vessel, a handsome male with raven black hair, pale skin and bright, sky blue eyes, though Sam imagined Michael was to blame for the ethereal glow to his eyes. He too had six wings, though not like any Sam had ever seen before.
Gabriel's and his own could both- if not for the colour- be mistaken for birdwings, with Sam's at a neat, long and slender shape, and Gabriel's at a short, broader shape, but Michael's most certainly could not. Unlike the neat converts of a bird wing, Michael's topmost feathers were messy and upturned faintly, looking more than a little unsuitable for flight. However, it was his primaries and secondary's' that were the oddest. While the converts ranged from the size of his pinky finger to the size of his middle finger, the primaries and secondary's were even longer than his arm, and as long as his fist. His total wingspan must have been around thirty feet! They were all as white as snow, giving of a glow, akin to sunlight hitting quartz constantly, and it looked as if each of the feathers had been dipped in gold.
Just a normal day as a Winchester. Yep.
"I hadn't expected you," Sam blurted, "the thought that you might be here didn't even cross my mind." His voice was much softer than he'd prefer, and he faintly registered Gabriel leaving with his hands raised placatingly. In the cage, Michael and Sam had grown close, they could even be considered friends.
Michael had whisked him away from Lucifer as often as he could, and for hours they would just talk. Sam had run out of stories after the first century, but Michael never minded.
The ravenet nodded, and Sam could see the faint upturn of his lips.
"I assume you would like to see your brother and Castiel?" He offered politely, raising an eyebrow. Sam nodded and stood swiftly.
He followed Michael into a brightly lit hallway, shutting the door behind him. He found- with surprised- that in what looked like real gold, letters had been formed. In his own, neat handwriting, the name 'Sam' stood out from the bright white coloured paint of the door. He glanced around the rest of the hall, and found that the other doors matched his owns aesthetic. Dean, written in messy, cramped printing. Castiel written in small, neat cursive. Michael was written in a slightly messy cursive, while Gabriel's looked like the epitome of extra, filled with far too many twists and loops. Lucifer's was a neat cursive as well, probably the fanciest aside from Gabriel's. Sam was situated in between Lucifer and Gabriel, with Dean directly across from him, Castiel from Gabriel, and Michael from Lucifer.
"Huh."
Michael led him into Dean's room, and he remembered swiftly what Gabriel had said about him still being asleep- except he wasn't. Dean was sat up in bed, rubbing at his face, though he did look up at the sound of the door opening, gaze locking with Sam's, before drifting to Michael's, then their wings.
Dean's were sleek and sharp, shorter than Sam's own with a swirl of different grey shades and tones, a few carried a faint hue of brown, while others were nearly black. He noticed, however, that none appeared even close to white, the lightest were a steel grey.
"Chuck talk to you, too?" He grunted, and Sam could see very clearly the concealed comment.
"Oh, spit it out, Dean."
"Your wings are kind of girly, dude."
"And yours look like it's about to rain - better grab an umbrella, huh?" Dean snorted at the sharp sarcasm and got to his feet, stretching. "Besides, mine are bigger. I wonder if that's saying something?" He suggested with a cheeky light in his eyes.
Dean raised an eyebrow, "I mean, not that size matters, or anything, but yours are definitely compensating for something."
"If mine are then so are yours, and you wings are quite broad as well, I-" they were startled from their banter by a throat clearing, and Sam noticed Michael fighting a smile.
"I apologize for interrupting, but we should probably head downstairs, yes?"
"Yeah," Sam agreed.
"Hang on," Dean cut off, brow furrowed, "Sam, who is this guy?"
Sam blinked, then seemingly recalled that Dean had not been there when they had met once more, nor had he known Michael well enough that even if he had been there, he would have actually recognized him (apart from the whole, "Michael?" "Yes?" thing, of course).
"Oh, sorry Dean." He frowned, "I guess you don't really know our newest companions going into Hogwarts, huh? For one, Gabriel's back and tagging along. Cas is- as usual- coming with, and-" he grimaced, understanding that Dean's reaction was likely to be either harsh or explosive- or both. "-And then, there's... Michael and Lucifer."
"What?!" Yep, both. Sam winced.
"You mean to tell me that we're going to have to spend, what, six- seven years with the devil and Mr. Good-son over here?" He gestured at Michael, and Sam felt a hint of hot, righteous anger curl in his stomach at that. "They wanted to start the apocalypse, Sam, the end of all things! They'd have used us as meatsuits and fought to the death, uncaring about the millions of people bound to die! And-"
"Then go blame Chuck!" Sam snapped, rendering his brother silent. He'd been angry, they'd both been angry lately, and there was no way around it. It was… odd, to say the least. He had no idea where the anger came from, or why it was so bad, o violent, but it was there, and he couldn't stop it. "Have you forgotten just who helped us stopped Amara? The damn Devil, that's right, Lucifer. We put our differences aside then! I know, seven years with them? You never signed up for that, and you're worried. I get it. But don't take your anger out on me- them either. Just calm down."
Dean took a deep breath, nodding. He released it after a moment, and spoke again. "You're right, I'm sorry." Sam was faintly surprised at the apology. "I can't be like this all the time. We were gonna head downstairs, right?"
Sam nodded, and then they were following Michael out into the hall and then down the stairs. The halls were kind of soothing, with soft cream floors and the same dark wood flooring that had followed them into the rooms. The house was new, and therefore foreign, so he took careful not of where Michael led them. They past Castiel and Gabriel's room, then turned left, where a set of dark stairs were clearly visible. Behind that, it seemed as if the hall extended into some sort of sitting area.
His suspicions were confirmed when Michael voiced it. "Past there is a sitting room, and a deck. He gestured to the right of Castiel's room, there is another just out there." They trailed down the steps, and Michael pointed to a door on the right once they hit the bottom. "That's a training room, inside is a small storage room, and you can use it to get into the kitchen if need be." They wandered down the hallway, towards the only other door in the entire space. Through it was clearly an entrance hall, where the wood floors changed to stone. To the left was the front door, and once more to the right was a large living room that gave way into a kitchen about the same size.
"That's the bathroom- or, one of them." Michael gestured to the door in the kitchen, and then led them to where they could see the room extending off the kitchen and to the right, curbing the training room. "And finally, that is the dining room. There are a few others I forgot to show you, the basement, which is just a laundry room and a sort of game room, and the second bathroom, which is in the bedroom hall."
"I presume that Gabriel is in the game room, and I know Lucifer is outside. Feel free to do what you'd like, until Castiel wakes up, then we are all going to have a conversation about what comes next." Michael shot them a faint smile, then, disappeared back towards the upstairs as the tour concluded.
Sam blinked.
That was… odd… perhaps their fight made the archangel uncomfortable, he knew he likely wasn't very welcome around Dean at the moment.
Sam settled into a comfortable white couch, watching as Dean peeked curiously into the training room, raising an eyebrow at his whistle of appreciation. "Damn, not too bad- almost as good as the bunker. Almost." Sam smiled, reassured by his more relaxed attitude. It was good that Dean had calmed, he had a quick temper, and today had been stressful.
"Apparently it did not take as long as I had expected." Michael had returned, this time with Castiel in tow.
"We met in the hallway." Cas elaborated, his voice as gruff as always.
There was an awkward moment of silence.
"I suppose I'll go and get my brothers, then." Michael made his uncomfortable escape, tone strained as he started back for the hall.
Sam took the time to examine Castiel's wings. They looked like miniature galaxies, a deep, empty black filled with blue and purple nebulas that seemed to move in thin wisps of the inky blackness of his wings, thousands of silver dots Sam recognized as stars were scattered within. His wings were messy, each feather curled at the tip until the image of the galaxy was slightly askew, just a little too off-center. It was adorable, and fit Castiel's personality quite well in Sam's appearance. Mysterious and cryptic on the surface, but with a good, kind heart and a curious nature. Sam found himself smiling slightly, not even caring too much that Cas and Dean had been talking while he zoned out, and that they were now in the middle of a conversation. He was too far entrapped in his musings to pay attention anyways, thinking about the early days, before Castiel had become Cas, before he had become a brother. Yes, mysterious and cryptic at first, and a truly great heart.