Author's Note - This is something I wrote last week, after a previous request from williewildcat, to write a Heart Of Darkness style story with a Supernatural twist. I enjoyed writing this one and hope that I have done the idea justice. So, williewildcat, this one is for you!! ;) :D
Everyone Needs A Nemesis.
Chapter One.
Angels have walked the Earth for thousands of years, unnoticed by humans, unhurried in their observations, forever patient and wise. I know this for I am angel myself, and I am Shekinah.
I know, and have felt what few other angels have felt - I know what it is like to be human. I spent 32 years as a human, having fallen some time ago. Upon meeting the angel Castiel and subsequently falling in love and finding my soul mate, I was given the chance to regain my angelic nature.
Of course, I jumped at the chance, for I disliked being a human, considering it a burden I didn't want any more. Now I feel free, revelling in my newly regained status as an angel. How I had missed being an angel...
I had my orders to accompany Castiel in watching the brothers Winchester - not that I minded the task, for I actually liked both Sam and Dean - particularly Dean. Of course, the task wasn't always an easy one because of the path they chose to tread. They were hunters of the supernatural, hunting demons, and other such monsters on practically a weekly basis.
This week proved to be no exception to the Winchester rule.
It all started when Dean wanted to get spares for his beloved Impala....
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Castiel was detained elsewhere, so I accompanied both Sam and Dean to Bobby's Salvage Yard in Jenna's old Mustang. Jenna had been my name when I was human, a name which I would no longer recognize for it was not me. I kept the vessel when returning to walk among humans, with Jenna residing quietly in here with me. My true visage was too much for most humans to bear, who no doubt wished to keep their own eyes from being burnt right out of their heads. So, the vessel was necessary for my purposes.
I got out of the car, slightly dazzled by the sun beating down upon us, before shading my eyes with my own wing, leaving my hands free should I need them. I noticed that Dean took shelter beneath my wing also, although Sam didn't. Sam, I had noticed, seemed a little wary of me now that I was an angel. I put it down to him being the boy with the demon blood, and leery of anything angelic. Dean remained blissfully complacent with my new status. Perhaps he was just used to Castiel around him more than Sam was.
"Bobby, you here?" Dean called, as I walked beside him, still sheltering him from the sun with my wing.
Sam followed behind us, kicking idly at stones upon the ground, and I stilled a few with my hand when they got too close to hitting my outspread wing. Sam muttered an apology behind me, and I grunted back a mumbled response that it was okay.
There was no answer from Bobby - which was kind of worrying, seeing as I knew that Dean had only spoken to the elder hunter a week previously. As far as I'd overheard, Bobby had not mentioned anything about leaving town for a while - and Bobby seemed the type to give due warning - at least to the Winchesters - if he were about to leave on a hunting trip.
I'd always liked Bobby, right from the moment I'd first met him - really, he seemed like a father figure and a good role model for the Winchesters, now that their own father was gone. For a short time, he'd seemed like a father figure to me, as well - at least, until, I'd attained my true form. I knew a father far greater than anyone else could claim now.
I remained quiet by Dean's side, ready to fight, should the situation call for it, should Bobby be in any trouble at all. I let Dean go before me into Bobby's house, following close at his heels, with Sam directly behind me, and I could feel his alarm and sudden alertness at Bobby's silence.
Bobby was nowhere to be seen inside the house - literally nowhere. The house remained quiet and devoid of human life - other than Sam and Dean themselves, of course - the only indication of someone living there was the proliferation of books surrounding us, and the faint odor of cooking still hanging in the air - as though Bobby had been there recently.
"Where is he?" Dean asked, futilely, turning around on the spot, as though that mere action would bring the hunter out from wherever he was.
"I do not know, Dean. He has been here recently - he had egg and bacon for breakfast," I said, solemnly.
"Dude, you're freaky. You can smell that?" Dean asked, in disbelief, as he blinked at me owlishly in the gloom.
"Can't you?" I asked, head cocked on one side.
"No, you're the angel, not me! You have some powerful sense of smell, if you can smell that! Well, if you don't know where in Hell he is, then I don't have a chance!" Dean snorted before turning away.
"Being an angel does not necessarily mean that I have all the answers, Dean!" I said, quietly, as I picked up a book from nearby and flicked through it idly.
"God, I swear you are getting more and more like Castiel as every day passes!" Dean muttered more to himself than to me.
"Thank you!" was all I said, taking it as more of a compliment than Dean intended it to be.
"You angels are weird," Sam said, on his way past me, as he too picked up a stack of papers from nearby.
"So sayeth the boy with the demon blood," I muttered back, with a scowl, as I picked up another book.
"Oh, can it, guys, you're not helping!" Dean said, as he opened the fridge.
I wasn't surprised to see him snag a sausage and eat it with some great enjoyment. I hid a smile and shook my head at the incorrigible Winchester. Sam just gave his brother a withering, and disbelieving look, which made me grin even more. The pair of them together really were quite amusing.
"I think I have found something, Sam, Dean!" I said, as I stared down at the book I currently held in my hands, opened to a specific page.
In between the pages, in Bobby's scruffy handwriting was a brief note, addressed to Sam and Dean themselves.
"It's for you!" I said, passing the note over to Sam, being the one nearest to me at the time. "Well, both you and Dean, actually!"
Sam nodded out his thanks, before he started reading the note out loud. The note was brief, but to the point - explaining that Bobby had had to leave quite suddenly to go to the Congo on another hunt. Surprisingly, he didn't leave a contact number. Despite this though, at least in Bobby's note, he did give a vague description of where he was going, and made mention of a tribe in the vicinity of this intended area.
Sam went outside to fetch his lap top and a quick Google session later threw up the answers we so badly needed. It seemed as though he was in Bantu territory - namely in the Loango region, near the Congo Basin.
"This is very Heart of Darkness, isn't it?" Sam commented, absently.
I cocked my head at him in confusion, as Dean asked - "Do what, Sammy?"
"A story ... by Joseph Conrad.... oh, never mind!" Sam said, grinning briefly at the pair of us.
"Right ... " Dean said slowly. "I vote we go after him. There's something ominous about this. Why would Bobby just disappear, and not give us either due warning nor a contact number ... anything? That is so unlike Bobby!"
"Maybe you should go after him - make sure he's not in any danger," I suggested mildly, as I finally put the book down that I had been holding.
"Just what I was going to say!" Dean said, eyeing me suspiciously. "You not coming with us, Shekinah?"
I looked over at Sam at that, who was looking back at me with a sense of curiosity in his gaze that bore none of the animosity I expected.
"I am coming, Dean. You are my charges, so shall I follow you," I said solemnly, as I stood, fluidly.
A small flicker of emotion came and went in Dean's eyes that I couldn't decipher, but Sam merely turned away from me, expression unreadable.
"When do we leave?" I asked, flexing my wings slightly in the small room, to free them of a sudden cramp.
"Now, if you're gonna keep doing that. Don't want you wrecking Bobby's room, you vandal," Sam said, before leaving the room.
I had to laugh at that, even as Dean raised his eyebrows at his brother.
"What's the matter with him?" he asked.
I shrugged before leaving the room in the younger brother's wake, leaving Dean to trail after us, another sausage in his hand, chewing hungrily on a mouthful.
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We had to wait until the following morning to get a flight to the Congo, as we were too late to catch one going that very day. I stayed with the Winchesters while they slept that night, watching over them, as I did not need sleep myself. I unfurled my wings from my back once again, as I sat by the window - staring out at the river flowing outside, and the stars shimmering in its glass like surface.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Sam asked, suddenly, softly, at my side.
I did not let him see me flinch, merely turned to look at him, with a slow nod of assent.
"It is," I said, just as quietly.
"I bet you've seen far more beautiful sights in your lifetime," Sam commented, as he regarded me with a shrewd gaze.
I bowed my head, before I said - "I am over 2000 years old, Sam. I continue to see beauty in everything, yet I cannot remember a single one. It is all the same to one such as I!"
Sam nodded, before saying - "What's it like being an angel?"
"Indescribable," I replied. "I cannot put into words how it truly feels, nor can I put into words what it truly means to be an angel. And, before you ask, I am not ready to discuss the reasons behind why I fell, yet, to you."
Sam nodded slowly, as though that had, indeed, been his next question.
Then he asked something else.
"What's it like to be in love with an angel?" he asked, softly. "I'm sorry if it's a little out of line, but I didn't even know angels could love or be in love."
I smiled wistfully at him for that. He was but a human after all. Let him have his curiosity while he could.
"It's ... beautiful!" I said, gently. "Like the most intense love you have ever felt for another, yet magnified a thousand-fold - for as an angel, everything is just.... more, you know? More intense, heightened ... beautiful. And I am truly blessed indeed, that it is in Castiel that I have found love, that I have bonded with him as my soul mate. I would not have it any other way. I would rather die than have him taken from me. I would kill to keep him at my side! I know that it is the same for him as it is with me. I can feel it - how it is for him."
From far off, where Castiel was, I could feel his warmth, his love for me, and I felt his lips press to mine, in a kiss. I kissed him back, before smiling.
"It must be nice to know something like that," Sam said, wistfully, apparently not having noticed my silent exchange with Cas. "I don't know what it feels like!"
"Not even with Ruby?" I asked.
"Not even with Ruby!" Sam confirmed, almost sadly, before we both fell silent.
*Go back to bed, Sam. Unlike me, you need your sleep," I said, quietly, not really expecting Sam to do so.
Surprisingly he did, withdrawing from my company, to return to his bed. I watched while he settled himself down, and when he proved restless, ghosted across the room on noiseless feet, before tapping him gently upon the forehead, to aid him into dreamless sleep.