Title: More Than Anyone I Have Ever Met
Fandom: Supernatural
Characters:
Prompt: 31 Day Place Challenge - Day 11: The Roadhouse
Word Count: 681
Rating: K
Genre: Friendship, Family
Summary: There was a time that Harvelle's Roadhouse hadn't been a prime hunter gathering spot. But that wasn't important at the moment. Actually, unless you were a history buff, that wasn't important at all. When it had existed on Earth, it had been burned to the ground shortly before all hell broke loose. Literally. It still existed now. Only, this time, it existed in Heaven.
Author's Notes: Title from 5.16 "Dark Side of the Moon": Ash: "I mean, you boys die more than anyone I have ever met."
Episode Tags:
10.17 "Inside Man"
5.10 "Abandon All Hope…"
5.16 "Dark Side of the Moon"
9.10 "Road Trip"
6.16 "…And Then There Were None"
7.12 "Time After Time"
7.20 "The Girl With The Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo"
10.21 "Dark Dynasty"
8.12 "As Time Goes By"
7.16 "Out With The Old"
12.06 "Celebrating the Life of Asa Fox"
11.23 "Alpha and Omega"
Disclaimer: I own nothing …


There was a time that Harvelle's Roadhouse hadn't been a prime hunter gathering spot. But that wasn't important at the moment. Actually, unless you were a history buff, that wasn't important at all. When it had existed on Earth, it had been burned to the ground shortly before all hell broke loose. Literally.

It still existed now. Only, this time, it existed in Heaven.

And ever since that time that all the Robert Singers had escaped their own personal heavens, and Bobby Singer had helped Castiel break the Scribe out of Heaven's Jail… well, the Angelic Board of Heaven (the committee that now controlled Heaven in the absence of other leadership) had debated on just how to deal with him. However, they couldn't adequately agree on any sort of punishment. Instead, they debated until they'd found a compromise they were all willing to live with. In light of the unrest that resulted, they elected to allow regulated movement between the different heavens. They set up a series of Socialization Zones: tiny town sized heavens that anyone's soul could frequent to talk to other souls. One such area was specifically created to cater to former hunters, Men of Letters, and others who had knowledge of the supernatural on Earth. One section of "Hunter Paradise" looked a little like something out of the Old West with dirt roads and wooden structures. And in the middle of this section was the Roadhouse.

Ellen and Jo could usually be found tending the bar and waiting tables along with a man named Tahmoh – a bartender from Texas who had allowed the angel Gadreel to use him as a vessel. Ash (who would take breaks from his own little patch of Roadhouse paridise) could often be found at the end of the bar with this laptop, chatting and tossing a few back with Albert Einstein and Abraham Lincoln, or arguing companionably with Frank Devereaux – who would also drag Charlie Bradbury into an argument, at least after he found out she'd been able to crack his coding. And Bobby had taken to sitting at a table in the corner, playing poker, drinking whiskey, and swapping stories with other hunters – which usually included stories about the notorious Winchester Brothers. His usual poker buddies were generally hunters who had worked with his boys at one point or other.

Today he sat around a table with his old hunting buddy Rufus Turner, Eliot Ness (of all people), the redhead he'd met as a ghost, Charlie (when she wasn't engaging in a battle of wits with Frank and Ash), and probably the only individual from the Men of Letters who didn't treat hunters as though they were dimwitted brutes: Henry Winchester. Charlie was proving to be a little card shark, and Henry was the one who usually ended up giving her a run for her money – the man had taken to his pseudo-granddaughter almost immediately, despite the fact that he didn't understand what she was saying half the time.

It was about halfway through their third game when two new arrivals came. They were acquaintances of another one of the more notable hunters here, a man named Asa Fox. He had arrived only the day before. Both of the new arrivals came with news of, not only the brothers, but of their mother as well – who was alive again after being dead for thirty-three years. They all blended in seamlessly with the others – meeting hunters from other times, including one Gabriel Van Helsing.

The door to the Roadhouse opened once more and, slowly, the room became silent. Bobby looked up from his cards to see what caused it and quirked and eyebrow. This was new. He noticed Henry's expression take on a startled mixture of wistfulness and guilt.

"Hello, John," he intoned after the silence began broaching on uncomfortable. "Play a round?"

John looked around, spotted Henry and hesitated, then shook his head. "Not today, Bobby." He instead strode over to the bar and sat on an empty stool.

"What'll it be, Winchester?" Ellen asked John. The noise level and activities resumed.

- 30 -


Footnotes:

(1) Tahmoh Penikett – the actor who played Gadreel's original (and final) vessel.

(2) Gabriel Van Helsing – from the 2004 Van Helsing movie starring Hugh Jackman.


Completed: January 21, 2017