Nine Months Later: February 15, 2014

3:40 PM

The Men of Letters Bunker (Lebanon, Kansas)

"David and Carol Moffat of Spokane, Washington, a once infertile couple, have given birth to twins today!" "A young couple in Warlaby have given birth to a miracle child!" "86 year old Swiss woman gives birth to a healthy baby boy!" "The centaurium erythraea, an endangered plant in Sweden, has begun to grow out of season!" "Increase in population of European rabbit!" "Polar ice caps refreezing!"

Sam, wrapped in a thick, wool blanket from head to toe, sat at a desk in one of the main rooms of the bunker, skimming through today's biggest headlines on his laptop. His sniffed. This, it seemed, was the legacy of the fallen angels, Anna Milton times a couple million. Miracle children and the reconstruction of the environment. From this, it was easy to think that Metatron had, after all, done a good deed. But that was just not so.

Other news articles, the ones the newspapers were hiding behind the cute baby photos and newly planted gardens, had titles like, "Another Pregnant Woman Murdered in South Africa," "Portuguese Football Coach Charged with Brutal Molestation," "50 More Dead from Botched Organ Trafficking in Poland." Without any angels to fear, the demons were having a field day, month, year. These titles weren't as bad as some of the others Sam had seen, but they still made him hate himself a little more.

Out of nowhere, Sam began to cough violently. Blood spattered across the computer screen, and the blanket surrounding him seemed to be making him colder. Sam threw it off, and covered his mouth with his forearm until the hacking stopped. Once it did, he grabbed a tissue and began scrubbing at the computer screen, attempting to get the blood off. It only half-worked, but well enough that Sam could see the screen again. He threw the soiled tissue in the already full trash can at his feet.

This sort of outburst was not rare, but in fact, happened about twice in a 24 hour period. After 9 months, Sam couldn't really say he was used to it, but it, like so much else, had become a part of life.

Behind him, Sam heard footsteps, and he turned to see Dean coming in, both hands full of grocery bags. Crowley was beside him, a case of beer tucked under one arm, a box containing a new toaster under the other, to replace the one that had burnt out.

"Hey," said Dean, setting the grocery bags down on the table beside Sam. He eyed the trash can suspiciously. "How are you feeling?"

"Great!" replied Sam, a fake grin splitting across his face from ear to ear. He took his foot and moved the trash can out of Dean's line of sight. "How was the senator?"

"Much better than the last one!" piped in Crowley cheerily, placing the beer and toaster beside the grocery bags. "This one lived."

Over the past months, the demons had made a habit of possessing people in positions of power, much like the Leviathans had done with Dick Roman. Some of their favorite people were politicians - mayors, governors, senators. As far as they could tell, the president had been left alone, though they could have just been doing a good job of hiding it. The senator from Missouri that Dean and Crowley had presumably just saved, had gone, in the course of a day, from being a staunch environmentalist, to wanting to cut down an entire state park. The "last one" had been from South Dakota, and he had not be so lucky. Dean had had to put Ruby's knife through his chest.

"I'll put these away!" said Crowley, grabbing the grocery bags from the table and heading toward the kitchen with them. Sam and Dean watched him go.

"How is he?" asked Sam, once Crowley was one of earshot.

"As cheerful as ever," said Dean, taking a beer out of the case Crowley had left and popping the cap off. He took a long drink. "All he wanted to talk about on the way home was how great the cinematography in Game of Thrones is."

Sam chuckled. In all honesty, he still wasn't entirely comfortable living under the same room as the former King of Hell, but sometimes, New Crowley was kind of amusing.

Though the ritual had never been completed, the effect Sam's purified blood had had on Crowley in the church had not subsided, but seemed to have morphed and settled into what was now New Crowley, who liked to watch HBO, cook, and sing show tunes. He still had all of his demon powers though, which had come in quite handy. Because Sam was basically useless except for research, Crowley had started going out on hunts with Dean, once they'd established that he wasn't faking it, and really was the "nice guy" that he claimed to be. It was also rather nice that many of the demons they encountered were still scared shitless of Crowley, even though one of them had said that Abaddon was now ruling Hell, and was, in his own words, "much scarier than Crowley had ever been."

"You're back," said a flat voice.

Sam and Dean looked up to see Kevin appearing from the hallway down which was his bedroom. His hair was a mess, his clothes were wrinkled, and he had bags under his eyes. He looked, for the second time in his life, like hell.

"Have you been reading the angel tablet?" asked Dean.

Kevin nodded.

"And?"

Kevin shrugged. "Same as."

"Kevin, it's been nine months. How could you-"

"Don't you think I know that, Dean?" snapped Kevin. "I know what's going on out there. I want to fix things just as much as you do. And I want to get away from Crowley. But I'm telling you, there is nothing on that tablet about how to put the angels back in Heaven. Not unless you want to round up a bunch of newborn babies, along with their graces, that have fallen all across the earth, and then figure out which one goes with which."

Dean sighed. "I'm sorry, Kevin. It's just..."

"Don't worry about it," said Kevin, taking a seat across the table from Sam and putting his head down. "If only Castiel hadn't been such an idiot."

Dean's jaw clenched. "Cas thought he was doing the right thing."

"Did someone say Castiel?" asked Crowley, appearing from the kitchen. "Has someone spoken to him? Is he here?"

"No, Crowley, he's not here," said Dean, rolling his eyes.

"Oh," said Crowley, obviously disappointed. "You know, I have all these demon powers and I know loads of witchcraft, and nothing I do seems to help me locate him. He doesn't have to hide. All I want to do is apologize."

"Metatron probably did something with him. Either that, or he fell like the rest and just got reborn as someone's bundle of joy. You can probably stop looking for him now, Crowley," said Sam.

"But-"

Dean slammed his beer bottle down on the table and quickly exited the room. He wasn't entirely sure when it had started, but sometime after the Fall, whenever someone mentioned Castiel, Dean's heart would start to race and he'd feel dizzy and unable to breath. He felt like he was drowning.

"Was it something I said?" Dean heard Crowley ask as his palms slipped on his bedroom door. He wiped his hands on his jeans, tried the door again, and failed. Dean slowly slid to the floor, his legs tucked beneath him. He looked upward. "Cas," the prayer came, though Dean was sure his friend could not longer hear him. "Please come back to me. I need you, man."

"We all need you."