Prologue
Life is a curious thing. We spend the time given to us searching for the "whole meaning of it" and more often than not it slips right past it. We ignore the simplest of answers even when they are placed directly in front of us. I asked my father once what it meant to waste one's life and he told me rather simply that no life is ever wasted. "We all serve our part", like actors on a stage we play our roles. Occasionally though, some of us decided to throw out the script and make up are own lines. "We can't all be heroes kiddo, but if you can meet your death knowing that at least one thing on this earth has been made better by you then your life has meaning." I never expected much out of myself but my father had. He told me he knew I'd grow up to do great things and live such a life that death would tremble at the thought of taking me. Sadly I haven't done a very good job at holding up my end.
It wasn't from a lack of trying, I really did attempt to do something good with my life. Nursing school straight out of high school, volunteering, I even gave countless stray cats a home. By home I mean my home. I've always kind of been a cat lady. Then these two strangers walked into my life and everything changed. I was still a nurse of sorts, my clientele had just changed. I suppose being a hunter was just another step in my whole pay it forward life style.
Dean is saving my life as I stand in front of a crowd, knees trembling while the noose around my neck begins to prickle. After that Dean's watching me in horror as the Son of Perdition sends me flying across the room. Dislodged piece of piping tearing it's way through my insides. All around me are the sounds of cracks, my ribs snapping as they go. It's a shame, Dean and I had finally became friends.
Honestly, of all the things I've done in my life dying has got to be the most unusual. No one could really explain it to you, there's no true way to describe it, it's just something you have to experience to understand. You might as well ask someone what heaven looks like. There are few things in life that belong completely to ourselves. Death and whatever comes after, well that's entirely up to you. There is a great kindness and love that comes with being with someone as they pass. Still, when it really comes down to it, we all die alone.
For a moment the fog in my mind is lifted. Outside the city bustles by, utterly unaware that my survival rate has just dropped to zero. The dilapidated ceiling, wires, and outlets sticking out of the cracks in the wall are our only audience. Dean is doing his best to keep it together but I can see the panic growing inside him. Fear shining out of those big hazel eyes beautiful in that way that they hardly seem real. Frozen in shock we stare at each other, not sure which is worst, being impaled against a wall or the ripping off the band aid moment when you pull yourself free. The way he's looking at me I know he needs my approval or at least some acknowledgment of what's he's about to do. Half in shock I manage a nod. Inhaling deeply he grips me firmly by the shoulders and yanks me forward. The scream that shreds its way out of my lungs sounds inhuman. The dying yelp of an animal struck by a fast moving vehicle.
Mortality at it's finest.
Like a sack of bricks I slump heavily against Dean's chest. No sooner as he caught me that the room begins to spin.
"Look at me!" Dean demands as he stands over me, my vision gradually coming into focus. The building were standing in wont be here tomorrow. With Lucifer and Michael in their respectable vessels tomorrows show down will most likely torch half the planet and Detroit will be leveled to a wasteland of smoldering rumble. People will get up in the morning to go about their lives, get dressed, drive to work and in one brief second cease to exist completely. No body really understands it, we just do our jobs, and die.
That, or the Croatoan virus will eat its way through ninety percent of the population turning them into cannibalistic freaks. 2004 version Dawn of the Dead, none of that slow moving bull shit. These bastards will run at you in a full sprint and once your bit your done. After that you have a very small window of time in which to off yourself before your brain begins to boil and your friends start to look tasty.
With his hands pressed against the gaping hole in my side Dean tries to stop the bleeding. Its a fruitless attempt seeing that even if the bleeding were to stop my eternal organs are far beyond repair. In sort of sick fascination I keep an eye on the pool of crimson as it spreads further across my chest. This shirt had a pattern to it but I can't remember it now. Gathering me in his arms Dean and I travel down the dilapidated hallway, the constant dripping of my blood leaving a gruesome trail behind us.
When I was a child my father and I visited my grandmother in the nursing home nearly every weekend. Those trips were never very heartwarming but one in particular always stood out. I'm still not sure what it was, intuition or just coincidence, but when my father and I left that day I knew it be the last time we'd ever see my grandmother alive. The phone rang at 8:14 that night and just like that she was dead. One second here and the next gone. From the tips of my toes to my forehead I can feel the chemical reactions inside me.
Five minutes to heart failure.
Five minutes to evacuate soul.
Five minutes till nothing at all.
"Wait." Dean's arm's are wrapped beneath me, holding me halfway inside is jacket. My voice is weak bundle of words as my head bounces against his shoulder with every heavy step. "Please wait." I can hear the sound of a door being kicked open as cool outside air fills my lungs. Everybody assumes the reason for oxygen mask on airplanes is so that passengers can breathe in the case of a crash, but actually that's just a front. Truth is oxygen can get you high if consumed in a high concentration. Right before you die you begin to take deep panicked breaths, do this long enough and you'll eventually become docile and accept your fate. "I don't want to die running." I mutter into Dean's chest as we hurry down the alley, boots echoing hard against the concrete.
"You're not going to die." Dean says confidently. Over the last handful of months I've became a great decipher of the many voices of Dean Winchester. He has his normal everyday gruff, followed by his what I like to call the "I'm not wearing hockey pads" deep batman voice and lastly this; the bitter hopelessness that comes when he knows he's lying to a friend. Odd, here I am the one dying and I feel guilty. The idea of leaving him given what just happened, well another loss is the last thing this poor guy needs. Not to mention I had recently became aware of the fact that I was possibly falling in love with him.
"Bet you the impala your wrong." Timing has never been a strong point of mine and my attempt at a bad joke falls just short of tasteless. Doesn't really surprise me, Deans never been very good with goodbyes. His track record with farewells has been anything but prudish. Normally they end in blood and tonight I am no exception. I nudge him in the side and try to catch his attention but he quickly adverts his eyes.
"Don't do that." He says despairingly while searching in his pocket for his phone.
"Do what?" I ask I reach into my jacket and hand him mine instead. He nearly drops it as it passes from my hand to his. The smooth glass screen is streaked with blood and he's doing his best not to fumble with it. I hear the phone ring once before Bobby picks up on the other end.
"What's going on?"
"Bring the car now!"
"Dean-"
"Now!"
With his back pressed against the alley wall Dean takes a quick scan of our surroundings. That's when I feel it, that first jolt, the screech of tires right before a crash. My body jerks and that warm searing pain engulfs me. Arms wrapped around me we slide our way to the ground. My blood boils and freezes all at once. We're down to three minutes.
With his palm against my cheek Dean pulls me closer. Pressed this close to him I can feel his shoulders raise in a deep inhale then jerk, jerk,jerk their way back down. He's beginning to see just how all of this will end. I had driven the poor man crazy with our arguments over where to eat, fighting over who would drive, basically everything we could bicker about. But he was about to have to add me to the long list of people he'd been unable to save. If I knew how this would all turn out I would've preferred to have died in the run down apartment upstairs. These long goodbyes are always worst.
With trembling fingers I grip the collar of his jacket and pull it close against my cheeks. The skin on my hands looks thin and pale under the moonlight. Inside my mind a search for something to say, a way to tell him the truth without burdening him with it. Moments like this though make it damn near impossible to think straight. When your time is running out everything begins to seem overwhelming. The big picture is blinding, the little details deafening.
"If you were planning on telling me anything deep and meaningful" I mumble weakly into his neck. "I'd suggest you get started."
"What are you talking about?" He asks, adjusting his grip on me and trying to sound casual. "It's not even that bad." My mouth taste the way your hands do the after you've been counting change. Shaking my head in disagreement my chin is abruptly decorated with crimson spots. Any hope you have of living tends to go out the window right around the time you start coughing up blood. Gently he thumbs away the blood. This is when I feel the tears because in this moment my life matters for nothing. "It's not that bad." He assures me again, this time sounding even more bleak than before.
My heart feels weak and heavy, but everywhere else the pain is ebbing away. The seconds fly away and every second seems somehow colder. "Holly. Holly!" I can hear Dean's voice in my ear but it seems at to great a distance to reply. Tires squeal as the Impala rounds the corner before coming to a halt next to us. My eyes flicker at the headlights, car doors screeching loudly at being forced open too quickly. Glancing up I look at the stars one last time. They're so far away that by the time their light has reached us its already burnt out. My father once told me that all we ever see of stars are their old memories. I blink and they're gone. Two minutes.
We're in the backseat now. I've spent so many of my last days in this car that it almost seems poetic that I would die in it. Hopefully it won't ruin the interior. Dean's hands feel warm against my cold skin as they push down firmly. Seeing him trying to slow the bleeding is like watching someone try to carry water in the palm of their hands. No matter how hard he tries it continues slipping through. When I look down I see nothing but red. Red shirt, red jacket, red hands. Even the longest ends of my gold hair are now a deep shade of scarlet. There's a darkness when you die that comes without a warning. Its as if the dimmer on your life is being turned down. One second you're trying to hold on, the next your just letting go.
Tight arms tighten around me, this is it. Castiel turns to me from where he sits in the opposite window seat. A hand on my foot, his blue eyes all knowing if any one else knew for certain that I was a goner it was him. His power sources may be depleted but he's still a angle of the Lord, even if his parents did sort of kick him out. I'm piercing the veil and seeing things with clarity. Even with his hard exterior he still seems solemn at my passing. In the front Bobby's driving like a manic but I catch his eyes glancing back at me through the rear view mirror. "I'm gonna take care of you." Dean's breath his hot as he speaks softly against my ear. "We're gonna get you patched up."
Tick tock
I'm running on fumes. I want to tell them something that they can hold on to, anything to give them hope but there's no room for it. We are all at the bottom together. I'm no poet, there is nothing I could say to make this situation any better. Sams gone full dark side from saying yes. The apocalypse hasn't been adverted and there's a good chance I'll meet all of them on the other side tomorrow. We all knew this was the most likely consequence of our actions, but damn we tried.
Tick tock
The light is fading. I can hear the wind howling outside. This is it. With what little strength I can muster I find Dean's blood stained hand in the dark and squeeze it. I have his full attention but as quickly as I open my mouth to speak my thoughts fly apart.
One minute to heart failure.
One minute to evacuate soul.
One minute till its all over.
Its so dark now, so cold. I'm reaching for the last bit of life in me, but I fall. Somewhere in the distance my train is pulling in. My eyes close and I can hear the sound of my name but it's too late. Always has been and always will be.
My name is Holly Owens, most people start their stories off at the beginning but I always found that a little too David Copperfield for my taste. My life never made much sense or followed much of a schedule anyways. I was twenty three when I died on a city street in Detroit a day before the Apocalypse.
Talk about cutting it close.
There would be no obituary or condolence cards. Just a small funeral under a tree in Barton Hollow Alabama. Sam and Dean did end up doing the impossible and casting Lucifer back into his cage. In the grand scheme of things it was for the better of humanity, not so much for our little miss fit gang. This was it, the proper point for my story to end. Bobby would go back to hunting and Dean would finally get the nice perfectly boring life he wanted. But God brought Castiel back and Castiel has his connections.