Disclaimer: Supernatural and Constantine are both the properties of their respective owners and not mine. I just love them to bits.
"Dean Winchester I presume?"
"And who the hell are you?" Dean asked, peering suspiciously at the stranger on the doorstep. Behind him, he heard Sam quietly draw his knife, ready to fight.
The man outside looked around uneasily, as if afraid they were being watched. He was dressed, oddly enough, in a suit and tie, although when dean looked closer he noticed that the hems and edges of the fabric were smoking slightly, as though the man had just escaped from a burning building. In one hand, he held an enormous golden cross-shaped gun, although he seemed to have forgotten it was there. Overall, he looked tired and slightly scared, and Dean's gut instinct told him that they weren't in any danger. Still, he didn't want to let his guard down.
"My name's Constantine, John Constantine. I guess you could say that we're in the same line of work. Look, can I come in? This isn't something I can whisper through a half-open door."
"Hey, Buddy, no offense, but-" dean began, but a clatter behind him made him stop. Looking over his shoulder, he was astonished to see that Sam had dropped his knife. He was shakily lowering himself into a chair, eyes wide as her stared at the newcomer. There was a strange look on his face that Dean, if he didn't know better, might have called awe. "Sammy?"
"Let him in Dean."
"Hang on now Sam-"
"Dean just do it!" Sam snapped. His eyes darted nervously around the room, and he unconsciously began to massage the scar on his left palm. Grumpily, Dean stepped aside and allowed Constantine to hurry inside. Casually tossing his coat across a bed, the man sat across from Sam and stared at him intently.
"Do you know me?" His voice was cautious, as if he couldn't quite believe what he was hearing. Feeling somehow left out, dean stomped over to the mini-fridge and grabbed two beers. After a moment, he grudgingly picked up a third and went back to the table. Constantine accepted his with a nod of thanks, but Sam just kept staring, eyes glittering strangely in the crappy motel lighting.
"I recognize you now, once I heard the name. He used to talk about you, sometimes, when he was really furious." Sam's voice shook slightly.
"Who? Sam you're not making sense." Dean leaned against the wall and sipped his beer, trying to keep an eye on his brother and this Constantine guy at the same time.
"Him, Dean!" Sam was squeezing his hand so hard that the last inch of scab had cracked, and blood was oozing sluggishly onto the table, but he didn't seem to notice. "Lucifer. This guy cheated the Devil."
For a moment there was silence, as Dean and Constantine stared at Sam. when they spoke, it was at the same time, questions overlapping.
"Cheated the devil? Sam, how-"
"How did you know that?" Constantine nervously pushed his sleeves back, and Dean noticed two sets of thick, pearly scar tissue crisscrossing his wrists.
Sam seemed not to hear either of them, attention focused inwards. "When I was trapped, in the cage, Lucifer and Michael would fight. Sometimes Lucifer would bring up this man, Constantine. He said that Constantine was supposed to be his, should have been his, that Michael's side stole you out from under his nose." Sam too fixed his eyes on the scars.
Constantine was staring at Sam like he had two heads, breathing a little too rapid, face pale. "My god," he whispered. "The rumors are true. The apocalypse, you being trapped in the cage with Lou… that all really happened to you? Holy shit." The look he gave the Winchesters was one of pure respect.
Ignoring the other man, Dean crossed the room and grabbed Sam's shoulders, shaking them gently, then with more urgency. He knew where Sam's thought had gone, and it wasn't anyplace they should. "Sam? Sammy! Come on dude, snap out of it!"
Sam gasped and jerked away from Dean, blinking his eyes back into focus. He stood and went into the bathroom, where Dean could hear him splashing water on his face. Constantine watched curiously, but the finality in Dean's eyes warned him not to ask. Neither of them spoke until Sam rejoined them at the table, hand freshly bandaged.
"Alright now, you." Dean pointed his beer at Constantine accusingly. "How did you end up on the Devil's most wanted list?"
The man took a deep breath before responding. "When I was fifteen(?), I tried to commit suicide," he began. "I was raised a Roman Catholic." He looked at the brothers as though that should explain everything, but Dean just stared blankly back.
"And?"
"Dean, suicide is one of the worst sins a catholic can commit," Sam replied impatiently. "You commit suicide, you go straight to Hell. Fast pass, no ifs ands or buts."
"But that's so stupid!" Dean argued. "Why the hell would you be damned automatically like that? And besides, he's not dead." Dean waved the beer bottle again for emphasis. Sam rolled his eyes and gave Constantine a long-suffering look, which cause the older man to briefly crack a smile. However, he sobered as he continued his story.
"I was, technically. I flat-lined in the ambulance. They resuscitated me in under a minute but, well, you both know how long a minute is." Dean and Sam both flinched, almost imperceptibly, but Constantine continued as if he hadn't noticed.
"After that, I knew I was damned for all time, but I also knew I was never going to be trapped there if I could help it. So I became a hunter. I thought if I could exorcise enough demons I could maybe earn myself a heavenly get-out-of-jail-free card. Not that that worked."
"So what, you figured slicing your wrists again would somehow cancel out the first time?" Dean interrupted.
"Dean!"
"No Sam, it's alright." Constantine gave Dean a thin smile. "Nothing like that, I'm not an idiot. It's a long story though, and not why I'm here. All you need to know is that I finally did something good enough to get me off the hook. Literally." This time Constantine gave a malicious little grin at their uncomfortable shuffling.
"Ok, sure, I'll buy that. But why are you here? From the sound of it, you're pretty good at what you do. Why do you need our help?" Dean kept his voice steady, but a curl of apprehension was rising inside him.
"I don't need your help. I've-" the man hesitated. "I've found something that belongs to you." Constantine dug in the pocket of his pants for a minute, then produced a tangled, foul-smelling knot of something and dropped it on the table.
Dean saw that there was some kind of cord there, which seemed to be tangled around one of those plastic bracelets that they give hospital patients. He was about to ask Constantine why he thought these were their problem when Sam's hand shot out. Wordlessly, he held up a small gold object, which dean realized was an amulet. Looking closer, he saw that it wasn't just any amulet either. The last time he had seen this amulet, it had been sitting forlornly in a trash can in some motel, where he had dumped it after Cas gave up. Of all the places it could have gone, it ended up in some random hunter's pocket?
With numb fingers, Dean picked up the bracelet, which was warped and blackened. Tilting it carefully, he could just make out the stark black lettering, half-ruined.
Novak, James 819834
Male, DOB 6/- - -
Bootbock Menta- - -
The rest of the lettering was obscured by how warped and sooty the bracelet was. Cas. Something squeezed inside his chest, and he had to clear his throat several times before anything would come out.
"Where did you find this?" Dean's voice shook a little, but he didn't notice.
Constantine hesitated slightly. "I have this… ability I guess you would call it. I don't know why, but since I was brought back in that ambulance, I've been able to kind of… slip through the cracks between here and Hell." Sam exhaled softly and Dean raised his eyebrows, but when neither spoke Constantine continued. "Sometimes, depending on the job, I have to go there. On my last case, I accidentally stumbled across an enormous lakebed. It was empty except for a man, at the very center, who was surrounded by demons and hellhounds."
"What did he look like?" Dean interrupted urgently. Constantine narrowed his eyes and glared at Dean.
"He was in Hell, Dean. What do you think he looked like?" Constantine saw pain flash behind Dean's eyes and sighed softly. "He was tall, maybe, with dark hair? I couldn't see very well, he was far away and I didn't want to risk going closer because of the demons."
"You didn't try to save him?"
Constantine's patience snapped. "Dammit Dean, just because I'm there doesn't mean I can save everyone, or anyone! I'm just an observer. I didn't even know who it was, for all I knew he was a serial rapist and he deserved it!"
Dean looked away, face flushed, and didn't respond. Sam moved his hand as if to give his shoulder a reassuring squeeze, but stopped himself. Nodding at Constantine, he prompted, "Okay, so there was this guy. What happened?"
"He saw me, somehow, or sensed me, I don't know. He kind of stretched his arm out to me." Constantine demonstrated. "There was this blast of cool, fresh air, and a kind of rushing, fluttering noise, and then the bracelet hit me in the chest, with the amulet around it. That was when the demons around him noticed me and I had to escape. I tried to go back, but I could never find the place again, like it kept moving."
"And so you just assumed that helping some guy being tortured in Hell deliver a psych ward bracelet was the right course of action?" Dean's voice was rough.
"Actually, it's happened before," Constantine replied, but didn't elaborate.
After a second Sam asked, "But still, how did you know that it was for us?" Wordlessly, Constantine gestured at dean to turn the bracelet over.
Smeared in ugly red-brown across the back were the words "Dean Winchester" and a single bloody fingerprint. As Dean traced the marks with his finger, his left shoulder prickled, although the scarred handprint was long gone. A rushing sound filled his ears that had nothing to do with angel wings.
"I have to go," Dean said abruptly, dropping the bracelet on the table like it had burned him. Sam tried to say something but Dean was already out the door, the Impala's engines roaring as it sped off into the night.