Disclaimer: If I owned Supernatural, Gabriel would still be munching his way through the world's supply of candy. Dean'd eat pie in my house, Castiel would be my pet and Sam would be tied up (hey, at least that's canon) in bed. But alas, that is sadly not to be. No money is being made and no infringement is intended.
Plot: Castiel and Gabriel go missing and the brothers have to find them before their latest enemy does. Castiel is quite possibly in mortal danger, and frankly, Dean's not sure if he's even going to survive without him. Destiel, Sabriel. Possibly mpreg later.
A/N: A new fic, yay! Will be around 10 chapters, give or take. I can promise at the very least monthly updates, but let's hope I have more time than that. But enough of me, let's get this show on the road;
Chapter One
"Dean."
The voice felt strangely familiar as it echoed in his ears, but his eyelids still insisted on remaining closed. He felt something soft against his cheeks and felt his hand twitch to reach up and touch. He felt like he was floating, as if the ground was merely translucent. Was he flying? He tried to open his eyes again, before again drifting into his consciousness.
"Dean." The voice insisted. This time he managed to force open one of his eyes, peeking through his lashes. He heard himself gasp, as he closed the eye quickly again. What in the bloody hell was going on?
"Dean. Open your eyes."
Whatever it was did, it obviously did not intend to leave him alone. He would have to deal with it. Dean took a calming breath, flexing his fingers and willed his eyes to open again. The sight once again had him gasping.
"WHO…" He felt himself becoming breathless, the air becoming heavy, as the view left him feeling perplexed. "What are you?"
The… blue light? He couldn't quite make a shape out of it, but it seemed to tilt its head at him.
"Dean." It repeated again, as if that would explain everything. "Focus."
Dean squinted his eyes, trying to make out the contours. The voice seemed so very, very familiar…
"DEAN."
"…Cas?" Dean gasped, his brain cells finally allowing him to catch up. The blue smoke finally seemed to smile at him, in that quirky sort of way only the angel seemed to be able to do. Dean shook his head. Focus. "What's going on?"
The angel seemed to hesitate, before what he guessed was Castiel's head seemed to drop and the angel reluctantly spoke.
"I require your assistance."
"Sure, Cas. With what?" Just as Dean asked, the world around him started to change. The airy quality of his surroundings grew thicker, gaining a bluish green shade, becoming wetter. If he didn't know better, he'd say he was trapped in a sea or a lake. But how could he speak, if he was submerged in water? As if to test that theory, he tried to speak, but before he could open his mouth, a finger was pressed against his lips. Finally he could see the human shape that once was Jimmy Novak.
"Don't speak." Castiel's voice spoke directly into his head, those blue eyes staring as intensively as always into his. Dean tried to glare in question at him, still not understanding, and hating that fact. "I require your assistance. It is of utmost importance. Gabriel is in trouble. The world will burn if we do not stop her."
Dean's confusion and frustration grew. He hated being left outside the loop, especially when it meant that he didn't know how to protect his loved ones.
"I wish I could go about this differently, but you are the only one who can ch-" Castiel's eyes widened, before he simmered out of existence.
"CA-"
~O~
Dean bolted out of bed, as if struck by lightning. His skin felt ice-cold and sweaty. Wet. His mind supplied for him. Man, what was going on?
He looked around the room, looking for his brother. He found the tall shape sitting at the small table, clicking away on that infuriating, but ever so practical, laptop. His eyes seemed to go back and forth over whatever page he was looking at.
"Sammy?" He tried calling for his attention. When no reply was forthcoming, Dean sighed and tried again. "Sam."
"What?" Sam grunted in reply, not bothering to look up until he realised Dean wasn't elaborating. He glanced at his brother questioningly, scrunching up his eyes slightly as if he was preparing to measure every little thing for further analysis in that giant brain of his. "Dean?"
Dean sighed, and closed his eyes, letting his long lashes rest on his cheeks. He flexed his fingers. They felt clammy. Wet. His mind seemed to insist on it. With another sigh, he opened his eyes and met Sam's concerned ones.
"I think Cas is in trouble."
~O~
Dean paced in the small motel room, feeling very much like one of those caged animals at Zoo. After talking for a few hours, Sam had gone out to buy a very late lunch, or an early dinner. Cas was not answering his calls, and his already frayed nerves couldn't deal with this. But he hoped his inner strength, also known as the famous Winchester-stubbornness, would conquer over them and guide him through this. It didn't stop him from worrying relentlessly though.
"Cas… I thought everything was finally going to be okay. Or normal. Whatever that is. I mean, we… We killed Lucifer. Well, Gabriel finally did, on his second try. We stopped the freaking Apocalypse. The freaking big badass Devil is dead! How much higher a level of sonuvabitches are there? What monster will we have to hunt this time?"
The flutter of wings had him looking up with a quickly smashed hope.
"I find it preposterous how whiny you truly are." The British accent of the angel Balthazar met his ears, and he felt himself deflate completely with a sigh. "What joy it is to see you too." Balthazar quirked an eyebrow at him, so Dean grunted at him, not feeling up to making a more elaborate reply. Then he changed his mind. Hoping against hope once again… He stopped pacing in front of the angel.
"Did Cas send you?"
"Perhaps." Balthazar smirked. "Perhaps not." The twitching vein on Dean's forehead made him chuckle. "Such blasphemy, calling Lucifer son of a bitch."
Dean rolled his eyes. "Do you actually know anything?"
"I can not seem to make up my mind if you deserve the kind of trust Castiel has in you. You are merely a human, and hardly a flawless one at that." Balthazar sighed theatrically, glancing at his nails with an air of nonchalance over him, before finally asking. "How much do you know about the birds and the bees?"
"The birds and the bees… Are you freaking serious?!" Dean looked flabbergasted.
"Indeed I am. Trust me, this is getting somewhere. You changed something so deeply ingrained as the basic instincts of nature, when you hindered the ending of life. Everything living is trying to come back from this, for a lot of it did die and many things are forever lost. You didn't think it would be without consequences that you saved this dying world? Humans are still destroying this planet without the Powers of Heaven leading it forward."
"So what Castiel wants help with is the…"
"The Greenhouse effect. Mother Nature is pushing it along, since even the Earth itself thought it would end, it is still working on achieving that goal."
"Mother Nature is real?" At Balthazar's nod and quirked eyebrow, Dean sighed. "Why am I even surprised? Fuck, I need a drink."
"Will a lukewarm beer do?" Sam asked, as he peeked through the front door, having heard just the very last part of Dean's sentence. Dean grabbed the bag from his hands and started rummaging around it. "What's going on? Why is Balthazar here?"
"Mother Nature is still trying to destroy the world as we know it, the whole greenhouse…"
"Effect?" Sam asked, receiving a nod, before Dean let out a happy whoop at finding a large apple pie in the bag. He would definitely need it to deal with the angel. Sam smiled indulgently at his older brother's brief happiness. Dean always had so much responsibility weighing his shoulders down. More often than not, it was his fault. The rift the Apocalypse (and the fact that he chose a demon over his own brother) caused between them was slowly being mended. Before Sam could ask the angel anything further, Dean spoke up.
"So what does this have to do with Castiel?" He was getting tired of dancing around the subject, and decided to finally just ask the most essential question, "How can I help him?"
"He and Gabriel are missing. They were looking for her." At Sam's questioning face, the angel added, "Mother Nature. And as for what we need you for… Castiel said to use your profound bond to find him, if needed. And it is. Heaven is in chaos."
"But he's not answering my calls… How do I reach him?"
Balthazar's smirk looked purely sinister.
A/N: A quick question, how does everyone feel about mpreg? ;)
