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Chapter #1
The hotel room was quiet and Dean couldn't sleep. He tossed and turned but in the end he couldn't seem to will himself to slip into unconsciousness. He was like a fussy baby and knew what he needed.
So, he grabbed his car keys and drove the Impala out on to the open road. It was 11:30 p.m. He had been trying to get to sleep for almost an hour, but he had been too uptight in the motel. In the Impala he was the king, and the open space of the world soothed his crowded mind. There was more place for his thoughts to roam, and roam they did.
They roamed in between the past, the present, and they tried to imagine the future. Usually he would be fine with that. Think about life, ponder the meaning of the universe, and let the hum and rhythm of his baby lull him into a peace that tossing and turning never could. Usually these drives were the therapy he needed, but tonight wasn't the night.
He didn't want to remember the past, and he didn't want to think about the future. He picked up a cassette tape at random and shoved it into the tape deck. No radio, just the loud and thumping base of hard rock.
But it wasn't working. He was still stuck in the city limits and everywhere he was reminded of what he was trying to forget.
Christmas lights were hung up on the houses. Nativity scenes were lit up so that you could see them in the night. Shops were open late so that last minute shoppers could get their presents. It was Christmas Eve and Dean just wanted to forget. Christmas wasn't his kind of holiday.
He kept driving until he left the town behind him. He would keep driving in a straight line until he finally numbed himself to the holiday cheer, and then he would turn around and slip back into the room like nothing had happened, like he didn't know the next day might be a day of holiday cheer for everyone else, but for the Winchester family it would be just another day. Another day to find a hunt, kill a monster, and save some lives.
Dean shook his head from dreary thoughts and started to sing with the song, let the song take him away.
After he flipped the tape and started the B-side Dean felt his eyelids drooping and knew he had finally become appropriately numb. It was just him, the trees, the road, and that's when Cas suddenly popped into the passenger seat amongst a sound of rustling angle wings.
"Dean I'm sorry for interrupting but-" Cas was cut off as the car swerved too close to the ditch. "You need to pay better attention to the road."
Dean gripped the wheel with both hands and gave Cas a sidelong and withering look. "My driving is perfectly fine. You're the reason I nearly went off the road, don't scare me like that Cas."
"You're right I shouldn't have just dropped in on you like that, but it's only because it's important."
"I guess so, it's almost midnight. What do you need?"
"Crowley's up to something."
Dean smiled without humor and brought the car to a stop so he could turn around in the middle of the deserted high way. "Of course he is. What is it this time? He wants to find the lost city of Atlantis because purgatory didn't match up to his expectations?"
"How'd you know?"
Dean just looked over at Cas and waited for him to start laughing and saying that it was a joke, but Cas was never good at joking. "You're serious?"
"Why else would I have said it if I wasn't serious?"
Dean just nodded his head. "Is there really an Atlantis?"
"I don't have any information that would point other wise."
"Alright. I guess we have to find Atlantis. When we get back to the motel we'll wake up Sam and get started on the research."
"I could just transport us there."
"No, that's okay. I'm sure it'll take Crowley longer to find Atlantis than the twenty minutes it'll take me to drive back. This is one drive I'd like to complete. I'll meet you there if you just want to wake up Sammy and get started without me."
Cas tilted his head as if a different angle would provide him with the information as to why Dean wasn't acting normally. But the answer didn't come. "You're different Dean."
"Yeah well," he looked at the dashboard. It read 12:01. "Merry Christmas."
Cas sat up straighter and decided that some mysteries weren't meant to be solved, and Dean Winchester was just one confusing mystery. "I'll meet you back at the motel."
Sam started off dreaming about nothing. It was just him and a soothing blackness, but then the dream morphed into a nightmare. From the darkness a long wail cam through and Sam found himself trying to find the source but he couldn't because there was nothing around him except the never ending blackness. The thing wailing would have to find him, and it did.
A moose slowly walked into his realm of vision and it sounded sad, maybe even hurt. Sam started walking towards the creature but that was the wrong decision. The moose's wails stopped as he locked eyes with Sam while the tall man began to approach. Then he lifted his hoof and pawed at the ground like a charging bull.
That's when Sam's comforting dream of nothingness turned into a nightmare of him being chased by a moose. Why was he even dreaming about moose? When was the last time he had even seen a moose?
And then in the middle of being chased by a gigantic moose an earthquake hits. The grounds shaking and Sam almost looses his footing. Then a voice starts to boom from above. "Sam… Sam you need to wake up… Sam…"
Sam startled awake and found Cas shaking his shoulder. "What are you doing here?"
"Dean said to come ahead early so that we can get started on research."
Sam rubbed a hand across his face. The clock said 12.02. "What's going on?"
"Crowley is trying to find Atlantis."
Sam just stared at Cas but he took the silence that came afterwards as Cas' way of saying he was being very serious. "Alright, what should we start looking for?"
"I thought we should start with the beginning of the lore."
"Plato? You want to start reading Plato?"
Cas nodded his head. "I know Greek so I picked up a copy on my way here. I was hoping that you two could use your hunter resources to find some other information."
Sam swung his legs onto the ground and that's when he noticed Dean's empty bed. Yeah, it was Christmas. "Well, the news that Atlantis is a real thing is a surprise to me. I don't think any of the other hunters are going to know anything." But Cas' face held the hope of someone who needed this to work, and Sam knew he'd end up giving Garth a call even though he thought it would be a waste of time. On second thought, maybe Dean could make that call. Garth seemed to get along with Dean better.
Sam found his laptop and stared at the blank search box. "What am I doing here Cas? What could be so important that this can't wait until morning?"
"There's an energy source in Atlantis that Crowley wants to get, and we can't let him have it."
Sam sighed and decided the straight forward approach was best. Where is Atlantis. It might have brought up some crazy search results, but he dealt with crazy too often to be put off now.
A few minutes later Cas broke the silence. "Dean was different when I talked to him." Sam just nodded his head as he tried to understand the musings of some guy who was potentially high while writing this particular internet article. "Why?"
Sam looked up at Cas who was sitting ram rod straight in the chair across from him. "Why is he so different tonight?" Cas nodded his head. "Well, it's Christmas. We've never had a good Christmas before. We don't tend to celebrate the holiday because of things like this." He pointed to his computer screen.
Cas shook his head. "You must have had some kind of good Christmas before."
"One. That was during Dean's last year before he went to hell as payment for bringing me back. I think he might still want to celebrate it, but there just aren't any good memories from our childhood. Honestly we don't know how to have a good Christmas."
Cas stared at him, and then slowly nodded his head. Sam went back to the laptop.
The door opened and Dean came in. "So you heard the good news Sammy? Atlantis is a real thing."
Sam smiled. "Yep, another impossibility that we'll have to make possible."
Dean pulled out the final chair around the table and plopped down Plato's Atlantis, that he bought at one of the stores that had still been open. He looked over at Cas. "I guess we had the same idea."
Cas nodded his head. And he would start reading again in another moment. He would get back to this mission, but at this moment his mind was trying to process how someone couldn't have a single good Christmas. He knew the Winchester's hadn't had the best kind of childhood, but still, they should have had one good Christmas.
Maybe they just didn't remember, and since this was Christmas, and Cas was an angel that could time travel, he decided he would find that good Christmas because the Winchesters deserved something good.
