Saturday Afternoon With the Angels
Rating: PG-13/T
Genre: Humor
Summary: Things had not gone well last time. Sam had no reason to think that this would be any better. Warning for strong language in some places.
Author's Note: YESH, I wanted to do a sequel. It's one of the few stories I have where I write Cas and Rachel as brother and sister rather than lovers.
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. It belongs to Eric Kripke.
()()
"… I'm just saying that it would be nice if for once you could give some consideration to your words before you let them out of your mouth."
"How was I supposed to know she was a nun?"
"A postulant, Dean. She was trying to get into the nunnery. And the veil she was wearing might have been a hint!"
"It was white!"
"Postulants have white veils, Dean, official nuns wear black!"
"Well excuse me, Dorky-Mc-Dorkerton, but I don't- HOLY MOTHERFUCKER OF THE FUCKING-!"
Sam thought that that particular wording was oddly appropriate (or inappropriate, if you were not yet immune to Dean) for their conversation. He had about two seconds to consider that before grabbing the dashboard and door of the Impala with an iron grip as it swerved dangerously on the road.
Now, if they were on a dirt back road or even a routinely-but-not-constantly-used street, this might not have been a problem.
However, Sam and Dean had just broken out of a long stint of traffic that was still very pressing around them at noon in Boston. As Dean had so smartly stated, "Is every Dick and Jane in the damn city on their freakin' lunch break? MOVE IT ASSHOLE!" Followed by a long press on the car horn.
Dean did not do well with traffic. Not well at all.
And having a couple of angels pop up in the back of the car without any semblance of warning did not help that fact.
Castiel looked unaffected, possibly apologetic that he'd made Dean swerve so violently. Rachel looked, in a word, unhappy.
"What did you just say?" Once the blood in Sam's ears stopped pounding and he had a chance to think, he realized that Dean's alarmed profanity might loosely be interpreted as (or the beginnings of) blasphemy, and blasphemy seemed to be one of Rachel's 'do-not-push' points. She had a few of those.
Dean, however, did not seem to be in the mood for her temper. He had one all his own, thank you very much. Pulling over into the breakdown lane with a loud screech, he whirled around to face her.
"I said Holy motherfucker of the fucking fuckers, because that's what you say when two angels pop up in the back of your damn car without any freaking warning!"
"What would you like us to do? Sound the heavenly choirs every time we're about to descend to earth?" Rachel snapped back.
"Sure thing, sweetheart, just make sure you aren't one of the ones in the choir, because I can only imagine what a banshee like you would sound like when it sings!" Rachel puffed up with anger and moved to retort, but Castiel cut in.
"Rachel has a lovely voice." He said it with that same 'I-don't-quite-understand-what-you-mean-please-clarify' voice and expression that he usually used when he was taking Dean more literally than he should. Rachel looked flattered and slightly mollified, whereas Dean merely rolled his eyes and turned back around to let his head fall to rest on the steering wheel.
And then they heard the siren.
"Oh fuck me," Dean growled, bringing his head up abruptly. "See what you did? We're getting pulled over!"
Now both Castiel and Rachel looked confused. "We're already… 'Pulled over'." Rachel said, motioning vaguely with her hand towards the car and the guardrail visible out the right-hand window.
"Dean- Just don't." Sam cut him off quickly before he could snap back, popping open the glove compartment and pulling out the registration, handing it to his brother. He wasn't entirely certain that Castiel and Rachel were aware of their tentative status with law enforcement, and that it would be better if this incident went by unnoticed and undocumented.
Meaning that it would be better if Dean didn't respond to Rachel's observation, because that might lead to the kind of display where an officer might feel obliged to take certain actions.
Actions that could get him killed. Or maimed.
Dean rolled down the window and looked straight ahead, expression still dark as the officer leaned down and looked inside, flicking over Dean, then Sam, then Cas and Rachel. "Afternoon, folks. Everything all right? You swerved pretty hard back there." He seemed to be looking for an answer from Dean in particular, but he didn't respond, and so Sam sighed and elbowed him.
"We're fine, officer."
"It was our fault," Castiel supplied, and Sam held his breath and hoped that he would keep it short and sweet because it was usually when Cas spoke at length that people started to realize how unusual he was. "We accidentally surprised Dean." Sam pointed to his brother indicatively and nodded.
"That so?"
"Yes. Arrest me before I kill them." Dean growled tightly.
The officer, thankfully, took that as a joke. "All righty then. Are you folks from out of state?"
"Yes sir." Sam said.
"Right then, I'll let you off this time, but you should know there's a mandatory seatbelt law in Massachusetts, so buckle up."
"Of course. Thank you." The officer nodded, tipped his hat and went back to his car. Sam let out a long breath as Dean flipped the key in the ignition. "Dean, Cas, Rachel- Seat belts."
"I'm thirty-frickin'-two, Sam, I'm not putting on my frickin' seatbelt."
"If that cop has friends up the road, he might have them on the lookout to make sure we did as he said Dean, stop acting like a five year-old and just do it." He glanced back, then did a double-take when he saw twin expressions of confusion from the two angelic beings in the back.
"You have no idea what a seatbelt is, do you?"
"No."
"None."
Sam heard a slight thunk. Dean had dropped his head onto the steering wheel again.
"You can't take a guess?" He snarled.
Sam motioned to the belts on either side of the angels. "Yeah- And then the little metal part on the buckle right there goes into that bit down beside you. Yeah."
"It's not going in."
"It's not?"
"No."
"Jesus-please-us-"
Castiel's arm flew out sharply, catching Rachel in the chest as she lunged forward to assault Dean. Her brother then proceeded to push her back against the seat as he adjusted her dysfunctional belt buckle and snapped her in. She glared at him.
"I could snap this if I wanted to."
"You break any part of my baby and I'm roasting your wings in a bonfire of holy oil!" Dean hissed, head shooting up and whipping around to glare dangerously at her.
"Maybe it would be better if no one talked for a bit!" Sam hissed, slouching in his seat and cringing in expectation of a possible Doom-Blast from the back, only reaching over to jerk Dean back towards the road.
For five minutes, there was total silence.
Dean was death-glaring the road, and Sam could practically feel Rachel's gaze burning through the back of his seat. He risked a glance in the rearview mirror and saw that her arms were crossed. Castiel was alternating between staring straight ahead and glancing almost nervously at his sister. It suddenly occurred to Sam that he had no idea if Rachel was older or younger than Castiel, or if they were about the same age.
Castiel was the first to break the silence.
"Dean."
Dean sucked in a deep, deep breath.
"Yes, Cas?"
"The silence in unnerving. May I turn on the radio?"
Dean shut his eyes, and then quickly flipped them open again when he remembered he was driving.
"Fine."
And so Cas turned on the radio.
As it was, he'd done this the angel-way, which involves very little movement.
As such, Dean would later realize that he should have taken into consideration the idea that the station that flipped on would not be the classic rock one that he usually had the radio tuned to.
The radio sprang to life, a lot louder than Dean remembering it being when he'd last had it on-
"IT'S FRI-DAY, FRI-DAY, GOTTA GET DOWN ON FRI-DAY-"
"SHUT IT OFF!"
()()
About half an hour later, when they were nearly to the motel in Wakefield they'd frequented in the past, Sam deemed Dean's temper diminished enough for conversation again.
"So what are you guys doing here?"
"We believe we may have located one of the weapons that Balthazar sold off before the bulk of them were returned." Castiel said.
"I thought he brought all of them back." Dean stated, eyes narrowing.
"You clearly overestimate our brother's ability to efficiently complete a task." Rachel snipped, arms re-crossed (She'd loosened up enough to uncross them at one point after the incident earlier).
"He brought most of the weapons." Castiel defended.
"He should have brought them all."
"He couldn't keep track of all of them."
"He wouldn't have to if he'd never stolen and then sold them in the first place."
Dean said nothing out loud, but Sam could tell he agreed. The motel was right up ahead, and Dean sighed, signaling and turning into the parking lot. Getting out of the car would give him a chance to get a healthy distance away from She-Bitch. Sam likewise unbuckled his seatbelt with the intention of dashing out of the Impala as soon as it stopped moving; not because Rachel in particular was worrying him, but because she and Castiel seemed to have descended into a semi-private argument that he was quite certain he and Dean weren't meant to be listening to.
"I don't know why you stick up for him-"
"He's our brother-"
"Yes, and what a wonderful brother he's been: Stealing the weapons, running away, abandoning us to Raphael and making us think he was dead-"
"Not everyone can handle that kind of upheaval, Rachel, he probably wasn't the only one-"
"I'm pretty certain he's the only one who stole countless weapons that could have given us the advantage over Raphael-"
Dean and Sam jumped out of the Impala and met around back by the trunk.
"Damn. The phrase 'old married couple' jumps to mind." Dean grumbled.
"Or 'really dysfunctional young couple'." Sam agreed quietly.
The siblings suddenly appeared beside them, thankfully appearing to not have heard what the brothers had said. They were giving each other almost cold looks, and Sam felt his stomach turn; when he and Dean got into it, they threw punches and wrestled. When Castiel and Rachel got into it, things would probably be blown up.
"So," Sam said nervously. "What are we doing?"
"We're waiting for-" Castiel stopped, blinked, and then nodded at something. The younger Winchester turned around and saw a familiar blonde angel standing near the entrance to the check-in area. Sam winced; Rachel and Dean in the same room were bad enough.
Balthazar mockingly threw up his arms in greeting. "Boys!"
"Oh, for the love of God-"
CRACK.
Dean howled in pain and doubled over, clutching his skull as it pounded with a vengeance from the strike Rachel had laid on it.
"Don't blaspheme!" She snarled.
"Go straight to-"
Sam grabbed Dean, Castiel grabbed Rachel, and together they frog-marched their siblings towards a very amused Balthazar.
()()
"So, can I take it your ride up was pleasant?"
"These two got us pulled over." Dean jerked his head towards Castiel and Rachel. "Cas and the one with human issues."
"I don't have human issues, I have Dean Winchester issues!" Rachel spat.
"And I've got issues with angels that have massive sticks shoved up their-"
"ALL RIGHT!"
Everyone jumped and stared at Castiel, who was huffing and puffing slightly as he tried to come down from the rage. "Balthazar, did you find the weapon or not?"
"Not quite." The other four stared at him with rapidly growing expressions of dark fury (they'd been stuck in a car together for over half an hour for this?), and he quickly put up his hands. "Better! Better than that! I found out the fellow managed to collect another of the angelic weapons. Cuts down the search a bit."
"But now we have two very dangerous weapons that may potentially be used against us." Castiel said. "Which one did he find?"
Balthazar winced slightly. "That's actually why I called in some backup. He found the Lion's Thorn."
"The what?" Sam and Dean exchanged looks.
"The Lion's Thorn. It's a piece of ivory enchanted to send anyone it makes skin-contact with go into a completely violent rage. I take it you've heard of the Aesop fable with the mouse and the lion?"
"Yeah, the mouse pulls the thorn out of the lion's paw." Dean's brow furrowed.
"I thought the mouse saved the lion from hunters." Balthazar waved his hands vaguely.
"The tales vary from source to source. The point is, anyone who makes skin-to-skin contact with this item starts rampaging like an angry, injured lion until someone pries it off them."
"Uh…" Sam shut his eyes for a moment, then reopened them. "…Maybe I'm just playing the role of the stupid human-"
Rachel opened her mouth, glancing pointedly in Dean's direction, and Castiel elbowed her so sharply in the ribs that she clutched them and started to cough.
"…but what use could that possibly have for an angel?"
"It's not a controlled rage," Balthazar supplied, taking a sip from the full wine glass he always seemed to be carrying. "It's more or less like a tornado- Attacks anything that happens to be in front of it, but it can't focus on a target. You throw the Thorn at someone in battle and they become a complete mess."
"Okay…" Sam thought for a moment. "So… Why did you need to get us involved? If it's angelic weaponry, you guys would be the best ones to handle it, right?"
Castiel and Rachel looked up from their silent in-argument to observe Balthazar closely, and it then occurred to Sam that Balthazar had not, judging from their expressions, told them everything when he'd called to them.
"Yes, Balthazar," Rachel asked, tone suspicious. "Why did you feel the need to get them involved?"
"…They're my friends?"
"EH!" Dean imitated a game-show buzzer with surprising accuracy. "Try again, Wino." Balthazar gave the older Winchester brother a look of simmering hatred and rolled his eyes in a defeated manner, flinching slightly.
"It's… The Silver Nimbus."
His siblings' expressions were alarmingly blank in the seconds after he said that.
"Silver Nimbus?"
"A nimbus is a halo, right?" Sam asked, and Balthazar nodded. His glass was empty and he was now tapping it almost anxiously. "What's it do?"
"It contains a large amount of stored grace, which comes in handy when fighting an opponent you're not at equal strength with, or when you need a relatively small boost in power for some other reason." He was not looking at Castiel.
"…And again, we factor into this how?" Dean motioned to himself and Sam.
Balthazar chuckled weakly, almost nervously, and Dean saw him shoot a somewhat wary look at Rachel (logical; she would seem like the one that would cause him severe physical harm). "Did I, ah, mention that it cloaks the holder so that they're completely undetectable to angels?" Castiel and Rachel both glared evilly at their brother while Dean and Sam mulled over that for a moment.
"…Why the hell would you guys make a weapon like that?"
"It was meant to protect members of the Host from the Fallen." Castiel growled. "I cannot believe, that of all the things you could sell, you had to choose that. Are you completely incapable of foresight?"
"That always was more of Gabriel's talent."
"Can I hurt him?" Rachel asked Castiel bluntly. "Please?"
Dean and Sam were surprised to see that Cas seemed to be giving that some serious thought.
"Only if we can't get those weapons back." Castiel said flatly.
Balthazar might have paled slightly, and from the way Rachel was glaring at him, Dean and Sam were not curious as to why.
()()
Not unlike the last time they'd met together, Sam went out for food.
This time, however, Castiel remained in the room with Dean and Rachel to make sure that he didn't come home to the same scene as the last time (Rachel pinning Dean to the ground and pushing his face into the carpet). And this time, Balthazar accompanied Sam out of the room, likely to escape his very angry brother and sister for at least a little while. Sam did not look thrilled about his company.
Dean flipped on the TV to Cartoon Network and threw the remote down on the bed. "There, Looney Tunes: Sit down, watch and mull over the purpose of ridiculous TV programs like you did last time."
Rachel gave Dean an absolutely ugly look and, to her gratification, he flinched; he knew that look well enough by now. But apparently the idea of being clothes-lined by Cas again like she'd been in the car was unappealing, because she sat down on the end of the bed and glared at the TV (Said glare softened against her will as the antics of Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck went into full-swing).
"It's rabbit season!"
"Duck season."
"Rabbit season!"
"Duck season."
"Rabbit season."
"Rabbit season."
"I SAY IT'S DUCK SEASON, AND I SAY FIRE!"
BLAM.
Rachel's lip may have twitched. Dean and Castiel observed passively from the kitchen area. "She's easily amused." Dean muttered.
"No she isn't. This is just oddly entertaining to her."
"Five year-olds laugh at the Looney Tunes. She's easily entertained."
"She's an angel of the lord highly unfamiliar with humanity's sense of humor. I promise you, in heaven, Rachel is very hard to placate when she's bored."
"I heard that."
"I know you did."
For the first time, Dean's eyes flipped between the two and he actually got a feeling of genuine-brother-sister-ness rather than generic-angel-siblinghood.
"So are you really going to keelhaul Balthazar if we can't get those weapons back?" Or one of us dies trying?
"I fully intend to." Here, something like mischief entered the angel's eyes. "You may not see it, Dean, but Balthazar and I once had a relationship not unlike yours and Sam's. I have… Leverage on him, as you might say." Dean's eyes popped open a little.
"Like…?"
The very corner of Castiel's mouth quirked upwards, not unlike Rachel's expression at the Looney Tunes' antics. "If I told you, Dean, then I would lose that leverage, now wouldn't I?"
Dean nodded very, very slowly, and for the first time in a long time he was just a touch afraid of Cas.
"Yeah. Don't I know it."
BLAM.
"You're dith-picable."
A small, strange noise peeped up, and Castiel and Dean turned towards Rachel, who was biting her lip.
She was giggling.
Rachel.
Was giggling.
Dean didn't know whether to be heartened by this show of humanity or disturbed beyond all reasonable doubt.
"Castiel!" Rachel said, "Castiel! Come here." She took her brother's hand and pulled him down so that she could whisper something in his ear inaudible to Dean. And then, then something really scary happened.
Castiel snorted with laughter as well.
Dean's eyes were wide as saucers.
"Holy Hell, the world is ending and Lucifer didn't even pop the lock on his cage."
Sam returned ten minutes later looking a touch miffed.
"How was it?" Dean asked darkly, knowing the kind of answer he was going to get.
"It was a fifteen minute interrogation into my sex life," Sam growled. "'Are you a virgin? You look like a virgin. You know, there's this lovely woman in Paris willing to do some very interesting things so long as you're blindfolded-'" He shivered. "He was doing it to freak me out. I know it. That damn smirk was on his face the entire damn time."
"Yeah, well, I got something freakier." Dean's expression went even darker and more solemn than before. "Her? Miss Stick-Up-My-Ass over there-?"
He was interrupted as the clicker flew between their heads, only narrowly missing Dean's.
"I heard that too."
"Whatever!" Dean snapped. "She's normal now, but earlier? She was giggling. And then she told Cas why she was giggling, and you know freakin' what? He started too." Sam's eyes widened. "Yeah, I know Sammy, it was some weird Twilight-Zone shit going on. Can angels be possessed?"
"No we can't," Rachel answered.
"Wasn't asking you, She-Bitch-" Dean realized his knee-jerk error too late, and a moment later Rachel had an arm pinned behind his back with one hand, using the other to press his face into the floor (the bare, wooden floor), her knee digging painfully into his spine. Almost as quickly Castiel was trying to pull her off (Balthazar stayed where he was and watched Dean get dominated with an almost serene smile on his face).
"Please," Castiel begged almost painfully. "Please. What is it going to take to stop you from provoking one another every five minutes?"
"A distraction," Sam suggested. "Any kind of distraction."
"Rachel, Dean- If Rachel didn't use her above-human abilities, who would win a race around the block?" Balthazar asked in a tone of faux-innocent-curiosity, his eyes flipping between the two.
"Pfft." Both Rachel and Dean snorted at the same time, and then promptly glared at one another.
"I'm a soldier." Rachel said icily.
"My dad practically trained me as one from age four and up."
"I've been trained as one for longer than your race has been on two legs."
"Let's find out then." Dean challenged. Rachel was up off the bed in a second.
"Let's."
They stomped outside. Balthazar's eyes flickered between Castiel, Sam and the door, and then he grinned.
"I'm sorry, but this is way too good to miss." He disappeared in the blink of an eye, leaving angel and human alone.
"Rachel will win." Sam noted.
"She will."
"And Dean will say something stupid."
"And she will hurt him."
"Is it sick that we know this routine as well as we do now?" Castiel shrugged.
"They are our siblings."
Sam sighed and went to wrap up the food that Dean hadn't had a chance to touch. It was maybe two minutes later that he remembered.
"What did you and Rachel find so funny earlier?" Sam turned, and then stared as the angel fought to keep his composure, failing and smirking a bit.
"She said…" Castiel's face had another mirthful spasm, "She said that… The duck… Reminded her of Dean." He snorted and turned away, apparently very amused.
Sam had to think for a moment before remembering that Rachel had probably been watching the Looney Tunes, and on the Looney Tunes there was only one duck, that being Daffy, who was-
Sam gnawed on his lip as a chortle bubbled up.
"Where'd she get… Where'd she get that idea?" His voice had cracked halfway through the sentence.
As if God were listening and decided to give them one of those ever-convenient moments, the sound of Dean and Rachel's voices drifted from the parking lot:
"You freakin' cheated!"
"I told you I was trained!"
"No way! You totally pulled some angel-bullcrap!"
"You're just bitter because you lost."
"Like hell I am, She-Bitch!"
There was a loud crashing noise, followed by what sounded like Balthazar laughing his ass off. Within a minute or two, there was a sound of sirens, and Sam contemplated that the police had some pretty good response time.
"Let's go get them before they get themselves arrested."
()()
"Okay, so, let's go over this again: You were in the forest, and…?"
"And we saw this guy."
"This, like, big guy. With a silver circle-thing on his head."
"Right."
"And he was going nuts, man! He was just running around smashing trees and bushes and stuff, all with his bare hands! He almost attacked us!"
"Did he see you?"
"Maybe. He was tweaked out, seriously: He freaked us out, so we started yelling, and it's like he heard us, but he couldn't find us, even though we were right in front of him. He looked confused."
"And the people you saw in the forest…?"
"I caught them on camera! Here-"
…
Fsssht.
Beep.
"Hey man, you got a joint?"
"Uh- Here- That's- That's not important. I'll just-"
Whiiiiiirr-
"Here! Here!"
Beep.
"RRRRRAGH! ARRRRAAAAAGH! NAAAAAH!"
"HOLY SHIT, HOLY SHIT MAN!"
"DON'T STAND THERE FRICKIN' RECORDING, MORON, RUN!"
…
…
"Did we lose him?"
"I think so. What the hell, man? What was wrong with him? You think he's messed up? I think he's messed up."
"Totally messed up."
"Completely messed up."
"Very messed up indeed!"
"HOLY SHIT!"
"You see, I never did understand that particular phrase."
"WHERE THE HELL DID YOU COME FROM?"
"Would you believe Morocco?"
"Hey, what are you doing out here?"
"Us? What the heck are you doing out here?"
"We're here to perform a satanic ritual involving a sacrificial goat and a virgin. She's the goat, he's the virgin."
CRACK.
"OW!"
"Are you guys, like, vampires or something?"
"He thinks we're vampires!"
"I heard what he said."
"What kind of vampires come out during the day?"
"I know."
"Have you seen a guy around here? Might have been in the throes of a particularly, uh…Violent rage, perhaps?"
"Dean!"
"What? You want to beat around the bush until the guy makes his way into town?"
"It's called TACT, Dean!"
"Your brother doesn't know the meaning of the word 'tact', Sam."
"I do TOO, She-Bitch!"
"Call me She-Bitch ONE MORE TIME-"
CRASH.
FZZZZZZT.
Beeeeep.
"Okay, so… What happened next?"
"The guy came back."
"And?"
"And he had, like, a really big log."
"And?"
"And he smacked that guy- Dean- with it. The lady laughed."
"And we ran the hell away."
Sigh. "All right. Well, why don't you boys let me keep this-" Taptap. "-And I'll see if I can't get to the bottom of this."
"Yeah man."
"We can go?"
"Please do."
"You want us to come back and help you identify those guys when you find them?"
"Please don't.
As soon as the two young men were gone, Balthazar morphed from a police officer back to his normal appearance and snorted.
"Bloody stoners." He looked at the tap in his hand and sighed. "It's certainly never boring with those Winchester idiots, but this is the last time I get them involved in angel-business."
()()
"Geez. All this trouble over a freakin' halo and a piece of ivory smaller than a freakin' coffee mug."
"At least it wasn't something that could make locusts eat you from the inside out." Sam shivered; he didn't actually remember seeing that, but Dean had described it to him, and he had a very graphic imagination.
Dean chuckled, and only just missed the sounds of wings flapping behind him.
"You know, I bet if you put that thorn-thingy on She-Bitch it wouldn't have any effect."
Sam flinched. "Dean-"
WHACK.
-End
()()
AH, THAT WAS FUN. XD
I realize now that that all-dialogue piece may have been a bit confusing.
Dean
Sam
Rachel
Balthazar
Castiel
Guy 1
Guy 2
On Rebecca Black's song 'Friday': I've only ever heard small snippets of the song, usually accompanied by a caption beneath the video/sound byte saying that the person who posted it feels like gouging their own eardrums out whenever they hear this song because it's been overplayed too much. THIS IS WHY I DON'T LISTEN TO RADIO ANYMORE.
I tried looking up this song on YouTube? I couldn't find it. All I found were parodies of the song. You KNOW you have to poke fun when you can't even find the full, legitimate song anywhere.
(On that note, the first place I DID hear it was on SlashGashJokerWhore's video "CRACK!VID? | i don't even know;". Check it out- It's very funny. XD).
