The three men sit there and wait as Lou pounds down an entire water bottle in one go. They say nothing, knowing what a shock everything has to be, and they're at quite a loss as to where to even begin.
"Ahh," Lou sighs with love when the bottle is empty. "Clean water. Holy shit is that amazing. Uh." She looks at the three hunters and now that her mind is cleared enough she has to know, "Where's Lizzy?" She stares at Bobby, needing to know any and everything about her best friend and where she is.
"She's safe, back at Bobby's place," Dean tells her automatically, not having thought twice about answering a question about his wife.
"How the fuck would you know that?" Lou asks, not understanding why Dean would ever be in the know about her best friend.
"I, uh…" Dean tries to come up with an answer that won't get him killed but he can't.
"We'll get you to her soon, Lou. You just need to take a minute before we get back to her," Sam assures her as he gets up and grabs a second water bottle from the mini-fridge.
"No," Lou denies with sheer impatience. "I need to see her…"
"And do what? Walk right through Bobby's front door and say 'honey, I'm home' like she hasn't thought you were dead for four years?" Dean suggests. "You'll freak her right the fuck out."
"And what the hell do you care about if I freak her out?" Lou questions. "Last I checked there's nothing I could do to compare with what you've done…"
"Things have changed, Lou," Bobby cuts in with a very warning tone. "You've been gone a very long time."
"Yeah, but some things don't change," Lou says while glaring at Dean. "Some people don't fucking change."
"You'd be surprised," Dean says mostly to himself, looking down at the silver band that's been on his right hands for years. People do actually change as he's pretty much the best example of living proof. His wife has done nothing but change him for the much better since they met.
"Is she ok?" Lou questions the room. "What has she been doing?"
"She's good," Sam tells her, sitting down next to her on the bed and handing over a second water bottle. "Lizzy's really good. And happy."
"Yeah?" Lou says with surprise.
"Yeah, hon. She's good," Bobby confirms.
"What's happening with her?" she questions, unscrewing the cap of her second water bottle and takes a huge swig.
"Whoa, take it easier this time," Sam warns her, knowing too much water all at once could just cause problems. "Slow down."
She stops drinking like Sam requests, wiping her mouth crudely with the back of her hand, and looks back to Bobby. "Well?"
"Well… she's… she's married for starters," Bobby gets it over with. "'Bout two years now."
"Married!?" Lou asks, nearly choking on the word. "What!?"
"She is," Sam smiles at Lou. "And she's very happy."
"Holy shit," Lou awes, not having seen that coming. "Fuck. I never figured… I mean I, I hoped she'd get out and get a real life…"
"She hasn't exactly," Dean says painfully and does it quietly, feeling the hatred Lou has for him and how much it's about to get worse.
"What do you mean she hasn't exactly? She got married," Lou rebuts, not getting it.
"But when you marry a hunter it's kinda hard to ditch the life," Dean says with a huffed laugh, feeling highly uncomfortable all of a sudden. He looks down at his hand and spins the silver ring on it out of anxiety. Lou's gonna hate him for this one.
"A hunter? Seriously?" Lou asks with sheer disappointment. "I had hoped that my dying would at least get her to straighten out and ditch it all. But she goes off and gets hitched to a fucking hunter? Why the hell would she…?"
Lou pauses, watching Dean's movements closely. He won't look at her. And not only that but he's fiddling with the ring on his right ring finger out of sheer… guilt? It clicks.
"No fucking way would she be that fucking stupid," Lou says and gets Dean to look up at her. "You? She married you?"
"I'm not the person you remember…"
"Bullshit!" Lou calls him out. "You ditched her! You chose random ass over her when she loved you so much that… I, I can't believe she'd be this fucking dumb!"
"Lou, you don't know everything!" Dean tries to get her to listen. "Lizzy's not dumb. I am. Me, not her. I know I'm the dumb one for leaving her back then, but now… we're good. I've apologized until I was blue in the damn face and now we're really good." Dean pauses and smiles, suddenly wanting to get back home as quickly as possible. "I would never do anything to hurt L. I wouldn't. Without her I know I'm nothing so you really don't have to worry about us. Just give me a chance here, Lou. That's all I'm asking. I'll prove it if you give me the chance to."
"Already did that once."
"Then do it again."
Sitting quietly, staring daggers into the man that just told her he married her best friend, she needs time to accept this.
"You'll see," Sam assures her. "Trust me. Lizzy and Dean are not something you need to worry about. They've been through a lot and somehow came out the other side stronger than before. It's annoying." Sam laughs a little at the truth of this.
"I'll second that," Bobby adds in for support. "I damn near lose the whiskey in my stomach once a day with those two living in my house."
"Your house?" Lou laughs. "You taking in all the strays now?"
"Something like that," he laughs at the idea. It's close enough to the truth.
"So when can we leave?" Lou asks the room. "Bobby's is way better than here and I wanna see Lizard."
"Give it a day," Sam suggests. "You can stop, readjust to the world… maybe take a shower and eat something real."
"I can do that at Bobby's…"
"How about we fill you in on everything that just happened first," Bobby cuts in. "These past four years ain't been… sunny. We've all been awful busy. There's a lot you need to know."
"I doubt you could tell me anything more shocking than Lizzy marrying Douche Bag over here," she jerks a thumb at Dean and he bites his tongue. She needs the time to see it. He'll prove to her that he's a better person than he was when she last knew him.
Sam just sighs. "Trust me, there's a ton…"
SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
"So… you went to Hell?" Lou starts to sum everything up that took over two hours of conversation to clear up for her while pointing at Dean. He nods yes and she can see how they weren't joking. A lot happened in four years. "Which is why you ditched out on Lizard. You wanted to protect her from that?"
"Absolutely," Dean emphatically answers, glad she at least has the reason behind his disappearing act back then.
"But you came back when that dick angel pulled your ass outta the fire?"
"Yeah, pretty much," Dean agrees.
"And he's also the angel that's been watching over Lizzy her whole life? Helping make her who she is?"
"Yes," Sam answers.
"Shit. That is so fucked."
"We know," Bobby shares her sentiment as he looks back on his past few years. Never as a hunter did he see all that he's been through coming but hey, that's his life. It's seriously messed up but it's his.
"Oh, and… my fucking dad is also Lizzy's biological dad… so we're half-sisters. Which is why they moved next door to us when we were kids, so dad could see her and be a part of her life. We've been blood related all along…. Fuck me, man," Lou shakes her head. "Wait… if Lizzy has some kind of link to this angel jackass then do I too?"
"Don't think so," Bobby tells her right away. "You only have half the Nephilim DNA in you that she does. You should be angel-link free we think. And you were with him for days on end. I think you'd know by now if you did."
"Good. That guy wasn't exactly someone I'd invite to my birthday party," Lou grumbles, sipping her third water since they sat down. "Ok, so… then… the Apocalypse happened? Sam took on Lucifer and dove into his Cage and was there for, like, a year?"
"Year and a half, yeah," Sam nods. Lou shares a look of utter sympathy.
"And I thought I had it bad," she remarks, knowing his fate had to have been so much worse.
"I'm back though, so it's ok…"
"But your brain is cracked," Lou reminds him. "That's not good at all, Giant. I mean… how do we even begin to fix that?"
"We?" Sam says with surprise to her, the 'we' such a big statement to make.
"You think I'm ditching you guys anytime soon!?" she asks loudly. "You gotta be kidding me. And we gotta find a way to help you, Sam. Seriously."
"Well look at that. We agree on something," Dean points out, getting Lou to look at him without complete hate for the first time.
"Oh God, what a mess," Lou tells them. "I can't believe all this happened while I was gone."
"It's been a rough run," Bobby comments.
"But, one thing I don't get," Lou starts up. "You guys had a serious destiny. I mean, you both started and stopped the damn Apocalypse. You had a fate… but if Lizzy was a prophesized person too… it can't be to protect Dean like they said. So what's her part in this?"
They all shut up pretty quickly at that.
"Oh, so it's good," Lou sarcastically bites, already getting the feeling that they're about to spill something bad.
"That was a cover," Dean explains. "It was all a lie, the whole protecting me bullshit."
"Well then, what was it?"
And again it grows silent.
"Come on, guys," Lou gets annoyed. "She's got an angel on her ass, or at least she used to, so she's gotta be important."
"She is," Dean nods and sighs as he sucks it up. "She's supposed to bring about the Second Coming."
Lou stares at him a beat, eyes narrowed onto him. "One more time? I'm still adjusting to the real world."
"The Second Coming. God on Earth part two," Dean says easily, having adjusted to the idea. "You might know the first time this happened… Jerusalem, North Star, three dudes on camels throwing a baby shower…."
"How is she supposed to do that?" Lou asks, confusion hitting her hard.
"There are parts of the Bible that are not quite right and then there are parts completely missing," Sam jumps in. "One of the missing parts is how exactly God will come to Earth the second time around. Supposedly he's going to take a vessel…"
"Lizard's God's vessel!?" she asks with total fright.
"No, no… she's not the one taking on God. Her son is supposed to," Dean just blurts it out and gets it over with.
Once more Lou is just staring at him as she sits there. Her face goes blank with the news.
"Her son?" Lou wonders to make sure she heard correctly. "Lizzy… she has a son?"
"His name's Samuel Robert Winchester," Dean says to her, taking his phone out of his back pocket and lighting up the lock screen. He hands it over to her. "He was born on February twenty-first. He was a month early but he was one healthy little badass from the jump."
Lou stares down at the picture on the phone. It's of Lizzy in profile, her face lit up with a bright smile as she leans over the baby seat in front of her, a small newborn looking up at her with bright blue-green eyes, a tuft of dark hair, and an upturned little nose. She looks incredibly happy.
"He's already up nearly a pound from when he was born so he's about seven pounds now," Dean tells her. "He's, ah… he's awesome." He smiles wide with the pride he has in him over this kid. "He barely cries. He actually made a face something like a smile the other day… thought L was gonna flip. He eats like a horse... and he's just… ah, he's great."
Lou bites her bottom lip. When the screen goes black after a minute she lights it right back up, not ready to stop looking at her best friend… her sister… and her nephew she knew nothing about until right now. They both look so happy.
When Lou looks back up to Dean, the man that has clearly made her Lizzy happy while she's been gone, she's out of words. She never, not in four years or four billion years, would have ever thought this is how life was carrying on without her.
"I'm not so bad," Dean promises. "And we're really happy… aside from the world around us."
Lou just nods and looks back at the picture.
"Wait… so, um, does that mean that Samuel…"
"Sammy," Sam corrects for her.
She smiles a little at that but it drops quickly. "Does that mean Sammy's God's vessel?"
"Yeah," Dean answers her. "That's his own destiny, kinda like Sam and me."
"Over my dead fucking body," Lou says harshly and her fire isn't lost on any of them. She peers back down at the picture on the phone, unable to stop looking. She's never met the boy, fuck, she just found out about his existence at all, but she'll do anything to help him. That's not a question. "No one's coming for him. Dean, no one or thing will take him away from us. Not if I'm around."
Dean huffs a thankful laugh. "Sam said the same damn thing. Guess we got the Sammy Squad complete now."
"Oh yeah…" Bobby rolls his eyes. "We got quite the motley crew going."
"Beats anything else I've seen," Sam says to them all, sure that this group is much strong now with Lou there.
"Thanks, Lou. Seriously, thank you," Dean says to Lou for her conviction already while using a phrase he is not really accustomed to using very often. "We need all the people we can get to change his future."
"He's my nephew," Lou shrugs in answer as she hands the phone back, thinking it should be obvious.
"You might hate me for now but I gotta say it's good to have you back, Lou," Dean speaks up. "It's been… hard, without you. Very hard. You've had some good people missing the crap outta you up here."
She's surprised by his words. Lou looks at him with shock. "It's just good to be outta there. It was…" She stops herself and sighs. "It's over. And I couldn't be more thankful for that."
"How are you feeling?" Sam questions, hoping the return from Purgatory compounded by the transformation isn't wreaking havoc on her.
"Like I got hit by a fucking Mack truck," she answers easily enough, sitting in the middle of one of the beds, her legs Indian-style not unlike her sister's would be.
"Are you hungry?" Sam wonders, looking to give her every form of comfort he can afford for her right now.
"Actually, yeah… I'm…"
She stops short when she hears the sound of the door to the adjacent room open and slam shut. She's off the bed in a flash, grabbing Dean's gun from where he placed it on the nightstand and aiming at the shared wall. He eyes dart around, looking for the threat that she assumes is coming.
"Lou," Bobby calmly says to her, standing up. She sharply turns and aims the handgun at him. "Hey! No, no. Lou… it's just me. Gimme the gun."
She just breathes unsteadily while her hands shake. The TV turns on in the other room and once more she aims the gun at the wall, finger on the trigger.
"Lou," Sam tries this time, walking to her slowly as she looks her in the eyes. "Hand me the gun."
Shaking her head no, she refuses.
"Come on. You think I would ever put you in any kind of danger?" Sam says with a slight smile, his hand reaching out towards her. "You know I wouldn't. You're safe here."
Her hands stop shaking with his words.
"Put the gun away."
Lou drops her hands and sighs. She closes her eyes with the confusion. She's so used to the high alert and survival minute to minute. Returning to her former world is not a simple task.
"You alright?" Sam pries on, stepping right up to her with his still going concern, calmly taking Dean's Colt out of her grip.
Lou surprises him when she doesn't answer and instead walks right into him, her arms around his middle as she just looks for something real and safe. Since she came to on the floor of this motel room the only time she's felt right was when she hugged him. She needs more of that with the jumbled up mess of everything going on in her head.
"You're safe now, Lou," Sam reminds her again, a hand to the back of her head as she presses her cheek to his chest. He closes his eyes and takes a second to enjoy the feeling of being complete, like he's actually whole for the first time in a very, very long time. "I've got you. You're safe."
"You sure you're ok here alone with her?" Dean question his brother as he drops a bag full of weaponry and protective items to leave there on one of the beds.
"I think I got this," Sam near laughs at the question.
"I don't know, Sam," Bobby chimes in. "She's not exactly her old self right now."
"And I wouldn't expect her to be," Sam says easily, pulling takeout containers from the white plastic bag they're in and placing them on the table. He got a little bit of everything from the small dinner down the street as he didn't know what she'd want. Eating food hasn't happened for her in a long time so he wanted her to have whatever she felt like.
"Just keep an eye on her, a close one," Bobby suggests through a warning tone. "I'm worried about her coming back like this. It can't be easy."
"I'm worried about her too. Believe me," Sam responds with as he looks over the eight takeout boxes. Ok, maybe he went too far. He then turn his attention full onto the two other men in the room as the shower in the bathroom continues to run after twenty minutes already. "But I can handle this." The small smile he tries to hide isn't lost on either of them.
"We know you can," Dean says with a small nod, heading for the table and opening the nearest box.
"Hey!" Sam calls out to stop him.
"This have onions on it?" Dean questions.
"I, uh…"
"Lou hates onions," Dean proclaims without knowing if that's true or not. He closes the box and picks it up, Impala keys in the other hand. "I'll just take care of this one for you."
"Gee, thanks," Sam sarcastically returns as Dean heads for the door.
"No problem. Call us if you need us," Dean responds over his shoulder as he leaves, ready to get back home as quickly as possible.
"Seriously, something goes wrong you give us a ring," Bobby reinforces. "And I suggest you give Dean a heads up before you two get back tomorrow. Don't just pop in."
"I would never do that to Lizzy," Sam promises. "Get his ass home before he starts weeping or something."
"Never thought I'd see the day that kid would rather be home with a baby than out on the road with his Baby," Bobby laughs a bit and grabs the motel door. "See ya', Sam."
"Bye Bobby," Sam responds and Bobby closes the door as Sam opens the weapons pack Dean just brought him.
Dean's worried as all hell about leaving Lou so soon. His fatherly instincts are screaming for him to stay and take care of that lost kid but Sam will have to do. He trusts Sam completely.
"Hope he's ready to handle her," Dean says as Bobby gets into the passenger side of the Impala, Dean turning the key and roaring the engine to life. "She seems a little… primal… right now."
"Yeah, she's about as normal as the rest of us," Bobby jokes, giving Dean a look to let him know he shouldn't throw stones when he lives in a house made of glass. "Sam will be just fine."
"Yeah…" Dean trails off, hoping Bobby's right. Lou's a mess and a trigger happy one at that.
"Dean?"
"Yeah?"
"You really think Lou's gonna try and hurt him?" Bobby asks, a smirk on his face.
"Not intentionally," Dean says easily. "But what if someone coughs next door? She might try and chop his balls off…"
"Let me put it this way… Sam can handle Lou, even right now. Even if she pulls a gun on him again, you know this."
"Ok," Dean nods but never puts the car in drive.
"We gonna phone home or you just gonna sit here, ET?" Bobby asks, looking at Dean with impatience. "There's nothing left for us to do here. Let's go see how Mom and Sammy are doing."
A slight smile flashes across Dean's face as he puts the car in drive immediately. Suddenly he couldn't get out of there fast enough.
"Plus, we gotta figure out how to tell Liz about everything that just happened," Bobby points out. "It's a lot to take."
"I say we drop the Cass bomb tonight when we get back," Dean says, logically thinking things through. "She can process that one until we hear from Sam tomorrow. When I know they're close I'll tell her Lou's back."
"That's smart," Bobby commends. "We tell her too soon and she'll hotwire a junker and peel outta there so fast we'll never catch up to her."
"Exactly."
Bobby nods. "Sounds good to me."