Disclaimer: Supernatural belongs to Erik Kripke, Warner Brothers and quite possibly others who are not mentioned here. No money will be made from this fan fiction.
Summary: When Dean goes to sell his soul at the crossroads to bring Sam back, someone else steps in to negotiate the deal. Cas did get a sign and it sent him off into the past to change things. AU from The Man Who Would be King and All Hell Breaks Loose.
It's All in the Details
By Colleen
Chapter 3
Sam's mouth hung open and Dean had an arm wrapped around his own stomach, a sick expression on his face.
"He tagged my soul? "
Sam didn't know what to say to that and the two of them might have stayed there staring at each other for some time, if the sounds of Led Zeppelin hadn't started playing from the pocket of Dean's jeans.
Both men jolted slightly when the phone went off and Dean quickly pulled it out to answer it. "Bobby…" Dean's voice came out rough and he cleared it and tried again. "Hey Bobby, yeah, I found him. The summons?" Dean looked at Sam, who shrugged. "That's a little complicated. What, no, no, we're okay. We'll meet you back at your place." Dean paused a moment, not sure how to phrase the question he wanted to ask the older hunter. Giving up, he simply charged ahead, Dean style. "Hey Bobby… Do you know any spells that will let you read someone's soul?"
"Okay." Bobby said, pacing the area in front of his desk. "Just to make sure I've got this straight. You," he pointed at Sam. "Were stupid enough to try to summon a demon without knowing its real name." Sam squirmed under Bobby's gaze, but didn't say anything. "Only before you could complete it, he shows up anyways and stops you."
Sam frowned. "Yeah, it was… weird. He actually sounded worried that I could have gotten hurt."
Dean snorted. "Yeah, so worried that he threatened to burn your eyes out if you did it again."
Sam winced at his brother's statement, but didn't say anything.
"The knife didn't work." Dean shot his brother a look. "And just how did you happen to have Ruby's knife with you anyway?"
Sam shrugged. "Borrowed it."
Before Dean could ask anything else, Bobby took over the questioning. "Didn't it work at all?"
Dean grimaced. "He seemed to find it funny."
"Well, that's comforting. What about the Colt?"
Sam shook his head. "Didn't get the chance to use it."
"Okay, so after all that, he tells you that if you want to help your brother you need to read Dean's contract first. Only, you can't, 'cause apparently the guy carved the particulars into Dean's soul."
Dean nodded. "Yeah, that about sums it up. So, know any spells or rituals that'll let us read this puppy.
Bobby sighed. "I'll start looking."
Feeling that Sam and blonde demons shouldn't mix, Dean took his brother's place when he was supposed to meet up with Ruby. He stayed only long enough to hand her back her knife, neglecting to tell her that it hadn't worked on the crossroads demon at all.
By the time Sam met up with her again, he didn't think to mention it either.
The next few times that Castiel quietly checked up on the Winchesters he noticed that they still hadn't read Dean's contract. A check in on Bobby proved that the older hunter was using his time between hunts researching souls. It took a second visit to realize that he was looking for a way to read the human soul.
That... didn't make any sense. Doing it that way would be very painful for Dean. Much along the same lines as Cas shoving his hand in and checking that way. Why didn't Dean simply sit down and write it out? All he would have to do to access it would be to relax and clear his…
Cas made a fist and clunked himself on his forehead. He'd know Dean how long now? When had he ever seen the man truly relax.
Castiel walked down the steps of the stadium. He knew just enough about sports to know that the game being played on the field below was called baseball, but not much else. He stopped long enough to collect two glasses of beer and a bag of peanuts from an attendant before heading down one of the aisles.
Dean looked up at him as he offered him one of the plastic cups of beer. He took it with a nod and turned back to the game. Cas sat down beside him and sipped at his own drink, waiting. Dean took a long drink of his beer and set the glass down in a cup holder. He watched the game for another minute.
"I'm dreaming, aren't I?"
Cas nodded. "Yes. And before you ask, yes, I really am here."
Dean licked his lips, his mouth suddenly dry despite the beer. "And you're here because?"
Cas pulled a few sheets of paper, held together with a paperclip, out of one of his coat pockets. He presented it to Dean. "Here, it's a paper copy of your contract. If I'd realized you were having so much trouble reading yours I would have given it to you sooner."
Moving carefully, Dean took the papers from him. "Thank you." He said, rather stiffly.
"You are welcome." Cas replied, watching the game rather than looking at Dean. He frowned at what was happening on the field. "Do they have touchdowns in this game, or goals?"
Dean snapped awake before he could answer him.
Dean paced back and forward in the limited space provided by their motel room while Sam was doing a speaker phone conference with Bobby and searching his computer at the same time. The older Winchester gave the sheets of paper next to Sam an annoyed look. You'd think if somebody were going to go to all of the trouble of invading your dreams to give you something, he'd make sure it was in English and not some weird sort of code.
Bobby looked at the pictures of the contract that Sam had just sent, a dumbfounded expression on his face. He got up and pulled a book out of one of the piles behind him to see if what he thought he was seeing was right, or if he'd finally gone senile.
"This don't make a lick of sense."
"What doesn't Bobby?" Sam asked, his voice coming over the speakerphone.
"The contract's in Enochian. What kind of demon writes a contract in angelic script?"
"One with a sick sense of humour." Dean yelled out.
Bobby had to admit, Dean probably had a point.
"This'll take awhile to translate. You boys had better work on your copy as well. Less chance of screwing it up if we have two translations to compare. Also, I've got a hunt and no one I can fob it off on. Don't worry though, I'll keep working on this at the same time."
"Thanks Bobby."
"Thanks man."
Bobby walked through the darkened house, flashlight in hand. A sound had him looking behind him, but there was nothing there. He turned back and opened a set of sliding pocket doors, revealing a kitchen that was clean and probably inviting in daylight. Right now though…
Screaming, clawing, it jumped him. Too fast, too strong. Bobby couldn't do anything to stop it. It beat him into the floor, barely gave him a moment to breath and none to think.
"Bobby!"
The hunter gasped as he was suddenly freed. Using the nearby table, he managed to get to his feet. He stared uncomprehendingly at what he saw once he was upright.
The clawing, screaming thing was… his wife. A man, with dark hair and wearing a trench coat was holding her up against the kitchen's refrigerator. Bobby was a little slow on the uptake at the moment, but he knew well enough who the man had to be by Sam and Dean's descriptions of him.
"You're Cas, aren't you?"
"Yes."
Bobby's wife tried to get at the other demon's eyes and he slammed her against the fridge to discourage her.
"Hey." Sure, she was possessed, but still.
"You have to wake up Bobby."
"What?"
"You're dreaming."
Bobby shook his head. "No."
"How long ago did your wife die, Singer?" The question was harsh and had Bobby itching to put a blade in the man in front of him.
Apparently growing tired of dealing with demon Mrs. Singer trying to scratch his eyes out, Cas shoved with the hand that he was holding on to her with. White light flashed from her eyes and mouth and her face went slack. Horrified, Bobby watched as the deal demon didn't so much let her go, as stopped holding her up. Her body dropped to the floor in the boneless manner that only the dead are capable of.
"You bastard." A knife suddenly in his hand, Bobby leapt at the demon.
If it had been any other situation, the hunter would have admired the grace the other man used in disarming him.
"If you're not dreaming, then were did you get this knife. You didn't have it a moment ago."
Bobby paused. No, he hadn't had it. Weapons and possible weapons were something hunters kept track of automatically. He knew he had been completely unarmed, except for the flashlight, since he'd entered the house.
Which, made no sense. Even when he was relaxing at home, he always had at least a knife on him.
"I'm dreaming?"
"Yes, now wake up, before they drag you off to the hospital."
Bobby gasped and sat up, scaring the ever-living hell out of the chambermaid that was standing over him.
"Oh, God, I'm sorry. I thought maybe you were…" She trailed off, obviously not comfortable with saying that she thought he might be dead.
"No, no." Bobby said, trying to calm her down. "I'm afraid I'm a really heavy sleeper. Thank you for worrying thought."
It took him a few more minutes to get her out of the room. Once he had, Bobby headed to the bathroom to answer the call of nature. If the room's clock was right, he'd been asleep for close to twelve hours.
Dean was watching his little brother get drunk and bitch about his older brother not helping with the translation and not wanting to be saved when Bobby called. Glad for anything to keep Sammy's mind off Dean's ever-looming deadline, he bundled his brother up and headed for Pittsburgh.
When they got there, they found Bobby in a hotel room, surrounded by the piles of his research and strung out on way too much coffee.
"Dude, don't you think you should, I don't know, sleep maybe?"
Bobby gave a laugh. "That's the last thing I should do, 'cause it probably would be the last thing I do."
Bobby had been investigating the death of a professor who was conducting experiments with a plant known as African dream root. Apparently, the stuff lets you go walking in other people's dreams. Take enough of it and you could control someone's dreams as well, even up to the point were you could kill them from inside the dream.
"All the user needs to do is add a little DNA from their target. Unfortunately for me, before I knew it was him, he offered me a beer." Bobby's face twisted up in disgust at himself. "I drank it. Dumbest friggin' thing."
He pulled out a file. "Jeremy Frost. Full on genius, 160 IQ. Which is saying something, given his dad took a baseball bat to his head." He picked up a photo from the table and handed it to Sam. "Here's father of the year. He died before Jeremy was ten. Anyway, the injuries left the kid unable to dream, at least until he became part of the experiment."
Sam looked at the photo of the father and then passed it to Dean. "Sweet guy." Dean frowned. "Hey Bobby, if this Jeremy was controlling your dream, how did you get out?"
The older man hesitated for a moment. "Well, it turns out that your dreams aren't the only ones 'your' Cas can visit."
Dean crossed his arms over his chest, annoyed. "He's not 'my' Cas. He's a freaking scary pain in the ass who apparently intends to roast mine. That's not exactly the bases for becoming best buds."
"Yeah." Bobby said, agreeing. "Which makes me worry. He keeps popping in and being useful. There's got to be something more he wants."
Dean's expression could have been carved from stone. "Yeah, well whatever it is, he isn't getting it."
After two days of looking for Jeremy and coming up empty, Bobby was obviously close to the end of his rope. If he didn't sleep soon he'd go stark raving nuts.
"Okay." Dean said. "Enough's enough. If we can't beat him then I say we join him."
Sam and Bobby both looked at Dean, confusion on one face, exhaustion on the other.
"Here's what we need to do." Dean said, continuing. "We score some of this dream root and Sam and I take it."
"Uh, why?" His brother asked him.
"So we can go into Bobby's dreams and take Jeremy out. Let's face it, the only way we're going to find this guy fast enough is in there."
"That's a terrible idea." Bobby told him.
Dean nodded. "Yeah, I know, but do we really have any other choice."
Bobby sighed. "Can't say I can think of any."
"One problem." Sam said. "Where do we get the dream root from?"
Dean thought for a moment. "Oh, crap."
"What?"
"Bela."
Sam frowned at him for a moment before he got it. "Ah, crap."
"Yep."
"Don't we have any other options?"
Dean shook his head. "The only other 'person', and I use that term loosely, that we know that can go walking around in other people's dreams is Cas. And I mean, can you see that happening?"
Despite the situation, Sam had to chuckle.
Dean nodded in agreement. "Just think of it. Me saying something like, Hey, Cas. I know you intend to drag me off to Hell, but I was wondering if you could do me a favour by taking me and Sam into Bobby's head so we can capture his dream stalker."
"That sounds to be a rather dangerous undertaking."
Dean spun around and moved back a step from his own trench coated boogeyman. Sam and Bobby both shot to their feet, their hands on the closest weapons available. Unfortunately for them that didn't include the Colt, as it was locked in the room's safe.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Dean asked, none too quietly.
The demon frowned. "You asked for my help."
"And you actually came?" Dean asked, his voice cracking slightly.
"I feel I owe you a boon, in recompense for the misunderstanding with the contract."
"Right." There was not a lot of trust in Dean's voice.
Cas shrugged.
"Ah, no offence." Bobby told him. "But I really don't want you in my head again."
The demon stared at him for a moment, before nodding. "I understand. I could send the boys in without me."
The three of them looked at each other, and then back to Cas. "How much control would we have?" Sam asked.
"How much would you like?"
Sam and Dean found themselves in a pleasantly furnished home. It took them a few moments to realize that it was Bobby's place, only nicer.
"Bobby?" Dean called out.
"In here."
They found him in the kitchen, staring down at the body of a young woman.
"Bobby, who..?"
The older man blinked back tears. "She was my wife. She got possessed and I didn't know then what I know now. She was insane, rabid and I stabbed her trying to protect myself. It didn't stop her of course, but then Rufus showed up and did the exorcism…" He felt each of the Winchester's grab onto one of his shoulder's and give it a squeeze.
"God, Bobby, I am so sorry. We never knew." Dean said.
Bobby shrugged and knuckled the dampness from his eyes. "Well, everybody got into hunting somehow. Now come on, let's find that yahoo and get this over with."
Since they didn't want him in the room with them while they were unconscious, Castiel had set a time delay into the Sleep for Bobby and the Dream Walking for Sam and Dean. Once he'd left, the three men had demon proofed the room. This couldn't keep him out, but he let them believe that it did. Besides, he didn't need to be in the room with them to keep track of how they were doing.
Dean had apparently gotten separated from them, and was wandering some strange hallway. Bobby and Sam had actually found the stalker. Sam was closing the trap while Bobby distracted Jeremy by taking on the form of the Father that had nearly beaten him to death with a baseball bat as a child. It should be over shortly.
He refocused on Dean just as horror and darkness seemed to swallow the hunter whole.
"You can't escape me Dean. You're going to die, and this, this is what you're going to become." Eyes black and covered in blood, the demonic version of Dean leapt at human Dean, only to be stopped short as a hand grabbed him by the head. Human Dean raised a hand to shield his eyes as a white light burst from the demon's eyes and mouth.
When his vision cleared, he found Cas standing beside the demon's body. The expression on his face was pained.
"Dean, we need to talk."
Dean staggered back a step as he heard the same words the other Dean had said twice to him. He shook his head, but didn't have the chance to say anything.
In real life, Jeremy Frost gasped and died in his sleep. Several miles away from him, in a hotel room with some of the most frightening wallpaper ever printed covering the walls, three men snapped awake.
Cas sighed as he found himself standing in the lobby of the hotel. He was going to have to tell Dean the truth, or at least some of it. He hadn't until now, because the longer he could make things look as if they were still the same, the better his chances were to change them and make it stick. However, given what he'd just seen… If he didn't tell him soon, Dean wouldn't actually have to go to Hell to be there.