Act 6 - In Which A Plan Is Hatched, With Obvious Flaws

There were nights when Dean liked to pretend that running from cops wasn't one of their skills. Tonight was not one of those nights.

They all piled into the Impala, mainly because it was easier, and took off in the nick of time, just as a flash of blue lights appeared in the rearview. Damn, they were cutting it close. Wasn't the first time, probably wouldn't be the last. As for Cas's car, he could come back later for it, or, if it was impounded, they could bust it out. Wouldn't be the first time for that either. Oh, the lives they led.

Sam told them his new theory, that the trickster was a weak ass motherfucker, or something to that effect. To be honest, Dean was doing his best not to be distracted by the audience, which in itself was distracting. Add to that keeping an eye out for cops, and still feeling a little loopy from getting knocked out, and his attention wasn't so much scattered as shattered into a million pieces. He made himself narrow it a bit so he could hear what Sam was saying.

"What weakens a trickster?" Dean asked. He'd never even heard of that as a concept.

Sam shrugged. "I don't know. But we should figure it out if we can."

"Wait," Cas said from the back seat. "This began with a summoning, correct?"

"We think so," Sam replied. "All evidence points that way."

"Maybe the trickster's weak from being in the Underworld so long."

Dean exchanged a look with Sam, confirming he didn't quite get that either. "Do you mean Hell?" Sam asked.

Dean could see Cas's frown in the rearview mirror. "I know Underworld is considered another name for Hell, but it's not. Far from it."

"So what is it?" Dean wondered.

"It's where gods and demi-gods go when they die, if they can die. And it's often used to trap or exile immortal beings."

"Wait, what?" Dean replied, confused. Although, really, it made sense, didn't it? Of course gods wouldn't go to Heaven or Hell when they died. They'd have their own special place, because they were fucking snobs.

"Have a lot of tricksters been exiled to the Underworld?" Sam asked, steamrolling him. Which was fair enough, because Dean's exclamation wasn't really a question more than an expression of dismay. They really had too much going on right now. Why was there always more?

"Yes," Cas said, answering Sam's question. "Despite what your lore may have told you, killing tricksters is extremely difficult for mortals. Most people opted for trapping them in the Underworld. It's not easy, but it's still easier than trying to kill them."

"And trying to summon a demon can summon one of them instead?" Sam wondered.

"No, because Hell and the Underworld are different places." Cas paused briefly. "But if a Human assumed they were one and the same, and attempted to call something up from the Underworld ... I can see why they're dead."

"They opened the door, and something nasty jumped them, but not a demon, which they may have been prepared for," Dean said.

Cas nodded, making meaningful eye contact with him in the mirror. Man, Cas had pretty eyes. "The Underworld is designed to hold everything within its confines. Nothing can leave, unless a door is opened from this side."

"So these idiots accidentally - or maybe not so accidentally - tried to summon something from the Underworld, ended up a snack, and now it's living in that creepy old place, and sicced a sitcom laugh track on us to wear us out until he's in shape to kill us?" Dean asked, putting it all together. The audience roared with delight. Saying it aloud, it sounded insane. And therefore, plausible.

Sam shrugged, and gave him a facial expression to match it. He was guessing. They were all guessing. Dean could feel Cas's eyes on him. "It does sound ridiculous. But it makes sense." That was Cas throwing them a bone.

"What weakened him?" Sam asked.

"Being in the Underworld. Most tricksters feed off people or their environment. Being trapped in the Underworld robs them of their strength. The longer they're there, the weaker they are."

"So this guy's been in the stir for a while," Dean guessed.

"Stir?" Cas asked, brow furrowing in confusion.

Sam sighed. "He means Underworld. He's been trapped for a while."

"Considering a normal trickster would have been able to kill you on sight, yes." The audience took that for a laugh line.

"Does that narrow down the suspects at all?" Sam asked.

Cas thought about it, frowning. He kept looking between him and Dean, and Dean had no idea why. "Not as such. There haven't been too many tricksters captured recently."

"Can we build an attack around this?" Dean asked. "At all?"

For a good minute, the sound of the engine was the only noise, as the audience was quiet. It was such a relief, Dean almost hated it when Cas broke the silence. Almost. "We know where he's staying. We can try and trap him inside."

"So he can't feed?" Sam said, finishing the thought. "That's a great idea. How do we do that?"

"Oh." Cas said, and Dean's meager hopes were smashed to pieces. "If he's still weak enough ... what do you have in the trunk?"

Dean snorted. "What don't we have in the trunk? We even have a grenade launcher -"

"No," Sam said, giving him a pissy look. "I don't even know why you bought it. Or how. "

"I told you, I met this guy in a bar in Baja -"

"Why do the worst stories I've ever heard about you always begin in a bar?"

Dean thought about that. That wasn't true, was it? That couldn't possibly be true. He had a lot of bad stories. "You know, I was in Hell, and Purgatory. I have much worse stories than buying army surplus from the back of a van."

"You know that was probably stolen, and if it really is genuine military issue, illegal as hell?"

Oh, was that Sam's issue with it? Was he having law school flashbacks? Because, boy howdy, they could both be convicted of murder raps, theft, grave desecration, fraud ... frankly, they should by all rights have criminal records thicker than an unabridged dictionary. "Um, dude? Our lives are illegal as hell. I really don't think potential stolen goods is gonna tip the cart over."

Sam gave him his death frown again. At least the audience seemed to enjoy it.

"Do you have any artifacts, or rare herbs?" Cas asked, ignoring their little side argument. He was probably used to their bullshit by now.

"Artifacts?" Sam repeated. "I don't think so. I think we do have some rare herbs. What do you have in mind?"

"An inventory review," Cas said. That was the strangest punchline ever.

Dean found a good place to pull over, namely the abandoned parking lot of a closed down store, that had a nice dark spot not visible from the road. Then they got out, and showed Cas the trunk.

The trunk had not gotten bigger over the years, but their ability to store stuff had become more tactical and methodical, so technically they carried as much stuff as they had ever carried. They had all the usual stuff- salt, ammo, iron, holy water, holy oil - but some new stuff as well, including the aforementioned grenade launcher, and an old fishing tackle box full of various but often useful herbs and small oddities. Cas had seen their trunk before, but he always looked slightly puzzled by it, like he couldn't imagine them ever needing all these things. But he knew for a fact that they did.

Cas went through the things, asking questions if he ever needed to, which wasn't often. Finally, he asked, "Do you know where to get quantities of mistletoe and wormwood?"

Dean and Sam shared a looked that Dean liked to think of as deadpan, before Sam turned to Cas. "Those work on tricksters?"

"In a manner of speaking. They hate it. And if we can get enough of it, we should be able to contain a weak one, at least for a little while."

"When you say quantities, how much do you mean?"

Cas scowled as he thought. "Quite a bit, if we want to encircle the whole mansion."

Sam briefly considered that, and shook his head. "I'm not sure we could find that much of either mistletoe or wormwood in a big city, and this is the middle of nowhere. No way are we going to be able to do that. Is there a plan B?"

The look on Cas's face said no, so Dean did his best to come up with something. There had to be something else, right? "You said people tricked tricksters into the Underworld? Why can't we do that?"

Cas gave him the "are you unhinged" look that Dean had seen so many times, he was starting to take it personally. Why didn't he ever look at Sam like that? Sam had crazy ideas too. Sometimes. "Because it would be extremely difficult, and takes some spell craft."

"We can cast a spell, Cas," Sam said. That felt like an understatement.

Cas's lips thinned to a grim line. When that happened, bad shit was coming. "This is not a normal spell. It will require some blood and lots of power. We'll need a witch."

As tall orders went, that was one of the tallest. "Well, odds are there's one in this town, but why would they do anything for us?" Sam asked.

"Uh ... bleep," Dean said, rubbing his eyes.

"What?" Sam asked.

"We know someone witch adjacent," Dean replied, finally daring to look at Sam.

He knew Sam understood what he was saying when his expression fell. "Oh bleep"

Cas looked between them, curious. "You don't mean Crowley, do you?"

Dean nodded. It was Cas's turn to look away, muttering, "Bleep."

Yeah, that was pretty much all you could say about that.

Dean texted Crowley again, this time sending, You said you wanted to help us beat up the audience? This may be your chance. He'd barely shoved his phone back in his pocket when Crowley emerged from the shadows. "Where are they?" he asked. He was wearing the same suit as before. The audience greeted him with raucous applause.

Dean sighed, knowing how well this would go over. He powered through anyway. "To get to them, we need to get to the trickster."

Crowley raised an eyebrow at him, before glancing at Sam, and Cas, who seemed unusually tense. "That goes without saying, doesn't it? Oh - you're going to ask for my help, aren't you?"

"Please don't be a bleep about this," Dean said, even though he knew Crowley would be a dick about this.

Crowley grinned. He was looking forward to this. "How else would I be?" The audience roared. Yep, they loved Crowley. And he probably wouldn't admit it, but the bastard loved it.

Sam got right to the point. "While the trickster's weak, we wanted to try and exile it back to the Underworld. And we need someone with magical abilities -"

Crowley burst out laughing. It was partially genuine. "Brilliant. You skipped shooting yourself in your faces? Because it is the better option."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Crowley -"

"I'm serious. I told you, god level. These things don't bleep around. Goddamn it, that is annoying."

"Are you saying you can't do it?" Dean shot back. He knew Crowley's ego wouldn't let that stand.

Crowley knew what he was doing, and narrowed his eyes at him. "I could do it, but what makes you think the trickster will fall for it again? We aren't talking about a demon trap here. It's a trap in the purest sense of the word. You have to set it, and wait for the trickster to fall into it. It fell once. It won't fall again."

"Sure it can," Dean insisted. "New bait. Besides, it's weak and rusty. I'm gonna guess it's not at its best right now."

"Considering you're not dead, that's a very easy you've forgotten an important thing."

"What?"

"Why the bloody hell would I want to help you? This isn't my fight."

"Not yet," Cas said. "But imagine what happens when a trickster god starts taking over. Hell's souls will start drying up as he eats them himself. By that time, he'll be immensely powerful. What then?"

Crowley scoffed, but Dean could tell that bothered him a little bit. Not much, but they wouldn't need much if they got Crowley to believe it was in his best interest to get rid of this thing now. "That's years away, if it happens at all."

"Years?" Cas repeated. "Did you forget what happened to Atlantis?"

Crowley frowned, and Sam looked like he'd just been goosed by a frisky librarian. The audience found it amusing. "Atlantis? Wait - that was real?"

Cas nodded. "It was. Until a trickster god took over."

Crowley gave Cas a scrutinizing glare. "And a whole bunch of angels sunk the bloody thing. How many people did you kill exactly?"

Cas at least had the decency to look a bit ashamed. "It was not our intention to sink the entire island. The trickster was more powerful than we anticipated."

"And you destroyed the most advanced civilization on the planet at the time. Bravo, angels. No wonder you were put on celestial time out."

Sam still looked surprised by this development, but Dean could see Cas bristling, and when he got defensive, things could escalate quickly. So he moved a bit closer to Crowley, putting himself between him and Cas, and tried to get things back on track. "Let's get back to now, okay? No one wants a repeat of Atlantis, apparently. So help us put this thing back in the Underworld before it reaches full power, and you have to deal with it by yourself, huh?"

Crowley's look was flinty. He knew they were trying to manipulate him. The thing about Crowley was, sometimes he was okay with that. Dean had never been sure of the why of it, until he became a demon for a bit. Then two things became very clear. Crowley may have been the King of Hell, but more often than not, he was bored and lonely. Pretty much the only reason he and Sam were still alive was because sometimes they provided some amusement for him, and that was it. Dean was kind of glad he learned that while a demon, because as a human, he would have been fucking pissed off. Time and distance had allowed Dean to realize that was super fucking sad, and he almost felt bad for Crowley, which he hated, because, duh, King of Hell. So his sympathy was muted. But there was some irony at work here. All Crowley wanted to do, when they met him, was take over Hell. He achieved that goal, and discovered it didn't make him any happier than being King of the Crossroads, or at least not in the long term. Of course, he couldn't pity him ... well, he did as a demon. But as a human that was a non-starter. Not just because Crowley would get all pissy about it, although he would. Mainly it was that he didn't deserve it. That Hell thing was a deal breaker, if the whole making Cas go dark side and nearly die for good, and the Mark of Cain thing weren't reasons all by themselves.

For several uncomfortable seconds, Dean was afraid he was going to tell them to get fucked - or, technically, to get bleeped - but they lucked out, as Crowley must have been very bored. "Which god are we dealing with here?" Dean, Sam, and Cas all exchanged a look, a tacit 'you tell him', but Crowley figured it out by himself. "Holy hell, you still don't know, do you?"

Sam actually looked a bit embarrassed. "There are a lot of trickster gods."

Crowley rolled his eyes and shook his head. "If I do this, you three owe me. Big time."

Dean cleared his throat, and when Crowley finally deigned to look at him, he simply said, "Ensenada."

He and Crowley got up to some shit while Dean was a demon. Most of it was pretty pedestrian, considering he was possessed by the Mark of Cain and Crowley was the King of Hell. They could have burned down the world if they really wanted to ... and the Mark of Cain kind of wanted to. But Crowley enjoyed having a buddy to carouse with, so most of their time was spent doing that, much to the Mark's dismay. Oh sure, sometimes Crowley had a grudge to work out between the orgies and the arson, but the Mark didn't get a chance to kill as much as it wanted. And there was this one time that Crowley asked him to get something from the fairies, a dangerous tome of black magic, without exactly spelling out how complicated this mission was. The Mark survived - of course it did - but some bad shit could have happened to it, far worse than death, and Crowley had neglected to mention it. That had been a deliberate omission on his part, and that resentment festered until the Mark finally decided it was done with Crowley. But the Mark felt owed by Crowley, and Dean remembered that feeling.

Crowley clicked his tongue. "If you hadn't been a big drama queen, we could have resolved that."

Sam looked between them, and that little anxiety line formed between his brows. He didn't know what this digression was, and he absolutely didn't like it. "What are you two talking about?"

"Just a favor Crowley still owes me."

"I don't owe you jack bleep," Crowley snapped. "You destroyed it."

"Because liars don't get rewards, Crowley. So help us out and I'll call it even."

If looks could kill, Dean would have been a smoldering corpse. And with a King of Hell, that possibility was always on the table. "I don't owe you anything."

"Fine. You don't owe me, and we don't owe you. We'll just do this thing, and figure out the accounting later."

They stared at each other, the audience tittering in the background, and Dean honestly didn't know which way it was going to go. He may have ruined things by trying to call in his chit, but goddamn it, Crowley did owe him at least one. "Fine. But I'm holding you to it."

"Wouldn't expect any less," Dean admitted, to the laughs of the audience. Sam was still giving him the look. The one that said "what did you do with Crowley that I in no way want to know the details of". You'd think so much couldn't be squished into a single look, but Sam was unusual in that way. Or Dean was simply accustomed to his expressions by now. Again, he felt like they could do most of their communication by looks and hand signals by now. Cas was kind of giving him a similar look, except Cas wanted to know details, and honestly, Dean knew he was better off not knowing.

Crowley looked at Cas, and asked, "Are we talking the Stellen incantation?"

"That would make the most sense, considering we're not sure how strong it is."

Dean was glad Cas knew what the hell he was talking about.

Crowley turned his gaze on Dean and Sam again. "Are you sure you're ready for this? This isn't a small thing."

"Yeah, we figured that part," Dean said.

Crowley still had a smug look on his face, and he didn't like it one bit. "So I assume you know where the trickster is?"

"More or less?"

"How are you going to lure it out of wherever it is and into our trap? And where are we going to get the blood?"

Dean shrugged. He actually hadn't gotten to figuring out that part. One disaster at a time. "You can have our blood."

"Really? All five gallons of it?"

He quickly looked to Cas, assuming this was what passed for Crowley's sense of humor, but Cas's grim lipped look was back. It wasn't a joke. They actually needed five gallons of blood for this spell.

The audience, as always, roared with laughter.