They'd given Adam a 'hunter's funeral' at the request of Dean, who hadn't given any reason for it and didn't insist on the same for his mother. Perhaps he'd finally accepted the poor lad who hadn't stood a chance was a Winchester, or maybe he was feeling guilty about not being able to save him. It was hard to work out which. Then they'd headed to the motel as the sun was rising, deciding to rest up that day and head back to Bobby's the next to drop Amelia back off so she could head back to University in time for her term re-starting. Something she really, really didn't want to do.
She left them alone to have a shower before they tried to source some food, and the moment the door swung shut Sam turned to Dean, looking alarmed.
"Okay, what the hell was that?" He asked his older brother, who chucked his jacket on the chair by the table and headed towards his bed.
"What was what?" He asked, pulling off sounding vaguely confused as he sat down and liberated his feet from his boots. No one could appreciate how much of a relief it was to not have your feet constrained by leather.
"What was what?" Sam exclaimed in disbelief, "Oh, I don't know. Perhaps the singing and the bright light that saved your ass, Dean?" Dean shrugged, like it was no big deal which just infuriated Sam more.
"What about it, Sam?" He replied and Sam just stared.
"What was that?" He ranted, trying to get Dean as worried about it as he was, "I mean, there's something incredibly unnatural about a girl summoning a large, protective light when she sings! And it sang back, I know it did. What do we do?" Dean's eyes narrowed at the implications of what Sam was saying and he stood up.
"Are you suggesting we gank her?" He shouted angrily, pointing at the wall, "Because that's Amelia you're talking about."
"I know." Sam replied but Dean shook her head.
"I don't think you do." He interrupted, "Even if she wasn't Amelia, the girl we grew up with." Sam opened his mouth to protest but Dean cut him off with a glare, "Even if she wasn't her, you gonna explain that to Bobby?!"
"If Bobby knew..."
"Bobby knows." Dean snapped.
"Bobby knows?" Sam asked before his eyebrows raised and his mouth fell open slightly, "Wait, you know?"
"Yes!" Dean shouted before wincing at the sound of his own voice, "Yes, I know." He repeated, quieter this time, "And it's fine, Sam. So just drop it."
"Just drop it? Dean..." Dean stormed over.
"Yes, Sam. Just. Drop. It." He warned, "It's been dealt with, that's all you need to know. Don't mention it again, and don't you dare ask her about it."
"What?" Sam's hands clenched together, "I'm just supposed to ignore it?"
"Yes, you are!" Dean told him, "If she wants to tell you, then that's fine, but until she does you leave her alone. Do you understand me?" Sam nodded, glaring openingly at him.
"Perfectly." He snapped, "I understand that, once again, I'm being kept out of the loop." Dean chucked his hands to his sides.
"Oh, here we go again!" He exclaimed.
~0~0~0~
Amelia opened the door, slinking into the room and immediately felt the tension between the two brothers. Dean was reclining in front of the television but was obviously not watching it, while Sam was at the table on his laptop, clicking furiously if that was possible.
"What happened?" She asked, startling the pair who hadn't notice her enter. Sam then looked over at his brother with his best bitch face.
"Nothing, apparently." He snapped, going back to his computer like a sour-faced teenager. She stared at him for a few more moments, before turning to Dean, who was purposefully not looking at her.
"Okay, one of you is going to tell me." She commanded, hands on her hips, "You're grown men, act like it!"
"I would." Sam replied haughtily, Dean moving his mouth mockingly along with him, "However, I'm not allowed to talk about it." She sighed, turning to Dean.
"What did you do?" She asked him and he looked offended.
"What makes you think I did anything?" She raised an eyebrow expectantly, waiting for the moment he exhaled, like he was being severely inconvenienced, "He was going to kill you!" She spun on her heels to stare at Sam, her mouth slightly opened.
"I wasn't." He snapped at Dean before looking at her, "I wasn't, I swear." He tried to reassure her, "I just thought we should find out what happened at the house. I wasn't aware that everyone knew but me." Again, this was joined with a pointed look to Dean.
"What?" She asked, still confused, "You mean my angels?" The stunned look on his face confused her even more, "Didn't Dean explain that to you when I was in the shower? That's why I went..." She turned to Dean, "Why didn't you tell him?"
"Because you told me to never tell anyone!" Dean defended and she pointed at Sam.
"He was there!" She exclaimed before sighing, rubbing her face and turning to Sam, "When I sing, angels come. They always have done." She shrugged, "The light is a fraction of their true form, they only appear in that light when they're not fully there. Otherwise your eyes would have burnt out, and as I was trying to save Dean, it seemed counter productive to have them fully there."
"So you can just summon angels now?" Sam scoffed, "No offence, but most of the angels we've met are dicks."
"Yes, they are." She agreed, "Quite a few angels are dicks, you get used to it. Some aren't, though. My angels aren't, otherwise why would they come at the command of a pitiful human?" She sat down in the chair in front of Sam, "I understand you being wary, Sam, I do. And I'm sorry I never told you about them sooner, but they're not new, I've had them since I was first able to talk. Nothing's changed except your perception of me. Have I ever done anything other than save your brother that had given you any reason to not trust me?"
"I never said that we should kill you." Sam reiterated, "I just asked what we should do. Dean's the one who decided that I was going to gank you." She turned her head to look at Dean, eyebrow raised and he tried so hard not to look guilty, or at her. She continued to wait for an explanation until he chucked his arms in the air.
"What did you expect me to think?" He ranted, "All we do is gank stuff."
"Nice to know you have faith in me, Dean." Sam snapped sarcastically, and like that the tension left the room as the two brothers began arguing again. She stood up, ruffling Sam's hair, which he ducked his hair to get away from and she fell onto the bed next to Dean, leaning against the headboard as she told the both to shut the hell up so she could watch television.
~0~0~0~
The blood swirled around her head, running in all directions as even her instincts failed her, keeping her frozen on the floor. Dean pressed against his wrists, his hands wrapped around them as he stared down at her, looking just as terrified as she felt. The muscles on the left hand side of his face were on view, the scraps of skin left behind imitating his every movement. His eyeball rotated in his skull as his blood dripped onto her skin, trailing down her face with her tears...
"Amy." His voice pleaded, the image falling away to the darkness behind her eyelids. She trembled, but didn't open them in case she saw his face again, "It's okay, it's not real."
"Dean..." she whimpered and she flinched as something touched her head.
"Go to sleep, Princess." He told her gently and, as if on command, she drifted back off again.
Dean glanced over at his brother apprehensively, only to find him still asleep and relaxed slightly. Amelia had fallen asleep somewhere in the middle of the DVD of Die Hard 2, which was a travesty in itself, but he'd not had the heart to wake her up. Not that he cared, and it wasn't like he could sleep now it was daytime. He just turned over to daytime television and kept a close eye over the two sleeping next to him. Sam was out like a light, he'd not even murmured when Amy had whimpered to herself. Nothing else showed her distress, but the fact she looked less than peaceful had him gently shaking her awake.
She'd begged him to stop, slurring her words but whatever she was dreaming was definitely about him. When she'd drifted off to sleep again, she still showed no signs of the horrors she had seen in her head. He went back to his stories, his resolve to watch over them as they rested strengthening even more.
Real life wasn't like the movies, or books. Her nightmares didn't disappear just because the man she saw being tortured was safe next to her, or had reassured her that so was she. They kept coming, they'd never stopped. Her only hope was to replace them with something even more terrifying, Dean knew that from bitter experience, but it didn't stop him trying.
~0~0~0~
"Yes, Uncle Bobby, it's fine." Amelia said into the phone as she chucked her back into the trunk of the Impala. Her book bag sat by her feet as she turned, leaning on the small amount of body she could get to with the trunk door open, "Dean said he wanted to see where I was living."
"That boy just wants to gawk at all your classmates." Bobby pointed out and Amelia nodded to herself.
"Oh, I know." She replied, "Can't wait until the rip him to shreds. He still doesn't understand that he's just man-meat to them."
"Are you going to stop off and pick up your stuff?" He asked as Sam appeared with his own bag. She shot him a smile, motioning to the phone call with a shift of her eyes.
"Nah, there's not much there I actually need immediately." She explained, "I'll get a lift back with Claire in a couple of weeks. She's got a weekend off and we're gonna spend it back at home."
"All right." He replied with a sigh, and she knew he was disappointed that she wasn't heading back home before heading back to university, "Be safe."
"I will." She promised, "It's almost summer vacation, I'm not missing that." He chuckled and her smile grew, "Love you, Uncle Bobby."
"You too, Princess." He replied before they said there goodbyes and hung up. She looked at the screen, quickly making sure the call had ended before putting her phone back in the pocket. She had a thing, well, it wasn't much of a thing, but she always had to tell her Uncle Bobby that she loved him at the end of phone calls, or when she was heading anywhere without him. She guessed it stemmed from not telling her mother it when she was left with Bobby before she died, but it wasn't much of a hassle, and if he'd drank enough he'd be able to say it back, which was always nice to hear.
"Can't believe you're letting Dean near your friends." Sam told her, chucking his backpack in. She shrugged.
"He'll be fine." She brushed off, "Won't know what's hit him." She reached down to pick her book bag up, but Sam got there first, lifting it with an ease she couldn't have done. He placed it gently into the trunk, shutting the lid with a gentle thud.
"Interesting reading." He commented lightly and she blinked at him in surprise, her heart spreading up slightly.
"I... I suppose so." She replied slowly, testing the waters.
"I didn't know demonology was a requirement for Literature." He added and she shrugged, turning and trying to brush it away.
"Thought they might be useful." She explained, "I'll go find Dean." She told him. Dean had headed to check them all out, he shouldn't have been far away.
"Amelia?" He called after her and she paused, looking over her shoulder.
"Yeah?" She asked, slightly impatient.
"When did you drop out?" She turned back around quickly, ready to argue her case before realising she really didn't want to argue. She deflated in defeat and took the few steps she'd taken to stand next to him, leaning on the Impala.
"January." She stated, "I went back after Christmas in an absolutely foul mood. These girls had started going missing on campus over the break, some turning up with no necks, some not turning up at all."
"Vampires?" Sam guessed and she nodded in confirmation.
"Just one, trying to build his own nest. Took me a few days to find his base, but I took him down and the girls he'd converted." Sam's eyebrows shot up slightly as he leant back, surprised.
"On your own?" He asked and she nodded.
"It wasn't nice." She defended, "These poor girls hadn't done anything wrong, but they were killing other girls and I had to stop them. No one likes to kill anything. But for the first time in... Oh, I don't know how long, I felt useless. Next day I dropped out. I got a job, but the company went under and I'm running out of money."
"Does Dean know?" He asked and she shook her head, "Does Bobby?"
"I don't know how to tell them both." She whispered, "They both put so much stock in me being the 'normal' one. The one who got out." She looked up at Sam, "I don't want to get out, Sam. I want to make a difference, no matter how dangerous or destroying it is." She scuffed her toe on the ground, looking like a child and Sam had a flashback to when they were kids and would play together. Sometimes she'd stop, and look guilty, and he'd ask why. She'd tell him she felt bad because she forgot her mum and was happy, but he would tell her that Dean said that was okay, because he did the same. He'd told her Dean said that you might think you forget, but you don't deep, deep inside. She'd asked how deep was that and he said he didn't know.
The next time one of them had cut themselves, they'd tried to look. Amelia had screamed the scrapyard down and Bobby had been perplexed when they'd told him they'd been looking for her mom.
"It's up to you." Sam told her, "You can't let what they think sway you. But Bobby's gonna notice when you don't graduate."
"I'll get to that." She declared as she spotted Dean heading towards them, "Don't tell Dean." He nodded.
"Off the damn car." Dean scolded the pair, smacking each of them upside the head, "Let's hit to road." Amelia climbed in the back of the car, watching Sam trying to get in with his gigantor legs was always a laugh. Dean started the Impala up before rubbing his hands in glee, "College chicks, here we come!" This time Amelia smacked him, causing him to yell in protest.
"Stop being such a perv." She scolded playfully, "Seriously, Dean. They're my friends, you're not sleeping with them."
~0~0~0~
Dean had headed out in search of supplies, leaving her and Sam in her house in Aberdeen, waiting for him to come back. She lived with four other women who were all students and were either already out for the evening or were upstairs getting ready. Dean had been very specific in his plans for the evening and they weren't to head out to the bars until at least 11, although when Amelia had asked why he'd explained that she'd told him to stop being pervy.
So, while Dean searched for these mysterious 'supplies', she and Sam stayed in and pottered around the house. A couple of her house mates had come gawking, but she'd been expecting that when they'd finally been allowed to visit where she lived. A quick glare had sent them on their way and now she was watching Simpsons reruns, because who didn't like Simpsons?
"Sam?" She called, "Get me a drink, will ya?" She waited for him to answer, be it with an affirmative or with an insult but none came. She contemplated getting up instead and fetching her own drink, but that seemed more trouble than it was worth.
"Sam?" She shouted this time, but no answer. She sighed in defeat, he must have been in the bathroom upstairs. She stood up with a stretch and reluctantly headed towards the kitchen, chucking the refrigerator door open. On her shelf sat her last can of Coke. Did she drink it? Yeah. She took it and slammed the door shut, turning around and popping the tab open with one finger.
In the doorway stood a man with short hair, brown almost to the point of black, wearing a trench coat over a suit. A silver blade was in his hand, held ready to attack her at a moments notice. His features were set hard, her stance one of attack but she didn't notice. She was stunned into dropping her drink, the fizzy drink spurting on the floor around them, by the man's eyes. She'd never seen such a stunning, radiant blue before and it actually took her breath away.
"Castiel." She breathed.
"Who are you?" He demanded, his voice deep, not exactly what she had been expecting but it also seemed to fit him perfectly. Her mouth opened and closed a couple of times as she couldn't tear her gaze away from his eyes.
"Your grace." She whispered, a slight shake of her head, "Wow." In an instant she was slammed against the refrigerator, the knife against her throat and she cried out in pain, her spine aching.
"Who are you?" He asked again, slowly this time and she tried to lean back and get away from the blade cutting her slightly.
"My name's Amelia. I'm Bobby Singer's God daughter." She blabbered out, "Sam!" She screamed, hoping she sounded terrified enough.
"I don't think so." He told her with a slight tilt of his head, "You seem human, but I didn't know you were here. You're being hidden from angels. Why?"
"It's not by choice." She promised, "Sam! Get your ass down here, now!"
"What did he do now?" Dean asked, beer in hand, "Woah! Cas, dude, let her go!" He rushed over, putting a hand on the angel's arm to try and move him away. Under any other circumstance Dean wouldn't have been able to shift him and he knew it, but Castiel's plan changed and suddenly they were both gone. Amelia gulped in the air she hadn't been able to get just a moment ago, sliding down to the floor as Sam rushed in, half-shaved.
"What the hell?" He asked as she panted.
"I just met Castiel." She told him, rubbing her neck and seeing a small streak of blood where she'd been cut, "I don't think he likes me." Sam walked over and helped her up, giving her neck a quick check but the cut was purely superficial.
"He doesn't like anyone." He reassured her, "Although, he didn't try and decapitate me. Where is he now?"
"Dunno. He zapped Dean somewhere. No warning or anything, I don't think Dean'll be happy."
~0~0~0~
Dean was not happy. One moment he had been whistling as he entered Amelia's student house, beer in one hand along with the promise of drunk college chicks hanging over the night, putting him in an extremely happy mood. Of course, then he'd found Cas ready to kill her and it'd really put a damper on his night.
Now, instead of being a house walking distance from Student bars, he was in a middle of a field with an angel who had a stick up his ass.
"Dude, seriously!" Dean snapped, "Take me back, now."
"Who is she?" Castiel demanded in return, more than a little riled by the fact a normal human woman had been completely hidden from not only him, but he suspected his superiors as well. No human had that kind of power without supernatural help.
"Who, Amy?" Dean asked, confused, "She's Bobby's God daughter. Don't tell me you angels can't tell who had Godparents and who doesn't?"
"She is hidden from angels. That is impossible without intervention." Cas insisted angrily, "She needs to be disposed of." Suddenly Dean went on the defensive, the threat against his friend causing him to round on Cas.
"Excuse me?" Dean snapped, "That's my friend you're talking about."
"Then you need to choose your friends more wisely." Castiel retorted, "She must be involved with demons. There is no other explanation and therefore she is a threat to the mission."
"She's not working with demons!" Dean insisted, "Trust me." Castiel's eyes narrowed, looking at him with that confused look Dean had seen on his face from the moment they'd met.
"Trust you?" Castiel repeated and Dean joined him in his anger.
"It's not demons, you asshat!" He shouted, "It's angels! So get down off your high horse and take me back so I can make sure you've not actually done anything stupid."
"Angels?" Castiel scoffed, not making any move to take them back, "I would know if it was angels, Dean."
"You didn't even know she existed." Dean pointed out, "So you're not as well-informed as you think you are."
"Why would angels hide her from other angels?" He asked pointedly, because it was a ridiculous notion. Dean growled in frustration, torn between storming off and attempting to throttle Cas.
"Look, I'm not supposed to say." He snapped, "And I really don't want to tell you if you're just gonna go back and rip her head off her shoulders. But if you're going to be such a douche-bag about it..." He sighed, "She sees them when she sings, all right?"
"She sees angels when she sings?" Castiel asked and Dean nodded.
"It's just this... thing." Dean explained, trying to downplay it, "They really like it when she sings, they're probably keeping her off your... angel radar." He suggested. Cas paused, looking slightly to his right in thought, but Dean thought he always looked like he had forgotten the stove was on so he actually was never sure if he was being thoughtful, or just looking slightly constipated.
"Dean!" He turned and suddenly he was back in the kitchen, both Amelia and Sam staring at him in surprise. Sam had an arm around her, obviously comforting her as Castiel strode towards her with purpose. She shrunk towards Sam apprehensively and he pulled her against him, ready to try and get her out of the way should Cas try and hurt her again.
"Dean tells me you see angels when you sing." Cas stated and she nodded meekly, drawn back up to his glowing eyes, "Show me." He demanded.
"I... I can't." She stuttered out, and he held his blade tightly in his hand once again, "Not here, it'll cause a mess. People will notice." He nodded, grabbing her roughly around the arm and taking them to the field he had just transported Dean to. She looked around, slightly startled.
""Where are we?" She asked him. It was dark, must have been the middle of the night, but South Dakota it was only around 8pm and barely dusk.
"Scotland." He barked shortly, "Show me." She nodded, taking a deep breath.
"I don't know when, I don't know how." She started, a white flash of light illuminating the area. It was the sign of an angel's true form, but being one himself he could sense that there was more than one there. The ground rumbled under foot, but Amelia didn't seem to be too worried, "But I know something's starting right n-ow…" Cas blinked, falling into a stunned silence as an angelic harmony filled the air, accompanying her as if it was backing music, "Watch and you'll see, someday I'll be, part of your world-" She held the note exquisitely, the heavenly voices complimenting her until she stopped, when the world around the two fell abruptly silent and dark once more. Cas stared at her and she looked at him expectantly, but he didn't say a word, "Castiel?" She prompted. He looked her over again, but nothing seemed to have changed about the human in front of him. No black eyes, no twisted face. She was just an ordinary human with questioning grey eyes.
It was incredible, a deep calmness resonated from the centre of his being, filling him completely with a sense of hope and a deep understanding he'd only felt a few times before in his vast lifespan. The inner peace that came from the singing that had surrounded them most likely made humans feel a similar sense of blessing, but for any angel it was like a gift from their Father himself.
He'd heard of this, whispers of stories throughout his garrison. Most of the time the stories that were told were to keep them in line, stories of warning about what had happened to other angels who had not obeyed. Stories of angels who had thought for themselves, like Gadreel and Abner. However, one of the nicer ones, almost mythical in nature, was of the human charge with the music of Heaven running through her veins. A mere human who could make angels weep with simultaneous joy and sorrow, the power of temptation on her lips.
She could command the Choir.