Chapter 7

Chuck couldn't believe his luck at the fact that he might be having the biggest hallucination ever or the world was just out to get him. The guys calling themselves Sam and Dean Winchester knew what he didn't put in the books. The woman who said she was Absolution was a casual observer, just like how he wrote her into the books.

When she walked into the house and near where his desk was, it was inevitable that she would find the painting. He was surprised at her reaction though. When she saw the painting she gave a slight smile and said, "So that's what happened to it."

When Chuck looked at Sam and Dean, they were looking at her but they weren't at weirded out as he was. It was like they were used to this and led him to further believe that they were real. He was still nervous because she was standing next to the painting and smiling at herself that was smiling at herself. It was really Twilight Zone in the extreme. He tried to make small conversation, "Uh please be careful."

"Don't worry Chuck. It's in better hands than when I last touched it. I was such an ingrate," she said.

"O—okay."

She then chuckled and said, "Relax Chuck. You're not the first one to freak out over something like this." She gestured towards the painting as she turned to look at him.

The resemblance was striking. Chuck did notice though that some of the angles in her face sharpened more into their adult proportions and if one looked carefully there was that ever alert look in her face even though she was being pleasant. It was like she couldn't allow herself to relax and now that Chuck could think about it, if she was who she said she was then she wouldn't really be relaxed though it wouldn't hurt to chill just a little.

A bark caught his attention and Chuck realized that a dog followed them in. He said, "Please no dogs."

"Why not? It's not like you're allergic and she's harmless unless you piss her off," Dean shot off. He had his arms crossed over his chest looking like he wanted to beat someone up and it was equally intimidating with Sam standing next to him.

"Dean," the woman hissed. She then looked at Chuck and said, "I'll take her out if you don't mind me looking around."

Chuck actually didn't mind. She wasn't trying to beat him up for the Supernatural books because she was standing with the two guys she came with. He watched as the dog followed her out after receiving a slight whistle. They went through the house and out through the back and he went to the kitchen to grab a drink. This was one twisted day.

On his way back after taking a drink, he knew it was too much to hope for but they were still there, "Oh, you're still there."

Sam and Dean were standing next to his desk. Sam was looking occasionally at the painting and then around. Dean appeared to be the more focused though he was sure to have noticed the painting as well. He said, "Yup."

"You're not a hallucination," came out more like a statement. However when Chuck heard Dean's response, the only thing left to say was, "Well, there's only one explanation. Obviously I'm a god."

It was plausible. How else did it explain the fact that he was writing about two very real people down to the detail and not to mention that what he once thought of as fantasy came to life? Okay in all fairness the woman did say that she was over five hundred years old. But she looks so sexy… better than some of the other women… er.

"You're not a god," Sam said. He could almost hear the nonsequiter from Angela about real gods and goddesses. The sad thing was that he knew what she said would be true since he had a tangle with his fair share and he had been possessed by one for a brief time. He would know.

"How else do you explain it? I write things and then they come to life? No, I'm definitely a god. A cruel, cruel capricious god. The things I put you through! The physical beatings alone!" Chuck could recall all the times the Winchesters suffered serious injuries at the hands of the monsters they hunted. "Then there is the fact that Absolution gets hurt and you fight about it…"

Dean looked at Sam a little confused about what Chuck meant. Sam made a silent motion to remind him and he nodded. He looked back at Chuck trying hard to be nice as Angela asked as he replied, "We're still in one piece."

"I killed your father. I burned your mother alive... and then you had to go through the whole horrific deal again with Jessica. All for what? All for the sake of literary symmetry. I toyed with your lives! Your emotions... for entertainment," Chuck rambled on ignoring the fact that Sam tried to get him to stop because of what he was talking about. "I mean that emotional spill with Absolution when Dean went to hell... Had I known she was a woman, I wouldn't have done that."

"You didn't toy with us, Chuck, okay? You didn't create us," Dean tried to reassure the guy. He had to admit that he was doing a nice job so far of being nice but this was going beyond insane. He had to change the tone after Chuck quizzed him about the bugs and the ghost ship and bad writing. "Chuck, you're not a god!"

"We think you're probably just psychic," Sam added a little more gently.

Chuck made a scoffing noise at that, "No. If I was psychic, do you think I'd be writing? Writing's hard!" He sat down on his couch and took another drink of liquor. This was…

Dean blinked at that. Writing was hard? He lived with someone who could spin tales and make lies sound the truth. She wrote quotes in notes to Sam and she even made Christmas into a holiday poem. Then to be fair he had to admit that she was good at the creative stuff. He had proof of that when she was put through the same crap he and Sam were put through at the Sandover building.

While he was director of marketing sales she was in charge of advertising and she had good stuff but he dismissed it as civilian crap. What she produced from when she said she had strange dreams. Thinking about it now he figured that she got the dreams like Sam did because she was like his brother in that he scratched the scab when it was bothering him. Probably something didn't seem right to her and she ended up having dreams of her memories of them hunting.

There had been a total of two paintings and numerous charcoal drawings. Those he thought were pretty awesome even though they depicted some pretty gruesome stuff at times. There was one charcoal drawing though that wasn't so gruesome. In fact it was the oddball of the collection. Where the majority of them showed some of their hunts; there was a nice one of Sam holding Absolution and the manifestation of the sword's soul, the one that stood out was of a happier time.

It was one of Angela riding piggyback on Sam and he was in the background. Dean could remember that. Sam had badly teased her and he was reaping the consequences when she jumped on his back like she did. He couldn't remember what it was that Sam was teasing her with but it certainly was entertaining to watch. Sam did have a slightly longer arm reach than she did and if push came to shove he wouldn't hesitate to utilize it. The drawing was really good for charcoal and was such an oddball. Then again Dean always thought she was one when it came to certain things.

When that job was over and there was the collection of stuff, that one Dean automatically looked for. She wanted to get rid of them but both he and Sam decided against it even though they all depicted parts of their hunts together. Sam went geek on him and mentioned one work of art by an unknown artist from the early twentieth century that was similar in terms of style. They took them all and shipped them off to Bobby. The one charcoal drawing Dean kept. It was small enough to fit into an 8x10 frame and definitely small enough to keep in his duffle. It was sad that she never spoke of it again but Dean was certain that she thought about it often enough.

In the meantime Sam was trying to find some logical explanation, "It seems that somehow you're just focused on our lives."

"That only briefly mentions Angie," Dean muttered.

"That is her name?" Chuck looked at the Winchesters. "Cause I could have sworn that it was a different one."

Sam cleared his throat on that one. Dean glanced at Sam for a moment wondering why he was getting upset that Chuck had written about Angela in an abstract way. He looked at Chuck and asked, "Are you working on anything right now?"

Chuck had been reading what he had written and going over the conversation that played out the moment he opened the door. Even the conversation with Absolution or Angela, he was still having a hard time reconciling the two names as one person. The name Angela was abstract like a voice in his head. As he was reading, he reread a part and it hit him. "Holy crap."

"What?" Dean looked at Chuck as he leaned back in his chair.

Chuck looked down at what he had made his corrections on. He had finished putting Absolution's role into it and it ran smoothly. He held it up. "The latest book. It's uh… It's kind of weird."

Sam looked at Chuck, not sure where this was going. Dean was doing the same thing. In their experience that usually wasn't a good thing when something weird came their way. If he were honest he was still thinking about Angela's behavior during their nighttime conversation. She may have said it was a weird but something was telling him that there was more to it. He didn't want to accuse her of lying. He was concerned. He turned his focus to the situation at hand, "Weird how?"

"It's very Vonnegut," Chuck replied.

Dean leaned in, "Slaughterhouse Five Vonnegut or Cat's Cradle Vonnegut?"

Sam couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What?"

"What?" Dean looked at his brother. He had read the books… not that he was going to admit to that to just anyone. He looked at Sam and at the look he explained, "Me and Angie had a Dead Poet's Society thing a while back. She was reading one of them and… I got involved."

Sam blinked at that. It was a surprise when Dean admitted to anything that spelled nerd. It was an even bigger surprise that he was in a literary discussion with Angela who once read out loud Dracula to him to get him to sleep. He gave a slight shrug to say that he was okay with that.

Chuck looked at both of them and said, "It's Kilgore Trout Vonnegut. I wrote myself into it. I wrote myself… at my house… confronted by my characters and I was told that Absolution was a real person." He looked up at the Winchesters and hoped that they didn't hurt him over this. He wasn't stupid since he noticed the little things like Sam's constant glancing at the painting and the almost glare at the Shadow Chasers graphic novel on the table.

The silence was a bit intimidating and Chuck asked, "You guys aren't going to hurt me are you?"

"No they're not," Angela said as she walked through the house. She looked at the Winchesters and then at Chuck as he was holding the sheets he had just written. She leaned on the desk and gave a slight smile, "So I guess you should have seen that you were meeting someone supposed to be dead huh?"

Chuck relaxed at little at the reassuring smile she was giving. "I suppose so though I never had anything telling me what Absolution looked like. In fact the only thing that I know for sure is the tattoo that Absolution has had since birth."

Angela raised her brow while she smiled at that. She looked at the one she was sure was the Prophet and said, "Honey, you have no idea."

Charlie was sitting on the front step and holding a soccer ball. He had the most interesting conversation with the woman that came to his neighbor Chuck's house. He knew that the first thing he said was the most cheesiest of things to say and he took it right from a movie that made it the cheesiest line ever. Yet she didn't seem to mind. In fact it seemed that she was expecting him to come out.

Charlie "Black Kettle" Lakota felt that something was going to happen that day. He sensed it when he woke up and went through his morning routine that he had adapted. Ever since his mom died, he had to make changes to his life through necessity and mostly it was staying out of his father's way. That morning he had to be especially quiet since it had been one of those nights.

He had noticed her when she got out of the car with the two guys she was with and her dog. He could tell that she was not on the same page as her friends. It was like she was tagging along for some other reason. He didn't find out until he saw her standing in Chuck's back yard.

The reason he said that cheesy line was because he thought she was. It was more likely the trick of the light but she did seem to have a glow about her. It softened her hair and made her look really pretty. She already was but it made her more so. Then there were the things she said; she almost sounded like his grandpa when he talked about the old stories and one about an angel who cared about the world and risked much to keep it alive.

It had been a bit of a surprise when she admitted straight out that she was looking for him. His mom said that he was destined to meet the one who would protect him from the danger that was to come. She said that it was a rare thing to meet a warrior who existed but didn't since their job was to protect and often from things that people didn't understand. Charlie found though that he liked the blunt manner since it sounded like there was more honesty there than anywhere else.

They talked a little until he had to go in. He was off track from school and he knew that he had to get inside. He had some chores to do. He did tell her that he would be glad to talk to her some more when she was done with Chuck. That had her laughing and he was confused about that and he wondered if she was a little crazy since she was laughing at something that was not funny on his end but she found it amusing. He said that he would be out in about thirty or so minutes in the front if she wanted to talk some more and he ran back into his house. Now that he thought about it, he didn't wait to see if that was agreeable to her.

"So you're a kid that likes to kick things."

Charlie looked up to see the woman standing there looking down at him with a smile on her face. Her dog was standing right beside her, its tongue lolling out. He looked up and said, "I happen to like soccer."

Angela chuckled as she looked down at Charlie. "It is pretty cool. I happen to know someone who liked playing it as a kid. Now he can kick in a door like it's nothing." She looked around and added, "So do you want to go for a walk? Maybe to the park?"

"Aren't you afraid of people thinking you're abducting me?"

"Aren't you afraid of people thinking you are kidnapping me?" Angela gave a smug smile as she looked at Charlie.

Charlie chuckled a little at that. "There's the park near here. They have a pretty decent green." He stood up and tucked the ball under his arm. "I know the way."

Angela made a gesture and let Charlie go first and then fell in step beside him. "Don't you need to let your father know?"

"He's gone for now." Charlie grew a little quiet. He adjusted the ball under his arm so it didn't fall out. "He won't care at the moment. He's not himself. Hasn't been for a long time."

Angela nodded as they walked down the sidewalk. She hadn't met the man yet but it was clear just by what she had seen so far indicated that there was something going on in the kid's home life. She didn't see any physical evidence of the worst kind of thing apart from the unspeakables that would probably make her into a ravaging beast if given the chance. If she had to venture a guess it was one of the dark things that plagued Native Americans when the whites came west and brought their white ways and of course the drink.

"So you said that you came for me. What do you mean by that?"

Angela looked down at the boy and then forward as they walked, "I'm not going to kidnap you if that's what you think. I don't do that."

"Didn't think so."

"Don't be an assbutt," she said in a firm boy. "And don't tell me that it's a bad word. Would you rather have me call you a smartass?"

"Can't help it. I started acquiring it ever since Mom died." Charlie shot a look at Angela that was almost defiant.

"Yeah well you're talking to a master of being a smartass," Angela countered. "And that took several lifetimes." She put her hands in her jacket pockets and strolled along. She pursed her lips for a moment before she said, "You asked me if I was an angel. Do you think I am?"

"Well…" Charlie had to think about it a little. He didn't want to sound like a silly little kid who believed in fairy tales. He was under the impression though that if he were to tell the truth, she wouldn't laugh at him. "You kind of look like an angel. Not the halo type stuff but you do look like one."

"So I look like an angel but not like an angel?" Angela teased the kid a little but gently.

"More like what I think what Grandpa describes when he tells the stories of our people. My favorite is hearing about the angel or spirit that rode across the lands and stood up for the People. Grandpa says that those stories have been handed down since the white man started moving west."

Angela grew thoughtful at that. She was well aware that there were stories in Spanish told about her. She was the lady of the moon or something like that. She hadn't been joking when she told Sam that one. There were others around the world that became part of urban legend and fairy tales and hokum and often distorted way beyond the actual events. It was why she was vastly amused at this with what was happening to the boys. She then said, "Interesting."

Charlie looked up at her as they continued their walk, "You know my grandpa believed in them and so did my mom. She said that this angel is one that will sweep across the land against the forces of evil and battle their chief so that the warriors under her command wouldn't have to."

That sounds like me through and through, Angela thought to herself. "The angel will fight the chief?" She wanted some clarification. There were the references in Revelation that she had but when it was translated into other cultures that didn't necessarily have a Bible, it made her curious.

"Well Grandpa thought it unlikely but Mom always thought that it would happen. She would get these dreams and then tell them to me and other people. She was known for knowing things as well as healing. She was a medicine woman, a rarity with our people."

Angela felt her lip twitch. She remembered being called that a long time ago. She was also called a crazy white woman for trying to be a man but she earned the respect as a healer and a warrior. "Crazy white woman," she muttered to herself as she chuckled about it, "When a woman tries to be a man she becomes one. This is not natural."

Charlie listened to Angela talk. "Grandpa said that too but he also said that there were a few women who were given the strength of warriors. The angel in his stories was one and so was Mom," he countered. He looked down a bit and then added, "Mom said that the angel will be able to consume the light and darkness but could only fight one but she believed that the angel would fight the chief not because of the love she would have for life but for the one person."

Angela blinked at that. It sounded like it was something out of a bad romance novel or something. What the kid was implying that she wouldn't fight possibly to the death for the sake of all mankind but for one person. She couldn't conceive of it really but she would be the first to admit that she would do anything to keep Sam and Dean from going through this whole Apocalypse but she always kept in mind the bigger picture even though it sucked on her personal life.

"Mom said that the angel will save the one taken by the evil chief in more ways than could be named. She was always going on about it especially the part where the angel will have a name that means 'angel'. I think that's why I think it is you," Charlie went on while shrugging his shoulders. They had come to the park and he put the ball down on the ground and started kicking it while he walked. "Your name is Angela and Mom said that the angel looks for things that are lost and protects them."

"Interesting kid," Angela replied as she tapped the ball with her foot when it came to her. "So you think I am this person your mom told stories about?"

"Are you saying that you're not?" Charlie kicked his ball to her after doing some fancy footwork. In a way it was meant to be challenging.

"I didn't say that now did I?" Angela countered smoothly and took the ball. With a movement with her foot, she scooped it up and did some fancy footwork to keep the ball in the air. When she was finished, she popped it up in the air and caught it like it was nothing before handing it back to Charlie. "I did say that I was looking for you so it is probably safe to say that I am what your mom talked about though I think it came with some embellishments."

Charlie took the proffered ball and then noticed the tattoo on the underside of her wrist. He took a look at them and said, "Neat." He looked at the one on top of her right hand and noted that it was different from the other two.

Angela gave a slight smile but was interrupted when another voice entered, "Indeed it is. So the Medicine woman has returned."

She turned to see an elderly man looking at her with eyes that missed nothing. She glanced at Charlie who was looking up at her with a solemn expression. It looked like she was in the middle of being caught in a trap of sorts but she could sense no malice and Sasha was her best indicator. She looked at the old man with a pointed look.

A/N: Looks like Angie found out what happened to her painting and Chuck realizes its all real. Angie finds more about Charlie. Keep watching for more Will you be My Angel...