AN: I am SO sorry I missed yesterday's update guys! Been dealing with some family/personal stuff these last two days, but I didn't want to make you wait until Friday for this update. I will do my best to resume the T/F schedule, but with the holidays and traveling coming up, I may need to shift the days around just a hare.
Thanks for your patience and understaning
-Dark Heart-
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John couldn't believe the sight. He wanted to tear his eyes away from the horrible image, but it was as though he was entranced. He couldn't look away, at his oldest son snoozing and drooling on the 'angel' in the backseat—and the 'angel' just sat there, fingers moving through Dean's hair. John saw earlier a blue glow to its fingertips; the same glow that had covered nearly every inch of its body when his boys found it on that sidewalk.
John knew he needed to have a serious discussion with his boys about the creature masquerading as an angel, but he also knew it wouldn't do any good. Whatever spell or trap the creature had cast on his boys was horrendously strong, and John didn't know what he could do to break it. He had never seen this kind of magic before.
No, talking would do no good. John would have to deal with this by himself. It was only fair after all; all that his boys had endured on their own, demons and Apocalypses, and death, John could stand on his own two feet and take down this insidious beast that had slunk its way into his boys' fragile hearts and minds. Dean, especially, seemed trapped under this beast's magic. He called it family, and John knew how important that was to Dean, knew he wouldn't just consider anyone family.
Still, it wasn't that surprising that Dean could fall underneath a spell like this. Dean was great with a shotgun, and there was no one John trusted more to watch his back, but John knew the truth. Dean was just not that bright. Sam got the brains, Dean got the brawns. That was just the way things worked out sometimes. And there was never anything wrong with that. Some cases needed muscle, and some jobs needed someone on the front lines doing the dirty work.
The poor boy hadn't even been able to finish high school. How was he supposed to know he was being tricked by some sort of rare demon not even John had seen before? So, Dean. While it was a pity, it was not a surprise that he would fall victim to something heinous like this.
Sam, though. Sam was smart, resourceful. He looked at things from all sorts of different angles before he took a side. And this creature had managed to trick Sam too. That was what told John that this monster was dangerous. Smart, powerful. And it had his poor boys wrapped around his finger. They didn't even know what kind of trouble they were in.
This thing was able to put them to sleep with a touch of a finger. It could kill with just as much too, but they trusted it, kept it with them.
It was looking down on Dean, now, with an odd expression on its face. Something soft and gentle, but there was a greater sternness underneath it.
If this was some sort of demon, it could kill them all right now. John's eyes slide quickly to the speedometer; Sam was pushing past seventy miles an hour. John's eyes returned to the rear view mirror, watching the creature. Dean was sleeping by its influence, helpless. They were all helpless. If this thing chose to attack, there was nothing they could do, nowhere they could go unless they wanted to jump out of a moving car going as fast as they were.
John didn't want to die. He just got his boys back, back from the claws of Hell and demons. His wife was murdered and his life ruined because of demons. He wasn't going to just sit back and let them do it again.
John didn't want to believe in angels. His boys seemed convinced they existed, but John didn't want to be. If they were real, where were they? Mary used to talk of angels all the time, and John had hated it then, hated how she filled Dean's head with that nonsense.
But if they were real, John knew one thing for certain. That thing in the backseat was not an angel.
They pulled into Pigeon Ford, Tennessee late that night. Eight straight hours in the car had made John's back sore, and his stomach ached in hunger. They found a 24-hour diner and stopped to have an incredibly later dinner. Only one other booth was occupied by two teenagers, a boy and a girl, and they were leaning over their table, giggling at each other as they passed a milkshake back and forth.
John smiled lightly. It was sweet, young, innocent love. It reminded John of when he had first dated Mary.
They slide into a booth tucked against the corner, John sitting next to Sam, the angel and Dean sitting across. Soon, a waitress came and took their order. John and Dean each went for a bacon cheeseburger, while Sam got some sort of chicken wrap.
"And what can I get for you, sweetie?" She asked the angel.
"Coffee, please."
She hummed a little. "Coffee this late? Guess you're not going to bed anytime soon."
"I don't sleep," the angel said.
The waitress grinned. "Wouldn't have anything to do with your ten o clock coffee, would it?"
The angel stared at her. She cleared her throat and tucked her pen behind her ear. "I'll have that out in a jiffy," she said, her heels clacking on the linoleum.
Sam and Dean shared a look with each other and broke out laughing.
"What's funny?" the angel asked.
"She was flirting with you, Cas," Sam said.
"She was?" the angel turned his head in the direction the waitress left.
"She didn't call any of us 'sweetie'," Dean said.
"Dean's just jealous," Sam said. "Don't take it too personally, Cas."
Watching the interactions they shared only infuriated John. How could they not see it? This thing had them hook, line and sinker, had them convinced it was a fool, as though it didn't know exactly what it was doing. He couldn't bear it, couldn't bear to watch the monster play his boys right in front of John's eyes.
"Dean," he said, stern. "Can you tell us more about the case?"
Dean shrugged. "I mean, not really. Told you all the article had."
Just then the waitress came by with their food. She began to sit their meals down. As she leaned over the table to reach back towards Sam and the angel, her breasts pushed out of her shirt.
"And one coffee," she said, winking. The angel's face drained of all color, but Sam and Dean's grew red and John could tell they were trying to hold back laughter.
John couldn't stand to watch this either. "Excuse me, ma'am," he said. Sam and Dean's little juvenile giggle fest ceased to a halt. "Have you heard about any disappearances around here?"
Her lips puckered and she sighed. "Yeah. Small town like this, word gets around pretty fast. Not that anyone knows much, mind you."
"Well, what do you know?" Sam asked.
"Um, same as you, I suppose. Two people just…vanished, almost into thin air it seems."
"Sounds scary," Dean said, wiping a drip of sauce off his plate and licking it off his finger. "What do the police think happen?"
She shrugged. "People come, people leave. We're not a very exciting town, in case you haven't noticed. The police think they got bored and left."
"Do you think that?" Sam asked.
"Honey, if I could, I'd pack up and be outta here in a heartbeat," she said with a smile. "I'll leave you to your meal." She walked away to tend to the teenagers across the diner.
"What do you think?" Sam asked. "Cas?"
The angel ripped open a packet of sugar and spilled it into his coffee. He grabbed two more and did the same, while responding, "We need more information."
"We should find the families," Dean said. "If these people were taken by a djinn, it should've been sudden. If they just skipped town, the families have to know something, right? People who are planning on running away gotta be acting weird before they leave."
"I'll look tonight," Sam said. "You up for doing interviews, Dad?"
John bit into his burger. It was a bit of a stupid question, was he 'up' for doing interviews. What did it matter? Interviews needed to be done. That was it. "It's like riding a bike," he said instead.
"But we can't all go doing interviews. Four people is way too much," Sam said.
"You and Dad go," Dean said, mouth full. He wiped his chin on his sleeve. Sam sighed at the sight. "Cas and I will look around town, see if there's anywhere a djinn might be stashing vics."
John tightened his jaw. He watched the angel take a tentative sip of the coffee. He didn't want either of his boys alone with it. It had been alone with Sam last night; there within inches of Sam at his most vulnerable, in his sleep. It could have done god knows what to him, and Sam would have been helpless, Sam would have invited whatever destruction the monster carried behind him.
He wanted to argue, fight, make a scene. He didn't care. These were his boys, their lives on the line. John would, and had done, anything to protect them. He nearly said he would work with the creature—he would get it alone and deal with it, break whatever spell it enchanted his boys with, and then he would kill it like every other supernatural creature that ever had the misfortune to cross his path.
He stayed quiet instead. He couldn't just volunteer to work with the monster. It was obviously very intelligent, and strong; John didn't even know how strong it was, or what he could use to kill it. He needed to know those before he could even attempt as assassination.
This monster was bad news, but John forced himself to think rationally. He was being paranoid. The monster could hurt his sons, but…There was no reason it would hurt either of his sons. It needed them, obviously, for protection, for help in its passing as a human. Sam and Dean said it had been working with them for years; if it wanted to kill them, it would have done so by now. So, John had to acknowledge that logically, there was no reason for him to worry about it hurting one of his sons.
But it couldn't be allowed to live. It wormed its way into his boys' brains and hearts, was manipulating them into calling it family and offering it their devout protection and camaraderie. Plus, it was a monster, and that was just the way it worked. Save people, kill monsters, never the other way around, never even just half of it. You couldn't save people and save the monsters. If the monster wasn't killed, the people weren't saved. His boys wouldn't be safe until the monster was gone.
"Sounds like a plan," John said. He took another bite of his food. It tasted rotten on his tongue suddenly, and he had to wash it down with water. He kept his eyes locked onto the 'angel'. It still sat there, drinking coffee.
Most monsters needed to feed, but demons didn't. John could never recall ever seeing a demon eat or drink, or do any of the other basic human needs. It was strange to see this one trying so hard to appear as human that it participated in unnecessary tasks. Except, if that was its goal, it would make more sense for it to order a full meal.
"Why coffee?" John asked.
"I like the taste," it said, a small smile forming on its lips as it stared down into the mug. Steam continued to curl from it like skeletal fingers towards the ceiling.
"If he wasn't an angel, he'd be pissing like a racehorse he drinks so much," Dean said through a mouth of full food.
"Dean, you're disgusting," it said, nose scrunching in distaste. "It's impolite to speak with your mouth full."
"What would you know about polite, you make babies cry."
"That wasn't my fault," it said, frowning. "And, isn't it in the nature of a baby to cry anyway?"
"Yeah, Dean," Sam said, smirking. "If babies can't cry, who can?"
"I hate all of you," Dean murmured. He yawned.
"How are you still tired?" Sam asked. "You literally slept the entire drive."
"Excuse me, but maybe you forgot the part where I hadn't slept at all in days?"
Sam raised his eyebrows. "So, sleeping arrangements. I can bunk with Dad tonight if you want."
John pulled his lip through his teeth. He tasted blood.
"You guys can't spend more than five minutes alone together without going for each other's throats. Dad can get his own room and us three will bunk in one. Well, it's really only us two, since Cas doesn't need a bed."
John exhaled. Okay, he still wasn't happy with that arrangement—or how his boys just began calling the shots themselves without any consultation from him; but, it was better than Dean staying alone with the monster. Surely, if it were to go rogue, both his boys could hold their own against it.
"Well, we should get going then," Sam said. "We've got to get an early start tomorrow morning if we want to cover all our bases."
John and Dean slide out of the booths. Dean pulled his wallet out of his pocket and went to the front to pay.
John lingered behind waiting beside Sam and the monster. He kept staring at the monster out the sides of his eyes. He had to know what this thing was before he could come up with any sort of plan on destroying it.
"Christo," he said, faking a sneeze,
"Gesundheit," Sam said. John's eyes never left the creature; and its eyes never turned that all-consuming black John had expected. Its eyes didn't change at all, didn't even look over towards him in acknowledgement.
It didn't mean anything. Just because its eyes didn't turn black, didn't mean it wasn't a demon. It was just a type of demon John had never seen before, maybe one of a kind, like Yellow Eyes, or Alastair.
Dean came back from paying the tab and they began walking back towards the car. John lingered behind, ensuring he was at least two steps behind.
He whispered under his breath the beginning of the exorcism spell. The creature didn't flinch, not at the first word, or after the first sentence, or even when John began to the second verse. John wanted to push through and finish it—a demon was never forced from the vessel until the last word of exorcism rite was spoken—but they had reached the car by that time, and anyway, even if took the entire rite being spoken, usually demons reacted at once. This creature hadn't reacted at all.
"Cas, you get shotgun," Dean said, opening the front passenger door.
"Aw," Sam said. "I guess chivalry isn't dead after all."
Dean flicked Sam his middle finger. The creature furrowed, but ducked its head to get into the car. Dean walked around to get into the driver's seat.
"What, you're not going to open the door for us?" Sam said with a toothy grin.
"You're a strong, independent woman," Dean said, opening his door. "Why don't you actually put that college degree to use every now and then?"
Sam huffed, but opened the back passenger door. He slide across the bench seat and slide across. He had to angle his knees towards the opposite door to fit his long legs in the foot wells. John could see the discomfort in his younger son's face, but he didn't say anything.
It would be uncomfortable for John too to have to squeeze into the backseat with Sam, his basketball stature only ever a weakness when it came to traveling; but at least John could keep a better eye on the creature and Dean. Looking through the rear view mirror, while requiring nearly no effort, was suspicious. The movement was obvious. John didn't want to be obvious, didn't want this creature to know John was watching its every move. If he was going to get the jump on it, John needed it to trust him.
He couldn't see the creature's hands from this position. Couldn't see if they had that ethereal blue grow to them it had used earlier to lull Dean to sleep.
John just had to accept that, for the time being, he would have to work with this monster, until John could figure out what it was. Once he knew that, he could figure out how to kill it. But for the time being, he was going to have to work with it.
He glanced out the window and his blood froze in his veins. That strange woman was there again, standing outside the entrance of the diner.
You're not feeling ill? The creature asked. Hearing things, seeing things?
He had said no, because he wasn't. It was just a trick of the eyes, he decided. He was still tired and his brain was still catching up to the reality. He blinked hard and slow and when he opened his eyes again, the woman was gone.
Just like she always was.
John dug his fingernails into the soft flesh of his palm.