Cas stayed up on the bow for hours.
Dean took a driving shift and Sam took a nap; then Sam took a driving shift and Dean took a nap; and Cas stayed there on the bow the whole time, wings spread. Pointing now and then, one arm outstretched, to show the way.
At lunchtime Dean took him a sandwich. Dean ate his own sandwich up there too, standing just behind Cas and peeking over Cas's left wing (which, of course, was only partly spread) at the view ahead. Dean had just finished his sandwich when Cas called back over his shoulder, "Dolphins, Dean! Get in front. Take a look."
Cas folded his wings in and scooted back rapidly, inching back off the bowsprit, and guided Dean in front. As soon as Dean took hold of the handrail and stepped carefully forward, onto the skinny little bowsprit, he knew why Cas had been spending the whole day here.
It really felt like flying.
It was like being suspended in midair. From this position Dean couldn't actually see any of the boat at all. Instead all he saw was sun and sea, and all he felt was the wind. There was nothing on either side but the wind; nothing above him but the wind; and nothing below him but the surface of the sea, several yards below, rocketing past with amazing speed in a sparkling blur of wave and water. Bursts of spray hit Dean's legs now and then as the boat zoomed through the waves.
Wings began to spread in Dean's peripheral vision. Cas had inched onto the bowsprit just behind Dean, and was standing just a foot behind Dean's back, spreading his wings again. Cas tapped Dean on the shoulder then, and pointed down toward the sea, where, it turned out, dark gray shapes were dashing through the waves just in front of the boat. There were dolphins! A whole horde of them. Some of them even surfaced, practically right under Dean's feet, riding the bow-wave of the boat with what seemed like obvious joy. Dean was overcome with an almost giddy joy himself at the sight, and he shouted back to Sam, "SAM! DOLPHINS!"
Sam nodded, with a great big smile; he'd seen them too. And then there were dolphins all around the boat suddenly, dozens and dozens of them, leaping on all sides.
After several magical minutes, the dolphins disappeared back down into the depths. But Cas started tapping Dean's shoulder now and then to point out other things, too. More dolphins, in the distance; dozens and dozens of flying fish (each of which burst out of the water and glided for an astonishing long distance before falling back down); huge, stiff-winged birds with big dark eyes that circled the boat for a while; once a distant whale-tail on the horizon. Cas even began pointing out the different textures of the waves, and the patterns of the clouds in the sky.
It's the furry cows all over again, Dean thought. He loves the world.
He loves it all. He thought he'd lost all of it. And even though he can't fly— not really, anyway— he's still so glad just to be here at all.
As am I, Dean realized.
They stood there a few minutes together, watching the sun and the spray, and the flying fish, and the distant whales.
Eventually Sam called out from behind them, "Let's go a little faster now the dolphins are gone, ok?" Dean waved a hand in acknowledgment, and the boat speed picked up with a surge. The wind hit Dean's face powerfully now. Cas's right wingtip immediately started to flare out even more widely, as if the rush of wind were making it positively irresistible for Cas to stretch his good wing out to its very full extent. But then there was a slight scuffling noise just behind Dean, and Cas quickly pulled the right wingtip back inward to match the left. Dean heard a muffled swear.
"You okay?" asked Dean, twisting around a little to look at Cas. Cas's wings were folding in now.
"Yeah," said Cas. "Fine." But he looked a little crestfallen, and his wings shuffled uncomfortably against his sides. "Wind's a little strong for me, I guess," he remarked, with what seemed a deliberately casual air.
He's unbalanced, Dean realized. He can't extend the right wing all the way in a strong wind without being knocked off balance.
Because the left wing can't match the right.
"Lean on me," said Dean. "Try again."
Cas hesitated a moment, searching Dean's eyes.
"Lean on me," Dean repeated. "Grab on. I'll hold us both steady." Dean's part of the waistrail, here at the very front of the bowsprit, was a solid steel bar. But the part that Cas could reach now, from his position behind Dean, was only rope.
"You sure?" Cas said, still looking a little doubtful.
Dean nodded and turned to face front.
After a slight pause Cas leaned against Dean a little, tentatively at first. But after a few moments he seemed to gain some confidence and soon was bracing himself more securely against Dean's back, and even put his chin down on Dean's shoulder as if to give himself an extra anchor point.
"Put your arm around me," Dean told him, and Cas snaked his right arm across Dean's chest and grabbed onto Dean's left bicep.
"Ready?" Cas said. Dean nodded, and Cas gradually extended both wings out, the right wing going all the way out this time.
Cas was flaring his wings out slowly, but almost immediately Dean could feel how much the uneven wingspread was pulling Cas to the left. But Cas held tight onto Dean, and Dean held firm to the steel handrail, and Cas got his good wing all the way open this time. Dean even felt him give a little sigh of satisfaction when the wing was all the way open.
"Feels good?" Dean said to him, grinning a little.
"Feels great," Cas agreed.
They stood there together a moment, the sun shining down, the water rushing past, and the wind whistling through Cas's feathers.
Then Cas said, directly into Dean's ear, "You know, this is almost exactly how I carried you when I flew you out of Hell."
Cas fell silent, and Dean stood there flabbergasted, suddenly realizing that Cas's right hand was on Dean's left shoulder, just where that handprint had been. I'm the one who gripped you tight, Cas had told him, all those years ago. But somehow Dean had always imagined Cas standing beside him, in Hell, tugging Dean along somehow with just one hand on his arm. It had never occurred to him that Cas might have been pressed up behind him so closely, with an arm wrapped right around him like this.
It made sense, of course; Cas would have needed a secure hold on Dean.
I'm the one who gripped you tight...
Cas spoke again, lifting his chin off Dean's shoulder this time to say right into Dean's ear, "You fought me."
He did not put his chin back down this time, but stayed there with his mouth at Dean's ear, as if about to say something more, but he paused.
"You fought me all the way," said Castiel. "You fought me the entire way. I had to turn you so you were facing away from me, like this, because you were fighting so hard. But I didn't let go."
The sun gleamed on the whitecaps ahead of them; the glittering sea rolled past.
Castiel said, "Balthazar asked me later why, when my wings caught fire, why I hadn't batted out the flame with my hands."
A flying fish broke the surface and skittered away. Dean tracked it with his eyes till it fell from the air, to sink once more beneath the shining waves.
Castiel briefly loosened his grip on Dean's shoulder, lifting his fingertips a little as he said, "I actually did try to bat out the first feather that caught fire. But then I nearly dropped you. So I put my hand back on your arm, here," — he tightened his grip again, on Dean's left shoulder— "but my hand still had some hellfire on it, and you were burned. I was sorry about the burn, Dean... I don't think I ever told you that."
He paused a moment and added, "I never let go after that."
Then Cas set his chin back down on Dean's shoulder.
He was quiet after that, and they watched the sea roll past.
The wind and the salt spray seemed to have gotten fiercer, for Dean's eyes were stinging.
For another long moment they seemed to simply soar through the air. Cas's right wing stayed fully outstretched for quite some time, and Dean hung tight to the waistrail, blinking to clear his eyes.
Lean on me all you want, Dean thought. Lean on me all you need.
But then Cas's wings abruptly pulled in, both wings tucking inward by a foot or two, and both tilting slightly against the wind as if to try to brake (to maneuver, Dean suddenly realized, feel Cas's weight shift yet again against his back; of course, that's why the wings pulled in when Cas was tense; it was an instinct that got him ready to maneuver). Dean glanced over, trying to gear himself up to say something — "hey, thanks for getting me and Sam out of Hell" seemed a little insufficient, didn't it? Maybe something about "I never minded the scar on my arm"? "In fact I kind of miss it"? But then he saw that Cas was focused now on something far away.
"Look," Cas said, nodding toward something far ahead. "On the horizon." Dean followed his gaze and saw... something.
It was very far away, just a tiny dark blob wavering on the horizon. Miles away. Dean squinted at it, shielding his eyes with one hand. Slowly the blob resolved into a thin, wavering vertical line. A shipmast? A weirdly shaped cloud? Cas had closed wings entirely now as they both stared at it, trying to figure out what it was. It darkened suddenly, and got bigger, writhing around in the sky as if it had suddenly become disturbed.
It was getting closer.
"Dean, this is something strange," said Cas into Dean's ear, and they retreated rapidly off the bowsprit to go consult with Sam.
The magical moment of sun and sea and light seemed to disappear as Cas and Dean clambered their way back to the stern, the sky growing dark and overcast in moments. By the time they reached the pilot's console, the wavering vertical line was much larger. Sam was already slowing the boat; he'd spotted it too. As soon as Cas and Dean got within earshot, Sam called out, "What the hell is that, Cas?"
"I'm afraid it's a water-tornado," said Cas, making his way down into the pilot's console next to Sam. Dean joined them, and all three of them stood side-by-side, watching the menacing dark line.
"A water-spout, I think you call them?" said Cas. "Sam, you may want to slow further."
Dean asked, "So... is a water-spout also an... elemental?" It made a certain sort of sense, and sure enough Cas nodded.
"Think we can outrun it?" said Sam, glancing at the speedometer.
"I doubt it," said Cas, shaking his head. "This is an air elemental, and they're fast. It's an air elemental that's trying to borrow energy from the sea. And it looks like it's succeeding."
Sam tried anyway, reversing course and trying to run, but the water-spout caught up to them with almost lazy ease. Sam throttled down, and they watched tensely as it approached.
"Maybe if we give it a beer?" suggested Sam, but Cas shook his head. "That likely won't work," he explained. "Food worked for Mr. Magma, because his element is solid matter; alcoholic drinks worked with the river elemental, because those drinks were all water-based. But this is an air elemental. I suspect it won't be amenable to food or drink. We could try, of course."
Dean opened a beer and shook some into the air, on the off chance it might help, but the beer droplets just fell into the sea. And the water-spout didn't slow. It rushed right at them, tall and menacing, a slender column of whirling air and water. Soon it was looming over them, terrifyingly large, hundreds of feet tall and at least thirty feet wide. It came up off their right side just a hundred feet or so away, filling half the sky, still approaching, and Cas said sharply, "Get behind me." He maneuvered to the side of the boat, pushing past both Dean and Sam and spreading his wings as if he were trying to shield them both.
The moment Cas spread his wings, the water-spout stopped.
There was a weird howling noise in the air, like a sound of sighing wind mixed with thunder, and Cas's eyes widened.
Cas called out something. Something in that strange elemental-language that he'd used before.
More howling from the air, the water-spout hanging right in front of the boat; again, Cas shouted something back.
"Is it talking to you?" Sam whispered. Cas gave him a sharp not now gesture with one hand, and Sam fell silent.
The sequence repeated several times, the wind-howling noise alternating with Cas's strange words. But something clearly wasn't working, for Cas was looking increasingly frustrated. The water-spout was getting agitated too, and it started bouncing and swaying in front of them, kicking up some big waves that rocked the boat alarmingly.
At that point Cas reached over to the right wing, grabbed his own alula and yanked hard, grimacing.
"Cas!" said Dean, reaching out to stop him. "No! Don't hurt your wing!" But Cas just yanked harder, till with a hiss of pain he'd pulled out the longest alula-feather. A slender black feather, four inches long. The alula started bleeding, a trickle of blood working its way slowly down the wing, but Cas ignored that and tossed the feather into the air. It whirled upwards, straight toward the water-spout.
There was a little spark of light as it vanished into the water-spout, and the whole water-spout seemed to twitch. Then it straightened, and steadied, and got a little more slender, a little less dark.
A little less menacing.
It started to move away from the boat.
"Follow that tornado!" Cas ordered. Sam and Dean stared at him. Cas looked at Sam expectantly, gesturing at the throttle, and said, "Follow it! It's trying to help us."
Sam and Dean blinked at each other, and Sam hurriedly put the boat in gear and started (rather hesitantly) following the skinny water-spout.
"Cas, what the hell is going on?" demanded Dean.
"It's the strangest thing, Dean," Cas said, still not taking his eyes off the water-spout. "This is the hurricane elemental, believe it or not. That's what it says, anyway. Apparently the word has gotten out, from Mr. Magma and the sturgeon, and I think also the Zion elemental, that enslaved elementals are being freed by two humans and an angel." He frowned, adding, "This is extremelyunusual. The different types of elementals normally don't talk to each other."
Sam said, "I'm getting the impression, though, that it's also pretty unusual for elementals to be enslaved in the first place."
Cas considered that and nodded. "You have a point. Indeed it is. It involves an ancient form of magic that hasn't been used for a very long time. Apparently it's driven them to consult with each other."
Dean asked, "Cas... Wait. Are you saying this elemental came over here... to... " Dean glanced up at the huge water-spout ahead of them. "To ask us for help?"
Cas nodded. "It says it's been looking for us for weeks, hoping that we would come here. It's been forced to make the hurricanes - it isn't doing it by choice. It spotted my wings from a long way off— apparently it spotted me right about when you encouraged me to spread my wings all the way, Dean. It saw my wings from the upper troposphere several hundred miles to the south, and then it realized we are two humans and an angel, just like it had heard about from the other elementals, and it got excited and apparently it came running all the way over here, from hundreds of miles away, to ask for help and to try to lead us to the cowboy. It's not supposed to be here— the cowboy's forbidden it from getting this close to Great Abaco Island— but it's snuck past the cowboy's defenses by borrowing a very small bit of energy from the Gulf Stream elemental." Cas paused and added, "The air elemental got uncertain about me when I folded my wings in; that's why it was looking so agitated as it came closer, and that's why it calmed down when I spread my wings out again."
"Wait, wait," said Sam. "Cas, an air elemental is talking to you?"
Cas shook his head and said, frustrated, "It's trying to, but the problem is, it can't seem to hear any of my replies! I could hear everything it said, but it couldn't seem to hear me. Maybe the snow-nado had the same problem, actually. I'm starting to think that it's not that they don't want to talk; perhaps the problem is that they simply can't hear angels who are earth-bound. It was about to conclude I wasn't an angel at all, so I gave it the feather. It seems reassured now, wouldn't you say?"
Dean and Sam both glanced over at the thousand-foot high water-spout, which was now purring neatly along ahead of them, trailing a train of peaceful, small puffy clouds out of its top end. It was heading right across the ocean on such a dead straight course it might have been an old-time locomotive following a train track.
"You know," said Sam, "I never would have said before that a tornado could look reassured, but that does actually look like a reassured tornado."
Cas confirmed that the water-spout was leading them unerringly to Great Abaco Island. And a few hours later, once they finally got close to the island, the water-spout steered them carefully around to the long southern shore of the island.
"This is tremendously useful," said Castiel. "We had no idea where on the island we should be focusing our efforts. This could have taken days otherwise."
"Is it getting smaller?" said Sam. He pointed at the elemental, and Dean took a critical look. The water-spout was, in fact, noticeably thinner. And shorter. Cas nodded, saying, "I believe you're right, Sam. It did say, earlier, that it would probably get progressively weaker as it approaches the cowboy. So it won't be able to lead us the whole way there. But it'll lead us as far as it can."
By late afternoon the water-spout had guided them to a large bay of turquoise water, and it seemed to be trying to point them toward a certain area of the shoreline, where there was a string of ritzy vacation houses up on a small sandy bluff. After some discussion they decided to back off a bit and go ashore a mile away, to sneak up a little less conspicuously (though, as Dean pointed out, "sneaking up" on anybody when you had a small tornado on your team was a dubious concept at best).
They picked a spot to unload, where Sam got the boat close enough in that Cas could hop out into fairly shallow water and wade to shore, carrying their necessary equipment (and some dry clothes) over his head, holding his wings as high out of the water as he could. (The left one dragged a bit, of course, but Cas did pretty well.) Then Sam and Dean took the boat a little further out to where they could anchor it safely, and both brothers swam back to shore to join Cas. While they were drying off, helping Cas dry his left wing, and changing their clothes, the water-spout drifted onto shore nearby and immediately grew smaller still, soon shrinking down to just a little dust-devil that began wobbling around on the shoreline, kicking up bits of dried seaweed and loose leaves.
"I think it's waiting for us," said Sam. Once Cas had his wing-backpack on and they all had their weapons, Dean said to the dust-devil, "All right, you puff of wind." He took a few steps toward the dust-devil and gestured up and down the beach. "Where do we go now?"
Cas had warned them that this elemental didn't seem to know English. (Cas's theory was that it had probably spent most of its life in the upper troposphere, where there was not much English to be heard.) Yet the dust-devil seemed to get Dean's meaning anyway, for it began to move slowly in a certain direction, though wobbling a little drunkenly. By now it was barely the size of the little stunted beach pines, with a little mess of leaves and dust whirling weakly at its base. But it managed to start making its way forward, and Sam, Dean, and Castiel followed along behind.
It led them about a mile through scattered beach pines and scrubby ground, roughly parallel to the shore, getting smaller and weaker the whole time. The sun began to set and the light grew dim, but they could still see enough, in the fading twilight, to follow the little dust-devil. Eventually they realized it was taking them directly toward a particular building: a big, fancy-looking house up on the little sandy bluff, with huge plate glass windows that looked out over the sea. This house was all alone; there were no other houses nearby.
Cas pulled the crucifix out of his pocket and checked it. Sure enough, it had started to spin.
"That's it," whispered Dean. "That house. That's got to be it." They decided to creep a little closer to try to check the layout before developing a firm plan. The dust-devil, now shrunken to barely person-height, tried to accompany them, but there came a point where it paused and seemed unable to move any closer to the house. Dean took several steps past it before he realized it wasn't coming with them anymore.
"Dean, it can't go any further," said Sam. They all stopped and looked at it. The little dust-devil was incredibly weak and skinny now, maybe six feet tall. It seemed barely able to keep together at all, just a tiny whirling bit of breeze barely a half-foot across, only able to bat a couple of leaves around. Two leaves, and a little black thing.
A little black thing. Dean squinted at it, trying to get a closer look.
A little pointy black thing, about four inches long.
"It's still got your feather, Cas," said Dean.
Sam said, "Wow, it can barely keep the feather up. Cas, this thing's really the elemental that's been doing all the hurricanes? Those gigantic ferocious Category 5 hurricanes?"
"Yes, it is," said Castiel. "It's extremely weak here because the enchantment enslaving these things is that powerful. Though the enchantment's easy for us to break, for the elemental it represents a powerful binding. Being this close to the cowboy, against direct orders, must be tremendously difficult for it." He studied it for a moment, and added, "I'm amazed it's holding together at all, actually. This must be causing it tremendous discomfort."
"Well, little tornado, you better turn back here," said Dean. "We'll do our best to help you. And, I know you probably can't understand me, but, if we do manage to set you free, please don't kill us accidentally, okay?"
He started walking away from it, but suddenly the dust-devil made one last desperate surge toward Dean and fell right on him. Dean flinched, but the dust-devil was so weak now that all it seemed able to do was puff lightly against his skin, and throw one of its two leaves into Dean's hair. Then it threw the other leaf at Sam, and last of all it tried to return the feather to Cas. But by now it was almost too weak to carry the feather— it only managed to loft the feather a foot or so toward Cas, and Cas had to reach out and snatch his alula-feather out of the air himself.
Cas held the feather thoughtfully, and Sam and Dean held their leaves, watching the rapidly weakening dust-devil. It went limping away back in the direction they had come, barely visible now, just a little moving twist of air that was only visible as a stirring of loose dirt on the ground.
"I never thought I could feel so sorry for a puff of wind," said Sam, tucking his leaf in the front pocket of his shirt and buttoning the pocket closed. Dean stuck his leaf in a pocket too, and Cas tucked his feather carefully away.
They got all their usual gear out, Sam and Dean armed with pistols and Cas with an angel-blade, with various other weapons stashed at the ready in their pockets. Dean found, though, that he felt pretty uneasy. They really had no idea whether they'd be facing just another helpless human like Burt, or a full-powered angel like Ziphius, or maybe even something worse. So Dean called a halt, behind a few trees near the house, to have a whispered strategy discussion.
"I was thinking about sigils," whispered Dean, turning to them both, "I know that didn't work so well against Calcariel, but maybe we ought to—"
"—Just give up?" said a cheerful voice.
A finger snapped, and flood lights sprang to life all around the house.
There was a short, round, dark-haired man smiling at them from the veranda of the house about fifty feet away. He was wearing a little pendant of blue glass around his neck. He didn't seem to have any kind of weapon— and didn't need to, for when ahe snapped his fingers again a moment later, at once Dean and Sam both lost hold of their pistols and Cas lost his blade, the three weapons flying out of their hands and through the air to land neatly at the man's feet. A third finger-snap and Dean suddenly found that he couldn't move his feet at all. Or his hands; his arms seemed bound to his side by invisible cords. He was still standing very close to Cas and Sam, since they'd just had their heads together whispering to each other, and he looked over at them desperately. But they both just gave him unhappy looks back. Neither Cas nor Sam seemed able to move either.
"Boys!" said the dark-haired man, clapping his hands twice in summons, and two burly Bahamians with demon-black eyes stepped out of the shadows at the corner of the house, one on the left and one on the right. They each were holding assault rifles. M-16's. The good ol' US Army classic, with big curved 30-round magazines sticking dramatically out from the lower sides.
"Oh man, you dudes don't mess around," said Dean, his heart sinking.
"Three against three!" said the dark-haired man cheerfully. "Perfectly even fight! Can't say it's not fair."
"Right," said Sam, "An angel, or whatever you are, and two demons with M-16s, against three unarmed humans. Whose hands you've frozen. Totally fair."
The man gave him a wide, toothy grin. "Three humans? Let's see, who's your third companion there?" He walked a little closer, peering at Cas, and he said, "It truly is Castiel, isn't it? Castiel! I heard you might have gotten mixed up in all this but I admit I didn't truly believe it till today. I wanted to see it for myself. You know, I could have just stopped your hearts, all three of you, the second you stepped on shore from that boat— by the way, did you really think we wouldn't notice a thousand foot high water tornado? That elemental is going to be very sorry for doing that, I can promise you that!"
Cas said, "Belaniel. What are you doing here? Why are you involved in all this?"
"Belaniel" grinned, and said, "It's nice to see you again too, Cassie. It's been quite a long time since the South Pole garrison days, hasn't it?"
An angel, thought Dean, trading a grim look with Sam. Dammit.
Cas said, his voice low, "What do you want from us?"
"Well... my boss wanted to stop you fellows at the Gulf Stream, actually," said Belaniel. "With that little plan of disabling your boat. But, as I said, I wanted to see you. And, Cassie, I noticed you were able to navigate anyway, and that you were communicating with the elemental. Listen, Castiel. You've got some decent skills. I've decided to offer you a chance to join us."
Cas blinked. "Join you?"
"I thought you might be interested. Because it was you, after all, who cast us all out of Heaven."
Cas said, in a distinctly aggrieved tone, "I've told everyone who will listen, I didn't know what Metatron was planning—"
"I believe you," interrupted Belaniel, "But you played a role, and you can't say you didn't. But, Castiel, you can redeem yourself. By helping the angels find a new home! Cassie..." (Dean rolled his eyes; the "Cassie" was getting annoying.) Belaniel continued, "We can build a new Heaven right here. On Earth! All we have to do is sweep the planet clean first; just wipe everything out and sterilize the earth, do a bit of cleaning, sweep up a bit, maybe some bleach; a few centuries ought to do it; and then just plant some flowers, put a few benches around and it'll be perfect! And a couple of us have come up with a pretty feasible plan to wipe the planet clean. We're starting with North America."
"Oh, you are kidding me," said Dean. "Calcariel's plan again?" Calcariel, in Wyoming, had been trying much the same thing. (Minus the flowers and benches.) "Didn't you guys learn your lesson with Mr. Magma?"
Belaniel glared at him, but conceded, "The magma elemental didn't work out, agreed. Ziffy told me what happened. But I wasn't part of the team then, and there's lots of other elementals to try. Don't you humans have a saying... if at first you don't succeed, try, try again?"
Sam put in, "And killing millions of people is okay with you?"
Belaniel shrugged. "Yes, to put it bluntly. Millions of people, or millions of ants, or millions of chickens, and so on. To be honest, you all look to me like slightly advanced bacteria. I don't really see that there'll be that much of a loss. Our boss has a good plan and I think it'll work."
Sam said, "Your boss? The Queen?"
Belaniel gave a chuckle. "Not a bad term for her now. Yes, I suppose so - the Queen."
"So what's the plan?" said Dean. "Rile up all five elementals at once?"
"Oh, no, most of them are just decoys," said Belaniel.
Cas, Sam and Dean exchanged bleak looks, and Belaniel smiled at their expressions, saying, "We originally tested several elementals to see which had the most continent-cleaning potential. But we were planning all along to pick just the best one and then keep the others as decoys. The freshwater ones were near useless— they can only flood a very limited area. The marine one showed a lot of potential and we were planning to base our whole approach around it— did you know that thing can produce a ten-thousand-foot tsunami, if it really sets its mind to it? But, unfortunately, some other irritating hunters seem to have freed that one. Though at least the elemental took them down to the bottom of the sea for their troubles."
This was awful to hear; Dean had to struggle to keep his expression neutral.
Belaniel went on, "This air one, now, the one that led you here, is actually pretty strong, but it turns out it always weakens when it goes over land; it can only really affect the East Coast. We're keeping it as a backup, though. Anyway, as I said, we held on to all the rejects as decoys. Basically to keep you fellows running all over the place for as long as possible. Worked like a charm, didn't it? Because here you are on the complete wrong side of the continent!" He smiled, and said, "My idea, actually, if I can take a bit of credit. Ziffy didn't really appreciate how persistent you Winchesters can be, but I'd heard some tales."
Dean couldn't even look at Cas and Sam.
They'd come the wrong direction.
They should have gone west, all along.
Cas said, "But what would you have done if we'd gotten west in time?"
"Oh, we had a little insurance plan," said Belaniel. "Which we don't need anymore. So, old friend, what do you say? Join us, and help us build a new Heaven here on Earth! We really could use another angel. It's been rather difficult coming up with reliable personnel, and we really need someone who can speak with air elementals. They won't talk to most of us who fell. If we could get one more angel—"
"Oh, Belaniel, no, no, no," said Cas, shaking his head. "That's no redemption at all, and that is no Heaven at all that you would be building. Annihilating life on Earth is the worst evil there is, can't you see that? Worse even than what Lucifer did! Belaniel, listen to me, human life is valuable. Every human is unique, Belaniel, and their souls can be so beautiful, and— "
"Yes, yes, I'd heard about how you'd gone native," interrupted Belaniel. "Gone slumming with the locals quite a bit, haven't you? Pretty obvious, isn't it? But I wanted to extend the offer nonetheless." He started to walk over to Cas, saying, "This is your last chance—"
And then Belaniel froze in mid-sentence, staring at the bottom of Cas's backpack. He said, "Wait. What... what is sticking out of your rucksack, Cassie, are those..." He walked around behind them and peered more closely, saying, "Are those... feathers?"
He waved a hand, and the whole pack flew backwards off of Cas's back, jerking Cas's arms and wings roughly as it wrenched off. Cas winced and folded his wings back up.
Belaniel's eyes widened. He walked further around Castiel, looking at the wings from behind. "Mortal wings? What in Heaven's name... oh...oh, dear Lord, Castiel—" Belaniel actually grabbed hold of Cas's left wing (Cas flinched at his touch, leaning forward and gritting his teeth, his hands helplessly bound to his side.)
Belaniel pulled the left wing wing out, extending it a few feet to take a close look at it from behind.
"Castiel, you've been tertialed?" said Belaniel.
Belaniel sounded truly appalled. He poked the half-extended wing gingerly with one finger (Cas flinched again) and said, "Tertialed, and mortal wings! Dear lord above, I was not really expecting this." He let go of the wing and shook his hand, wiping it on his pants as if fearing some sort of contamination from Castiel's "mortal" wings. "Oh my goodness. Ziffy broke you. Didn't she. She said she was going to try, but we never knew what had happened. Ziffy actually broke you. Yet somehow you survived? Astonishing. Simply astonishing."
Dean snapped, "Would you just get on with it?"
"But this is so fascinating!" said Belaniel, walking slowly all around Castiel now, and peering at his wings from all angles. "I've never seen mortal wings! I've heard of the possibility of course, but never seen a case myself. And I've never even heard of a broken wing healing. Many angels injured their wings in the fall, of course, but everyone who broke a wing ended up dying. Cassie, what was it like? How much did it hurt? Can you move it at all? What's it like to know you'll never fly again? How did it feel to know you'd always be stuck with completely useless wings?"
"He's just fine," growled Dean. "His wings are great. Thanks so much for asking."
"And by they way they're not useless," added Sam.
"Oh really?" said Belaniel, stepping back around to their front and looking at Sam with his eyebrows raised. "Wings are for flying, you know. Without flying, well, what else are they good for?"
"They can hand us things," said Sam.
"They can punch people," said Dean.
Belaniel actually laughed. But then Castiel said earnestly, "Belaniel, my friends have been taking care of me. We share jokes and cookies and movies. We go out, and we see cows and dolphins and the sky and the sun. Mortal life is good, Belaniel. Even without flying. And even with the planet exactly the way it is. Whether you can understand that or not, it's true."
"Aw, that's so cute," said Belaniel, glancing at Sam and Dean, and then back at Cas. "You're happy with your little human friends." He shook his head, chuckling, saying again, "That's cute."
Cas exchanged a tired glance with Dean as Belaniel turned away from the three of them and strolled back toward his two demons, who had been waiting (somewhat impatiently) with their M-16's.
Turning to face Sam, Dean and Cas again, who were still frozen in a little clump together, Belaniel said, "Castiel, I'm sorry. I'm going to have to retract my offer. You're not an angel anymore, and we need someone who can talk with air elementals."
"I'd already rejected your offer anyway," said Cas, now sounding very exasperated, and with very much a you-can't-fire-me-I-quit scowl on his face. "Belaniel, listen to me—"
"Hey boys!" interrupted Belaniel, turning away from Cas. The demons perked up as Belaniel told them, "I know you want to try out your toys, so— go to it. Rip 'em apart!" Belaniel turned away to face the house, his hands laced behind his back, as if he weren't really all that interested in what happened next. The two thugs flipped their safeties off and raised their weapons.
Dean saw the guns come up, and saw the men take aim, and he thought, It couldn't last.
It could never have lasted. The interlude of peace, of togetherness, all the happy moments they'd had recently.
The furry cows, the knock-knock jokes; Cas in the car wash; their mixed-up Christmas dinner in the snow; Sam and Dean helping Cas preen his wings in the little motel rooms night after night, watching movies together... Dr. Mac and Sarah laughing together in the library... Cas spreading his wings on the boat... the sun and the sea and the dolphins... all of it, all those moments, seemed to soar past Dean now in a flash, and Dean thought, The good things don't last.
The good things never lasted.
Time slowed down. Dean turned toward Cas and Sam, with a hopeless thought of trying to shield them both from at least some of the gunfire. But he couldn't even move his arms, and his feet were still glued to the ground, and all Dean could do in the end was crouch down with them. He saw Cas ducking his head down, saw Sam crouching too, saw Cas's wings start to flare out around them— the left wing around Dean, the right around Sam. Cas's hands were still magically bound together, but apparently he could still move his wings. Not that it was going to help, of course. Dean even had a split second to notice, with a detached clinical interest, Oh, look, the left wing's doing great, he's actually got it all the way around me. That must be half-extended at least, right? Maybe that time on the boat in the wind helped open the wing up a little more...
They crouched together in a hopeless little huddle.
The gunfire began, a tremendous roar of noise. It was over.
Dean could feel the bullets hitting him, punching his side brutally hard. Dozens of bullets, pounding his side and back ferociously. It was like being hit with dozens of blows from a hot iron hammer.
Strangely, it didn't actually hurt all that bad. Dean even had time to think, as he hunkered down under the tent of Cas's wings, leaning onto Sam and Cas, So this is what it's like to get shot to death. It's not so bad.
And at least we're all going together. Not so bad, really.
The deafening roar of gunfire stopped. There was a clicking sound; both M-16s had run out of ammo. Dean's ears were ringing; the very air seemed to echo in the sudden silence. Dean heard the clatter of the empty magazines being removed, heard Belaniel say "That ought to do it," heard a finger-snap, and in the next moment Dean realized his hands and feet were free.
Dean was still waiting to collapse from the bleeding, waiting to choke up blood, waiting for the pain to hit. They were all bunched together now, still crouched down, Cas's wings still wrapped around them, their three heads close together. Dean glanced at Sam and saw Sam looking back at him from just inches away, his eyes wide. For a moment they just stared at each other.
Close beside them, Cas whispered, "Now."
Dean hadn't even fully registered that they weren't dead yet when Cas whipped open his wings.
The two demons paused in the middle of reloading their weapons and stared at them in confusion. Belaniel had been walking toward them, clearly expecting to see three crumpled dead bodies, and he faltered in mid-stride just ten feet away, gaping at them with an almost comically baffled look on his face.
Sam was the first to snap into action, charging right at Belaniel without any weapon at all. It was a desperation move, and of course Belaniel simply waved one hand and poor Sam went flying through the air, only to slam into the ground nearly twenty feet away.
But Sam had successfully distracted Belaniel. And while Sam was flying through the air, while Belaniel was watching him in disdain, there was a flash of silver. It was Cas's second angel-blade, whipping through the air right at Belaniel's chest. (Dean happened to know that Cas had actually brought not one but three angel-blades. The original one he'd had in his hand — the one Belaniel had taken from Cas earlier — and two more also, one up each sleeve. It wasn't traditional for angels to carry more than one, but Cas was not really a traditional angel, was he?)
Belaniel glimpsed the blade at the last moment and managed to flick one finger up to try to divert it. The blade veered, and didn't hit him in the heart where Cas had aimed, but Belaniel had been a hair too late and the blade did sink deep into one shoulder. Belaniel cried out and staggered back, a shaft of vivid white light lancing out from the wound. Cas was already throwing his third blade; again Belaniel tried to deflect it, again he was a hair too late, and this one sank deep into his thigh. Both wounds blazed with bright light. Beloniel screamed again and fell to his knees.
Then there was a huge burst of white light, and they all had to shield their eyes.
When the light faded, Beloniel's vessel was face-down on the ground and both demons were staggering, half-blinded from the blast of Heavenly light, fumbling with the reloading of the M-16s. Cas and Dean made short work of them after that; a half-blinded demon was no match for an angel blade.
Dean glanced over at Sam and was relieved to see him getting slowly to his feet, giving Dean a somewhat shaky thumbs-up. Dean spun back to Cas, then, dreading what he would find when he got a close look. Cas was standing still, looking at one wing and then the other, and Dean dashed over to him, saying, "Let me see, Cas, let me see," trying to brace himself for the inevitable sight of the blood and bone and the mangled feathers. For though Cas, Dean and Sam were somehow uninjured, the wings had definitely taken all the brunt of that brutal gunfire and surely they must be destroyed.
But all Dean found was smooth sleek intact feathers. He checked the left wing, and then the right: No blood. (Well, except for the tiny wound from the torn-out alula feather.) No bone. No mangled feathers. The wings were intact. Though they were glittering brightly in several places, almost steaming. Even as Dean was studying the wings, still trying to figure out where the damage was, some of the bright areas peeled off the outer surface of the feathers and fell off, clinking against the pebbles on the ground.
The bright areas were flattened discs of metal. Apparently that was all that was left of the bullets.
"Cas?" said Dean, staring down at the flattened bullets.
"Yes, Dean?" said Cas, as he bent down to pick up one of the smoking disks of metal. He hissed in surprise, dropped it and stuck his finger in his mouth. Apparently the metal disc was still hot.
"Cas, you never mentioned your feathers are bulletproof."
"I'm as surprised as you are," said Cas, looking at both wings curiously. "I didn't know."
Dean almost laughed. "You didn't KNOW?"
"Well, they were always impervious to everything when I was an angel, of course," explained Cas, fingering one of his feathers. "But I always assumed it was due to Heavenly power. In fact everybody's always assumed that. It never occurred to me it might be an intrinsic property of the feathers. I don't think even Schmidt-Nielsen knew that... and obviously Belaniel didn't know either. We might have made an interesting discovery." He looked up at Dean, and said brightly, "Perhaps we should write it up."
"Perhaps we should take you along on every hunt for the rest of our lives," said Dean.
Sam tottered slowly up to them, looking a little worse for wear but at least on his feet, just as they heard a low moan and realized that Belaniel was moving.
Dean grabbed one of Cas's blades off the ground and was just about to stab Belaniel again when Cas yelled, "NO, Dean! Wait! That's not Belaniel anymore!"
Dean paused, confused, as Cas knelt down by Belaniel's vessel, gripped it by one shoulder and one hip, and gently rolled it over. A dark-haired man lay there, looking up at them, gasping. He said, in a completely different tone of voice than Belaniel's, with a strong Bahamian accent, "You gotta... hurry..."
Cas looked up at Dean and said, "It's not Belaniel. It's his vessel."
"What? I thought Belaniel was dead?" said Dean.
"I thought so too at first," said Cas, glancing around at the ground. "But, look, no wing scorch-marks." Dean looked around, and realized Cas was right: the ground was unblemished. Cas went on, "He was only wounded. They were bad wounds, though, and he must have been too weak to heal the vessel, and he must have also realized he was too weak to fly it anywhere. He decided to abandon the vessel and flee. The blaze of light was because he was so badly wounded— he was really leaking a lot of power."
Cas was trying to put pressure on the man's shoulder-wound as he spoke, but a lot of blood was flowing out around Cas's hands. Dean crouched down next to the man and said, "Hang in there. We'll get you help."
But the poor fellow was bleeding pretty badly, from both the shoulder wound and the thigh one. Sam was trying to staunch the thigh-wound now, but it wasn't looking too good. The man was groping clumsily at the blue pendant around his neck, muttering, "Break it... break it..."
Cas nodded at Dean, and Dean cut the pendant loose with one of the angel-blades, stood, and ground it to dust under his heel.
There was a huge roaring of wind all around them for a moment, the trees lashing from side to side, pine needles flying everywhere.
The wind noise receded away to the south, and everything went calm.
"What's your name?" said Dean, crouching back down by the man.
"Billy," gasped the man. "You've... got to hurry. Got to go... west."
"We know, Billy," said Dean, nodding. "We'll get there by the full moon. Don't worry."
"No," Billy whispered. "BEFORE... full moon. New plan... Friday. You have... to get there... by Friday. They're doing it... Friday."
"This Friday?" Dean said, startled. Tonight was Sunday. Friday was only five days away! He glanced up at Cas, saying, "What's he mean? Don't we have till the full moon?"
Cas looked up at Dean with a very worried expression. He said, "Dean... moon phase only matters for water elementals! They must have been planning to take action on the full moon so that they could use the Pacific elemental at its full strength. But they've lost the Pacific elemental! So phase of the moon doesn't matter anymore." He shook his head with a hiss. "Drat. They must have changed their plans."
Billy nodded weakly, and whispered, "California... redwoods. Friday. Air and... fire."
"The air and fire elemental together?" said Castiel. "Oh— oh, I see. Use the air one to fan the fire?"
Another nod, and Billy gasped out, "New plan is... huge... firestorm. Huge, huge!... Wall of fire... moving over... whole continent." Another ragged breath and he gasped, "You've got to stop them."
"We'll get there. We'll do it. I promise," said Dean.
"And... they've got... your friends..." Billy added. Dean frowned at him, puzzled, and Billy added, "The... girl... the guy. They grabbed them both... last night. Nurse and... vet. That was... the... insurance."
There was a long deadly pause.
Sam whispered, "Sarah and Mac."
Dean at felt sick. And then heartbroken.
And then white-hot with fury.
Not again. Not again. Not again, was all he could think.
The good things never last.
Billy added, gasping heavily now. "They're going to... feed them... to the... fire. Friday. You've got to hurry." He took one more long sighing breath, and he didn't breathe again.
A/N -
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