Chapter Twenty-Eight "The God Complex"
The first thing Benny saw when he opened his eyes was a ceiling fan spinning lazily overhead. The right side of his face felt numb, and he was having a hard time focusing. He blamed the fan for how dizzy he felt.
"Good, you're awake." Jody's voice came from off to the left somewhere.
Benny turned his head and found that he was lying on the ratty couch in the abandoned garage. Jody was sitting on the edge of a low table with a small cooler next to her. She had a half empty water bottle in one hand, and with the other, she reached into the cooler and took out a blood bag.
"Here," she said, handing Benny the blood. "You'll feel better once you've had a drink."
Benny reached out and took it. As his fingers brushed against her hand, he could feel her blood pumping just beneath the skin. She was right; he did need a drink. He quickly uncapped the bag and sucked out the blood. Immediately, his head began to clear, and the room stopped tilting.
Benny sat up and took stock of their situation. The bodies of six vampires still surrounded them, as well as the arm of the last one.
"He got away," Jody said. "After he knocked you down, I hit him with dead man's blood, and he ran."
Jody's voice seemed off. It was a little too husky, and Benny noticed dark bruises forming on her neck.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
"I'm fine." Jody nodded. "Almost got my throat crushed, but I didn't. You?"
Benny held up the empty blood bag. "Works wonders," he said.
"You wanna go after the guy, or..."
"Not now. He may be weak, but so are we. I get the feeling he won't be down for long."
"Who was he?"
"I don't know him, but he's got a direct line to the Alpha."
"Yeah, he talked like that girl last time. What do you think he meant about being forgiving?"
"Means he still needs Dean. Which could give us some advantage. It would help if we knew what they wanted."
"And you didn't get anything else? No creepy mind control or telepathic communication?"
"He was controlling me for a second there. I snapped out of it when I say he was going to kill you."
"Oh... well, thanks for that. I owe you one."
Benny shook his head. "Let's not keep track. I'm sure we'll have plenty of opportunities to even the score."
Benny stood and looked around the room again. He could see a sliver of light coming from under the door, and he instantly began to dread going outside.
"We should clean up before we go," Jody said.
Benny wasn't sure whether she meant clean up themselves or clean up the destruction they left in their wake. Probably both. She had brought their bags from the car, so they took turns using the bathroom to wash off the blood and change their clothes. While Benny was waiting his turn, he found some gasoline and other flammables and began spreading them around the room. Jody gave him a funny look when she came out of the bathroom. Benny just handed her a gas can and let her finish while he changed.
"You know, I didn't really think about it," Jody said as they headed for the door. "And I should have. It's a classic forensic countermeasure."
"Arson?" Benny asked.
"It won't completely destroy the evidence, but it will buy us some time."
"You shouldn't feel bad that you don't think like a criminal." Benny put his hand on the door and adjusted his hat.
Jody shook her head. "It's thinking like a hunter I need to do," she said. "The last thing we need is a bunch of cops after us."
"You think they haven't noticed all the deaths so far?"
"I think I've never been around to find out, so we should go."
Benny nodded and took one look back. He lit the matchbook he found on the table and threw it behind him before he stepped out into the unforgiving sun.
~oOo~
It wasn't as if Castiel didn't know people kept a lot of secrets from him. Sam and Dean especially had so many layers that it would probably take too long for them to explain all the lies and omissions. This wasn't really any different. So, Dean had run into others in Purgatory. What did it matter? What bothered him was that anyone thought it necessary to keep it a secret.
Benny probably hadn't bothered to mention it because they hadn't talked much and it had mostly been about what was going on here. Castiel had hardly talked with Emma either. She didn't seem to like him much. But why Sam or Dean hadn't talked about it was a mystery. Perhaps Sam didn't want to remember his painful visit to Purgatory. But Castiel had been there with Dean the first time. That was something they had in common. Something they both understood. And while they seemed to have drifted further and further apart anymore, Castiel didn't understand why Dean hadn't talked about it. They talked about everything.
Or they used to.
Castiel was suddenly very aware of the fact that he and Dean hadn't talked much since the latter's return. It made sense. Dean was dependent on Castiel's blood, so he probably didn't like being around him that much. The more Castiel thought about it, the more everything seemed to fall into place.
Of course, that still didn't solve the confusing problem of Purgatory residents getting into Heaven and why Gadreel was informing Dean of this. Everyone with a device connected to the Internet had gotten the message, but they all knew it was meant for Dean.
Castiel sat in the alcove closest to the door, watching the others work. He could hear Sam and Dean talking out in the war room, but he couldn't make out what they were saying. They were arguing, though. Perhaps something more happened in Purgatory than the usual fighting to survive.
It seemed like a long time before Dean came back into the library alone. He didn't seem to notice the others anymore, but came straight toward Castiel and pulled up a chair from the table.
"Sorry about that," he said, resting his elbows on his knees and rubbing the side of his forehead.
"Oh," Castiel replied, realizing that Dean was talking about the interruption. "I'm sure it was important."
"Yeah, I guess. I thought Sam would have already said something to you, but apparently he promised not to, so I will."
"Dean, what are you talking about?"
"Who was with us in Purgatory. You remember Lenore?"
Castiel remembered all too vividly. "Yes. I killed her."
"She asked you to."
"She asked you, but you wouldn't."
"Doesn't matter. She couldn't come back with us because we don't know what happened to her body."
"I took it to a park and buried it. It didn't seem significant until now."
Dean had a look of amusement mixed with shock on his face. "You know where she is? Cas, we can bring her back."
Castiel frowned. "Why would we do that? She wanted to die."
"I sort of promised I'd get her out because I wanted Benny to come with me, and he didn't want to leave her behind."
"Why would—oh. Are they... mating?"
Dean choked but quickly composed himself. "You know, I don't wanna know. They're together, anyway."
"That does make things complicated."
"How?"
"Vampires mate for life, but she's not alive at the moment. It's a relational quandary."
For some reason, Dean looked intensely uncomfortable. "Yeah, sure. But there's something else."
"There must be because I don't know why you needed to tell me all that."
"I was leading up to it. I told you there were others. Plural. Lenore was one of them, but the other was...Cas, it was Meg."
Castiel had the metaphorical feeling of his stomach dropping. It couldn't be true. She was dead. Her soul had been destroyed.
But souls couldn't be destroyed.
"What... how?" Castiel finally managed to ask.
"Her words? She got most of the demon knocked out of her and found the portal from Hell to Purgatory."
"But why would she? Why not come back to Earth?"
"Maybe she couldn't get out that way. I don't know. Don't ask me to understand why she does anything."
"I know the two of you never got along."
"That's not the point. Cas, I'm telling you this because you deserve to know. She didn't want you to remember her, I guess, but that's probably because she thought she was never getting out."
"And she's in Heaven now? Gadreel could bring her here, but she would have to find a new body. Unless..."
"I don't know what happened to her old one. Last I saw her, she was getting killed by Crowley."
"Yes, and he would know where to find her. Unless he destroyed the body."
"And how do you think you'll convince him to share this information?"
"I won't. You will."
"Yeah, that's a better idea."
"Your sarcasm misses the point."
"Which is?"
"Crowley has what you'd call a soft spot. For you. I suppose I can understand it, though I'm still not sure why it happens."
"Why supernatural beings just love me?"
"It's a mystery."
Dean smiled. A real, happy smile that Castiel hadn't seen in a long time. "It's a mystery to me why you like Meg too, but I'm going to get her back for you," he said.
"Why are you doing this, Dean? You don't have to."
"That's why, I guess. There's a lot of stuff I have to do. Saving you, saving the world, but this? This is just something I can do for my friends."
Castiel nodded. "We're going to have to coordinate."
"What do you mean?"
"With Gadreel and Crowley and the location of Lenore's body. If we bring them back at the same time, anyway."
"We could use the morgue downstairs to hold them until we get their souls back."
"There's a morgue?"
Dean grinned a little too widely. "Yeah, it's really cool."
"I don't understand your definition of 'cool'."
Dean laughed but didn't bother explaining himself. Castiel had come to expect that.
~oOo~
It had been so long since Dean carried a cell phone around in his pocket, that his first thought was that he was under attack when it started ringing. The feeling passed before he embarrassed himself, and he saw that it was Benny calling.
"How'd it go?" Dean asked, stepping out into the hallway so as not to interrupt the excessive amount of research that was going on in there.
"Six out of seven," Benny replied. "And one arm."
"Ouch. Arms don't grow back, do they?"
"No. But the guy who got away was probably a first generation."
"Like me?"
"Nobody is like you, but he was as close as they come. He did that freaky voice thing you do sometimes, but I think it was the Alpha talking through him."
"My voice isn't freaky."
"That's what you got out of that?"
"No. Alpha's got a new favorite. What does that tell us?"
"He may be up there, but he's not a favorite. He told me he had a message for you. The Alpha still wants you. Said he would be 'forgiving'."
Dean laughed at that. "Is he delusional or just desperate?"
"Maybe he thinks he can convince you to come to his side. If his errand boy could get into my head, maybe he's planning on getting to you that way."
"What, by turning my friends against me? He's not gonna have much luck with the humans and the angel and the Amazon. Not to mention the demon."
"Meg? She's not exactly in the area right now."
"No, but Cas and I have a plan. Speaking of which, we need you and Jody to bring back Lenore's body. It's in South Dakota."
Benny was silent for a long moment. "What?" he finally said.
"I know it's kind of... well."
"Yeah, unpleasant doesn't begin to describe it. But a human still has to pull her out of Purgatory."
"She's not in Purgatory. I don't know exactly how to explain it, but I think I subconsciously created another portal. Lenore and Meg are in Heaven."
There was another uncomfortable pause before Dean heard a faint sigh from the other end of the line.
"Okay, so one of your angel friends brings their souls to Earth for us?"
"I've got Cas working on that. He'll send you the location of Lenore too. I'll take care of Meg."
"She can possess any body she wants, can't she?"
"Yeah, but I get the feeling she'll want this one. I know someone who might be able to help."
"Do I want to know?"
"No. Just bring back Lenore and try not to get killed, all right?"
Benny laughed darkly. "Brother, that's the easy part."
I'm really excited for where things are going, and I'd love to hear what you guys think of these new developments. On a side note, for any Arrow fans, I'm currently working on a story in that fandom which should have it's third chapter up in a few days.
