A/N: Set during the season 5 episode "Sympathy for the Demon".
"Are you sure we should be here?" Cole asked as he looked around. The room was bright and there was a calm stillness in the air.
"Where else did you expect me to take you to keep you safe?" Leo asked him. They had orbed in from the manor. With Barbas after them, the sisters had agreed that Cole was an innocent that they needed to protect and it had been up to Leo to do so.
"And where exactly is here? I mean, are we...?" Cole pointed upwards. He thought he already knew. He could just feel the goodness and light surrounding them there, but he had to be sure.
"Yeah," Leo said with a shrug, as though it were nothing. "What is it?"
"Well, it's just... for a guy like me, I would expect the Elders to smite me on sight," Cole admitted, trying to keep his tone a little lighthearted, but he was being entirely serious. He was nervous just being there, despite the warm, safe feeling that was surrounding him.
"You mean because of your demonic past?" Leo asked him.
"Take your pick, Leo," Cole said to him. "The fact that I was born half-demon... My years in the Brotherhood, becoming the Source of All Evil, all those powers from the demonic wasteland," He listed off. "I would think I'd be the very last person they'd allow up here."
"Right now at this moment, you're an innocent. You're not evil," Leo told him.
"Aren't I? Do you really believe that?" Cole challenged. "No matter what I do everyone seems to think I'm evil anyway." Cole was more than a little fed up with the way he'd been treated. Without any demonic powers coursing through him, he felt lighter but still the same man he had been.
"My powers don't lie, Cole. If you were evil, I wouldn't have been able to heal you," Leo insisted.
"And that's the only metric that matters, right? Let's just throw intent out the window if demonic powers are involved." Cole paced the length of the white room they were in.
"What do you want me to say? We're trying to help you," Leo told him.
"Now maybe, but what about then? What about a few months ago when I came back with all of these powers? What about when I was possessed by the Source?" Cole snapped.
"Possessed?"
"And what is it about up here, huh? Why am I saying all of this?" Cole asked, not really sure why he was venting so much to Leo. Normally these were things that he kept to himself and if he was going to talk to someone about it, it certainly wouldn't have been Leo.
Leo was a little flustered by all the information coming at him. He figured he'd address the last thing first. "In order to achieve peace and serenity in the afterlife, you have to let go of everything that plagued you in your mortal life. I brought you to one of the rooms used for that. It seemed like the best place," Leo offered with a shrug.
"You brought me to a heavenly confessional?" Cole was even more incensed at hearing that. "Jesus, Leo, I think I would have been better off taking my chances with Barbas."
"I didn't know where else to bring you to keep you safe! I couldn't exactly put you into the general population here with all of the Elders-"
"So they do have a problem with me being here. I knew it!"
"Cole, what did you mean when you said you were possessed?"
Cole rolled his eyes. "Why don't you ask the Elders while we're here. I'm sure they already know," He said, fighting the urge to say more. He felt like he was giving the Elders and whoever else that might be listening the satisfaction of hearing his deepest secrets and he was stubborn enough that he wasn't going to spill everything.
Leo sighed. "Fine, you don't have to say anything else if you don't want to, but it might help," He said to him and Cole scoffed as he continued to pace.
"We should be down there helping them you know," Cole finally said after a few moments, breaking the silence between them.
"You don't have any powers now. You're no match against Barbas," He reminded him.
"How long has it been down there? I assume time works differently here too just like it does in the underworld, right?" Cole asked him and Leo gave a nod.
"We can go ahead and try to head back," Leo told him. Though for Leo it only felt like minutes had passed and for Cole it felt a bit longer, it had been hours on Earth. He knew he was taking a risk with Cole's life by taking him back already without having heard from the girls, but he was a little worried that they hadn't been in contact at all. He went over to Cole and grabbed his arm again to orb them back to the manor. Cole felt the warmth and light feeling leave and he was certain he'd never feel anything quite like that again as they settled back into the cold mortal world.