"They said to lose the man bun, Samuel." Dean sat down across from his brother, trying to keep his sleeves rolled up properly. "How do they do this?"
"Look, the hillbilly clothes are bad enough. I refuse to give this up too. My hair is sacred, Dean." He paused, taking a drink from the bottle the real Sam had set in front of him. "Ugh. They actually drink this stuff? And enjoy it?"
"They have it made here. No filing quarterly reports, no investors to answer to, no budget meetings, no worrying about where to park the jets on media tours… this simple life has its perks," Dean answered.
Samuel looked back to his laptop with a frown. "They don't get paid for any of this. They're wanted by every law enforcement agency known to man. They have to deal with actual Heaven and actual Hell. It's so much messier than it needs to be. I know Gray isn't a fan either. At least that woman - Grace - has a decent closet, but I doubt she ever has anything to dress up for."
"Ah, she'll warm up to it. She's just weirded out because I married her in this universe. I've got to admit, that is kind of weird. She'd annoy the hell out of me."
"That's my wife you're talking about," Samuel warned, not taking his eyes off of the computer. "It looks like they've started to build the same sort of HunterNet program that Uncle Robert had going. Look at this."
Meanwhile, Grace and Grey were in the kitchen, pouring themselves glasses of wine while Grace filled her counterpart in on everything she usually did. "You've got to lose the pearls," she noticed. "I don't wear them unless we've got to infiltrate somewhere."
Gray drained her wine glass, pouring herself another. "How can you stand him? Your Dean? He's childish, and annoying, and thinks he knows how to run a corporation because he got a business degree from Stanford. Stanford! It's not even an Ivy. Just because he's the oldest… I'm sorry, that's not very polite. I'm sure he's different here."
"How long have you hated him?" Grace asked, swirling her wine in her glass.
"Since… forever. I met him when Samuel and I came home for the winter holidays one year. He had just gotten back from a ski trip with his college friends. He was just… downright rude and horribly entitled. His parents always did like him better."
"Well, in this universe, he can be an asshole sometimes, but he's still sweet. My Sam and Dean - their mom died when they were young, and their dad wasn't around much. They did the best they could. Dean's grown up a lot from when I first met him. He's gotten things together, as much as he could've been expected to." Grace took her wedding ring off, handing it over.
"What am I looking at?"
"The inside. Does yours say the same thing?"
I was made for loving you. - Dean
Gray handed it back, along with her own ring for Grace to inspect. There was nothing written on the inside, though the stones were much larger. "That doesn't mean anything."
Grace passed the ring back, saying, "He has horrible nightmares, so I found a spell that would stop them. I can't stop my own - it's too dangerous. So when I wake up sobbing, he gets up too. Even if it's just to sit there with me and remind me that they're not real anymore. He'll let me steal his fries when we're at a diner, and he'll order an extra cup of coffee so I can sleep a little longer in the car. He always picks up snacks when we stop for gas, even if I'm asleep, because he knows I'll want something to eat eventually. He mastered cooking heart-shaped pancakes for Valentine's Day one year, and he still makes them every Saturday if we're both home. He calls every night when he and Sam are out, just to let me know they're okay. He's saved my life dozens of times. We've lost a lot together, but we've always been able to pull each other back from it. Like I said, he may be an asshole sometimes, but he's a good man. At least in this world."
"Your Dean isn't like ours at all. He was about to get married, and then he went on a hunt in Las Vegas and… it took their father months to get the photos out of the papers. His poor fiancee, she moved across the country. I suppose she wouldn't have to worry about that now," Gray mused, leaning on the kitchen counter. "Well, I'm glad your Dean got his act together. Ours only did because his father sent him off to one of the hunter training camps. We run them like a military boot camp, and it works. We've got the best hunters in the world. We had the best hunters in the world," she reminded herself. The only things they owned now were what they had managed to squeeze in their car. The private jets, the custom-tailored closets, the company, all of it was gone.
"He wasn't always like this," Grace assured her. "But he's settled down. It took a while."
The sound of footsteps startled them both, Dean coming into the kitchen and looking between them. "Okay, not to be weird or anything, but which one of you is my Gracie?"
Grace smiled, coming to give him a kiss. "This one."
"I knew it."
"Hmm, no you didn't," she answered confidently. "You found the Occultum?"
"Yeah. And we've got a plan for our friends here."
A few phone calls later, Grace was sending their alternate selves off with a cooler full of snacks and directions to the closest airport. They had booked plane tickets and were off to Brazil, where they could hopefully build a new life in a place they'd never been before. She'd helped them pack suitcases and secure the documents they'd need, pulling a bit of magical help to make everything passable. Before long, they were ready to set off across the world.
Closing the door behind them, Grace sighed, hoping they'd make it safely. She went back down the stairs, hoping she'd run into Dean. And run into Dean she did. He had been on his way to find her. "Hey." He pulled her into a hug, both of them realizing how much running around they'd done, how busy they'd been, and how little they'd slept. "I'm going to take a shower and head to bed. Jack's - come with me." He took her hand and led her to the kitchen, leaving Grace at the door.
She stepped inside, finding Jack sitting in the dim light. He'd been crying, trying to restrain the flood of emotion that had suddenly hit him. "I'm sorry. Grace, I'm so sorry. I destroyed your life, both of your lives, everyone's lives. You two were almost out of this, almost free, almost… I ruined it. I got so angry and I… I didn't care that they were in the way. I'm sorry. I see the way you look at me when I walk by, how you're afraid I might snap on you or Dean or, or hurt one of you. I -"
"Jack," Grace said, keeping her voice even as she sat down next to him. "I'm not going to say it's alright, because it isn't. But I… I do forgive you. You couldn't help but lash out, and Jack, Dean and I might never be able to have kids of our own again. Probably not, barring some sort of miracle. But you will always be our family. I know I'm not your mom, but I'll look out for you like you're my own. We're going to get through all of this together, as a family." She put a hand on his shoulder, Jack reaching out to hug her. "Getting your soul back… it takes some time to readjust. But we're all here if you need us. A lot of us in this house have lost our souls once or twice."
"Thank you."
Grace stood, telling him that he should try to get some sleep. "You need to reset everything. Here." She put a hand to his forehead, mumbling a few words under her breath. "You've got about twenty minutes to get to bed, or you'll fall asleep on your feet. You shouldn't have any weird dreams. The spell's designed to knock you out and let you rest."
She left him in the kitchen, finding Dean getting ready for bed. "We're gonna need more toothpaste soon."
"Can I talk to you about something?" She stepped into their closet, changing into her pajamas as Dean brushed his teeth.
"Sure. Is it a 'what do we do now' kind of thing? Because I have no clue."
"No." She sat down on the end of the bed, Dean standing in the bathroom doorway. The light shining behind him highlighted how tired he was, how worn out he really was, a kind of exhaustion he'd never show them on the road. "Dean, I… never mind, we should get some sleep." She stood, but Dean pulled her into his arms, keeping her from going anywhere.
"Gracie, if something's bothering you, you can tell me." He kissed her cheek, holding onto her as gently as he could. He could tell that she was afraid, afraid of putting words to something she had been thinking about for a while. "Whatever it is -"
"Dean, I -" Turning to face him, she stopped. The way the low light of the bunker shone in his eyes, she could tell that he couldn't take much more bad news. Not today. No matter how much it was eating away at her, she couldn't drop the news on him now. It wasn't going to be a problem, not until after all of this was over, if they lived that long. So she went with something else. "I'm terrified. I know Billie has a plan, and I know we have to trust her, but we're fighting Chuck. I keep going from 'we can do this' to 'we're fighting God, that's impossible'."
Dean reached behind them to turn the lights off, the darkness somewhat comforting. "So do I. Sometimes it seems like we can do this, and then we have to find the freaking Garden of Eden. I don't know, I want to say we're gonna be able to fight our way out of this, but we're at least going to go down swinging. You, and me, and Sam, and Cas, and everyone else. Like you said, it's all we can do. And if we lose, we lose, but we're gonna put up a Hell of a fight. I can't promise you that we're gonna be okay, or that we'll figure it out, but I promise you we're going to do everything we can to take Chuck down."
"It won't be that bad, if he just... dissolves us."
"Yeah, it won't be that bad." Dean held onto her, knowing that Chuck wouldn't spare them his wrath. They had been working against him for too long. But for now, he thought he'd let her believe. Just like he'd melted alternate universes, he would just melt this one too. It would all be over quickly. Or so he would tell Grace. She didn't need to know, and he prayed that she would never have to find out, that none of them would ever have to find out. The only problem was that there was no one left to pray to.
