(5/26/2017) And here it is, dun dun duuuuun! I wrote both chapters at the same time, thus the quickness. Anyways, hope you enjoy!
Thank you jkmp28, RHatch89, thedarkpokemaster, and Sage of Wind Dragons for the (super quick) reviews! And all you favoriters and followers get cherries!
They were in the midst of yet another stay at yet another random motel when a thing wearing Dean's face rapped on the door.
Buffy laid it flat with her fist.
Regardless of Bobby's shouts and the creature's moans, the Slayer stomped ruthlessly on its stomach. The next move would have been to crush its genitals (providing it had any), but Sam pulled her back, knife in hand. As the monster stood up, the hunter brandished the weapon and demanded, "Who are you?"
"What are you?" Buffy clarified.
The thing rubbed its stomach. "Like one of you two didn't do this?" it yelled.
"Do what?" Sam shouted.
Bobby placed himself between the creature with Dean's face and its supposed siblings, hands outstretched pleadingly. "It's him!" he cried. "I've been through this already. It's really him."
The blade in Sam's hand clattered to the floor. "What?"
"I know," Dean said, his familiar smirk lighting up the room. "I look fantastic, huh?"
The siblings stared at one another, stupefied. With a quivering smile, Dean took a step forward to embrace them both… and found himself suddenly drenched in holy water. Again. He looked over to his sister, an empty bottle in her hand, as he wiped moisture from his face. "Not a demon or a vamp."
"Oh my God!" Buffy cried as she hurled herself into his arms. Sam swiftly joined them and the three soon became a squeezing mass of tears and sobs. Bobby stood unobtrusively to one side, a small smile on his face and tears in his eyes.
From between the two significantly taller men, a muffled Buffy called out, "Breathing! Becoming a issue?"
The siblings reluctantly parted. "How?" Sam queried, baffled. "When?"
"One of you tell me," Dean replied as he folded his arms. "What did it cost?" he asked, suddenly forbidding.
"Cost?" Buffy repeated. "For what?"
"You think one of made a deal?" Sam asked incredulously.
"That's exactly what we think," Bobby uttered gruffly.
"I didn't," Sam said.
"Nope," added Buffy.
"Don't lie to me," Dean snarled.
"We're not!" snapped his sister.
Dean jabbed a finger first at Buffy and then at Sam. "There's no other way this could have gone down! Now tell the truth!"
"It wasn't us!" Sam cried.
"Bullshit!"
"We tried to get you out!" Buffy shouted back. "For months and months and months! We asked witches and-and-and psychics and we even tried to reopen that stupid gate. We even looked into opening the Hellmouth but there was nothing." Her eyes watered again. "Nothing."
"We both tried to bargain," Sam said quietly, furiously. "No one would deal. We failed and I'm sorry, all right? Dean, I'm sorry."
"Me too," Buffy added.
"It's okay, you guys," Dean said, mollified. "You don't have to apologize, I believe you."
"Don't get me wrong," Bobby said. "I'm gladdened that Sam'n Buffy's souls remain intact, but it does raise a sticky question."
The eldest brother grimaced. "If you guys didn't pull me out, what did?"
They spent a few more minutes reverifying that their suppositions were incorrect; Dean continued to insist he was just Dean while Sam and Buffy denied their involvement with his resurrection. Bobby mentioned a psychic that was only a few hours' drive away and they decided to head there in the morning.
Dean told his siblings he remembered nothing of Hell, much to their relief. They told him that they'd spent the intervening months being normal hunters. Nothing out of the ordinary. It was obvious, at least to Bobby (the only outside observer), that not a single one of them was telling the truth. The elder man felt, however, that it wasn't his place to question their decision to be taciturn with one another.
While his sister chattered excitedly to both Sam and Bobby, Dean excused himself to the bathroom with a quip about how toilets must have been disgusting in Hell. He relieved himself, washed his hands, and stared at his reflection.
…Screams. Everyone was screaming. He was screaming. His flesh was being torn off strip by strip with infinite patience and nightmarish skill. Hands dove into his stomach and played with his intestines. He died again…
…and again…
…and again…
…Pain unrelenting, days upon days upon days…
…Someone was trying to tell him to hold on, to fight, but it was just so hard…
Dean splashed water on his face to hide the tears. Of course he lied to them. What did they expect? There was no reason for either of his younger siblings to know what he'd been through. All that would do would bring up more misery and horror than they could ever comprehend.
"Dean?"
Buffy knocked insistently on the door. Bemused, the eldest brother opened it and lifted a querying eyebrow. "What?"
His sister thumbed towards the door. "Bobby and Sam said they didn't want to finish waiting for you to poop and went to get pizza. You need anything?"
"Nah. Just another beer."
"Plenty left."
The pair sat down on the couch companionably. There was comfort in the normalcy of the gesture; a small joy that it was even possible to be there with a bottle in hand while in the company of family.
Dean permitted himself a small, contented belch and put his feet up on the weathered coffee table. After a few minutes, Buffy sighed. "There's something you need to know," she said quietly.
Her tone put Dean immediately on alert. "What?"
"Don't tell him I told you, okay? Promise?"
"Sure."
"Something's up with Sam. He keeps sneaking out. I don't know why and I don't know where."
"What, you never asked him about it? Or followed him?" Dean's sister curled into the couch and shrugged.
He wiped a hand down his face. Buffy had always been closer to Sam, with the spread in ages giving Dean plenty of allowance to be a big, bossy brother. In contrast, the two younger siblings played together, giggled with each other, were real, innocent children with one another. The fact that Sam was keeping secrets and Buffy wasn't doing her best to suss them out was highly suspicious. "Okay, what's going on with you two?"
"Nothing."
"Yeah, sure," Dean said, unconvinced. He changed tack. "Mind telling me why you're on the road and not, you know, at home?"
Buffy shrugged again. Finally frustrated with her obstinance, Dean plunked down his beer bottle and stood up. "What is going on with you? Your mom freaking flipped the fuck out when I called! What the hell did I miss?"
Indignant, Buffy shot to her feet. "You called my house? Why?"
"Looking for you!"
Dean was taken aback when his sister's lip began trembling. "It's none of your business," she finally told him.
"Okay," Dean said, doing his best to moderate his tone. "Then what happened with that a-capella thing?"
"Acathla. Angel opened it. We closed it. End of story."
"Can't be."
"Why not?"
Dean's answer was forestalled by the return of Sam and Bobby. Buffy and her elder brother put on their best faces to greet their family back into the room and tried their hardest not to let the past few minute's hostility be noticed. It seemed to work; Bobby cracked open a beer and sat noisily into the couch and Sam grandly presented Buffy a small cheese pizza and dug into an all-meat special.
For the time being it was enough that Dean could pretend everything was fine. He was back with his brother, his sister, and the man that had been more of a father to him than his actual father. Being with family would sustain him for now.
October 2007
The meeting with Pamela Barnes, the psychic, went disastrously.
The attractive thirty-something woman introduced herself by flirting salaciously with Dean and inviting Sam along for the ride (to which his older brother made clear, "You are not invited!"). She then laughed at Buffy pretending to vomit at the mental picture, then got right down to business.
During the seance they had gotten a name: Castiel. It told them to back off, which Pamela ignored. In retribution, it proceeded to burn her eyes out from her head.
Bobby went with the psychic to the emergency room while the siblings went to get a bite to eat. Or at least to try; after witnessing Pamela's gruesome injuries none of them were up to choking anything down. Dean ordered pie just to have something to poke with his fork.
Moments later the waitress, the cook, and the four patrons all revealed black eyes.
After a standoff (during which Dean claimed he'd been let out due to his "perky nipples" and slapped their leader silly) they rushed out to the car and breathed a collective sigh of relief. The mostly pointless incident at least gave them some further information; this Castiel thing wasn't a demon. Whatever it was, however, was big and powerful enough that it had the hellspawn completely terrified.
They checked into the Astoria Motel for the night. Exhausted by the ordeal of the past few days, Dean collapsed into one of the beds almost immediately. He was awakened a few hours later by a sleep-tousled Buffy. "Dean. Dean!" she hissed.
Her brother garbled out a response. Impatient, Buffy woke him up completely by flicking his ear and shouting his name again. Dean roared in pain and sat up flailing. "WHAT?" he demanded loudly as he palmed his reddened earlobe.
"Sam's gone."
"What?" he repeated, this time more in confusion than anger.
"Sam's gone! The Impala woke me up."
Shocked stupid by the rude awakening, Dean only managed to process part of what his sister had said. "He took my car?"
Buffy folded her arms and snapped, "That's what you're worried about? Jeez!"
The room's ancient analog television suddenly flicked on and interrupted Dean's rejoinder. Puzzlingly, the screen displayed nothing but static. Shortly thereafter the radio followed suit, the dial clicking over all on its own. A fuzzy country tune played for a few seconds before transforming into a shrill, swiftly rising, whine.
Eventually it became disturbing enough to cause both siblings to clap their hands over their ears. Both of them jumped when the dresser mirror shattered. Dean then covered Buffy protectively when the bathroom mirror, the closet mirror, and the windows all followed suit.
When the door burst open Dean snatched around for a weapon of any sort, certain that this was the source of the attack. Instead, the noise cut abruptly. Through the ringing in their ears Buffy and her brother faintly heard Bobby crying their names.
While they helped each other to their feet, the elder hunter rushed around the room collecting their belongings and stuffing them haphazardly into whatever duffle bag was closest. He then hurried outside, threw the luggage into the back of his truck, and came back to help them into the cab.
After starting the motor Bobby handed them purloined motel towels to staunch the blood from their ears. Dean patted a few scratches on his arms from stray glass. "You two kids all right?" Bobby asked worriedly.
"Peachy," Dean managed.
"Did anyone else hear someone talking?" Buffy wondered absentmindedly as she tossed her bloodied rag into the back of the cab.
"Through all that?" her brother asked incredulously.
"Saying what exactly?" Bobby added.
"I dunno," Buffy said with a shrug. "Word thingies."
Dean and Bobby exchanged quick, baffled glances. "Nope," the elder man finally said. "Just noise."
Dean cut across Buffy's continued speculation by pulling out his phone and calling Sam. After a brief, duplicitous conversation the eldest brother hung up and announced that they were going to summon the Castiel.
"Are you mental?" Buffy asked.
"Maybe," Dean replied. "But I'm sick of all this runaround. It's time to face it head-on."
"Yeah, but what if this Castiel-thing is a monster? Like a forty-foot giant with a serious bug up his butt?"
"A wha…?" Dean shook his head. "Then we pull a Skywalker and topple its ass."
"This is a bad idea," Bobby grumbled.
"We don't got a choice."
"We could choose life."
"I'm with the life-choosey decision," agreed Buffy.
"Tough," Dean stated firmly. "No more getting caught with our pants down."
"Shouldn't we tell Sam?" Bobby asked.
Dean frowned and shook his head. "Nah, he's better off where he is. Wherever that is."
"Sure," Buffy said gamely. "He can come scrape our pancaked corpses off the floor after we're done."
They discovered an small, abandoned barn several miles down the road. It had been neglected for a substantial amount of time (cobwebs and dust lay thick on every surface), but its walls and foundations were well built and the cheap hanging bulbs were still connected to the power grid.
Dean and Buffy hauled out as many different weapons as they could from Bobby's trunk. Knives of all materials, guns, stakes, holy water, and salt bags were arranged on the folding tables that they had discovered behind some moldy hay bales. Bobby then gave each of them a wall, a diagram, and several cans of spray paint. When they were done, sigils decorated nearly every conceivable surface, including an enormous devil's trap that took up nearly half the floor.
"I'm so artsy," Buffy declared as she tossed down an empty can.
Her brother rolled his eyes. "We ready?" he asked Bobby.
The elder hunter lit a math and held it over a bowl of ingredients. "Yup. This should summon near about anything, long as the name's right."
After a brief look at one another, Buffy and Dean headed for the weapons table and made their choices. Dean grabbed the Kurdish knife (which he was frankly shocked to see; he'd assumed it had been charbroiled along with his body) and a shotgun with salt rounds. Buffy grabbed a machete.
"Go," uttered the Slayer.
The match was tossed in.
An hour later it was past eleven and Buffy was bored, bored, bored. The battery on her phone had died and no amount of pleading or whining would get her brother to lend her his.
"You sure you did the ritual right?" Dean groused. Bobby, rightfully, gave him a dirty look.
Buffy, who was lying on her back, head dangling backwards, on the cleanest wooden box she could find, complained, "Can we go now?"
"Will you cut being a big baby?" her brother asked, annoyed.
Buffy pouted upside down at him. "You're the baby, you big, fat… baby thing!"
Dean's furtherance of their petulant exchange was blocked by what felt like a minor earthquake. The glassless windows rattled as the floors and walls quivered ominously. Buffy flipped to her feet and snatched up her blade as Bobby hustled to the table and prepped a shotgun.
"Wishful thinking," Dean called over the noise, "but maybe it's just the wind."
With a loud report the door slammed open. Astonished and frightened, the Slayer and the two hunters watched a dark haired, blue eyed man in a trench coat and black suit stride calmly through the entryway.
The devil's trap on the floor could have been a child's chalk doodle for all the attention he paid it. None of the other sigils seem to warrant his attention either. The hanging lights popped, sparks raining down, as he walked purposely forward, his eyes set on Dean.
Both hunters discharged their weapons several times. The only notable damage was to the creature's clothing.
"Who are you?" Dean snarled as it came within arms length.
In a calm, measured tone, his voice deep and gravelly, the stranger replied, "I am the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition."
"Yeah. Thanks for that." With as much force as he could muster, Dean plunged Ruby's blade into the monster's heart. He examined the weapon sticking out of his chest as if it were an especially fascinating bug.
Then he pulled it out and dropped it on the floor.
Buffy swung her machete and Bobby an iron crowbar at the man's head. The thing twisted around with preternatural speed and caught both weapons on their descent. He tossed them casually aside.
Bobby backed away as it approached, his hand scrabbling blindly at the table for another weapon. The creature placed two fingers on the hunter's forehead and he dropped like a stone.
Buffy took a fighting stance that he regarded with amusement, distracting him long enough for Dean to rush to Bobby's side. He checked Bobby's pulse and found it remarkably steady. The hunter slowly realized that the older man was merely in a deep slumber.
Buffy and the monster were still squaring off. Without glancing over, it said, "Your friend's alive."
"Who are you?" Buffy demanded.
"Castiel."
"Well, duh. But what are you?"
"I am an angel of the Lord."
There was a moment of silence as the Slayer and her brother processed the information. Then, with all the attitude and delight she could muster, Buffy grinned and declared, "Shut up."
The colloquialism seemed to baffle the so-called angel. He cocked his head sideways and peered down at the enchanted girl. Rather than convey fascination, however, Dean was quick to show his contempt. "There's no such thing."
"This is your problem, Dean," Castiel chastised. "You have no faith."
Both Dean and Buffy flinched as lightning suddenly crashed repeatedly overhead. The unnatural brightness illuminated Castiel…
…And the great shadow of wings on the wall behind him.
The siblings stared, wide-eyed, until the feathered appendages began to fold and the irregular flashes ceased. To cover his astonishment, Dean angrily spat, "Some angel you are. You burned out that poor woman's eyes."
Castiel sighed. "I warned her not to spy on my true form. It can be… overwhelming to humans, and so can my real voice. But you already knew that."
"You mean the gas station and the motel. That was your voice?"
"Hah!" Buffy cried. She smacked her brother on the arm. "I told you I heard words."
The angel walked towards Buffy and backed her up against the weapons table. She hit it with her back, causing all the items to rattle and a knife to clatter to the floor, as Castiel stopped just inside of her personal space. "The Slayer," he said pensively. "I have wondered what it would be like to be in your presence."
"Yeah, well, right now you're getting so far up in my presence I can see your nose hairs."
"Get away from her," Dean growled as he stepped between them and shoved the angel away. He hovered protectively in front of his sister as he asked, "So do all angels appear in the form of holy tax accountants?"
"This?" Castiel picked at the jacket's lapels. "This is a vessel."
"You're possessing some poor bastard?"
"Dean!" Buffy snapped. She yanked her brother around so they were face to face. "Stop annoying him before he goes all eyeball-burning on us!"
"This thing pulled me out of Hell!" Dean yelled back. "You're not seriously thinking that it was just to be nice?"
"Maybe!"
"No, it was not," Castiel inserted. "God commanded it. We have work for you."
"See?" shouted a vindicated Dean.
"Will you stop with the loud voices?" Buffy shrieked back.
"Look who's talking! And you," he snarled as he turned towards the angel. "Oh, what the fuck?" Dean searched wildly around the sparsely furnished room. Somehow, without making a whisper of a noise, Castiel was gone.
Hay and dirt shuffled on the floor as Bobby regained consciousness. He moaned and sat up. "What the hell happened?" he wondered.
Dean and Buffy glanced at one another. "We should get going," Dean finally said. "We'll tell you on the way."
Acknowledgement : Some lines of dialogue are taken directly from the episode, "Lazarus Rising" (SPN 4.01).
Author's Note : Cass didn't have too much of a personality in the beginning other than "don't fuck with me" (at least in my opinion), but I figured Buffy might confuse the crap out of him early on ;)
P.S. Don't worry. I didn't forget about Angel.
