In case you don't know, Supernatural messed up the actual angelic hierarchy.
Chapter 20
Atropos' words floated heavily in the room, the suggestion being so... so utterly extravagant that there was no mind that could assimilate it fast enough. To say that it left everyone dizzy with the implications would be an understatement.
"Ach, and here I considered myself an ambitious witch," Rowena laughed daintily. "Cannot deny it sounds like an exciting adventure, though."
One by one, all the inhabitants of the bunker were eventually back to their senses.
"Atropos, is what you are proposing truly feasible?" Castiel doubted.
"Of course it is. If it was done before, it can be redone again. Aren't you the one who told me to believe in God's instructions?"
"Yes, but..." the seraph stammered, his eyes darting around. "This might be an exploit too ludicrous even for us."
"Really? Compared to what?" the blonde fate was more than a little surprised. "To avoiding the Apocalypse, twice? To opening Purgatory and swallowing the leviathans? To assisting in the birth of a nephilim? To releasing the Darkness?"
Castiel ended shutting up, since there was nothing he could say to defend himself and his friends against the barely veiled reproaches.
"You needed a plan, so here you have it. It's your choice now. Free will, right?"
"Okay, sweetie. We got it," Balthazar said, all charming smile in place. "A foolhardy plan is still better than no plan at all. Can you stop nagging us now?"
"Nobody's nagging you," the woman was clearly annoyed. "But even if I were, why would anyone comply to you?"
"Because if you continue bitching so sexily in front of me, I'm going to ask you out on a date!"
Not even a single emotion betrayed the fate's face, light fury still shining in her eyes, but slowly a very flattering blush dared to rise to her cheeks.
"Just because you ask, it doesn't mean that I have to accept."
"Oh, sweetie." Balthazar was enjoying a lot flirting with the stick-up-her-ass agent of Destiny. "I can be extremely persuasive."
It was obvious to anyone that the poor fate was already seething, and very likely imagining some kind of painful massacre with the silver-eyed angel in the starring role.
"Guys, please!" Sam interrupted, being the voice of reason amidst the impending, fateful debacle. "Do you really think this is the moment for that?"
"Can I go already?" Atropos inquired instead, looking viciously at the rogue. "I can't cut a thread until Lachesis has measured it."
"No, wait!" Dean shouted, raising a hand like trying to stop her from vanishing into thin air. "These frontier angels, where are they? How do we summon them?"
"Shouldn't you know that?" Atropos directed the question to Castiel. "The anunnaki should be mentioned in the Angel Tablet, since it pertains to the nature of angels. And you already got yourselves a prophet, as I see."
"The anunnaki?" Castiel repeated. "But they..."
"I know who they are," Jessica perked up unexpectedly. "I studied them at mythology in college. They are ancient deities from the valley of Mesopotamia. There's also this theory about them lending a hand in human evolution."
"That is not a theory," Castiel explained. "The anunnaki were a group of angels that God appointed as teachers to humanity. They were in all those grand civilizations that I mentioned earlier, like Atlantis or Lemuria. But over time, they were called back because humans needed to learn by themselves. And then, they disappeared."
"They didn't disappear," Atropos shook her head. "They merely returned to only serve their original task when their teachings were deemed to be wasted. Those nine angels, the anunnaki, were the ones to establish the hierarchy in Heaven. Each one of them served as the apex of a choir: seraphim, cherubim, thrones, dominions, virtues, authorities, principalities, archangels and angels properly speaking. And in the same way they gave Heaven its structure, they also give this world its own."
For a moment, nobody said anything. Doubts or not, it almost felt like the plan had already set itself.
"Guess I have work to do now," Kevin commented, cracking his neck. "Stiff back and muscle cramps, here we go again. You better bring me chips, guys!"
"You know you can feel at home, Kevin," Sam smiled. "Just like before, or... better. Yeah, let's aim for better."
"Well, then?" the blonde fate insisted, irked and pointing to the floor. "Do you mind?"
"Ah, sure." Dean went to the rim of the circle and smeared with a foot some of the white chalk they had used to draw it. "There you go, lady. And thanks."
Just huffing as a last sign of acknowledgement, Atropos disappeared in a cloud of golden glitter.
"Oh, she's so into me," Balthazar smirked.
"And you're so into delusion," Rowena whispered to herself, hiding her grin behind her cup of tea because it was evident that the angel could hear her perfectly.
Castiel and Jessica started to clean and put everything back in place, when suddenly Dean cursed loudly.
"Dammit!" he smacked his forehead. "And she's already gone!"
"What's the matter?"
"Fuck, Sammy. We didn't ask her about Legion."
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After Atropos left, the people in the bunker took to other activities, since the tethering gemstone that they had used in the summoning needed a couple of nights under the moonlight to recharge. Balthazar had flown back to Heaven to inform Naomi of the new plan and see if she had anything to add, or if she had maybe located the human whose soul he was keeping; Dean was in the garage, tending to his Baby and trying to distract himself for a little; Sam and Jessica had gone to visit Mildred in Oak Park and do some grocery shopping; Rowena had already been taken home, declining the invitation to stay in the bunker even if they had to call the blonde fate again; and Castiel was reading a book in the library, in company of the three teenagers, who were doing the same.
"I'm not sure I understand what this book talks about," Jack frowned adorably at a page in The origin of species. "This man says that everything is the result of biologic selection through many generations, humans included, but I thought God was who had created everything. Sam told me this. It's what the Bible says. Was this man lying?"
"Oh, pal. You don't want to start one of those topics, I assure you," Kevin warned him sympathetically, surrounded by dictionaries and minding the Angel Tablet. "There are people out there who take very seriously defending religion against science, or the opposite. And I don't mean it in a good way."
"No, Jack. Darwin was not lying," Castiel looked up from his Sweet bird of youth. "He was mostly right in his hypotheses, but he did not know all the facts, therefore he established them chronologically wrong."
"How would his hypotheses be chronologically right?"
"As far as I can guess," the angel speculated, "God was not only creative but also curious about what he would do, and what would come from it. He did not create all the animals at once, for example. He dropped just a single cell in the primal ocean, and waited to see what would happen. Over thousands of years, that cell became insects, fishes, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and finally mammals. So, in a sense, it is correct to state that he created the animals, and also that they evolved, like Darwin determined."
"Oh, I understand," Jack smiled happily.
"Where do the dinosaurs fit in that explanation?" Kevin asked jokingly, not going to miss this chance of discussing existentialism with a celestial being.
"Dinosaurs suffered extinction when Michael and Lucifer were playing toss, and Michael missed a comet. Or at least, that is what Gabriel always swore. But knowing him, I do not discard the possibility that somehow he was to blame too."
"What about Adam and Eve?" the nephilim asked. "The Bible said that God created them, but this man insists that humankind descends from apes."
"There are fossils in different stages of evolution all around the world," Kevin added.
"That is a mixed truth too," Castiel explained indulgently. "I do not know why, but God must have been specially fond of apes. When they appeared, he took them as a subject for experimentation, seeking how much further he could improve them. Sapiens as you are now were the final product when he gave them a soul, like Adam and Eve. But no masterpiece is achieved without some previous drafts, like is the Homo habilis, Homo erectus or Homo antecessor."
"People in this world are strange," Kaia spoke for the first time, a Voltaire in her hands.
The three males looked at her, politely waiting to hear something else about such a statement, but the dreamwalker didn't seem prone to elaborate.
"What makes you say that?" Kevin finally asked.
This time Kaia looked up, glancing briefly at her companions before immersing herself again in the book.
"In my world there were disputes too, but not like the ones I saw through my piece's eyes. We fought for protection, for rights or for honour; but here you don't fight against outside menaces: you fight among yourselves. You kill each other only for daring to have a different like or opinion. I know what terror is, and still I find you terrifying."
"Is that opinion yours, or from the original Kaia?" Jack inquired.
"A little bit of both, I suppose," the avatar girl admitted, after considering her answer for a moment.
"Kaia," Castiel talked to her rather apologetically. "I did not have the chance to get acquainted with the first you, but I know she did not have an easy life. I know she suffered a lot, but I still believe there must have been something that gave her some sort of reprieve, or she would not have survived as long as she did."
She tensed for a second, but looking up again and locking her eyes with the angel's, she nodded slightly.
"There was," she confessed with a tiny smile. "She liked philosophy, and poetry. One for dealing with the bad things, and the other to convince herself there was something good out there."
"Hey, now that I think about it," the prophet interjected, having a sudden realization. "If we reset the dimensional frontiers, you won't be able to go back home. Neither could you travel to those other worlds that your pieces were sent to."
"I know, but I already told you that nobody would accept me back after failing my trial. That's not how things work in our society. And between this world and the others accessible to me, there's not really much of a difference. There's still blood everywhere. But believe me, this may not be the best one, but it's neither the worst."
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Two days later, Sam and Jessica were in the library too, but the mood was silent and heavy. They were alone together preparing the summoning again, the hunter drawing sigils on the floor and his fiancée putting in place the other items, like gemstones and candles. He wanted to say something, anything, but wasn't sure how to be supportive with what was roaming in her mind.
"Sam," she eventually called him, sitting hunched in a chair. "I don't know what to do. I'm thankful to Mildred for her offer, but it caught me off guard."
"Precious, that depends completely on you," Sam answered gently, trying to reassure her. "There's no rush, you don't have to take a decision now when you're still mourning. And I'm sure Mildred thinks the same, she just wanted to offer help in case you needed it because she's a kind and perceptive person."
"So you think I should accept and let her adopt me?"
"Jess, this isn't about me, this is about you having a life again. That's why we went looking for your parents in the first place, right? I can only tell you," Sam spoke sincerely, "that in terms of paperwork, it's easier to falsify some documents if there's a real person to attach you to. But either way, whatever you choose, we'll find a way. And I repeat, it doesn't have to be now if you don't feel ready yet."
Jessica was about to say something else, but then the lights began to flicker, and a few seconds later Balthazar and Rowena appeared behind the couple, in the war room. Kevin, who had gone earlier to eat in the kitchen, also returned, still chewing something.
"Good afternoon, my dearies," Rowena greeted politely.
"Balthazar," Sam grunted. "Could you please stop messing with the lightbulbs every time you arrive? We know you do it on purpose."
"I so do not!" the angel defended himself. "Have you any idea of how many layers of protection I must trespass to come here? Almost as many as you wear. This place is like a damn onion! The least I deserve is a few sparks."
"I don't remember Cas ever complaining about it."
"Because Cas is a sap willing to put up with everything and anything, as long as he gets to eye-fuck your brother."
Sam would've liked to reply to that, reply with whatever, but sadly the truth in such a statement was too great to allow it, so he had to bite his tongue. There was also the fact that right then Dean and Castiel joined them, probably alerted of the witch and the other angel's presence through the failing electricity, and his older brother wouldn't appreciate being the topic of conversation.
"Ok, are we ready? I hope all of you have written down whatever you'd like to ask Atropos, because I don't think that woman will go easy on us for summoning her again. I'm not gonna risk my neck a third time."
"Please, Dee. You underestimate her allure way too much."
"Listen, Thaz, whatever floats your boat, it's what I've always said. Less competition for you, so be happy."
"Where are Jack and Kaia?" Jessica asked.
"They are in Jack's bedroom, watching a film on the laptop about a little bear addicted to honey," Castiel responded, tilting his head. "But even if I understand the appeal of honey, I do not think that such behaviour should be encouraged and made fun of, specially if it is aimed at a child audience."
"Yeah, I can't imagine that anyone with that much of a sweet tooth would be a good role model," Sam chuckled, glancing at the other hunter.
Dean pulled a face at his little brother, but didn't say anything. Instead, he turned to the angel.
"They are in his bedroom alone? Cas, maybe it's time that you give Jack the talk."
"The talk?" he repeated, confused. "What talk?"
"Don't ask me what talk! I thought you were culture savvy now."
"I mostly am, but sometimes I still have difficulties discerning the exact meaning of your many euphemisms."
"I was under the impression that technically Jack is only four months old," Rowena supported. "Despite his teen visage, isn't that a bit too soon?"
"I don't think age really factors here," Dean retorted. "That Kaia is who knows how many decades old, and still got stuck in time as a teenager. She probably needs the talk too, and better be safe than sorry. So good luck, Cas."
"I do not even know what you are talking about yet."
A choir of suffocated laughs erupted around the oblivious angel, effectively dissipating the tense atmosphere. After that, Rowena chanted her Greek spell again and sprinkled the rim of the circle like she did the previous time. And once more, the blonde fate stood before them.
"I can't believe this," the irate agent of Destiny said. "What do you want now? If you didn't like what I proposed, then too bad, because there's nothing else for me to suggest."
"No no no no!" the younger Winchester jumped to say, attempting to placate the woman. "It's not that, not at all! We thank you, we really thank you for that plan. But before, you told us that you also might have an idea about what to do with the shedim, remember? Legion. We... we kinda forgot that point two days ago, so we had to summon you again. Deeply sorry, but it was out of necessity."
"This is what happens when you don't ask phone numbers to important people," Rowena whispered in confidence to Jessica, patting her arm. "Believe me, I can relate."
Atropos was still annoyed, but Sam's explication seemed to work, because she calmed down quite a bit.
"The shedim aren't easy preys, which I know it's an understatement, considering that you're hunters," she confirmed, tapping a finger on her Book of Life. "They're vicious creatures and each one of them has an ability, something that makes them extremely bothersome and hard to defeat. Legion is just one of them, it wouldn't really make much of a difference if any other had escaped instead of it."
"You don't say," Dean snorted. "That thing disintegrated the last Prince of Hell like it was nothing."
"In Legion's specific case, I don't think you're in any capacity to kill it. Your best shot would be to imprison it again."
"How?" Sam inquired. "Jack could probably open the jail again, but more shedim would get out instead. And Legion isn't going to stand still, waiting for us to push it back inside."
"Nobody said it had to be the same jail," Atropos grimaced at their blockheadness. "Hell is full of them, or even Heaven. Maybe Purgatory? Whatever, just use your imagination!"
"We're not unleashing that thing into Purgatory. No way," Dean immediately denied. "They already have enough fun there containing the creatures from the Black Lagoon."
"Then what about the Cage?"
In less than a second, the mood in the library turned gloomy and sour. The Cage... Lucifer's original suite, where now the archangel Michael in his Adam vessel was trapped; and where the third Winchester brother, who had fallen prisoner of Heaven's schemes, was trapped too. Everyone knew the story, more or less, everyone except apparently the guardian of Ananké.
"We can't open the Cage," Sam informed her, clenching his jaw. "First of all, after Crowley's demise, there's nobody else that we can ask to take us to Hell and guide us across. And second, we still have the other three Horsemen rings, but not Death's. And I'm pretty sure that Billie isn't going to care about our problems, with or without God."
"You know what? I don't care about your problems, and still I'm here, dealing with my fair part." Atropos' patience was running thin, which was clear to everyone. "You wanted help? Ideas? I gave you two: invoke the anunnaki, and send Legion to the Cage. The Angel and Demon Tablet are both in your possession, so you have the necessary tools. What else do you expect from me, to do the job for you? Because people out there still have destinies to fulfill while I chat idly with you."
"You know, sweetie, my offer remains, about removing that sti-..."
"Balthazar, don't you dare finish that sentence," the fate glared at him.
"No," Dean muttered, and then bellowed, raging. "Damn fucking no, we're not sending that aborted thing with Adam! To hell with you and your fucking plan!"
Not managing to keep calm in the fate's presence, the older hunter kicked a chair in his way out and ran from the room.
"Dean!" Sam called, going after him. "Dean, wait!"
When both Winchesters were out of sight, the rest of the people looked confused at each other, unsure of how to react after such an exit. It was only after a full minute that the young prophet finally asked:
"Did he say Adam? What does he have to do with this?"
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Several hours later, Dean was still coped in his bedroom, sitting on the edge of the bed. Elbows on knees, forehead resting on his crossed hands, and eyes closed in silent brooding. He hadn't talked with anyone since storming out of the library, but now someone knocked on his door. He didn't bother with an answer, and after a moment of hesitation, the person on the other side took it upon himself to be allowed in.
"Hey, Dean," Sam said quietly, entering and closing the door again. "Atropos is gone already since a while, in case you want to come out. And no matter how much confidence Balthazar has on his flirting skills, I don't think we'll dare summoning her again. Like, ever."
The other hunter didn't answer. Sam sat on the other edge of the bed, and leaned backwards until their backs were touching, supporting each other.
"I'm not that happy either with what Atropos suggested, you know."
"We're not doing it, Sammy," Dean finally grumbled, still not moving. "I'm not doing it."
"I know, I know. Believe me, I don't want to do it any more than you."
Dean breathed deeply, rubbing his eyes.
"Do you think..?" he tried to ask. "Do you think there's still something of him left down there? Something that we could save?"
"I don't know," Sam answered, forlorn. "For all the time that my soul was there... look in what state it was returned to me. Adam has been there a lot longer than that. And truth be told, I can't even make up my mind about what would be worse: if there's nothing of him anymore, or if actually there is."
"Maybe... maybe Michael... he didn't do to him what Lucifer did to you. He's still a winged dick, sure, but he's not the one called the Devil. And we've been told that he has gone insane! Perhaps he left Adam alone."
Sam didn't answer, partly because he didn't dare to get his and Dean's hopes up, and partly because either way they weren't able to find it out. A few minutes of silence passed.
"You know, there have been times... times when I was just this close to beg Cas to go to the Cage and retrieve him. But for some reason that I don't know why, in the end I never did it."
"Of course you know why," Sam replied with a little smile that his brother couldn't see, but could hear in his voice. "It's because Cas would do anything for you, like he has done so many times before, but it wouldn't be fair to him and you know it. When he pulled you out of Hell, his whole garrison had to fight their way in; to pull me from the Cage, he had to join forces with the King of Hell, and still, he and Crowley only barely managed to get my body out through a crack. Asking Cas to go alone and single-handedly rescue Adam would be unbelievably cruel, because you know that he'd try."
Dean snorted, but didn't correct him.
"What we're going to do then, Sammy? We can't let Legion roam freely."
"The idea of imprisoning it again isn't bad. Just like Atropos said, Hell is full of jails, it doesn't have to be the Cage. If we could only find a demon willing to work with us on this and let us into Hell, maybe this would be one less problem off the list. I'm sure Rowena knows one spell or another for that."
"Or perhaps Kevin will find something else in the Demon Tablet."
"True, there's also that," Sam agreed.
Another minute of silence, that was broken by a not so shy growl from Dean's stomach.
"You hungry?" the younger Winchester chuckled, getting up. "You should come out already and have dinner with the rest of us, Dean. Jess told me she was going to make focaccia."
"What the hell is a phookacha?"
Sam just laughed merrily down the hallway, allowing his brother a few minutes to recompose himself. But when Dean was alone, a sudden idea shone in his mind. He glanced suspiciously at his nightstand.
It wasn't possible, he knew it wasn't. He already had spent it for Cas, his only wish, and he would do it again without a doubt. Castiel came back, and that was what mattered. And yet... he hadn't had the pearl with him at that moment. Dean had poured his heart into that prayer, and it had taken an hour to show results, but the angel came back to life, back to him. And that was the end of the story.
And yet... that nagging doubt in the bottom of his mind wouldn't leave him alone. He had to know.
Sitting again on the edge of the bed, Dean opened the drawer in his nightstand, and started rummaging through it. The keys, the hot magazine, the credit cards, the lube... he really should tidy up some day. At least Cas had already disposed of the four-days-old sandwich under the bed. Oh, there it was, what he was looking for.
Wait a second. There-it-was.
Amara's gift, her teardrop. The black pearl, it was still there! How was it possible? Didn't it get spent after reviving Cas? Unless... unless the seraph's return was unrelated to the mystical tiny sphere. Castiel had said it himself, that he was thrown out of the Empty after being awaken by Jack and annoying the Cosmic Entity to no end. It certainly didn't sound like Amara had anything to do with it. Did that mean he had another chance to make a wish?
Holy shit.
"Amara," Dean whispered, taking the small jewel in his hands and joining them in prayer, closing his eyes. "It's Dean. I have the pearl with me this time, right here. I... I believed you had sent Cas back to me, for which I was extremely grateful, but either I'm misunderstanding how this works, or it wasn't your doing. If it's the latter, then please, please, I beg you, take Adam out of the Cage. Let him... let him go home, or Heaven, whatever. Anywhere is better than there. So this is my wish, which I hope you can fulfill. Take my brother out of the Cage."
Dean breathed heavily for a while, his heart beating fast. As usual, nothing indicated that his wish had been listened, the pearl still intact in his hands. He was starting to wonder if there was actually any sign to expect.
He got up when his stomach growled again, demanding food, and put the pearl back in the drawer. It was only then that a frightening thought became clear in his mind. Adam, and Michael. The last time the brothers saw each other, the archangel had taken possession of the boy, and now Dean had pleaded for his liberation. What if, by doing so, he had also released Michael?
Fuck, what had he done?
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