Author's Note: Final spoiler alert for The French Mistake episode. All characters belong to their creators.
Chapter Inspiration: Distance by Christina Perri featuring Jason Mraz
Chapter 12
Dean and Sam landed hard on pavement. Looking around, they saw an African-American lady walking up to them. A derisive look on her face.
"You two." She said, disdain dripping from her words. "Have the strangest luck."
"Raphael?" Dean asked, curious to determine if this was the angel who wanted his, Sam's, and Cas's heads, all on pikes.
The woman didn't reply, merely nodded infinitesimally. "Nice meat suit." Dean quipped. "Dude looks like a lady."
Raphael, unamused with Dean's remarks, raised a fist rendering the brothers in intense pain. They both reacted by doubling over, but Dean's hand relaxed, dropping the key.
"The key." Raphael commented calmly, bending over to pick it up.
"And that will open you a locker at the Albany bus station." Balthazar appeared and informed the archangel.
"Really?" Raphael asked the newly arrived angel.
"You see, I needed a modest decoy to make it more convincing." Balthazar explained.
"Give me the weapons." Raphael demanded.
"Sorry darling, they're gone." Balthazar informed, well everyone standing in the motel parking lot Sam and Dean had gotten yanked into.
"What!" Raphael was outraged, but calm.
"I said, too bloody late. You see, they were so well hidden, that I needed time to find them. So, I volunteered these two, for a game of fetch with Virgil." Balthazar started. Hearing that they were set up as a diversion had Sam fuming angry, and Dean beyond pissed. "You two were such an adequate stick, thank you, thank you boys."
"You've made your last mistake." The archangel threatened Balthazar.
"Oh, I've got a few more up my sleeve, honey." Balthazar replied, goading Raphael.
Raphael stepped forward to smite Balthazar when there was a whooshing of wings, then the real Castiel's voice sounded from behind her.
"Step away from him, Raphael." Castiel commanded. "I have the weapons now; their power is with me." At that moment, thunder sounded, and lightening flashed showing the shadow of Castiel's impressive wings.
"Castiel." Raphael shouldn't have been surprised, but somehow the sneaky angels had pulled one over on him.
"If you don't want to die tonight, back off." Castiel replied, his voice hard.
Balthazar smirked, and just like that, Raphael left. The play had been made, and Raphael was no longer an immediate threat.
"Well Cas, now that you have your sword, try not to die by it." Balthazar told Castiel, giving him a crooked smile in comradery. Castiel barely acknowledged the sentiment, but his eyes did soften a fraction. Just like that, Balthazar was gone. Now it was down to just the Winchesters and Castiel in the motel parking lot.
"Cas, what the hell?" Sam asked.
Without a word, Castiel walked up to the brothers and transported them back to Bobby's, where there was still a hole in the wall.
"Wait, you were in on this?" Sam asked angrily now that they were back where they started from. "Using us as a diversion?"
"It was Balthazar's plan. I would have done the same thing." Castiel replied, no inflection of remorse in his tone.
"That's not comforting Cas." Dean piped up angrily. He hadn't just used them, he'd left Hermione and his baby in danger, and that was not okay with him.
"When will I be able to make you understand. If I lose against Raphael, we all lose, everything." Castiel had turned to face Dean, so he could impress upon him the seriousness of the situation he had found himself in, when Balthazar concocted the plan to use him and his brother.
"Yeah Cas, we know the stakes. That's about all you've told us." Dean yelled angrily. Hermione woke with a start at the sound of Dean yelling. He sounded distressed, so she got up and as quietly as she could, she toddled down the stairs to listen.
"I'm sorry about all this, I'll explain when I can." Castiel replied before disappearing.
"Freaking angels." Dean muttered.
Having heard the whoosh of Cas's wings, Hermione rushed around the corner. She hadn't been expecting to see Sam and Dean looking spooked in front of a large hole in Bobby's study where the window had been. Dean felt Hermione's eyes on him. Slowly he turned to look at her for the first time in 3 days. She looked the same as when he'd left, wearing sweatpants and one of his AC/DC t-shirts, hair in a ponytail. She'd never looked so beautiful to him. It took a second for his feet to register the command from his brain, but when they did, he was striding across the room quickly. When he got to her, he wrapped her in a hug as tight as he dared without hurting her, or their baby.
"Dean, are you all right?" Hermione asked, her arms coming around his waist.
Instead of answering her verbally, Dean slanted his mouth over Hermione's, locking her in a passionate kiss. He poured everything he couldn't say out loud into that one kiss, and prayed she understood it. Her lips responding back to his reassured him, and so he lost himself to it. He was so willing to get lost in the kiss that he missed the disgusted noise from Sam's throat. Hermione however, heard it, so she broke the kiss, but she pressed her forehead firmly to her hunter's.
"What was that for?" Hermione asked.
"I missed you." Dean reluctantly admitted.
"Dean, I've only been asleep for maybe an hour." Hermione replied, looking at the clock in the living room.
"What?" Dean questioned.
"I don't know what happened to you guys, or why there's a hole where Bobby's study window used to be, but it's only been an hour since I went upstairs to go to sleep." Hermione explained.
Dean pulled away from Hermione while the information soaked into his brain. He watched Sam walk over to a door jam and hit it with his hand. Sam let out a sigh of relief. "Solid. It's real. Nice." He told Dean.
"Yeah, yeah, real, moldy, termite eaten, home sweet home. Chock full of crap that want to skin you. Oh, and uh, we're broke again." Dean quipped. Hermione was busy looking back and forth between the two like they had lost their minds.
Sam scoffed softly. "Yeah, but hey, at least we're talking." Dean rolled his eyes at the quip.
"Okay, what did I miss?" Hermione asked, her arms coming up to cross in front of her chest.
Dean, who'd been three days without seeing, or being near her, was in a fairly pervy mood around her, and that move didn't help him at all. His eyes went straight to her chest.
"My eyes are up here, Dean." Hermione saw right where his eyes went, and called him out much to Sam's amusement. "Not funny moose." Sam's face paled at her nickname. There's no way she could have known the King of Hell had also dubbed him 'moose.'
"Where did you hear that?" Sam asked.
"I made it up. You're super tall." Hermione dismissed the question in favor of getting an answer to hers. "Now is anyone going to tell me what's going on?"
"Freaking angels zapped us into an alternate reality. There it was three days, here apparently, an hour." Dean replied, his fingertips coming up to rub his forehead. He was getting a headache.
"I'll put on some coffee for you. You guys look like you're about to collapse." Hermione said, dropping her arms and heading for the kitchen.
Before she could start making the coffee, Dean and Sam made another one of those telepathic decisions they were good at. "Hey Hermione, no coffee, let's just go to bed." Dean suggested, his shoulder coming to rest on the doorway opening into the kitchen.
"Are you sure?" She asked, looking from her hunter, to his younger, taller brother.
"Yes I'm sure, and isn't tomorrow the big day anyway?" Dean asked.
"Yes, it is." Hermione replied with a slight blush.
"Well then, Sammy, we're going to bed. Big day for us tomorrow." Dean told his brother as he grabbed Hermione's hand. Together they ascended the stairs to the bedroom, and beds that they shared.
Dean woke first the next morning and discovered he slept in the same position all night. He was curled around Hermione, his hand around her waist. He smirked slightly, as his hand began to caress her where their child was growing. A kick pressed against his fingertips causing his smirk to grow into a full-blown smile. Today was the day they'd find out what they were having. He was nervous about her apparating to England, but trusted that she wouldn't do it if it wasn't safe.
"Little one just told you good morning." Hermione mumbled, startling Dean who had no idea she had woken.
"How long have you been awake?" He asked, nuzzling a nose into her hair.
"Since the kick." Hermione replied, snuggling closer to Dean.
"Well then, let's start this over again. Good morning you two." Dean quipped.
"Good morning. What time is it?" Hermione asked. Even though she was awake, her eyes were still closed. She wanted to relish the moment she found herself in.
Dean lifted the arm that had been around her waist, and bent it so he could look at the watch on his wrist. "It's 7 a. m." He told her, before returning his arm to its previous position.
"I should get up and get ready. We need to apparate in less than an hour." Hermione told him, moving from her side onto her back so she could stretch.
Reluctantly Dean removed his arm from her waist, giving her room to stretch out. He rolled and sat up on the edge of his side of the bed. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he got up to grab his clothes for the day from the old dresser that was in the room. Slowly, Hermione did the same, except she pulled her clothes from the duffle bag she'd brought with her from Hogwarts. They both dressed fairly quickly, Dean wearing his usual: jeans, and a black t-shirt under a plaid button up that he cuffed the sleeves to his elbow. Hermione dressed in a pair of her maternity jeans, and the plaid shirt she'd stolen from Dean when he was staying with her in England.
"Hey, I wondered where that shirt went." Dean retorted when he saw what she was wearing.
"I sneaked it out of your duffle months ago," Hermione told him.
"Wait, what?" Dean was confused.
"I got it out of your bag when you and Bobby were staying at Hogwarts. I wanted something to remember you by, so sue me." Hermione snapped.
"Woah!" Dean held his hands up in a gesture of surrender. It was one of those times her pregnancy hormones had U-turned on him. "I didn't mean it like that."
Hermione's hands went to her hips, but before she could retort back, her hormones made another sharp U-turn on them both, when her eyes filled up with tears. "You don't want me to wear your shirt?" She asked, her voice breaking.
"Shit!" Dean swore. He was starting to get whiplash from the mood swings. "I didn't say that." He replied to her in a gentle tone. "I don't care that you're wearing my shirt. I was just saying; I didn't know you'd taken it when I was looking for it. That's all." He moved so he was standing directly in front of her, taking her hands in his.
"So, you're not mad at me?" Hermione asked for clarification.
"No, I'm not." Dean told her, dropping a light kiss on her nose.
Just then, a familiar whoosh filled the room. "Hermione is distressed." Castiel announced.
Dean groaned, and dropped his forehead onto her shoulder. "Cas, now is not the best time for this." He warned, not lifting his head, and Hermione chuckled, the tears in her eyes drying.
"I sensed distress. Where is the danger?" The angel asked.
"There's no danger, Castiel. Dean and I were just talking, and my emotions decided to show him how fast they can change now." Hermione explained, her thumbs automatically rubbing soft circles into the backs of Dean's hands.
"Fucking hormones." Dean swore, his head still resting on Hermione's shoulder. It kept his anger towards Castiel at bay.
"Very well, if there's no danger then…" Castiel didn't finish his sentence before he was off again.
Dean lifted his head and looked around. "Figures." He said before releasing Hermione's hands. "We good?" He asked her.
"Yeah, we're good. Sorry to go all pregnant woman on you." Hermione replied, her cheeks flushing in embarrassment.
"Don't be sorry. It's not like I didn't do this." Dean replied.
"You didn't do it alone." Hermione deadpanned.
"That's true, I distinctly remember…" Dean started before Hermione cut him off.
"And now, I think it's time to go." She interrupted.
"Let's do this." Dean said. Hermione gave him a smile before picturing their destination and jerking her wand to activate the apparition spell.