Epilogue

(Busboy)

I'm here with the them in the San Isidro Mission cafe just over the border in El Paso, Texas but who's gonna notice me? I'm just the guy who throws the crap covered dishes into the big gray tub and wipes the tables with a rag more disgusting than the tabletop could ever be. I'm the invisible dude with bad breath and zits and the hearing of a comic book superhero.

The Impala is parked out in the lot and the two of them are huddled up in one of the booths having a heart to heart. They completely ignore me while the waitress, who's back in the kitchen promising to give the cook a hand job if he hooks her up with a dealer who'll sell her some primo black tar, waits on their order. I'm lugging a tray of condiments to refill the table setups and set up shop a few booths away and listen to them as they talk about what happened.

"What I wanna know, what I've been afraid to ask you since we left Armadillo Infantes, is exactly what happened," Sam says.

Before he answers any question Sam asks Dean usually pauses to decide whether to tell the truth or to lie, a 'tell' not lost on Sam or on me. Dean takes a drink of his water and it looks like he's struggling. "Just a puke-a-thon worthy of the Guinness Book of World records," he finally says.

Suddenly I'm interested in what he's hiding and so is Sam. "And Lilith just went out with a whimper, like all the rest?" Sam says doubtfully.

"More like a bang. Knocked you and Bobby out cold," Dean laughs after the fact.

"Are you're sure she's gone?"

Dean reminds his brother that some angel told them she was. Sam's still skeptical but Dean seems to be willing to bet the farm on anything this particular angel tells him...so it can't be Castiel.

"So why didn't I go...out, too?" Sam then wants to know.

I've been wondering the same thing and, as Dean's pause ahead of this one grows longer and longer, I move a table closer to them and I'm all, sticking straight out from my goofy looking head, ears.

"Because you were only exorcising demons," Dean answers and looks toward the kitchen to see if the waitress is coming back then to Sam to see if he gets it.

"But Azazel's blood, my powers..."

"Are God given, Sammy," Dean says simply and as shocked as I am I don't drop a grain of salt, bad luck and all.

It takes a few seconds for the words to sink in but Sam's so convinced he's evil that he dismisses the notion and so do I. He comes up with his own theory, "Angel saved me didn't she? She kept me from going to hell."

Dean looks down at his hands on the table and the silence stretches out for a good minute before he says, "She didn't keep you from going to hell, Sammy, she kept me."

I squeeze the catsup container so hard that it erupts out the top like a volcano and drips down my hand like blood but they don't notice. Sam just closes his eyes and sighs a deep one.

"Think about it Sammy. It all makes sense. Azazel was a son of a bitch but technically he was a fallen angel. I went to hell and we all know what happens to you there," he finishes with a shrug of his shoulders and I feel for the guy...but not too much.

"Is that why you didn't want me to use the spell? Why you went alone? Because I'd send you back to hell along with all the other...?"

"Dude, it's okay," Dean says softly but the unspoken word must be a bitter pill for him to swallow now and he's silent for a little while again before he explains to Sam, "I didn't want you to use the spell because, even though Ruby's agonizing death would have been totally made of win, I didn't want anything to happen to you."

After digesting what he's been told Sam says, "This so totally sucks," then adds, "So I guess this means we can't hunt together anymore."

"Bullshit," Dean says, "We've still got the nail and an angel riding shotgun now. I don't ever, ever, ever wanna go back there, Sammy, but I will if it means we can kill off even one more demon as powerful as Lilith," he says selflessly and I want to gag. He's just stupid enough to do it.

I head back toward the kitchen and as I pass their table I grab Dean's hand and hold it down and tell him, "I've got a message for you."

It's true you never forget your first love...or your first demon and Sam recognizes me. "Ruby" he yells out in warning but not before I grab a steak knife and drive it through Dean's hand so hard that the blade tip snaps off in the wooden table.

This is not over, it's just beginning and leaning in, my borrowed eyes turning milky white, I tell him, "Tag you're it."