The Water
Ch 9
'You alright?'
It was the first time River had spoken to him since he had taken her as a vessel, and it was both relieving and worrisome to hear her voice. On one hand, it meant that his Grace hadn't overwhelmed her, burned her up and left her body an empty shell for him to inhabit and a Doctor for him to explain her death to (which would have been a very awkward conversation, to say the least). On the other hand, it meant that his most recent flashbacks had distracted him enough that she had woken up. He had hoped to keep her asleep for this whole little possession fiasco, as being a vessel was not a very pleasant experience. The fact that he had lost enough of his control for her to wake up meant that his memories were affecting him more strongly than he thought (and he thought they were affecting him very strongly).
'I am fine.' The woman responded with something that would have been a scoffing noise, had she had vocal cords.
'Honey, if this is you being fine, then I'm surprised you haven't exploded from unwarranted self-flagellation yet.'
'It is not unwarranted.'
'You're not even bothering to deny the first part. You're obviously not fine.' Cas sighed, sliding down from his position leaning against the wall onto the floor.
She was right of course. He wasn't fine. His memories were coming back quickly, bombarding him with various images every time he saw something that reminded him of the past. Which, considering he was thousands of years old, was pretty much always.
It wouldn't have been so bad if he was remembering happy things, or comforting things. Hell, he'd settle for slightly melancholy things. Unfortunately, being chased by Leviathans is not a good way to remember happy things, so instead he was treated to a wonderful montage composed of essentially everything he had done wrong ever.
The list of his misdeeds was disturbingly long.
He had to get back to the Winchesters. If anyone could prevent the Leviathans from swallowing the world whole, it was them, and they would need all the help they could get to emerge from the conflict with their lives. A fleeting image of Sam falling into the gaping maw of Hell, of him arriving too late to save him, flickers in front of his eyes, and he thinks that maybe his help isn't good enough. But it will have to do.
River sent him another one of her mental scoffs, 'Guilting yourself to death isn't going to help anyone, honey. I'm sure you did plenty of good things, too.'
'And how would you know?' He could hear River's laugh, ringing in his ears.
'If you weren't good, then you wouldn't care about it. You wouldn't be sitting against a wall introspecting, you'd be running around cackling maniacally and blowing up planets. Only good people feel guilty about things, Cas,' a pause, 'between you and the Doctor, you probably have more guilt saved up than everything else in the universe put together,' Cas cocked his head to the side, confused, 'Oh come on, don't tell me you haven't noticed! All it takes is one look and you can see how sad he is. He's the same as you, and that alone should tell you you're not evil.'
She stopped talking then, leaving Cas alone to his thoughts once more, but they were less dark than before. He was going to find the Winchesters, and he would be good enough to deserve helping them.
The Doctor met Cas in the hallway and helped the angel to his feet, clapping a hand on the celestial being's back as he did so.
He walked side by side with the angel, moving toward the spot where they had parked the TARDIS, and he was just about to open the door when he came to a sudden realization.
He didn't feel nervous about Cas anymore. When he looked at the angel, he could still see River (he would always see River, how could he not? It was her body, after all), but he could also see the angel. He had seen the angel before, of course, he wasn't blind. It was just that he didn't really acknowledge him. Not as a separate entity. He thought he did, but now he realized that a part of him had just considered the angel to still be River, an illness infecting her and making her wrong. He hadn't been able to watch the not-River do things because it seeing River act so out of character felt wrong. Now, though, he was looking at Cas. It wasn't weird to see Cas tilt his head to the left, or stand there, silent and still. It was just Cas.
And he was standing there like an idiot, processing all this. They should get going; Cas needed to wash off all the Leviathan goo, and then they needed to look for the Winchesters. Or find Cas a new body.
Because despite the fact that the Doctor wasn't repulsed by the sacrilege of the angel wearing River's face, he would very much like to have her back.
Detective James Bristoll was spying on the strange teleporting creature and her companion. As much as he hated admitting to an activity with such negative connotations as espionage, there was really no other way to describe it.
Something was up with "Agents Smith and Novak". Really, it wasn't even a leap of logic to assume that the two of them, or at least the woman, was not human. After all, humans don't typically teleport or heal. And despite the fact that they had been helpful this one time, Bristoll doesn't trust them. As far as he is concerned, if it isn't human it's a monster, and if it's a monster then it was just a matter of time before it went darkside.
The two mysterious Hunters have reached a phonebox, which confuses Bristoll. There are no payphones in the area, and even if there were, they certainly would not be situated at the top of a hill outside of town. Smith pulled a key from his pocket and unlocked the door, stepping inside. Novak followed afterward. Bristoll wondered how they both fit in that tiny box, and what they were doing there. The box only had looked big enough to fit two people if they were pressed against each other in a very uncomfortable and most likely sexual position and – oh God, Bristoll was never going to get that image from his mind, was he?
When he focused his attention on the box again, he realized that, yes, he was going to get that image from his mind. In fact, he had already forgotten it, distracted by the fact that the box was disappearing. It faded gradually from the hilltop, and within a minute there was nothing left to suggest it was ever there but a square of pressed-down grass. Bristoll tried to think of something that travelled in such a manner, and failed. The policeman didn't like the idea of a monster he doesn't know about. He doesn't like it because that means there is a good chance that the Hunters don't know about it either, and that sort of ignorance generally lead to a lot of people dying. Sighing, Bristoll decided to warn someone (he couldn't just tell Cliff, the older Hunter was practically smitten with the two strangers for some reason).
Instead, he scrolled through his cell phone contacts until he found the name the name he wanted.
Singer, Bobby
800 miles and a little over an hour later, the Sam Winchester decided his brother needed a hunt to get his mind off of the Leviathans.
A/N: Sorry for the wait guys! But I kept getting writer's block on the last part! The fact that it's tech week on my school play is definitely not helping either…
