The Man Who Knew Too Little
Ch 12
By Jokers
Crowley complained the whole ride to Rufus' house. Then, he complained for the ten minutes they stood on the porch, continuously applying pressure to the doorbell and waiting for the old hunter to deign them worthy of his presence. As soon as the door creaked open, however, the whining stopped and the slimy businessman smile was back in place.
"You've got ten seconds to justify me getting out of bed before noon." Dean bit his tongue on the remark that it had been afternoon for a good hour or so and held out a bottle of scotch. Rufus grunted a "come in" and moved to the side.
Dean followed the gruff former Hunter inside the house, then turned around, snickering silently at Crowley's reaction to the place. The former demon nearly tripped on a pile of clothes (Dean would be lying if he said he didn't do the same thing the first time he visited, but that was just long enough ago that watching other people do it was funny) and spent the rest of the short trip to the living room casting disgusted looks at everything in sight.
The man was visibly restraining himself from a violent outburst by the time he was sat down on a ratty old couch, limiting himself staring at his hands as though he could glare them clean of the myriad of germs that inhabited the messy house.
"Alright. Now you have until I finish this bottle. Get talking."
"Do you remember that demon you helped Bobby find? The one with the scotch?"
"Yeah I remember. Went to jail for that."
"Well, he's right there" Dean pointed in Crowley's direction. Rufus didn't seem to know whether to be amused or shocked.
"No way. He stepped through at least three devil's traps." Dean shrugged.
"We don't get it either. He just dropped into Bobby's kitchen and started bleeding on everything."
"You sure that's not his vessel then?" Crowley scoffed.
"Sorry Samuel L. Jackson, no dice. Pretty sure I'd notice if I were that poor sap again," He motioned down at his body, "But now, you're stuck with little old me," The demon sighed dramatically, "And I'm stuck in this wonderfully clean house."
"Oh, stop bitching Crowley." Dean glared at the former king of Hell.
"We're sure." Sam spoke calmly, but with an edge to his voice that Dean knew meant he was trying very hard not to pull a bitch face. Rufus examined Crowley critically.
"What do you want me to do about it?"
"Well…" Dean trailed off.
"God came back." Sam finished.
"And what does that have to do with him?"
"God's a total asshat. He's restarted the apocalypse."
"Of fuck no. I'm not getting involved in that again."
"We're not asking you to," Sam was pulling a bitch face at this point. It wasn't one Dean had seen before, and he filed it away for later categorization, "It's just that we've got dicks with wings busting through the windows left and right, so it's kind of difficult for us to watch a demon on top of that."
"So you want me to babysit?"
"Yes."
"No."
"Well, that's fine. That's great actually. It means that we can ask for your help with Michael and Raphael. If we'd left Crowley with you, you'd have been busy and we couldn't have bothered you." Dean grinned as Rufus took on an expression generally reserved for those who had just smelled something rather awful.
"You owe me a lot of scotch for this."
"Thanks Rufus!" With that, the Winchesters made a swift exit, leaving behind a cranky hunter and an even crankier former demon.
"So." Crowley elongated the syllable, fully aware of how annoying he was being. Rufus ignored him.
Again.
They had been following this pattern for about four hours. Well, Crowley had. Rufus seemed determined not to participate. Crowley sighed, a habit he hadn't grown in to until he met the Winchester boys.
"You know, as much as those two knucklehead grew on me, sometimes I wanna punch them in the face." Crowley turned to Rufus and let out a silent huff of laughter.
"I hear you."
"I'm going to get some more scotch." With that horrible stilted segue, Rufus disappeared and left Crowley in silence.
God gazed down at the former demon sitting alone in Rufus' living room, an amused grin on his face. He wouldn't have guessed turning the King of the Crossroads into a human could be so amusing, but he was enjoying the decision thus far. It gave him something to do while he waited for the Winchesters to realize it was their move. He had been worried he would get bored.
Though really, he didn't know why he was concerned. His two pet archangels were amusing enough to distract him for ages. He glanced back at them, his smile widening. Michael was as impassive as ever. It wasn't all that difficult to keep him that way given that, every time a thought managed to fight its way into his pretty little head, God beat it into submission. He had a private bet with himself about how long it would be before the Protector of Heaven gave up trying to pull his mind back together. Neither of the numbers he guessed were very large.
Though Raphael's face was, objectively, quite blank, next to Michael she was quite expressive. A little bit of wariness had seeped through the cracks in the stone barrier between Raphael's mind and her body, and it made God even more amused, if that was physically possible. At first, the Healer had been just as undoubting and faithful as ever, but time passed quickly in Heaven and, though it had only been a few days in the human world, it had been quite a bit of time for the angels. Raphael had begun to grow confused at her brother's actions, attempting subtly to remind Michael of who he once was. God doubted the second youngest archangel even knew what she was doing.
God could have just taken the doubt from Raphael's mind, made her just as loyal as her older brother, but that wouldn't have been fun. Instead, he let the angel have her little bit of doubt. It was entertainment. And besides, the seeds of doubt would most likely never bear fruit. Raphael was one of his most devoted angels, after all. (If she did, however, it would be a simple matter to erase the past few months from his mind and restart).
Raphael was feeling rather confused.
She didn't understand the reason for her befuddlement. After all, things were as they always had been. Lucifer was a monster, Gabriel was failing to live up to expectations (though the fact that he had failed to live up to expectations by aligning with said monster instead of just running away like normal was a little surprising), the Winchesters were a nuisance and Michael…
Michael was standing no more than five feet away, as static as the landscape around him. Raphael brushed a thin wisp of Grace across Michael's mind, and all she got in return was silence. Without orders from Father, Michael might as well have been an inanimate object. And that was what really confused Raphael, what really shouldn't have. The oldest angel had always been like that, an extension of God's Will, more perfect than any of them could ever hope to be. So it shouldn't have felt wrong, seeing his blank expression, his unfocused eyes staring out at something Raphael couldn't see. But it did.
An image of the four archangels together flitted before her eyes. Of Michael smiling an easy, natural smile, of initiating conversation without being told to. Of herself feeling both at ease and terrified, the former because her older brother always knew how to lift her spirits. The latter because she thought she might love said brother more than God.
Raphael realized she was shaking and wished she was back in her human form, in the fragile body, which was so much easier to control. She forced himself to still, to calm down, repeating it's not real, it's not real, it's not real over and over again in her head until she believed it. The confusion she felt before intensified, spreading into every fiber of her Grace and settling in for a long stay. Sh didn't understand where that vision had come from. It wasn't a memory, but it felt like one, felt more like one than most of her real memories, and that thought caused the bewilderment to crystallize into ice-cold fear. She knows she should go tell his Father about the problem, that God can easily make her feel better, but the same part of her that couldn't quite believe the vision was false refused to let her move in the right direction. Instead, she glanced at Michael, who was standing just as still as ever, and sighed.
"Alright, I think I've got something." Bobby slammed a heavy leather tome onto the coffee table. Dean could've sworn he heard the piece of furniture rattle from the weight of the book. He glanced at the title, and then directed a rather skeptical expression at his surrogate father figure.
"The Methods and Processes by Which to Dispose of Powerful Ancient Creatures, and Other Topics, a Manual by Eric Kripke? Jesus Christ, how many thesauruses did this guy burn?"
"I know it sounds tacky, but the things pretty accurate most of the time. Anyway," With some effort, Bobby cracked open the heavy book and leafed through the yellowed pages, "Here we go. 'Yahweh: It is said that the only way to defeat the Almighty One is by piercing him with a weapon coated in the blood of His Son. There are few relics which can boast this achievement, indeed only one that still exists. This weapon is the Holy Lance, which posthumously pierced the side of Jesus of Nazareth. He must already be in a weakened state when the weapon is used, or His Power will repel the attack. God must be stabbed in the right side, his wound mirroring that of the Son. The poison of His own lifeblood will creep into his veins and destroy him.'"
"Well that's fucking optimistic." Dean said, attempting to take a swig of his beer, then frowning when he realized it was empty. A knot of dread settled in his stomach as he mulled over the description in his mind. Creep into his veins and destroy him. If the weapon could do that to God, what hope would Cas have?Cas is probably dead anyway, at least if we do this the Unholy Douchwad can't use his body. He would want that. Telling himself that wasn't working. so instead he got up and went to the kitchen for another beer.
A/N: So that's a chappie. Shit's probably gonna start going down within a chapter or two, so this fic has a theoretical end in sight. Unless we get distracted. Which is probable.