Disclaimer All recognizable characters/settings belong to their creators. The stories listed here are transformative works, from which I've made/am making no financial profit.
Warnings Language; references/allusions to torture and non-con.
8. Reasonable Doubt
Dean straddles the white line and pedals to the metal, drives like a force of fuckin' nature because it's out in the open now, nothing hidden, his cards are on the table and maybe he feels slightly less sick, slightly less anxious, feels maybe like a dead man walking when he hears the phone ring just before they flick the switch on the electric chair. Even if his brother is thumbing his nose at God.
"Dean. You out to break the land speed record?" Bobby says balefully from the back seat.
Keeping an eye on me, Dean thinks, because Bobby is a canny old bastard, and he clearly knows damn well something's up that isn't just the looming prospect of the ground opening up and six billion souls tumbling into the outer darkness. It sparks momentary irritation in Dean, but then he flashes to Bobby's face when he opened the door all those months ago, a mix of hope and horror, joyful and repelled all at once. You're the closest thing I have to a father, he remembers, and he eases up, guides her back over to the right.
"Can we turn on the heater?"
Sam grumbles his way into Dean's thoughts, reaches ahead to start fumbling with knobs, and Dean swats his hand away."No."
"It's freezing."
Dean hasn't used the heater since Hell. "I like the cold," he says. "It makes me feel… less hot."
"But it's Minnesota. In December," is the unimpressed response. "How could you possibly feel—"
"We're on I-90," Dean deflects. "We could do the Spam Museum. How about it? Anyone? Sam? We never saw it last time."
"It's thirty degrees, Dean," his brother cuts in. "If that. Can't we have the heat on?"
"Arctic air masses," Bobby chips in from the back seat.
"What?" Dean snaps back. "What about it?"
"Arctic air masses, I said," the old man continues. "There aren't any natural barriers north or northwest of Minnesota to block arctic air from pouring south. Ten coldest counties in the country are all in Minnesota."
"Punxutawney fuckin' Phil," Dean mutters under his breath.
"Readers Digest Book Club," Sam breathes back at him, and then he starts tapping his hand on his thigh. "She'll be few miles further on," he says neutrally.
Like I give a flying fuck, Dean thinks viciously, and he has a glorious five-second fantasy of skidding on black ice and plowing into the bitch, remembers she was damn well hurting after Alastair had at her and maybe he can tear off his own strip by turning her meatsuit into roadkill, even though all it means is that some other poor sap will be sucking in her hellfumes within ten minutes of him braking sharply and bleating out fake apologies to Sam while his brother peels her off the blacktop, flat as a paper doll. Like Flat Stanley, he sniggers inwardly. Flat Ruby, and he can buy a camera and take snapshots of her propped up against all the local landmarks as they cross the lower forty-eight.Here's Flat Ruby visiting the Biggest Skillet in the South. And here she is again, posing next to the Second Largest Ball of Twine in the West. Fuck it, might as well take her to the Spam Museum since it's close by. And Dean remembers how she hopped sideways into the maid at that motel, wonders idly if Sam would still be as fascinated by her if the only meatsuit within reach was some fat, tightly-permed, middle-aged nutjob cat lady from Missouri.
Bobby still isn't happy about the plan, Dean can feel the old man's doubt buzzing at him from the back seat, tiny popcorn kernels of annoyance carefully aimed by the kids three rows behind, bouncing off the back of his head right at the good part of the movie, and the old man chooses that precise second to say so.
"I still don't like this, Dean."
With a sigh, Dean responds, "I know, Bobby. I heard you the first twenty times."
Not put off, Bobby reiterates,"It doesn't make sense."
"What does in this whole mess?" Sam offers.
"You tried calling your angel?" Bobby fishes.
Dean shakes his head at that one. "Calling him? Like, on the phone? These guys don't carry cells, Bobby."
"Idjit," the old man snaps. "I mean – calling him. In your head. Like… praying, I guess."
"Praying?" Dean barks it out, half-amused, half-appalled, because for a second he's looking at a splinter of his mind's eye that he leaves buried deep, a clear image of himself kneeling down in his all-in-one PJs with the built-in feet and the button flap at the back in case he needed to take a dump during the night, and his hands are clasped and he's saying his prayers, and a voice is saying them along with him. The voice always comes from behind, and he never turns his head because he was four and never knew he needed to keep looking, never take his eyes off her, because soon she would be gone.
"I don't think these guys come when they're called," he says finally. "I mean… he's off fighting somewhere I guess. He isn't up there watching over me. Is he?" He raises his eyes up almost involuntarily, can't help wondering if the dude is sitting cross-legged on a cloud, strumming a harp, and whether he'd keep the trenchcoat on for that.
"He's your guardian angel," Bobby says archly. "How the heck would I know how these things work?"
Dean shrugs. "He generally just turns up. Flap, flap. Not like chickens or anything. Really big flap flaps. Not loud, just… heavyweight. Like a really big – bird. But not the muppet."
"Ostrich?" Bobby says, and he sounds genuinely intrigued. "No, those have small wings. Swan? Condor?"
"More like something from one of those old Ray Harryhausen movies, or Jurassic Park," Sam chips in. "One of those prehistoric birds with the big leather wings."
"But he has feathers. He showed me," Dean supplies, and it's possessive almost, like he's ring-fencing his angel, maybe like he's doing some territorial pissing of his own because if Sam gets to have his pet demon maybe he damn well gets to have his pet angel and be the only one who sees his feathers. "Well, sort of. It was more like the shadow of them. Hell of a wingspan, must've been about—"
"She's just up there," his brother cuts in and points, and there she is, parked off the road, scenic view, sitting on the hood of her car.
Dean pulls up about ten feet away, keeping his distance because the smell of the Pit emanates from her, Charnel no 5, and he wonders if she can smell where he's been too.
Bobby is on him faster than a rat up a drainpipe the minute his brother slams the door.
"What is going on with you and him? And don't tell me it's nothing, boy, because you're walking on eggshells round each other. Is this the Iowa thing? The siren? Because if it is you need to—"
"It isn't the siren, Bobby," Dean starts, and then he stumbles to a halt, turns around in his seat. "Well. It is. I guess. But it's other things. Her."
"Ruby?" The old man quirks an eyebrow. "You don't trust her."
"Do you?" Dean clips back.
Bobby snorts. "Not exactly. I don't really know what to make of her, if truth be told. But. Like Sam said – she helped us fix the colt, gave you those hexbags."
"You need to figure out how to make the hexbags," Dean grouses. "Then she'll be surplus to requirements."
"Well now she's giving you new ones, I'll take a look at the old ones and figure them out," Bobby concedes. "Though there's likely spellwork involved, so it'll take some time."
Dean nods, flicking a glance out to his brother, deep in conversation with the demon. Ruby is smiling up at Sam and she looks so damn normal, pretty brunette, not Sam's type at all, more Dean's, and isn't that ironic. He studies the way Sam gazes down at her, like he's entranced, like he's eating her up with his eyes, thinks about what Castiel told him, what Sam did to Alastair. "Bobby… do you believe that theory about immutability?" he asks.
"That some things aren't capable of change?" Bobby answers. "Meaning her?"
Dean bites at his lip. "I guess. She started out as a witch and ended up as a demon. I don't see how she can be good. Can things that are evil at the core turn good? And she came from Hell… how can anything that crawls out of Hell be good?"
"Some things that crawl out of Hell are good, Dean," the old man says, his voice gone strained.
When Dean looks back, Bobby has an odd, tight expression on his face. "What things?" Dean prods. "Tell me one good thing that crawled out of that place that was—"
"You," Bobby says, and he clucks his tongue impatiently. "Idjit. You."
It makes Dean think of the angel, his eyes so wide and earnest. "Cas said that."
"Then it must be right, him being a man of God and all," Bobby says decisively. "In any case, maybe good isn't even the point, maybe it doesn't have to be what motivates her. Maybe she's like Meg and she just doesn't want Hell on Earth. I mean…" The old man jerks his head in her direction. "Look at her. Living the life, snazzy little sports car. I can see Armageddon cramping her style. Maybe it's self-interest that has her helping you boys, but that doesn't mean you should turn down the help. God knows you need it."
Dean snorts. "I don't like her. She makes Sam different… something's different about him. Off. He's – I don't know how to describe it."
"Well I do," Bobby snaps. "Arrogant, aggressive, in your face. Damn well snotty if you ask me."
Finding he can manage a wry smile, Dean says, "Don't sugarcoat it, Bobby."
The old man huffs. "Anyhoo. Might be nothing to do with her. You know…" He stops, sighs out.
"What?"
"The thing about you being back is that it means it could all happen again," Bobby says bluntly. "When you were gone it was over. And as… as awful, and I mean fuckin' awful as it was to think about what was happening to you – well, it was done, finished. Nothing we could do. But now. It could happen again. And I know damn well I couldn't deal if it did, Dean. So. How must your brother feel about it…?"
Dean lets it hang in the air for a minute or two before he replies. "Well, he has her, doesn't he? Doesn't seem like it took him long to take up with her after she got out. And all this worry for my health seems to fizzle away to nothing when it comes to staking me out for Lilith, huh?"
Maybe Bobby doesn't want to touch that one with a bargepole because he skirts around it. "You know I'd rather you weren't on this trip," he says. He eyes Dean suspiciously then. "This thing with her. Well. She was down there at the same time as you."
It makes a chill run up and down Dean's spine, makes his throat go dry. "Yeah. She was."
"Did she… uh. Was she—did she…?"
"I had my eyes closed," Dean whispers. "I had my eyes closed. When I had my eyes."
He's lying, because he didn't have his eyes closed all the time, didn't have them closed when the voice was familiar, when it whispered in his ear, I made it Dean, I'm here to get you out, when he stared in disbelief and wept with joy, before the face smiled, this is what I'm going to become… this is what I want to become, and the hands roamed up and down his torn flesh and made him scream again. Once more with feeling, Dean…
"Jesus. Dean. Son, I just—"
"I don't know," Dean cuts the old man off desperately. "I don't know if she did, Bobby. But I know she's one of them. And… well. Immutability."
Sam is heading back now, his usual shuffling walk, hands stuffed in his pockets, and Ruby stands in the background, jacket open to the weather. Dean finds himself wondering if maybe she doesn't like the heat either, because she comes from the same place he does, and he shudders. And then he thinks about what he really meant when he opened his big mouth to Bobby about immutability.
Can things that are good at the core turn evil?
Sam must have dozed off, because he jerks awake to find himself staring at his brother's back.
Dean is perched on the end of the bed, stock still, glued to the television, channel surfing, back and forth, the Food Network, a slasher movie judging by the screams, then Animal Planet, where a couple of mangy lions are taking down a wildebeest and the doomed creature's struggles are curiously serene and graceful in slow-motion, completely silent. Then the Food Network again, steak sizzling on the grill, rare, hands slamming handfuls of ground meat down onto a butcher's block, pounding glistening pink muscle and gristle into hamburger patties, slasher movie, knife flashes, blood sprays out, arterial spray, and Sam winces, can't stomach that now. And on to Animal Planet, teeth and claws ripping, raw, bloody, stringy muscle, kittycat faces dipped in blood, slasher movie, eyeballs pop, Food Network, sizzle-pop, slasher movie, screaming, Animal Planet, intestines dragged out, and faster, faster, images flashing in and out, and something isn't right.
"Dean," Sam says.
Faster, faster, faster.
Sam crawls past his brother, off the bed, glances at the fixed stare, switches off the set. "Dean," he tries again.
Dean still stares at the blank screen, at his reflection. "Tongues," he murmurs distantly. "My signature was tongues. So I wouldn't have to hear them beg."
Sam feels his guts cramp and curl. "Dean," he says. "I shouldn't have said that. It just came out, I. Don't know what came over me."
Dean looks up then, smiles but it doesn't reach his eyes. "You sure about that, Sam?" he says softly. "You sure it isn't the company you've been keeping? Fell in with a bad crowd… She's jerking your chain. I know it."
The fact Dean is talking and not throwing punches isn't exactly a relief. As he sits down, Sam briefly considers the irony that sometimes where his brother is concerned a right hook and a slammed door might just be easier, because he only talks when he has to, and when he reaches the point where he has to, it's usually more than either of them can handle. But talk he will, if it'll help. "What you said, back in Shoshoni, about how it was you Yellow Eyes really wanted. It was so you'd break the seal."
Dean nods. "Looks that way. Ole Yeller was a man with a plan."
"When I tried to deal for you," Sam starts, and he sees a muscle twitch in his brother's cheek as Dean looks away but he keeps going. "When I tried to deal, the crossroads demon said they had you right where they wanted you. And it just, it didn't – register. But I still don't get it, Dean. Why you?"
Dean shoots his eyes up at that, and they're forming narrow green slits. "You mean why am I so special?" he snaps.
Sam throws up his hands. "Well, yeah. In a way. I guess. But not like you think. Or thought. It's just that all along we thought they wanted me. So. Why you?"
After a shrug, Dean says, "Had to be a righteous man, apparently." He snorts. "Who'd have thunk. Me, righteous. Even Cas believes it. But he don't know me that well, huh?"
"Well," Sam ventures, and he's careful, apologetic. "It is a reach. But… it's not as if you're… you know. Bad. Unrighteous." Like me, he thinks. Cain and Abel.
Dean's voice goes thin. "Alastair said he thought it was supposed to be dad."
It's like the air is sucked out of the room and Sam pinches the bridge of his nose, confused. "Wait a minute," he says feebly. "Are you saying that—"
"Yep," his brother grates out. "Hundred years on the rack. Old man looked good on it, huh? On account of the fact he never broke."
Somewhere beyond the horror whirling around inside his head, dad, Sam finds words. "Demons lie," he says, and it hangs there for a minute and his brother doesn't acknowledge it. "Dad wasn't what you might term righteous either," Sam adds.
Dean sniffs, a little derisive. "I guess. The angels sure as damn didn't spend forty years down there fighting off demons to look for him. Far as I know, anyhoo."
"I doubt he could have held out that long," Sam responds carefully, because he knows the wound has never really healed for Dean like it has for him. "And anyway, he'd never have walked out like he did if he was on the rack. I think Alastair was messing with your head. I mean… he would. Wouldn't he?"
Dean snickers, but it's hollow. "Yeah. He'd mess with my head alright." He gives Sam a sidelong glance. "You ever think about it? After dad died?"
"No… I shut it out, I guess," Sam replies, and he's shutting it out even as he says the words, because it's done, dusted, home and hosed, and he wants to come out the other side of this conversation with his lasting memory of John Winchester still his dad's smile before he walked into the light. "Dad – died. He just died. That's what I told myself. And when we figured out he made the deal, I never wanted to think about what came after." Sam bites his lip at the memory of his brother's desolation back then, and he knows what the answer will be even before he asks the question. "Did you think about it?"
"All the time," Dean whispers. "All the damn time. Different for me I guess, since it was my fault."
"It wasn't your fault Dean," Sam counters sharply. "It was dad's choice."
"Like it was my choice," his brother breathes out. "So you could have a second chance."
Sam knows where this is going. "Maybe this is my second chance," he says softly. "Maybe this was always how my second chance was supposed to go, Dean, maybe it's a second chance to keep you out of Hell, because if you—"
"You figured it out, I see," Dean says, edgy now, and his expression is more alert to match.
Sam sighs. "Well? Has Castiel said anything? About the deal still being on the table?"
"Nope, he hasn't said a word," his brother replies. "Either way."
"So you have actually asked him?" Sam fishes.
The answer is noncommittal. "Sort of."
Sam doesn't give up. "What does that mean?"
Dean grimaces. "I hinted. He didn't take the bait."
Exasperated, Sam pushes some more."Well, why don't you just, you know –ask him?"
"Maybe I don't want to know the answer," Dean snaps. "Ever think of that? Maybe I'd like to hang on to the hope I might rest in peace next time."
Sam taps his hand on the table, feels a sudden cresting irritation at his brother's apathy. "What you said, about how it has to be you who stops Lilith. I don't suppose Cas has any big ideas for how you're going to do that without getting yourself killed?"
Dean flops abruptly backwards onto the bed, arms outstretched. "No. He does not."
"Does he know anything?" Sam says, knowing he sounds churlish. "Does he do anything except flap in from nowhere to practice his growly voice on us? Is he even—"
"He's just a grunt, Sam." Dean yawns, rubs at his eyes. "He's out of the loop."
Sam offers what he thinks is the obvious. "So what good is he then?"
"I like him," Dean replies, and then, more meaningfully, "I trust him."
The subtext is clear as day. "I trust her," Sam says quietly. "She hasn't steered me wrong yet."
Dean shoots bolt upright and his face is tense. "She's a demon, Sam. She's done nothing but steer you wrong."
Bristling, Sam pushes back. "But you know why I—"
"Yeah, and I get it, I really do, Sam," his brother cuts in. "But I didn't ask you to pull a fuckin' Anakin trying to get me out of there, and I—"
"I didn't ask you to make the fucking deal in the first place, Dean," Sam barks back, his voice rising, his fingers snatching at the air. "It was stupid. And it was selfish. And it—"
"Was so much more than that," Dean says. "And if you don't know that… Jesus." He shakes his head, spins and reaches to grab the car keys from the table before striding to the door, and Sam pushes up to follow.
"Dean – wait a minute, where are you going?"
"Out."
"Are you going to get drunk somewhere?"
Dean stops at the door, sags against it, oddly still, and his voice is wrecked. "Down there," he says. "They—they… enjoyed me, Sam. Down there. I'm not giving you any more details than I already have, because Jesus, look how that turned out. But they fuckin' enjoyed me. And then they turned me… turned me into something… else. And now I'm going back. Fuck."
He turns, and his features are softer, somehow younger. "I need for you to stop," he says quietly. "Stop what you're doing with her. Because you know it isn't right, Sam, because you know it came from something unholy, and it's changing you. Because Cas said they'll stop you if I don't, or if you don't stop yourself. But most of all because I don't want you becoming what I became down there. I never want to see black eyes looking back at me from your face."
It swells up inside Sam, anger and hurt. "I had to do what I did, Dean," he grates out. "I was desperate. You don't know what it was like. You died. And I had to—"
"And you died," his brother hisses. "Don't you fuckin' dare tell me I don't know what it was like, Sam. You aren't the only one who smelled his brother rotting. I was desperate too. So don't you fuckin' dare tell me I don't know. Or that it was selfish to want you back."
"If you could rewind all this, would you still make the deal?" Sam asks, and it comes right out of the blue, surprises him because he never intended saying it, doesn't even think he consciously thought the words before they came out.
It surprises Dean too, Sam sees him flinch. And he stares at Sam for a long moment, and his eyes are bleak, and his tone is glacial when he finally replies. "Don't ever ask me that again."
Sam hopes it's a good sign that he doesn't slam the door. "That went well," he informs the room.
Dean's bottle of Jack is all present and correct on the nightstand, the first thing he unpacked as usual, and Sam snaffles it, gulps a mouthful as he roots out his phone and speed dials. She's prompt, as she always is.
"Yeah, we're here," Sam confirms brusquely. "You got anything new?"
Bobby is coming out of the room next door as Dean leaves, and he waves a piece of paper.
"I tried calling Kathleen's cell again, no answer. Called the copshop and she's home sick. Tracked her down, looks like she's livin' a couple of miles outside of—"
"Thanks," Dean cuts in, plucking the paper out of the old man's hand as he stalks towards the car. "I'll tell her hi for you."
He's pulling out as Bobby starts waving and hollering, stops to buy gas and a map, flirts briefly with the tired-looking blonde checkout jockey. Twenty minutes later he's parked up on the verge, he's lost, and it's getting dark. "Jesus," he mutters, as he fumbles his flashlight out of the glovebox, squints down at the map. "Living up the ass of nowhere. What the fuck is that about."
He huffs out, stares into the dusk, tries not to dwell on what Sam asked him, because it's the one thing he hasn't let himself think about since he flicked on his Zippo and found himself in a different corner of Hell. He's scared of the answer, he knows, because whether it's yes or it's no, it'll say something profound about where he is now in his relationship with his brother. No leaves him feeling sick and dizzy, because no means he has let go in some way, let go of the responsibility, the job of Sam, maybe even some of the love, because no means he can see a future without Sam instead of just the muzzle of his Desert Eagle. But yes… yes leaves Dean feeling sick and dizzy because yes is what Yellow Eyes said to him, yes is his pathetic, self-loathing, self-destructive desire to sacrifice himself for his family, truth is they don't need you, yes is atrocity, corruption, depravity, evil, eternal damnation, yes is tongues so he doesn't have to hear them beg, and yes is the end of the world.
"How are you feeling, Dean?"
"Christ!" Dean nearly jumps out of his skin, swipes a shaking hand across his eyes. "Must you do that?"
The angel is as calm, as impassive as ever. "You are a martyr to your nerves, Dean," he says, nodding thoughtfully. "Perhaps you should try meditation."
"Don't tell me," Dean snipes. "I need a mantra."
Castiel takes up less space in shotgun than Sam, doesn't sprawl like Sam, doesn't exude tension either, might even just raise an eyebrow if Dean cranked up the music instead of bitching about the volume. He just looks over and smiles that near smile he always smiles, the barest quirk of his lips, like he doesn't know how to smile properly or maybe doesn't think it's allowed. And then his face falls serious again and for a second he seems uncomfortable, not sure how to proceed.
"Have you spoken to your brother?" he ventures finally.
"You could say that," Dean mutters.
"In point of fact, I did say that," Castiel responds, as literal as ever.
"No, that's not what I—uh. Just. Forget it. It's a saying." Dean rubs his jaw hard, slants his eyes over at the angel. "Do you… Are you – there? All the time? Watching? Listening? Like – on a cloud or something?"
Castiel raises his eyebrows, appears to ponder it. "I'm… aware," he says. "Aware of your presence and whereabouts.
But subconsciously aware. So I don't hear or see you at all times, but we are bonded and I know when you need me. Does this make sense to you, Dean?"
Dean thinks on it a minute. "Bonded. And you just get a funny feeling about me."
"Something like that."
"And you don't know what I spoke to Sam about."
Castiel shakes his head. "I wouldn't observe without your consent, Dean. But…" The angel's turn for a sidelong glance this time.
"But what?" Dean prods.
"I can try to listen. If you wish to – talk."
Dean snorts, almost laughs. "There is no try, Cas," he says. "There is only do. Or do not. And anyway, I don't talk." But it turns out he does, because the words are spilling out fast and furious. "Those black-eyed bastards, they killed our parents. Didn't he ever, one time, stop to think about that before he started running with their kind? Didn't he ever, once, stop to think that I didn't want this, didn't want him doing this to try to save me? Fuck knows, I told him enough times. I told him two minutes before those hellhounds ripped me apart, Cas. Those things, demons, like her, maybe even her, she was down there at the same time…"
He stops for a minute, leans down into his hand and rubs hard at his brow like he's trying to wipe away the memories, if only it worked. "Maybe her," he repeats. "I don't know… and he still did it. And I'm tryin' real hard to understand why, but all I can see when I look at him is black eyes, black fuckin' empty eyes, straight out of Hell, and Alastair, he, he – used to make me see things that weren't real, weren't really there…" He looks up, across. "But. You know that," he says. "You saw."
"I saw." Noncommittal, calm. Frustrating.
Fuckin' leg, tremors.
"Cas, uh…" Dean falters for a minute before plowing on. "If you didn't need me to stop this, would you still have pulled me out of there?"
The angel's tone is neutral. "I wouldn't have been sent, Dean."
"Yeah, I guess," Dean says, and though he knows it isn't the dude's fault, he's bitter about it. "Whatthefuckever."
"I think I would be poorer for it," Castiel says suddenly, and it's like a switch flips and he's less guarded, less stilted, he's like he was in Shoshoni. "Poorer for not knowing you, Dean."
Dean smirks, finds he can't help teasing the angel. "You thinking now, Cas? Maybe even thinking for yourself?"
Castiel tilts his head, might even half-smile again, and Dean shakes his head, sighs out long and heavy, chews at his thumbnail for a minute. "Can you sense Lilith the way you can me?" he asks then. "Sense if she's in the ballpark?"
Castiel looks blank for a second before his face brightens. "The ballpark? This term was coined during the space race, yes?"
"The space race?" Dean pulls a face. "It's a baseball term, Cas."
"I believe I'm correct, Dean," Castiel replies, and Dean could swear his expression is smug. "The return from orbit being an inexact science, NASA described your nation's space rockets as having landed in the ballpark if they fell to earth within a predesignated area. And no, I can't sense Lilith."
Dean rolls his eyes. "Ballpark meaning baseball park, Cas. Can't sense her as in just can't, or can't as in she's cloaked? Like, packing a hexbag?"
"We don't know if Lilith uses hexbags to cloak herself, Dean," Castiel says patiently.
"But it's possible? She could be flying below radar?"
Castiel gives him the same level stare. "You mean the object detection system that uses electromagnetic echoes to identify the distance, altitude, position or velocity of both moving and fixed objects such as aircraft, ships—"
"The end," Dean cuts in, glancing over. "Know-all. You're like Agent Scully, only not as se…" He lets it die, pinches the bridge of his nose. "What the hell would Lilith be doing in Duluth anyway," he mutters. "Place is an epic fail."
"It's possible Lilith could be flying below radar," Castiel replies. "And who is Agent Scully?"
Dean's phone sounds, and, "Thank God," he mutters. "Saved by the bell." Bobby, and Dean flinches at the static and strains to hear. "What? What? Say again, Bobby, you're breakin' up. Bobby. Bobby? What? Whassat?" No signal worth spit, and he winds down the window, holds the phone up, nada, and then he thinks what the hell, he might as well get it over with. "Am I going back there, Cas?" he asks bluntly, and he turns to look the angel in the eye, but the seat is empty.
"Fuckin' typical."
Another fifteen minutes and Dean is pretty sure he's driving in circles. He's about to give up and head back to town to face his brother when he spots the road, well hidden and winding, and the house is long, lowset, nestled well off the beaten track in among naked, angry looking trees that point petrified arms accusingly at him through the closing darkness. "Wuthering fuckin' depths," Dean mutters.
Her Jeep and a truck whose? are snuggling close to share body heat on the driveway and Dean parks up off the track, practices what he's going to say as he trudges up the driveway, even practices what she might say, thinks a few minutes on what he might do and then smiles while he imagines what she might do. He has to give himself a mental cold shower then and he pictures his brother's bitchface as he rings the bell because it's the best antidote he knows to jettisoning the bombs ahead of target.
"Hey," he croaks, as the door creaks open, and music he vaguely recognizes from another lifetime floats out. He clears his throat, smiles his sunniest smile. "Hey, Kathleen. Long time no see."
"Yeah," she says distractedly, raising her hand and waving a finger vaguely. "Just… wait there. A minute. I'll be right back. Don't move."
And it's sure as shooting, Dean thinks. There's a man here. Hence the truck, and as he hears footsteps coming back he's already starting his apology for bothering them so late.
He hears the discharge, oddly muffled, feels the impact smack bang center of his chest, damn, hurts, and he's jerked up off his feet and flying backwards, and he thinks, just like fuckin' Rockford as it all goes black.