A/N
Firstly, thank you all again for the reviews, I am so behind with replies that it isn't funny but I want this finished before Thursday so for now, its write, write, write. I don't want to trip on any ideas of what the show is doing and then get stuck before I finish. So apologies.
Ok. I sat down, plot in mind, notes on the desk. I started to write and then three hours later I'm sitting at the screen, looking at my notes and asking the muse, what the ….? This is not what I sat down with in mind but somehow, this is what I wrote. I know where its going, but it so isn't what I intended when I started this. I blame the muse.
So, ensure that your hands are inside the carriage, we are all passengers on this one and we are going for a ride! Hang on.
Castiel appeared beside him as Bobby closed the phone. "What do you mean that he's gone for help? Who's help would a friggin' archangel need?"
"I don't know, and he didn't stop to enlighten me." Castiel stopped, cocking his head to one side. "Where are Sam and Dean?"
"Still inside."
"We need to find them." The angel started forward into the waiting area not pausing to see if the elder hunter was still following or not.
Bobby slowed him with a hand. "He's here, ain't he?"
Castiel turned, eyebrows raised in wonder. "You can feel it too?"
"Feel what? Do I look like a freakin' psychic?" Bobby gestured towards the reception desk. "The girl's missing and it too quiet, even for here." The hunter strode forward, pushing open the doors to the ER treatment rooms. An outside door further up from where they were standing was open and the doctor that had been dealing with Dean was lying on the floor just to the side. Bobby paused briefly to check her pulse. "She's dead." Biting down on the panic that wanted rein over him he turned to his angelic companion. "Think you can take him on your own?"
The angel shook his head. "No, not without Heaven's assistance, but perhaps I can hold him off long enough for Gabriel to come with help."
"That's not reassuring, not at all. Give me the knife." Bobby held out a hand as he moved forward, checking the rooms to find the right one.
"It may not be of use." The angel advised, passing it to him as he spoke.
"I know but it's better than spit." He drew up outside a door and motioned to Castiel. Nodding his understanding the angel pushed round him and into the room.
They stopped short at the sight in front of them. Sam was still lying on the bed, Dean was down on the floor and the Horseman was hovering over him.
"Get away from him," Bobby growled as he stepped forward, unsure what he was going to do but needing to get closer to his fallen friend.
"Or you'll do what?," the Horseman laughed cruelly. "Tickle me with your little pig sticker? You can't kill Death Mr Singer," it sneered at him.
"No, he can't, but he can watch while we do." Three heads turned to take in the forms that now stood at the window. Gabriel smiled a slow knowing smile at them and moved closer, his two companions remaining where they were. Back lit from behind by the sun that lit the room it was hard to see their faces but Bobby would have known them anywhere.
He squinted and then drew in a sharp breath. "What the….?"
The Horseman threw the angel an incredulous look and then snapped his fingers. "I've got back up on the way too." Dean jerked at his feet and Sam moaned low from the bed, shifting and starting to sit up. "And if that's all you've got then I really feel sorry for you."
"Death, Death, Death. Didn't your mother ever teach you not to judge a book by its cover? I'll see you your horsemen and I'll raise you this…." Gabriel turned to his companions. "Boys."
Bobby's mouth dropped open as the two heads rose in unison, an older version of the Winchesters staring at him with eyes that shone with a heavenly fire. "Dean told God to get his ass down here and help."
Gabriel smirked at the Horseman.
"So he did."
---
2020
Sam approached the house with the ease of someone following a well practised routine, stopping to check the mail box and then trotting up the stairs to the porch. He put a hand to the handle and pushed open the door, stepping through and dropping the letters he'd picked up on the table just inside the hallway. Following the hallway and the smell of cooking down to the kitchen he walked through the archway and smiled as the woman at the stove turned to look at him, her own returning smile fleeting.
"Morning sis, where is he?" Sam walked over to her and dropped a kiss to the woman's forehead. "Something smells good." He stepped back and took a seat at the table, casting a glance over the paper as he did.
"Hey Sam. He's out back, a guy showed up, said he was an old friend." The worried tone in her voice made him look up.
"What's wrong?" Old senses kicked in as he turned to look out across his brother's garden. Dean was sitting facing him, talking to a man, his face darker than Sam had seen it in a long time.
"Dean didn't seem happy to see him." She paused, wiped her hands on a dish towel. "Something's not right Sam."
He gave her his best reassuring smile and stood again. "Hey, I'll go check on them ok? Don't worry."
Sam's long legs made short work of his brother's backyard, Dean looking up as the screen door banged shut, not smiling as he watched his brother come to him.
The man turned and Sam stopped short. "You. What do you want?"
Gabriel smiled at the younger Winchester. "I need your and your brother's help. There's a problem that we need to take care of or all this, it doesn't happen."
Sam folded his arms. "Problem?"
"Come on Sam, you know what he's talking about." Dean locked eyes with his brother. "We knew it was us that fixed it, we just didn't know how, guess it's time to fill in the blanks."
"Then I'll go on my own, it doesn't need both of us." Sam turned to the angel. "Does it?"
The angel shrugged. "I don't know. This is the first time for me remember. I'm Gabriel from 2010 not 2020. Only you and your brother were there before."
"Yes but our 2010 versions were out of it. We don't know how it went down." Sam argued. "Not all of it at least."
"Sam." Dean's voice was calm when it interrupted. "We knew that this was coming and I'm not letting you go on your own."
"What about Karen? And the kids? I can do this on my own, you should stay here."
Dean shook his head. "If we don't do this, if this doesn't work, then all this changes anyway. We do this together or not at all Sam. Stronger as a team, remember?"
Sam huffed and Dean laughed. "I'll take that as a yes." He looked back over to Gabriel. "I need a minute."
"The horseman is already there Dean. Make it a quick one?"
Dean headed back into the house, through the now empty kitchen and upstairs to his children's bedrooms. He could hear Karen and Samantha giggling in the other room so he stepped into his son's room first.
"Robert?" He gently shook his slumbering son.
Sleepy eyes opened, a soft smile greeting him. "Daddy? It time to get up?"
Dean lifted the four year old from the bed and hugged him to him. "Not yet sport but I gotta go somewhere with Uncle Sammy and I just wanted to say bye before I left. You gonna look after your mom and Sammy while I'm away?"
The little boy smiled again, causing big dimples to appear on the little face, hazel eyes shining with his father's trust in him. "Yes daddy."
"Good boy." He settled his son back down. "You go back to sleep, mommy'll wake you when it's time to get up." Dean kissed the little boy's head earning a squeak of protest.
"Daddy!"
"Sorry." Dean held up his hands in surrender. "Forgot you're a big boy now." He tucked the covers round his child and headed through to the other room.
Karen turned as he came in, a worried smile on her face. "Everything ok?"
"Yeah, just an old friend that needs a hand. I need to go, but it shouldn't take long." He crossed to her and pulled her into a hug. She let the fact go that he held her a bit tighter and a bit longer than usual, tried to ignore the way he breathed her in as if trying to imprint the feel and the smell of her to him.
"Is this it," she asked. "The thing that you told me you would have to go do?"
He nodded his reply, brushed her hair back from her neck and brushed his lips to it. "I'll be back before you know it."
Their little girl gurgled in her cot and he let Karen go, stepping back and over to lift his six month old daughter up and hold her to him. The irony of his children's ages wasn't lost on him, history threatening to repeat itself save for the fact that Karen wasn't John. If the worst was to happen, if he saved his younger self only to die doing it, if this was when and how it all ended then she would put her children first. Of that he was sure.
"You be good for mommy ok? No throwing up or peeing on her." He tickled the little girl and she giggled again, squirming in his arms before she settled back down, tucking her head under his chin and her thumb in her mouth.
Karen watched as he repeated the actions of memorising his daughter and she came forward, drawing them both into a hug. "Be careful Dean."
He put Samantha back into the cot and took Karen into his arms again. "I will but if something happens, I need you to let it go, to just get on with your life, promise me you will."
She reached up and kissed him, a gentle, loving kiss, tears beginning to shine in her eyes.. "You know I will, somehow. I promise. I'll see you later." It wasn't a question.
He kissed her again at that. "Count on it. I need to go." He stepped back and almost ran from the room.
In the garden Sam and Gabriel were awaiting his return. "You ready now?," the angel asked as Dean joined them.
"You can still stay Dean," Sam offered.
"No, let's just get this over with."
Gabriel raised both his hands. "We need to make one little pit stop, I've got someone that wants to hitch a ride." His smile was cryptic.
Upstairs Karen moved over to the window, watching as Dean joined the others, as he turned to look up and smile at her.
Then she blinked and they were gone.
End Notes
This is now very AU, not that it wasn't before. Muse gets what it wants and it decided that if Zach can try and get the guys to do what he wants by flinging them into the future then Gabriel and God have just as much right to bring them back to help themselves. Seemed fitting that God would use both boys to try and deal with the final piece of the puzzle that needs solved, the Horsemen. Hope you like. More soon, Mary x