Authors' Notes: Nothing much to say, except maybe that reviews are love, and we hope you're enjoying the story. So on with the show!
Dean moved to follow but Sam grabbed his elbow, just barely catching the plate as he leapt up. "She needs some time to process all this, man."
"The hell she does," Dean said resolutely. What he'd seen on her face was sorrow. She felt alone out here. He had to remind her that she wasn't. And that she really really didn't want to report them to authorities.
"Dean, come on—"
He shouldered past Sam and stepped into the hall, right smack into Ellen Harvelle. She looked no more forgiving than her daughter.
Her hand was already sitting on the butt of a blaster and judging from the tight grit of her jaw, she would use the weapon without much debate.
Dean swallowed and pushed around her, dodging his head in apology. "Just wanna talk," he promised, walking down the hall towards what he was pretty sure was Jo's room. He kept his pace slow, sensing that running after her would send Ellen chasing right after him.
When he got close to Jo's door, he heard a muted, thump-thump-thump coming from inside. He pushed the chime and waited.
"Go away."
"Nope. Not an option."
"Go. Away."
He pushed the chime again. And again, timing the sound to the continuing thumps until the thumping stopped and the door slid open.
"You're a pain in the ass," Jo announced, and a palmball came sailing at Dean's head.
He dodged just in the nick of time and the ball bounced off down the hall. "I know; it's a gift."
"What do you want?" She was clearly unamused, glaring at him from where she'd flopped herself onto her bed.
"Just to make sure you're alright."
"And I don't rat you out."
Okay, there was that, too. Dean stepped in with his palms showing in surrender. The room contained all the typical fare for a utilitarian ship, very little personalizing décor except for a few framed photos stuck to the walls and fuzzy pillows and a mostly-empty desk. with scant bric-a-brac. He'd almost forgotten how spare a person had to be, living in a house that could rock and jolt at a moment's notice. He might even have missed it a little.
"Jo, I …" He pushed all the air from his lungs and took the liberty of sitting on the end of her bed. She moved her foot, but not before giving him a solid kick. He probably deserved it. "I know this sucks. It sucks balls. You miss your dad. I miss my ma. Life ain't fair."
She huffed but didn't meet his eyes. She wasn't going to make this easy.
"Look. Ask me anything. If I can answer you, I will. I don't do touchie-feelie all that well but you've got to have questions about Earth or the Awakening, all the whys and wherefores. That stuff I can tell you—"
"What's it feel like?"
Dean blinked. "Come again?"
Jo looked up and her gaze was sharp, fingers twisted together. "Apotheosis."
"Oh. Well. It don't tickle, that's for sure." Dean looked up at the ceiling, cogitating. It'd been almost ten years now, and though you don't forget something as traumatic as getting your soul fucked with, it wasn't a topic he chose to linger over, in his quieter moments. "It's kind of like having your insides dehydrated, extracted, screwed around and then reconstituted before they're forced back in, wrong-ways. Or thereabouts."
"Wow."
"Yeah."
"How old were you?"
"Fifteen. Sammy was eleven. It was really hard on him; we didn't think the little jerk'd make it." Dean snorted and leaned his back against the wall, stretching out his legs. Jo didn't seem to mind. "He was this scrawny, chicken-necked kid, way too young to be going through it, but at the time? We were all so damned mad and grieving, we'd have done anything. And the Firm banked on that. Sons of bitches."
"What was it like, having an Angel for a mom?"
"She wasn't; she was Nephilim, just like my dad."
Jo narrowed her eyes and sat up. "No, that's bullshit. The only way to make Nephilim is Angel plus human. Everything else dies."
"Hey, Ellen's no Angel—" Dean couldn't stop himself from smirking at that "—but you happened, didn't you?"
"I'm not Nephilim."
"You're Nephilim-adjacent! I can see it."
Fear flickered across Jo's face; this was clearly news to her.
"But then maybe it's just me and Sam who can tell," he was quick to add. "Because we're freaks and all. Right?"
"Yeah. Right." Jo didn't sound the least bit soothed by the suggestion. "What flavor of freak are you, anyway? You and your freakishly tall brother?"
"Sam heals. He can suck 'health' or 'lifeforce' or 'souljuice' or whatever-the-fuck from one living creature and shove it into another. I can read machines and if I really work hard at it, I can slip a little piece of my own mighty mojo into an engine so that it can talk back."
"Ah, so that's what you did to your ship!"
Dean nodded, puffing his chest. "She's my Baby. If she had fingers, I'd put a ring on it."
"How romantic," Jo said dryly. But her lips had curved into an almost-smile, so that counted for something.
"So you and your brother, you just hang around Earth healing people and talking to spaceships?"
"Mostly we try to lay low. Dad's still out there fighting to try to keep us safe. Least we can do is not draw attention to ourselves."
Jo nodded, something inscrutable in her eyes. People are a bazillion times more difficult to read than machines. Why did I think this was a good idea? He studied her sidelong—in case Mama Harvelle was just outside the door—and tried to get a bead on Jo's opinion of all this. He sensed she was waffling; the indecisive set to her jaw, the prickly silence, all spoke to her quandary. Part of him really liked her sharpness and snark; the other part just wanted to manipulate the hell out of her naivety and get him and Sammy back to Baby and out of this quadrant, as quickly as possible.
Dean cleared his throat and let his gaze wander the room. Jo's little nightstand was empty except for a lamp, a ruffled elastic hair band, and a small music box. He leaned closer, curious, impressed by the box's intricate design. It was some kind of light, hand-carved wood, dyed a soft blue. He pointed at it and looked to Jo. "May I?"
Her eyes widened for a second, and it looked like she was going to say no, but then she shrugged, swallowed, pasted on a brave face. "Be careful with it. Dad gave me that when I was little…"
Dean brought the small box up to eye-level and delicately opened the lid. He waited for the music, tilted his ear next to the side and when nothing happened, he moved to turn the little silver key.
"Don't bother. Stopped working a few years ago," Jo told him.
The wind-up, melodic mechanism was hidden away under the fake bottom of the box, a rich blue velvet made to look like the night sky. There were multiple figures inside-all of them designed to move with the music-a moon, a cow, a cat with a fiddle, a plate and a spoon. "Where'd he get this?" Dean asked, curious. "They don't build music-boxes like this anymore...or ever."
"Brought it when he came back from Europa. He worked at the rehydration plant for a few years."
"That place used to be an engineer's paradise, I heard." Dean had debated heading to Europa himself a few times when he was younger. But that was before the Firm and the Big Mouths had set up outposts there, about five years ago.
"Not anymore."
Dean ran his finger over the blue velvet cover and found the latch to open the floor of the box. It lifted barely a millimeter—just enough to expose the release for the side panel of the box. Enough for him to coax it open the rest of the way with his thumb. There were over two dozen tiny gears underneath, all of them connected to one of the figures above. Through the lowered side panel, Dean could see nearly all of them.
"What's wrong with it?" Jo asked.
With a tiny, controlled effort, Dean reached out his thoughts, skimming over the small notched wheels until he found the sets that weren't moving. They weren't out of alignment, they just didn't want to move anymore, the teeth caught on each other tighter than they should, latching together instead of pushing each other forward. Gingerly, he grabbed the small crank with his fingers and turned, watching the gears move pitifully and then lock up. "When did this stop working, exactly? Do you remember the day?"
"My eighteenth birthday. I always play it—played it—on my birthday, last thing before bed, but that night it just wouldn't work." She sniffed. "I woke Mom up. She couldn't get it to work either. Nobody could."
"What's the song it plays? You know the melody?"
Jo nodded.
"Mind humming it?" Dean asked, narrowing his eyes as he looked at the gears again.
"What?"
"I know it's weird, just...humor me. Please?"
With a slight eye roll, Jo began humming softly, struggling for a bit until she hit just the right notes.
The gears reacted to the melody, responding to Dean's prodding mind and after a few more seconds, began to move. He put his fingers on the crank and nudged it slowly, until the metal comb and nubs of the music barrel aligned with Jo's hummed tune. The cow began to jump, the cat's paw began to move back and forth across the fiddle and the dish and spoon moved along their little groove from one side of the box to the other.
Jo stopped humming.
Raw edges of metal smoothed themselves as the gears turned smoother with every pass. After few more seconds of successful play, Dean handed the box back to Jo.
She stared at it, and then at Dean.
oOo
Sam watched Ellen allow Dean passage—but just barely—before she leveled her glare back into the bunkroom. It bore into Sam like heat, almost physical in its anger. He hunched his shoulders in some vain attempt to seem smaller and more vulnerable than he was.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Harvelle," he began, mostly to fill up the air between them, "about your husband. About Bill."
She lifted her chin and an eyebrow, the expression dripping distrust.
"I didn't know. Honest."
Still, no quarter given from the woman.
Sam ran his palm over his unruly hair; he felt all the bumps and loose hanks coming free of the braid, which seemed to reinforce what a mess they were in. "Please don't turn us over to anyone," he said urgently.
She folded her arms, unyielding. "Why shouldn't I?"
"I thought you'd be sympathetic to … us. To Nephilim. To what the Grigori are trying to—"
"I'm Harvelle-sympathetic. Plain and simple, young man."
"Yeah. Of course. But you have no idea how many people could get hurt if we're handed over to the Firm." He was scrambling for purchase with her, not even sure where his logic was going.
"If memory serves, it's the Leviathans who have to worry about you amped-up Nephilim, not 'people'. So maybe I'll just let the Big Mouths have you."
Sam's skin ran cold when she said that. "But you know why your husband joined the Grigori, right?"
"I'm a little tired of you Winchesters bringing up Bill," Ellen spit at him. "Way to salt the wound." She pivoted and left the room, heading off in the direction Dean had gone.
Sam stalked after her, stammering. "Wait. Mrs. Harvelle. Ellen."
"Just don't," she snapped without turning around.
"My mom used to think it was amazing how the Firmament had given their blessing to her and Dad's engagement. Like, guardian Angels, literally. Wasn't until years after her death that we found out they'd put Mom and Dad together, that they were watching us the whole time." Even though Sam was a good foot taller than Ellen, he had to work to keep up, talking at the back of her head. "They wondered what two successful, Apotheosized Nephilim would spawn. Whether we'd be freaks or useless or deformed or … whatever. Dad started poking around and he uncovered all kinds of covert breeding programs." Sam paused, caught his breath, wondered if she was listening to him in the least. "We aren't race horses, Mrs. Harvelle."
Ellen eased her stride as they neared an open door. Jo's room. Sam could see the outlines of Jo and Dean inside, backlit by a small reading lamp. He heard Ellen inhale deeply, and she turned to face him.
"Please," Sam said, spreading his hands wide, nearly brushing both sides of the hall. "We don't want to be weapons or experiments. We just want to be … normal."
Ellen speared him with a dark, even stare. Her cheeks were spotted with color. For a moment, all Sam heard was their mutual breathing, then from inside Jo's room, there came music. Ellen's mouth dropped open and she looked towards the sound. Sam didn't know what had just happened, but Ellen's eyes suddenly pooled wet and her breath hitched.
"Momma," Jo said, smiling as though she'd just seen a shooting star. "He fixed it."