Sam Winchester pushed the gasoline pump nozzle into the Impala and pulled back on the trigger. It immediately clicked off. He tried again and the same thing happened. Shaking the heavy car wasn't easy but when it finally began to move he heard gasoline sloshing close to the top of the fill pipe.
The gas gauge had been on 'E' when they'd pulled into Chuck's driveway and when they'd left the prophet's home to pull into the nearest gas station it was below 'E'. Sam told his brother that the gas gauge was effed up and Dean cursed a blue streak. With no time to get it fixed they would now have to travel using the mpg method.
A full tank and, because Dean was lead footed in general and now in a big hurry to get to Rufus', only ten miles per gallon tops. Traveling around eighty miles an hour on the interstate they would be stopping every 240 miles or approximately every three hours for gas. And so it began.
Three hours of Metalica while Sam wallowed in a pit of remorse and self-loathing all the while trying to hide the effects of going cold turkey. Three hours of AC/DC as Dean bounced back and forth between "Fuck Satan and the bitch he rode in on" and his plans to fulfill the prophecy and Dean's destiny to "Fuck God, Zachariah, Castiel and all the other angels but especially Pinky, please just one time" and his plan to take Sammy and leave for parts unknown. And three hours of Sabbath as Chuck imagined all the ways Dean would beat the crap out of him when he finally saw what had been written about Bobby Singer.
Dean estimated that the tank was almost empty and they pulled off of the interstate and into the nearest gas station pulling up to one of the pumps. With the prophet pretending to be asleep in the back seat and Sam pumping the gas Dean headed inside to stock up on Pork Rinds, Cheetos, Slim Jims and any number of snacks, all of which would remain perfectly preserved even after a nuclear holocaust or Armageddon, whichever came first.
Sam pulled the nozzle from the pump and went through the same motions he had before. Place nozzle A into slot B, press the trigger and...click. Not bothering to try again he simply put nozzle A into pump slot C and walked into the building.
"Got us some food for the ride, Sammy," Dean said pointing to the pile and Sam's stomach turned at the thought of the greasy, salty, crunchy non-food Dean lived on.
He said weakly pointing to the large candy display in front of the cashier, "I just want a Coke...and some of those Hershey bars."
Grabbing a fistful Dean tossed them on the pile along with a six pack of coke and pushing a credit card across the counter added, "And gas on five."
"We didn't need any gas," Sam said and when Dean turned to him he made a circle with his thumbs and forefingers and briefly lifted his hands over his head.
"Yeah, right," Dean said and wondered what else the angels were up to. He found out just minutes later when he barreled by a cop sitting in his cruiser on the side of the highway, a speed gun in his hand aimed directly at the Impala, doing about ninety.
"Fuck," Dean cursed with a mouthful of cheese like substance. He wiped his fluorescent orange fingers on a rag and glancing into the rear view mirror watched as the cop pulled out and gave chase only to pull over a family from Milwaukee in the mini van directly behind them.
Breathing a sigh of relief and thanking Pinky for small favors they made it to Rufus' rambling two-story house where Gabriel and Castiel waited for them on the front porch in record time.
"You made good time," Gabriel remarked as the three of them got out of the Impala and made their way to the bottom of the steps.
"Yeah, thanks to Our Lady of Perpetually Filled Gas Tanks," Dean told her.
Giving credit where credit was due Gabriel glanced to Castiel who just shrugged his shoulders and Dean said to him, "Thanks Cas...for the gas and the blind cops and for the complete absence of any red lights."
From Dean's light tone Gabriel knew Chuck hadn't spilled the beans, as it were, but to know that she had only to look at the misery in the prophet's eyes.
"Where's Bobby?" Sam demanded heading up the steps.
Gabriel stopped him with a raised hand and his rapid breathing; the sweat dripping down the sides of his face and the chocolate on his breath didn't go unnoticed. "He's inside," she said and added, "but demons have come...and gone."
Sam didn't care. Nothing could be worse than seeing Satan up close and personal but when he walked into the living room and looked up he knew he had never been so wrong in his life and a strangled sound came from his throat and his stomach heaved and he threw up chocolate all over the rug.
"Sammy!" Dean shouted.
Castiel tried to stop him but he just pushed his way between Pinky and the Pain following his brother's cry.
"He's gonna kill me," Chuck wailed and looked pleadingly at his Archangel but Gabriel didn't seem concerned even when Dean's agonizing cry shattered the quiet.
Nor was she concerned when he bolted back out the door and grabbing her painfully by the scruff of her neck and pushed her inside. She wasn't concerned because she had already seen it.
The angels had already seen it but Chuck had only seen it in a vision and when he came into the living room and beheld the spectacle in the flesh...and blood...he gasped and started to mumble something about God's mercy and Jim Beam's whiskey.
The living room of Rufus' house was called a great room and it had two stories of interior wall hiding the staircase to the second floor. Pictures of friend and relatives had once hung on the wall. Some, like his beloved wife and children, lost to goodness and some, like his brothers in arms, lost to evil but eventually all lost to time. But now the photographs, the wooden frames and the sheets of glass littered the floor, smashed beyond recognition, and in their place hung three men.
One black with a penchant for Johnny Walker Blue, another white with a taste lately for soda pop and a third a young man with blonde hair wearing black dress pants and a crisp white shirt now stained with blood. He was a preacher of sorts come to the door to save a couple of old heathen ending up in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Each was crucified, arms spread wide, hands nailed with precision to the studs, feet crossed and spiked as well, the full weight of the bodies resting on blocks of wood ripped from the beamed ceiling and slammed through the drywall in a great show of strength and uncontrolled fury. In addition to the obvious wounds to hands and feet Bobby Singer's head was crowned with a wreath of rusted barbed wire. Dried rivulets of blood marked his face and directly over his heart a deep gash still seeped blood.
"Bobby!" Dean shouted but Bobby didn't answer. Rufus Turner moaned and his head flopped to the opposite side and the young hunter started to freak. "Help him!" he shouted grabbing the old man's legs trying to ease the pressure on his limbs and to ease his pain.
Sam and Chuck, using a blood covered hammer thrown carelessly onto a couch, managed to get Rufus down amid agonizing screams and Dean, tears shimmering in his eyes, grabbed Bobby's legs and shouted up at him again. But the older hunter remained still, his eyes closed, his face serene in what surely must have been a cruel and painful death.
But Dean wasn't about to let him go gently. "You," Dean pointed at Castiel, "You fix him...fix all of this," and he demanded and swept his arm across the horrendous scene.
"It's too late," Castiel said softly looking up at the remaining crucified with both fear and wonder, "It's too late."
"You're an angel for fuck's sake," Dean yelled and Sam, remembering a time when Dean lay in the hospital, so very near to death at the hands of Alastair, cut him off.
"He can't do it," the younger Winchester told him and Dean realized Sam was probably right. So he turned to Gabriel and said, "But you can." And even though she gave him a 'Who me? look' he knew he was right.
After long moments punctuated by Rufus' groans Gabriel sighed and told him, "Yes, I can...but I won't," and Dean knew that the final straw had finally fallen and he could feel his world start to tilt.
He looked around for something, anything, with which to kill the angels and grabbing the bloody spike Sam had dislodged from Rufus' shattered feet he walked up to Gabriel and said in a voice, low and menacing and tinged with insanity, "You do it, bitch, or you're dead."
"Biyatch?" Gabriel said incredulously then grew serious, "This is Lucifer's doing. It's a warning to you...to us...to not interfere."
"I got the message loud and clear. Hell, I even got the whole picture in Technicolor-ed blood," he assured her angrily, "Now make this right...or I'm gone and I'm taking your suck-ass prophecy with me."
"Oh, hell," Gabriel sighed in exasperation her full lips pinched tightly together, "We can't go following him around undoing the damage he does. It'll throw everything off, change everything and maybe not for the better."
"Oh, like everything is peachy keen now."
"Could be worse," she told Dean.
He gave her a withering look and her nostrils flared and her lip curled causing one eye to squint but he would not be put off with her bitch face and said rhetorically staring levelly at her "Not for me...so bring him back," and remembering the other men he added, "Bring them all back."
"Listen, Dean," she said and tried to explain the ways of heaven to him, "God commanded Castiel to follow your orders but I have free will and answer only to Him."
"Forget Him!" Dean barked out with a mirthless laugh, "He sure as hell's forgotten you."
Dean didn't think she had any but still he tried to appeal to her humanity, "Just answer to yourself. Let your conscious be your guide Pinky. Be all that you can be...and do the right fucking thing!"
No wonder Zachariah's panties were always in a bunch Gaberial thought. Dean Winchester was tenacious to say the least and maybe a little crazy and she considered doing as he asked but she wanted him to know there were still consequences. "You play fast and loose with other people's lives, Dean Winchester," she reminded him, "Maybe your Bobby won't appreciate you bringing him back."
"I don't care," he told her and he didn't. He'd lost his mother when he was four and for all intents and purposes he'd lost his father then, too, and although he'd fought heaven and hell for his brother he'd lost Sam and he ground out, "Haven't you taken enough from me?"
Yes, Gabriel thought, yes we have and as they watched Pinky rose up into the air until she was even with Bobby's Singer's body. She touched first the nail through his left hand and it fell to the floor, as did the nail through his right when she touched it. The spike in his feet pulled away just as easily and she removed the crown of barbs from his head. She took his body in her arms and floated back down and laid him gently on the floor next to Rufus.
Squatting down next to the black man she laid hands on Rufus' wounds and they healed quickly. She then looked up at Dean and said, "Criss Angel, eat your heart out," and laid hands on Bobby Singer. The wounds on his extremities healed but the hunter remained cold and unmoving.
"Pinky," Dean whispered pleadingly and she smiled to herself knowing he doubted her intentions and her ability. She slowly placed her hand into the gaping wound on Bobby's chest, just as Saint Thomas had done to Jesus of Nazareth, and Bobby's eyes fluttered open.
Falling to his knees Dean wrapped his friend's cold hand in his and squeezed holding on for dear life. Using Dean's strength for leverage Bobby sat up and looked straight into his eyes and said gruffly, "What took ya so long?"
Dean, forgetting completely his aversion to chick flick moments, hugged him hard while Sam looked on tears rolling down his pale cheeks.
Chuck just rocked back and forth chanting "Thank you, God. Thanks you, God" under his breath.
Castiel, enraptured with the resurrection he'd just been privileged to see, helped Rufus to his feet and swaying unsteadily the old man asked the scantily clad healer, "Can you save the Witness?"
All eyes turned to the third victim of the unholy trinity and Gabriel sadly shook her head. "I told you this was a message for us, too," she reminded them, "Now cover your eyes."
The third victim of Lucifer's pain and rage began to shimmer and thrum and a blinding white light filled the room and when the day was still again only a dark imprint of where the Witness had hung remained.