Author's Note: I am SO SORRY for the delay in getting this chapter out folks. I truly am. But better late than never, right?
Thanks again to everyone who has been reading, and especially to everyone that has left comments or kudos. They help SO MUCH to keep me motivated, you don't even know.
Hope you enjoy!
Dean's familiar with the five stages of grief.
Denial. Anger. Bargaining. Depression.
Acceptance.
Hell. He's old hat at them. They've been closer and longer lasting companions than anything or anyone else in his life, save Baby and Sam.
Doesn't mean he doesn't think it's all a bunch of bullshit. Manufactured, packaged, and sold by overpriced shrinks to gullible, desperate people. There's nothing so easy, or subdivided about any of it. The reality of it is that they all swirl together, a poorly mixed cocktail that goes down your throat like motor oil, and hardens in your stomach like concrete.
This go around, Dean can pinpoint the moment denial set in with ease. It started with an angel blade facing the wrong way, and jammed with intent into the gut of the one holding it. There'd not been enough seconds allotted to him for the processing of that inexplicable act before what he guesses was in fact the same blade had been plunged through the back of Castiel. The light of his grace burning bright until it was snuffed out; his empty vessel hitting the ground with a reverberating thud that rung in Dean's ears for days after.
Before that whole sequence of events had run its course Dean had already begun to pray. To bargain.
To beg.
For anyone. For anything. To somehow rewind the world back ten, twenty, thirty, sixty seconds. Even while it was still refuting what it knew to be true, it was willing to make a deal, if someone would just correct what had gone wrong.
Would just fix it.
It was then, his mind still tripping over in refusal of fact, that his mother had come marching out, fists swinging, and been drawn through the portal. Sealed away by fates that don't know how to be kind.
Anger had come rolling in not long after. Playing a staccato rhythm against a verse of 'no no no' and an out-of-sync harmony of 'please please please.'
The three of them - denial, bargaining, anger - had moved in fully after that. Unhappy dwellers in Dean's head, rattling around his skull so that sleep was useless, and focusing on anything else was an impossibility, right up until the moment he'd clutched Crowley's note and bottle of Craig in his hands. At which point, they'd all begun to be swallowed up by the gaping wound of realization.
They're gone.
And there's damn well nothing he can do about it.
Whatever jackass doc said that acceptance was some final culmination of grief didn't know shit.
No other recourse that he could see, Dean had settled down with the bottle and the dark specter of loss, and drank until he couldn't feel anything anymore. Sam by his side at first, but then later when even that much human contact became overwhelming, alone in the empty quiet of his room.
It didn't help, not really. It never does.
Not that it matters. Wasn't like he had any better options.
And so it goes. For weeks.
He keeps the empty bottle of Craig on his dresser.
Sam notices. Dean knows he does. Dean sees the way that his brother does a double-take over it when he comes knocking one afternoon, sandwich piled high up on a plate in offering. He doesn't mention it. Just holds the plate up higher, a wan smile on his face, and for that Dean is grateful.
Dean keeps the note too, but it's nowhere where Sam could see. Hidden in the table by the side of his bed, under the cover of a copy of The Sirens of Titan that's seen better days, a couple of skin mags tossed on top so that he knows his brother won't go digging. It's been crumpled and flattened. Folded and unfolded. The crease pressed down and sharpened over and over again. He wishes it said more than the scant few lines written on it.
He's simultaneously glad it doesn't.
Dean spends most of the time sequestered away in his room, lost in his own head. Trudging through bottles of booze, a persistent loop of music pumping through his headphones in a futile attempt to block out the endless refrains of Should've been faster...should've been better...Couldn't save them...I can never save them...Why did he?...Is she really…? Is he…? Why? why? why why why?
He's aware of himself enough to be thankful for his brother acting like a life preserver as he sinks deeper and deeper into that pool of grief, all five of the damn stages washing over him in alternating crests, a threat of drowning that begins to feel more like a promise the longer it persists.
Sam finds a way to lure him out of his room every few days. Sometimes it's with burgers, or pie. Other times it's questions on lore that don't seem to have any purpose other than to get Dean talking. And on one memorable occasion, a desperate call for assistance when the washing machine had kicked over onto its side (how?!) and was washing out the whole hallway with suds, got Dean's legs moving.
Things'll be better for a bit after that, when he's feeling almost normal. Almost alive. When he's floating in that shallow end, and he can forget.
But when that passes, things are just that little bit worse.
He'll catch himself wondering where Cas has gotten off to, what he's doing. He'll start to reach for his phone, intent on shooting a text off to the angel. Or to his Mom. To check in. Instead he'll freeze up at the text message screen, thumb hovering over the leftover text message chains that'll never be added to.
That leads him further down the rabbit hole, and he'll go wandering listlessly through his archived photos, bloodshot eyes soaking in images he damn well knows he should have deleted long ago, but glad now that he didn't, for reasons he'll never own up to.
And he'll remember.
He remembers. And one of the other stages will fill him up like a flood.
Rinse, repeat.
The whole thing is a work in progress that Dean knows from experience won't get any better so much as he'll become accustomed to the weight of it dragging him down.
The way he had to with his Dad, and Bobby. With Ellen, and Jo. With Kevin, and Charlie. With Benny.
He damn well doesn't want to get use to it. He just wants them back. All of 'em.
Wants them here. Now. Home. Earth. Wherever. He honestly doesn't give two shits about how . If he could have his family, every last one of them, back?
There's little he wouldn't give - wouldn't do - to make it happen.
(That should scare him, but it really doesn't.)
Not that any of it matters, because no one's listening. Not when there's no one left but him and Sam who give a shit.
And it's because Sam still gives a shit that Dean (eventually) lets his brother drag him out of the bunker. Just milk runs at first. A little salt and burn here, a little 'look! the British Asswipes missed a vamp!' there.
His liver thanks him for the break.
It's not that long, all things considered, until he starts following leads of his own. The air outside of the bunker recharging him in a way that sleep fails to these days. He starts to drag Sam out of the bunker, and away from his fruitless search to rescue their Mother, so that they can instead chase after something that stands a chance in hell at succeeding. Propelled forward by cold-simmering rage that helps to keep the grief at bay.
And sure, Dean knows that finding Lucifer Junior and making him pay for everything he's taken away from them - from Dean? It won't bring his family back, but it'll feel damn good all the same.
And he clings to that.
Which is how they end up at the world's shittiest excuse for a mill (damn thing doesn't even have a wheel ), stuck in some weird-ass transporter feedback loop, tracking down the cause of their recent misery.
He's so focused on the task at hand, so beyond thinking for even a moment that something could maybe (just maybe) go their way for once, that when Castiel steps out of the shadows, flaring his grace bright as proof of his existence after Sammy has enough presence of mind to make the request (something Dean, frozen with shock as he was, didn't even consider), Dean is blindsided by it.
Because despite everything; despite having been to hell, to heaven, to purgatory and back. Despite having his brother brought back to him once, twice, countless times. Despite Castiel having done it almost as often. Despite the one-time gift that was Amara bringing his Mother back to them...
Despite all of that, the idea that someone somewhere may still be on their side? That something could go right ? It's not until Sam and him have both wrapped Castiel up in hugs in turn, and he's been able to tell for himself that the angel is real, and solid, in front of them, that he thinks it may just be possible.
The swirling waters of grief recede a little at the thought.
They're still lapping at his ankles, but for the moment, it's enough.
~~~\/~~~
Crowley's manuscript on all things demon, angel, and in-between proves to be invaluable in far less time than Bobby figures it took Crowley to write the thing.
The hunter spends the next day and a half combing through it, line by line, until his eyes beg for mercy; never letting Crowley get more than a room away, in case he has questions.
And, oh boy, does he have questions. An endless supply of them.
"So you're saying that God's scribe-"
"Metatron. A suck-up of epic proportions, and about as trustworthy as a rabid dog."
"You're saying that he created tablets on everything?"
"That's right. God's own personal Silmarillion. Word on the street was that they were meant to help defend mankind from any who might threaten it."
"Sounds useful."
"Oh believe me, with all the creepy-crawlies you have wandering topside these days, they will be. Though if I were you, I'd check, double-check, and triple-check the contents another dozen times or so after you have a prophet translate them."
Bobby frowns, leaning back in his chair to eye the man sitting across from him. "Why? If God made these to help -"
Crowley scoffs, twirling the pen in his hand around a half-step; tapping it against the stack of incomplete pages in front of him in between each twist. "Help is often a matter of perspective. Some of them are as liable to let loose the beasts of your nightmares as they are to lock them up, if you're not careful. Not to mention that Metatron? Is, in the words of Dean Winchester, a great big pile of dicks. Back in our reality, he buried his own spells into the angel tablet either without God's knowledge, or without God caring. May have done that with others too, just because he could. Could cause a fair bit of havoc."
"Right."
"I've only ever seen the three I described, but I've heard whisperings of a fair few others. I've jotted down what I recall about them. Last known locations, that sort of thing. Our histories aren't so divergent that it should be at least somewhat applicable. If we're lucky, at least a few are still in existence."
In between the question and answer sessions, Crowley continues his work. Seeming intent on keeping his word to transcribe his vast knowledge onto the page. This time out in the open where Bobby and Mary can see the amount of effort he is putting forth.
(Bobby's beyond denying that he's impressed.)
There's a second, smaller stack, done by the time Bobby is through reading the first.
He begs off reading that one for a pair of sunrises, giving his dried corneas some peace. He instead spends the next day putting out feelers through his hunter network. If they can get their hands on just one or two of these things…
Well, they may just stand a chance of saving the human race.
And it would all be thanks to a former King of Hell turned resurrected human from an alternate reality.
Who'd of thunk it?
The network all looped in and notified as best as he can manage, given the piss-poor communication system they have these days, Bobby gets back to reading, idly munching on some jerky that Crowley pushes his way when he settles back at the table between Mary and the other man.
(Bobby ain't gonna make a big deal about it, but as much as he knows the two don't belong in his dystopian nightmare, it sure is damn nice having 'em around all the same.)
Mary and Bobby spend the next several hours going back and forth over the writings, while Crowley's pen scratches away, filling up sheet after sheet with more material.
After the fiftieth time that either Mary or Bobby interrupts Crowley to ask for clarification on a sigil here, or a symbol there, the frazzled former demon spews out a series of what Bobby thinks are benign curses, though he can only make out about half of what is said, mixed up as they are in a series of languages that Bobby is pretty sure include both Enochian and Aramaic (and maybe a little...Welsh? It's hard to say...), and kicks himself away from the table, stomping off towards his room in a manner more consistent with a four year old than someone several centuries old.
When he returns he drops a literal stack of papers on the table with what appears to be their own personal Rosetta stone. "Here. It's only half-finished, but if it stops you from bloody bothering me every five seconds you can have it."
Bobby rifles through the delivery, narrowing his eyes up at Crowley when he's done giving it a once over. "Just how much Enochian do you know?"
Crowley's brow creases and he cocks his head, a gesture on his face that seems to be half-way between a frown and smile. "All of it."
"You're fluent...in the language of the angels?"
"Yes. Rather handy in our line of work, wouldn't you say?"
"Uh-huh. And just how did you manage that?"
"I'm not as young as I look. Picked up a few things over the centuries."
Bobby scowls at the other man. Annoyed, but also not surprised by the response. "One of these days you and I are gonna have a conversation, and you ain't gonna deflect."
Crowley winks at him. The bastard. "Get me a bottle of genuine scotch, aged 30 years, and it's a date."
The remains of the day is half gone when Mary voices a question that causes Bobby's head to whip up in a way his stiff neck doesn't appreciate.
"You think their version of the lance is still in hell?"
"Hard to say. If their Michael has himself a meatsuit, and their version of Lucifer's already been dusted like Robert here seems to think, then I'd say there's a chance that the lance is back in its original owner's hands already. Well out of our reach."
Mary heaves a sigh, slouching back in her chair. "Shame. If we could get our hands on that…"
Bobby's eyes shift between the two of them, noting the matching frowns they're both sporting. "What are you two goin' on about?"
Mary shrugs. "Nothing more than a dead end." But she passes Bobby a section of text marked 'Go Ahead, Bring a Gun to a Knife Fight (But Also Bring Knives)' to him anyway. His eyes go wide when she points to the drawing at the bottom of the page. "That's Michael's -"
"Lance. Yeah, I heard that part." Bobby swallows around the sandpaper that is suddenly wrapped around his throat, feeling his heart hammer against his chest. Not daring to hope quite yet, but...edging in the general direction of the emotion. "What's so special about this thing?"
Mary and Crowley share a look, some unvoiced exchange that Bobby frankly doesn't give two shits about passing between them, before Mary replies. "It's a weapon designed by Michael specifically to take out Lucifer."
Crowley picks up the thread from there. Speaking slow and purposeful, in that way of his that skirts condescending just enough to keep Bobby from smacking him upside the head on the regular. "Meaning, it - in theory - is capable of taking out any Archangel."
Mary hums, running a hand through her hair and scrubbing at the back of her neck. "Can't get much more powerful than that."
"No. Don't suppose you could…" Hope, that dangerous little emotion, is blinking awake at the back of Bobby's mind. "You draw this from memory out of a book, or…"
Crowley smiles, the gesture not quite reaching his eyes. "First hand experience. Yours truly had the pleasure of snapping it in half."
"You what?!" Bobby darts his gaze between the pair, horrified at the nonchalant manner in which Crowley is holding himself after making such a declaration.
It's not Crowley, but Mary who responds, looking away - over and past Crowley's shoulders as she does. "A friend of ours was dying after being stabbed by it. The only way to save him was to break the lance, destroying the runes inlaid on it before they could finish the job."
Bobby lets that sink in, taking the time to bend closer to the drawing and examine the detail as best as his old eyes will let him.
"Why so interested?"
When Bobby looks up at the question, the pair of them are both watching him. Mary looks at him with genuine curiosity, but Crowley...Crowley looks like he may have already figured out the why of Bobby's interest.
"Because I think I know where to find it. And it ain't with Michael, or in hell. It's in frigging Utah."
End Note: So...you may have noticed that there was no explanation regarding how Cas is back yet. My apologies for that, but for SOME REASON that scene just wasn't working in this chapter AT ALL, so it's been tabled for the next update. Which should HOPEFULLY not take another 3 weeks...*fingers crossed*