Chapter 35

Nadia was sweating and panting in her sleep. Dean kept trying to shake her awake but nothing was working; he couldn't get through to her. Sam retreated to the bathroom to get a wet washcloth to try and cool her down. She was starting to grow dangerously hot. As he knelt beside the bed, Nadia's phone rang and he took it from her pocket. "It's the station," he glanced up at Dean. "They're probably ready for the interrogation... What do you want to do? Who knows how long this thing could last," he looked down at Nadia's suddenly frail looking body.

"She'll be fine," Dean growled and ripped the washcloth from Sam's hand. "She just needs to cool off. Once her temperature goes down, she'll be fine."

Sam tossed the phone on the end of the bed. "You said that she got hot to the touch before..."

"That was different. It was like she was hot on the outside...just her skin. This is coming from deep inside; like the flu or something."

The phone rang again and Sam snapped it open. "Hello?" He listened to the person on the other end for a while. "Agent Graham seems to have come down with food poisoning. Is there any way to push the interrogation off until tomorrow?" He rolled his eyes, "I understand that, sir, but letting Rebecca stew on her failed murder attempt, will help her become further unstable. Unstable, with someone like her, in a situation where she is in police custody, is a good thing. We just need you to do your jobs there and keep her safely locked up from the rest of the community. Keep at least one officer outside of her cell at all times." He paused and watched Dean slide his arms under Nadia's shoulders and knees. Dean lifted her and headed toward the bathroom. Sam hurried to wrap up the call. "Yes, she will handle it tomorrow." He paused and glanced toward the bathroom where Dean had just disappeared into, "I promise. If it would make you feel better; let Officer Carter interrogate her tonight. Maybe he can get something out of her. Okay, yes, will do. Goodbye." The phone snapped shut and he tossed it onto the bed in one fluid motion.

"What are you doing?" Sam asked from the bathroom doorway while he watched Dean lay Nadia gently on the tile floor and turn on the tub's faucets.

Dean kicked off his shoes and adjusted the temperature. He pulled off his jeans and shirt and turned to look at his brother. "She needs to cool down, Sam." He reached for the door and started to close it in Sam's face, "I'll let you know if I need help." Sam looked down at Nadia's shaking body and nodded as he stepped back out of the way of the door.

"Angels? Seriously?" Aidan repeated as she looked from Castiel and Uriel to Nadia. She looked Uriel up and down and glared, "Well I can already tell that I'm not going to be your biggest fan." Uriel gave her a look of utter disgust. She moved on to look Castiel over and smiled faintly, "You have good taste though. That is a very nice suit; loving the eyes."

Nadia glared, "Aidan, could you not?"

Aidan rolled her eyes. "So, I'm curious. Why did you invite the big bad Greaser to the Soc party?" Everyone looked at her with an air of confusion. She looked between them all, "Outsiders… It's called reading, people." She sighed heavily, "Why did you invite the demon to the angel party? Is that easier for you to understand?"

Castiel looked curiously at Aidan and then shifted his gaze to Nadia. "Nadia believes you are something different."

Aidan lifted one brow, "Different?" She looked at Nadia.

"They want to kill you. And in doing that, they kill me," Nadia clarified. "They think you are a mindless, bloodthirsty killer. I told them you're not."

"I'm not?"

Uriel smiled as if all his theories had been proven true. Nadia glared at Aidan and had the sudden urge to punch her in the face. This gives a whole new meaning to arguing with one's self, Nadia thought to herself. It was a surreal experience to watch a 3D reflection of yourself move and talk of its own accord.

Aidan smirked faintly, you're telling me.

Nadia straightened up and thought, you can hear me still?

The question is, can they? Aidan's gaze zeroed in on Castiel and Uriel. The intensity left her gaze and she smirked again. I bet the big one is overcompensating. In heaven he might have been a big shot but down here he's put on a leash. Not that he could probably do much anyway. I bet he couldn't even touch me without getting a jolt from his shock collar. I don't understand why angels are so feared; I don't see anything special in front of me. Like over-grown cherubs, they are.

Nadia and Aidan waited tensely for Uriel to lunge but it was obvious from his complete lack of reaction that neither he nor Castiel could hear their thoughts. How is it that they are completely cut off from what's going on in our head even though they are in our head? Nadia wondered.

Aidan shrugged slightly and Nadia refocused on the conversation that was happening outside of her head. "Aidan, could you please take this seriously? This is our life we're talking about."

Aidan sighed heavily and crossed her arms. "Fine, but do you seriously think that what you say about me is going to make a dent in their one track little minds? They have orders and like a dog with a bone, they aren't going to drop them just because you ask them to."

Nadia's face turned grim. She had been thinking the same thing but didn't want to believe it. Somehow hearing it from Aidan made it more real. Did they even have a shot of surviving this? Or was she destined to be put down because of what half of her was? She looked firmly at Castiel, "She is arrogant and stubborn and blunt but she isn't a ruthless murderer." She could see Aidan glaring at her during the arrogant and stubborn descriptions but ignored her. "She killed those people to save herself and to save Dean. Because of a deal that I made. Look, we did our best to choose people who were already going to die. We didn't run around slaughtering the innocent."

"But you did." It was annoying how simply Castiel replied sometimes.

She paused to change tactics, trying to appeal to their conscience. Do angels even have consciences? "Things aren't always that simple. In fact, they are rarely ever so simple. If Dean is so important to you then are you so twisted up about what I've been doing? You said that you would have sent someone to retrieve him from hell? Well it seems to me that this whole thing of him not going to hell at all would save a lot of time. I don't know what your plans for him or Sam are, but I can tell you right now that using them is going to be a hell of a lot harder than you probably think."

Castiel was watching Aidan from the corner of his eye but suddenly his attention turned fully onto Nadia. Uriel was watching Aidan like hawk and she was glaring back in much the same way. "Yes, it would be time saving; but there are things that are only set in motion if he is sent to hell. There are things he will learn only there. Things that will help us."

Nadia narrowed her eyes at Castiel. "You want him to go to hell. You're an angel, how can you fight for someone who is so important to you, to go to hell? I don't know if it's been too long since you checked out the travel brochure, but hell isn't exactly a dream destination."

"As I said before, Dean's time in hell is pivotal to what's to come. His time there sets in motion things that will lead to utopia on earth. It is time for that to happen."

She picked up on the way he was so careful to watch what and how he spoke. She took a step toward him and both Uriel and Aidan reacted by doing the same. "At what price?" A chill went through her body and everything around her seemed to fade slightly. She glanced around to see what was happening but returned her focus to Castiel as she decided it was probably his or Uriel's doing.

Castiel's head tipped back slightly and his face became totally neutral but his eyes glanced around him. He looked at Uriel and gave some unspoken signal. Nadia realized that that was the question he'd been so careful to keep her away from. She was about to move closer and ask again but those gigantic black shadow wings appeared on the walls behind him and Uriel. It was for show of course since they didn't need to fly out of her mind; but it was intimidating and she took a step back. They disappeared.

Nadia looked over to where Aidan was standing and looking annoyed. They both looked grim when their eyes met. "I have to warn Dean," Nadia looked around her as if searching for a manifested way to escape from the dream. A door, a window, something, anything to get out.

"Are you sure that's such a good idea?" Aidan asked.

"Why wouldn't it be?"

Aidan stepped back and leaned backward until she fell back against the wall. She crossed her arms as she leaned causally back, "You know how Dean is; if you tell him without knowing everything, all he'll do is obsess over finding it out himself while doing the odd job here and there. Doesn't he have enough on his plate already? Between Rebecca and you, he's about to snap. Half of him wants to beat the demon right out of you for what you've done while the other half wants to throw you on the bed and take your clothes off with his teeth. Give him too much more to think and worry about and pretty soon he is going to do something about it. About which…we can't know. But if you keep this to yourself and let him worry only about Rebecca, what's after you and his feelings for you then maybe he can keep himself together. What good is it going to do to tell him that all of heaven wants him to go to hell so that they can use it against him to play some integral part in the apocalypse?"

Nadia sighed and dropped her head backward to look up at the old beams of the ceiling. "Maybe you're right." She looked back at Aidan and pressed her lips together as she debated with herself. "Okay, we won't way anything until we know-"

Suddenly cold splashed over her and she gasped as Aidan flew back into her and the barn and everything in the dream disappeared from around her. She felt warmth beneath her and in bands around her as ice rained down over her body.

"Come on, Nadia. Come on baby, wake up. Wake up."

Dean had turned the cold dial of the bathtub all the way on. He slid his arms under Nadia's knees and behind her shoulders to lift her and he stepped under the freezing water. He didn't bother to pull the curtain closed as he sat down in the tub with Nadia in his arms and lap. He'd kept her clothes on in hopes that keeping the wet fabric against her skin would cool her faster.

He gasped as the water ran down his back but he ignored it. The chill almost felt soothing when it ran over where Nadia's skin had been. She was so hot that he worried there would be permanent damage to her brain. He scooted back to let the water splash mostly on her, trying to get her to cool down and wake up.

Her neck and face were flushed bright red. He wet his hand and put it to her face. "Come on baby, wake up." Her head was hanging limply back against the tile of the shower stall and it gave him a sinking feeling. He'd never wanted to see another person he loved like that ever again. After Sam and the deal he made, he'd never expected to live long enough for it to happen. But here he was holding someone he loved in his arms trying to fight against something he couldn't see. Fighting something he couldn't see, something others didn't understand was his specialty and yet he could do nothing now. He hated himself but he was also hit with a realization he had been denying because he everything logical told him that it was wrong. He loved Nadia. He still loved her even after everything she did. She did it to save him and he finally understood why. After all, he'd done the same thing for Sam; he'd done it because he loved him, he was his family. It's what you do for family. It was what drove Nadia to make the same decision; only better because if she succeeded then they all got to live. She loved him enough to give up her own life.

"Nadia, wake up. I'm sorry. I'm an idiot. Please wake up so that I can take it all back. Please." He filled his hand with water that was rolling off her shoulder and tipped it over her forehead like a priest baptizing a tiny baby. At last she gasped and her chest pulled toward the ceiling like she'd been shocked with a defibrillator. "Nadia, Nadia it's okay." He held her head against his chest as tears escaped and mixed with the water running off his hair. "It's okay. You're safe. You're safe."

Nadia woke up to a sensory overload. She was sweating and yet she shivered from being cold. Slowly the fever dimmed and she started to shiver more uncontrollably. Abruptly she became cognizant of Dean's voice in her ear and she noticed that it was his arms wrapped around her that had felt like bands of warmth. She blinked away drops of water from her eyes and looked up to see Dean's face bent over her. He looked insanely worried and relieved at the same time as he looked down at her.

She watched water droplets setting precariously on the ends of his eye lashes and the tips of his hair. She reached out to touch a droplet that had made its way from his temple to his lips and disappeared into the corner of his slightly open mouth. This was a dream, she was sure of it; he hadn't looked at her like that since she'd left. But something didn't feel right. She shouldn't be freezing in a dream but after the dream with the angels, anything seemed possible.

As soon as her finger met his bottom lip, she knew it was all real. Dean, the angels, everything; and she started to cry. Not only were angels after her, but she had made a deal to kill 1,000 people to save Dean, and now angels were dead set on her not completing her goal. It was all too much.

"Hey, it's okay. Nadia, you're safe. You're with me." He paused and nervously licked his lips, determined not to chicken out on what he'd decided to do. "I'm sorry for being an ass." He turned and shut the water off. When he turned back around, he pushed her hair off of her forehead and then followed the line of her jaw with his thumb. He looked her straight in the eyes and whispered, "I love you."