Wild West World: Part 2
Castiel adjusted his hat and exhaled slowly as he peered around the side of a bank, Dean had let loose all of the tied horses and spooked them into a stampede which left Cas to take care of the rest. There was a plan in place to escape if something went wrong, and to be fair neither of them expected a mob of towns people but Cas wasn't about to give up. Dean seemed to get out of there, Cas hadn't quite seen what happened but Dean was gone with a flourish of some crazy display.
Cas remembered a time when he would've panicked about Dean leaving him like that, he'd be nervous and an anxiety train wreck. Not anymore, he'd seen his fair share of trouble and even jumped off a train or two himself. Life wasn't as simple as it had been back at his father's tavern but that didn't mean much, life was better and Cas enjoyed every forsaken second of it.
Michael was in his sights now, their original target for a plan that had actually worked out pretty damn well. Michael, or at least the thing possessing Michael, was distracted enough by the commotion going on that he hadn't noticed Cas' presence. And that was perfect, except something else happened that made everything so much stranger.
Sam appeared. Out of nowhere he appeared near Michael and Cas had no words in his vocabulary to really explain what he'd seen.
"What the fuck…" came closest.
The outlaw tipped his hat to whatever gods were watching him at that moment and moved in.
Sam in the meantime stood face to face with a man he'd met before but something just wasn't right about him. "Michael?" He wasn't sure if it even was the same guy, his expression was so distorted.
"Hello, what's this?" Michael sneered and his face pulled back unnaturally for a human, "The priests are here I see."
Sam's eyes widened a bit, "You're from the Void, aren't you?" He didn't skip a beat or hesitate, if that was true he needed to know it.
"Well I wouldn't know to call them priests if I weren't, now would I?" Michael grabbed Sam's shirt and pulled him up close, "Where's your brother?"
"Killing scum like you. Where's my boyfriend?" He spat indignantly, his teeth ground together as he fought the swell of fear in him. He didn't ever want to get that close to something able to possess people again but there he was. Sam wasn't about to pass up the opportunity to talk to a Void creature that could speak, that could give him answers.
"Killing scum like you." Michael wound back to strike when a shot suddenly rang through the air. The shadow-possessed man froze when he realized the arm he was about to use wasn't functioning the way it should. Sharp eyes snapped back to the cowboy approaching from around the building behind them, a long coat flowing in the wind and a hat tilted down to shade his face. "You pain in my side! Look what you've done to my fucking body!"
"It's not your body, get out of him." Cas levelled the pistol at Michael's head, "I won't hesitate to put a friend out of his misery."
Sam shook his head, "No! Don't kill him yet Cas, I need answers!"
Cas furrowed his brow but had to leap out of the way of an assaulting possessed man, the random townsman lunged after him with vigor. "Son of a bitch!" Castiel swore and shot him in the leg, twice for good measure. There were others that went after though, all the captivated people on Michael's side bolted forward, their faces stretching in awkward expressions of anger and fear. The humans inside fought for their freedom but none of them managed to capture it.
Sam squirmed and ducked out of his over-shirt, leaving Michael to hold onto an empty fabric. He looked at the man better from further away and realized that Cas had managed to shoot the guy's elbow so precisely that he'd blown apart the joint almost entirely. Whoever this Michael was to them he wouldn't have a left forearm anymore. "So Jet's alive?" He asked the creature as it inspected its missing limb.
"I liked this body, you know? It was nice, something decent to walk around in but then you all had to break it!" It hissed and flickered as it looked up at Sam a little more viciously, the shadow bled through its host a few times before regaining control. "Do you know how hard it is to hold onto a body when it's in pain? I don't want to feel this shit!"
"Tell me where Jet is!" Sam shouted again, taking steps away as Michael stalked toward him, "What happened to him?"
"The king has him now!" Michael shrieked and charged for him.
"RUN!" Castiel caught Sam's arm and bolted with the young man at his side. They stumbled over debris and bodies as they sprinted out of there. The townspeople were still around, all in shock about how they'd let Dean Winchester and Castiel Novak get away. And left in even more surprise when they saw Castiel again, the outlaw dressed this time as they expected and escaping in the same direction.
"There he is! Get him!" They hollered and an uproar among the people echoed.
"What did you even do to these people!?" Sam called to Cas who answered with a loud whistle first.
"No time to explain, just run!"
Sam kept up with the cowboy version of his friend but nearly tripped over himself when a gorgeous white horse galloped out of nowhere. It ran up alongside Castiel who grabbed the saddle and flung himself up before reaching down for Sam. The young Winchester grit his teeth and made a break for it, attempting to mimic Cas' movement but ultimately it was Cas that got him on the horse. Sam held tight to Cas' waist as bullets flew past them at an uncomfortably close distance.
The wind blew through his hair and for a second Sam felt better, adrenaline rushed through his veins mimicking blood, his mind was washed clean of questions and all he thought about was running. Running away, the enemy behind him, a clear cut of black and white never felt so good. Sam looked back again and felt his heart leap in his throat a second time that day, the shadow-possessed were on their tail and inhumanly quick. "They're fast, Cas!"
"I know, we need to lose them." Castiel leaned in close to his horse and clicked his tongue, his heel lightly pinching her side to encourage her to go faster. And she did, Sam gripped Cas a little bit tighter and tried not to think about motion sickness as they tore around bends and leapt over obstacles.
It was wild, even after all the things that Sam had done up to that point he still thought it was amazing. Horseback riding was incredible and beautiful, the animals were so powerful and lovely, and it just gave a sense of freedom like nothing else; a back-to-nature sort of feeling.
The chase was over too quickly for Sam, Castiel managed to get far enough ahead that Michael's group lost sight of them. They rode hard for a little while longer until Cas got his mare to slow down and duck into a naturally made cove in a dried out river bed. They went far enough in that someone would have to be fairly close to see them inside and took a moment to relax.
"What the hell did you do back there?" Sam asked again, motioning toward the town.
"Saved your butt, you're welcome." Cas sighed and ran his hand down the side of his horse's face, petting her gently.
"No, I mean…. Thank you, but what did the townspeople want from you?"
"I'm associated with some bad-named outlaws," Cas shrugged and smiled over at him, "Wrong place, wrong time, misconstrued stories and voila, bad reputation."
"That was a hell of a bad reputation." Sam leaned against the cave wall and slid down to the ground; his hands pushed up into his hair and parted it away from his face like his mom had done before.
"Yeah, not much I can do about it now. I don't really mind though," Castiel strolled to Sam's side and dropped down next to him. "I actually shot him…"
"Yeah, you shot a few people."
"Michael was the Sheriff where I grew up, I can't believe I shot him." Cas took off his hat and looked at it quietly.
Sam was silent for a bit as he watched Castiel trace the rim of his cowboy hat sadly. "Did Michael give you that hat?"
"No," Cas chuckled and ran his hand over the top of it, "It was the first thing I ever stole actually."
Sam smirked, "So he tried to hunt you down for it?"
"Wrong again, actually I used to be the owner of a tavern in his town. One day I went to a caravan to check out their stock and put on this hat. Me and several others were kidnapped by a gang of bandits, tossed onto a train and taken away. After the escape and rescue I just sort of walked away with this thing." He replaced it atop his head and leaned back. "Michael was one of the people responsible for getting me out safely, he's always been there for me and I shot him…"
"Just his arm." Sam offered supportively, "He'll live, Cas."
The outlaw turned to him and a smile pulled at his lips again, "I guess you're right… So what's going on? Who are you?"
"Sam Winchester, you've probably met someone like me."
"No one that looked quite the way you do. You're younger than he is I think. Not to mention you act differently."
"Is it that obvious I'm not a cowboy?"
"Oh hell yeah."
They shared a quiet laugh and let the conversation slip away again. The sun was slowly disappearing and the area grew darker by the second.
"To answer your question," Sam pulled his knees up and held them there, "I'm travelling with another Castiel and my brother Dean, we're on a mission to stop monsters like the ones that possessed your friend."
"How does that work? How do you kill those things?"
"I can't, only Dean and Cas can. They're some crazy high priest things, prophecy and all that. I'm along for the ride, I guess." He'd never felt so useless, before he was a little justified in being there when he wasn't a third wheel but now it was just –'oh Sam's here.' Or maybe 'we have no idea where Sam is, better go find him.'
"Don't sell yourself short, Sam." Cas reached over and placed a hand on his shoulder, "I used to think I was just along for the ride but you're so much more than that to everyone you travel with, okay? I'm just as significant to the team as anyone else is, I don't know about you but ours is more of a family than a team. We matter to one another and I'm certain you're a whole lot more than you think you are."
"What if I'm not?"
"That's just in your head, you're the only one that sees it that way." Castiel insisted and somehow it felt right hearing it from him.
"You really were just a bartender, huh?"
"Yeah, useless until I needed to not be. You'd be surprised what you're capable of."
Another quiet moment shared between them and Sam appreciated it more than anything, it wasn't his Cas per se but he had the same feeling about him.
"So what do we do now?" Sam asked softly.
"I think it's safe to head to the rendezvous point, Dean'll be worried about me."
The two pulled themselves away from the wall and stood up, each stretched and went to the horse's side, "What's her name?" Sam carefully ran his hand along the hair of its mane.
"I called her Angel, not very creative but I don't really care, it suits her." Castiel pulled himself up and helped Sam behind him, "Let's go girl," he whispered and clicked his tongue again. Angel whinnied and complied, trotting out of their hiding place and across the terrain.
"How far do we have to go?" Sam called.
"Not far, should get there before twilight."
Sam nodded and looked ahead to the horizon, the creature's words swimming in his head.
Killing scum like you.
The king has him now!
'That thing I saw in Futurum, whatever it was controlling him in that vision it's doing it now. He's alive and he's out here somewhere.' Sam clenched his jaw and narrowed his eyes as the thought settled in his mind, 'Whatever you are, you'd better get the fuck out of my boyfriend.'