Chapter 3 - Never Tear Us Apart
"What exactly are we looking for, Aunt Gail?" Rob was asking her now. He had his laptop on the dining room table, typing in his password.
Gail had a mouthful of food, and she put up her hand for a moment as she chewed and swallowed. Riley watched her, bemused. Except for a couple of very rare occasions, he hadn't seen Gail eat before. And even when he had, it had never been like this. She was spooning food off her plate like she couldn't get enough of it. Like her life depended on it. Which he supposed it more or less did, since she was a human now. How weird was that?
"Anything disaster-y," she said, taking a drink of water to wash down the food. Then she frowned. "I'm sorry. That sounded callous, didn't it? I just meant that I need to find something where a lot of people have died."
"So you're really gonna confront Death?" Riley asked her, with a mixture of respect and horror in his voice.
"Well, I don't know if 'confront' is necessarily the right word, but I'm going to find him so that I can talk to him, yeah," Gail replied. "I'm pretty sure he took Cas to the Netherworld."
"You're going to ask Death to bring him back?" Riley persisted.
Gail nodded. "Of course I am." Although just how she was going to accomplish that was beyond her at the moment. Gail still hadn't formulated a convincing argument in her own brain for that yet. She gave Riley a faint smile. Maybe if she convinced him, she would convince herself. "Death has done us a couple of favours before," she told the young Angel. "In fact, we had him over here for dinner recently, to ask him to bring Linda back. He sat where you're sitting, right now."
Riley looked startled. He glanced down at the chair he was sitting in, as if it were going to bite him, or something. Gail's smile widened. Riley had grown leaps and bounds maturity-wise since she had met him, but he still had that same naive quality that she found so endearing. She hoped he would never lose that. Even Cas still had his own streak of naivete, although it was sometimes hard to discern under the mantle of all the responsibility he bore now.
"Nothing like that right now, but I set up the news feed so it'll give us immediate notification of anything coming in," Rob announced. He looked at Gail's plate hopefully. "Are you gonna finish that, Aunt Gail?"
She sat back in her chair, rubbing her stomach. "No. Help yourself. Please, save me from myself. It's been so long since I've been that hungry."
Rob grabbed her half-eaten plate of food, grinning. "I'm always hungry," he said. "Mom says I have a hollow leg."
"I used to be the same way," Riley told him. "You'll probably grow out of it."
"Who wants to grow out of it?" Rob said, scraping the food off the plate into his mouth. "I love eating." He set the plate down on the table, empty. "Thanks, Aunt Gail."
"Just call me Gail," she said, her lips twitching. "I'm also your sister, remember? It's too confusing."
"How does that even work?" Riley said, puzzled.
Gail gave him a half-shrug. "Nobody knows," she quipped. "Everybody's related to everybody around here. Hey, how has everything been going in Heaven without us?"
"It's OK," Riley said glumly. "Ethan's in charge of the Academies, Henri and Linda are still co-chairing the main board, and Bobby's still in charge of the Suic-" He broke off, looking stricken.
"It's all right, Riley," she said, sighing. "That was stupid on my part. I was just trying to do anything I could to get Cas back." She nodded towards the computer. "That's why this is so important."
Rob looked closely at her face. "Can I hold your hand for a second, Gail?" he asked her suddenly.
Gail nodded, offering it to him without question. She thought he was looking for comfort, but a moment later, he said, "We're gonna get him back, Gail. But it's not going to be easy."
She laughed shortly. "When has it ever been?"
"We're gonna need him back, too, for when our Dad calls us all to that place he's setting up," Rob said, frowning.
Gail stared at him. Then she gently disengaged her hand from his, her heart racing. "Let's just focus on one crisis at a time, OK?" she said, a little irritably. Gail was growing tired of all these dire, cryptic warnings about Vincent. If he wanted to do something to them, why didn't he just DO it, already?
Rob actually understood. That one brief touch had told him a lot of things. Gail wouldn't be able to do anything, or talk about anything else, until they had Uncle Cas back. She was obsessed right now. But, now that Rob had held her hand, his faith had been restored. He'd seen Cas through her eyes, protecting her from all of those Demons who'd wanted to torture her in Hell. Cas was somewhere, and his essence was still strong. Rob could feel it. He was glad she wasn't giving up. But she'd better get Uncle Cas back quick. It wasn't gonna be too much longer until their dad sent out the call, and Rob knew that they would have no choice but to come.
There was a ringing sound coming from the computer, and Rob turned to it now. "There was a plane crash in Italy," he announced, scrolling down the screen. "Just over four hundred passengers. No survivors."
Gail felt sick, because her first impulse had been excitement. That was probably just the kind of thing she was looking for. But what kind of person did that make her, that she was happy about that kind of loss of life? She couldn't worry about that now, though. She knew her priority. Depending on what she would have to do for Death to make him grant her the favour, and Crowley's little parting gift on the back of her skull, Cas might have to put her on a big-time atonement program when he got back, though.
"Do you want me to take you over there?" Riley asked Gail. She considered for a moment. Would that be enough? It was hard to say. Death was the head honcho, for lack of a better term. He had a whole staff of Reapers to gather souls for him. Many times, Death didn't personally attend when people died. But every once in a while, he did, especially if there were large numbers. There didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it. But if she went to a few of those places, Gail was hoping he would show. That was all she had right now. She had killed herself, yet he hadn't shown up. That fact had thrown Gail for a bit of a loop, and it had probably led to the skewed thinking that had made her force Bobby's hand, making him send her to Hell. All this time, they had been operating under the assumption that, if Cas went to the Netherworld, she would, too. But Death was the one who made those kinds of decisions, and he obviously felt otherwise. Gail wasn't quite sure how she felt about the apparent fact that she was so insignificant to Death that he hadn't even bothered to show up when she'd died. That would be another feeling to throw on the pile, for sorting later on.
Gail nodded to Riley. "We'd better go, just to be on the safe side." She looked at Rob. "Can you stay here and hold down the fort?" she asked him. "Maybe make note, if there are any other incidents. Put a bookmark on them, or whatever it is you guys do." Her lips twitched. "Oh, and there's more food in the kitchen. Help yourself."
Riley took Gail's hand and popped her out of the house. Rob looked at the empty plate on the table, shrugged, and then took it into the kitchen in search of more food.
Joseph stood in the middle of the field, looking around at the smoking debris. The plane had slammed right into a mountain. Didn't they have technology on those things that was supposed to prevent that sort of thing from happening?
Oh, well. That was those four-hundred-odd humans' bad luck. Right now, he had a job to do. But as he neared the impact site, Joseph saw that another being was beating him to it.
Ammit was standing with her arms spread wide, breathing in all the souls of the unfortunate people who had died in the plane crash. Men, women and children. The Sinners and the Righteous alike, and everyone in-between.
"Hey!" Joseph called out. "What do you think you're doing?"
Her eyes had been closed in ecstasy, but now, as she soaked up the last of the power, like sopping up gravy on a plate, her eyes snapped open. Joseph took a half a step back. She had glowing cat's eyes, and the arms that were outstretched were scaly, with sharp claws at the end. But then, as she swallowed her bizarre meal, her appearance settled into that of a buxom brunette woman.
Joseph's mouth was open. This was no Reaper. "What manner of creature are you?" he asked her insolently. "How dare you take our souls?"
"YOUR souls?" she said scornfully.
"Yes," he said insistently, walking closer to her. "I came here to do a job."
"Well, isn't that unfortunate," she said, shrugging. "I guess you'll have to go back and tell your employer that you're taking a sick day, then. And I would mind who you're calling a creature, if I were you. Once I take over from that pathetic old man, there'll be some staffing changes. I'll probably be laying off those who disrespect me." Ammit smiled slowly. "Or maybe I'll just eat you all, instead."
Joseph was stunned at her sheer audacity. "You think you're going to take over from Death?" he said in a hushed tone.
"Oh, I don't think so, I know so," she said, still smiling. "With each and every day, my power grows. A few more events like this, and I'll be ready to take him on, even without the Books. So you go back and tell your boss that the glass ceiling is about to shatter, and I'm going to use the biggest shard to cut his throat. OK, Joseph? I'll see you around."
Then she snapped her fingers, and was gone.
Riley and Gail missed Ammit by mere moments, but a stunned Joseph was still standing there when they arrived. Riley had popped them right into the crash zone. There were no officials right where they were at the moment, but Riley was aware that they had minutes, only.
"Death?" the young Angel said to Joseph, and the Reaper laughed mirthlessly. "No," he replied, looking at the two of them. "What's an Angel doing here with a human?"
"Riley?" Gail said to her companion. "Who are you talking to? What does he look like?"
He looked at her strangely, and then it dawned on him: only Angels and other otherworldly beings could see Reapers. But Gail was a human now. He described Joseph to her, but she shook her head. "He's not Death," she told Riley.
Joseph was thoroughly disconcerted now. "What do a lesser Angel and a human want with Death?" he asked them.
Riley was mad now, but not about the "lesser Angel" thing. He gestured to Gail. "Don't you know who this is?" he asked Joseph.
"No," the Reaper said, but he was uncertain now. He couldn't feel anything coming from her, but she seemed familiar to him, all the same.
"This is God's wife," Riley told him. "Gail."
"Castiel's wife is a very powerful Angel," Joseph scoffed. "This is a human woman."
"Please tell your employer that I need to meet with him," Gail said out loud. This was really weird. She couldn't actually see the Reaper, so she was basically talking to air. In a humorous moment, Riley put his hands on her shoulders and pivoted her so that she was speaking in the right direction. She would have to have a laugh with him about that later, once she got Cas back. "Tell him..." She thought for a moment. This Reaper, assuming he gave Death the message at all, was going to say that it came from a human. What could she say to convince Death that it was really her? "Tell him that if he wants some more drob de miel, I'd like to see if we can strike up an agreement. He'll know what that means."
Joseph looked at the pair. What a strange few minutes this had been. He had shown up for work as if it were an ordinary day, and been given two messages for his boss from two very different types of women. He shook his head vigorously. Maybe he SHOULD have taken a sick day. He disappeared, without another word.
Frank hung up the phone. "That was Rob," he announced to the group. "Gail's OK, but now she's got Riley popping her around the world, looking for Death. How weird is it that, in our family, that's a completely normal sentence?"
"So she's determined to carry on with this delusion?" Chuck said worriedly. "We've got to get her some help."
"What would you suggest?" Frank said, sighing. "When she gets like this, there's no talking to her. The harder we try, the more she's going to resist."
"Maybe we're going about this the wrong way," Sam mused. "Bobby, maybe you should bring Liz down to talk to her. They're best friends in Heaven, right? Plus, they were childhood friends. Maybe she'll listen to Liz."
"Good luck with that," Bobby said grumpily. "I already tried talking to Liz, and you know what she said? Once she and Gabriel gave me Holy hell for letting Gail go to...well, ya know...she said she's fully supportive of Gail, doing whatever it takes to get Cas back. Liz said she thinks their love is so strong that it wouldn't surprise her one bit to see them reunited. And that's a direct quote."
Chuck's lips twitched, despite himself. "Liz is the kind of person who thinks Bambi's mother is only sleeping, and that Darth Vader just needed more love."
Frank barked out a laugh. He rolled his eyes. "They really do be crazy," he remarked, looking at Paul for confirmation. Paul's eyes grew wide. No way was he going there. No way, no how. Liz was as sweet as a sack full of sugar, but she was also almost as scary as his little Boo.
"WHO really do be crazy?" Jody asked Frank sharply.
"Angels," Frank said quickly. "Angels be crazy."
"Yeah, that's what I thought," his wife said, as Dean swallowed hard to keep the beer from coming out his nose.
"Come on, Paul, let's go," Chuck said. "I know when I've been insulted." But he tipped Frank a wink, to let him know he was kidding.
"Thanks, you guys," Frank said sincerely. "Thanks a lot, Paul. I owe you one."
"Forget it," Paul said, extending his hand to Gail's brother for a shake. The two men shook. "I was glad to help," the Angel said. "When you talk to Gail next, please give her all of our love. And you know what, Frank? If anybody can get Cas back, my money's on her. Take care, brutha." Frank gave Paul a double-take, and Paul chuckled softly. Then he and Chuck were gone.
"You coming?" Jody said to Frank. She picked Angela up from Sam's arms. He'd been cuddling the baby, talking softly to the infant. Angela yawned, stretching her chubby little arms cutely. "See that?" Jody said. "Your daughter's tired, and so am I."
Frank glanced at Sam. "I'd like to stay here for a bit and talk to the guys, if that's OK. Do you mind?"
"Nope," Jody said. She came forward and gave her husband a hug with her free arm, and Frank kissed Angela gently on the forehead. "Bobby, Dean, help me get the baby stuff and bring it out to the car," Jody ordered the men.
"I can help - " Sam started to say in a mild tone, but Jody looked at him, and then she looked at Frank again. "No. You two, stay here," she said sternly.
The men all exchanged glances, but Bobby and Dean got up obediently and followed Jody down the corridor, picking up baby things on the way.
Frank cleared his throat. "That's Jody's way of saying that I'd better apologize to you, if I don't want to sleep on the couch tonight."
"You don't have to apologize to me, Frank," Sam said uncomfortably.
"Yeah, I do," Frank said, taking a seat at the table opposite his friend. "I just don't know how. I'm not very good at apologies, Sam."
"You were grieving your sister's death, or so we thought at the time," Sam said softly. "I know what that's like. Dean and I have been through it. There's no worse feeling in the world than losing a brother or sister, especially one you're really close to, like you guys are."
Frank took a hit of his beer. "Yeah, or losing someone you're in love with. Right, Sam?"
Sam avoided his gaze. "Come on, Frank. Let's not do this."
"Look, Sam, I'm not trying to be an asshole, here," Frank said quietly. "It's just that somebody needs to talk about the elephant."
"There's no elephant," Sam said, taking a drink of his own beer. "She's married to one of my best friends."
"Was," Frank corrected. "Listen, I hate to sound like the bad guy here, but I seem to be the only one around here not drinking the Kool-Aid. I loved Cas too, man, but he's dead. Once my sister accepts that, she'll be much better off. Which means that she'll be a widow, and she's also human now, too. Doesn't that kind of put you guys back to Square One?"
Sam wanted to be outraged. He wanted to look at Frank and tell him off. Say that that was ridiculous, it was insulting, and it was just plain wrong. But instead, he just took another drink.
Gail and Riley were back at the house now, telling a wide-eyed Rob about their encounter with Joseph.
"So you can only see these Reapers if you're an Angel?" Rob said, fascinated. "Sounds kind of like those creatures in our boy wizard books, right, Aunt...I mean, Gail?"
She laughed humourlessly. "Yeah, I guess so. Which begs the question: I wonder if I'll even be able to see the Big Guy, when the time comes? IF the time comes." She sighed. "Anything else on the computer?"
"Not yet," Rob replied. "Don't worry; I'm keeping an eye out." He looked from her to the computer screen and then back at her again. "I'm glad you're back, Gail," the young man told her. "Everybody was so miserable when you were gone. Dad was a mess."
Gail's heart hurt. "I can just imagine," she said in a subdued tone. "Let me guess: he was angry all the time, and he drank too much."
Rob was astonished. "How did you know that?"
Gail gave him a look. "Please," she said. Then her expression grew serious. "Are he and your mom OK, do you think?"
The young man shrugged. "Yeah, I think so. They fought a bit, but whenever Mom would start to get really mad, she would pick up and go to one of her cancer meetings. I showed her how to set up a Facebook page, and now she runs a support group for cancer patients. Sometimes she would take Angela with her to the meetings, and sometimes I babysat, if Dad was too - well, you know." But then, Rob's face brightened. "That kid's gonna be one smart cookie. Did I tell you? Her first word was 'Rob'. I've been trying to get her to say other names, too. Have you ever stopped to think about how many one-syllable names we have? Sam, Dean, Chuck, Cas..." Rob put a hand over his mouth. "Oh, man, I'm sorry, Aunt Gail."
"It's OK, Rob. I thought of it too, of course," Gail told him. Then she sighed again. "They all think I'm nuts, don't they?"
But as Rob tried to think of an answer to that question that wouldn't sound completely mean, Riley piped up, "I don't."
Gail looked at him. "You don't?" she asked, with a tone of surprise.
"No, I don't," the young Angel said, sounding nearly as surprised as she did. "I kind of did, at first. But now I don't, any more. I'll stay with you for as long as you need me to, Gail. If anybody can get him back, you can. And if I can help you do that, in any way, I'll be glad to."
Gail smiled warmly at both young men. Her soldiers. "I appreciate the support, you guys," she told them sincerely.
Rob looked at her hopefully. "Is there any more food?"
Joseph had passed along the messages, and Death had been angered by what his Reaper was telling him. Both women would have to be dealt with, but of more immediate concern to Death was the mystery being, who was taking souls that she was not entitled to.
Death knew who that was, of course, even though his Reaper would not. She was hardly the first individual who'd sought to usurp his position throughout the millennia. No one had ever posed much of a threat to him, though, not really. But Death was disturbed to hear that Ammit had apparently opted to throw the usual code of conduct out of the window. She had done pretty well for herself, having finagled her way into a position of responsibility as the Keeper of the Lake of Fire. That had been a first, for a female entity. But Ammit had obviously set her sights on a much higher position. Everyone needed to have goals, but she was going about things entirely the wrong way. Stealing souls like that was extremely dishonourable. She was supposed to remain by the Lake to receive the few wretched souls that trickled down to her. It was time that Ammit received a refresher course regarding her place in the scheme of things.
He could sense her as soon as he went to Earth to attend at the site of a minor earthquake in Yugoslavia. Less than a dozen people had died in a small village. Definitely not worth his time. But he'd just wanted to see.
And sure enough, there she was, inhaling the essences of the people who had died there, as if it was her right to do so.
"I see you got my message," Ammit said to Death, without a trace of fear.
"Indeed I did," he replied calmly. "Now I am here to deliver one of my own. You will cease what you are doing, immediately."
"You know what? I don't think so," Ammit said, walking through the rubble toward him. "You men have had things your way for centuries now."
"This has nothing to do with being male or female. You know those kinds of things are fluid when it comes to beings such as ourselves," Death pointed out. "It's all about fairness, and the natural order. Everyone has their place in the scheme of things."
"Oh, and I suppose my 'place' is where you say it should be?" she said sarcastically.
Death was unruffled. "That is correct. I am the ultimate arbiter, yes."
"Well, I think it's time for a change," Ammit said insolently.
"There will be no change. You will do as you're told, or suffer the consequences." Death raised his walking stick, and Ammit fell to her knees. She glared up at him. "Do you think you can keep me subjugated like this forever?" Ammit fumed. But Death made no answer to that. Yes, he could. Of course he could.
But then, an amazing and worrisome thing happened. Ammit struggled to her feet, and then stood in front of him defiantly. How had she done that? She should not have been able to do that.
"I will have your position," Ammit told Death, smiling sourly. "Once all of the new souls I have gathered at the Lake have gone into the fire, and I acquire just a few more, I will be back for you, Old Man."
Then she disappeared.
Gail had asked Riley to go out and get some Chinese food, and she and Rob had grazed their way through most of it. They were still waiting by the computer, but so far, only minor events had occurred, such as car accidents and the like, and one very small earthquake in Yugoslavia that had claimed less than a dozen people.
"Here," Gail said, tossing Riley a fortune cookie. He looked at her questioningly. "I know you're not going to eat it," she said to the young Angel. "I'm not going to eat mine, either. I never did like them much." She took one for herself, looking at Rob. "It's tradition. Your Dad and I used to do this all the time whenever we got Chinese food on the road. Too bad we never got one that said 'You'll be kidnapped by Demons tonight'. That one would have saved us a lot of trouble," she quipped.
Gail was kidding, of course. That kidnapping had actually been the best thing that had ever happened to her. It had led her to Cas. Where was he right now? What was he doing? Was he in the Netherworld, patiently waiting for her to get there? Did he even know that she had died, too? Was he going as crazy as she was, right now? Oh, great. Now she was depressed as hell.
"Mine says 'Books can provide great knowledge'," Riley said, dropping his cookie on the table. "Whatever that means."
"'It takes a lot of Good to overcome a little Bad'," Rob read aloud. He put his fortune down on the table and stuck a piece of cookie in his mouth, crunching it with his teeth. "Huh. Interesting. What's yours say, Gail?"
She looked down at the angled cookie in her hands, suddenly afraid to open it. What if it said something about losing a loved one? Then she decided she was being stupid. The "fortunes" in those things were nothing but platitudes. Generalities. Just like horoscopes. The things they said were so generic that they could apply to anyone, really. She broke it open and looked at the piece of paper. "'Live every day as if it were your last'," she read aloud, and the three of them looked at each other.
And that was when there was a knock at the front door.
"I thought I would save us both some time," Death said dryly.
Gail gaped at him, temporarily rendered speechless. She had not seen this coming. Then she shook it off, and opened the door wider. "Come in, please," she said to him.
As he moved past her down the hall towards the dining room, Gail cursed herself. Rob was here. Frank was going to kill her. Not that Death posed any danger to her nephew, of course. It wasn't as if he just ran around killing people, or anything. Still, she didn't think Frank was really going to care about that.
Rob and Riley stared up at Death, open-mouthed. He nearly smiled. He always got this reaction from the young ones. Death turned to Gail. "I know who they are, of course, but it is customary to provide introductions in these types of situations. However, since you are in mourning and they are very young, I will overlook it. Oh, and before you ask, I have made myself visible to all of you for ease of conversation."
"Would you like some Chinese food?" Gail blurted out.
Death gave her a curt shake of his head. "I am not particularly hungry at the moment. I am merely here to tell you that I am aware of what you are doing, and you are wasting my time."
"Then I'll get right to the point," she said quickly. "You sat right there at our dinner table and told us that you believe in what's fair. That you reward sacrifice, if that sacrifice was warranted."
"All right, fine. Then I will get to the point, too," Death replied, tight-lipped. "Castiel's sacrifice was NOT warranted. He was supposed to have killed you. You were the one who was supposed to die that day, not he. God is much more important than any one Angel. Now Heaven is without a leader, again."
Gail let out a frustrated breath. "All right. Then what about fairness? Was it fair for Raguel to have used that ring against Cas like that? What was even the point of that? Because he wanted the Holy War? What would THAT have done to your natural order? I'm sure it would have thrown everything out of whack. Why aren't you out there punishing Raguel, then?"
The young men gasped out loud as Death pointed his walking stick at Gail. "Do not speak to me with such disrespect," he said in a clipped tone. "You think you are very clever, don't you? That all you have to do is look at me, and I will capitulate. The very notion of you trying to 'logic' me is absurd. You are a spoilt child, who is dealing in matters better left alone."
"Well then, you know what you have to do, don't you?" Gail said coolly. "If it was supposed to have been me, then, let it be me. I don't want to live without him, anyway."
"No, Aunt Gail!" Rob exclaimed, but Gail looked at Riley instead. "Take him to the bunker, Riley. Please."
"Gail..." he started to say, but she shook her head. "No. Do it, please. For me. For Cas." Then she looked at Rob. "Tell everybody I'm sorry, but I just can't do it. I've tried, and I just can't. I see him everywhere I go. I hear his voice in my head." She was crying now. "My head hurts, my stomach hurts, and my heart hurts. This is beyond grief. It's unbearable. Cas and I are the same person. I don't exist without him. I don't WANT to exist without him. Tell everyone I love them. Now, go. Please."
"We love you too, Gail," Riley said. Then he took Rob's hand, and winked him out of the house.
Gail stood facing Death as stoically as she could, silent tears streaming down her face.
"All right, I'll take you to him, then," Death said to her, frowning. "But not because of anything that you have said or done here today. Merely because I can see that you will not stop, and I do not wish to be saddled with you at every turn. But, know this: you cannot keep on doing what you are doing. I thought the lesson would have been obvious. When you committed suicide and I did not come for you, I thought that you would have taken the hint. I suppose it was my own fault, in a way. I should never have granted you and Castiel a favour to begin with. Now, you look at me and you think that I am an easy mark. An old fool."
Gail's forehead wrinkled. What? Where had THAT come from? But she remained silent for the moment, afraid that one wrong word from her might make him change his mind.
Death sighed. Then he reached out and touched her forehead with one finger and she fell to the floor, dead.
They were walking down a quiet, suburban-looking neighbourhood now, just Gail and Death, side by side. She was overjoyed. Death was taking her to Cas! She looked all around. So, this was the Netherworld. It didn't seem so bad, really. A little devoid of character, maybe, but it was quiet, and the streets were clean. They had passed many different types of locales in the blink of an eye: rural, urban, mansions, apartment buildings, and everything in-between. She supposed it was like Heaven, in that respect. Everyone lived in the type of domain in which they were the most comfortable.
They came upon a simple house in the middle of nowhere, with a small front yard. There were flowerbeds next to the porch steps, and as Gail followed Death around the side of the house, she saw with delight that there was a large vegetable garden in the back yard. Then she looked in the meadow behind the gardens and burst out laughing. She couldn't help it. There was a small flock of sheep, quietly grazing there. Cas had finally gotten his sheep.
"Can I help you?" he asked from behind them.
Gail wheeled around. Cas was standing on the steps of the back porch, frowning at them. She started to run to him, but there was something about his expression that made her stop.
"We just wanted to have a look at your vegetable garden," Death said calmly. "We did not mean to disturb you."
"Oh," Cas said. He looked expressionlessly at Gail. "My apologies, Miss. I did not intend to be rude. But, I do not receive visitors."
"Then we'll be leaving," Death said. He touched Gail's arm, and suddenly, they were standing in a forest clearing. She looked around wildly. What the hell?
"Why?" she asked Death, anguished.
"Because," he said coldly. "Because you cheated the game. Because you tried to make me do what you wanted me to do, simply because you wanted it. You committed suicide when it was not appropriate to do so, and then, you conspired to manipulate me. Well, you have gambled, and ultimately, you have lost. You do not dictate the terms for the Afterlife; I do. There is a natural order, which must be respected. You think you are above the rules, don't you? But, you are not. So now, you will live here for all of eternity, without your husband."
She stood there in utter shock. He couldn't be serious. He just couldn't be.
"Hasn't a part of you known all along that this was the way that things were going to go?" Death asked her softly. "You prepared yourself for a solitary existence, even as a child. You will have your books, and Castiel will have his sheep. And now you see why I do not believe in love, or sentiment. Those types of feelings only serve to weaken you."
"But - " she tried to say, and Death held up his hand. "You overstepped your bounds, and now, you have to pay the price. There is always a price to pay for trying to cheat Death, Gail. Always."
Then, incredibly, he turned his back on her and began to walk away. "Wait!" she exclaimed. "Wait! Please! Can't we strike up some sort of deal? Can't we even negotiate? Please," she begged him. She was wailing now. "Please! I'll do anything you want. Anything."
Death stopped, turning around slowly to face her. "All right, then," he said calmly, moving back in her direction. "How about if I were to ask you to kill Frank, or Sam and Dean? How about little Angela?"
Gail stared at him, frozen in shock. Then Death shook his head, frowning at her. "You disappoint me," he said dryly. "This is not a cheap, dime-store horror novel, and I am not a cheap, dime-store villain. When will people ever understand that? I do not care who lives, or who dies. I truly do not. My only concern is the souls. It has always been about the souls. It will always be about the souls." But now, something occurred to Death. Perhaps there WAS something that she could help him with.
"Do you know of the Demon Goddess, Ammit?" Death asked Gail suddenly.
"Yes, of course," Gail said quickly.
Death thought for a moment. He would never admit it, of course, but his experience with Ammit had unnerved him a little. He was unused to such impertinence, especially since she had seemed to have enough power to give him a real challenge. And she had said that she was going to acquire even more power from the souls that she had stolen and taken to the Lake of Fire. The Lake was one of the very few places that Death was unable to access. He simply could not go there.
But God could.
After some discussion, and some strategic silences on her part, Gail was able to discern that Ammit was making trouble for Death. And that, he was trying very hard not to admit it, but the Demon Goddess concerned him. So much so that it seemed as if Death might be willing to negotiate with Gail, if he was under the impression that she could help him with Ammit.
So, Gail did the only thing she could do: she lied.
"Cas and I can kill her for you," Gail offered. "The markings on our blades state that two Original Angels can combine to use their blades to strike her down."
Death was looking at her, scrutinizing her face closely. Gail kept herself calm, and her face without expression. Back when Cas had been playing poker, he was an expert at not giving anything away. He could have a Royal Flush all the way down to a nothing hand, yet his expression always remained exactly the same. He had tried to teach her how to do that, but Gail had been unable to master the skill. She was always an open book, no matter how hard she tried to hide what she was really feeling. There was a reason she had only played high-stakes poker a couple of times, Gail had told her husband, smiling. It was because she sucked at it.
But now, she was running the biggest bluff of her life. This was the riskiest thing she had ever pulled, in a way. But in another way, she had nothing more to lose. If Death walked away from her now, she was screwed, for all eternity. She was desperate.
After an unbearable pause, he finally said, "All right, Gail. You have a deal. But if I find out that you are misleading me, or should you and Castiel fail, I will send my Reapers after each of your loved ones, one by one. Are we understood?"
"Yes, of course," Gail said, keeping her expression and her tone steady. "We are completely understood."
Death continued to gaze at her for another nerve-wracking moment. Then he touched her forehead with his walking stick, and then everything went black.
Gail came to slowly, as if rising to the surface from the deep end of a swimming pool. She opened her eyes, but her vision was blurry. Where was she now? And why was the ground underneath her so bumpy? She felt dizzy; disoriented. She put her hand down to steady herself, and the ground moved underneath her.
"Oof," Cas said softly.
Her eyes snapped wide open. THAT was why the ground had been moving! It wasn't the ground! It was Cas!
"Sweetie!" she exclaimed. She rolled over onto her stomach, moving up his body until she was looking down at his face. "Cas!" She clung to him, peppering him with kisses.
Cas smiled slowly. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close. Somehow, it did not surprise him one bit that he should be waking up with her here, on the same Egyptian field where he had killed himself an indeterminate period of time ago. "My love," he murmured. "My darling. What sort of miracle have you performed?" Then he began to kiss her, too, and then she started to cry.
"I'm sorry, Cas," she said, sniffling. "I'm leaking all over you."
"I have never been happier to be leaked on in my entire existence," he told her, kissing her forehead, her cheeks, her nose, and her lips.
"I'm never letting go of you," she said, still clinging to him. "Never. People are going to think we're conjoined twins. I was so scared, Cas. I didn't want to live, sweetie. You have no idea - " Her throat closed up, and she whimpered.
"Shhhh," he soothed her. "Shhh. Please don't cry." But he was crying now, too. He saw her blade lying on the ground, stained with blood. When they had come to, she had been lying on top of him. Cas could do the math. When he had killed himself rather than be forced to harm her, she had committed suicide, too.
Raguel! Cas sat up quickly, still holding Gail close to him, afraid to let her go. But the Archangel was nowhere to be seen. Cas raised his free hand, but Michael's ring was gone. He breathed a sigh of relief.
Cas looked at Gail lovingly. He should be lecturing her, telling her she should not have committed suicide just because he had. But he didn't have the heart; at least, not right now. She was still weeping, and Cas was pretty certain that he was, too.
"Let's go home, my darling," Cas said softly. He picked their blades up from the ground, pulled her closer to him, and winked them away.