Note- *vaguely prays that this will not become a crazy obsession because I wrote four chapters in 24 hours and I don't sleep enough* May I just tell you guys how awesome you are? Maybe? Yes? Good.
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Chapter 3 - Strangers and Old Friends.
Castiel.
For the next few days, Castiel was the epitome of cautious. He felt eyes constantly following him, heard the rustling of leaves and bushes when they really hadn't moved at all, and was constantly looking over his shoulder, eyes searching blindly for somebody that wasn't there. The days grew longer as winter drew in, and the freezing fingers of frost chased Castiel every day as he ventured further and further into the mountains. But, despite Castiel's newfound paranoia, he did encounter one very old friend.
After all this time, Meg had barely changed. She still wore the same mangled, fingerless gloves, and she still had tangled and matted black hair that somehow ended up looking (to Cas) every manner of hot. But Cas doubted that he and Meg would ever really get back together. Maybe in another life, when the world wasn't ending and she hadn't tried to murder his big brother.
"Well hello there, my trenchcoated friend," she said in a lazy tone, as if the whole world had failed to entertain her. "Fancy seeing you here." The two stood across from each other on a long, lonely road, a few miles south of a crossroads
Castiel nearly growled. "You're the one who's been following me! You started that onslaught - you tried to kill me!"
Meg laughed, baring her hands. "No blood on my hands, Cassie. The person who started that thinks he's far, far grander than little old me. He's even picked up a kid half-gone. What a dipshit." She laughed, but Castiel could feel a slight pang of hope in the top of his chest. There was somebody else surviving out here, somebody other than Meg?
Meg stopped laughing after a second, and Castiel nearly cursed as she gave him a long, assessing look. "You want to meet him, team up?"
"I never said-"
"You're the most obvious person I've ever met, Castiel." Meg stared at him for a second more, then rolled her eyes. "I hope you don't mind if I don't attend your wedding?"
Cas opened his mouth to reply, stuttered for a second, and then closed it again. Desperate to change the subject, he said, "Well then, why are you here? Even if you're not tailing me, you're tailing the other guy. Why?"
Meg considered her answer for a second, shooting Cas a furtive look out of the corner of her eye. Eventually she sighed and said, "I happen to have known his father… Or at least, somebody I know did. And if you let this slip to anybody, Castiel Novak, I'll skip rope with your entrails."
Before Cas could answer, Meg cleared her throat and glanced at the broken watch on her wrist. "Time flies when you're having fun, but now I'm afraid I must love and leave you, Cassie."
"Where do you even have to be?" Castiel muttered, shooting his old friend a subtle glare.
"Somewhere over the rainbow."
The look Cas gave her could've burnt through steel.
"No, Castiel, I can't tell you." Meg rolled her eyes in irritation, slamming her thumbs into her pockets and starting to walk away. "It's a whole new world, old friend, and I'm just picking up scraps."
(Later, Cas found a seashell and fifty seven cents in his pocket, and contemplated what Meg actually meant by 'picking up scraps')
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Sam.
Yawning and burying his face in his hands, Sam slapped himself lightly on the side of the face. Dean shot him a look that was caught between laughter and vague concern, and slapped the younger lightly on the back.
"What, were you up all night out at the nightclub last night, Sammy?" he joked.
Sam groaned. "It's just Sam, Dean - and no, I wasn't. You just snore. Loudly."
Dean gave a bark-like laugh. "Shut up, bitch."
"Jerk," Sam replied, not even thinking about it.
"Aw, come on Sammy, you love me."
"Not even close."
As Dean laughed, hitching his pack higher on his shoulder, Sam thought back over everything that had happened in the last few days. For one thing, he didn't find Dean nearly as creepy as he had when he first met him - in fact, once you got to know him, Dean was okay. Sam knew from experience that you didn't tend to find many okay people in the apocalypse, so, he thought, he might as well stay with him for a while at least.
He also learnt something interesting; Dean was a survivor of the fall of Outpost 4. He'd only been out in 'the real world' (as he put it) for four months - but had managed to find some semblance of a routine. On the good nights, Sam and Dean would find the skeleton of an old car or a rundown old house or shed to sleep in - but good nights were few and far between. Mostly, the two would find trees to sleep in, or alcoves in the rocks, or even once the inside of an old van.
Dean was no Gabriel, but he was close enough.
"You know," Gabe said one night, out of the blue, "even though you're the same age, you act nothing like my brother.
The fifteen-year old Sam, lying on the grass a few feet across from the other, glanced over. "You have a brother?" he asked quizzically.
"I've got two, but as far as I know, one of them is safe at Outpost 4." The twenty-year old gave a soft smile, eyes glued on the stars blinking in the dark blue sky above. "The other met a girl - head over heels for her - but I guess I got in the way of their love story. She turned out to be… Not the most friendly of people, and I left, but I guess I…" He trailed off. "I wish we could meet up again someday, me and my brother. It was at the very beginning of this mess, you know, when everybody was still confused and frightened and people were only just starting to change. My brother wanted to find a shed somewhere and stick his head in the sand, but this girl wanted to take advantage of the New World Order, and when I agreed with my brother, she wasn't too happy."
The older gave a long sigh. "I'm sorry, kiddo, it's just been a long time. I'd like to think that my brother let her go, y'know, found that shed and stuck his head in the sand and didn't take it out. I just hope he's alive."
There was a long silence, and then Gabe turned over. "'Night, kiddo."
(Three days later, Sam woke up to find him gone, with only a note saying, 'I'm going to find my brother'.)
Funnily enough, the topic of Gabriel rolled around only a few days later. Sam and Dean had risked lighting a small fire, and Dean sat across from him, sharpening his single knife.
"So, this whole time, you've been on your own?" Dean asked. It was a cleverly hidden question, slipped beneath the pretence of a conversation starter, and Sam saw right through it. "About a year ago, I spent a while with a guy called Gabriel; yes, Gabriel, as in The Nativity Gabriel."
Sam tried to ignore Dean's muffled laughter and went on. "We travelled together for a few months before he left, and I haven't seen him since."
"I thought 'Gabriel' was supposed to be the name of an angel, not a dick," Dean grumbled. "Why'd he leave?"
"He wanted to find his brother," Sam answered. "That's more important than looking after me- Dean move!"
Dean barely dived out of the way before a figure had been thrown out of the darkness behind him and into the dirt, narrowly missing the fire as it hit the ground with a painful thump. Behind them, a quivering roar of noise rose up through the trees as whatever had thrown it hurled itself from the treeline - a six-foot tall, monstrous infected with stark-white hair and rough, patchy skin. Sam didn't think about it, only turned to run away as fast as he could (he didn't fancy a close-and-personal meetup with his distant biological cousins yet) but Dean scooped up the unconscious figure, slung him over his shoulder in a fireman's lift and then followed Sammy into the night.
Behind them, more and more of the beasts scampered from the forest, screams tearing from their throats like macabre war cries as they raced after the pair. The deadweight on Dean's shoulders was light, sure, but the muscles in his legs burned as he hauled him along. He couldn't keep this up for much longer.
"Hey!" he yelled, not even sure if the person was concious, "Can you run?!"
"I-" came a gravelly voice, "I think so!"
Dean practically threw him off, grabbing the other's hand once he was on solid ground and hauling him along to run in stride with him. The stranger stumbled for the first few steps, but then fell into step with him, legs pounding on the ground as the sounds of the pursuing infected echoed through the trees.
"They're- they're not fast," the stranger heaved, clutching what appeared to be an injured forearm as he ran. "They'll give up soon. I've been fighting them for hours."
"Then how the hell are you still alive?!" Dean growled, not in the mood for vague statements as the wind roared a vicious chorus in their ears.
"I'm strong."
That shut Dean up for the rest of the adrenaline-fueled sprint, but when they finally got out of earshot of the things, he found that he was still clutching his hand.
Letting go and shoving Sam behind him, Dean whipped out his knife. Though the monsters raging wars on the world outside the door were dangerous, so were the people.
"Who the hell are you?" Dean's voice was low and dangerous, his whole body tense, but the stranger simply met his eyes with a neutral, level stare that sent a thin chill down Dean's spine.
"I'm Castiel, and I'd suggest that you put the knife down."
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That should not have taken half an hour oh god. I'm sorry I'm stupid XD
Reviews are lovely!