Chapter 18: Building and Empire

From the Journal of Bobby Winchester

I was healing well. Magnificently well. On my feet and exploring well, despite Crowley trying to make his pleas for me to rest sound like threats. How was I supposed to sleep all day when for the first time in my life there were people. Granted, I couldn't talk to them, but people. And no constant threat of my soul's utter destruction. Just ghost army death. I was, to be frank, giddy.

I was, at the moment, learning how to throw a spear. I was pretty good at twirling and stabbing, things I could practice in the confines of the bunker, but throwing was never something I had worked on. A man about my age was teaching me. He was called Ashte, but that's all I had deciphered yet. I considered it the height of triumph that I had gotten him to call me Bobby.

He was currently standing behind me as I was turned to the side. His hand was gripping my back wrist, his other on my forward wrist, holding them in the correct position. His firm chest was pressed right up against my back. I looked down his muscular forearm that was flush with mine. I hadn't really had any idea that forearms could look like that.

I gripped a spear and he gripped my wrist and took a step forward, guiding my body into the correct motions. His breath was hot in my ear. He showed me the step a few more times then released me and took a step back. My back felt cold when he did.

I hefted another spear and tried it, full speed. The spear flew far and straight, sticking hard into the ground. I lifted my arms and shouted happily. Ashte banged his fist on his chest and yelled in his deep, resonant voice. Differences in voices felt magical to me. His was deep, like Crowley's, but not so gravely. It was clear and young and strong. I beamed at him.

Over his shoulder I saw Crowley leaning against a hut, watching us. He looked downright unhappy. I loped over to him, "Why are you so dour?" I asked, tossing him a grin.

"I am not dour, Winchester." He sneered.

I pulled a face at him, "What the Hell, Crow?"

He scoffed with exasperation, "We're so far back in time I'm not even sure when we are, there are hordes of angry ghosts and you're flirting with a boy."

I frowned, "I wasn't flirting with him…he was just teaching me to throw a spear."

Ashte was looking over at us curiously, Crowley gave him a dismissive hand gesture, he shrugged and walked off. Crowley turned back to me. "Stand with you feet apart and throw the spear." He raised his eyebrows, "That suffices doesn't it?" he shifted behind me and gripped me roughly by the waist, growling into my ear. "Or does it work better if he's got you pressed against him?"

I spun around, faster than he was and shoved him away from me, "We don't know each other's language, you massive dick. And so what if he was flirting with me, we're here to stay, yeah? So why can't I flirt with a muscular guy who wants to teach me to throw a spear?!"

Crowley snarled but I laughed. "Come on, Crow, drop it. It's not a thing, okay."

"I suppose you haven't been around many men before, you must be all a dither."

I shoved his shoulder, "Shut your mouth, Kinglet, more importantly, why are there ghost armies?"

"I have actually been giving that a bit of thought, since I haven't been running around half healed being felt up by moderately good looking Bronze Age men."

"Only because none of them have offered."

He swatted my nose, "That, love, is neither here nor there."

I laughed, "Let's walk while you monologue, out of town."

He put out his hands in an acquiescent sort of way, "Lead on, Winchester."

I did, heading out toward the river, glancing over my shoulder and adding, "And stop calling me Winchester."

As we walked he continued on his diatribe, "The ghost armies, I've been talking the best I can to some of the locals, and there have always been ghost armies. Often, if they know they're going to die, they run off into nowhere in hopes of not killing their own family." He had his eyebrow raised like this was all supposed to really mean something to me.

"Did you think of why though?"

He grumbled, "You are destroying my artistry."

"You're giving me a headache."

He sighed in a beset upon sort of way. "The ghosts don't have anywhere to go, love."

I stopped and faced him, "What?"

"I spoke to a number of reapers."

"You just spoke to reapers."

"For the sake of the fire of hell, I'm the King of the Damned, that is the sort of thing that I do."

"Isn't there another King of the Damned though?" I asked, "I mean a king of the current damned?"

He smirked at me, "No. That, love, is what I'm trying to tell you. The ghosts aren't going anywhere because no one has made a place for them to go. No one has quite figured out the value of souls yet. So, they're just roaming around, homeless."

I stopped. "Crowley, we have to do something."

"Well, yes, darling, obviously. Or we'll be eaten by ghosts."

"No, I mean, everyone is doomed. Everyone. We have to help the dead people."

He made an exasperated face, "What do you exactly propose?"

"You first, Crow, you obviously have a plan in mind."

"My plan to was hunt down their corpses and salt and burn them until –"

I cut him off, "Let's build Hell."

He stared at me.

I stared back.

"I beg your pardon."

"I mean…you always bitch that Hell was idiotic right? Demons just killing people, nothing helpful. So let's make Hell. But we can make it however we want. Think about it, Crow," I was getting excited, "Clearly, if heaven is even a thing yet, they don't have any idea of how much they're wasting, so we can just take anybody who dies. We can make an army of heroes, Crowley. Hell will never fall to the Hellions, it will never fall to anybody." I was breathless and leaning toward Crowley.

He put up his hand. "You want to…build and command Hell with me?"

"Well…yeah."

He cocked his head and narrowed his eyes at me, a smirk rising across his face, he stepped closer to me and put his hands on my upper arms, "I tell you that there is no place for the ghosts to go and you respond by asking me if I am interested in stealing souls from the ignorance of heaven, making an army, and creating Hell in my image." He was breathing rather hard and his eyes were boring straight into mine.

I caught his fire, leaning forward, a toothy, ravenous smile carving across my face, "Yeah, Crow, I do."

He was towering over me a bit now, hands trailing up and down my arms like he couldn't quite believe what was right in front of him, "You know, Kitten, when we first met I thought you would be nice to keep around, after all, you could kill Hellions. But I sort of assumed you had survived because of a fluke. Why would I give up the last woman on earth, but, darling," he said 'darling' with a rapturous sort of groan, "You survived because you're magnificent." When he said magnificent he was all predatory teeth, looming above me.

I bared my teeth at him, gripping his hips, firm and commanding where his touch was teasing and delicate, and I hissed in a low breath, "Don't you forget it."

That shirtless boy had given me shivers but Crowley sent my blood pounding and powerful through my veins. Made my stomach stiffen. Made me light headed. We remained poised there, teeth bared at each other for a prolonged moment. He blinked and took a half step away from me, looking uncertain.

I growled and seized him by the front of his shirt, pulling him toward me. Entirely unproficient in what I was doing, but drunk on how it felt, I pushed my lips against his. He responded immediately. He gripped me, a hand fiercely in my hair, the other possessively on my hip. He pushed me roughly against the river bank's lone tree. There was a drumming coursing through my body that I was unfamiliar with, but hell if I wasn't excited to become familiar with it.

I was unsure of what I was supposed to be doing, so I gave up to instinct and raked my nails down his sides, under is shirt. He let out an inhuman snarl what sent fire lashing throughout my body.

We were going to rule hell.

AN: Finally the romance has returned! But um….I cut it off rather suddenly. Because…well, for one thing I rated the story teen and for another she is writing the journal in full understanding that her father is going to read it so….BUT. I'm feeling racy, and if anyone would LIKE the full version of this. Give me a holla.