Chapter 42
Gilgash threw open his arms and screamed in joy. Crowley's blood stained his hands to the elbow. He sprinted through the hallway, the heart of the demon king warm in his hands. He found the wall, Bones baying behind him and he began to draw.
He was breathing hard. It had all come to this. His thousands of years of torment, his soul burnt down to a demon, the wandering of his queen, the degradation of serving a false king. He had done it. The last thing his Lady had asked of him and the greatest. The monsters were dead and Hell was about to be reborn.
If all went well, Gabriel fought in heaven, freeing the imprisoned souls.
The sigils smeared in the dead king's blood made an intricate circle. He took half a moment to admire his work before he slid the long knife from his belt. He held Crowley's heart to the wall and it a swift stroke pierced it, staking it into the stone.
A crack scratched downward from the knifepoint and crooked downward until it reached the bloody circle. With a sudden boom a deep crevice shot around the sigil and it illuminated with a holy light. Hell shook.
Gilgash fell to his knees in the convulsions and looked on wide eyed as the door so long ago sealed broke apart and crumbled.
He had not remembered how bright they were. The spirits, his people. They streamed from the door in a deluge, spears twinkling and armor shining.
Gilgash laughed and ran his bloodied hands through his hair. He had done it. He had done it. He had done it.
He collapsed in exhaustion and exuberation, his fists hitting the ground.
"Captain Gilgash, it's been quite a long time."
A long fingered hand was tilting his head up and he stared up into that beautiful face.
He gave a terrible whisper, hardly trusting his eyes, "My king."
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Dean leapt to his feet. Everything was shimmering around him in a blue haze, he gripped the letter and steadied himself. The blue cleared and he stood between Sam and Cas in the motel room. Bobby's corpse was still on the bed.
Dean snarled, "What they hell?"
They flew around as the door opened softly, the sunlight tearing through to illuminate the dirty carpet. A young man stood framed in the light, lanky blond hair tied back. Not particularly tall nor handsome. Blood leaked from sores that opened near his hair line and across his hands. He was followed by a slim dark man with blood that coated his hands.
The blonde quirked his head at the hunters, "Hello, Sam. Whatever are you doing here?"
Sam stepped back, his heart speeding up and breath pulled out of his lungs, "Lucifer!"
"What!" Dean shouted, he tore the Hellion's blade from his belt.
Lucifer rolled his eyes and lifted his hand toward Dean. Swiftly Gilgash put a hand on Lucifer's arm, "My king, don't, he's her father."
A long pause followed, "You're kidding. Huh." Lucifer raised an eyebrow and shrugged, "I don't think I've made a very good impression on him."
Lucifer looked passed them at Bobby's body and his brow furrowed, "Well, I hate to cut this short but I have to don't have a lot of time, unless you want to play host, Sammy." He said mockingly at Sam who sneered.
"As you can see," he continued, "Aaron, here is not long for this world."
Dean stepped forward, between Lucifer and Bobby, brandishing the knife.
Dean didn't get a choice, Lucifer waved a hand and Dean, Cas, and Sam were flung across the room and sat neatly in the grimy couch against the wall.
Gilgash seemed unable to approach the body and instead stood stiffly by the Winchesters. As Lucifer bent over her body Gilgash looked nervously at Dean a few times and wiped his hands hurriedly on his pants, "It is an honor to meet you, Dean Winchester, father of Bobby Winchester."
Lucifer looked up at him, "What did you call her?"
Gilgash jumped, "Bobby, Bobby Winchester, it was the name she had at birth. Given to her by her father."
"She was a human?" He mused, "A Winchester. And named after an old grumpy drunk." He blinked as though something had dawned on him, "Oh Dean, maybe I should have puzzled that one out."
Dean scowled up at Gilgash, "Who the hell are you?"
Gilgash bowed, "Gilgash, sir, Captain of the High Guard of the Underworld. Now, and eternally at your service."
"Where the Hell were we, Gilgash!" Dean snarled.
"I'm sorry about that, that was Gabriel, I believe, keeping you safe. The letter is real, that is the important part."
Blood dripped down from an open wound into Lucifer's eyes and he brushed it away with irritation before very softly touching Bobby's cold brow, "Bobby?" He said softly, "I suppose it suits you. Don't worry, my love, it won't be long."
He pressed his palm against her sternum and closed his eyes in concentration. More wounds opened across his face and blood seeped through his shirt. Light burned out of his hand and arced across her body. Where it faded her wounds were healed. "Did you kill him before he devoured your soul, Persephone?" he murmured.
Lucifer gritted his teeth suddenly and a small growl of pain escaped him. Dean tried to pull himself from the couch.
Lucifer screamed and light filled the room, nearly blinding.
The light dimmed after a moment and Lucifer stilled, staring down at Bobby's body.
Dean too looked on at her body, made whole.
After all eternity stretched out, all eyes riveted on her. Her chest rose in a gasp and she heaved herself up in a rush, eyes flying open.
Dean, suddenly free from the couch, slammed forward to her. She blinked and looked at him, Lucifer forgotten at her side. Her green eyes were almost like his, a little muddier, a little darker.
Sam and Cas were silent, it had been harder to see before, when she was a corpse, but she looked so much like him. Her hair that couldn't decide if it was dark or light and an angular jaw that tensed when she gritted her teeth.
"D- Dad?" She said it disbelievingly with a hoarse voice.
"Yeah."
Lucifer made a small noise and she shifted around, "Luce." He moved down toward her but stopped, she remained rigid and scowling. She said in a much darker voice, "What-who is that?"
Lucifer wrinkled his nose, "What do you mean, who is that? I just rose you from the dead. I haven't seen you for thousands of years since I was dragged into the pit. I thought you were dead!"
She frowned, "Who's the kid you're wearing?"
He shrugged, "Does it matter?" He sounded indignant, "I raise you from the dead and-"
She pushed herself to her feet and nearly toppled, Dean caught her by the shoulder. She jumped and blinked then looked away from him and back to Lucifer, "You're killing him."
"Then tell your uncle to be more accommodating."
"Just let him go, , how old is he, fifteen? You don't need him where we're going anyway."
He shrugged, "Sixteen, but he's just a human."
A shadow passed over her face for little more than an instant but then she grinned at him, "Lucifer," she said in the way she had first said his name, lingering over the syllables, "Go to the palace, I'll be there soon and I can see you the way I remember you."
Lucifer looked like he was about to protest but he sighed, "You could thank me." He murmured before disappearing in a rush of wings.
"Gil, you too, I'll see you soon." He followed Lucifer out.
Dean hadn't noticed that the set of her shoulders had changed while she spoke to Lucifer until they fell after his disappearance. She looked like he always did, bone tired.
She turned back to face him looking uncertain and antzy. "Um," she said in a soft voice, "Hey, Dad. Did you get my letter?"
Dean grimaced because he recognized that look too. Did I screw up, Dad? Are you disappointed? Are you mad? How many times had he looked at John like that?
She was the kid with the pink sigils on her wall and the killer of the Hellions and the Queen of the Dead. And she was looking at him like she was lost. He pulled her forward and wrapped his arms around her.
She nearly collapsed against him, burying her face into his shoulder and gripping him. "Proud of you, kid."
She pulled back and looked at him with a set jaw. "You read the letter? The whole thing?"
Dean gave her a grin, "So you ran off with a demon while you were trying to save the world, talk to your Uncle Sammy, he knows all about that."
Sam, who was looking at them rather fondly looked affronted.
She spotted Cas and looked at him uncomfortably, "Sorry I uh...murdered you."
"Sorry I murdered your father."
"I feel like we're even."
She ran her hand awkwardly through her hair and ruffled it in the back, "So I uh- I should go."
Sam spoke up, "To Lucifer."
She inspected him, "Are you Uncle Sammy?"
His stern expression broke and he nearly grinned, "Yeah."
She looked at Dean, "I gotta go."
"No you don't."
"I have a war to fight, we could finish off the demons."
"What about Crowley, I know what he did, you want me to gank him?"
She half laughed, "If Lucifer is out then Gilgash already did."
"You okay?"
She really did laugh, "Not at all, Dad. But I gotta go."
She took a few steps toward the door and Dean didn't stop her. She stopped with her fingers on the knob and tensed, not facing him. She spoke without turning in a breaking voice, "Tell me about Jo and Ellen."
"What?"
"Can you just-" she started then paused to take a few breaths, "Can you just tell me how they died."
"They got ripped apart by Hellhounds and blew themselves up to give us a chance to escape."
"During the apocalypse Lucifer started?"
"He dragged Sammy into the pit with him. Tortured him. Almost got him killed. You're Grandma Mary, she died because of him too, and Sam's girl Jess. Your grandpa John too. Half the things this family's lost is because of that angel."
"Can I meet you at the bunker?"
Dean pressed the bunker key into her hand, "Yeah, kid."
She looked back at him for a moment and said, "It's all going to be finished in Hell. But I'll be back, Dad. Don't try to follow me, just meet me at the bunker and...just read what I wrote. The journal...and the letter."
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She stepped through the gateway and into her Underworld. Flames licked around her and she could hear screams echoing in the distance. Her father had been tortured here for forty years. Her grandfather before him. Her namesake, Bobby Singer, had languished here. She tried to conjure them around her.
She walked forward and where she stepped the fires cooled. Living earth spread out around her and she proceeded toward the palace.
She was not in the garb of a Queen, nor a warrior of old. Her old armor inscribed with a W, her gowns that spread like molten ivory on the ground were lost. Her hair didn't shine as it once did nor her eyes glisten. She was dressed in a torn flannel and bloody leather jacket. Her jeans were muddy and her boots were worn.
Demons gaped at her as she passed with golden flowers blooming at her feet and the fires of Hell extinguishing around her. Some of them knew, or at least suspected who she was and made way for her. There were some among them who revelled in her resurgence, the legendary queen, others who gnashed their teeth, fearing the end of the bloodbath in which they had been wallowing.
Her path to the palace was watched but it was not impeded.
She walked up the familiar steps and as she rose the palace drew itself back together. Broken arches knitted themselves together and elegant floors bloomed beneath her. Inside her people waited, standing shoulder to shoulder in the palace, filling its halls. When she entered they fell as one to their knees, many crying out, "My Lady!" they called and, "Savior of the dead!"
Lucifer waited for her in the throne room that built itself back up upon her entry.
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The Letter from the Bunker
I waited so long before I could move. So many years gritted passed and I left my son dead on the stones of Hell. But I knew when my time would come. I knew, Dad, because you told me. You cradled me on your lap and told me about Metatron and the civil wars in heaven. You told me about the demon king sick and broken on the blood of man.
I waited.
I saw Crowley stumble out of his hotel room where he had killed the demon. He was sweaty and pale. His eyes were rimmed red. I had watched him cry at movies and call out in his sleep. My time was come.
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"Sephone," Lucifer said softly. He was almost as she remembered him. He didn't need a vessel here and was almost again the devastatingly beautiful boy he had been when she had struck her deal with him on the battle field.
"Luce." Had he not righted her sundered soul? Had he not told her that he would bear any pain on her account? Had he not held her hand while she birthed his son?
Had he not been willing to destroy the world if her father had not stopped him?
He pulled her against his chest and kissed her. She buried her hands in his hair and kissed him in return. Her heart was going to damage the inside of her ribs. He tasted like she remembered. His hands did not move as they had.
They were sure and greedy and hungry.
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From the Journal of Bobby Winchester
Here, Crowley, is my last story for you. You already know half of it.
I was reading the books about my father that I had found, written by a prophet. I wanted to finish them before I ever spoke to him. I couldn't handle if he hated me. I thought if I read what he had done, I thought that I would know if I had done right.
I had always meant to avoid you, I had done it so well for so long.
I knew that you were alive, young and rising to power, but my love, I couldn't stand to see you. You wouldn't be the you I remembered. It wouldn't be the man who had healed me with his dark smoke when Zeus put his claws into me. It wouldn't be the one who sat beside me on his throne and pulled me from the wreckage of Hell. The same heartbeat I had slept to for so many years.
But there you were.
You looked so much the same that I couldn't look away. You caught me staring at you and I was terrified. Terrified you would speak to me. Terrified I wouldn't have the strength not to jump you where you stood. Terrified you would smell the same and terrified that you wouldn't.
When you finally spoke, in that tone I had missed for so many years, my heart fluttered and it was all I could do to flee. But I think, in my haste, I let some of the vestiges of what I had learned as Persephone slip out and grow that flower. Was it that that intrigued you? Was it that singular blossom that made you chase after me?
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Bobby stepped back, "Luce, if everything is going as it should, I have work to do."
He gripped her face and peered down at her, his expression intense, "I missed you Seph. It has been so many years."
She, nearly overwhelmed, dropped her head against his chest and shut her eyes, "Me too, Luce. Every day."
"Can you revive him?" She said, face pushed into his chest.
"Dean?"
"Yeah."
He stroked a hand through her hair, "I don't know."
She looked up at him and took his chin tightly in her grasp, forcing him to look down at her. "If you love me, Lucifer, bring him back."
He looked at her rather coldly, "He was my son too." He stepped away from her and sneered, "I want Michael dead for what he did as badly as you!"
She didn't retaliate, she widened her eyes at him and blinked softly, "I know, Luce, I'm sorry."
He softened. "There is a spell."
"Tell me!" Her voice for the first time, broke in desperation.
"We need the blood of the one who killed him." His face warmed, "I saw you fight him. You nearly won. Together we will have enough of his blood for a thousand spells."
"I need a weapon, Luce."
He reached behind the throne and withdrew a spear tipped with a silvery point nearly fifteen inches long, "Forged from an angel blade, made just for you."
She took it and spun it, testing for balance.
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The Letter from the Bunker
He was so broken and weak. I really was reading those books though, that the drunk prophet. I couldn't tell you anything yet. I felt lost, Dad. I was working so hard to pull together this plan but I wasn't sure. I wanted to know if it was what you would have done. I needed to know if it was what a Winchester ought to do. I think it is, Dad.
I let him sit there for awhile. I could still read him. He might have been younger and sick on human blood, but he was still the man I had spent millennia beside. His gaze darted around challengingly. I watched anger brew in his blood and I waited until his shoulders hitched as they always did when his anger was about to blossom over and I made my move.
I widened my eyes and looked at him, I stared at him like I couldn't believe what I had encountered. As though he was the only thing I could possibly see.
He approached, as I knew he would and I fled before he could convince himself I was uninteresting. I left him a gift.
Of course, it wasn't a coincidence that Castiel arrived. He was hunting me. And that brought you and the world conspired for me.
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They waited with bristling weapons, facing the doors. Her soldiers still so loyal after so many thousands of years tucked away. They leaned forward, eager to reclaim their homeland. Bobby Winchester waited for her signal.
It came in a cataclysm, a burst of noise issuing from a golden horn high above sliced into her ears. She twisted her hand and a great hole in the rocky ceiling of Hell fell thunderously down smashing upon the newly extinguished earth.
They poured through the hole in mad droves, souls by the thousand, the million, led by a gloriously armored Gabriel, who no longer looked like a lanky half grown teen but radiated a terrible majesty.
Their shining silver dimmed as they hit the ground and they coalesced into their own forms. Running pell mell toward the demons.
It was then that Bobby moved, leading her people forward in stiff formation at the demons around them.
Demon claws tore around her and she danced through them, a warrior in the field of battle as she had not been in millenia. Battle roared in her ears and snarled against her, her people chasing back the blistered, twisted, unsavable souls. Taking back what had been theirs.
A horrible roar snarled behind her and she was knocked forward off of her feet. She flipped herself over and scrambled back, but someone was between her and the colossal demon bearing down on her. He deflected the demon's vicious claws with a short curved knife and sliced through it's throat with a defiant yell.
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From the Journal of Bobby Winchester
In that Library where you cornered me, I nearly gave in. I lashed out at you, desperate to keep you at arm's length but the way you smelled. The burn of your sulphur dragged me back and I was nearly dizzy. I wanted to kiss you, Crowley, I wanted to bury my face against your chest. I wanted to listen to your hear your heartbeat again and sleep for the first time in years.
I'm sorry for what happened. I'm sorry that I came to your office and sat against you and asked you to kiss me. That wasn't fair. I'm sorry. But I missed you.
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He pulled her up by the shoulder. He was a scruffy looking older spirit with dark hair and a rough dark beard "You're the queen they keep harping about." It wasn't a question.
She thrust her spear passed him, demolishing a demon poised to cut him down, "Yeah, I s'pose!"
He pushed her down and away from an attack and cut down another demon, "Thought you'd be better at keeping yourself alive."
"I've had some trouble with that recently, got a name?" She replied, jabbing over his head. He looked damn familiar.
"John Winchester." He introduced hacking down another demon.
She barked in laughter, "Really?!"
She kicked a demon back and they rolled behind an outcropping to catch their breath.
She held out her hand, she had been imagining him based on a single picture he had with her father and uncle as kids, it was weird to see him real and moving in front of her. He was older than he was in the picture, "Nice to meet you, John Winchester, I'm - I guess I'm your granddaughter."
He gave her a hard look, "Thought you were an ancient goddess or somethin'."
"Nah, angels, end of the world, long story."
He looked her up and down and nodded, "Dean's, huh. He raised a hunter?"
"Yeah, I guess."
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The Letter from the Bunker
I only lost it once. We were in that library where I didn't expect him to come and he gave me that smirk. The wiley way he talked. The weedling conniving thing that had sold the life of my son. Have you ever felt rage like that, Dad? That you couldn't control and blinded you and turned you into something else? I almost killed him. I was going to rip out his heart again.
But the way that he smelled almost ruined me. Because it was the same as always. It wasn't the blood that I tasted when I murdered him for the sake of little Dean, it was the sulphur that had lulled me into sleep. I know that you are braver than I am. I know you never run from anything, but I ran away from this convoluted thing to the part that I knew how to do. I knew how to fight Castiel.
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Fire lurched across the ceiling and John Winchester and his granddaughter looked up. An angel was raging across Hell's sky, making for the hole in the ceiling. His wings one with an unfeathered scar running across it, were wonderously golden.
He was followed by a different angel, blonde haired with sleek ebony wings, a long knife clutched in his hand.
Hatred burned around her heart when she saw Michael and her fingers called for blood. Gold flowered vines, such as had not been seen in the pits for thousands of years roiled from the ground. His name ripped from my throat in rage.
"Lucifer himself is flying through the sky and you're after Michael?" John spat in wonderment.
Her eyes didn't leave the golden winged angel and she growled, the vines twisting around her feet, "He murdered my kid."
A moment rumbled passed and John pressed his wide bladed, curved knife into her hand, "Better for fighting close up."
She glanced over at him and for half a second made eye contact with his ferocious, unforgiving eyes. She turned and handed him her spear, "Azazel was on Lucifer's orders."
Then vines exploded outward and careened through the air toward the fleeing archangel.
They caught around Michael's feet as Lucifer caught up to him and dragged him downward with Lucifer bearing down on top of him.
She leapt at him as he came down and tore at his feet, cutting into them with John's knife, pulling him to the ground. Lucifer knocked him to his stomach and she sprung on him, grinding her knees into his back. She had forgotten how the fire burned. She could smell him and hear the voice growling that had taunted her with the death of her son. She felt the rasping hatred that compounded everything she had ever felt. Her breath heaved so fast in and out of her she was almost light headed. She felt consumed.
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From the Journal of Bobby Winchester
I knew how my fight with Castiel was going to end. I had tried so many times to prevent it, to sneak out of dying, but I couldn't. I only had your dagger and it wasn't enough to kill him and stay on the safe end of his claws. I thought I could probably get the job done, but I wouldn't live to tell about it.
I let you down, Dad, you know. I should have killed Castiel after the first attack. I should have laid down my own life but I wanted to live.
And I couldn't turn my thoughts from Crowley. After you patched me up and burned me closed, you stayed. It was almost how it was before. I could close my eyes and pretended that it was like it was before. You were so nearly my Crowley. I thought that if I could kill Castiel, if I could crawl away from killing Castiel in mostly one piece. I thought that maybe I could tell you about what you and I were. What we did. I thought I could tell you about the Hell that we made together.
If I could just survive, perhaps I could have you again.
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She wanted more than to kill him. Her knees crushing into his back she hefted her grandfather's knife and hacked into the shoulder of his wings where they met his back, her other hand ripping at them.
Blood flowed hot across his back and laughter escaped out of her and she tore free one of his glorious, golden wings. Beneath her he screamed and her knife bit into his remaining wing. "DID YOU THINK YOU WOULD GO UNPUNISHED!" She shrieked.
Her voice was almost unrecognizable to her, it broke and spiked into high rasps and escaped out of her like a fugitive, "DID YOU THINK YOU WOULD NOT PAY FOR THE DEATH OF MY SON!"
She had longed for his blood to coat her hands for two thousand years. Every breath that she had taken had stung in loss and ache since her boy Dean Winchester had been dashed on the stones and for the first time since she had watched him die her vision was clear and the fog that had settled into her brain evaporated.
The spice of his blood lit her nostrils and, only halfway through the tendon and bone, she tore his last wing from him.
He was trying to push himself up but her vines had wrapped around him and so much blood was pouring from his ravaged wings his strength was failing.
She pulled his head back by the hair.
His voice was rough when he pleaded, "I would not have killed the boy, it was your Hades who made the deal! Release me!"
There was screaming and roaring around her but she was numb to it. She snarled into his ear, ignoring his bargaining, "When you spill the blood of a Winchester, you spill your own."
And she stabbed him through the spine. He screamed briefly and blood blossomed from the wound. But she was not finished. She wrenched the knife from his body and ground it into him again. She did not stop. His blood was covering her, her legs and pants sodden from kneeling over his bloodied back, her face speckled with what had spurted up. Her hands coated to the elbow and she continued, two handed, bearing the knife in with her entire weight again and again.
It was John who eventually pulled her off. He took the knife from her hand and steadied her by the shoulders.
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The Letter from the Bunker
I still had your journal, grampa's journal. I had filled it in with my own part and tucked it away in my jacket.
When Crowley burned my wounds healed and snuck into my room to lay against me as I slept I knew that I had done nearly what I set out to do. I had to only draw him in enough that my history would be tantalizing enough to get him through the journal.
He will be there when I die killing Cas. Killing Cas, of course, is just a public good, finish what I started, keep the world turning sort of things. But dying is my masterstroke.
Because I've got him. The lonely and blood drunk King of Hell will never leave my journal unread. If you read it, Dad, you know where I led him to Gilgash. My loyal Captain who was waiting to be found.
Then it will all come down to him. Because Lucifer was wrong. The locks on the doors don't need the blood of the person who drew the sigils to open. They need the blood of a hell king. A willing hell king.
That was the problem, he had to be willing. He had to offer it up. I think I got him, Dad. It's almost a shame, I was almost disappointed that I didn't get to sink a knife into him again. Dean's blood drown thousands of years of me loving that demon. I am not the forgiving sort. But Gil got to do it, and god knows he's been holding his breath for a chance at that.
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Around her the fighting had stopped. Golden vines were pulling themselves back into the ground, crushing the demons along with them. She hadn't even noticed.
Lucifer stood a few feet away, staring at her with wide eyes. Her ferocity had been too extreme and he had not even had a hand in the death of his brother. Vines that had been holding him back were just now falling from his wrists.
She closed the distance between them, her mind singular, "Is this enough of his blood, Lucifer! Can you do the spell?" Her blood was still pounding in her ears.
He sneered darkly at her, "Why did you hold me back! It was my right to kill my brother!"
She exploded toward him, "The spell! DO IT! BRING HIM BACK!" She struck his chest with her bare fists that were still dripping with Michael's blood and pounded against him, fire in her eyes, "BRING HIM BACK, LUCIFER!"
He caught her wrists and looked at her startled at her ferocity. "Yes, yes alright. I'll do the spell. That's enough blood."
He looked around and said, "Gilgash. Bring the body."
Gilgash, returned to his true form and looking desperately familiar came forward with a bundle wrapped in an old cape from the uniforms of the High Guard, "I rescued him, My Lady, his body, and laid it in the palace. I knew you would return for him."
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The Letter from the Bunker
I hope you're reading this tucked away safely where I asked Gabey to put you. I don't want you getting hurt while I clean up my mess.
The part with Crowley was hard to plan. Hard to push all the pieces into the right places. But I wanted him dead.
The next part is so much harder. I know what he is, Dad. I know what he did and I know what he became. I know. But it hurts.
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Lucifer took the bundle and opened its wrappings, revealing tiny savaged bones. He took Bobby's hand and smeared it down them, coating them in Michael's lifeblood. Under his breath he murmured in Enochian, growling, rumbling words. The blood curled around the bones and rose from them in shudders. He bent down and lay the bundle on the ground, stepping back and continuing to murmur. Bobby stood slightly behind him, pressed against his back and side, watching the corpse of her son.
During the course of ruling Hell, Bobby Winchester had told so many stories, it had begun as a survival attempt and became a quest to save the world from a terrible fate that had turned her into a god.
Tendons elongated and wrapped themselves in muscles and the bones shivered into configuration. Organs grew in his tiny open belly and skin tucked itself around him. Feathers and hair sprouted and his eyes filled with color.
It had gotten so turned around then and for a stretch, a long and warm beautiful stretch it was a story that held the demon Crowley above all others. It was a story about a broken and desperate love.
He lay still cold and unmoving, lashes spread out on his little eyelids. Finally. Finally finally, she saw him quake with his first heartbeat and his little mouth opened to gasp at the air.
It had been about pain. And surviving what could not be survived. It was about floods of romance and saving a people.
Lucifer was looking up and he saw John Winchester, the angel blade spear gripped in his hand. He turned to face the oncoming threat, pushing Bobby behind him.
She had almost thought it was a story about the choice between two different kinds of love.
Bobby wrenched his arms behind his back and pushed him forward, bearing his chest. Her spearhead, forged from an angel blade gouged through Lucifer's sternum as John charged. Light flickered behind his eyes and he looked back at her. He died with betrayal and surprise cut into his beautiful face.
But the story of Bobby Winchester, in the end, was about the same thing as it always is when it is about a Winchester.
She picked up little Dean, who had begun to cry.
Family.
AN: So there it is. All done! Thank all of you for bearing with me and sticking around until the end. I hope you liked it. I will be editing and updating it now that it is all done, so some time in the future it will be clean and nice.
On another note. I am no projectless. I have some ideas floating around my brain and if you want to add any weight to my decision making my choices are:
Reader/Gabriel trash
The other (immensely different) iteration of Bobby Winchester
One last time, Thank you all. Your reviews and encouragements mean so much to me.