AN: Some pizza, flirting, a nod to Elvis, whiskey with a schmoop chaser and ta-da the story's a wrap! I'll also post a "chapter" with all the prompts and who supplied them. For everyone who participated, thank you so much for taking part in my silly story. There are a few prompts I'm not sure I did justice to, but I did manage to incorporate all of them in one way or another and it was a lot of fun! It's something I may well do again someday.

Janice is a fantastic beta! I'm lucky to have her.

* * *

"This is a very strange place for a picnic," Barb observed. They had laid out a big wool blanket that smelled a little bit like gasoline from years of living in the trunk in front of the schoolhouse where they'd camped.

"We don't have any good explanations for the cops or anyone else about what happened," Sam explained, which was good, because Dean had just taken a huge bite of a slice of Penny's excellent super deluxe pizza. "So we're staying out of sight until we skip town." Yeah, that didn't touch the rest of what was weird about their little meal, but whatever.

Sam and Dean had told the hostages that they were safe to come out, gotten rid of Vaughn and all of the hellhound bodies that they could, and returned Chloe to a very grateful Cindy and her husband. There wasn't much else they could do. Besides, they still had to free Hiram and his friends.

Dean looked over at the ghost, who was staring moodily at his own resting place through the iron fence. He'd been pensive since his minor blow-up at Vaughn, seeming embarrassed about it. Sam had kindly told him that it wasn't his fault and even apologized for dragging him along on the hunt. He'd thanked the ghost for his help and, yeah, Dean had too. He wasn't a bad dude for a guy who'd been planted like a hundred years ago.

By now, he'd heard the story of Hiram coming along. Apparently, when Dean had dropped off Sam here, geekboy had had the idea to talk to the restless ghosts and see if anyone wanted to hitch a ride and help out. He'd even had Hiram's pocket watch with him. (Apparently, Sam had found it in the castle's master bedroom and it had still been in his jeans pocket when he got dressed at the hospital.) Since Hiram still considered himself the owner of the castle and scion of the family, he'd agreed eagerly. He was probably also really, really bored.

Dean waved Hiram over. Why not? They already had a motley crew. Cas was slowly eating a piece of pizza with a thoughtful expression, like he was analyzing the ingredients or something. Crowley had disdained their offering and was drinking something out of a red Solo cup, which amused Dean although he really did not want to know what was in said cup. (Dean didn't know why the two were still there, considering how dedicated they were to the Satan hunt, but he didn't care enough to ask.) Barb was sitting cross-legged like someone forty years younger, nibbling on a breadstick. Sometimes she picked a piece of sausage off the pizza on the plate next to her and fed it to the Doberman-ish helldog whose head was resting on her knee. Barb had declared the creature a female, named it "Tulip" of all things, and decided that it was going home with her. Though it was the definition of docile with Barb, Dean could hardly think of a less appropriate name, but in their entire acquaintance, he had not yet succeeded in talking Barb out of anything she felt strongly about.

Two Hunters, the world's most bad-ass den mother, an angel, a ghost, a hybrid hellhound, and the King of Hell sat down for pizza…possibly even weirder than eating pizza with Death.

"Hey, Hiram, how come so many of you guys are, you know, awake and not moving on?" Dean asked around another mouthful. Sam smacked his arm, probably thinking that he was being insensitive. But Hiram didn't seem like he'd be upset by stuff like that. He'd already willingly shared other stuff that Dean had asked, including the fact that he'd died of what he called an inflamed throat.

Hiram drifted over – he'd been acting less and less like he had a corporeal body. It was probably high time to send him on. Since Barb was leaving soon, the brothers had decided to spare her the sight of dug up caskets and burning bodies.

"My great-nephew Eugene dabbled in witchy claptrap," Hiram reported. "He is the one who threw a rock at you. He's always been rather immature. In any case, he had hoped to speak to his cousin who had passed on and found some spell to do so. Except it raised all of us and killed him. And here we all remain." He waved toward the graveyard. "Ironically, Mabel was so angry that she never speaks to him at all."

Dean squinted toward the tiny cemetery which was covered in what looked like wisps of fog. He thought he could make out the form of a young woman in a large bonnet sitting on the ground with her arms crossed. But maybe he was imagining things.

"We might be able to re-consecrate the ground and send you all on that way," Sam suggested thoughtfully. He looked at Hiram, probably thinking about how awkward it would be to dig up and burn the guy's body right in front of him.

Dean brightened. That would also be a whole lot easier. He didn't count exactly how many headstones there were (or ask if everyone was hanging around), but there had to be close to twenty. Even though the graves were all old enough that there probably weren't any vaults to bust through and it was unlikely they were the full six feet down, digging them all up would've been a truly massive amount of work. He might have even considered asking (maybe even begging) Cas and Crowley to stay and help.

"I can help with that," Cas said as if following Dean's train of thought. "I should be able to consecrate the ground."

"Really?" Barb asked, rubbing Tulip's ears as the mutt drooled on her knee. "How does that work if you've fallen?"

Cas looked frustrated. "I fell. That's different from being fallen."

"How? You fell from Heaven, right?"

Crowley was smirking. "Yeah, how is it different? I mean, you've certainly rebelled often enough. And now you're working with me."

"That's – it's for a good cause," Cas argued.

"You know, neither of you is what I would've expected," Barb pointed out mildly. So mildly that Dean knew she about to a lay a zinger. He'd been on the receiving end of her insightful (and pointed) pragmatism before. "Castiel, you are much more aware of shades of gray than I'd've thought. And you understand that you can get a lot more done when you can weigh relative good."

Cas frowned like he was going to argue but Barb wasn't finished.

"Crowley, you seem to consider Castiel and the Winchesters like friends, something most demons must not be capable of. And a lot of what you do isn't specifically motivated by causing pain or misery or whatever it is demons are supposed to like."

Now Crowley was frowning too. Dean was watching with delight, and he could see Sam and even Hiram listening as well, each with a small smile on his face.

Barb wiped her fingers delicately on a napkin and resumed stroking Tulip's ears. "It seems like you've both been affected by humans. Changed by being around them – us, I suppose. Actually, it seems like you'd both really like to be human."

Both the angel and the demon stared at her open-mouthed with shock.

The high-pitched honk of a horn sadly interrupted what they might have said.

"Ah, that must be my ride. Judy's an airhead, but she certainly can read a map. Sam, dear, could you go just down to the curve in the path and direct her here, please?" Barb started working her way out from under the dog. Her husband had been right in the middle of haying, and therefore one of her sisters had volunteered to come and bring Barb back to her car. Her nuttiest sister.

Sam hopped up and hurried to obey. Barb somehow had that effect on people. Hiram moved out of sight, as they'd discussed before. Hopefully Judy didn't look too closely at the cemetery.

The car that rolled into sight, almost too wide for the narrow path, definitely fit its driver. It was a powder blue 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz convertible, complete with whitewall tires, a hot pink interior, and huge tail fins.

Judy's frizzy white hair was even wilder than usual. Her long skirt was adorned with sunflowers, her shirt with dizzying purple stripes. She was out of the car almost before it had stopped. Tulip had stood up and Judy immediately began to pet the dog's head and baby-talk it, not intimidated by the fact that its head was level with her chest.

Still petting the dog, which was leaning against her now, Judy looked at the group in front of her. "Barbie, how is it that you are always surrounded by beautiful men?" she demanded.

Dean rolled his eyes. Judy was an incorrigible flirt who'd once made Bobby blush.

Crowley stood and gave Judy one of his smarmiest smiles. "Charmed, my dear," he purred.

Barb, who occasionally acted like a 12-year-old, made a puking sound.

"Are you an FBI agent, too?" Judy asked. She knew that wasn't really what Sam and Dean were, but she was good at pretending otherwise.

"Yeah, he's Agent Bieber," Dean cut in, still salty about the alias he'd been stuck with.

"Crowley," the demon corrected, taking Judy's hand and kissing it. "And who are you, Beautiful?"

"I'm Barb's sister Judy," the older woman answered with a grin just as mischievous as Crowley's. "But I can be whoever you want me to be."

Barb had had enough. "He is not a nice man, Judy," she warned.

"Technically, he's not even a man," Dean muttered under his breath to Sam who just rolled his eyes.

"Well, a girl like me doesn't always want nice," Judy answered, and Cas made a strangled sound next to Dean.

"You can't –" the angel started, clearly worried about the demon making a connection with the not-so-innocent woman.

"We need to get going," Barb interrupted briskly. "We need to get to my car before it gets dark out. Your night vision is terrible, and my life has been in danger enough lately."

"Hey! I haven't been in an accident in 30 years or so," Judy complained.

"That's because everyone sees that boat coming and gets out of your way." Barb was apparently finished with the conversation. She gathered her purse and called the dog to her.

"Another time, handsome," Judy drawled. "But if you're lonesome, Blue Eyes there keeps staring at you." She winked at Cas, who scowled in a way that made him look like an angry toddler.

"I would much prefer to never have to see him again!" he announced.

"See? He likes you." Judy sent a jaunty wave toward Sam and Dean. "Nice to see you two again. Be sure to come see Barbie soon – there isn't nearly enough eye candy by us. Bring your friends along!"

Judy executed a very large three-point turn, nearly scuffing the front bumper on the iron fence of the cemetery and coming even closer to the corner of the old schoolhouse with the back one. She also ran over a corner of the picnic blanket and came close enough to Baby that Dean felt his blood pressure rising. But then the two women and the dog disappeared down the path, the former arguing about Judy's manners and taste in men until they were out of sight.

Dean considered warning Crowley to stay away from Judy, but he was sure the demon was just messing with them. Pretty sure. And anyway, he had far bigger things to deal with. He and Cas probably shouldn't have stuck around Yakima as long as they had.

They stayed long enough for Cas to help with the re-consecration of the little cemetery. Just before they were finished, Sam turned to Hiram.

"Thank you," he said solemnly. "You didn't have to help, but you really stepped up."

"And saved our bacon a couple times," Dean added since he didn't mind giving credit where credit was due.

"One last adventure," Hiram said with a smile. "Though I admit, I am looking forward to being at rest."

Sam held out a shiny gold pocket watch. "I'll make sure to get this back to your family," he promised.

"Actually, they have quite a few of my things," Hiram demurred. "Books, portraits, and so forth. I think you two should keep it...er, if you'd like it. Consider it a gift."

"Wow. Thank you. Are you sure?" Sam asked.

"Dude, that's awesome." Dean looked at the watch, still holding time. There was an etched depiction of a tree on the front and Hiram's initials on the back.

Hiram gave them a smile and a salute. "My pleasure. Farewell, gentlemen."

* * *

Several Months Later

"I'm going to check the P.O. box," Dean said. He wanted to ask Sam to come along but didn't know if that would be weird. For six long weeks, he hadn't seen his brother, hadn't seen anything except the walls of his little cell, then he'd expected to die at Billie's hand.

He was still feeling off. And it was really hard to let Sam out of his sight. He might have felt like a creeper for sometimes getting up at night and looking in Sam's room to make sure he was there except that he'd caught Sam doing the same thing to him.

It kind of felt like they'd never get normal back. But they'd been through worse. Dean was confident that this, too would pass. But in the meanwhile, he really hoped Sam would come with him.

"Oh, I've been meaning to go into town," Sam said, hastily closing the book he'd been staring at. He, like Dean, was a little extra jumpy, a little more likely to get claustrophobic in the bunker than before they'd been locked up. Maybe he needed to be with Dean too.

They stopped in a seed store because Sam was a weirdo who was convinced that he could grow some herb things by the back door of the bunker, grabbed a few staples at the grocery store, then swung by the post office.

Sadly, Derrick, who always looked squinty-eyed at the Winchesters, was working. "Oh. You two," he said by way of greeting. "You have some unclaimed packages. I nearly sent them back." He said it as if they'd personally offended him by not picking the packages up earlier.

"They aren't unclaimed anymore," Dean said back before Sam could be placatory. He wasn't a big fan of Derrick, who didn't like anyone he'd known for fewer than 20 years. "Could you, I dunno, get them?"

Sam didn't even scold Dean for being rude.

The first package turned out to be a fuel pump for a gorgeous old Bentley they'd found in the bunker's garage. Dean had completely forgotten he'd ordered it. But the second package was from Barb's address in Iowa. There was a note from her saying she'd received the enclosed box and was forwarding it to them...and they should come visit soon.

The smaller box was postmarked Chicago and had a hand-written letter inside.

Dear Sam and Dean,

In light of everything that has happened, I've learned that life is too short to stay in a job you hate just because of the money. Since I last saw you, I have finished helping my boss create the perfect wedding for his daughter (not at a castle) and assisted in overseeing the repairs to Congdon's Castle as a favor from my boss to his friends who own it.

Then I quit. I moved to Chicago with my fiance Jake and, having lost my taste for elaborate weddings, got married on the shore of Lake Michigan with Jake's teammates and a handful of family and friends in attendance. It was perfect.

I am cherishing life, having twice faced supernatural threats, and twice been rescued by the two of you. I know that you have steadfastly refused any sort of payment or gifts or anything more than my deepest and most sincere thanks, but I have sent you a couple things that I came across and I think you might appreciate.

If there is ever any way that I can possibly help you, please let me know.

All my best,

Charlene

Dean carefully unwrapped the first item and cheered. It was the crossbow. "Dude, I love this thing!"

"There's a bunch of the bolts, too," Sam reported. "And this." He pulled out the Winchester 84 with something like reverence. It was completely repaired, a task that must have taken a lot of money and an extremely talented gunsmith. It wasn't a replacement, either, because JW was still scratched into the bottom of the stock. Sam traced the letters with his finger, looking a little emotional.

"Man, remember that hunt?" Dean asked quickly, before he could get maudlin too. "It was kinda nice to not be facing Luci or something world-ending, ya know?"

Sam laughed. "That was a terrible hunt! Gangsters, hellhounds, a demon."

"Ghosts too," Dean reminded him. "Don't forget ol' Hiram."

"Or Barb in the Maserati."

"Or Crowley flirting with Judy."

Sam snorted. "Don't remind me! It was kind of like that time Bobby's neighbor came over while we were staying there and he was trying to convince her to leave without telling her why."

"Oh, yeah!" Dean grabbed the whiskey decanter and a couple glasses. He poured a few fingers in each. "She was totally there for a booty call." He shuddered at the thought of all the innuendos the woman had thrown around while the very confused boys listened from the top of the stairs, too young to understand what was happening. "I don't know if I ever saw Bobby get that red again."

"I can remember once," Sam responded, accepting the drink and leaning back in his chair. He finally looked relaxed. "Remember when he screwed up a booby-trap and almost blew himself up? And Dad and Pastor Jim had to pick buckshot out of his ass!"

Dean threw his head back and laughed. "I forgot all about that! I think I repressed it!"

Sam smiled at Dean, a real smile, not forced or faked. "Here's to remembering the good stuff...and forgetting the sight of Bobby's ass."

Dean clinked his glass with Sam's. "Hear, hear!"

* * *

AN: Confession – I couldn't stand the thought of them losing the rifle after I made it all sentimental! Also, I was worried that I couldn't reasonably get Judy into the story until I realized that Barb had no transportation unless she was willing to take King of Hell taxi service.

The "nod to Elvis" was that he drove a 1959 Cadillac Eldorado, though I think his was actually pink.

Long Live BRUCAS: Thank you! I hate "killing" monsters that look like animals, so I had to have Crowley take care of them. I'm afraid I kind of skipped the clean-up and what they told all the people who were affected by the hellhounds and helldogs. I'd love to hear what people would say about an ambulance on the roof of the castle.

Jenjoremy: Thank you! I like the image of Sam stuffing demon trap bullets down Vaughn's throat. Also, I'm way too amused by having Barb call out Cas and Crowley. I missed my opportunity for somebody to refer to one or both as Pinocchio and wanting to be a "real boy."

Christine: Yes! They definitely were saying 'I love you' with their insults. You're so right. Thanks for your nice words. This story didn't go at all the way I thought it would, so it's lovely to hear that you liked it anyway. I'm sorry I didn't get the Cas and Barb interaction in but I couldn't make it fit the way I wanted it to. I don't know if I did your prompt justice, either, but hopefully you got a smile or two from the story anyway!

Colby's girl: I stole the angel fish line from another commenter. Also, the guys lying on the grass talking about the hunt was such a last-minute addition that I put it in there after Janice had already finished beta-ing and had sent the chapter back. I just thought of it while trying to fall asleep and had to add it. Thank you!

muffinroo: Gotta love badasseryness! And sassy Sam is always fun. I really need to write more Crowley, first because Crowley's awesome, but second because he brings out Sam's snark like nobody else. As I just wrote above, the scene lying on the grass was one of those last-second additions, but I'm so glad you liked it. I adore those little bro-ments.

Timelady66: I might have gone to my favorite thesaurus and picked out the most pretentious word for wimpy that I could find. It felt very Crowley to me. Chickenshit probably fits Vanth/Vaughn better! Yup, I totally threw an ambulance at Sam. It's too much fun to invent new ways for him to be in danger. I think I need to write more Cas and Crowley...they are a riot together! There's a moment in the show where Crowley says, "Together again," and Cas says "yay" in a totally flat voice. I adore that!

Spnlady: Not quite the ending, but thank you! I will definitely keep writing.

Visionary: First of all, thank you so much for such a kind and lovely review. It absolutely made my day to read it! I'm so glad you find the flying ambulance and other crazy things I throw into the stories unique and interesting rather than too weird! It's always fun to think of a new situation to put them into or a super odd new kind of threat. I had to learn that it's not only acceptable to devote some space to the small in-between moments between our boys but that many readers seem to enjoy it. Thank you for that! The overprotectiveness is such a key part of their dynamic...I love giving it "screen time." The scene with the boys going over the hunt together was a last-second add but it's personally my favorite part of this chapter. Anyway, I so appreciate your thoughtful and helpful words.

Kathy: An almost-flashback, huh? There's a snippet of a flashback in this chapter too because I don't think I'm capable of writing an SPN story without including at least Bobby's name. You know what? I "saved" the rifle even before I read your comment about it! Like so often, you and I are on the same page. Actually, I'm think I'm going to do a one-shot Weechesters story specifically for you next. Stay tuned. I don't know what made me think of having a demon swallow the devil's trap bullets but I figured that in the body was in the body one way or another, right? LOL. I am so glad that you liked these last few chapters so much, and grateful that you always let me know what you enjoyed.

Luckyme1: Thank you! I read some of your comments on my other stories too and I appreciate every single one. I had to laugh about 'detritus.' I have a bad habit of getting stuck on a word. It was facetious then accoutrements. Maybe I need to branch out with flotsam or miscellany or something instead of detritus! LOL! Thanks again for your kind comments.