BUS STATION - KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI
Getting close to noon, it was a warm and sunny day in KC. Dean and Sam had left the Greyhound terminal and boarded a bus leaving for Sioux Falls. Even though it was practically departure time, there were only two other passengers on the bus. The boys took a couple of seats in the very back, Dean taking the window seat.
Sam peered at the sky outside. "You see that?" he said.
"See what?" Dean asked. "There's nothing-."
"Exactly," Sam said. "It's January in the Midwest and the sky is blue? It's warm out. An hour ago, we were in Kansas and it was raining death."
"Think there's anything to it?" Dean asked. "Me, I stopped quoting Chinatown years ago."
Sam sighed. "Yeah, I'm kinda starting to not care anymore," he said.
Dean snickered. "One of these days it's gonna be raining frogs," Dean said. "Won't even give a crap. Back on topic. Whose ass do we kick about this friggin'... Time Crotch, anyway?"
"Okay, we are not calling it that," Sam said. "Also, it kinda sounds like it was your ass."
"You believe Crowley?" Dean asked.
"We have nothing else to go on," Sam said. "All we can do is play 'what do we know' with half a deck."
"Yeah, right," Dean said concededly. "Okay, where do we start? We know we're not in the past-. We're not, right? I mean, Bobby's alive, but I'm still seeing all the same billboards. It's 2013."
"Seems like," Sam said.
"And I allegedly did... something that created a parallel universe," Dean said.
"Not parallel," Sam said. "Like, two equal branches, forking out from the same fixed point."
"Like a Time Crotch," Dean said smugly.
Sam glared at the seat in front of him, his mouth shrinking practically into a dot.
"No," Sam said, but moved on quickly. "We also know that, in this version of the present, we died during the Apocalypse."
"How do we even have a phone plan here?" Dean asked.
"Off-topic," Sam said.
"Right," Dean said. "I saw two angel stains at the cemetery-."
"Michael and Lucifer," Sam said.
"-So we know we took those goons down with us," Dean said.
They took a beat to be kind of pleased with themselves. In this version of events, they killed Michael and Lucifer. Nice.
"I'm guessin' Bobby can fill us in on the rest of the story," Dean said. "I mean, whatever changed, it sounds like it happened pretty close to zero hour. Or else more would be different."
"Or less," Sam added.
"Right," Dean said. "Then all we gotta do is..."
"Kill Crowley?" Sam asked. "'Cause we've been so rad at that for the past four years-. Well, three and a half."
"I thought it was two and a half," Dean said.
"You forgot about the year you were in Purgatory," Sam said.
"Yeah, but then what about the year I spent with Ben and Lisa?" Dean asked. "Are we just gonna split the difference?"
They sat for a moment and considered it, frowning thoughtfully.
"Off-topic," Sam said.
"So what if we don't play?" Dean said. "We don't find Crowley, we don't off ourselves. It's a bad pitch - I say we don't swing."
"Was that even a question?" Sam asked.
"I'm just sayin'," Dean said. "What happens if we don't? Based on what we know."
"Best case scenario?" Sam said. "We'll be stuck in this dimension forever and Crowley still wins."
"Awesome," Dean said bitterly. "What's the worst case scenario?"
"The... two dimensions try to occupy the same space at the same time," Sam said. "Both telescope. Time either stops, or it comes undone, and we're talking galactic annihilation."
Dean stared at Sam for a moment. "And which episode of Doctor Who are you basing that on?" he asked.
Sam looked a little embarrassed. "The Wedding of River Song," he said. "But, to whatever you're about to say: Alex Kingston."
Dean thought about it. "Touché," he said.
The bus finally started moving, pulling out onto the road. Dean squinted out the window as something caught his eye: a billboard - black with red lettering, in something very like the Hellraiser font. At the center, it read "Season Three" and beneath that, "Revelation 13:5."
SIOUX FALLS - SUNDOWN
Sioux Falls, the Winchester's one-time second home. The whole town was blanketed in ice, just as cold and gray as January in the Midwest ought to be. What little noise you might hear on a busy day was drown out by high winds and snow-plows. After about six hours on a bus and fifteen minutes in a cab, the boys arrived at Bobby's and saw something that scared the hell out of them.
Even at it's best, Bobby Singer's place had been a ramshackle nightmare for decades - the way there wasn't a dividing line between the giant salvage yard and the shuttered old house. Cars piled on top of cars. A place for everything and everything wherever Bobby felt like putting it, mind your own damn business. Even after the rottweiler had been gone for years, even after the house had burned down, it had still been a place that people avoided walking past at night. Without mentioning it to each other, Sam and Dean both held the same sad, little hope - that the house would be intact again, still spooky and cluttered, yet occupied and comforting. Like they remembered. But too much had changed there. They couldn't help feeling for a moment like they'd somehow forgotten the address.
The fence around the property was replaced with hedges and there were lampposts every so often to kill the gloom. The old garages were still outback, but the junkers were all gone - which seemed like an impossible feat, even with three and a half years to do it. There was too much snow to tell, but it seemed likely there was grass in the yard again. A neatly shoveled circular driveway led to the front of the house, there was a set of white wicker furniture on the porch and the roof was re-shingled. The house was brightly painted now. Friggin' yellow. The only clue to whose house it might be now was the beautifully restored blue Chevelle parked in the driveway. But the thought that this was where Bobby lived in this dimension was too much. The boys looked properly wigged.
Sam shook his head, at a loss. "I don't know," he answered.
"I didn't say anything," Dean said.
"Really?" Sam asked. "'Cause I could've sworn I just heard someone say, 'what the hell'."
"It's okay, man," Dean said anxiously. "I heard it, too."
They walked up the driveway... of the cheerful, well-kept house. God, it was weird. Like a flash-back dream with bad intel. Someone turned off a light in the second story window and had moved the curtain aside, just a bit. They were being watched.
"What did you say to Bobby on the phone," Dean asked.
"Nothing," Sam said.
"Bobby was there and you didn't say anything?" Dean asked.
"I called my dead friend on the phone and he answered," Sam said. "I panicked."
Meanwhile, the front door swung open and someone stepped out onto the porch. It was Bobby, but again, some things had changed. He was a lot more groomed than the man they knew. Not the superficial version he broke out to impersonate law-enforcement, but full-on, haircut every week, "I got a beard-trimmer for Christmas" kind of groomed. He still dressed like an old redneck, but his clothes were newer, in better condition. He'd gotten some color, too. But he seemed more aged than he ought to have been by now. He had the sad, decrepit look of an ex-president. He also had a shotgun. A nice one, with a big, shiny suppressor. Sweet, but off-topic.
"Took you long enough," Bobby said. There was hostility in his voice. A severe smile on his face. He was so pissed off, it could count as a super-power.
He pulled the gun to his shoulder and aimed vaguely at Sam and Dean. They put their hands up.
"Bobby?" Dean said, trying not to freak out. "It's us, Bobby, we can explain."
"Yeah, I bet you can," Bobby said. "I don't know who your boss is, but tell him I said 'nice try'."
They braced themselves. Bobby aimed at Dean. But before he could pull the trigger, someone ran out ran out onto the porch.
"Bobby, stop!" Castiel shouted. "It's them."