Salt of the Earth
Title: Salt of the Earth
Author: gladdecease (pinch hit)
Recipient: metonomia
Characters/Pairings: Claire Novak, Castiel (implied throughout)
Rating: PG-13
Warnings/Spoilers: None.
Notes/Prompt: Claire, post-Rapture, becoming a hunter, and she knows Castiel is there even when she can't see him.
Summary: Claire finds her own way of doing God's will.
--
In the middle of all the chaos that happened the day demons stopped being stories, one image stands out clearly: her father, tired and pale in his dark dark suit, dumping an entire canister of salt across the doorway of the pantry. When she ran, the salt clung to her shoes, crunching with every step.
Years later, when the rest of that day has faded next to the brilliance of a few short moments of glory and light and rightness, she can still remember the crunch of salt, the traces of translucent powder she'd tracked into the big black car.
One of the brothers - Dean, the one who slit a man's throat to save her life - had looked at the mess and said that Daddy was smart, that a line of salt was a brick wall for demons. He'd smiled at Mom then, and made a joke about security systems or something that made her laugh, just a little, and Claire had felt better.
Though that wasn't actually Mom laughing, not really.
Claire doesn't like to remember that, the sting of her cheek as Mom glared at her with ink-dark eyes, so she focuses on what Dean had said. Salt stops demons. So does Dean's knife, the one that had glowed when he killed Uncle Roger, and so can Dean's brother, just by glaring at one.
She can't glare demons into submission, and she doesn't have Dean's knife, so salt will have to do.
--
She called the number the brothers gave to Mom once, not long after it happened. Just once, to ask in a quivering, shaky voice what happened to Daddy. How much longer Castiel would need him. When Daddy would be coming home.
Because Mom saying that Daddy went to Heaven wasn't enough. Wasn't true, not if Castiel still needed him. And if he didn't need him, then Daddy would be home again. Would be here, with her.
Dean saying nothing at all wasn't enough either, but it was a more honest answer.
--
She quickly learns that salt alone does very little good.
It's completely defensive, and while pure protection is enough for a scared mom and a confused little kid, a girl who wants to help, to fight, needs a bit more than that.
She needs a weapon.
Claire can't use a gun, not when the sight of one still reminds her of the awful thing that convinced her to let Castiel change her life. But a knife doesn't seem so bad.
A couple of carefully phrased searches on Google turn up a small silver blade with blessed wood in the handle that costs her allowance for half the year to buy, and the other half to get delivered secretly. The long wait and fear of discovery leave her impossibly nervous, to the point where she wonders if it was worth getting at all.
But holding it in her hand, she feels a thrill of rightness that she's only felt twice before, and when she throws it at a target the first time it hits dead center.
She knows this is the right thing to do.
--
Mom stopped praying, after everything. Claire used to think it was because of the demon, that Mom thought that being possessed meant she wasn't good enough for Heaven anymore.
When she turned eighteen, she realized that wasn't true. Mom had stopped praying for the same reason Daddy didn't say Grace when he came back. They'd given up on Heaven, on God.
She can't understand why.
--
Claire still prays. Sort of.
"Exorcizamus te," she begins slowly, watching the demon she's trapped with careful eyes. She recites the rest of the exorcism like she's done a hundred times before - omnis this, omnis that, omnis several other things, in nomine him, her, and it - and watches with no small satisfaction as the demon finally gives in and leaves the man, a cloud of ink-black smoke flying out of his mouth, then bursting into light.
Two feet behind her, a gun slides into its holster, and her partner for this case whistles long and low. "I've never seen an exorcism like that," he says, though he doesn't sound all that impressed.
"Just something I'm good at," she says. Too good, it seems.
He shakes his head. "I've seen people who were good at this before, little lady. You are something else."
"I'm not so little, Mr. Turner," Claire says. And she's not; she's taller than Mom ever was now, and old enough to do anything but run for President at this point. Not little in any way.
"You're little enough." He starts to clean up the evidence of their presence, leaving Claire to check on the man collapsed in the middle of the pentagram, a few grains of salt sticking to his cheek.
She checks his pulse. "Still alive," she says to Mr. Turner, who grunts in acknowledgment as he packs up his tools. Standing up, she grinds the important bits of devil's trap with the heel of her boot, until the salt is indistinguishable from sand, powder-fine. Satisfied, she looks up at Mr. Turner. Who is frowning at her, an old man's suspicious frown.
"What?"
"You do things a little differently, don't you?"
"I do things right," she insists. One of his eyebrows raise as if to ask, "is that so?" but he doesn't say anything, just picks up his bag and walks out the door. Claire follows him outside and asks, because she's curious, "Why do you still do this?"
He takes awhile to answer. "Because I know what's out there, and how to stop it, and I'd feel responsible if I didn't do something." He stares at her. "Why did you start?"
"Same reason," Claire lies. She has no true answer that he will understand.
--
Claire stopped praying like normal people around the same time she figured out why her mom had stopped. There wasn't much point in praying to God when He wasn't there to answer, or even to listen, so she'd gone to alternate sources.
"Castiel," she said the first time, kneeling by a hotel bedside. "I know you're busy up there, but if it's not too much trouble, could you take care of my mom? I worry about her. And, maybe, could you tell me what happened to my dad? And... I'm not sure what I should do now." Not sure if it was appropriate, she whispered an "amen" just in case.
That night, she dreamed of her dad's face, and of light, and of warm perfect rightness.
When she woke up she knew that Daddy was gone, that he was helping Castiel. That she could help too.
She opened the package she found on her doorstep with no return address listed, no signs of actually being mailed, to find a box of salt sitting inside, waiting for her.
Author: gladdecease (pinch hit)
Recipient: metonomia
Characters/Pairings: Claire Novak, Castiel (implied throughout)
Rating: PG-13
Warnings/Spoilers: None.
Notes/Prompt: Claire, post-Rapture, becoming a hunter, and she knows Castiel is there even when she can't see him.
Summary: Claire finds her own way of doing God's will.
--
In the middle of all the chaos that happened the day demons stopped being stories, one image stands out clearly: her father, tired and pale in his dark dark suit, dumping an entire canister of salt across the doorway of the pantry. When she ran, the salt clung to her shoes, crunching with every step.
Years later, when the rest of that day has faded next to the brilliance of a few short moments of glory and light and rightness, she can still remember the crunch of salt, the traces of translucent powder she'd tracked into the big black car.
One of the brothers - Dean, the one who slit a man's throat to save her life - had looked at the mess and said that Daddy was smart, that a line of salt was a brick wall for demons. He'd smiled at Mom then, and made a joke about security systems or something that made her laugh, just a little, and Claire had felt better.
Though that wasn't actually Mom laughing, not really.
Claire doesn't like to remember that, the sting of her cheek as Mom glared at her with ink-dark eyes, so she focuses on what Dean had said. Salt stops demons. So does Dean's knife, the one that had glowed when he killed Uncle Roger, and so can Dean's brother, just by glaring at one.
She can't glare demons into submission, and she doesn't have Dean's knife, so salt will have to do.
--
She called the number the brothers gave to Mom once, not long after it happened. Just once, to ask in a quivering, shaky voice what happened to Daddy. How much longer Castiel would need him. When Daddy would be coming home.
Because Mom saying that Daddy went to Heaven wasn't enough. Wasn't true, not if Castiel still needed him. And if he didn't need him, then Daddy would be home again. Would be here, with her.
Dean saying nothing at all wasn't enough either, but it was a more honest answer.
--
She quickly learns that salt alone does very little good.
It's completely defensive, and while pure protection is enough for a scared mom and a confused little kid, a girl who wants to help, to fight, needs a bit more than that.
She needs a weapon.
Claire can't use a gun, not when the sight of one still reminds her of the awful thing that convinced her to let Castiel change her life. But a knife doesn't seem so bad.
A couple of carefully phrased searches on Google turn up a small silver blade with blessed wood in the handle that costs her allowance for half the year to buy, and the other half to get delivered secretly. The long wait and fear of discovery leave her impossibly nervous, to the point where she wonders if it was worth getting at all.
But holding it in her hand, she feels a thrill of rightness that she's only felt twice before, and when she throws it at a target the first time it hits dead center.
She knows this is the right thing to do.
--
Mom stopped praying, after everything. Claire used to think it was because of the demon, that Mom thought that being possessed meant she wasn't good enough for Heaven anymore.
When she turned eighteen, she realized that wasn't true. Mom had stopped praying for the same reason Daddy didn't say Grace when he came back. They'd given up on Heaven, on God.
She can't understand why.
--
Claire still prays. Sort of.
"Exorcizamus te," she begins slowly, watching the demon she's trapped with careful eyes. She recites the rest of the exorcism like she's done a hundred times before - omnis this, omnis that, omnis several other things, in nomine him, her, and it - and watches with no small satisfaction as the demon finally gives in and leaves the man, a cloud of ink-black smoke flying out of his mouth, then bursting into light.
Two feet behind her, a gun slides into its holster, and her partner for this case whistles long and low. "I've never seen an exorcism like that," he says, though he doesn't sound all that impressed.
"Just something I'm good at," she says. Too good, it seems.
He shakes his head. "I've seen people who were good at this before, little lady. You are something else."
"I'm not so little, Mr. Turner," Claire says. And she's not; she's taller than Mom ever was now, and old enough to do anything but run for President at this point. Not little in any way.
"You're little enough." He starts to clean up the evidence of their presence, leaving Claire to check on the man collapsed in the middle of the pentagram, a few grains of salt sticking to his cheek.
She checks his pulse. "Still alive," she says to Mr. Turner, who grunts in acknowledgment as he packs up his tools. Standing up, she grinds the important bits of devil's trap with the heel of her boot, until the salt is indistinguishable from sand, powder-fine. Satisfied, she looks up at Mr. Turner. Who is frowning at her, an old man's suspicious frown.
"What?"
"You do things a little differently, don't you?"
"I do things right," she insists. One of his eyebrows raise as if to ask, "is that so?" but he doesn't say anything, just picks up his bag and walks out the door. Claire follows him outside and asks, because she's curious, "Why do you still do this?"
He takes awhile to answer. "Because I know what's out there, and how to stop it, and I'd feel responsible if I didn't do something." He stares at her. "Why did you start?"
"Same reason," Claire lies. She has no true answer that he will understand.
--
Claire stopped praying like normal people around the same time she figured out why her mom had stopped. There wasn't much point in praying to God when He wasn't there to answer, or even to listen, so she'd gone to alternate sources.
"Castiel," she said the first time, kneeling by a hotel bedside. "I know you're busy up there, but if it's not too much trouble, could you take care of my mom? I worry about her. And, maybe, could you tell me what happened to my dad? And... I'm not sure what I should do now." Not sure if it was appropriate, she whispered an "amen" just in case.
That night, she dreamed of her dad's face, and of light, and of warm perfect rightness.
When she woke up she knew that Daddy was gone, that he was helping Castiel. That she could help too.
She opened the package she found on her doorstep with no return address listed, no signs of actually being mailed, to find a box of salt sitting inside, waiting for her.