SOME PEOPLE HAVE REAL PROBLEMS--3/10 (Supernatural: Crowley, Growly, Sam, Cas, Dean)
Title: Some People Have Real Problems
Fandom: Supernatural
Word count (total fic): 20,353
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: None, really, maybe some Dean/Cas hints. Don't hold the lack of pairing against it, though--If you're a dog lover, you'll probably like this story...
Summary: When Crowley's meatsuit mutinies it's up to Castiel and the Winchesters to help The King Of Hell him get back into his favourite blood and guts condominium. What starts off as a seemingly easy assignment quickly turns into a drama about a dead dog and a haphazard pile of memories. Putting a leash on Crowley's body proves harder than expected.
Notes: Takes place after season five, AU afterwards--Sam was rescued from Hell in much the same manner as Dean. Otherwise it's canon.
This was written for the crowley_bigbang on livejournal. I didn't quite make it for the official track, so this is the unofficial posting :P.
Dean Winchester was not grasping the gravity of the situation. Sam, his moose-like brother, stood over him in brooding certainty that something in the universe as they knew it was Seriously Wrong, but Dean...No, Dean Winchester was far more content to stare into the pink and purple Little Mermaid hand-held mirror Castiel had borrowed from a young Motel #8 guest and snicker at Crowley's scowling face. "I'm thinking this pink is totally your colour." He choked on his laughter as he held the mirror up, his fingers testing the two day old stubble at his chin. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the fairest of them all. .."
"Don't worry, I'll make sure you eat a poisoned apple," Crowley shot back.
Winchesters. Bloody bollocks Winchesters. Crowley tried to push his way out of the edges of his makeshift prison but there was no escaping the Disney influence on his inner surroundings. Little clams began singing in the background. "That body of mine has a lot of explaining to do," Crowley growled. An animated fluorescent green shrimp pinched him on the nose and giggled as it swam away. "When I get it back, damned if I'm going to make it suffer..."
"You'll be the one suffering," Sam reminded him. "You live in it."
Two poisoned apples, then. "Bollocks," Crowley said.
Sam frowned, his usual neanderthal stance that indicated he was thinking deeply. As the more cerebral of the Winchester duo, he was certainly devoid of constructive answers, a fact that was beginning to nag Crowley's sense of hope of getting back on track and regaining his new post. He longed for those days that stretched into infinity where he had a physical form to prop him up and enjoy a good scotch, the stretch of a comfortable couch and a warm fire doing miraculous things for his twisted soul. Yes, he'd been complaining that he was bored and his posting was a bit more of a prison than he'd anticipated and not the challenge he'd wanted. Yet things were worse because here he was, in a prison that was even more stifling and infuriating, this time with little blue seahorses kicking him in the ass and chortling at him with a musical whinny. The huge, sanctimonious face of Dean Winchester smirked back at him. If only he could reach out of this mirror and choke the little corporeal bastard!
"So your body just dumped you." Sam paced the room as he thought this over, his long shadow cutting across the curtains in the front window.
"That's what I said."
"There has to be a reason. You're sure it didn't have a soul? I thought you invaded the body of a literary agent?"
"I rest my case," Crowley said. He gave Sam's still questioning gaze a frustrated groan. "The guy was already on his way out. He ate too much red meat, he led a sedentary lifestyle and he drank like a fish. He stroked out before I could even get the paper signed, and since I was already in the place, I took over the lease."
"So, a body with no soul."
"No soul."
Sam continued to pace the room, an action that made Crowley increasingly nervous. He wanted to shout at the Goliath to quit wearing a hole in the already threadbare rug, but he also knew that Sam Winchester needed this physical push to make his brain juices come to life. A starfish gently nudged Crowley's elbow and he grabbed it with his right hand, choking the squeaking life out of it as he punched the stupid happy face with blunt force trauma. "You going to sing now, you little happy bastard? Oh look, Uncle Crowley got your tongue--YOU GOING TO SING NOW?"
The animated starfish tried to wrench itself free from his iron grip, the tongue hanging from his other fist in wriggling, gory shreds.
"Geez, Crowley, get a grip." Dean propped the Little Mermaid mirror against a pillow on the unmade bed. "You don't have to go all rageaholic on the thing. Come on, man, it's the happiest place on Earth."
"Goddamned cheerful little fucker!" Crowley punched the starfish twice more before leaving its battered animated yellow body bruised blue and purple. "I just want my damned body back! How the hell would you feel?"
"So let me get this straight." Sam pulled up a dining chair from the breakfast nook and straddled it, giving himself a good view of Crowley in the small hand mirror. "Your body has no soul, not even really a mind at this point. It's running on the fumes of what you left behind in it, and it's kind of going through automatic motions, like showering and shaving and getting dressed--all the mundane stuff."
"That's right. It's nothing without me."
Sam shook his head. "No. That can't be true. Because it knew to leave you behind for some reason, and I'm guessing it expelled you because, in its own way, the body felt you weren't supposed to be there or..." Sam's eyes instantly lit up with understanding, "...Or something was triggered. Like in its memory."
Dean clicked his fingers in agreement. "Organ donors."
"If a body memory was triggered, it could react in much the same way as its host might have, with its needs being met on the cellular level..."
"What the hell are you idiots talking about?" Crowley's booming voice shattered Sebastian's hearing, leaving the crab bleeding from his little crustacean ears.
To Crowley's shock it was Dean who explained it best. "There this phenomenon that's been recorded, where when people get organ transplants, like a heart or a lung or an eye or whatever, they can actually experience personality changes. These changes are caused by the memory in the cells of the donors interacting with the body of the new host. Like, this one guy, he hated swimming and yet when he got a donor heart from a guy who was part of a professional swim team you couldn't keep him away from the water. There's all kinds of weird things, like suddenly liking anchovies where you hated them before because the donor used to like them, or watching certain movies or even having memories of places that you've never been."
"That could be what's happening here." Sam focused on Crowley, edging his chair forward. "Tell us exactly what you were doing before you were separated from your body."
Crowley shrugged. "I was just sitting by the fire watching the furnace repairman roast."
"Typical day," Dean agreed.
"For the King of Hell, yes," Crowley testily replied. "I was bored, actually. I was thinking about how this promotion has left me rather empty, the whole concept of Hell being relegated into this dull miasma of petty wants and needs that have no meaning. The apocalypse business left me with a bit of ennui, all that adrenaline and then...Nothing." He gave the Winchesters far too serious gazes a careful perusal of his own. "I'm sure you understand."
"I do," Dean said, surprising him.
Crowley kicked the corpse of the starfish for good measure. It squeaked like a dog toy. "So I read the paper. The Dear Granny section."
"Dear Granny?" Sam choked on his words. "You actually read Dear Granny?"
"She had some very good advice about investment opportunities last week." Crowley set his jaw, his pride in his secret enterprise showing through. "I find the conflicts rather amusing."
"She's a demon," Dean said, and Crowley's black heart fell. "Put her on the list for execution when we get a chance. So--You were reading the exploits of the depressed and pathetic while you were feeling depressed and pathetic and then...."
"I don't know." Crowley paced in his mirror prison, his hands deep in the virtual pockets of his trousers. Sea urchins and gold coins littered them and he emptied the pockets with a new slew of curses. "I read Dear Granny and then I called over Growley and--No. I read an article, just a little side story. Someone had drowned their neighbour's dog."
The motel room was quiet for a long moment.
"That's fucked up," Dean said.
"No kidding. Who does that to a *dog*?"
"Son of a bitch," Sam said, his face twisted into an angry sneer. "When you catch that guy you need to rip off his toes and feed them to his anus."
Castiel was wide eyed as he stared at the two Winchesters and the small hand mirror holding Crowley. "I don't understand. That's quite a severe punishment for harming something that isn't human."
"It's a *dog*, man," Dean said, and glared at Castiel as though he'd just suggested they eat a baby.
"Castiel, you can't possibly think that someone doing that to a dog should get off easy." Sam's hands were on his hips, and he was looming above the angel, his massive height seeming to dwarf him. From Crowley's perspective, he certainly looked as though he was shrinking inside of that floppy trenchcoat. "Haven't you heard the term 'man's best friend'?"
Castiel was still confused. "I don't understand. Many people die from dog bites and attacks every year, they are more a nuisance than an asset."
"Oh, I knew it!" Crowley gloated from within his pink rimmed cage. "He's a cat person!"
"No." Castiel gave confused glances to all of them yet again. "I admit that rumbling thing they do with their stomachs can be quite enticing, but I in no way resemble a cat person."
"A cat person." Dean shook his head, staring at Castiel with naked disappointment. "That explains so much."
"But I'm not."
"Hold on, let's back this up." Sam was up and pacing again, his massive height monstrous in the low glow of the lamp at Dean's bedside. His brow was hooded in shadows as the thoughts ran furiously through his moosehead brain. Or so Crowley thought that was how it worked, for all he knew it was a pile of moths playing poker in there, he had no evidence to the contrary. Sam hadn't been quite the same since he'd been pulled out of Hell, though why the experience was more frightening for him than his brother was another mystery. Two angels had given their lives to snatch Sam Winchester out of Hell before he was chained into the cage with Lucifer and Michael. Knowing their Sammy, it was all about the guilt. Crowley couldn't help but inwardly smile at this.
"It's about the dog," Sam said, certain.
It was Crowley's turn to be confused. "What about the poor dog?"
"The body, your body--it didn't react to anything else, it wasn't until you read that article about the dog being drowned. Tell me," Sam was excited, moving close to the edge of the bed and taking the hand mirror into his meaty grip, his upper lip curling as he chewed on his own knowledge. "what did you do right after you read that article? You said something about the hell hound."
"I gave Growley a scratch behind the ears. It made me feel bad for him, I mean, what kind of monster does that to a dog? *I* certainly wouldn't do that, I would never condone one of my minions doing something like that." He thought of Growley at his feet, his big, powerful silent partner who was with him wherever he went, always protecting him, warning him, being the one companion he could truly trust. His big oafish hound who would snap up souls with all the ease of a spider snagging a fly--slowly,, deliberately and causing as much pain as possible. "I...I love my dog."
The dark in the motel room seemed to deepen. Sam slowly sat back in his chair, while Dean raised a brow at his brother, an unspoken question between them.
"It doesn't matter if I'm the King of Hell, my job is to hate humanity." He sniffed, wondering how Growley was getting on without him. He was probably hungry, needing a walk. He loved frolicking and swimming in the lake of fire this time of night. He always looked so goofy as he shook off the ashes and sparks, his eyes glowing like red embers of ignited coal. "There's nothing in any contract I've seen that says I'm not allowed to love my bloody dog."
"That explains it." Sam sat back in his chair, confident in his assessment. "That's why your body reacted the way it did. You sparked a memory, one that was so strong it decided to shake you off and do something about it." He clasped his hands together and turned to Castiel. "We need that newspaper article."
Dean was cautious. "You think that's where Crowley's body is headed?"
"Why wouldn't it?" Sam rubbed his palms together, thinking on it. "It's going to where it remembers it was loved. It's going home."
Fandom: Supernatural
Word count (total fic): 20,353
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: None, really, maybe some Dean/Cas hints. Don't hold the lack of pairing against it, though--If you're a dog lover, you'll probably like this story...
Summary: When Crowley's meatsuit mutinies it's up to Castiel and the Winchesters to help The King Of Hell him get back into his favourite blood and guts condominium. What starts off as a seemingly easy assignment quickly turns into a drama about a dead dog and a haphazard pile of memories. Putting a leash on Crowley's body proves harder than expected.
Notes: Takes place after season five, AU afterwards--Sam was rescued from Hell in much the same manner as Dean. Otherwise it's canon.
This was written for the crowley_bigbang on livejournal. I didn't quite make it for the official track, so this is the unofficial posting :P.
Dean Winchester was not grasping the gravity of the situation. Sam, his moose-like brother, stood over him in brooding certainty that something in the universe as they knew it was Seriously Wrong, but Dean...No, Dean Winchester was far more content to stare into the pink and purple Little Mermaid hand-held mirror Castiel had borrowed from a young Motel #8 guest and snicker at Crowley's scowling face. "I'm thinking this pink is totally your colour." He choked on his laughter as he held the mirror up, his fingers testing the two day old stubble at his chin. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the fairest of them all. .."
"Don't worry, I'll make sure you eat a poisoned apple," Crowley shot back.
Winchesters. Bloody bollocks Winchesters. Crowley tried to push his way out of the edges of his makeshift prison but there was no escaping the Disney influence on his inner surroundings. Little clams began singing in the background. "That body of mine has a lot of explaining to do," Crowley growled. An animated fluorescent green shrimp pinched him on the nose and giggled as it swam away. "When I get it back, damned if I'm going to make it suffer..."
"You'll be the one suffering," Sam reminded him. "You live in it."
Two poisoned apples, then. "Bollocks," Crowley said.
Sam frowned, his usual neanderthal stance that indicated he was thinking deeply. As the more cerebral of the Winchester duo, he was certainly devoid of constructive answers, a fact that was beginning to nag Crowley's sense of hope of getting back on track and regaining his new post. He longed for those days that stretched into infinity where he had a physical form to prop him up and enjoy a good scotch, the stretch of a comfortable couch and a warm fire doing miraculous things for his twisted soul. Yes, he'd been complaining that he was bored and his posting was a bit more of a prison than he'd anticipated and not the challenge he'd wanted. Yet things were worse because here he was, in a prison that was even more stifling and infuriating, this time with little blue seahorses kicking him in the ass and chortling at him with a musical whinny. The huge, sanctimonious face of Dean Winchester smirked back at him. If only he could reach out of this mirror and choke the little corporeal bastard!
"So your body just dumped you." Sam paced the room as he thought this over, his long shadow cutting across the curtains in the front window.
"That's what I said."
"There has to be a reason. You're sure it didn't have a soul? I thought you invaded the body of a literary agent?"
"I rest my case," Crowley said. He gave Sam's still questioning gaze a frustrated groan. "The guy was already on his way out. He ate too much red meat, he led a sedentary lifestyle and he drank like a fish. He stroked out before I could even get the paper signed, and since I was already in the place, I took over the lease."
"So, a body with no soul."
"No soul."
Sam continued to pace the room, an action that made Crowley increasingly nervous. He wanted to shout at the Goliath to quit wearing a hole in the already threadbare rug, but he also knew that Sam Winchester needed this physical push to make his brain juices come to life. A starfish gently nudged Crowley's elbow and he grabbed it with his right hand, choking the squeaking life out of it as he punched the stupid happy face with blunt force trauma. "You going to sing now, you little happy bastard? Oh look, Uncle Crowley got your tongue--YOU GOING TO SING NOW?"
The animated starfish tried to wrench itself free from his iron grip, the tongue hanging from his other fist in wriggling, gory shreds.
"Geez, Crowley, get a grip." Dean propped the Little Mermaid mirror against a pillow on the unmade bed. "You don't have to go all rageaholic on the thing. Come on, man, it's the happiest place on Earth."
"Goddamned cheerful little fucker!" Crowley punched the starfish twice more before leaving its battered animated yellow body bruised blue and purple. "I just want my damned body back! How the hell would you feel?"
"So let me get this straight." Sam pulled up a dining chair from the breakfast nook and straddled it, giving himself a good view of Crowley in the small hand mirror. "Your body has no soul, not even really a mind at this point. It's running on the fumes of what you left behind in it, and it's kind of going through automatic motions, like showering and shaving and getting dressed--all the mundane stuff."
"That's right. It's nothing without me."
Sam shook his head. "No. That can't be true. Because it knew to leave you behind for some reason, and I'm guessing it expelled you because, in its own way, the body felt you weren't supposed to be there or..." Sam's eyes instantly lit up with understanding, "...Or something was triggered. Like in its memory."
Dean clicked his fingers in agreement. "Organ donors."
"If a body memory was triggered, it could react in much the same way as its host might have, with its needs being met on the cellular level..."
"What the hell are you idiots talking about?" Crowley's booming voice shattered Sebastian's hearing, leaving the crab bleeding from his little crustacean ears.
To Crowley's shock it was Dean who explained it best. "There this phenomenon that's been recorded, where when people get organ transplants, like a heart or a lung or an eye or whatever, they can actually experience personality changes. These changes are caused by the memory in the cells of the donors interacting with the body of the new host. Like, this one guy, he hated swimming and yet when he got a donor heart from a guy who was part of a professional swim team you couldn't keep him away from the water. There's all kinds of weird things, like suddenly liking anchovies where you hated them before because the donor used to like them, or watching certain movies or even having memories of places that you've never been."
"That could be what's happening here." Sam focused on Crowley, edging his chair forward. "Tell us exactly what you were doing before you were separated from your body."
Crowley shrugged. "I was just sitting by the fire watching the furnace repairman roast."
"Typical day," Dean agreed.
"For the King of Hell, yes," Crowley testily replied. "I was bored, actually. I was thinking about how this promotion has left me rather empty, the whole concept of Hell being relegated into this dull miasma of petty wants and needs that have no meaning. The apocalypse business left me with a bit of ennui, all that adrenaline and then...Nothing." He gave the Winchesters far too serious gazes a careful perusal of his own. "I'm sure you understand."
"I do," Dean said, surprising him.
Crowley kicked the corpse of the starfish for good measure. It squeaked like a dog toy. "So I read the paper. The Dear Granny section."
"Dear Granny?" Sam choked on his words. "You actually read Dear Granny?"
"She had some very good advice about investment opportunities last week." Crowley set his jaw, his pride in his secret enterprise showing through. "I find the conflicts rather amusing."
"She's a demon," Dean said, and Crowley's black heart fell. "Put her on the list for execution when we get a chance. So--You were reading the exploits of the depressed and pathetic while you were feeling depressed and pathetic and then...."
"I don't know." Crowley paced in his mirror prison, his hands deep in the virtual pockets of his trousers. Sea urchins and gold coins littered them and he emptied the pockets with a new slew of curses. "I read Dear Granny and then I called over Growley and--No. I read an article, just a little side story. Someone had drowned their neighbour's dog."
The motel room was quiet for a long moment.
"That's fucked up," Dean said.
"No kidding. Who does that to a *dog*?"
"Son of a bitch," Sam said, his face twisted into an angry sneer. "When you catch that guy you need to rip off his toes and feed them to his anus."
Castiel was wide eyed as he stared at the two Winchesters and the small hand mirror holding Crowley. "I don't understand. That's quite a severe punishment for harming something that isn't human."
"It's a *dog*, man," Dean said, and glared at Castiel as though he'd just suggested they eat a baby.
"Castiel, you can't possibly think that someone doing that to a dog should get off easy." Sam's hands were on his hips, and he was looming above the angel, his massive height seeming to dwarf him. From Crowley's perspective, he certainly looked as though he was shrinking inside of that floppy trenchcoat. "Haven't you heard the term 'man's best friend'?"
Castiel was still confused. "I don't understand. Many people die from dog bites and attacks every year, they are more a nuisance than an asset."
"Oh, I knew it!" Crowley gloated from within his pink rimmed cage. "He's a cat person!"
"No." Castiel gave confused glances to all of them yet again. "I admit that rumbling thing they do with their stomachs can be quite enticing, but I in no way resemble a cat person."
"A cat person." Dean shook his head, staring at Castiel with naked disappointment. "That explains so much."
"But I'm not."
"Hold on, let's back this up." Sam was up and pacing again, his massive height monstrous in the low glow of the lamp at Dean's bedside. His brow was hooded in shadows as the thoughts ran furiously through his moosehead brain. Or so Crowley thought that was how it worked, for all he knew it was a pile of moths playing poker in there, he had no evidence to the contrary. Sam hadn't been quite the same since he'd been pulled out of Hell, though why the experience was more frightening for him than his brother was another mystery. Two angels had given their lives to snatch Sam Winchester out of Hell before he was chained into the cage with Lucifer and Michael. Knowing their Sammy, it was all about the guilt. Crowley couldn't help but inwardly smile at this.
"It's about the dog," Sam said, certain.
It was Crowley's turn to be confused. "What about the poor dog?"
"The body, your body--it didn't react to anything else, it wasn't until you read that article about the dog being drowned. Tell me," Sam was excited, moving close to the edge of the bed and taking the hand mirror into his meaty grip, his upper lip curling as he chewed on his own knowledge. "what did you do right after you read that article? You said something about the hell hound."
"I gave Growley a scratch behind the ears. It made me feel bad for him, I mean, what kind of monster does that to a dog? *I* certainly wouldn't do that, I would never condone one of my minions doing something like that." He thought of Growley at his feet, his big, powerful silent partner who was with him wherever he went, always protecting him, warning him, being the one companion he could truly trust. His big oafish hound who would snap up souls with all the ease of a spider snagging a fly--slowly,, deliberately and causing as much pain as possible. "I...I love my dog."
The dark in the motel room seemed to deepen. Sam slowly sat back in his chair, while Dean raised a brow at his brother, an unspoken question between them.
"It doesn't matter if I'm the King of Hell, my job is to hate humanity." He sniffed, wondering how Growley was getting on without him. He was probably hungry, needing a walk. He loved frolicking and swimming in the lake of fire this time of night. He always looked so goofy as he shook off the ashes and sparks, his eyes glowing like red embers of ignited coal. "There's nothing in any contract I've seen that says I'm not allowed to love my bloody dog."
"That explains it." Sam sat back in his chair, confident in his assessment. "That's why your body reacted the way it did. You sparked a memory, one that was so strong it decided to shake you off and do something about it." He clasped his hands together and turned to Castiel. "We need that newspaper article."
Dean was cautious. "You think that's where Crowley's body is headed?"
"Why wouldn't it?" Sam rubbed his palms together, thinking on it. "It's going to where it remembers it was loved. It's going home."