Deals Aren't Meant To Be Upheld, Part 3
Sam’s superhero costume/outfit or whatever is not spandex, thank god, because Dean does not want to see that. It’s dark and long-sleeved and padded so it’s bullet-proof, and he has a red half-mask that covers around his eyes and the top of his nose. Dean never got how that works, but it does for some reason. Dean’s superhero whatever is made of leather, flexible leather pants, a hi-tech bullet-proof shirt he made himself and his father’s old leather jacket with a black half-mask. Castiel looks the same, trench coat and all, except for the blue half-mask, and Bobby is called Bobby and doesn’t even bother to shave his beard. Then again, it is his signature.
There’s another flash of light, and Dean thinks that if he doesn’t have his sometimes awesome healing power, he would be blind by now. Who knows how Sam and Bobby are handling it. Dean doesn’t have the chance to ask anything, because the next thing he knows he’s in headquarters.
Headquarters is pristine. It has white walls and black carpet floors, ornate chandeliers drop down from the ceiling. The ‘living room’ is filled with plush black leather couches and mahogany tables. Flat-screen televisions hang on the walls, as do pictures and posters; bookshelves are shoved against the same walls. Wooden floor dons velvet red carpets, and phones hang everywhere. The kitchen is well-furnished, sleek and modern and incredibly well stocked. There are many washrooms, some with bathtubs to rival the Prefect’s bathtub in Harry Potter (not that Dean had read Harry Potter). Bedrooms are catered to everyone’s desire, and it wouldn’t even look like a superhero headquarters if it wasn’t for the three hi-tech test rooms and many computer rooms and the weapon’s room.
Dean, Sam, Cas and Bobby are standing right in the middle of the room, Cas very close behind him.
Huntress greets Dean first, blonde curls bouncing excitedly as she hugs Dean tightly. Dean feels air whooshing out of his lungs, but doesn’t complain. Instead, he hugs back lightly, not exactly used to public displays of platonic affection. When they break apart, Huntress grins happily at Dean, brown eyes shining with affection. It’s nice to know she got over her little crush on him; it would be supremely awkward if she still liked him that way.
“Look at you,” she grins, “All healthy and not dying and on the road again with an all new death threat hanging on your shoulder. It’s just like the old times.”
“Shut up,” Dean grins back at the girl he considers a little sister and ruffles her hair. She shrieks and dances out of the way, clutching at her hair. Dean laughs, actually laughs, which is something he hasn’t done for a pretty long time. He missed her, and the rest of the crew.
“Righteous, Liberty! Man!” Doctor Badass grins, clapping them on their backs and having seemingly appeared out of nowhere. “I’ve missed you. It seems like you’re still getting into trouble.”
Dean smiles back genuinely, snatches Castiel by the arm and pulls him forward. “Huntress, Badass - this is my boyfriend, Angel.” Dean still really hates Cas’ alias, but it does kind of fit. Righteous Man and his boyfriend Angel, the most biblical yet quite possibly the most blasphemous couple in superhero history, and Dean doesn’t care. Huntress raises an eyebrow and the redneck that got expelled from MIT, Doctor Badass, snorts and says, “Man, I knew it! You were always way too pretty to be straight.”
Dean looks and feels affronted, but he waves it off. It’s Doctor Badass, he’s always like this, even though Dean had scored many pretty ladies back in the day, really. He’s just never had a connection with anyone he way he has with Castiel. He scans the room, looking for Vixen and Trickster. They’re normally there, teasing and flirting with him.
“Where’s Vixen and Trickster?” Dean asks, and Huntress shrugs. Doctor Badass grins, smug.
“What are you not telling me?” Dean says this suspiciously. A dozen scenarios flash through his head, of Trickster and Vixen running off together, going to the bar, and having sex, everything and anything. Dean doesn’t really want to think of any of that, as hot has Vixen is.
“They’re off patrolling,” Doctor Badass smirks, and Dean fumes. He hates it when Badass does that, especially when Dean is being especially paranoid. Castiel tugs at Dean’s jacket, and he turns to realize two things: a) that Sam is gone, and b) that Bobby is gone.
“What the fuck?” Dean blurts, “Where’s Sa - Liberty and Bobby?” He scans around the pristine room and the hallways, and he sees nothing. There’s a time when he wishes he got X-ray vision instead of healing. It would have been a lot more fun, and a lot more useful. Then again, there’s also shooting lasers from his eyes. That’ll be pretty cool.
Castiel grips Dean’s hand in his, and pulls Dean towards a room gently. Dean wonders where he’s going and absently hopes that Castiel is enraptured by some horny spell and is going to have sex with him. Then again, if that happens in front of Huntress and Doctor Badass, it would be a source of constant embarrassment. Dean tries hard to remember how they wouldn’t know Castiel after two years and concludes that maybe he should talk to his friends more. The last two years were hectic, and they only really had time to talk to Huntress’ mother and Trickster. Dean thinks Huntress and Doctor Badass have seen Cas, but have never spoken to him. He nods, and Castiel looks at him like he’s insane.
***
When Anna wakes up, the first thing she sees is the blonde girl standing on top of her. She’s twirling a small, jagged knife filled with carvings of runes. She’s wearing the exact same thing, except for one thing: her eyes are a complete, oily and iridescent black. The girl grins, ruby red lips pulling back in an almost snarl, half a grin and half a snarl. Anna forbids herself from shuddering, staring at the girl defiantly.
Another blonde girl, this one with a pixie cut, strides in. She’s wearing dark jeans and a red leather jacket, and she gives Blonde Girl #1 of a look of obvious dislike. She rolls her eyes, says, “Ruby, the boss says I get to look after the girl now.”
The first blonde girl - Ruby, apparently - casts Blonde Girl #2 a look of distrust, says “Meg, the day the boss trusts you is the day I go brunette,” she snorts and twirls a golden blonde lock of hair with her fingers, the knife is still held loosely in her other hand. Anna wonders if she can jump up and grab the knife from Ruby’s fingers, but she figures it would be too dangerous. Plus, the heavy iron chains holding her to the ground may interfere with the plan just a wee bit. Or, you know, a lot. So Anna doesn’t try, although she wants to.
Blonde Girl #2, Meg, looks briefly pissed but smiles with saccharine sweetness. “Fine,” she retorts with forced lightness, “Then I guess we’ll both look after her.” And with that, she parks herself down on the dirty floor of the cell and stares at Anna, then at Ruby expectantly. Ruby closes her eyes, looking all too annoyed, and directs her gaze to as far away as Meg as possible.
Anna takes this as an opportunity to check out her chains. She twists around and sees that the chains are of a dark iron, not a spot of rust staining its rough, coal black surface. It is heavy and thick, each loop of the chain as big as her hand. The shackles are tight around Anna’s delicate wrists, and she twists it to see how much mobility she has with it. Sadly, the skin twists with it and the chains jangle. Meg and Ruby glance up, both eyes flaring black in warning.
***
“Okay, that’s it.” Bobby grunts, closing a large dusty book with a thump. A cloud of dust rises off it, swirling in the gentle light before fading away completely. Dean, Sam, Cas and Bobby are all in the study, and they stare despairingly at the book. It was the very last one in every collection on extraterrestrial entities and other planets they have, and it showed them nothing. Absolutely nothing about Gehenna, or that magic dagger, or anything. They have next to nothing. But next to nothing isn’t actually nothing.
Doctor Badass had hacked into the United Nations database using his own unique power, technopathy. All Supers are supposed to tell their alias, their power, their power level (one to five, one being almost useless and five being Jean Grey/Phoenix, except thankfully no one’s ever seen a level five) to their own government just so it can control the Supers, and all of the names and powers are entered in some huge spreadsheet in a top-secret computer somewhere in the UN. There aren’t many people who could speak to the dead, to no one’s surprise. Around 190 countries in the world, seven billion people, one out of a hundred of them Supers, and there are only 5 people who can talk to dead people and project them in dreams so they can talk to the living. Frankly, the team is glad because that seriously clamps down on their choices, and right now limits are very good.
The five people, listed from most powerful to least: first, a man named Morpheus, level four and like Sam, they don’t really have a name for his power. It does, however, fit perfectly to what they wants and they wanted to just stop the search right there when Huntress sensibly told them that if he isn’t they guy they were screwed.
Another man named Necromancer can see, talk to, and resurrect the dead. Dean thinks he’s read the Hobbit one too many times, but when he says it out loud Sam glares at him. Level three. The next one is a woman named Seer, a level three who can see and communicate with the dead. Number four and number five are barely worth a look, a level two who knows when people die and can momentarily see their soul and a level one who knows when a person about to die is nearby.
Doctor Badass then runs a search to see where all of them are currently. There are two currently in the United States of America: Seer and Morpheus.
“So it really is Morpheus, huh.” Dean mutters, wondering if they have to kill the guy so that Dean can have a good night of sleep. It isn’t the first time, but he has never liked to kill anyone, especially not because of him.
“Here,” Ash points to a spot on the map. “That’s where Morpheus currently is. It’s an apartment under the name of, uh,” he squints at the laptop, “A Jeremy Frost. He’s in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.”
Castiel nods, “We shall go now.” He presses two fingers on an unsuspecting Dean’s forehead, and with another flash of light they’re off, leaving an irate little brother, a vexed telepath, and two other Supers with a warning fresh on the tips of their tongues.
Morpheus can only be killed in dreams.
***
Dean and Castiel lands in the middle of a dusty living room, with a bulky television, mismatched couches and gloomy grey walls. Dean gazes at the room, unimpressed, and turns to glower at Castiel. His darling boyfriend is standing behind him, looking inappropriately proud of himself. Dean actually doesn’t want to ruin his mood, except…
“Cas, this Morpheus dude is a level four,” Dean frowns, “We might need backup. Also, we don’t know what’s going to gank the guy. Maybe he needs a special sword too.” It seems absurd, but there are circumstances where that’s happened. Dean hates those circumstances. It’s just the normal drill, and then BAM! you stab the guy and he springs right the fuck up. Sometimes, it occurs to Dean that hating that particular skill is hypocritical and he’s pretty sure he needs a special sword to finish him off, so it’s not just aliens, but he brushes it off. He hates his power most of the times anyways.
Castiel, however, shakes his head, “Morpheus is just a member of Homo Eximius group, despite the god whose name he stole. I believe he can be killed the normal way.” And, as if he knows exactly what Dean’s retort will be, he says, “And your power is what grants you the ability to resurrect. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Dean knows that, but there’s something that’s just rubbing him the wrong way, and he doesn’t know what it is. And Dean really hates it when he’s in the dark about anything. He knows that Castiel has a point, but Dean’s stubborn and he would rather trust his instincts than what science or whatever tells him.
“And what if Morpheus is more powerful than that? Cas, the guy can kill you. Maybe even me, maybe he can do it the Freddy Kruger way, and believe me that is not a good way to die.” A horrible thought worms its way into Dean’s brain, and it’s cold and clammy and so disgusting that he doesn’t even want to think about it, but… “Cas, what if the dude kills us?” Dean implores “He’d kill two out of the three remaining level fours we have. There would be only one level four left to fight Crowley, and Trickster isn’t all that trustworthy. It’d be like - could be like,” Dean flails his arms around frantically, trying to convey a word, a single word that no one mentions anymore. “You know.”
Detroit, Dean doesn’t say, because no one wants to remember Detroit. Mostly, the major fuckups caused by superheroes are done years before now, but now is a mere one year from Detroit, where the Super equivalent of a nuclear bomb went off on May 6th, 2011. Even now, Detroit looks even more like a wasteland than before, grey dust settling over every surface and the sun hidden behind a constant cloud covering. Bits of metal are melted and buildings hang half-broken or in piles of rubble. The explosion was so great you could actually physically see the shockwaves dispense and proliferate from the centre to the very edges of the huge city. Before the explosion - the thing that actually caused the explosion, actually, there was a fight, a huge fight, the fight of the century, actually. It was an apocalyptic grand finale, a showdown that just … wasn’t. But there were six level fours before, and three of them were murdered. There were twenty people in the League of Heroes and now there are nine. It would certainly be a good, an amazing story to tell, but it’s still simply too painful and filled with shame that no Super really wants to think of it, and when the Normals do, it’s when they remember that not all Supers are good, and that even the best can get swayed to the forces of evil.
Even Sam and Cas were almost killed, and Dean had knocked himself out for a week after summoning up enough healing power to shoot at the two most important people in his life so they would wake up and be without any kind of injury. It was also how Bobby got himself stuck in a wheelchair, no thanks to Dean.
“Dean,” the voice is low and gravelly and soothing and familiar and it instantly jolts Dean out of his blast to the past, calms him down too. “We have to look for Morpheus. He could be doing something, talking to Alastair right now. And I will not let them continue to torment you. Besides, Crowley means to bring the war to his plant. Earth holds no concern for him.”
Dean smiles weakly, “Thanks, Cas.” He folds his hands in Cas’, smiles. But he thinks that Crowley does have an ulterior motive. Dean’s been doing the superhero thing for pretty long, faced badass villains a lot worse than Crowley, but none of them, not even the stupidest one, have gone and revealed their plan in a evil monologue on national television. It’s just not done, and Crowley strikes Dean as smarter than that.
Castiel nods, and slowly they creep to the door at the end of the one hallway the apartment has, the one they believe is the bedroom. They reach the dull brown door with the grimy brass doorknob and slowly open it.
A brown, green, and white streak pounces on the two superheroes, and they’re promptly knocked out.
Dean wakes up to the dark night sky. Glimmering stars twinkles in the distance, and a full moon hangs like a lightly glowing ornament. The grass is soft under Dean’s back and dark, swaying trees dance around him. Craning his next to the right, he sees Castiel lying eagle-spread beside him. Dean reaches a hand out, and gently shakes Cas’ shoulder to wake him up.
“Cas, wake up.” He whispers, shaking Cas’ shoulders again. Cas groans, but obliges. When his brilliant blue eyes open, he jolts up and looks around frantically. Dean agrees with his panic.
“This is not where we were.” Castiel is the king of stating the obvious. Captain Obvious bows down to Castiel.
“I know,” Dean pushes up to his feet, surveying the perimeters carefully. There’s a soft whooshing sound accompanied by a swift black shadow. He frowns, trying to find the shadow again, to no avail. He pushes Cas, “Did you see that?”
“See what?” Castiel asks, also scanning the place. “We are in a dream world made by Morpheus.”
“Ya’ think?” Dean asks sarcastically. “Damn it, I knew this wasn’t going to be good.” He turns to Cas, “We’re on his turf now. He can do whatever he wants with us.”
“Hm, well you’ve got that right. But it’s not him you should be afraid of.” Ice slithers down Dean’s spine at the abhorred, raspy voice. He turns and sees a flash of glacier cold eyes and wrinkled skin before a gust of wind sweeps dust and grass into the air and the sky clouds and flashes bright with lightening and heavy rain and Dean feels a sense of total disconnect.
When the storm clears a second later, Castiel is left drenched and totally alone. The place is calm again, the skies clear and bright with stars. Castiel once again examines the scene, but there’s no sign of Dean.
“Dean!” Castiel yells, but there’s no one that can hear him but the cold, uncaring wind, and the wind helps his voice bounce around aimlessly and uselessly around the trees, where no one can hear him and no one cares.
“Cas!” Dean screams, and his voice disappears as if in to a void, sapped from existence all too quickly. It feels small and useless, pitiful. Alastair laughs from behind him, and his voice is deafening, tumultuous. It bounces from the walls and the ceilings, a cacophony of harsh, mocking laughter.
The room he’s stuck in is small and bare, with one dusty window and a locked door. There’s a familiar chair in the corner, and Dean’s flesh tingles with forgotten memories of sharp spikes and betrayal. Alastair grins from above him, his flesh whole once again and his eyes pure white. His teeth are still long and jaundiced when he grins, and his fingers are still long and adorned with wickedly sharp, claw-like nails. His thoughts race, all spinning around Cas. Is he okay? Did Morpheus get him? And, shamefully, will Cas rescue Dean?
“Dean, Dean, Dean,” Alastair muses, “It’s such a shame that we keep meeting here. I would love to meet you again in the real world, but…” He grins happily, and it looks deranged and wrong and monstrous on his face, “Look at this world! It’s so…” he tuts, “Flexible. I can do anything I want - look like anything I like.” He pulls out a rusty scalpel, “Remember him? I like to call him George. After my grandpa. You know what they did to him? They placed him in a hollow bull statue, called the Brazen Bull, and roasted him up. Oh, sure, it went out of style here, but where I come from people love it. It was a good technique - ingenious, really, but you can’t see them roast. Oh, sure, they scream, but I enjoy the visual aspect too. So I’m going to use my second favorite, which is something I made up myself.”
Dean stares at Alastair’s face wearily, and Alastair laughs. He picks up a bottle filled to the brim of a greenish, hissing liquid and pours it over the scalpel.
A scream tears through the room, bouncing off and echoing as Alastair digs the acid-soaked scalpel into Dean’s arm. Boiled, bubbly blood burns as it slides off the limb, and Dean screams as it sears through skin and flesh, leaving burnt black ashes in its wake.
Dreams are varying, indistinct, and this one is no different. Despite that, Castiel wanders from forests to swamps to something that looks suspiciously like New York City in his search of Dean. So far, nothing, but Castiel doesn't give up easily. In fact, he is every bit as stubborn as those Winchesters are, and proud of it. Dean has taught him well.
Castiel remembers when he first came to Earth. Their customs, language, slang - all were so different to him. Dean was there all along the way, and he helped Castiel in his own particular way. Back then, Dean was Castiel's advisor, charge, protector, best (and only) friend, and brother and then came the second year, and the events that would lead up to Detroit. Dean had been under heavy pressure, in pain, and Castiel had wanted to do something, anything, to help Dean. That's when he realized that he was in love with Dean, and that no matter what happened or how hard he might try to end it, he would always and forever love Dean. And, amazingly, Dean reciprocates that love. What's more, being from Elysium, Castiel has a greatly heightened life expectancy, one that matches Dean's or is even higher, but Castiel has never seen the need to inform Dean of this. Then Alastair happened and Castiel did not want to.
Now, after almost losing Dean, Castiel knows that he wants to tell Dean. He wants to tell Dean every single thing, if only in case something like this happens again. Castiel does not want to wander around an ever-changing world to find Dean. What Castiel wants now, more than anything, is a bright yellow road with a sign that says 'Dean this way' and to get to Dean one must simply walk the yellow path. Dean told him of something like that, and showed him the movie called the Wizard of Oz. Castiel found the movie tedious and unentertaining, but Dean had found it amusing enough. He seems to have especially liked the flying monkeys. Castiel would watch the Wizard of Oz a thousand times now if it meant having Dean back now.
"Dean!" He calls again, as he has been doing every approximately fifteen minutes. His voice is hoarse, but Castiel does not understand why. He thinks it would have something to do with water, except that this is a realm made entirely of imagination and Castiel knows that if he focuses hard enough he will be perfectly fine. However, he has other matters to attend at this moment, such as finding Dean.
Heat sweeps the place, smearing the land and smelling faintly of sulfur. The trees disappear into green and brown smudges, the sun an indistinct point of light. Then everything shifts, like a carpet being pulled under his feet.
When everything settles, Castiel is in the middle of a ghost town. Dust covers the streets in layers and layers, tumbleweeds bounce and spin down the empty streets, carried by a faint wind. Buildings are either crumpled and hanging or lying in a heap on the ground. The concrete is grey as the skies above Castiel, and there is absolutely no way to figure out what time of the day it is, or if it even is day. No light escapes the heavy grey prison of clouds, and the trees are yellow and withered from bugs and lack of light, as are the grass and the flowers. There is not one sign of life, not even a mosquito. It's eerie and unnatural, and every strand of hair on Castiel's neck stands up firmly.
He doesn't know where Dean is, except a part of him, a strong part, is telling him that Dean is here, in this destroyed city. It is vague, but he is there. Castiel has been raised to trust his instincts, and it has not been wrong before. Although it has gotten him in some huge messes, it was always for the right thing, always doing the right thing.
Alastair has put away his scalpel and has taken out the razor. Dean wishes that would be better, but it really isn't. It really, really isn't. The razor flays the skin from his muscles, exposing slick, bright red tissue. He glides it up one part of Dean's arm, then another, and then another. Three wetly gleaming pieces of skin, Dean's skin, falls to a tray without a sound. Alastair picks one up and examines it as a butcher would examine a piece of meat, cruel and hungry. He twists the skin around his finger like a ring, then around his wrist like a bracelet. Finally, he shrugs and tears off a bite off the tip of the long piece of human skin, chewing thoughtfully.
"Not bad," he decrees, "Little too salty, but it's chewy. And I've always liked salt. Ooh," he says suddenly, tilting his chin towards Dean, "Look at that."
Dean looks down and sees that the three pieces of skin has been replaced by new, baby-pink ones. His power - Dean doesn't really know how to describe it most days, and this is a day. But maybe that's just the pain.
"You know," Alastair says conversationally, tearing off a bit more of the strip of skin and chewing. "I've always loved that power. It was so entertaining at the best of times and downright helpful at the worst."
He throws away his razor in exchange for a small dagger. He carves a big, round circle on Dean's abdomen and then just lifts the solid layers of skin and muscle and tissue and fat right off, leaving the organs in plain sight, like a grotesque version of Operation.
Sticking his hand into Dean’s gut, Alastair gropes around in there and pulls something out with a wet plop. It’s pale and round, no organ Dean’s ever seen. Of course, Alastair could have simply made it out of thin air. Dean’s seen that happen.
Alastair squeezes it like one might squeeze for milk, and sure enough, milky white pus dribbles out. Its freezing, every contact with the organs like an icicle stabbed in. Dean pants but tries not to scream, instead he thinks of Cas. He wonders where Cas is. Here. Now. Is he looking for Dean, like he had before? Dean hopes so. He hopes nothing bad has happened to Cas. He hopes Cas is safe and now that he thinks of it, he doesn’t really want Cas to come here, because then Alastair can get his claws in Castiel, and Dean would rather die a thousand times before he lets what has happened to him be inflicted on anyone he loves.
***
It's been three days. No contact from Dean and Cas. None. It's driving Sam crazy.
"Three days!" He exclaims to Bobby, throwing his hands up for emphasis, "Three days! They've been gone for three days, and we're not doing anything?"
"What can we do?" Bobby asks tiredly, "Morpheus is too dangerous for us to wage war against; he'd kill us in an instant."
"He's not a god," Sam retorts. "He can't just kill us."
"He is a god in dreams, and that's where he'll make us go. That's where he'll take us."
"Well, what if Dean and Cas are in the dreams now? Huh?" Sam challenges, "What happens then? They don't even know how to gank the guy!"
"Well, we certainly ain't gonna go and get ourselves sucked into one of those dreams and become even less of a help!" Bobby argues hotly, "Don't you dare get reckless, boy! I thought your Daddy taught you better than that."
Sam snorts, but it's true: he just hates being helpless. He hates having to stay and just sit his ass down while his brother is being hunted down, or even worse.
Intellectually, he knows that Dean and Cas have proved hundreds of times over that they are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves, but when they're in danger it feels different. It feels like they're helpless, even though they're anything but.
Dean, Sam knows, will look after Castiel and Castiel will protect Dean, and they will work as a well-oiled machine, to employ a cliché. They care for each other, and Sam knows they hate being separated.
Doctor Badass - and that's still a crappy superhero name - comes up to Sam and places a hand on his shoulder. "It'll be fine, Liberty. I'll just hook this thing on my laptop, : we'll go when Morpheus dies. We should get ready first."
Bobby and Huntress nod, and Sam obliges grudgingly.
***
"You have it?" Crowley barks. "You better tell me you have it. I have been waiting too long for it for you to not have it."
"Sir," an uncertain voice squeaks out of that infernal device the humans call a mobile phone, and Crowley closes his eyes in an attempt to calm himself down. Damn it, he knew the gits won't be able to get it on their own, but what has he done? He let them go anyways! He berated himself for being so bloody stupid. "We know where it is." The voice continues.
Huh. Crowley's eyes snap open. That one's new. He didn't expect that one.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" He snaps into the phone, because he still has a reputation to uphold and half of said reputation is based on his smooth-talking nature and the fact that he’s unflappable. Crowley's not letting a person whom he doesn't even recognize shake that reputation, not even a little. "Get the bloody thing and bring it to me. How long is it going to take?" If it takes more than one day, Crowley is going to see if his power works through the phone. He has already waited for four days since he's sent his minions on their mission, and Crowley is not the world's most patient person. He prefers immediate results. Sue him.
"One day, if we go fast."
"Then you'd better run like there's something chasing you, because if you take one hour, just one, longer than a day then it will be me chasing you, and killing you."
Crowley grins maliciously when he hears the gulp, even over his crappy phone. "Y-yes sir." The minion stammers out.
***
So four days later, Anna is freaking hungry and bored because apparently no one is allowed to hurt her. Ruby is standing guard and she also looks bored, which really says something.
“I’m hungry,” Anna informs Ruby. Ruby glowers at Anna, snarling. Her hands briefly glow orange, but she takes a deep breath, calms down.
“I gave you food.”
“One slice of bread isn’t food.” Anna retorts sourly. She stares at the knife held tightly in Ruby’s hand, wonders if she’ll be able to get the knife if she tries hard enough. Probably not, she concludes, frowning.
The door slams open and black smoke rushes out, and it forces itself down Ruby’s throat. Anna’s eyes grow wide at the sight.
Ruby blinks when the smoke finishes, “Its Meg.” She says, “My power is possession, and we are getting the hell out of here.” Seeing the question in Anna’s eyes, she sighs. “The knife Ruby has is the only thing that can kill Gehennians on Earth, and there’s only one, but in Gehenna there are thousands, like finding a rock. I needed to get it.” Ruby - or Meg now, Anna guesses, crouches down and snaps the chains holding Anna in place. “Let’s go.”
***
"Dean!" Castiel yells. "Dean!" The words bounce off the rubble of the ghost town, and Castiel stares, trying to find out where the place is. Nothing looks the same, yet in a weird way everything does. It makes no sense. But when have dreams ever made sense?
No one answers. Of course no one answers; there’s no one here, except for Castiel. And Dean could be anywhere - in the buildings, in another place, hell, maybe Morpheus has released his hold on Dean and now he’s being tortured by the evil bastard.
Tortured.
Suddenly, everything looks familiar. Castiel knows this place. He’s seen this place. He remembers what had happened in this place, but when he remembers it he remembers green grass and golden sun and vast vegetation and fury. So much anger but nowhere to release it, until…
Castiel directs his gaze to a building. It’s old and nondescript, painted white and with small windows. Rotten green vines creep up the walls. It’s it. That’s the building. This is the building Castiel found Dean in, bound and broken, with Alastair slicing and dicing Dean. A horrible feeling tells Castiel that he might find the exact same thing.
Castiel closes his eyes, focusing on the place. The next thing he knows, he’s in the hallway. It’s dark and damp and sick, but Castiel only cares about one thing: getting to Dean. It’s the only thing in the world at the moment, an entire planet, the entire universe singled down to one tiny hallway in a derelict building in a fake dimension.
A scream slices through the air, sharp and cold as a knife and it stabs Castiel straight in the heart, because he knows that scream. Remembers it, from what seems like so long ago. He knows what accompanies that scream, and what it looks like.
Knows that Dean is suffering horribly and that Castiel promised himself that he would never, ever allow Dean to experience that kind of torture again, and now he’s failed. Failed horribly, but he’ll be damned if he lets this persist.
The door is rotten and old, and one kick is enough to break it down. Inside, the white walls are splattered with blood and gore, and Alastair stands in the middle, looming over a pale yet bloody figure. Alastair has a white apron on and rubber gloves, looking like a pathologist about to perform an autopsy. That is, until Castiel gets a good look at the person lying on the slab. Pale and silent as death, Dean has his eyes closed and he doesn’t appear to be breathing. The thought makes Cas’ heart stumble until he firmly reminds himself that this is all a dream and that dreams do not affect reality.
“DEAN!” Castiel screams anyways, because seeing your lover looking like a corpse is something no one should see and something Castiel has become all too used to over the years he’s known Dean.
Alastair grins with sickening yellow teeth, peeling back his lips to expose blackened gums. He plunges his fist into Dean’s open stomach, pulling out lengths of intestine. Dean doesn’t scream. Alastair grins and fashions them into a kind of overlong necklace, the shiny pink meat hanging limply down his neck. A piece of pale, almost translucent material is pulled from a tray, and Alastair bites it and tears it as if it’s jerky. Dean whimpers at that, and Castiel realizes what it is with a jolt. Skin. It’s Dean’s skin, his precious Righteous Man’s skin, the skin that he caressed and kissed and now he’s really mad.
The next thing Castiel knows, he’s in front of Alastair and punching the son of a bitch in the nose. Sam got to do it the first time, and Castiel feels a certain sick pleasure that he can also participate in the execution of Dean’s tormentor. Sure, it may only be a dream, but it’s an incredibly vivid, intense dream. It’s a dream Castiel is trapped in. He can make the rules here.
Creativity is never Castiel’s strong suit, but he tries his best. The force of the punch knocks Alastair across the room, landing with a crash and a shower of debris. Castiel strides over and places a hand calmly over the monster’s head and closes his eyes. Bright light, like Trickster’s, streams out of his hand and into Alastair’s head, his eyes burn slowly to a bloody crisp as the light pours out of eyes, tongue shriveling up as light rushes out of his mouth. It’s one of the most satisfying things Castiel’s ever had to pleasure to witness. Behind him, Dean stares at Alastair’s crumpled corpse with wide eyes, as Castiel releases him from his bonds. Dean collapses weakly into Castiel’s hold, and Castiel moves to kiss him.
But after Alastair dies, a new shade forms in front of the body before Dean and Cas’ very eyes. It’s a familiar person, a familiar face. True, they’ve only seen him once, but you tend to remember the guy who preternaturally knocked you out just by a finger. Both men tense, and the shape in front of them smiles lazily.
***
It’s Morpheus. Of course it is, because this is still a dream and Alastair was already dead. Was already dead. He grins maniacally at Dean and Cas, cracks his neck. Behind him, Alastair is flickering in and out of existence. His eyes are burnt sockets and his tongue is lolling out for some inexplicable reason. Morpheus raises an eyebrow at Dean’s position - clinging at Cas while Cas holds him.
“How sweet,” Morpheus drawls lazily, and he raises a hand. Dean and Cas are slammed forcefully on to the wall. They push themselves up, only to discover that they’re frozen in place. Dean decides that he hates trying to fight someone in their own dimension, and judging from the look on Castiel’s face, he agrees.
Castiel places a hand on Dean’s arm, asking him silently if he’s okay. Dean nods and they direct their glares at Morpheus. The villain laughs scornfully, teasingly. Because yeah, what will Dean and Cas do? Kill him with the force of their glares? Morpheus has a very valid reason to laugh. Dean doesn’t blame him, even though he wants to smash Morpheus’ face into the pavement.
“I’m not gonna kill you,” Morpheus informs them. “I just need you incapacitated. Well, I need Righteous incapacitated more than you, Angel. Crowley’s waiting, and we’ve already wasted four days.”
Four days? Dean sends a bewildered glace to Cas, who shrugs. He doesn’t know either.
Morpheus grins. The world flashes.
The ceiling ripples, turning blue, then black, then green and back to blue. Sometimes it is all the colors swirling in a psychedelic whirl, other times seems to of only one. Walls sway and bulge, shrink and twist, and the ground rumbles and flows up and down like a river on a stormy night. Amidst all the chaos, Morpheus launches himself at Dean, and they crash to the ground. Castiel roars, and Dean watches in disbelief as Morpheus is grabbed and hangs in the air, suspended only by a hand. Cas' hand. Castiel is holding Morpheus high above the shifting ground, and it looks like the villain weighs no more than a feather. If Dean didn’t know Cas, he would be scared.
But he does know Cas, very intimately in fact, so he is not scared. A bit disgruntled, sure, because he would like to be the one who kills Morpheus, but not scared. Dean knows that Castiel also has a pretty violent temper, at least when it comes to Dean, so it doesn't surprise him at all when Castiel places a hand softly, almost reverently, around Morpheus' neck and snaps. Morpheus' body jerks with the action, and then it droops almost sadly.
Suddenly, the walls juts outs and erupts, pink slime showering the whole room. It leaves behind a black hole, a vacuum trying to suck everybody in the room - the dream - out. Resistance is futile, though, and the inhabitants of this dream are stretched almost comically. Then the entire world goes black.
***
“Oh, good. You’re up.”
Dean blinks blearily. What? What the hell just happened? Isn’t he in a dream? With Cas? Where’s Cas? Didn’t he get sucked into a black hole? That sucked. But is he still dreaming?
“Am I dreaming?” He groans out. Flailing a hand about, he manages to grab onto something warm and soft. Kind of flat, though. Dean frowns and moves it around, trying to figure out what the hell it is.
“Get your hands off me.” Castiel demands. Dean immediately snatches his hand back, contrite. He frowns - there are three people here. Dean knows he and Castiel are here, but who’s the other guy? The voice seems vaguely familiar, but Dean can’t put his finger on it. He doesn’t know who the other person is, and that immediately makes him twitchy. Is the person a threat? What if the person hurts Cas, or Sammy? Dean decides to screw worrying and just open his eyes.
And groans, closing his eyes again. Damn it, out of every single person in the League of Heroes, it just had to him, huh? Dean’s life sucks. It really, really sucks.
Trickster grins happily when Dean opens his eyes again, “Heya Deano! Miss me?”
“No!” Dean snaps. He rubs his eyes and wonders why it had to be Trickster. It could be anyone but the Trickster, why Trickster?
“It’s not just me.” Trickster continues, still looking all too happy. Dean wonders if Cas is awake enough to kick Trickster. Dean sure as hell isn’t. “Vixy is here too.” Vixen, the hot girl Dean rescued from some creep who has the power of mind control. Mind control, and yet she got lured in by some creep dressed as a priest and she was in danger. It doesn’t even make sense, except maybe she didn’t want to hurt him or something. Dean doesn’t get it - if someone tried to kidnap and kill him, he won’t care about pain he might cause to the guy. “And so is your little brother and his entourage.”
Dean’s eyes snap to the right instinctively, and there he is. Sammy is standing tall, in front of Huntress and her mother, called Commander (for a reason), and Bobby. He looks exhausted and proud of himself, and Dean immediately knows what Sam did.
“Your brother’s power is really something,” Commander says, “He pulled you straight out of the dream world Morpheus trapped you in.”
“Thanks.” Dean says to Sam. He looks at Cas, who now looks awake yet slightly annoyed. “You okay?”
“I am fine,” Castiel rasps, and he looks over Dean to check if he is fine as well. When he determines that Dean is okay, he says, “Where are we?”
“Just behind Crowley’s lair.” Trickster informs them, pointing to an ominous looking warehouse behind them, “Morpheus was working for Crowley and he spun you two here. Everyone else followed. I’m pretty sure this is the final showdown now.”
“Great,” Dean mumbles, and he helps Cas up, brushes away dirt and mud from his trench. “So we just go in? Without any weapons or anything?”
“Crowley’s opening a portal to his home planet today. We don’t want more of those things getting to our home.” Vixen says, looking uncharacteristically solemn. Trickster nods.
Dean sighs, looks at Cas. Castiel nods and the decision is made. ‘’Fine. We go in and-”
“Wait!” The shout rang from seemingly nowhere, a feminine voice, a familiar voice. “Stop. We have something.”
It’s Anna, looking beaten up and grimy, red hair flying behind her as she rushes up to Dean. She’s holding a shiny, serrated knife tightly in her hand. Behind her, a girl with blonde hair and a red leather jacket follows, looking annoyed.
“That knife you need to kill Crowley? I have it.” Anna raises the knife high above her head, waves it around. “Here.” She presses the knife to Dean’s hand. His fingers wrap around it, and he looks confused.
“Thanks?” Dean sounds confused too, “How did you get this?” Castiel stares at Anna with piercing eyes.
“Got captured by Crowley’s cronies. Meg here busted me out.” Anna points to the blonde girl, who scowls.
“Dean. We must go.” Castiel says urgently, grabbing Dean’s arm. Behind him, the warehouse starts glowing red. Dean grimaces.
“Yeah, we should.”
Dean wants to kick in the door, but a warning look from what seems like everyone else stops him Instead, Castiel calmly and subtlety poofs them inside the warehouse, which is derelict and smells oddly of chlorine. Dean's not quite sure what to think of it, because it doesn't seem like somewhere Crowley would stay based on what he knows of Crowley. Admittedly, it isn't much, but he knows that Crowley is way too well-dressed to ever like some place like this. Still, if Cas thinks it's the place then it probably is. Dean still doesn’t trust Trickster, though. Sue him. The bastard killed him a hundred times over.
Despite the rotting walls and all the chlorine and the fucking red glow from the walls outside, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that any kind of living organism inhabits the place. None. There isn't even a rotting two-week-old ham and cheese sandwich or freaking graffiti. It's kind of pathetic, and that is what triggers his suspicion level up to twelve. If Crowley is anything, judging by what he seems like, it is not pathetic. It seems to be pretty much the opposite.
Motioning for Cas to follow him, Dean leads their little group through a large hall, where at the end there is predictably a door.
This time, Dean kicks in the door.
Crowley swears violently when he is interrupted, and he is glowing sinister red. The same red that Dean and his League of Heroes saw outside. The goons immediately stiffen, flexing overlarge muscles and stepping forward menacingly. One or two even crack their knuckles.
Huntress grins wildly, Commander rolls her eyes, Bobby sighs wearily, Trickster looks like he is one second away from cackling manically, Vixen gives Trickster an indulgent look and places a perfectly manicured hand on his shoulder, Sam just looks annoyed, and Cas looks furious and determined and brave and glorious, like an avenging angel, and Dean did not think that, he thought something manly and monosyllabic. He thought Cas looked hot. Really.
"Goons!" Crowley orders, pointing a finger at Dean's crew, "Attack!"
And so the goons attack, racing like pissed-off bulls towards their perceived enemies. Stampedes of caribous have been calmer than this, as the goons charge. Immediately, ten or so freeze and drop thanks to Bobby's Jedi mind tricks, Huntress and Commander, the epic mother-daughter dual, kicks the collective asses of even more, and Vixen causes others to turn against each other. The League is winning, winning easily, and Crowley knows this.
Except Crowley is too busy doing other things, like opening a portal to another planet, a hellish planet, and its working. A hole of every shade of red is spreading on the wall, spinning like a whirlpool, the middle a bottomless black pit and surrounded by red as bright as blood, dark as a rotted apple, so light it's almost pink, and everything in between. It shifts and dissipates, converges and splits, and it's mesmerizing. Hypnotic.
Then a roar is heard, a screech, and scream of terror. The portal is not made for one way travel, it appears. Demonic things and things that resemble monsters fly, crawl, stagger, slither, and walk out of the portal. A slimy looking dragon-like creature flies above and releases a stream of blackish goo that burns everything it touches; something that resembles a gigantic millipede crawls up to the ceiling and twists and writhes, hissing. It spits white spider webs, catching people in the webs and causing Castiel to constantly poof them out. One of those dragon things spit on Dean, who swears as the goo melts through the leather and his self-made armor. It sears his skin, which clears up right away. Crowley watches the display with hungry eyes.
He grabs Dean, presses his hands on Dean's chest. Behind him, the sound of battle is heard. A thing that looks like a much shorter version of a troll from the Harry Potter universe smashes his wooden club everywhere it can reach, and a sharp-toothed monster/alien thing snaps at the air, trying to find fresh food. But Dean's not looking at that, not looking at his brother, who's currently pulling black smoke from some of Crowley's goons, or at his boyfriend, who is poofing around, helping everyone. No, his focus is on Crowley, who is sucking Dean's power out right this moment.
"Goddammit!" Bobby shouts, "Those damned things won't die!"
No, Dean thinks, they won't. Because there's only one thing that will kill Gehennians and Dean has it. Except he's getting woozy and he's not so sure what the hell is happening anymore and he's very, very tired.
"Dean!" Castiel shrieks as he sees bright golden wisps of something he knows instinctively is power float from Dean's chest and into Crowley's mouth, and Dean's eyes roll to the back of his skull and his breaths go short. Something bites Castiel and he swears.
The shouts awaken Dean enough for him to grip the knife in a tightly clenched fist. With one violent motion, he twists the knife and slams it into Crowley's gut. Crowley chokes, eyes bulging out, as hot, thick, red blood spills onto Dean's hand. Crowley flashes gold, like electricity crackling, and he falls down dead with a thump.
Dean stands there breathlessly, gasping, and turns his wide eyes to his friends- his family. Castiel smiles widely back, and it feels awesome. He just killed the big bad, he's not dead, Cas isn't dead, Sam isn't dead. No one's dead, and Castiel looks so proud and loving even though that huge smile seems really creepy on him for some unfathomable reason and Dean really, really wants to kiss him-
"Hate to break the moment, lover boy, but the portal's closing and unless you want these things to populate the world forever with only one knife to kill it we need to get them all in there." Bobby shouts.
"No problemo," Trickster grins and gives Vixen a very meaningful look, and suddenly there's an exact copy of every single person on their side near the portal, and they start, one by one in a precise line, walking into the portal. The alien things go along with it mindlessly - Vixen's doing, Dean suspects - and they are all inside the portal in a flash. One carries Crowley's corpse into the portal with him.
The portal closes, leaving the bloodstained and panting heroes alone. Vixen gasps happily and turns to Trickster, pouncing on him and firmly pressing her lips on his. Trickster makes an undignified squeak that Dean plans to torment him with for eternity with and kisses her back just as enthusiastically.
Apparently that's some kind of a cue, because Huntress and Commander embrace, Bobby sighs and smiles, Sam pouts, probably thinking of Jessica, and Dean and Cas melt into a warm kiss of their own.
"So," Dean says when he breaks away from the kiss. He stares deeply into Cas' bottomless blue eyes, "We go home, what do you want to do first thing?"
Castiel also stares deeply into Dean's glowing green eyes, says, "I would very much like to sleep."
Dean pouts because he'd been thinking of something else a lot more fun that also involves a bed, but he gets that yeah, it was pretty dammed action-packed. But weren't they sleeping for four days? When he points that out to Cas, Cas rolls his eyes and says, "It does not seem like it. We can have sex first if that is what you desire."
Sam groans loudly, but Dean grins and plants another firm kiss on Castiel's lips as an answer. He has the best boyfriend ever.
***
Gehenna's harsh red horizon hurts his eyes, and the bright, pulsing sun turns that pain into agony. The tough, dry, black grass underneath him tickles and scrapes his over sensitive skin. It's too hot, the sky rippling with magnificent heat waves, and it feels like his flesh is melting off his bones. Despite the heat, it's raining like hell, scalding droplets searing into his body, soaking him in boiling water.
And yet in spite of all the pain, he has never felt better. Power, glorious and strengthening and amazing, rushes through his veins. It feels like ice and fire all at once, cooling him down and making him feel comfortably warm- not that he needs to be warmed. Although he's really pissed that his plan didn't work... well, no it did work. Just not the way he planned it. But still, he's back on Gehenna, and he has the powers he wants.
He has the power of healing.
Crowley pushes himself up and looks around at the barren landscape around him. It's an eyesore compared to Earth, and his troops are off to who knows where, but it's okay.
He's got a plan.
End
Part Two Masterpost