Unexpected Destinies Chapter 29
Title: Unexpected Destinies
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: up to and including Exile on Main St., AU from the end of season 5
Warnings: AU
Word Count: 2,412
Summary: Sam and Dean finally meet for the first time since Stull Cemetery.
PRESENT
Before his grandfather could reply to his last comment, Sam's phone rang.
"What the Hell is this?" Christian demanded.
"I don't know," Sam replied.
"Are we still going in as planned?"
"Yes, just keep your eyes peeled. Oh, the guy in the trench coat standing right next to Dean is Castiel."
"The angel?"
"Yeah."
"Brilliant. I told you there would be something supernatural involved in this."
"Hey, Cas is not some monster we need to kill."
"Are you still sure about that?"
Sam opened his mouth to reply, but then stopped. Did he really know for sure that Castiel was on the up and up here? The angel had done some pretty stupid stuff in the past and Dean wasn't exactly known for being a great influence on people at the best of times. Who knew what those two had taken it into their heads to do without himself or Bobby there to monitor the situation and steer them clear of their more stupid and risky plans?
"Look, whether he's on our side or not, you really don't want to start shooting at him or anything like that," Sam replied instead. "From what Bobby said, he's been restored to his full power and Dean and Bobby tried everything they had against him during their first meeting and he didn't so much as blink. There's only two things that work against angels as far as I know and we don't have either."
"And what are those?"
"Angel swords and lit holy oil."
"Where do we get those?"
"We don't, you have to get them from an angel, at least as far as I know. Dean probably still has them, but they'd be in the trunk of the Impala and there's no way you'd get at that before Castiel stopped you."
"I don't like this."
"Tough."
With that, Sam disconnected the call and shared a look with his grandfather.
"Let me guess, he wants to pull out," Samuel stated.
"Yeah."
"He has a point, but I think it's too late to back out now. There are too many unanswered questions about this whole deal and if that angel is still on Earth, then we need to find out why and whether any of the others are still here as well."
A very good point and one that Sam hadn't even thought of, which just went to show how far off his game he currently was. He wasn't used to that anymore. Ever since he'd first joined the Campbells, he'd been getting better and better at hunting now that he finally had partners who were at the same level as him and who shared his drive.
"Well, here goes nothing then."
Samuel threw him an odd look and Sam couldn't help but compare him to Castiel just then. Both of them were hopeless when it came to cultural references and certain customs which most people today took for granted. Then he pushed all those types of thoughts from his mind and focused himself completely on the upcoming situation. They were close enough for him to identify Dean with the naked eye now and a little further along Samuel slowed and stopped the car, Bobby and Christian pulling up alongside them.
Sam quickly got out to ensure that his was the first face Dean and Castiel saw, just in case they got spooked should they see Christian, Gwen or Mark first. Not to mention what kind of reaction seeing Samuel might cause. The reaction they got, though, was completely not what he had expected at all. Instead of looking worried or even mildly surprised, his brother merely glanced at each one of them in turn as if they were all expected.
What the hell?
Castiel's lack of expression was practically par for the course, as he seemed incapable of feeling human emotions, but Dean's? That wasn't right, he shouldn't know about Samuel's resurrection or his own decision to join their mother's family. So why did he look like he did? Or, if Sam really thought about it, how did his older brother even know to text him with these coordinates in the first place? Things just weren't adding up here and he hated it. It set him edge and made him want to hit something, preferably either his brother or something supernatural that wasn't built like a rock.
"Hello, Sam," Dean greeted, voice neutral.
"Dean," Sam replied automatically, frowning.
That had to be the most unenthusiastic greeting he'd ever received from his brother and that was saying a lot. Though they'd fought and had their bad patches, Dean was normally pretty happy to see him, especially after such a long separation. His brother just didn't deal well with being separated from his family, something he'd never seemed to grow out of no matter how normal it was to do so.
"Bobby, Samuel," Dean continued, giving each man a brief tilt of his head in acknowledgement.
"Dean, what is going on here?" Sam demanded, hating how little he knew about what was going on.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the hurt Bobby tried to hide at how coldly he'd been greeted. It was just another thing that didn't add up for Sam. Dean loved Bobby, often treating him like a surrogate father and therefore he just couldn't fathom the lack of proper greeting he gave the other hunter now.
Almost unconsciously, Sam had started stepping forward towards his brother, but he quickly stopped when both the unknown man and woman moved, the former shifting his weight so he was ready to react quickly and the latter stepping forwards.
"That's close enough," the woman ordered.
"And who are you?" Sam demanded.
"That's not important right now."
"Deirdre? Deirdre Winchester, is that you?" Samuel questioned in disbelief.
"What?" Sam demanded, stunned.
"That's your aunt, your father's sister, I recognize her now from when she was younger than you."
Dean sighed loudly and glanced upwards as if asking for help before he pushed off the Impala and stepped forwards. Castiel, as usual, shadowed his movements and, if Sam didn't know any better, he'd say that the angel was pressed right up against his brother when Dean came to a halt. From where he was standing, it looked like there was absolutely no space between Cas' chest and Dean's back. And really, had his brother still not managed to explain personal space to Castiel?
"Deirdre Winchester has technically been dead for just over ten months now," Dean informed them.
Dead? Then how was she standing right here, looking remarkably aliv-
Sam's mind ground to a halt as he took another look at his newly discovered aunt and suddenly caught sight of the expression on her face. It was one that he'd seen before, just over a year ago, though on a completely different face. A male face. His half-brother's face. No, it couldn't be! That was impossible, he'd made sure of it himself with his own two hands. There was no way this could be happening. And yet... the expression was exactly the same, not similar, but identical, as was the stance his aunt now stood in. Not to mention the way she was watching him expectantly.
"No, impossible!" Sam finally found his voice again. "That's just not possible!"
"Sam?" Bobby inquired.
"I locked you up!"
"What? Like you locked yourself up? Or Adam?" Deirdre shot back. "Because that obviously worked so well in those cases too."
"But- no, Jesus."
"Don't blaspheme," the order came at him from two different directions at once and Sam couldn't help but take a step back.
Although he had never particularly thought of Castiel as fierce some or worth being afraid of, Sam found that he was rapidly rethinking that assessment as the look the angel was now throwing at him was all of the above. Then, of course, there was Michael, if what his aunt said was to be believed. Given Dean's complete lack of interruptions, he had no choice but to think that it was.
"What is it?" Samuel demanded, stepping up to stand beside him. "What is she?"
A bit further to the right, Christian also took a step forwards and he didn't need to be able to see Gwen and Mark to know that they were tensing as well. They'd all worked too well as a team for months for him to not know how they'd react. Despite his shock, Sam didn't miss the way his brother's eyes swept their line, most likely noting everything he already knew and assessing their strengths and weaknesses. It was one of Dean's talents, the ability to take in people at a glance and deduce a fairly accurate guesstimate of who they were and what they were capable of. Though he didn't show it, Sam knew that Dean must be worried right about now as they didn't really have a weakness, not as a team. They were a well oiled unit of five that compensated for any individual weaknesses and Bobby's presence only gave them more strength.
"An angel," Sam finally replied. "Or an archangel, more like."
"Michael?!" Bobby's voice was full of the disbelief and astonishment that Sam himself felt.
"In the flesh," Dean stated then paused. "Well, so to speak anyway."
"Michael the archangel?" Christian questioned. "Didn't you lock him away, Sam?"
"Yes."
"Then how?"
"That's a very good question."
"With a very simple answer," Michael stated. "My brother's cage was only ever meant to hold one angel, not two. The moment Sam decided to pull me into it along with Lucifer, he doomed Gabriel's plan to failure."
"Wait, go back for a second," Bobby interrupted. "Adam's out as well?"
"Yes, his soul has returned to Heaven," Castiel informed him.
Sam felt a pang of guilt not only at the fact that he'd almost completely missed the reference to his half-brother, but that he'd not really thought of Adam at all since he'd gotten free from Hell. What did it say about him that he'd forgotten about him so easily despite knowing what the poor kid was going through because he'd been stupid enough to say yes to Michael?
"What exactly do you mean when you say that Sam doomed Gabriel's plan to failure?" Samuel demanded. "He succeeded in locking up Lucifer."
"No, Sam managed to do so temporarily," Dean corrected. "By trying to lock up Michael as well, he made the whole cage unstable so that in the end everyone in it, Sam, Adam, Michael and Lucifer, would get out."
Sam froze at the words. No, that wasn't possible! That couldn't be possible! That would mean that the Apocalypse wasn't over as he'd thought it was. That meant that all that he'd suffered, all that he'd gone through, had been for nothing! Unable to stop it, images from his time as Lucifer's vessel, of attacking and killing his friends and trying to do the same to his brother flashed across his mind. They were followed swiftly by memories of what had happened down in Hell on those handful of occasions that Lucifer had halted his fighting with Michael long enough to focus on him. Given that he'd been there two and a half long years, he knew it could have been worse, but it had been the devil himself who'd taken out his anger on him, so he felt it was comparable to having been tortured nonstop for far longer.
"How long do we have?" Bobby asked. "How long until Lucifer gets out?"
"He already is," Michael stated.
"What?" Sam exclaimed.
"Lucy got out a while ago," Dean said.
"If he's out then why haven't we heard of anything?" Christian demanded.
"What? You mean besides the sharp rise in aberrant behavior from all things supernatural?"
"That started ages ago."
"Yeah, in preparation for Lucy's return."
"Why didn't you tell us?" Sam cut in, looking at his brother in betrayal. "You have to have known about this for a while, why didn't you tell us?"
"What? Like you told me about your escape from Hell?" Dean shot back.
"That's different! You were with Lisa and Ben, living a normal life. You had everything you ever wanted or dreamed of having."
"I wanted my brother back! I wanted to know that you were safe and not rotting in Hell, completely at Lucifer's mercy."
"Dean, I..."
"We were trying to do what was best for you, Dean," Bobby added.
The laughter that escaped Dean's mouth was so harsh and bitter that Sam shivered and, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Bobby take a step back. "What was best for me?" Dean spat. "More like what you wanted without a single thought as to what I might want!"
"No, Dean," Bobby denied, horrified. "We really were thinking of you."
Dean snorted and looked away. Before Sam could say anything else, Castiel shifted and moved around his brother to face the two of them. The expression on his face was ferocious and he once again wondered how he could ever have thought the angel harmless.
"You wouldn't even dare make such a claim if you'd seen the state in which I found him," Castiel thundered. "He was pushing himself trying to find a way to save you, Sam, not eat-"
"Whoa! Cas, stop!" Dean exclaimed.
Sam could only watch in disbelief as his brother stepped close to the angel, completely ignoring his personal space, and wrapped an arm around his chest from behind as if to restrain him from smiting Bobby and himself. It was startling to think that Castiel just might have been prepared to do exactly that. What the hell had happened to him being seen as a friend by the angel? Yes, he'd always known that Castiel preferred Dean to him, but he'd felt pretty sure that the angel liked him as well by the end there. Had all of that just suddenly disappeared? Despite his preoccupation, some part of his mind noted that while Dean had felt no hesitation in physically restraining the angel, he hadn't stepped alongside or in front of him. Since when did his brother voluntarily stand behind a protective stance meant to defend him?
Castiel half turned to look at Dean and there they went again, staring at each other like there was no one else around. Oddly, Sam found it a comfort to see that some things at least hadn't changed as it seemed like almost everything else had.
Chapter 30
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: up to and including Exile on Main St., AU from the end of season 5
Warnings: AU
Word Count: 2,412
Summary: Sam and Dean finally meet for the first time since Stull Cemetery.
PRESENT
Before his grandfather could reply to his last comment, Sam's phone rang.
"What the Hell is this?" Christian demanded.
"I don't know," Sam replied.
"Are we still going in as planned?"
"Yes, just keep your eyes peeled. Oh, the guy in the trench coat standing right next to Dean is Castiel."
"The angel?"
"Yeah."
"Brilliant. I told you there would be something supernatural involved in this."
"Hey, Cas is not some monster we need to kill."
"Are you still sure about that?"
Sam opened his mouth to reply, but then stopped. Did he really know for sure that Castiel was on the up and up here? The angel had done some pretty stupid stuff in the past and Dean wasn't exactly known for being a great influence on people at the best of times. Who knew what those two had taken it into their heads to do without himself or Bobby there to monitor the situation and steer them clear of their more stupid and risky plans?
"Look, whether he's on our side or not, you really don't want to start shooting at him or anything like that," Sam replied instead. "From what Bobby said, he's been restored to his full power and Dean and Bobby tried everything they had against him during their first meeting and he didn't so much as blink. There's only two things that work against angels as far as I know and we don't have either."
"And what are those?"
"Angel swords and lit holy oil."
"Where do we get those?"
"We don't, you have to get them from an angel, at least as far as I know. Dean probably still has them, but they'd be in the trunk of the Impala and there's no way you'd get at that before Castiel stopped you."
"I don't like this."
"Tough."
With that, Sam disconnected the call and shared a look with his grandfather.
"Let me guess, he wants to pull out," Samuel stated.
"Yeah."
"He has a point, but I think it's too late to back out now. There are too many unanswered questions about this whole deal and if that angel is still on Earth, then we need to find out why and whether any of the others are still here as well."
A very good point and one that Sam hadn't even thought of, which just went to show how far off his game he currently was. He wasn't used to that anymore. Ever since he'd first joined the Campbells, he'd been getting better and better at hunting now that he finally had partners who were at the same level as him and who shared his drive.
"Well, here goes nothing then."
Samuel threw him an odd look and Sam couldn't help but compare him to Castiel just then. Both of them were hopeless when it came to cultural references and certain customs which most people today took for granted. Then he pushed all those types of thoughts from his mind and focused himself completely on the upcoming situation. They were close enough for him to identify Dean with the naked eye now and a little further along Samuel slowed and stopped the car, Bobby and Christian pulling up alongside them.
Sam quickly got out to ensure that his was the first face Dean and Castiel saw, just in case they got spooked should they see Christian, Gwen or Mark first. Not to mention what kind of reaction seeing Samuel might cause. The reaction they got, though, was completely not what he had expected at all. Instead of looking worried or even mildly surprised, his brother merely glanced at each one of them in turn as if they were all expected.
What the hell?
Castiel's lack of expression was practically par for the course, as he seemed incapable of feeling human emotions, but Dean's? That wasn't right, he shouldn't know about Samuel's resurrection or his own decision to join their mother's family. So why did he look like he did? Or, if Sam really thought about it, how did his older brother even know to text him with these coordinates in the first place? Things just weren't adding up here and he hated it. It set him edge and made him want to hit something, preferably either his brother or something supernatural that wasn't built like a rock.
"Hello, Sam," Dean greeted, voice neutral.
"Dean," Sam replied automatically, frowning.
That had to be the most unenthusiastic greeting he'd ever received from his brother and that was saying a lot. Though they'd fought and had their bad patches, Dean was normally pretty happy to see him, especially after such a long separation. His brother just didn't deal well with being separated from his family, something he'd never seemed to grow out of no matter how normal it was to do so.
"Bobby, Samuel," Dean continued, giving each man a brief tilt of his head in acknowledgement.
"Dean, what is going on here?" Sam demanded, hating how little he knew about what was going on.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the hurt Bobby tried to hide at how coldly he'd been greeted. It was just another thing that didn't add up for Sam. Dean loved Bobby, often treating him like a surrogate father and therefore he just couldn't fathom the lack of proper greeting he gave the other hunter now.
Almost unconsciously, Sam had started stepping forward towards his brother, but he quickly stopped when both the unknown man and woman moved, the former shifting his weight so he was ready to react quickly and the latter stepping forwards.
"That's close enough," the woman ordered.
"And who are you?" Sam demanded.
"That's not important right now."
"Deirdre? Deirdre Winchester, is that you?" Samuel questioned in disbelief.
"What?" Sam demanded, stunned.
"That's your aunt, your father's sister, I recognize her now from when she was younger than you."
Dean sighed loudly and glanced upwards as if asking for help before he pushed off the Impala and stepped forwards. Castiel, as usual, shadowed his movements and, if Sam didn't know any better, he'd say that the angel was pressed right up against his brother when Dean came to a halt. From where he was standing, it looked like there was absolutely no space between Cas' chest and Dean's back. And really, had his brother still not managed to explain personal space to Castiel?
"Deirdre Winchester has technically been dead for just over ten months now," Dean informed them.
Dead? Then how was she standing right here, looking remarkably aliv-
Sam's mind ground to a halt as he took another look at his newly discovered aunt and suddenly caught sight of the expression on her face. It was one that he'd seen before, just over a year ago, though on a completely different face. A male face. His half-brother's face. No, it couldn't be! That was impossible, he'd made sure of it himself with his own two hands. There was no way this could be happening. And yet... the expression was exactly the same, not similar, but identical, as was the stance his aunt now stood in. Not to mention the way she was watching him expectantly.
"No, impossible!" Sam finally found his voice again. "That's just not possible!"
"Sam?" Bobby inquired.
"I locked you up!"
"What? Like you locked yourself up? Or Adam?" Deirdre shot back. "Because that obviously worked so well in those cases too."
"But- no, Jesus."
"Don't blaspheme," the order came at him from two different directions at once and Sam couldn't help but take a step back.
Although he had never particularly thought of Castiel as fierce some or worth being afraid of, Sam found that he was rapidly rethinking that assessment as the look the angel was now throwing at him was all of the above. Then, of course, there was Michael, if what his aunt said was to be believed. Given Dean's complete lack of interruptions, he had no choice but to think that it was.
"What is it?" Samuel demanded, stepping up to stand beside him. "What is she?"
A bit further to the right, Christian also took a step forwards and he didn't need to be able to see Gwen and Mark to know that they were tensing as well. They'd all worked too well as a team for months for him to not know how they'd react. Despite his shock, Sam didn't miss the way his brother's eyes swept their line, most likely noting everything he already knew and assessing their strengths and weaknesses. It was one of Dean's talents, the ability to take in people at a glance and deduce a fairly accurate guesstimate of who they were and what they were capable of. Though he didn't show it, Sam knew that Dean must be worried right about now as they didn't really have a weakness, not as a team. They were a well oiled unit of five that compensated for any individual weaknesses and Bobby's presence only gave them more strength.
"An angel," Sam finally replied. "Or an archangel, more like."
"Michael?!" Bobby's voice was full of the disbelief and astonishment that Sam himself felt.
"In the flesh," Dean stated then paused. "Well, so to speak anyway."
"Michael the archangel?" Christian questioned. "Didn't you lock him away, Sam?"
"Yes."
"Then how?"
"That's a very good question."
"With a very simple answer," Michael stated. "My brother's cage was only ever meant to hold one angel, not two. The moment Sam decided to pull me into it along with Lucifer, he doomed Gabriel's plan to failure."
"Wait, go back for a second," Bobby interrupted. "Adam's out as well?"
"Yes, his soul has returned to Heaven," Castiel informed him.
Sam felt a pang of guilt not only at the fact that he'd almost completely missed the reference to his half-brother, but that he'd not really thought of Adam at all since he'd gotten free from Hell. What did it say about him that he'd forgotten about him so easily despite knowing what the poor kid was going through because he'd been stupid enough to say yes to Michael?
"What exactly do you mean when you say that Sam doomed Gabriel's plan to failure?" Samuel demanded. "He succeeded in locking up Lucifer."
"No, Sam managed to do so temporarily," Dean corrected. "By trying to lock up Michael as well, he made the whole cage unstable so that in the end everyone in it, Sam, Adam, Michael and Lucifer, would get out."
Sam froze at the words. No, that wasn't possible! That couldn't be possible! That would mean that the Apocalypse wasn't over as he'd thought it was. That meant that all that he'd suffered, all that he'd gone through, had been for nothing! Unable to stop it, images from his time as Lucifer's vessel, of attacking and killing his friends and trying to do the same to his brother flashed across his mind. They were followed swiftly by memories of what had happened down in Hell on those handful of occasions that Lucifer had halted his fighting with Michael long enough to focus on him. Given that he'd been there two and a half long years, he knew it could have been worse, but it had been the devil himself who'd taken out his anger on him, so he felt it was comparable to having been tortured nonstop for far longer.
"How long do we have?" Bobby asked. "How long until Lucifer gets out?"
"He already is," Michael stated.
"What?" Sam exclaimed.
"Lucy got out a while ago," Dean said.
"If he's out then why haven't we heard of anything?" Christian demanded.
"What? You mean besides the sharp rise in aberrant behavior from all things supernatural?"
"That started ages ago."
"Yeah, in preparation for Lucy's return."
"Why didn't you tell us?" Sam cut in, looking at his brother in betrayal. "You have to have known about this for a while, why didn't you tell us?"
"What? Like you told me about your escape from Hell?" Dean shot back.
"That's different! You were with Lisa and Ben, living a normal life. You had everything you ever wanted or dreamed of having."
"I wanted my brother back! I wanted to know that you were safe and not rotting in Hell, completely at Lucifer's mercy."
"Dean, I..."
"We were trying to do what was best for you, Dean," Bobby added.
The laughter that escaped Dean's mouth was so harsh and bitter that Sam shivered and, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Bobby take a step back. "What was best for me?" Dean spat. "More like what you wanted without a single thought as to what I might want!"
"No, Dean," Bobby denied, horrified. "We really were thinking of you."
Dean snorted and looked away. Before Sam could say anything else, Castiel shifted and moved around his brother to face the two of them. The expression on his face was ferocious and he once again wondered how he could ever have thought the angel harmless.
"You wouldn't even dare make such a claim if you'd seen the state in which I found him," Castiel thundered. "He was pushing himself trying to find a way to save you, Sam, not eat-"
"Whoa! Cas, stop!" Dean exclaimed.
Sam could only watch in disbelief as his brother stepped close to the angel, completely ignoring his personal space, and wrapped an arm around his chest from behind as if to restrain him from smiting Bobby and himself. It was startling to think that Castiel just might have been prepared to do exactly that. What the hell had happened to him being seen as a friend by the angel? Yes, he'd always known that Castiel preferred Dean to him, but he'd felt pretty sure that the angel liked him as well by the end there. Had all of that just suddenly disappeared? Despite his preoccupation, some part of his mind noted that while Dean had felt no hesitation in physically restraining the angel, he hadn't stepped alongside or in front of him. Since when did his brother voluntarily stand behind a protective stance meant to defend him?
Castiel half turned to look at Dean and there they went again, staring at each other like there was no one else around. Oddly, Sam found it a comfort to see that some things at least hadn't changed as it seemed like almost everything else had.
Chapter 30