FIC: SPN [30 nano shots] Dean Winchester's Guide to Close Encounters of the Angelic Kind
Title: Dean Winchester's Guide to Close Encounters of the Angelic Kind
Author: Wolfling
Character(s)/Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Theme: Special Table - Nano
Link to my list of prompts here
Prompt(s): 03. encounter
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 1565
Disclaimer: yeah, not mine.
Summary: Yeah, there was a time that I thought believing in angels was looney tunes too, but trust me. They're real. So here's a guide to the various levels of encounters you could have with them.
People have been using this list to categorize so-called alien abductions for years. Now I've seen a lot of strange things, but I've never seen any little green men from outer space. Gremlins, yes. Space aliens, not a one.
What I have seen and have ended up having way more personal experience with than anybody would ever want are angels. Yeah, there was a time that I thought believing in angels was looney tunes too, but trust me. They're real. So here's a guide to the various levels of encounters you could have with them.
Close Encounters of the First Kind
This is a sighting, with no physical proof. This doesn't happen all that much with angels. They're usually either being really really subtle and trying to just be another face in the crowd or they're being really really flashy in a blow things up kind of way. Chances are, if you realize you're having an angelic encounter, you're going to have a whole heap of physical proof left behind.
Still, if you ever see a shooting star, it's just possible you're not looking at a hunk of rock falling to Earth. Angels take falling kind of literally.
Close Encounters of the Second Kind
This is where you have some kind of physical evidence of an encounter. Angels tend to be pretty flashy, so if you have a run-in with one, you'll probably have something you can point to to help prove it. Electronic devices will turn themselves on and go all staticky when they're around. And like I said above, things have a habit of blowing up around angels -- be it windows, lightbulbs, gas stations or other angels. (Yeah that last is as gross as you're imagining it to be. Kinda makes exploding glass almost seem like a good thing, doesn't it?)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
This would be the face to face kind of encounter. You see the angel, the angel sees you, stuff happens.
There's a few different ways this can occur. You can come face to face with an angel in its true form. This is usually really, really bad. 'Cause unless you're one of a very few special people who can see and hear an angel's true form (and most of those people have other ways why this is very bad, see the Really Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind section below) you're going to come away from this encounter one hurt puppy. And by hurt puppy I mean your eardrums will explode from an angel's voice and if you see an angel in its true form, your eyes will burn right out of your head. Gives whole new meaning to the phrase blind date, doesn't it?
Angels aren't stupid though (dicks with wings, yes, but not stupid dicks with wings) so when they want to interact with the average human, they take a vessel. Which is to say, they possess some poor schmuck and walk around in him like he's an ill fitting suit. This is a whole world of suck to the guy being worn, but it does make life easier (where easier means your eyeballs aren't catching on fire and your eardrums aren't exploding) for anyone else around the angel.
When in a vessel, angels look pretty much like your average run of the mill human, though if you see them over time, you'll notice that they don't seem to know how to change their clothes. Magically repair and clean them, yep, but actually take them off and put on new and different clothes? Suggest it to one and they'll probably just tilt their head puzzledly at you, like that dog from those old RCA commericals.
They can, if they want, show their wings while in a vessel. Well sorta anyway -- it's more the shadows of the wings instead of the actual wings themselves (because then we'd be back to the burning eyeballs) but it's still pretty damn impressive.
There's a third way you can have an encounter with an angel face to face, though maybe it's stretching the definition a little. See, that whole thing in the bible where angels can appear to people in their dreams? Totally true. Also often totally annoying. I mean, one minute you're playing naked twister with the entire Dallas cheerleader squad, the next you've got your angel standing in the middle of the twister board still dressed like a holy tax accountant telling you you've got to talk about the apocalypse. Not exactly the way I was anticipating that particular dream going, I tell you. A piece of advice, if you do have angels popping into your dreams willy nilly, it might not be a bad idea to make a rule where you don't talk about the end of the world unless everyone has pants on.
Just saying.
Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind
This is where we move beyond simple face to face encounters to actual abductions.
Now I know what you're thinking. They're angels, Dean. The good guys. They wouldn't kidnap anyone. Yeah, not so much. Remember where I said they're dicks with wings? Dicks generally don't have anything against kidnapping.
And it's not just things like hauling you from your motel room to torture a demon for them or zapping you to some angelic version of a green room to wait for the apocalypse to start you have to worry about. No, angels can yank you against your will through time as well as space, and the next thing you know you're talking to yourself, literally, or meeting your parents before they got married.
Fun as that might sound -- which is to say no fun at all -- angels are kind of hard to stop doing that sorta thing if they're really put their minds to it. You can try to keep them from touching your forehead, as that seems to be how they move you, but they're fast little buggers when they want to be. If they want you somewhere else, chances are, sooner or later you're going to end up there.
Really Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind
There's also another thing that, while it's not exactly kidnapping, is kind of infinitely worse. And that's being used as an angel's vessel.
Not only will you be trapped in your own mind while the angel uses your body to get on with whatever angel business they have (which never includes such mundane things like eating and sleeping), but if someone kills the angel while they're inside you, they're probably going to kill you too. Not on purpose mind, but since most angel deaths seem to involve a knife through the throat (or exploding) it's not just the angel who gets the mortal blow there. Plus, depending on what kind of angel's riding you, even if you don't get killed, you could end up taking up drooling and staring blankly into space as full time hobbies when the angel lets you go. The more powerful the angel, the better chance you'll end up permenently catatonic as a result of the experience. Sounds like fun, don't it?
There is good news though. An angel can't take you as a vessel without your express consent. So as long as you keep saying stay the fuck out of me, they have to do that.
This doesn't mean that they won't resort to some pretty drastic measures to get you to say yes, up to and including lying, bribery and torture, but believe me. Don't give in.
Just say no to being an angel condom. It never ends well.
Close Encounters of the Fifth Kind
This would be when things move beyond just being an encounter and becomes something reciprocal. A friendship or something more.
Now this isn't going to happen with most angels because of the whole being dicks with wings thing. But there's a few out there that aren't dicks, that are actually pretty awesome, in all senses of the word.
If you're lucky enough to end up with an angel like that, be prepared to spend a lot of time explaining human customs and slang. Sometimes you can talk them through stuff, but other times you're going to have to take a hands on approach. It's going to make you want to bang your head against the wall sometimes, believe me.
But it's worth it. Because angels who aren't dicks are not only rare, but intensely loyal and selfless and they may not get the whole human thing but they keep trying to figure it out. And progress can be made. In my case, we've mastered cell phones and leaving a voice mail, as well as the importance of coffee and pie. I'm still working on getting him to maybe consider wearing other clothes, but I have managed to get him to understand there's some things it's better to not have any clothes on at all for.
In a related note, he no longer tries to talk to me about the apocalypse when one or both of us are without pants. He's learned there's better things to do in that situation.
And we're having close -- very close -- encounters of the very best kind whenever we can.
Author: Wolfling
Character(s)/Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Theme: Special Table - Nano
Link to my list of prompts here
Prompt(s): 03. encounter
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 1565
Disclaimer: yeah, not mine.
Summary: Yeah, there was a time that I thought believing in angels was looney tunes too, but trust me. They're real. So here's a guide to the various levels of encounters you could have with them.
People have been using this list to categorize so-called alien abductions for years. Now I've seen a lot of strange things, but I've never seen any little green men from outer space. Gremlins, yes. Space aliens, not a one.
What I have seen and have ended up having way more personal experience with than anybody would ever want are angels. Yeah, there was a time that I thought believing in angels was looney tunes too, but trust me. They're real. So here's a guide to the various levels of encounters you could have with them.
Close Encounters of the First Kind
This is a sighting, with no physical proof. This doesn't happen all that much with angels. They're usually either being really really subtle and trying to just be another face in the crowd or they're being really really flashy in a blow things up kind of way. Chances are, if you realize you're having an angelic encounter, you're going to have a whole heap of physical proof left behind.
Still, if you ever see a shooting star, it's just possible you're not looking at a hunk of rock falling to Earth. Angels take falling kind of literally.
Close Encounters of the Second Kind
This is where you have some kind of physical evidence of an encounter. Angels tend to be pretty flashy, so if you have a run-in with one, you'll probably have something you can point to to help prove it. Electronic devices will turn themselves on and go all staticky when they're around. And like I said above, things have a habit of blowing up around angels -- be it windows, lightbulbs, gas stations or other angels. (Yeah that last is as gross as you're imagining it to be. Kinda makes exploding glass almost seem like a good thing, doesn't it?)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
This would be the face to face kind of encounter. You see the angel, the angel sees you, stuff happens.
There's a few different ways this can occur. You can come face to face with an angel in its true form. This is usually really, really bad. 'Cause unless you're one of a very few special people who can see and hear an angel's true form (and most of those people have other ways why this is very bad, see the Really Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind section below) you're going to come away from this encounter one hurt puppy. And by hurt puppy I mean your eardrums will explode from an angel's voice and if you see an angel in its true form, your eyes will burn right out of your head. Gives whole new meaning to the phrase blind date, doesn't it?
Angels aren't stupid though (dicks with wings, yes, but not stupid dicks with wings) so when they want to interact with the average human, they take a vessel. Which is to say, they possess some poor schmuck and walk around in him like he's an ill fitting suit. This is a whole world of suck to the guy being worn, but it does make life easier (where easier means your eyeballs aren't catching on fire and your eardrums aren't exploding) for anyone else around the angel.
When in a vessel, angels look pretty much like your average run of the mill human, though if you see them over time, you'll notice that they don't seem to know how to change their clothes. Magically repair and clean them, yep, but actually take them off and put on new and different clothes? Suggest it to one and they'll probably just tilt their head puzzledly at you, like that dog from those old RCA commericals.
They can, if they want, show their wings while in a vessel. Well sorta anyway -- it's more the shadows of the wings instead of the actual wings themselves (because then we'd be back to the burning eyeballs) but it's still pretty damn impressive.
There's a third way you can have an encounter with an angel face to face, though maybe it's stretching the definition a little. See, that whole thing in the bible where angels can appear to people in their dreams? Totally true. Also often totally annoying. I mean, one minute you're playing naked twister with the entire Dallas cheerleader squad, the next you've got your angel standing in the middle of the twister board still dressed like a holy tax accountant telling you you've got to talk about the apocalypse. Not exactly the way I was anticipating that particular dream going, I tell you. A piece of advice, if you do have angels popping into your dreams willy nilly, it might not be a bad idea to make a rule where you don't talk about the end of the world unless everyone has pants on.
Just saying.
Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind
This is where we move beyond simple face to face encounters to actual abductions.
Now I know what you're thinking. They're angels, Dean. The good guys. They wouldn't kidnap anyone. Yeah, not so much. Remember where I said they're dicks with wings? Dicks generally don't have anything against kidnapping.
And it's not just things like hauling you from your motel room to torture a demon for them or zapping you to some angelic version of a green room to wait for the apocalypse to start you have to worry about. No, angels can yank you against your will through time as well as space, and the next thing you know you're talking to yourself, literally, or meeting your parents before they got married.
Fun as that might sound -- which is to say no fun at all -- angels are kind of hard to stop doing that sorta thing if they're really put their minds to it. You can try to keep them from touching your forehead, as that seems to be how they move you, but they're fast little buggers when they want to be. If they want you somewhere else, chances are, sooner or later you're going to end up there.
Really Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind
There's also another thing that, while it's not exactly kidnapping, is kind of infinitely worse. And that's being used as an angel's vessel.
Not only will you be trapped in your own mind while the angel uses your body to get on with whatever angel business they have (which never includes such mundane things like eating and sleeping), but if someone kills the angel while they're inside you, they're probably going to kill you too. Not on purpose mind, but since most angel deaths seem to involve a knife through the throat (or exploding) it's not just the angel who gets the mortal blow there. Plus, depending on what kind of angel's riding you, even if you don't get killed, you could end up taking up drooling and staring blankly into space as full time hobbies when the angel lets you go. The more powerful the angel, the better chance you'll end up permenently catatonic as a result of the experience. Sounds like fun, don't it?
There is good news though. An angel can't take you as a vessel without your express consent. So as long as you keep saying stay the fuck out of me, they have to do that.
This doesn't mean that they won't resort to some pretty drastic measures to get you to say yes, up to and including lying, bribery and torture, but believe me. Don't give in.
Just say no to being an angel condom. It never ends well.
Close Encounters of the Fifth Kind
This would be when things move beyond just being an encounter and becomes something reciprocal. A friendship or something more.
Now this isn't going to happen with most angels because of the whole being dicks with wings thing. But there's a few out there that aren't dicks, that are actually pretty awesome, in all senses of the word.
If you're lucky enough to end up with an angel like that, be prepared to spend a lot of time explaining human customs and slang. Sometimes you can talk them through stuff, but other times you're going to have to take a hands on approach. It's going to make you want to bang your head against the wall sometimes, believe me.
But it's worth it. Because angels who aren't dicks are not only rare, but intensely loyal and selfless and they may not get the whole human thing but they keep trying to figure it out. And progress can be made. In my case, we've mastered cell phones and leaving a voice mail, as well as the importance of coffee and pie. I'm still working on getting him to maybe consider wearing other clothes, but I have managed to get him to understand there's some things it's better to not have any clothes on at all for.
In a related note, he no longer tries to talk to me about the apocalypse when one or both of us are without pants. He's learned there's better things to do in that situation.
And we're having close -- very close -- encounters of the very best kind whenever we can.