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Right. I don't know what happened last night, and I'm not sure I want to. This is me, sitting happily back in my feel-good verse and saying screw it. *sheepish* Here you go.
Title: Home
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Good Omens, Supernatural
Continuity: Follows straight from Rest
Characters/Pairings: Dean, Sam, Gabriel, Castiel, Crowley, Aziraphale, Bobby. Dean/Cas, Sam/Gabriel (strong), Aziraphale/Crowley
Summary: Short roadtrip, and arrival at Bobby's
Wordcount: 4667
Disclaimer: Still not mine
Currently, he was leaning towards 'more'.
He and Sam were sitting up front. Dean driving, as was only sensible, seeing as Aziraphale obviously had no experience with cars if he thought what they were currently driving in was even remotely a good excuse for one, Crowley currently had no hands, and if both of them were in a car, Sam was shotgun. This may not have been his baby, but there was no reason to mess with a good thing. Sam was up front mostly because Aziraphale was fussing over their two injured angels, and frankly it wasn't safe to go near him. Since Cas was starting to look more like himself and less like a corpse under Aziraphale's care, Dean wasn't actually going to complain this time.
Unfortunately, because Aziraphale was fussing and mucking around with Grace and healing and shit, because Cas and Gabriel were currently taking up the two couches in the back, and Aziraphale the floor between them as he worked ... Crowley was also up front.
He was, in fact, sitting (lying?) in Sam's lap. His brother was sitting beside him with a lap full of demon snake. A lap full of talking demon snake.
Between that, whatever was happening in the back, and the fact that he'd been awake for more than twenty-four hours by this point, it was getting kinda hard to concentrate on the road. And Crowley, it turned out, was a back-seat driver of truly epic proportions.
"Bloody hell, kid, Aziraphale drives faster than you, and the last time he was behind the wheel was in 1926! This is an Interstate, not a carpark!"
"Sam ..." Dean gritted his teeth. Hard.
Sam smiled fixedly back. "We've been over this, Dean. He's nine feet long, he's got fangs, and he's sitting on top of my junk. You tell him to shut up."
"Don't be silly, dear," Aziraphale cut in from the back, looking up from Castiel. "Crowley would never do a thing like that! You're perfectly safe, I promise you."
They looked down at Crowley. Crowley bared said fangs in a very slow, very promising snaky smile, and rested his head pointedly on Sam's thigh. They looked back at each other, shrugged, and Dean went back to the road, gritting his teeth and pressing the gas a little. Maybe Crowley had a point. The faster he went, the faster this road-trip from hell would be over. And that ... that could not happen soon enough. It really, really couldn't.
Then, purely to bring joy and happiness back to their lives, Gabriel decided to wake up. Of course he did.
"Why are we in a limo?" the archangel rasped, blinking up at the disco-ball hanging from the ceiling (Anansi had a really sick sense of humour). Sam almost dumped Crowley into the foot-well turning around in his seat to look. "And please don't tell me we're not, and this is what passes for Heaven for renegade archangels. Because nice and all as the seventies were, I'm not all that interested in spending eternity there ..."
"You're not dead!" Sam interrupted quickly. Desperately. Dean almost complained. He wouldn't have minded messing with Gabriel's head for a couple of minutes there ... But Sam sounded so ridiculously happy saying it, so stupidly relieved, and if Dean's eyes weren't fixed grittily on the road he'd be looking at Cas right now, so ... Driver shuts his cakehole, he guessed.
"Well, that's certainly a relief," Gabriel smirked tiredly, shifting around behind Dean. "It's always nice, not being dead. Doesn't really explain the limo, though. Unless you boys have gone up in the world, and a long way down in taste, while I've been out ...?"
"Blame your friend," Dean growled, changing gears with perhaps more force that was strictly necessary. Crowley grunted assent, climbing back up into Sam's seat as Dean's brother scrambled over the back towards Gabriel. Dean very pointedly didn't look after him.
"Friend?" Gabriel squeaked after a second, somewhat breathlessly. Possibly because Sam had just dived on top of him, and Dean was not thinking about that, dammit!
"Anansi," Aziraphale elaborated helpfully, leaning back into Castiel's couch out of the way. "Mind your foot there, dear, if you don't mind. And don't put any weight on his back or shoulders, they may still be a little tender ... There. That's better. It's lucky you're so small in this form, Gabriel, isn't it?" All bright and beaming, and Dean stared fixedly at the horizon and ignored Crowley laughing snakily to himself beside him.
"Make short jokes at your peril, demon," Gabriel growled breathlessly from the back, but not very threateningly. More by rote than anything. Then he shut up, and there were other noises, right behind Dean's back, and this was, officially and without doubt, the worst. Roadtrip. EVER.
"I didn't know archangels bent that way," Crowley noted, ever so helpfully, from the passenger seat.
"Watch his back," Aziraphale reproached, equally helpful, and concerned about all the wrong things, in Dean's opinion. "Sam? Samuel! Dear, don't hold him that way. Around his waist, dear boy, if you must put them somewhere ..."
"I thought humans needed to breathe on occasion?" Crowley murmured, staring quite happily at the side of Dean's head. Because the target of the demon's glee was not at all obvious, here. Dean took a hand off the wheel long enough to flip him the finger, and stared pointedly just past the tiny naked woman perched on the end of their hot-pink hood, ignoring both the sloppy sound as Sam and Gabriel presumably pulled out of their passionate lip-lock, and Crowley's snickers.
"Ah ... hello?" Gabriel tried, sounding more dazed than usual. "Um. Happy to see you too?"
"Don't you dare do that to me again!" Sam growled, not sounding dazed at all. More furious. And hurt. And ... something Dean didn't want to think about too closely.
"Kiss you?" Gabriel asked, flippantly enough, but there was a shake in his voice. Dean groaned. Not a good plan, archangel ... "Because if you don't want me to kiss you, Sammy, you really shouldn't have ..."
"Gabriel."
The archangel sobered. Not in time, really, but better than Dean had done during the Mystery Spot incident. Sammy ... Sammy didn't take people almost dying on him too well. Neither did Dean, of course, but Sam ... Sam got intense about it. Joking ... not the best plan in the world.
"Didn't exactly intend to end up staked to the floor with six demons about to chop my wings off, Sam," Gabriel said, carefully. Slowly. "I didn't go and plan it, or anything. I just ... I just didn't expect my brother to ..." He trailed off. Dean stared rigidly at the road, and tried to ignore the little nugget of understanding that beat on the back of his skull for the bastard. He was not going to end up liking the Trickster. He was not.
"I know, Gabriel," Sam whispered, quietly. "I know. Just ... Please, try not to do that again, okay? We've got enough people almost dying on us ..."
Gabriel made a sudden noise, a sort of strangled gasp, and Dean almost drove off the road, and actually stopped on the shoulder, turning already to tell them, whatever the hell they wanted to do in private, not while he was driving ... but when he looked back the archangel was doing his best to fall off of the couch beside Sam, moving towards ... towards Cas.
"Little brother, if you are dead, and that's what he's talking about ..." Gabriel muttered, elbowing an indignant Aziraphale out of the way almost frantically, grabbing for Cas' hand. "Though why they'd be carrying around your corpse ... then again, these are the Winchesters, so who knows ..."
"He's not dead!" Dean cut in harshly, glaring back at him. "Trust me. If he died saving you, I'd have left you at the factory, whether it was your fault or not! Cas is not dead." He paused, mostly to repeat that to himself a couple of times, to reassure himself. Cas was not dead. Cas was not dead. And more ... "He's also still an angel. Lucky break for you, I guess."
"Dean!" Sam growled, with a nice little echo from Aziraphale. Gabriel, though ... Gabriel just looked down at Cas, traced a hand over his chest and forehead the way Aziraphale had done. Just to check, maybe. Just to make sure. Then he looked up at Dean, and there was a sort of tired smile tucked into the corner of that mobile mouth. A wry little twist.
"If Castiel ever does die on my account," he said quietly. "You can be sure I will not object, to whatever you decide you have to do about it. Believe me, Deano. Believe me."
"I'll object," Sam cut in, glaring at Dean, one giant hand landing protectively on Gabriel's shoulder. The archangel flinched a bit, blinking in something almost like shock, and Dean felt his mouth twist. Damn it anyway.
"No-one is dying!" Aziraphale growled from somewhere behind Gabriel, coming up onto his knees and pushing Sam back into his seat. Then Gabriel after him, more carefully and with a soft, comforting little smile. "So if we could all grow up and start acting like adults again, that would be helpful!" He flapped his hands in annoyance, tucking Castiel's hand back onto the couch from where it had fallen.
Dean smiled a little. He couldn't help it. "Yeah? Gonna make sure of that, are you? The no dying thing, I mean."
"Maybe ..."
And that wasn't Aziraphale. Or Gabriel. Dean turned in his seat, looked at the snake curled thoughtfully beside him. Crowley wasn't looking at them. He was looking up at the sky through the windshield, golden eyes distant and slow. And for a second, all Dean could think of was how seriously surreal the sight was, the feeling, sitting in a fucking pink limo watching a talking snake plot.
"Dearest?" Aziraphale frowned, shuffling forward to lean around the back of the seat to look down at him. "Crowley? What do you mean?"
The snake shifted, about a foot and a half of him directly under the head curving gracefully around, and Dean just stared. Because this was a snake, it was an honest-to ... an honest-to-Someone snake, it moved like a snake, it looked like a snake ... and it sounded like Crowley, like the fallen angel who'd gotten them all drunk and tempted an angel with cream buns and wings under an apple tree.
"Not yet, angel," Crowley murmured. "Let me think a little longer. Not yet."
"So long as you're not thinking what I think you're thinking," Gabriel spoke up, low and dangerous. Crowley uncoiled a little, a smooth, muscular motion, and peered around Aziraphale's hip at the archangel. His head tilted, so completely human a gesture that Dean was weirded out all over again, and that was so not helping him focus on the actual conversation here.
"Not yet," Crowley said again. An almost gentle reproach. "Whatever you heard, archangel ... don't pusssh yet, yesss? Let me think. Get sssssome ressst. Let me think."
"Gabriel?" Sam, sounding more than a little worried. Dean didn't blame him. "Gabriel, what's he talking about?
The archangel said nothing for a minute, as they all turned to look at him. Well, except Cas, who was still out of it. And Aziraphale, who was still watching his demon. Okay. So it was mostly him and Sam who turned to watch the archangel, but hey! It was slightly less weird than watching the snake. Gabriel, for his part, leaning heavily on Sam, just watched Crowley suspiciously. And maybe ... sympathetically? The hell? What was going on here?
"Alright," the archangel said at last. Slowly. Then he smirked a little bit, and it was odd how Dean had never noticed before how careful that expression was on Gabriel, how not-quite-natural it could be when the archangel didn't actually mean it. "Just don't do anything I wouldn't do, demon."
Crowley smirked faintly. "That doesn't leave much that I can't do, archangel. You realise that?"
Gabriel grinned. "Shut up, Crowley. And, Dean?" Dean blinked, looked up. "If we're going anywhere today, we might want to get our asses back in gear? Just a thought ..." Dean blinked some more. Actually resisted the urge to rub some grit out his eyes. Then he growled, glaring, and turned back to the wheel, blinking out at the shoulder and the road beyond it. Right. Going somewhere. Bobby's. Right.
He released the brake, pulling out as smoothly as the behemoth he was driving would allow, and very pointedly didn't look back at the noise his brother made, the soft sigh, or sideways as a very worried Aziraphale pulled Crowley up and out of the passenger seat and cuddled him.
And, most importantly, he didn't look back at the still form on the couch, didn't look back to see Cas' slack, pale features. Because if he looked back now ... they weren't ever getting to Bobby's.
"What you done to them?" Bobby growled, as Dean leaned back against the limo and snorted to himself. Aziraphale, poking his head around the car door, looked mildly concerned as Sam tried to shuffle forwards to protect Gabriel. Bobby stopped him with a glare.
"I don't know what you mean," Gabriel smirked. Tiredly, but still. He stared down at Bobby and the gun, and didn't look the slightest bit fazed, until Bobby poked him in the belly with the barrel. Gabriel flinched back a little, and growled at Bobby's faint look of satisfaction.
"Bobby," Sam said, quietly. With more than a little growl himself. Bobby ignored him.
"Pull the other one, Trickster," he said, quiet and deadly, looking pointedly at the car. "You think I don't recognise your style when I see it? I haven't heard from these boys for three days, and then they show in this piece of crap, and guess who's tagging along? So. What. Have. You. Done?"
Gabriel's face moved. A sort of exhausted twitch around the eyes and mouth, somewhere between amusement and hysteria, and Dean abruptly decided that okay. Amusing as this was, maybe the archangel actually didn't need it right now. Or Sam, or any of them, in fact. Maybe they just ... didn't need this.
"Bobby," he said, rough and gravelly, moving forward to rest a hand on the barrel of Bobby's gun (and decades of training screamed at him for that one, pointed out exactly how stupid a move it was, but he was just too tired for anything else) and pushing it gently down and away from Gabriel. "Right trick. Wrong Trickster. He's on the level, Bobby. Let him be."
He didn't know which of them looked more stunned at that, Bobby, or Gabriel himself. But Sam was biting his lip, and looking at Dean with pride, and ... yeah, okay. It sort of felt good. And there was a weird rightness about seeing the surprise in the archangel's face over something good for a change, a weird satisfaction in surprising someone with something other than a shotgun to the head or a knife in the neck. It felt ... pretty good.
Bobby looked at them, between them. Looked behind them to where Aziraphale, with Crowley draped around his neck, was peering worriedly out of the car. He looked at them, took in how tired and shaken and simply flattened they all were ... and sighed. Heavily.
"I suppose you'd all better come inside then," he grunted, wheeling back a few paces to give them room, glaring disgruntledly. "And if anyone tries to kill me, I'm blaming you. Idjits."
Dean grinned a little, sort of shakily. "Thanks Bobby."
Bobby grunted, waving a hand irritably as he watched Aziraphale climb out and pull Castiel after him with Sam's help. Dean lost track for a second getting his angel scooped up and settled. "Yeah, yeah. Just get your asses inside already. We'll figure the rest out after. Oh. And someone get this monstrosity outta my sight before I hurl, will ya?"
Gabriel smiled at that. "That, I can help you with," he murmured, clicking his fingers before anyone could stop him. Both Sam and Aziraphale squawked at him, rushing forward to catch him as he sagged a bit, but the limo vanished, presumably back to wherever Anansi had magicked it from in the first place. Gabriel smirked pointedly in Bobby's direction, leaning heavily on Sam, one hand perhaps wandering a little more than Dean wanted to pay attention to.
Bobby rolled his eyes.
"Um, excuse me?" Aziraphale moved forward, carefully, steadying Gabriel into Sam's care, one hand coming up to cradle Crowley's head. The demon shifted uneasily around his angel's shoulders, and Bobby stiffened suspiciously.
"Who're you?" he asked, shortly and not exactly friendly. Aziraphale grimaced slightly.
"Aziraphale," he said, cautiously, before looking down at the snake around his chest. "An angel. Of the non-homicidal kind, I assure you! And this ... this is Crowley. He's ... a demon." He flinched, and flapped a hurried hand at Bobby's expression. "Also of the non-homicidal kind, I promise you! He and I have known each other for centuries, I can definitely vouch for him, Mr ... ah?"
"Singer," Bobby growled, squinting suspiciously. Aziraphale beamed at him, causing Bobby's eyebrows to climb up under his hat, and Dean sort of smirked over Cas' head. It was kinda fun, watching someone else react to the ... whatever it was that made Aziraphale who he was. "Robert Singer." Aziraphale beamed some more, coming forward to hold out a hand. Bobby stared at it for a second, and at the snake blinking lazily at him, before taking it cautiously.
"I'm so pleased to meet you, Mr Singer!" the angel smiled, shaking vigorously, while Crowley grinned snakily. He paused, taking Bobby's hand between both of his own, staring into the middle distance for a second, and then a slightly distant expression slipped into his eyes, sort of sad and proud. When he looked back down at Bobby, something in his face made the older man shake a little, stunned.
"Yes," the angel murmured. "Very pleased to meet you, Robert. You're a good man. A very good man."
Bobby flushed, beet-red, and tugged his hand back awkwardly. "Yeah, well. Whatever." He looked down at his knees, avoiding everyone's gaze, and Dean felt something clench a little in his chest at the tiny, shy smile tucked in the corner of Bobby's mouth. The little glimmer of embarrassed pride.
Yeah. Aziraphale may be a fruit-cake, but he was alright. He was alright.
"Can we come in?" Aziraphale asked, folding his hands in an oddly formal gesture as he looked at Bobby, smiling faintly and gently. "My demon and I? We have been ... We have a little arrangement with your boys, you see, and we'd rather stay with them for the time being, if no-one minds?"
Bobby blinked up at him, then slanted a wry look over at Dean and Sam. "They on the level too?" he asked bluntly, tipping his head at Aziraphale and smiling very faintly. They grinned back.
"Yeah, Bobby," Sam murmured quietly, his arm snug around Gabriel's waist. "They're on the level." Dean hugged Cas close, and nodded. Bobby squinted at them a little longer, just for a minute, and shook his head with an exasperated smile.
"Sure," he muttered, turning to wheel back towards the house, shaking his head. "Why not? Come on in, the lot of you, and quit cluttering up my yard!"
Dean was nodding, hefting Cas in his arms awkwardly to try and follow, mentally measuring the distance and thinking absently about telling Cas to lose some frikking weight when he woke up, when Aziraphale reached out to catch Bobby's shoulder and pull him gently to a stop. Bobby froze, staring up at him. So did everyone else.
"I wonder," said Aziraphale, very gently. "I wonder, Mr Singer ... if we might borrow your wheelchair? Castiel is not well, you see, and Dean seems to be having some trouble with him ...?"
Bobby blinked up at him. Then over to where Dean had Cas half over his shoulder, arms tight around his angel and head shaking frantically at Aziraphale. No! No, you stupid angel, he was fine, he had it, don't go asking Bobby shit like that ... What the hell, Aziraphale? But the angel was smiling, serene and gentle, and didn't seem to notice the frantic messages he and Sam were trying to send him.
Bobby looked back. "What am I supposed to do? Sit him in my lap?" he grumbled. But he wasn't moving. He hadn't jerked away from the angel. He looked like he was actually thinking about it. Dean wasn't sure what to feel about that.
Aziraphale smiled at him. "Well, you could, I suppose. It would be rather awkward, though. Wouldn't it be easier if you simply ... walked with me?" He held out one soft hand, palm up, and smiled quietly.
Every last one of them froze, staring. Bobby ... Bobby didn't move. Bobby didn't blink. He just ... sat. Stared. Same as the rest of them, and Dean wondered if they were all feeling the same sick, heavy, hopeful twisting he was. He wondered if they all wanted as badly as he did to punch Aziraphale, or cry.
Then Crowley moved. Curling up off Aziraphale's shoulders, arching high to actually look down at his angel, golden eyes soft and exasperated. "You sap," he accused, flatly. Not a hiss in sight. "You bloody sap, angel. You had to. You just had to, didn't you? This is why I don't let you near hospitals ..."
"Hush, dear," Aziraphale interrupted, smiling up at him for a second. "He's giving us his hospitality. It's only fair. And we do need that wheelchair, after all. Unless you feel a pair of hands coming on?"
"Not my fault," the demon huffed, shifting his coils primly. "I haven't taken out a small base in years, and never like that. It's hardly my fault it takes a while to get back the mental focus for a shift."
"Of course not, dear," the angel smiled, reaching up to pat him gently. "So stop complaining, there's a good fellow?"
"Hey!" Bobby blinked, coming up out of his shock a little, getting back a spark of temper. "If this is some kind of joke to you two, you can damn well ..."
"It isn't," Aziraphale cut him off, very gently. If he was conscious of them staring holes in his back, he didn't show it. Instead, he simply reached out to Bobby once more, hand steady and calm. "I would not joke about such a thing, Mr Singer. Robert. I promise you." A soft smile, gently coaxing. "I promise you. Please?"
Bobby glared at him. Hot. Uncertain. Angry and hopeful. He stared at him. And then ... then he looked down at his legs. Looked down, and focused. Twitched his foot. Moved his foot. Stiffly, almost painfully. He moved his foot.
Dean felt some invisible someone kick him solidly in the gut. He heard Sam gasp beside him, saw his brother twitch forwards out of the corner of his eye. He didn't move. He couldn't move. Could only watch, distantly, with something thick and choking in his throat, as Bobby took the angel's hand and slowly, laboriously pulled himself to his feet.
"There we go," Aziraphale murmured, smiling softly, steadying the man carefully. "There we go. Thank you, Robert. Thank you." Bobby blinked at him, hands clutching the angel's arms, shaking his head in confusion as Crowley wrapped a coil around his wrist as if to help. The demon pointedly refused to meet anyone's eyes.
"What ..." Bobby started, thickly. "What the hell you thanking me for? That ... why the hell are you thanking me?"
"For trusting me," Aziraphale answered simply. "For letting us in. For giving Castiel your wheelchair. For being who you are, Robert Singer. For being a good man."
Anyone else, that would have sounded like platitude, or worse, some kind of mockery, some kind of sick joke. People didn't get rewarded for being a good person. Dean knew that. People got shafted, that's what they got. People, angels, even demons. They did something good, they got shafted for it. That was the way things worked, and always had. Saying differently ... anyone else, it would have sounded false, and cruel, a front for some ulterior motive. Aziraphale ... believed it. And there wasn't one of them there who doubted it.
Or one of them who had any damn clue what to do with it, either.
"We should ..." Sam managed, at last. Barely. "We should ... get inside?" He shrugged uneasily, almost leaning more on Gabriel now than the archangel had been on him a moment ago. He looked ... stunned. Amazed. Sort of ... warily, hopefully happy. Like something wonderful had happened, and he liked it, but he was sort of waiting for the bubble to burst. He looked sort of like Dean felt.
"I think that would be a good idea," Gabriel said quietly, looking up at Sam's face, at his expression. There was something soft in the archangel's expression, something quiet and real and nothing Dean had ever thought to see on that face. Something that cared.
"Yeah," Bobby said, still sort of staring at Aziraphale, still being sort of held up by him. "Yeah."
He shook himself, pulling himself together with an obvious effort, and pulled back a little. The angel let him go, Crowley releasing his wrist gently as he pulled away, and they smiled softly at him. Bobby, avoiding their eyes, looked over at the rest of them. At Sam. At Dean. He looked ... good. He looked so damn good. Standing on his own two feet again. Dean swallowed.
Then Bobby turned around, red to the ears, and laid a hand on the back of the chair. His chair. He sort of shuffled a bit, biting out a breath in shock and dizzy joy. And then he took the handles, turned it around, and wheeled it over to Dean. From the outside, not in it. Staring at his feet the whole way, watching them as they moved, as they held his weight. He stopped at Dean's side, looked up at him. Shook his head like there was nothing he knew how to say.
"On the level, huh?" he said at last, smiling faintly. Dean tipped his head around a smile, blinking back tears.
"Pretty much," he whispered. Swallowed. "Pretty much."
And Bobby smiled at him, biting his lip and shaking his head, and helped him lower Cas gently into the chair. Braced his legs and helped Dean take his angel's weight, helped him hold Cas up. Helped him help him. The way things should be.
"Come on," Bobby said, hoarse and happy. "Come on. Let's get you boys and your damn angels inside, huh?"
"And demon," Crowley grumbled. "Don't anyone forget the demon!"
"I suspect we couldn't if we tried," Gabriel drawled, leaning on Sam again, curled into Dean's brother and smiling distantly. Almost like he didn't even know he was doing it. "I suspect you wouldn't let us."
"Up yours, archangel," Crowley hissed, and dropped his head huffily onto Aziraphale's hair. The angel winced a little, and reached up to bat him off again, laughing silently as the demon glared. Dean watched them, his hand pressed around Castiel's shoulder, Bobby grinning at his side. Dean watched them.
And for the first time in a long while, he found himself smiling.
Contd: Interludes
Title: Home
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Good Omens, Supernatural
Continuity: Follows straight from Rest
Characters/Pairings: Dean, Sam, Gabriel, Castiel, Crowley, Aziraphale, Bobby. Dean/Cas, Sam/Gabriel (strong), Aziraphale/Crowley
Summary: Short roadtrip, and arrival at Bobby's
Wordcount: 4667
Disclaimer: Still not mine
Home
The limo (monstrosity) wasn't subdivided into front and back. There was no partition between driver and passengers. Whether this made the trip to Bobby's more or less surreal, Dean wasn't quite sure.Currently, he was leaning towards 'more'.
He and Sam were sitting up front. Dean driving, as was only sensible, seeing as Aziraphale obviously had no experience with cars if he thought what they were currently driving in was even remotely a good excuse for one, Crowley currently had no hands, and if both of them were in a car, Sam was shotgun. This may not have been his baby, but there was no reason to mess with a good thing. Sam was up front mostly because Aziraphale was fussing over their two injured angels, and frankly it wasn't safe to go near him. Since Cas was starting to look more like himself and less like a corpse under Aziraphale's care, Dean wasn't actually going to complain this time.
Unfortunately, because Aziraphale was fussing and mucking around with Grace and healing and shit, because Cas and Gabriel were currently taking up the two couches in the back, and Aziraphale the floor between them as he worked ... Crowley was also up front.
He was, in fact, sitting (lying?) in Sam's lap. His brother was sitting beside him with a lap full of demon snake. A lap full of talking demon snake.
Between that, whatever was happening in the back, and the fact that he'd been awake for more than twenty-four hours by this point, it was getting kinda hard to concentrate on the road. And Crowley, it turned out, was a back-seat driver of truly epic proportions.
"Bloody hell, kid, Aziraphale drives faster than you, and the last time he was behind the wheel was in 1926! This is an Interstate, not a carpark!"
"Sam ..." Dean gritted his teeth. Hard.
Sam smiled fixedly back. "We've been over this, Dean. He's nine feet long, he's got fangs, and he's sitting on top of my junk. You tell him to shut up."
"Don't be silly, dear," Aziraphale cut in from the back, looking up from Castiel. "Crowley would never do a thing like that! You're perfectly safe, I promise you."
They looked down at Crowley. Crowley bared said fangs in a very slow, very promising snaky smile, and rested his head pointedly on Sam's thigh. They looked back at each other, shrugged, and Dean went back to the road, gritting his teeth and pressing the gas a little. Maybe Crowley had a point. The faster he went, the faster this road-trip from hell would be over. And that ... that could not happen soon enough. It really, really couldn't.
Then, purely to bring joy and happiness back to their lives, Gabriel decided to wake up. Of course he did.
"Why are we in a limo?" the archangel rasped, blinking up at the disco-ball hanging from the ceiling (Anansi had a really sick sense of humour). Sam almost dumped Crowley into the foot-well turning around in his seat to look. "And please don't tell me we're not, and this is what passes for Heaven for renegade archangels. Because nice and all as the seventies were, I'm not all that interested in spending eternity there ..."
"You're not dead!" Sam interrupted quickly. Desperately. Dean almost complained. He wouldn't have minded messing with Gabriel's head for a couple of minutes there ... But Sam sounded so ridiculously happy saying it, so stupidly relieved, and if Dean's eyes weren't fixed grittily on the road he'd be looking at Cas right now, so ... Driver shuts his cakehole, he guessed.
"Well, that's certainly a relief," Gabriel smirked tiredly, shifting around behind Dean. "It's always nice, not being dead. Doesn't really explain the limo, though. Unless you boys have gone up in the world, and a long way down in taste, while I've been out ...?"
"Blame your friend," Dean growled, changing gears with perhaps more force that was strictly necessary. Crowley grunted assent, climbing back up into Sam's seat as Dean's brother scrambled over the back towards Gabriel. Dean very pointedly didn't look after him.
"Friend?" Gabriel squeaked after a second, somewhat breathlessly. Possibly because Sam had just dived on top of him, and Dean was not thinking about that, dammit!
"Anansi," Aziraphale elaborated helpfully, leaning back into Castiel's couch out of the way. "Mind your foot there, dear, if you don't mind. And don't put any weight on his back or shoulders, they may still be a little tender ... There. That's better. It's lucky you're so small in this form, Gabriel, isn't it?" All bright and beaming, and Dean stared fixedly at the horizon and ignored Crowley laughing snakily to himself beside him.
"Make short jokes at your peril, demon," Gabriel growled breathlessly from the back, but not very threateningly. More by rote than anything. Then he shut up, and there were other noises, right behind Dean's back, and this was, officially and without doubt, the worst. Roadtrip. EVER.
"I didn't know archangels bent that way," Crowley noted, ever so helpfully, from the passenger seat.
"Watch his back," Aziraphale reproached, equally helpful, and concerned about all the wrong things, in Dean's opinion. "Sam? Samuel! Dear, don't hold him that way. Around his waist, dear boy, if you must put them somewhere ..."
"I thought humans needed to breathe on occasion?" Crowley murmured, staring quite happily at the side of Dean's head. Because the target of the demon's glee was not at all obvious, here. Dean took a hand off the wheel long enough to flip him the finger, and stared pointedly just past the tiny naked woman perched on the end of their hot-pink hood, ignoring both the sloppy sound as Sam and Gabriel presumably pulled out of their passionate lip-lock, and Crowley's snickers.
"Ah ... hello?" Gabriel tried, sounding more dazed than usual. "Um. Happy to see you too?"
"Don't you dare do that to me again!" Sam growled, not sounding dazed at all. More furious. And hurt. And ... something Dean didn't want to think about too closely.
"Kiss you?" Gabriel asked, flippantly enough, but there was a shake in his voice. Dean groaned. Not a good plan, archangel ... "Because if you don't want me to kiss you, Sammy, you really shouldn't have ..."
"Gabriel."
The archangel sobered. Not in time, really, but better than Dean had done during the Mystery Spot incident. Sammy ... Sammy didn't take people almost dying on him too well. Neither did Dean, of course, but Sam ... Sam got intense about it. Joking ... not the best plan in the world.
"Didn't exactly intend to end up staked to the floor with six demons about to chop my wings off, Sam," Gabriel said, carefully. Slowly. "I didn't go and plan it, or anything. I just ... I just didn't expect my brother to ..." He trailed off. Dean stared rigidly at the road, and tried to ignore the little nugget of understanding that beat on the back of his skull for the bastard. He was not going to end up liking the Trickster. He was not.
"I know, Gabriel," Sam whispered, quietly. "I know. Just ... Please, try not to do that again, okay? We've got enough people almost dying on us ..."
Gabriel made a sudden noise, a sort of strangled gasp, and Dean almost drove off the road, and actually stopped on the shoulder, turning already to tell them, whatever the hell they wanted to do in private, not while he was driving ... but when he looked back the archangel was doing his best to fall off of the couch beside Sam, moving towards ... towards Cas.
"Little brother, if you are dead, and that's what he's talking about ..." Gabriel muttered, elbowing an indignant Aziraphale out of the way almost frantically, grabbing for Cas' hand. "Though why they'd be carrying around your corpse ... then again, these are the Winchesters, so who knows ..."
"He's not dead!" Dean cut in harshly, glaring back at him. "Trust me. If he died saving you, I'd have left you at the factory, whether it was your fault or not! Cas is not dead." He paused, mostly to repeat that to himself a couple of times, to reassure himself. Cas was not dead. Cas was not dead. And more ... "He's also still an angel. Lucky break for you, I guess."
"Dean!" Sam growled, with a nice little echo from Aziraphale. Gabriel, though ... Gabriel just looked down at Cas, traced a hand over his chest and forehead the way Aziraphale had done. Just to check, maybe. Just to make sure. Then he looked up at Dean, and there was a sort of tired smile tucked into the corner of that mobile mouth. A wry little twist.
"If Castiel ever does die on my account," he said quietly. "You can be sure I will not object, to whatever you decide you have to do about it. Believe me, Deano. Believe me."
"I'll object," Sam cut in, glaring at Dean, one giant hand landing protectively on Gabriel's shoulder. The archangel flinched a bit, blinking in something almost like shock, and Dean felt his mouth twist. Damn it anyway.
"No-one is dying!" Aziraphale growled from somewhere behind Gabriel, coming up onto his knees and pushing Sam back into his seat. Then Gabriel after him, more carefully and with a soft, comforting little smile. "So if we could all grow up and start acting like adults again, that would be helpful!" He flapped his hands in annoyance, tucking Castiel's hand back onto the couch from where it had fallen.
Dean smiled a little. He couldn't help it. "Yeah? Gonna make sure of that, are you? The no dying thing, I mean."
"Maybe ..."
And that wasn't Aziraphale. Or Gabriel. Dean turned in his seat, looked at the snake curled thoughtfully beside him. Crowley wasn't looking at them. He was looking up at the sky through the windshield, golden eyes distant and slow. And for a second, all Dean could think of was how seriously surreal the sight was, the feeling, sitting in a fucking pink limo watching a talking snake plot.
"Dearest?" Aziraphale frowned, shuffling forward to lean around the back of the seat to look down at him. "Crowley? What do you mean?"
The snake shifted, about a foot and a half of him directly under the head curving gracefully around, and Dean just stared. Because this was a snake, it was an honest-to ... an honest-to-Someone snake, it moved like a snake, it looked like a snake ... and it sounded like Crowley, like the fallen angel who'd gotten them all drunk and tempted an angel with cream buns and wings under an apple tree.
"Not yet, angel," Crowley murmured. "Let me think a little longer. Not yet."
"So long as you're not thinking what I think you're thinking," Gabriel spoke up, low and dangerous. Crowley uncoiled a little, a smooth, muscular motion, and peered around Aziraphale's hip at the archangel. His head tilted, so completely human a gesture that Dean was weirded out all over again, and that was so not helping him focus on the actual conversation here.
"Not yet," Crowley said again. An almost gentle reproach. "Whatever you heard, archangel ... don't pusssh yet, yesss? Let me think. Get sssssome ressst. Let me think."
"Gabriel?" Sam, sounding more than a little worried. Dean didn't blame him. "Gabriel, what's he talking about?
The archangel said nothing for a minute, as they all turned to look at him. Well, except Cas, who was still out of it. And Aziraphale, who was still watching his demon. Okay. So it was mostly him and Sam who turned to watch the archangel, but hey! It was slightly less weird than watching the snake. Gabriel, for his part, leaning heavily on Sam, just watched Crowley suspiciously. And maybe ... sympathetically? The hell? What was going on here?
"Alright," the archangel said at last. Slowly. Then he smirked a little bit, and it was odd how Dean had never noticed before how careful that expression was on Gabriel, how not-quite-natural it could be when the archangel didn't actually mean it. "Just don't do anything I wouldn't do, demon."
Crowley smirked faintly. "That doesn't leave much that I can't do, archangel. You realise that?"
Gabriel grinned. "Shut up, Crowley. And, Dean?" Dean blinked, looked up. "If we're going anywhere today, we might want to get our asses back in gear? Just a thought ..." Dean blinked some more. Actually resisted the urge to rub some grit out his eyes. Then he growled, glaring, and turned back to the wheel, blinking out at the shoulder and the road beyond it. Right. Going somewhere. Bobby's. Right.
He released the brake, pulling out as smoothly as the behemoth he was driving would allow, and very pointedly didn't look back at the noise his brother made, the soft sigh, or sideways as a very worried Aziraphale pulled Crowley up and out of the passenger seat and cuddled him.
And, most importantly, he didn't look back at the still form on the couch, didn't look back to see Cas' slack, pale features. Because if he looked back now ... they weren't ever getting to Bobby's.
---
All things considered, Bobby actually took their arrival pretty well. Hot pink limo and everything. He was sitting on the porch, shotgun against his shoulder, aimed and ready as the limo pulled up. He gave Dean the once-over as he climbed out of the driver's door, watched him stretch for a moment, and dismissed him. He watched Sam climb out the back the same way, narrow-eyed and squinty, and dismissed him too. Then Gabriel climbed stiffly out, stumbling slightly against Sam, and Bobby nodded quietly to himself, flicked the safety off, and rolled forward in his wheelchair to level the gun at the archangel's chest. Gabriel blinked at him."What you done to them?" Bobby growled, as Dean leaned back against the limo and snorted to himself. Aziraphale, poking his head around the car door, looked mildly concerned as Sam tried to shuffle forwards to protect Gabriel. Bobby stopped him with a glare.
"I don't know what you mean," Gabriel smirked. Tiredly, but still. He stared down at Bobby and the gun, and didn't look the slightest bit fazed, until Bobby poked him in the belly with the barrel. Gabriel flinched back a little, and growled at Bobby's faint look of satisfaction.
"Bobby," Sam said, quietly. With more than a little growl himself. Bobby ignored him.
"Pull the other one, Trickster," he said, quiet and deadly, looking pointedly at the car. "You think I don't recognise your style when I see it? I haven't heard from these boys for three days, and then they show in this piece of crap, and guess who's tagging along? So. What. Have. You. Done?"
Gabriel's face moved. A sort of exhausted twitch around the eyes and mouth, somewhere between amusement and hysteria, and Dean abruptly decided that okay. Amusing as this was, maybe the archangel actually didn't need it right now. Or Sam, or any of them, in fact. Maybe they just ... didn't need this.
"Bobby," he said, rough and gravelly, moving forward to rest a hand on the barrel of Bobby's gun (and decades of training screamed at him for that one, pointed out exactly how stupid a move it was, but he was just too tired for anything else) and pushing it gently down and away from Gabriel. "Right trick. Wrong Trickster. He's on the level, Bobby. Let him be."
He didn't know which of them looked more stunned at that, Bobby, or Gabriel himself. But Sam was biting his lip, and looking at Dean with pride, and ... yeah, okay. It sort of felt good. And there was a weird rightness about seeing the surprise in the archangel's face over something good for a change, a weird satisfaction in surprising someone with something other than a shotgun to the head or a knife in the neck. It felt ... pretty good.
Bobby looked at them, between them. Looked behind them to where Aziraphale, with Crowley draped around his neck, was peering worriedly out of the car. He looked at them, took in how tired and shaken and simply flattened they all were ... and sighed. Heavily.
"I suppose you'd all better come inside then," he grunted, wheeling back a few paces to give them room, glaring disgruntledly. "And if anyone tries to kill me, I'm blaming you. Idjits."
Dean grinned a little, sort of shakily. "Thanks Bobby."
Bobby grunted, waving a hand irritably as he watched Aziraphale climb out and pull Castiel after him with Sam's help. Dean lost track for a second getting his angel scooped up and settled. "Yeah, yeah. Just get your asses inside already. We'll figure the rest out after. Oh. And someone get this monstrosity outta my sight before I hurl, will ya?"
Gabriel smiled at that. "That, I can help you with," he murmured, clicking his fingers before anyone could stop him. Both Sam and Aziraphale squawked at him, rushing forward to catch him as he sagged a bit, but the limo vanished, presumably back to wherever Anansi had magicked it from in the first place. Gabriel smirked pointedly in Bobby's direction, leaning heavily on Sam, one hand perhaps wandering a little more than Dean wanted to pay attention to.
Bobby rolled his eyes.
"Um, excuse me?" Aziraphale moved forward, carefully, steadying Gabriel into Sam's care, one hand coming up to cradle Crowley's head. The demon shifted uneasily around his angel's shoulders, and Bobby stiffened suspiciously.
"Who're you?" he asked, shortly and not exactly friendly. Aziraphale grimaced slightly.
"Aziraphale," he said, cautiously, before looking down at the snake around his chest. "An angel. Of the non-homicidal kind, I assure you! And this ... this is Crowley. He's ... a demon." He flinched, and flapped a hurried hand at Bobby's expression. "Also of the non-homicidal kind, I promise you! He and I have known each other for centuries, I can definitely vouch for him, Mr ... ah?"
"Singer," Bobby growled, squinting suspiciously. Aziraphale beamed at him, causing Bobby's eyebrows to climb up under his hat, and Dean sort of smirked over Cas' head. It was kinda fun, watching someone else react to the ... whatever it was that made Aziraphale who he was. "Robert Singer." Aziraphale beamed some more, coming forward to hold out a hand. Bobby stared at it for a second, and at the snake blinking lazily at him, before taking it cautiously.
"I'm so pleased to meet you, Mr Singer!" the angel smiled, shaking vigorously, while Crowley grinned snakily. He paused, taking Bobby's hand between both of his own, staring into the middle distance for a second, and then a slightly distant expression slipped into his eyes, sort of sad and proud. When he looked back down at Bobby, something in his face made the older man shake a little, stunned.
"Yes," the angel murmured. "Very pleased to meet you, Robert. You're a good man. A very good man."
Bobby flushed, beet-red, and tugged his hand back awkwardly. "Yeah, well. Whatever." He looked down at his knees, avoiding everyone's gaze, and Dean felt something clench a little in his chest at the tiny, shy smile tucked in the corner of Bobby's mouth. The little glimmer of embarrassed pride.
Yeah. Aziraphale may be a fruit-cake, but he was alright. He was alright.
"Can we come in?" Aziraphale asked, folding his hands in an oddly formal gesture as he looked at Bobby, smiling faintly and gently. "My demon and I? We have been ... We have a little arrangement with your boys, you see, and we'd rather stay with them for the time being, if no-one minds?"
Bobby blinked up at him, then slanted a wry look over at Dean and Sam. "They on the level too?" he asked bluntly, tipping his head at Aziraphale and smiling very faintly. They grinned back.
"Yeah, Bobby," Sam murmured quietly, his arm snug around Gabriel's waist. "They're on the level." Dean hugged Cas close, and nodded. Bobby squinted at them a little longer, just for a minute, and shook his head with an exasperated smile.
"Sure," he muttered, turning to wheel back towards the house, shaking his head. "Why not? Come on in, the lot of you, and quit cluttering up my yard!"
Dean was nodding, hefting Cas in his arms awkwardly to try and follow, mentally measuring the distance and thinking absently about telling Cas to lose some frikking weight when he woke up, when Aziraphale reached out to catch Bobby's shoulder and pull him gently to a stop. Bobby froze, staring up at him. So did everyone else.
"I wonder," said Aziraphale, very gently. "I wonder, Mr Singer ... if we might borrow your wheelchair? Castiel is not well, you see, and Dean seems to be having some trouble with him ...?"
Bobby blinked up at him. Then over to where Dean had Cas half over his shoulder, arms tight around his angel and head shaking frantically at Aziraphale. No! No, you stupid angel, he was fine, he had it, don't go asking Bobby shit like that ... What the hell, Aziraphale? But the angel was smiling, serene and gentle, and didn't seem to notice the frantic messages he and Sam were trying to send him.
Bobby looked back. "What am I supposed to do? Sit him in my lap?" he grumbled. But he wasn't moving. He hadn't jerked away from the angel. He looked like he was actually thinking about it. Dean wasn't sure what to feel about that.
Aziraphale smiled at him. "Well, you could, I suppose. It would be rather awkward, though. Wouldn't it be easier if you simply ... walked with me?" He held out one soft hand, palm up, and smiled quietly.
Every last one of them froze, staring. Bobby ... Bobby didn't move. Bobby didn't blink. He just ... sat. Stared. Same as the rest of them, and Dean wondered if they were all feeling the same sick, heavy, hopeful twisting he was. He wondered if they all wanted as badly as he did to punch Aziraphale, or cry.
Then Crowley moved. Curling up off Aziraphale's shoulders, arching high to actually look down at his angel, golden eyes soft and exasperated. "You sap," he accused, flatly. Not a hiss in sight. "You bloody sap, angel. You had to. You just had to, didn't you? This is why I don't let you near hospitals ..."
"Hush, dear," Aziraphale interrupted, smiling up at him for a second. "He's giving us his hospitality. It's only fair. And we do need that wheelchair, after all. Unless you feel a pair of hands coming on?"
"Not my fault," the demon huffed, shifting his coils primly. "I haven't taken out a small base in years, and never like that. It's hardly my fault it takes a while to get back the mental focus for a shift."
"Of course not, dear," the angel smiled, reaching up to pat him gently. "So stop complaining, there's a good fellow?"
"Hey!" Bobby blinked, coming up out of his shock a little, getting back a spark of temper. "If this is some kind of joke to you two, you can damn well ..."
"It isn't," Aziraphale cut him off, very gently. If he was conscious of them staring holes in his back, he didn't show it. Instead, he simply reached out to Bobby once more, hand steady and calm. "I would not joke about such a thing, Mr Singer. Robert. I promise you." A soft smile, gently coaxing. "I promise you. Please?"
Bobby glared at him. Hot. Uncertain. Angry and hopeful. He stared at him. And then ... then he looked down at his legs. Looked down, and focused. Twitched his foot. Moved his foot. Stiffly, almost painfully. He moved his foot.
Dean felt some invisible someone kick him solidly in the gut. He heard Sam gasp beside him, saw his brother twitch forwards out of the corner of his eye. He didn't move. He couldn't move. Could only watch, distantly, with something thick and choking in his throat, as Bobby took the angel's hand and slowly, laboriously pulled himself to his feet.
"There we go," Aziraphale murmured, smiling softly, steadying the man carefully. "There we go. Thank you, Robert. Thank you." Bobby blinked at him, hands clutching the angel's arms, shaking his head in confusion as Crowley wrapped a coil around his wrist as if to help. The demon pointedly refused to meet anyone's eyes.
"What ..." Bobby started, thickly. "What the hell you thanking me for? That ... why the hell are you thanking me?"
"For trusting me," Aziraphale answered simply. "For letting us in. For giving Castiel your wheelchair. For being who you are, Robert Singer. For being a good man."
Anyone else, that would have sounded like platitude, or worse, some kind of mockery, some kind of sick joke. People didn't get rewarded for being a good person. Dean knew that. People got shafted, that's what they got. People, angels, even demons. They did something good, they got shafted for it. That was the way things worked, and always had. Saying differently ... anyone else, it would have sounded false, and cruel, a front for some ulterior motive. Aziraphale ... believed it. And there wasn't one of them there who doubted it.
Or one of them who had any damn clue what to do with it, either.
"We should ..." Sam managed, at last. Barely. "We should ... get inside?" He shrugged uneasily, almost leaning more on Gabriel now than the archangel had been on him a moment ago. He looked ... stunned. Amazed. Sort of ... warily, hopefully happy. Like something wonderful had happened, and he liked it, but he was sort of waiting for the bubble to burst. He looked sort of like Dean felt.
"I think that would be a good idea," Gabriel said quietly, looking up at Sam's face, at his expression. There was something soft in the archangel's expression, something quiet and real and nothing Dean had ever thought to see on that face. Something that cared.
"Yeah," Bobby said, still sort of staring at Aziraphale, still being sort of held up by him. "Yeah."
He shook himself, pulling himself together with an obvious effort, and pulled back a little. The angel let him go, Crowley releasing his wrist gently as he pulled away, and they smiled softly at him. Bobby, avoiding their eyes, looked over at the rest of them. At Sam. At Dean. He looked ... good. He looked so damn good. Standing on his own two feet again. Dean swallowed.
Then Bobby turned around, red to the ears, and laid a hand on the back of the chair. His chair. He sort of shuffled a bit, biting out a breath in shock and dizzy joy. And then he took the handles, turned it around, and wheeled it over to Dean. From the outside, not in it. Staring at his feet the whole way, watching them as they moved, as they held his weight. He stopped at Dean's side, looked up at him. Shook his head like there was nothing he knew how to say.
"On the level, huh?" he said at last, smiling faintly. Dean tipped his head around a smile, blinking back tears.
"Pretty much," he whispered. Swallowed. "Pretty much."
And Bobby smiled at him, biting his lip and shaking his head, and helped him lower Cas gently into the chair. Braced his legs and helped Dean take his angel's weight, helped him hold Cas up. Helped him help him. The way things should be.
"Come on," Bobby said, hoarse and happy. "Come on. Let's get you boys and your damn angels inside, huh?"
"And demon," Crowley grumbled. "Don't anyone forget the demon!"
"I suspect we couldn't if we tried," Gabriel drawled, leaning on Sam again, curled into Dean's brother and smiling distantly. Almost like he didn't even know he was doing it. "I suspect you wouldn't let us."
"Up yours, archangel," Crowley hissed, and dropped his head huffily onto Aziraphale's hair. The angel winced a little, and reached up to bat him off again, laughing silently as the demon glared. Dean watched them, his hand pressed around Castiel's shoulder, Bobby grinning at his side. Dean watched them.
And for the first time in a long while, he found himself smiling.
Contd: Interludes
