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Some more hijinks, with permission from Mia and Morgan. Heh.
Title: A Little Rebellion
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Good Omens, Supernatural,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mia6363's Ironies verse
Characters/Pairings: Crowley (GO), Aziraphale, Emma, Dean, Castiel, Gabriel, Crowley (SPN). GO!Crowley/Aziraphale, Dean/Castiel, SPN!Crowley/Gabriel preslash (hints)
Summary: She's fifteen years old. She deserves a little rebellion, doesn't she? Emma makes possibly an unwise decision
Wordcount: 5425
Notes: Emma's 15 here, so that puts it before the 16th birthday celebration in Chapter 5 of Ironies. Set after Lizard-eyes and the Angel
Warnings/Disclaimer: Language, a little. None of the universes or characters are mine. Especially not Emma, who's all Mia's.
A/N: Can I just add? I'm so very amused that the spellchecker wanted to correct 'unflustered' to 'upholstered'. Now I have this image of Aziraphale as a sofa. *snickers to self* I'm a loon, I am aware of this ...
Until the phone rang. Until the phone almost vibrated him off the windowsill, in fact, and bloody hell, whoever this was, they'd best have a very, very good reason for calling him ...
"Mr Crowley?" a young, female voice asked, rather hesitantly. "The Other Mr Crowley, I mean? Aziraphale's Mr Crowley?"
Crowley blinked, looking down at the display. Which was currently in Arabic, and alright, he was never, ever letting the angel near technology again. Particularly his technology. Arabic gave him a headache, after so long in England. Unfortunately, despite that, he could still read it. Which meant he'd been right the first time, and this was who he'd thought it was.
"Emma?" he asked, slowly. Reluctantly. Hoping maybe he was wrong. "Emma Winchester?"
Her voice brightened, cheered. "You remember me!"
Crowley rolled his eyes. "Yes, well. When my first meeting with someone involves archangels coming at me sword first, I tend to remember them. Just a little quirk of mine." Though maybe, the little Aziraphale-sounding voice in the back of his head whispered, maybe that wasn't exactly her fault. He growled at it silently.
"Er. Yes. Um. Sorry?" she tried, cautiously. Almost nervously, and Crowley could already hear the angel giving out to him, could already see the tired, vaguely disappointed look in Aziraphale's blue eyes ...
"Yes, well," he said quickly, with as much cheer as he could drum up on short notice. "Hopefully, since we won't be doing that again, our next meeting won't be quite as memorable, eh?"
There was a long silence on the other end of the phone. Too long a silence. Every paranoid instinct Crowley had (and he had a lot) started screaming at him, and he found himself moving instinctively away from the window, downstairs into the shop proper. Moving, in fact, towards his angel, and pretty soon he was going to have to yell at himself for that, but for now ...
"Um," the bloody girl started, equally cheerful, equally false. "About that ..."
"What've you done now?" Crowley hissed, looking warily in all directions, backing towards Aziraphale. Not that he actually thought Gabriel was going to drop out of the sky at him, or anything. Much, anyway. Hey! Who the hell knew, with archangels?
Emma answered him. Or thought she did. Crowley took the phone away from his ear, staring at it for a second, wondering if the angel had somehow managed to do something really strange to it that made it translate voices to Arabic too. Then he put the phone back to his ear, just to check.
"What was that?"
"I said, I've run away from home," Emma mumbled again, sullenly. Challengingly, daring him to give out to her for it.
Crowley stared into the middle distance for a long second. Watching his life flash before his eyes. All six thousand years, two thousand wars and two apocalypses of it. "That's what I thought you said," he murmured faintly. Behind him, Aziraphale actually looked up from his books at Crowley's tone, actually put down his latest find in order to come over and see what had happened. "And, ah ... Not to put too fine a point on this, but ... Why are you ringing me about it?"
"Um," Emma murmured, hesitantly, something in his tone getting through to her as well. "Well. I was hoping ... Mr Aziraphale said to call if I needed help, and ... I was hoping ..." She took a deep breath, marshalling her courage or something. Crowley wished he could remember how to marshall his, because he had this idea, this inkling of where she was going with this ... "Could I stay with you guys for a while? And. Um. Could you, maybe, hide me from ... well, from my Dads. And Uncles. Especially my Uncles. Um." A long pause, while Crowley could think of nothing, absolutely nothing to say, and she waited. "Um. Please?"
Crowley said nothing. Couldn't have if he tried, the words refusing to resolve themselves over the buzzing in his head and the visions of grisly death that paraded themselves before his mind's eye. Gabriel ... Archangel and Trickster. Known for very ... ironic punishments. And Crowley. The other Crowley. He'd heard rumours about the little bastard for years. Nasty streak, that one. Enough to make even nutjobs like Alastair think twice about tangling with him. Not to mention dearest Kali, who'd been smearing demons around the landscape quite literally from the moment she'd sprung into being. And the Dads. Lets not forget the Dads. A hunter was bad enough, but an ex-angel ... He'd heard about Castiel, too. Castiel had an imagination, and something of a hair-trigger when his charges were concerned. For a daughter ...
"Dearest?" Aziraphale jogged his arm gently, as the silence stretched. "Dearest? Crowley, dear, what is it? What's wrong?"
Crowley blinked a bit. A lot. Handed the angel the phone. Carefully. Distantly. "Here," he said. "Why don't you talk to her, angel."
Aziraphale frowned at him, juggling the phone up to his ear, eyes rich with concern never leaving Crowley's. "Hello? Who is this, if you don't mind ... Oh, Emma! Hello, dear girl, how are you? ... Ah, excuse me? Oh, dear. You've really ...? Oh dear. And you want ...? You asked Crowley? Oh, no, dear, I'm sure he's fine ... Yes dear, I'm sure we can work something out, but let me just call your parents first ... But Emma, dear, I really think ... No, don't hang up, my girl! Now, there's no need ... Listen, my dear, just let's meet up and talk about this, how about that? We promise we won't do anything you don't want until we've heard your story. And we can all decide what's best to do after that. Yes? ... Oh, good girl. Thank you. Yes dear, we'll meet you there. Half an hour, no trouble. Do stay safe until we arrive, yes? And stay warm, dear. Go inside the cafe if you're cold, please ... Alright. Alright dear. See you soon!"
The angel fumbled with the keypad for a second, eliciting an outraged squawk or two from the phone, but managed to successfully end the call. He frowned down at it for a second, brow wrinkled in thoughtful concern, before looking back up at Crowley.
"Well, this is something of a mess, isn't it?" he commented cheerfully. "Really dearest, the things you get us into ..."
The shock inside Crowley shattered. Luckily, there was a healthy dose of rage to replace it.
But she couldn't keep doing this. She was fifteen, dammit! She deserved ... she deserved some privacy, didn't she? She deserved some time, just some time, where she didn't have to know there were at least two people who could pop in on her no matter where she was or what she was doing. She deserved some time without having to watch every shadow wondering if her Uncle Crowley knew she was talking to this boy or that boy. She deserved some time without having to panic that Uncle Gabriel was watching her from Heaven or something. She deserved some time without her Dads having little freakouts about every random thing she did or didn't do. She deserved some privacy, dammit!
And she fully intended to get it, too. She just had to convince ...
There they were! About time!
She stood up in the booth as Mr Aziraphale ambled through the door, looking around carefully and beaming at the lady who came up to him. Behind him, Lizard-eyes slunk in, looking pretty much like Dad did whenever Papa gave him that long, slow stare that made him do whatever he was told, whether he wanted to or not. Emma smiled a little, before she caught herself. Before something twanged a little in her chest and reminded her that she maybe wasn't giving her Dads any reasons to smile right now ... She shoved that thought down, and waved until the two supernatural beings wandered over and sat down opposite her.
Which they did. And then proceeded to stare at her. Lizard-eyes belligerently and more than a little nervously, as if he expected her to call down an archangel to smite him any second now. For a second, some weaselly little voice in the back of Emma's head prompted her to push that, to use that. She blinked at herself, squashed it. And caught Aziraphale's eye, caught the deep, knowing look in ancient blue eyes, caught the soft pity and pride there, and the hint of steel underneath it again. She caught that, and it caught her.
It made her uncomfortable, that flash of understanding she saw there. Uncomfortable to be seen so clearly. Papa could look like that, sometimes, but Papa loved her too much to ever point it at her, to ever delve inside her like that. Mr Aziraphale ... he wasn't her Papa. He wasn't her Uncle. And he could read her. She ... wasn't sure she liked that. She could read a lot about people herself, now. Uncle Crowley had been teaching her. Not the obvious, like her Dad, trying to teach her how to know if someone was a threat. More subtle. How to know if someone could be useful. As important, he said. A useful skill, had saved his life many times. But, being on the receiving end ... it wasn't a comfortable experience.
"I need your help," she said quietly, trying to cut through the weight in the air, the knowing. Looking between the two of them, watching the way they could communicate with only a glance. Catching the little nod between them.
"Yeah, you said," the Other Crowley grumbled, wrapping his long, skinny hands around a cup of coffee that hadn't been there a second ago. "Listen, kid, not that I don't like you or anything ..." A long pause, while he seemed to think about that ... "Actually, never mind if I like you. What I want to know is, is there any particular reason why you're trying to get me and my angel killed in the most gruesome, ironically appropriate way possible? Because, honestly, whatever I did to offend you, I'm not remembering it over here ..."
She blinked at him. "I'm not trying to get you killed!" she protested, confused. Where had he ...? She'd heard of paranoid, but this ...
Aziraphale smiled gently at her, and patted his demon quellingly on the shoulder. "Don't mind him, my dear. He doesn't trust people easily. Demon, you know." A beaming smile, confident in her understanding. She found herself smiling hesitantly back. "It's just ... well, my dear, asking us to take you in, without your parents' knowledge ... I have to concede Crowley the point. That is rather likely to get us, ah ... into a little trouble, maybe?"
"A little trouble??" Crowley cut in, incredulously. "A little trouble, he says! The archangel tried to paste me across six planes just for being in the same room as her! If he finds out we've gone and kidnapped her ..."
"You haven't kidnapped me!" Emma interrupted, hurriedly. And stopped. "Er. You haven't, right? You're not planning to, or anything?"
Aziraphale stared at her in outright horror, while the Other Crowley dropped his head into his hands. "And now she's claiming we kidnapped her!" he muttered furiously. "She calls us, asks us to put our bloody necks on the line, and she's turning around and calling us the bloody villains, and angel, we are going to get killed, I'm telling you ..."
"No!" she said quickly. "No, that's not ... I didn't mean ... Look! I just want ... I'm not talking forever, or anything, or even all that long, I just ..." She stopped, sighed, scrunching down in her chair. "I didn't mean to get you in trouble, or anything, I just ... Have you ever had to live knowing that someone was watching you? All the time? Have you ever just wanted ... just some time alone? Where you didn't have to report to about five different people wanting to know what's happening in your life? People who could wave their hands and know it anyway, know it every time you try to lie, to keep something back, to keep one little thing to yourself ..."
They stared at her. Both of them. And looked at each other, golden eyes softening against blue, something rueful and understanding ... Emma felt her heart leap a little, a twinge of hope, because she knew that look, that was the first look Uncle Crowley taught her, when people are hearing what you're saying, believing it. These two ... they understood. She didn't know how, but they understood. And maybe, just maybe ...
"My dear," Aziraphale said, gently, turning back to look at her. "My dear, I'm sure your parents, and your ... Uncles? ... I'm sure they don't mean to make you uncomfortable ..."
"I know," Emma said, very quietly. She did. She did know. They were only trying to look out for her. And they had reason to be afraid, she knew that, she remembered that, she knew they had reason, so much reason, to want to protect her, she knew it was only because they loved her, but ... "I'm just ... tired," she said. "I just want ... Even a few days. Just a few days, where they don't know where I am, where they can't see what I do. Where I can just be me. Just for a few days. That's all I want." She stopped, looked at them, saw the wavering in Mr Aziraphale's eyes, the cool consideration in Lizard-eyes'. "Please?" she asked. "Please?"
"We can't," the demon said, but almost gently. Almost gentle. "Not that we don't understand or anything, kid, but ...
"It wouldn't be fair," Aziraphale explained, very, very gently. "Not to them. I know how you feel, my dear, believe me, I do, but it wouldn't be fair to those who care about you. To lose you for ... How long have you been missing, anyway?" He frowned, suddenly concerned. "Already, I mean. How long have you been gone?"
Emma felt her mouth twist, shame, maybe, and a little twinge of pride. "I told them I was going to a friend's house yesterday," she admitted. She'd carefully researched about her bracelets (okay, she'd asked Uncle Gabriel if they could ever be blocked, if anyone could ever take her away from them, because Uncle Gabriel was smart, he really was, but he wasn't always as suspicious as he could be) and wrapped them carefully on the way over, nipping back in around half the town until she could get to the bus stop and move over two cities. She had a fake ID. She'd like to blame Uncle Crowley for that one, but that was all Dad. Just in case. Papa didn't know yet. She had a feeling he was going to find out in very short order. She had another feeling he wasn't going to be very happy about it.
"Yesterday," Crowley repeated. Slowly. Shocked. "Yesterday? You've been missing since yesterday, and we're sitting on the same bloody landmass your family is even now tearing apart in search of you?? Bloody hell, kid, you really are trying to kill us!"
"No!" she snarled, beginning to lose patience with him, and also beginning to feel nervous again. Feeling her Uncles breathing down her neck. Because Lizard-eyes was right, even without the bracelets, it couldn't take them that long to find her. Not when she wasn't shielded or anything, like her Dad had been during the war, and she needed somewhere safe, and she needed it now, and they were all she had ... "Please!" she begged, leaning forward to catch Mr Aziraphale's hand, because he seemed the softest of them, the most likely to help. "Please," she asked, more quietly, but no less desperately. "Please. Just give me a few days. Please, Mr Aziraphale. Please. I promise, I'll explain everything to my Uncles after, I promise I won't let you get hurt, but please ... Please. Please."
Aziraphale stared at her for a long, long minute. Forever, she thought. And if she'd found it uncomfortable before, if she'd thought he was weighing her then, now ... Now she thought he could tell her the colour of her soul, and what she'd had for breakfast, and why she'd asked for it besides. Now he looked at her like she was the most important thing in the whole universe, and the most flawed, and she shivered down to her toes. She understood now why Dad sometimes talked about Papa with awe, why when he was sitting in the dark sometimes, late at night, remembering ... he would tell her about how angels looked at you, and there would be fear in his voice. Awe. Amazement. She understood him now. She understood.
"On one condition," the angel said at last. Heavy as aeons, even as the demon squawked beside him. "On one condition, Ms Winchester, or we will kidnap you, here and now, and bring you straight back to your parents. Understood?"
Emma swallowed, and nodded. "What condition?" she asked, in a very small voice. Suddenly realising how arrogant she might have been, asking these ancient things for a favour when they were none of her family, when they barely even knew her or had to care for her.
Aziraphale measured her quietly, gently but completely without remorse, for another second, then smiled gently. "You must let us call your parents," he said. Raised a hand at her instant protest, because that was exactly what she'd been trying to avoid. "No," the angel said, and there was no room for argument there. "Listen. Not to tell them where specifically you are. Just to let them know that you are safe, that you are with people who will protect you, and that you will be returning to them very soon. Very soon." A warning, and then the angel smiled. Or smirked, really. "And, of course, to explain to Gabriel why he can't find you no matter how hard he looks."
Emma stopped, blinked. "Why ... he can't find me?" she asked. "But ... if he knows to look for you ... My Uncle Gabriel can find anyone. If he knows he can find me if he finds you ..."
Crowley smirked. The lizardy one, the cold, smug one. A golden glitter of pride, and Emma still wasn't completely sure if she liked that smirk. If she trusted it. But the demon was smirking anyway, and when he explained, she agreed he might have reason. "Kid, we've been on the run from Heaven, Hell and everyone in between for going on forty years now. Not to mention we've been planetside for as long as there's been a planet. Trust me, if we decide we don't want to be found ... we're not going to be found. End of story. Yon Messenger can search 'til his wings fall off, if he fancies."
Aziraphale smiled at her expression. "My dear, you came to us for help, didn't you?" he asked pointedly. "You must have believed we could give it, to do that ...?"
Emma swallowed, beginning to wonder exactly what she'd gotten herself in for, but at the same time ... at the same time feeling a kind of thrill. A kind of hammering in her chest, a kind of fearful pride, shamed courage. Because this ... wasn't this what Dad talked about, sometimes? And her Uncle Sam? Wasn't this what they meant, when they talked about how things used to be, back in the old days, when they'd been fighting? Making allies, risking everything, figuring out how to beat things that couldn't be beaten? Challenging anyone who tried to control them?
She was a Winchester. She was a Winchester. And maybe ... Maybe it was time she showed her family exactly how much of a Winchester she was.
"Okay," she said, and it was almost as much a challenge as it was an agreement. "Okay. I'll call them. If, and only if, you promise to keep me hidden for ... Three days? Three days of freedom?"
"One," the demon shot back instantly, cold challenge, but there was a gleam in his eye, too. Confident, eager. Terrified, but fierce despite it. Emma grinned at him. She had him. She knew she had him.
"Three," she repeated, smirking up at him, copying her Uncle Gabriel's slow drawl. "Or don't you think you can manage it, demon?"
He hissed, pulling in breath in shock and pride and grudging admiration, and smiled. A cold, reptilian twist of his lips. "Oh, yessss," he breathed. "Oh, yes, you are Crowley's niece, aren't you? Fine then. Three days. That best be a long phonecall, but ... three days. Guaranteed."
Emma smiled, and held out a hand. "I'm a Winchester," she said, proudly. "And a fast learner, Mr Crowley. You remember that."
"Yes," Aziraphale murmured, watching them with a faint smile. "So I see, my dear. So I see."
In fact, none of them took it well. Which was only to be expected, really, but Crowley was giving serious thought to just handing the girl over here and now and taking another nap for about a millennium or so. Under the Saharan desert, maybe. Castiel had an imagination. Gabriel was bad, and the things Crowley had said in old Greek over that loudspeaker had probably warped the phone forever (and wasn't that a blast from the past in all the worst ways), but Castiel ... That angel had taken to humanity like a duck to water, and it was really showing.
"Now, don't you take that tone with me, Castiel!" Aziraphale huffed, completely unflustered, but rapidly becoming more than a little annoyed. "I've already promised she will be perfectly safe, and I, at least, have never broken my word!"
Oh yeah. Did Crowley mention that apparently Castiel had known his angel from the bad old days? Earth's garrison, and all. Cas used to check up on Aziraphale from time to time, back when he'd had a stick so far up his arse people were surprised he could talk around it. One of them sword and smiting types who came down for a grand total of about five minutes every five hundred years or so to glare at his angel and judge him for getting soft.
Aziraphale held grudges about that kind of thing. Crowley knew all about them.
"I am not questioning your word, Aziraphale," the little bugger answered back, with the kind of false, heavy tolerance that put up every back in range. "It is simply your ... ability ... that I worry about. I do not know that you are capable of keeping my daughter safe ..."
"I am perfectly capable," his angel growled back, his hair beginning to float a little, a little hint of smite coming on. A little hint of Grace, and that ...
Crowley snapped out a hand, breaking the moment, bringing his angel's gaze back around to him and making Emma jump. The girl had gotten awfully pale over the last fifteen minutes, flinching a little every time one of her fathers spoke. Pain and shame stared out at him from her eyes, and wavering determination. She hadn't known. She really hadn't known how this would affect them, how terrified they'd been. How anguished and afraid. How furious. At this rate, the kid was going to need every last second of those three days to think up an apology, and Crowley for one was not planning to help her with it.
But before any of that ... He needed to stop the devious little ex-angel from riling up Aziraphale until Gabriel could track his booming Grace. The bloody sneaky little bugger, and Crowley felt a flicker of admiration there, for that kind of cunning, for the ability to wrong-foot and bring down an enemy the angel had managed to hold onto even as a human. Don't get him wrong. He did admire Castiel for that.
But he wasn't about to let him point it at Crowley's angel. No sir.
"Nicccce try," he hissed towards the phone, and the group waiting on the other side of it. "Nice try, Cassss. But we're not falling for it. If you want to track our Grace, you'll have to manage it with what you've got. Not going to help you by getting all angry and smite-like, I'm afraid."
Aziraphale flushed, dipping his head sheepishly.
Castiel slumped. Crowley didn't even have to see it. He could hear it in the ex-angel's voice, in the suddenly flat and weary tones. "I had to try," he said, very quietly. "I'm sorry, Aziraphale. I had to try. For my daughter ... If it was there to try, I had to."
"I know," Aziraphale answered, equally soft, switching off his grudges as if they'd never been. "And I know all of you will try. I know you have to. And I realise that if you succeed ... you will not be best pleased with us, and you have every right not to be, but ... We have given Emma our word. We promised her three days, and we will do everything in our power to give them to her." A pause, a wry little smile, and Crowley wanted to hug his angel, and yell at him in equal measure. "I'm sorry, Castiel. All of you. I am sorry."
"Papa," Emma said, voice cracking a little as she looked up at Aziraphale, and down at the phone, and the tired and frantic angel on the other end of it. "Papa, I didn't mean ... I didn't mean to make you so ..." She stopped, swallowed hard. "I'm sorry," she whispered, very quietly. "I really am sorry."
"I know." Castiel's voice was rich and warm, disappointed and proud, and Crowley wondered idly if it was only parents who could manage that, who could be both at once and show it. "Emma ... we will talk, when you come home. We will talk."
Maybe Emma would like to join him in the Sahara. Not that Crowley would let her.
"Emma," Dean said, and stopped. Couldn't continue, struggling for control of his breathing, struggling to mask the crack in his voice. Emma couldn't have flinched any harder if he'd struck her.
"Crowley," her godfather growled suddenly. Probably trying to break the strangled moment, and Crowley couldn't blame him for that, even if he could wish the other demon hadn't decided to pick on him in order to do it. "If you can be found, I will find you. Know that." Said in guttural Latin, the accents of Hell, masked so that the humans present wouldn't know what he was saying. Wouldn't be scarred by it. "And I know you remember the old days. The old ways. If you allow harm to come to her ..."
"I won't," he answered, coldly, in the same language, glad the other demon couldn't see his knees shaking. "My word, Crowley, and you know what that means. You of all people. You know what it means."
There was a pause, and then the demon said, in English, in lighter tones. "Be sure of it, then. And I'll see you in three days. If not ... sooner."
"Sooner," Gabriel promised behind him. "Much sooner."
"No," Emma spoke up, suddenly. Quaveringly, but still. She spoke up. Stood up, came to stand between Crowley and his angel, to glare down at the phone in pain and shaking pride, determination. "No, Uncle Gabriel. Uncle Crowley. Da ... Dad. Papa. You're not looking for them. You're not looking for us."
"The hell we aren't!" Dean shot back, temper riding up over pain, quick as lightning. Crowley would smirk, if his skin wasn't on the line. "Emma, whatever you're trying to do with this, we are not leaving you alone out there ...!"
"I'm not alone!" she snapped back, chin tilting up, defensive and angry and every inch her father's daughter, from what little Crowley's seen of the elder Winchester. "I trust them, Dad! I really trust them. And they deserve ... They deserve better than to be treated like this!" She stopped, slumped a little, looking up at Crowley in shame. Over her head, Crowley saw his angel smiling quietly. Proudly. He almost groaned and gave the game away.
Bloody angel. Always prompting people to do the bloody right thing ... they were retired, when was Aziraphale going to realise that?
"It's my fault," Emma went on, quietly. "It's my fault, Dad. I wanted ... I just wanted a little privacy, a little freedom, and I didn't think and now ... Don't take it out on them. They were just helping me, trying to keep me safe. When I come back ... I'll accept whatever punishment you think I need. But don't take it out on them, okay?"
There was a long silence. Then Gabriel, sounding rueful, exasperated and more than a little emotional, said quietly: "Aziraphale, did anyone ever tell you you're a right bastard sometimes?"
Crowley smiled, grinning at his angel while Emma and probably everyone else blinked in confusion, and leaned in to commiserate. "All the bloody time, archangel," he agreed. "All the bloody time. But it works out for all concerned, usually, so just shut up and don't complain, right? It's easier that way."
"What is he talking about, Gabriel?" Castiel murmured, low and pointed, and Crowley could almost see the archangel shaking his head.
"Don't worry about it, bro," Gabriel said, with maybe a little laughter bubbling up under the words. "Trust me, alright? I think ... I think Emma might be in better hands than you think." A full blown grin, now, everyone could hear it. "Might even learn a few things ..."
"Er. Uncle Gabriel?" Emma asked worriedly, looking between Crowley's shark-like grin and Aziraphale's beatific smile. "Uncle Gabriel, what ...?"
"Oh no, kiddo," the archangel smirked, and there was a bit of a snap in it, a bit of a crack, that let Crowley know the others hadn't been the only ones hurt by the girl's little trip to the dangerous side of the street. Hard as diamond. "You signed up for this. You get to live with it. Think of it ... as a learning experience." Then, softening. "And gingersnap?"
Emma swallowed, still staring warily at him and the angel. "Yes?" she asked, expecting to get yelled at some more, maybe. Expecting to have to duck. But instead ...
"Come back safe," the archangel said, very quietly. Almost a plea. "Come back safe, Emma, and don't make us wait." A soft sound, a grunt from the other demon as the archangel did something. "You know how much it can hurt to have to wait," Gabriel finished, very gently.
"Shut up, nut," the other Crowley muttered, almost too low to hear, but they heard him. They all heard him. And Emma smiled a very wobbly smile, and leaned in to press a kiss to the phone. Not to hear, but to feel, and Crowley knew those waiting on the other side did feel it.
"I know," she said quietly. "And I will, Uncle Gabriel. Everyone. I will."
And she leaned in, and ended the call.
And Crowley and his angel looked at each other, looked up at the sky, made a few rapid and entirely silent calculations apiece, nodded once, and whisked her away.
If they were going to outrun an archangel, a goddess, and all the forces of Heaven and Earth, plus whatever enemies the Winchesters had who might happen to hear of this ... well, they'd better start moving, hadn't they?
Honestly. The girl was trying to kill them. She really was.
Title: A Little Rebellion
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Good Omens, Supernatural,
mia6363's Ironies verse Characters/Pairings: Crowley (GO), Aziraphale, Emma, Dean, Castiel, Gabriel, Crowley (SPN). GO!Crowley/Aziraphale, Dean/Castiel, SPN!Crowley/Gabriel preslash (hints)
Summary: She's fifteen years old. She deserves a little rebellion, doesn't she? Emma makes possibly an unwise decision
Wordcount: 5425
Notes: Emma's 15 here, so that puts it before the 16th birthday celebration in Chapter 5 of Ironies. Set after Lizard-eyes and the Angel
Warnings/Disclaimer: Language, a little. None of the universes or characters are mine. Especially not Emma, who's all Mia's.
A/N: Can I just add? I'm so very amused that the spellchecker wanted to correct 'unflustered' to 'upholstered'. Now I have this image of Aziraphale as a sofa. *snickers to self* I'm a loon, I am aware of this ...
A Little Rebellion
Crowley was enjoying a nice nap when the phone rang. Nice sunny day, which was rare enough for England, and what's Earth's laziest serpent to do on such a day, except curl up on Aziraphale's windowsill and doze happily? Nothing, that's what. Crowley was perfectly content to just soak up the slightly dusty rays and listen to his angel go into quiet raptures over his latest acquisitions downstairs.Until the phone rang. Until the phone almost vibrated him off the windowsill, in fact, and bloody hell, whoever this was, they'd best have a very, very good reason for calling him ...
"Mr Crowley?" a young, female voice asked, rather hesitantly. "The Other Mr Crowley, I mean? Aziraphale's Mr Crowley?"
Crowley blinked, looking down at the display. Which was currently in Arabic, and alright, he was never, ever letting the angel near technology again. Particularly his technology. Arabic gave him a headache, after so long in England. Unfortunately, despite that, he could still read it. Which meant he'd been right the first time, and this was who he'd thought it was.
"Emma?" he asked, slowly. Reluctantly. Hoping maybe he was wrong. "Emma Winchester?"
Her voice brightened, cheered. "You remember me!"
Crowley rolled his eyes. "Yes, well. When my first meeting with someone involves archangels coming at me sword first, I tend to remember them. Just a little quirk of mine." Though maybe, the little Aziraphale-sounding voice in the back of his head whispered, maybe that wasn't exactly her fault. He growled at it silently.
"Er. Yes. Um. Sorry?" she tried, cautiously. Almost nervously, and Crowley could already hear the angel giving out to him, could already see the tired, vaguely disappointed look in Aziraphale's blue eyes ...
"Yes, well," he said quickly, with as much cheer as he could drum up on short notice. "Hopefully, since we won't be doing that again, our next meeting won't be quite as memorable, eh?"
There was a long silence on the other end of the phone. Too long a silence. Every paranoid instinct Crowley had (and he had a lot) started screaming at him, and he found himself moving instinctively away from the window, downstairs into the shop proper. Moving, in fact, towards his angel, and pretty soon he was going to have to yell at himself for that, but for now ...
"Um," the bloody girl started, equally cheerful, equally false. "About that ..."
"What've you done now?" Crowley hissed, looking warily in all directions, backing towards Aziraphale. Not that he actually thought Gabriel was going to drop out of the sky at him, or anything. Much, anyway. Hey! Who the hell knew, with archangels?
Emma answered him. Or thought she did. Crowley took the phone away from his ear, staring at it for a second, wondering if the angel had somehow managed to do something really strange to it that made it translate voices to Arabic too. Then he put the phone back to his ear, just to check.
"What was that?"
"I said, I've run away from home," Emma mumbled again, sullenly. Challengingly, daring him to give out to her for it.
Crowley stared into the middle distance for a long second. Watching his life flash before his eyes. All six thousand years, two thousand wars and two apocalypses of it. "That's what I thought you said," he murmured faintly. Behind him, Aziraphale actually looked up from his books at Crowley's tone, actually put down his latest find in order to come over and see what had happened. "And, ah ... Not to put too fine a point on this, but ... Why are you ringing me about it?"
"Um," Emma murmured, hesitantly, something in his tone getting through to her as well. "Well. I was hoping ... Mr Aziraphale said to call if I needed help, and ... I was hoping ..." She took a deep breath, marshalling her courage or something. Crowley wished he could remember how to marshall his, because he had this idea, this inkling of where she was going with this ... "Could I stay with you guys for a while? And. Um. Could you, maybe, hide me from ... well, from my Dads. And Uncles. Especially my Uncles. Um." A long pause, while Crowley could think of nothing, absolutely nothing to say, and she waited. "Um. Please?"
Crowley said nothing. Couldn't have if he tried, the words refusing to resolve themselves over the buzzing in his head and the visions of grisly death that paraded themselves before his mind's eye. Gabriel ... Archangel and Trickster. Known for very ... ironic punishments. And Crowley. The other Crowley. He'd heard rumours about the little bastard for years. Nasty streak, that one. Enough to make even nutjobs like Alastair think twice about tangling with him. Not to mention dearest Kali, who'd been smearing demons around the landscape quite literally from the moment she'd sprung into being. And the Dads. Lets not forget the Dads. A hunter was bad enough, but an ex-angel ... He'd heard about Castiel, too. Castiel had an imagination, and something of a hair-trigger when his charges were concerned. For a daughter ...
"Dearest?" Aziraphale jogged his arm gently, as the silence stretched. "Dearest? Crowley, dear, what is it? What's wrong?"
Crowley blinked a bit. A lot. Handed the angel the phone. Carefully. Distantly. "Here," he said. "Why don't you talk to her, angel."
Aziraphale frowned at him, juggling the phone up to his ear, eyes rich with concern never leaving Crowley's. "Hello? Who is this, if you don't mind ... Oh, Emma! Hello, dear girl, how are you? ... Ah, excuse me? Oh, dear. You've really ...? Oh dear. And you want ...? You asked Crowley? Oh, no, dear, I'm sure he's fine ... Yes dear, I'm sure we can work something out, but let me just call your parents first ... But Emma, dear, I really think ... No, don't hang up, my girl! Now, there's no need ... Listen, my dear, just let's meet up and talk about this, how about that? We promise we won't do anything you don't want until we've heard your story. And we can all decide what's best to do after that. Yes? ... Oh, good girl. Thank you. Yes dear, we'll meet you there. Half an hour, no trouble. Do stay safe until we arrive, yes? And stay warm, dear. Go inside the cafe if you're cold, please ... Alright. Alright dear. See you soon!"
The angel fumbled with the keypad for a second, eliciting an outraged squawk or two from the phone, but managed to successfully end the call. He frowned down at it for a second, brow wrinkled in thoughtful concern, before looking back up at Crowley.
"Well, this is something of a mess, isn't it?" he commented cheerfully. "Really dearest, the things you get us into ..."
The shock inside Crowley shattered. Luckily, there was a healthy dose of rage to replace it.
---
Emma curled herself around her hot chocolate, tucked into the corner booth at a crappy diner, trying hard not to flinch every time someone walked in the door. Trying extra hard not to flinch whenever someone walked out of anywhere else. It was hard to be on the run from people who could pop out of the sky or the shadows, and the lady at the counter had been giving her weird looks since the third time she'd almost panicked when someone came out of the bathroom. She was almost beginning to think this was a bad idea, but ...But she couldn't keep doing this. She was fifteen, dammit! She deserved ... she deserved some privacy, didn't she? She deserved some time, just some time, where she didn't have to know there were at least two people who could pop in on her no matter where she was or what she was doing. She deserved some time without having to watch every shadow wondering if her Uncle Crowley knew she was talking to this boy or that boy. She deserved some time without having to panic that Uncle Gabriel was watching her from Heaven or something. She deserved some time without her Dads having little freakouts about every random thing she did or didn't do. She deserved some privacy, dammit!
And she fully intended to get it, too. She just had to convince ...
There they were! About time!
She stood up in the booth as Mr Aziraphale ambled through the door, looking around carefully and beaming at the lady who came up to him. Behind him, Lizard-eyes slunk in, looking pretty much like Dad did whenever Papa gave him that long, slow stare that made him do whatever he was told, whether he wanted to or not. Emma smiled a little, before she caught herself. Before something twanged a little in her chest and reminded her that she maybe wasn't giving her Dads any reasons to smile right now ... She shoved that thought down, and waved until the two supernatural beings wandered over and sat down opposite her.
Which they did. And then proceeded to stare at her. Lizard-eyes belligerently and more than a little nervously, as if he expected her to call down an archangel to smite him any second now. For a second, some weaselly little voice in the back of Emma's head prompted her to push that, to use that. She blinked at herself, squashed it. And caught Aziraphale's eye, caught the deep, knowing look in ancient blue eyes, caught the soft pity and pride there, and the hint of steel underneath it again. She caught that, and it caught her.
It made her uncomfortable, that flash of understanding she saw there. Uncomfortable to be seen so clearly. Papa could look like that, sometimes, but Papa loved her too much to ever point it at her, to ever delve inside her like that. Mr Aziraphale ... he wasn't her Papa. He wasn't her Uncle. And he could read her. She ... wasn't sure she liked that. She could read a lot about people herself, now. Uncle Crowley had been teaching her. Not the obvious, like her Dad, trying to teach her how to know if someone was a threat. More subtle. How to know if someone could be useful. As important, he said. A useful skill, had saved his life many times. But, being on the receiving end ... it wasn't a comfortable experience.
"I need your help," she said quietly, trying to cut through the weight in the air, the knowing. Looking between the two of them, watching the way they could communicate with only a glance. Catching the little nod between them.
"Yeah, you said," the Other Crowley grumbled, wrapping his long, skinny hands around a cup of coffee that hadn't been there a second ago. "Listen, kid, not that I don't like you or anything ..." A long pause, while he seemed to think about that ... "Actually, never mind if I like you. What I want to know is, is there any particular reason why you're trying to get me and my angel killed in the most gruesome, ironically appropriate way possible? Because, honestly, whatever I did to offend you, I'm not remembering it over here ..."
She blinked at him. "I'm not trying to get you killed!" she protested, confused. Where had he ...? She'd heard of paranoid, but this ...
Aziraphale smiled gently at her, and patted his demon quellingly on the shoulder. "Don't mind him, my dear. He doesn't trust people easily. Demon, you know." A beaming smile, confident in her understanding. She found herself smiling hesitantly back. "It's just ... well, my dear, asking us to take you in, without your parents' knowledge ... I have to concede Crowley the point. That is rather likely to get us, ah ... into a little trouble, maybe?"
"A little trouble??" Crowley cut in, incredulously. "A little trouble, he says! The archangel tried to paste me across six planes just for being in the same room as her! If he finds out we've gone and kidnapped her ..."
"You haven't kidnapped me!" Emma interrupted, hurriedly. And stopped. "Er. You haven't, right? You're not planning to, or anything?"
Aziraphale stared at her in outright horror, while the Other Crowley dropped his head into his hands. "And now she's claiming we kidnapped her!" he muttered furiously. "She calls us, asks us to put our bloody necks on the line, and she's turning around and calling us the bloody villains, and angel, we are going to get killed, I'm telling you ..."
"No!" she said quickly. "No, that's not ... I didn't mean ... Look! I just want ... I'm not talking forever, or anything, or even all that long, I just ..." She stopped, sighed, scrunching down in her chair. "I didn't mean to get you in trouble, or anything, I just ... Have you ever had to live knowing that someone was watching you? All the time? Have you ever just wanted ... just some time alone? Where you didn't have to report to about five different people wanting to know what's happening in your life? People who could wave their hands and know it anyway, know it every time you try to lie, to keep something back, to keep one little thing to yourself ..."
They stared at her. Both of them. And looked at each other, golden eyes softening against blue, something rueful and understanding ... Emma felt her heart leap a little, a twinge of hope, because she knew that look, that was the first look Uncle Crowley taught her, when people are hearing what you're saying, believing it. These two ... they understood. She didn't know how, but they understood. And maybe, just maybe ...
"My dear," Aziraphale said, gently, turning back to look at her. "My dear, I'm sure your parents, and your ... Uncles? ... I'm sure they don't mean to make you uncomfortable ..."
"I know," Emma said, very quietly. She did. She did know. They were only trying to look out for her. And they had reason to be afraid, she knew that, she remembered that, she knew they had reason, so much reason, to want to protect her, she knew it was only because they loved her, but ... "I'm just ... tired," she said. "I just want ... Even a few days. Just a few days, where they don't know where I am, where they can't see what I do. Where I can just be me. Just for a few days. That's all I want." She stopped, looked at them, saw the wavering in Mr Aziraphale's eyes, the cool consideration in Lizard-eyes'. "Please?" she asked. "Please?"
"We can't," the demon said, but almost gently. Almost gentle. "Not that we don't understand or anything, kid, but ...
"It wouldn't be fair," Aziraphale explained, very, very gently. "Not to them. I know how you feel, my dear, believe me, I do, but it wouldn't be fair to those who care about you. To lose you for ... How long have you been missing, anyway?" He frowned, suddenly concerned. "Already, I mean. How long have you been gone?"
Emma felt her mouth twist, shame, maybe, and a little twinge of pride. "I told them I was going to a friend's house yesterday," she admitted. She'd carefully researched about her bracelets (okay, she'd asked Uncle Gabriel if they could ever be blocked, if anyone could ever take her away from them, because Uncle Gabriel was smart, he really was, but he wasn't always as suspicious as he could be) and wrapped them carefully on the way over, nipping back in around half the town until she could get to the bus stop and move over two cities. She had a fake ID. She'd like to blame Uncle Crowley for that one, but that was all Dad. Just in case. Papa didn't know yet. She had a feeling he was going to find out in very short order. She had another feeling he wasn't going to be very happy about it.
"Yesterday," Crowley repeated. Slowly. Shocked. "Yesterday? You've been missing since yesterday, and we're sitting on the same bloody landmass your family is even now tearing apart in search of you?? Bloody hell, kid, you really are trying to kill us!"
"No!" she snarled, beginning to lose patience with him, and also beginning to feel nervous again. Feeling her Uncles breathing down her neck. Because Lizard-eyes was right, even without the bracelets, it couldn't take them that long to find her. Not when she wasn't shielded or anything, like her Dad had been during the war, and she needed somewhere safe, and she needed it now, and they were all she had ... "Please!" she begged, leaning forward to catch Mr Aziraphale's hand, because he seemed the softest of them, the most likely to help. "Please," she asked, more quietly, but no less desperately. "Please. Just give me a few days. Please, Mr Aziraphale. Please. I promise, I'll explain everything to my Uncles after, I promise I won't let you get hurt, but please ... Please. Please."
Aziraphale stared at her for a long, long minute. Forever, she thought. And if she'd found it uncomfortable before, if she'd thought he was weighing her then, now ... Now she thought he could tell her the colour of her soul, and what she'd had for breakfast, and why she'd asked for it besides. Now he looked at her like she was the most important thing in the whole universe, and the most flawed, and she shivered down to her toes. She understood now why Dad sometimes talked about Papa with awe, why when he was sitting in the dark sometimes, late at night, remembering ... he would tell her about how angels looked at you, and there would be fear in his voice. Awe. Amazement. She understood him now. She understood.
"On one condition," the angel said at last. Heavy as aeons, even as the demon squawked beside him. "On one condition, Ms Winchester, or we will kidnap you, here and now, and bring you straight back to your parents. Understood?"
Emma swallowed, and nodded. "What condition?" she asked, in a very small voice. Suddenly realising how arrogant she might have been, asking these ancient things for a favour when they were none of her family, when they barely even knew her or had to care for her.
Aziraphale measured her quietly, gently but completely without remorse, for another second, then smiled gently. "You must let us call your parents," he said. Raised a hand at her instant protest, because that was exactly what she'd been trying to avoid. "No," the angel said, and there was no room for argument there. "Listen. Not to tell them where specifically you are. Just to let them know that you are safe, that you are with people who will protect you, and that you will be returning to them very soon. Very soon." A warning, and then the angel smiled. Or smirked, really. "And, of course, to explain to Gabriel why he can't find you no matter how hard he looks."
Emma stopped, blinked. "Why ... he can't find me?" she asked. "But ... if he knows to look for you ... My Uncle Gabriel can find anyone. If he knows he can find me if he finds you ..."
Crowley smirked. The lizardy one, the cold, smug one. A golden glitter of pride, and Emma still wasn't completely sure if she liked that smirk. If she trusted it. But the demon was smirking anyway, and when he explained, she agreed he might have reason. "Kid, we've been on the run from Heaven, Hell and everyone in between for going on forty years now. Not to mention we've been planetside for as long as there's been a planet. Trust me, if we decide we don't want to be found ... we're not going to be found. End of story. Yon Messenger can search 'til his wings fall off, if he fancies."
Aziraphale smiled at her expression. "My dear, you came to us for help, didn't you?" he asked pointedly. "You must have believed we could give it, to do that ...?"
Emma swallowed, beginning to wonder exactly what she'd gotten herself in for, but at the same time ... at the same time feeling a kind of thrill. A kind of hammering in her chest, a kind of fearful pride, shamed courage. Because this ... wasn't this what Dad talked about, sometimes? And her Uncle Sam? Wasn't this what they meant, when they talked about how things used to be, back in the old days, when they'd been fighting? Making allies, risking everything, figuring out how to beat things that couldn't be beaten? Challenging anyone who tried to control them?
She was a Winchester. She was a Winchester. And maybe ... Maybe it was time she showed her family exactly how much of a Winchester she was.
"Okay," she said, and it was almost as much a challenge as it was an agreement. "Okay. I'll call them. If, and only if, you promise to keep me hidden for ... Three days? Three days of freedom?"
"One," the demon shot back instantly, cold challenge, but there was a gleam in his eye, too. Confident, eager. Terrified, but fierce despite it. Emma grinned at him. She had him. She knew she had him.
"Three," she repeated, smirking up at him, copying her Uncle Gabriel's slow drawl. "Or don't you think you can manage it, demon?"
He hissed, pulling in breath in shock and pride and grudging admiration, and smiled. A cold, reptilian twist of his lips. "Oh, yessss," he breathed. "Oh, yes, you are Crowley's niece, aren't you? Fine then. Three days. That best be a long phonecall, but ... three days. Guaranteed."
Emma smiled, and held out a hand. "I'm a Winchester," she said, proudly. "And a fast learner, Mr Crowley. You remember that."
"Yes," Aziraphale murmured, watching them with a faint smile. "So I see, my dear. So I see."
---
To say the angel didn't take it well was like saying Krakatoa in 1883 had been a 'bit of a hiccup' (which it hadn't been, as Crowley could personally attest - Aziraphale hadn't taken his little century-long nap at all well).In fact, none of them took it well. Which was only to be expected, really, but Crowley was giving serious thought to just handing the girl over here and now and taking another nap for about a millennium or so. Under the Saharan desert, maybe. Castiel had an imagination. Gabriel was bad, and the things Crowley had said in old Greek over that loudspeaker had probably warped the phone forever (and wasn't that a blast from the past in all the worst ways), but Castiel ... That angel had taken to humanity like a duck to water, and it was really showing.
"Now, don't you take that tone with me, Castiel!" Aziraphale huffed, completely unflustered, but rapidly becoming more than a little annoyed. "I've already promised she will be perfectly safe, and I, at least, have never broken my word!"
Oh yeah. Did Crowley mention that apparently Castiel had known his angel from the bad old days? Earth's garrison, and all. Cas used to check up on Aziraphale from time to time, back when he'd had a stick so far up his arse people were surprised he could talk around it. One of them sword and smiting types who came down for a grand total of about five minutes every five hundred years or so to glare at his angel and judge him for getting soft.
Aziraphale held grudges about that kind of thing. Crowley knew all about them.
"I am not questioning your word, Aziraphale," the little bugger answered back, with the kind of false, heavy tolerance that put up every back in range. "It is simply your ... ability ... that I worry about. I do not know that you are capable of keeping my daughter safe ..."
"I am perfectly capable," his angel growled back, his hair beginning to float a little, a little hint of smite coming on. A little hint of Grace, and that ...
Crowley snapped out a hand, breaking the moment, bringing his angel's gaze back around to him and making Emma jump. The girl had gotten awfully pale over the last fifteen minutes, flinching a little every time one of her fathers spoke. Pain and shame stared out at him from her eyes, and wavering determination. She hadn't known. She really hadn't known how this would affect them, how terrified they'd been. How anguished and afraid. How furious. At this rate, the kid was going to need every last second of those three days to think up an apology, and Crowley for one was not planning to help her with it.
But before any of that ... He needed to stop the devious little ex-angel from riling up Aziraphale until Gabriel could track his booming Grace. The bloody sneaky little bugger, and Crowley felt a flicker of admiration there, for that kind of cunning, for the ability to wrong-foot and bring down an enemy the angel had managed to hold onto even as a human. Don't get him wrong. He did admire Castiel for that.
But he wasn't about to let him point it at Crowley's angel. No sir.
"Nicccce try," he hissed towards the phone, and the group waiting on the other side of it. "Nice try, Cassss. But we're not falling for it. If you want to track our Grace, you'll have to manage it with what you've got. Not going to help you by getting all angry and smite-like, I'm afraid."
Aziraphale flushed, dipping his head sheepishly.
Castiel slumped. Crowley didn't even have to see it. He could hear it in the ex-angel's voice, in the suddenly flat and weary tones. "I had to try," he said, very quietly. "I'm sorry, Aziraphale. I had to try. For my daughter ... If it was there to try, I had to."
"I know," Aziraphale answered, equally soft, switching off his grudges as if they'd never been. "And I know all of you will try. I know you have to. And I realise that if you succeed ... you will not be best pleased with us, and you have every right not to be, but ... We have given Emma our word. We promised her three days, and we will do everything in our power to give them to her." A pause, a wry little smile, and Crowley wanted to hug his angel, and yell at him in equal measure. "I'm sorry, Castiel. All of you. I am sorry."
"Papa," Emma said, voice cracking a little as she looked up at Aziraphale, and down at the phone, and the tired and frantic angel on the other end of it. "Papa, I didn't mean ... I didn't mean to make you so ..." She stopped, swallowed hard. "I'm sorry," she whispered, very quietly. "I really am sorry."
"I know." Castiel's voice was rich and warm, disappointed and proud, and Crowley wondered idly if it was only parents who could manage that, who could be both at once and show it. "Emma ... we will talk, when you come home. We will talk."
Maybe Emma would like to join him in the Sahara. Not that Crowley would let her.
"Emma," Dean said, and stopped. Couldn't continue, struggling for control of his breathing, struggling to mask the crack in his voice. Emma couldn't have flinched any harder if he'd struck her.
"Crowley," her godfather growled suddenly. Probably trying to break the strangled moment, and Crowley couldn't blame him for that, even if he could wish the other demon hadn't decided to pick on him in order to do it. "If you can be found, I will find you. Know that." Said in guttural Latin, the accents of Hell, masked so that the humans present wouldn't know what he was saying. Wouldn't be scarred by it. "And I know you remember the old days. The old ways. If you allow harm to come to her ..."
"I won't," he answered, coldly, in the same language, glad the other demon couldn't see his knees shaking. "My word, Crowley, and you know what that means. You of all people. You know what it means."
There was a pause, and then the demon said, in English, in lighter tones. "Be sure of it, then. And I'll see you in three days. If not ... sooner."
"Sooner," Gabriel promised behind him. "Much sooner."
"No," Emma spoke up, suddenly. Quaveringly, but still. She spoke up. Stood up, came to stand between Crowley and his angel, to glare down at the phone in pain and shaking pride, determination. "No, Uncle Gabriel. Uncle Crowley. Da ... Dad. Papa. You're not looking for them. You're not looking for us."
"The hell we aren't!" Dean shot back, temper riding up over pain, quick as lightning. Crowley would smirk, if his skin wasn't on the line. "Emma, whatever you're trying to do with this, we are not leaving you alone out there ...!"
"I'm not alone!" she snapped back, chin tilting up, defensive and angry and every inch her father's daughter, from what little Crowley's seen of the elder Winchester. "I trust them, Dad! I really trust them. And they deserve ... They deserve better than to be treated like this!" She stopped, slumped a little, looking up at Crowley in shame. Over her head, Crowley saw his angel smiling quietly. Proudly. He almost groaned and gave the game away.
Bloody angel. Always prompting people to do the bloody right thing ... they were retired, when was Aziraphale going to realise that?
"It's my fault," Emma went on, quietly. "It's my fault, Dad. I wanted ... I just wanted a little privacy, a little freedom, and I didn't think and now ... Don't take it out on them. They were just helping me, trying to keep me safe. When I come back ... I'll accept whatever punishment you think I need. But don't take it out on them, okay?"
There was a long silence. Then Gabriel, sounding rueful, exasperated and more than a little emotional, said quietly: "Aziraphale, did anyone ever tell you you're a right bastard sometimes?"
Crowley smiled, grinning at his angel while Emma and probably everyone else blinked in confusion, and leaned in to commiserate. "All the bloody time, archangel," he agreed. "All the bloody time. But it works out for all concerned, usually, so just shut up and don't complain, right? It's easier that way."
"What is he talking about, Gabriel?" Castiel murmured, low and pointed, and Crowley could almost see the archangel shaking his head.
"Don't worry about it, bro," Gabriel said, with maybe a little laughter bubbling up under the words. "Trust me, alright? I think ... I think Emma might be in better hands than you think." A full blown grin, now, everyone could hear it. "Might even learn a few things ..."
"Er. Uncle Gabriel?" Emma asked worriedly, looking between Crowley's shark-like grin and Aziraphale's beatific smile. "Uncle Gabriel, what ...?"
"Oh no, kiddo," the archangel smirked, and there was a bit of a snap in it, a bit of a crack, that let Crowley know the others hadn't been the only ones hurt by the girl's little trip to the dangerous side of the street. Hard as diamond. "You signed up for this. You get to live with it. Think of it ... as a learning experience." Then, softening. "And gingersnap?"
Emma swallowed, still staring warily at him and the angel. "Yes?" she asked, expecting to get yelled at some more, maybe. Expecting to have to duck. But instead ...
"Come back safe," the archangel said, very quietly. Almost a plea. "Come back safe, Emma, and don't make us wait." A soft sound, a grunt from the other demon as the archangel did something. "You know how much it can hurt to have to wait," Gabriel finished, very gently.
"Shut up, nut," the other Crowley muttered, almost too low to hear, but they heard him. They all heard him. And Emma smiled a very wobbly smile, and leaned in to press a kiss to the phone. Not to hear, but to feel, and Crowley knew those waiting on the other side did feel it.
"I know," she said quietly. "And I will, Uncle Gabriel. Everyone. I will."
And she leaned in, and ended the call.
And Crowley and his angel looked at each other, looked up at the sky, made a few rapid and entirely silent calculations apiece, nodded once, and whisked her away.
If they were going to outrun an archangel, a goddess, and all the forces of Heaven and Earth, plus whatever enemies the Winchesters had who might happen to hear of this ... well, they'd better start moving, hadn't they?
Honestly. The girl was trying to kill them. She really was.
