Afraid of The Light

Chapter 28

Season: 7

Episode: Survival of the Fittest

***

"Stay, won't you. There's really nowhere to run." Crowley says, blocking meg off as she goes to run for the door. "Don't even think of smoking out, pussycat. I've got eyes all over the place."

"Leave her be." Cas says, notifying the demon who was yet to notice his, mine and his daughter's presence until now.

"Castiel. When last we spoke, you - well, enslaved me. I'm confused. Why aren't you dead?" A question we've all asked.

"I... don't know." He answers honestly.

"Well, do you want to be? 'Cause I can help with that." Celeste and I take a step forward.

"All right, enough." Dean says, stopping a full on war.

"It's enough when I say. I came here to help you. I find out you've been lying to me, harboring an angel, and not just any angel - the one angel I most want to crush between my teeth."

"Oh, so you can crush angels now, huh?" Meg asks smugly from her corner.

"You bore me. You know that? You have no sense of poetry." From the hospital experience... I can tell. "Now, what do you have to say for yourself?" He asks Cas.

"Well, I'm still, uh, honing my communication strategy. I haven't even been back to Heaven. I-I keep thinking there are no insects up there, but here we have trillions. You know, they're making honey and silk and... miracles, really." Crowley looks to me for clarification as he did with Dean halfway through Cas' spiel but I don't return it with a shrug like dean did. I just glare.

"What are you talking about?"

"Um, preferring insects to angels, I guess." Not a hard preference really. "Here. I can offer a token, if you like." He walks up to Crowley, handing him a zip-lock bag filled with honey. Honey I specifically remember him getting. And also getting stung doing so. "It's honey. I-I collected it myself."

There's a pause as Crowley contemplates what he just heard. "You're off your rocker. He's off his rocker - is that it? Karma's a bitch, isn't it?" Crowley picks up the nearby whiskey, sniffing it, cringing, then putting it down.

"Look, did you come here to, uh, donkey-punch your old grudges or to help us end Dick? Pick a battle." Dean demands.

"Well, I'm vexed. I'd like to do both. But where's the fun in clobbering a ball of wet fur? Text me when Sparkles here retrieves his marbles, I suppose. Meanwhile..." Crowley fishes a vial of blood from his pocket. "a prezzie."

"Really? Just boxed-up and ready to go?" Sam asks suspiciously

"I'm a model of efficiency."

"Is that right? Then why were you late?"

"Dick had me in a devil trap. He's not an idiot. He knows what you two are after."

Sam and I look to each other. "So what did he offer you?"

"A fair deal. In exchange for giving you the wrong blood. It's demon, but is it mine?" I narrow my eyes and take a step forward. Crowley looks to me. "It's my blood. Real deal."

"And why should we trust you?"

"Good God, don't. Never trust anyone. A lesson I learned from my last business partner." He glances to Cas.

"All right. Give us the blood."

"Certainly. Oh, bonus. Meg, I'm gonna scoop you up, take you home, and roast you till you're jerky." Castiel takes two steps forward. He's in front of me again. "But not... yet. Cas can have you for now. Hilariously, it seems he'd be upset at losing you, and his little angel would be upset at him being upset. And the boys need Cas and the baby to get Dick. Don't they, Cas?" Crowley asks and I frown deeply, looking to the angel.

"Oh, I - I don't fight anymore."

"Come on. Given the particulars of your enemy, sadly, you're both vital." I glance to a confused Celeste in slight panic. What did he mean she was vital????

-

I stand between the two boys, staring down at the bone and the bowl that the blood will be mixed in. I can feel the power radiating off of the ingredients in front of us. I'm mesmerised by it.

"Well, one thing's for sure - we only get one shot." Dean says, to which I reply:

"Then make it count."

"You think Crowley's, uh..." Sam says as he examines the vial of donated blood.

"Double-crossing us?"

"Yeah."

"You've got to figure who he wants dead more - us or Dick."

"Depends what Dick offered. Here we go" Sam says.

"I don't think he is." I say as Sam pours the last of the blood into the bowl. What I don't tell them is why. "So do we, uh..." Sam says as he picks up the bowl, examining it, trying to figure out if there's a missing step.

"Uh, there's no magic words - nothing. We just... just go." Dean reads

"All right, then." Sam pours the blood and my eyes illuminate for a moment as I watch the power get drawn into the bone. It's hard to describe, but it's like a sponge, soaking in really thick corn syrup. When I snap out of my trance, I realise the boys wouldn't have seen what I just saw. Because on a non-spiritual plane... nothing really happened at all.

"Where's all the thunder and lightning?"

"Uh... maybe it worked?"

"Awesome."

There's a flutter of wings and then arms around my waist, a hand on my shoulder.

"None of this should cause you any ill effect." Castiel explains to us as he hands us a really good looking sandwich. "We went to a little farm in Normandy for the wheat and the lettuce and tomato and - and I thoroughly examined and comforted the pig before I... slaughtered it for the ham." I frown as I look down to Celeste who insisted she go with her father. I'm assuming she now regrets it from how tight her hug was. "You need your strength."

"Thanks, Cas." Dean says as he takes his plate.

"Cas, why was Crowley so certain that you need to come with us? That Celeste needed to come?" Sam asks and I tense. My sudden trance of power and rejuvenation snapping like a rubber band stretched too thin.

"Crowley's wrong." I say, I hear Cas say it too. "I'm not letting my baby go in and get herself killed." I continue before Cas does.

"I'll be waiting right here." Cas confirms.