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I, Castiel, don’t dream. So, why was my vision blurry, I thought as I sat up and holding my head. Feeling something warm intrigues me, so I bring my hand around into view. What else would it be but blood. However, I’m not supposed to be bleeding. I shake off the delusion as I go to stand up. Glancing around, I’m reminded of the empty, as I don’t see much of anything and that makes me nervous. It’s neither heaven or earth or hell for that matter. As I go to take a step, a loud voice shouts my name.
“Castiel! Don’t forget.”
I can not tell who it is, however the voice does sound quite familiar. There’s a poke to my side and then a pull that gets me to realize that I actually am dreaming because I’m frozen in place. A blinding white flash happens in front of my eyes and I awake with a gasp, lying on my back.
“Ah brother. You’re still alive I see.” Balthazar says, hovering over me. Bang, Crash. Ow!
“Could you quit it with the sentimental crap and help.” Gabriel shouts as he walks over to us.
I groan as I slowly push myself up into a kneeling position. I feel so weak and have to take a breath. I voice my concern,
“Why hasn’t my grace kicked in? I don’t think I can help, I feel sick.” I say, hanging my head and still kneeling on the ground. I feel two sets of hands go under my shoulders as they help me to stand up. I can now see both Gabriel and Balthazar staring at me with curious expressions. I now remember what happened in the last few hours before I was knocked unconscious.
“Ah. It comes down to this. Me against hundreds. Let the first round begin.” Lucifer yells as he charges the row of angels at the gate of heaven. He kicks, punches, and bites about twenty or so other angels before turning around and is face to face with me. He sends a fist toward me, however I grab it and twist to get free and then use my right foot to tip him that sends him face down to the ground. Lucifer growls and pushes to stand and goes right back to fighting. As I am hoping to keep my strength up, someone steps between us. Lucifer, the sneak that he is, then takes out a dagger, flips over the figure and hits me in the back of the head hard. As I’m falling down to the ground, I glance over to see Gadreel getting stabbed in the chest by Lucifer and vanishes right before my eyes.
“He killed Gadreel.” I randomly say, noticing that they are still holding me up.
“Shame. So, who brought you back then. It has to be someone from our side but why without your grace?” Gabriel asked, with a tiny hint of actually feeling behind it.
“Lads, let’s go somewhere out of the way.” Balthazar says as he starts to half drag me to an alcove on the side of the mountain that appeared out of nowhere. I place my hand on the rock wall to lean against, so they can let go of me and I turn to face them. Before I can even say anything, my abdomen growls and I bend over to humanely throw up.
“Well, at least you missed my new shoes.” Gabriel says smiling. I groan, look up at him and ease myself down to sit against the stone wall.
“You have a bloody strange predicament.” Balthazar worriedly says.
“As opposed to the ongoing war right now?” I ask while pointing out to the field where still hundreds of angels are fighting Lucifer, who now has demons joining the battle.
As they turn to look, I notice that Lucifer has been killing more of our brothers than sisters. ‘What is he planning?’ I think. The clouds start to turn gray and the wind picks up and a presence surrounds the battle. A second later Michael appears and turns to face Lucifer. It’s now silent and no one moves as Michael and Lucifer start to engage with more brutal attacks; the crowd erupts with chanting and shouting. It goes on and I’m not sure for how long, after a while, Lucifer has the upper hand and is prepared to stab Michael with the dagger. However he suddenly drops it and clutches his head and then shouts with rage,
“No! What is the meaning of this? Get out of my head.” He then goes quiet and seems to be listening and begins to talk out loud.
“Of course I was. Yes, without a doubt. But. No. Please, no anything but that. I’ve always had. What is it that I can do to make you trust me? Fine, he’s not going to like it.” Lucifer then turns to look at the three of us and starts to walk over, the crowd parting as he does. Balthazar and Gabriel react and turn to fight, stepping in front of me. I frown at the unusual reaction from them. Lucifer huffs and says,
“Not you two morons.” He pushes them apart to the side.
“Castiel, I was instructed to help you.”
“Uh. You were instructed to help him with what?” Michael addresses, raising an eyebrow. It takes a few minutes, then Balthazar figures out what and grabs Lucifer's arm, who gives him a glance and shakes him off. With the conversation going on, I get myself into a standing position, once again leaning against the wall and waiting.
“Cassie.” Balthazar starts to say, however I’m not paying attention to him, but to Lucifer. When he’s a foot away Lucifer stops in his tracks, he places his hand an inch above my head and starts initiating the transfer. They all gasp and stare at the thin, blue light that’s connecting the two of us. Balthazar knows why he’s doing this and by the look on his face is surprised that Lucifer’s actually doing it. Soon the color changes to red and a strange pain rips through me, so I scream and fall to my knees.
“Lucy, he’s had enough. Stop it!” Gabriel shouts at him, as both him and Balthazar grab Lucifer's arms and pull him away from me. I fall to the ground for the second time and feel like myself again. I’m now angry, I snap up and grab Lucifer by the neck and hold him there.
“Easy there, brother.” Michael says walking over and gives me a pat on the shoulder next to where Balthazar is standing.
“Now is this anyway to say thank you.” Lucifer says, with a smirk on his face.
“Technically you didn’t do it for him, now did you.” Balthazar states.
“Boys. Boys, is that a fair question.” Lucifer tries again. I’m not even sure why, but I’m not even squeezing his neck, just holding him and I then realize who's instructions he followed.
“Oh, that's it. Father spoke to you. In your head just minutes ago. You did it to get on his good side, didn’t you?” I inquire.
“Guilty.” Lucifer states with a shrug while still being held up in the air. I’m disgusted by his action and drop him to the ground.
“So, what now? Where is he? Maybe you need to do more than just give me your tainted grace.” I say.
“How should I know? This is why I started the war in the first place. To find him. To spite him.”
“And yet, you just gave Cassie your grace to try and get him to show up.” Gabriel points out.
“It’s not going to work. Just that little deed won’t be enough. Since we’ve stopped fighting, I’m done and out of here.” Michael announces and turns to walk away from the small group. We watch him as he fades out in the distance. Of course that was not a good move for the three of us. Because with the distraction, Lucifer takes the moment to stab both Gabriel and Balthazar in the chest and they vanish, as well.
“No!” I shout. Lucifer only just pushes me aside and says,
“Watch me take over heaven, Cassie.” then starts to laugh loudly and victoriously. He then rallies up his demons and goes to charge the gate door. I turn and run to follow, however I stop when a bolt of lighting strikes Lucifer's right hand, he tries with his left and receives success. The others stare as Lucifer and the demons now enter into the other side of the gate. No one seems to know what to do as they are perplexed by what just happened. Just as I'm thinking about following him, one by one a surge goes through the remainder of our brothers and sisters and they all start to vanish in a flash of light. Soon it’s coming down to just me when the occurrence stops. Everything freezes again, for like the third time that day. I sigh as I’m really getting tired of that happening.
“Oh, Castiel. This is what will happen if you don’t get back to the original mission I assigned you to do.” father says as he appears in front of me. Oh wait, I forgot. He wants to be called by another name for reasons unknown. What was it again, Chuck?
“I don’t understand. My original mission. You will have to refresh my memory.” I explain cocking my head to one side. He just stands there watching me with his hands clasped behind him and gives a small chuckle. He walks toward me while explaining.
“You don’t seem to realize that this was all an illusion.” spreading his arms out, just like angel wings. He continues,
“None of this was real. It wasn’t even a test. This was to show you what would and will happen if you fail to complete the mission that I specifically wrote out for you. You, Castiel, are made for this exact mission, no one else. So, you must successfully complete this particular mission” I’m trying to decipher what mission he’s talking about. I start to think back to before Lucifer started the war, to what I was doing. Chuck gives a sigh and produces a chair to sit on and says,
“I’m going to wait until you tell me what you remember about the mission. So, I know you understand why I chose you and that you are still up for it.” I go back to my train of thought and think some more. I close my eyes and speak aloud.
“I remember something about hell, uh, rescuing. That’s not it. Breaking someone. No sorry, breaking out of someplace.” I open my eyes and see him smiling.
“That’s all I can remember for now. Is my assessment correct?”
“Oh, Castiel, you remember more than you think. And for that I will grant the rest of the missing pieces to you.” he says, then takes his pointer and middle finger and presses them against my forehead. He pulls them away and I remember everything now. He takes a step back and smirks, I return it with a hard nod. With that he vanishes and I teleport to the place I need to be. I place my hand out and pull.
‘Dean Winchester, you are hereby withdrawn from redemption. Arise and with your brother stop whatever evil that tries to end the world.’
The End. However it’s also the beginning.