Chapter Text
In the Course of Justice
Therefore,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this:
That in the course of justice none of us
Should see salvation. We do pray for mercy,
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy.
-The Merchant of Venice IV.i
Chapter One
Previously…
“I'm glad you made it, Sam, Mercy. But the angel blade won't work, because I'm not an angel anymore. I'm your new God. A better one. So you will bow down and profess your love unto me, your Lord. Or I shall destroy you…”
Now…
If Mercy wasn’t the only thing keeping all six feet and four inches of her brother from face-planting into the floor, she wouldn’t have so much as ‘bowed down’ to Cas as fallen to her knees in horror. As it was, Sam swayed so suddenly into her side she was nearly taken down by him anyway. Whatever scraps of adrenaline had propelled him down the steps and given him the strength to plunge that angel blade into Cas’s back had clearly abandoned him. Right now he was as ungainly on his feet as a drunk moose.
Bobby’s steady voice broke the smothering silence. “Well, all right then.” Her mentor lowered himself to the floor until he was kneeling in broken glass, face straight. “Is this good, or you want the whole ‘forehead to the carpet’ thing?” After a moment, he prompted, “Guys?”
Sam’s weight bore down on her and she knew kneeling would be a relief for him. His breathing was harsh and unsteady in her ear. He would probably be passing out in a manner of minutes either way–kneeling halved the distance to the floor. She adjusted her hold on him and began carefully lowering herself to the ground, helping him not to entirely collapse as they went. Dean was following suit, but their knees never even kissed the bloody tile before Cas said, “Stop.” He glanced at Dean and Bobby, and then at her and Sam. “What's the point if you don't mean it? You fear me. Not love, not respect, just fear.”
“Cas,” Sam wheezed out.
“Sam, you have nothing to say to me; you stabbed me in the back,” Cas said tonelessly. He turned to Bobby. “Get up.”
Bobby did, with a stiffness that spoke of a litany of bruises and strained muscles.
“Cas, come on, this isn't you,” Dean implored.
“The Castiel you knew is gone,” Cas said without a hint of warmth.
“So what, then? Kill us?”
Cas’s head tilted to the side. Such a familiar sight and yet Mercy felt her heart constrict. He wasn’t regarding Dean with the gentle curiosity or confusion that normally accompanied the gesture. There was nothing but ridicule in his voice as he said, “What a brave little ant you are.” Dean’s eyes widened at the dehumanizing term. “You know you're powerless, you wouldn't dare move against me again. That would be pointless,” Cas patronized. “So I have no need to kill you. Not now. Besides, once you were my favorite pets before you turned and bit me.”
“Cas,” Mercy whispered. She untangled herself from Sam, pausing to make sure he could bear his own weight, and stepped forward. Across the room, Dean’s eyes bore into her in warning to stand down. Normally she would listen, but this was Cas. She had to try. She reached out with a shaking hand and brushed her fingers against the sleeve of his coat. “Cassie-”
He turned with inhuman speed and grabbed her wrist tightly, yanking her a step closer with such force she was sure if she’d tried to resist he’d have separated her shoulder from its socket. His other hand grabbed her chin in a bruising hold and she felt her breath freeze in her lungs as he looked down at her with uncaring eyes.
“My little Mercy-Elizabeth,” he cooed as he squeezed her jaw. It occurred to her that he could snap her bones as easily as she could crush a grape. “If I knew you wouldn’t fight me with your every breath to get back to your brothers, I would take you with me. There is still loyalty in your heart, isn’t there, dear pet?”
She felt a dizzying heat rush into her cheeks. The embarrassment caught her off guard, and she swallowed back tears.
“Who are you?” Dean asked.
“I’m God,” Cas replied simply. He released her, and Mercy stumbled back, heart pounding. “And if you stay in your place, you may live in my kingdom. If you rise up, I will strike you down. Not doing so well, are you Sam?”
“I’m fine,” Sam croaked out. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I’m fine .”
Mercy glanced to the side, still fighting to calm her racing heart, and found Sam half-lidded and pale.
“You said you would fix him!” Dean snapped. “You promised!”
“If you stood down, which you hardly did,” Cas said sharply. He looked at Sam with disdain. “Be thankful for my mercy. I could have cast you back into the pit.”
“Cas, come on, this is nuts! You can turn this around, please!” Dean begged.
The former angel did not acknowledge her brother’s plea. “I hope for your sake this is the last you see me,” he said, and then he vanished.
The crushing weight of his presence was gone in an instant, and Mercy finally did fall to her knees, barely missing a particularly large shard of glass on the floor. The tile blurred as her tears threatened to hit a crisis point and spill over. She might have let them if Sam hadn’t groaned in pain.
“Sam you okay?” Dean asked.
Blood dripped freely from Sam’s nose. His eyes rolled back in his head and his entire body seized as he gasped in a pained lungful of air. She was closest to him, and made it to his side just as he collapsed, not quick enough, though, to prevent him from the fate she’d saved herself from seconds prior. He didn’t seem to notice the ragged cut in his hand–she knew there was something far worse going on inside his head.
-M-
“Come on! Come on, Baby! Mercy, those all-state legs of yours doing anything or am I fixing this car by myself?”
Mercy rolled herself into a seated position, so she was no longer braced flat on her back with her feet pressed into the dented roof of the Impala, and shot her brother a mock-glare. Or course, he was contorted into the same position she’d just unfolded her body from, so she was glaring at his legs and her unamused expression was completely lost to him.
It was eighty degrees outside, and even hotter in the twisted metal frame of the Impala. Sweat matted down her curls, and she’d not enjoyed the sensation of peeling her skin off the Impala’s leather bench. Even in running shorts and a tank-top she was overheated. “You’re going to be fixing this car all by yourself in a minute after I pass out from heat exhaustion in your metal death trap. It's not working. We’re gonna have to hammer it back into shape,” she said.
“Don’t be so dramatic–it's not even that hot,” Dean said. “Quit your whining and assume the position. We almost had it before you gave up.”
Mercy huffed, but flipped back over. When they were finished she was going to make herself ice cold lemonade and not give Dean a single sip as revenge.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Yeah, whatever.”
The stubborn metal groaned as they both pushed with all their might, but it did not give. Dean huffed and puffed out a series of curses and Mercy knew she was making a few unladylike noises of her own as they struggled to undo what several tons of force had wrought to the car with just their feet and some good-old fashioned grit.
“You two fixin’ her or primal screaming?”
Bobby appeared on her side of the car, upside down in her vision. “Both,” she answered, blinking rapidly as hot sweat dripped into her eyes.
Dean sighed. He patted her leg, throwing in the towel, and they both extricated themselves from the car. Bobby held out a beer towards Dean, and offered her a rootbeer. The chilled glass felt amazing in her hands and she immediately pressed the bottle to the back of her neck. “Thanks,” she said.
Her brother murmured his own appreciation as he took a sip of beer, and then asked, “How’s Sam?”
“Still under, but alive,” Bobby answered.
Mercy sighed. More the same. She dropped into one of the lawn chairs she’d pulled from the garage earlier. The plastic was uncomfortably warm from baking in the sun all morning, but sitting down was too nice to pass up.
“Yeah? What about God part deux?”
“I got all kinds of feelers out, so far diddly.”
She popped open her rootbeer and lazily tracked Dean with her eyes as he walked over to the table where they’d laid all their tools out and began scrounging around for something. “And what exactly are you looking for?” he asked.
Bobby’s arms moved in a half-aborted gesture. “Exactly. What? Miracles, mass visions, trench coat on a tortilla? I don't know what I'm lookin' for.”
“Ah, well, he'll surface.” Dean found what he’d been searching for, a ball peen hammer, which he began mechanically wiping down with a cloth. Mercy narrowed her eyes and took a sip of her rootbeer to refrain from saying I told you so .
“So,” Bobby said. “Say we do suss out where ‘new and improved’ flew off to..."
“Yeah?”
“The hell we plan to do about it?”
“I don't know, Bobby, I got no more clue than you do.”
Mercy leaned back in the lawn chair and her eyes fluttered shut. She hated that they were having this conversation. The what the hell do we plan to do about it conversation was always about stopping monster s. She brushed her fingers against her chin and felt the phantom of Cas’s fingers where he’d grabbed her.
“I don't even know what books to hit for this, Dean.”
“Well, figure it out!” her brother snapped.
Mercy’s eyes popped open in time to see Bobby’s hurt expression. Dean blinked, as if surprised by his own outburst. His gaze dropped to the ground and he took a steadying breath. “I’m sorry,” he murmured sincerely. “This ain't in no book. If you stick your neck out, Cas steps on it. So you know what I'm gonna do?”
“What?” Bobby asked.
Dean turned towards the Impala. “I’m gonna fix this car with my sister, because that’s what I can do. I can work on her 'til she's mint,” he said as he crawled back into the frame, hammer at the ready. “And when Sam wakes up, no matter what shape he's in, we'll glue him back together too. We owe him that.”
“I’m with you,” Bobby said. Mercy caught his eye and they shared a meaningful look.
She stood up from the lawnchair, abandoning her root beer, and grabbed the ball peen hammer that had been sitting on Baby’s hood the entire time, right where Dean had set it down earlier and apparently forgotten.
“I’ll go see about tracking down these parts,” Bobby offered as she slid into the front seat once again. The older hunter grabbed the hastily scrawled list they’d made earlier when they’d done a complete inventory of Baby and stuffed it into his pocket.
Dean’s grunt of acknowledgment was nearly drowned out by his renewed battle against the Impala’s mangled frame. Mercy settled into the car and split her attention between being the perfect mechanic’s assistant–priding herself on being able to anticipate Dean’s every move–and plotting how best to trick her brother into taking care of his basic human needs like rest, food, and water.
An hour later, she finally settled on her most faithful trick. Mercy set her hammer down and wiped the sweat from her brow. It wasn’t even a complete exaggeration when she groaned as she stretched her legs out of the car. She felt the second she had Dean’s full attention on her, though his hands never stopped their work, and initiated the second part of her plan. Without saying a word, she began using her knuckles to massage up and down the side of her shin.
The hammering stopped. “That leg hernia bugging you again?” Dean’s voice rumbled from next to her. “Shin splints?”
“Just a cramp, I’m fine,” she replied breezily, reaching for the hammer.
He narrowed his eyes at her, and easily nudged the hammer out of her reach. “Go hydrate, that usually helps.”
“Seriously, I’m fine,” she insisted.
There was a subtle shift in his posture, and she knew she’d successfully triggered his big brother care motivational system. The most effective way to get Dean to take care of himself was to let him take care of you–a loophole she and Sam have been known to mercilessly exploit. Dean rolled his eyes and said, “Take five, Forrest.”
“Come on, there’s too much work to-”
“Alright, you asked for it.” Dean hefted himself out of the car and came around to her side. He held out his hand, and she clasped it tightly as he hauled her to her feet. “I swear you and Sam both have the survival instincts of lemmings.”
Since he was doing exactly what she wanted, Mercy refrained from pointing out the hypocrisy in that statement. He herded her into the kitchen and got her a glass of ice water, all the while muttering about the evils of jogging. “You don’t even have track or cross country anymore, why are you still running anyway?” he grumbled as he washed his hands. “You practicing being chased?”
“Cardio is good for your health, Dean,” she dead-panned.
“But at what cost, Merce?”
Dean began to gather ingredients to make lunch, absently setting out enough bread to make sandwiches for three. He kept complaining, but Mercy wasn’t really listening anymore. She leaned forward, rested her chin on her fist, and just watched her older brother perform normalcy. He was good at it–too good, and yet, not good enough.
Someone cleared their throat. Mercy glanced over her shoulder and immediately sprang to her feet. Sam leaned in the doorway. He looked exhausted, but he managed a strained smile. “Hey, Dean. Hey, Merce.”
There was a cautious hope in Dean’s eyes as he said, “Wow, you’re, uh, walking and talking.”
Mercy showed no such caution or restraint. She was across the kitchen in an instant, pushing up on her tiptoes to wrap her arms around her brother. He grunted from the force she hit his chest with, but his arms came around her waist, and she felt him rest his chin on top of her head. She squeezed him once, before pulling back to ask, “You’re okay?”
“Yeah. I, uh, put on my own socks, the whole nine,” Sam said, laughing in a slightly awkward manner. Mercy took his arm, drawing him further into the kitchen and nudging him into the chair she’d previously occupied.
“Well, that's uh... I mean you, uh, you sure you're okay?” Dean pressed.
“My head hurts a little, but...basically,” Sam assured them again.
“...Seriously?”
Sam’s expression softened. “Look man, I'm as surprised as you are but, yeah, I swear.”
“Good!” An invisible weight sloughed off of Dean’s shoulders. “No reason putting a gift horse under a microscope, right?”
“Yeah,” Sam agreed. “Are you guys making lunch?”
Mercy nodded. “We’re taking a break from fixing the car,” she explained, perking up. “Hey, you know what? I keep some pie in the outside freezer when I go on a baking binge and make too much. We deserve a treat. I know it’s not fresh, but-”
“You had me at pie,” Dean said, holding up his hand to halt her rambling. Something dawned on his face a moment later and he was looking at her with laser intensity that had her eyebrow raising and her lip quirking up. “Wait, are you telling me you stockpile pie ? We have a secret pie stash? ”
Sam laughed, which made Mercy break out into a grin. “Uh, yeah? I guess I am. Come on, I’m feeling generous, I’ll show you where. Sam, set the table?”
“You got it,” Sam agreed.
The eldest Winchester was already beelining for the garage, and Mercy was quick to follow. There was no doubt in her mind Dean would desecrate her organizational system in pursuit of pie without a second thought. At the door though, she paused. An uneasy feeling settled in her stomach and she glanced back.
Sam stood frozen at the silverware drawer. There was a haunted, not-quite-there look in his eye. It only lasted a couple of seconds before he shook his head like he was trying to get water out of his ear, and began setting the table for four.
The wheels in Mercy’s head spun.
-M-
When Cas surfaced, he surfaced like a nuclear submarine performing an emergency blow. Suddenly, he was everywhere. On the radio, in the paper, on every news channel, smiting religious leaders, white-supremacy organizations, motivational speakers. Mercy’s stomach turned every time the body count upped. There were good things, but they were buried beneath an ocean of blood.
“Motivational speakers?” Sam repeated in an incredulous tone. He popped up from the under the hood to look at the radio like he was waiting for the host to make a correction.
“Yeah,” Dean grunted as he worked. “I'm not sure new Cas gets irony any better than old Cas. Of course, old Cas wouldn't smite Madison Square Garden just to prove a point.” He sighed and a shadow passed over his features. “He is off the deep end of the deep end. And there's no slowing down.”
They’d been listening to the reports come in for weeks now. The Impala wasn’t mint yet, but she was getting close, and Mercy couldn’t help but dread what would come when she was ready for the road again.
“So, what? Try to talk to him again?” Sam said.
Dean looked at him sharply. “Sam,” he ground out.
“Dean, all we can do is talk to the guy,” Sam argued. He glanced at her, and Mercy ducked his gaze, easily finding something on the Impala to occupy her hands. “Mercy’s on my side. Right, Merce?”
“There aren’t sides,” Dean immediately countered. “He's not a guy. He's God. And he's pissed. And when God gets righteous, you get the hell out of the way; haven't you read the Bible? Am I wrong, Mercy?”
A heavy silence hung in the air and Mercy finally looked up to find both her brothers staring at her expectantly. Mercy grit her teeth. “I am not some kind of coup de grâce to be used in arguments when one of you wants the other to shut up,” she said in an annoyed tone. “Talk to each other, not at each other. ”
They at least had the decency to look contrite. Firmly, but no longer with quite such an angry edge, Dean said to Sam, “Cas is never coming back. He's lied to us, he used us, he cracked your gourd like it was nothing. No more talk; we have spent enough on him.”
Sam was quiet for a thoughtful second. Mercy couldn’t help but wonder where this sudden desire to talk to Cas had come from when before Sam had been all distrustful subterfuge. Not to mention, he’d been proven right for it. “Okay,” he finally agreed.
“Hand me that socket wrench,” Dean said, and they moved on.
Aside from bodies, another thing that had accumulated in the past few weeks was the oddities in Sam’s behavior. They happened relatively infrequently, but any at all was too many in Mercy’s opinion. There were times when Sam would be operating functionally, and then would suddenly stop, like the lights were on but no one was home. Or he’d react against seemingly nothing. Jumping at phantom noises, defending himself against shadows.
Then there were the nightmares.
Mercy walked into the kitchen later that night to find Sam slumped over the table and asleep. It didn’t appear entirely peaceful, but there also weren’t any signs to indicate he’d tipped over into one of those night terrors, so she figured it was best to let him be. Any rest was good rest, in her opinion.
She was making a cup of sleepytime tea when Sam suddenly thrashed in his sleep.
“Sam,” she called, wary of approaching him. She knew better than to try and pull a hunter out of a bad dream from striking distance. Dean in particular had a habit of waking up armed, at the very least, with his fists. But Sam’s expression only tightened, so she tried again, louder. “Sam! ”
He jackknifed into a seated position, looking frantically around–at first up at the ceiling, and then finally to her. The second she found recognition in his eyes, she was at his side. His nostrils flared and he leaned unconsciously closer, pressing his forehead to her shoulder as he tried to calm his breathing. Mercy had taken to wearing her perfume, because Sam was always able to ground himself quicker if there was a familiar scent nearby. Dean had teased her when he’d first noticed, but it worked too well for her to care.
“Hey, you okay?” she asked, threading her fingers through Sam’s long hair and lightly scratching his scalp. “You with me?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he breathed out. “I’m with you.”
Whether consciously or not, he’d not answered her first question, but Mercy didn’t think it was the right time to press. They stayed like that for a full minute, until Sam stood up shakily and looked around. “Where’s Dean and Bobby?” he asked, after finding the common area quiet.
“In the garage. Dean’s thinking we can finally paint, so he’s taping up the Impala,” she answered.
He nodded. “I’m gonna go see if they need any help.”
Mercy pursed her lips. “I’ll come with you,” she offered, but even as she spoke, the kettle began to whistle and she was reminded she’d been making tea.
“Join us when you’re done with your tea. I can make it to the garage myself, you know,” Sam said in a knowing tone, having immediately guessed the reason behind her offer. Still, he smiled and squeezed her shoulder in silent thanks as he passed.
She watched him disappear, frowning at the slight stumble in his gait. The kettle continued to scream, though, and she tore her eyes away from the now empty doorway to turn off the stove. As she steeped the teabag, she let her thoughts wander. A couple of days ago her grades had been posted, and she’d gotten an email from her advisor asking if she’d given any more consideration to her plans for next year–if she wanted to go ahead into her junior year as a typical student or take an accelerated track that would see her graduate a year early.
Most of Mercy wanted to be done with high school as soon as possible, which was probably why she was planning to write back and ask for resources regarding getting her GED and being done with it all together by the end of the summer. She was just wrestling with feeling like she’d be disappointing her brothers by going through with it.
Mercy sighed. She cupped her favorite Doctor Who mug in her hands and went off to find her family. Crickets sang into the night as she walked the path to the garage. Light was spilling through the door and she heard Bobby’s voice when she approached saying, “What we've got to do is hunt the son of bitch. Unfortunately, I lost my God guns.”
Sam’s voice said, “Well, I mean is there some kind of heavenly weapon? Maybe something out of that angel arsenal that Balthazar stole? There has to be something that can hurt him.”
The words rattled inside her head– hurt, hunt . They were talking about Cas. Before the tears that had been caught in her throat for weeks could force their way out, she brushed her fingers against her jaw, remembered cruel blue eyes, and swallowed them back down again. When she slipped inside the garage, cradling her tea, Dean caught her eye immediately.
“He's God, Sam,” Dean said, but he was staring directly at her. “There's nothing, but there might be someone .”
She narrowed her eyes. Mercy had a feeling she knew exactly the someone Dean was referring to and she would not be happy to be right.
-M-
His little sister was not happy with him. Dean felt her hot anger prickling his neck as she glared at him over the brim of her mug the entire time he and Sam prepared the Devil’s Trap in the basement. She’d not been this pissed off at him since the last time he’d tried to wring a favor out of Death.
“Okay, all set,” Sam called to Bobby as he snapped the cap back onto the spray paint and stepped away.
Bobby nodded and lit the match. Dean straightened up when the summoning spell was set alight and Crowley appeared in the trap. The smarmy little dick was in the middle of pouring a stiff drink. He took one look at the familiar basement, another look at the fresh paint on the floor, groaned, and said, “No. No! No! Come on!”
“Don't act so surprised,” Bobby said, folding his arms across his chest.
Crowley glared at them, but it had nothing on the one Mercy was still leveling in his direction, so Dean easily brushed it off. “My new boss is going to kill me for even talking to you lot,” the demon growled.
“Well, you're lucky we're not stabbing you in your scuzzy face, you little piece-”
“Woah, wait!” Sam spoke up, cutting off the finale to Dean’s insult. “What new boss?”
“Castiel, you giraffe.”
Dean didn’t think he’d imagined the hastily covered up snort he heard from Mercy’s direction, and he sent her an unamused look as Bobby pressed, “Is your boss?”
“Is everyone’s boss,” Crowley corrected. “What do you think he's going to do if he finds out we've been conspiring?” He looked between all of them expectantly. “You do want to conspire, don't you?”
“No. We want you to just stand there and look pretty,” Bobby said sarcastically.
The demon cocked his eyebrow. “Listening.”
“We need a spell to bind Death,” Dean said, cutting to the chase.
“Bind ” Crowley repeated. “Enslave Death? You having a laugh?”
“I said the same thing,” Mercy said. “Only, you know, less British.”
Crowley smirked in his sister’s direction, and Dean bristled. “Shut up, Mercy,” he ground out, before turning back to the trapped demon. “Lucifer did it.”
“Like that’s a ringing endorsement?” Mercy muttered.
“I said, shut up, Mercy.”
“You should really listen to Kitten, Squirrel, since she seems to be the one in control of the collective Winchester braincell today,” Crowley said, expression placid once again. “That’s Lucifer.”
“A spell’s a spell,” Sam retorted.
“You really believe you can handle that kind of horsepower? You're delusional!”
Dean set his jaw. “Death is the only player on the board left that has the kind of juice to take Cas.”
“They'll both mash us like peas,” Crowley said brusquely. “Why should I help with a suicide mission?”
“Look!” Bobby snapped, apparently as tired of the back-and-forth as Dean. He toed the Devil’s trap, and said knowingly, “Do you really want Cas running the universe?”
Crowley met the grizzled hunter’s gaze head on. His jaw ticked, and Dean watched as he finally poured himself that glass of whiskey. He knocked it back, and Dean breathed out through his nose. Step one, arguably the easiest, complete.
-M-
Step two was proving to be a pain in the ass. Step two was actually step two, three, and four rolled into one: break into some rich guy’s wannabe Rancho Bizarro, smash the God crystal, make Death their bitch. Simple.
They christened Baby’s fresh paint job with a cool nine hour drive before parking her about a block away from the mark and hopping the fence. The private security guard would have a sizable knot on his head, but he’d live, and they were inside within the next ten minutes thanks to Bobby’s quick work.
Dean had cased a few joints like this in his illustrious hunting career, but he never stopped being floored by some of the crap rich people wasted their money on. He trailed his flashlight over display case after display case of useless garbage before finally striking gold. The fulgurite was huge, but it was also nothing Dean could imagine wanting to spend such a ludicrously large sum of money on.
He tucked his flashlight under his arm and braced his hands on either side of the glass. As he was about to lift the case, there was the sharp, unmistakable crack of a gun being cocked and Dean froze. He turned slowly and found himself staring down the barrel of a gun that looked more like it was used to seeing the inside of another display case than a range. Dean didn’t think the man holding it had done more than shoot clay pigeons. Maybe he hunted over bait from the safety of a tree, or had a guide practically carry his ass and set him up with an easy shot so he could brag to all the other old farts at the country club, but Dean could see in his eye he’d never even aimed at another human before.
He raised his hands nonetheless. “Hi, uh… I don't want to hurt you. Really.”
“I'm the one with the firearm, son,” the man, presumably Dr. Weiss, said.
“I get that,” Dean replied slowly, eyeing him and his wife up and down.
He had them bound to their own dining room chairs and gagged in a minute. Mercy joined him a moment later, having found and utilized the kitchen to reheat their offering to Death. The aroma in the air was mouth-watering, and he could only hope Death would agree.
“Dean!” she groused, noticing the terrified couple.
“What, was I supposed to let them shoot me?” he asked.
Mercy cocked an eyebrow and looked at him in a way that told him exactly what she was considering letting her answer be. She’d been in a mood since their little rendezvous with Crowley. He knew she was against their entire plan, and she’d been making her opinion on the matter clear with every chance she got. She turned to the husband and wife and said in a tooth-achingly sweet tone, “I’m so sorry about my brother.” She shot a glare in his direction. “Nobody taught him proper manners.”
Bobby and Sam were next to join the circus poor Dr. Weiss’s study was becoming, and Dean said, “Hey guys, so this is Dr. and Mrs. Weiss…”
“Hi,” Sam said reflexively. “Uh, sorry?”
Dean rolled his eyes at the fact that both his brother and sister had decided to apologize to the owners of the home they were breaking into and robbing. Typical. “I found the God thingy,” he said, jerking his chin in its direction.
Bobby threw his gear down on the desk. “Well, let's light this candle.”
He couldn’t imagine what Dr. and Mrs. Weiss were thinking as they set up for the ritual. Bobby mixed the spell together as he and Sam cleared a space and drew the sigils in white chalk. Mercy’s one and only contribution had been the food. She stood on the fringes and frowned severely for the rest of the process.
Finally, they were as ready as they were going to be, and Bobby recited the spell, “Te nunc invoco, mortem. Te in mea potestate defixi. Nunc et in aeternum!”
The house rumbled on its foundations. Books flew off the shelf, every glass surface in the room shattered. It was when huge fissures opened up in the ceiling that Dean began to legitimately worry the entire mansion was going to come down on their heads. Mercy was half a room away until she wasn’t and she had pressed herself into his side and grabbed hold of his hand to squeeze tightly as Bobby finished the spell.
On his final word, the shaking suddenly stopped. They all looked around with trepidation. Dean stepped away from Mercy and called out, “Um… hello? Death?”
“You're joking.”
Dean jerked around in surprise as Death appeared silently behind him. He was exactly as Dean remembered. Same stiff black clothes, severe face, deadpan tone, flat eyes. He swallowed hard. “I'm sorry, Death,” he managed to get past the lump in his throat. “This isn't what it seems.”
He held up his hands and a silver chain like liquid mercury appeared between his wrists. “It seems like you bound me.”
“For good reason, okay?” Dean stuttered. “Just, uh, hear us out. Um, Merce?”
His sister stepped forward, now holding their offering. “Tennessee barbecue ribs with a side of cornbread and fried pickle chips, just like Mean Old Sal taught me how to make,” she said in an even tone.
Death eyed her. “That easy to soothe me, you think?” His sharp gaze then landed on Sam. “This is about Sam's hallucinations, I assume? Sorry, Sam. One wall per customer. Now unbind me.”
Hallucinations? Dean wanted to demand of his brother, but that revelation would have to be put on the backburner for now. Sam’s throat jerked. “We can’t. Y-yet ,” he hastily tacked on when Death’s eyes bore into him.
“This isn't going to end well.”
“We need you to kill God,” Dean said.
Immediately, the full intensity of Death’s bleak eyes were on him. It wasn’t like looking into the eyes of a predator. It was like watching a natural disaster come barrelling towards you–inevitable, but also, entirely indifferent. An involuntary shiver wracked Dean’s spine, and he had to do his best to pretend it hadn’t.
“Pardon?” Death said in a gelid tone.
“Kill God. You heard right.. your honor,” Bobby spoke up.
“What makes you think I can do that?”
“You told me,” Dean reminded him.
Death’s eyes slid to him again, this time with a hint of annoyance. “Why should I?”
“Because…” Dean’s mouth was dry. “We said so, and we're the boss of you.” Mercy’s foot came down on top of his toes so hard he had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from yelping like a kicked puppy. Foot now throbbing, he cleared his throat and added, “I mean… Respectfully.”
“It’s not the natural order,” Mercy said quietly, but in an assured manner. “Is there some way you could help us?”
“Amazing.”
Castiel materialized in the room and Dean felt a ripple of shock run through them at the former angel’s appearance. Out of the corner of his eye, Dean saw both of Mercy’s hands fly up to cover her mouth and silence her sharp intake of breath. Cas’s skin was riddled with deep, red pockmarks. Dean had seen this once before, when Lucifer inhabited a vessel too weak to contain his true form.
“Oh, Cas,” Mercy said, hands falling to rest above her heart.
Cas’s eyes were slightly unfocused as he looked between them all. He didn’t acknowledge Mercy had spoken. “I didn't want to kill you, but now…”
“You can’t kill us,” Dean cut in.
“You've erased any nostalgia I had for you, Dean.”
Cas raised his hand as if to snap his fingers and erase more than just nostalgia and Dean played their trump card. “Death is our bitch,” he said, knowing he'd pay for that comment from Mercy later, but not caring at the moment. Cas finally seemed to notice the Horseman in the room. “We ain't gonna die, even if God pulls the trigger.”
“Annoying little protozoa, aren’t they?” Death said. He considered Cas for a long moment. “God? ” he repeated, like he finally understood something, and it occurred to Dean that Death might have thought they were having a very different conversation earlier. “You look awfully like a mutated angel to me. Your vessel's melting. You're going to explode.”
“No, I’m not,” Cas said coolly. “When I've finished my work, I'll repair myself.”
“You think you can because you think you're simply under the weight of all those souls, yes? But that's not the worst problem. There are things much older than souls in Purgatory, and you gulped those in, too.”
“Irrelevant. I control them.”
Death raised his brow. “For the moment,” he said ominously.
“Wait,” Dean blurted out before he could stop himself. “Uh, what older things?”
Death gave him a hard, disapproving look, but nonetheless began to explain. “Long before God created Angel and man, he made the first beasts–the Leviathans.”
“Leviathans?” Dean repeated, mouth suddenly tacky.
“I personally found them entertaining,” Death said, tilting his head. “But he was concerned they'd chomp the entire petri dish, so he locked them away. Why do you think he created Purgatory? To keep those clever, poisonous things out. Now Castiel has swallowed them. He's the one thin membrane between the old ones and your home-”
“Enough,” Cas said.
“-stupid little soldier you are,” Death finished unflinchingly.
“Why?” Cas demanded. He strode across the room. His vessel was taller than Death, but there was no doubt who Dean knew had the bigger presence. “Because I dared open a door that he shut? Where is he? I did a service, taking his place.”
“Service?” Death repeated in a questioning tone. “Settling petty vendettas?”
“No,” Cas said sharply. “I'm cleaning up one mess after another– selflessly .”
“Quite the humanitarian.”
“And how would you know? What are you, really? A flyswatter?”
“Destined to swat you, I think.”
“Unless I take you first.”
Dean’s gaze bounced back and forth between the mutated angel and Death incarnate. He and his family had quickly become fixtures in the room no more important than the furniture as these two cosmic entities sized each other up.
Death apparently had heard all he needed to. He glanced at Dean and said, “Really bought his own press, this one.” He sighed, like he’d tired of a tedious interaction. “Please, Cas. I know God, and you, sir, are no God.”
“All right, put your junk away, both of you,” Dean spoke up. “Look, call him what you want. Just kill him now!”
Cas slowly turned to face Dean. His blue eyes a dark, roiling ocean of seething anger.
“All right, fine.”
Death raised his hand, palm facing Cas, but Cas quickly snapped his fingers. Death’s shackles shattered in an instant, and Dean’s heart dropped. “Thank you,” Death said. “Shall we kickbox now?”
The unbound Horseman’s eyes were drawn to the plate Mercy had long ago set down. He sat in an armchair and drew the plate closer on the table. Dean had never seen someone manage to politely eat barbecue ribs, but he was now able to add that, along with pizza, to the growing list of typical finger foods he had learned Death preferred to eat with a fork and knife.
“I had a tingle I'd be reaping someone very, very soon.” Death leaned around Dean and called to their unwilling and probably petrified hosts, “Don’t worry. Not you.” He tried a homemade fried pickle chip next and appeared unbothered when Cas decided to vanish into thin air, commenting idly, “Well, he was in a hurry.”
Death finished his meal tidily in the stifling silence of the room. He used the cornbread to sop up any of the remaining barbeque sauce, and hummed as he enjoyed the pickle chips. It was as he used a napkin to politely wipe the corners of his mouth that Sam caught his eye and nodded at Death. Say something.
“Um-”
“Shut up, Dean.” Dean’s teeth clicked as he snapped his mouth closed and Death set the napkin aside. “I'm not here to tie your shoes every time you trip. I warned you about those souls how long ago? Long enough to stop that fool. And here we are again, with your little planet on the edge of immolation.”
“Well, I'm sorry. All right?” Dean said sarcastically. “I've been trying to save this planet, so maybe you should find somebody better to tip off.”
“Maybe I should spend my effort on a better planet.” He rose from the chair, using his cane as leverage. “Well, it's been amusing.”
“Wait, h-hold on, hold on!” Sam said, grimacing when Death paused to look at him. “Just, can you give us something? You- you have to care a little bit about what happens to us.”
Death’s expression was flat as he said, “You know, I really don’t… but, I do find that little angel arrogant.”
“Great, let’s go with that,” Dean said hopefully.
“Your only hope is to have him return it all to Purgatory. Quickly.”
Sam’s eyes widened. “We need a door.”
“You have everything you need at that lab. Get him to return there and compel him to give up the power.”
“Compel?” Dean repeated incredulously.
“Figure it out,” Death said in an icy tone.
“But that door only opens in the eclipse, and that's over,” Bobby pointed out.
“I'll make another. 3:59, Sunday morning, just before dawn. Be punctual. Don't thank me. Clean up your mess.” He turned on his heel, but paused to add. “Try to bind me again, you'll die before you start…” his gaze fell on Mercy. “Thank you, Mercy-Elizabeth. The pickle chips were wonderful.”
“Any time,” Mercy choked out, the hospitable response a reflex.
Death hummed consideringly, and then disappeared from the room.
-M-
Mercy spent the morning studying in the junkyard. Normally she did her schoolwork in the study, but she hadn’t found the time to mention to her brothers that she was going to sit her GED exam in a month. She figured this was going to be one of those ‘better to ask forgiveness than permission’ moments.
Despite the exam being a grueling seven hours, Mercy wasn’t too concerned about it. Mostly she was focused on brushing up on a few of the concepts within each of the four content areas, but she’d had a fairly rigorous course load last year that had been mostly composed of AP and honors classes. Her advisor, once she’d been talked around to Mercy dropping out, hadn’t been worried either.
She sighed and set aside her laptop, giving her eyes a break from the screen. The dented hood of the ford she was sprawled out on creaked as she shifted her weight to get more comfortable.
“Hey, Castiel. Um... Maybe this is pointless.”
Mercy cracked open an eye and spotted her brother standing a little ways away. He wouldn’t be able to spot her from where he was, and Mercy knew she should probably announce herself.
“Look... I don't know if any part of you even cares, but, um, I still think you're one of us, deep down. I mean, way, way, way off the reservation, but…” Sam blew out a breath. “Look, we still have till dawn to stop this. Let us help. Please.”
“I already tried that,” Mercy finally spoke up.
Sam jolted and looked at her with wide eyes. “Mercy, you scared me.”
“Sorry,” she offered. She slid off the hood and tucked her laptop under her arm.
Her brother glanced at the computer and raised an eyebrow. “Is this where you’ve been hiding all morning? Aren’t you on vacation?”
“Just some summer work,” she replied easily.
He nodded. “You headed back in? Cause, I’ve gotta warn you, Dean’s in a mood.”
She sighed and strolled over, linking their arms together like they were off to see the wizard. “When isn’t he? Come on, let’s face the music together.”
“So, you already tried, huh?” Sam asked as they walked arm in arm.
Mercy recalled the stilted, awkward prayer she’d said earlier while half-hoping Cas wasn’t listening and wouldn’t respond. She hadn’t known what to say, not really, not beyond, please be at the lab before dawn. What else was there?You’re scaring me, please come back, I love you?
She touched her face and swallowed hard.
“Hey,” Sam said. He reached out hesitantly and brushed his fingers against hers where they massaged her jaw unconsciously, before drawing them away and just holding her hand tightly in his. “I know this has been hard for you.”
“It’s been hard for all of us,” she deflected automatically.
Sam rolled his eyes, but there was a soft look on his face. “You don’t have to do that, Merce, seriously. You’re Winchester enough without the stupid bravado crap Dean and I pull.”
His words caught her off guard, and Mercy’s heart skipped a beat. “Thanks,” she whispered, and he squeezed her hand just as they walked inside.
The moment was ruined when they entered the study and the sounds emanating from Dean’s laptop reached her ears. She grimaced, but Dean just grabbed two more glasses and poured a generous amount of whiskey in both.
“Only if you turn that off,” Sam said.
Dean glanced at her and then back at his screen before sighing and shutting it down. Mercy breathed out her own sigh, one of relief, and sat down next to Sam. She picked up her glass and clinked with her brothers just on principle, but immediately set the drink back down. She suspected the only reason Dean had poured one out for her was because he knew she wouldn’t touch it anyway.
“Mercy, Sam.”
She sat upright. Cas had appeared in the doorway. He leaned heavily against the frame, blood on his clothes and in his hair and staining his pale skin.
“Cassie,” she said cautiously.
His eyes focused on her, barely. “I heard your call. I need help.”
-M-
It was entirely useless, but Mercy couldn’t help but try and wipe the blood from Cas’s face as Bobby and her brothers scrambled to get the ritual together before the eclipse.
“We need the right blood. There's a small jar, end of the hall, s-supply closet,” Cas ground out. He was on the floor, trenchcoat wrapped tightly around himself as he shivered in the cold, damp air of the laboratory. His vessel was running incredibly thin, and Mercy knew they were working against more than one deadline.
Sam rushed off to find the blood, and Mercy used her damp cloth to clean the dark stain on Cas’s cheek. She wondered whose blood this was, and quickly decided she didn’t want to know. “Dean? Mercy?” Cas rasped.
“What, you need something else?” Dean asked as he worked to clear a spot on the tile wall to paint the sigil.
Cas’s head rolled as he tried to angle himself to see Dean. “No. I feel regret, about you both, and what I did to Sam.”
Her brother looked away immediately. “Yeah, well, you should.”
“If there was time, if I was strong enough, I'd-I'd fix him now. I just wanted to make amends before I die,” Cas said.
Mercy’s hand shook as she lowered the cloth. No, this was too much to confront right now. And yet, there was no other time. She remembered, months ago, at Rufus’s funeral, what Dean had said about blanket apologies and family.
Something's gonna get us eventually, and when my guts get ripped out, just so you three know, we're good. Blanket apology for all the crap that anybody's done all the way around.
She waited to hear what he’d say now, and looked at him expectantly. A curt, “Okay,” was all he managed, and Mercy’s shoulders dropped.
“Is it working?” Cas asked.
“Does it make you feel better?”
Cas thought about it for a moment. “No. You?”
“Not a bit.”
Her brother turned back to the wall, and Mercy’s heart sank. She took Cas’s hand and held it tight between both her own. “I forgive you,” she murmured quietly.
The angel looked at her, blue eyes shot through with red. He brought up his other hand, the one she wasn’t holding, and cradled her cheek gently. Mercy felt her breath hitch and she swallowed hard. “Your mother had incredible foresight with what she chose to name you.”
Tears burned in her eyes. Mercy couldn’t swallow them down anymore. They spilled down her cheeks, and she choked on a sob. “It’ll be okay. This will be over in a few minutes,” she said.
Cas smiled sadly, and brushed away her tears with his thumb in a soothing motion. “It will,” he agreed, but she was pretty sure they were talking about two different things.
“Merce, get him up,” Dean called.
She glanced over her shoulder and saw he’d finished the sigil. Bobby was standing ready with the incantation. Vaguely, she registered that Sam was missing, but she pushed that thought aside as she hauled Cas to his feet. She helped him stand in front of the wall, before stepping back and into Dean’s chest, selfishly wanting comfort from her big brother.
He gave it. As Bobby began to recite the words, Dean wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her into his chest without question.
“Ianua magna purgatorii, clausa est ob nos lumine eius ab oculis nostris retento sed nunc stamus ad limen huius ianuae magnae et demisse fideliter perhonorifice paramus aperire eam…”
The sigil burned and then the wall fractured and fell in on itself. A void opened up behind the wall, howling with a fierce wind that clawed and pulled at Mercy’s clothes. She leaned further into the protection of Dean’s chest.
“...Creaturae terrificae quarum ungulae et dentes nunquam tetigerunt carnem eius ad mundum nostrum nunc ianua magna, aperta tandem!”
“I’m sorry, Dean, Mercy,” she heard Cas say.
Then a bright light erupted from the angel’s chest and she was forced to close her eyes against the onslaught. Thousands of souls poured out of Cas and drained into the door. And the sound it made. Mercy was suddenly reminded these souls weren’t human, but monsters, and she believed it based on the horrible caterwaul they made as they were dragged back into purgatory.
It was over in seconds, and Cas collapsed just as the door resealed itself.
“Cas!” Dean shouted, the worry in his voice betrayed his previous apathy towards the angel, and they rushed forward to his side.
Dean turned him over and Mercy buried her face in her brother’s neck as Bobby declared, “He’s cold.”
“Is he breathing?”
“No.”
“Maybe angels don’t need to breathe?”
Bobby’s tone was as gentle as she’d ever heard it. “He's gone, Dean.”
Hot tears slipped down Mercy’s cheeks and soaked into the collar of Dean’s shirt. She felt his arm wrap around her, his hand coming to cradle the back of her head. “ Damnit .” Dean’s voice cracked on the phrase. “Cas, you child. Why didn't you listen to me?”
A ragged gasp had Mercy peeking out from her brother’s embrace in time to see Cas’ chest seize as the damage to his vessel healed almost instantaneously. Mercy could hardly believe her own eyes. The color was returning to the angel’s cheeks, and Dean jolted into action. “Cas?! Hey! Hey! Okay, all right.”
The angel struggled to sit up, and she and Dean each grabbed one of his hands and pulled him forward until he was vertical. Cas blinked. “That was unpleasant.”
A laugh forced its way out of Mercy’s throat. The tears never stopped, but now they were tears of relief. “Let's get him up.” Dean said, and they pulled him the rest of the way to his feet. “Easy, there.”
“I’m alive,” Cas said, staring down at his own hands in confusion.
“Looks like,” Bobby said gruffly.
“I'm astonished. Thank you, all of you.”
Mercy began to wipe away her tears and giggled when Bobby grumbled, “We were mostly…just trying to save the world.”
“I'm ashamed. I really overreached.”
The blunt understatement was such a Cas-ism, Mercy’s fractured heart ached. She’d missed him so damn much. “You think?” Dean said sarcastically.
Cas stared into his eyes. “I'm gonna find some way to redeem myself to you.”
“All right, well, one thing at a time,” Dean easily deflected. “Come on. Let's get you out of here. Come on.”
But Cas resisted as they tried to guide him out of the lab. “I mean it, Dean,” he insisted.
“Okay. All right. But let's go find Sam, okay?”
“You need to run now!”
A harsh shove at her back had Mercy stumbling and almost falling. She turned and her eyes widened when she found Cas hunched in on himself, a groan ripping its way out of his throat. “I can’t hold them back!” he rasped.
“Hold who back?” Dean demanded.
Cas cried out, clutching his abdomen. “They held on inside me.” He managed to pick his head up, eyes in agony. “Dean, they're so strong,” he whimpered.
“Who the hell-”
“LEVIATHAN!” Cas shouted. “I can’t fight them, RUN!”
Dean began pushing her towards Bobby. “Go! Go get Sam! Go get Sam!” he was insisting, and Mercy bolted towards the door.
“Too late!”
She made the mistake of glancing back. Cas was grinning widely. It had been his mouth that had formed the words, but that hadn’t been Cas’s voice. The entity inside the angel’s vessel grabbed Dean by the collar. “Cas is-” his face contorted in awkward, exaggerated thoughtfulness, like he was trying to find a word. “He's gone. He's dead. We run the show now!”
“Dean!” She watched helplessly as he was launched across the room and into a tray of glass dishware, which shattered under the force of his body’s impact.
“Ah!” the being inside Cas said in apparent delight as his eyes landed on her.
Mercy tried to scramble out of the way, but it grabbed her. Suddenly she was weightless, and then her head collided with something and she was gone.