You've seen
this party, right? If you haven't, go read some stuff from the master fic list. I guarantee you'll find something you love. Probably more like fifteen somethings. It's a smorgasbord of awesome.
I keep passing out at the buffet and waking up with comment!fic on my plate. I was going to collect everything I wrote for the party in one post, but it all turned out sorta dramatic and I seem unable to write anything that takes up fewer than two comments anymore, so instead, I'm giving each prompt an individual post.
Title: And miles to go...
Characters: Castiel, Becky
Ratings/Warnings: PG
Word Count: 1300
Summary: From
lassiterfics' prompt: Cas and Becky on a road trip.
If he squints, Castiel can imagine he’s in Dean’s beloved Impala. This car is the same make and model, but the differences stand out like glaring errors: a fuzzy leopard print cover on the steering wheel, a plastic replica of Dean’s amulet hanging from the rearview mirror alongside the main character from a Japanese cartoon series, and strangest of all, the music. It’s…pop music. Bouncy, redundant pop music that Becky is singing along to under her breath as she drives.
This is good, Castiel thinks. A reminder that it isn’t Dean’s Impala - a reminder that the Winchesters will not always be around to catch him when he’s weakened. These are the end days. A feeling of safety should not be fostered.
“320 more miles,” Becky announces cheerily. “It’ll be dark before we get to Bobby’s. I was thinking we could stop at a motel for the night - y’know, someplace kinda shifty looking on the edge of a small town, with decor that hasn’t been changed since the 70’s? Really authentic.”
“It’s not safe,” Castiel says. “If I stay in one place for too long, the host of Heaven will find me. That would put you in the path of danger as well.”
Becky’s grin doesn’t falter. “Really, it’s an honor to be able to do something for Sam. I don’t mind.”
“You would if you met my former superiors.”
Castiel’s head aches. It has ached since he transported his half-shattered vessel away from the location of Zachariah’s ambush, overshooting the state where the Winchesters were staying at the time and landing nineteen miles shy of Becky’s front door. The trip took too much out of him. Had his cell phone been broken in the brawl, Castiel would likely still be lying on the merry-go-round at that playground, his bones slowly knitting together and the wounds seaming closed beneath stains on his coat. Sam had performed a ritual he called “phone tag” to net Castiel a ride to their meeting place, though, and even though it was the middle of a workday, Becky had shown up at the playground within the hour.
He rubs the spot above his left ear where the hair is still crispy with dried blood.
“There’s aspirin in the glove compartment,” Becky says, reaching across the dash to tap it.
“I doubt it will do anything.”
“Can’t hurt to try, can it?”
“I suppose not.” Castiel opens the glove compartment and pulls the first aid kit from amidst the papers within. A copy of No Rest for the Wicked threatens to fall out with it, and he tucks the book securely into the back. He opens the first aid kit, the sharp plastic latches digging into his thumbs with a surprising amount of discomfort. It smells of antiseptic, which clashes with the artificial strawberry kiwi scent that pervades the rest of the car. Castiel opens the aspirin bottle and pours a small pile of the pills onto his palm, wondering how to judge the dosage. One pill per injury seems logical. He swallows the handful, and they go down sticky.
“So,” Becky says, tapping her fingers against the fake leopard skin steering wheel, “are you, like, slowly becoming human?”
Castiel chokes slightly on the last of the pills. “What?”
“Well, y’know, this whole losing your angel powers thing,” Becky says, shooting him a look like her meaning is obvious. “Taking hours to heal yourself? Needing to bum a ride from a friend of a friend? I mean, come on, Cas, it doesn’t take a genius.”
“I’m just cut off from Heaven, that’s all,” he says, a little shaken. “My well of power is limited.”
“It’s okay,” Becky says, shaking her head. “Characters are always shading into the gray area between human and nonhuman in this series. I wrote a paper about how Supernatural reframes the ‘others’ - not like the others like in Lost, with the Dharma sharks and stuff, but that ‘other’ figure in fiction that you’re supposed to be in fear or awe of - because characters are always becoming ghosts and vampires, and how that supports my theory about Sam and Dean’s gay subtext, but really the paper was about that classification of the others. Anyway, maybe now you’re following that theme by taking that transition in the opposite direction and becoming human.” Her eyes follow a sign on the roadside. “Ooh, a Sonic! Do you want to stop and get dinner? They’re always advertising in my area but they don’t have any nearby.”
Castiel finds his mouth conspicuously open. “No,” he says, slowly.
“We wouldn’t have to stop for long,” she says. “We could just grab food and go.”
“No, I’m not becoming human,” he says, frowning at her. “This isn’t fiction. There aren’t themes.”
“Uh-huh. You’ve heard of the Winchester Gospel, right?”
“Yes, I-”
“Family,” she says, raising a finger in the air. Then another. “Self-sacrifice.” Another finger, and on until she runs out of them. “Blurring the border between human and other. The monster within. Coming of age. The importance of the past in shaping the present. You follow me, or should I get my binder of internet essays out of the trunk?”
“The books themselves were crafted by a man,” Castiel says, bristling. “Men seek and create patterns in fiction.”
“Have you read Chuck’s other stuff?” Becky counters. “I’m like the guy’s biggest fan, but even I have to say, this series is way more cohesive than anything he could’ve done on his own.”
There’s a long span of quiet and pop music in which Castiel wonders if she’s told Chuck her feelings on the rest of his projects. His head continues to throb, and the car hits a dip, sending a shock up through the mending bones in his left leg as well. Castiel sinks into his seat, letting the seatbelt dig into his chest.
Wearing a seatbelt for safekeeping. Maybe he is becoming human.
“If this world and these people are so fictional to you,” he says, rubbing his head, “then why help? Why drive me across state lines on Sam’s request?”
Becky smiles out at the road, then at him. “How could I say no to an offer to be involved in a story this awesome?”
Castiel doesn’t have the words to respond to that.
Becky shrugs, stoppering a chuckle behind her lips. “Anyway, if Chuck’s writing really is coming from God, then that means that God’s an author and I’ve been violating His copyright for years with slash fic, so I should probably do all I can to get in good, y’know?”
The song changes. Castiel thinks he might be smiling. “That makes sense.”
“You sure you don’t want to stop at Sonic?”
“Stop wherever you like. I don’t normally eat.”
“Ohmigod, I’m going to introduce you to slushies! My treat. I mean, obviously my treat. Angels don’t carry money, do they? That wouldn’t make any sense.” She glances over at him, and says out of nowhere, “I would totally slash you with Dean sometimes. If you were fictional, I mean.”
Castiel knows he is smiling. He feels it stretching his lips, warming his core. His head is beginning to feel better, though he can’t be sure whether it’s the smiling or the pills that are doing it. “Thank you for the ride,” he says.
“You’re most welcome,” Becky says with a pleased little grin, and eyes the next mile marker. “314 more miles to go!”
THE END!