Chapter Text
Two weeks after the trip to Smith Center for breakfast, Olle wonders sleepily through the Bunker toward the small kitchen they all use. He had spent the last three days hunting vampires in North Dakota; taking Dean with him while Sam and Cas continued to research the Darkness. They had been back exactly long enough for him to grab a shower and realize, despite his exhaustion, he was ravenous. Dean's diet of bad drive thrus and worse diners made him ache for something real to eat, and he was pleasantly surprised when he opened the refrigerator and found enough odds and ends to make himself a Monte Cristo. As he turned from the stove, plate in hand, Dean and Sam came in, geared up like they were leaving.
“What's going on guys?” Olle asks grabbing a knife and fork to eat the buttery, cheesy sandwich.
“Got a call from a friend,” Dean says dropping his bag by the door and going over to make coffee, while Sam grabbed an apple from the counter. “Headed out to Cottage Grove, Minnesota. Something is killing people and it's dressed like a rabbit.”
“Let your brother drive Dean,” Olle says taking a bite of his sandwich before going to the refrigerator for ketchup, he knows it is awful, he does not care, and a glass of water. “You haven't slept in two days. The rabbit,” he asks dropping back into his chair, “if they have them in custody, what's up?”
“The costume, the head,” Sam says, “won't come off.”
Olle nods, “Could be cursed object.”
“Yeah,” Dean says pulling a Yeti mug from the cabinet and filling it with sugar and that horrible non-dairy creamer. “Shouldn't take more than a couple days there and back,” he says going over to wait, impatient as ever, on the coffee.
Sam joins his brother, empty mug in hand, and asks, “What are you gonna do?”
Olle swallows before answering, “I'm gonna get about twelve hours of sleep, then teach Cas yoga.”
“What?” Sam asks reaching for the pot after Dean fills his mug.
Olle shrugs, “He saw me doing the Sun Salutation and said he wanted to learn. I think he knows more than he's letting on, though. I told him I'd show him.”
“Cas, doing yoga?” Dean says shaking his head. “I can't see it.”
“Hey,” Olle says, “the vessel got that body somehow. He looks like a runner, though, all long lean muscle. He'll take to yoga.”
Dean gives the bigger man a long, uncertain look before grabbing his bag and saying over his shoulder, “Let's go Sammy, burning daylight.”
Sam stares at the other hunter for a moment, Olle obliviously gone back to his food, before he shakes himself of whatever he was thinking and follows his brother.
Olle finishes his food and wonders back toward his room, but he notices the light from the TV in Sam's room. Giving a gentle knock on the partially open door, he pushes it further open and walks inside. Cas is sprawled on top of the made bed in black sweats that must have, at some point, belonged to Sam because they were too long for the angel, and a gray t-shirt. This is exactly where he was when Olle came in that day and found him alone before they went to help Dean and Sam go after Crowley and Amara. He thinks about sitting down on the bed, but he will go to sleep if he relaxes at all, so he stands there and says, “Hey Cas, what'cha doin'?”
Cas doesn't look up, just lifts his arm to point at the screen, remote in hand, “Watching 'A Fantastic Fear of Everything.' It is very interesting,” the angel says.
Olle looks at the screen, poor Jack was setting his socks on fire in the oven, and says, “It was a good movie. Simon Pegg does a lot of good movies. Hey Cas,” the big man asks after a pause, “how long have you been laying here like this, watching TV?”
“Sam has been sleeping,” he pauses for a moment, “somewhere else,” he says like he is not sure where but does not really care. “He says the light keeps him awake. That was right after you and Dean left. How long have you been back?” he asks, still not paying attention to anything but the TV.
Olle groans and, if it were any other angel, he would be praying to Gabriel, but it is Cas and he cannot ask Gabriel for help with the angel. He takes a deep breath and asks the older archangel for a small favor, 'Hey Luce,' he prays silently to himself, 'Cas is really messed up right now and I'm draggin' serious ass. I know it is a lot to ask, I shouldn't, it's abuse of power, but I need a quick snap to recharge my battery so I can try to fix your broken brother.' Before he is finished praying, Lucifer appears in the doorway and Olle just follows him out into the hallway.
“He is a mess,” the angel says sadly from his lean in the doorway across the hall. “Sam and Dean should stop leaving the door open, anyone can just come in and out.”
Olle goes over to him, voice low like the archangel's, not to distract Cas from the TV, “I think they do it for Cas, but I'm not sure they realize how heavily warded the place is, how impregnable it is when the door is sealed.”
Satan shrugs, “You said you needed me to 'snap to recharge your battery,' but I don't know how to do that.” Lucifer does not question why Olle did not pray to Gabriel or Balthazar; he knows both have issues with Cas that have yet to be resolved.
Olle sighs, he had forgotten all the simple things the archangel did not know his Grace could do. Teachable moment, awesome, he thinks tiredly, before motioning for Lucifer to follow him down the hall into the library. Sitting down at the table, Lucifer across from him, he starts, “Just looking, because you're an archangel, you can tell what a perfectly healthy person or a not so healthy person looks like, right?” At his nod, Olle goes on, “Now, you know me, based on my baseline appearance, how do I look right now?”
The angel's eyes go unfocused for a moment and glow, slightly, with Grace before he says, “Sick all over, but not dangerously so.”
“That,” he says tiredly, “is exhaustion. I haven't slept in three days, I haven't had a really decent meal in almost a week, I'm probably a little dehydrated, I killed eight vampires last night, we had to get rid of all fifteen bodies, there were six survivors and two who needed the cure, plus four victims, and Dean refused to stay longer than it took to clean us out of there so we drove all night. I want IV fluids, a double dose of oxcy, and fourteen hours of sleep,” he says bluntly. “Cas is marinating in whatever funk he has sunk into, though, and Sam and Dean are just letting him stew. They either haven't noticed, don't know how to deal, or, in classic Winchester fashion, are oblivious to anything not the two of them.”
“I'd go with the last one,” Lucifer mumbled and Olle smirks, he is getting better. “How do I fix all this?” he asks gesturing to all of Olle with one hand and an distasteful look on his face. “So you can fix Cas.”
“It is a healing, but it's more complicated than just putting a lot of broken or missing stuff back where it goes,” Olle says. “If you keep practicing, the easier ones can be done without touch.”
“How can putting one of you back together like you're supposed to be ever become as easy as something like resetting time? Dad made you all pretty complicated, there are so many different layers and parts,” Lucifer says.
As a surgeon, an immortal, and a user of magick, Olle knows Lucifer is not wrong, but he underestimates his own ability to grasp and merge the different concepts of chemistry, biology, and spirituality. “You'll get better, Cas and Baz could both do it, before Michael got hold of them, it'll come to you. This, though, is harder than what I already taught you. You'll have to touch me, anywhere, but it helps if you pick a power point like my heart or my third eye, so you don't have to force my body to accept what you're doing; it just flows through the energy point.”
“Okay,” Lucifer nods getting up and coming over to stand in front of the big man. “How much do I have to touch you? Like my whole hand or what?”
Olle chuckles, “It depends on how much Grace you think you'll need to fix me. As an archangel, though, you have a lot of power in a small amount of Grace so one finger should do. If I were dying, all cut up or shot or cursed or something, maybe two, but you'll get a feel for it the more you do it.” Lucifer nods and places his right index finger on Olle's forehead at his third eye. “Now, it's about letting your Grace flow out of you and into me, but not with any real purpose. Grace is pure energy, perfection, and it heals automatically. Try it,” Olle says with a nod and feels Lucifer's Grace slowly spread through him and he sighs, it feels amazing. He closes his eyes and feels the ache, the exhaustion, the hunger all leave his body.
“Now what?” Lucifer asks.
“When you can look at me and tell I'm well again, withdrawal your Grace back into your own body,” Olle says as he fills himself start to empty of the archangel's energy. “The more you practice, you'll learn to single out what needs fixing and focus on that.”
“How's that?” Lucifer asks uncertainly, stepping back to look the big man over, satisfied, but needing positive reinforcement.
Olle stretches in his chair and, with a groan, says, “I feel great Luce, thanks!” Standing up, he turns to the angel and asks, “How is everyone? I'm going to try to sneak off back to the house soon, grab my bike and some books and weapons; clothes would be great. Just see how everyone is doing.”
“Training is a constant,” Lucifer starts. “Kevin is as enthralled by your libraries as I am. Even Linda is getting Beth to teach her Latin and Beth and Balthazar are teaching her hand to hand, standard firearms, and small blade combat; she is surprisingly good, a quick learner.” Lucifer says it all with the detached voice of a soldier delivering a report, but Olle is still impressed with his observation of Kevin, Linda, even Beth; it would not have shocked him if the archangel completely ignored the existence of all of them but Gabriel.
Olle nods, taking his report, and says, “How's your brother?” knowing the omission of Gabriel's goings on had been on purpose. He wants to know, but, at the same time, doesn't and finds himself waiting, nervous to hear the archangel's answer.
Lucifer pauses for a few precious microseconds to think about how to answer that. He knows what Olle is really asking and he knows how his brother would respond, he also knows why Olle prayed to him and not Gabriel; and it was not just because of Castiel. “He reads almost as much as Kevin and I do, combined,” the devil starts. “He attempts to track our aunt, unsuccessfully, and he trains. He is,” Lucifer pauses for the right word and to let Olle know, without telling him, that Gabriel is coping if not moving on, “focused on the mission.”
Olle sighs, wishing Lucifer had given him more, but glad Gabriel is doing well; better, at least, than Cas right now. “Good,” he says standing to clap Lucifer on the back, “good. Thank you, Luce, for your help. You're welcome to stay, if you can, I'm going to teach Cas yoga,” he says starting toward the doorway leading to the hallway where Sam's room, and Cas, are located.
Lucifer smiles and laughs quietly, “I will stay for a while, hopefully proximity to my Grace will improve my little brother's mood.”