Chapter Text
Dean Winchester was lying under the Impala with half a wrench in one hand and the other shoved up to his elbow inside the engine when the motel room phone started ringing. He grunted through his teeth, kept tightening a bolt for a few more seconds, and pretended he hadn't heard it. The phone persisted. Dean sighed with resignation.
"Yeah, I'm coming... damn it."
He rolled out from under the car, stood up with a jerk, and, as usual, hit his head against the chassis.
"Ouch! Son of a...!"
He rubbed his forehead as he walked toward the room. The phone kept ringing as if the person on the other end was determined to wake even the dead.
"Alright, alright... calm down."
He picked up the receiver.
"Hello?"
"Am I speaking with Dean Winchester?"
Dean leaned a shoulder against the doorframe.
"Depends. If it's to collect taxes, I'm Jared Padalecki."
There was a silence.
"Mr. Winchester?"
Dean smiled.
"Just kidding. Who's speaking?"
"I'm Richard Hale, director of Stanford University."
Dean arched an eyebrow.
"Uh-huh. And I'm Harrison Ford."
Another silence. A much more uncomfortable one.
"Mr. Winchester... I regret to inform you that an emergency has occurred regarding your brother Samuel."
The smile vanished from his face almost instantly.
"Sam?"
"I need to ask you to remain on the line. There is a student who wishes to speak with you."
Dean frowned. A student.
He heard the sound of the phone changing hands, someone breathing heavily, and, a few seconds later, a female voice that had clearly been crying for several minutes.
"Dean?"
"Yeah... who is this?"
"Jessica... Jessica Moore."
Dean had never heard that name.
"I'm Sam's girlfriend."
For some reason, that reassured him a little. Sam had a girlfriend. Well. That explained why lately he called even less than before. Dean was even on the verge of smiling.
"So you're the one to blame for my brother forgetting about his family."
Jessica let out a sob. Dean's smile vanished before it could even form.
"Jessica?"
There was no immediate answer. Only ragged breaths.
"What happened?"
"Dean..."
"Where is Sam?"
Jessica burst into tears again.
"I'm so sorry."
Dean felt a knot in his stomach.
"Jessica."
"There was... there was a fire."
The world seemed to stop.
"No."
"I..."
"No."
"We couldn't get him out."
Dean stopped hearing everything else. The next words came muffled, as if someone had stuffed cotton inside the receiver.
"...Sam..."
"...died..."
The phone slipped from his hand and hit the motel carpet. Dean simply stood frozen. He didn't know how much time passed. Maybe five seconds. Maybe a minute. Until something inside him cranked back to life.
He bent down, picked up the Impala keys from the nightstand, and practically ran out of the room. He didn't even close the door. The motel owner shouted something when the Chevrolet's engine roared so loudly it made the parking lot windows shake.
Dean was already too far away to hear him. He turned the key. The cassette he had left playing started blasting at full volume. Without thinking, he turned it off. For the first time in years, driving with music felt like a bad idea. He stepped on the gas. The Impala responded as always. The road began to disappear beneath the wheels.
Dean pulled out his cell phone with one hand while keeping the other on the steering wheel. He dialed Sam's number.
Voicemail.
He hung up. He dialed again.
Again.
And again.
And again.
On the fifth attempt, he slammed the steering wheel with the palm of his hand.
"Answer the damn phone, Sammy!"
Nothing. It kept going to voicemail. Dean tried again.
"Come on... come on..."
Voicemail.
Again.
Voicemail.
Another time.
Voicemail.
He gripped the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turned white.
"Don't do this to me..."
The speedometer kept climbing. Ninety. One hundred. One hundred and twenty. The needle kept advancing while the landscape turned into a green and gray blur on both sides of the road. Dean was barely aware of the speed. He only knew one thing: Stanford was too far away.
His head was moving much faster than the car. He remembered twelve-year-old Sam stealing his french fries. Sam asleep in the back seat of the Impala. Sam insisting on going to Stanford. Sam telling him he wanted a normal life. Dean swallowed hard.
"I should have called you more..."
Another curve appeared ahead. He took it without lifting his foot off the gas. The tires screeched. The car slid just a few inches. Dean corrected the wheel. It worked. For two seconds. Then a semi-truck appeared on the other side of the road. Dean turned the wheel with all his might. The wheels lost traction. The Impala began to spin. The sound of tires against asphalt was replaced by the crash of bending metal. The semi's lights completely filled the windshield. Dean managed to see the horrified face of the driver.
Then he just said, with an almost absurd calmness:
"...Well. Dad's gonna kill me."
And everything vanished.
When he opened his eyes again, he expected to find a hospital, a paramedic yelling at him not to move, or, with any luck, Saint Peter asking him if he preferred the stairs or the elevator. Instead of any of those options, all he found was a completely white immensity that seemed to have no beginning or end. There was no ceiling, no floor, and yet he was standing. The air smelled of absolutely nothing, and the silence was so perfect that Dean could hear the sound of his own breathing.
He looked down. He was still wearing the same jeans. The same boots. The same jacket. He patted his chest.
"Well... that answers the question of whether you can take clothes to the afterlife."
Nobody answered. Dean turned slowly around.
"Hello?"
A voice spoke behind him.
"Dean Winchester."
Dean jumped a little.
"Jesus!"
He turned around. In front of him, several figures made entirely of light began to appear. He couldn't distinguish faces, eyes, or even defined bodies. Only bright silhouettes whose intensity forced him to squint. Dean watched them for a few seconds. Then he sighed.
"Well... you guys are definitely not from the DMV."
The figures remained motionless.
"Am I dead?"
One responded with absolute serenity.
"No."
Dean waited for an explanation. It didn't come.
"Are you going to elaborate on that answer, or does the mystery come included?"
Another figure took a step forward.
"Samuel Winchester lives."
Dean felt like everything else stopped mattering. He stepped closer immediately.
"What did you just say?"
"The death of Samuel Winchester does not yet belong to the natural course of the world."
Dean blinked.
"...You talk like every sentence was written by Yoda after reading a dictionary."
The figures did not react. Dean let out his breath in frustration.
"Alright. In plain English. Is my brother alive?"
There was a moment of silence. Then one of the figures replied.
"He can be."
Dean no longer asked where he was, what those things were, or why he was still breathing after crashing into a semi-truck. All of that could wait.
"What do I have to do?"
The figures seemed to observe him for a few seconds before answering.
"Accept a pact."
Dean let out a dry laugh.
"Of course. There's always fine print. Do I have to sell my soul? Because, honestly, I expected that to happen later in my life."
"In exchange for Samuel Winchester continuing to live..." The voice paused. "...you will enter into marriage."
Dean frowned.
"Excuse me?"
"You will enter into marriage with the commander of the garrison of angels destined for the protection of humanity."
Dean looked at them one by one, waiting to find out who the comedian of the group was. Nobody seemed to be joking. Dean pointed at the figures.
"Is this a hidden camera show? Because I swear, if Ashton Kutcher steps out from behind a cloud, I'm going to get really pissed."
Nothing.
"I have to get married... to an angel?"
"Yes."
Dean let out an incredulous laugh. The figures remained completely still. Dean stopped smiling.
"Sam lives?"
"Yes."
He looked down for just a split second. He didn't even need to think about it.
"I accept."
"Do you accept the pact?"
"Yes."
"Do you accept the marriage?"
Dean raised both hands in desperation.
"Yes! Yes! Whatever! Just make my brother live!"
The light began to grow more and more intense. Dean squinted his eyes. The last thing he managed to hear was a single phrase.
"The pact has been sealed."
And the world disappeared again.
Dean woke up with a gasp so sharp that for a second he thought he was still falling. His hands were still gripping the Impala's steering wheel, and the engine was still running, purring with the same calmness as always, as if it had never been about to become a crumpled ball of metal against a semi-truck. He blinked several times. He looked at the windshield, then the dashboard, then his own hands. There was no blood. There was no broken glass. Not a single dent. He slowly turned his head toward the road. Right in front of the car was a huge green sign.
WELCOME TO STANFORD UNIVERSITY
Dean looked at the dashboard clock again. Barely a few minutes had passed since he left the motel.
"What the hell was that?"
He rubbed both hands over his face, trying to wake himself up. He slapped his cheeks a couple of times. He even opened the door, got out of the car, and walked completely around the Impala, expecting to find at least a scratch. Baby was perfect. Dean rested both hands on the car's roof.
"Well... either I've gone completely crazy, or I just had the weirdest dream of my entire life."
He stood thinking for barely two seconds. Dream, death, hallucination, or whatever the hell it had been—there was only one way to find out if it was real.
Five minutes later, he was already practically running up the stairs of the university residence hall. A student had to step aside to avoid being run over by a twenty-two-year-old man who looked ready to break through an apartment door using nothing but his shoulder. Dean knocked three times.
"SAM!"
He waited exactly one second before knocking again.
"SAMMY!"
Movement could be heard on the other side. Sam Winchester appeared in a gray Stanford sweatshirt, his hair completely messy, wearing an expression that mixed sleep with absolute confusion. They stood staring at each other for several seconds. Sam was the first to speak.
"...Dean."
Dean just looked at him. Alive. Breathing. Without a single burn. Simply Sam. Looking like he had just been woken up at eight o'clock on a Sunday morning. He frowned.
"What are you doing here?"
Dean still didn't answer. Sam let out a small laugh.
"I've been away from home for six months, you know? This is supposed to be the part where you let me make my own mistakes."
Dean crossed the distance between them in two steps and hugged him so tightly that Sam let out a muffled sound.
"Dean!"
He got no response.
"Dean, I can't breathe!"
"Deal with it."
"Seriously!"
"Five seconds."
"Five seconds for what?"
"To make sure it's you."
Sam let out a completely confused laugh.
"Who else would it be?"
Dean finally let him go. He looked him up and down again. He still couldn't find absolutely anything out of place. Sam raised both eyebrows.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah." Dean blinked.
Sam crossed his arms.
"So... what happened?"
Dean opened his mouth. He closed it again. How was he supposed to explain that?
'Hey, Sammy. Fifteen minutes ago a girl named Jessica called me to tell me you were dead, then I crashed into a semi-truck, some talking lamps offered me a celestial marriage, and now apparently you're alive again.'
That sounded like an excellent way to end up committed to a psychiatric ward. Dean cleared his throat.
"Nothing."
Sam looked at him with incredulity.
"Nothing?"
"Just..." He shrugged. "...I felt like seeing you."
Sam burst out laughing.
"Liar."
"Excuse me?"
"You never drive eight hours just because you miss someone."
Dean pretended to think about it.
"Well..."
"See?"
"I also needed an excuse to check if college food is still a crime against humanity."
"You haven't even gone inside."
"I'm working on that."
Sam shook his head, laughing. Dean breathed for the first time since that door had opened. All of that was still spinning in his head. But Sam was there. That was enough. Dean gave him a light nudge on the arm.
"Hey."
"What?"
"You haven't called."
Sam made a face.
"I've been busy."
"Too busy to dial a number?"
"I have classes."
"Uh-huh."
"Homework."
"Uh-huh."
"Exams."
"Uh-huh."
Sam sighed.
"What do you want?"
Dean raised a finger.
"A call."
"When?"
"Every Sunday."
Sam let out a laugh.
"Every Sunday?"
"Every single one."
"Dean..."
"Five minutes."
"I won't always be able to."
"Then ten."
"It doesn't work like that."
Dean pointed toward the parking lot.
"If you don't call one Sunday..."
Sam followed his finger with his gaze. He saw the Impala. He looked back at Dean.
"...Are you going to show up here again?"
Dean smiled with total intent.
"Unannounced."
"That's emotional manipulation."
"It works, doesn't it?"
Sam rolled his eyes.
"Alright."
Dean extended his hand.
"Promise it."
Sam scoffed.
"Seriously?"
"Seriously."
Sam ended up shaking his hand.
"Every Sunday."
Dean smiled contentedly.
"Good boy."
Sam pulled his hand away immediately.
"Don't you ever say that again."
"What?"
" 'Good boy.' "
Dean started walking toward the stairs.
"Noted, champ."
"Not that either!"
Dean was already laughing when he heard Sam shout from the doorway.
"Drive safely!"
Dean raised a hand without turning around.
"I make no promises!"
"Dean!"
"See you Sunday... if you call!"
When he left the building, he was still smiling. He looked back at the residence one more time. Sam was still there, leaning against the doorframe, shaking his head as if he had just survived a small hurricane. Dean raised his hand again. Then he closed the car door. Dean remained motionless for a few seconds. Then he let out a long sigh.
"Thank you..."
He didn't know who it was directed to. He didn't care. Sam was alive. That was all he needed to know.
An hour later, he still didn't know what to do with himself.
He had driven aimlessly through half the city until he ended up parking in front of a small bar whose only decoration consisted of a huge neon sign that read COLD BEER and a window so dirty it barely let you see inside.
Dean smiled.
"Now we're talking my language."
He pushed the door open. The place smelled of beer, old wood, and peanuts. Perfect. He sat at the bar.
"A whiskey."
The bartender set the glass down in front of him without asking questions. Dean had barely taken a sip when a calm voice spoke beside him.
"You shouldn't be drinking after what happened today."
Dean turned his head. A man was sitting two stools away. Dark suit, impeccably pressed beige trench coat, blue tie, perfectly messy black hair, and eyes so intensely blue they seemed completely out of place in a bar full of truckers. Dean watched him for a few seconds. Then he looked back at the whiskey. Then he looked back at him.
"Well..." He raised the glass. "Normally when a guy dressed like that talks to me in a bar, it's because he wants to sell me life insurance."
The man tilted his head slightly.
"I don't sell insurance."
Dean smiled.
"That's what someone who sells insurance would say."
The stranger seemed to seriously consider that possibility for a couple of seconds.
"I suppose so."
Dean let out a laugh.
"Right."
He liked this guy. He was weird. But amusing. Very amusing.
Dean didn't know exactly how long he had been sitting next to that man.
Normally, Dean Winchester had a pretty well-developed ability to gauge a situation. He knew when someone was lying, he knew when a case was too dangerous, he knew when a person was about to try to kill him, and he knew, especially, when someone was being way too weird for their own good.
This man was way too weird.
But not in a dangerous way.
More like in a "probably spent the last twenty years locked in a library with no human contact" kind of way.
Dean took another sip of his beer and looked at him sideways.
"So..."
The man turned his head toward him.
"Yes?"
Dean gestured with his hand.
"What's your story?"
The man blinked.
"My story?"
"Yeah. You know. The thing everyone has. The 'I'm a mysterious guy sitting in a bar in an expensive suit with a face that looks like it doesn't know what a joke is' thing."
The man seemed to analyze the sentence carefully.
"I am not sure I understand the last part."
Dean smiled.
"Exactly."
The stranger took his glass of water and drank calmly.
"I do not have an interesting story."
Dean let out a small laugh.
"That's a lie. Everyone has an interesting story. Look, I have a brother who went off to a fancy college and is probably eating salad voluntarily right now. That's a tragedy."
The man tilted his head slightly.
"Do you not like salad?"
"Trust me, nobody who eats lettuce by choice is doing well."
The man fell silent again. Dean pointed at him.
"That. That right there. What you just did."
"What did I do?"
"That awkward silence. Most people laugh when I make a joke."
"I did not understand the joke."
Dean stared at him for several seconds. Then he let out a laugh.
"God, you're unbelievable."
"I am not sure if that is a compliment."
"Believe me, it is."
The man continued to look at him with that serious expression that seemed permanently glued to his face.
Dean leaned an arm on the bar.
"Let me guess. You're a soldier."
The man turned, surprised.
"How did you know?"
Dean closed his eyes slowly.
"Right. Of course. You've got that straight posture, you don't understand current pop culture, you don't seem to care about your appearance. And the waitress has been checking you out for 5 minutes now, and you're just looking toward the door waiting for a threat."
The man seemed genuinely confused.
"Is that strange?"
Dean opened his mouth. He closed it. Then he pointed at the man.
"Yes." He took another sip. "Very strange."
For some reason, that didn't bother him. Maybe it was because after the day he'd had, anything could happen. He had received a call saying his brother was dead. He had driven like a maniac. He had witnessed his own accident. He had spoken with beings of light who basically told him, "congratulations, now you have a celestial wedding." And now he was sitting in a bar talking to a man who seemed to have been created in a lab to not understand sarcasm. Compared to everything else, it was almost normal.
"Have you never seen Pretty Woman?"
The man shook his head.
"No."
Dean looked at him, horrified.
"What?"
"I have not seen that movie."
"Alright. Alright. It's fine. No big deal." He raised a hand. "Maybe you're more into action. Die Hard."
"No."
"Star Wars."
"No."
"Indiana Jones."
"No."
Dean set his glass down on the bar.
"What do you do for fun?"
The man thought for a few seconds.
"I read."
Dean looked at him.
"That explains a lot of things."
"What things?"
"Never mind."
The stranger tilted his head again. It was curious. Every time Dean said something, the man seemed to store the information away as if it were a class. As if every conversation were an investigation.
"What is your name?" Dean realized he hadn't even asked him.
"Castiel."
"Castiel? Doesn't sound like a soldier's name, sounds more like a beekeeper's."
The man remained calm.
"You flatter me, bees are quite wonderful."
Dean put down his glass.
"You're weird, man."
"Yes."
"You know what? I'm going to pretend that answer makes sense."
The bar began to empty out little by little. The conversations dropped in volume. The bartender started wiping down the counter. Dean checked the clock. He couldn't believe so much time had passed. He was supposed to have one beer. Not end up sitting and talking to a stranger for hours. Though, technically, his day had started with an impossible accident and a conversation with celestial beings. So his definition of strange was a little warped.
The man left money on the bar. Dean raised an eyebrow.
"You leaving already?"
"Yes."
There was a brief silence. Then the man spoke.
"Come with me."
Dean looked at him.
"Well." He smiled sideways. "That sounded way more suspicious than you probably intended."
The man frowned.
"It was not my intention."
"I know." Dean finished his drink. "That's the worrying part."
Even so, he stood up. Maybe it was a bad idea. In fact, it was probably a terrible idea. But after everything that had happened, a part of Dean just wanted to do something that didn't involve highways, accidents, or glowing entities making deals. They stepped out of the bar; the night air was cold. Dean bundled up in his jacket, and they walked to a nearby building. Dean looked around. The place was way too elegant for someone who, according to himself, "didn't have an interesting story."
"Let me guess."
The man looked at him.
"What?"
"Family money."
"Yes."
Dean let out a small laugh.
"Of course."
They went up to the apartment. It was exactly what Dean expected and at the same time completely different. Way too tidy. It looked like the place of someone who didn't leave clothes thrown on a chair or dishes forgotten for three days. Dean looked around.
"Wow."
The man took off his trench coat.
"What?"
"Nothing." Dean pointed to the room. "I'm just saying this place looks like it belongs to someone who knows where all his socks are."
The man tilted his head again.
"Is that important?"
Dean smiled.
"To most humans, yeah."
The man seemed to ponder that information. Dean shook his head.
"You are incredibly weird."
There was no answer. Only a kiss. The night continued without any more questions. Without talking about impossible accidents, dead brothers who came back to life, or pacts that nobody understood. For a few hours, Dean simply stopped trying to understand the world.
When he woke up, the first thing he noticed was that the bed was way too comfortable. The second was that he was definitely not in his cheap motel. He opened his eyes slowly. The ceiling was huge—well, the room was huge. Dean lay there looking around.
"Well..." He sat up. "This definitely isn't a roadside motel."
He got up and looked for his clothes. There was no one in the apartment.
"Hello?"
Silence. Dean found his shirt and put it on. It was then that he felt a strange sensation on his shoulder. Like a slight burning. He frowned.
"What the hell...?"
He walked into the bathroom. When he turned on the light, he froze completely. On his shoulder, there was a perfectly defined mark. A hand. As if someone had placed their palm directly onto his skin and left a permanent imprint. Dean touched it carefully. It didn't hurt. But it was there.
"This wasn't here yesterday."
A calm voice answered behind him.
"Yes, it was."
Dean spun around so fast he almost hit the sink. The man from the bar was standing in the doorway. He was already dressed. Dean pointed to his shoulder.
"What the hell is this?"
The man took a few steps toward him.
"It is a union mark."
Dean blinked.
"A what?"
"A marriage mark."
His brain seemed to be attempting to reboot.
"Okay." He raised a hand. "I'm going to need you to start that sentence over again, but this time using words that don't sound like a cult's instruction manual."
The man observed him.
"My name is Castiel."
Dean waited.
"I am the commander of the garrison of angels on Earth."
Dean remained motionless. Castiel continued with the same composure.
"And you are my husband."
Dean stared at him. For several seconds, he said absolutely nothing. Then he raised a hand slowly. His expression was that of someone whose brain had officially left the conversation.
"Dean?"
Dean took a deep breath. And with the absolute seriousness of a man who had just discovered he was accidentally married to an angel, he said:
"Pretty woman... walking down the street."
Castiel frowned slightly.
"I do not understand that reference."
His life had just gotten a whole lot weirder.