#They hijacked the official storefront. Say this. Then leave.

[drcaris]

....? Happy pride, I guess.

#🕰 #They hijacked the official storefront. Say this. Then leave.

[wwwafflewrites]

The Not-So French Mistake

Chapter 4: Siege of Sunshine

Sam was going solo in his search for water. There were several people gathered around the local market, but a boy who looked to be in high school was the most attentive of the group.

Sam asked him: “What’s going on?”

“We can’t get in,” the teenager panted, fanning his face in a vain effort to cool himself. His cheeks were flushed rosy and sweat trickled down his nose, while visibly straining to remain strong for the townsfolk. “The doors are melted shut.”

“Melted?” Sam’s gaze darkened and he stared at the storefront. It was a metal door; melting such would have required extreme equipment, but there it was, a puddle of molten metal pooling on the sidewalk, which took thousands of degrees to heat up. There was something very wrong here.

“All right…” He searched for another way in. Upon finding one, he announced, “Everyone cover your eyes!”, and he proceeded to kick the window down with the point of his boot. The impact had the glass collapsing onto the tile of the market with a glittery shatter.

Sam wiped at the sweat building into beads along his forehead and swept his hair behind his ears. His gaze met the long-missed treasure among the town: bottled water.

He beckoned for the teenager to follow him into the store and marched up to the fridge which had remained a relieving, frigid temperature. “What’s your name?” he asked the teenager sincerely.

“Caleb.”

Sam snatched a few bottles from the shelf and shoved an armful into the teen’s chest. “All right, Caleb. I need you to hand these out to the people outside. Everyone. Yourself as well. Only allow small sips though; you don’t want to shock their system.”

The boy nodded in appreciation, gripping the load and rushing outside to deliver the vital supplies.

Sam took his own bundle, half-dashing toward the crumpled figure of Sydney and a hovering Castiel. He distributed the water to nearby individuals and lingered as the angel persuaded Sydney to drink. “Are you..?” he began to ask, but his question fell short. It was rhetorical; of course she wasn’t okay. Nobody here was.

Digging into his pocket, Sam seized his phone and dialed. The automatic voice answered tauntingly, and there was a long beep. “Bobby,” he said urgently as he eyed Sydney, who was rousing. “There is something really wrong. Dean had to take a few people to the hospital because of heat stroke. It’s bad down here. Call me when you can.” Sam hung up, and a gnawing sensation lit his gut in worry. “He said he was watching the phones,” he murmured. Something was wrong.

Sydney was slow to rise to her feet, but eventually, she achieved such. While rocky on her toes, she was persistent. “Sam, Cas, go for Bobby. He could be in serious trouble. I’ll keep supplying the water. Dean said he would be back soon, right? I’ll be fine.”

Sam and Castiel shared a skeptical look,  but Sam nodded. “Just don’t get into trouble and keep yourself hydrated. I’ll call Dean, so if he doesn’t meet you here, there’ll be a search party. Don’t let it get to that. Trust me, we’re efficient.” He inspected his pockets until he recovered a phone and handed it to her. “There. I always have a spare phone on me. Call us if anything unusual happens.”

With that, the pair withdrew to scavenge for a working car to hijack, which was rather difficult, considering half of their wheels had melted. Sam did the math, and it took roughly a thousand degrees  of heat to melt rubber wheels, mind you, while the air around then only ranged around a hundred or so.

This was undoubtedly their kind of gig.

After they had hijacked the closest vehicle in the shade, Castiel was first to speak. “You believe she will stay?”

Sam snickered at the concept. “Uh―no. That’s why I implanted a tracker on the phone. Dean can locate it, too. Comes in handy during hunts gone wrong and runaway friends, you know?” He could recall a few cases it had been convenient.

In a normal circumstance, they would have let her leave, willingly. However, they didn’t know the angels’ beef with her, nor did she have any family she could contact, and as a teenager, that was hazardous. They weren’t going to release her knowing perils that lay ahead of her, or worse, unknowing.

Castiel dipped his head with a drained smile. “You’re rather deceptive, Sam.” It was a compliment. A second later, a whiny protest originated from the angel’s lower abdomen. Cas’s reaction was a priceless mix of shock and dismay.

Sam laughed, “I think your stomach disagrees. Don’t worry, I plan on getting you some food before we search for Bobby. We can’t have you going on nothing. What do you think about having a burger?”

“I would like that.”

Sam appreciated the spell of time gifted to him with the angel. He admired Castiel, but even more, he envied Dean. How couldn’t he? His brother had been gifted a best friend from heaven, and all Sam had ever earned were a few filthy comments depicting him as ‘the boy with the demon blood’, as if he had been a flea hitching a ride on a demonic bloodhound. Looking back, Sam could only visualize himself in that exact foul and impure way. He had been disgustingly feral, and such a betrayal should not have been pardoned. While Sam had been delusioned, he had ignored the pleas of his family, and there was no excuse for that.

Sam envisioned what still-angel-Cas would have said if he had listened in on Sam’s dark musings. ‘Do not dwell on the past, Sam. You have long been forgiven by the Lord.’ Yeah, that seemed about right. Sam had always disliked when Castiel tuned in on his mind, but he was correct; Sam had built a surrounding nest of his own self-loathing. While cozy for a time, the twigs were beginning to rot and decay, and eventually, Sam would need to wrestle away from his comfort-zone and stoop to the ground to build a new nest. Metaphorically.

Castiel had never endorsed in Sam’s attempts of diversions from his self-hatred. It was no wonder he got along with Dean; he was just as stubborn.

Sam recalled their past conversations. ‘Sam, you are no idiot, you are far from pathetic, and you most certainly will not lose me as a friend.’ The angel had been taken aback by such dark contemplations that had lurked within Sam’s mind.

‘Quit knocking around in my head, Cas.’ He had been defensive.

The angel had cast a brooding look of empathy to his tall companion and had replied gently, ‘They were very loud, angry thoughts, Sam. Angered and distressed natured thinking is… similar to covering your ears at a rowdy concert; I can't―fully omit them. I had not meant to invade your privacy, as you say. However, they were not true to any extent. I would not lie to you.’

Sam actually livened at the positive memory. He would always be encouraged by the humble consolation he had received from Cas, whether or not the angel knew such. It eased his conscience knowing his brother and Castiel, an angel, would eternally forgive his unforgivable, repetitive lapses of error. Sam felt lighter in his seat.

Snapping out of his bout of daydreaming, he balanced his attention from the road to fishing out his mobile phone and swiftly panning through his contacts until it highlighted Dean. After nearly swerving into a sharp turn sign, he handed it to Castiel. “Could you call Dean?”

Cas took the device, thankfully and sufficiently experienced enough with cellular devices to press call, and put the phone to his ear.

The wavering ringtones rang for three beats before cutting out into Dean’s voice, “Sam? You all right?”

“Hello, Dean.” The angel greeted.

The connection was fuzzy, static buzzing behind Dean’s voice. He was tentative. “Cas? Where’s Sam? He okay?”

Sam glued his eyes to the road and spoke clearly, so the phone picked him up. “I’m here, Dean. Bobby never answered the phone so Cas and I left to check on him.” Sam dreaded this part; this was the moment Dean would realize the missing chunk of information.

There was that expected delay. “…where’s Sydney?”

“Still in town… helping.”

“Sam!”

Sam rushed to defend his actions, “Hey, I gave her my spare phone so we can track her and she can call. You think I trust her to follow through? You know I’m not that careless.”

A low grunt fizzled through the speakers. Steely eyes and a murderous tick in his jaw: it was undoubtedly decorating Dean’s face. After a pause, Dean’s voice sounded through again. “Cas, did you get anything to eat?”

Cas put the phone to his mouth in impulse. “Soon, I will get a burger.”

“Good for you, buddy.” A static rustle signaled that Dean was in motion. “All right. Well, I got them to the hospital; they should be fine now.” Muffled padding of feet crackled on the other end. “The sun quit it’s antics about a half-mile back..”

Sam nodded. “ I think there’s a radius set around the town, so the sun only has its full strength there.”

"Yeah, whatever, dork.” Dean said.

“This is good, Sam,” Cas intoned. “This means the sun has not been harnessed to its full potential.”

“Yeah, or it’s being directed toward something.”

Dean sandwiched the phone between his shoulder and ear as he fiddled with his keys to the Impala. He elbowed the door open and slumped into the driver’s seat. “Then we have an official case.”

Sam considered it, “According to the location of Bobby’s phone, he was taken pretty far out. I doubt his absence was a coincidence.”

“No, never is.” Of all the cases they had self-employed themselves to, there were never coincidences―never two clashing supernatural beings occupying separate hauntings in the same compass to create ‘coincidences’. They knew that much. Each monster had their own niche, their own job and purpose, and if two overlapped territories, they generally drove the other out.

“I’m worried they’re trying to lead us away from the fight, Sammy. Lure us out with Bobby as the bait.” Dean ignited the engine, “I’ll go get her; you get Bobby. You at least found some water back in the town, right? It’s like a desert there.”

“Yes,” Cas assured him, cupping the phone with both hands. They had taught him how to hold a phone, right? Sam recalled having done so. Twice.

“Good.” Dean cruised, coasting along the asphalt road, his mind at peace. Scenery rolled on by; trees whisked, shrubbery barreled in a variance of green lines, and clouds flew past like saucers. “Good. Call me when you find Bobby.” Blip.

Sam offered an open palm for the phone and pocketed it once in his possession.

“Do you often track your friends?” Castiel was merely curious.

“Heh, well… we rarely keep friends long enough to do that, most of the time.” Sam set his jaw to mask his inner heartsickness. “But, yeah. Um, Dean and I keep tabs on him. He juggles all of our messes without batting an eye, so we always felt we should do the same.” He kept his facial expression solemn.

Cas reflected on that. “I suppose that is the cost of your profession. I have no desire to believe you deserve such, though.” From observing the Winchesters dark and unpleasant daily lives, Castiel had concluded that a hunter’s life was the cruelest and most unfair career a man could undertake. Every hardship had Sam and Dean sacrificing blood, sweat, and tears.

It took a considerable amount of elbow grease and straining to solve the predicaments Castiel’s brothers had abandoned and left for the Earth to suffer. The consequences that the angels should have endured had befallen onto humanity. To Castiel, that was the most cheating and dishonorable way to serve God: to ditch your troubles onto broken, righteous souls only to shield your own selfish life.

To say he respected the Winchesters was a grand understatement. He was honored to serve them and was repeatedly awed by their will to save and protect among strangers. They risked everything, expecting no payment in return, or worse, expecting negative consequences. Castiel reminded himself of this whenever he questioned his alliance with the hunters and their quest to liberate the world from evil. Cas owed them everything; they had showed him the privilege of freedom and how to fight for it.

Not once had Dean refused giving his service and aid. He would abandon his dreams and wishes to fight in a war he had not started. With no hesitance! All Dean had ever longed for was a family, and all Castiel had ever wanted to do was to grant him such a pure desire.

Something within Castiel fumed at heaven and his father. Why must life be so corrupt? For what reason can’t those who do good earn good? He didn’t understand why Dean had accepted that so easily. Didn’t the Winchesters understand they deserved the world?

His clenched hands naturally twisted into his lap as he seethed. He looked to Sam, anticipating confirmation in Sam’s eyes, but he only looked sad. Oh, he remembered sullenly; he had forgotten humans could not read thoughts, and neither could he, any longer. However, by the pinch of Sam’s lips, Cas could tell the thoughts were self-loathing. The angel shrunk instantly, anger having vanished.

Perhaps, they do not understand their worth. Not yet.

Sam hovered his foot over the break, observing the new atmosphere. They had entered an urban town. It was contemporary, each townhome resembling the following, with a few individual components added for personality.

It was welcoming, and to Castiel’s delight, a congenial diner stood a few blocks away.

Tags: @queen-bubble, @rosaren2498