Sam and Dean

Lucifer had been freed, and they had been magically teleported onto an airplane. The How and Why escaped him, but he was disinclined to question it (since all answers pointed to God).

They rushed to Chuck's house, looking for Castiel and Chuck. "He's blown apart," Chuck said, picking teeth and guts and terror out of his hair.

Dean crushed the heartbreak, Sam too, their friend in battle wiped out in an instant.

When Zachariah showed up in the house is when it all turned to shit.

"Thought we'd find you here," Zachariah said, wearing that damned lawyer.

"You just keep your distance, asshat," Dean spat. You started the fucking apocalypse, not Sam or me or anyone else, you manipulated us right into it.

"In another day I'd lightly banter with you, but this is not the time. Events are not turning out as planned."

"Oh, aren't they?" Dean mocked roundly. Wonder what that feels like.

"You freed Lucifer, Sam," Zachariah said, rounding on him. "Except that you didn't."

"What?" Sam said, taken aback. His temp was one fifty, his eyes were black, Chuck said. He was pretty sure that's what happened.

"Oh you opened the cage all right, but when the first angels got there there was nothing in there," Zachariah said. "So either you already said yes and allowed him to take you, or we lost him already, and both are not good."

"Oh, so now that you've gone and fucked up your apocalypse you're crying to us?" Dean snarled, almost livid. "Sam hasn't said yes to anything."

"Yeah, check me, I'm no angel," Sam laughed, almost manically. Not an hour after he started the apocalypse, they lost track of Satan, and apparently he was the meat suit destined for him.

It settled in comfortably with Sam's self-hate. Part-demon, murder, the living body for Satan himself.

"I can see that," Zachariah said dryly. "You better watch yourself, boy, or we might smite you pre-emptively. And Dean," He said, rounding on him. "We'll get you to – "

The angels were banished, Dean slamming his hand down on the banishing sigil.

"So I'm Lucifer's chosen vessel," Sam laughed, still reeling. "Great! Just great." He felt an overwhelming temptation to collapse on Chuck's dilapidated couches and ignore whatever the fuck had been happening for the last six hours. This can't be real.

A wonderful revenge plan that was supposed to kill Lilith freed Lucifer, Ruby was playing him, the angels playing Dean, and now Sam was actually guilty of everything Dean accused him of. He hadn't gone darkside, but he had doomed the world.

"He needs a yes, just like all of these other douchebags, and he ain't getting it," Dean growled. There was a lot he doubted about Sam, but this wasn't one of those things.

"You're damn right," He said. That was the least he could fucking do.

Dean and Sam

Dean and Sam hole up with Bobby, and pour over files. It doesn't take them long to put together Chuck's riddle and locate the Michael Sword.

The demon possessing Bobby attacks, and they get Bobby to a hospital and they get to John's lockup.

Dean and Sam bust into the lockup, shotguns ready, demons already dead on the floor.

"I see you told the demons where the sword is," Zachariah said, laughing lightly.

"Oh thank God, the angels are here," Dean snapped, sarcasm thick in his voice.

"And to think, they could have grabbed it anytime they wanted," Zachariah continued. "It was right in front of them."

"What do you mean?" Sam asked, already dreading the answer.

"We may have planted that particular piece of prophecy inside Chuck's skull, but it happened to be true. We did lose the Michael sword. We truly couldn't find it. Until now. You've just hand-delivered it to us."

"We don't have anything," Dean said dryly.

Zachariah rolled his eyes. "It's you, chucklehead. You're the Michael sword."

Dean stared blankly, then laughed. "Of course I am, because Sam's Lucifer's angel condom, why shouldn't I be Michael's? That's symbolic, brother versus brother, cute. But no thanks."

"I can't believe you even thought you could kill Lucifer, Dean. You're a human, and not much of one." Zachariah was having his go at Dean, and he looked like he was enjoying it.

"Lets go, Sammy," Dean said, turning away.

"I don't think so," Zachariah said, making a finger gun and pointing it at Sam. "Bang."

There was a sickening crunch, and Sam crying out in pain. "God damn it, you dick," Dean snarled.

"Keep mouthing off, I'll break more than his legs. I am completely and utterly through screwing around. The war has begun. We don't have our general. That's bad. Now, Michael is going to take his vessel and lead the final charge against the adversary. You understand me?"

"How many humans die in the crossfire, huh? A million? Five, ten?" Dean pressed. He didn't give a shit about heaven's agenda, the good God of the Bible was an absentee father and he'd already had enough of those.

"If we don't find and destroy Lucifer, all of them will."

"They wouldn't if you just hadn't started the apocalypse," Dean snarled. "You need my consent, and you'll never have it."

"Okay. How about this? Your friend Bobby—we know he's gravely injured. Say yes, and we'll heal him. Say no, he'll never walk again."

Dean swallowed thickly, pictured Bobby's anguished face. Never walk again. "No."

"Then how about we heal you from...stage-four stomach cancer?"

Dean's gut erupted in pain, and he immediately coughed up blood. He felt like his stomach was cramping, caving in, all encompassing pain. "No," he said, knowing he'd die soon. This was better than Bobby's lifelong disability.

"Then let's get really creative. Uh, let's see how...Sam does without his lungs." Another finger, and Sam is gaping like a fish on the floor.

"Just kill us already," Dean said desperately, a little too desperately, still coughing up blood. God damn it, he was watching Sam die, again.

Out of nowhere, Castiel shows up, stabs everyone but Zachariah. Dean's glad, Dean's thrilled, except that Sam is still rolling around without lungs like a fish and his skin is turning blue and he's watching Sam suffocate while he's coughing up blood and dying, and if Castiel doesn't hurry it up they'll both be in hell before Castiel can save them.

"How are you – "

"Great question," Castiel sad blandly. "How did those boys end up on that airplane? Another great question. One I think is worth considering. Put these boys back together, and I won't ask twice."

Zachariah looks at Castiel, one long murderous look, and as he disappears with a wingbeat Sam and Dean are made whole.

"What are those around your neck?" Dean asked. He knew what angel grace looked like, bottled up from Anna, and there were two identical bottles around Castiel's neck.

Castiel instead put his hands on their chests, and they were both assaulted with the scraping pain.

"What the hell," Dean said, as quickly as Castiel said "Enochian sigils to hide you from other angels. All angels in creation, actually."

"What did you do, brand us?" Sam asked, and Castiel replied "Carved it into your ribs."

There was a silence, and Dean kept staring at the grace hanging around Castiel's neck. Sam opened his mouth to ask about it, and he was gone.

Dean and Sam

"There's something fishy going on here," Bobby said. The stale hospital room was suffocating, and Bobby's new wheelchair the elephant in the room. "Where are the signs? The apocalypse? What's Lucifer doing? Demons are partying up a storm, but there aren't any plagues – "

"Lets be thankful, okay," Dean said, tired.

"Lets not be," Sam snapped back. "Lucifer is out there, and if we don't see what he's doing that means he's planning something under our noses."

"Not to mention heaven," Bobby said. "They're angling to make you two the vessels of the generals, right?"

"It's not happening," Dean said, and Sam replied "Of course, Dean," with just a little irritation. Why did Dean keep saying that like it was a question?

Sam listened as Dean spouted about how they were going to win, not angels or demons or a great battle that would roast the planet alive. But as soon as Dean left the hospital room, Sam followed.

"We could find the colt," Sam was saying, "We could use one of the bullets on Lucifer –"

"What difference would it make?" Dean said, attitude all defeat. "I said that for Bobby's benefit, but you know the truth. We're done for."

Dean was the picture of defeat, walking around the car, and Sam couldn't deal with this any longer. "Is there something you want to say to me?"

"I tried, Sammy. I mean, I really tried. But I just can't keep pretending that everything's all right. Because it's not. And it's never going to be. You chose a demon over your own brother— "

"Have you ever bothered to look at it from my point of view?" Sam interrupted, and Dean's face changed to anger. "I would give anything to take it all back, because it let Lucifer out, but what if it didn't? Then we'd be successful, and Lilith would be dead. There's a ton I would take back, things you don't know about Dean, but it's not like I was being evil, doing this for fun."

Dean's face morphed. "I can't believe this, you let Lucifer out, how are we still having this argument? Your eyes were black, Sam."

"This line of reasoning," Sam exclaimed. "It's preposterous. It's evil because it exists in me? Then you should put me down now, Dean."

"That's not what I – "

"I know! That's the whole point! Condemn me for my actions, Dean, not because I took advantage of something physical in me."

"You chose Ruby over me," Dean all but snarled.

"I thought it was the right way to save the world!" Sam said. "I know, I know that doesn't fix anything, God knows, but it's not like I just abandoned you for no reason!"

"Like you did for Stanford?" The words were out of Dean's mouth before he could temper them.

All of Sam's fight drained away. "Dean, that wasn't about you," he said quietly.

Dean pressed his lips together. "You keep leaving me," his voice said, strangely empty.

"It's not like that," Sam implored. They had never spoken about why he left, the final fight turning into distance, then Dad went missing, then Jessica died, and it kept getting pushed back until it never happened.

"What is it like, huh!?" Dean shouted, loud temper filling the dead hospital parking lot.

"I disagreed with Dad!" Sam yelled back. "I thought there was more to life than this! I just wanted a choice! It was him who said stay gone, I know you remember."

"If you're going, then stay gone," John's voice thundred in the dingy motel room. Sam never wanted to stay gone, but he didn't want to stay around a father who so readily issued ultimatums to his only living family.

Sam left out the open door, and immediately his heart cracked for what he had lost.

"God damnit I know, Sam, but you're the one who left and you're the one who chose Ruby –"

Sam brought his fist down, almost on the Impala, but stilled himself just in time. No level of anger justified taking it out on their home.

"I didn't choose Ruby over you in the ways that mattered, Dean," Sam barked after a pause. "I tactically believed Ruby's plan to save the world was better than yours. You're still the one I've looked up to since I was born, dude, how could you not see that."

"You did a lot of bad things over the last year," Dean said, changing tack, defending his anger, burning hot inside his chest. He didn't want to forgive Sam because they made a life doing what's right, damnit, and they can't make excuses.

"Yeah," Sam said, mouth dry. "I've got a lot of making up to do. But Dean, you do too."

Dean hung his head. Not in the same ways.

He wanted to remain angry, remain pissed, Sam let Satan himself out of hell and unleashed him upon the world. But Dean knew that Zachariah played him, and Ruby played Sam, and Azazel played Sam too, and his Dad played both of them, and now they were the chosen vessels for Good and Evil like some sort of cosmic joke. Where was the right in that?

The only other person in this with him was Sam, and he couldn't stay mad at Sam and stay alive in this complete shitstorm at the same time.

"I'm angry," is what Dean said. This time, he meant at more than just Sam.

"I am too," Sam said, and meant the same thing.

Weeks passed, and not a peep. No horsemen, no plagues, nothing more than demons rampaging the earth, possessions spiking from 3 in 2006 to 24 in 2007 to 50 in 2008 to clear over 300 and it was only halfway through 2009.

Demon possessions on an unprecedented scale was bad, but Revelations made it seem like there would be a lot worse.

"Cas isn't picking up, either," Dean said dryly for the fifteenth time. "We're completely on our own."

"Other hunters are taking out the demons, that's good," Bobby supplied, but Dean waved him off.

"I meant on the intel."

"Cas can't ignore us forever," Sam said. "Something's gonna happen, eventually. He's probably preoccupied with that quest of his to find God." Sam had his own set of thirty thousand papers before him, trying to put together a picture of the apocalypse.

"I'm more worried about the angels," Bobby said. "Lucifer's probably working up to the great plagues, but where are the angels that are supposed to be stopping him?"

Dean spread his hands. I don't know jack shit, his posture said. None of them did.

The radio silence continued, and Dean couldn't take it anymore.

"I'm tired of waiting around for a disaster to happen, it's been two weeks. Sam, lets get out on the road and go kill some fuglys, yeah?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "We can take out some of these demons while we're at it, with how many there are there's probably even one close."

"You boys have fun," Bobby said from his wheelchair, whiskey in his lap. Sam tried not to notice how much Bobby was putting away, tried not to ask him about it. He doomed the world, and killed innocent people to drink tainted blood, he had no right to query a man about his alcohol.

"There's gotta be someone we can talk to," Sam said instead. "A… psychic, or angel, or hell, a demon that knows what's going on."

"We're hunting fuglys, we can ask around while we're at it," Dean said, already holding his duffel bag.

"Where are we going first?" Sam asked, thinking Dean already had a destination in mind.

"Demon possession three states over, all convenient like," Dean said. "You can get your questions ready in the car."

"What is Lucifer planning," Sam snarled, dousing the demon in holy water.

"I don't know, I don't know!" The demon screamed, head jerking away from the burning water.

"Tell us what you do know," Dean said while Sam continued.

"Demons are self-interested, so act in your self interest," Sam said, pulling out Ruby's knife. "If you don't give us what we want, your interests might not be served."

"If I tell you anything I'll be rotting forever," the demon spat. "Dead might be better. Besides, you wouldn't kill this lovely human I'm riding."

"They might already be dead," Dean said, ever so nicely. "Knowing demons, they probably are. And there are ways to check."

The demon swallowed. "All right, okay? Shit. Look, I really don't know anything, except – all the higher ups, they're upset. Lucifer's gone missing."

"We know that," Sam snarled. "Give us something we don't know."

"Lucifer hasn't been talking to anyone in hell, far as I know!" It pleaded. "Lucifer's just gone, there, please let me go now! I won't rat you out!"

"That's all?"

"I swear, on Lucifer, that's all I know."

Dean began to read an exorcism over the demon, and it jerked, and screamed, "Don't send me back there!" but soon it was gone.

The meatsuit slumped over, dead. Sam regarded him sadly. A man, late thirties or early forties. Nice plaid shirt. Flannel. Probably a father, a husband.

"I hate it when they don't make it," Sam sad as he cut him free, laying him down, closing his eyes the final time.

This poor man, his family never finding closure, forever wondering who his brutal murderer was. An open case, forever. The first of many the apocalypse will take.

"I was out of place to be so angry at you," Dean said, almost out of nowhere.

"What?" Sam said, abruptly.

"Calling you darkside. You're always crying for the victims, you couldn't be darkside," he mumbled, almost ashamed of himself.

A girl, in the drunk, like a vampire, Sam drank her.

"Stuff you don't know," Sam mumbled, equally quietly.

"Do you want to share?" Dean asked, awkwardly, like he didn't know how. "Can't be worse than what I did in hell," he said, cracking a pathetic joke.

"That was different, you were trying to survive –"

"So were you, Sam," Dean insisted. "In a different way. You were trying to make sure we all did. People have murdered for far less."

Sam didn't know if Dean knew about the girl, but the way he said it, casually, made Sam think he just happened to choose the word murder.

"Lots of people died while I… learned…." Sam mumbled instead.

"Victims die all the time," Dean said, Sam's excuse playing out of Dean's mouth. "They probably wouldn't have made it anyway."

"That's exactly what Ruby said," Sam spat bitterly, cleaning up the crime scene, and Dean had no response.

They wiped away fingerprints and positioned evidence, quietly, pensively.

"You started the apocalypse, but I did too," Dean said quietly, a little later. "First seal, last seal, remember?"

Sam pressed his lips together. It crossed his mind, more than a few times, but with Dean forgiving him he couldn't find the heart to hold it against his older brother.

"We're both guilty," Dean insisted. He seemed strangely invested in this line of reasoning.

"Why the sudden change of heart?" Sam pressed instead. "You were ready to kill me for days."

Dean continued with their tedious work, cleaning their fingerprints off of everything. "It's just," he laughed awkwardly, "The universe keeps fucking us, dude. If we don't have each other, what do we have?"

Sam had no answer. That's exactly what he thought. They both have done a lot of fucked up things, but even bigger forces played them, put them in those awful positions. And the hits never stopped coming.

Sam cleared his throat awkwardly. "So Lucifer's just not around?" He said, all business.

"Looks like it," Dean said, all business too. "You think Michael's in town too?"

"We can't ask Cas," Sam said. "Even if he was answering our calls, he's not on heaven's VIP list anymore." Obviously, they had no other angels to ask.

Dean hummed. "I have an idea, but it's a dangerous one."

"You WHAT?" Bobby's voice thundered through the phone.

"Just for a little bit," Dean insisted. "Just say 'yes' long enough for him to come – "

"And then what, say "I take it back?"" Bobby yelled.

"Well, before he gets in my bones, but yeah," Dean said dryly.

"This is a terrible plan," Sam said from the other side of the motel room, watching Dean on the phone with Bobby.

He was right, it was terrible.

"So is Sam gonna do this for fun, too?" Bobby all but snarled.

"That's one too many archangels for me," Dean said. "No, the demon we interrogated said Lucifer wasn't around, wasn't speaking to anyone. It's like he isn't home." Harassing the archangel Michael is one thing, but harassing Satan is another.

Bobby's silence was loud on the other end of the phone. "Come do it in my shed, so when you die I don't gotta collect your bodies."

Dean figured that was as close to an 'okay, be safe' as Bobby would ever give.

"On our way," Dean said, snapping the phone shut.

"I can't believe we're dong this," Sam said. "This is –"

"So stupid, I know," Dean said, waving his hands. "But what are we gonna do, call Zachariah or someone else and wait for him to blow our legs off? Again?"

"We need to call Cas for backup," Sam insisted, standing, packing the car.

Dean groaned, and spoke out loud at large. "Dear Castiel, or whatever, I'm gonna say yes to Michael and see if he shows up. It'll be a great show. Please come make sure Sam isn't liquefied."

No response.

"I thought surely that would be enough to draw his attention," Sam remarked. Neither one of them said it. Where has Castiel gone?

Dean shrugged. "He'll show up," he said, feeling strangely assured.