A Better Place

It was a rather beautiful day in Lebanon, Kansas. The Sun was out, blocked only by the occasional passing cloud, and the weather was fair. The place was nice, too – a small clearing in the woods that stretched for miles within the land that the Men of Letter's Bunker was situated under.

Maybe one day someone would come across the three headstones that stood proudly beneath the branches of a massive juniper tree. There were no bodies that lay in the ground, but once upon a time, ashes had been scattered in the wind as each stone found a home amongst the roots of the tree. It had been a long time since anyone had visited those headstones. Almost a hundred years, in fact. Most would have thought the woods would be cleared out by now to make room for new housing or some such excuse, but something kept the chainsaws and real estate agents away. So, no, neither the woods nor the headstones were going anywhere anytime soon.

Many memories sang here. Not necessarily in the way that one would consider the clearing being haunted, but at the same time, one might say that the echoing stories of those remembered here could be heard just as easily as one might hear a friend calling from across the room. On the occasion that someone did happen to stumble upon the clearing, he or she might think themselves going crazy for hearing someone shouting "bitch!" at the muttering of "jerk" and the subsequent fond sigh of "children".

But those curious souls would not find the clearing for another several decades yet. By then… well, none from now need to know what happens that far into the future.

Jack smiled at the thought, placing a hand on Mary's headstone. She would have reminded him to not think so far ahead when there was so much to do here and now. Dean would have just given him a look and then rolled his eyes while Sam said something similar to Mary's statement. They may have been long gone by now – their souls resting in Heaven – but never would they be forgotten.

Oh, how Jack missed his human family. He had made many friends since they had died, but none had been able to come close to what Jack had shared with the Winchesters. With a knowing heart and steady presence, Castiel had helped Jack with his grief at each passing.

Kneeling down in the grass, Jack moved to place a hand on both Sam and Dean's markers next. The brothers had fought so hard to not be the one to lose the other first. In the end, they had left Earth together. Jack remembered that day just as clearly as he did the many days that had been filled with their smiles and laughter.

The nephilim wasn't sure how long it would be until he saw them again – whether that be in Heaven or here in this clearing. He had made a promise to each of them that he wouldn't let himself be too distraught if that time never came to pass. That was why he had to come here. He had made it clear to his angelic guardians that he wouldn't leave until he made his goodbyes. For now at least, he had the reassuring feeling that he would come back one day.

"Ya good over there, kiddo?" a carefree yet faintly concerned voice called from across the clearing.

Another, deeper and more gravelly, voice reprimanded the other at a softer volume, though Jack had a pretty good idea of what Castiel was saying.

"What?" the first exclaimed, sounding like a child that had been slapped on the wrist for no good reason. To be fair, the archangel wasn't the most patient of beings despite his technical status as a saint.

Jack's smile turned into an amused grin as he heard Castiel grumble at pouting Gabriel. He stood and looked back at the two, who were more or less bickering now. Running a hand once more over the headstones, Jack cast one last glace to the names of his family.

"It's the end of a wonderful chapter, but there's still a whole book left to go," he whispered to the souls, who would hear his message where they were in their heavens.

The time had come for them to come together. The Cosmic Entity had awoken, and It was not happy. This was not a task that could be left to the hands of the Light or His children, nor could the Darkness hope to fight It in Its domain of Void – for in a Void there could be no Light, no Darkness, no Balance.

Jack let his hands fall back to his sides. It was time to go.

Truly, it was none of their faults, though it was a culmination of all their actions that woke the (metaphorical) slumbering beast. And it was their responsibility – not simply to protect only their universes – to defend all that was, both the Light and Darkness. For they were the children of All.

"I can't wait to meet everyone. You talk so much about them. I have at least five pranks ready for each—"

"No, Gabriel."

"Aw, Cassie, you know better than to say that," the archangel chastised the angel with a mocking finger wave.

They would meet in Guinevere's universe. She was the only reported child of Michael. The others were born more commonly of Gabriel, Raphael and Lucifer or archangels that Jack hadn't heard of before Shirou told him of them.

Jack rolled his eyes at his uncle. He and Castiel were both still a bit worried over how well Gabriel might take meeting Lucifer again, but Gabriel had brushed them off, rather pointedly putting his foot down after they began to get ridiculous (or so Gabriel had said). Later, Castiel had pulled Gabriel over for one last heart-to-heart. Jack knew that Gabriel had finally conceded that the thought of seeing his older brother scared the ever-loving crap out of him, but he also wasn't about to miss out on this – it wasn't every lifetime that you got to witness a bunch of archangels' kids join together to take on an Overpowered Big-Bad (again, his words).

Shirou had agreed to keep an eye on the known nephilim and inform them of the plan. He also offered to look for others and help them get to the rendezvous point, admitting that he had plenty of free time to do so. He then reminded Jack how time worked differently across the Nexus. The portals they could create ripped through both space and time.

"Take as long as you need," Shirou had told him.

"Let's get this show on the road!" Gabriel practically demanded, only to let out an un-archangelic yelp at his leg being attacked.

Seeing his dog gnawing on Gabriel's pants, Jack shook his head. Crowley was perhaps the only other constant in Jack's life. The demon had settled into his role early on and was rather content with it, especially considering that the other option had been death. He had found that he didn't need an actual voice to get his point across most of the time. As Gabriel lost his shoe and let out an indignant squawk, Jack could see how that had been proven correct.

"Crowley, give Uncle his shoe back."

The demon dog just walked over to Castiel's side and regally sat down with Gabriel's shoe still firmly trapped in his jaw. Jack really shouldn't have expected any better. Gabriel huffed and snapped another shoe into existence, making a show of putting it on, all the while muttering evil things about Boston Terriers with red eyes.

"Ready to go?" Jack asked Castiel, favoring to ignore his uncle's antics.

Jack hadn't met any of his other 'cousins' besides Gwen, Shirou and Shelter yet. It had been another of Shirou's impressions, part of living with his family for as long as he could. He'd insisted that Jack would have plenty of time to meet the others when the time came.

Still, from his visions Jack knew that there was a pair of twins, Evangeline and Alexander. They had grown up with their father – Raphael – and were especially talented in the matters of the mind (Evan) and body (Alex). There was also Jason, who was more or less the complete opposite of Jack yet took a liking to him despite being from what was essentially a mirror version of Jack's universe. Eri was a bit odd, even by nephilim standards, and Jack wasn't quite sure whom their sire was… Abigail made doubly sure that everyone knew who her father was. She wasn't necessarily as obnoxious as her father could be, but she had certainly inherited his personality along with the reality-bending talents that came with being a child of Gabriel.

"As I'll ever be," his father answered, bending down to pick up Crowley, who spat out Gabriel's old shoe.

The dog let out a huff, twitching his ears. Just waiting on you, birdie.

Jack reached over and scratched behind the dog's ears, earning a pleased woof. Then Jack moved a distance away from his family, steadily drawing on the power that he'd been storing in the clearing. It wasn't as much as he would have gotten from a ley line, but it would have to do. Besides, he was far stronger and more in control of his powers since he'd last ripped through space-time in order to travel through the Nexus.

There was one thing that his uncle was on the same page with Jack about: Lucifer. Jack wasn't nearly as nervous as Gabriel was, but at the same time, Jack couldn't help but feel something in his chest twist at his sire's mention. Castiel was his father, and it hadn't taken long for Gabriel to claim the title of uncle. (Sam and Dean had been the best of brothers, and Mary was as close to a second mother as Jack was going to get.)

Jack didn't know what to think about Lucifer anymore, not after he'd left the archangel with Shelter.

In a way, he really did hope that Lucifer had figured it all out.

By the time Jack stepped through the portal he'd made, ensuring that it closed behind him, Castiel had already gotten onto Gabriel for something or another. They had already talked about this with him too. Gabriel was one of a select few archangels that would be joining the Nephilim on their daunting task.

But they would do it. They were stronger together than apart. Even if it took a while to get used to one another, they all knew they would end up working together in a certain kind of harmony that couldn't be achieved any other way.

They were a family. A very strange one – with cousins and sisters and brothers and parents and uncles and aunts from everywhere – but they were each as close as close could be. No matter how different or strange they were, they could still relate to one another.

(It didn't matter to Jack what the rest of the universes thought of them. They were perfect enough for him.)

(This was his paradise.)

A/N: Shortest one of them all, but it was also kind of an epilogue. (Oh, stop your crying; you already knew it was ending). But really, this was fun, if a bit a long haul. I wouldn't have it any other way XD

Last Edited: [6/23/2019]

lone ranger22: Thanks! And it was a long time after they'd died too. Even if they had died of old age, this chapter was at least a hundred years afterwards.