Title: It's The End
Author: Maat
Characters: Dean, Sam, Bobby, Chuck, Castiel, Eli (OC)
Pairings: Cas/OC
Rating: T, for language and violence and some sexytimes later on
Spoilers: Begins directly after Season 4's "Yellow Fever," so everything from that up to the end of season 4.

Summary: Eli Grant: Hunter. Pain-in-the-Ass. Abomination. And now, Heavenly Appointed Bodyguard to the two idiots who just might bring about the apocalypse. Falling for a blue-eyed angel? That was not part of the plan. Alt Season 4, Cas/OC

Note #1: This story started as a whim, written due to the fact that I could find very few decent Supernatural fanfictions that were not slash (it's just not my thing), or that didn't use atrocious grammar. In shows where a strong female character is not present, I enjoy reading OFCs, because I think they bring something to the table that an all-male cast cannot.

Note #2: Eli is pronounced Ee-lye. Feedback is welcomed.

Supernatural: It's the End

"…So then he says, 'my mother-in-law is a demon,' and of course he doesn't realize he's in a bar full of hunters…"

Bobby Singer's muffled voice drifted out of the open window, along with the snorts of someone laughing. Dean heard it and tapped Sam's shoulder, holding his finger to his lips. Behind them sat the Impala, freshly washed and gleaming a dull black in the mid-afternoon sunlight.

"Dean, we are not going to eavesdrop on Bobby's private conversation," Sam hissed.

"Oh yeah? Then why are you whispering?" Dean countered, nudging Sam with his elbow. He immediately answered his own question. "'Cause you're curious. Since when does Bobby have visitors? When does Bobby tell jokes?"

Sam merely look exhausted, his head dropped down onto his chest, his eyes briefly closing. They had driven all night and sleep still hung heavy in their eyes, but Dean was trying desperately to rally. He was used to no sleep now anyway, using forced cheerfulness to steer attention away from the fact that he slept in fits and starts, that lines were sprouting around his eyes and that his smile was just a little bit empty. The knowledge of his time in hell was still buzzing around the brothers with the weight of unspoken words.

At that moment, however, there was merely sun, the tinted leaves of fall, the smell of the salvage yard and the hope for beer or at least coffee inside of the house. "I'm knocking," Sam said in a determined voice, pushing the hair from his forehead and turning back to the door.

"…and he's been drinkin', of course, and suddenly the whole bar is listening and when one of them asks if he's smelled rotten eggs lately he says, 'what, like her rancid feet?'"

"Oh, fuck, Bobby…you have to stop," a woman's voice gasped between fits of laughter. "I'm.. . I can't breathe…" The laughter started again, unladylike snorts and chuckles.

"Dude, it's a chick," Dean breathed, beaming, latching on to a familiar mindset. "Bobby's got a girl in there!"

Sam shook himself out of his stupor, his hand still raised. "I don't care, I'm knocking," he said again, and this time pounded his fist against the wood.

The sound of heavy boots on old wood headed their way. Dean closed his eyes and muttered, as if in prayer and in part to piss off his brother: "Please let her be hot, please let her be hot."

"I can hear you, you know," Bobby's voice rang out. The chipped door swung opened to reveal his bearded face, genial with the hint of a smug grin, topped as usual by a dirty baseball cap. "How you boys doin'?"

"Good to see you, Bobby." Sam briefly embraced the older man before stepping into the hallway.

"We're doing fine," Dean said in way of greeting, shoving his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket as he followed Sam into the house. It was dim inside, and the air smelled of mothballs and car oil and the dirt of old shoes. "Just wondering why we had to drive all night to get here. The world ending?"

"You say that as if it's an ironic statement," a female voice said from the kitchen doorway, sounding vaguely amused.

Dean smirked at the newcomer. "Oh, right. Apocalypse. Keeps slipping my mind."

There was an awkward pause that Bobby didn't seem inclined to break. Sam was finally the one to step forward. "Hi, I'm Sam," he said, walking up to her and holding out his hand. "This is my brother Dean."

"Eli," the woman said, and instead of shaking his hand she pressed an open beer into it.

"You're a friend of Bobby's?" Sam asked, taking a long pull from the beer bottle while Dean looked on jealously. Eli smiled, a lopsided, too-big grin.

"Don't pout, Mr. Winchester," she said, handing Dean the second bottle. "This one's for you. And yeah, I'm a friend of Bobby's. I was his trainee."

"Eli's a hunter," Bobby supplied as they moved into the kitchen, settling themselves around the Formica table. "Damn good one, too."

"Aw, Bobby, you're sweet," she said, rummaging around in the fridge for another beer, which she cracked open with the rusty bottle-opener attached to her belt. She glanced up to see Sam and Dean staring at her suspiciously. "What?"

"You're a hunter?" Dean asked, leaning back in his chair, his legs stretched out in front of him. He wanted to feel...something: flirty, maybe, or smug, but all he could manage was a kind of suspended exhaustion and the beginnings of flickering anger and burning irritation, the desire to lash out.

Eli arched an eyebrow at him. "Yes," she said slowly, a hint of edge in her voice. Dean shrugged, looking slightly embarrassed but not chastened.

"What? I thought you were like…Bobby's niece or neighbor. Hometown girl. Baking cookies or something."

"Blow me," she snapped.

"Well, the hair doesn't help," he pointed out, jerking his chin at the two squashed yellow buns on the top of her head. "And the freckles are frankly adorable. You look like you're 18."

"I'm 25," she growled. "And you're a dick."

Dean continued eyeing her as if she were a bug under a microscope, his eyes tracing the curves of her hips before lingering with a scrutinizing glare on her pretty, if not particularly outstanding girl-next-door features: green eyes, high cheekbones, upturned nose bridged by a mass of freckles like tiny orange constellations. She looked like she should be giggling with friends about boys, not dressed in a ratty white t-shirt and cargo pants with military boots and a beer in hand, discussing the end of the world.

"Now that you've finished checking me out," she said in a clipped voice, "can we please get down to business?"

"Right," Sam said loudly in an attempt to quell the rising tension in the room. He rested his elbows on the table, fingers picking with nervous energy at the label of his beer bottle and simultaneously trying not to yawn. He thought, briefly, of the beds upstairs in the spare rooms; even with their constant layer of dust they seemed like heaven, deep and soft. "Bobby, what did you call us back for?"

Bobby leaned back and took a drink, distracted. "What? Oh, right. Well, two things really." He held up two fingers. "One," he said, putting the first one down, "I wanted to hear firsthand about how Dean nearly pissed his pants like a little girl while hunting ghosts…"

"I've got a finger of my own for you," Dean barked, flipping him off. Eli let out another unattractive snort.

"And two?" Sam asked. Bobby sighed and put the second finger down with an air of reluctance. "To introduce you to Eli."

There was a long pause. "And why…" Sam started, glancing at the blonde perched on the counter-top, some uh oh feeling already swelling in his stomach.

"Because I'm gonna be coming along with you guys from now on," she said with deceptive sweetness.

"Oh no," Dean said immediately, sitting up straight, his body under the leather jacket clearly tense and ready to fight. He inhaled through his nose, letting the heat of anger wipe away his lethargy. "No. Bobby, what are you thinking? And sorry, Sailor Moon, but we don't need any hangers on. Especially not when we have the fuckin' apocalypse to worry about!"

"One," Eli interrupted, imitating Bobby by holding up two fingers and then slowly putting the first one down. "It's not his idea. He's just a mutual friend and I thought it would make the transition easier for all of us. And two, I'm not a 'hanger on.' I'm here on orders. I'm your bodyguard."

The two men nearly choked into their beers. "I'm sorry, what?" Sam spluttered at the same time Dean snapped: "Are you out of your fucking mind?"

"Nope," she answered serenely, drinking her beer and swinging her booted feet so that they clunked against the cabinets.

"Then whose idea was this?" Sam asked.

She sighed and hopped off the counter top. "Who do you think? It was God's."