The Wheels On The Bus Chapter 31

“Dean?” Jack, who’d been nearly dozing off in his chair after he’d exhausted himself from crying, uncurls from his position at the sound of Dean’s shout.

The man’s already stumbling out of bed, only giving the scene in the infirmary a glance before he mutters, “Shit,” and storms out of the room. Jack gets up to trail after him.

“What happened?” Jack asks.

“Chuck,” Dean spits out, livid. He pauses at the sight of the rubble outside of the infirmary. “What the fuck happened here?”

“Zachariah,” Jack says.

“You fought him?”

“Adam did.”

“Adam - “ Dean steps back into the room, Jack stepping aside to let him. The sight of his youngest brother laid out on one of the beds darkens something in his gaze. If he wasn’t already angry, he is now.

“He won,” Jack offers.

Dean grunts, and then turns away to continue to wherever he’d been planning to get to. Jack follows after him.

“The Empty agreed to help us and resurrect our allies,” Dean says. “But while we were negotiating, we got interrupted.”

“By Chuck?”

“He resurrected all of them,” Dean says.

Jack stops in his tracks. “All the angels?”

“And then some, I think,” Dean says, stopping to accommodate him. “The Empty was furious, but it’s not like it can do anything against Chuck. It sent me back.”

Jack nods, already communicating the information to Castiel and everyone else, in case Dean hasn’t yet. There’s several bursts of panic and one resigned train of thought from the other end.

“What are we doing?” Jack asks.

“We’re calling everyone in town back in,” Dean says. “No doubt Chuck’s going to target us, and if we let everyone stay outside, they’re either going to take people hostage or slaughter everyone in town. We’ll fortify the school.”

It’s not going to be enough, Jack knows. A couple of hunters against the entirety of the Heavenly Hosts, it’s not going to be enough.

But what choice do they have?

“I’ll help,” Jack says.

Dean nods. “I’m headed to the comms room,” he says, turning to put a hand on Dean’s shoulder. “I’m gonna need you to gather all the volunteers and get them to the gym, after that, I’m sending hunters to ward the area and guard it. You’re going to stay there and protect the civilians, alright?”

“Alright,” Jack says.

Dean squeezes his shoulder. He seems to pause, suddenly, like he’s listening to something.

Then he pulls Jack in for a hug. The boy can only stand there in shock, before he realizes what’s happening and wraps his arms around Dean.

“Sorry about this, kid,” Dean says.

“It’s okay,” Jack says. “Shit happens.”

Dean laughs. “That it does,” he says, pulling away. He pats Jack’s shoulder one last time. “Be careful.”

“You too,” he says, and with that, Dean rushes off to the comms room, while Jack heads for the kitchen, where he knows most of the volunteers are.

They’ve got another siege to live through.

-

“Chuck sabotaged the angel plan?!” Belphegor screeches through the Shedim’s lungs, even as the Shedim pilots the body, swatting away angels with the wave of a hand and ducking past swords being slashed about.

“So it seems,” Castiel says, shoving an angel off of him and stabbing his attacker through the chest, a brief flash of light erupting from them.

“Samuel,” Rowena says, coming to the same conclusion as everyone else even though none of them have had the time to talk about it. If Sam can see Chuck’s thoughts, then it’s not farfetched for Chuck to know Sam’s.

The Shedim ducks as a blast of energy ripples from Amara throughout the rest of the cavern they’re in. It bowls over several angels, but more of them are coming forth from the Cage - or, well, the Empty of the Cage. Apparently, the Empty-as-the-afterlife and the Empty-as-the-Cage can be connected, then.

Belphegor forces the body to look at Amara, at the displeased look on her face. She can’t go all-out here, not when there’s three of her teammates with her.

They need to bring this fight to the Cage. And they need to drag Chuck along with them.

We’re already talking to Michael, if you’re in a hurry, the Shedim tells him.

Great, thank you, Belphegor says.

The Shedim ducks from an angel’s attempted swipe and tackles said angel’s torso, driving them to the ground. Quickly, the demon pushes himself off of them and bites into the angel’s throat, tearing a huge chunk of it off as he violently pulls away.

Belphegor watches as the torn flesh - the area that’s been bitten - starts to bubble and blacken like boiling tar. The angel’s eyes flash blue, not in power but in pain, and they start to claw at their mangled throat.

Do you have to be so violent? Belphegor asks.

You’re asking me that while we’re under attack? The Shedim lifts himself up to a crouch, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. You got any plans, genius?

Just tell me when Michael’s done his part, Belphegor says. And tell him to alert me if he’s dragged his father to the Cage.

Alright, the Shedim says. It stands, immediately stepping to the side to avoid getting stabbed in the face. It catches the angel’s arm and bends it back where it’s not supposed to be bent with a sick crack.

If they can just time it right, they can trap Chuck into the Cage. Fuck the plans. Chuck’s already thrown them to the wind - they’ll just have an impromptu beatdown and deal with everything.

And they have to win. They can’t not win.

They don’t have a choice.

But if Belphegor’s not fast enough, then they could fail. The Cage could be closed with Chuck outside, and then he’s not going to have an immediate solution to try to shove him in there and close it again. No, the safest way for this to go is to close the Cage while Chuck is distracted.

But that would mean either Michael or Amara has to be stuck in there with him.

Come on, Belphegor, think.

Someone manages to land a punch to the Shedim’s face, snapping his neck to the side. The demon snaps it right back into place with a low growl.

As the fight goes on, Belphegor continues to observe the scene through the Shedim’s eyes. There’s blood and limbs flying all over the place, pulses of light from when an angel is killed, a couple of blasts of purple from Rowena’s  magic, puffs of black smoke when Amara exterminates -

Amara!

She’d been powerful enough to bring back Mary Winchester, if Belphegor remembers correctly. She’d be able to yank anyone who’s trapped in the Cage out.

Hey, Belphegor tells the Shedim. If you can, get me to a clear area.

What?

Once Michael drags Chuck into the Cage, I’ll close it, Belphegor says. And then, I’ll have Amara yank him out.

Gotcha, the Shedim says, and immediately starts bodily plowing through the sea of angels, easily throwing everyone trying to cling to it aside like a bunch of mannequins. There’s a couple of boulders to the side of the cavern. If they can get as high up as they can when Michael arrives, they can use the bingo card to close the Cage. Afterwards, they can all retreat, and Amara can grab Michael, and they can deal with whatever’s going on topside.

An angel with a longsword and a shield stands in their way. The Shedim deftly sidesteps the sword, catching the blade in his hand. Its edge cuts into his palm. Belphegor sees the smoke rising from the demon’s hand as the holy blade starts to burn it, but the demon only bares his teeth and bashes his head right into the angel’s.

The angel stumbles back, bringing the sword with him, and the Shedim immediately darts forward, jumping up, landing on the shield as it starts to be tilted upward as the angel falls, and uses it as a launching pad to get to the boulders behind his attacker.

Madman! Belphegor yells. Your hand!

We got where we needed to be, right? The demon sounds amused. You know if you were less of a coward, you could have done that too?

No, I have something called a self-preservation instinct, he says. Just because a sword to a hand wouldn’t kill me doesn’t mean it wouldn’t hurt.

Shut up, you little fucking baby, no wonder a ghost can cut you up and you’d cry.

Hey!

The Shedim stands, careful to keep his balance on the boulder, and starts scaling up the higher rocks to get away from any angel that might try to follow after him. Once he finds himself at a respectable height, he stops, looking out over the carnage.

There’s too many angels. The others seem to be holding their ground, but there’s so many angels.

Shit.

We need to hurry.

Don’t worry about it, your boy Michael’s on the move, the Shedim says, crouching down and taking out the bingo card from his pockets. It’s folded and creased, but it’s still whole, and across its squares, there’s a line of X’s. A bingo. Won’t be long now.

Good, Belphegor says.

Below him, angels are already trying to climb up. The Shedim holds a hand up and snaps his fingers - and like something suddenly weighed them down, the angels plummet to the ground, hitting their allies in the process.

Pests, the Shedim mutters.

Have you ever seen an angel before?

Castiel.

Before-before, asshole.

Lucifer, the Shedim says. And all the other demons who were originally angels. They’re not that much different, now that I’ve had a way to compare them to each other.

Belphegor hums, or does the mental equivalent of it, anyway. He wonders if he’s changed any from when he’d first fallen.

Oh, here he comes, the Shedim says, Keep your senses open, idiot.

Shut up, Belphegor says, trading awareness with the Shedim for a moment. He feels it, the sudden electric feeling in the air, the sensation of lightning and fire approaching.

Then -

Belphegor!

Michael!

Belphegor raises the card in his hand, prepared to invoke a miracle into existence and -

Pain.

Pain pain pain pain.

He looks down, noticing the bloody arrowhead that’s sticking out of his - the Shedim’s chest.

It burns.

Angel blade, he thinks, in the second he keeps consciousness and hasn’t shut down from the pain yet. Morphed into an arrow and shot at him. Angel blades are a manifestation of someone’s Grace, they change depending on what suits the angel - this is why Gregori have longswords, Archangels have different angel blades, why lower ranking angels have silver shortswords -

He feels himself be pushed back to the recesses of the Shedim’s consciousness, but he can’t protest, not when he feels like he’s being cooked alive from the inside out.

The last thing he’s aware of is a burst of power, a shout, and then the feeling of falling.