Love: This story was written for marcicat in the Great Birthday Swap of 2011. I requested some things, and she requested some things (I forgot the nail polish). I wrote this as a followup to Little Wild Moonflower. She wrote the fabulous Send Somebody as a followup to one moment in mind and Ex-Spooks, Guns, and Money (send them all, there's a party in Miami). Because she's awesome like that.

Note: Although this story involves characters named for real people (primarily Jensen Ackles, with mention of Jared Padalecki, Misha Collins, Mark Sheppard, Sebastian Roché, Richard Speight Jr., Sydney Imbeau, and Gattlin Griffith), it is not in any way meant to portray the actual characteristics, circumstances, or activities of these people. The names are meant to reference fictional characters from an “alternate reality” as portrayed by the Supernatural episode “The French Mistake.”

***

He’d known Mark was coming back.  They’d all known.  Before Mark had left, they’d known he was coming back, and everyone was glad because he was great to work with.

It wasn’t until Jensen understood the characters were, well, real that he started to wonder what Mark’s return would mean for the Supernatural storyline.  Because Castiel had killed him, right?  Crowley was supposed to be gone, and if he wasn’t, then it was gonna be Cas who got in trouble for it.

The morning after Castiel had sent them home – sent them back – Jensen found a script on the table beside his bed.  Not his script, but Misha’s: a copy he’d never miss, Jensen realized, squinting at it.  It had a messy note scrawled on the back, handwriting he’d never seen before but instinctively recognized.

Cas, the note said.  Wrong reality.  Get rid of it.

Dean’s handwriting.  If it came from the days they were all living over again, Jensen assumed Misha would have his own less bedraggled copy.  But since when was Castiel an interdimensional messenger service?  And what made Jensen the most likely recipient?

On impulse, Jensen grabbed a piece of paper and scribbled a message back.  He folded it, put it on top of the untouched script, and headed for the bathroom before he could think too hard about what he was doing.  Of course the piece of paper was still there when he got back.

He felt stupid for doing it, but he slapped a post-it on top of the paper before he left for the day.

Dear Castiel, it said.  Plz give to Dean.  Thx.  Jensen.

He’d forgotten about it by the time he fell into bed that night, exhausted and distracted and gone.

Almost gone.  He was reaching for the light when he realized the script was still sitting there on the table.  Same place, same wrinkles, not a page missing or dog-earred or any less impossible than it had been when he first saw it.  (Misha, of course, had had his script in his pocket when Jensen arrived.  And when he left, for that matter.)

But the folded piece of paper was missing.

***

Jensen left another piece of paper on top of the script the next day, but it didn’t disappear.  He left it there for a week.  He even tried putting another post-it note on it, but nothing happened.  He searched everywhere, just in case the first letter hadn’t actually been whisked away by an angel from another reality but had instead fallen down behind some piece of furniture somewhere.

He had no more luck finding the first piece of paper than he did losing the second.

No big, Jensen decided.  Obviously.  Angels had better things to do, right?  He should burn the thing – the letter and the script both – but he couldn’t make himself do it.  Not yet.  So he hid them and tried to forget.

Two months later, Mark came back.

Jensen probably should have been surprised when he found Misha sitting on the edge of his bed that night, wearing the too-big suit and trench coat.  But he wasn’t, because he knew before the man looked up that it wasn’t Misha.  It wasn’t even a man.

“Hi,” Jensen said, reaching for the door.  He closed it carefully behind him.  Shutting himself in with an angel was only as risky as everything else involving angels.  “How are you doing?”

Castiel lifted his face from his hands.  “I’m not Misha,” he said.  Tired blue eyes warned Jensen not to ask.

“Yeah,” Jensen agreed, stepping away from the door.  “I got that.”

Castiel didn’t seem surprised to hear this.  “You gave me advice once,” he said.  “I must ask you to do it again.”

Okay.  Maybe he was the one who was confused.  “I’m not Dean,” he said.  Just to be clear.

Castiel gave him an odd look.  “I know that.”

“Right,” Jensen said.  “Just checking.”

“Tell me what to do,” Castiel said.

“You know what to do,” Jensen said carefully.  He wondered if he should sit down.  He felt a little creepy, looming over an angel like this, but sitting next to him on the bed seemed weird too.

“Why do you say that?” Castiel demanded.  “Dean says that too.  If I knew what to do, wouldn’t I be doing it?”

“You are doing it,” Jensen said.  “You’re asking for help.  Let them help you, Cas.”  The nickname rolled off his tongue without conscious thought.  He was so conditioned to it that even awe couldn’t make him stop.

“I’m asking for help,” Castiel repeated.

When that was all he said, Jensen shifted uncomfortably.  “I can’t... I can’t tell you what to do.  You know that, right?”  He decided to take the show’s theme and run with it.  “That’s not what free will is, anyway.”

“I don’t want free will,” Castiel said, unexpectedly vehement.  “I just want to be sure again.”

“We don’t get to be sure very often,” Jensen told him.  “Even when we’re following someone else’s orders.”

Castiel frowned.  The floor took the brunt of it.  “Dean is often sure.”

“Dean doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing,” Jensen said.  “You gotta know the front he puts up is an act.”

“Then why should I follow him?” Castiel asked, turning the force of his gaze on Jensen.  “If he is unsure?”

“Cas, you wouldn’t follow anyone who was sure.”  The show was littered with guest stars Castiel had rebelled against.  “You already know that about yourself.”

“I’m an angel,” Castiel insisted.  “I’m meant to be sure.”

Jensen folded his arms.  “How do you know?”

“It’s just something we know,” Castiel said.  “It’s something we all know.”  Like that was the end of it.  Like he’d never questioned anything he knew.

“But you can learn things,” Jensen said.  “Right?  You know more today than you did a year ago?”

“I know less than I thought I did,” Castiel muttered.

“So you know something different,” Jensen said.  “The point is you’ve changed.  You can change.  You were meant to be sure.  Maybe now you’re meant to be something else.”

Castiel tilted his head.  “I’m not sure that reasoning is sound.”

Jensen had to smile.  Angel or no, it was strange seeing someone who looked so much like Misha be serious for so long.  “Well, maybe that’s part of the plan.”

“My lack of certainty,” Castiel guessed.  “You’re using semantic ambiguity to make your point.”

Jensen shrugged.  “Depending on what the semantic ambiguity is, maybe.  Is it working?”

“Only if your point is that there is no point,” Castiel told him.  “And I can’t accept that.”

He reached up to scrub at his face, noticing as he did it that Castiel followed his every movement.  He wondered if Dean did the same thing when he was frustrated.  He wondered if it was weirder if he did or didn’t.

“Look,” Jensen said, dropping his hands.  “Cas.  What are you doing?”

“Talking to you,” Castiel replied.

Okay.  That wasn’t exactly what he’d meant, but it would do.  “Is that what you want to be doing?”

“I want to be talking to Dean,” Castiel said frankly.  “But he will try to persuade me to abandon my deal with Crowley, and I can not afford to be swayed.”

That was what he’d meant.  “You’re dealing with Crowley,” Jensen said.  It felt weird using Mark’s character name off-set in a way that “Dean” and “Cas” and “Sam” didn’t.  Lack of familiarity, he figured.

“I’m trying to win a war,” Castiel said.

“By dealing with Crowley,” Jensen repeated.

“There’s a bigger picture,” Castiel said stiffly.  “My dealings with him are in service to a higher ideal.”

“You can’t have big ideals if the small ones get compromised, Cas.  It’s like a house without a foundation.”  He’d always known that episode of Babylon 5 would come in handy.  “Building good things on the backs of bad only means the good things can’t stand on their own.”

Unfortunately, Castiel wasn’t overwhelmed by the profound nature of his argument.  “Maybe they can’t,” he said, looking away.  “But some people deserve to have them anyway.”

Jensen didn’t move.  It was still shocking to realize that every time Misha told him, “I did it for you,” somewhere an actual angel was saying the same thing to Dean.  And meaning it.

“Do you think Dean wants a good life if it costs him you?” he found himself asking.

“Yes,” Castiel said.  The way his gaze flickered to Jensen made him look doubtful.

“Maybe you should ask him,” he said.

Castiel looked away again.  “I know what he’ll say.”

“In that case,” Jensen said quietly, “maybe you should believe him.”

Castiel didn’t reply for a long moment.  When he did, it wasn’t at all what he’d expected.  “You are much gentler than Dean,” he said.

Jensen had to smile.  “Drives you crazy, doesn’t it.”

He thought he saw amusement in the gaze Castiel lifted to his.  “Perhaps.”

Jensen was better at staring than Misha was, but he had nothing on Castiel.  “Can you really keep doing that?” he asked at last.  “Staring, I mean?”

“Do you find it disconcerting?” Castiel looked curious, and Jensen tried to remember if Dean had ever commented on it.  Personal space, yes.  But staring?

“It’s, uh...”  Jensen shrugged awkwardly.  “Misha always laughs.  When we –”  He gestured back and forth between them, and Castiel nodded.

“I should go,” he said.

“Right,” Jensen said.  Then, “How, exactly?”  He’d been in that episode too, and he was pretty sure Castiel needed someone from his own universe to pull him back.

“Balthazar,” Castiel said.

Apparently that was all it took, because he was instantly elsewhere.  The problems with that were, in order of importance: Jensen was also elsewhere, it wasn’t an elsewhere he knew, and Sebastian’s alter ego wasn’t the one waiting to greet them – Dick’s was.

Dick, who played a mean-spirited, capricious, and less dead than widely believed character.

Probably not a good sign, Jensen thought.

“Sorry, bro,” their kidnapper said.  “Balthazar’s busy.”

“Gabriel.”  Castiel didn’t sound surprised.  “Your intervention is unnecessary.”

“Oh,” Gabriel said with a smirk.  “Did I forget to mention?  This isn’t your reality.

“Either of them,” he added, glancing at Jensen.  “It’s more fun, though.”

That was when the door to Gabriel’s weirdly styled apartment opened and a kid shoved his way in with a thunderous expression on his face.  Jared was right behind him, looking exasperated and relieved and about two seconds away from yelling something that passersby probably shouldn’t hear.  A clatter like wild animals coming around the corner made Jensen swing wide, away from the door and unfortunately right into Castiel.

He felt Castiel steady him, solidly inhuman at his back as a gangly golden puppy came skidding past.  The puppy paid no attention whatsoever to him, giant paws sliding on the black and white tile as it raced for the door.  Or the people in the door.

One of the people in particular.

“Oh, great,” the boy announced.  He was glaring at Jensen in a freakishly familiar way while the puppy crashed into Jared and tried to climb him like some sort of puppy tree.  “So much for ‘age doesn’t matter,’ huh?  Get tired of waiting for me to grow up?”

Jensen wanted to look at Castiel, but there was something about the kid: something he thought he’d seen before.

“Dean?”  Castiel sounded puzzled, which didn’t reassure Jensen in any way.  Castiel’s “puzzled” was anyone else’s shocked beyond belief.  “Why do you look like that?”

“Like you don’t know,” the boy snapped.

Jensen would have taken a step back, except that Castiel was still behind him.  He wasn’t touching Jensen anymore, but it wouldn’t take much.  A deep breath would probably do it.  But holy shit: that kid was him.

“Gabriel,” Jared said.  In a tone Jensen had never heard directed at Dick before: annoyed and amused and mostly, overwhelmingly, fond.  Like he knew he wasn’t supposed to laugh.  Like it was his job to keep this nutcase in line, and everyone knew it, and Jared didn’t care.

Not Jared, Jensen realized.  Of course.

Sam.

In Gabriel’s apartment, decorated as it had been for the Mustang episode, because they hadn’t been kidnapped by another angel from Castiel’s reality.  They’d been diverted from his reality entirely.  To Titanic world.  And, okay, there’d been jokes about using the trickster’s place for that motel scene, but Jensen hadn’t really thought...

“I had nothing to do with it,” Gabriel said, holding up his hands.  Then he tipped his head, reconsidering.  “Well, actually, I’m the reason they’re here.  But what you’re thinking isn’t my fault, because they’re not who you think they are.”

Jensen could feel young Dean frowning at him.  Which was creepy on a lot of different levels, actually, including the one in which Dean announced, “You’re not me.”

Jensen just stared at him.

“This is Jensen,” Castiel said.  “Why are we here?”

“’Cause I’m tired of having the brat around,” Gabriel said.  “Sam won’t let me send him anywhere he can’t look out for him.  You’re already bending reality; he might as well hitch a ride with you.”

And then they were standing in someone’s house.  Someone’s front hall, it looked like.  There were children everywhere.

Okay, part of that was probably the fact that young Dean was still glaring at him.  But there was another girl there in the doorway who looked an awful lot like an older version of Sydney – in pajamas – and was that Gattlin behind her?  Jensen had no idea where they were, but he was being yanked around by freakin’ angels and he wasn’t taking any chances.

“Cas?” he said under his breath.  “We okay?”

Castiel wasn’t behind him anymore.  He was standing in front of both Jensen and young Dean, and there was a knife in the hand he held behind his back.  Jensen was gonna take that as a “no.”

“Dean?” Jared’s voice said, and Jensen turned.  He was sitting on a floor that didn’t look at all like Gabriel’s living room, a woman on the couch behind him and more pajama-clad children scattered in front of the TV.  “Everything all right?”

“No,” young Dean replied, folding his arms where he stood between Jensen and Castiel.  “Your stupid archangel is messing with reality again.”

“Excuse me,” the woman on the couch said.  Her voice sounded familiar too, and Jensen wondered if closing his eyes would help or just make him look stupid.  “You’re the one who’s twenty years too young.”

“Dean?” Jared repeated, and this time his gaze flicked to the kid.  He looked more surprised now, but not nearly as worried as he should.  “What happened?”

Because this wasn’t Jared either.  Obviously.  It was still Sam.  And the woman on the couch behind him was the same one who had greeted Jensen and Jared at the door of Dick’s cabin months ago.  Because apparently Sam and Gabriel got along better when Gabriel was a woman.

“Hi,” Jensen said, when young Dean just glared and Castiel didn’t turn around.  “I’m Jensen.  I’m from another reality where this is all a show called Supernatural.  I play Dean on TV.”

“Really,” Sam said.

“Yes,” Castiel said over his shoulder.  “I’m afraid Gabriel and his unfortunate sense of humor conspired to send us here, instead of back where we came from.”

“Wait, let me guess,” Sam said.  He looked awfully amused for a guy whose four kids were staring like they took apart intruders for breakfast.  “You play Castiel.”

“No,” Castiel said.  He still hadn’t turned to look at them.  Keeping an eye on the antichrist, Jensen assumed.  “I am Castiel.  I am not native to either of your realities.  I was visiting Jensen to ask his advice when Gabriel intervened, sending us both here.”

“What did you want his advice for?”  It sounded like Gattlin’s voice.  Jensen tried to remember the name of his character: Joey?  Jeremy?  Jesse?  Jesse.  That might be it.

Castiel didn’t answer, and Sam asked, “Do you play young Dean?”

Young Dean scoffed in a way that was very familiar.  “Why would anyone watch a TV show about our life?”

“Hey,” Jensen protested automatically.  Then he remembered who he was talking to and he changed his mind.  “Okay,” he said.  “Fair point.”

“Hello,” Gabriel interrupted.  “Your life is awesome, and you’re welcome.”

That was when Jensen recognized the little girl closest to the TV.  “Maribel?”

She didn’t look at all surprised.  “Hi Jensen.”

“Wait,” Sam said.  “You know him?”

“Castiel was protecting him a few months ago,” Maribel said.  “Balthazar accidentally pulled him over when he sent their Dean and Sam through a window to another reality.”

Jensen hadn’t expected it to be this, of all things, that rendered everyone speechless at once.  Most notably Sam, who was staring at Maribel, and Gabriel, who was staring at him.  Or Cas.  Probably Cas.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to be the one to break the silence, but if Maribel was here – if she lived here – 

“Uh,” Jensen said.  “So.  Not your lives, exactly.”  Jerking his head at Castiel, he added, “I think the show’s about his reality.  I mean... ’cause there aren’t any kids in it.”

“Maribel,” Sam said, focusing on what was, in retrospect, probably the more important topic.  “How long have you been switching realities?”

“I just go to see Father,” she told him.  “He’s sad.”

“Cheer up, bro,” Gabriel said.  Even accounting for the woman thing, her voice sounded funny all of a sudden.  “You still have Balthazar.  We lost him years ago.”

“No,” Castiel said.  He didn’t sound cheered at all.  “You didn’t.”

Then the Gattlin and Sydney lookalikes were in the living room, just as impossible as anything.  One second they weren’t there, the next they were, settling one in each of the armchairs, like they’d just walked in and sat down.  Jesse – Jensen was pretty sure his name was Jesse – offered when Castiel turned to glare at him, “I got tired of waiting for you to put down the knife.”

The girl had been named Claire, right?  The daughter of Castiel’s vessel?

“You might as well come in,” Sam said, cutting Castiel off before he could say anything that might get him turned into an action figure.  “Sit down, at least, while you tell us what’s going on.  Gabriel can magic up some chairs for you.”

“Yeah, about that,” Gabriel said.  More armchairs appeared as she spoke, and the inside wall of the room was suddenly a good fifteen feet farther back than it had been before.  “Are we sure they’re okay?  You may have a get of out jail free card with Dean, but I don’t need Cas questioning my babysitting skills after the whole dog at the power plant thing.”

“Are you still whining about that?” Sam asked.  “Adamel let Cerberus in, and the tidal wave was really small.  It was Lucifer’s fault, anyway.”

“Then why was I punished?” the boy who wasn’t Jesse wanted to know.

“I don’t think being sent to your room on earth really counts as punishment,” Sam told him.

“Excuse me, I was the one who ended up pregnant again!” Gabriel exclaimed.  “I’m sorry if I think that’s a problem!”

Again, Jensen thought?

“Oh, everyone wants to be you,” Sam said, rolling his eyes.

“Because of my hot lover,” Gabriel finished.

“Next time he’s in town be sure to introduce us,” Sam retorted.

For a moment Jensen forgot that the person standing next to him wasn’t human.  Nudging Castiel with his elbow, he muttered, “Are they always like this?”

He might as well have poked the wall.  “I wouldn’t know,” Castiel said stiffly.

“Is there anything to eat?” young Dean wanted to know.  “My Sam wouldn’t get me ice cream after I insulted his mutt.”

“I have a dog?” Sam asked, his attention successfully diverted.

“Do you want a dog?” Gabriel countered.

Young Dean glowered.  “That’s exactly what you said in our reality.  And then we had to move in with you so Sam could take care of it.”

“There’s ice cream in the freezer,” Sam said, levering himself up off the floor.  “I’ll show you.”

“We’re missing the movie,” Gabriel complained.

“There’s a button for that,” Sam said over his shoulder.  “It’s called ‘rewind.’”

“Yeah, in 1986,” Gabriel shot back.  “Join the digital age, Sam.”

“That’s funny coming from someone who still gets tripped up by wreaths made from pagan herbs,” Sam said.  “You want ice cream?”

“Surprise me,” Gabriel replied.

“I doubt it.”  Sam sounded like he was smiling as he led young Dean into the kitchen.

“You and Sam are together.”  Castiel, on the other hand, sounded disturbed.  Jensen figured that for him “disturbed” meant somewhere between horrified and angry.  “Where is Dean?”

“Hello!” young Dean’s voice called from the kitchen.  “Still here!”

“Where is your Dean?” Castiel amended, staring at Gabriel.

She shrugged, gaze flicking from him to Jensen and back again.  “Off somewhere banging you, probably.  Take a load off, bro, you look exhausted.  It’s giving you wrinkles.  Very unsightly.”

“I’m a little worried that this explains why you and Jared had so much fun together,” Jensen muttered, taking the nearest chair.  He was tired, even if it was against Castiel’s work ethic to admit it.  He wasn’t sure he’d meant for anyone else to hear, but of course, Gabriel was listening.

“Jared?” she repeated.

“He plays Sam,” Jensen said with a sigh.  “When Balthazar messed up our realities, Castiel left us with you.  You and Jared were BFFs by the time we went home.”

“Gabriel is sad in their reality too,” Maribel said.  She looked around at the other kids like she knew they were hanging on her every word and added, “Heaven is at war.”

“With who?” Gabriel demanded.  “Hell?  Earth?  Demons, dragons, horsemen of the freakin’ apocalypse?  There’s no one we haven’t fought.”

“Heaven is consumed by civil war,” Castiel said curtly.  “It takes its toll.”

Gabriel narrowed her eyes at him.  “You’re fighting.”

“I’m a soldier,” Castiel said.

“You’re fighting angels,” Gabriel said.

“That’s what civil war means, yes.”  Castiel looked resigned now, and Jensen wondered if Gabriel had deliberately turned his attention away from her and Sam.  Then he felt bad for thinking it, because even Gabriel had to see that this was tearing Cas apart.

“Hey,” Sam said, pausing beside Castiel’s chair and shaking a box in his direction.  “Have a drumstick.  Anything we can do?”

“What are those?” Castiel asked, giving the box a suspicious frown.

“Ice cream,” Sam said.  “In a cone, with chocolate and nuts on top.  Try one.  The kids love ’em.”

Jensen craned his neck, catching a glimpse of young Dean in the kitchen with bananas and cherries and a can of whipped cream and more than one carton of ice cream.  Because of course they had all those things on hand.  Anyone who lived with an archangel probably had whatever they wanted.

“Jensen?” Sam said.  “Want a drumstick before the kids empty the box?”

“Sure,” he said, surprising himself.  But whatever, it was ice cream.  And he’d had a long day.  “Thanks.”

He felt a little guilty when he looked over and realized Castiel hadn’t taken one.  The kids did empty the box, as Sam had warned.  They more than emptied the box.  Jensen knew for a fact there’d been five left in there after he took one, and all six kids ended up with a cone.

“Do you want some of mine?” a little girl who wasn’t Maribel asked Castiel.

“No,” Castiel told her.

“Okay,” she said, apparently untroubled.

“Oh god,” Jensen blurted out.  “Are they all angels?”

So every eye in the room was on him when Dean walked in with two bowls: bananas expertly cut in half, three scoops of ice cream, with whipped topping and two cherries each.  “Eat up,” he said, handing one of the bowls to Castiel.  “It’s good for you.”

Castiel eyed the concoction like it was some kind of poisonous blade.  “I find that unlikely.”

“I find it awesome,” young Dean told him.  “You don’t want me to eat them both, do you?”

Castiel seemed uncertain.  “If you wish.”

“I don’t wish,” young Dean said.  “Have some freakin’ ice cream, Cas.  I made it for you.”

That must have been enough, because Castiel accepted the bowl.  Young Dean glared around the room and stomped over to his own chair as well as any twelve-year-old could stomp.  “What are you all looking at?” he demanded.

“Uh, Jensen,” Sam said quickly.  “We have an app for that, if you want.”  He was pulling something out of his pocket – his phone, maybe – while he crushed the empty drumstick box in his other hand.

“You,” Gabriel told young Dean.  “You’re just as sickeningly domestic in every reality, aren’t you.”

Young Dean rolled his eyes.  “Says the angel babysitter.”

Of course Sam had an iPhone.  Jensen wondered a little wildly if he’d gotten it while he was hunting with his grandfather, or if he’d just happened to mention it to Gabriel one day and there it was.  “An app for what?”

“The kids,” Sam said.  “The angels.  All of it.  Becky got one of her friends to make us a searchable database of pictures and names.  Garrison, rank, vessel name, family... prayers that work, prayers that piss them off... that kind of thing.  It’s like the enochian internet.”

He handed over the phone, which was apparently looking for a picture match.  Jensen eyed it, then held it up to Sam.  The fake clicking sound made Sam smile – a little uneasily, maybe?  Jensen just smiled back at him.

“I’m in there,” Sam admitted.  “Just remember, what Becky thinks is important isn’t always what a normal person would be looking for, okay?”

Jensen raised an eyebrow at the screen.  “You have a kid with Lucifer?”

The youngest boy raised his hand – the one who had complained about his punishment for letting Cerberus loose – and Jensen snapped his picture too.  Adamel, the screen said.  Son of Lucifer and Sam, second of the Modern Nephilim 1.0.

“He didn’t have a choice,” Gabriel grumbled from the sofa.

“Oh, and the one I have with you was all my idea,” Sam retorted.  “Not that I don’t love you guys.  All of you.  Remember that.”

Jensen pointed the phone at another kid before Sam could take it back.  Maia, it said.  Daughter of Gabriel and Sam, first of the Modern Nephilim 2.0.  Jensen wasn’t sure he should ask.

“Modern nephilim?” he said out loud.

“Kind of a long story,” Sam said.  “Our Cas had some extra power.”

“From where?” Castiel wanted to know.

“Who knows,” Gabriel said.  “Michael.  God.  The universe; it’s a mystery.  Even he doesn’t know, if you ask me.”

Jensen was more interested in Sam’s phone, but the panicked tone in which Castiel said, “Michael’s here?” got his attention.

Weirdly, this caused another one of those silences.  Jensen glanced around.  No one moved, but he got the creepy feeling that they were all mentally looking at each other.

Then Gabriel really did look at Maribel.  “Let me get this straight,” she said.  “You introduced yourself to Jensen here, but you didn’t tell Cas who your parents are?”

“He already knew,” she said, but she gave Castiel a funny sideways look.  “I thought.”

“I don’t think he did,” Gabriel said.  “No one gets that freaked out by their husband’s name unless they seriously weren’t expecting it.”

Jensen raised his eyebrows, looking first to Sam and then to the rest of the room.  No one except Castiel seemed even remotely surprised.  “Yeah, so, hey,” he said, raising his hand awkwardly.  “Husband?”

“Michael,” Castiel said, with considerably more vehemence.  Possibly venom.  “I will never accept him.”

Jensen looked at Maribel again.  Then he held up Sam’s phone.  Her image appeared with the description, Maribel.  Daughter of Castiel and Dean/Michael, first of the Modern Nephilim 1.0.

He opened his mouth to say, Dean is Michael? but some vestigial survival instinct kicked in just in time.  Too bad it didn’t work in interviews.  Even if Jensen was sure no reporter could ever be as menacing as Castiel when Dean was threatened.

“Cas,” Sam said carefully.  “When did you first... meet Michael?”

“At Stull.”  The words were clipped and unforgiving.  “In the body of your younger brother.”

There was a pause, and Jensen couldn’t figure out the expression on Sam’s face.  “My younger brother?” he repeated at last.

“Adam,” Castiel said.

Adamel looked at him, and Castiel frowned.  He glanced at Maribel next, then back to Sam.  “Adam was raised by angels as a potential vessel for Michael,” he said.  “To manipulate Dean into saying yes.”

“Right,” Sam said.  “Okay.  So... he said yes instead?  Adam, I mean?  And Michael... possessed him?”

“Yes,” Castiel said.  “I killed him.”

Sam and Gabriel exchanged glances.

“Temporarily,” Castiel added grudgingly.  “Then Lucifer killed me.”

“Uh-huh,” Sam said.  “And yet –”  He made a gesture that was probably supposed to finish the sentence for him.  “Here you are.”

“My death was also temporary,” Castiel said.  “Though I don’t think Lucifer meant it to be.”

“God brought him back,” Jensen offered.  Just so he could feel like he was contributing something to the conversation.

“Really.”  Sam was clearly past believing them by now and moving rapidly into “humoring the crazy people.”

“Michael,” Gabriel said.  Then she stopped, like she didn’t know where to go with that.

Before anyone could say anything, though, she added, “I know.  Believe me, I’m tragically aware.  But you’ll probably want to see this.”

Or, Jensen realized, like she was talking to someone who wasn’t there.

He was there a moment later.  He and Castiel both, looking rumpled and windblown and very, very casual.  Gone were the ever-present coats and long-sleeves Jensen was used to, and Castiel’s suit had been replaced by wrinkled khakis and a dark blue t-shirt.  The jeans that Dean was wearing were rolled up and sandy at the cuffs.  They were both barefoot.

“Oh, for the love of – you weren’t even having sex, were you,” Gabriel grumbled.  “I bet you were walking on the beach, holding hands and talking about your feelings.”

Was she allowed to say that in front of the kids, Jensen wondered?

If Sam was planning to rebuke her for it, Castiel’s reaction must have gotten in the way.

The other Castiel, since Jensen’s Castiel stiffened visibly but said nothing.  T-shirt Castiel shoved his Dean back by the simple expedient of forcing himself to the front, between Dean and the glare Jensen’s Castiel was sending their way.  “You don’t understand,” T-shirt Castiel said.

Jensen’s Castiel didn’t move.  “You’re a traitor,” he said, too calm.  Colder than Jensen had ever heard him.

“And you’re a fool,” T-shirt Castiel replied.

“Okay,” Dean said from behind him.  “Now that we’ve got that out of the way, someone tell me what’s going on.”

“They just showed up in the front hall,” Sam said.  “That’s, uh, Castiel from another reality, I guess.  And that’s Jensen from a reality where he plays you on TV.  I don’t know where young you came from, but he doesn’t sound twelve, so.”

“Wait –”  Dean frowned over Castiel’s shoulder at young Dean.  “You’re with them?  Why are you me?”

“Because Cas had a temper tantrum,” young Dean snapped.  “Why do you think?”

Dean eyed him skeptically.  “Which reality are you from?”

“The one where Gabriel’s a jerk who’s making a play for my brother,” young Dean replied, shoveling another spoonful of ice cream into his mouth.

Jensen looked over in time to see Dean catch Sam’s eye and smirk.  “Yeah, sorry,” Dean said.  “That doesn’t really narrow it down.”

“Why do you allow this?” Castiel interrupted.  He hadn’t stopped glaring at T-shirt Castiel.  They might as well have been the only people in the room.  “What did he promise you that you condone this travesty?”

“Hey,” Dean said, and this time his tone was laced with warning.  “Back off, buddy.”

“Dean,” T-shirt Castiel said quietly.  “He believes I am allowing Michael to use you as a vessel.”

“Oh.”  Dean seemed to consider that, gaze sliding from one Castiel to the other.  “Huh.”

No one said anything for a moment, and Jensen couldn’t help but notice that the children continued to eat their ice cream like this kind of thing happened all the time.  On the other hand, they lived with angels.  Or the Winchesters.  Possibly both.  Things like this probably did happen all the time.

“Well, thanks,” Dean said at last.  “I think.  I mean, obviously you’d have a problem with someone else using my body.  I’m kind of creeped out that some version of you thinks you’d let it happen, though.”

“Of course I wouldn’t,” T-shirt Castiel said.

At the same time, Sam said, “Well, but he kind of did.  Right?”

Jensen paused mid-bite.  He’d decided to follow the kids’ example, but the ice cream tasted weird in his mouth when Sam said, “Cas is the one who gave Dean Michael’s grace.”

“Gave it back,” Dean corrected.  “He gave it back ’cause Zach would have killed me otherwise.”

“Step aside,” Jensen’s Castiel said.

“No,” T-shirt Castiel replied.

“Hey,” Dean said, putting a hand on T-shirt Castiel’s shoulder.  Dean moved around him, which didn’t seem to make T-shirt Castiel very happy but at least he allowed it.  “Both of you, cut it out.”

“Your presence is unacceptable,” Jensen’s Castiel said.  He lifted his hand, and Jensen knew that gesture.  That was the “someone’s about to get smote” gesture.

Maybe it said something about how unlikely they all found the idea that Castiel’s hand lit up and Dean flew back against the wall before anyone made any move to stop it from happening.  T-shirt Castiel stepped forward then, glowing and wild and inexplicable, and Jensen had a little girl on either side of him.

Claire on one side, Maia on the other.  The kids had redistributed themselves instantaneously: Adamel with Sam, in front of Gabriel, the other girl in front of young Dean.  Maribel was helping her Dean up, silver sword in her hand as she stared over her shoulder at Castiel.  Jesse stood in the middle of the room, face turned upward to watch Castiel glare at them all.

Still adorable in PJs, Jensen noted distantly.  But Claire was the only one who’d kept her ice cream.

“Where’d you get that kind of power, bro?” Gabriel asked.  She was still sitting on the couch, but Jensen could only see one of her hands.  He didn’t know if that meant anything with angels or not.

“This will not stand,” Castiel said, his voice low and his expression no less deadly than before.

“Okay, I’m not a vessel,” Dean said.  He was sitting now, but he had his hands out to the sides and he was making no move to get up.  “I don’t know what happened in your reality, but Michael’s not in me.  He is me.  He was born as me and his grace was dormant until I got kidnapped by archangels and Cas figured out how to level the playing field.”

Castiel did a pretty good job of ignoring the army of children currently staring him down.  “That is absurd.”

“Yeah, tell me about it,” Dean said.  “But hey, think of all the awesome decisions I’ve made – there’s bound to be a dud somewhere, right?”

“Dean is not an archangel,” Castiel informed him.

“Turns out yeah,” Dean said.  “He is.  Believe me, no one else was happy about it either.”

Gabriel raised her hand.  “I think it’s hilarious,” she offered.

“You’re not normal,” Sam reminded her.

“You’re welcome,” she said.

“Cas,” Dean said.  “Stop scaring the kids.”

“We’re not scared,” Maribel told him.

“Fine,” Dean said.  “Stop scaring me.  You’re freaking me out, man.  Just back off.”

Castiel lashed out instead, flinging his hand forward as light gathered, and T-shirt Cas smote him to his knees.  Jensen stared, but his Castiel barely seemed to react, gazing across the now much closer floor at Dean.  Who was on his feet without moving, Maribel at his side, and damn, he really was an angel.  That was freaky as all get out.

“Is this what it comes to?” Castiel asked, his rough voice so soft Jensen didn’t register the words at first.  “Is this the only choice left to me?  It’s you or the world?  Because I always choose you, Dean.  I chose you over and over again.”

“I know.”  Dean put a hand on T-shirt Cas’ shoulder as he passed, squeezing hard, and the weird glow dissipated abruptly.  Dean crouched down in front of Jensen’s Cas, who now looked only at the floor.  “This isn’t the end of the line, okay?  This is just... one of those weird things that happen.”

“If I had let you say yes to Michael,” Castiel whispered, “heaven and earth might be safe today.  But I couldn’t give you up.  I could never give you up.”

“Hey.”  Dean reached out, putting a hand on Castiel’s shoulder the same way he’d done with his own.  He shook him in a way no human should be able to, staring at Castiel like they were alone in the room.  “Saving the world’s not about giving people up, okay?  It took me a long time to learn that, but you and Sam finally got it through my thick head: saving the world’s about who you take in.”

Castiel finally lifted his head.  “So you took in Michael.”  

“No,” Dean said.  “I was already Michael, Cas.  I’ve always been Michael.”

“Not in my reality,” Castiel said.

Dean raised his eyebrows at him.  “You sure about that?”

“Dean was with me at Stull,” Castiel said.  “When we defeated Michael.  He couldn’t have been there twice.”

Jensen heard Gabriel mutter, “Says the man who just fought himself,” but he was more interested in the idle conversation he remembered from the cemetery shoot.  When Misha had gone over to speak to fangirls by the road, and Jared had complained about the takes they weren’t using.

“He wasn’t,” Jensen blurted out.  “I mean, he wasn’t supposed to be.”

Dean looked up, but Castiel didn’t move.  Jensen wouldn’t either, if he was surrounded by kindergarteners wielding angel swords, but maybe that was just him.  Castiel probably had other reasons.

“Michael was supposed to come forward,” he offered.  “Um, in the script.  In my world.  You were supposed to be fighting Michael from the past – the one you met when you went back in time.  It was a thing, you know, to set up the contrast between Michael and Lucifer: Lucifer was the patient one, and Michael just wanted to skip to the end.

“They couldn’t use it,” Jensen added awkwardly.  “They ran out of time for the apocalypse when they realized everyone cared more about where Castiel was sleeping and if Dean felt bad about it or whatever.”

He had a moment to regret drawing everyone’s attention before Sam said, “So, wait.  This show you’re on: it’s not, like... a horror show?”

“It’s a romantic comedy,” Gabriel finished for him.  “Emphasis on comedy.”

“No,” Jensen said, when some response seemed to be required.  “It’s a drama.”

“Wait,” Gabriel said, suddenly echoing Sam.  “Why did you immediately go to horror?  How do you know it’s not a religious show?  We’re spreading the word of God, Sammy.”

“You ran away from home to join the pagans,” Sam reminded him.

“I didn’t say it was your god,” Gabriel pointed out.

“Cas,” Dean was saying quietly.  “I can help.  What are you doing here alone?”

“I went to see Jensen,” Castiel muttered.  Not as though he was convinced he was talking to Dean, but like he couldn’t help himself.  Like he wanted to be talking to Dean so badly that maybe he could pretend.

“Why?” Dean insisted.

“Because I couldn’t ask you,” Castiel said fiercely.  “You got what you wanted, you’re enjoying your life again, and I have to keep you out of this!”  Castiel lifted his gaze, staring back at him again.  “You’ve given enough for heaven, Dean.”

“Hey,” Dean said.  “Let me decide that.  Heaven can kiss my ass, but you gotta know I’ll do anything for you.  And that’s my call.  Free will, right?”

“I don’t ask you to stand with me,” Castiel said.  “Not because I think you won’t, but because I know you will.  You deserve better.”

“But I want –”  Dean broke off, staring at him in shock.  He turned on his heel and stared up at T-shirt Castiel.  “This is like karmic retribution, right?  Now I’m you.  What the fuck.”

“Do you always swear in front of the kids?” Jensen asked without thinking.

“They usually swear more than this,” Claire said.

“Sam and Gabriel don’t,” Maia added.  “But Sam says Gabriel is more inappropriate when she isn’t swearing than when she is.  We’re not allowed to tell any of Gabriel’s stories at school.”

You go to school? Jensen thought, but Dean was ignoring all of them.

“Cas,” he said, looking at Jensen’s Castiel again.  “I want you.  I don’t care what you think I deserve: all you’re gonna do by cutting me out is piss me off, and man, you really don’t want me pissed at you.”

For one crazy second, Jensen thought Dean might hit him.  As a reminder or something.  It would break his hand – or maybe it wouldn’t, if he was an angel now.  Whatever.  It would be a typically Dean way of dealing with problems.

That was the only explanation he had for why he didn’t realize what was coming when Dean put both hands on Castiel’s face and smoothed his thumbs under tired eyes.  Dean leaned in and kissed him, an angel filled to the brim with power borrowed from hell, like nothing Cas had ever done could make him stop.  Like he expected it to matter, somehow.

Castiel didn’t move.  Dean’s hands slid into his hair and down, crossing behind his neck and stretching out into the air instead of gripping his shoulders.  It took Jensen several seconds to realize what was happening.

Dean had his hands on Cas’ wings.

“I don’t care what you think I’ve done for heaven,” Dean whispered.  His forehead rested against Castiel’s, now, and Cas looked... well.  It was hard to tell in his coat, but the line of his back looked a little less rigid.  “I know what you’ve done for me, okay?  Give me a chance to back your play the way you always back mine.  Let me give you something for a change.  Ask me for help, Cas.”

“I don’t want Michael’s help,” Castiel told him.  Quiet, but still defiant.

Not so much as a flinch.  “So ask Dean.  It’s fine, Cas.  Whatever you need is fine.  Just don’t be alone in this.”

“Excuse me,” Gabriel interrupted.  “I get that we’re doing the sharing and caring thing, but that’s stupid advice.  Who cares if he doesn’t like Michael?  He obviously needs an archangel, and he’s got you.  Get over it already.”

“Gabriel,” Dean said, not moving.  “Shut up.”

“Do you want him to die?” Gabriel said bluntly.  “No.  Then tell him how to win his war.”

“I won’t sacrifice Dean.”  Castiel’s tone was utterly uncompromising.

Jensen wondered, not for the first time, what it was like to be worshipped by an actual angel.

“Hello,” Gabriel said.  “He’s right there!”

“It doesn’t... always work out that well,” Sam muttered.  Like he was trying to shut Gabriel up without everyone hearing, for once.  And failing.  As usual.  “When Anna got her grace back she kind of – exploded.”

“It’s because I was in heaven,” Dean said.  It was an open question whether he was trying to reassure Castiel or give him some kind of hint.  “You brought Michael’s grace to me in heaven, so it didn’t mess me up as much.”

“As much,” Gabriel scoffed.

At the same time, Sam added, “We think.”

“I have no interest in Michael,” Castiel said stiffly.

Dean huffed out a laugh, hands still on Castiel’s shoulders.  “I want to say too bad, ’cause he’s got an interest in you, but I guess that sounds kind of creepy if you don’t think we’re the same person.”

“Comes across a little creepy even when you are the same person,” Sam remarked.

“Bitch,” Dean grumbled.

Sam rolled his eyes.  “Jerk.”

Jensen saw his Castiel look at Sam sideways, but he couldn’t see his expression.

“This really puts a different spin on the age difference.”  Young Dean, apparently unperturbed by the sight of himself on the floor kissing an angel of hell, scraped the last of his ice cream out of the bowl.  “Gabriel’s gonna be pissed.”

“Or moderately entertained,” Gabriel said.

Young Dean glared at her over his spoon.  “You know, if you’re going to be this obnoxious in every universe, you could at least make me the right age again.”

“I’m sure I had a very good reason for de-aging you,” Gabriel told him.  “Or no reason.  One or the other.”

Dean muttered something that sounded a lot like, “Fucking Balthazar,” and Gabriel perked up.

“Come again?” she said.  “Not literally; there are children present.  Allegedly.”

“I’d hit you,” Sam told her, “except that I know you’d like it.”

“Try me,” Gabriel said.

“This isn’t kid-appropriate conversation,” Sam said instead.  “Just so you guys know.”

“We’re not supposed to talk about violence around humans,” Maia offered, as though reciting a lesson.

“Or imply things about other people’s sexually deviant behavior,” Gabriel added.  “Easy though it often is.”

“Is that what you were doing?” Maia asked curiously.

“No,” Sam said.

“Absolutely,” Gabriel said at the same time.  She smirked at Sam.

Instead of taking the bait, Sam asked young Dean, “Why are you twelve?”

“Balthazar spilled the beans about Cas here being the littlest angel,” young Dean said.  “Made me feel like I was robbing the cradle.”

Jensen’s Castiel was still on the floor, ignoring Dean’s efforts to help him up, so it was T-shirt Cas who said, “I existed thousands of years before you were born, Dean.”

“Yeah, human years,” young Dean agreed.  “Apparently in angel years you’re about –”  He broke off, making a face.  “Twelve.  Give or take.”

“Angel years are no different than human years,” T-shirt Cas insisted.

“It would be awkward,” the other Castiel muttered.  It was the most he’d seemed to care about the conversation in minutes, and he was on his feet again at last.  “If you were younger.”

“Hey,” Dean said.

“Yeah, see?” young Dean interrupted.  “It’s weird, right?”

“Angels don’t come of age as humans do,” Castiel said.  “We are always as you see us now.”

Such a lie, Jensen thought.

Young Dean seemed to agree.  “Bullshit,” he said.  “Look at them.”  He waved a hand at the angel children.  Still arrayed around the room in colorful pajamas that had kittens, puppies, hearts and transformers on them, their swords looked more like toys than anything.

“Their physical appearance is not indicative of their maturity,” Castiel said.

Jensen saw Dean exchange glances with T-shirt Cas, and he would have given a lot to see a script right then.  They had to be reading each other’s minds, right?  What the hell did they talk about when the world wasn’t ending?

“Cas,” young Dean was saying patiently.  “They can’t even tell when Gabriel’s making a dirty joke.”

Castiel frowned.  “Neither can I.”

“I rest my case,” young Dean said.

“Okay, Gabriel should not be the defining factor of adulthood,” Sam broke in.  “Can we just agree that everyone is however old they say they are and move on?”

“Sure,” Dean said.  “As long as we all agree that I win.”

“Michael wins,” Sam corrected.

“Damn straight,” Dean said.  “Hey, how come we didn’t get any ice cream?”

“Because you’re too busy not having sex,” Gabriel told him.

“It’s your night off,” Sam said.

“And we’re missing all the fun.”  Dean looked around the room, but his gaze lingered on T-shirt Cas.  “Right.  Call us if you need us.”

Dean vanished first – definitely an angel – and T-shirt Cas leveled an impassive stare at the rest of the room.  “Don’t need us,” he said.  Then he, too, was gone.

“They’re a terrible influence on each other,” Sam said.

“Pathetic,” Gabriel agreed.  “Can we finish the movie now?”

If he knew his Disney movies, and he did, they were watching “Tangled.”  Jensen wasn’t sure what Gabriel found so fascinating about it, but he did think it was interesting that every child in the room looked to Sam – except Adamel, who looked at Jesse, but Jesse was looking at Sam so it was pretty much the same thing – for an answer.

“Yeah,” Sam said.  “Sure.  You guys don’t have anywhere important to be, right?”

The look he gave them said that the right answer was “no,” and Jensen wasn’t about to argue.  He wasn’t going to convince Castiel, either, but somehow young Dean managed.  It could have been the leftover ice cream, or the adorable children, or just the respite from a seemingly endless war.  Any of those things would have been enough for a normal person.

Personally, Jensen thought it had something to do with how relaxed young Dean looked slouched against the back of his armchair, watching the TV screen when he thought no one was looking.

***

Jensen woke up in his own bed the next morning.  He was both relieved and surprised.  There hadn’t been any talk of how he was getting home, and when Castiel had sat stiffly to wait out the kids’ movie Jensen could only wonder how long they would be there.  The Angel Express didn’t care much about other people’s schedules, as far as he could tell.

He was back now.  He was just as busy as before.  He didn’t have time to read farther ahead in the script than what they were shooting that day.  (That was his story, and it had nothing to do with wanting – or not wanting – to know how it all turned out.)  So the final scene of the season snuck up on him.

Misha fumbled the line about professing their love.  Jared laughed at him, of course.  And the whole time, Jensen tried not to think about that night in another reality.  A night that could have been a dream, where Jensen had heard another Cas’ Dean promise that he’d always be there for him.  Where another Cas’ Dean had kissed him like he meant it, holding onto his wings until their eyes met and Castiel knew he wasn’t kidding.

Where Dean had told him to let them fight with him.  He wondered if Dean had known what the request would sound like coming out of Castiel’s mouth.  Angels didn’t ask their soldiers for things – they definitely didn’t explain – and if Cas sounded awkward about it, wasn’t that what Dean expected from him?

Wasn’t that what Dean liked about Cas?  That he always tried, no matter how unlikely the odds?

Was that why Dean was still standing there, trying to talk Cas down way past the point where most people would have said that ship had sailed?  The bridge hadn’t just burned, it had blown up between them, leaving one on either side of an impassable chasm – and they were still talking.  They were still listening, reacting to each other like the exchange mattered.

By the time Misha finally got through “bow down and profess your love to me” without breaking character, all Jensen wanted to say was, “He does, Cas.  He already does.

“He does everything but say the words.”