Episode Eighteen: Absence
The Winchester brothers, after returning to the bunker, looked for Jack, Mary, and Lucas, but came up emptyhanded. Sam returned to the Library, where Dean was sitting at one of the tables with two beers, one for him and one for Sam.
Sam threw his hands up. "Nothing."
"They probably just stopped for a bite on the way back. You know how mom gets after a hunt," Dean said, taking a drink from the bottle.
"Yeah, true that," Sam agreed as he sat down.
"Well, hey. Here's to another miraculous Sam Winchester survival." Dean held up his bottle and Sam hit his against it, before they both took a sip. "Got to say, man, if Lucas hadn't have healed you..." he chuckled. "You know, lately, it feels like we'd be up the creek if it wasn't for him and Jack. I mean, first Jack takes care of Michael, and then... Nick."
Sam laughed, "Kind of sounds like you're bummed about it."
He frowned. "No. A 'get out of jail free' card? I'll take that." He got out his phone and dialed Mary's phone number. The line rang twice before he and Sam heard her phone buzzing on the map table. The brothers looked to the phone, then back at each other. "Looks like they left in a hurry."
"Try Jack," Sam suggested and called him himself while Dean dialed Lucas's number. After a bit, he hung up. "Jack isn't answering."
"Yeah, neither is Luke," Dean sighed.
They shared uneasy glances with each other. What could have happened. (A/N: I know this is a weird transition but here we go)
---
"Lucas? Luke, hey, wake up, kid." I woke up on my back to Dean shaking my shoulder and shining a flashlight in my face. Freaked out, I sit bolt upright and accidentally hit my forehead on Dean's nose. He staggers back and his hand flies to his nose, which is now bleeding. "Arggh! Son of a bitch!"
I hear Sam yell from inside the house, "Dean?"
"I'm okay Sammy," he bellows back. "Just found Lucas and a bloody nose."
"Sorry," I mutter, standing up. I tap Dean's shoulder and his nose is as good as new. Suddenly, I remember what happened. "Dean, where's Jack," I ask urgently.
"We don't know. We tracked his phone here until it went dead, so we just figured we could trace his tracks," he explained, looking around. "Hey, where's mom?"
Taking a shaky breath, I looked behind him to where I had last seen Mary stand. He took my hint and approached the site, only to crouch down again as he frowned at the ground.
His thinking was interrupted by Sam's voice, which was now outside. "Dean! Dean. In the cabin, its... its..." He trailed off and Dean shone the flashlight around the blast site, in which everything was ash. I slowly stood up and shuffled over to them.
"Nick," I finished for him. "It's Nick's body inside the cabin."
---
I sat on the steps of the cabin, waiting for Castiel. Sam and Dean were inside taking care of Nick's corpse. Finally, Cas's truck pulled up behind the Impala. I saw the angel sitting inside, thinking for a bit before he opened the door and stepped out. We walked inside and Sam turned around from looking at Nick.
"Cas," Sam stated.
"Is that Nick?" The angel addressed the body, which was now under a blanket.
"Yeah. We looked around. No sign of Jack or mom. There's a blast site behind the house. It looks angelic, just... bigger."
I looked down at my feet guiltily. I hadn't yet worked out a way to tell them, "Hey, you know the son of Lucifer that you've raised for his whole life and is basically your own son? Yeah, he killed your mother to the point where there's nothing left of her." And even if I could find a way to tell them, I still didn't know whether or not I should yet. I didn't want to be the one to have to deliver that message, but I also didn't want them to find out later and then be mad at me for not telling them sooner.
"Might have been Lucifer," Dean spoke up. "Nick was trying to bring him back."
"Yeah, but Jack said - "
"Who cares what Jack said? We don't know what happened! But I swear, if he did something to her, if she is..." He pointed to Cas. "Then you're dead to me."
Sam spoke up again, "Dean."
"No, he knew." The older Winchester was furious now. "He knew something was wrong with the kid. He knew it, and he didn't tell us! He didn't even tell us!"
I frowned. "Wait, tell you what? What happened when I was out?"
Dean's voice was practically dripping with sarcasm as he explained. "Well good old Cas here may or may not have neglected to let us in on the little detail that Jack freaking disintegrated his snake!"
"Oh," I muttered. Cas saw that? Did he see me on the bed? Did he know that I was there? I snapped myself out of my thoughts.
Cas started, "I was scared. I believed in Jack for so long, I... I believed that he was - that he was good. I knew that he would be good for the world. And he was good for us. My faith in him it - it never wavered, and then I-I saw what he did. It wasn't malice. It wasn't evil. It was like Jack saw a problem and in his mind, he just solved it with that snake."
Dean snapped, "The snake?"
He continued, "What he did wasn't bad. It was the absence of good. And I saw that in him. But we were a family, and I didn't want to lose that, so I thought I could... fix it on my own. Felt like it was my responsibility. So I left. And I didn't tell you. If I could go back and just - just talk to him right then and there, I would. But I can't, Dean. And I failed you. And I failed Jack. And I failed -"
Dean interrupted again, "No, no. Don't even say it. Don't even say her name."
"Dean," Sam stepped in front of his brother. But before he could say anything else, his phone rang. Sam pulled it out of his pocket.
"Who is it?"
"Rowena," he told us, then answered the call and put it on speaker. "Hey."
The redhead's thick Scottish accent came through the speakers. "Hello, Samuel. I did what you asked - I used scrying magic on the boy, tried to find him. But his energy, it's too unstable. It was like looking at the sun."
Sam interjected, "And Mom?"
I heard Rowena take a breath. "Say it," Dean spat.
"I don't know what happened or where she is... but I can tell you with certainty. Mary Winchester is no longer on this earth." Neither party hung up until after Dean threw a rage fit and bashed one of the chairs against the wall, smashing it to pieces.
"What do we do?" Sam asked him.
"What we always do when we lose one of our own. We fight. We fight to bring them back."
"How? Billie?"
"Rowena. She's got the Book of the Damned. She's resurrected herself more times than we can count."
Castiel frowned. "How? We don't even know where your mother is."
"Then go to Heaven and find her!" I glanced around at our makeshift group. Everyone looked uncomfortable. Save for Dean, who looked deadly calm and had a frighteningly determined look in his eye. He looked straight at me. "Tell Rowena we're on our way."
A/N: Happy Holidays!