the road so far

[venatical]

Who: Dean and Chuck
Where: The diner
When: Day 96
What: Chuck missed a few chapters, so Dean's going to fill him in.

Dean grabs something for them both to eat and finds them a table. They'd be at the bar if he didn't want to have this conversation three times over, and he's not sure what Ellen or Jo have heard yet. He's going to have to fill them in too, but maybe he can leave them in the cold for a while like Chuck until he finally has to give up believing in their blissful ignorance. With Becky around, he's probably going to find out that he's been missing at home anyway. He doesn't even know how Chuck died, though, so that's going to be... awkward.

Hopefully Chuck enjoys the sandwich because Dean made it himself, and it's damn good if he has anything to say about it.

Comments

[godsprophet]

Chuck shakes his head. Raphael hadn't mentioned anything about back home, not as far at he can remember. "No, Raphael hasn't mentioned anything about this. I just... you know, figured he didn't know anything about this."

That does sound vaguely familiar, and Chuck struggles to remember where, or who, he heard it from. And then it hits him. "No, but, uh. Balthazar did mention something about Heaven being in disarray." He does remember that conversation being focused a lot on Castiel, who had some plan Balthazar wasn't certain of.

That, at least, would make sense. Castiel did understand the concept of free will better than any other angel in Heaven, it would only follow that he would want the same for the rest of the Host. That would make it Castiel versus Raphael, with Casitel being desperate enough to look to Purgatory to win that war.

A war that Castiel must have won, since it ended in Raphael's death. And then, leviathans.

[venatical]

"He was involved. He was really involved, up until he lost." And then Cas killed him. He's leaving deliberate holes in this story that Chuck isn't calling him on, and Chuck's a lot of things, but Dean knows he's smart, too. He knows the people Dean's talking about inside and out because he's written them; hell, he knows Dean, and that's one uncomfortable thought. If he's not pushing, it's because he's letting Dean skip it or he doesn't want to press. Fine with him.

"And then everyone was screwed for a while. Leviathans almost took over, but -- that's when we found the tablet that called Kevin into service, the new prophet. He read up on how to kill the toothy bastards, and we did, which is how Cas and I wound up in purgatory."

So yeah, Dean's just plunging ahead.

"We got caught in the blastwave that came from killing the head Dick. Uh, Leviathan."

[godsprophet]

He's leaving deliberate holes, yes, but he's giving him just enough clues for Chuck to be able to piece it all together. It might take him a second or two, but really... in the end, it's kind of basic storytelling? And if Chuck is nothing else, he is a storyteller.

He got a degree for it and everything.

He takes this time to take another bite of his sandwich as he thinks things through. The sandwich is really good, though. And he's not just saying that because he lives in a house full of angels that have no idea how to cook whatsoever.

"How did you get out of Purgatory? I mean, that's just like being trapped in Hell, right?" It occurs to him only after he says those words that Dean's memories of Hell probably aren't something he wants to think about. "Uh, sorry."

[venatical]

Dean stops and glances up at Chuck, and no, he doesn't really want to think about his memories from hell. Purgatory was different, though. In purgatory, it was constant combat, but at least the things he tortured were all monsters. It was fighting for his life, but it was something he can more easily live with. And it wasn't Alistair teaching him, grooming him, telling Dean how proud he was of him.

No, now he's thinking about it, and he tries to push the memories aside as he goes back to what he was doing. There was only a brief few seconds of pain, of dark memory, before he stuffs it all aside again.

"Not exactly. I ran into a guy who knew about a portal back to Earth. It'd only work on a human soul, though, since purgatory wasn't made for humans, especially not ones that didn't technically die. So he and I fought our way out."

[godsprophet]

Chuck meets Dean's glance with an apologetic look. He doesn't mean to burst out with painful memories that the brothers had lived through. But, honestly, for the longest time he'd thought they were fictional. And details like that - Dean going to Hell, Jessica dying - they're painful, yes, but sometimes he forgets.

He knows, logically, the Dean Winchester is sitting in front of him, and Dean Winchester has been through events that he doesn't like to speak about. But as an author, bringing up plot details - because that's what they were, for almost four years - isn't a big deal. And mixing the two together isn't as easy for him as it should be.

"But, uh, obviously you made it out." Suspense is good in storytelling and all, but with Dean sitting right across from him, telling him the story, the suspense is kind of... lost.

[venatical]

Dean frowns, totally almost insulted. Come on, dude, work with him here. He isn't the novelist.

"Yeah, but it was hard!" Jeez. Chuck made it sound like a walk in the park. He grumbles to himself and goes back to his food, trying to put his thoughts together to fill Chuck in on everything else that happened. It's closer, so it's hard to pick out the big details.

"Since then Sam and I and Kevin were working on locking up Hell for good. Kevin had the demon tablet, and he told us about these three trials. It didn't really work out because Sam would've had to kill himself to finish it." And that was that. No more explanation needed.

Does anyone here know what happened with the angels other than him and Meg and Cas? He's not even sure.

[godsprophet]

Chuck raises his hands in a symbol of surrender at Dean's defensive outburst. "Yeah, no, I believe you! I mean... Purgatory." That's impressive, is what it is. After all, how many people get to say they broke out of both Hell and Purgatory?

He's pretty certain that's a list that begins and ends with Dean Winchester.

"Oh." Yeah, he can certainly see how that would be a problem. Closing up the gates to Hell was a good idea, and Chuck is totally supportive of it... but if the cost of doing it was Sam's life, then he understands that's not a thing that's going to get done.

"There's not another way to do it or anything? No fine print?"

[venatical]

He narrows his eyes, but fine, okay. He will accept Chuck's frantic backpedaling as appropriate acknowledgment of the difficulty of escaping purgatory. And really somehow underneath that he's managing to be blase about what was maybe one of the hardest experiences of his life -- maybe because he's had a lot, from Hell to watching Sammy die the first time -- but the 24/7 combat was tiring.

"I don't think so. We were lucky enough to get that kid to read the big print." That actually isn't doing Kevin any favors; he did read all the fine print, which wound up being Metatron's notes.

"So there you go. You're... basically caught up." He stops because wow that's sort of a whopper, and he looks at Chuck sharply for a second and then shakes it off. No big. He doesn't have to mention that all the angels were falling when they left. Nope.

[godsprophet]

Dean's always been blase about big, huge events. Chuck knows that. It is, after all, part of Dean's character. Not that Dean's a fictional character or anything but, you know what he means. Even when he met the Winchesters for the first time, they shook off mentions of their worst experiences like they were nothing.

That, and Chuck honestly has no idea what Purgatory would even be like. He can imagine, of course, but his imagination would never live up to the real thing. And so Chuck is perfectly fine leaving things as they are. Besides, he's not quite sure Dean would tell him, if he asked for more.

(Deciding not to tell Chuck about the angels falling, all things considered, is probably the best option. He would hate to give himself away when the person responsible for such an act isn't even present in Kore. )

"Oh. That's... a lot." He's sure Dean didn't explain every little thing, but even as far as major detail points go... there was a lot there. Clearly, several years had passed, and while Chuck knows exactly what all can happen in a year in the life of the Winchesters... that somehow as a lot more than what he thought there would be.

[venatical]

Dean has to agree, yeah. Jo said something similar. He's starting to wonder if he should write this stuff down, but no, he'd rather not have a written record of any of this -- heh. He hadn't been thinking of Sarah and what happened with Chuck's books, but that does bring us back around to that topic, however inadvertently. The moment is here; he could dump that on Chuck's lap and let him stew with it, but Chuck can't jump back in time and unwrite those books.

What happened to Sarah is something Dean can stash away, pull out if he ever wants to deliver Chuck a blow, but for right now he keeps it to himself.

"Yeah, you missed a few chapters, but those are the Cliffsnotes. I don't know, man. We stopped the apocalypse; I kinda thought that'd be... something. Seems like in the end it was just the least terrible option."

[godsprophet]

A few chapters? More like an entire series. Or, rater, a good two series. He's sure, if he had enough information, he could write an entire series on the leviathans and then, about the closing of the gates, however that pans out.

But Dean's two for two today, in the list of things he's opting not to tell Chuck. Because he would, he'd feel awful if he ever learned about what happened with Sarah, what his books did to her. But.. well, it's not like he really ever had another option. Kevin's prophet abilities might not include seeing and narrating the future, but Chuck's did.

But Chuck doesn't know about Sarah, or the consequences of writing those books and so he lets out a sigh, instead. "Yeah, I though... I mean, what could be worst than the Apocalypse, right?" A lot of things, apparently.