veneficusvenato | Alice, Through the Looking Glass

Alice, Through the Looking Glass

Do your job, you love it, Lee had said,

and Sokka hadn't helped adding, Be good
and we'll make it worth your while even.

For them, Jo'd stood still while two of the costumers got to make her over in a way she rarely agreed. She told herself if was for Sokka and Leah, but it was for Gillespie, too. Who might have been a Gil, but could have been a Dick, John, Harry or Bartholemuel, too. That was the job, after all. Part of which was dressing up and dragging the newest trainee to a Ministry Function, because that, too, required training this high up.

Learning that this was all part of it, too.

Blending in, using your real name, but with the longest-lived lie you were handed.

Today, which involved watching two people curl her hair and apply her makeup with wands, and even a board that looked more like an artists pallet. Then a short white dress, with just enough give to hide her wand but nothing else, and an even smaller, more ornamental, looking shoulder jacket.

It would have been lovely if that was the worst the night could offer. Dresses, makeup, small talk, and Gillespie. But things never went that easy, really, did they. She couldn't just go home and bitch to her people about the mind numbing boringness and the funny tasting food. No, of course not. Instead the night went from that to explosions, sparks raining purple and black, from two dozen people dressed in black and purple, and running.

Shoving Gillespie, while shouting and and firing behind them. Creating a diversion. A spectacle. They weren't meant to be the people who did clean-up or cattle herding of the ministry wives and children. This wasn't exactly what they were for either, but they excelled in a pinch. Just like a handful of the other groups that had been in the milling dinner crowd.

The throbbing knuckles, and the disarray of her curls, as well as a rip along one side of her skirt, had happened before the running started, but they were lost in that. The way running did. Took every thought that wasn't attacks, hexes, and counter-spells. Stumbling through the doorway that should have led to a staircase, but didn't. She felt it sizzle through her skin, but all the three wizards were following right after, and as a burst of purple exploded toward them, Jo shoved Gillespie out of the path.

But it slammed straight into her, acid burning and needle stinging, sending her stumbling backwards, with a crack that she was sure was one of those damned heels they'd insisted on, which only helped it. She reached out to catch the reddish drape hanging behind her, but her fingers went straight through it, and her shoulders followed sending her into a tumble.....

...that did not have her slamming the ground less than a second later.
Or the one after that. Everything went black around, and she swore she would
have Gil's ass for breakfast, as well as the costumers, and her best friends.....

....before the light returned in a blinding assault and Jo collided solidly,
in an all too familiar feeling, with another body beneath her.

[ Jo's Timeline: 1 Year Before Order of the Jobberknoll
SPN Timeline: ??? ]

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"That, too. I mainly meant the whole, you know. Magic thing." The part where she's alive and his version isn't doesn't need to be said; it's a given.

He has the feeling said 'magic thing' will take some getting used to. He'll have time. He seriously doubts they'll find the answer to sending her home immediately. It could be days. Weeks, even.

Right. Time to change the subject slightly. "Cas should be here either sometime tonight or tomorrow. He might be able to help figure things out."

Damn him and his stupid face, and the muscles in her cheek that fluttered just a little when he didn't even argue the point.
Even though they both knew what he meant. She'd be surprised if he didn't flinch for a while at the sight of her wand.

"I don't know what you could be talking about." There was a careless wave of a hand, her first two fingers sharper.
That very possibly might have caused a cart to roll a few inches. Not far enough into the street to be a bother. Or a scene.

"I'm obviously just an absolutely, everyday, ordinary girl, run the mill, British-American dual citizen, with absolutely nothing --no job, skills, hobbies, proclivities -- to interest any of these people." A bland, as markedly almost blank as it was almost teasing. "Or you."

Beat. "Who might have score an O all of her O.W.L.'s and been near the heads of both of those countries at a point. But I couldn't say for sure." There's the faintest flick of a smirk. "Then, I'd have to kill you, and both of us being dead, here, would be a sin."

Edited 2016-10-14 05:35 (UTC)

"I think Cas might object to having to bring me back. Again," Dean says dryly. "Not to mention it would upset Sam. And yes, I will give context when we're not in a Walmart parking lot."

Best to give her news about things like this in pieces instead of all at once. Give her time to absorb one thing before moving on to the next.

He's soon shifting the bag in one hand to the other, freeing up his ability to pull out his car key to open up the trunk and deposit the bags in it before slamming it shut again and heading to the front of the car to unlock the driver's side door. He intends to lean over and unlock the passenger side one as well, but he wouldn't be surprised in the least if she beats him to it.

Except Jo hasn't moved.

She's still standing somewhere near the back of Baby.

Unable to not think the name. Unable to make her feet even move.

Because.

No.

He didn't.

And if he -- even if --

That's not. It's just not.

"You don't get to just say something like--" Like that. There's solid metal under her hand and she doesn't remember when she started touching the car. The parking lot doesn't even exist. The store doesn't. The whole world refracted down to Dean. And Dean's face. And what he just said, no matter how he just said it.

She's not even sure if her organs are connected to each other. Her blood is moving. She's still breathing.
She's always kept access to file she shouldn't. She always had to know. Always had to know he was okay.

Nothing in the world makes sense if she has to hear, or has to make herself actually say, barely above a whisper, her voice a waver almost demanding to make that a joke, something, anything else. Anything but a sideways truth. "You died?"

All right, apparently, they're doing this now. Dean rests his arms on the top of the car and gives her a level look. "You'll need to bear with me, because I don't know how much of my and your Dean's pasts are the same. Basically, when Sam and a whole lot of other people were babies, a demon messed with them.

"Once everybody was hitting twenty-two, abilities started showing up for them. In Sam's case, it was visions of people who were going to die. Mostly people connected to him. Awhile after that, said demon, who, by the way, killed Mom because she interrupted him while he was occupied and who later took Dad out, basically kidnapped everybody in waves to make them fight each other to the death."

Dean swallows and licks his lips. "Sam didn't make it. So I went to a crossroads and made a deal. What else was I supposed to do? Dad told me to keep him safe--been drilling it into me since I was four--and I failed."

It's words. It's all words. Words blowing through her harder that magic and poison that's still left her feeling vaguely disoriented sometimes. A fountain of words. Dean Winchester. Staring over the the car at her. Tell her how he died. How he did it to save Sam.

She doesn't know when she starts moving, rounding the car. Not on the passenger side. On his. Past the trunk. Past the door. Barreling against him. Even if it's probably wrong. Inappropriate. Not her place. Not her world. Not her Dean. Except. It's still Dean. Dean still died, and nothing in her understands any of the details between point A and point B. Not if that one is TRUE.

She can't stop. Her forehead ends up against her chest. Her arms half around. Finger fisting in his shirt.

She has to know he's real. He's alive. Right now. Solid. Alive. Heart beating.

And there's a viciousness, in her whisper against his shirt, that was never present even in the garage,
"Don't you even dare make a joke about this."

Maybe later. Maybe never.

Not about what she's done. Not about dying.

Dean was startled, because he wasn't really expecting this, his arms going around her in a hug a moment later, lowering his head to rest it against hers. "I've had time to get used to it. Your Mom effectively slapped me upside the head for making her have to hear from another hunter that I was back. Told me to keep her on speed-dial."

He can't help the small grin that forms at the memory. "I told her 'yes ma'am' 'cause she was kind of intimidating. Always has been, since I first met her."

He blows out a breath, grin disappearing. "Cas saved me for a couple reasons. One, to try to keep me from unknowingly setting the first ball for the Apocalypse rolling. Two, little hard for Michael to wear me to said Apocalypse if I were dead or a demon."

She shouldn't be doing this. Not at all. Not a little. He's not (him). He's still (alive). Some part of her brain, absent and aloof, finding everything in the disjointed details her training refusing to let her forget can't help but notice. He's warm. He smells exactly like the clothes she had the first day. But better. Warmer. Actual. Old memories. Old pains. Too close to the shock. Especially when he actually puts his arms around her and rests his head on top of hers.

Jo snorted out, in surprise a little, maybe painful amusement, at the story about her mother. Lips pressing hard. She was not going to tear up. She didn't. She wouldn't. She shook her head, even against the burning. She'd always wanted that. Dean to meet her mom, and he had. That one day. The last day they ever saw each other. It'd been a big thing. Bringing him back to America. To the Roadhouse. To her.

It meant a lot of things she didn't say, and he'd gotten that.

And then it was all over. It was all done.

She'd seen her mother again, much later. But never him.

Jo refused to be this stupid. Refused if it hurt everywhere. Even if maybe she was almost tearing up. She made one of her hands unfit the material of his shirt and slid it between them, against his chest, meaning to push away, but somehow she didn't. Somehow she found the beat of his heart, even though her hand was only in the middle of his chest, where her head had been, and all she did was look up, the agony of the whole of these ideas meeting something like incredulousness in her expression. About him being used for ---what.

"And somehow you like this guy? This angel?"

Dean loosens the hug, giving her enough room to get loose if she needed it. "He was a pain in the ass at first, sure. He's much easier to get along with now after I've had a few years to work on him. He actually stood against Heaven, siding with Sam and me about trying to put a stop to the Apocalypse. See comment a couple days ago about God needing to fix him."

She probably needs the reminder, given their current choice of topic. It's just a mite distracting. "I think you'd like him. He might hug you when he arrives. As a word of warning."

"Maybe someone--" There's an emphasis there, and a meaningful look, like someone was definitely not her. "--should inform him that I'm not really the hugging type."

Totally not like there was anything of the sort going on right here in this second, that Jo herself might have started.

Which was about as much true as it really wasn't. She hugged long gone colleagues, and Sokka and Lee hung on her like limpets until she scattered them. Even though she almost never did. It had been too long. It'd been too long. so many years, and the loss of Dean, before she broke all the rules to take them back for herself when Lee almost died. Even when they'd stopped looking at her like she might up and vanish on them again. Lee was always jostling her, and Sokka was always hugging her or dragging her somewhere, arm in arm, like they were still kids back at Hogwarts.

(And, okay, maybe. Just maybe. Because she kind of liked it. For them.)

Jo leaned sideways against the car, "You've had a very different life over here, too."
Maybe just as fucked up and broken in a lot of very different ways.

It's wrong, but she's glad neither of them died on each other.

Life was hell without him. But a life she chose. Could survive just fine.

She couldn't see how she'd want to choose life, want to be alive, if he was suddenly gone.

"He isn't much for hugging either. He generally just does it when something important has happened. It took him awhile to even start doing so." It took the amount of time he's spent on Earth and the Winchesters to get him there.

"No kidding. I bet your me can't say he helped stop the Apocalypse," Dean says, giving her a cocky grin. Time to bring things around to him being a smartass and her trying to puncture his ego. Give them a break from the heavy subjects.

"And this angel, who apparently has problems with morals and picking sides, is going to think my falling through the world is important." That's a line of logic she's not even well into following. She got the whole, if she breathes through the tension the threatens to still spider-crack her ribs, brought him back. From. You know. And is friend. But wanted him in some crazy Heavenly fight.

"He might have." Is almost obviously evasive. Leaning her back on the car. "I don't exactly keep track of his log sheets."
There were some things she couldn't get her hands on. And some she could. Stories from both sides of the pond.

But there are honestly some things she doesn't do. Some steps she knows would be too far to go forward.

"Well, you did fall through a hole in the universe. Knowing how that happened and if it can be repeated might be nice for him," Dean points out. "Helps prevent being taken by surprise by another occurrence."

Not to mention, Jo's important to Dean, which makes her important to Castiel.

She looks over, faintly pointed, but not cruelly so. The last of her words still sticking just a little too sharply. "Helps with getting you this door that you want, too, maybe." She pulled her hand back from his shirt. Both. The one in between them instead swinging the way a door might instead. "To make it possible to come and go."

The idea of which was...confusing to consider with him this close. With the thing he'd said.
The one that was going to be buried in the coldest, furthest, box in her head she could ever make.

"Even if it might not be smart at all. You're lucky you go me, and not one of the people who was chasing me."

"If I got one of them instead, I wouldn't have hesitated with that wrench," Dean points out with a raised eyebrow. "If we can figure out how to make those doors or whatever and control where they go, we can try to keep them from opening into... sensitive locations."

"You didn't hesitate with the wrench, to begin with. Given the aim at my face, which-" The word is superbly airy. "-I'm really rather attached to." Though she supposed that was his point, too. Even if she hadn't really had any marker for comparison in that second. She wasn't out for blood. Well, not his, at least, in the middle of Ministry firefight.

Not ever, if she was being honest. She'd left him, but she toed a dangerous line and made her colleagues see him as untouchable, too. Unless they wanted to suddenly see themselves on the opposite of the line with her in that same second. She didn't care about the reasons or the responsibilities or the rules she'd broken. For him. Even after. Even now.

"Actually, I did. Not for long, since I came to the only reasonable conclusion about what you were fairly quickly, but I did. I just didn't let it slow me down too much," Dean tells her candidly. Given the job, too long a hesitation could get him killed. He couldn't afford to do so too long.

She doesn't blink. There's nothing in her made or left that might. She's been being trained for this world in some way, almost since she was born, the ways of monsters and magic. She'd expect nothing less from every one of her contemporaries. She's been in fights she's won and lost by the skin of her teeth all year, near every year, since her graduation at seventeen. She's nearly died only twice. Only. And both times she was saved by the same man.

This one, but not this one. Hers, but not hers, and never hers again.

The last time he hadn't stayed long enough to see if she even woke up. It was a clear enough message.
About his ownership of the globe, and his feelings about how everything had gone down with her choices.

"I'll make you a deal, if-" There's a second, curse Godrick, that she nearly reaches out to touch him -- tug on his shirt, pull his belt loop, something deceptively simple and absolutely beyond the bounds of something to even consider -- when she decides to say those words. Something coy and casual, just enough frank that the twist is like a dash of spice. But he isn't hers to touch, moment of weakness and stupid (and his curling down around her) aside.

She pushes off the car instead, sliding away from between it and him. "If you are game."

Edited 2016-10-15 02:54 (UTC)

"Should I start being concerned?" Dean asks, eyebrows going up as he starts trying to figure out what she might want. Because her wanting some sort of deal wasn't ominous at all.

If it involves talking about all the other bad shit in his past, he would like to wait until they were home, so he'd have access to his alcohol and be free of the need to drive for a good long while.

She's not surprised he tenses. Or that she can hear it in his voice. She does let herself reach out and run her fingers along the war as she walks back the way she came. It says a lot about the both of them. He never liked uncertainties or games he didn't know every step in before he played them. Neither of them did.

It made their first year bumpy to say the least.

That it was tangled in their jobs, and breaking rules hadn't helped.

"Simmer down, Winchester. I'm not going to ask you for your soul in a Walmart parking lot." Jo shook her head, walking around the other end to go toward her door. "It's easy. Simple. Tell me about her. This, not-me, other girl, you would have willingly killed me for. And for each of those, I'll answer some question you have about--"

Jo shrugged, resting her arms and chin briefly on the car over her window.

"--whatever. Magic. My world. Things that come up."

"I'm pretty sure Sam would beat me to within an inch of my life if I ever did that again." No more demon deals, nope. Having a hellhound coming after him to collect the bill was terrifying enough the first time.

Dean finally opens his own door to get in. "Well, that provides rather less need for alcohol than I was thinking."

Doesn't take it away entirely, but is better.

Jo slid him a look, before it's a half roll of his eyes. Because, the thing is, while she and Sam didn't always see eye to eye in those years, when and after he finally got to meet her, but they both agreed in most things Dean being an idiot. Or noble. All too often the two went hand in hand. No matter how stupid or brave the move, neither of them would have actually killed him. Or gotten that close. Even if Jo had screamed any number of ways he deserved to have bitten the dust.

But the other has to be asked, quizzically even. "What did you think I was going to ask you for?"

Was it something she should have asked for, or should be avoiding, or should dig toward.

"All the bad crap that's happened," Dean says promptly. "There's a lot of it to get through."

Including more deaths. Which he's not going to bring up until they're back at the bunker, otherwise, they'd never leave the parking lot.

She clicked her seatbelt and leaned her head back, looking out the passenger side window.

"That much is mutual." Not that she's agreeing they're going to get through it. In the time she's been here, she's alluded to much and admitted to far less than she's been told. She knows a good larger portion of that is her training, leaving no real artifacts of her life behind anyone could pin to her fleeting presence. But another part. Yeah, that's probably him.

What she offered is more than he knows what is. But he can realize that or not as he wants to.

Dean gets the car started so they could get going. "Maybe we can trade stories and drink. Make a not particularly happy party out of it. Want to swing by somewhere for something to eat, or are you good?"

He actually has slightly mixed feelings about food right now. He's sort of hungry, but the earlier conversation matter has kind of put a damper on his appetite.

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